a hot bed for local manufacturing in support that is what keeps your city vibrant we'll make a compelling place to live and visit i think that local business is the lifeblood of san francisco and a vibrant community will be participating in today's meeting remotely. this precaution is taken pursuant to local, state and federal orders. commission members will attend through video conference and participate to the same extent as if they were physically

present. please note today's meeting is live on sfgov tv and stream lined online live as well. once again streamed live at sfgovtv.org. public comment is available on each item of the agenda. each member of the public is allowed three minutes to speak. opportunities are via phone call calling 415-655-0001. again the phone number is 415-655-0001. access 146 693 8503. again, 146 693 8503

mute the television, radio or computer and especially important if you are watching the web link to prevent an echo when you speak. when the system says your line is unmuted, it is your time to speak. you will hear staff say "welcome caller." when you start speaking you'll have three minutes to provide public comment, six minutes online with an interpreter. you'll hear a bell when you have 30 seconds remaining. if you change your mind and want

to withdraw yourself from the public comment line, press star 3 again. you will hear the system say you have lowered your hand. once three minutes is expired, staff will thank you and mute you. you will hear "your line has been muted." attendees who wish to speak during other public comment opportunities should stay online and enter their hands by pressing star 3 when the next item of interest comes up. public comment may be submitted in writing as well and will be shared with the commission after the meeting was concluded and be included as part of the official meeting file. written comments sent to ethics.commission@sfgov.org. thank you madam chair. >> chair ambrose: thank you. can you call the roll please?

>> clerk: commissioner bell? >> commissioner bell: here. >> clerk: commissioner bush. >> commissioner bush: present. >> clerk: commissioner chiu. >> commissioner chiu: present. >> clerk: you have a quorum. >> chair ambrose: we're going to call public comment on matters appearing or not appearing on the agenda. members of the public who wish to speak, dial star 3 if you

have not done so to be added to the public comment line. please proceed with public comment. >> clerk: agenda item number 2, each member of the public has up to three minutes to provide public comment. if you joined earlier to listen to the proceedings now is the time to get on to the line to speak. if you haven't done so, press star 3. it is important that you press star 3 only once to enter the queue. once you are in the queue and standing by, the system will prompt you when it is your turn to speak. it is important to call from a quiet location. address your comment to the commission as a whole. madam chair, we are checking for callers.

we have a caller in the queue. please stand by. your three minutes starts now. >> good morning commissioners. my name is ellen zhou. i am a public social worker. i am a union delegate for government employees and member to remind all of you in san francisco to return to god. i have been coming to you ethics commission many, many times

starting from 2016 and the last i spoke to you virtually over the phone was march 12th 2021. 2022, you all know san francisco, one party politicians authorize 5,000 a month for anyone come to san francisco sleeping inside a tent. people who have disability spend $17,000 a month and for average homeless person, that is $8,000 a month. we, the city because of the lawless politicians, they spent 12.3 billion a year for a sink hole city, san francisco. you all remember 2020 we had

more than 700 people die and pass away on the streets. right now we have 20% housing units available but lawless evil politicians talking about building affordable housing when we have 75,000 empty units available. san francisco politicians to murder our unborn babies by using our public money. they support illegal drugs by continuing advocating to open illegal injection sites. they support drug dealers. i am here today to request ethic

commission, you, all of you, to review the situation with the failed city with about 18 elected officials to return law and order to protect us, the people who pay taxes. who pay the price to live in a city, san francisco, we do not -- >> clerk: your three minutes have expired. >> thank you. >> chair ambrose: thank you caller. any further commenters in the queue? >> clerk: please stand by. no further callers in the queue. >> chair ambrose: thank you. public comment is closed on item 2.

i'm going to call item 3, the consent calendar, draft minutes to june 11th, 2021, regular meeting. does any member of the public intend to offer -- i think there's another -- sorry. there are two items on consent, right? the draft minutes and one of the stipulations. >> clerk: correct. >> chair ambrose: we can call them together if they're both on consent. okay. so i'm going to call the consent calendar items 3 and 4 together with one roll call vote unless someone wants to take either the draft minutes or stipulation on yes on prop c versus universal

childcare in san francisco and move it to regular calendar. seeing no request to do so, both of those items are being called together. is there any public comment on the consent calendar if you could please check mr. moderator. >> clerk: thank you. the ethics commission is receiving public comment on consent items 3 and 4 only in this meeting. each member of the public has up to three minutes to provide public comment. you will hear a bell when you have 30 seconds remaining. if you have not done so, press star 3. it is important you press star 3 only once to enter the queue. pressing it again will move you back into listening mode. if you haven't done so, press star 3 to be added to the queue. for those on hold, continue to wait until the system indicates you have been unmuted.

we have a caller in the queue. your three minutes begins now. >> thank you again ethics commissioners. i spoke in item 2 for a lawless city officials that is running city hall. only 18 elected officials. you the ethics commission had a duty to protect government. i am so sad to see you who volunteer your time, some of

them you get paid. only one me in the line for public comment. i remember when you open at city hall in person, you had more people go in and listen. but now you're running an ethics commission public hearings all by yourselves. that means the general public is not informed with anything you talk about. i believe in my honest opinion. please do outreach to the people that you impact in the items you talk about, childcare, universal childcare, who are the

beneficiaries? did you do outreach to parents? did you do any outreach to all who are planning to have families. you all know the entire unified schools is failing because we're not open. there's no public comments. my name is ellen. i live in san francisco, i live in district number 9. i have seen a failing ethics commission fail to enforce law

and order. at least i know that you today, there's only one me in here for public hearing. i don't know if you have public hearings, anyone spoke to you at all from the public the last 15 months other than march because i was here march 12, 2021. please reach out to people on the items that matter to san francisco. not just talk about amongst yourself -- >> clerk: the three minutes have expired. >> thank you. god bless you. >> chair ambrose: thank you. any further callers in the queue? >> clerk: please stand by.

no additional callers in the queue madam chair. >> chair ambrose: can i have a motion to approve items 3 and 4? commissioner bell moved. if you would call the roll on 3 and 4 on the consent calendar mr. moderator. >> clerk: a motion has been made and seconded to items 3 and 4. i will call the roll. (roll call) the motion is approved. >> chair ambrose: thank you very much. i'm going to call item 5 on the regular calendar. this is proposed streamline stipulation decision and order in the matter of cammy

blackstone complaint number 1920-010 and i'm going to ask jeff pierce to speak to this matter and while we're waiting for jeff, if any member of the public wants to enter public comment, they should enter in now. commissioners, if you have questions or comments for jeff that you want to discuss about this, please raise your hand. >> thank you chair ambrose. i'll hand it over to senior investigator eric willett who administers the streamline program. >> chair ambrose: thank you. >> good morning chair ambrose and commissioners. i can field any questions you have about this.

i see commissioner bush's hand up. go ahead. >> commissioner bush: thank you. i want to just by way of background, are these the first cases we've had involving lobbyists? >> yes, commissioner bush. these are the first provisions of law under the lobbyist ordinance we put forward to you. you are correct. >> commissioner bush: in this particular case, did the lobbyist initially disclose there were no contacts? >> in this matter, no. ms. blackstone has reported all contacts but failed to include the payment she received from her employer which is in this matter, she's an employee of at&t and we contacted her to

amend the filings and reflect a portion of her salary to cover the time it took to make those contacts. >> commissioner bush: so it did include who the contacts were? >> yes, that's correct. >> commissioner bush: does that account for the fact that the stipulation is at the level it is? >> can you expand upon that commissioner bush? >> commissioner bush: the fact that those elements were disclose account for a lower stipulated penalty than it might have been otherwise? >> i see, so ms. blackstone took the corrected action to file the amendments and return the signed stipulated agreement within the first 30 days span, which

reflects a tier 1 penalty calculation, in this matter, $500 plus 15% of all payments received. so it is an amount of $1112. >> if i can offer a clarification. as described, this is not a shadow lobbying case. there was no instance of lobbying we could tell that went undisclosed. we saw it essentially as a paperwork case that the

streamline program was designed to handle in this accelerated matter. there were no aggravating considerations here. and all of the calculations were within the thresholds and guidelines that the streamline program asserts. to your question about whether it would have been a different stipulation under different facts, certainly. and staff could have looked at this differently if there were different facts or aggravating factors. >> commissioner bush: thank you. that clarifies things for me on this case. >> chair ambrose: thank you. any other comments? if not, i'm going to call for public comment. mr. moderator, can you please call for public comment? >> clerk: we are checking to see if there are callers in the queue. please continue to wait until the system indicating you have

been unmuted. we are on public comment of item 5 in the matter of cammy blackstone. press star 3 to be added to the public comment queue. please stand by.

we have no callers in the queue. >> chair ambrose: public comment is closed on item 5. thank you commissioner bush for bringing out some of the background on the case. i appreciate it. i would like a motion to approve the stipulated settlement if there is one. commissioner chiu has moved. is there a second? thank you commissioner bush. can you please call the roll. >> clerk: (roll call) the the motion is approved. >> chair ambrose: agenda item 6, another proposed streamline

taken off the consent calendar, decision and order in the matter of jennifer stojkovic complaint 1920-011. i'm going to turn to mr. pierce again to lead us into the discussion. >> thank you chair ambrose. and i'll give it back to senior investigator eric willett. >> this case is very similar to the previous matter resolved in item 5. the only difference here is that jennifer stojkovic upon reviewing her record noticed she failed to report one contact. in addition to amending her previously reported contacts, to reflect the payments received, there was one month she had added a contact not previously reported in addition to the payments not previously

reported. >> chair ambrose: so i'm going to start. i guess maybe i didn't read it closely enough. my impression was there were multiple years when the contacts were not disclosed. is that -- did i read that wrong? >> on the language of the stipulation, it says and or the payments she received from her employer. maybe there's details lacking there for how many months it was amended to reflect the payments received and how many included payments received and additional contact. the background on this one was

one month there was additional contact not previously reported that was amended to reflect -- >> chair ambrose: how did that information about the missing contact come to light? >> it came through self disclosure when she was reviewing records to amend them to reflect the payments received, she noticed she had an additional contact and went ahead on her own and filed that amendment. >> chair ambrose: thank you for that. all right. commissioner bush. your hand is up. i didn't know if you have comments on this or from the last time. you're muted. >> commissioner bush: thank you. as i read the stipulation, there were many months beginning i think in 2017 in which her

reports were going to have to be amended. what were the amendments? >> the amendments were primarily to reflect payments she received from her employer. this is again similar to the previous matter, that is jennifer stojkovic is employed by city and had to amend to reflect the portion of her salary spent on making those contacts. so sarp has specific eligibility requirements for inclusion in the program and because it was only a portion of salaries, they were still under the sarp provisions eligibility standards.

she also took the action in the first 30 days and her penalty is $500 plus 15% of previously unreported payments. that is $431 in this matter. >> commissioner bush: for each of the months, did she disclose with whom she had contacts? >> yes, with whom and the matter she was attempting to influence. >> commissioner bush: that didn't come through clearly in the stipulation. i would urge that in the future stipulations clarify what was and was not disclosed to the public as part of this process. i understand from looking at the web page, it is a nonprofit.

is that correct? >> i believe so. >> commissioner bush: why is the nonprofit making disclosures as though it was a lobbyist? we exempt them from lobbyist disclosures. >> we do for certain types of fee. fee organizations and i believe the city is a different type of fee organization that is not exempted from the reporting requirements under the lobbyist ordinance. >> commissioner bush: and on their web page it shows they provide to the public and to their members a list of recommendations including recommendations of endorsements and voting for members of the

board of supervisors. it is my understanding that nonprofits are not permitted to endorse candidates for office. isn't that correct? >> if they're doing it through the different fee organization types, i think that's a way around prohibition. >> i might add quickly commissioner bush, if there are -- if a nonprofit in the city is engaged in conduct that might jeopardize their tax exempt status, it would be beyond the scope of the commission's jurisdiction. >> chair ambrose: it's an important thing to know about. and it's important to know -- i didn't realize there was a differences between 501-c-3 that could engage in political conduct but i assume that's the

basis of the different treatment under the lobbyist ordinance. is that -- a fair assumption? >> that's correct and -- >> if i may weigh in a bit. i'm not really a nonprofit expert, so maybe i'm entering into unknown ground but there's an exception for contacts made by c-3 or c-4 nonprofit organization. 501-c-3s can weigh in on ballot measures but not endorse candidates. i'm not that familiar with the organization, city is a c-6. something like the chamber of commerce would be a c-6. they treat different classifications in different levels of political activity.

