consistent way and we're hoping to expand and do more training services for customers on key services. so before the pandemic, we were doing customer trainings on electronic plan review, we weren't able to do those in person as planned, but we are really excited to make use of some of this great space here and find ways to bring training and development opportunities for our customers. help them learn to use our services better and learn more from them so we can be better. capabilities include experiencing a friendly customer service team. we have hired a group of we will be ten by early 2021. of trained and experienced customer service professionals from various industries that are currently working on the permit center floor. they will really become a conduit between all of the departments learning services,

about all of the agencies that are here. and being able to help customers with a broad set of questions and work with them. so that we just have a unifying thread customer service through across all of these departments when somebody comes into the building. we have a state-of-the-art cueing system that we're working with and we'll continue to work on more digital services to provide streamlined friendly and efficient experiences. next slide please. and just some quick pictures. oh, one of the pictures flipped on its side. oh, actually two of them did. well that's no fun. maybe let's not linger on these. when you come you will see it in person. kind of crazy. oh, and these pictures went crazy too on the conversion. left hand side is our cueing system and right hand side is a squished up picture of the payment kiosk.

part of our payment solution delivery will be we have a traditional point of sale system like a cash register. very very fancy cash register, but we also have payment kiosks to allow customers to just run in and make a payment if they have received an invoice and be done or if they don't want to wait in line that they can make a payment and grab the receipt and walk away. next slide please. next slide please. let's see how my time line held up. this is just a click. kind of overview of the permit center journey. really it began in 2018 when the permit center director was hired. and she spent you know, probably about three months really learning and doing research and analysis on our space and going

through volumes of information that the controllers office put together on the department services and potentially for the space. and once she learned that information she began hiring up our team and then we got to work and we spent much of 2019 putting the permit center together. so precaring systems, doing research, working with service designers to understand customer experiences and to develop and implement and reenvision how our services should work. early 2020 we began rolling out electronic plan review, training staff, training customers, moving materials and getting ready to launch that and then the pandemic hit.

and that meant we needed to pause on work we were doing. and shifted resources and really spent a lot of summer on two things. one we had to continue to move. there was a time line we were obligated to meet so you know, thousands of employees moved into the building. and we were part of each one of the moves working with public works and the real estate division on miscellaneous pieces. a lot of it was it related, but getting everybody settled and getting their desks ready. and then in addition we reallocated a lot of our resources to the department of building inspection to a system. and then towards the end of august, early september, things settled down. you know we got into our grove of how work waour groovehow wore

through the pandemic. that allowed us to add more in person services. in addition to doing planned drop off for over-the-counter work and we have a lot of resources that are assisting with appointment services for dbi, we're also assisting with bringing in fire only permit customers and the environmental health has added appointments that we help bring their customers in safely and get them to the environmental health folks. public works has added drop off services and we're part of that as well. we were hoping to open up to in person over-the-counter services this winter. unfortunately, we pulled back on that for health and safety reasons. we will revisit it sometime early january we'll just continue to monitor the covid rates and adjust and again, a lot of this has been really fluid. i will say the staff across all

of the departments have been pretty fantastic. doing their best to work in a really unstable environment. things change from week to week. they have been doing you know their best to keep up. we try to weave in and out as as much as we can and pick up slack for whatever the departments need. but really our main focus has been customer service and making sure that we keep the in person customers moving.

>> as we add more services. we willed a customer experience solution so that we can hopefully build some automated

bats to respond to inquiries quicker and build a building base to provide more information to customers at their fingerti fingertips. i will skip strategic planning. we will pick up special business and events work at the end of the year. we want to resume the events planning work we were doing. we need to reconfirm which business services are coming to the space. a lot of things changed for the department. they brought more services online. that will help us create post pandemic service plan to understand what the new world is. that is the permit center. in a few minutes. i will take a breath and see if anybody has any questions.

commissioner yekutiel. >> i am in my small business. something just happened. this is commissioner yekutiel. thank you for the presentation. i have a couple questions. i actually pulled up my photograph of me in the planning building with my plan for when i recently visited a couple years ago. all of these memories flooded back. i am so excited about this. someone recently moved the plans through the process himself

without help of anyone. i did it alone. i can still feel the sweaty armpit of nervousness and anxiety i had sitting in that building. quick questions. one, where will pick be related to the new permit center. >> pick is actually on the permit center floor. i will explain the floor plane. -- floor plan in the bottom middle of the floor. they are in the middle of the floor, easy to get to. >> same floor as all of the different counters? >> yes, exactly. they will be five of the 70 counters that are available. >> okay. great. that is helpful. it looked like from the floor plan and we will see this when we visit in person. each of the different departments have a different

sectioned off area. one thing helpful in having all of the counters in one area, when something was an miss in one defendan department they wot out to the other department. that ability to have them all-in-one area is lost in this plan. you get more overall tables, is that correct? >> that is the floor space that is bigger. what we are giving you because we are more spread out, you have the crackerjack customer service reps that can help move you around the floor or help active runners, frankly, in between departments. if a customer or department needs something, you have a team of people ready to jump to assist customers and staff. >> that is great. when the occupation expediter was explained. it was so sad we needed people

to do this. i am glad there are people on staff to help answer questions of folks like me who are competent but need to figure out where to go first then next. dph in order to get the dph set of permits for moving through man check you had -- plan check you had to go through dph. you don't have to go there. you can get it all done in the same place? >> yes, they should be sitting on the floor, and they should be a routing station. your plans can be walked over to somebody if you have physical plans and they can stamp them. i hope that really what we are dealing with you have an electronic set of plans, and all departments are in a session and can electronically stamp them for you.

>> there was something satisfying about a physical stamp. i understand that is more sustainable and probably easier. do the assembly permits you don't have to go to second street any more? >> fire will have the second street staff and their former 1660 street or mission street folks all-in-one space together. >> i have to say for folks who have gone through this, having requiring folks to go to dph then fire then notary. you have your own notary, hello. i had to go find a notary in san francisco. it was complicated. i am so glad to hear second street fire assembly permits on one floor, pick on the same floor and there will be on site nottary services?

yes, certified in january, hopefully. >> this is amazing. >> my last question. you know, the process of moving through plan check can that a long time. for me i was there. i got there at 9:00 and left at 5:00. in the old planning building no concessions and no nearby restaurants of any kind. if you have low blood sugar and get hungry it was tough. you can't leave because they call out your name. then if you miss your name you are screwed. will there beacon sessions in this new floor plan at all, snack bar or something? >> two-part answer to your question. one, no, no concessions here. next door to us in the residential tower there is a retail space for a cafe. unfortunately, with the pandemic i don't know if it is the same vendor selected previously.

it is suspected a cafe or restaurant space. we also have a wonderful system that will let you leave. we are planning to use that even during the pandemic so customers can wait in the car or away from the permit center to limit the people on the floor. you can leave and go to the market and get a salad or coffee, and then you will have anywhere between five and 15 minutes to come back to the permit center when you are summoned, cell phone and e-mail. >> for fellow commissioners who haven't had the pleasure of going through this. it is like dmv. you wait for a long time. put in your name and someone calls out your name. if you miss it, they just go to the next person and you lose

your spot. there were a lot of people. the question about concessions is important because if you had to get up to get water or get a bite to eat or use the rest room and they called your name and you missed it, that was it. that happened a couple times. it was sad. it is really exciting to hear a cueing system. too bad no snack bar on the premises. the fact you can leave solves that problem. thanthank you very much. this is exciting. >> vice president zouzounis. >> thank you for the presentation. i am excited about this permit center. the goodwill that used to be from provided customers to the businesses in the area, and i know a lot of them are looking forward to having a customer base nearby again. i don't know if you had this

number in earlier slides. what is the maximum goal for number of employees that you believe are going to be working at the permit center? >> actually presently because i just had to do this for health and safety plan. we have up to 80 employees on the floor right now. that is during the pandemic. it will probably be about the same. d.b.i. is working maximum capacity right now as is the permit center team. then with the building full, honestly i don't know. it is thousands of employees that will end up staffing the building when it is open again. >> that is great. that is great. to answer commissioner's question there are a lot of businesses across the street,

down the alleyway. this is a spot for small family owned cafes and food trucks. i am excited for them to be able to retain some of the customers coming through. we hope the customer representatives give people recommendations for nearby spots to go while they are waiting for their name to pop-up. i am excited for the tour on friday. thank you so much. >> i wish i would have known this i would have texted you for a recommendation. >> it is down the alleyway from the permit center. we are excited to have a customer base. the goodwill folks were like family for a while. looking forward. >> great. any other commissioner comments?

this is something the small business community has been waiting for for a long, long time. it is representing a children in how the city does business. it is going to be fascinating in the wake of the pandemic how much business as a whole and the city business moved offline into work from home. it will be fascinating to see how that plays into this. i think regardless there is a need for in person services, and i am sure the rest of the commission agrees with me. godspeed. you have our full support, and if there is anything we can do to help, we would certainly be glad to do so. the preps as presented look like

a great starting point to move forward. let's continue to stay in touch, and fingers crossed, by summer we are starting to get back into being able to go in person and be indoors together and have a normal life again. >> thank you very much. likewise. we hope to be able to partner with you and really need for us to thrive and do well need data and input from external entities to tell us how we are doing and what things are working and what things are not. we welcome the feedback and looking forward to a great partnership in the future. >> absolutely. we are committed to being a friendly and positive partner in making that happen. as you and i well know, no

matter what plans we make they will fall apart and be completely broken the seconded we hit the ground running. i am sure we will have more input when that happens. what you presented so far looks great and i am excited to see it happen. it is hard to imagine how that wouldn't be a substantial improvement how things were before. >> mr. president before we closeout the item, i want to make one note in terms of office of small business space. we are excited that we have been included in the permit center, and we are there because we know that businesses are going to hear about the one stop permit center and go there. they are going to go before they are really ready to engage in permitting. they are doing research and development. our space is there to really

catch those businesses. often they need a conversation to help them think through all of the considerations before they engage with the department. there are many other considerations that in terms of operating a business not just related to permitting, just the permitting to get your business open. we are excited to have space to be a value add for departments to be able to direct individuals to so that they don't have to go to city hall and walk the three blocks to city hall to get their questions answered. our presence won't be there until likely -- i mean rebecca will give me an idea, but we likely won't be there until the permit center is fully operational, until there is no

