held on september 13th, 2021. the meeting is being called to order at 4:30 p.m. the small business commission thanks sfgov for televising the meeting which can be streamed at sfgov.tv. members of the public, the number is (415) 655-0001. access code is 2483907176. press pound and pound again to be added to the line. when connected, you will hear the meetings discussions, but you will be muted and in listening mode only. when you're hear your item of interest come up, dial star three to be added to the speaker line. if you dial star three before public comment is called, you

will be added to the queue. please mute the device you're listening to the meeting on. when it is your time to speak, you'll be prompted to do so. best practices are to call from a quiet location, speak clearly and slowly and turn down the device you're listening on. public comment is limit today three minutes per speaker unless otherwise established by the presiding officer of the meeting. speakers are requested but not required to state their names. sfgov tv, please show the office of small business slide. >> today we will begin with a reminder that the small business commission commission is to voice your concern about the economic vitality. the office of small business is the best place to get answers about doing business in san francisco during the local emergency. if you need assistance with small business matters particularly at this time, you can find us online or via telephone and as always, our

services are free of charge. before item number one is called, i'd like to start by thanking media services and sfgov tv for coordinating the virtual hearing and the life stream and special thanks to matthew for assisting with the public comment line. item number one. >> clerk: item number one is roll call. [roll call] mr. president, you have a kor. >> president laguana: >> commissioner dickerson: will you read the ramaytush ohlone

acknowledgement. >> commissioner dickerson: the small business staff acknowledges that we are on the unceded an zest tal homeland of the ramaytush ohlone who are the original inhabitants of the san francisco peninsula. as the indigenous stewards of this land, and in accordance with their traditions, the ramaytush ohlone have never ceded, lost, nor forgotten their responsibilities as the caretakers of this place, as well as for all the peoples who reside in their traditional territory. as guests, we recognize that we benefit from living and working on their traditional homeland. we wish to pay our respects by acknowledging the ancestors, elders, and relatives of the ramaytush ohlone community and

by airplaning their sovereign rights of first peoples. >> president laguana: great. item number two. >> clerk: i believe we read item number two, we have some recusements. >> president laguana: yep. great. so commissioner adams, i understand you need to recuse. >> commissioner adams: yes. i would need to recuse from item number two since i do work in a business. we have several tenants as a landlord, i have several small business tenants who the ordinance would benefit. so i need to recuse myself. >> president laguana: and commissioner ortiz-cartagena, i heard you might possibly need to reaccuse. >> commissioner ortiz-cartagena: i do. [inaudible] >> president laguana: okay. so i move to allow the commissioners to recuse.

>> clerk: item two, recusal of commissioner adams and commissioner ortiz-cartagena. >> president laguana: i think we need a second. >> clerk: sorry. >> president laguana: no problem. >> commissioner: i second. >> clerk: commissioner huie seconds. all right. recusal of commissioner adams and commissioner ortiz-cartagena. commissioner dickerson. >> commissioner dickerson: yes. >> clerk: [roll call] all right. the commissioners are recused. item two, board of supervisors file number 210809: administrative code-covid-19 commercial rent relief fund. this is an ordinance amending the administrative code to

establish the covid-19 commercial rent relief fund to provide financial support to landlords of certain commercial tenants where the tenant was unable to pay rent due to the covid-19 pandemic and setting a sunset date of 24 months from the effective date of the legislation. this is a discussion and action item. presenting today, we have supervisor safai. >> president laguana: welcome, supervisor. sorry? >> clerk: i just want to make -- oh, yeah. >> president laguana: he's here. he's getting plenty of sun and getting his vitamin d while hoping helping us fix the commercial rent relief for the city. that's a two for if i've ever seen one. supervisor, welcome, and you have the floor and we're very excited to hear what you're presenting. >> supervisor safai: thank you, president laguana. thank you commissioners, director regina dick endrizzi and others that are joins us

today. i really just want to set the context for this and have a little conversation about where we are in terms of economic recovery as it relates to small businesses. you know, for me, in my office and team, we've been relying quite strongly on the october 2020 economic recovery taskforce report as a foundational tool on what small businesses have identified as areas of concern. and then trying to focus on policies that would help alleviate the pressures imposed on our small businesses not to their request or anyone's thinking or liking during this global pandemic. you know, we've hosted multiple hearings at the budget and finance committee around revitalizing tourism and helping our small businesses and small business corridors thrive and also the occupancy of our larger xhernl buildings and office buildings in

general. i've worked on countless meetings with our city administrator, our controller, the city's economist, the director of economic and workforce development, small business, office of small business and spoken with many entertainment commissioners and small business commissioners and small businesses over the course of this time all regarding the recovery, economic recovery of our city. i've also worked with supervisor peskin and other members of the board to provide the eviction protection for our commercial tenants for unpaid rent due to financial constraints imposed on them by covid turning pandemic so we would also expand it to businesses with 50 to 99 employees. if the commercial eviction moratorium expires at the end of this month, which we believe it will, there will be a whole host of businesses those

ranging from a couple employees all the way up to 99 employees with a number of different phase in protection periods. supervisor peskin took the lead on those businesses with 50 or less employees and we did the last little bit, between 50 and 99. also we did a lot of work with all of you who i mentioned on the shared spaces program. was one of the leaders on that as well as the streamlining. we started the whole streamlining for small businesses conversation in district four and eleven working with supervisor tang back in 2018 and the mayor and her team had the foresight to take that along with many of you, proposition h citywide and now we have the benefit of having a streamline process that we're continuing to strengthen and make stronger for small businesses as they try to cut through the red

tape. so all that's to say that, for me, the protection recovery and revitalization of our small businesses has been a real top priority and for us to recover as a city, for us to properly recover, we have to protect our small businesses because as i'm sure you all know, if i'm being 100% honest, no one wants to see a string of empty boarded up store fronts all over our city because businesses had too much mounting or rent debt they couldn't negotiate with landlords or they couldn't find a way to get out from under. i think that what this ordinance does is it says first and foremost that both parties will get to the table, both parties will negotiate a revitalized lease term.

but then also, this would be 100% grant, no loans, up to $35,000 if we can get working with the mayor to put money into this fund. we believe that the right amount of money that we're hoping for in this fund would be around $25 million and we feel like it could help thousands of businesses and thousands of employees. we've heard from multiple small businesses that actually have benefited from ppe, that have benefited from some of the city's previous loan grant programs, but still have mounting debt. so we feel like working with the office of economic workforce development and many of you, this money would be put aside to those that would convene mediation process and renegotiated and 100% of this money if this money is put into this fund would have to be applied toward rent debt. so we're trying to really

revitalize, protect, and re-establish many of these small businesses and hope they don't go under and ensure the economic recovery of our small businesses. we feel like also and i'll just end with this in saying that we know from back in the spring and we're going to get an updated version of that report somewhere between $100 million to $400 million in back rent have accumulated across the city. so we know that this is real and budget and legislative analysts provided that report in march and we're going to be getting an updated report of that very soon and we feel like this is something that somewhat of a tsunami that's about to hit the city if we don't tackle this. we've been working nonstop. have had really good conversations with the mayor's office and other members of the

board as well as many people out there that are on this call today as others and feel like it's very clear that these businesses can't take on anymore debt. that, at this points, the need is for grants as a way to help resolve some of the commercial rent debt that they have. so i just want to acknowledge you, president laguana, regina dick endrizzi, the office of workforce development, along with the entertainment commission, gloria, mary thomas from the golden gate restaurant association. mario from the council of district merchants. just a lot of the chamber of commerce. this is something that's on many peoples' radars and i'm sure many of you have your own personal either experiences or stories with small businesses and small landlords for that matter and landlords for that matter that want this to help mortgage debt and others to

really help to revitalize our economy. so i really hope you all can support this ordinance that would be creating the format for the creation of this fund and we will continue to work with the mayor's office hopefully to establish some money into this fund. thank you, president laguana. >> president laguana: thank you. and, appreciate you taking the time to present this program. commissioners, do we have any questions for the supervisor? while i wait for them to form late their questions, i have a quick one. oewd is going to be handling the rule making for the fund if established. what -- do you imagine that there being the opportunity for the commission to be able to provide feedback on that? those rules and just make sure that they're in line with the goals of the small business community? >> supervisor safai: i think that's a great question.

