job. i wouldn't be able to do this job without my team. you can assign them any job, they can handle it, and again, without them, i wouldn't be here. i take pride, you know, for what i do. we are providing a very good water department. my name is roselle, and i have been working with the water department . >> chairman: good afternoon. this meeting will come to order. welcome to the july 26th, 2021,

the land use and transportation committee. i'm supervisor myrna melgar. we are also joined by supervisors connie chan and supervisor shsha safai. >> clerk: to the same extent as if they are physically present. the board recognizes that public access to city services is essential and invite public participation in the following ways. you can make public comment via phone. channel 29 are streaming the call-in number across the

screen. comments or opportunities to speak during the public comment period may be made via phone by calling the number on the screen. that's (415) 655-0001. and the meeting i.d. is 146 916 4664. i'll repeat that. that's 146 916 4664 and then press pound and pound again. when connected, you will hear the meeting discussion, but you will be muted and in listening mode only. when your item of interest comes up, please dial star and then three to be added to the speaker line. best practices are to call from a quiet location, speak clearly and slowly and turn down your television or radio. alternatively, you may submit public comment in either of the following ways, you can e-mail myself the land use and

transportation clerk. if you submit public comment via e-mail, it will be forwarded to the supervisors and be made part of the official file. you may also send correspondence to city hall. finally items acted upon today appear on the border supervisors agenda. today, we have agnes lee assisting with chinese interpretation. agnes, thank you for joining us today and if you can please make opening announcements. [speaking chinese]

. >> clerk: thank you, madam chair, that was the opening announcements. >> thank you, madam clerk. please call item number one. >> clerk: yes, item number one is ordinance amending the environment public works health from the department of environment for each vehicle and debris box used for such transport and affirming appropriate findings. members of the public who wish to provide public comment on this item should call the

number on the screen. that number is (415) 655-0001. the meeting i.d. is 466964664. then press pound and pound again. you'll only need to press this once. please wait until the system indicates that you have been unmuted and you may begin your comments when we get to public comment and we have agnes lee to call out item number one as well. agnes. >> [speaking chinese]

. >> chairman: thank you so much. we are joined by supervisor safai who will make a comment. supervisor safai, remember that agnes will be translating for you after you are done with your remarks and, colleagues, we will also have a translation of any comments you have as well. welcome, supervisor safai. >> supervisor safai: thank you, colleagues.

i'll be very brief. i just wanted to thank you all for the amendments last week, thank you for your support. i will be remissed to not make my staff or ej, earnest jones who put a lot of work on top of this that my previous staffers have done. this is a labor of love taken over two years, but we feel like this is an appropriate step, a very important step that will help us to achieve, take a big step toward achieving our environmental goals and zero waste in the city. and, at the same time, cut down on illegal disposal and make that proper dispossessedal and illegal dumping. and extend that to our vehicle

transporters that are taking mixed construction and debris. should i stop and let her translate? is that okay. >> translator: sorry i am doing for p.c. session. yes. >> supervisor safai: okay. >> clerk: through the chair. it's a bit different for remote. we do interpretation for public comment, but in live meeting, agnes would be in the room interpreting, but because it's remotely, we only do it during public comment. >> chairman: sorry about that. i think i gave the wrong instructions. thank you, supervisor safai, you can finish your comments. >> supervisor safai: okay. thank you. and that was it. thank you to the department of environment and their team, director rafael, joseph's wife and an entire department along

with public works and their staff, the sheriff for all of their collaboration and thank you to my close sponsor president walton for his continued support on this effort. so that's it. thank you. >> chairman: thank you, supervisor safai. we've heard this item last time we met and we -- there were significant -- substantiative amendments that were introduced by supervisor safai. so if no one as any questions from the committee and i don't see anybody's name on the roster, we can go to public comment. madam clerk. >> clerk: thank you, madam chair. d.t.a. check to go see if there are any callers in the cue. if you have not done so already, please press star three to be added to the queue. for those already on hold, please continue to wait until the system indicates that you have been unmuted. we have sixteen listeners with

one speaker in the queue. if you can unmute the caller, please. >> yes. i support the legislation. thank you. >> clerk: thank you. and it looks like that was the only caller. >> chairman: okay. with that, public comment is closed. supervisor preston. >> supervisor preston: thank you, chair melgar. i just wanted to thank supervisor safai for his leadership on this and i know there was a ton of work that went into this and appreciate all his work and his team and also from mr. jones and the department of environment folks. i think there are some ordinances that come through committee that may or may not grab a lot of headlines, but have a huge impact and i think that the, you know, the scale

of the of these issues and the environmental impact when this isn't done right is really significant. i just want to appreciate all your work on this, supervisor safai. >> supervisor safai: thank you. >> chairman: i think you were going to make a motion, supervisor preston, but, before you do that, there is one other public commentor who wants to tell us something. so ms. major. >> thank you guys. >> clerk: thank you, madam chair. if you can unmute the last caller, please. >> hello. [ speaking foreign language ] >> [speaking foreign language]

>> sorry. >> [speaking foreign language]. >> translator: the caller is here for item two. >> clerk: thank you. thank you so much. let me just confirm with d.t. if there are any more callers in queue. she's typing. it looks like we have eighteen listeners with four in queue. agnes, can you do me a favor and just make one more announcement that this is for item number one, public comment and if folks would like to make public comment, just go ahead and press star three. >> [speaking chinese].

>> clerk: all right. we have nineteen listeners with four in queue. if you can unmute the first caller. hello, caller. you're on the line.

it looks like that caller hung up. >> so we're going to move to the next caller. hello, you're on the line. >> hello? hello, caller. hi, you're on the line for item number one. >> am i on? >> yes. >> clerk: hello, sir. sir, if you can lower the volume of your tv, that might

help. >> translator: [speaking chinese] >> hello? [speaking foreign language] . >> translator: this caller is still for item number two. >> clerk: oh, okay. let's take the next caller, please.

>> translator: [speaking chinese] thank you. >> clerk: okay. next speaker, please. hello, caller. you're on the line. looks like they hung up. okay. and, let's take the last caller. >> can you hear me now?

>> clerk: yes. go ahead. >> okay. good afternoon. david pillpell. i just wanted to agree with supervisor preston's observations that this is the kind of ordinance that doesn't get as much press, but has a lot of impact. i wanted to thank supervisor safai for him and his staff and their considerable work on this, the city attorney, the various folks at the department of the environment, james, jack, robert, debbie, jennifer, charles, eden, i may be missing folks. anyway, great work. i'm sure there's more to do on c.n.d., it's a big and complicated area. but this is a significant step forward and thank you to all who've labored hard to make this happen. thanks again. >> clerk: thank you. next speaker, please. >> chairman: madam clerk, i was wondering if there are any

mr. speakers in the queue. agnes, could you please make an announcement in chinese what is item number one because folks are not understanding that this is not the lincoln park item. they're just hearing item number one. so if you can make that announcement and go back to the queue if you're not here to speak about the demolition debris, that would be really helpful i think. please, agnes. >> translator: [speaking chinese]

thank you. >> clerk: through the chair, there are no more callers in the queue. >> chairman: okay. thank you very much, madam clerk. now, i think supervisor preston was going to make a motion. >> supervisor preston: happy to move this item to the full board with recommendation. >> chairman: thank you, supervisor. madam clerk, can you call the roll. >> clerk: yes, madam chair. item number one, [roll call] you have three ayes. >> chairman: thank you, madam clerk. the motion passes. will you please call the next item. >> clerk: yes, item number two

is a resolution initiating a landmark edition under article 10 of the planning code for lincoln park. members of the public who wish to provide public comment on item number two, should call the number on the screen. that number is (415) 655-0001. the meeting i.d. is 146 916 4664. and, agnes, if you can make an announcement of item number two, please. >> translator: [speaking chinese]

thank you, madam clerk. >> chairman: thank you, very much. we are now joined by supervisor connie chan. supervisor chan, thank you so much for introducing this item. as a member of a different immigrant community, i just thank you from the bottom of my heart. i think it's so important that we keep the stories and the history and the culture alive of folks to build a city and whose stories don't often get told and not incorporated in a lot of the history that gets passed down. i think it's very significant. thank you so much for the thoughtfulness and the floor is yours. >> supervisor chan: thank you, chair melgar if you may indulge me i want to make a quick remark in chinese and letting some of our constituents know this item is up. [speaking chinese]

thank you, chair melgar for scheduling this today. i am so excited to be initiating a landmark for lincoln park formally known as "city cemetery." from the 1870s until the early 1900s, city cemetery was used as a burial ground for veteran chinese, japanese, french, greek,

scandinavian, italian and jewish association. an estimated 20,000 bodies rest beneath the turf out after which, half were chinese immigrants. and two prominent cemetery monuments still stand. throughout the open line time of the cemetery and years after, chinese family associations sent representatives to temporarily burry to see chinese immigrants who would then be entered by a bone collector who prepared the remains to be transported to their home villages back in china. the burial of the deceased in the chinese section of chinese cemetery -- of city cemetery was a location for religious rights that include prayer, the burning of inscents, and the burning of symbolic paper money and clothes for the deceased's

journey into the afterlife. after its reclassification as in municipal park in 1909, that benevolent social and religious societies with cemetery section were given six months to find these remains of the buried dead which occur in a scattered and disorganized fashion and as indicated by municipal reports, removal continue as late as 1916. it remains unclear which societies we move there and how many burials were removed because no registers, records, or deeds about the cemetery have survived. it stands proud today as a

symbolic and and as an elected leader and a chinese immigrant, this is deeply personal moment for me to have the privilege of honoring the history and sacrifice of generations of chinese immigrants and immigrants like chair melgar has mentioned from all over the world. before even my own arrival and our arrival as a first generation immigrant. and, as we walk on the ground of lincoln park, it is my hope that this landmark destination will help us remember the blood and tears of our ancestors shed as part of the power that has built san francisco into the great city that it is today. i would like to that all the community members and organizations who have sent in letters of support including the chinese benevolent association also known as chinese companies. chinese historical society, a.a.p.i. and historic

preservation. and really, a special thanks to the descendants of the man who donated part of the land that is now known as lincoln park. as a reminder that it was due to the generosity of the family that san franciscans are able to enjoy lincoln park as a public park today. i will also like to thank marshell pudrow from the planning department who's available to answer your questions as well as stacy bradley from the san francisco recreation and parks department. my office has proactively convened multiple meetings between planning and rec and park to ensure that a landmark designation for lincoln park will not interfere with the recreational activities in the park or the maintenance of the golf course which i know is a concern that has been raised by

some. last, but not least, i especially want to thank the interim president and ceo of san francisco heritage for all the time and energy he and his team have put into researching city cemetery and organizing a diverse group of community members and organizations in support of this legislation. and, it's also going to be the city's first archaeological land marc. here today and making a short presentation on the historical significance of lincoln park. with you i'd like to turn it over. >> thank you, supervisor chan for that great introduction. i don't know that i can add much more, but i can show some nice photos of what you've said. i'm from san francisco heritage and i'm here briefly just to

share some information on the former city cemetery, now the site of lincoln park in the outer richmond district. shortly after the creation of san francisco, a municipal cemetery was located on the edge of the city limits. a triangular plot shown circled in red in the lower right. you can see it here. it was called yerba buena cemetery and by the 1860s, it was fast filling up while the city planned to use the site for a new civic center and city hall. we can add to the western outside land in one thousand eight hundred sixty-six. four large private cemeteries had already been established around lone mountain when the city created its own reservation for a new 200-acre city cemetery in 1868.