>> commissioner bush: from looking at guide star, it does include them as nonprofit as a c-3. and it includes their filing with the form 990, done by 501-c-3s. and that lends to the question of if that's the kind of organization they are, why on their web page do they promote people to support or oppose certain candidates running for the board of supervisors. >> and certainly, perhaps we're getting far from the settlement, if there's concern about what they are allowed to do under the tax credit, but as jeff missioned, outside the

commission's jurisdiction. the irs would enforce such matters. >> commissioner bush: or the state tax agency as well, right? >> it's possible. i suppose you could reach out to the franchise tax board. >> chair ambrose: i do think -- i appreciate staff's work on stipulated settlements, we are getting off of the agenda. i'm going to move us back to mr. moderator, can you ask if there's public comment on this particular item? >> clerk: we are checking to see if there are callers in the queue.

those on hold, continue to wait until the system indicates you have been unmuted. we are currently on the public discussion on the motion of agenda item 6. in the matter of jennifer stojkovic complaint number 1920-011. if you have not done so, press star 3 to be added to the queue. you will have three minutes to provide comment. you will hear a bell with 30 seconds remaining. >> while the moderator is looking for public comment, to commissioner bush's question about if nonprofits have to disclose contacts, it is our understanding that there is an

-- c 3s and c 4s but only those who filed a 990-n or 990-ev. it is our understanding reviewing the filings those are available only to nonprofits below a certain revenue stream or operating budget but those who exceed file a 990 do not qualify for the exemption in the definition of context. >> chair ambrose: thank you for that. i always appreciate learning something new. it is good to know as we probably hopefully see more of these.

welcome commissioner lee to the meeting. i wish you were sitting on the lovely beach somewhere. i have to learn how to use the backdrops some day. back to the moderator. >> clerk: we have callers in the queue. >> chair ambrose: thank you. >> clerk: welcome caller. >> hi there. i wanted to point out that this type of behavior is the whole reason for the creation of the ethics commission. i really commend the board for taking the action but i want to know there are specific penalties for misreporting including a $50 a day fee for each instance of not correcting the report. that would make the fine well into the six figures. this penalty seems very short of true justice. thank you so much and for doing what you do. it is so important to continuation of running the

city. thanks. >> clerk: thank you caller. we have another caller in the queue. welcome caller. your three minutes begins now. >> good morning commissioners. greetings to those of you i haven't seen for a while. and my greeting to the new commissioner who i have never met. i just wanted to speak on this matter just briefly to raise the question of whether it is right in the sense that with so many months and years of non disclosure, whether it would not

be advise for them to make the recommendation on the stipulation before it comes before the commission. i think the public should see what is going oven and better transparency would be afforded if you required the filings to occur before the item is taken up by the commission. i think that's the case really for any lobbyist. i don't know your current rules but if that's not the rule, it could be changed to be that way in my view or at least examined and detailed. that's all i wanted to say. again, good to see you all and i'm glad you survived the epidemic and i hope all of those you are close to and your friends also survived well.

>> chair ambrose: on the point you raised, i want to take a minute to hear from staff. i noticed that as well. i understand that we want to acknowledge and reward behavior where compliance is within a certain time period and they signed the stipulation and we can complete the enforcement action, but the question that he raised -- so if they sign and file the disclosure the missing piece, my impression is, we do get that before the commission

meeting, right? that was set for june 30th or something like that? so we do have the completed packet. but it seemed like there were options where we could have an action on this but then they would pay more money to not give us the information until after the meeting. is that -- aren't there like three tiers if you don't pay until the end of july, then you owe more money but then we would not have seen the information before acting on it. >> we wouldn't present a stipulated agreement to the commissioners without having verified the corrected action was taken.

some of it is part of the calculation for the penalty amount. >> chair ambrose: so you have the information and it is an available to the public, okay, all right. >> yeah. and the different dates provided are if it takes longer than 30 days to take the corrective action, then it increases the penalty amount. when it gets to your desk, action has been taken. >> chair ambrose: okay. all right. and i'm also going to assume

that on the rightness issue, that there weren't actually undisclosed reports that we haven't seen. that it was just in that instance, it was the payment, the percentage of her salary, a payment but all of the contacts but one she later identified and came forward with were known. >> yes, that's correct. >> chair ambrose: and the final point that the other commenter made, the $50 fee to not correct the report, yes, of course that would be a lot of money, but i think at least in my view and this instance, if it were to happen again with either of these individuals now that they have been put to notice that

they must disclose a percentage of their salary then i would definitely want to look at the additional penalty. are there further commenters in the queue? >> clerk: yes, please stand by. >> i don't have a horse in the race at all but i noticed people were talking about about exemptions for nonprofits. my understanding of the law and i just pulled it up, this comes up from time to time, any 501-c-3, a charity employee is exempted from the lobbying laws

period, regardless of the tax filings they make with the irs and for c-4, social welfare organizations, their employees are exempted if the organizations themselves are quite small and file 990-ns ore z's meaning they have raised $200,000 or less in a year or have $500,000 in assets on the books at the time of the filing and tax returns, which are generally very small c-4s that fit into that category. any c-4 larger than that, they have to file 990s with the irs, standard tax filings and they do have to comply with the lobbying laws. any other type of c

organizations, they have to comply regardless of size. that's my $0.02. thank you for your service. >> chair ambrose: thank you and thank you for the information. are there further commenters in the queue? >> clerk: thank you. madam chair, no further callers in the queue. >> chair ambrose: thank you. with that, public comment is closed. i do see commissioner chiu i think you had your hand up -- >> commissioner chiu: with regard to the $50 a day. i take from that, it's at the

discretion? my clarifying question would be under the new framework that the commission has adopted for the streamline processing of these matters, is the $50 per day fine or penalty, is that at the discretion of the commission? >> yes. so we do include modifiers in addition to the percentage of previously unreported payments received. we also add $500 if they resolve within the first 30 days and that increases as well as the percentage taken for the length of time that it takes for corrective action to be taken and the stipulated agreement to be signed off on. and the ordinance does still allow for discretion application of the $50. we try to reflect percentage and dollar amount in addition to the

percentage amounts. in an effort to demonstrate the severity of -- >> chair ambrose: application of these factors can send a strong deterrent message that if you fail to file and there's a pattern in practice or huge number of incomplete or missing milings, there are consequences from that. commissioner bush, your hand is up. >> commissioner bush: i want to make sure i understand, 501-c-3 regardless of size do not have to file as lobbyists? >> chair ambrose: i was thinking

on that point, given it is highly technical and legal area of law, that we just give the staff some time to pin that down and just provide us with a response at the next meeting because we might be contributing to confusion and misinformation and i think it would be useful to know exactly who our lobbyist law applies to. and he mentioned that any employee is exempt, which if they hire their lobbyists as employees, that's a whole other curiosity. with that, i really -- it's not on the agenda, i'm going to have staff get back to us with some clarity.

>> commissioner bush: i recommend we push this over to the next meeting and not vote on it now. until this is resolved. it's a significant issue. >> chair ambrose: okay. i don't know that i see it ties to this particular stipulated settlement since this individual did file. but if that's your motion to continue this item, is there a second? >> i'll second. >> chair ambrose, i apologize for interrupting, before you seek a vote on the motion, i want to clarify, as far as i can tell, sf is not a c-3, it's a

c-6. >> commissioner bush: they file a form 990 and as a 501-c-3. if you go to guide star, you find it there. >> not as a c-6? >> commissioner bush: right. >> chair ambrose: can you please call the roll on the motion? >> clerk: a motion has been made and seconded. i will call the roll. (roll call) >> chair ambrose: this is to move the item to next month's calendar. (roll call)

four votes in the affirmative and one opposed, the motion is approved. >> chair ambrose: with that, just to make sure when you put it on the calendar, if we could have not all the federal regulations under the irs code but a quick summary of the different categories of nonprofits and which of those are subject to our lobbying rules, that would be helpful. with that, i'm going to call agenda item 7. looking at the time, go ahead. discussion of possible action on statement of incompatible activities, so-called sia for the department of homelessness and supportive housing, shs.

we're going to hear from pat ford about the sia. and mr. ford, when you start, if you can just -- we haven't seen action by the ethics commission adopting an sia since most -- we haven't had new departments in my tenure here, can you quickly explain what the role of the ethics commission is in reviewing and approving statement. >> definitely. thank you chair ambrose. good morning commissioners. pat ford, senior policy and legislative affairs council. sia is statement of incompatible activities. a statement that each city department must adopt that sets out certain activities incompatible with duties of officials and employees within the department. as chair ambrose mentioned, when

a new department is created, it must adopt a new statement of incompatible activities. and each time a new statement is created or existing statement is amended, approval of the ethics commission is required. additionally, the city must meet and confer with affected employee bargaining units and that has to happen before the commission votes to approve or amend sia. the department of homelessness and supportive housing was created in 2016. this would be a new sia for that department. the department has worked with department of human resources to meet and confer with a number of employee unions. the unions were first notified on april 8th of the new sia and provided a draft of it and on may 5th meeting was held to talk

about the sia with the unions and then on june 23rd, meet and confer process was closed out. so at this point, now the next step in the process is for the ethics commission to look at the sia and to vote to approve or not approve it. if it's approved at this point, the sia becomes operative and they can distribute to officers and employees. as you saw in the memo, this sia essentially mirrors the exact same language in most other departments sia's. there are a few provisions that are unique or different for this particular department. i just called those out on the second page, there are three of them. one says that no employee or

officer within the department can be a registered lobbyist. there's also language that clarifies that employees can engage in volunteer activities for nonprofits and that doesn't contradict the rule for participating in activities subject to review by the department. and then lastly, it says no employee or officer can serve as a member of the board of directors of a nonprofit that applies for funding, including grants or contracts that are administered by the department. those are the provisions unique to this one. otherwise, it mirrors language in the other sia's. staff is recommending the commission approve this sia. and also melanie from the department is here and can provide comments she would like

and answer questions you might have. i'll turn it over to melanie. >> chair ambrose: thank you. and welcome. i have a quick question. did i read in here that the employees of this new department are all subject to the form 700 level 3 reporting and if so, why is that? doesn't this department have a fairly substantial budget and numerous contracts engagement. why would they be level 3 reporters? that's to you, pat? >> i need a second to look at the code to see what theirs are.

>> chair ambrose: i think it was in the memo. i swear i didn't make it up. i'm pretty sure i read it somewhere. in any event, maybe melanie, you can explain, what is the department for the department of homeless for a year. >> good morning. i'm actually going to -- if emily is on, i don't have the number memorized. i think it's around 600 million for this fiscal year but emily cowen is our deputy director of external affairs. i do want to state that not all of our employees are submitting form 700s. >> chair ambrose: we wouldn't expect all of them to submit, but the ones making decisions about the 600 million, i would have expected them to be at

least a level 2 form 700 filer. >> chair ambrose, i looked that up. so, the executive director, deputy directors and finance and performance manager all disclose at category 1. the contracts manager, information technology director, personnel manager and homeless and supportive housing managers are category 2 to provide supplies, materials, machinery to the department. >> chair ambrose: thank you. that makes me not worry about that then. thank you. commissioner chiu you had your hand up. >> commissioner chiu: i had a question for mr. ford.

the provisions you highlighted, given the kind of ongoing and ever widening corruption scandal out of dpw, does this statement of incompatible activities capture those activities we think should be restricted or otherwise addressed in sia of this nature? >> my approach in looking at

this sia and any sia is to see if it's in line with other sia's. i think any new policies the commission would want to pursue, the sia is not the ideal vehicle for that. the ideal for new policies is to put it in the code or regulation so it applies uniformly across the board to all departments. unfortunately this is a shortcoming of the model itself. we have as many sia's as department and changing one doesn't change of all the other departments. as far as new rules needed in light of what we have learned over the last 18 or so months, i think the code is really where i'm fixated.

>> in an ideal world we would have rules and legislation applied equally across the board. but given the allegations that have come out of the corruption scandal, there's an opportunity to address those. as i recall from some of the reports that came out, there was a statement incompatible activities and didn't touch on anything, now that we know about it, why wouldn't we apply these learnings in order to deter

behavior that could lead to problems down the road? i fully appreciate that becomes a patchwork and in the absence of policy standpoint, there's legislation and rule making is obviously the most far reaching way to address it. but the moment we are in right now. i'm not suggesting that we have to go back at this point, but i want to make the point, how do we as an ethics commission, the house is burning down and while it would be great to have a full slate of fire trucks but if we have a garden hose to apply to the fire, shouldn't we use that as well.

