i'm san francisco mayor london breed and i'm so excited to be here at the port today. we were just here celebrating juneteenth. every weekend there are some incredible markets and it was so crowded. the waterfront was alive and well. and, in fact, last weekend i think it was, these days go by so fast, i was at the giants game celebrating with roscoe. a full -- almost a full house, but it was amazing. amazing to see the waterfront active, to see it alive, to see the excitement and now we have a couple other things to add to our re-opening efforts. in fact, ferry service started today. additional ferry service around

the bay area. and, we also have opening this weekend the exploretorium and for tours the s.s. brian. and we even have more common includes fireworks on the northern waterfront for the 4th of july. and, finally, to top it all off as we get ready to re-open our city, it just wouldn't be the same unless we had fleet week returning in october. so a number of incredible milestones. a lot of great activities. san francisco has been through so much this past 15 months and i want to take this opportunity as i always do to really thank the people of the city for complying with the very challenging orders to

shelter-in-place to wear a mask, to get vaccinated. over 82% of san franciscans have been vaccinated and we just saw the announcement from the cdc that people were vaccinated don't necessarily need to wear a mask, however, we know there are still a lot of people that are not vaccinated and just because san francisco is doing a great job, doesn't mean there are others out there that aren't. we want to ask you because the cdc talked about today the variants and how the vaccine protects you from the variants and those who are vaccinated and we don't want to go backwards. we don't want to go back to that place where we're shutting our city down. i hope we don't have to go back to that place. in the meantime, it's so important that we enjoy our city. we enjoy all these great

attractions. we support one another, we have a great time. and what i've also consistently said, it is so important that when you are out in the streets now that our city is re-open that you keep a smile on your face because, right now, this is a privilege. and we have to remember, we were on lockdown for over 15 months in san francisco in the bay area and other parts of the country and so how much do we really appreciate being out here, being able to see faces without masks, being able to enjoy this cloudy, beautiful san francisco day. i will tell you that i am showing up to everything i'm invited to if i'm available. i've been to baby showers already, and birthday parties and other activities. openings. block parties. i even crashed a block party before when i was just driving by. i said you know what, i'm going

to say hi to a couple of neighbors because it feels good to see people again. because it feels good to be out again. keep that same positive spirit as we re-open and as activities begin and as folks are out doing and eating and drinking and being merry and having a good time because san francisco's coming back and we've got a lot of making up to do with the activities that we want to do that we missed out on the past year. thank you all so much for being here. enjoy the waterfront this weekend and some great activities and at this point, i want to introduce the director of the port of san francisco, elaine forbes. [applause] >> welcome everyone. i have a smile on my face. it's great to see everyone here at the waterfront not wearing a

mask. we're welcoming back 4th of july fireworks and fleet week. two cornerstone events for the waterfront. today we're celebrating the re-opening of the exploretorium and the s.s. jeremiah. increased ferry service starts today with 30% more ferries running. the ferries are here to enjoy the beautiful bay while commuting or just having some fun. next month, we have the return of cable cars and meanwhile we have the f-line running up and down the embarcadero. summer on the waterfront is here. there are so many adventures to be had. the port is proud to be home to really an amazing seven and a half miles of bayside waterfront in the city. our water front includes peer 39, fisherman's wharf, and amazing parks and opens and heron's head park in the southern waterfront and more

than 10 installations of public art. i want to thank our mayor, mayor breed for her incredible support of this waterfront and bringing back events like the 4th of july and fleet week. and of course, for her stellar leadership in navigating the pandemic and getting us safely to today as she re-opens and oversees the comeback of our city. the port welcomes more than 24 million visitors a year. economic activity here supports $4 billion in economic annual output for the city and more than 16,000 jobs. that is why we're excited to welcome back cruises this fall which brings about 300,000 visitors to the waterfront each year. our cruises will follow the cdc guidelines and we'll have vaccinated passengers and crews and we're expecting our first cruise ship in september. this fall, we're partnering with small businesses and local artists. we want to show case our local

talent and create tailor made experiences for fun and enjoyment. from crane cove park to pier 29, activities draw people to the waterfront supporting economic recorpse. these will happen as we welcome cruises, cable cars, fleet week, and hopefully a giants playoff season. thank you all for coming out today supporting our waterfront, a prosperous waterfront is a prosperous city. we welcome you to come down and enjoy some of the world's best views, best food, and best experiences. and now, please join me in welcoming phoebe white. this museum brings hundreds and hundreds of children and adults to our water front for learning fun.

following phoebe white, we'll hear from louis lovan and rear admiral wayne bays. thank you so much for being here today. [applause] >> thank you, elaine, and thank you, madam mayor, for your remarks today and more importantly for your leadership. we're so proud to be part of the san francisco community. i'm absolutely thrilled to see the progress we have made against the pandemic. it's an absolute honor to be here today and with our colleagues and neighbors on the waterfront of this wonderful city. i am delighted to share and you already know that after 15 months of closure, the

exploretorium opened today. it is wonderful to see our community re-opening fully and to be part of the collective energy that is reemerging and gaining momentum in the bay area. i would also like to personally take the opportunity to thank elaine forbes and the port for their support and partnership since we first moved to the waterfront in 2013 the exploratorium is a learning organization. we as a community have also learning and experienced more directly than ever the critical role that science plays in all of our lives. whether it's the science behind the pandemic or vaccines or climate change or the role of technology in our lives today.