longer requirement around social distancing protocols. that will be, you know, aways away. we will be there and we are very excited about it. >> will this be supplemental to the city hall location? will people go to both locations or in place of? >> supplemental. they will be able to go to both places. >> are there just for my future note. are there any staffing or budget changes to happen to the office of small business to accommodate that or are we good to go with the folks we have now? >> we may need to give that consideration. right now the plan is to have staff rotate. then we will be able to make a determination as to the volume, both if we begin to see

increased volume of service needs by having the two locations, we will make that determination. >> thank you. we should go to public comment. any public commenters on the line? >> there is no one in the queue at this time. >> seeing no public comment, public comment closed. any further commenting, commissioners? seeing none, rebecca thank you for coming and persevering through the technical issues. we appreciate the update and look forward to talking to you again in the future. >> thank you very much. >> look forward to seeing you later this week, too. >> next item, please. >> item 4. proposed special committee on racial equity and subsequent appointments. articled v establishes special

committees maybe formed for limited duration for a specific purpose. president shall designate a commissioner to serve as chair of special committee. chair shall work with the director to accomplish said task. unless the commission specifies otherwise, the president is empowered to appoint member to special committees. the committee may be formed by a majority vote of the commission. discussion and action item. >> all right. so this is important work for the commission and central to our mission. i know this is something we all care deeply about. i feel like we started to talk about who might want to

participate in such a committee, but, director, can you remind me where we last left things or did we leave things? >> yes, mr. president. so where we last left things was in august your recommendation that the commission have members work on the equity work in between meetings so that we -- because our meetings are full. not taking meeting time to do some of the work, and at my recommendation, my recommendation was to consider vice president commissioner zouzounis, commissioner dooley and commissioner ortiz-cartagena

as special committee members and they all said, yes, they are interesting to do the work laid out not only in what is required of reporting to the office of racial equity, but if there is additional work that the committee and commission thinks the commission should take up. >> great. >> first step would be the official formation of establishing the committee. it doesn't necessarily have to have the members identified. the commission approves that special committee is formed. >> okay. do we vote to create the committee? >> yes. >> great. would it be acceptable to make a motion to form the committee? >> yes. >> okay. >> you would have to take public comment first. >> any public commenters on the

line? >> there is no one in the queue at this time. >> i would be delighted to nation the smoke to form the commission. >> i second that motion. >> motion by commissioner laguana to form the committee on rake equity. seconded by commissioner adams. roll call vote. >> commissioner adams. >> yes. >> commissioner dooley. >> yes. >> commissioner hule. >> yes. >> commissioner ortiz. >> yes. >> commissioner yekutiel. >> yes. >> motion passes 7-0 with no absents. >> before the next item, real quick. just so i am clear on procedure and process when do we designate

members? what is the process for fo for designating members, when will they report back in what is the timeline so i make sure the agenda is properly reflects our obligations? >> yes. the commission -- the rules of order do not speak to an absolute requirement for the commission to vote on the committee members. it ithey can. it is a special committee based upon the work that the special committee will do, there could be a time where it might be having other members come in not made up of the committee. that is to your discretion now

that the special committee would be made. right now in terms of the appointment who sits on it formally with you establishing who the is the chair of the commission. that answers your question. in terms of setting the timeline. the timelines for the work that the commission has to meet for the office of racial equity, the work is to be done between january and june of 2021. the first key metric to meet is amending the bylaws to reflect racial equity and that is due to the office of racial equity in march. the remaining items are to be

done and completed by the end of june. >> in terms of next steps everything happens offline until the committee reports back in. >> correct. >> okay. we will follow up with that then offline. unless there is further commissioner discussion. i didn't mean to skip over you, commissioner adams. >> thank you. no problem. we used to do these committees a lot in my early days on this commission. they are very helpful. it is at your discretion who is on them. i do believe director the meetings with the appointees

have to be in public, correct? >> yes. >> they will help you more than you realize, and the choice is the three who want to do it are excellent choices. any support i can give to this, i will. thank you. >> i concur on the choices and i also concur on i think the output will be extraordinary and extraordinary narrowly helpful. i am looking forward to it very much. vice president do you d zouzoun. >> i am looking forward to this formation to centralize some of the work of the commissioners who were recommended to work on the committee outside of the commission are ready if it is an

ethnic trade association or equity neighborhood that we focus on. i am excited to kind of institutionalize that work further. i am interesteeded in the understanding of the small business equity reporting so we can line up our goals and work on that and be informed with issues you are finding in the office during intake processes. that is all i have to say for now. we will talk next steps offline. >> thank you so much. thank you to the committee members for stepping up and taking on this additional responsibility. i know we have all taken on a lot. this is a big job.

i appreciate you doing this. any other commissioner comments? seeing none. next item. please. >> 5. resolution number 2020-003. support for nightlife and entertainment venues. resolution establishing the commission's support for night light and entertainment venues and urging the mayor and board of supervisors to provide economic relief. discussion and action item. >> commissioners you received the draft resolution in your packets. this is a follow-up to the entertainment agenda item we had last week. this is a resolution that will support this industry, which we all agree is valuable cultural

asset to our city. presumably everybody has had time to review. do you have any questions? this is a good time. i did want to mention our clerk has submitted a few amendments to address non substantive changes to make sure we are amenable to the changes. now is a good time to talk about the resolution in front of us if you have any questions or comments. >> there is the senior policy and drafter of the resolution. i have three amendments that i would like to submit for the resolution. first in the seventh paragraph and the first sentence place of entertainment should be capitalized. just for the record.

on the eighth paragraph i wanted to also include and apologies for not having this included initially, but that entertainment also includes bars like music venues and nightclubs and highly concerned they would need to close permanently. i want that also included in the resolution. the next paragraph, the ninth paragraph, i would like to add that same language that bars like music venues will need to close permanently and in addition more than half of survey respondents to the survey reported having lost between 75 to 100% of expected business income and between 75 to 100% of expected individual income for the year 2020. that is what i will be adding to

the resolution if the commissioners are amenable to that. >> do we need a vote on it? >> yes. >> okay. i move we take a vote on it. >> point of procedure question. i have an amendment i would like to add to. shall we do it now? >> do it now. >> just before we do that. we need to take public comment and there should as fares i understand there should only be one vote to approve with amendments as presented, is that correct? >> yes, all amendments, proposed amendments should be presented

now. then we have -- public comment on the amendment and then actually on the amendment -- sorry. amendments presented and public comment on the amendment and the resolution because you need to hear the public as to whether they want to urge you to accept those amendments and then action on the amendments and full resolution. >> are there two votes or one vote? >> my understanding there is one vote. >> it is two votes. you have to vote to accept the amendment and then on the full. on the resolution with the amendments. >> she will make the proposed

andments then open up if there are any others for public comment. >> after all of the amendments? >> right. >> do we vote before public comment or after public comment? >> you vote after public comment because you want to hear whether the public wants to have you accept those amendments or not. >> i apologize. do you want to make the proposed amendment? >> yes, the only comment i wanted to add and we can vote on it. the line that gives recognition to entertainment venues part of cultural districts or cultural. i know we have a lot that are

specific to communities. they are recognizing that. >> what would you like it to say? >> i mean i think it can go after the one of the sentences in which we recognize entertainment venues are culturally significant in san francisco. then we canlaborate and say specifically venues that holed cultural significance and the communities or part of cultural districts?

>> i would see the drafter of the resolution that it might go in after the whereas where it says -- the first page whereas entertainment nightlife businesses are historical to the san francisco unique cultural and contribute significantly to the vibrancy of the city. after that one. >> in line with something whereas many of our entertainment and nightlife businesses are of special cultural significance to the cultural districts they reside in. >> or the communities they were founded in or something like

that. >> did you get that? >> yes. >> okay. we need to vote on these amendments now. public comment. sorry. tell me five different times and i won't remember. is there any additional commissioner comments before public comment? >> i just want to say this is exactly what this commission should be doing. this is a very powerful statement. it needs to be said. we need to push more envelopes. i don't about you. after that presentation last week, i couldn't sleep. this really bothered me. i am happy we are doing this. we all want to be law-abiding

and do what is right in this pandemic and follow the law and do what is right. these people are getting screwed. excuse my language. it breaks my heart. this commission is doing exactly what it should be doing. pushing the envelope and pushing, pushing, pushing. i commend each and every one of you for this. thank you, president laguana for having the people speak last week. we have to hear more of this. right now we are in trouble, folks, if something doesn't happen sooner than later. i read this. it is excellently written and i really appreciate these amendments you are putting in. thank you, vice president zouzounis. this is good. thanks. >> thank you, commissioner adams. i think the lion's share of the credit goes to the excellent

clerk for drafting the resolution building on some language provided to us by the entertainment coalition. i share your feelings about the entertainment community and the testimony we heard last week. i think your suggestion that we hear more direct testimony from people affected is a good suggestion and we would be wise to follow up on that in this moment this community is decimated, not just entertainment but small business community as a whole. we have really had a tremendous obligation and responsibility to do everything to advocate for them. that is what this commission was chartered to do.

i am deeply proud of the commission and the commissioners that i serve with and the staff of the osb that be can take testimony from folks and turn around with a resolution to get behind a short time later. with that, i think we should go to public comment. if i understand this correctly, and i probably have managed to mingle it. public comment will first be on the amendment. then we will take a second round of public comment on the resolution as a whole. is that correct? >> mr. president, you can hear public comment on both items. you want to -- the public is able to make comment on the the full resolution and make comment on the proposed amendment. then after public comment, then you would take those amendments,

vote on those and then vote on the final resolution. >> one of those days i will learn how to do stuff. we will have more comment after the public comment. >> it is about a potential amendment. can you and perhaps explain why the new number amount was not included in the financial desires? i am sure there was a reason for it. i feel like giving specifics is useful but i am sure there was a reason why we didn't include in the resolution how much money this community needed in financial support. >> this is the senior policy analyst donovan.

i read the package of recommendations. i also drafted and helped form our commission's recommendation to the mayor and board of supervisors regarding federal economic stimulus and relief. there is not one number that i believe would satisfy the need for this industry that the city could likely provide. this industry is decimated. i don't know there is one that could be provided. i did want to include that from the survey, from the

entertainment and nightlife survey, these 318 businesses reported that they can expect up to 100% loss of personal income and revenue for the entire year. with respect to that, that is what -- i mean $318 million, $400 million at the very least. these businesses are grossing more than $1 million per year in order to pay for staff and their own personal expenses. if you would like to include an amount that is 100% up to you. given the fact that i don't know there the going to be any one for one number that would meet the need.