>> i don't think i'm going too far off the agenda to say reviewing sia's is part of the larger ongoing conflict of interest project that will be a later phase of the project. right now we're looking at gift rules, that's the second phase and in the third phase, we'll look at a number of things and sia's are one of them, is there a way to drive policy that overcomes that kind of patchwork issue you mentioned. so that's on the radar. not as part of this agenda temper say, but part of the larger policy project we're working on. >> commissioner chiu: right. i think there's -- it can be both and. it doesn't have to be mutually

exclusive and i think there is an opportunity to have different sia's addressing different issues because the risks are different for different departments. those that do a lot with public contracting would have different exposures and opportunities for incompatible activity versus a different type of organizations like the ethics commission where we don't have public contracting and don't deal a lot with these revenues. so i think it's -- more to discuss as we go forward. but, just wanted to make that point. thank you. >> chair ambrose: thank you. i'm going to have the moderator

call for public comment on this item. if you want to make the announcement about public comment. >> clerk: we are checking for callers in the queue. for those on hold, wait until the system indicates you have been unmuted. we're on public discussion of agenda item 7.

we have no callers in the queue. >> chair ambrose: thank you. i saw your hand up commissioner bush. i wanted to find out if we had a number of public speakers on this. you had a comment, please. >> commissioner bush: two comments. first i associate myself with commissioner chiu's observations that we don't want to be the enemy of the good and changing this would be good. i don't think we need to wait for the perfect. more specifically, when you get into the provisions, under activities subject to review by the department and under a, it

refers to assistance and responding to city bids and so forth. no officer may provide selective assistance that is not generally available in the matter that confers a bidder or proposer, blah, blah, blah. but then it provides an exception. the exception is, when it's for a charitable organization. if a city official or employee of this department is assisting a charitable organization in the fundraising opportunities. the definition is very broad and i think too broad for what we

have in mind. for example when the mayor established the committee to have 100th anniversary of celebration of city hall, that was a charitable organization. in other cities like los angeles, what they have done is to narrow the definition from charitable organization to charitable organization providing services. so you are not cutting out the ability to assist organizations that are helping low income people who are in need of assistance but no longer providing city staff or officials to assist an elected official with their particular

issues. i would suggest that we take a deeper look at how we define charitable organizationses in this and all other cases. >> if i could chair ambrose. i want to make sure i understand what you're looking at commissioner bush. this is on page 4 of the sia talking about activities subject to review by the department, specifically assistance in responding to city bids, rfp's. you're looking at the bolded language, is that right? no officer or employee may provide assistance to individuals or entities, including nonprofit charitable organizations.

is that the language? >> commissioner bush: that's right. >> that's not an exception. >> commissioner bush: the issue is not just city contracts. you have charitable organizations seeking to influence the decision of who will be hired, who will be named to a commission. so they lobby the mayor over who will be the commissioners. or they lobby the department head as to who is going to be the enforcement actor. or they lobby over the policy of how it's going to be interpreted. there's nothing new about all this. this is the way the world works in this city. >> chair ambrose: i need to bring this back to this particular department. i hear what you're saying about -- but specific -- the point you made, you thought there was an exception for an employee of

the department of homelessness to be able to provide selective support to a charitable organization and i think i heard mr. ford say no, that's not how that reads. is that -- correct? >> that's correct. yes. this language actually is just clarifying that there's no exception. that even if you volunteer for a nonprofit, you still can't provide them with selective assistance. >> chair ambrose: which makes sense to me. okay. >> commissioner bush: that's only assistance in cases of contracts. it's not assistance in lobbying for policy changes or appointments. if you have been around city hall, you know that's where -- >> chair ambrose: but we're talking about city employees,

how to conduct themselves as city employees. the problem you are raising, which i hear you, has to do with the activities of charitable organizations engaged in city activities. but this sia is about -- the thing i'm concerned about is that right now we have a department of homelessness with a $600 million budget and ramping up and they don't have a statement of incompatible activities. bringing it back and we have a lot more items on the agenda today. so bringing it back to the matter at hand, i agree with everything you all have been saying about how we need to better integrate the good government conduct code and regulations and sia's since it is the thing that everybody in the department gets a copy of every year. but that's not what we're doing right now. right now we're trying to

provide the department of homeless and supportive housing with the guidance that is just the sort of fundamentals. to that end, i want to ask for a motion to move this sia and again, we can take up this larger issue as mr. ford was saying as part of the policy priority program. so thank you very much commissioner lee. sorry. we might have to take a snack break. i can see my blood sugar is dropping. do i have a second to approve this sia? commissioner chiu. mr. moderator can you call the roll on the agenda item 7? >> clerk: (roll call)

four votes in the affirmative and one opposed, the motion is approved. >> chair ambrose: okay. with that, i'm going to -- it's 10:45. we could try to press forward with agenda item 8, but i think what i'm going to do, can we take a five minute break? would that be okay with everyone? and then come back and do -- we have the annual report and discussion of the performance

audit on our return agenda. so five minutes. i'll see you back here at 10:50. thank you.

>> chair ambrose: i will call agenda item 8. i assume commissioner bush will be back on any second.

there you are. agenda item 8, discussion and possible action on the revised draft of the fiscal year report. i'm going to turn it over to executive director pelham and thank her and her staff for the work they have done to bring this forward to us. with that, i jump in and open it up to comments. i see commissioner chiu, your hand is up. i don't know if that was prior -- okay. all right. so go ahead director pelham if you wanted to just present the item. >> director pelham: thank you. good morning commissioners. following the last commission meeting where you provided feedback on the initial draft we had for the june meeting.

we took that feedback and updated the draft report for your further consideration today. just as a general overview, what you see different in this draft than previous is that we tried to be responsive to categorizing the information in ways that were more in alignment with the goals we want to achieve. we added a table of contents you'll see and divides it to the three key areas we have been focused on. strength in oversight and accountability and practice and continued to really strengthen our service through the department. there's a final section on looking ahead. we did go through an update of the year end with final numbers that we had based on the june 30th end of the fiscal year

on page 5, you'll see a graphic that includes those highlights from the year at a glance. and then the report flows from there. we have organized summary of key highlights around program areas and then the group, the updates that are program and operational and policy according to the goal they're seeking to serve starting on page 9. so certainly hope you had a chance to review it. we recognize that maybe you have additional comments or feedback you would like to provide based on this draft, happy to hear that from you today and see how you want to proceed towards ultimately finalizing the report to distribute to the public to reflect the work we have done as an agency over the past year.

chair, i think you're muted. >> chair ambrose: thank you. i was saying thank you again and to your team for gathering all the information. commissioner chiu, i see your hand raised. >> commissioner chiu: yes. thank you chair ambrose and director pelham and the entire ethics commission staff. what a tremendous year really, congratulations and kudos for not only doing all this work but doing it from home, from your kitchen juggling childcare and stress and overhanging of the pandemic. this is just tremendous. really proud to be part of this work. i think the only comments i have on the report relate to

additional headers and formatting. for example on page 3, maybe right in the middle of the photo -- first paragraph, we could put a heading in there to break things up. the graphs by topic. i can send this off line afterwards. but with areas of focus or program focus and then at the end on page 4, i would love to see under results like the major highlights, we have the highest percentage of public finance ever in the history of the program. we dispersed however many -- almost $3.5 million and closed out -- so pull some of those highlights into page 4 so at a

glance, if the public only reads the first two pages, they will come away with key highlights of our accomplishments. and then starting page 7, same theme. instead of saying programs. i would suggest grouping the work under public finance or transparency, investigation and enforcement instead of having to read each bullet point to find what they may be looking for, the eye is drawn to, i want to learn more about audits and i wouldn't lead with administration or operations. i would lead with whatever it is, the more hard hitting work that are the highlights in terms of what we have accomplished.

not just doing our regular business. on page 7, i think we have done that. but i don't know if we would think of it as the biggest accomplishment this year. and then similarly under strengthening laws and heightening awareness, what about putting the tldr, just bullet points at the top of the paragraph so people don't have to read the whole thing. what are the key accomplishments under conflicts of interest code so there's more detail down below but you can get the gist in a quick skim of the work we have done this year. i think some of the comments -- i know that not only is this a

ton of work to produce the report and i think it's really incredibly valuable to encapsulated everything we have done in this year in particular, because this is an extraordinary year of the pandemic but it also serves as a one-stop resource for people who don't know that much about the ethics commission or do know something and want to understand, what have we been doing when we're not at our desks this past year and i think the exercise is well served to see what did we set out to do. how did we meet the mark and importantly, celebrate the successes. >> chair ambrose: i appreciate all of your comments. there's so much information in there and yeah, each pass tried to bring more of it forward, but

-- and shifting administration and operations down and pulling up the program work not to -- not acknowledge how hard all of the administrative and operations but in terms of reading public, they'll be more interested. i know you are a great editor. if you could provide it to the director, those are great suggestions. >> commissioner chiu: absolutely. >> chair ambrose: commissioner bush. >> commissioner bush: i concur with the comments that the staff

have done a heroic amount of work in a challenging year to make sure that we are meeting the public's needs for transparency and accountability. i have several observations. one is that the annual report, as it makes sense, focuses to such an extent on the ethics commission that it doesn't allow the public to see how we are tied to other parts of the city government. for example, in the charter itself, we are required to coordinate with the city attorney's office and district attorney's office. we are required to coordinate with the controller over whistleblower complaints. so you also have to work with

the sunshine task force on public documents. i think that we need to see ourselves as part of a whole when it comes to addressing ethical culture in san francisco. with that said, the preamble to the annual report refers to us returning to an ethical culture. and i think that's a goal but we do not have an ethical culture we're returning to. in fact, san francisco lacks an ethical culture and has from its inception. the whole reason san francisco city lines are drawn the way they are is because people didn't want to be associated with the corruption in our city. as i'm sure those who know the

city's history know, at one point, the entire board of supervisors was arrested and put in jail, along with the mayor. that was over corruptions taking bribes. the reason we have the 1932 charter is because of corruption. the reason we have ethics commission is because of corruption being addressed. i think if we say we are returning to an ethics culture, we are stating beyond the facts and what the public has come to see about the city. i think we should say it's our goal and aim to establish a more fully ethical culture for san francisco. having said that, there are a number of points in this that i have outlined in e-mails with the executive director to

explain my concerns and considerations. i would direct those too the attention of my fellow commissioners, which i will send separately to you. they are the basis for why i'm hesitate to endorse this as it is now. thank you. >> chair ambrose: any other comments from commissioners? let's go to public comment. >> clerk: we are checking. if you just joined the meeting we are on agenda item number 8.

if you have not done so, press star 3 to be added to the public comment queue. you'll have three minutes to provide public comment, six minutes if you're on with an interpreter. you will hear a bell at 30 seconds remaining. please stand by. there are no callers in the queue. >> chair ambrose: public comment is closed. i'm hesitate to put this over again. it feels like we've already done that once at this meeting. i identify commissioner chiu's

recommendations as more in the nature of the presentation of the existing material. with respect to commissioner bush's note, i could over a bottle of wine sit down and debate with you and my 35 years in city government the various times when ethical culture flourished and where and how and when it might have been dented. but if it's important to you, you can strike the word again and then that sentence will be aspirational. i think there's -- first i want to second all of the good work of the staff. it is an impressive set of accomplishments for a very challenging year and yet we know there's so much more that needs

to be done and we'll talk about that in the next agenda item, reflect upon the performance audit we got last year about this time and where we have been and where we're going. i actually want to move this draft forward with the deligation to the executive director to hear the comments and make improvements that can reasonably be reflected, but for my own purposes, i would like to see if there's a motion to adopt it with the direction to the executive director to incorporate commissioner chiu's changes and commissioner bush's recommendations to the extent they can reasonably be affected.

commissioner lee is seconding that motion. i don't know if there's further discussion on that or friendly amendments to my long motion. >> commissioner chiu: once the report has been advised, could we have an opportunity to review the revised version before it is posted to the website? i'm not sure how that is done -- what the publication process is. if we could see the product before -- not necessarily to delay but simply have an opportunity to review it before it is given to the world. >> chair ambrose: yeah.

i think that's perfectly reasonable. as anyone who has ever produced anything, the more editors, proofreaders the better. on the other hand, there's a point where have you to stop editing. but anyway, executive director pelham, did you want to speak to that? i don't see any reason why if we can turn around another draft before the agenda goes out for the august meeting and make sure everybody gets a chance to see it and if there are some reason at that point for you to bring it back for further commission discussion, that would be an opportunity to do that. >> director pelham: thank you chair ambrose. i think what would be most helpful -- i appreciate and

look forward to receiving commissioner chiu's feedback as well. i did forward to you just commissioner bush's mentioned feedback he provided. i shared that information with you all. you have that in your inboxes. i think what might be most helpful, to get a sense of direction from the commission. if you prefer to have this on agenda for action in august or prefer to just take a look at it and then assume we can finalize off line after having one last look on it. just a clarity for planning purposes. >> chair ambrose: let me interject here. you just sent all the commissioners commissioner bush's comments and response, then you need to -- i don't know what we do remotely. put that up on the website. anything you share. andrew maybe you can help me,

anything you share at the meeting with commissioners has to be something that all the public also has the benefit of seeing. we've already closed public comment on this item. so it's a little awkward. what do you think andrew? how do we make that available to everyone else? >> simply post it on the website and if somebody sees something, they can let us know. >> chair ambrose: okay. great. >> commissioner bush: i would like to recommend posting it on the facebook page that ethics hasn't updated for several years now. it would be good to have today's agenda on the facebook page because we have hundreds of people who have said they are following us there. >> chair ambrose: that's a different topic and we can take

up our outreach in general. but in terms of meeting the sunshine ordinance, whether it's -- the issue is meeting the sunshine ordinance, putting it on the web page is what we need to do. the other question about how we engage with the public on facebook or other social media is a whole other agenda item topic that should be taken up. going back to your point director pelham, i was trying to make a motion to delegate to you the final authority what i'm hearing from commissioner bush and chiu, they want another look.

i'll withdraw my motion and you can take it up on the august agenda. is that where we're going with this? that way i don't have to worry about the public seeing commissioner bush's comments. >> as an alternative, do you want to delegate commissioner bush and commissioner chiu to have one last look before it is posted? >> chair ambrose: if they disagree, it kind of puts director pelham -- she either has the authority to finalize it based on what we have said here or has to bring it back. my motion is to delegate to the executive director to approve the final version with the comments we have received. but if you guys want to hear it

again, then that's -- any other ideas about this? commissioner bush? do you -- i gather you are not ready to approve it in the form it's in. so, commissioner lee, i gather that you are ready to move forward and delegate the authority and i know that commissioner chiu, you want to give your comments but you want to see it so that leaves commissioner bell. what are we going to do here? >> to clarify, i am fine delegating to executive director pelham to finalize. i just would like to see a final version before it gets posted.

i don't feel the need to put it over to the august meeting. >> chair ambrose: okay. >> commissioner bush: i think the tone needs to be aspirational. we have come a long ways but we have a ways to go. we don't take note of the fact that we're getting credit for acting on behalf of behested payments but here we are in july and the board of supervisors has yet to calendar a hearing on what we sent over there. so there are hiccups in the process that i think should be acknowledged if we're giving a report on the annual report. our annual report is, we did the job, and we're still waiting for the board of supervisors to get its job done.