i know that we've already been working with you and others and we'll continue to do that and i'm absolutely open for that conversation, for you all to have the opportunity to weigh in and work with that office for sure, but i would let oewd speak for themselves. >> president laguana: okay. great. thank you. i appreciate that. commissioner huie. >> commissioner huie: thank you, very much for your presentation on today's item. one question i have is how did the number of $2.5 million come about in terms of those businesses being excluded? the one that gross receipt over $2.5 million? >> supervisor safai: from what we understood in terms of where ppe were going, talking to a lot of the businesses, talking to a lot of landlords, we felt

as though there were significant programs and support there. i've had a lot of conversations with some of the medium to larger landlords that have tenants that are of larger gross receipts and there has been, you know, the ability to renegotiate the terms of those leases, renegotiate the debt. so we were really trying to come into a sweet spot where the need seemed to be the greatest based on the data that we had. >> commissioner huie: great. thank you. and, also, in terms of like number of people, i don't know if this is something that you would be able to answer, but do you know like how many people you hope to capture in this fund? >> supervisor safai: well, that's why we set the number. we believe the average grant will be about $25,000. has the ability to go up to $35,000 but for the purposes of kind of averaging it out, we

felt like $25,000 would probably be a good average number. that allows us to hit at least a 1,000 average small businesses. the average small business has anywhere between six to ten employees so we knew we were going to get the best bang for our buck in that zone. some obviously have more employees and some have less and as president laguana has said, there's other programs out there that are specifically designed as a tax credit for the number of employees that each business employs, with him and others to -- >> commissioner huie: i think we lost him. >> president laguana: we appear to have lost the supervisor. give him a second, see if he's able to log back on. is lauren still with us?

>> director: i do not see lauren. >> president laguana: i see the square, but no video and no audio. >> can you hear me? >> director: yes. >> apologies. i believe his phone may have had some issues. let me see if he can log back on really quickly. >> president laguana: no worries. >> commissioner huie: i feel really out of site i'm actually okay. >> president laguana: lauren, i don't know. cynthia was the last question we had. i don't have anymore questions. the supervisor doesn't need to come back since commissioner huie feels her question was answered. we can make his life a little bit easier. well, actually, i take that

back. vice president zouzounis has a question. i apologize. >> understood. let me get him back on as quickly as i can. apologies. >> vice president zouzounis: i mean, if he can't be back on to answer my question, i'd love to be part of this conversation after or other spaces outside of commission. >> absolutely. let me just work on getting him back on and i will follow up if anything. >> president laguana: there he is. >> supervisor safai: hey everyone. sorry about that. my battery died so i was ending by saying that we're going to do -- we felt like that was the right number for the best bang for the buck at that. so we're hoping. we're continuing the conversation with the mayor's office. there's no money in the fund yet, but we will continue to negotiate and do everything we can to get that set up. and i don't know what other

questions i missed after that. >> president laguana: none. but we do have at least one more. vice president zouzounis. >> vice president zouzounis: thank you, president laguana. thank you, supervisor safai, for coming before us today. we appreciate your efforts in this area. i wanted to ask a couple questions. can you define exactly the moratorium period that is being referenced in terms of when it starts and when it ends so that we can understand the timeframe of it here. >> supervisor safai: so we're aware that the eviction moratorium is potentially going to end on september 30th and what we're focusing on in general is, you know, there may or may not be many businesses

now that are subject to or susceptible to being evicted based on back rent. so some of that will depend upon the business itself, how much background it has and when and if their leases are expiring. so that will have a lot to do with that. when i was referencing the moratorium, i was referencing the eviction moratorium expiring on september 30th, but in many ways, that's just kind of a flash point because many businesses are saying that some landlords won't negotiate with them until the eviction moratorium kicks in and some have said they're worried they could potentially be evicted with no room for negotiation. although, we think once landlords find out there's money in this fund if we're able to get it funded, they will be very open to sitting down to negotiate at that point. does that answer your question? >> vice president zouzounis: yeah. and i think things will become more clear as this program and

legislation hopefully passes and develops in terms of people being eligible from when they first started paying or being unable to pay their rent. >> supervisor safai: got it. we do define the period within the period that's impacted by covid, for sure. >> vice president zouzounis: okay. >> supervisor safai: the rent period would be from just bringing up last year. we do define the period. that rent debt would have to be accumulated from, for sure. >> vice president zouzounis: so it's probably tied to when it was an official shutdown date, when the city declared the shutdown date? >> supervisor safai: yeah. >> vice president zouzounis: okay. thank you. in terms of how -- what are the parameters of restructuring the lease conversation that you plan to have? is it just limited to that

honoring three more years or restructuring so that there are at least three more years? is that kind of the start and end of what that restructuring of a lease conversation will look like? >> supervisor safai: we felt like it was important to have leverage on both sides. we talked to a lot of people in the community, small business community and felt like that was the right number that there would be some restructuring of the term of the lease as well as 100% of the money has to be applied to rent relief debt. basically could not be utilized for anything other than rent debt. but, yes, that was how we did that. also, a small chunk of the money, about $500,000 would be set aside for, you know, third party negotiates so that we would be looking at the office of economic development to identify that, identify that group or groups that would come in and help us, help the small

businesses, help the landlords sit down and negotiate. >> vice president zouzounis: okay. great. thank you. and, i think my last question kind of got answered with the gross receipts cap, but i was trying to understand the line on section -- let's see. where it says, regardless of whether the tenant operates one location or more than one business. my question is how are we making sure that we're not helping formula retailer, but, i guess, the gross receipts cap kind of safeguards that? >> supervisor safai: yeah. but it also. i thought we had a line in there that this would not apply to or allow for formula retail. i'd have to go back and check the legislation, but i think we were kind of purposeful in that formula retail would not be allowed. >> vice president zouzounis: yeah. maybe because of city attorney, you weren't allowed to put that

in explicitly because i didn't find it, but i feel like the gross receipts cap will probably solve for that. >> supervisor safai: okay. we'll double check. i think we put it in there before. we're able to say specifically this will not allow for businesses that fall under formula retail. >> vice president zouzounis: okay. right on. thank you so much. >> supervisor safai: we'll double check that. thank you for the good point. >> president laguana: supervisor, quick question. the $400 million not in terms of the amounts, but in terms of the actual number of businesses, i remember seeing that controller report. have you seen anything on the break down of where businesses are located that are behind on the rent? >> supervisor safai: the commercial corridor neighborhood? >> president laguana: yeah. >> supervisor safai: i don't