>> that may beings sense. i know that other departments and industries are asking for certain dollar amounts based on conjecture, but they understand from a negotiating point. it puts them in a much stronger place. what we heard loud and clear from the last meeting last week they need money. they need not be evicted which is great. one of the main crux of the issues is they have very high fixed overhead costs that aren't going away. commercial eviction is one piece of it, but we need to put money in the bank accounts to pay their bills. i don't know how to square this circle. i understand how like it feels like pulling the number out of a hat. we did hear $48 million in the last -- that was on the

proposal. that is a lot of money, also, maybe those venues that doesn't apply to all folks with entertainment. intelligent people crafted this. i am not proposing a specific amendment. i want it out there that it puts us in a tougher negotiating spot when we don't put a range or wouldn't it be nice if or we expect the financial ruin to equate to x amount because it then makes it harder for the elected officials to know how much they should be ballparking advocating for. >> we included in that letter to the mayor and board of supervisors that the advocate for $10 billion in set asides for ppp loans for san francisco

small businesses. we also had another section within that letter that spoke to the specific needs of the entertainment and nightlife businesses. that grants be established specifically for independent venues for those expenses that you just mentioned. >> that was in the supplemental crtf letter? >> no that was the letter. >> we just can't as a commission advocate for a specific dollar amount from directly to the federal government. we have to do that through the board. >> right. >> if i may. so commissioner, as always, you have a very sharp and pointed

suggestion that, no, i mean that in the best possible way. i love holding feet to the fire and really trying to put a specific number on it, you know, there is a lot of setting an anchor price and negotiating from there. the challenge with respect to this particular resolution, in my view, is the 908 bill for federal stimulus that they are calling it now bipartisan agreement. i got the draft language. it is a $700 billion bill. now they have taken out the aid to the cities and liability and that is a separate bill so this bill doesn't get caught up in that. the $700 billion including $300 billion for ppp to allow

first round ppp recipients to go back and get second round. i think part of the problem here for me and there is also some stuff for other expenditures. i guess part of it for me is when we are literally days -- potentially hours away from there being a dramatic children in the amount of money that is -- dramatic change to the amount of money available to the city and businesses, it seems premature to specify an amount when things could be dramatically different tomorrow. with that being said, maybe that is the wrong take on it. maybe you just put a number out there. i also try to balance. i mean my take on it i want the

commission to have credibility and don't want to make the commission look like we are not in touch with the other side of the balance sheet. >> that point is well-taken. i am not -- i see this document as a guiding document for our advocacy as a commission to the folks making the decisions on behalf of this community, the next question after someone gets this. how much? as long as we seem to have a good answer to that question if asked. if it is you commissioner or director how much money does the community need? great. if we did want to add language, which i am not necessarily proposing. it could be something to the effect of the san francisco

venue coalition estimated the amount needed to fully plug the hole to be in the estimated $48 million. something like that. it is not the small business commission but passing off work done by the coalition last week saying the san francisco venue coalition estimated the amount of relief they require would be $48 million. at least, you know, if a member of the board of supervisors takes this to the budget committee meeting they can say i heard that they need at least $48 million to plug the hole. >> i think that is a reasonable suggestion. why don't we put that in the whereas. that is an additional amendment whereas the entertainment venue coalition. >> the san francisco venue coalition.

not independent. they are different be. >> yes, i understand. whereas the san francisco venue coalition determined that the entertainment community would need $48 million in order to sustain itself through this next phase of the pandemic. >> the only wrinkle to that is that was specifically for venues. the resolution expands, not just venues. familiar. >> that's right. >> it is other things. >> we have a birth of a conundrum. the number floated for subset of the group that we are doing the resolution on and we lack data to form it. >> i am sorry to have caused the wrinkle in this commissioner

laguana. mannys has an entertainment permit. we a venue. i don't know. director do you think adding in the numbers in this resolution would add teeth needed or distracting and unnecessary. >> you know i have a better path. >> i missed this sparring. >> why don't we move forward with the resolution as drafted. then let's make a commitment to revisit this in our first meeting in january, and it can be a quick agenda item. at that point we will know a couple different things. one, we will know what if

anything the board of supervisors have done for entertainment to date. we know what the federal government has done to date. we will have perhaps a better sense from the entertainment community what they might need to get to the next four to five months. then we can make an additional resolution. we are not limited to one resolution. we can make another resolution that is more specific and we can use the time remaining between now and then to put a finer number on this. with a little more basis and research than we are able to do right now during this hearing. >> sounds good. >> thank you, commissioner. >> is there any other amendment before public comment?

are we 100% there are no more amendments? commissioner your lips are moving. i thought you were making another amendment. >> no, no more amendments. i am amendmented out. >> can we have public comments. any public comment on the line. >> three callers on the line. >> let's hear from them. >> hi. thank you for giving me an opportunity to speak. i am calling in support of the san francisco venon you coalition and this resolution is near and dear to my heart. i am richard wilson. i made this my career for 20 years. street level promoter, stage hand, worked in operations and have been the head of security

for the local san francisco venue. the san francisco nightlife and music scene has not only kept me employed it has been my life. we are suffering. there are no remote work options for us like there are in the tech industry. we rely on the ability to gather in public for our industry. the outlook for the future seems bleak. we are the first industry to take the hit and the last industry to come back. public gathering are once again safe -- who news when that will be. we are struggling. i can assure you we need stages to come back to when the public gatherings are safe again. stage hands, ushers bartenders promoters, security, lighting and sound we need your help. that is all i have to say.

>> thank you for your comment. >> thank you so much for taking the time to take up this matter. i am rob. we spoke last week. i am urging you to do two things. a, pass this resolution in support of entertainment and nightlife. it is vitally important for the city's culture. b, i am urging you to draft a second resolution that is specific to venues.

>> hello, commission. i am allison. thank you for hearing me. i am part of the san francisco venue coalition. also, former gm of 365 club.

this particular meeting is really special, near and dear. thank you for all of those kind words in item number 2. you guys know bimbos is unique. it is irreplaceable. the truth is that the business has been closed since march. it hasn't had any options, unlike restaurants or any other retail stores that have other revenue forces during this pandemic, and it is bittersweet to have a legacy business registry when we are closed and knowing that we are totally on the line. encouraging to pass this resolution. let's do it. let's get that first step but let's keep going.

it is true. thank you, commissioners, we need funding. like i said we are on the line. i know i it is a huge bezel and there are -- huge puzzle. we need your help and i can tell this commission is on board with this. please do it for bimbos. i miss that place. thank you. i do urge for that second amendment, too. we will keep coming to the meetings, too. thank you. >> if thank you. next commenter, please. >> i am a member of the sfvc and i would like to urge you to pass this resolution. i would also like to

respectfully ask the commission to acknowledge that we are hoping for federal aid, but looking to this city to contribute to financial contributions to preserve the culture. there is always a question of where the money comes from, and $48 million is not a small chung of change. recently is supervisor haney pointed to city emergency relief fund. we are aware the state has a tax surplus. i know this commission does not have jurisdiction to allocate those funds to us, you guys have done a great job in bringing awareness to the issue. i would ask you continue to do so and help us get to those funds so that our staff can return and we can all come back to work and help the city recover. thank you.

>> okay. next commenter, please. >> hello. thank you. i am duncan, part of the sfvc. co-worker of rob readies. you know the numbers. i don't need to reiterate that. i want to call somebody who is grown up in the area and going to shows since i could. [please stand by]

>> as you know, independent venues have huge heart beat of the city. being the first businesses to close and going to be the very last to reopen, we're staring down this massive amounts of debt and bankruptcy. shows lot of the tenacity of these people in the city and how

much they know we're worth to hold on to get back. we will not get back until december or fall of 2021. it's heart breaking. in order to get to the other side, almost going to be 18 months of zero revenue. it's going to be a patch work of city, state and federal relief. we do thank you for amplifying the voice of independent venue in san francisco. i say again, it's zero revenue. i can't think of another business that has not been able to operate since this pandemic began. we worry about the plight of business. we're in communication with employees, contractors and vendors. they're hurting. we heard these stories from the

venue coalition last meeting. thank you to the commissioners, steven adams for recognizing how difficult it is to hear these stories. we're fighting here in san francisco to bring awareness and relief so we can survive and help rebuild the city, independent venues have been trying to recover. raising awareness to the mayor and board of supervisors is going to be critical to money actually being spent to invest in the future by san francisco. as you know, president laguana stated, we have our fingers cross-ed this federal stimulus comes through. for cities and business and individuals, i don't think the fight stops there. we need to work together to work on specific policy and programs

that ensure that venues are not excluded. we look forward to engaging in conversations and come up with tangible relief for independent venues in the city and can't thank you enough. thank you very much for all of your time and for helping to champion this cause. thank you very much. >> thank you, next comment please. >> clerk: that was was the last one one. >> president laguana: okay. is there any additional commissioner comments after the public comment? while i wait, i'll say something. this is not going to be only resolution we don do on this ma. this is not the only action we take on this matter. this is just the beginning.

we're going to move the ball forward now while we can. we're also going to keep focusing on what we can do to make more movement quickly and as president of this commission, i will commit to following up with all of you in the entertainment community and making sure that we get some actual real measurable progress out of this. >> commissioner yekutiel: my take away from -- this is in general, a lot of us probably feel this way, there does seem to be this black box of where the money is. i know we were presented to by our esteem controller who explained the budget. i can imagine that everyone is

coming to the city for money for things. now. we're in a time of recession. it will be really helpful to understand what are potential places, specific funds we can ask about. they mentioned on this call, the city had an emergency relief fund. i'm not sure what that is. where is that housed? i saw recently that the city administrator had her own discretionary fund. i'm sure there's a reason for that. are there discretionary funds, does oewd have discretionary, we know there's a fund that's for

some stuff. we revealed last week, $406 million sitting in accounts. we know there's legal issues. we find out through the press there's $406 million sitting in the account. i guess this is directed towards the director and the president. if you guys know of particular funds with fancy names that have pots money in them, it would help us with our advocacy. we can ask about those funds and see what's left in them. that make sense? >> president laguana: it does. i think -- having been chasing after this and programs i'll let the director speak to this. >> commissioner yekutiel: it's almost like you're trying to get into a really hot restaurant. you know you need to say like

i'm with bill kind of thing. it's almost like there's some kind of secret budgetary password you have to use. what about about that emergency relief fund. oh, that fund the one with $100 million in it that hasn't been touched. >> i think, as we know with hdso money, there's regulations. taking your interest and your request, i can't say that i know where the pots of money are. some of them are particularly assigned to certain things.

are there as emergency spending or funding extra funding for certain types of spending. it's to go back to the controller and ask for that list and where all the -- what is that additional money, the emergency money. where does it live and are there specific spending requirements attached to that money? i can tell you, oewd does not have a magic pot of money. it most certainly wished it does or could. any magic money that happen for oewd for money that is transferred into oewd?

