>> hearing no others. next item. thank you very much. >> this is a reminder to turn off all electronic devices.

the fire commission a regular meeting, wednesday, july 10th, 2019, and the time is just after 9:00 a.m. item one, roll call. [roll call] item two, general public comment members of the public may address the commission for up to three minutes on any matter within the commission's jurisdiction and does not appear on the agenda. speaker should address the remarks to the commission as a whole and not to individual commissioners or department personnel. commissioners are not to enter into debate or discussion with a speaker. the lack of response from the commissioners is not necessarily constituting agreement with or support of statements made during public comment.

>> thank you, madame secretary. is there any public comment in item two? come up to the podium. seeing none, public comment is closed. questions or discussions from commissioners? >> item three, approval of the minutes. discussion and possible action to approve meeting minutes of the june 26th, 2019 meeting. >> on item three, approval of the minutes. is there any public comment? seeing none, public comment is closed. >> thank you. >> commissioners? >> move. >> second. >> thank you very much. all in favor say aye? >> aye. >> any opposed? none. thank you very much. madame secretary? >> item four, chief of department's reports. report from janine nicholson on current issues, activities, and

events within the department since a fire commission meeting on june 26th, 2019 including budget, you can't -- academy, special events, medications and outreach to other government agencies and the public and report from operations deputy chief, report on overall field operations including greater alarm fires, emergency medical services, bureau of fire prevention investigation and homeland security and airport division. >> thank you very much. chief nicholson, as always we will have you report first. are there any questions from the commissioners? chief? >> thank you. good morning, everyone. janine nicholson. some highlights since the last fire commission meeting of june 26th. we completed our meet and greets with candidates for the 126th class and we have moved forward with our selection and people

are going through medicals and backgrounds right now. we had a lot of really good candidates and we couldn't choose all of them. our intention next year, we didn't have time to put this together this year, but we want to do more of a panel interview with multiple members from the department and then they sort of boil it down and send their top picks up to us. it was pretty intense process for myself and the other chiefs. we met with about 100 people, so we definitely put our time in and i think we have some pretty good people for our next class. we are happy about that. i also met with simply member david to in the past couple of weeks and he is a great ally for us on the state level and he is happy to work with us on different things that we may need to move forward with the state level. i met with dr. christopher

caldwell who is an emergency department head of zuckerberg san francisco general, and we discussed how the prehospital and hospital system is all connected and how it is sort of broken right now and he and i and dr. colfax from the department of public health -- health are going to have a sitdown and meet to discuss what can we do together so we are not , you know, being redundant, and any new pilot programs or anything like that. whether it is having some community medicine, global community medicine, or what have you, so we are going to discuss that. but really, i let him know that we are basically up staffing the hospital's a lot of the time because we are waiting in triage for so long because there are no beds, and so, really, i feel

like what we need is e.m.s. prevention because a lot of people don't necessarily need to go to the hospital. so what is that e.m.s. prevention looking like? we will have further conversations about that. i attended a meeting regarding the fire station 13 plan review this past monday. we had quite a few of us in attendance and we are working with the developer, the architect, and the department of real estate to get what we need at this facility, so we have had four meetings in a think we have another one next week. we are continuing on with that. the chase center, we are conducting a drill on july 24th at about four or five in

the afternoon. it will be right after the giants game when there will be an uptick of traffic. we are going to basically have a drill where we call our resources to the area as if we are going on a full box or, you know, having a large medical event or the like, because we have been trying to show m.t.a. and the chase center our concerns about our access, not just to the chase center, but around the chase center and through one neighborhood to the other. so i think that will be really instructive for them and we are also putting in writing to them what our concerns are and what we are asking for. so that has been a really good and we have had a lot of help from chief cochrane and the fire marshal on that as well. the budget has to go to the board of supervisors twice this

month, and the expectation is that we are hoping it will be signed off in the beginning of august by the mayor. thank you for those who attended the pride parade. it was a good event, very fun. thank you for attending. i will think my command staff who attended as well. the 4th of july, we up staffed for that and it went really well i will leave that up to the other chief to tell you about that, but she cochrane and chief worship -- chief worst worked on the event action plan for that and we put some resources out in the field this year and it was really successful to keep people safer. we have invited the mayor's office and the board of supervisors to a fire operations event on september 14th.

