questions before the liaison report? >> i have a question. lauren post. i was wondering when you mentioned in the presentation it is only about a third of the investigations that actually yield some changes in the department or whatever the outcome is that stem from the complaint, and then you mentioned there, you have been talking about to jurisdictions around the country, how does our action percentage compare to other cities? is that sort of normal, is ours higher or lower. obviously a lot of factors weigh into that to the extent of complaints and problems within the city government that people are complaining about. it seemed pretty consistent, the

36%. i don't know if that's good or bad. i just don't know. >> i don't have a quick and ready answer for you unfortunately. but that is something i would be happy to look into and coordinate a response back to you through chair mchugh. with these whistleblower programs up and down the state and through the country, there's not a standard for numbers that get reported out. i would have to see who else is doing similar type of reporting and collect the information and figure out how we measure up against it. because i don't have the answer now, let me get back to you if i could please. >> that's nice. i'm not sure you have to do that work. overtime in the city, it has been so consistent but it seems you are constantly improving the whistleblower program and your team's administration of it.

any thoughts on why that 36% is so consistent, doesn't go up, doesn't go down. any thoughts on that? >> my first reflection on that would be to look at the increasing volume of reports we have been getting. and even though the numbers have trended upwards since 12/13, we are seeing the same bracket of complaints that result in policy change. while the numbers have increased, the numbers have sustained reports stays within the fairly consistent bracket. and that would be to do more digging but that is immediately how i'm reflecting off of the question you just presented.

(please stand by...)

>> about attributing acomplaintn or to a termination for any number of personnel reasons, and also programatic reasons, or advice from our deputy city attorneys. we don't release that type of information, that sort of causal, yes, that whistleblower complaint resulted in this action or that termination. that said, i think we're all aware of a swirling of different factors that may have resulted in any number of the recent terminations from whether it be b.t.w. p.c.e., or

any other city department. i'll have to side step that due to problematic reasons. >> all right. i'll just keep reading the newspaper, then. >> there is nothing more than than i would like to tell you that the whistleblower was the cause of that to taught our own horn, but i can't do that, due to our program's limitations, unfortunately. >> fair enough. >> it is a good question and a good answer because it shows that part of the most important part of that whistleblower program is the confidence that people can have in reporting things that they see and having that remain confidential. but i'm the liaison, so i can segue right into the liaison report. that was a good question, brian, and a good answer, dave, because even though i don't think either of you got what you wanted to hear, that was an

important conversation to demonstrate that nothing is more important than the efficiency of the program and the confidentiality, or protection of people feeling like they have this safe confidential mechanism to report wrong-doing with the city, number one. and then, number two, to have confidence that that report or complaint will be handled professionally and with the utmost care. so i've been the whistleblower liaison since i started, over a year now, maybe a year and a half, and i continue to stay in touch with dave and the other staff. we have welcomed some new staff members that i've gotten to know. we've reviewed not specifics of complaints in the last quarter, like we used to, but whether complaints have been

substantial or not, there has been a decrease in substantive complaints, and an increase in complaints that i -- i call them like spam mail or spam e-mail, for no reason. i think that i can report that the program is continuing to communicate with me openly and directly, and my confidence and faith in the program remains high. we're seeing a lot of changes because of covid, the way that people report, and since last march, february or march, pre-covid, we implemented a different hotline to deal with a different level of corruption. so it's great to see the numbers be the stats, but stati, but they can be thrown off a little by different ways that people report now.

reporting from home instead of in an office, and being able to make use of different avenues to make reports. so the liaison report doesn't go much further than that. they're reaching out to liaison and neighborhood organizations, which i think is great, because that is really important, too. we're seeing more users or attendees of webinars, which is excellent. that plays right into our best-in-class program. and we continue to move forward until we can meet for our reviews in person and do some more indepth reviews. so thank you, dave, and thank you to everybody else here on the program. do we have any other questions, or should we

move to public comment? >> i have one more, if i may. this might be for peg, but i noticed on the audit presentations we're hearing today, there are so many senior staff members who are acting, including or beloved mark. so why are so many staff members acting and not a permanent position. thank you. >> is mark still here? >> this is in the audit function. >> yeah. which is under my -- go ahead. >> the short version is that, like everything else in covid, our exam process has been delayed, and so that means people stay in acting appointments until an exam can be done to formally qualify and put somebody into a permanent position. and i anticipate that

pretty soon we're going to finish one of the exam processes that is relevant in the audit unit and they'll have permanent appointments again. but mark can also comment. thanks. >> thanks for that. we're -- it is pretty much what peg mentioned. so within the city services audits, which is where the whistleblower program fits, which is under my oversight, we have been limited in terms of our capacity, in terms of recruitment over the last year, and this has been a way for us to really patch some of those holes that we have been having in terms of staffing and providing opportunities for our team to basically provide coverage, as needed. and as i think we've mentioned in the past, we do have a larger audit team within n.c.s. a.

audits, just to make sure we have the audit and investigation both synergy and assistance on both fronts. >> okay. thank you. i'll look forward, peg, to the exam process moving forward as soon as everyone can be in office, having a smoother function. thank you. >> if there are no other member comments, should we move to public comment? >> i think you're muted, rosanne. >> still muted, rosanne.

>> can you guys hear me now? i'm not sure what happened there. my headset muted itself. members of the public who wish to provide public comment on this item should call 415-655-0001, i.d. 1871041784. then ##. if you haven't already done so, please dial *3. the system prompt will indicate you have raised your hand. please wait until the system indicates you have been unmuted and you may begin your comments. please note that you will have three minutes. madam chair, i do see there is one person with

their hand raised. so i will unmute them. speaker, please go ahead. you have three minutes for public speaking. >> good morning committee members. this is dr. derrick curr, a whistleblower. 10 years ago, whistleblowers appealed before this committee to approve the whistleblower reports. we requested that the reports include data on the number of retaliation complaints filed with the ethics commission and how many were sustained. we believed that the whistleblower program had a responsibility to inform its clients about the results of their retaliation complaints. we also wanted to draw attention to the fact that the ethics commission had

never sustained a whistleblower retaliation complaint. the whistleblower program began reporting this data in 2012. over the past nine years, the public could see how many retaliation complaints were processed and how many were sustained. until now. the current whistleblower report omits the count of sustained retaliation complaints for the first time in nine years. please look at page 16 of the current report. the table showing whistleblower retaliation claims has been trumcated.