think the budget analyst did it that way. >> president laguana: oh, okay. >> supervisor safai: to your point, one of the original hearings we had a couple months ago, the idea, i think the farther away you get to the downtown core, some of the more mom and pop business landlords and mom and pop business owners with fewer employees, less locations, you know, many of them that, you know, did not avail themselves or were not able to avail themselves as the restaurant relief program or the ppe program i think we'll start to see some come terms. many of them women, people of color that need this additional help and, you know, that's not to say and i just want to be 100% clear, you know, really appreciate what the mayor has done and the mayor's office and office of economic and workforce development. originally $20 million to $25 million was loans, now a

lot of that is being converted to grants. when you compare that to tenant relief. you know, tenant relief statewide is in the billions with a "b" and in san francisco it's far north well over $100 million. and as you all know, i'm preaching to the choir, literally preaching to the choir that small businesses are the main driver of our local economy. they drive our g.d.p., they drive our employment and so many different aspects and then the argument that i have made and many of you make, so much of what makes san francisco special, so much of what people come here to see and experience are these small businesses and so, you know, we saw a number of them go under in the last couple months because they and they specifically identified

mounting commercial debt as one of those core issues. so we feel like this is an impending crisis and we really hope that we're able to get some money into this fund and help these small businesses survive and thrive in the city. >> president laguana: that's the choir. commissioner huie. >> commissioner huie: just one more question. you know, there are some businesses who have been covering their rent by taking out loans and through other means. how does this legislation support those businesses that maybe have not defaulted on their rent, but have been -- but are still under water? >> supervisor safai: well, i mean, the simple answer would be i think a lot of the people that will avail themselves of this fund if we're able to get it funded will be people that will still be in business and

hopefully they will still be in business. right. my dry cleaner, for example, i'm running to go see him now so i have some clean shirts for, you know, the board meeting tomorrow and the rest of the week, he has back rent. he's taken on loans and, you know, he's like i can't take on one more penny of debt. so this doesn't exclude anyone that's taken on any loans and they might, you know, be doing it the best they can to be current in terms of payment to serve a portion of their rent, but they still have that back rent. the criteria will be if you have that back rent. if some of your debt is impacted or if some of our own particular situation involves debt, you're not going to be excluded from the program, you just have to show and if that's by having the landlord and the tenant at the table or the property manager at the table,

that will be clear that that particular business has back rent that's been unpaid. >> commissioner huie: so if the landlord has still been able to collect because the tenant has been taking out a loan to be able to pay rent, but the tenant is sitting with the debt now, you're saying they would kind of negotiate and talk through this process to be able to qualify for the program? >> supervisor safai: i think first and foremost, again, i don't want to punish anyone for, you know, remaining current. again, i was talking to a child care operator the other day, she said she took some equity line on her home so she could remain current. she has a small amount of debt. the first criteria, first and foremost will be the debt. and, in terms of how we deal with those that might be current, but they might be the ones that are, like you say

their situation might be impacted by the fact that they have to take on that debt which affects their bottom line, that's definitely something that we can look into a little bit more. but first and foremost, we're trying to start with those, you know, we also said you would of had to have been in business for three years. we're not necessarily targeting businesses that have just opened up. we felt like 2.5 in gross receipts was the right cutoff. we also had to kind of say, first and foremost, this is commercial rent relief program, those that have that, but we can definitely look into if a certain amount of that is impacted or all of it is impacted by debt, but it would be a little harder to then say, how do you -- there's other programs that we have. we have the existing grant and loan conversion programs. and so we definitely can look

into that as well. >> commissioner huie: okay. thank you very much. >> president laguana: great. well, i'm not seeing any other questions. one last call. don't see any. so can we go to public comment, please. >> clerk: there's no one in the queue for public comment. >> president laguana: okay. seeing no one. public comment is closed. commissioners, you know, i have to say, the one thing i hear the most from small business owners is what are they going to do with all this debt and how are they going to get caught up on rent? i personally know at least half a dozen businesses that are either closing when the moratorium expires or are thinking about closing or a lot of anxiety and stress about how they're going to make it past that september 30th deadline. so for the supervisor to take

the lead on trying to help with this program, i think that that at least from my perspective is something small business community desperately needs. so i certainly am supportive, but if anybody feels differently, by all means, now would be a good time to talk about it. vice president zouzounis. >> vice president zouzounis: yeah. this is exactly the kind of stuff we need to take for commercial tenants, but i just want to get a sense how we can support this timeline if it's passed because i'm seeing a lot of, you know, moving pieces in terms of we have a short timeline if it's going to sunset after two years, how do

we ensure that oewd and any partners that need to be for negotiation to administer for something like this in that short time frame and i'm definitely thinking ahead like if we are going to be bringing on third party negotiators, i'd love to see, i mean an r.f.p. process takes a lot, but what has been a recurring thing we've brought up is existing city partners don't necessarily cover all of the harder to reach communities that need these new programs. so are you planning on offering new r.f.p.s for this? do we have the financial desemination tools, i mean, the

office of small business submission went through this with the new entertainment grants. we had to set up new systems. how can we support that timeline? do you see there being any obstacles or implementation that we need to keep an eye on? >> supervisor safai: is that directed to me? >> vice president zouzounis: i'm posing it to anyone. >> president laguana: you know. i'll jump in. i think if the legislation is funded and passed, i would certainly be inclined to invite oewd in to present and we can talk about the implementation. you heard my question earlier about rules and guidelines. i think that'd be an appropriate conversation to have at that time. given that, you know, we're still fingers crossed hoping the legislation is passed and

funded, i think we can save those questions for when we actually have something to talk about, but i think those are the right questions, vice president zouzounis, and certainly we've seen many instances where it took longer than we thought and didn't reach into the communities that we wanted them to reach into. i know just through working with the supervisor on this program that has been top of mind for him. supervisor, i don't want to speak for you, but you've certainly relaid that concern to me several times. i'm confident that we will work through it and we'll get through it. are there any other -- sorry. vice president zouzounis, did that answer your question? okay. so i'm going to go ahead and make a motion that we approve

file number 210809: the commercial rent relief fund. >> commissioner: second. >> clerk: a motion by the president, seconded by vice president zouzounis. the motion is to approve -- >> vice president zouzounis: i think it was seconded by commissioner dooley. >> clerk: oh, i'm sorry. motion to approve. [roll call] >> commissioner: he's recused. >> clerk: that's right. [roll call]

motion passes. >> supervisor safai: thank you everyone. >> president laguana: supervisor, thank you. appreciate everything you're doing. looking forward to working with you more on this in the future. >> vice president zouzounis: thanks supervisor. >> supervisor safai: have a good evening, everyone. >> president laguana: next item please. >> clerk: item three, presentation, digital equity strategic plan 29-2024. it's a review of the digital equity strategic plan and its overlay with small businesses. we have linda gerull cio, executive director of department of technology presenting today. >> director: pardon me, through the president, before we continue, i want to make sure the two commissioners have rejoined the meeting. >> president laguana: we'll wait for them. >> and this is linda gerull. good afternoon. could you please start my video

and allow me to share? >> president laguana: hello, linda. welcome. >> hi. there we go. >> president laguana: we're just waiting on our two recused commissioners to rejoin. >> perfect. can you see my screen? >> director: i do want to confirm that both have been notified. >> president laguana: we'll give them one more minute to rejoin. i want to make sure they have the opportunity to see the presentation. linda, i appreciate your patience. >> no worries.