this land is now occupied by lincoln park in the east and the fort meyer v.a. medical center on the west. the federal government created fort miley in 1893. at the time, there hadn't been any burials on that section of the land. city cemetery was officially established in 1870 with the first internments of about 250 people moved from the former yerba buena cemetery. in addition to the city and county sections which we've used for indigenous dead buried there were sections granted to various organizations. these were ethnic, occupational, or fraternal based. they were defined and fenced off. jewish, german, japanese, italian, french, african american, greek, and scottish sections as well as one for members of the grand army of the republic, civil war vets

who had fought on the union side. the knights of pithius. at least 20,000 bodies were buried at city cemetery between the late 1870s and the late 1890s. just as with the former year, the buena cemetery, the city's growth began putting pressure on the valuable real estate used by all the cemeteries. new large burial grounds were established in what is now the town of culma and as early as 1887, there were proposals to turn city cemetery into a park. new burials in the city were banned by ordinance 25 at the turn of the 20th century. in one thousand nine hundred nine, the city gave the various associations six months to move their buried members out of city cemetery so that it could be turned into a park. the city and county did not feel it was necessary to move the thousands of bodies the

county itself had buried over the years deciding to leave the individuals under the ground of the new park. mostly, economically disadvantaged, these people still there never had more than a simple wooden cross as marker. and, although there were objections, the ruling attitude was reflected in newspaper headlines like the dead must not be permitted to injure the living. some bodies were removed on an ad hoc basis over the next decade or so. fences, caretaker cottages, gates, markers and other cemetery related infrastructure were removed for the creation of the lincoln park golf course. but two notable structures were left for unknown reasons and remain today amid the fareways and the greens. one you can see here on the left. this structure was erected and used by the gong chao

benevolent association. the chinese script refers to this as a temporary resting place before the bones of the dead were sent to their home village in china. i recently had the pleasure of meeting a descendant of the gentleman who replaced this section. it's an amazing structure still there today. not far away in what was a section for working sailors sponsored by a charity named "the lady's seaman's friend's society." it has a dedication to the charity's founder, mrs. rebecca lambert, but the most significant remainder of the 30-year history of the cemetery are the thousands of san franciscans still lying under ground remains often comes to light notably some 900 bodies were uncovered during

the 1993 and 1994 renovation of the california legion of honor museum. there are many markers, plaques, memorials in lincoln park touching on notable individuals and events. including the holocaust, world war i, the creation of the 1920 lincoln highway. mostly hidden on the golf course, there's nothing interpreting city cemetery or commemorating the more than 20,000 san franciscans still at rest there. we could of talked a lot longer about it, but if you have any questions, i'm delighted to answer them. thank you. >> chairman: thank you, so much mr. lebounty. i really appreciated the pictures to go with supervisor

chan's story. supervisor peskin. >> supervisor peskin: thank you, madam chair. i'm disappointed on the e-mails i got on behalf of the san francisco golf alliance. i would be honored to be listed as a co-sponsor. >> chairman: thank you, supervisor peskin. supervisor mar. welcome to our committee. go ahead. >> supervisor mar: thanks chair melgar. i'm actually here for another item but i'd like to thank you for the opportunity on this for bringing this landmark designation forward. kind of like the action the board just took last week to

establish. just to confirm on the effort to really recognize and lift up the rich heritage of the chinese community and in this case, many different, you know, ethnic communities in our city as well as other communities and especially on the west side of the city. so thanks to the chinese historical society of america and all the advocates and i would love to be added as a co-sponsor as well. >> chairman: supervisor preston. >> supervisor preston: thank you, chair melgar and supervisor chan and also just sharing so much of this history with all of san francisco. so i would love to be added as

a co-sponsor and thanks for bringing this forward. >> chairman: thank you, supervisor preston. and, supervisor chan, i would love to be added as a co-sponsor as well. thank you so much. did you want to say a last few words before we go to public comment? >> supervisor chan: i do and thank you so much, chair melgar, and thank you, colleagues, for your co-sponsorships. i think it really speaks loudly about where this board stands especially for the aapi communities and the ethnic communities in san francisco especially in this climate right now with a lot of just hate going on before we do move

forward, i do want to because of what supervisor peskin has brought up, i do want to acknowledge the comments and the letters that came in with some of those who are golfers or, you know, advocates for golf course that i would love to call on the planning department. in this case, i think allison vanderslice is here. i want to confirm with this legislation, it will not prevent the city department from maintaining the golf course that permeates this at lincoln park. i'm here today and to answer your question, the planning

department does have a very robust archaeological review that's undertaken under the california environmental quality act. those review procedures would stay in place and based on our discussions with my department, those processes would not change as part of the landmarking. so there wouldn't be additional review procedures. so therefore ordinary maintenance and repair as well as other utility work such as irrigation work and other work that would need to continue forward to do maintenance would not be impacted and would continue as they do which i'm happy to answer questions on. thank you. >> supervisor chan: great. and i think that a lot of folks

also think about that any other type of renovation, i think even without this and could you please confirm for us on the record just so that folks actually understand how it works. >> yes, so i mean right now, the department has a pretty robust review of projects that need to go through soilster event at lincoln park. so we have clear procedures in place. i'm happy to go into more details about what we currently undertake. any major projects there such as redesign of the golf course would need to go through that kind of environmental review as well and would need to go through a series of identification, of locations, of potential locations, of human remains and then very careful removal of those remains outreach with dissonant

communities, reburial, public interpretation, all of that would be already required and so we're not anticipating that those would change. major changes or those smaller irrigation projects going through different levels of those treatment processes depending on the types of impacts they would be causing to the remains and the level of disturbance that they're causing. >> supervisor chan: thank you. i really appreciate the explanation and i really hope that also help this lands mark destination legislation is to formalize what the park has already been in place. it truly is a way to recognize all of our ancestors, not just

chinese immigrants but just really a diverse group of those immigrant that is came and built san francisco. it's really truly an honor to not just honoring the chinese immigrants but all of them that built san francisco and make us who we are today and, you know, i wouldn't label myself as like spiritual, but i definitely am a person who loved to remember our history because i think we need to know where we've been in order to know where we're going and i actually love that philosophy. and, i value that. and i really am grateful that my colleagues on this thank you chair melgar for indulging me in this time. >> clerk: thank you, madam

chair. checking to see if there are any callers in the queue. if you haven't done so already, please press star to be added to the queue. please continue to wait until the system indicates that you have been unmuted. it looks like we have twenty listeners with 12 in queue. can you please unmute the first caller. >> hi, good afternoon, madam chair and to the board of supervisors. i am speaking on behalf of the board of directors of asian and pacific islander americans and historic preservation in support of the city landmark

the history is almost nonexistent. the city of san francisco has promoted its multi-racial, multi-ethnic sectors including historic preservation. lincoln park is notable in the way in which communities are embedded in the site and identities and history from a very wide public. we applaud local steakholders who've been working with the city's planning on this effort. we commend supervisor chan for her leadership on this designation. and we recognize that designation and not alter the general maintenance work or current use of the golf course or the legion of honor. we also acknowledge that a broad coalition have historical

connections to the city cemetery and we owe it to our ancestors and predecessors, many of who are still there to recognize its importance. a landmark designation would be an important first step. i thank you for your time and strongly urge you, the commission to support the city landmark designation of lincoln park. thank you. >> clerk: next speaker, please. >> hello. hello. >> clerk: hello. you're on the line. >> okay. my name's larry yee. i'm the presiding president of the chinese benevolence association and we are all in support of connie chan's motion to place the lincoln landmark which has the burial shrine there as well as the other shrine. this place is a resting place for our earlier dissidents.

and many of them did not go home and they made america their home and they buried their bones here in america. i also want to thank this body for being cosponsor of this resolution and, as someone would say to the golfers, as you make this a historical landmark, this park will stay as it is. they will not be transforming other than the golf course. so you can thank god for connie chan's motion here and i would speak for our association that was in 1872 that were in i guess had stakes in here and many other associations in chinatown. so in speaking of chinatown, i would say this is a special place for us.

this is where our ancestors are laid to rest and please do not disturb our ancestors. thank you very much and i'm looking forward to go to the full board. thank you, connie chan. thank you. >> clerk: thank you for your comment. through the chair, just want to repeat the announcement for folks on the line. members of the public who wish to provide public comment on this item should call the number on the screen. that number's (415) 655-0001. the meeting i.d. is 146 916 4664 and then press pound and then pound again. the system will indicate you have raised your hand and please wait until the system indicates you have been unmuted and you may begin your comments. agnes, if you can repeat the announcement in turquoise for me please and in green.

>> translator: okay. [speaking chinese] thank you.

>> clerk: thank you so much. can you unmute the next caller, please. >> good afternoon, members of the board of supervisors. thank you for having this hearing. my name is richard grossman. i'm a district one resident and

i live not too far from lincoln park. i went on a walking tour to see this monument and learn the history of this area that had the cemeteries there and it's really a rich history and i strongly urge this become a city landmark and i would urge another hearing about the zoo. i think it's time for that to become a landmark and the planning commission staff as of all the paper work it needs to process the application. so i look forward to hearing on the mother's building project. thank you. >> clerk: thank you, mr. rossman. next speaker. >> hi, my name is grant ingraham.

i'm a district one resident i'm also an chuck supporter of public golf in san francisco and i was part of the effort this past weekend which obtained the signatures of over 150 park golfers who expressed their concern about this initiative. and many of these golfers were seniors of asian heritage. we will not apologize we have real concerns that this initiative didn't consider the ongoing survival of the course. at the same time, every golfer i spoke to strongly supported celebrating and commemorating the great pre-golf history at lincoln park. it's likely the oldest public golf course in the western united states and it's a living resource of the health and

happiness of san franciscans. the golf community strongly is in favor of reasonable efforts to commemorate the history of this site, but i'm sure we can find a way to work together without limiting the ability to operate the lincoln park golf course. thank you very much for your time. >> clerk: thank you, mr. ingraham. next speaker. >> hello chairperson melgar and the other supervisor members. i would encourage the entire board to vote in favor of the designation of lincoln park. signage is also of utmost

importance. this property known as golden gate cemeteriment between the 1860s in early 1900s. it was the only municipal barrier place in san francisco for at least 23,000 indigent dead. in looking at the 24 different societies granted sections, these communities included various ethnicities coming to san francisco to seek a better life. through history, these immigrants have contributed to the growth and development of san francisco and california in numerous industries. the chinese specifically in agriculture, commerce, manufacturing, and fishing. in the 1860s, the chinese were the dominant work force of the transcontinental railroad. the chinese showed their intellectual contributions and

ultimately raised america's global status. this burial ground is their resting place and the ancestrial grounds of the ancestors. which needs to be preserved in order to honor the chinese pioneers who without fortune sack fused, endured, and contributed to america's growth, improvement, and development. thank you for your co-sponsorship, supervisors, to designate lincoln park for landmark designation. >> clerk: thank you so much. next speaker, please. >> this is richard harris with the san francisco public golf alliance. we wrote a letter on may 25 and

then this weekend collected many letters which it sounds like the committee has received. and thank you for that. the monument and the golf use of the property have coexisted nicely. the golfers and the maintenance staff making the rounds have preserved those two outstanding monuments from vandalism for 100 years. and they should be able to coexist in the future. we are concerned as we have set forth in our letters that the maintenance and renovation including trenching for irrigation. it's a site that has been

designated for recycled water already. drainage and other course improvements, potential renovation. we are concerned that that be enabled with the designation with whatever landmarking plaques and recognition, trails, whatever is appropriate. we think that can be done, but that will depend on the language of the final legislation and we want to be part of it and included in that. we thank supervisor chan for her comments in the introductory remarks that she does not intend this to

interfere with the golf use. thank you very much. >> clerk: thank you so much. next speaker. >> hello. my name's john martini. i am a san francisco native. i have the honor to work with the national parks service around san francisco and around the country and i finished as a historian at the presidio san francisco. transition transition [please stand by]

california oil fields and ended up on a sand dune overlooking the golden gate, what we call lincoln park. during the research, what struck

me was not only these people represented a part of san francisco that we don't often think about, but also how many of them were still there. the idea that it was a conscious decision if the bodies weren't -- or represents a different thinking of a different time. >> clerk: thank you. next speaker please? >> hello. i'm the great, great granddaughter who donated the property for chinese immigrants living in san francisco. i'm calling today in support of making the temple, lincoln park cemetery a san francisco landmark. as stated in supervisor connie chan's resolution, this land is

sacred ground as no one knows how many chinese and ethnic and immigrant community members remain in the lincoln park cemetery. i would also like to suggest that if budget allows that signage be erected designating the landmark so visitors know where it is located. we owe it to our many chinese foremothers and forefathers who still remain here, the great respect due to them and to keep this land forever honored by making it a sanctuary for ancestor worship. i thank you for your time to the full board of supervisors. >> thank you. next speaker please. >> hello. this is robert wong.

i am with the chinese consolidated association and i also represent the chinese american citizens alliance as the past president. i strongly urge the san francisco board of supervisors to support supervisor connie chan's motion to place lincoln park, including the shrine and other similar shrines on the san francisco historical landmark list. a heritage for chinese americans here in america because this was the beginning of the history of chinese americans. thank you for your time and hopefully we can pass this.