this omission obstructs transparency and accountability. it writes off a key concern of city whistleblowers and of the general public. thank you very much. >> clerk: thank you, caller, for your comments. chair mccue, i do not see anyone else in the cue for public speaking. >> chairman: okay. should we move to the next item? >> clerk: yes. item seven, opportunity for committee members to comment or take action on any matters within the committee's jurisdiction. one fiscal year 2020 to 2021, seaboc work initiatives, (a), standardized templates,

and (b) expenditure audits (c) other committee business. the liaison report of the 2018 embarcadero earthquake safety bond. action by the committee and response to such presentation. (b) c.s.a., f.y.2021, sea goboc 2021, and follow up on the public integrity review, and independent review of the whistleblower program, and liaison assignments. >> good morning, committee members. this is peg stevenson. i'm a city performance director in the controller's office. unless chair mccue has

any opening remarks she wants to make on this item, i'll just run down the list. our practice here is to keep the ongoing list of work initiatives of yours and committee business, and if that is nothing to report on that, we'll pass that item. but it keeps keeping them on the agenda as a helpful reminder for all of us. standardized templates, this is the committee's desire to take a look over all of the bond reporting that goes on and ensure that you're seeing consistent and comparable information on scope, schedule, and budget across them. and as i've said a couple of times before, we have not had any staff time due to the covid response, to work with your assigned liaison on this, but it is my profound hope that we will start getting back some of our staff time in the next quarter, and definitely in the next fiscal year, and then we'll get started on this. i think kristin chu is

still the assigned liaison for this purpose. expenditure audit, this is where we keep with audits group on any construction audits that they have coming up, of the type that cummings just reported on, and make sure that they are on your agenda, and you're aware of any that are upcoming, and we calendar them to appear in the same timeframe that you're hearing a bond report on that subject. which we've just done with the housing bond. public finance: included in your packet is a schedule of upcoming bond issues, and i will pause and ask anna or deshon to note that and see if there are any highlights they want to bring to your attention. >> chairman: go ahead. >> good morning, members of the committee, this is deshon. if you refer to the memos we included in your packet, i'll just walk you through some of our

current and anticipated geo bond debt issue wansz. issuances. we're getting ready to close the affordable housing 2019 bonds in the amount of just under $255 million, and the first issuance of earthquake and emergency response 2020 bonds in at amount just above $81 million. and we expect to close both of those transactions on the 30th, and then those programs can get going on their projects. we're also going through the board for approval of geo refunding bonds to take advantage of some favorable market conditions to generate debt service savings for the city. we expect to issue at least one series in may, ahead of our june call day, and we may do forward refunding for some bonds

that are due in december, depending on market conditions and everything, if it achieves enough savings to warrant that. and then we're also working on transactions that are to come in the summer. one is the final issuance of transportation 2016 bonds, to close out the balance of that authorization, and planning to move forward to the first issuance from the health and recovery bond from 2020, and we're still ironing out the projects that will be funded by that first issuance. and we need to make another issuance to the emergency earthquake 2020 bond later this summer to accommodate some changing need for those projects, with largely an in-reference to move those projects forward. so we'll be going back to the board this spring for those three transactions in the summer. and then just looking ahead to next year, we anticipate a second

issuance of sea wall bonds sometime in 2022, and also a followup for the health and recover bonds as those projects get into gear as well. but we don't have a firm timeline for any of those. if you have any questions, i'm happy to speak to those -- to the calendar, but that's our presentation for the upcoming calendar. >> i have a question for anna and deshon. how did the march sales go? for the bond issuance rate? >> i will let anna speak to it in a little more detail, but we got a lot of bids for our bonds. one was a negotiated transportation, and we got a lot of interest and subscription in that. and the other was a competitive transaction, and we got 14 bids, i believe, for those bonds, and received favorable based on both. and i'll let anna go into more detail. >> sure. the affordable housing

bond, there was a strong interest from a variety of investors, including retail investors, municipalities that were interested in having those bonds in their portfolios, and also e.s.g., for environmental and social government-focused investors. it was great to see their interests, plus a wide variety of institutions. and we got a significant number of bids for our ether transactions. so definitely successful sales. >> chairman: thank you. good. okay, if there are no other comments or questions for public finance, i'll go on to section two. you had the sea wall bond on your last meeting, but mr. fantou was not available to make his report. >> i don't see him today,

either. >> clerk: he is absent. >> i know he has met with the sea wall bond program manager, so we'll have to have him give that update at a future meeting. the c.s.a. work plan, again, i would invite mark to give any updates, if he wants to, but our situation is unchanged. we've been working 100% in the covid emergency. during the next quarter, the april, may, june quarter, we're all working hard to start to consolidate and wind down the functions that can be wound down because the case rate is dropping, hospitalizations are dropping, and vaccination rates are picking up, all good trends. and we hope to start doing some work on our other mandates, which have not been worked since the beginning of the fiscal year, but that is still -- we'll see how the quarter goes. i'm hoping to get about 10 to 20% of my staff's time

back by the end of the quarter. mark, any updates you want to give for the current year? >> very quickly on the c.s.a. audit sign, there is still a portion of our time that is being devoted to the covid cost recovery effort. our folks have been leading the claiming of some of our costs to the various sources, including fema public assistance, as well as the cares act funding. so a portion of our c.s.a. audit folks are working on that. and a main group of the folks are working on the usual, normal things that falls under c.s.a. audits, including whistleblower program. and we've been working, also, on the public integrity assessment suites of work that we've been working on in the last year, and we're continuing to do so.

as well as everything in between, from performance audits to to concession audits and all the things that we have in our work plan. and we will, as part of our work planning for next fiscal year, hopefully we'll alleviate, as peg also mentioned -- some of our cost recovery work, given that we've been doing it for a year, and we may have some leaner ways we can do it as a city. that hopefully will free up some of our capacity to do some of our performance audits, as well as compliance work. >> great. thank you, mark. if there are no questions for mark, in your packet was the updated sea goboc work plan for the current year, and we now have a consistent schedule of when the bond programs

come before you. i would just note on that that we still showed august, october, and december meeting dates at t.b.d., and i think we can confirm, while the committee is all seated here, that we'll use the same cadence we've used before, fourth mondays of the month. so august would be monday august 23rd. october would be monday october 25th. and in december, i think we would move it up a week, so it is before, not after, christmas, so it would be monday, december 20th. so let me just propose that as a formal amendment. and see if there are any questions or comments. if not, rosanne can make the recommendations on people's calendars with the webex service.