>> chair ambrose: we can send that message in a way to the board of supervisors with a letter of inquiry or something that is not going to be embedded in the annual report. i don't know if you recall, but last meeting when we had the draft, i asked you all if you had specific edits or recommendations for the looking forward section to be prepared to bring them forward and i tried to write an aspirational message in the final section. so, yeah, i guess i'm acknowledging that there's a lot of information in there and how we bring it forward could use some improvement and sort of visual prop, but -- in terms of what i see a role of an annual

report being, it's not -- anyway. i'm going to stop. the motion i made then i guess and commissioner lee seconded still stands with the caveat that before the executive director exercises her authority to finalize the document, she will circulate it to the commission and that would have to be in a publicly available draft form so that if at that time there was a request to bring it back before the commission, that's something that could be considered or there are some other further improvement to be made. with that, i'm going to ask ronald to call the roll.

i think the big substance we all want to get to is our performance audit and where we go from here in terms of action opposed to reporting. >> clerk: a motion has been made and seconded. i will call the roll. (roll call) it is approved. >> chair ambrose: thank you for that. i'm going to call item 9 discussion and possible action on the staff report of status of implementation of recommendations of the august 2020 budget and

legislative analyst report of the ethics commission. i'm going to turn it over to executive director pelham. thank you. >> director pelham: thank you. commissioners this is the item that provides a status report as of june 30th of the implementation so far regarding recommendations made in the performance audit issued last august by the budget and legislative analyst at the request of the board of supervisors. that audit was conducted february through august of last year. we have been reporting since the issuance of the report in january this year on sort of the status of work at that point and now with this report on how things stood at the end of the fiscal year. on the report, you see there's a summary table to indicate where we were as of january of this calendar year and june 30th at

the end of the fiscal year. at this point, as you recall, there were 16 recommendations in the performance report that we fully embraced and recognized all of those are strong foundations to continue to improve our impact as an organization and impact of our programs. and as of january earlier this year, we had 50% of the recommendations that were in progress or completed. 50% still in the planning stages. and only 13% had been completed at that time. as the end of the year, as you see detailed on the chart, we have 37% of the recommendations completed and 37% in progress and only a quarter of them are in the planning stages. the report we have attached to this agenda item details each of

the recommendations, each of the 16 recommendations that were included in the bla's report. it showed recorded in the audit. the due dates that they recommended and then the detailed information designed to help us be accountable and for you to understand and the public to understand where we are in terms of implementing those recommendations. one of the things we're very aware of, we want to be as transparent as possible. we have identified key milestones as we have recorded them over the last six months and year as the recommendations were issued by the bla and the

links to the specific report, you can see here an annual report or ethics training plan, a lobbying audit plan we have developed with our manager. so this is a summary of where we are. i'm happy to walk through any of the details with you. it's clear a number of the items are remaining in progress with either staffing we just hired this past few months, some other work we'll be continuing once we have additional staffing expected to be onboarded this year once the city approves the budget we anticipate, leading to additional resources and so this is a work in progress. i think we wanted to be as clear as possible in the note section where things stood and what we accomplished in terms of specific deliverables to this

point. there's a lot of information here. i'm happy to take the chair's direction as how to proceed. i'm happy to do whatever suits your interest at this point. >> chair ambrose: thank you for this. there's a lot of information, a lot of detail, a lot of work done and work to be done. and yes, getting the existing staffing positions you have been able to achieve this year opens up the possibility for actually accomplishing all that the performance audit set out as necessary approvements. certainly if that budget is approved -- we won't know that until when? the fiscal year 2022 budget.

>> director pelham: i think august. i know the board of supervisors goes on recess for the last part of august. before they recess. we should know next month. i believe. >> chair ambrose: okay. i think probably best to go directly to commissioner comments and questions. so, commissioner chiu, you have your hand up. >> commissioner chiu: that was from the prior item. i'm just reviewing.

i do want to say great progress in moving and converting those items from blue to yellow to green. i have one question relating to item 10. maybe in the nexen forcement investigation update, mr. pierce, maybe you and your team could talk a little bit about what the goals are for completing investigations and interim milestones. like how are we measuring and what goals are we setting for ourselves to work through the backlog of cases and additional

cases that come through. and how successful are we in achieving those goals. that would be very helpful. >> noted, thank you. >> chair ambrose: i'm going to have -- ronald, if you can see if there's any public comment on this item and then i'll wait to see if commissioner bush comes back. there you are. let's do public comment and then i'll come back to the commissioners. >> clerk: we are checking. we are on agenda item 9.

if you have not done so, please press star to be added to the public comment queue. you will have three minutes to provide public comment. you'll hear a bell when you have 30 seconds remaining. please stand by. >> commissioner chiu: if i may while we're waiting to see if there are public commenters. director pelham with regard to staffing. i'm just curious on item number 4, it says ensure adequate staffing in the ethics commission. i can't recall what the recommendation was from the bla as to additional staff needed given the additional resources

we have plus resources approved for the following, for the upcoming fiscal year, are we at or above the recommended staffing levels that came out in that report? >> director pelham: thank you for the question. the report at the time was based on the recommendations we made in the prior fiscal years budget. we required a position not funded last year. in short, the positions we just filled this fiscal year bring us up to -- well, i think it's fair to say with the recommendations we are seeing potentially funded in the budget, we will have the adequate staffing to ensure.

does that answer your question? >> commissioner chiu: yes, thank you. >> clerk: there are no caller in the queue. >> chair ambrose: thank you. public comment is closed. i wanted to suggest that the information contained in this chart, report, be apended into the annual report. i think it provides the -- not as expirations but certainly the goals we are striving to accomplish and certainly a focal point or checklist for the work program for the year and it would fit in a report. so i don't know if anyone else sees that as something the

public would appreciate. it's a much more detail-oriented focus on where we're at and where we think we're going. but with that -- go ahead. >> director pelham: we will make sure the link is live to the current report. if you are preferring an attachment, we can do that as well. i think you have a link to it but sounds like that is buried. >> chair ambrose: it's an idea. i see a lot of hands. i'm going to go to commissioner bell and see what his thoughts are. >> commissioner bell: thank you chair ambrose. i have of course kind of set back as the newer person on this and respect the work that the

staff has done in the annual report. as kind of the newest looking at it with outside eyes and not having the deep history i love hearing from commissioner bush when he educates us on what has been happening in san francisco. what isn't clear to me is the annual report supposed to be things that happened like in june we did this and july we did that. or is it supposed to be more of a narrative about the ethics commission and what its intents are in terms of successes and failures. it reads to me like a -- i'm

just commenting here. it reads to me more like what happened rather than a narrative that one in the public could grab on to. the charts in the audit, even though it is more detailed, looking at the charts you can immediately see progress in terms of things we're moving towards something. i just wanted to at that. it's not clear to me what the purpose of the annual report is, because i'm not sure everybody understands. if it were a narrative, just something i put as something to think about for next year, it moot read a bit differently.

so i just say all of that to support the notion of a chart that kind of shows what we have been doing and that kind of thing. >> chair ambrose: thank you for that. just so you know, historically, the limited history of the annual report has ut was just a list of accomplishments. then there was a break for five years and then we were willed to do an annual report. this is a work in progress.

this -- i do see in the recommendations, that the annual report would be better if it communicated goals and activities and outcomes and set metrics on performance. i think that this chart, which highlights actually on rkzs and is dissection of the things we have been striving to do, where we might be able to move forward u.i appreciate it is a link and there are all the live links in the report, i actually think a visual going back to commissioner chiu and commissioner bush's point, if you pick it up -- some people would read it from core to cover but most people will just -- i

think it presents the information in a way that is readily acceptable. commissioner bush, please. >> commissioner bush: i have to confess that my point of view is based on about three deckids of doing annual reports. sometimes for political office and sometimes for governmental officer. i understand the difference between the two. in this case, it seems we're at a got governmental. the chair that director pelham

created looking at the recommendations takes us in that direction. in that respect, one of the issues that is raised is our ability to close cases. the bla's review, they cited one particular referral which we required by the charter to do sitting at the city attorney's office for 2.5 years, which is a long time to wait for something to come back.

>> director pelham: if i might answer. thank you for the question commissioner bush. as you can see from recommendation 9. the bla recommended an annual case closure rate and goals of doing that, which we identified in the case closure plans. and to report on progress quarterly to the commission. based on that, our first report will be at the end of the first quarter of this physical year. the referrals to the city's attorney or da office is something we would anticipate on a quarterly basis as recommended by the bla. >> commissioner bush: the other question i have, the charter requires city commissions to

have a commission secretary. now that we're staffed up to 35 positions, up from 15 i believe it was when you came on board, director pelham, what are the plans for a commission secretary? >> we have not requested in our budget to date and i don't have that in the upcoming year. in my judgment, we have not been able to achieve lacking the resources we have had has been a property in my view. whether the commission believes they need a commission secretary is something we can consider putting in a budget. i believe one of the functions that roll serves is done by program staff and executive

director. >> commissioner bush: it's not up to the commission, it's not up to you, it's in the charter. it's not we would like to do it, it's we will do it. if we're going to hold people accountable for complying with the charter, we should start by doing it ourselves. i recall we brick it back to the commission, people are feeling they don't have direct as to to the commission that a secretary is designed to do. i would ask that be concluded as we continue the update on staffing at the commission. thank you. >> chair ambrose: i don't know

if there's any other comment from the commissioners. we don't need a motion to approve this. i think it's -- mostly we would leak to see this calendar regularly. particular i i would say after the budget goes through and you know what your resources are going to be, recommending even with the new positions that are necessary, it will be months before you get the job amentment and another round of hiring but i think then you'll be in a better position to say how we might really be able to knock

all of these things into the green category and setting new goals for the commission. this is a useful document. with that, i'm going to close this agenda item and move on to item number 10. >> sorry for interrupting chair ambrose. commissioner chiu and bell, did you have anything further you wanted to bring up. i notice that your hands are raised. okay. >> chair ambrose: thank you. i made that assumption but thank you for checking. >> clerk: just in case. >> chair ambrose: discussion of the report since the last

meeting. dr.er pelham. >> director pelham: this just gives highlights. the deputy director gaythri thaikkendiyil did appear before the board of superviors budget committee and presented the commission's budget and notice the full enforcement -- there have been in changes in rnlgszs to our budget. if it moves forward as an tase peated, we should have a buzz of roughly 6.5 pillen. we're looking forward to getting

the work mrshed. and ut has an ut date on the appointment ordinances. i know this has been ongoing, pending before the board of supervisors for some months. there's been no action to date. we know the budget season has consumed much of the board's attention but we are -- once the board vee sessions in august, it seems unlikely they would continue to take up tims between now and then. we will be in communication with members of the board to seek the rules committee chaired by supervisor peskin to take up that issue as soon as possible this fall. yesterday afternoon i had an

update from starve. the public portal we used to access the information and evaluate the information that's there. i reported last month we were integrating the new disclosure tool, api i believe is the lock word for it to have our data updated and it has been updated. it's not something written in the report but reconfirmed yesterday that provides information for the public to have new ways to review lobbyist directories, disclose activities, all electronic

registration since 2010. this provides a robust way for the public to access and review. one other note on hiring, we do have the two positions that were vacated this spring, they have moved into the an date application review face. those positions are moving on expedited hiring practical. beo if the .2 last notes.

commissioner bush asked for an update on the redistricting commission. we have looked at that. we know there were a number of city provisions that apply to individuals appointed to the commission working internally to put together information for the website that helps the public understand what the rules are that apply to the redistricting commission as city officials filing form 700s with the work of the clerk's board overs. we can probably have that next month. we did not have further information to report on the racial equity plan. in terms of horted work, i hope to have that for you.

and there's a lot of information i lifrnged from this report about the city's reopening. there's been a number of developments related to the city's ability to move forward with greater physical presence. i've attached those policies here. they are policies and developments we will be working to put together. part of this will look at how we manage in a post covid environment with our work in terms of it is a hybrid online remote i think we're looking forward to applying the lessons we learned about how we with get working with each other and commission meetings for the past

months and we look forked to keep the lessons in focus. i understand there may be develop to start physically and ascy rear r rear. but the mayor is having her first reunion of department heads next wednesday. we'll get more updates from the this will be a significant part of our focus to make sure we do it quickly. i appreciate your patience and happy to answer any questions.