everybody have a nice day. >> thank you mr. wong. next speaker please. >> hello. >> hello, you're on the line. >> hello. (speaking chinese) can you speak closer to your phone? >> hello? (speaking chinese)

>> it might help to turn down the tv so there's not an echo. (speaking chinese) (speaking mandarin)

>> speaker's time has expired and we need two minutes for the interpretation. thank you. hello members of land use and transportation committees.

i'm with the chinese consolidating association. i'm here to support the resolution introduced by supervisor connie chan regarding the initiative for the definition of lincoln park as city landmark. while i'm here to support the resolutions is because for most chinese americans, they are immigrant here for almost 100 years ago and make a lot of contributions to americans. they help to build roads and helped with -- as you know, in the city cemetery, there are 20,000 remains in cemeteries and

among those about 10,000 are for chinese remains. why the chinese people deserve this is because chinese people work very hard, decades ago and make a lot of contributions decades ago for u.s. when they get older, they cannot come back to china, that's why they were buried here. and i really hope you can value the contribution made by the earlier transimmigrants and the reason i'm here to support the resolution introduced by supervisor connie chan and also we hope through this resolution, we can help to preserve and protect our chinese heritage and

also i really think as for the golfers, we are not really against them to play golf in this land, but we hope they can understand why we really think this resolution should be passed. thank you. >> thank you. next speaker please. >> hello. hello? (speaking mandarin)

(voice of translator): hello members of land use and transport committee. i'm here to support the resolution introduced by supervisor connie chan regarding

initiates for the designation of lincoln park as a city landmark because we really think that the monument is really important because it can help us to commemorate how important the contributions made by the chinese americans thank you for your consideration. thank you. (end of translation)

>> next speaker please. >> can you hear me now? >> yes. >> great. very moved by the earlier testimony. thanks to supervisor chan for sponsoring this and for the history. i wanted to connect this to some of the work that's been done on language access over the years and racial equity action plan. a lot is said about history, race and tolerance in society in general and here in the city, but not nearly enough action is taken to explain the people, places and things that we find that proceeded us. this is an important and very good step. i believe that recreation and park department and probably

puc, real estate and other various departments should interpret the properties donated by or recognizing the history and people that came before us on their websites, through signage and programming, walking tours like was referenced earlier. maybe we should add resources so susan and the library history center can coordinate or help the efforts. as opposed to my comments on friday, i would enthusiastically support this resolution. thank you to everyone. >> next speaker please. >> hello?

(speaking mandarin)

(voice of translator): hello members of the committee. i want to thank connie chan and this is a protection for the minority race heritage as well because many years ago, there's a lot of chinese families, they don't have sons or daughters.

the people make contribution to, they still have this resting place, we should preserve and protect this monument for our earlier chinese immigrants. and i also want to emphasize that we are not against the golfers to play golf in this land. while we hope we can preserve the monument to commemorate our earlier chinese immigrants. thank you. (end of translation). >> thank you. we have 11 listeners with one

left in queue. next speaker please. >> hi. jordan and steven here. we're residents of san francisco. we are in support of the bill and we want to speak as young asian americans who particularly in this era of uncertainty and api violence, having something official, having something recognized by the government about our heritage and where we came from is vital not only for remembering our history but building our future as residents in this city. and then i'll pass it to steven as well with something to say. >> my name is steven.

i have been -- i was born and raised in the city and on many occasions, i have been in contact and communication with many of the elders of the san francisco chinatown community and what i want to say is on many occasions when i go to lincoln park, trying to honor the memorial and the golf course they would give us the warning might get hit with a golf ball. i don't think that being in fear for your safety while honoring your ancestors can be considered

co-existence. thank you. >> thank you so much. just checking to see if there are further callers in the queue. that looks like the last in queue. madam chair. >> supervisor melgar: thank you madam clerk. supervisor chan, i understand you may have amendments to your legislation that you want to introduce? >> supervisor chan: yes, thank you chair melgar. and thank you colleagues for your time and for your patience. so here are the amendments that really also thanks to supervisor peskin for flagging for our office to specifically really for the duplicate, the listing of the societies at the city cemetery.

and the duplicates are page 1 line 19. and page 3 line 18. those were the duplicates. now, here i do want to grand the planning department 90 day -- additional 90 days extension because of their work that they have been working on a lot of the types of legislation and want to give them ample time. page 3 line 18, grant a 90 day extension for the historic preservation to respond to allow

the climate department more time to complete the review of the landmark designation. what would typically have 90 days, this would allow a total of 180 days, hopefully enough time, six month's time that will allow the planning department because they make this request due to the backlog of the landmark destination. i'm happy to grant that to make sure we get the work done. i hope to have your support, i think i do with co-sponsorship but a positive recommendation to the full board. thank you. >> supervisor melgar: thank you. so supervisor peskin, i was going to say thank you so much. >> supervisor peskin: i am happy to move the amendments that supervisor chan just spoke to and that have been circulated to us earlier. >> supervisor melgar: thank you. madam clerk, will you call roll

please? >> clerk: (roll call) you have three ayes and i have added as co-sponsors to this item. >> supervisor melgar: thank you. supervisor peskin would you like to move this with a positive recommendation? >> supervisor peskin: i would like to move this as amended with positive recommendation as a committee report. >> clerk: (roll call) you have three ayes.

>> supervisor melgar: thank you supervisor chan and thank you for joining us. madam clerk, can you please call the next item? >> clerk: item 3 is a resolution landmark designation under article 10 for clay theatre at 2261 fillmore. members of the public who wish to provide public comment should call the number on the screen. that number is 415-655-0001. the meeting id is 146 916 4664. then press pound and pound again and press star 3 to line up to speak. only press it once. the system prompt will indicate you have raised your hand. please wait until the system indicates you have been unmuted when we get to public comment. madam chair? >> supervisor melgar: thank you madam clerk. i'm a little confused, we do not

have chinese interpretation for this item or we do? >> clerk: that's correct. we only had a request for up to item number 2. >> supervisor melgar: thank you so much. we are joined by legislative aide to supervisor stefani and planning on stand-by for any questions. welcome ms. donovan. >> good afternoon supervisors. can you hear me okay? great. this matter before you today is a resolution to initiate the landmark designation of the clay theatre at 2261 fillmore street. the clay theatre is one of the oldest movie theaters in san francisco and has significant historic value. for over 100 years, one of the most accessible cultural

institutions in the neighborhood. prices affordable to those all walks of life. after this news broke, the neighborhood associations and merchants about how much of a loss this institution would be to fillmore street. sadly like many other theaters in san francisco, the clay theatre did close in early 2020. for well over a year, the supervisor has continued to hear from members of the community about how much of a loss it has been for the neighborhood. it was the first in san francisco to host midnight streamings starting with premier in 1972. as tradition continued, classics like the rocky horror picture show in the room that drew hundreds each month. the supervisor is hopeful we can affirm and preserve the special

historic clay theatre. prior to this meeting, we distributed clerical amendments supplied to us by the city attorney's office. we have received a request from the planning department to include a clause that would provide more time for the planning department to complete the review of this resolution and with that, i will close. if you have any questions, i'm happy to answer them and happy to read through the clerical amendments if you need. >> supervisor melgar: thank you ms. donovan. i wanted to make sure i understood, is the 90 day clause part of the amendments you are asking to introduce? >> the planning department has made the request for the extension. supervisor stefani is happy to accommodate the request. >> supervisor melgar: so one of

us will move it then. supervisor peskin? >> supervisor peskin: thank you madam chair. as with the last item, i would be delighted to be listed as a co-sponsor and at the appropriate time, happy to move the amendments. >> supervisor melgar: thank you supervisor peskin. if there are no further comments or questions -- did you want to share remarks about the item? >> hi, can you hear me? >> yes. >> the department doesn't have a specific presentation related to this. we just wanted to respectfully and formally request the 90 day extension to allow for a total of 180 days for the historic preservation commission to render the decision.

we thank the supervisor's office for taking that under consideration. >> supervisor melgar: thank you. supervior preston. >> supervisor preston: thank you chair melgar and supervisor stefani's office. this is not in our district but very close and we are jealous of the fact that you have this amazing space. and i think these landmarking efforts are important for long-term presentation and all of us have had in our district the loss of theaters, movie theaters and other performing spaces. there were years of wanting to knock it down and then through protecting these kind of resources, found someone who is using it and helping to preserve it. i think it's really important and really helps protect these

spaces for whatever the next use is to make sure the integrity is intact and hopefully be there for years to come. i wanted to thank supervisor stefani and would like to be added as a co-sponsor. >> supervisor melgar: thank you supervisor preston. and as my colleagues, i too would like to be added as a co-sponsor. i think we all have these historic theaters in our neighborhoods that act as anchor institutions in neighborhood commercial corridors and means so much to generations of people in san francisco who have grown up attending performances and things. i'm so happy we're all supporting each other and being able to preserve these spaces. thank you supervisor stefani and ms. donovan. so colleagues if there's no other questions or comments,

let's take public comment please. madam clerk. >> clerk: thank you madam chair. just noting that i have supervisors peskin, preston and melgar as added co-sponsors. we're checking to see if there are callers in the queue. press star 3 to be added, you only have to press it once. for those on hold, continue to wait until the system indicates that you have unmuted and you may begin your comments. please unmute the first caller.

>> i'm tj fisher. i think the clay is so important to all of us in the city. i can't count the number of movies i have enjoyed there and it's such a beautiful space with cultural importance and i really couldn't speak to those things in summary better than what has been said, but i just want to really repeat my beliefs that it is so important to take care of these spaces. i think in addition to the cultural value of the theater itself, so many times, friends and i have come to fillmore and we have also gone to restaurants and bars and bookstore and other shops. i think these neighborhood anchors are really what it's going to be about as we get back

out there in the city. i thank the renovation of the harding that was mentioned and the new mission as the city funded -- at the avenue on san bruno have shown us what a big difference taking care of these iconic spaces, lighting the neon up, it really makes a big difference to our communities. i think the small businesses and residents are hoping we take care of the spaces. thank you very much again. >> clerk: thank you. next speaker please. >> can you hear me now? >> clerk: yes, you have been unmuted. >> great. i think this is it for me for today. the way we experience arts and culture and get together as

people contributes to society coherence, keeping us together. we have lost many single screen theaters in the city and should try to retain the remaining ones for theater or other uses. hopefully the san francisco theater foundation or another entity can take over the clay for film or find some other use that respects the historic integrity of the structure. there should be no dispute between preserving culture and history and maintaining economic uses, especially in a city like ours. thank you to supervisor stefani, city planning and others who

have worked to preserve the clay as a landmark. thank you again. >> clerk: thank you. next speaker please. >> good afternoon supervisors. it's woody from san francisco heritage again. i wanted to express that heritage strongly supports the initiation of the landmark of the clay theatre. the significance to the upper fillmore street neighborhood, they all combine to make it a deserving city landmark. that's just it, to say that heritage strongly supports this and thank you. >> clerk: thank you. it looks like three in the queue with eight listeners. >> good afternoon. i worked at the clay theatre for over 10 years. personally i know how much this building means to the city of san francisco.

since it was constructed in 1910, it has done one purpose, to show films. hopefully through landmark status of the building it can be preserved in a way that future generations can enjoy the building. i host the midnight screenings of the room there for many years and want nothing more than to see the jewel box of a theater continue to stand as it is. thank you for listening this today and hopefully long live the clay. >> clerk: thank you. next speaker. >> i'm going to mention i have had problems following this. it's been stalling, i don't know if it's there or here. the sooner we can get back to city hall for hearings, the better. when the technology works, it works, when it doesn't, you're cut off completely. i want to express my sentimental

attachment for the clay. when i was a teenager, it seemed very sophisticated to go to foreign movies that were just becoming popular. my sister and i would go to the film festival just starting at the metro on union and to the clay. going to the clay, we wandered around and discovered the neighborhood and found this wonderful section of victorians for the first time were being painted in unusual striking attractive colors making us realize it wasn't just the outdated places we saw in the 1950s. i would go later when i moved to knob hill, we had eight theaters in the area, i could buy books at the little bookstore outside.

this is a terribly important place. our very last theater was lost a while back because they couldn't get the lease renewed. the more of these neighborhood theaters we can keep, the better. they're so important for the neighborhood commercial districts. and i have been warned there's one on knob hill the planners consider to be under threat. to me i never went there. having a sign out does not attract but apparently planners think it is important. are we losing a landmark that should have been landmarked. i don't know if somebody might want to think about possibly looking at other theaters that still remain, whether or not they're the ones we went to and that concludes my remarks.