>> president laguana: that is the challenge. well, commissioner yekutiel, it's a great suggestion. we need to pursue this offline and vote on the resolution in front of us now. so we get something done. >> commissioner yekutiel: sir, yes, sir. [laughter] >> president laguana: i move that we support the resolution and amendments as currently drafted. >> you first need to adopt the amendment as proposed. >> president laguana: i move we adopt amendment as proposed.

>> second. >> clerk: i believe that was a tie. commissioner adams or dooley. who like to have it? >> it was miriam. >> i'll second it. >> clerk: miriam, motion to approve? >> vice president zouzounis: sec ond. >> clerk: roll call vote. [roll call vote]

>> sometimes i fear the clerk of the board is watching our meeting. she's sitting back and laughing in her chair at how disorganized the clerk small business seems sometimes. >> president laguana: every time i do that intro at the beginning, i aspire to have a speaking voice as good as hers. i know i'm like nowhere near. that's the gold standard for public speaking in my view. >> clerk: that motion passes 7-0. no one in the dissent or absent. is there a second motion? >> vice president zouzounis: jus t clarification, we voted on the amendment and now we're voting on the full?

>> clerk: yes. >> president laguana: i motion that we approve the full resolution with amendments. >> seconded. >> clerk: motioned by commissioner adams to approve the resolution with the amendment previously voted on by commissioner laguana. roll call vote. [roll call vote]. motion passes 7-0. we are now on item 8, which is the director's report update report on office of small business and small business assistance center, department programs and people and legislative matter and announcements from the mayor and announcements regarding small business activity discussion

items. >> thank you commissioners. first, i want to start off by congratulating commissioner yekutiel for being passed out of the rules committee out of sfmta board. congratulations to you. then, i also want to extend, this is our last meeting of calendar year 2020. hard to believe that we are here. i want to extend my appreciation to media services for their support that they provided to the staff and for you as commissioners in running our meeting. and really helping the city get through this process and be able

to conduct this business in a virtual environment. we all have learned many new and great things from that. thank you media services, sfgov tv, i just really appreciate all that you have done to support us. to move on to -- i have a very short report tonight. i want to let you know -- i'm going to monthly report out our client service numbers. i am reporting the november total. our staff served 313 businesses. 13 businesses came through inquiries from the sf business portal. note that this sort of -- this number kind of takes us back to

numbers pre-covid. we're going to get into doing new business services. the engagement time with each of those businesses is longer because we're not being able to conduct it in person. 25 businesses were assisted in spanish and nine businesses were assisted in chinese. 14% of that 313 were prestart-up. 14% of the 313 were businesses with less than one year in business. then 40% of the businesses had one or more years in business. we assisted hand full in businesses in closing their business and four businesses seeking assistance in

relocation. the top four district that we served, this is in order, is d3, d fine9, d10 and d6. also has a high equity reflection as well. the top issue, there's some interesting issues that has arisen in the last couple of weeks. one is we're in greater need for legal assistance around leases and rent and small businesses. i do want you to know that the office of economic and workforce development is working to engage the bar association to help provide the legal assistance. legal services for entrepreneurs is -- the demand is very great

that's coming through them. to help keep up with the volume and the need, we're going to be expanding that assistance to the bar association. we're also seeing businesses predominantly food related businesses that have more extensive p.i. and preopening costs. their getting their business open. several have just begun the process when covid hit. there was definitely a pause when construction for the business, commercial business sector wa was not allowed. businesses are getting close to opening but they're finding they don't have enough funding to

complete their project. the funding, there's not enough funding out there for newly starting businesses. of course, these businesses aren't eligible for the idle and the ppp because they were not in operation in 2019. any of the covid funding, they're not eligible for. i want to say that i'm very happy that the commission did put in it recommendations to the mayor for federal funding that we do need to substantially also increase funding for newly starting businesses. we want to make sure those that did get started, not go out of business or don't have opportunity to start their business. we need to make sure, we have

enough funding to help new businesses going as well. that's a key part of our economic recovery. i want to extend my appreciation that commission also gave back in consideration in its recommendation. i am working with oewd, we are getting inquiries from our services and massage. only key distinction is that technically medi spas do have a doctor on site to do some doctor procedures but the doctors don't perform the massage, any facials. i know that this was something that was brought up. one of the perhaps meetings with

the commission with dr. argon. those are the key things i want to highlight for tonight. there aren't any significant pieces of legislation that were introduced last week at the board of supervisors. i will provide you with some written updates. the legislation that you heard around the entertainment permit and restaurant permit, last week, has minor amendment but it's to codify some of the business licensing and tax payment dates and deadlines. with that, i'm happy to take any questions. >> president laguana: do you have any questions for the director? no questions.

i think those are some things we want to keep an eye on, the whole personal service issue remains a vexing problem. i think now with dr. argon at the state and with no current public health officer, it's unclear when we'll get a replacement public health officer. i seen some supervisors saying they plan to have a replacement public health officer. we need to find some way to advocate for small business with the current structure. it's like everything else, there's a whole lot of moving parts. it's very difficult to figure out what the right path to take

is. i appreciate you bringing that up. >> you're welcome. perhaps, adding on to that, commissioner laguana, as the commissioner may want to give some consideration for future resolution, i just thought of this. looking to our mayor and board of supervisors, one of the key components that dr. argon was advocating for was really using risk-based management tools. i don't think that's really been fully developed at the state level or local level. i think there's still room and time for those things to be worked on and implemented. i think that will also be critical and also conveying to

the consumer as we start to -- after the immunization reaches a critical level to build back customer confidence, it's a more escalated recovery as opposed to a slower recovery in terms of customers returning to businesses. >> president laguana: i thought a lot about those comments you made about risk-based models i'm hoping we'll start to see that get rolled out and that will result in a more surgical response to shutdowns which at the moment, seem not a surgical as it could be in enabling folks to stay open while still being

very careful about public health. this seems like it needs to be worked on american an -- and ada more careful approach. thank you again for this comment. >> commissioner huie: thank you very much. as i'm thinking about it, i feel like right now, we have an opportunity to kind of reimagine what this next phase is going to look like. i don't know if it's the new year approaching or the place we are in terms of having some understanding of the virus, of the environment. i feel like we're at a midway

point. it make sense senior us to kind of maybe recognize how much we've kind of put together in this time frame. from march to now, we've helped and seen sectors organize. we've seen leaders rise up. we've seen all these different things happening. people gathering numbers and gathering information about their sector and about their business. we have now kind of this big vault of information that i think we have it kind of disorganized in a way. i think we could take this opportunity to do something more with it and reimagine what i think an ideal kind of reopening might be. what happened is that, i think

certain businesses and sectors get kind of left behind when something else marchs forward. i feel like it's a constant struggle and maybe it doesn't have to be that way. i don't know if that's just dreaming and wishing. i feel like that's kind of needed to pull yourself out from the weeds and see what can be a better plan and for us to be able to propose that given the information that we know. are we also -- part of what we do is advocacy. having the data, having the information and i think -- i feel like now we have a lot more than we started with in terms of we know just the information we have about the entertainment venues, the information we have

about nail salons. we understand a lot more about our business community than we did. i think it's kind of a good time to recognize what are the things that we do know now and what are the risk that we should be evaluating and how do we advocate for something that's less surgical as you described and advocating for a reopening of our economy that really keeps people safe but may be puts more responsibility on what we do with our personal time or how we spend our personal days. i don't know exactly what the solution is. i wonder with all of this information that we gather, i don't want to see us minimize how much we know today versus how much we knew in the very beginning of this and to be able

to look like at the big picture and see what we might be able to actually change. i do believe that we should continue with resolutions and try to help with things like on a line item kind of basis. i think that we as a body or as a group, have the ability to see the big picture that maybe other -- before coming on this commission and just being an advocate in my neighborhood. i didn't see the big picture than now being on this commission. i have a better sense. i hope that we can collectively think about what the future of san francisco recovering from this pandemic could look like in maybe water strokes.