>> president laguana: okay. well, i think we should get started. >> good afternoon. my name is linda gerull and i serve as the city cio and i want to introduce ray lesho and he is the digital equity manager as well as brian roberts who is with the department of technology as the executive policy analyst. so we're here today to talk about digital strategies and opportunities and resources for small businesses in san francisco. ray and i will be sharing this

presentation. he'll do some slides and i'll do some, so we hope to have time at the end for any questions you might have. so a bit about the digital divide in san francisco as you know, there is a significant population pace over close to 30,000 that lack any internet access and 64,000 that lack broad band and more time was broad band and internet connectivity was needed during covid than when students were trying to distance learn and seniors needed telemedicine help and access and, of course, as people worked remotely and as people needed to look for new jobs remotely, internet is certainly an essential service and so that's why this is so important and certainly to our small business community and as

par of course of the economic taskforce recovery recommendations, internet access is an essential service and needed for digital equity and economic equity in the city. so, ray, would you like to share this slide? >> sure. i was just trying to find the unmute button. so, yes, just giving a little bit of background, we've, i mean, low income populations have been affected, you know, pretty much the most with this now exacerbated, you know, inequities that exist due to the pandemic and i know business owners have been impacted as well. our approach is pretty much a three-prong approach. we focus on three, you know, we

have three areas of focus. number one, we have internet access. if you think about internet access, just to kind of make the distinction between wifi access and broad band, wifi uses radio frequencies and signals to transfer data without wires and broad band is transmission of data with the use of high-speed internet and those are two pretty distinct things and it's important to kind of highlight that when we're talking about equity. so when you look at internet access, we talk about gradual obsolescence. so the obsolescence of internet technology connected to the impact of low income populations engaging with the internet content. where as broad band populations enjoy the advantage of having more time online, a broad of variety of activities and the creation of new content.

so they may -- so someone from affordable housing, you know, from the low income population may not be able to enjoy adobe suite or be able to create that website that someone in diamond heights may be able to enjoy doing. the other leg of the stool is devices. low income households can have limiting access in technology due to the devices being shared by other folks in the household which can affect their frequency of use, which in turn reduces the opportunity for learning and hence real life and income opportunities. the ability to create digital content. so that affects them economically and, finally, i mean, we've got to think about, you know, how many people are sharing spaces. if i, you know, if i have a device that i have to share with two or more people, it's going to be pretty much -- it's going to be difficult for me to

participate in the digital economy. and then, lastly, the digital skills gap. digital intuition is a major component of an advancement in technology. to introduce technology and advanced skills to their learning and the more skills a person possesses, the more confident they become to overcome online challenges. if you think about some folks in our senior population, you know, tech is a nebulous place for them. so we have to provide these additional skill trainings so they can participate in this digital economy. next slide, please. so, i mean, obviously, with this new pandemic, we have to think outside of the box, we have to pivot and essentially innovate ourselves to success

and pay attention to the nuances. next slide, please. so through our civic -- yeah that's perfect. through our civics bridge program which is actually kicked off by the office of civic innovation, we've partnered with them. we've partnered with sales force, and we've partnered with the office of economic and workforce development to basically develop and we didn't figure this out until later and, actually, you can go to the next slide. so you're seeing here, this is kind of like how we kind of came to our final project. so a little bit of background. as you may know, we have a digital equity strategic plan and, in this plan, we've identified digital literacy as i mentioned before as a major piece that we want to address and t ensure every san

franciscan has a solid baseline, a solid foundation to move from. so, you know, after kind of taking a look at this, we use our -- actually, one of our research fellows does a little bit deeper to figure out what specifically do san franciscans need or want to be successful? what resources do they need? and, in that discovery, and we did surveys. we talked to community based organizations that are staples in the community. we discovered that they wanted to be business owners. they wanted to be entrepreneurs. they wants to learn how to participate in the upside of e-commerce. we talked to community based organizations that are already in that space and who want to

be in that space, who have hostess curriculum that we developed and we decided to map out a plan. an implementation plan. next slide, please. so, again, the goals were design. so this is per crowd source information that we got from the community. not us. not ray. not linda. this is the community telling us. so design in entrepreneurship and digital e-commerce play book. it would be used by c.b.o.s who have the trust of the community to implement this strategy and teach them how to be successful online. next slide, please. so yeah, that's the one. so just kind of cutting to the chase. this is what you'll learn. it includes, but not limited to what you see here. think about the first time, you

know, as a business owner, you got that business property tax assessment and you didn't even have a brick and mortar location. you were trying to figure out what are they asking for? well, we're going to actually help them navigate that form and various other forms and maybe they think off the bat, they need to be an l.l.c. or c-corps or s-corp or whatever. so they can be successful. so e-commerce, marketing basics, you know, how to leverage web applications like maybe intuit. they're going to need to understand how to read a cash flow statement. they're going to need to understand these things intricately so they can be successful long term. this digital skills play book

and entrepreneurship play book encompasses all of that. next slide, please. i think i'll hand it over to linda. >> yes. i'll do the next one. so now you've heard about what ray's work is doing and how he's partnering with other city departments to deliver different types of literacy, different literacy to our community and he can go into great detail of that. the department of technology is looking to close the digital divide in terms of the infrastructure that the city needs to deliver that broad band service throughout the city and in the most prioritized areas where there is less access which are shown in this map. and, some examples of recent work, we have over the last

three years connected approximately 7,000 housing apartments and affordable housing complexes to the fiber network and are delivering service. this also includes senior, low income complexes, low income housing with high numbers of students. rec and park centers that are used for community hubs and the mayor's program for student learning in covid and where we're installing internet service as well. whether it's a navigation center or a housing complex, we're trying to with internet

service over the next three years. so where this leads us and where does small business fit into this program is really around what we're leaning forward and leaning into around building a digital city which includes closing the digital divide. as we look at these different types of services, there are opportunities and we will be testing this to deliver service in a neighborhood and that neighborhood could actually be a business corridor or it could be a neighborhood that is unserved by commercial wifi. so we'll be looking at those types of opportunities from an infrastructure point of view and if you have a specific business corridor, we may be able to do a pilot in the next years so we look forward to the types of ways we can be of service to the small business community.

of course, as ray mentioned, our digital literacy training and coaching to the c.b.o.s and small business owners will be around accessibility, data privacy and cyber security. so all of this learning and accessibility will be a benefit to the small business community. so we are here to answer any questions that you might have. i can't see hands, so you're going to have to help me here. >> sharky, you're on mute. >> president laguana: i had to cough and i muted myself and i forgot. thank you both so much for the excellent presentation and this is great work and it's going to have a huge impact on our community. commissioners, do we have any

questions? vice president zouzounis. >> vice president zouzounis: thank you both so much. this is definitely something we want to help especially from our racial equity committee and i wanted to know what stage you're in right now. i read the report and i remember seeing a portion about distributing devices. has that already been put in motion or is that not a step we've gotten to yet? >> well, i appreciate you bringing that forward because as ray pointed out, it is one of the legs of our three-legged stools, access, devices, and literacy. and we are not funded for devices, so that is a gap in our program right now. so we would love to understand what opportunities there might be for devices.