>> clerk: we'll look into the delay on your side but i haven't had anyone bring it up in the tech chat. that was the last caller in queue madam chair. >> supervisor melgar: thank you madam clerk. supervisor peskin, do you want to move the amendments? >> supervisor peskin: so moved. >> clerk: sorry, there was one more person who popped up when i stopped it. go ahead. >> good afternoon supervisors. i don't know what happened. i was in the queue earlier. but in any case, san francisco neighborhood theater foundation, we're an all volunteer nonprofit organization and actively advocating for the historic theaters for over 20 years and

we're so pleased to support the clay's landmark designation and appreciate the work of supervisor stefani to bring it forward. as you heard, the clay is historically significant having been in continuous operation since 1910. we heard from ms. donovan how cherished and supported it is by immediate neighbors and movie goers city wide. our work at the clay dates back many years. we have worked with the owner on multiple different scenarios to assist him in modifying the interior to add dining facilities and bar to the theater for greater financial feasibility. none of those plans came to fruition. in early 2020, the owner put the theater on a market and we made

an offer at the then asking price $3.5 million. it was rejected by the owner even though we met the asking price. we understand he's now seeking significantly more and asking $6.5 million. that's what we last heard. we would like to see the clay of course landmarked and see the clay open again as a movie theater. as a movie theater, not retail. and there's really no reason why it can't be. we urge the committee to vote in support of the nomination and thank you very much. >> supervisor melgar: i believe supervisor peskin has made a motion. if you can take roll please. >> clerk: (roll call)

>> supervisor melgar: and supervisor peskin, do you want to do the honors of making the motion with a positive recommendation. >> supervisor peskin: so moved. >> clerk: (roll call) you have three ayes. >> supervisor melgar: please call item 4. >> clerk: an ordinance designating the canary island

pine. if members of the public want to provide public comment on item 4, call the number on the screen, 415-655-0001. the meeting id is 146 916 4664. then press pound and pound again. if you would like to speak, press star 3 to line up in the queue and the system prompt will indicate you have raised your hand. madam chair. >> supervisor melgar: thank you madam clerk. for this item, we again have ms. donovan, legislative aide to supervisor stefani's office. >> thank you chair melgar. thank you. i will be presenting on behalf of supervisor stefani the matter before you, the ordinance that would designate a more than 100 year old and very majestic canary island pine tree as a

landmark tree. in june of last year, the tree was nominated for canary island pine located on her property. at the meeting, the urban forestry council found it meets the status. unfortunately i don't believe the department of environment was able to send to this hearing today but i am available for questions if there are any and i know there may be a caller or two on the line who could speak to the matter. >> supervisor melgar: thank you. supervisor peskin. >> supervisor peskin: thank you madam chair. as with the two previous items and as a co-sponsor back in the day to then another supervisor landmark tree legislation, i would like to be added as a

co-sponsor of this item. that's it. >> supervisor melgar: thank you supervisor. if there are no other comments or questions from my colleagues, madam clerk, let's take public comment. >> clerk: thank you madam chair. noting supervisor peskin's co-sponsorship. if you haven't done so already, 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 three listeners and one in queue. if you can unmute the caller please. >> good afternoon. this is patricia hanley. i assume i'm being heard. is that correct? >> clerk: yes, ma'am, we can hear you. >> thank you to the board and

urban forestry council and particularly peter of the council, i am the owner of the property, i'm the owner of the tree that is there. the tree is over 100 years-old, over 80 feet tall. it is the tallest tree in cal hallow. all around it has become quite a pavement and cement area in a community that used to have a lot of trees. i believe there is no opposition to this. it's majestic and provides shade and noise reduction and provides a home to wildlife and i am committed to maintaining it and paying to maintain it and it is on my property. i believe no opposition. i hope you will all support this. thank you very much. >> clerk: thank you so much. and let me know if there --

there are no more callers in queue. >> supervisor melgar: thank you madam clerk. with that, public comment is closed. i would like to thank ms. hanley for her stewardship of this wonderful san francisco treasure. supervisor preston? >> supervisor preston: i would like to be added as a co-sponsor as well. >> supervisor melgar: thank you supervisor preston. and i would like to be added as well as a co-sponsor. supervisor peskin, did you want to move this to the full board with a positive recommendation? >> supervisor peskin: so moved. >> clerk: (roll call)

>> supervisor melgar: thank you. that motion passes. will you please call the next and last item? >> clerk: item 5, a hearing on the findings and recommendations of the budget and legislative 2021 report decarbonizing buildings by eliminating natural gas and requesting several committees to report. members of the public who wish to provide public comment, call the number on the screen, 415-655-0001. the meeting id is 146 916 4664. then press pound and pound again. if you haven't done so already, press star 3 to line up to speak. the system prompt will indicate you have raised your hand. madam chair. >> supervisor melgar: thank you. this is a meaty item. we have a number of presentations and we have

received lots of back-up materials. i would like to welcome supervisor mar to the committee who will be giving opening remarks and then we'll have presentations from the budget and legislative analyst office and the san francisco environment office, the sfpuc and the san francisco climate emergency coalition and emerald city collaborative. welcome supervisor mar to land use and transportation committee. >> supervisor mar: thank you for accommodating this hearing today and thank you supervisor mandelman for joining us. we're having this conversation for a simple reason. we are in a climate emergency that will only get worse. there's no path forward to meeting the climate goals

without this. that's why i commissioned this report and called this hearing. there's no question that we need to electric electrify our buildings. first, when we talk about costs in the bla analysis includes large numbers. it should be done in the context of the tremendous cost of doing nothing. the cost of worsening climate disaster and increasing energy bills for those left behind by the private market as energy economics shift. when we talk about doing big things and challenging things, often times we focus more on the challenge, on the burden and not as much on the benefits and there are tremendous benefits for our climate and for safer and more resilient homes and buildings. for creating good paying union

jobs and for saving money for consumers and taxpayers when compared to the cost of doing nothing. as a city we have declared a state of emergency for climate change and passed an ordinance requiring all electric new construction and i want to thank supervisor mandelman for his leadership on both efforts and they are important. while it is relatively easy to declare an emergency, it is harder to act on it. electrifing new buildings doesn't do anything for the emissions we already have and pails in comparison to the buildings that exist in the city. frankly other cities are further ahead than we are in decarbon -- decarbonizing buildings.

we have a responsibility to lead and not follow on this crucial issue. we can go big and we can go bold and frankly we can't afford not to. i think the timing of the hearing is important too. not the least of all because of the urgency to address the climate crisis but also because we're meeting today a week after we voted to adopt a new net zero emissions target moving the state up five years to 2040. we need to consider stricter -- we need to turn the commitment to net zero emissions into a clear road map and turn it into

action. i also want to acknowledge those who helped to get this here. i want to thank the community and labor advocates who have met with us, talked with us, pushed us and worked with us hand in hand for over a year moving the conversation forward. thank you to the climate emergency coalition, emerald city collaborative, jobs of justice, the building and construction trades council and many others for input and

partnership. i offer this report and hearing with responsibility in mind. thank you. >> supervisor melgar: thank you. before turning it over, i wanted to ask supervisor mandelman if he would like to give some remarks. >> supervisor mandelman: just briefly, i came by mostly to listen but i did want to thank supervisor mar for the report. i think this is the right time. we've taken some good steps in san francisco with building for new buildings and more aggressive climate action plan goals. i'm excited about some of the modest but i think important investments that the board made through the budget in some of the work i think will help us accomplish some of these

decarbonizing goals or at least point us in that direction. mostly thank you to the advocates who keep pushing us to do what we needed to do years ago. >> supervisor melgar: thank you. welcome. you can do your presentation now. thank you. >> thank you chair melgar and members of the committee, supervisors mar and mandelman. we prepared a report for supervisor martha was released in april of this year on decarbonizing residential buildings. i'll present a summary of the report now and i will start with sharing a screen.

i trust the slides are on the screen now. i'll start with the context for the request and what supervisor mar asked for, for our office to prepare an estimate of the cost of retrofitting san francisco's residents that have fossil fuel supplied appliances or natural gas-fuelled appliances. the cost of retrofitting those to electricity fuel. this would be consistent with the city goal of net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. as the department of environment has reported, buildings in san francisco and particularly residential buildings are the

second largest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions in san francisco. contributing at the time we wrote the report, about 38% of the city's greenhouse gas emissions and now i believe it is about 41% in some updated materials. it's second only to transportation. for residential buildings, this means emissions due to gas-fuelled appliances. and so replacement of these with electric-fuelled appliances could significantly reduce the city's greenhouse gas emissions and the second most source. to get straight to the big numbers that supervisor mar referenced, we came up with estimates of retrofitting the san francisco residents that have appliances that are at least partially if not fully

fuelled by natural gas. this is both single family and multi family housing units. we relied on two studies prepared by reputable firms and they gave us a range of estimates. the low and the high. either a single family housing unit or unit in a multi family building. the estimates were higher from

e-3. then if you multiply it out by the number of units, about two thirds are multi family in san francisco and one third single family, you can see the math. the low end comes to about $3.5 billion. the high end, $5.9 billion. it's a high price tag and we'll talk about some of the implications of that as i go forward and we have details about that in the report. right now with the current -- by the way, on the estimates, those are averages and there are all kinds of variations based on the cost of the appliances purchased and wide range.

and the labor to move the old ones out. sometimes they can be difficult to get to and more costly. we know there's a big range and another factor affecting the cost, how well insulated the buildings are. given all that, we have taken the averages the consultants have built in as best they can all the different variations. granted, there would be quite a range of costs possible. but what this chart shows, the current state and if you have natural gas appliances now in your household, it is less costly to replace them with natural gas appliances again. you can see the estimates here for a single family home and four unit building. for the single family, it would be about $12,000 more for

replacement of these appliances to go to an electric retrofit. that's a hurdle in thinking about this and how it would be affected by whoever is paying for these kind of retrofits. in addition, another hurdle that the current state is electricity costs more per unit than natural gas. so here you can see the cost per unit of electricity is about $0.22 per hour. that's an average from 2009 to 2019. it has gone up year by year a little bit. natural gas is $1.21.

then we have the conversion in there for you. for natural gas at $1.21, the equivalent for electricity, about $6.50. it's more expensive, electric appliances tend to be more efficient to off set that difference. that's another hurdle in thinking about replacing the appliances and then the ongoing costs associated with it. not getting yet into the question of who would pay for it. however, there's a twist. in the future, this pattern, this current structure could be reversed. we have read from some energy specialists, forecasts that show this current cost structure could be reversed. the cost advantage could actually shift to electricity. in one study in particular by

e-3 consulting, the same that did the analysis of the cost of retrofitting shows by 2050, natural gas costs could increase by 127 to over 1000%. big jumps and electricity between 20-40% during the same time period. the difference is largely due to increased electric. as that occurs, there are a lot of fixed costs associated with transmitting and distributing natural gas and those costs would have to continue to be incurred and paid for. if there are fewer customers for that, that unit cost goes up. for example, in the recently

adopted legislation in san francisco, to require new buildings to be all electric fuelled, that means less demand for natural gas and starts to drive the shift in the price difference. in addition, a big factor for the future, as i mentioned earlier, the more efficient electric appliances available. they can replace water heaters and h-vac systems with more efficient and requiring fewer units of energy to serve their purposes. another factor, electricity cost can be off set through solar panels and renewable energy. the cost of maintaining the appliances could be less overtime to the extent that households are making sure of

solar panels. the more that occurs for solar or renewables, the lowering the cost for appliances. here's projections prepared by e-3 of natural gas rates from 2019 to 2050. i mentioned earlier that the baseline for 2019 is $1.32. so what they project, again, based on increased is a number of scenarios through 2050. cost up to $19 for natural gas based on the extent to which it occurs. what is interesting about this though, this red arrow reflects

$3.40. as natural gas hits that level, it would start becoming more costly than electricity. electricity will be going up at a much lower rate. i mentioned the 207-40%. the cost for natural gas would be based on the extent of building, the more it happens, the higher the cost of natural gas and the lower the cost of electricity. this chart shows how it plays out for a household with all electric appliances versus natural gas.

at the rate at the baseline, electricity would have gone up say by 30% in the first scenario, $0.29, natural gas at $3 and still less costly than electric. but when it gets to the $3.40 rate shown with the red arrow, that switches. natural gas now becomes more costly. just a small difference. but as that continues and goes up, the costs become more favorable to electricity. you can see when it gets up to $19, there's a significant difference. anywhere above $3.40.