we will actually put them through the different fire operations, put them in the burn room, perhaps have them cut a car open, really show them what it is that we do, what it takes to do what we do, what kind of equipment we need, and what we are talking about when we are asking for resources. i think this can be a great tool for us. the union is really spearheading this and we are working with them on that, but i think it is a really good educational tool. station visits are ongoing. i think we only have about two or three left to do and then we will take the rest of the summer off on that and we start in september, most likely with all of the command staff hitting a couple of stations here and there to keep that line of communication open. and then, as you may have seen, there has been a little bit of

press lately about the tubs fire , for one and the study that came out about that with the cancer prevention foundation. and that was yesterday and then there was also some press about our ambulance staffing that you may have seen as well. we are asking for what we believe we need and we will continue to make the requests. and the one last thing i can say is that e.m.s. is working on the h. three level one meet and greets for that next class, which is at the end of august, sometime in august. yeah, that concludes my report. thank you. >> thank you very much chief nicholson. i will ask for public comment after the chase report.

seeing no member of the public, public comment is closed. questions and comments from the commissioners? commissioner cleveland? >> thank you, mr. president and thank you for your excellent report. i had a question on the time it takes for intake to the hospital's, for all of our 911 calls, to take everyone to the hospital. do we have to take people that we pick up on a 911, do we have to take them to a hospital or can we take them to some sort of alternative location? >> right now there is a sobering center where we can take people, and that is part of, i believe, the pilot program ultimate destination, but that is definitely something that i will have a conversation with dr. koufax and dr. caldwell on. is there some other thing we can do besides jamming at the hospitals in keeping our ambulance is out of service.

what we have also seen out of the past several years is our time on task for our e.m.s. personnel for the ambulance has gone up 27%. what used to take maybe maybe an hour is now taking an hour or an hour and a quarter plus. that is really impacting our ability to respond, so we really need to look for some creative and smart solutions to this. >> right now it is just a sobering center, that is the only location that we can divert to other than hospitals? >> yeah. >> we need to find some other locations that can be approved. >> yeah. and that would be, you know, a pilot project that we could certainly discuss, but it's and there are a lot of other things we can do as well. we are picking up more people at shelters and supportive housing places than ever before and that is since the city added nursing

staff to these places. we need to get out and educate and communicate with this stuff as well. we are looking at that as well. >> is there any kind of state requirement that we have to take a 911 pick up to a hospital? >> state requirement? local? can you speak to that chief tom? >> hello, commissioners. good morning. there really aren't any other options that we have in terms of other ways that we can transport patients. we can have patients agree to be refused, we can get permission from the bay hospitals, from doctors, to refuse a patient if they, you know, don't want to go to the hospital, we have that option, but other than that, we

pretty much have to transport patients. >> if someone has to go to the hospital, we take them to the hospital. >> but what if they don't want to go to the hospital, where do they get taken? >> if they don't want to go to the hospital, we leave them where they are. if they don't want to take it taxi to the hospital or go by private vehicle, we will do documentation for that. >> so we really need to increase the number of other options out there other than hospitals to take our 911 victims. thank you very much. those are all my questions. >> thank you very much. vice president covington? >> thank you, mr. president. i just wanted to say, chief, i think that is the idea of having the mayor and the supervisors go through simulated training is an excellent idea and i hope that you will have a post so we can

show them what that is. [laughter] because it is kind of hard for people to visualize what it is. once they see it, i think they will agree that we could use several of them. also, congratulations on finishing up the visit to all of the stations. the visits to all of the stations, i think that is great. for those people who perhaps didn't read this morning's chronicle or see the evening news last night, can you tell us a little bit more about the tubs fire study? >> yes. so the tubs fire, as you may or may not remember it was just about two years ago. it was napa, sonoma, santa rosa homes that burned, about 60 -- 5600 structures burned. our members were up there for weeks and in terms of our quote

unquote wildland fires, they are now wildland urban interface is. it is everything that is in our homes burning. as we know, there's a lot of toxic stuff in there. as we know, and wildlands urban firefighting, our members do not wear their heavy turnout gear, they do not wear their scott air packs because they need to remain mobile. so they are breathing in and absorbing a lot of stuff so there has never been a study done on that on firefighters and so the san francisco firefighter cancer prevention foundation realized this was going on and it took a few weeks to get all of the pieces in place to test 180 firefighters, some from san francisco, some from santa rosa, possibly san jose, oakland, urban firefighters who do put -- who were deployed there and then they had a control group of 30 firefighters who did not.