>> is there a requirement that it is spaced out a certain amount of time? or do you think it would benefit members to move that december 20th meeting a little earlier? i know a lot of people are traveling or doing year-end. that's my busy time of the year. how does everybody feel about that? >> make it a week earlier is fine with me. >> earlier would be better. >> would you guys prefer december 6th or 13th? >> either. >> i'm indifferent. >> either. the 6th would probably be a little better, but either is good. >> the 6th would be better for me, too. >> clerk: okay. i'll schedule it for the 6th. >> december 6th. >> great, thank you. >> chairwoman: okay.

so item 2d, housing public perception survey, you've heard me say this before, but we're interested and we have a pool of qualified vendors for public perception surveys. you're interest in having the next bond program that is the subject of a public perception survey is housing bond programs. it is useful to hear their presentations and get an idea of what we might test here. scope, schedule, and budget, and to write a contract, again is something that i shop to be able to start work on next quarter, and we'll definitely be able to start in the new fiscal year, and we've met with the liaison to shape the scope, schedule, and budget for that and put it out for bids to our vendor pool, who are public perception survey and pooling experts, hopefully during the first quarter of next fiscal year. >> so next fiscal year, is that july 1st?

>> starting july, right. >> july 1st. >> 2e, the public integrity review, we keep this on the calendar in case there is any intersection between the bond program and the public integrity review work that mark delarosa referenced, and our office is working on with the city attorney. just, again, to have an early notice and discussion to you in case there are any contractors or contracts or cost centers in the geo bonds that intersect with findings we're making or presentations we're making in the public integrity review. and i'll just pause there and see if mark wanted to comment on this. i think we're up to date. but, mark? >> yeah. i think you're all up to date as well, so just, very quickly, so we've completed our fourth public integrity assessment. the last one being we issued in january on the airport commission and

citywide ethical standards over procurement. we're working on at least three additional ones that are in the pipeline. one being on the recology of rate-setting process, and other ethical requirements. and as peg mentioned, we will continue to flag, as necessary, should we bump into any nexus between those vendors and contractors that have been implemented in the various investigations, as well as the geo bond programs. and we're also alerting, obviously, as we're doing our expenditure audits, alerting the departments who are matching those to do the same so that we're all on the same page. >> thanks, mark.

2f -- >> i have one quick comment. sorry, peg. tim and bart and i have been in communication with mark and ben about some of this information from the public integrity review, and to see if there was cross-over between any of those contractors and go bond projects. i'm not sure if we circulated that information, so we want to make sure, rosanne, that you can do that or i can forward it to you. >> okay. >> so for our next meeting, we're covering parks -- i think that that was relevant with one of those contractors, and lauren with the earthquake safety, i'm not sure if you were brought into the loop on that. but we will then -- we'll make sure you know what that is. >> great. thank you. >> i think we should keep

an extra eye on that. >> uh-huh. >> so, rosanne, can you circulate that information? >> oh, yes, i will. >> okay. great. thank you. >> chair mccue, was that it? any other questions or comments from mark on this? >> no. i just want to make sure everybody is in the loop with that information. unless, mark, is there an update on your latest report? okay. >> yep. >> okay. independent review of the whistleblower program, again, this refers to a long-standing interest of the committee on having an audit test or a peer review or some combination of that type of work on the whistleblower program. this is where we would look at some statistics. for example, like you referred to in your discussion about the rate

of results and compared them to other comparable programs, had somebody test our integrity of our systems, and test some -- do some sort of standard audit procedures on the program of the type you've heard our auditors discuss on many types of things. we intend to issue an r.f.p., so we would offer the opportunity to do it to our already qualified vendors, and anybody in that business to achieve a maximum independence on looking at this program. i feel like a broken record, my apologies, but i plan to commit staff time to do it in the first quarter of next fiscal year. and i feel confident that we'll have it under way during the first half of the next fiscal year. and i'll work with your liaison on the scope, schedule, and budget for that. and then, finally, liaison

assignments, i'll pause there because chair mccue has been in contact with your new members on this subject, and she has a more recent update than i would. >> i have reached out to some members individually, but i want to circle the whole group to see if anyone is interested in changing any of their reports or taking on additional or becoming co-liaison with anyone else if you find any of these interesting after you took your original post. but judy -- welcome, judy -- has offered to take capital plan and help and homelessness, and jane has offered to temporarily take the 2019 housing bond, since that goes with her other liaison assignments. jane, do you think that needs a co-liaison? is there anyone else interested in that as well? >> i don't think it hurts to have a co-liaison this

because i think it is good do have another set of eyes on these. it is always good to get someone else's perspective, so i would welcome that. >> okay. great. >> i'd be interested in being a co-liaison on the 2020 homeless bond. i've covered a lot of topics. >> okay. excellent. okay. so brian and tim, and you'll get back to me. and then why don't i circulate the updated -- rosanne, i know you've been updating that list, if you would update it with those two comments -- >> okay. >> and lauren -- >> yes, i'm happy to put the 2020 bond team together, and i'll

continue and close things -- that's fine. >> that's great. thanks, lauren. okay. we can circle back to the whole group and see if anybody would like to jump on this co-liaison with anybody else, if interested. and then just a reminder if anybody is doing site visits, which, yeah, i would guess not many people are, but maybe in the coming months that will hopefully start back up again. i haven't gotten a chance to do any tours of these facilities, and i would love to when they start back again. so please reach out to the other members of the committee and let them know. and then we can do that. >> okay. >> that's all i have. does that cover it, peg? >> yes. so if there are no more questions or comments on any of the sub-items in

item seven, from me or mark or from any other colleagues who spoke on it, you can go to public comment on it, i guess, rosanne. >> clerk: okay. public comment. members of the public who wish to provide public comment on this item show call 415-655-0001, i.d. 1871041784 then ##. if you haven't already done so, please dial *3 to line up to speak. a system prompt will indicate you have raised your hand. please wait until the system indicates you have been unmuted and you may begin your comments. please note you will have three minutes. madam chair, i'm checking the speaker cue, and i do not see any hands raised for public speaking. may i close the public speaking for this item? >> chairwoman: yes,

thank you. >> clerk: madam chair, may we adjourn the meeting? >> chairwoman: yes. almost 11:30, right on schedule. >> clerk: for the record, it is 11:28. thank you. >> thank you, everybody. >> bye. >> good-bye. [meeting adjourned at 11:29] >> and good morning, everyone.