some households would be better equipped to afford a cost like that than others. the city could fund all or a portion of the costs. there's another approach. and that would result in substantial city costs but could be covered potentially by bonds and phasing the initiatives. so over time the changes would be made but not necessarily all at once to smooth out this cost.

or it could be combined with rebates and incentives and a mix of the tools available to reduce the hardship on any one party. in this table we show the layout, impacts of different approaches. one is already in place in san francisco. the electrical appliance requirement for all new construction, shown in the third row here. that will have an impact that will increase and help with this shift in cost advantages that i mentioned from natural gas to electricity. but the row in green is the retrofitting of all residents. that is the biggest impact. we are talking about 240,000 housing units with some fuelled

by gas if not all. the costs are highest and that's the biggest pay off in terms of reusing greenhouse gas emissions. and again, with the buildings being about a fourth of the source. we have other alternatives in here. retro fitting appliances to the point of natural replacement, when they need to be replaced any way, then it could be a mandate by the city they have to be replaced by electric fuel appliances. this would reduce the cost to just the cost of the property owner based on current cost of appliances. you can see in this row here, that would lower it to down to $2,000 up to $12,000 versus the 14,363 to 34,970 of just doing

wholesale retrofit initiative for all residences and appliances now. then other possibilities is requiring electric appliance retro fits at the time of transfer of ownership. that would make a difference also and would probably amount to about 2,464 single family housing units per year sold and subject to this requirement. and additional multi family. all these things help but nothing gets to the big numbers and big change -- >> clerk: i just wanted to note that your time has hit 15 minutes. >> i will wrap up and say we have some other options in the report for reducing costs and funding sources.

they're detailed in the report itself. we also have examples of rebates, something the city could consider. we have a recommendation that the board of supervisors plan on a working group to deal with it further and explore the various options and approaches that could be used. we're here and happy to answer questions. >> supervisor melgar: does anyone have questions before we move on? >> i have a few questions. thanks again for all of your

work on this report. i think i just have questions around the incentives that other cities have offered the rebates and financial incentives of getting property owners to retrofit their gas appliances to all electric. the sacramento utility district seeps to be the most forward thinking on the incentive approach. do you have any data on the impact or scope of the incentive programs, like how many retrofits they are resulting in? >> we don't have that information supervisor mar. we did see in the report, the amounts available and as you

mentioned, sacramento is the ones we reviewed was the most generous with over $13,000 available per household. that is getting close to the low end estimates of a complete retro fit. sacramento as you know has its own utility district. that money has been generated from rate payer revenue and surcharge on rates put aside for that purpose. it seems to be a good approach to use and something that san francisco could consider either through the cta for san francisco or arrangement through pg&e that would be subject to approval of course. others from the bay area, they receive grants.

>> supervisor mar: thank you. and i think one of your slides showing different potential policy options, you mentioned that one of them was that the city could fund all or some of the cost of the retrofits. that would be a large amount, in the billions of dollars. you mentioned a bond measure would be the logical way to consider funding that. are you aware of other cities that have pursued a bond measure to build these? >> no. we're not aware of that supervisor. we did search around for other cities to see the state of the programs and didn't find one other than other cities have adopted new construction

requirements and a city in washington at the time we did the report was considering a city-wide initiative like this. at the time we produced this, they had not yet identified a funding source or establish it. i can tell you, there's a lot of and in this type of thing in states around the country but at the time we did this, no other specific program that has started the program to this expense through a bond. >> supervisor mar: thank you. and i have a question about the policy options that you have presented. sort of going beyond just the carrot approach of offering financial incentives to enacting a form of mandate or requirement of retrofitting, a couple of the main ones you presented were on

requiring retro fit from natural gas to appliances at the natural end of life of the appliance when people have to replace and there was the policy of requiring the retrofit when the property is sold. and a number of other policy recommendations. have these been -- any of these been enacted in any other cities you're aware of? mandate type requirements? i'm not aware. ruben, if you're on, were there others that popped up in your research? >> no, we could not identify any other cities with this

requirement. probably the closest thing we had that we could find to a mandate was mission -- imposed in new york city. and fines for buildings based on usage type, the type of energy used. that starts in i believe 2024 and fines will increase over time and limits for energy use for buildings will decrease by 2030. >> and that i think is interesting, too. the fines that are going to be charged for buildings that are not meeting the energy requirements can be used to retrofit others and become a source of funding for rebates or retrofits. it has the effect of changing the behavior of property owners and if it doesn't, providing

money for retro fit. >> supervisor mar: and for new york city, besides the building emissions on limit on larger buildings that you just referred to with penalties, i think you mentioned it separate, carbon fee that new york city has created on larger buildings. has that one been in place already and is it generating revenue seeing to used to support -- >> i believe it's the same pranl program. the fee is imposed if you go above the limit allocated to your building. that goes into effect in 2024.

>> supervisor mar: thank you. >> supervisor melgar: supervisor preston? >> supervisor preston: thank you supervisor >> supervisor mar: and the bla. just in the slide looking at different options, i was thinking about potential hybrid between some of the options. i was going to ask you if some other possibilities were done in other cities. i think i have heard about the limited number of cities that have done something strong here. but it does seem to me that to have homeowners take the cost side of it or ban it or require the change and have the government pay for it or require

them to change and wait until the property sells or have them do it at the time the property sells is one thing i was thinking you could absolutely have a system where you mandate the change as the homeowners that can afford to do it, pay for it and those who can't, the city fronts it to be paid back at the time of sale. i wanted to put that out there. a combination of options you laid out. that would have the homeowners who can afford it, bear the cost and those who can't could get the city to pay for it and then have the city reimbursed in some kind of fund at the time that they sell and just to be real about folks -- most folks selling if they have owned for a long time -- i think that's a good point at which to to have

requirements but i'm concerned with the low numbers. if we wait until the time of sale to make the change, it will be decades before we are significantly changing our emissions city wide. just wanted to put that out there. i don't know if you have initial thoughts and i was going to ask about other cities but i'm pretty confident the answer is no from what you have said about other cities. i'll leave it at that. thank you. >> supervisor melgar: thank you supervisor preston. i have a couple of questions. so i am wondering, half my family lives in europe and it seems to me after visiting so many times over the years that

european cities have been on this much longer than we have. i don't know anything about the local policies of why it is people started moving. but i'm wondering if your analysis of what other cities have done included european cities or other places in the world or just u.s. cities. >> we looked just at u.s. cities. we weren't -- if we bumped into something about europe, we would have included it. i just had a reaction which is very different energy policies in a lot of european countries that may affect the pricing and economics of appliances used but we have not studied the details of that. that's just a thought that we could be coming from a very different place here. >> supervisor melgar: understood. so my second question was about

the human behavior, if it was part of what you looked at in your analysis. if folks had to buy new appliance because an old one breaks or do they buy a new appliance because they are remodelling their kitchen or doing an addition and that means that -- if it's a property owner because they need to refinance or something, i wonder if that was part of the analysis you did. >> we had quite a bit of discussion about those questions. when do people need to make that change. just thinking about it, and thinking about incentives, when would people be inclined to want to do this. certainly remodelling -- all those key points that we have

talked about in the alternatives are the natural kind of places to do it. there's nothing like it breaking down to encourage people to make a purchase. i guess there's a wide range and trying to design a program, i think you have to consider all of the human behavioral side and what the incentives are for people. to go back to the recommendation about establishing a working group, i think there's a lot to work through considering human behavioral. >> supervisor melgar: thank you. despite the antidote of water heaters that lost 40 years, the average life of the appliances

is what, 10-15 years. if we were going to have a goal of getting to neutral by 2040, we have to do something like that. my last question was about energy efficiency. again in human behavior. if you took that into analysis. if we were to have a more comprehensive decarbonzation package that included not just switching from gas to electric appliance but energy efficient windows and , the cost to the property owner might be more attractive if that was part of your analysis. over time it's not just the energy efficiency of the appliance but the entire property that could save money. i wonder if you have considered

it? >> i think it's a good point chair melgar. and we did look at that. as i mentioned earlier, insulations of homes is not in the cost but something to consider to help fund that so people are insulating their homes and that could make a big difference in the costs. the other thing, the appliances get better and better. electric appliances already are improving in initiatecy and i'm sure that is going to continue to occur. so looking down the road, i think there's a lot of optimistic signs for making the switch. no one knows for certain, but it certainly seems like many things are pointing in that direction. looking at the whole home and

housing units and insulations and how things are run, i think that's a very important part of the undertaking. >> supervisor melgar: thank you for this excellent report. since i don't see any other colleagues on the roster, let's go on to the department of the environment. welcome. >> thank you chair melgar. thank you supervisor mar for hosting this hearing. i just want to add a little fact from the conversation that was had. i believe the city of piedmont locally has electric mandate for time of sale. obviously they're small and don't have the complexities like here but that's one example locally. i'm going to share my screen here. give me a second.

does everyone see that screen? great. so thank you again. it's a pleasure to be here. i'm the policy and public affairs officer for the department of the environment. i want to introduce a few colleagues of mine on the line listening and may assist and jump in to answer questions. our director is on the line. from our climate team, barry hooper. (please stand by...)

>> zero emission homes are

important opportunities to deliver social equity benefits. moving on," take a deep dive into emissions and what is generating emissions here in san francisco. as you can see the transportation sector is the largest source of emissions. it is followed by the building sector, which represents 41% of the city's emissions today. going further, you can see the difference in building emissions from 199022019. i want to highlight two trends. the first is electricity makes up a smaller share of emissions. we went from 50% to less than 10% in part to the electricity supplies at clean power s.f. and others. and with all the clean electricity coming into the city. it is a great opportunity to electrify buildings. emissions have decreased

significantly overall. the cleaner electricity supply is a factor. natural gas has increased as a%, it is not driving up emissions anymore. it's lower in 2019 then it was in 1990. overall, the electricity grid has driven a lot of this difference. there's not much emissions left in the electricity supply. if we want to continue moving the needle, we have to eliminate natural gas in our buildings diving even deeper, let's look at building typology. commercial buildings are at 44%. now that we have established that gas is the overwhelming contributor to emissions and buildings, what can we do about it? the good news is that proven technologies are here. let's start with water heating. heat pump water heaters are

highly efficient electrical appliances that use electricity to move heat from surrounding air and transfer it to water, instead of generating the heat directly. it is the inverse of a refrigerator. it is a highly proven technology and it is off the shelves today. you can easily get it. let's talk about space heating and cooling. electric air heat pumps use electricity to move the heat from the air. this technology can be used to heat a building by moving heat indoors or cool a building by moving heat outdoors just like a refrigerator. and that means there is extra benefits of heating and cooling. gas systems only provide heating. if you think that our climate -- if you think about climate change and how we will have more high heat days, we will need the cooling in our buildings. it is useful. this technology has been around for a while and it is used a lot in europe. next, let's talk about cooking. gas stoves and ovens can be

replaced by electric ovens and electric induction cooktops. these consist of an electromagnetic coil that creates a magnetic field and supplies electric current. when brought into the field, the compatible cookware is warmed internally. the source of the heat is the cookware itself and the cooking top remains -- the cooking top surface is cool and that makes it much sorry -- safer to work with. and finally, close dryer. if you're not hanging your clothes out to air dry, close dryers can be replaced by electric pump dryers. in the older days, a long time ago, they didn't work that well. they now do. the technology is proven and it readily works. so now that we have taken a look at technology and we know it is not a barrier, what about cost? we know the b.l.a. report analysis had a large cost to total building decarbonization. i want to break it down for a real-world scenario and look at

what the cost would be of replacing the appliance at the end of its useful life. it shows an example of the cost difference in time of replacement for gas and electric appliances and i will note this data has a different source then what is in the b.l.a. report but it represents documented real-world cost today. there is a cost of an additional $600 for the electric version, were you also get a much more efficient appliance that will save you money and energy bills over the long run. roughly 5% of energy using equipment is replaced each year which underscores an important point. every existing building will experience advantageous moment for decarbonization. we have to decarbonized them at these precise moments if we want to take advantage of costs and savings. now that we have a better understanding of emissions, technology, and cost, i want to note the significant strides in engagement and the milestones that we have achieved for

decarbonization thus far. let me highlight a few examples. we have partnered to create a partner network for engaging with an engaged community of stakeholders to identify equity priorities and process for residential building decarbonization. the mayor also convened a zero emissions task force bringing together sector leaders, nonprofit leaders, community leaders, financing partners to identify equitable and effective ways to build decarbonization. under this umbrella, we had an existing commercial working group and a new construction working group the one thing i want to highlight is the all electric new process. it's 10 years ahead of the city's commitment. and box three i want to show you that we are leading by an example. there is a new construction in major -- and major retrofits.