>> chair ambrose: so the board is on recess until august and the mayor is not going to make recommendations about the emergency declaration and how to handle public hearings until september, is that correct? >> director pelham: i don't know if that the case or something issued in preparation of new changed use of city hall space. we haven't seen that yet. we know their office is working, spending a lot of time working to provide that guidance. last we heard, it was roughly around september that boards and commissions would start meeting in physical spaces again in city hall. that's all i know at this point. >> chair ambrose: thank you for that. commissioner bush.

>> commissioner bush: i would like to suggest a survey of staff for how many are receiving a bonus for foreign language facility and if they're not receiving a bonus, what are the language capacities at the commission so we can take note of that to do our outreach. thank you. >> chair ambrose: commissioner chiu. >> commissioner chiu: thank you chair ambrose. i would like to associate myself with commissioner bush's observations and comments on that. i think that's really important information to know. i have one question.

with regard to it stalling at the board of supervisors, do i take that it is unlikely it will be heard at the rules committee prior to the recess? >> director pelham: that is my estimate. pat ford is here if he has further information. last i heard we don't anticipate movement. >> yeah. thank you director pelham. through the chair, i did hear from supervisor haney's office today, they have requested that supervisor peskin who chairs it will do that july 19th. we haven't gotten confirmation yet but that is what they requested. i'll keep you posted. >> commissioner chiu: please do and let me know if we as

commissioners could be of any assistance in encouraging the rules committee hear this item as -- as commissioner bush pointed out, this was sent to them last year i believe. was it december of 2020? and if it's not taken up until september -- was it november? yeah. so this is -- to commissioner bell's point, what is the narrative. people can interpret data and if it's not -- things get focused on and if it's not focused or acted upon and it's been sitting there for them to move forward, i think it says a lot about their priorities. so anything we can do to help expedite the process at the

rules committee, please let us know. and then on the city reopening piece, i hope that the city will provide flexibility to departments to be able to adjust to the new reality. because i think just focusing on the ethics commission, 16 months of this pandemic has been about pivoting and adapting and demonstrating tremendous flexibility to be able to do the tremendous work that is captured in the annual report. and when -- i hope it's not going to be a mandate. you must go back by date certain. i think there's a lot of learnings that will have come out of this pandemic experience i think it will be important to

create a new kind of normal. i don't think it will go back to the way it was pre-pandemic. we have come through so much together. please let us know if there's anything we can do to help. (please stand by...) .

>> : to really make san francisco government transparent and accountable and to catalyze and neuter and grow and mindset and culture here. which given the back drop of what we've been operating against is needed now more than ever.

in these extraordinary moments, we have this extraordinary opportunity to meet this moment and make our mark. i would just ask director pellum and the higher ethics director team to look ahead an remember the work. what we're here for and as we navigate our way together and take the great things we learned through the pandemic about collaboration and working together and without face-to-face, all of that creativity and collaboration that we demonstrated and perfected over time empower that with in person brainstorming and

having coffee and eating doughnuts together. and how do we bring that together into a new normal. i, for one, believe that this change is going to knock it out of the ballpark. we can do great things, better things. it might not look like before and maybe it shouldn't look like before. we can really shape this timely and critical mission. the board and people of san francisco are all counting on us and can't wait to see the amazing result. >> : yeah. keep us posted director so we

know what's happening next after you have your mayor's department head meeting. with that i'm going to go ahead and call agenda item 11 which is discussion and. >> : did you want to do public comment on this item. >> : i did do public comment before this discussion, didn't i. someone who is taking notes please check on that. >> : i am taking notes. i don't see that public comment was taken. >> : sorry. can you please let us know if there are any callers for item

ten. there are no callers in the queue. >> : thank you for that. public comment for item ten is closed. i'm going to call number eleven.

does any member of the public intend to offer public comment. they should call in and dial star three now. membersis there anything you would like to have calendared for future meetings. >> : thank you. i would like to put on the agenda a mid year presentation by the director on the racial equity plan. >> : okay. i think the executive director said that she was planning on doing that in october. i don't know if that's because that's when there's a review with the city's department of human resources work program.

in any event, i will let you speak to that. >> : we have been plan to go have our first quarterly report for the fiscal year on the status of the implementation of our racial equity action plan after the first quarter. the commission would like more information sooner, it's likely to say we're working on a variety of things but we don't have a lot to describe in detail yet. if we can have something to report back to you on after the first quarter and regularize that that would be most useful and productive. want to hear from the commission direction as to how you would like to proceed. >> : all right. >> : madam chair, if i may, the reason i wanted to have a

discussion or get a published report next month is as wre we aregetting ready to hire more workers with the new budget and as the ethics works program is going to get into gear, it would be helpful for us to really look at the plan and see where we can really address some of the issues such as how we're going to reach out to some of the under served communities, not under served but communities who have not been traditionally familiar with the commission. so i don't want to wait for a few months. i do want to look at where we are at so that we can address

some of the potential pit falls we may have. it doesn't have to be a thorough presentation but just an update of where we are and we can move from there. >> : okay. thank you for that. commissioner bush. >> : thank you. yes. i think commissioner lee is exactly correct. i think the timing of doing it in july also works well as the new school year gets started. some of these schools do take an opportunity to do their community participation in government. one of the things i think that needs to be clear to people is that participation translates into action in their communities.

it's one of the reasons we have a deficit in some parts of the city, at the same time we have a deficit of participation in the city. they go together. i would like to add for an agenda item general public out reach not simply on equity issues including the use of social media and the purposes of commission secretary as part of our out reach and participation. as part of that i would hope that the staff would bear a report for us on actual levels of human participation either in our commission meetings, they've called in or by submitting written comments which i've

never seen on our commission calendar, or participating in ip meetings. any measure that they have that shows that we have engaged the public more directly. i think that they can break that down into under served communities versus assisted parties who have a professional reason to be present would be useful as part of an out reach to see where we are and where we need to go. thank you. >> : thank you. any further recommendations for future action? seeing none. i'm going to call for public comment. mr. moderator could you please read the instructions. >> : we are checking to see if there are callers in the queue.

please wait until the system indicates you have been unmuted. please stand by. madam chair, we have no callers in the queue. >> : all right. public comment on agenda item 11 is closed. due to our goals we're going to

ask if there are any public comment for commission by laws section two agenda item 12. could you please read the instructions and see if there are any commenters in the queue. >> : madam chair, we are checking to see if there are callers in the queue. we are currently on the public discussion on item number 12. matters appearing or not appearing on the agenda. if you have not already done so please press star three to be added to the public comment queue. will you have three minutes for public comment. six minutes if you are on the line with an interpreter. you will hear a bell go off when thirty seconds is remaining. please stand by.

as a friendly reminder to members of public. public comment may also be submitted in writing and will be included as part of the official meeting file. written comments should be sent to ethics dot commission at sfgov dot org. madam chair, we have no callers in the queue. >> : thank you for that public comment is close haded on agenda item number 12. item 13 which is adjournment. i want to thank you all for participating today. we've decided we don't need a motion to adjourn. i'm just gavel down. you all have a wonderful month of july. take care. >> : thank you, everyone. >> : have a great weekend.

>> : take care. >> hello, everyone. and welcome to the ribbon cutting ceremony for 490. i'm the deputy executive director for mission housing development corporation and it is my honor to welcome you back isn't that exciting? we are back into our neighborhood.

you know, after, what, more than a year of collectively fighting the covid-19 virus. thank you, mayor, london breed. and thank you supervisors and all of the community effort that allowed us to be here today in this outdoor space to be able to celebrate 490. and we would like to remind you though as we are so proud to be hosting you here today, we want to encourage you to kindly wear your masks as you enter the building, and to respect still the social distancing guidelines that 490 is basically asking from all of us. for our own safety. now it is my great pleasure to welcome today's guest to conduct the ceremony for us, we're very excited that she's here today. and a community-based organization that is going to be headquartered here at 490. and we're very excited about that. [applause] they'll be located at the flex place at the corner of 16th and

south van ness very, very shortly. basically what they do -- they provide immigrant families in the bay area with social services and emergency support for most cultural values and serve as a bridge between our community and consulates and the governments. so we are very pleased to have them come today to conduct a blessing to make sure that this building is blessed today. and i invite lydia to come up to the stage and begin that blessing ceremony. come on over. [applause] >> good morning to everyone. i am going toed in spanish and she'll translate it, okay. [speaking spanish]

(speaking foreign language) [speaking spanish] (speaking foreign language) [speaking spanish] (speaking foreign language) [speaking spanish]

(speaking foreign language) [speaking spanish] (speaking foreign language) [speaking spanish] (speaking foreign language)

[speaking spanish] (speaking foreign language) [speaking spanish] (speaking foreign language) [speaking spanish] (speaking foreign language)

[speaking spanish] (speaking foreign language) >> thank you very much. thank you.

[applause] >> [speaking spanish] i just want to recap because we didn't have someone to translate in english what she just finished saying, but she wants to thank brim housing and mission housing, the mayor, all of the agencies, and anybody that had a contribution to make this building a possibility for the community. she wants to express her gratitude. she also talked a little bit about the journey for many -- you know, from yucatán. i am so sorry. and they came here to look for a better -- and just more positive opportunities. and i get a little choked up because i know what that trajectory looked like as an immigrant person and someone that as myself, i know what that means. and she wanted to remind every member those that we lost during this pandemic. and so, again, she wants to have

you all keep the good fight to make sure that we can continue to build affordable housing and she's looking upon all of you guys to be able to do that. mucho gracias. so, let's continue on. and let's talk about what is 490. it's an 80-unit affordable housing building that you're sitting here today that is located in the san francisco mission district. just a couple blocks from here we have the authentic 1950 mission that is another wonderful partnership with the partnership of bridge housing and ourselves that we were proud to do a groundbreaking very recently. what has that done for me, and for those that may be wondering what that word represents. we decided to name it for various reasons because it actually means to "move upward, forward, and a desire to always advance." and we believe that it embodies the resilient spirit of this neighborhood, a neighborhood

that fought and they were very vocal about what they needed. and so here together as a community, as a group, we're celebrating this amazing, amazing celebration for 490. so we continue to [speaking spanish] so we'll continue to move forward, right? right? yes! yes! yes! [applause] mission housing and bridge housing are proudly basically celebrating the -- what we consider to be such a great accomplishment. and so we just want to be sure that you celebrate along with us because this is actually a little piece of history that we are sharing with you today. we saw about 230 families that moved into their homes here. we actually have several -- several -- several -- looking -- several -- please wave to those residents that moved in here, and i just want to welcome them to their new home. we're so excited. it really makes me get choked up

because there's nothing to fight for something, deliver something, and then see the families moving in and this is what we're celebrating today. this is for you. so now it is my great pleasure to welcome someone that is an advocate for affordable housing and i know that she's been very, very vocal about it for many years and she continued to be a partner and a supporter of our organization and everyone here that is sitting here today -- our mayor -- our mayor of san francisco that has been extremely busy for the past year or so, and we're very thankful for her to have time to join us today. that being said, mayor london breed, would you please come up and share your thoughts. [applause] >> thank you, marcia. i've got to say today is definitely very special because it's been a long time coming, and i think that some of the folks that are joining us here today don't really realize the history and the struggle and the challenges that have existed for so many years, specifically in the mission community.