i'm the acting director of san francisco public works. i would like to welcome you all this morning to the celebration of the second street improvement project. this project has involved a collaboration of many as elected officials, public works, m.t.a., the p.u.c., and the county and the transportation authority, and the planning department. and of course, i can't forget our partners here in the community and the east hub and the yerba buena, and the c.b.d.s, and the san francisco bicycle coalition, and the walk san francisco group, as well,

along with -- and the south park group, along with -- as well as residents and businesses. and the result of this partnership is a reimagined streetscape, and today, it's more safer, it's more beautiful, and it's more resilient, and i'm honored to be here today with the champions that have made that all happen. and leading that charge is our mayor, mayor london breed, who i would like to welcome here right now. [applause] >> the hon. london breed: thank

you so much. i am really excited to be here downtown in the financial district. it's starting to come alive again, so let's not say that san francisco may come back. san francisco is coming back, and we're coming back stronger than ever and with a vengeance. and the fact is that we know that it's important to make sure that the downtown area, as we move thousands of people every single day in and out of office space, in and out of restaurants, back and forth across the bridge and in san francisco to work, we know how important it is to make sure that our streets are safe. during this pandemic, when we had to close over a year ago, luckily, the ability to allow folks to continue to work in construction, to continue to build housing, to do streetscape programs like this, those things were allowed, and so we want to thank all of the laborers, all of the

construction workers, the electricians, and all the people who worked on this project and got the job done despite working during challenging times. i want to really thank the departments who have been so actively engaged in completing this project. now oftentimes, when we show up to a ribbon cutting, it's probably for something that we can maybe see a little bit taller, like a housing development or some building or some monument, but today, we celebrate the sidewalks, we celebrate the trees, we celebrate the streetscapes, and believe it or not, one of the best things we can do in san francisco that i know most people love is undergrounding utilities, those utility wires that used to be above ground are now underground. the new planters, and the protected bike lanes.

we just announced protected bike lanes in soma that will help make biking in this area safer. so i'm really excited about all that this has done: the new garbage cans, the new benches, the new fixtures. so not only should these things be celebrated, these things are expensive. changing the way our streets are, changing the way our infrastructure are, this saves lives. people need to move around not just on the bus, not just on muni, but on your bikes and by foot and know that you are safe. i'm really excited that we're here today because as people start to return to work, office space can now return back to

25% capacity, and we'll be heading into the yellow in a couple of weeks, and we're hoping that people will be starting to return to the office. i don't know about you, but i'm ready to return to the office and ready to be around people and start to enjoy the city once again. i think people will appreciate these changes that will make a real difference in people's lives and how they move around the city. i really want to thank each and every one of you for being here today, and more specifically, i want to thank public works for their work and their leadership on this project. i want to thank sfmta for their continued work on this partnership because now, the ramps and the ability to get on muni is going to be more safe, especially for those who have physical disabilities. i want to thank the county transportation authority for their work on this project, the public utilities commission, the hundreds of construction workers and people who helped make this possible, the

landscape architects. all of the folks, it really did take a village. and when we're here today, i don't know about you, but i remember when this was just a street. i remember when none of this was really here, and the sun was barely shining on this particular block. and now, if you look at it, yes, we may be a little bit in the shade, but the sun is shining on second street, people are riding bikes on second street. people are going to be able to come out to this community. thank you so much for being here. and now, i'd like to introduce the supervisor for district 6, supervisor matt haney. [applause] >> supervisor haney: thank you, mayor breed, and thank you for your leadership and your commitment to this project. thank you to the transportation authority, sfmta, the bike coalition and public works, and all of the workers who were a part of getting this done.

as mayor breed said, this has come at a really good time for our city. second street is such a critical thoroughfare for the economic life blood of our city. if you look around here, you see tremendous contributions to jobs, to growth, to prosperity here in san francisco. and one other thing that i also want to add, this is the street that many of us take to the giants games, and in just a couple weeks, we are going to be able to walk on the giants bats for opening day. we are going to have safe ways for people to be able to get to the game, to be able to walk safer, to be able to bike safer, to be able to experience a street that really accesses the potential of what our neighborhoods and our streets should look like. one thing that is true about

this area is not only is it an economic engine, it's also a place where a lot of people live, and one of the things that i heard time and time again from people from soma who live in this neighborhood, what they've told me is that please treat our community like the dense residential neighborhood that it is. that means that we want to be able to walk safely. that means that we want to be able to bike safely. that means we want thriving retail, and all of the things here were designed to get that done. not only the buildings and the people that work here, but for the people that live here. and i want to thank them. when i first got into office as supervisor here, i heard a lot from residents about this project, and it wasn't always positive. it was saying, when is this going to get done? it's creating a lot of noise,

it's creating a lot of challenges. i'm having a hard time getting around. and then, the feedback started to shift. this is great. i like it. this is going to make it safer for all of us. the bike lanes, the pedestrian spaces. the garbage cans -- we were here right before the pandemic to launch some of the big bellies that are here. everything that second street looks like is reflective of our potential when we make our city for people. and so with that, i want to introduce one of the key partners in this project who has helped to fund it and helped to support it, and that's tilly chang from the transportation authority. [applause] >> thank you, supervisor, and good morning, mayor breed, supervisor, and all community members. i want to add my congratulations to the whole community and also to the

departments, city departments who collaborated to deliver this multibenefit project. we're so proud to have contributed $13 million of sales tax as well as federal and regional funds to this project. it's about half of the project budget, and for that, we really need to thank the voters. thank you, voters for approving these transportation funding americas. this is the seed money that gets our money ready to compete and attract state and federal funds. just today, secretary of transportation buttigieg testified before congress about our next transportation package, and i'm so glad to work with sfmta, p.u.c., and all of these interdepartmental collaborations because that is how we're able to deliver beautiful projects like this. with that, let me go ahead and

introduce director jeffrey tumlin, director of the sfmta. >> thank you, tilly. from the 1930s to the end of the 20 century, the market street grid was seen largely as a grid to distribute traffic, particularly cars and trucks from the bay bridge into the rest of the city street grid. for the last 20 years, however, this neighborhood has been the fastest growing neighborhood in san francisco, and as a result of that, almost every single street in the south of market grid is part of san francisco's high injury network: the 13% of our streets that suffer 85% of the severe injuries and fatalities because of traffic. this needs to be fixed, and it's why, together with the department of public works and the sfmta, the c.t.a. is committed to repairing every single street in the market grid.