we have made significant progress in various areas. we also have programmes that directly address building decarbonization today, but we need to do more. efficiency is still primarily geared towards an industry dominated by natural gas. we need to shift the paradigm so it is an electrification paradigm. let me quickly review what we have in place. the first programme is energy s.f. which was started in 2020. it gives access to programmes and rebates to san francisco residents, businesses, and multifamily properties in priority neighborhoods. specific to build and decarbonization, it provides single family residents with a customized net zero action plan that explains the cost and benefits of solar, home heat pumps, and other efficiency upgrades. next we have the bay area regional network. it is a collaboration of nine counties that make up the san francisco bay area.

recently, this is the good news, they have expanded to include residential electrification, sigel family homes can get an additional thousand dollars for heat pump water heaters and 304 and induction cooktop. for multifamily building enhancements, you can build another incentive kicker for electrification measures like conduction cooktops, heat pumps, and others. that is good news but it is a drop in the bucket. we need to do more. let's look forward. as we continue down this path, all strategies and actions must be designed with stakeholder engagement and focused on creating protections for low and moderate income residents and vulnerable populations, while prioritizing a transition for workers. workforce development just

transition, one of the first things that came out of this programme was to prevent rent evictions and develop and adopt tenant protections and antidisplacement policies for renters that live in buildings that are transitioning to all electric. later this year, san francisco relates the -- release the updated climate action plan. it will be dated were driven and it charts a pathway to net zero emissions and works towards addressing racial and social equity, public health, economic recovery and a resilient future. it lays out strategies and actions. it has strategies to get the zero emission buildings, and protection again for low-end income -- low and middle income owners and renters with support for affordable housing developers, and ensuring new job opportunities for local workers. potential supporting actions include, by 2022, develop

systems and monitor the replacement of existing fuel equipment to all electric, by 2023, pass a residential time of sale policy that requires an electrification plan, prioritizing water and space heating, indoor air quality, electric safety, and recording a presence or absence of gas service for each property. between 2023 and 2028, phase in a policy that includes all new installed equipment to be efficient and all electric. and begin recording decarbonization status for each property at time of sale this is where the anchor partner informs the following supported actions. one, offer targeted technical assistance, including information about incentives, rebates and public and private

financing options, and two, partner with workforce training providers, labor unions, and apprenticeship programmes to align and disseminate electrification workforce training, funding, and project financing opportunities. first up, next steps. i will skip to the third post-it note. i feel like i have been skirting that issue. so much of the energy efficiency funding, so much of our grant funding, so much of the public funds, public good charges that are collected on utility bills are decided by the cpuc, policies and proceedings that come from the cpuc, state legislature, and we need to be advocating and talking with them to make sure that they are continuing and hastening their shift from the natural gas world to an electrification world. that is where a significant chunk of our efficiency money has come from and that is where a lot of our money to decarbonized will need to come from in the future.

that third post-it note is critical. going back to the climate equity hub is we have received some funding through the budget process and we are beginning to start a climate equity hub which will advance our dual goal of racial equity in decarbonization, and it will focus on helping people make the switch to all electric, create jobs, ensure economic inclusion, and make sure the building community has technical resources and the wherewithal to do these switches. we are also going to keep the long term stable funding scenarios that are needed to fund the climate action to take us from not many buildings being carbonized today, to an entire building stock that is being decarbonized tomorrow. it will cost billions of dollars, as you saw, and where that funding will come from, how this will happen, will it be seen, fun, a potential ballot measure, that is what the funding study will do.

and finally, the fourth post-it note, the building decarbonization roadmap is an idea that originated in conversations with supervisor mar's office. we have a roadmap that has been released for a couple years now. it has goals, it has metrics, in each year we can see how we are doing. and what we need to do to continue to get to a city that has an all electric transportation network. we need a similar building decarbonization roadmap. the next steps on that are to meet with stakeholders act make sure that we are putting together the right proposal to put together the roadmap, and talk with the supervisor's office about potential consulting dollars to help us get to the final product. that is my last slide. health and resilience are paramount to equity and that all points towards eliminating fossil fuels. time is definitely -- the time to act is definitely now.

the zero emission technologies are available, and delays will only make this transition more challenging later. i want to thank you for your time. we are certainly happy to answer any questions. >> thank you. i don't see -- supervisor mark? >> thank you for the presentation and for all of your work. and the entire team. your work has increasingly been important. we continue to address the climate crisis in our city. the board just voted to adopt the updated climate targets, including a reduction of sector

base greenhouse gas emissions a 60 1% compared to the 1990 level and a reduction of conception based emissions all in the next nine years, i believe. we are also -- and as stated before, we are moving up our target timeframe for achieving net zero emissions by 2040. i guess, maybe -- you touched on it in your presentation, but maybe a bit more. i am hoping to get more detail. this will specifically allow us to meet these top-level goals. >> thank you, supervisor mar for that question. to get to these goals, we will have to, as i alluded to, we will go from a building stock that is not decarbonized, to have asked second -- having significant inroads to the number of buildings who are

decarbonized and have eliminated natural gas. >> what was in the report, perhaps the best tool in the arsenal is time of replacement. it minimizes cost and as the technology, the technology is there, but as people become more familiar with it, as the marketplace drives greater acceptance, i think prices will come down. you saw in the one example in my slide, which is based on real-world documented evidence, what is the cost of heat pump water heaters for people who work going from gas to electric? there is only a 600-dollar difference. i think that kind of policy is one important goal in the toolshed. maybe the most important. it is also something to consider. and we have to think about the larger buildings. some of the largest buildings

which don't sell as much as smaller residential units. and one of the actions that we have in our climate action plan, and in the chapter 9 that we have is all these large commercial office buildings would be decarbonized by 2035. >> thank you. it seems to me that some potential mandates like natural life of replacement policy or time of sale policy for home really makes sense to consider. but in combination with incentives, financial incentives and rebates to help ease the financial burden on residents that would have to follow these. and figuring out the timeframe

and the coordination and sequencing of the mandate and the incentive which i think are the details of that are really important. i am happy to hear you mentioned that -- actually there was a reference to a roadmap decarbonization. i think this is the clearest next step that is needed to move this work forward. the city of berkeley recently completed a draft roadmap for electrifying existing buildings and colleagues, i did add the berkeley roadmap for building electrically -- electrification to the file. my other question is, what does the department of the environment need to develop such a roadmap? how quickly could it be developed. is it something that could be

developed by early next year, january, or early next year? >> let me address -- before i talk about the timeline, let's talk about what we need to do. i think the collaborative process that we embarked for the easy roadmap would be very helpful. we will need to get a few city stakeholders and departments around the table that are impacted by the decarbonization policies. we will then also, that is what we have been doing and we will continue collaborating with our stakeholders, members of the network, “dare, emerald city, we need to get them at the table to understand not just what the end goal is, because that is building decarbonization, “with the timeline looks like, one policies need to be put in place, how those all have repercussions, like if you do a

time of sale policy in 2023, you know, how many building started be decarbonized by 2024? by 2025 you can add up the metrics to see how you are getting to your 2040 coal or your 2030 goal as well. that is what needs to happen. and then it is always helpful to have a consultant to double check your work, maybe crunch those numbers, fill in where there may not be enough staff resources to full in, and you may bring expertise that is not necessary of the department. that is what we need. the timeline, you know, that is a tougher question. i would like to say that we could do this, kind of a six-month process, i would like to say that is a tentative answer to that. i would want to get back to you and check with a few folks to

make sure that the six months makes sense. that is -- but i feel like that would be a good, rough figure for you. i will circle back and double check and confirm. >> great. thank you. i would love to follow-up with you on that. thank you. >> thank you. next we have kathryn from the sfpuc who will give a 10 minute presentation on the item. welcome. >> thank you. good afternoon, supervisors. give us a minute here to get my slides up. i am catherine spalding. i am the deputy assistant manager for the sfpuc enterprise. i am very pleased to be here today to speak to you about this important topic.

next slide, please. first up, a quick reminder, we have two clean energy programmes. it is a full-service and publicly owned electric utility that is providing clean power for almost a hundred years. we also have the clean power s.f. programme which is our community choice aggregation programme launched in 2016. and in this model, energy is supplied. -- the energy supply is delivered by pg and e. we have 400,000 customer accounts of most san francisco residents and businesses are our clean power s.f. customers, again, we are providing the supply. we are still reliant on pg and e. for the distribution and for services like outages and billing. in terms of the programme, most

of our customers are municipal facilities like san francisco international airport, schools, libraries, city hall. together, we have our programmes and we are providing more than 70% of the electricity consumed in san francisco. next slide, please. there are a couple of issues that came up in the report around power supply, planning, and the grid. i wanted to take this slide to highlight the key points that i thought were relevant to the enterprise. first and foremost, we will be providing 100% renewable electricity by 2025. already the power programme, we are 100% renewable. the clean power s.f. programme, we will be 100% renewable by 2025. we're almost there now, but we need a few more years to get 100%. the other key points i wanted to make around these issues is that

the p.u.c., power enterprise, we will meet growth in electricity demand to support building decarbonization. we have a very in-depth, heavily regulated planning process called integrated resource planning process. we have both programmes. it is a roadmap for how we are going to meet customer demand as part of the process. we have very intricate and detailed forecasting. we are very much anticipating the increase in demand around the decarbonization of buildings as well as decarbonization of transportation. the third key point i want to make is the set of questions in the report around whether the power grid will be able to meet

the demand for residential decarbonization. so now we're talking about the distribution side of the business. as you all know, pg and e. controls the grid here in san francisco. so to be honest, it's a little bit of a wildcard. this will be a challenge for them to meet this demand. we will see if they are up to it. we certainly hope so. but only time will tell. as you all know, they have a very large service territory that has lots of competing demands throughout california. they have lots of updates and improvements that they need to make. they need to underground -- they need to put equipment underground for wildfire safety. there is a lot on their plate. here in san francisco we have, as you all well know, we have experienced a lot of delays and costs around our partnership with pg and e. so if the past is any predictor of the future, we can expect

more delays and costs as they build out distribution to meet demand. the other point here is the part of our electrical rates that refer back to the distribution. the distribution services that we get from pg and e. that will likely increase. they will build out the grid, but they will go back and charge our residential and other customers for that benefit. we will -- we will likely see rate increases as a result of their investments in building out the distribution grid. and lastly, there are additional electrical upgrade costs that will be very possible for building owners. this is not only the electrical panel upgrades that needs to happen on the customer side, but there can also be transformer updates as needed.

they may need to widen the conduit that runs underground. they may need to dig up the streets. we can expect that this will take time and could be expensive. next slide, please my last slide here is i want to talk to you about some of the decarbonization projects and programmes. we are currently implementing and planning at the p.u.c. to support building decarbonization. the first is a series of pilot projects that we have on decarbonization in some municipal buildings. this is on the programme side. this is not residential, but certainly we thought that this should shed light on this important topic. we are engaging in these pilot projects to better understand

the impact, costs, timeline, and technical aspects around people switching from gas to electric. we currently have three projects in the design and planning phase. these are at the s.f. zoo, this is at the department of public health community clinic, as well as the san francisco fire department station. we have already started to develop some lessons learned from these projects. we are finding that water heaters are a very -- a very good option to replace the water heaters. the heat pump furnaces are a good option as a replacement for rooftop gas fire and furnace heaters. we are, you know, as expected,

as already discussed, building decarbonization is expensive. it is time-consuming. it is considering a lot of approval from pg and e. and even just because the type of services changing, and there is a minimal load impact, it is still requiring a lot of process and reviews and approvals. and specifically for older buildings that use steam or radiant heating, we are finding that this is requiring even additional space or power upgrades. and finally, in terms of when it makes the most sense to make these signs -- these kinds of decarbonization improvements, it is when it is in the context of other major renovations when such changes can be incorporated into the design.