and, as we think about the idea of devices, i have to put on my c.i.o. hat and say, we have to look at the total cost of ownership of the device. it's not just what is the cheapest. it's not just what was refurbished by someone. if we're going to do this, we need to do this in a wholistic way. we would certainly buy in bulk, but we need to buy a standard laptop that would be something that would have a certain warranty, a certain shelf life. we could standardize our training on. if we end up with a hodgepodge of equipment, it's very difficult to do that digital literacy training in a simple l cost effective way. when we talk about devices, it really speaks to how we would do training, and would also speak to how we would do

support and we're trying to compress those costs. so i've got to do it standard. we have to do it large scale because then we could have the biggest impact. so you all understand these concepts, so i wanted to share that with you. we're looking forward to possibly some fundraising drives and through "give to sf" where we would have a fund to do these kinds of procurements and so that's what we're looking forward to and we would certainly appreciate your help. >> vice president zouzounis: thank you for that update. that's important information. i mean, i've worked for the federal government in the desemination of devices and training and the collection of it and i understand what you're speaking to in terms of that standardization, but i also remember reading like you wanted to create some kind of

hub where people can donate refurbished devices as well. >> yeah. i think that was in the original strategy plan and i think as we've matured in our thinking and we ended uptaking delivery of some refurbished equipment, when you find that you need ten different kinds of power cords, you know, it's just a mess. it's just way too difficult to manage in a large scale and i think, you know, refurbished equipment might be great for one small place where you might be doing some trainings and you have the technical expertise there to manage the different types of devices and troubleshoot, but what we're trying to do is push out a large number and keep our support costs low, you have to standardize. >> vice president zouzounis: yeah. that makes sense. i'm just also trying to help you think creatively because another big goal of our commission is to help branch small business with that social

equity work because there's so many points of connection that are often not seen by our legislators. they kind of silo us when it comes to some of the bigger picture, you know, social, you know, projects, social equity projects and i think this is one that small businesses can help with a lot. i think, you know, we have a lot of independent technology, you know, businesses that have scaled products, you know, they have used products. they have onhand staff that can help you. i would love to empower those types of businesses in our small business community hubs once this programming gets built out a little bit. i would love to connect with some of our, i know, for example, the sf firefighters credit union was doing kind of

an informal, you know, project on their own, you know, where they have -- i think there's different businesses that might have equipment that they don't use anymore or they have some kind of resource to offer if we do need to build out some programming to the standardized approach that you take up. i just wanted to put that out there that i think this is a good next step for small businesses contributing. >> and, certainly we're going to be looking forward to our local l.b.e.s contributing to any of the projects that maybe be coming forward. so we look for them to help us on these jobs. [please stand by]

during this entire pandemic. i guess to put some context and it. , seeing how this digital divide has grown during the last year and half, so i kind of dug in to your strategic plan early on and i'm curious

about a lot of these things and how we can helpour small business community . a lot of the plan is targeted towards residents and individuals and increasing their access and increasing their digital literacy . how do you see the data for smallbusinesses so far ?has there been aneffort to find out about the gap for small businesses ? >> that's really around ray's work. where you mentioned theprogram that just was completed for training . and the delivery through community-based organizations, theentrepreneurship and e-commerce digital stills playbook . that playbook would and reagan canchime in here , about how

you start off with digital skills. how you leverage marketing. what resources areavailable . how you deal with cyber security. those are the kinds of expertise that the playbook can bring and we get people starte thinking in a more digital way . how do you do that procurement side. how you do b-to-b. ray, do you haveany thoughts ? >> when i look at our playbook i use the analogy of the internet connectionbeing the road that you travel on . the device being the car. and then the digital literacy skills as drivers and . some have got drivers and going through school, some folks didn't and just gotin the car and drove .

so i think this training, what it can do for businesses that have largely been brick-and-mortarfor a long time is help them transition into a digital world . this is like addeddistribution channels . if you can feature your product or service across multiple platforms, that's a lot of visibility. so for businesses that they might be a cobbler, you might be whatever. you might solely relyon person-to-person, cheek to cheek transaction now you come and get this training that's free . you can be equipped now to participate in this digital economy. what i shared in terms of the curriculum, that was only a fraction of what's in the curriculum. only a fraction.

i'd be happy to share it with you, happy to get your ideas, thoughts, curiosities around what's in there andmaybe we can enhance it a little bit because you allare tried and true businesses . i'dlove to learn more about what you're thinking about this is just apilot . this is very malleable . we're trying to develop for the next iteration . so we've already identified some passionate folks who want to be instructors. the renaissance business center, not sure if you guys are familiar. we got one of their consultants to jump on board pro bono among others who are in the business community so i love to talk more about how we can access the network and begin sourcing some of our trainers, train the trainers to spread the good news of digital entrepreneurship.

>> president: one, i think that we have a lot of existing businesses that need to it or have needed to prevent. during this past year we've seen in that event there is a gap. it's kind of like, now we want you to take digitalpayments. now we want you to bring your whole menu online . now wewant you to do take-out and visibility . there are businesses that need help and ontop of that many of them need culturally responsive help . not to just the in a language but to understand and meet where the small business owner is what theirfears are about moving forward . there are people who are very connected, but they don't know how totranslate that into their business . so sometimes, i just imagine some of these workshops would be well attended by somebody who's already comfortable with

the startup, it can live in outreach. it's a lot of people who maybe would not know to come to this workshop or it's like, how do we meet people where they are would be my concern in terms of digital literacy. the second piece that i noticed is that in doing a lot of, i think somehow i think it's advocacy would be a word to describe it but i've been in chinatown for many months now trying to get the lay of what' happening and how to support small businesses there . early on i think what i noticed was that there was no reliable internet. like, to do business it's like you said . about individuals, having broadband internet, having

cable internet are hardwired internet is the lifeblood of what we do on a daily basis in terms of streaming, being able to use your favorite software. all these kinds ofthings . so without that in the neighborhood and relying on wi-fi to do business is not necessarily doable. i noticed that you had chinatown now, it said you're working on gettingmore robust wi-fi in the neighborhood . is there an opportunity to get more robust fiber into the neighborhood ? >> that's a tricky one because we allknow chinatown . everything is down together and there's no place to dig. you should see what we have to dojust to get inside the buildings . the buildings areold, the

wiring is old . and it's very very expensive. that's why you don't see that the carriers have done much and have really not built out at the same level that other parts of the city are builtout . one of the pilots that we have underway this year will be something called fixed wireless. you're familiar with wi-fi. and the people that jump on it, the more people, the more the signal strengthgoes down. it also depends on where you are . some like 5g, certain types of 5g will not goaround the building or will not go inside the building . you can light up the road but theminute they walk into the building they don't have wi-fi . so we're going to be piloting and testing some new types of technology with what are called

fixed wireless which is a different type of radio wave signal. that we hope will, we know will penetrate buildings. which would allow us to possibly light up a neighborhood or a corridor or a business corridor. that's what we're looking at right now. we're going to do a test to see if this will workand what type of signal strength we get. what the capacity is going to be . but we have to test this capacity because wi-fi only works to a point. this is a flavor of wi-fi but it's a different kind ofway so it might be much more robust which is what we're hoping for which would help us in places like chinatown . >> president: have you identified anyother member areas of the city that are similar to chinatown .

you have either priority areas for what you're telling me is we can't get get it so we're going to look at other solutions. >> i know at&t put a new tower in chinatown so there should be some relief there. we have always as we mentioned have been focused on residential areas. so we're hoping this pilot we're going to do this year will also be able to test a business corridor or. where focused in district 11 district 10 right now but it's a concept, if the concept works it would be something thatcould be scaled up across the city or in certain neighborhoods to be implemented . that's kind of where we are right now. it's changing rapidly and we certainly understand the need.