second street is especially important to us. it connects the transit center to the ballpark and the waterfront. it is an important street for every single mode of transportation, and so as a result of that, we've added daylighting for pedestrians at intersections. we've added protected crosswalks, and we've added protective bikeways because we know while bike lanes are good, in order to make biking attractive to normal san franciscans, they need to be physically protected from traffic. we're not just stopping at second street. during covid, we have been working to create a grid of safer walkways and protected bikeways throughout south of market. not just here but fifth, eight,

seven, brandon, embarcadero, in order to make this corridor from a truck dominated thoroughfare to one of the most walkable areas in san francisco. we're also very excited that our success here has garnered us a significant state award to make our experiments to folsom street available to everyone. >> good morning, everyone. i am so happy to be here today with you all to celebrate a project long in the works. 11 years ago, when this project began, i was starting my freshman year in high school,

so let's just stick with that for a second because this is how long it's been. our members at the san francisco bicycle coalition have been fighting for this for over a decade, and today, we are so thrilled to have a safe connection for people biking across soma all the way down to the ballpark. i know these safety improvements in addition to the protected bike lanes go a long way for families, bikers and pedestrians. when i see these new infrastructural improvements like this, i think about my own family members who still live in this district today, and i think about how it'll make them feel safer crossing the street in their own neighborhoods. new infrastructure like this is

crucial in making the south of market a safer place to live, to work, and to play as we move towards reopening our city. a decade is way too long to wait to bring needed improvements in safety in soma. people deserve to feel safe walking and biking of our city streets. we look forward to being able to celebrate more with you in the near future. we wouldn't be here today without our 10,000 members, supervisor matt haney, and former district 6 supervisor jane kim. thank you to director jeff tumlin, and special thanks to the community partners like alice rogers from the south beach community association.

without further adieu, i'd like to bring back the director to get this program going. [applause] >> thank you, clare. without any further ado, let's get down to doing the things that we came here to do, and let's cut that ribbon.

>> this meeting is now being recorded. good evening this is the meter g on the san francisco commission on the environment. cellphones and pagers can still happen virtually and are not permitted. due to the covid-19 health emergency and to protect commissioners and members of the public the commission on the meeting room is closed. however commissioners and department staff will be participating in the meeting remotely. this is taken pursuant to the statewide stay at home and all preceding and pro seeding local orders. commissioners will be attend by video conference or by telephone if that fails. public comment will be available on each item on this agenda. we are streaming the number at

the top of the screen. each speaker will be allowed three minutes to speak. comments or opportunities to speak during the public comment period are available via phone call 14156550001. and entering access code (187)492-0475. when connected dial star 3 to be added to the cue. best practices are to call from a quiet location, speak clearly and slowly and turn down any other devices. you may submit public comments to the commission affairs officer at environment@sf gov .org. if you submit via email it will be forwarded to the commissioners and included as part of the official file. i will now call the roll. [ roll call ]

all right president we have a aorum. aorum. >> good evening everyone. we recognize that they understand the interconnectiveness and have maintained harmony with the environment. they have a commitment to mother earth. as the protectors of this land, they have never lost or forgotten their responsibilities as the caretakers of this place.

we recognize that we benefit from living and working on their traditional homeland. as uninvited guests we affirmed their sovereign rights as the first people and wish to pay our respects to the community. as environmentalists we recognize that we must embrace indigenous knowledge in how we care for san francisco and all its people. thank you for your attention during that important acknowledgement. and thank you for joining us for our second commission meeting of march. we had a special commission meeting at the beginning of the month to hear a update on the department's budget. it was a sobering conversation to have i'm excited this commission has an opportunity to act on this and to work explore more stable and reliable funding solutions for the department. tonight we continue to work in ensuring our department has the funds it needs to meet and exceed our climate goals and to support the work we have to do to rise to the challenge of the climate emergency declared by our supervisors in 2019. i'm happy that we have the chance tonight to hear about a program that commissioner ahn

and commissioner wan have been a integral part of. and that we will get to hear a update on the cmd ordinance i hope we will use our commission voice once again to finally vote for the ordinance. tonight's is especially important at this point and time. the critical work we're undertaking requires we keep our eye on the goal of solving our climate crisis. we don't allow ourselves to be distracted by political turmoil or unfounded accusations. i'm completely in favor of good government and accountability and where there are problems we need to fix them and move forward so we can restore public trust and personally thrilled that our elected leaders are taking a hard look at our city to ensure we combat corruption anyplace that it exists and at the same time we need to support the good work of our department staff and its leadership.

i have been on this commission a long while and have been honored to serve here. at a time when no one should be sleeping well with the immense amount of work we have before us to save our climate i personally sleep better because i no he she's steering the environmental ship of our city. i want to state my support for her and reiterate this commission stands ready to push forward the important work she and the department are doing everyday. finally i want to take this moment to acknowledge the hate crimes that are happening to asian and asian-americans across the country and in san francisco. and let our asian-american commissioners know we standby you. >> we'll make public comment on the screen in case anyone would like to call in. comments should be for this item which was the president's welcome.

and you all have three minutes to make your comments and please also remember to press * 3 in order to be added to the queue. i'm not see neglect callers in the queue, but we'll take a quick pause for anyone that would like to call in on this item. >> i'm not seeing any callers in the cue. next item please. >> all right. our next sigh tell is approval of minutes. it's for march 5th, 2021 and

this item is for discussion and action. >> commissioners is there any discussion? can i hear a motion to approve the draft minutes please? [ roll call. >> any discussion or changes from the other commissioners? >> discussion for the approval of minutes back up on the screen. press * 3 to be added to the queue you will have three minutes to make your comment on the item. we'll take another brief pause.