they took their blood and urine. part of the problem was they weren't able to do it until after three weeks after they were back for three weeks, so a lot of times, you know, things can flush out or what have you. so the results, you know, i'm not surprised showed an elevated rate at several different toxins in their systems. so what we need is we need -- i'm not surprised by that. clearly we need more studies done, but we also need to figure out what it is we can do to perfect -- protect our members because there is no gear out there that can protect our members. if you can put a mask on, but, you know, it is not going to take the carbon monoxide out of the air and it is not going to -- so that is what that was. since then, the camp fire happened last year up in paradise and we were able to test a bunch of our members when

they were still up there. that is still pending, so that is what that was all about. just bringing awareness and letting, you know, sharing this intel with others in the fire service, we all know that it is happening in the fire service, but it is time to get proof, you know, to really effect change. >> thank you, chief. >> thank you very much. >> thank you. chief, the best thing i like about your report is your involvement with the two principal officers and an interview of the panel. i really commend you for that.

i think having more minds, you know how smart somebody is, and one person's view of a new candidate could be skewed with personal preference or whatever and by involving other people's minds and thoughts and assistance, i think that is great. i like your idea. i saw you last night on the news explaining what you explain to us about having the tank on the back and then also had difficult that be in -- that how difficult that would be in 100 degrees. so that is a real dilemma in trying to protect people's lungs , especially, but the one thing about taking the test three legs -- three weeks later, from the things i have seen since i have been on the board, since i have been on the commission is that most of the

stuff that you bring in in the short-term dissipates, so maybe having it three weeks later, if something is showing up strong, then we would show that is very negative. officials of the first couple of days, like you say, it goes through your system, so i like your explanation last night. you did a good job on your thoughts and sharing them with the public. good job. >> thank you. that is part of the reason we had a controlled group of 35 firefighters that didn't go to that fire and firefighters that did go had higher levels then the firefighters that didn't, even three weeks later. that is really concerning. >> thank you very much. >> thank you. chief, the stadium drill, i think that is a fantastic idea. i am wondering if there is a way that you could do that drill

again at a later time when there is an event at the new stadium as well as the current stadium to show them what exactly people will be going through in order to get to an emergency, if there are even dates that overlapped. i think those are the worst-case scenarios of when it will be at its worst and of course, it does not change our obligation to get there fast and quick, so would be great to do another one of those at a later point when there is an event at both facilities, with thank you for doing that. it is a good way of educating people. on the hospital up staffing, i appreciate the fact you are meeting with the hospital and educating them as well to some of the problems that we are confronting. has there been any effort to meet with the department of health to see if we can get additional resources to go with our e.m.s. six? we seem to be up staffing on our

e.m.s. six and the board of supervisors approved find new -- five new members to e.m.s. six. i'm wondering if that should be five new people at the fire department as opposed to, you know, getting five people from the health department. i have always been of the opinion that e.m.s. six was created because another city department is failing in a certain area and we are having to pick up the slack for it. that is one thought behind that. the second part is, on the up staffing, there is not a day that goes by where i drive down, i believe it is post street, the side of st. francis hospital and there are three ambulances sitting there. there is always three ambulances sitting there. this is what you were talking about when we are up staffing these hospitals because you are delivering people to these hospitals in ambulances and they are just sitting and waiting for the staff there to basically sign off on them to take them off our hands. is there a way, legally, maybe