and supervisor ronen can recall at a time when we saw a huge amounts of displacement of the people in this community, she was working as an aide for the supervisor in the office that she now occupies and i remember when i was on the board of supervisors and this community rallied together -- rallied together to ask for more support in san francisco, more support from city hall to build more affordable housing. and at the time i remember thinking to myself, what difference is it going to make when the people in this community may not even have an opportunity to get access to these units? and so together, myself and members in this community supported my efforts when the federal government, hud, said, no, we could not use neighborhood preference. i flew on the red eye to d.c., they changed their mind because all i did was tell them my story about my experience of growing

up in the philmore and what happened there, the redevelopment that came in, tore down a lot of beautiful homes owned by black people, rebuilt a number of affordable housing developments, but made it difficult for the people who lived in this community to have access to those units. i was watching as what was happening in the mission already happened in the philmore western edition community. so it was important that when we started, and we identified the number of the developments in this community, the community did a whole walk-thru, and i went through that walk-thru and that drive-thru to identify a number of properties and at the time our late mayor ed lee helped to put $50 million in the budget to begin the process of acquiring these sites, and i picked up the mantle and we were able to acquire some additional sites as a result of the work of this community, the advocacy of this community, not only do we

have seven sites identified for affordable housing in this community, we also are using neighborhood presence to make sure that people from this neighborhood have right of first refusal to access these units and to live in their community. [applause] that was -- i mean, this is -- i get emotional too, marcia, because i think about what's going to happen differently in this community for the people in this community. and so i was there for the opening of the childcare center, for the ribbon cutting and the ceremony. i was here when we did the groundbreaking, the amazing groundbreaking here with the space, to cleanse off all of the negative spirits and bring in the positive energy that these families deserve. we were on shopwell when we opened up a new senior developpent in and we have other properties where we're going to be doing a lot of ribbon cuttings in these community. in total almost 800 units and

counting. so that is absolutely amazing. [applause] but we know that there's more that needs to be done. this pandemic, although it set us back, we were still able to get this project done. we were still able to continue to build. and that is so critical because families, like the ones that we see here today, they're counting on us. they're counting on us to move as quickly as possible to get this housing built so that they can move in and raise their families in these incredible communities. i can't help but get excited, especially because i know that this is going to change and save lives. housing has to be the priority. san francisco has not done the best job of moving forward as aggressively as it should in building more housing opportunities. i can't imagine my grandmother who raised me -- i can't imagine what she would have to go through now in san francisco and what would happen and how difficult it would be for her to be able to raise her

grandchildren and take care of her developmentally disabled daughter nowadays and the access to affordable housing. it would be almost virtually impossible. what we want to do in this city is to change that to make sure that people have safer, affordable places to call home. and i'm so grateful that we are partnering with mission housing and with bridge housing to create these incredible spaces that are not just about buildings -- they're about people -- and people's lives. and their ability to live in dignity and take care of their families and live in a place like san francisco. and to be able to come back and tell those stories about their families emigrating to san francisco, or their grandmothers raising them. to be able to tell those stories, because they will have a future in this incredible city. and i'm so grateful that housing here will provide that opportunity. so, thank you, everyone, for being here. thank you for all of the folks that had a role -- the mayor's

office of housing and the bank of america and our financers. so it took a village. it really did take a lot of people coming together, but more importantly -- more importantly -- it took this community rallying and demanding what they know that they deserve in order to live in dignity in the community that they call home. so, thank you all, so much for being here today. [applause] >> thank you, joan, for coming out. >> thank you, all. thank you for making this (indiscernible) i'm so grateful. [applause] >> these are the stories that we are very proud of, that we should all be proud of. thank you, mayor london breed, and thank you so much for acknowledging and for being here and for the work, you know, that everyone was able to do to make

this happen. our next speaker is our executive director at extension housing to say a few words. i'm sure many more words but just a few. come on over. >> thank you, everybody. joan got me crying up here. give me a sec. thank you all for coming and i feel that i get to do this now and after 10 years it's kind of hard to believe that we're having a ribbon cutting every few months in the mission. marcia and myself took over the housing 10 years ago, well, we didn't look like what we look like now. we had a lot of growing to do, and we couldn't have done that growing without the support of our community. without the support of the late mayor lee and then mayor breed herself, and you know, most especially i'd like to thank bridge housing. we forced our way in the door

and no one could get rid of us, and bridge housing is the one that opened that door up. so we wouldn't be able to grow the way we are and to provide the things that we provide on a daily basis, not just in these new buildings, but in all of our buildings, if we haven't had the trust and respect of bridge housing. so, thank you very much, for showing up. [applause] >> coming to these ribbon cuttings, as great as they are, it has me thinking about the past and how far we've come and just how important it is for us to stop right now. we've all just gone through a really hard ordeal and we're still going through it, and it's important to look forward. you know, it's important to come together and to say here we are at this point in time. and i know that these things happened in the past and i know this person said that, and this person -- this company did that -- but here we are as a community together supporting each other. and we're standing on something tangible, on a physical

structure that was erected with the blood and sweat and tears -- and i guess a little bit of money from the san francisco government, of course, but without all of that coming together, working together, we wouldn't be here right now. we'd still be talking about how many people are displaced in the city and we would still talked about what if we could have built that. and we're standing on something that we did -- that we accomplished. and i just really want everyone to take a moment and to pat yourself on the back because it wasn't easy. it was exhausting. it was emotionally trying. but we're here now and we're about to have some empanadas later and have a good old time. so from the bottom of my heart i just want to thank everyone. thank you very much. >> thank you. right back at mission housing. really interesting story about this building and i want to talk about that and talk about

relationships and how powerful and important they are to achieving what we're here to celebrate today. back in the day when we were just fighting to stand in justification, you know, people forced out of the mission and we weren't under the cloud of a global pandemic like today. mission housing and bridge housing had partnered a block away from here. and he came to my office and said we'd like to get back in the game and that was a momentous day. not only did that happen but a few months later, and the mayor's office of housing acquired some land that we're standing on, it was fully entitled for a market rate condominium project. they had drawings that were done, they were ready to break ground. the mayor's office had the vision and the wherewithal at the time to acquire this shovel ready -- remember that term that we used to talk about? and the city took some grief at

the time because they paid a lot. in hindsight it looks like a pretty good number, a pretty good deal by today's standards. so i want to thank the mayor's office and the leadership for making that happen. and then sam and i, i think that we decided we should get the band back together after what happened here in 1950, and fast forward, and here we are today. you know, as sam said, a lot of blood and sweat and a lot of hard work and a lot of talented people that, you know, we're not going to be able to thank everybody today, but i want to thank the relationships that we value most and, really, the mayor's office of housing -- mission housing, as sam said, bridge and mission got together and we might have helped mission on some things, but they certainly helped us to understand what the mission is all about. and thank you for the blessing today. it's a complicated neighborhood, one that has been under a lot of pressure and, you know, if we

can come here and to be a part of helping to stem that tide, that's part of our mission. so i thank mission housing for helping to educate us about the mission itself. and we're not done. we're going to be working with mission housing and we're busy trying to finance the infrastructure, but bridge is going to build there and mission is going to build there and we'll have a couple more of these ribbon cuttings. so i look forward to that. and i also need to thank a few of the key actors here, and from architects, who we're working with in portland and here in the san francisco bay area. and those who built this building, and thank you, bob, and your team. and nibe is building in berkeley, another very complex neighborhood and a complex project. and i want to thank some of the folks at bridge briefly. mitch, who couldn't be here but his namesake here, this caterpillar was named after mitch apparently. so for all of you who know mitch, really helped to get this

off the ground and he was helped by anna and sarah and david from our team that worked with sam and michael and marcia and the folks from mission housing. so thank you all for helping to execute that initial vision and for being here today to help to celebrate. congratulations. >> i would like to introduce -- >> i would like to introduce -- god, you're tall -- even with heels. i would like to introduce the next speaker, supervisor hillary ronen. come right on over. [applause] >> supervisor ronen: thank you, everyone. it feels good, madam mayor, to keep coming to these ribbon cuttings. it's incredible. like sam said, after 10 years of not doing any of this, to be able to celebrate every couple months with, you know, the opening -- the ribbon cutting of a new affordable housing complex. and like our mayor said, this

isn't about buildings, it's about people. and talking to the incredible families that are living in this building we've got to remember where those families were coming from. there are so many families in the mission that are living in tiny s.r.o. hotel rooms -- four people, five people, to a room. and if that wasn't -- that's always been unacceptable, but after this year of pandemic when we weren't allowed to leave those rooms, when kids had to open up their computers and sit on their bunkbeds and be in a tiny space for 24 hours a day, and weren't allowed to hang out in the hallway because they could get sick -- that is cruel it almost feels -- it makes your home feel like a jail. and those are the kind of conditions that families moved from to finally be in a proper

home where their kids can run outside and be safe, where they can have their own bedroom and feel like they have that -- that privacy and that space to grow up and be kids. that's what projects like this make happen. and so thanks to the mayor's neighborhood preference -- thank you for that law, that was one of the best and the most important laws that we've ever passed in san francisco. making that happen, going to washington, and -- and not leaving and not taking no for an answer, it's one of your great legacies, mayor breed, because that is what made it possible for families that live in the s.r.o.s in the mission to move into proper, adequate housing for themselves and their families. and we can't stop -- like you said, we're going to keep on going because while there remains one family improperly housed in an s.r.o., where there remains thousands of people

living on streets of san francisco, we can't stop. we've got to keep this going. and thank you, mission housing, for resurrecting your housing development or we wouldn't be here and we wouldn't do all of these ribbon cuttings without you. thank you, marcia, and thank you, sam, and, bridge -- of course, you never stop. so thank you for partnering with our local community-based developers, because we need that local -- that local voice and that local commitment and those folks from the community that are doing this work, like sam, marcia and oscar and so many members of the mission housing team. thank you so much, this is a great day. congrats. [applause] >> i would like to introduce our next speaker, kevin blackburn, from the federal home loan bank of san francisco. [applause] >> well, again, it's an honor to be here this morning and, sam,

with your giant shirt there, and i am the last one to speak and i am feeling like the cleanup like willie mays right now. but i don't know if you have noticed but there's been a common theme that has gone through each speaker today and that is the stories. you know, i have some facts to share with you, but facts tell, but the reality is that stories sell. and the stories of the people whose lives have been impacted by having access to quality, affordable housing are the things that drive us to keep working hard to provide justice and equity for those who need it most. so i'm privileged that the federal home loan bank of san francisco, this is, like, the best thing that i get to do. i spend a lot of times on planes, well, prior to the pandemic, anyway, a lot of time

on planes going back and forth to d.c.. and that is hard work. but this is really where it all makes a difference. so, you know, the facts that i just want to share with you and i want to really congratulate mission housing development corporation and bridge housing for collaborating because to build affordable housing, it is the most difficult type of housing to build, period. and to do it and to see what you'd be able to create here, i think they deserve a big round of applause, don't you? [applause] of course it doesn't happen in a vacuum. you know, years ago i'd say, well, building affordable housing is like a seven-layer cake because you have so many layers of financing and expertise and, and now with the cost of housing continuing to increase it's probably a 10-layer cake now. but there are three layers of that cake that i just want to talk about and one is the

federal home loan of san francisco. we know what is going on in washington, and once upon a time there was an atmosphere where both sides of the aisle worked together for a common good. one of the things they created was the affordable housing program. and so the federal home loan bank of san francisco gives away 10% of its profits annually in the form of grants for affordable housing with. bridge as a partner, that has translated to about $33 million in grants to bridge. and the congressional district, speaker nancy pelosi, created 5,40 units of affordable housing and that's quality work. but we don't do it alone. we do it with community capital, and the members, the federal home loan bank that provided the grant. and then it takes affordable housing developers to bring it all together. and so for the federal home loan bank of san francisco, we're

honored to continue to be the legacy of building affordable housing in san francisco and we want to just acknowledge mayor breed and her vision to -- to be a fighter. you know, it's one thing to get in office and to kind of move things along. it's another thing to drive an agenda that really matters. and there's nothing that matters more than providing quality housing for people. so not only are we working to continue to support affordable housing, but right now with the legislation introduced in washington that would allow the home loan banks to support infrastructure, and that is important -- it is worth it. i was on the phone at 6:00 this morning back in d.c., because this legislation is really important and we want to be able as the infrastructure bill comes together to be another tool that banks can use to support the infrastructure development, because we need it. and so just keep your ears open we appreciate the support from supervisor ronen and from

speaker pelosi as well. so, thank you all for being here today. thank you, mission housing development, and bridge housing and this is a great day. and will we're honored to be able to celebrate it with you. thank you. [applause] >> all right. thank god i'm wearing my heels. i was going to wear my flats but i wore my heels. anyways, before we get moving on to the ribbon cutting ceremony, i just want to acknowledge the team that actually worked so hard to make sure that we can do this celebration, which is bridge housing team, and also mission housing team. for all of you that worked really hard here -- where is the staff? mission housing and bridge housing, lift your hands up? big and proud. [applause] there's a few here too that are shy to come out, but thank you so much. i hope that you guys enjoy this space. you are standing and sitting

here today and it's basically the place where our children are going to be able to play. parents are going to actually be able to go right here and do their laundry and to be able to have their kids run around here so i just wanted to acknowledge this space because i think that it's beautiful. and i'm a parent of three and if my little one his an opportunity to be in this space, i would be proud to have them run around because it's a beautiful, safe space. with that being said, we'll continue on with the ribbon ceremony and we'll ask the speakers to move up here. but before we would like to remind all of you that we have a reception on the rooftop. if you haven't been to the rooftop yet, we left that for last. and we partnered with a neighbor of ours, a commercial tenant of ours that is providing amazing empanadas to enjoy. so if you want to be at the reception, the elevators to my right, and another right there's going to be staff there directing you to take you to the

rooftop. and so you can grab a bite to eat and take it with you. and the other thing that we have are some amazing t-shirts. so for all of you joining us today, pick up your t-shirts. it's very nice -- nice t-shirt that you can take with you. very proud of that t-shirt. besides that i just want to say -- actually ask everyone that is here today -- i want to ask for a commitment. would you -- would each one of you guys commit to be supportive of affordable housing? we have learned about the stories about what this building represents and all of the work that everyone that is here today, and i just want to make sure that i hear you loud and clear that you are committed and to keep affordable housing efforts moving forward. can i hear that? [applause] okay. so, [speaking spanish] which means we're going to move forward together. thank you so much to all of the speakers. please come up. >> all right, are we ready?