but it has to work.it has to work andit has to work inside buildings . we have to have not just one personon at a time . so there's a lot of technology challenges to cope with . >> president: this idea of internet if you walk into a place and they say a course we have internet but do you have consistent internet, strong internet . what are your upload and download speeds. when you start to date in that's when you realize that were true and equities in our neighborhood because i was walking with commissioner dickerson . one of the first people we talked to had a robust business and is a wonderful letter of the community and as she's finding her page it's taking forever yes, our internet is slow .

this is in the bayview. it's not just in chinatown, probably not just in bayview either of us we're talking about true equity i think not having the physical infrastructure like we would just describe the difference between the ability, the netflix and the ability to do other things, that's a huge and equity that is only goingto increase if there's no actual investment into this . i do not think that wi-fi at this point in time, if you're talking about economic recovery post covid which is today, that's not happening. i just don't understand how. and i'm not upset at you. i don't know how many times, so that's why this is just ... this has become a passion. >> mind you, you can't get me

started on this, i'll talk all night. but let's put it in context. to implement broadband for the entire city, we did the analysis . we had 2.5 billion.what we focused on when the board of supervisors, they said what we want you to do is focus on affordable housing first so it's not to say that there would be an opportunity in the future to expand and we all know there are investments coming and grant projects coming from the federal government. we are about half a year away from that . depending on how it's really for residential as well with your help maybe we can find ways to make it more business brian is on the call. you remember seeing anything about small business in that grant ? >> yes linda.

there is definitely as part of the economic development component of these grants, it's not been solely devoted to residential service . a lot of it can be for middle networks. often they use access by residents as a metric to say this area is unserved or underserved . but the subsequent networks that are built would be just serve both residents and businesses. in other words they say where do we want to prioritize and they use mostlyresidential metrics for that . but then in terms ofservices that are seats subsequently up those would be both businesses and residential . >> president: it's hard for me to believe that the areas that

are underserved right now are the most just physically challenging places to get to. i feel like we've been saying this for years ever since we even got cable tv. that's kind of the inception of technology in this form. i feel like there are other factors that are preventing people from becoming digitally life present. i think those factors need to be addressed when we are really talking about the digital divide because we're seeing it in terms of how our students are going to school. there are really kids living in bunkbeds, doing homework on a smart phone. that is a reality that we have to live through and there are small business owners who do not havereliable internet to be able to take payments or be able to run a business .when

we're talking about trying to help people recover i feel like we have to have that real conversation why certain neighborhoods are being left out because i feel like at the pace thatwe're moving right now , it's your left behind today, it's going to be that much more difficult to catch up and we know this on an individual level. we need to face that idea when it comes to our burgeoning corridors. >> certainly. >> president: ihave other questions but i'd like to follow up .i hope my passion hasn't scared you. >> no, i'm with you. >> i'm here to help open those doors in the neighborhood but sometimes it can be challengin . i hope that we will be able to have this relationship and i'm ready to pound the pavement

with you guys and get people on board. i hope you will use me and adjust my excitement for what you're doing, hopefully we can continue this conversation after this meeting today. >> thank you. >> commissioner dooley. >> i think i've had my questions answered by the previous commissioners questions. >> perfect. commissioner ortiz-cartagena. we have commissioner ortiz-cartagena? we may have lost them. i see him but i donot hear him .

commissioner, yourmicrophone is muted if you're trying to talk . speaking of internet connectio , the commissionerrelate to me his frustration that he doesn't have a good internet signal at his business . andi think it's relevant to the subject and case in point . commissioner ortiz-cartagena, ifyou can hear us speak up as soon as you are back and we will get you in here. vice president zouzounis . >> vice president: thankyou to our presenters and thank you to commissioner dooley for making sure this item on our agenda and joining in the conversation . >> great. i second the thanks of commissioner huie and her

excellent leadership and i appreciate you coming in and presenting on thisimportant topic . a couple quickquestions on my end . it was the first or second slide mentioned in the survey. i was wondering if you would be willing to share that survey with us in the meeting materials that can be postedto our agenda. i'd like to look at it . not now but later when it's appropriate. it seemed likethere was some really interesting stuff in there . i know it doesn't come as a surprise to me that there are still large numbers of people without internet access but it's still even seeing that on some level is shocking that 7.6 percent of the populationdon't have internet at all in san francisco . the internet center of the world. and 15percent don't have

reliable broadband . to me , it seems reallyhard to build a small business . to be an entrepreneur and to be successful without having reliable internet. i want to send everything commissioner huie said and anyway our commission can be of assistance to you and helpful to you in moving forward on this goal i think is critical and important. mythird question , minor question. on the areas needing service, i noticed treasure island was not highlighted. do they havereliable internet there ? a little back story, i used the reverse there with a band that certainly wasn't the case then perhaps things have changed. >> know, we have to shoot microwaveover and we're barely

able to make it to the fire station . and what we had with vaccines going on at the fire station, we had to bring our silent trailer and and shoot a wi-fi signal into the building for thedoctors and nurses that were doing that work . the good news, that's bad news. the good news is that with the buildout of treasure island, the city will have 2 conduits on that island that will provide internet service to affordable housing and other locations. but is thatsomething you want to add ? >> know, just that. >> i'm sorry, please continue. >> it is as linda pointed out very bad internet access currently. in that case we have a path for both getting across the bridge

with cyber and an ability with the templates to build cyber to all the addresses there. >> president: are those condiments going on the bridge or under the day ? >> we're using the fiber to the island is on the bridge and as part of the laying out of the new street plan, we will have conduits in the street so we're using shared fiber across the consortium across the bridge. and on the islands, treasure island will have a conduit that we were discussing. >> president: quick question for you ray. on the cbo programs, perhaps you guys mentionedthis and i missed it and if so i apologize

. is there any room there or contemplation of a mentor ship program with existing businesses that have perhaps a good internet strategy and you know, would be willing to spend a little bit of time other businesses get their sea legs if you will ? >> to answer your question, yes. there's a mentor ship component baked in their viaan existing relationship . we tried to be very resourceful but it's a pilot. we didn't exactly get funded for this so we're partnering with our respective partners for community ventures. renaissance center and others. so to answer your question, ye . that's an extremely important component . we want to promote a community

field where you can tap into a brand of everyonearound you. if you continue that way in business , i think that's a strongindication you will be successful in business . >> president: my business is located in bayview and i'd be happy to lend a couple of hours to train or teach or coach or mentor any young or old. china's young in terms of the business, not the age of the entrepreneur. but help any body that's looking to make that transitio . certainly i'm an easy person to find and contact so don't hesitate to reach out once you get that program up and going.

all right. are there any other questions before i move on to public comment ? sorry, there is. commissioner, youare back . commissioner ortiz-cartagena. >> i'm deep intobayview and i have horrible internet connection . i'm deep in the water in bayview. so this is right up my alley. as commissioner and also as a ceo found her in the missing district one of the biggest things my co-commissioners have this is the digital preservation of small businesses. we mentioned all the stuff you didin the presentation . that's just a gap and it creates more barriers. just generationally. i also helped cofund the mission during the pandemic and

one of the biggest things ... [inaudible] for them to have to go online in the bayview, it's crashing on you you get discouraged and if it's your second job you don't have the time for basic ... [inaudible] we would love to collaborate in one capacity with business agencies and we would like to collaborate to see this through and expand and i just love it. >> i want to saysomething to that if that's okay . we are actually and you'll be

thefirst to know outside of my department . you're actually kicking off an event in the mission focused on the mission that caters to latinx households. what is is the emergency broadband benefit that we're really focusing again in those households and we want to bring in others and we will have already been in contact with one of my colleagues whose over the cultural district in the mission to bringthat in next couple of months . i would love to talk to you off-line to see how we can leverage a partnership because i understand whatyou're saying aboutthe bayview . that's something that linda , brian and myself are acutely awareof and are actively addressing with the resources we have .thank you.