we can check with the city attorney, i know we charge, currently, patients for transport, is there a way we can charge the hospitals for the amount of time that we sit on these hospitals? and make it a charge that is significant enough where they actually do something about it? there is no incentive for them not to deal -- not to do what they are currently doing. there just isn't. you are running an emergency room, you've got extra advanced life support people that come in that have a patient, those patients are being cared for by the san francisco fire department in this hospital. there is no incentive for those people, for the hospital to say, okay, i will drop this and go help those guys, or i will go hire additional staff to take those guys -- sows those guys can get onto the street. we need to create that incentive i'm confident that you should make it clear to, i don't know if their support on this commission for this type of thing, but there needs to be some sort of incentive, some

sort of hammer, some sort of teeth to us having to sit on those hospitals because it is not right, it is not our job. so, if you can keep us updated on how the discussions go with the hospitals, it would be greatly appreciated. on the budgeting, i know all the commissioners here worked very hard as well as your command staff. i have been on commissions for more then a decade and i have never actually been asked to lobby members of the legislature for a budget and we actually did that this year and i thought that was an incredible task. i think the rest of the commissioners and the command staff for holding our hands during that process and olivia, as well. but i think what we found in that process was that i don't think the members of the board of supervisors fully appreciate the resources that we need to because we asked for 12 advanced

life support people for our ambulances and we got zero. we need 40 and i think that was the message that we sent to them we need 40, give us 12, you get zero. i think that we need to do a better job as a department. this is not on you, but this is on all of us to educate the members of the board of supervisors as to what this really means to the city. in that, i watch the board of supervisors hearing where you asked for the resources. i thank you did an excellent job i think the message was clear from you, but i don't think it sank in. and what's important, what i have been learning over the last year, when i first started learning about level zero and you did explain it to the members of the board, he did specifically say to them that is happening in daily, i don't think it is fully appreciated what that means. what that means is when you call

911, there is not an ambulance to respond to your call. you get put in a line. so i am wondering if maybe we should reach out to the members of the board and ask them, for a period of a week, or for a period of a month, if they would like to be notified when we reach level zero in their district. so that every time that happens, someone called 911 and there is not an ambulance available, they get a text message so they fully understand how horrible that is because i understand that on some days, it is not just level zero, it gets up to level 12, even higher where there is 12 calls waiting. now, to the members of the public that are watching this, you're going to get care because we will send an engine to you that has staff that will take care of you, but the transport is the issue. that is a really big deal. i'm wondering if maybe we can reach out to the members of the

board of supervisors and asked them if they were interested in being alerted of when we reach level zero six during the daytime so we can -- they can kind of feel the pain and understand how often we are experiencing this. that is just an idea. in regards to the budget, we did get five new e.m.s. six members and i am wondering if that is because we did a really good job of showing them that that program is working well and i am wondering if that had something to do with the fact that we are now reporting to them with 40% of our calls that are homeless related. i think if we give them more information and get them invested in what we're doing on a daily basis, i think we will do a better job next year, which is, you know, just around the corner, of getting additional resources, especially if there was going to be an earthquake where the continues to be earthquakes in the state of california that demonstrate how bad of a situation we would actually be and if he got hit with a big one. in regards to the tub study, i

did go to the press conference yesterday. the work that the department, that you were doing with tony stephani is ground breaking and it is so important i had dinner would last night with a group from san francisco that his teaching courses in some of the small departments about cancer prevention and i talked to tony last night and i didn't even know this but he is a big part of the presentation with the work he is doing in that foundation. that partnership in cancer prevention is critical. keep up the good work you are doing. you guys are doing amazing work. this study that came out yesterday, as you said we are not surprised for it. but question is, what is our action plan? what are we going to do about it we know there are these cancer-causing chemicals that are on our skin, they are getting into our system, what is it that we can do about it? now that we've got the evidence,

we need to do some sort of plan of attack on it we mentioned the relationship with his family member david hsu and chiu and and i know scott weiner and our senator, obviously our governors have been supportive of firefighters and the city and i think there is currently a bill right now, the 20 billion-dollar bailout for pg and e. that will be on the governor's desk on two weeks. there should be something now that we have this information, some sort of 911 fund that funds that is set up where one is firefighters get sick 20 years from now, they are cared for because we know what is getting into their system, or some sort of funds that takes care of immediate testing once they come off those fire lines are while they are on the fire lines. let's gather more information and of course, what type of what