okay. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1... [applause] you're watching san francisco rising with chris manors. today's special guest is dr. steven zutnick. >> hello. the show is focused on

restarting, rebuilding, and reimagining our city. the director of the therapy center of san francisco and he's a professor in counseling psychology at usf. he's here today to talk to us about resocializing, and returning to the office. welcome to the show. >>. >> thanks, chris. good to be back. >> as we re-open, people are having different reactions. some are embracing the recent shifts while others are having a hard time readjusting. >> yes. i think it's an excellent question. my basic bias on this i think to give you a general overview is we ought to be following cdc suggestions and requirements, what they say, because that's where a lot of the things come. should i wear a mask. should i not wear a mask.

my answer is, yes, absolutely. i think we should wear a mask. i think we should social distance. it not only makes an impact on covid, it makes an impact on other diseases as well. as you and i were chatting, the deaths from flu usually average 30,000 a year. we've had 2,500 deaths from the flu so far this year, but at the very least, you need to be vaccinated. >> going back to the office is also an issue. there are some people are thrilled returning to work, others are nervous about it and there's a group of people who've been working onsite all along. let's start with those who are worried about returning to the office. what can be done to relieve their concerns? >> i think identifying a cohort of colleagues, fellow workers who you can just talk to and share experiences with.

you know, when you look at the advantages of groups, the major one is when we sit and talk to other people, we suddenly discover, oh, this isn't just me, i'm not some strange guy here. so everybody else i'm talking to is worried about the same thing. i think that will raise awareness among people. to say, oh, i don't know, what are we going to do? do we have fresh air in here? can we open some windows? does the boss care if i wear a mask? >> how about those who've been going to work all along. possibly the most traumatized. how would you talk to them about managing the possible stress and resentment they may have been feeling. >> the most at-risk population is the essential worker who because they are also one of the lowest paid populations,

have taken the biggest hits and the most risks. they're still at high risk. so they're dealing with a lot. they're dealing with depression, anxiety, insomnia quite a bit. and you've got a lot of ptsd by the way one last point on the health care workers. that's the tip of the iceberg. these are also the people who often have the least access to therapy. so we've got all these people out of there who've been in the trenches the entire time, never had a break, suffering a lot of trauma, and there are no services available for them. >> lastly, let's talk about management. with varying attitudes towards the lifting of restrictions, there may be some struggles in the work place. how would you advise management to ease the transition? >> management can encourage vaccination or require it. they can keep masks, physical

distance, hand washing, all of these things. and hopefully management will be responsive. i think, you know, given the title that the series, this is all new. we're all just moving in to a whole new phase. we haven't begun to see the research that's going to come out of what we've just been through. we've been through a terrible pandemic. there's been a huge toll and i don't think we've seen the tip of the iceberg on the impact. >> do you have any final thoughts to share? >> yeah. i think this pandemic has highlighted a lot of things. for me, certainly, is mental health professional and a behavioral scientist. it's clear to me, we need to educate people about science. this is not unknowable to people. the basic of science is constant questioning.

when you ask a question in research, you get one answer and about five new questions. things evolve continuously. so, yeah, when the cdc first came out a year and a half ago, they said, no, we don't need masks and then they said oh, we do and then everybody went crazy. oh, look how bad the sciencetists are. that's exactly what science does. we thought we didn't need it. then we discovered it was air born. i think we're seeing we have huge holes in the health care system and conversely, i think we're finding with the vaccination, what it means for everyone to have access to health care without worrying about how am i going to pay for it. so i think this is really forcing us to look at everything. it's been a very difficult time. it's going to continue to be a difficult time for people, but

i think that's also getting us to look at some really critical issues in health care. >> well, thank you so much for coming on the show dr. zlotnick. well, thanks again. we'll be back with another episode of san francisco rising shortly. for sfgov tv i'm chris manors. thanks for watching. >> it's great to see everyone kind of get together and prove, that you know, building our culture is something that can be reckoned with. >> i am desi, chair of economic development for soma filipinos.

so that -- [ inaudible ] know that soma filipino exists, and it's also our economic platform, so we can start to build filipino businesses so we can start to build the cultural district. >> i studied the bok chase choy heritage, and i discovered this awesome bok choy. working at i-market is amazing. you've got all these amazing people coming out here to share one culture. >> when i heard that there was a market with, like, a lot of filipino food, it was like oh,

wow, that's the closest thing i've got to home, so, like, i'm going to try everything. >> fried rice, and wings, and three different cliefz sliders. i haven't tried the adobe yet, but just smelling it yet brings back home and a ton of memories. >> the binca is made out of different ingredients, including cheese. but here, we put a twist on it. why not have nutella, rocky road, we have blue berry. we're not just limiting it to just the classic with salted egg and cheese.

>> we try to cook food that you don't normally find from filipino food vendors, like the lichon, for example. it's something that it took years to come up with, to perfect, to get the skin just right, the flavor, and it's one of our most popular dishes, and people love it. this, it's kind of me trying to chase a dream that i had for a long time. when i got tired of the corporate world, i decided that i wanted to give it a try and see if people would actually like our food. i think it's a wonderful opportunity for the filipino culture to shine. everybody keeps saying filipino food is the next big thing. i think it's already big, and to have all of us here together, it's just -- it just blows my mind sometimes that there's so many of us bringing -- bringing filipino

food to the city finally. >> i'm alex, the owner of the lumpia company. the food that i create is basically the filipino-american experience. i wasn't a chef to start with, but i literally love lumpia, but my food is my favorite foods i like to eat, put into my favorite filipino foods, put together. it's not based off of recipes i learned from my mom. maybe i learned the rolling technique from my mom, but the different things that i put in are just the different things that i like, and i like to think that i have good taste. well, the very first lumpia that i came out with that really build the lumpia -- it wasn't the poerk and shrimp

shanghai, but my favorite thing after partying is that bakon cheese burger lumpia. there was a time in our generation where we didn't have our own place, our own feed to eat. before, i used to promote filipino gatherings to share the love. now, i'm taking the most exciting filipino appetizer and sharing it with other filipinos. >> it can happen in the san francisco mint, it can happen in a park, it can happen in a street park, it can happen in a tech campus.

it's basically where we bring the hardware, the culture, the operating system. >> so right now, i'm eating something that brings me back to every filipino party from my childhood. it's really cool to be part of the community and reconnect with the neighborhood. >> one of our largest challenges in creating this cultural district when we compare ourselves to chinatown, japantown or little saigon, there's little communities there that act as place makers. when you enter into little philippines, you're like where are the businesses, and that's one of the challenges we're trying to solve.

>> undercover love wouldn't be possible without the help of the mayor and all of our community partnerships out there. it costs approximately $60,000 for every event. undiscovered is a great tool for the cultural district to

bring awareness by bringing the best parts of our culture which is food, music, the arts and being ativism all under one roof, and by seeing it all in this way, what it allows san franciscans to see is the dynamics of the filipino-american culture. i think in san francisco, we've kind of lost track of one of our values that makes san francisco unique with just empathy, love, of being acceptable of different people, the out liers, the crazy ones. we've become so focused onic maing money that we forgot about those that make our city and community unique. when people come to discover, i want them to rediscover the magic of what diversity and

empathy can create. when you're positive and >> as a woman of color who grew up in san francisco i understand how institutions can have an impact on communities of color. i think having my voice was important. that is where my passion lies when the opportunity to lead an office in such a new space came up. i couldn't turn it down. i was with the district attorney's office for a little over nine years, if you include the time as an intern as well as volunteer da, all most 13 years. during the time with the da's

office i had an opportunity to serve the community not only as the assistant district attorney but as director of community relations. that afforded the opportunity to have impact on the community in an immediate way. it is one thing to work to serve the rights of those without rights, victims. it is really rewarding to work to to further the goals of our office and the commitment we have as city employees and advocates for people who don't have a voice. i don't know of anyone surprised to see me in this role. maybe people have an impression what the director of the office of cannabis should be like, what their beliefs should be. i smash all of that. you grew up in the inner city of san francisco. my career path is not traditional. i don't think a person should limit themselves to reach full

potential. i say that to young women and girls. that is important. you want to see leadership that looks diverse because your path is not predetermined. i didn't wake up thinking i was going to be a prosecutor in my life. the city administrator reached out and wanted to have a conversation and gave me interest in the new role. i thought you must not know what i do for a living. it was the opposite. she had foresight in realizing it would be helpful for somebody not only a former prosecutor but interested in shaping criminal justice reform for the city would be the right person for the space. i appreciate the foresight of the mayor to be open how we can be leaders in san francisco. i was able to transition to the policy space. here i was able to work on legislation, community relations, communication and start to shape the ways our office was going to reform the

criminal justice system. it is fulfilling for me. i could create programs and see those impact people's lives. i am the change. it took truants youth to meet with civil rights movement leaders who fought to have access to education. being a young person to understand that helped the young people realize this was an important thing to give up. what we find is that young people who are truanted have a really high homicide rate in our city, which is a sad statistic. we want to change that. >> coming from a community we are black and brown. i don't reach out to other people. i don't think they feel the same way. >> i had the great opportunity to work on prison reform issues and criminal justice reform issues. we created a program at san

quentin where we brought district opportunities to lifers and talk about how we are all impacted by the criminal justice system. we brought over 40 elected das to san quentin for the situation. now we are inviting the police department. our formerly incarcerated group born out of this programming asked for the opportunity to work on a project where we could bring the men in blue on the outside to come speak to the men on blue inside to start the healing dialogue around how the criminal justice system specifically in san francisco impacts the community. i was attracted to the role. there was a component of equity that was part of this process. the equity community here in san francisco is a community that i had already worked with. before i took steps to visit cannabis businesses i thought it was important my team have a chance to go inside and speak to

men who had been impacted. that conversation needed to happen so we know how we are making an impact with the work that we are doing. the da's office as we were leading up to the legalization of marijuana in the state we started having conversations on the policy team what that could look like. the district attorney was really focused on the right side of history for this. we realized it would be quite a heavy lift for individuals who have been negatively impacted by the war on drugs to expunge the record. it was important to figure out the framework to make it seamless and easy. they put their minds to it after some time and many conversations the data analysts and other policy walk throughs on the team came up with the idea to engage

the tech community in this process. code for america helped us developed the rhythm to be used for any jurisdiction across the state that was important to create a solution to be used to assist all jurisdictions dealing with this matter. the office of cannabis is the first office to have a completely digital application process. we worked with the digital team to develop the online application. there are going to be hiccups. we are first to do it. it is one of the most rewarding parts to offer a seamless -- to offer a seamless approach. that is how they can find solutions to solve many of the community challenges. the best way to respond to prop 64 was to retroactively expunge 9,000 cannabis related records

for san francisco. it feels like justice full circle for my personal experience. in the past i was furthering the war on drugs just as my directive. really coming from a place of public safety. that was the mandate and understanding. it is nice to see that pass a society we are able to look at some of our laws and say, you know what? we got it wrong. let's get this right. i had the privilege of being in the existing framework. my predecessor nicole elliott did an incredible job bringing together the individuals super-passionate about cannabis. >> the office was created in july of 2017. i came in early 2018. i have been able to see the office's development over time which is nice. it is exciting to be in the space, stickily in thinking about her leadership.