>> president:wonderful. commissioner ortiz-cartagena, are you done ? we may have lost it. great. i'll see any other ... commissioner huie class i realized i am coordinating or i'm attending and helping to coordinate bringing people into chinatown to kind of walk-through and understand infrastructure and its needs . i would love to have you guys come to some of those as well. that's my. [bleep] and i will follow up with you after the meeting i wanted to put it out there that i'm ready to invite you guys out and hopefully we can make some substantial change. >> i am open, let me know please.

>> president: i think it's time toopen it up for public comment. are there any public commenters on the line ? okay. seeing none, public comment is closed. thank you again ray and linda and brian for your excellent presentation . we are all standing ... >> someone did result there ha . >> president: wonderful, pleas allow them to proceed . >> caller: that evening commissioners. my name is lily holt >> . [please stand by]

dsl. that a reality and thank you to commissioner huie for highlighting it and for attending and being part of this conversation. >> thank you. so, any other callers on the line? >> no one else on the line. >> public comment is closed. linda, brian and ray thank you so much. appreciate you spending time with us and bringing us up to speed on your very important work and we are in solidarity with all of you. we're ready to help any way we can. feel free to use us as a resource. happy to put you on the agenda with any updates or anything you might find to be of interest to the small business community and look forward to working with you

again. >> thank you. >> all right. next item please. >> item 4, board of supervisors file 210-810 business signs on awnings and marquees in addition to projecting signs in various districts and certain chinatown mixed use districts. in the eight priorities of the planning code and public necessity, convenience and general welfare findings pursuant to section 302. this is a discussion and action item. presenting today legislative

aide to supervisor stefani and audrey malone. >> it is great to be here this evening. happy to see all of you, virtually though and not in person, but i'm sure we'll get there. i'm joined by audrey malone from the planning department as well who will provide expertise on the item. before you is an amendment to article 6 of the planning code that contemplates how signage is regulated in the city of san francisco. specifically, supervisor stefani is proposing a sign to have business signs regulated in

business corridors and chinatown mixed use district. presently, businesses with suggesting signs and awnings are not allowed to have sign copy on both of those types of signs, i'm going to do my best to not get too much in the weeds on this and leave that to audrey when she has a chance to speak, but i wanted to give a bit of background on this proposal. coming to supervisor stefani's office with an enforcement case against them for having sign copy on both their projecting sign and awnings on their business. we looked into this a little bit more and found this rule had been started in 1994 right around the time that a lot of policies were being implemented.

we found that about a little less than 400 businesses across san francisco were currently out of compliance. it doesn't seem as if having sign copy on both projecting signs and awnings was operating against the public good or contributing to visual issues in any of our commercial corridors. nor had there been a significant number of enforcement cases brought against business owners. supervisor stefani's office wrote a proposal and it is before you today and we're hoping that we can have your support. with that, i will turn it over to my colleague audrey, we do have a power point.

if you could pass over controls to me, i can pull that power point up. >> i believe you should have them. >> i do not yet. >> i do see the slide -- i don't think i allow my computer to record me and why i maybe can't share. are you able to pull that slide deck up i sent? >> let me get it pulled up.

>> i'll introduce myself. good evening commissioners. i work in the legislative analysis division of the planning department. dominica asked me to come here today, it's a visually appealing presentation i guess you could say. in the sense that the ordinance would do something that would change the way we visually see our store fronts. so even though we're just changing a few words from ors to ands, it can get a little confusing. we put together a few examples to give you an idea. great. as that is getting organized for you to see, i wanted to make sure the first point of clarification was explained, which is that the planning

code's ideally signage and different types of signage but we also regulate awnings. those are separate from awning signs. businesses in most neighborhoods can have an awning and not put their business name on that awning and that would not count toward signage. that is just the first thing i wanted to make sure is clear. right now a business could choose to have an awning, in most zoning districts. they would have to meet the dimensional requirements on the slide. if they don't put their business name on the awning, they can have a projecting sign or in certain districts they could also have a wall sign. if we could go to the next slide. this is just a diagram in the planning code that shows what the dimensional limits are visually instead of a chart. we can go to the next slide.

this is taken from the sign handout to give you a visual of what we're talking about when we mention different signs. the first is the wall sign. that is something either embedded into the face of the building or attached directly to the face of the building. in most districts, those wall signs can be indirectly or directly illuminated. then we have projecting signs, which is one of the ones we're going to focus on today, that is something that starts on the wall of the building. it is afixed to the wall but projects out on to the street. then we have the awning signs, which means you have the regular awning and it is still subject to all of the dimensional controls that we were talking about earlier. you can put your business's name on the awning and it makes it a sign versus just an awning. the next slide. we pulled a very quick example

from a business not in san francisco. so we don't get anybody in trouble. this is in georgetown in washington d.c. of a business that currently would not be in compliance with our sign regulations because right now you cannot have a projecting sign and an awning sign in most of our neighborhood commercial residential commercial, residential mixed use. pretty much all of our zoning districts across the city, except for our -- i believe some of our industrial districts. we're not going to touch those today. if the business's name was not on the awning, this would be totally legal. because their name is on the awning, it is currently illegal by our code standards. next slide. under the proposed ordinance, the pointing out all of the reasons why this is legal, essentially the end story is

that the projecting sign and the awning sign could exist in this way. it does not mean any of the dimensional requirements in the code would go away or be moved. with the blue lines that is showing in an awning, the dimensional requirements that still exist, whether you put your sign on it or not. with the yellow, we show that's the signed copy and that copy for your sign on your awning must be no more than in this scenario, i said 40 square feet. that is the regulation in the district. the projecting sign, which is on the left of the photo with the pink has a bunch of different sign requirements. it can't be too high. it can't sit too low and can't extend out too far and be too big. the last two slides, go to the next one. i won't get into them too much.

just to give you an idea and you are welcome to look back at it later. all of these requirements are the dimensional requirements that still exist across the district that the ordinance is proposing to affect for projecting signs. these would remain in place. these would not change. the last slide. this is our copy, our sign copy limitations for awning signs in all of these districts. this also would not change. so the ordinance is proposing that instead of choosing between the two, projecting signs and awning signs, you can combine them both but you have to meet the regulations. i'm here to answer questions and apologize if i made it more

confusing. >> thank you audrey. just to close, we're fully aware that this is not the most groundbreaking piece of legislation that will save small businesses, but the supervisor is confident this is one fix or one bandaid if you will to the many thousands of cuts that businesses have faced over the years. like i said at the beginning, there are about 400 businesses out of compliance currently and they are effectively sitting targets for enforcement cases should someone with a lot of time on their hands take the initiative to file a complaint against those businesses and that's what we're trying to prevent with this proposal. >> do we have questions?