>> bees public comments are closed. >> we have to vote. >> all right. >> all right then. let's come back to the roll call vote please. >> president stevenson. >> aye. >> vice president ahn. [ roll call ] >> our next item is item 4.

>> i will put the instructions back up on the screen. i have just mutt the instructions up on the screen. press * 3 in order to be added to the queue you will have three minutes to make your comment. we don't see currently any callers in the queue, but we'll take another moment for anyone to comment on general comments. i'm seeing no-callers in the queue. >> all right thanks katy next item please.

>> all right. moving onto item 5, presentation of the commission on the environmental service award and this item is for discussion. >> all right. commissioner take it away. >> thank you very much. i'm delighted to present our environmental service award who recently left san francisco city attorney's office after serving as the department's counsel for four years. countless legal questions, document reviews and guidance in all of her help contributed to meaningful environmental and community impact. she was instrumental in helping toxics, plastics and litter reduction ordinances. she also worked with us on the antibiotic use in food animals ordinance, and flame retardant

chemicals in furniture and products ordinance. her expertise and dedication to helping us through numerous process questions and projects allowed us to ensure that we were following the proper protocols and doing our due diligence. i'm pleased to congratulate her for tackling key environmental issues and presenting her with this award and on behalf of all of us i wish you great success and lots of fun in washington, d.c. would you like to say a few words? >> i would love to thank you commissioner wald. when we finally get to the hard copy you will be able to see the california plot and know what you have left behind.

you have left behind not only the beauty of california, but the loving admiration of colleagues i was thinking when we worked together and working with unhappy stakeholders an how you helped us navigate to find good solutions to challenging problems in the service of environment. you with your grace and intellectual brilliance and your ability to listen and your forth rightness in delivering

information that maybe we didn't want to hear, but it's you know, the reality of what the law will allow us to do, is is a phenomenal skill set. i'm not at all surprised that the biden administration snagged you. know what a difference you have made and how much we're pleased that if we can't have you at least the biden administration gets you because you're request going to make a difference wherever you go. thanks commissioner wald. >> thank you director raphael. now i would like to invite john the deputy city attorney to say a few words. >> thank you i have worked with her for four years and had the

pleasure of being her immediate supervisor for the last year in the office. i have been working with her issues related to the environment, but also i want to note she has done an extraordinary amount of other work for the city while serving as your general counsel. defending, health warnings, and handling litigation involving the reform of the cash bail systems. she's brilliant. she's thoughtful she really was

complicated issues and thoroughly get to the bottom of them and that's especially useful for a commission and department like yours which has a lot of really complex legal issues in question. she's always professional and just nice and, everyone loves working with her for all of those reasons. her departure is your loss, my personal loss and the city's loss, but i really think that. >> thank you so much for this

recognition and even more for your kind words. today i'm taking aback and a little bit speechless. and i want to take this opportunity to really express my gratitude. this could not have been a more inspiring environment to work in to work with the department was such an honor. the work that the entire department and commission was always pursuing was for the betterment of our city and it just felt great to come into city hall and get to be a small part of that and to be a partner in all of the solutions that you have been driving your creativity, your rigger and the joy and zeal with which you all approach the work which is a true uphit battle. was just immensely inspiring the

pleasure was mine and i'm the one that should be saying thankful. i his words were so kind and so unexpected i really appreciate it. to work in our office was the highest honor. this has given in he great nostalgia and i wish i could be back there with you in person and i hope that everyone will be back in city hall in person soon. really thank you and i will take away all of the great lessons i have learned from all of you i think of them everyday and they continue to drive me in the work i do now. i very much appreciate it. >> thank you for those words. everyone can see why you're such a pleasure to work with.

back to you. >> good lick we all wish you the best and we miss you terribly. commissioners would anyone else like to say any words before we open up to public comment? commissioner ahn? >> i would like to say this is easily the moment where we go down and take our photo with you, but obviously we can't do that now, but please come back to city hall and we'd love to just have you experience the department once again as well. once actually when we're moved into our new offices as well, but appreciate all the work you have done for us so thank you. >> i very much intend to visit so thank you for that. >> is there any public comment on this item?

i do see we have some callers in the queue. just a reminder to hit star 3 to be added to the queue. one second while i put on my timer. >> i'm going to go ahead and unmute our first caller. now.

hi it's lowell from the public department. the comment i want to make is a thank you and quick story. i just want to thank you for assisting the department and the energy team. quick story is that back in 2019, we were awarded with a grant, but of course like it was only 30 days. so i was stressing i thought i was going to get fired for sure, but i contacted you and your unstoppable professionalism was clearly evident. you brought the calvary you helped us get into contract in no time. and you saved me from being fired so, i really enjoy working with you and every time we chat uhcvn5■i6w)ù k learned something new from you and it's been a honor working with you and on behalf of everyone on the energy team we thank you and wish you the best. thanks.

>> all right thank you for your comment. okay i see that we have another caller i'm going to unmute our next caller now. >> hi this is jen. i'm happy and sad so excited for you, but so sad for us. you have been an amazing partner to our department and specifically to my team. when you first started working with us we had recently passed requirement for manufacturers to take back. you were right there you hit the

ground running as we were in the middle of all of that. meanwhile we also had just gun drafting a new ordinance the use of flame retardant chemicals and furniture and juvenile products you helped us work with stakeholders and i think with both of those situations, you were both considering how we protect the city. i appreciate you finding that balance and helping us strike that balance. you also helped us draft past our requirements for our series to record on antibiotic use in food animals. i would say this is probably the most challenging of all of the ordinances and again, you were right there with us helping us understand what we can do and what we couldn't do at the city.