can we do to protect these people. i want to say publicly we need some plan of attack now and it is going to be an all hands type of thing and we have to bring our elected electives into this particular solution so thank you so much for this. i know this is an issue that is very important to our department thank you very much. >> thank you very much. >> thank you, again. chief, i was just writing down in my calendar and i noticed, is that july 24th that the chase -- that is the chase centre event? >> correct. >> none of the commissioners will be able to attend that day. >> no, but i am excusing some of my command staff to be there. i have the up -- i have the utmost fate -- upmost faith in

the both of them to get the message across and give them the intel we need. >> we won't be there because we can't. [laughter]. >> thank you. chief nicholson, thank you very much. just a couple of questions. in terms of the 126 class, when will that class start? >> likely the end of september. >> is that the last class for this calendar year, and then with the next class. >> president cleaveland: twenty- seven? >> we have one class per fiscal year for the next fiscal years.

>> also the concept you might develop a panel, but that is great, a great idea as well. in terms of the drill on july 24 th, you talked about a full box drill after the giants game, approximately about four to 5:00 when you say full drill is that with lights and sirens, or how does that work? >> this is still under discussion, but, you know, we need to be careful in terms of lights and sirens and racing through the streets when it is not an actual emergency, however , we also need to be realistic and we may come down somewhere in between where we use lights and sirens and we approach very cautiously so we are not, you know, just being careful. that is still under discussion but that is what i am leaning

towards. >> and chief nicholson, when it comes to the general public on this drill on the 24th, how much will the public be aware of this drill occurring? >> does anybody know? is the m.t.a. doing -- no, okay. us, the m.t.a., and the chase centre. i don't think there has been anything to talk about it. >> the reason i asked her that for that is because i'm assuming this scenario is a natural scenario of traffic and fans after again and folks getting into cars and going home and that kind of a natural exit is kind of this scenario that we want to put ourselves in place of to see how the reaction is in terms of traffic and such. >> yeah, there was some real

lack of and are -- understanding in terms of people we were working with on the other side of the table, in terms of where we respond from, how we respond, what our needs are, you can go down the street and you are fine , can't you just stage over here? so we want to show them, we're not all coming from one direction. we are coming from multiple directions. there's very limited infrastructure in terms of streets around and through that area, so we really want to show them in realtime, this is what we are dealing with and this is only with the giants game. this isn't with two incidents. if anyone has driven through third streets lately, it is very difficult on a tuesday at 11:00 o'clock. this is really to make sure our ask and our explanation is out there and so that we are not put

behind the eightball in the future on this. >> okay. thank you very much. the last question in terms of the 24th drill is there is an assumption that there will be a targeted spot by which our vehicles and crew are supposed to designate themselves and report that is in the midst of all of this geographical area. >> i think there may be a couple of different scenarios but we are not giving that away right now. >> okay. it becomes pretty clear that the commissioners will be pretty, obviously interested in terms of how this scenario develops as we move along. thank you very much, chief nicholson, for your comprehensive report. at this particular time, report from operations, the deputy chief.

>> good morning. sorry for the delay there. deputy chief of operations. this is my operations report for the month of june. in the month of june, we had a total of 18 working fires because of the department's rapid response and quick extinguishment, all of them stayed at a first alarm and none of them went higher than that. our members continued to hone their skills in training, which in turn results into fluid

extinguishment of fires and rescues. i will go over some of the fires and rescues briefly here. on the first we had a coastal rescue where we rescue two victims at baker's beach. on the first we had a first alarm fire at 4135 moraga. we had another fire at 5,713th street where five were displaced were -- with no injuries. we have another first alarm fire at 391 30th street with no injuries. another fire on the third, no injuries. on the fourth, we had a bay risk you on. fourteen where an adult male fell into the water and was rescued by fire. we had a fire on the fifth at 3957 caesar chavez where three were injured and we were able to rescue a wheelchair-bound mail. everyone recovered.