>> looking for the office it is always we might be before my time when i was working for the forboard of supervisors. i learn new things every day it is challenging and rewarding for me. >> we get the privilege to work in an office that is innovating. we get to spearhead the robust exprogram. >> i am excited she came on board to leverage experience as a prosecutor 10 years as we contemplate enforcements but approaching it without replicating the war on drugs. >> i was hired by cam laharris. i haven't seen a district attorney that looked kind of like me. that could be a path in my life. i might not have considered it. it is important that women and

certainly women of color and spaces of leadership really do their part to bring on and mentor as many young people as they can. it is superimportant to take advantage of as many opportunities as they can when they can intern because the doors are wide open. plans change and that is okay. the way this was shaped because i took a risk to try something new and explore something and show that i was capable. you are capable, right? it was about leaning in and being at the table to say my voice matters. you find your passion, the sky >> roughly five years, i was working as a high school teacher, and i decided to take my students on a surfing field trip. the light bulb went off in my head, and i realized i could do

much more for my students taking them surfing than i could as their classroom teacher, and that is when the idea for the city surf project was born. >> working with kids in the ocean that aren't familiar with this space is really special because you're dealing with a lot of fear and apprehension but at the same time, a lot of excitement. >> when i first did it, i was, like, really scared, but then, i did it again, and i liked it. >> we'll get a group of kids who have just never been to the beach, are terrified of the idea, who don't like the beach. it's too cold out, and it's

those kid that are impossible to get back out of the water at the end of the day. >> over the last few years, i think we've had at least 40 of our students participate in the city surf project. >> surfing helped me with, like, how to swim. >> we've start off with about two to four sessions in the pool before actually going out and surfing. >> swimming at the pool just helps us with, like, being, like, comfortable in the water and being calm and not being all -- not being anxious. >> so when we started the city surf project, one of the things we did was to say hey, this is the way to earn your p.e. credits. just getting kids to go try it was one of our initial challenges for the first year or two. but now that we've been doing it three or four years, we have

a group of kids that's consistent, and the word has spread, that it's super fun, that you learn about the ocean. >> starting in the morning, you know, i get the vehicles ready, and then, i get all the gear together, and then, i drive and go get the kids, and we take them to a local beach. >> we usually go to linda mar, and then occasionally ocean beach. we once did a special trip. we were in capitola last year, and it was really fun. >> we get in a circle and group stretch, and we talk about specific safety for the day, and then, we go down to the water. >> once we go to the beach, i don't want to go home. i can't change my circumstances at home, but i can change the way i approach them. >> our program has definitely been a way for our students to find community and build

friends. >> i don't really talk to friends, so i guess when i started doing city surf, i started to, like, get to know people more than i did before, and people that i didn't think i'd like, like, ended up being my best friends. >> it's a group sport the way we do it, and with, like, close camaraderie, but everybody's doing it for themselves. >> it's great, surfing around, finding new people and making new friendships with people throughout surfing. >> it can be highly developmental for students to have this time where they can learn a lot about themselves while negotiating the waves. >> i feel significantly, like, calmer. it definitely helps if i'm, like, feeling really stressed or, like, feeling really anxious about surfing, and i go surfing, and then, i just feel, like, i'm going to be okay. >> it gives them resiliency

skills and helps them build self-confidence. and with that, they can use that in other parts of their lives. >> i went to bring my family to the beach and tell them what i did. >> i saw kids open up in the ocean, and i got to see them connect with other students, and i got to see them fail, you know, and get up and get back on the board and experience success, and really enjoy themselves and make a connection to nature at the same time. >> for some kids that are, like, resistant to, like, being in a mentorship program like this, it's they want to surf, and then later, they'll find out that they've, like, made this community connection. >> i think they provided level playing fields for kids to be

themselves in an open environment. >> for kids to feel like i can go for it and take a chance that i might not have been willing to do on my own is really special. >> we go on 150 surf outings a year. that's year-round programming. we've seen a tremendous amount of youth face their fears through surfing, and that has translated to growth in other facets of their lives. >> i just think the biggest thing is, like, that they feel like that they have something that is really cool, that they're engaged in, and that we, like, care about them and how they're doing, like, in general. >> what i like best is they really care about me, like, i'm not alone, and i have a group of people that i can go to, and, also, surfing is fun. >> we're creating surfers, and we're changing the face of

surfing. >> the feeling is definitely akin to being on a roller coaster. it's definitely faster than i think you expect it to be, but it's definitely fun. >> it leaves you feeling really, really positive about what that kid's going to go out and do. >> i think it's really magical almost. at least it was for me. >> it was really exciting when i caught my first wave. >> i felt like i was, like -- it was, like, magical, really. >> when they catch that first wave, and their first lights up, you know -- their face lights up, you know you have them hooked. >> i was on top of the world. it's amazing. i felt like i was on top of the world even though i was probably going two miles an hour. it was, like, the scariest thing i'd ever done, and i think it was when i got hooked on surfing after

>> restaurants will be open for take out only, but nonessential stores, like bars and gyms, will close effective midnight tonight. [♪♪♪] >> my name is sharky laguana. i am a small business owner. i own a company called vandigo van rentals.

it rents vans to the music industry. i am also a member of the small business commission as appointed by mayor breed in 2019. i am a musician and have worked as a professional musician and recording artist in the 90s. [♪♪♪] >> we came up in san francisco, so i've played at most of the live venues as a performer, and, of course, i've seen hundreds of shows over the years, and i care very, very deeply about live entertainment. in fact, when i joined the commission, i said that i was going to make a particular effort to pay attention to the arts and entertainment and make sure that those small businesses receive the level of attention that i think they deserve. >> this is a constantly and rapidly changing situation, and

we are working hard to be aggressive to flatten the curve to disrupt the spread of covid-19. >> when the pandemic hit, it was crystal clear to me that this was devastating to the music industry because live venues had to completely shutdown. there was no way for them to open for even a single day or in limited capacity. that hit me emotionally as an artist and hit me professionally, as well as a small business that caters to artists, so i was very deeply concerned about what the city could do to help the entertainment committee. we knew we needed somebody to introduce some kind of legislation to get the ball rolling, and so we just started texting supervisor haney, just harassing him, saying we need to do something, we need to do something. he said i know we need to do

something, but what do we do? we eventually settled on this idea that there would be an independent venue recovery fund. >> clerk: there are 11 ayes. >> president walton: thank you. without objection, this resolution is passed unanimously. >> and we were concerned for these small mom-and-pop businesses that contribute so much to our arts community. >> we are an extremely small venue that has the capacity to do extremely small shows. most of our staff has been working for us for over ten years. there's very little turnover in the staff, so it felt like family. sharky with the small business commission was crucial in pestering supervisor haney and

others to really keep our industry top of mind. we closed down on march 13 of 2020 when we heard that there was an order to do so by the mayor, and we had to call that show in the middle of the night. they were in the middle of their sound check, and i had to call the venue and say, we need to cancel the show tonight. >> the fund is for our live music and entertainment venues, and in its first round, it will offer grants of at least $10,000 to qualifying venues. these are venues that offer a signature amount of live entertainment programming before the pandemic and are committed to reopening and offering live entertainment spaces after the pandemic.

>> it's going to, you know, just stave off the bleeding for a moment. it's the city contributing to helping make sure these venues are around, to continue to be part of the economic recovery for our city. >> when you think about the venues for events in the city, we're talking about all of them. some have been able to come back adaptively over the last year and have been able to be shape shifters in this pandemic, and that's exciting to see, but i'm really looking forward to the day when events and venues can reopen and help drive the recovery here in san francisco. >> they have done a study that says for every dollar of ticket sales done in this city, $12 goes to neighboring businesses. from all of our vendors to the

restaurants that are next to our ven sues and just so many other things that you can think of, all of which have been so negatively affected by covid. for this industry to fail is unthinkable on so many levels. it's unheard of, like, san francisco without its music scene would be a terribly dismal place. >> i don't know that this needs to be arrest -- that there needs to be art welfare for artists. we just need to live and pay for our food, and things will take care of themselves. i think that that's not the given situation. what san francisco could do that they don't seem to do very much is really do something to support these clubs and venues that have all of these different artists performing in them. actually, i think precovid, it was, you know, don't have a

warehouse party and don't do a gig. don't go outside, and don't do this. there was a lot of don't, don't, don't, and after the pandemic, they realized we're a big industry, and we bring a lot of money into this city, so they need to encourage and hope these venues. and then, you know, as far as people like me, it would be nice if you didn't only get encouraged for only singing opera or playing violin. [♪♪♪] >> entertainment is a huge part of what is going to make this city bounce back, and we're going to need to have live music coming back, and comedy, and drag shows and everything under the sun that is fun and creative in order to get smiles back on our faces and in order to get the city moving again. [♪♪♪]

>> venues serve a really vital function in society. there aren't many places where people from any walk of life, race, religion, sexuality can come together in the same room and experience joy, right? experience love, experience anything that what makes us human, community, our connective tissues between different souls. if we were to lose this, lose this situation, you're going to lose this very vital piece of society, and just coming out of the pandemic, you know, it's going to help us recover socially? well, yeah, because we need to be in the same room with a bunch of people, and then help people across the country recover financially. >> san francisco art recovery fund, amazing. it opened yesterday on april

21. applications are open through may 5. we're encouraging everyone in the coalition to apply. there's very clear information on what's eligible, but that's basically been what our coalition has been advocating for from the beginning. you know, everyone's been supportive, and they've all been hugely integral to this program getting off the ground. you know, we found our champion with supervisor matt haney from district six who introduced this legislation and pushed this into law. mayor breed dedicated $1.5 million this fund, and then supervisor haney matched that, so there's $3 million in this fund. this is a huge moment for our coalition. it's what we've been fighting for all along. >> one of the challenges of our business is staying on top of

all the opportunities as they come back. at the office of oewd, office of economic and workforce development, if you need to speak to somebody, you can find people who can help you navigate any of the available programs and resources. >> a lot of blind optimism has kept us afloat, you know, and there's been a lot of reason for despair, but this is what keeps me in the business, and this is what keeps me fighting, you know, and continuing to advocate, is that we need this and this is part of our life's blood as much as oxygen and food is. don't lose heart. look at there for all the various grants that are available to you. some of them might be very slow to unrao, and it might seem like too -- unroll, and it might seem like it's too late, but people are going to fight

to keep their beloved venues open, and as a band, you're going to be okay. [♪♪♪] [♪♪♪] >> i just don't know that you can find a neighborhood in the city where you can hear music stands and take a ride on the low rider down the street. it is an experience that you can't have anywhere else in san francisco. [♪♪♪] [♪♪♪]

>> district nine is a in the southeast portion of the city. we have four neighborhoods that i represent. st. mary's park has a completely unique architecture. very distinct feel, and it is a very close to holly park which is another beautiful park in san francisco. the bernal heights district is unique in that we have the hell which has one of the best views in all of san francisco. there is a swinging hanging from a tree at the top. it is as if you are swinging over the entire city. there are two unique aspects. it is considered the fourth chinatown in san francisco. sixty% of the residents are of chinese ancestry. the second unique, and fun aspect about this area is it is the garden district. there is a lot of urban agriculture and it was where the city grew the majority of the flowers. not only for san francisco but for the region. and of course, it is the location in mclaren park which

is the city's second biggest park after golden gate. many people don't know the neighborhood in the first place if they haven't been there. we call it the best neighborhood nobody has ever heard our. every neighborhood in district nine has a very special aspect. where we are right now is the mission district. the mission district is a very special part of our city. you smell the tacos at the [speaking spanish] and they have the best latin pastries. they have these shortbread cookies with caramel in the middle. and then you walk further down and you have sunrise café. it is a place that you come for the incredible food, but also to learn about what is happening in the neighborhood and how you can help and support your community. >> twenty-fourth street is the birthplace of the movement. we have over 620 murals. it is the largest outdoor public gallery in the country and

possibly the world. >> you can find so much political engagement park next to so much incredible art. it's another reason why we think this is a cultural district that we must preserve. [♪♪♪] >> it was formed in 2014. we had been an organization that had been around for over 20 years. we worked a lot in the neighborhood around life issues. most recently, in 2012, there were issues around gentrification in the neighborhood. so the idea of forming the cultural district was to help preserve the history and the culture that is in this neighborhood for the future of families and generations. >> in the past decade, 8,000 latino residents in the mission district have been displaced from their community. we all know that the rising cost of living in san francisco has led to many people being

displaced. lower and middle income all over the city. because it there is richness in this neighborhood that i also mentioned the fact it is flat and so accessible by trip public transportation, has, has made it very popular. >> it's a struggle for us right now, you know, when you get a lot of development coming to an area, a lot of new people coming to the area with different sets of values and different culture. there is a lot of struggle between the existing community and the newness coming in. there are some things that we do to try to slow it down so it doesn't completely erase the communities. we try to have developments that is more in tune with the community and more equitable development in the area. >> you need to meet with and gain the support and find out the needs of the neighborhoods. the people on the businesses that came before you. you need to dialogue and show respect. and then figure out how to bring in the new, without displacing

the old. [♪♪♪] >> i hope we can reset a lot of the mission that we have lost in the last 20 years. so we will be bringing in a lot of folks into the neighborhoods pick when we do that, there is a demand or, you know, certain types of services that pertain more to the local community and working-class. >> back in the day, we looked at mission street, and now it does not look and feel anything like mission street. this is the last stand of the latino concentrated arts, culture and cuisine and people. we created a cultural district to do our best to conserve that feeling. that is what makes our city so cosmopolitan and diverse and makes us the envy of the world. we have these unique neighborhoods with so much cultural presence and learnings, that we want to preserve. [♪♪♪]

>> chairman: this meeting will come to order. this is the june 28th, 2021 budget and appropriations. i'm joined by president walton, supervisors ronen, safai, and mar. i want to thank kaleena for broadcasting this meeting. madam clerk, do you have any announcements? >> clerk: yes, mr. chair. the minutes will reflect that committee members participated in this remote meeting to the extent as if publicly present.