this is a new programme. we are hopefully going to be launching in the next few months pending some additional approvals that we need. this is for the clean power s.f. customers, residential customers, and this programme will provide an incentive to contractors to install heat pump water heaters. it will include all kinds of workforce training to contractors and distributors about this relevant technology. in our analysis and market research, we found this is one of the most significant barriers to this new technology. it is the lack of information that the contractors had. that is why we are focusing in on this component. this is part of the regional programme that is being run by the energy council. and some of our initial analysis also has indicated that san francisco has a very favourable climate for this technology

because these heat pump water heaters work best when there is surrounding temperature. it's mild. we are also seeing on the negative side. we might have some challenges specifically with this in san francisco because of our dense urban environment and the need for the space, appropriate space to install these heaters. they it requires but is -- sufficient airspace around them because they cool the surrounding area. they are not very well suited to indoor environments like closets in a garage or basement -- and a garage or basement is much better. if so, we will ramp it up. and hopefully when more state funding becomes available through the technology and equipment for clean heating

programme then we will be able to utilize some of those funds for expansion this is something that we are trying to develop for our customers. we are just in the initial phases of this. we expect that it will be complicated. >> i just want to note that that was the 10 minute mark. >> thank you. >> thank you. i will just wrap up very quickly and say, in terms of energy efficiency programmes, thank you for raising the issue earlier. energy efficiency is a very important part of decarbonization discussions. we have multiple programmes that are available to our customers. we are hoping to expands and

launch in the next year year and a half some additional targeted energy efficiency programmes for customers in the food service sector. next slide is my conclusion slide. thank you very much for the opportunity to speak to you about the work today. i'm happy to answer any questions. >> thank you so much for the presentation. it is tremendous to hear you repeat the fact that san francisco and clean power s.f. and the p.u.c. will get to 100% renewable energy by 2025. that is great. that is all the more reason for us to accelerate our all electric building strategy, since we have such a clean renewable energy portfolio for

clean power s.f. i was really happy to hear the launch of the incentive for heat pump water heaters. again, maybe my question, how does this pilot programme compare to the incentives and subsidies and rebates offered by other municipalities? for example, they offer up to 13,000, $750 for household and rebate. and maybe my bigger question is, what would it take for the p.u.c. to really ramp up the rebate and financial incentive programme so we can really support more property owners to

make the change that needs to happen in their homes? >> thank you for your question. as part of our market analysis, we do look at either regional programmes. we look at the way -- the cost incentives, the structure programme and we incorporate that in our planning. the contract incentives are going to be priced at $1,000. i know that, i believe that they launched their programme with those higher incentive amounts, but i think, at this point, they are -- typical incentives are more about 200, 300,000 for various electrification initiatives.

we would very much like to increase the programme offerings and our customer programmes. we have access to some capital funding in order to roll out at a higher level. in order to do more, we are constrained by resources. we are caught between a lot of competing capital needs and the very important -- we still need to keep rates low, and ultimately we are required by the city charter, we are required by utility best practices to provide a rate at a cost of service. when we offer customer programmes, that comes out of the revenue rates and the revenue that we receive back. in order to do more, we have now

gotten to full enrolments. we are ramping up our programmes. we have committed a lot of resources to affordability and so we are ready to roll out and do more programmes, but we are constrained by the amount of resources on the table. the other key concern i would like to quickly raise is the lack of our ability of controlling the grid with pg and e. so for us to be able to control the local distribution assets, that would certainly speed our ability to roll out decarbonization initiatives. >> i just want to respond to your answer to my question about

the fairly limited rebates and incentive programmes that we are offering for building decarbonization and really san francisco has one of the most largest and a defective and most well-established community choice aggregations in the state with clean power s.f. we are just far behind many of our peers and offering the kind of incentives, as far as i can tell, there is no path forward for building electrification without them. there is a great deal of urgency in offering and creating these programmes and really offering them and there is tremendous benefits of doing so. i guess it is very frustrating to me that it just seems like the p.u.c. is not taking this as seriously as others and many of

our peers. >> i would like to assure you that we are very committed to decarbonization. we would like to move more quickly and we plan to move more quickly. we absolutely agree with you that incentives and rebates and customer programmes are a critical element in supporting this important policy initiative. >> great. thank you. thank you. >> thank you so much. thank you very much for the presentation. i'm sorry. i lost track. we have erica braveheart here for the s.f. climate emergency coalition. they will have a 10 minute combined presentation and that will be our last presentation.

welcome. >> thank you. >> thank you. good afternoon, everyone. i am the director for emerald city's bay area. we are a nonprofit collaborative collaborative of neighbor community workforce, affordable housing stakeholders committed to advancing sustainable environments while creating economies with opportunities for all. i have been enrolled in ensuring equity in building decarbonization excellence in san francisco for a few years now. the analysis presented in the vla impact report and by sfpuc is really important because electrifying existing homes and buildings is going to be really important. we need a local and state agencies to enact policies that provide funding, technical

assistance, education, and outreach to meet these goals. the market itself needs a trained workforce and a supply chain of manufacturers, distributors, retailers, installers and so on. we need to ensure that equity is at the center of these efforts. the city, and in particular the department of the environment, has been good at engaging front-line communities as coanchors in framing this work and lifting up equity issues. emerald city mentioned previously were part of the effort over the past two years where we engaged over 250 stakeholders with priorities which are expressed in the building operations section of the climate action plan, which includes tenant protections, increased opportunity for disadvantaged workers, and so on. the coalition is concerned with stakeholders and community organizations. we want to ensure that our priorities are taken through into the implementation of these policies and programmes.

we want to ensure that financial incentives, job training opportunities, and benefits of electrified homes are there for lower income residents first. we want a transition plan for workers who will be phasing out of gas. we also want to ensure higher jobs. so we don't go -- and the opportunity includes disadvantaged workers and small minority disadvantage contractors. this piece will take active training and building the workforce and contract in the pipeline. the proposed climate equity hub would go to addressing some of these issues. and a way to ensure equity in the policies and programmes is to figure out a structure so we can do this hand-in-hand with community, labor, and equity advocates. we have requested a task force comprised of these stakeholders to be appointed so we can be part of ensuring these equity outcomes. i urge our supervisors to approve this going forward. and including, i urge you all

and the city family to prioritize equitable building decarbonization efforts given the acute climate emergency that we are in. i will pass it to you, erica. >> hopefully you can see my screen. i wanted to give a quick backdrop here on the climate emergency. as probably everyone has seen in the last few weeks, our headlines have been full of climate problems. we are not succeeding in this fight. on the contrary, our policy pledges are insufficient to meet the crisis. our current policies in place are not even meeting the pledges. fortunately, san francisco has, as of last week, made a commitment to get to net zero by 2040. there is more action that can be taken but we need to get that commitment into actual -- actual policy and make infrastructure

from the ground and make it reality. the real work begins. let's talk about what that looks like. our natural gas infrastructure, as you probably don't know, is fossil fuel infrastructure in our city. all of these buildings are in using natural gas for heating and are a huge web of oil and gas infrastructure. we will be unable to shut down any gas plants until we help every single consumer transition off of natural gas. the only way to get to zero emissions is replace all usage of natural gas in our buildings. this is an important key point to understand where does -- where is that -- where is it that we are heading? and making third net zero goal for 2040, san francisco has committed that ensuring every single gas appliance is electrified by 2040. i just took a look at what that will entail to understand the mountain that we are about to embark on together.

the good news, as was shared previously, we do have the appliances that we need to do this. and very roughly, what it takes to do a transition like this is we need to stop making the problems worse. every other part of the green infrastructure transition, we need to stop building new infrastructure. we have taken the first step by requiring that all new construction be all electric. while that is a great first step, there is more we can do to stop further emissions. we need to prevent hookups to be installed in existing buildings. we need to address the natural gas usage in existing appliances and existing buildings. we heard some ideas earlier today for some of the many tools we have in our toolbelt that will probably need to be used in concert to achieve that. and finally, to actually get to zero, we need to clean out the obsolete infrastructure.

that means replacing any natural gas appliances that haven't reach their end-of-life, given that we do have a goal that we are trying to hit, and turn off natural gas pipelines given that we know that the pipelines themselves leak methane. it's a very potent greenhouse gas into the atmosphere. and the leaks are equivalent to the use of the natural gas themselves. it is a very important piece -- >> i'm just stopping your time. i wanted to know text supervisor peskin has to leave the meeting. we have a presidential action memo appointing supervisor martin place of supervisor peskin. you have four minutes left. >> thank you. just some very basic information to understand the transitional work life.

we have already heard from the most cost-effective time to convert an appliance and it is already going to be replaced. we know there is additional work that has to happen. the switch from gas to electric. and while all this technology does exist, it is not the most common. this will be a large transition for the workforce and for consumer education. here we can see, given the average lifespan, these are pulled from the b.l.a. report, when it is -- [indiscernible] -- when we would need to have a replacement be all electric. we need to add -- [indiscernible] -- back in 2010, before we were talking about this, there were

gas furnaces installed that, by default, will still be around in 2040, and will need to have some action that is more than just at the end of its natural lifetime. we have a small handful of years in order to ensure that 100% of appliances going forward are replaced with electricity. we need to be scaling this back very quickly. these are some average numbers pulled from the report to give us a sense of scale. this change is indicative. we see, at the end of life cost difference is a huge opportunity for an economic time to do the transition as opposed to what we are seeing in yellow here, which would be the cost of a forest replacement. whatever we can, we want to

ensure we are taking advantage of every single opportunity to replace an appliance when it is naturally going to be replaced. we will take a look at -- conceptually, this is not a roadmap, but to give us all a sense, we are talking about the same thing. what it looks like in order to take advantage of the end of lifetime replacement. let's just work backwards. they have committed to a net zero emissions in 2040. in order to achieve that, the vast majority, if not all of our buildings will need to have done this transition. let's assume that it is a three year -- a few year plan. and we want to do this remaining work. go find that 50-year-old gas furnace that is still around before we shut off the gas. let's say it is 2037. now we know that we need, depending on the appliance, 8-30 years before that for the time

of that appliance to be naturally replaced. we are talking about starting, 10 years ago, to the next few years, needing every single gas appliance at its end of lifetime to be replaced with electric. this needs to be mandated within the next few years if we are going to take full advantage of the economic opportunity of only covering the difference between the cost of the electric and gas. obviously this is a huge transition to bring it to 100%. so many of their precursors before that transition, workforce training, marketing, et cetera, really needs to be starting today in order to give us any shot of hitting the goal in 2040. >> i apologize for interrupting. your time has hit 10 minutes. >> thank you. the last very few things, there

are some immediate opportunities for action. this is a very incomplete list, with some of the opportunities that we have ahead of us that we need to stop any kind of expansion, we need to take advantage of opportunities when new equipment is being installed residential solar can improve these costs. we should be looking at hybrid approaches with solar electrification. i wanted to cover the cost of inaction. of all these costs, they are big. they will get bigger by the day and by the year. given that we know that san francisco has already committed to the transition to be completed by 2040, the opportunity now is to start this as soon as possible to enable as many of those transitions to the end of the appliance lifetime as opposed to a forced transition.

if you crunch the numbers, what that ends up meaning is that for every year they gas appliances continue to be installed, we are signing up for an additional $200 million in future additional transitional costs, which is the difference between having spent a little bit of additional money upfront to at the end of the gas appliance's life to make it electric instead verses in the future, needing to retire relatively well-functioning gas furnace. in that time, we are also continuing to add greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. 2million tons of carbon dioxide emissions are being emitted every year. in addition, about 2 million carbon dioxide equivalent times of methane, which is driving short-term heating effects and a large part of why we are seeing the effects today that we are, like the wildfires nearby.