so i just want to thank you for being right there with us trying to strike that balance, but also helping us be leaders. with out us i know our leaders wouldn't have benefited as they have been. thank you. >> katy are there any other callers in the queue? >> i'm sorry i was on mute. [laughter] >> go ahead and make your public comment. >> yes. hi. it's great to see you. i want to say that i really had the honor and pleasure and benefit of having worked with you since 2017. as i count it we worked on six different ordinances and i think five of them you were crafts

language and one of them you were helping respond to legal challenges, but i think it wasn't really legal challenge legal questions and we got a great result. this was span from expanding our ban on polystyrene foam to reducing single use or non-reusable foodware there were a couple ordinances on that that you worked on to precheck out bags, to our separation ordinance and to our cnd ordinance that we have on the agenda today. i so appreciate your willingness and ability to dive into the details and just you're such a sharp mind and helping us figure out all of those nuances and being so diligent and it just was such a pleasure to work with you and helping make these ordinances as strong as effective as they could be. and you're certainly really

skilled and patient and i say that we it's really our loss and we miss you. and you know, but it's clearly i know the biden administration is going to benefit and the country will benefit and i'm just really excited for you. i only knew recently where you ended up. so that's just really exciting and i look forward to hearing the impact that you make. i wish you best of luck and thanks so much. >> thanks for your comment. seeing no additional callers in the queue. >> can i just say something? >> go for it. >> maybe i should ask if i can talk. i just want to respond to the kind comments. it's so wonderful to hear from you and to remember the really great work that we did together. lowell you taught me so much and pretty much everything about

programs and jen it was such a pleasure to work with you on all of that legislation and also ask you for hiking recommendations pretty much anything to do outdoors you're my go to resource. and jack i really enjoyed working with you on implementing all of those programs really tough initiatives, but it's problems to solve and it could not have been a more fun thing to come to work and do everyday. so i missed working with all of you very much and so appreciate your kind words and you taking the time to come and share them is really, just just such a joy and just i can't say thank you enough to all of you and the commission. >> i wish you the best and we're so glad you can join us tonight. >> all right katy let's move to the next item please. >> all right our next item is item 6 presentation on brightline defense air quality monitoring program.

daniela cortes, brightline defense, haley o'brien, and the community youth center youth leaders and this is up for discussion. >> commissioner ahn go for it. >> even before starting the presentation maybe it's good to tell a little story to get our minds wrapped around the environmental justice implications of this program. and august 2020, i was doing a lot of the surveying for sliding the air quality sensors myself and just going really walking along the street and trying to find good light poles to place these smaller sensors on. a stranger came up to me and used antiasian slur and also tried to slap me in the moment. so taken aback i wasn't quite sure how to grapple with it, but

there wasn't a lot of time to reflect on it unfortunately because just two weeks later, the fires started and that's where the program coordinator for brightline daniela cortes and i continued to then quickly fight these sensors in order to make even the data available for the communities we were reporting to serve. so as frustrated now a days as i am, you know currently with the news of course we've seen about antiasian violence occurring from coast to coast, i'm heartened by this program. particularly by the participation of our community partners, the cyc youth leaders that you will hear from today as well as the attendant leader reggie who is here as well. daniela cortes, the brightline program coordinator will of course introduce each community stakeholder and really try to uplift their voices and ultimately despite the stress that i have been over the last year in trying to get this program up and running it's been

really an honor to work alongside all of the folks who are involved in this program and maybe i will just pause for a moment too and also recognize my fellow colleague commissioner sarah ching ting wan who is also very heavily involved in this program too. >> can we move onto the next presentation? katy do you have it to pull? >> thank you katy. good evening commissioners i'm daniela the program coordinator for brightline. i will be copresenting today on this budget. and also our stanford partners who have been helping us with our data analysis.

really happy to be here to share with we have done in the last year. just quickly, i want to mention how air quality is currently monitored and why we begin budgets in the first place. this shows you the reference stations in currently # 50. 250.in san francisco there is oy one. you can imagine there are significant blind spots and that's where we saw the need and why we started this project in the first place. we installed low centers in local san francisco neighborhoods that are uniquely burdened by air pollution. and it's data that these monitors just don't catch. so that is what we hope to do. that is what we hope to serve and educate our communities with. next slide please.

i mentioned before, we have reggie reed here and our community youth center youth leaders who are high school youth who have also been helping us throughout the whole year with a sensor network design with community outreach and surveying. and then in addition to the community partners we have our technical partner clarity and we also began a partnership with stanford last year in the fall and that has continued into this year as well. next slide please. so yeah this project began january of 2020 before all of our lives changed in march. we started meeting with our community partners. we took this great picture. we have representatives from the

air district, cyc, these were really the preliminary discussions as to how we were going to conduct our community outreach. where we were going to place our sensors and this all got pushed back because of the pandemic. so we actually weren't able to start installations until august very much in response to the wildfires as eddie mentioned. but in october we were able to finalize and this is one of the last sensors that we did at the cyc main office alongside commissioner wan. next slide please. so a quick overview of the program. the planning meetings took up the bulk of the year. last year we spoke with leaders, a variety of community members, stakeholders, altogether inside in input up to how we were going to design this network and where we should place our sensors and

we moved into phase 2 once we were able to cite all of our sensors. initially we were going to do 15 sensors, but because of increased community awareness and need, we are now up to 19 sensors as of today. we are now currently in phase 3 which is our data analysis where we are just analyzing and collecting all of the data from those 19 sensors. next slide please. so this is the actual device. this is a clarity sensor. it is powered by this solar panel which is the black slide you see there. it also has a cellular antenna that's how it translates into a open map made publicly available. they are very much weather resistant. very low maintenance and we chose clarity as our partner because they are very technically proficient. they are deployed all over the country. all over the world really. so yeah.

that's why we chose them and they have been a truly great partner in this project as well. next slide please. so the environmental policies katy next slide please sorry. as we are in the intersection of public health, environmental justice and environmental education we have very specific air quality issues that we wanted to identify and monitor through our sensor network. so it's very much congestion proximity to highways, diesel emergency generators, construction impacts and of course major air pollution events which in california usually translates into fire smoke. so that is what we had in mind when we put the network up. that is what we hoped our sensors will catch, but of course, there's a lot of factors that impact the air quality and the air quality issues. but that is what we're

monitoring. next slide please. and through it all why we're here ultimately we hope this project will help shape environment policy, help education the communities that we are serving and ultimately just improve our air and our cities. so whether that's through clean infrastructure or green energy, green buses there's a lot of factors that go into it. there's a lot of ideas, but ultimately that's what we hope to shape. next slide please. so the community in the process i mentioned that there was a lot of community outreach that went into our phase one. and given that this is an 8617 program the boundary of the network were is the by the consideration of sb35 disadvantage communities and low

income communities. so you can see on the map it's mostly that horizontal striped area. translated that map into the map you see on the right just to make the intersection the roads and the local landmarks a little bit clearer because ultimately we put this map on our surveys ant the community members, the stakeholders will just mark up the map and let us know whatintersections they thought e should be monitoring and that's what we used to set up the network design. with that i'm going to pass it off to reggie reed so is he can talk a little more about the survey and his experience. katy he might be an attendee if you could make him a panelist please. >> okay give me one second. >> yeah thank you.