we had a total of five wildland fires. we had another fire on the tenth at 137 milton with no injuries. on the tenth we also had a baby rescue with a 14-year-old boy. it was a recovery effort that was very difficult for members. they did a very good job with the conditions that they had. we had another fire at mission bay that looks like a large fire you may have seen it on the news but that was just because the astroturf was burning so it was more dramatic. it was put out with small lines. it wasn't easy fire to extinguish. another bay rescue at the marina greens with a capsized boat and two were rescued. another bay rescue on embarcadero one with one male adult. and then we had a fire at 1930 mission. on the 21st we had another first alarm fire at lucky and 24

th. what happened was also an adult female outside a building, and neighbor collapsed, had a heart attack and we initiated cbr because the medics were right there. she was resuscitated and taken to the hospital. it was a very quick response. on the 24th, we had a bay rescue at. thirty. and adult male was rescued. another fire at golden gate with 12 displaced with no injuries, and then on the first, we had a first on the 28th at valencia and 17th and an adult was rescued and he will be fine. i would also like to note we had an off-duty firefighter paramedic, matt baker, on the tenth, he lives near the river and he was off duty with his wife and he was able to save two people, save a family with a kayak, his own personal kayak. it was real nice. he did a nice interview on the news and he was very humble and

gave a lot of credit to the local fire department around there. we will be putting him in for a meritorious. this month, as you probably know was kind of short notice. homeland security will now be under operations. his report will now be included in mind. a lot of what homeland security does directly relates with operations, so all of his event action plans and everything we do, i have to move companies and approve these event action plans we thought it would flow better if he was under me, homeland security was under me. i have an addendum to add to this with what he has done in the last month, but since the last report that was given at the end of last month, he was instrumental, homeland security was instrumental in the 4th of july, all that work was done in june.

we started something called operation kaboom and in this operation, i had three taskforces this year go out, one was a fire engine, and oes rig that we placed at a station and then we had two more task forces that were complemented with fire , a mini pumper, p.d. and a fire marshal. and also d.p.w. behind them. they were able to rove around. they had 340 natural because -- calls dispatched to them. they had 110 calls and on views that they responded to those three companies together, taskforces, with those taskforces they were able to recover 500 pounds of fireworks, two guns, mortars and some in 1,000. they were able to stop a lot of unnecessary damage it was warily well received by the public. the public has been complaining

for years about certain areas and not being able to stop. taskforces were able to come in, destroy the fireworks, or take them as evidence, and we got a lot of positive feedback. it worked well with e.m.s. because that freed up the companies that are in that area to do their normal calls instead of little small spot fires all over the city. that worked out real well. we have some more intel and that will be even better. that worked out real well. you guys were talking a lot about the chase centre m.t.a. and you covered most of it, it is a huge concern of mind and we came into this in the middle of it. i would really like to have a dedicated lane to get in and out and that is what a lot of this discussion is about. it hasn't happened for us.

i'm not sure if m.t.a. understands, or the chase, how we respond, and from every direction, like the chief mentioned, and we need a way to get in and to get out and it is more or less their belief that tracks will be coming and they will clear lanes and we can keep going forward, but we have people coming from all lanes. we have companies coming down the 16, three companies will be coming up third, and then three or four companies will be coming the other side of third. we will have companies coming terry françois. we come at it from all directions. usually we take the path of least resistance and there really isn't going to be a good path of least resistance there. we want to show them how we all come at once and how they will handle that. one of the options is to use the tracks, but the problem with using the tracks is we have to get around the trains. we have large trucks and then

also if we are in the front, on the third street side, i'm concerned with, as you know, the first engine pulls in while you have other engines that have to turn around and back down and supply. i'm not sure if they are on the same page as us. that is our goal is to get them on the same page as ass and hopefully talk them into getting a dedicated lane. one of the issues they thought is we would share a bus lane. the only problem is, how will a bus get out of our way if all the other lanes are packed and the other streets are packed? it is a huge concern of mine. the fire marshal and homeland security has been helping me a lot with it. i think this will be the first of many, this drill that we will do on the 24th. we have done some tabletops, but it is hard to show them on a tabletop what our response is. it is not just for the chase centre, it is for the homes and buildings around it if there is a fire around there. it is a big concern.