>> president laguana: thank you, i appreciate that comment. we should -- there's always the ground level work that needs to happen and sometimes it can be something that doesn't seem that big to us but it's big to the businesses like paper bag fees or whether it's plastic utensils or disposable utensils. then the legislation and the resolutions and then there's high level stuff like the federal part and there's a global approach which is what you're advocating for. i think that's an important part of it too. the challenges always how -- we're just an advisory body.

we don't have any actual teeth. whatever we say, it's only as good as the advice that we're giving and it's good of credibility that we have with the listener. big part of our work is to bill that credibility and build that trust that we're going to give good advice. second part of it is is to give good advice. i'm always hoping if so many of our ideas and initiatives have come from different commissioners. the floor is yours, commissioner huie.

i'm happy to be a partner on anything that you come up with. >> commissioner huie: i'll work on that. [laughter] >> president laguana: okay. we'll move on to the next -- we got to do public comment. commissioner yekutiel. >> commissioner yekutiel: we're moving on from new business? >> president laguana: not yet. we have to do public comment on director's report. are you out? >> commissioner yekutiel: i have no comment on the director's report. >> commissioner dooley: i have something for new business also. >> president laguana: i'm calling on you guys, you're lining up for the next item. i apologize. is there any public comment on

the director's report? >> clerk: there's no public comment. >> president laguana: , next item please. >> clerk: item 9, commissioner discussion and new business discussion item. >> president laguana: commission er yekutiel, you were first. >> commissioner yekutiel: okay, technically, commissioner dooley and i voted at the same minute. >> president laguana: would you like to defer commissioner dooley? >> commissioner dooley: i'm bringing up something that i'm thinking of inform -- in term of our recovery. we will still be in semiemergency for a long time. some of may know, i visited this

tiny island of kawhi, they put together a small business website that allowed people to order online whether it was because they were closed, which was still true. most of businesses are closed there or from people are other places, visiting. they had visited that spot before and wanted to do some shopping. [indiscernible] i was thinking whether we can put something together neighborhood small tiny businesses can participate in a way having a portal a that says shop san francisco. it brings attention to very small businesses but that have really unique and exciting things to offer. i ordered baked goods from folks

in kawhi. it seems like our city and county could do something like that for our small vendors. that is something i would really be interested in looking into. >> president laguana: i love this idea. you can send a link website to the director so that we can share it with the commissioners? >> commissioner yekutiel: i have a couple of items that i want to present for new business.

the first about the legacy business program and whether or not if it has not already been done. if there is a password we can use to ask for special infusion of funds to our legacy business recipient understanding that for a lot of these legacy businesses, they're more cash strapped than some newly capitalized businesses. it's hard out there. it's not necessarily -- we don't have to make it an agenda item but maybe point of exploration for the director or the commission president and vice president. whether or not there are ways we can check in with the legacy businesses to see which one on the verge of closure or extra funds we can use in the legacy business. that's just putting it out there. it just came up in the beginning. the second thing -- >> president laguana: let me interrupt for a second. just an idea on that. i know that many of our legacy

businesses, some of them are groceries, i believe. i seem to recall. perhaps i'm wrong. there may be a few other legacy businesses. i'm just make the observation that not all small businesses are doing poorly in the pandemic. some are actually doing really well. the idea would simply be if you are doing well, would you be willing to defer on any glants or aid so that can be redirected to folks who are not doing well. >> commissioner yekutiel: at the least, commissioner, laguana, if there's some kind of list serve of the legacy businesses or richard compile them all in an e-mail and send out a brief survey or understanding of the health of them. this body and the businesses

themselves go through stuff so much to become a legacy business. these are like our babies. we need to see how they are doing. if richard hasn't already done that. grocery stores are doing fine, that's good to know. maybmay be we can think about ws to do special advocacy for those legacy businesses. >> president laguana: commission er huie is up after you. hopefully we can get an update on the survey. we could perhaps lean little bit harder on the legacy businesses and find some way to segregate that data perhaps, i don't know, if it will be possible how we're doing this.

that might be a way to get to the health of our legacy businesses through the survey. >> commissioner yekutiel: that's something that's happening with -- if the survey sent out to legacy businesses, great. if we have the e-mail of all the legacy business owners, if we have all their e-mails, perhaps it's a quick check-in. i don't know. this is not a specific recommendation. >> rick has been staying very close in touch would at the legacy businesses. we do want to know as soon as possible if there's going to be some anticipated issue. that said, we can take a look at the different sectors and taking a look at the businesses and

speak to you individually about some ideas along with the president potentially vice president. they are important businesses for us to retain. >> commissioner yekutiel: if may be we're trying to help as many small businesses as we can. if it's hard for us to find pots of money for particular industry, maybe it won't be hard to find pot of money to save legacy businesses. there are 40 legacy businesses on the verge of permanent closure, we can use that extra special emergency use authorization supplemental funds

in the slush to fund these businesses. it's my thinking. that's the legacy businessing. second thing is, vaccinations are coming. might be small businesses have a vested interest in the distribution of this vaccine. there's a lot of questions what is a front line worker and what is an essential worker. it might not be a bad idea for this body to find out what the person is locally making the decision. second piece is there's an interim public health director and potentially -- we all know, i think it's no mystery. there are lot of small businesses who feel very

aggrieved right now by the seeming lack of, science and facts that have come as backup to the recent health order. i actually don't think that small businesses have a lot of problems doing what needs to be done to protect people's lives. restaurant, bars and retail, folks are frustrated but they understood because decisions were then immediately backed up by data, science and facts. what we heard loud and clear with the outdoor dining, recent data come out that about less than 2% of new covid cases have been contact traced back to dining we have questions. i don't think it's outlandish to get the answers. what studies were done that

showed outdoor dining was the right call to make based on the data, science and facts. i did submit a number of public records request as it relates to the healthcare security ordinance after the last small business commission meeting about trying to understand what these funds are going and have gone and where they are sitting. i'm awaiting the responses to the public records request and have communicated to the office of the supervisor that i've been in touch with about this. i will update the commission once i hear back. thank you. >> president laguana: point of clarification, has dr. philip been named interim health director? i missed that? >> commissioner yekutiel: i

think there's some things that gets triggered. if the sitting public health director leaves the second in command automatically becomes interim until the permanent public health director gets chosen. she is the interim just by nature of thomas being done. >> president laguana: there's no deputy health director. if there was a deputy health director, that would be true. you may have better information than mine. my understanding and perhaps our director can share any knowledge she may have about this. my understanding is we did not have a deputy health director. as a result, the director of b.p.h. becomes the only health -- becomes the acting health

director. i'm a little unclear what the actual title is. i don't think there's an interim. last i heard. >> vice president zouzounis: i'l l find out specifically. there was the determination by the city attorney early on in terms of there was a question in terms of the role of dr. colfax and then dr. argon as the health officer. this determination stated that dr. argon was made the health officer is the head of the department of public health who is generally a medical doctor. at the time that dr. argon was appointed as the health service, the head of the department of medical health was not a health doctor. now we have a medical doctor, i

don't want to speak to what the next steps are. i will find out for you. >> president laguana: i know we're not allowed to lobby the state government. the state public health director is our former city public health director. the city will not go against what the state of california is doing. unfortunately, whatever it is, our state public health director is now empowered to might these decisions for the entire state. what i'm trying to funnel here is, i'm getting a lot of inbound. lot of frustration. lot of questions from my industry and they do not know

what to do with their feelings. as a representative of small businesses, to our city government, i feel a little bit ham strung. i do not know where they should focus their attention. we don't have a public health director and we don't know what the next one will be. once there's clarity on who's making a decision on the future of the industries. i would really love to bring them in this body to ask them important questions. >> president laguana: it is challenging. this is a state level position. there's that inability to take action at a state level. perhaps we can think about this

offline. there's nothing that i know of, that prohibits us as individuals from speaking with dr. argon, whom we previously developed a relationship with. perhaps, if we have specific questions or or you can speak with the other coalition partners in the small business community and think about what we might want to specifically request or lobby for or -- there's other ways we can assist. it doesn't necessarily have to be within the context of the commission. that's the challenge as far as

the commission in terms of interacting with statewide authorities. it's unfortunately outside airline scope. hue >> commissioner huie: i wanted to address the legacy business question. starting with that. i believe i had a conversation with rick at some point where we felt where we had talked about perhaps, him finding out more information or being able to survey the legacy businesses.

these are businesses that have learned how to really be generational and how to pass a

business down from one generation to another. which is crucial to many of our businesses that have done a lot. it's a different mindset. that's something i think could change san francisco community in terms of businesses not just opening up for a moment but really being an institution and what that might look like. i do think that the legacy businesses have a lot to offer in terms of their expertise as well. that will be really nice in addition to the knowledge that we have right now. the second piece, commission dooley, i love the idea of having a one-stop shop website. i feel like, i personally have

been trying to reach out to every small business and spend any money i have at the small business and i think there many residents who will probably feel the same as well as who have a fond place in their heart for san francisco. i saw an e-mail go by this morning where somebody had asked about something like this. i think lot of partners that we can probably talk to and you'd be happy to lend my support towards your idea. i think it's a great idea. lastly, one thing i keep talking about is a survey. the survey, i believe, will be done in all languages by wednesday. that's been my last update from the professor. that will be done. my ask of you, for all of as

commissioners is to maybe take a look at director's outreach document, if there's any way to help fill that out a little bit. i think all of you have really very positive and close connections to your supervisors. i think that might also help too. i do think the feedback that i gotten from all of you, has been surveys are tough now. people are getting survey fatigue. it will take a lot of effort on our part for outreach. i'm willing to go around, commissioner dooley and commissioner ortiz-cartagena has offered and every one of you offered this, walking door to door.

it is going to take the personal touch. hopefully the survey will be a nice excuse for us to connect with people within our community. i'm hoping that will be a good part of the holiday season. that's pretty much all i had for my commissioner report. i will probably attend a meeting that different things. i'm happy to support all the stuff you guys are working on. thank you. >> president laguana: question with regards to survey timing. this is an honest question, i don't have an answer in mind one way or the other. do we think it's wise to do a survey, put are the survey out right before the holidays?

would we collectively be better off just wait until after the first of the year? i'm not putting my thumb on the scale on that question. >> commissioner huie: my feeling from the professor and her experience so far, she's advocated for doing it now. we're going to get today's data and we are keeping it open through the month of january. whether it gains traction now or later, we can control that a little bit too if we're seeing that it's not hitting in the holiday. >> president laguana: i think that make sense. let me make a recommendation

based on my limited marketing experience. why don't we do -- an idea might be to release the survey pre-holidays, personal networks and kind of do a soft launch, if you will. then in january, try to do a full-court press, first and second week of january. lot of times, when you're promoting something, people need to hear it, from multiple channels simultaneously. i'm worried if we dribble it out over the holidays, we'll never gain a full head of steam. we should commit to doing a full-court press. in january when we think we can get everybody's attention. go ahead and release it now. it's just an idea.