some of the defining issues of our time have all highlighted how important it is for everyone to engage in topics of science. our vision is a world where people think for themselves and can confidently ask questions, questions answered and understand the world around them. at the exploretor yum and explore topics of science and ways that work for them. we don't tell people what to think, where to go, what to do. there are no right or wrong answers when you're exploring and learning.

so come on down. go online, purchase tickets yes, we're managing capacity and we honor all e.b.t. and museums for all card holders at the door but most of all, have fun. thank you madam mayor for the privilege of speaking today and i'd like to introduce louis lovan executive director of san francisco fleet week. thank you. >> let me take off my super cool san francisco fleet week mask. thank you very much, phoebe.

by the way the exploratorium rocks. do you guys still have the tactile dome? okay. that's the thing to do. it's true, we have all these events that are going to take place out on the waterfront. i have commander of strike group 3. admiral bays' assets are what will be coming up to san francisco and he'll talk to you about that. i'm very excited to bring back the live fleet week events including the fleet week air show presented by united. if you don't know it, you'll know when it arrives. it comes big and loud and it's a wonderful thing to do down on the marina green throughout the city and the bay. most of our events are outdoors. we'll have neighborhood concerts. the parade of ships, of course. and a number of other things that you can find out about by looking at our website

fleetweeksf.org or follow us@fleetweeksf. get the up to date information. right now, it's a full complement of fleet week events and, with that, i'm going to introduce admiral bays. >> wow. what a pleasure it is to be out here live in person without a mask on. thank you, mayor, for including me in today. yes, admiral wayne bays. i'm honored and excited to be with you today on behalf of your navy corps and coast guard team. as you all know, we could not do a fleet week in 2020 because of the coronavirus pandemic. but i'm really happy to say we're going to bring service members from the navy, marine corps and coast guard to be here with you in person for fleet week 2021 to celebrate the strong, long-lasting bonds

that exist between the military and this community which is a wonderful place. we're bringing ships, we're bringing aircraft, we're bringing equipment. we're going to bring the navy blue angels. i'm going to bring bands from the navy and marine corps. but the best thing we're going to bring -- yeah, that's okay. bring the hands. but the best thing we're going to bring is young sailors and marines and coast guard men and women to be part of this city and to meet you. [applause] yeah. so the last 15 months, we couldn't get out and about. but because of the change conditions, i want these sailors and coast guard men and women to come outlet amongst the community and meet you in person. i was here last time in 2014 when u.s.s commissioned.

you're going to be as proud of them as i am. now, fleet week is fun, but it's not just all about a port call. we also do training while we're here. we take advantage of all these ships and equipment and people getting together and we work to do training on things like disaster recovery efforts with local experts here. so i'm talking about emergency management, police, fire and medical professionals and other recovery people. this is about practicing our skill sets so that during times of emergencies or crisis, the military can support military authority its effectively and efficiently. it's really important training i think when you look back at the pandemic, it kind of puts an accent on the importance of that continued effort. so we cannot be with you in person in 2020, but i do believe that absence makes the heart grow fonder. so we're super energized to bring everything we've got to make this the best fleet week

possible in 2021. i thank you so much for the hospitality of this city. i look forward to meeting you all and my wife and i sincerely thank you if from the bottom of our hearts for celebrating our men and women that serve the military on behalf of this great nation. thank you so much and i hope to meet everybody in october. >> thank you, admiral bays and we really appreciate having you here and just touching a little bit about fleet week and our plans around emergency preparedness and our director of the department of emergency management is here. mary ellen carol. thank you so much for being here. she did an incredible job leading the efforts around covid here in san francisco. and so we will definitely take full advantage of the opportunity during fleet week to make sure that our emergency personnel are working with federal officials to take advantage of the opportunities to train, to learn, to grow,

and to be prepared for any situation for each and every one of you. when i look out into the waterfront and this area, again, i tell you all to keep a smile on your face. when this waterfront had the freeway before the '89 earthquake. and i remember when i was at galleleo high school. they would fly over at practice when we were out at lunch. it was incredible to have these planes fly directly over our schools and i think about those times and i think about where we are now as a city today. we've experienced challenging times before, but like this beautiful waterfront that's now open with no freeway in sight and if you didn't know about the history, and you probably

would never imagine how our freeway could block such a beautiful place. san francisco is a beautiful place and we celebrate our history and our diversity, but more importantly, as we come out of this pandemic, we celebrate our resilience to survive another situation that could have knocked us down. it set us back just a tad bit and as a result of that, we're coming back stronger. the phoenix will rise again. san francisco is rising again as we begin to re-open and having these incredible spaces, all these wonderful activities along our waterfront is going to make re-opening so much better. so i hope you will take advantage of these great opportunities to enjoy san francisco, to welcome your friends and family members from around the world, an the united states, around the bay area. there will continue to be activities and always great