this is also a huge health cost on society. what this requires of us is to convert the commitments into a decisive plan and past policy, and eventually infrastructure on the ground to ensure that all of buildings are transitioned by 2040. and bring everyone along in this transition, pull diverse stakeholders together to create a future together and this will be the only way we will get there. thank you. >> thank you very much. colleagues, do we have any questions for these presenters? okay. supervisor mark? >> thank you. thank you so much for your presentation. i really feel like you concisely distilled the most important point of the hearing and the need to move and move quickly

from a commitment to a plan and to a policy and action. and in each of these steps forward we will take time. thank you for highlighting the cost of delay every year, both in greenhouse gas emissions continued from our homes, as well as the cost -- the lost opportunity cost of retrofitting to all electric sooner and thank you for your presentation and for all of your work with the emerald city collaborative and highlighting the needs for this work to focus on equity and the need for it to engage and partner with community and labor groups. i did have a question. if you could speak a little bit more to the workforce need to hear and the opportunities to

create pathways to good jobs and good union jobs for disadvantaged communities in our building decarbonization work. >> thank you, supervisor mar. there is an acute shortage of qualified workers that are available right now. and in general, in the green sector. particularly as the volume and demand of work comes down the side, we will have an acute shortage. the residential construction sector tends to go low road, which means these are not unionized contractors. they are mom-and-pop shops that are often minority. they are often small and disadvantaged businesses. if we want to take the sector highroad, we need to basically offer capacity to small contractors to go high road. that is to pay for their living wages, to pay a living wage to their employees, and ideally, for the labor partners to come in and help them get signatory too. that is one strategy. then there is the whole

workforce training, which is to train -- a lot of these are, you know, plumbing or electrical or, you know, insulation jobs. that requires a few years of training. we want to ensure that we have that pipeline. whether it is city built academy or preapprenticeship training programmes, offered the specific training. both to contractors and as well as to others so we have that pipeline option and an inclusive workforce ready. >> thank you. would you say that there is a need to build out the workforce pathways and the contractor, education and support, especially for the small minority contractors in order for this work to ensure that it will be done in a high roadway and creating meaningful opportunities for disadvantaged

communities? >> that is absolutely critical if we are going to do this right. it is part of the equity lens. if we want this to be inclusive and benefit these communities, then the opportunities should flow to them. absolutely. >> thank you. i agree with that. i think this also be needs to be an important part of the roadmap to building electrification. thank you. >> thank you, supervisor mar. i have a question for you. i would like to talk about something that hasn't been talked about yet. this is specific to cooking stoves, which aside from really -- releasing carbon, releasing all kind of other things that exacerbate indoor air quality and exacerbate asthma rates

among some people who are already predisposed to having a whole host of other things. but i wanted to ask you is that food and the preparation of food is so intricately tied to tradition and love. i am a very committed cook and my staff and family know i love to cook. for many of us who come from cultures where open flame cooking is the technique used for preparation of food, most asian cultures and latin american cultures, the shift from blades to electricity can be tough. this is work that is mostly done by women at home. [please stand by]

>> to have he's these conversations because we're all going to be facing this in california in a few years, right. we have to lose our gas stove. i think education and behavior

change. people feel like it takes away from their heritage, culture or communities. very valid point and i think it a challenge to address that effectively. >> thank you to supervisor mar. my point bringing it up, i want us to address it intentionally and respectfully because frankly, it's different from a very well-educated environmental guide to tell an indian grandma, this is what you have to do. to have that conversation in a space that culturally appropriate and respectful. >> ok, so, that is it for our presentation. supervisor mar, i do want to make my closing remarks or are you good? >> i'm good.

we have public comment. >> thank you. let's go to public comment now. thank you. >> thank you, madam chair, do we have any callers in the queue? if you have not done so already, press star 3 to lineup to speak. speak. for those on hold, wait until the system indicates you have been unmuted. we have eight listeners with five in queue. you can unmute the first caller, please. thank you. >> caller: hi, my name is david with building efficiency and i'm a local contractor that installs those electrification measures. i just wanted to take a moment to say that we've been doing a lot of these electrifications

measures in san francisco for a while now. some of the additional things noted would be that we have issues with or i think that it takes a while, the permitting process is not very streamline so doing such large tasks working with sfdbi to maybe have one inspection or a streamline process. as of now, i can't even tell my clients exactly how many permits we're going to need and what the ex act process is going to be like. also, some people mentioned too, having the existing infrastructure like underground service, has been an issue for us, especially with our low

income weatherration programs and with laheeb and a lot of our clients are being left out of that are those that have old views, service panels, they're start into the process and any energy efficiency upgrades are starting below most other people and definitely having some sort of bottom-up approach, i think for those folks. it's really hard work in those communities and we have to turn down those a lot of time even though there are rebates and money available. we have eight listeners with five in queue. >> supervisors, my name is

francisco decosta. nowhere in this discussion has there been a needs assessment done, which is pre pandemic and post-pandemic. the way they are talking is if the pandemic is over. and most everything will be in place. as one speaker spoke, we have the smithsonian building inspection that is rife with corruption. the presenters should first go to the department of building inspection to find out how they operate. and then do a needs assessment, the large areas of land prone to

liquid faction from which methane gas sues into the air. one town of mass equals 22 tons of carbon dioxide, more or less. no mention is made of that. we have 45,000 homes. they don't want to rent it. we have 100,000 units like condominiums that are vacant. and many of them have gas. so, we need to do a needs assessment before the presenters can tell us anything about golden time lines. right now there's a lot of fluff in their presentation. thank you, very much. >> clerk: thank you so much many of next speaker.

>> caller: i endorse this effort to retrofit houses to get methane piping out from under our streets because it explodes and it's flammable. you are welcome with thatment i wanted to enter out, this is po. there's one thing we can do right away. as you know all know, heat pump pulls the heat out and puts it into the water or air it's heating and that is essentially what an airconditioner does. it pulse heat out of the surroundings and so we can start now and require any new air-conditioning system installed in san francisco be a heat pump. that's all i had to say. thank you, very much. bye. >> clerk: thank you, next speaker, please. >> this is chris i live in directing 3 and i'm also a

member of the seiu10-1 and i serve on the climate justice committee for 10-1. i just appreciate supervisor mar's presentation today and all the work he put no this really important issue and i appreciate the supervisors engaging on this. i wanted to bring your attention to a letter that a surgeoning coalition sent ut a month ago during the budget process called once for climate equity and one of the key asked was to start a building elective indication pile at program for low income residents with union local jobs, and other hiring requirements. this is something that unfortunately was not budgeted for in the pref budget however, i think there's an opportunity to pursue this going forward and we know whether through a supplemental budget process or some other process and it's something that extremely important to get this right and

equitable from the beginning. so hopefully, monday is from the state and federal government comes down, we are ready to hit the ground and running. so again, really encourage you to start some kind of low income subsidized. thank you for all your work. >> thank you, next speaker. >> hi, i'm representing the association for energy affordability and we're a 501c3 not for profit technical services and training organization dedicate today achieve being energy efficiency, green building practices and deployment of renewable energy resources and multi family buildings and our programs include the bay area multi family building enhancements program known as bambi and the csd low income weatherization program and for multi faultily

and the there is cash rebates for energy and water upgrades and family family properties and in the city and county of san francisco, aa partners with sf environment to administer the bambi program and to date it has served 526 properties providing over $26 million in row baits it's a state wide program that offers incentives to perform deepener gee retro fits and solar pv install allegations and they have completed seven projects in san francisco county and serving 743 low income households and the programs will launch in the near future as mandated i senate building and for lowy mission program and also the technology and' equipment for clean heading initiatives however, san

francisco the current state of decarbonation leafs a gap and desired and sector and funding and design will achieve california' climate goals and san francisco has the opportunity to build upon lessons learned from decor bannization and in doing so, the city is county can position itself to meet the goals set before fourth few are opportunity to comment. >> we have six listeners and three in dew. next speaker. >> >> caller: my name is paul wormer and i'd like to start by thanking supervisor mar for the work he and his office put in getting this report out. i'd like to say that i fully endorse sarah greenwald's comments about airconditioners

being heat pumps going forward. i'd like to raise a specific comment. this report was in response to a specific question and the challenge we face is the research question that determines in large part what the answers are. if you don't ask the right questions, you don't get the full scope of possible solutions. with climate change, we're looking at major engineering costs, major construction costs. one of the questions should be, is it appropriate to just do a like-for-like substitution. in order a heat pump heater for a gas fired heater. we should we look and say given the way the heat pumps deal with

energy and heat transfer, are there other systems that might work better for lower cost for the community, less impact, on the space as the sfpuc comments were about the challenge of locating heat pump water heaters and lot line construction? they are questions that could be asked that with broden the scope looking things like heat and cold as district energy supplies or a way of feeding for the city. thank you. >> thank you so much.

>> caller: this is joannie icen a resident of directing 10. i'd like to thank supervisor mar for this report and i agree with supervisor preston for ways to building electrification and people can afford it should pay and if they can't the city should pay and get paid become when the building sells and it's a great idea that means this thing can happen sooner and another comment is after the sfpuc person spoke, it was just glaringly clear we need municipal power and we need to get out of the pg&e and we need our own power transmission. that's it.

thank you. >> next speaker, please. this is the last speaker. >> i'm a resident of directing 9 and i want to echo the last couple of customers and also the caller from sciu1021 talking about the 1% for climate equity campaign and the need both from a jobs perspective and from a living in the future perspective for taking the initiative and really having san francisco it's on its climate goals in an equitable way. i also think that paul warmer's comment about thinking of this as a whole system and where we can get economies of scale doing things at a community or directing level is important and finally i want to thank supervisor mar for all his work on getting the topic of building

decarbonization for buildings rolling in a real way and so let's do this. thank you all for your time and your thought process and your action to have a livable future. >> clerk: thank you so much. we actually have one more taller ta just pandemic up. next speaker, please. >> caller: my name is daniel and like others i'd like to thank supervisor mar for commissionerring the report and leading the way on decarbonization and obviously supervisor mandelman and the full board for their work on electric indication to date. i obviously want to echo the sentiment of the a lot of previous call and he is highlight specific things and this was costs similarly to the

point about the research questions dictates the frame of what you under up looking at and it doesn't talk about both the cost of an action and the benefit of doing it. there's co benefits with health and we should take into account all of the benefits that would be getting from building electrification and i was disappointed in the budget cycle to see that the board didn't allocate any money to kick-start electrification and i'd like to see small scale pilots similar to other jurisdictions have done

focusing on low income and vulnerability communities and if we left the market force wouldn't be able to retrofit their own homes and they can get the benefits of quality, et cetera and even spending a few thousand dollars at home can go a long way in both the debar connizing and improving health so i encourage you to look at supplemental budget items as we look into the coming months and and not just on pad and paper. thank you. >> thank you so much and that completes the list of callers. >> thank you, madam clerk. seeing no other callers, public comment is closed. now supervisor mar, would you like to make closing remarks? >> yes, thank you so much chair

melgar and colleagues. for all this robust dialogue and thank you to all the folks that called in during public comment and i know many of you are part of the climate coalition that have been pushing us to step up to address the climate crisis here in the city and be a leader and as we've discussed, reducing or eliminating greenhouse gas emissions from our buildings is a complex problem and there's no silver bullet or single solution but i think we can do this and do this right and we need an ex witt able transition that brings everyone along and that offers funding and technical existence and doesn't put cost on the most vulnerable and we need fossil fuel and building one that creates good union-paying jobs and a pathway for workers and impacted industries and our disadvantaged communities and a

collaborative transition. we need to work across sectors hand and hands with community and labor stakeholders and we need to ensure seats at the table for residents for workers and for communities take holders and we need to identify the best and most impact roles for local leadership in where we can best partner with regional state and federal policymakers and we needy efficient effective coordination across city department and with other agencies. we must act with urgency and we must engage partners on this work and we must put our money where our mouth is and lead in policy and action and in other electrical appliances as ak ra men toe has done and we must

create a structure working group and task force or something else to co create the policies and cleaner greener future alongside with community and labor leadership and so thank you for this tub to have this really important discussion and i look forward to the follow-up on all this with you and with the community in labor stakeholders and with our city departments. >> thank you, supervisor mar. since you are a member of the committee of today, would you like to make a motion? >> sure. >> yes, i move that we file this hearing. >> thank you. >> i second. >> madam clerk. call the roll, please. >> just one order of house cleaning, if we can get a motion to excuse supervisor peskin from the remainder of the meeting beginning at 4:45.

>> so moved. >> on that motion, supervisor mar. >> aye. >> supervisor preston. >> aye. >> supervisor melgar. >> aye. >> you have three ayes. and i a apologize for interrupting, on the motion to file was it? >> yes. >> on the motion to file this item, number 5, supervisor mar. >> aye. >> supervisor preston. >> aye. >> supervisor melgar. >> aye. >> and you have three ayes. >> thank you. that motion passes. do we have any other items before us today? >> that completes the business for today. >> thank you. as a friendly reminder, the board of supervisors will be on legislative break in this committee will return to regular

business on monday september 13th, 2021. so, stay safe, everyone, have a nice break and we are a adjourned. 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.

magnuson. honda will be the presiding officer tonight. also present is deputy city attorney brad russi will provide any needed legal advice this evening.