>> so while katy is doing that most of the community outreach that reggie did was in its tender loin and selma areas. and we also have our yc youth leaders that did a lot of surveying in chinatown and different san francisco neighborhoods so reggie will be sharing his experience in the tenderloin and selma neighborhood. >> okay reggie are you there? >> yes can you hear me? >> yes you're very quiet. but we can hear you. hello? >> you're a little quiet. can you hear me now? >> we can still a little quiet if you can turn up the volume

now? [ inaudible ] >> is that better? >> a little bit. let me daniela did you get the phone number? oh, wait we could just give you the phone number now to call in and just do it over the phone would that work? (415)655-0001. and then there's an access code. are you ready for the access code? >> yes. >> access code is (187)492-0475.

>> if you have it open on another device just make sure to -- >> all right. go ahead. >> i'm going to go ahead and get

started. hello. >> all right reggie go ahead. >> go ahead. >> okay well, first of all, before i get started i would like to honor, you forgiving me the opportunity to represent. i also would like to take this effort to shout out to kelly for all of the work she does in the office to help us get our jobs done. i also would like to give a shoutout to my partner jason who i worked with while we were doing our surveys and brightline work together. he's not able to be here today, but i like to take a second to shout out to jason. the first thing i learned is how many people have breathing problems.

a lot of times you're not aware of that because nobody pays attention. you realize that's like five people that i missed that have copd. then i go out next week and run into another ten people that have copd. then it is like let me dig a little deeper and find out about this copd and so many breathing problems. it is a reduced air flow that makes it hard to breathe in the lung. one in 17 american adults have copd. i also found out that 15.5 million are diagnosed with copd, but millions more may have it. so what does this have to do with brightline and air quality? if you have a breathing problem it's very important that you have quality air. that's a given. i also found out that we need to give more attention to people

that have these breathing problems like asthma and copd. they really need quality air. it was really bad when we first started doing our brightline because we were having those wildfires? i was surprised how many people once they found out what we were doing they stopped and they were waiting in line so they could come and tell us about some of their experiences and air quality. one of the things i found out is a lot of people that have breathing problems i think they are contributing to the breathing problems is our environment. meaning the forest fires, cars, construction works. even cigarette smoke. a lot of the people that i

talked to i asked them about the air filter and normally when you're in the tenderloin, people want something free. you start talking to it. a lot of people when you tell them and they see you're generally concerned about their opinions on the air quality and their lung problems, a lot of them they really are concerned and interested in having air filter and things like that available to them. they were wondering if we could help them get an air filter. in fact i think i mentioned that at one of the meetings we should

somehow supply these people with some sort of air filter and their units especially people that stay in these older units where they don't have a lot of ventilation and i think that's something that we should really look into supplying these people with air filter. thank you for your time. >> thank you so much reggie. next slide please katy. and for anyone not knowing it's chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. 75% believe that air quality has negatively impacted their health. whether that's through copd, asthma there is a lot of factors, but there is consensus that air quality is not great. and it has a huge impact. next slide please. >> so i just want to pass it off to our yc youth leaders who will

also be sharing their work on the brightline program. >> hello everyone. can you hear me well? all right. okay. so, let me introduce myself first. i'm ken. it stands for community youth center youth leaders. today each of us will be taking parts of the presentation and briefly what is our role in the community and what do we exactly do? first of all, let me introduce the nine of us. first we have hellen. team from george washington high school, and we have blanka and me from [indiscernible]. mission high and sfi.

marshall, michelle from burton and edwin. next slide. so what does yc do? first we do outreach for the community and our major targeted group is seniors since we are bilingual or multibilingual. we have informations about disaster preparedness and teach first aid and cpr with multiple languages. we also participate in health fairs and festivals. bottom right you can see there's a photo of everyone in the program during the autumn festival of chinatown. to keep us connected, we also conduct school fairs like officer meetings and president meetings every month. next slide.

so we're here to work on outreach through people in the community and so more people will beware of how important air quality is. and how does it affect our daily life. for example, we have spread information on this project to other community programs about informations of what that air quality can do to people. and then a goal of crc and brightline is to graduate annual cohort of youth leaders with an increased community engagement, air quality data and environmental leadership. next please. >> we would participate in collecting data from surveys and discuss the solutions to what is effecting the air. our goal is to reach at least 500 households throughout the youth leadership program.

next. why is air quality important? air quality education can prevent respiratory illnesses for example like allergies and asthma. we can let people know what is wrong with the air pollution and what we can do to improve our air quality. next. we're trying to reach out to the audience by using images on media. so for example, we would post flyers so people can take a survey and learn what we're doing. we are also hosting workshops to talk about air quality and distribute flyers around the neighborhood and our community to educate people.

>> and over the past few months we have successfully outreached to over 550 residents in san francisco through senior buildings, neighborhood festivals and youth programs in our community. with he promoted air quality education and how it affects our environment and health. we also talked about listening to this issue and we have collected data. next please. our team have created two flyers with both chinese and english version to promote this project and encourage our community members to fill out the survey. the link will be sent or posted shortly. we also like to collect your opinion if you can help. next please. so what data that we're hoping

to collect from the survey. first of all we would like to know what is your opinion of the air pollution in your area. secondly the type of reaction due to the air quality people might have. and last, but not least, we'll also like to know what do you think of the reason might be of increasing air quality in your area? we highly recommend you filling out the survey because your voice values a lot to us. >> next please. [indiscernible] >> we were able to get 360 response. [indiscernible] next please.

>> i'm going to