the homeland security also went to d.p.w. disaster debris removal which i think was stimulated by fleet we'd coming up, but that is a concern with us because we also need a coordination to work with them in a big disaster. if we have trees down and building rubble in the streets, and it will affect our response during a big disaster, we need to their bulldozers and their teams to come in and clear roads so we can respond. we are working on a coordination with them, looking for a partnership. i talked about the fourth of july. the mobile command, we are looking to update that. we got that in by the skin of our teeth and the tentative date to get worked on his july 29th it will go to sacramento, go to the shops, and as you know, it is going for a buildup. that is our back up to the back up. we have our headquarters and at

d.e.m., and then this is our mobile one that we would use as another backup. so that is a big plus for us to get that done. homeland security was involved heavily in, as e.m.s. was, in the e.a.p. for pride, and it went off very well. we had all agencies working together in the unified command post, which is great to see, and we had many -- many pumpers, which you probably saw if you were involved in it, gators, mass casualty units, a mass casualty transport, bike patrols , emr and s.f. fd with a physician and a physician's assistant all in the box of the pride event. that worked out really well. all the companies on the outside were able to perform their normal duties. it was a nice job by homeland security.

truck ten and rescue one, i just put this slide in here. they did a nice rescue and they did -- they used the jaws of life to extricate and save somebody. we had another big bay rescue drill with battalion three so that part of the bay is around the ballparks and that area, the battalion three area, some more practising. we had the chinese delegates that came. we were happy to host them. they are learning how we protect our city. we have homeland security make sure they are who they say they are, and once they get approved, we show them how we work. we are continuing to doing our management for public safety. we still have roughly 15 firefighters every time learning how spanish will help us in public safety. and then operation genesis, we

did three times the d.o.t. with the veterans group. the black firefighters employee group, and we also did and s.f.o., and we just continue to support genesis on the opportunity with sfpd. district nine safety fare, i just put this in because it happened -- there happened to be a fire right around the corner at valencia street gardens and the engine six was right there so they got there so quick and put out a fire that could have gotten going but they extinguished it very fast. again, congratulations to the 125th class. i know some of you were at the graduation, but i have had some interaction with them and i just can't believe how motivated they are and we are excited to have them. they are a very motivated group. d.o.t. did a great job teaching them. this was also the month where we

remember the dedication to vinnie perez and tony valerio. it is the eight year anniversary i would like to honor them this afternoon. again, these are for the public, all of our platforms. they can follow us. next is the emergency medical services report, which i will let sandra tong do after my report. we have the data for review under the division fire prevention from the fire marshal and some notable faxes, some of the many in here. they put 11 of their community outreach presentations and added up -- they reached over 2,255 community members and they are given equipment to smoke ticket -- to smoke detectors, a lot of training, and a lot of handouts.

it has been very successful. they also conducted three large high-rise drills. twenty-seven internal training classes, and then plan check update. they reviewed, in the month of june, 1,004 applications, and that generated, for us, $736,000 over 736. very good. included is the data for the large community develop projects the port, the bureau of fire investigation, we are at 57 open reports. they responded to 15 investigated incidents this month. we have the data for the transportation advisory safety committee. also, because it is the end of the fiscal year, in total they completed 622 high-rise

inspections, 240 schools, and 3600 annual permits, which is quite a lot. included is the data from the airport recent activities. they are still working on the new active shooter exercise for the new hotel. it is in the works. they are planning an upcoming live burn training in august. there is a rundown in all of their runs for the cab runs. the bike medic program continues to have a very large success and we are in large support of that. they have continued to their training in coordination with all the surrounding agencies. and at the end we have a breakdown of calls for june and more information about the 18 working fires. except for the e.m.s. portion, this concludes the month of june 's operations and i'm happy to answer any questions.