>> commissioner huie: that feels like general marketing principles. it's like a presale or like vip survey [laughter] i recognize this is a public forum. my vip may not be that special. i do think that this soft launch might be nice during the season. i will be happy to talk about this offline and go over the specific outreach if you want to talk about it after, if that's possible. >> president laguana: okay. >> yes, that's possible. >> president laguana: okay. great.

any other commissioner questions or new business? i'll just go real quick. i've been investing lot of energy in bankruptcy reform, particularly at the state level. unfortunately many of our small businesses are not going to make it. it was about the adjournment notice. >> president laguana: i've not forgotten. by will come back to you. many of our business will not succeed and not survive. many of these business owners will be facing bankruptcy. currently bankruptcy law only allows $70,000 as a homestead exemption. if you're a small business owner

and you own your home, you have a $300,000 in equity, you're only allowed to keep $70,000 of that and file bankruptcy and the rest will go to jury lenders. if you have a car, the trustee will sell your car and give you back $2300. which is not enough money to buy a another car. there's all these different laws and they are unfortunately lender friendly for small business owners. i think they were written in contemplation of a time when most people were filing bankruptcy made mistakes or perhaps were engaged in fraudulent behavior. that's clearly not the case now. [please stand by]

>> forgive your debtor some portion of your debt so you can stay in business. great. you have got some debt forgiven. that is amazing. you are able to stay in business until you get a 1099 fee from the lender at the end of the year because debt, forgiven debt is taxable. if you have a $1 million loan and you got $500,000 of it forgiven, you could be looking at a -- doing quick math here. $150,000 tax bill that you weren't expecting. that tax bill is not forgivable or dischargeable in bankruptcy. i just wanted to alert everybody

this is a very serious matter. no policymakers that i am aware of are focusing on yet. i don't think the small business community fully understands how serious thi this iceberg is. perhaps an opportunity for the commission to write another memo about this, but i will say that in our federal ask we also made a number of recommendations around bankruptcy reform. there are similar laws that need changed at the federal level. it will be an ongoing "trainwreck" that will drag people out of being small business owners for the rest of their lives and they will never escape the damage of these 8 months because bankruptcy doesn't allow any escape. it is really awful. that is it.

i feel like i have other stuff, but that is enough for one day. it is mys to be done by 7:30 p.m. with that, i guess we will -- is there any public comment on the commissioner new items? new business comments? >> there is no public comment. >> seeing none, public comment is closed. next item, please. >> please show the office of small business slide. >> we will end with the reminder the small business commission is the small public forum for economic vitality of small businesses in san francisco it is the best place to get answers about doing business in san francisco during the local emergency. if you need assistance continue to reach out to the office of small business.

item 10 adjournment. >> do you want to make a motion? >> yes. this is commissioner yekutiel. i would like to motion to adjourn tonight's small business commission meeting in honor of the cliff house. a brief word about the cliff house. 157 years old. it was built by senator john buckley and cc butler. purchased by the first jewish mayor in 1883. there was a dynamite explosion in 1887 which destroyed it. there was a christmas fire in 1894 which burned it to the ground. then the mayor rebuilt it in 1896. this business survived the 1906

earthquake. then was burned to the ground in 1907 again. rebuilt and changed ownership a few times, but at long last in 2020 due to the covid-19 crisis it was announced yesterday or sometime this week that it was going to permanently close december 31st. they have laid off 180 employees. obviously, the cliff house is a san francisco institution. i have to believe there is not the last we have seen the cliff house it is too important to the city culture and history. it is possible that the permanent closure announced will be a permanent closure. it is important to adjourn in honor of the cliff house. >> i second that. >> motion to adjourn the meeting in honor of the cliff house by

commissioner yekutiel. seconded by commissioner adams. roll call vote. [roll call] >> motion passes 6-0 with one absent. the meeting is at injure adjourt 7:36 p.m. >> have a great holiday.

>> mayor breed: thank you. this is the beginning of a new year, after the end of a very long year. i am optimistic about what lies ahead for our city and our country, and i do believe there is hope on the horizon. that being said, we really -- wy challenging days in front of us. our daily average case

rates of 237 cases per day remains alarming. and we've never had so many people in the hospital with covid at one time. right now, in this very precarious moment, we are seeing what the impacts of the holidays will be. dr. kofax will provide more insight of those numbers, but we won't know the full affect of the holidays for the next few weeks. at this very point, san francisco and the bay area are under the stay-at-home order for the future. we have no control over lifting most restrictions, like those related to dining and personal services. what we do have control over is how we closely follow the health orders. we have control over our individual actions that can lead us to improve our numbers so we can keep people healthy, save lives, and get out of these state restrictions. i know this continues to

be so hard for everyone, especially our small businesses, that remain closed or are very limited in the services they can provide. we're doing everything we can to help. and today, at the board of sup visorssupervisors, they will vote on legislation to waive fees. these are fees that are previously deferred and are scheduled to come due in march. frankly, it is not enough. we need to eliminate them entirely. our small businesses need any and all of the help they can get. while we have provided a lot of direct support for small businesses over the month, including over $25 million in grants and loans, we know we need to do more. that includes finding ways to provide more immediate relief, and we are working on that right now. we're also helping our small businesses apply for new rounds of p.p.p. loans that are part of the new

federal relief package. we know a lot of our small businesses are closed or are struggling to stay afloat, and we will keep working to find ways to support them in every way we can. we all have a long road ahead. december was a really hard month, and january is not going to be any easier. but, like i said, there is hope. the rollout of the vaccine is something like we've never seen. hundreds of millions of doses will be distributed around the country. this is going to take all of us working together. today we're joined by dr. josh aldler, who is the chief clinical officer of health and vice dean of the school of medicine. the doctor will speak a little about how ucsf is participating in the rollout of the vaccine. it is important for

everyone to remember that the distribution of the vaccine is different from how testing was set up in this country. with test, the federal government basically left it to the local and state governments to figure out, on our own, which is why we created our own city-run testing city, city test s.f., which puts san francisco at the forefront of providing testing in this country. but in an expensive and complicated system that we built from scratch. with the vaccine, the federal government has purchased the vaccine and is distributing them through established networks of state and health care providers. so the vaccine rollout is a lot bigger than the city and the department of public health. but we do have a role to play, and one of those roles is to distribute the vaccine to our city-run facilities. that includes laguna honda

hospital, where over 715 vulnerable residents currently live. the good news is that starting yesterday, working with walgreens, we started vaccinating the resident of laguna honda, and by tomorrow, all residents who want the vaccine will receive it. this is in addition to the over a thousand staff members who have already been vaccinated and more to come. now, it's important, for a moment, to take a step back. often these press conferences, we talk about numbers, we talk in data. we talk in concept, like infection rates and i.c.u. capacity. we say things like, we're going to -- we're taking certain actions to keep the virus out of laguna honda, but la laguna honda is just a building. they attack our seniors. and people living with disabilities are the most

vulnerable. protecting the residents of laguna honda is very personal to me. my grandmother lived there for years at the end of her own life. so i know what those residents are feeling. i know what their families are feeling because they are not able to visit. our fight to keep the virus out of laguna honda has been a fight to keep these people alive, until we could do what we started doing yesterday: protecting them with the vaccine. i want to show a few pictures from yesterday. lathis is a photo of bernadette yee. she is someone who has been living for months and months in the type of facility that has seen outbreaks across this country. she, like so many others, have lived with the fear each and every day, and now she has the vaccine. now she and other residents of laguna honda are waking up today with an end in sight. this next photo is jasper

harris. while many of us had to sacrifice by staying home and limiting interactions, his sacrifice was to be in the facility where no one from the outside has been able to visit. he has had to deal with isolation and separation. thanks to the hard work of the staff at laguna honda, and all of the policies, our department of public health has put in place, he is alive and well, so that he can get the vaccine, so that he can keep on living his life. these are the lives we have been fighting for day after day to save. after months of uncertainty, they will now be protected. they are alive because of public health orders we put in place, because of the staff of the facility who have done their very best to care for them. because of the center of disease control who helped create a plan to protect this specific hospital. and because of everyone at the department of public

health, who has done the workday after day to keep our city safe. like i said, this is a moment, but it's a real moment of hope for our city. and we should be so proud. i know it is hard right now, but remember that each one of these people in laguna honda being vaccinated is someone who will continue to have birthdays with families and visits with friends. they will have more time. they will have months and years ahead that so many across this country, sadly, have lost to this virus. i know it is hard to see, but there is hope. the people of this city have rallied together, even though these truly difficult recent months -- through these difficult recent months, and soon we will push this city forward. i know that health orders can be hard to follow and confusing. i know that people feel like the rules are

shifting and changing and contradictory to one other. and even those who are doing their best aren't quite clear on what is okay and what is not okay. all we are asking is for you to do your very best, to use common sense, and to limit your interactions with others as much as possible, to help get us through this. we know it hasn't been easy. it has been tough on every one of us. and i would also ask that you have some understanding, some patience, and really some grace. we are all going through this together. it has been extremely challenging. so let's just remember the vaccine is here. these are difficult times, but there is a light at the end of the tunnel. and i can't wait until we're able to get back together again and able to celebrate without a mask on. that day is coming. so let's get through this together. thank you, everyone, for all that you've done and what you've continued to do. and now i'd like to

introduce dr. adler to talk a little bit about what ucsf's role is in helping to distribute the vaccine. >> doctor: thank you very much, mayor breed. good morning to all of you. let me just start with a couple of comments about the public health orders. ucsf has been a partner in supporting the health orders from the beginning. we know they've been affective in helping to slow the spread of covid-19. we've seen this in our own data for our hospitals and our clinics, but, in particular, as we've examined the situations in other health systems throughout california or the united states, it is imminently clear that the san francisco health orders have helped to keep our case orders, and especially the numbers of hospitalized patients in san francisco, lower than most other urban areas. and the importance of this is that it has allowed our hospitals to continue to function in a somewhat

normal fashion, without becoming overwhelmed, as has happened elsewhere, both in our state and in the country. and that's enabled us to continue to serve all of the patients who need hospital care throughout the pandemic. so we are committed to continuing to work with the city and the county to support the residents through this pandemic. and i encourage you all to do the very best you can to ensure that you continue to comply with these health orders, as they are so important. let me turn to vaccines for a moment. so with the approval of two vaccines in the u.s., ucsf is now very focused on vaccination as supplies become available. i will say that the size and scale of this effort is unlike any we've ever seen. so let me describe briefly how ucsf as one health system is part of the chain to provide vaccines to the people of san francisco. so ucsf is part of what is