food and wonderful views that will just continue to put a smile on your face. so thank you all so much for being here and thank you all for helping us get through this pandemic. san francisco is back. thank you. [applause] >> when i look at an old neon sign that's working or not working, i feel the family business that was in there. >> since 2009, citywide, sf shines, has supported businesses and sites like the ones that receive new neon signs. >> you know, sf shines is doing

an amazing job to bring back the lighting and the neon glow of san francisco. >> sf shines is such an amazing program, and i can't think of another program in another city that gives matching gunned funds to store owners, mom and pop owners, and if they've got a neon sign, they've really got a great way to advertise their business. >> this is a continuation of the sf shines program. >> focusing other neon signs is relatively new to us. of the seven neon signs, we've invested about $145,000. >> a good quality sign costs more, but it lasts infinitily longer. as opposed to lasting five

years, a good neon sign will last 15 to 20 years. >> in san francisco, the majority of neon signs are for mom-and-pop businesses. in order to be able to restore these signs, i think it gives back to your community. >> part of the project has to do with prioritizing certain signs in the neighborhood based on their aesthetics, based on their current signs, and base on the history. in the time that we've been here, we've seen a number of signs restored just on eddy street. >> there are a number of signs in the tenderloin and many more that are waiting or wanting to be restored. i have worked with randall and al, and we've mapped out every single one of them and rated them as to how much work they would need to get restored. that information is passed onto sf shines, and they are going

to rank it. so if they have x budget for a year, they can say all right, we're going to pick these five, and they're putting together clusters, so they build on top of what's already there. >> a cluster of neon signs is sort of, i guess, like a cluster of grapes. when you see them on a corner or on a block, it lights up the neighborhood and creates an ambient glow. if you havy got two of three of them, you've created an atmosphere that's almost like a movie set. >> some of the hotel, we've already invested in to get those neon signs for people to enjoy at night include the elk hotel, jefferson hotel, the verona, not to mention some we've done in chinatown, as well as the city's portal neighborhood. >> we got the fund to restore it.

it took five months, and the biggest challenge was it was completely infested with pigeons. once we got it clean, it came out beautiful. >> neon signs are often equated with film noir, and the noir genre as seen through the hollywood lens basically depicted despair and concentration. >> you would go downtown and see the most recent humphrey bogart film filled with neon in the background. and you'd see that on market street, and as market street got seedier and seedier and fewer people continued to go down, that was what happened to all the neon strips of light. >> the film nori might start

with the light filled with neon signs, and end with a scene with a single neon sign blinking and missing a few letters. >> one of my favorite scenes, orson welles is chasing rita hayworth with neon signs in the background. >> i think what the office of economic and workforce development is very excited with is that we'll be able to see more neon signs in a concentrated way lit up at night for visitors and most especially residents. the first coin laundry, the elm hotel, the western hotel are ones that we want to focus on

in the year ahead. >> neon signs are so iconic to certain neighborhoods like the hara, like the nightcap. we want to save as many historic and legacy neon signs in san francisco, and so do they. we bring the expertise, and they bring the means to actually get the job done. >> people in tenderloin get really excited as they see the signs relit. as you're driving through the tenderloin or the city, it pretty much tells you something exciting is happening here. >> knee an was created to make the night more friendly and advertise businesses. it's a great way of supporting and helping local businesses. >> there's so many ways to improve public safety. the standard way is having more eyes on the street, but there's other culturally significant ways to do that, and one those ways is lighting up the streets. but what better way and special way to do that is by having

old, historic neon signs lighting up our streets at night and casting away our shadows. >> when i see things coming back to life, it's like remembering how things were. it's remembering the hotel or the market that went to work seven days a week to raise their money or to provide a service, and it just -- it >> shop and dine in the 49 promotes local businesses and challenges residents to do their

business in the 49 square files of san francisco. we help san francisco remain unique, successful and right vi. so where will you shop and dine in the 49? >> i'm one of three owners here in san francisco and we provide mostly live music entertainment and we have food, the type of food that we have a mexican food and it's not a big menu, but we did it with love. like ribeye tacos and quesadillas and fries. for latinos, it brings families together and if we can bring that family to your business, you're gold. tonight we have russelling for e community. >> we have a ten-person limb

elimination match. we have a full-size ring with barside food and drink. we ended up getting wrestling here with puoillo del mar. we're hope og get families to join us. we've done a drag queen bingo and we're trying to be a diverse kind of club, trying different things. this is a great part of town and there's a bunch of shops, a variety of stores and ethnic restaurants. there's a popular little shop that all of the kids like to hang out at. we have a great breakfast spot call brick fast at tiffanies. some of the older businesses are refurbished and newer businesses are coming in and it's exciting. >> we even have our own brewery for fdr, ferment, drink repeat.

it's in the san francisco garden district and four beautiful murals. >> it's important to shop local because it's kind of like a circle of life, if you will. we hire local people. local people spend their money at our businesses and those local people will spend their money as well. i hope people shop locally. [ ♪♪♪ ]

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