>> thank you very much. at this time i will call for public comment. seeing none from the public, i will turn to the commissioners in terms of questions or comments. commissioner cleveland? >> thank you, mr. president and thank you for your report. a couple of questions or observations. on the 4th of july, i was in the bayview for a party and believe me, for two hours, it was an unbelievable of display -- display of fireworks all around that neighborhood. it was unbelievable. it was wonderful to see, but it was probably pretty dangerous. i applaud the operation kaboom. we need to do a better job of deterring these illegal fireworks, but you've got your job cut out for you, i will say that much. on the dedicated lanes for emergencies in the chase center,

is it possible to physically have a dedicated lane, and if so , can you share that information with the commission? >> originally we thought it would be a possibility, but sfmta is telling us it will not be a possibility. we have to convince them of the need of it. they think we are able to have cars get out in front of us or be able -- they think they are going to divert traffic down, if we are coming up third, converted up 16th. i don't think they realize that we have companies coming down 16 th. i think it is a lack of understanding of our response. because the chase center is backed up against water, we always had a better way of responding to a fire by taking the path of least resistance. there are many streets we can take. we see traffic, we go another way, we don't have that ability here. we have some thorough, some main

veins that we need to have access to, or at least have one of those veins opened up for us. >> but you have plotted it out? >> we have plotted it out. >> it is physically possible to have these dedicated lanes? >> if they let us -- it is hard for them because we have talked about having traffic come one way on third, and then just one lane on the other way coming down third and they have turned us down. basically we want to prove to them that it isn't safe and we memorialize it if they refuse to do so and we are involving the mere's office and everybody in this drill and hopefully they see the light. >> is basically m.t.a.'s management of the roads, right? >> correct. they have a perception that we will be able to communicate with them and tell them which way we are coming down and they can move for us. we don't have that kind of open line of communication when we are responding to a fire to talk to m.t.a. i think this will be a really

good exercise and i do think it will probably be the first of many. i think when they see this they will have to adapt and come to it with another plan. >> you mentioned operation genesis. can you explain a little bit more about what that is? >> that works with the police department and our p.i.o., jonathan baxter, who works with p.d. and it is for the youth to come to get some experience and see how the fire department works and the many aspects of the airport and the d.o.t., and they run them through a lot of drills. most of it is done at treasure island and division training at 19th and folsom. >> how do people get involved with operation genesis? >> there is a sign up, but our -- our p.i.o. gets out to the public pretty well. >> i think it is a great program >> he pushes it with p.d. a ton of it is on social media. it is on all of our sights that

are also up on the screen. >> i appreciate your report on the e.m.s. on the target populations. it is always concerning to me as to how many of our 911 calls are actually frequent-flier callers, you know, i noticed in the last month that we had a total number of 1,023 calls from our so-called frequent flyers and frequent flyers are defined as a person calling more than four times or more in a 30 day period , or more than two or more times in a 24-hour period, we are utilizing our e.m.s. services my question to you is what percentage of our 911 calls in june were actually by frequent fliers? >> would you have that? >> we would have to calculate that, but we can get that to you for sure. >> i don't know how may calls we had total in the month of june,

but i bet you that 1,023 is a big chunk of it. it is important that our elected leaders understand that so much of our 911 calls now are going out to people who frequently vote and repeatedly utilize our services. it is -- what is really disturbing is on the next page, you have listed some of the people that our frequent-flier users of services and i will notice number 14 here, ongoing efforts to engage and connect a sobering and medical detox frequently refuses services. he or she is frequently, they are refusing services, but they are you to lazing our fire department department services, our paramedic services on an ongoing and repetitive basis, costing our bet our city hundreds of thousands of dollars and they refused services to get detoxed or whatever the problem

is? that is just maddening to me, absolutely maddening. >> yes. >> i think that that is one of the reasons why i applaud the board of supervisors for approving our budget increase for e.m.s. six. hopefully there is more than used to be done there. absolutely more. >> i agree. i will have that ratio for you in the next report. >> thank you very much. >> vice president covington? >> thank you, mr. president. i will hold my medical questions until captain tom is up it is good to know about operation genesis. i had not been aware of it previously, so it sounds like a great program. [please stand by]

insisted us with one of the inspectors, mary saye, and she went out to a lot of these areas, and we took care of it before the fourth of july. they did a very good job. >> chairwoman: it's good that you anticipate these possible problems and get out there and solve them. i applaud you for doing that. on page three, you mentioned a month-long local coastal rescue drill. can you give us more details about that, please. >> let's see. >> chairwoman: under "functions," on page three. >> that