called a multi-county system. along with other facilities throughout california. as such, the vaccine is allocated to ucsf directly by the california department of public health. and then the deliveries come to ucsf from the vaccine manufacturers directly, based on the allocation of the california department of public health. it is clear that this is a major and complex initiative, and all of us are learning as we go. what is also clear is that we need to increase the rate at which we're able to deliver vaccine to people. and i believe that from the beginning of the time we started vaccinating two and a half weeks ago, that this is already happening. for example, at ucsf, we're now able to vaccinate up to 1100 people per day, and are working to increase this number even further. at the moment, we are

continuing to focus our efforts on vaccinating health care workers primarily, and hope to move on to additional groups in the next few weeks. and i can say that so far the supply of vaccine from the manufacturers and from the state has been able to keep up with the rate at which we are actually vaccinating people, and we hope that this will continue, particular as we increase the number of people we can vaccinate per day. thank you all. i'll turn it back to you, mayor breed. >> mayor breed: thank you so much. and now i want to turn it over to dr. grant colfax to provide an update on where we are in the city with our numbers. and thank you so much for joining us today, dr. colfax. >> doctor: good morning. and thank you, mayor breed. and thank you, dr. adler. we've always -- the health department has always had

a special relationship with ucsf, and we really appreciate the support during this unprecedented time. i also want to express our support for the people in communities and central and southern california, where the covid pandemic is particularly severe, and the situation is dire. and my gratitude to the thousands of people on the frontlines in san francisco fighting the virus every day. including in our hospitals, skilled nursing facilities, community testing sites, and now vaccination clinics. and, of course, to all of you who live and work in san francisco, who have sacrificed so much for nearly a year. a tough year. but i have great hopes for 2021, and i'm sure you do as well. and nearly 12 months into the pandemic, and with a holiday, i know this has taken a toll on us,

including on our mental health and well-being. so i want you to know that if you or someone needs help, it is available. you can call our behavioral health line 855-845-7415, to talk with someone who knows what it is like to struggle with behavioral health issues, or please reach out to your primary care provider or counselor. we need to care for ourselves and each other during this time. i hope we can all commit to that. another hope, of course, is that we will continue to join together to save lives and fight the current surge of covid-19, to vaccinate our residents and workers against it, and to finally overcome this pandemic that has dominated our lives. the great news is that the vaccine is here.

and it is being administered every day. but it will not have much of an impact on our current surge or any post-december holiday surge we may experience in the coming weeks. we remain in a serious and critical position, but our collective actions are making a difference. our cases of covid-19, and unfortunately our deaths due to covid-19 in san francisco, continue to increase, but the rate of increase seems to be slowing. however, at this time we do not know the full impacts of the december holiday. and it is plausible that we could see a sharp increase in cases, followed by hospitalizations, in the next few weeks. let's see where we currently are. can we have the slide, please. as this slide shows, our number of cases have been on the uptake.

this slide shows we are currently at 27 new covid positive cases per 100,000 people here in san francisco. and right now we are averaging about -- could we go to the slide before this, please? this is the slide. this slide shows that we're averaging about 27 cases per 100,000 people in san francisco. and we are averaging about 237 new cases of covid-19 every day. we have seen an increase, as you can see, since december 24th. but the 237 new cases per day is still a drop from about 290 new cases we were seeing in mid-december. but given the infectiousness of this virus, 237 is still far too many for us to let our guard down. when we stay home, avoid

gatherings, stay physically distant, and wear masks over both our noses and our mouths, we will drive this number down. we will keep our fellow san franciscans and ourselves from getting sick, help prevent hospitalizations, and make sure that we are all here for the vaccine. next slide, please. now, this shows the hospitalizations of people with covid-19 since the pandemic began. as you can see, the number of covid-19 -- people with covid-19 who need hospital care continues to climb, as we would expect when the number of cases climb. but thanks to your efforts with regards to precautions, hospitalizations appear to be climbing more slowly now. but, as with cases overall, we will not know

until mid-january how many people got covid-19 over the christmas and new year's holiday, and became seriously ill, requiring hospitalization. that's just based on how long it takes for people to show symptoms and become severely ill with covid-19. it usually takes up to a week, and even two. currently, and unlike many parts of this state, hospitals in san francisco have enough room to care for covid-19 and other patients. locally, we have roughly 35% of i.c.u. beds available. however, across the region, just 5.9% of beds are available. and because our regional i.c.u. bed availability remains well-below the state's threshold of 15%, we here in san francisco will remain under the state regional stay-at-home order.

and, as you know, the situation is much worse in central valley and in southern california. and while we have those i.c.u. beds now in san francisco, it is plausible, with our regional or statewide surge, that those numbers of i.c.u. capacity will drop sharply, perhaps due to a worsening of our local situation, or because of needs in the region and the state. staying home, as hard as it is, is keeping our already strained health system from being overwhelmed. it is saving lives. now i want to talk a little bit about vaccines. we are working with our health care partners, including ucsf, throughout the city, to get as much vaccine into as many arms as possible. unlike testing, we do not have local control of when vaccine is sent to san francisco.

or how much is received. the federal and state government have developed a distribution plan for the vaccine, and the state has defined the prioritization plan, which we must follow locally. that distribution plan shiftships the vaccine directly to health care providers, such as kaiser, ucsf, and d.p.h., which is a health care provider in the city, primarily for people who have medicaid or who are uninsured. with the exception of the vaccine, d.p.h., the health department, gets from the state, we currently have no ability to track the amount of vaccine that is being sent to providers. i can tell you this, that the department of public health, as a health care provider, has vaccinated more than 6,000 people. most frontline acute care

staff at zuckerberg san francisco hospital and laguna honda have been vaccinated, and nearly all paramedics and e.m.t.s have been offered the vaccine. and after today, over 90% of the residents at laguna honda will have received the first dose of the pfizer vaccine. that is great news. given the limited initial supply of covid-19 vaccine, the state has developed a phase approach for which group of people will get the vaccine and when. the first phase, the phase we are in now, defined by the state as phase 1a, prioritizes those workers in health care settings most likely to be exposed to the virus, and most needed to support our health care system. in san francisco, that is estimated to be over 80,000 health care workers, including nurses,

doctors, technicians, environmental service workers, nutrition service workers, e.m.t.s, paramedics, and many, many others. the majority of these workers are being vaccinated by their employer, whether it be the health department, c.p. m. c., ucsf, kaiser, and so far. we are waiting for the state to finalize the next phase, which is proposed to include frontline essential workers, such as public safety, grocery workers, teachers, and those over the age of 75. and we are working with the city's health care providers and pharmacies to scale up vaccine delivery. since the federal and state government are distributing vaccine directly to health care providers, these partnerships are vital to our collective success locally, as a region, and

across the state. we are discussing with our health partners ways to increase vaccination capacity. our goal is to ensure that vaccination is provided to as many people as possible, and as soon as we get vaccine. this is an unprecedented undertaking, the mass vaccination of the entire nation to end the pandemic. we are working hard, but right now vaccine supply remains limited, and many questions remain unanswered with regard to how soon vaccines supplies will meet demand. but please know, and we expect, that everyone who wants a vaccine will get one eventually, and we will work together, as we have done throughout this pandemic, to make this happen. while we planned for the availability of the

vaccine, we still must make a difference in this current surge by supporting each other and continuing to make good and smart choices that we know slow the spread of the virus, such as wearing a mask over both your nose and your mouth when you go outside, avoiding gatherings outside of your immediate household, and physically distancing whenever possible. as we start this new year, nearly 12 months into this pandemic, believe me, i'm counting the days, let's remember that our collective actions have changed the course of the virus in march and july. we can, and we will, do it again. thank you. >> thank you, mayor breed, dr. adler, and dr. colfax. before we start the "q" and "a," we're going to take a moment for our

reporters to submit questions on webex. we'll be right back. >> dr. colfax, are you ready? >> doctor: i'm ready, hello. >> dr. colfax, your first set of questions comes from various news outlets. california has six confirmed cases of the new coronavirus strain. which strain is more contagious and severe, and is there any new and detailed plan to stop spreading the strain. and there is a followup question: how can san francisco track the possible new strain? >> doctor: so when

you're referring to the -- >> the u.k. >> doctor: -- the u.k. strain, we know that the u.k. strain now is responsible for the majority of infections in the u.k., and, as we know, it has been detected across many parts of this country. we have not yet detected the new strain here in san francisco, but it certainly would not be surprising if and when it does get detected. and a number of laboratories, including at ucsf are genotyping of the virus, a select sample, to determine if and when this strain does show up. unfortunately, there is not a lot of capacity to do that, so only a very small member of samples are sent to la laboratories for this sub-typing, but we would not be surprised

if and when it is detected in san francisco or in the region. a couple of things about the virus: while it does appear to be more transmissible than other variants of the virus, it does not appear to be more lethal. and there is no reason at this time to believe that it is somehow resistant to the vaccine. and i think, most importantly, for people going about their lives right now, it just reinforces the need for us to practice those prevention activities, to wear a mask over both your nose and your mouth, to physically distance, and, again, not to gather because with more virus out there than ever before, and with the likelihood that this variant is out there, the things that we may have done in the past that we avoided getting infected, those activities are much more risky now. >> thank you, dr. colfax.

the next set of questions also come from multiple news outlets. why does san francisco have so much more i.c.u. availability than the regional average? even some counties that have had similar public health responses. and the followup is: could you expand on what you said about san francisco's i.c.u. capacity potentially dropping because of needs across the state? >> doctor: sure. i think right now our i.c.u. capacity is really good shape compared to certainly the rest of the state, for a number of factors. primarily, we have as a community so far weathered the worst of surges, so we don't have as many people proportionately in our hospital system because of covid-19 because of all of the efforts we have invested and the sacrifices we have made. the other key piece right now is seasonally, during

the holidays and right after the holidays, there are generally fewer people in the hospital for elective surgeries and so forth, and so we have more hospital capacity for that reason as well. and we have been working very hard with our hospital partners in the city to ensure that i.c.u. capacity is maintained as much as possible. with regard to that i.c.u. capacity being used for other -- for people in need across the state, and even, indeed, across the region, there is a statewide system by which hospitals, regions, can ask for assistance to transfer patients when they run out of capacity, to transfer patients into another jurisdiction. right now, for instance, we have more patients in our i.c.u.s across the city who are from outside

of san francisco. and while we have care available and people need care, it is the moral and ethical and right thing to do to provide that care when asked and when needed. and, again, we are watching that number very careful -- our capacity very carefully because as the central and southern part of the state continue to experience catastrophic situations, and as the region has fewer i.c.u. beds, we would expect our local i.c.u. bed capacity to start going down as well. obviously, i hope that doesn't happen, but it certainly is plausible at this time. >> thank you, dr. colfax. the next set of questions, again, come from various outlets. and it's a two-part question. how many vaccine doses has san francisco received from the state, and of those, how many doses have been administered.

and a followup: how often is san francisco receiving vaccine doses? >> doctor: so dr. adler mentioned the multi-county entities, kaiser, and others are receiving the vaccine allocated by the state. we don't have those numbers. right now the state is working on data systems to have that visibility, but i don't have those numbers, unfortunately, available. they have not been made available to us. i know the state is working very hard to get those numbers to local jurisdictions. what i can tell you is that the health department has distributed -- has -- has delivered 6,000 vaccines to people in our system, the frontline workers at zuck ber zuckerberg

hospital, and our e.m.t.s, and others. so we are distributed 6,000 vaccines. d.p.h. received 30,000 vaccines that were distributed to these other entities across the city. after that, the state switched to the small county entities distribution system, and we do not have those numbers available at this time. >> thank you. again, the next question is from various news outlets. has san francisco hospitals had any excess supply of vaccines? and if so, how have they determined how to distribute them? >> doctor: well, i wish that were the case. i can say we are pushing vaccines out into arms as quickly as possible. i know all of the entities in the city are doing that. that has not been an issue. we're getting vaccines

into arms, and certainly demand for the vaccine far outweighs supply. and we are working with our county partners to scale up vaccine distribution as quickly as possible, so that we will be ready when more vaccine comes. again, right now the demand far outweighs the supply. we are still in the phase 1a, and as required by the state, that phase 1a tier, we estimate that is over 80,000 people who live or work in san francisco who need vaccines. this is, remember, the first dose. we're just starting the second doses this week. >> thank you. this question from various news outlets: what are the city's plans for administering the vaccine to san francisco's immigrant community and people who are undocumented? >> doctor: so vaccines will, most likely, be distributed through health care providers.

and we will be doing extensive outreach with health care providers, through media, through trusted community partners, community stakeholders, community-based organizations, to let people know that vaccine is available. as you know in san francisco, we have a robust health care system. anyone, regardless of immigration status, receives top-quality care, including at the health department, and we are working very, very hard with stakeholders in communities, including immigrant communities, to ensure that people understand about the vaccine, and that people are able to -- will be able to access vaccine when it is available. >> thank you. the next question comes from multiple news outets. new york city is setting up mass vaccination sites and its five boroughs to

avoid delays in getting people vaccinated. is that possible in san francisco? >> doctor: so there have been no delays in getting people vaccinated. the demand far outweighs the supply. we are working with our health care providers, who we expect will be receiving the majority of the vaccines, kaiser, which as we know, covers many, many people, dignity health, and of course, here at the health department, to explore whether we can -- whether the vaccine will be more rapidly distributed and made available to people through these types of mass vaccination sites. and we are working with them to ensure that, again, the vaccine gets into as many arms as quickly as possible. our goal is to make sure that vaccine is not sitting in the freezer, and that as soon as the feds and the sat supply vaccine to local jurisdictions, to health care entities in san

francisco, that we get it into as many arms as possible. >> thank you. the next set of questions come from multiple outlets: how will san francisco determine who will be next in line for vaccines? and is san francisco taking any covid-19 patients from outside the county and/or region? >> doctor: so i will answer that second question first. as i said, there are four patients who are transferred from -- that we know of that are transferred from outside of san francisco in our current hospital systems across the city. so that total is four. with regards to determining who goes next for the vaccine, we are required to follow the state recommendations. again, we are in that phase 1a, and we are waiting for the state to finalize 1b, which

includes essential workers and people 75 and over. and it is anticipated there will be a phase 1c, and we will following the state guidelines in terms of prioritizing those populations for vaccine. >> thank you. and, dr. colfax, your final question from the day, from various news outlets: what is the current situation with infections at laguna honda, prior to vaccinations? >> doctor: so i think the really great news is that vaccinations started yesterday for residents at laguna honda. over 300 were vaccinated. we expect vaccinations to be completed by tomorrow. right now we have 15 laguna honda residents who have been diagnosed with covid-19, and we have 34 staff who were diagnosed. >> thank you, dr. colfax, for your time today. this concludes today's

press conference. we want to thank mayor breed, dr. adler, and yourself, dr. colfax, for your time. for future questions... >> this is one place you can

always count on to give you what you had before and remind you of what your san francisco history used to be. >> we hear that all the time, people bring their kids here and their grandparents brought them here and down the line. >> even though people move away, whenever they come back to the city, they make it here. and they tell us that. >> you're going to get something made fresh, made by hand and made with quality products and something that's very, very good. ♪ >> the legacy bars and restaurants was something that was begun by san francisco simply to recognize and draw attention to the establishments. it really provides for san francisco's unique character. ♪ >> and that morphed into a request that we work with the city to develop a legacy business registration.

>> i'm michael cirocco and the owner of an area bakery. ♪ the bakery started in 191. my grandfather came over from italy and opened it up then. it is a small operation. it's not big. so everything is kind of quality that way. so i see every piece and cut every piece that comes in and out of that oven. >> i'm leslie cirocco-mitchell, a fourth generation baker here with my family. ♪ so we get up pretty early in the morning. i usually start baking around 5:00. and then you just start doing rounds of dough. loaves. >> my mom and sister basically handle the front and then i

have my nephew james helps and then my two daughters and my wife come in and we actually do the baking. after that, my mom and my sister stay and sell the product, retail it. ♪ you know, i don't really think about it. but then when i -- sometimes when i go places and i look and see places put up, oh this is our 50th anniversary and everything and we've been over 100 and that is when it kind of hits me. you know, that geez, we've been here a long time. [applause] ♪ >> a lot of people might ask why our legacy business is important. we all have our own stories to tell about our ancestry. our lineage and i'll use one example of tommy's joint. tommy's joint is a place that my husband went to as a child

and he's a fourth generation san franciscan. it's a place we can still go to today with our children or grandchildren and share the stories of what was san francisco like back in the 1950s. >> i'm the general manager at tommy's joint. people mostly recognize tommy's joint for its murals on the outside of the building. very bright blue. you drive down and see what it is. they know the building. tommy's is a san francisco hoffa, which is a german-style presenting food. we have five different carved meats and we carve it by hand at the station. you prefer it to be carved whether you like your brisket fatty or want it lean. you want your pastrami to be very lean. you can say i want that piece

of corn beef and want it cut, you know, very thick and i want it with some sauerkraut. tell the guys how you want to prepare it and they will do it right in front of you. san francisco's a place that's changing restaurants, except for tommy's joint. tommy's joint has been the same since it opened and that is important. san francisco in general that we don't lose a grip of what san francisco's came from. tommy's is a place that you'll always recognize whenever you lock in the door. you'll see the same staff, the same bartender and have the same meal and that is great. that's important. ♪

>> the service that san francisco heritage offers to the legacy businesses is to help them with that application process, to make sure that they really recognize about them what it is that makes them so special here in san francisco. ♪ so we'll help them with that application process if, in fact, the board of supervisors does recognize them as a legacy business, then that does entitle them to certain financial benefits from the city of san francisco. but i say really, more importantly, it really brings them public recognition that this is a business in san francisco that has history and that is unique to san francisco. >> it started in june of 1953. ♪

and we make everything from scratch. everything. we started a you -- we started a off with 12 flavors and mango fruits from the philippines and then started trying them one by one and the family had a whole new clientele. the business really boomed after that. >> i think that the flavors we make reflect the diversity of san francisco. we were really surprised about the legacy project but we were thrilled to be a part of it. businesses come and go in the city. pretty tough for businesss to stay here because it is so expensive and there's so much competition. so for us who have been here all these years and still be popular and to be recognized by the city has been really a huge honor.

>> we got a phone call from a woman who was 91 and she wanted to know if the mitchells still owned it and she was so happy that we were still involved, still the owners. she was our customer in 1953. and she still comes in. but she was just making sure that we were still around and it just makes us feel, you know, very proud that we're carrying on our father's legacy. and that we mean so much to so many people. ♪ >> it provides a perspective. and i think if you only looked at it in the here and now, you're missing the context. for me, legacy businesses, legacy bars and restaurants are really about setting the context for how we come to be where we are today. >> i just think it's part of san francisco. people like to see familiar

stuff. at least i know i do. >> in the 1950s, you could see a picture of tommy's joint and looks exactly the same. we haven't change add thing. >> i remember one lady saying, you know, i've been eating this ice cream since before i was born. and i thought, wow! we have, too. it.

>> shop & dine in the 49 promotes local businesses and challenges resident to do their shop & dine in the 49 within the 49 square miles of san francisco

by supporting local services in the neighborhood we help san francisco remain unique successful and vibrant so we're will you shop & dine in the 49 chinatown has to be one the best unique shopping areas in san francisco that is color fulfill and safe each vegetation and seafood and find everything in chinatown the walk shop in chinatown welcome to jason dessert i'm the fifth generation of candy in san francisco still that serves 2000 district in the chinatown in the past it was the tradition and my family was the royal chef in the pot pals that's why we learned this stuff and moved from here to have dragon candy i want

people to know that is art we will explain a walk and they can't walk in and out it is different techniques from stir frying to smoking to steaming and they do show of. >> beer a royalty for the age berry up to now not people know that especially the toughest they think this is - i really appreciate they love this art. >> from the cantonese to the hypomania and we have hot pots we have all of the cuisines of china in our chinatown you don't have to go far. >> small business is important to our neighborhood because if we really make a lot of people lives better

more people get a job here not >> good morning, everyone. i'm joined by timon walton and rafael manldsleman. our clerk is ms. linda wong. i'd like to thank sfgov tv for broadcasting this meeting. madame clerk, do we have any announcements? >> yes. due to covid-19 health emergency, city employees and the public and the board of supervisor and legislative chamber are [inaudible], however members will be participating in the meeting. this precaution is pursuant to the local state and federal orders. committee members will attend the meeting via video conference and participating in a meeting to the same extent as if they are physically present. public comments will be available on