i'll start with one while we wait. projecting signs, i get excited, i think we're going to have- -- you just mean signs coming out of the building, projecting out of the building. as part of the sign code regulations that govern lighting of the signs or when they can be lit or -- >> yes. >> there are. it is on the last couple of pages of the presentation. the last row, regulated lum nation. most projecting signs can be either directly or indirectly illuminated. certain districts have limitations on that, especially during business hours for direct

or in neighborhoods. >> commissioner adams i'm going to invite you to make some comments because you have a lot of background in this and undoubtedly have useful observations for the rest of us. >> i think it's a great piece of legislation and like dominica said, this isn't groundbreaking but one of these little pieces of legislation that will help. the city does have restrictions on big illuminated signs. you can't have them at mid market. that was passed on a prop probably about 15 years ago, san francisco beautiful didn't want big electric signs on market street so they got banned. something like this, i feel, it

helps. with all the weird things about laws, this is clean-up stuff and i really appreciate supervisor stefani's clean up of this kind of stuff. that's all. >> it's certainly my observation there's a lot of legislation that becomes a zombie if you will, just marching on, dragging the rest of us to its doom. so this is the thankless part of government policy work that doesn't get all the big articles in the paper, but this is the stuff that really has the material impact on the businesses. so i would like to add my thanks as well. >> and it makes it seem -- it makes it look better and bring more life. you know what i mean? >> totally agree.

commissioner zouzounis? >> thank you to the presenters, we appreciate you coming before us. audrey, nice to meet you and dominica, nice to see you. i'm always here to support something that goes and looks at the codes on our books that need to be taken off. especially regulations and codes put in during broken window era time, i think there's a lot that our commission can follow up on and this creates a strong precedent for. i'm looking forward to getting into code with you all another time around related items. quick question i had. we know, and thank you for naming that this is something that is largely affecting a lot

of our retailers, immigrant-owned businesses, legacy businesses that have awnings they inherited, corporately sponsored signs that they didn't necessarily put in or have a choice even in becoming compliant. my question was, is it an awning that doesn't have your business name but has another business name, like coca-cola or something, does it fall into the same rules? >> unfortunately that would be considered an advertising sign because it's not just naming your business. it would be different if it said, your cafe, you put it and next to it you say what you serve. coffee, tea, snacks. that's all fine. that's fine saying what your

business is about. a corporate sponsored sign falls into an advertising sign. >> i'm interested in learning also, i'm sure you did research in this area around advertising signs since we do have some laws, which not a lot of businesses know about, but they have to do with coverage, certain space of your window area you can't have covered. certain signage you can't have. if we're expecting this to be kind of an action item for small businesses, they're going to have to come into compliance with awnings and signs and submit something to planning. i would love to see and maybe that's on us in terms of coordinating with other agencies or programs, but i would love to see sf shines or whatever other pro active programs that do outreach to include information on what you can and can't have

in terms of advertising signs and what you need to do to get into compliance with your business sign and all in one place since i'm sure you all did some related research on that and found there's city laws that have been updated in that area. >> we have a great description on our website of different signs. the city generally looks on advertising signs much more strictly than business for identifying signs but we'll take the comments into consideration. as far as enforcement goes of all of the businesses out of compliance, this ordinance would not force the hand of businesses to come in, we are still an enforcement division that is complaint-driven. so the good news, there

shouldn't be a huge rush of businesses that feel they have to come in, this is more if they do receive enforcement complaint against them, they can legalize it easily and resolve the complaint rather than lose signage. >> that's great. thank you for your response. >> thank you. are you done vice president zouzounis? okay. commissioner huie? >> thank you for bringing that to light. i really appreciate the trigger of the action in terms of not addressing it as a single thing, looking at the actual legislation, thinking about that more broadly. i'm wondering, are we talking about getting rid of the piece

of legislation or how do we get rid of the piece of legislation? is one of my questions. >> right now the code says that businesses cannot have copy or business names effectively on both a projecting sign and awning. it says you can have sign copy rotated on permitted awnings in lieu of wall signs and projecting signs and the change that is proposed or this legislation is a striking of that language that says in lieu of and replaces it with in addition to. so it makes an allowance for the businesses to have sign copy on both permitted awning and wall signs and projecting signs.

i don't know if that helps clarify it. >> yeah, i think -- sorry. >> explaining this change can be somewhat more difficult to do in laymen's terms but essentially a business can have business name on the sign that comes out from the building and on their awning as long as the awning is permitted. >> so in other words -- >> there's nothing the business needs to do? >> if someone were to file a complaint, this would give them a much easier pathway towards

resolving that complaint because they would simply need to get a permit for the sign. under current laws, they would have to remove the sign all together. >> okay. i really do appreciate, too, that in assessing this piece of legislation, looking at the outcomes and how the outcomes over the years, looking at enforcement and outcomes gives us the real answer talking about equity. we talk about it every day. equity. we know what pieces of legislation -- we know what they're doing. and outcomes when it's not levied equally. and so i think to look at things more carefully as that and being able to see what they are is

really important. i think even in the legislative process, just the way we do in our individual processing. i appreciate that this was brought up and i hope we can find more speed bumps that maybe don't look super discriminatory on the front-end but in outcome and enforcement, they create speedbumps for the path towards equity for all of our businesses. thank you. >> great. any other commissioner comments or questions? okay. so, is there any public comment?

seeing none, public comment is closed. do we have a motion? >> i'll motion. >> second. >> a motion to approve? >> yes, a motion to approve this piece of legislation. sorry. >> motioned by commissioner adams and seconded by commissioner dooley. (roll call vote) motion passes. >> thank you. congratulations. good to see you again dominica.

nice to meet you audrey and thank you for bringing this excellent piece of legislation to us. >> thank you commissioners. >> looking forward to seeing you again soon. >> take care. >> next item please. >> item 5. board of supervisors file 210-934 mandatory disability access improvement, extension of time deadlines. this was a discussion and action item. this is an ordinance amending the building code to extend the time for existing buildings with a place of public accommodation to comply to have all primary entrees and paths of travel into the building accessible to persons with disabilities or receive city determination of technical infees ability or hardship to granted the extensions from the deadlines and extend the time for

department of building inspections report to the board of supervisors. this is discussion and action item and we have jeff buckley of the department of building inspections presenting. and jeff, you should have presenter abilities. >> thank you commissioners. my name is jeff buckley policy and public affairs director with department of building inspection. before going to the slide deck, i wanted to highlight that this legislation, sponsored by mayor breed is a collaborative effort between dbi and also with the mayor's office of disability and with the office of small business. we worked very closely with the

director to craft this legislation and me in learning through the process learned that this legislation had its origins in the office of small business. so i think -- i'm happy to kind of come back and provide you both an introduction, refresher if you will to the program itself and talk about some of the legislative changes that go with it. what we have before us, i wanted to provide a little bit of context with the program -- >> we can't see your screen yet.

are we okay now? >> perfect. >> excellent. all right. the accessible business entrance program was created in 2016 with the strong support and crafting of the office of small business. what it does, it helps property owners comply with existing state and federal accessibility laws and really helps small businesses get ahead of the threat of litigation that has really resulted from not only the passage of the americans with disabilities act 31 years ago but the structure of enforcement that resulted from the passage of the piece of federal legislation. the passage unlike other federal efforts that consolidated

enforcement through the federal government or deferred that to local or state governments, in the case of the americans with disabilities act, for a whole host of reasons, ada enforcement was designated through the courts and really essentially kind of transferred that from the government to the individuals who file litigation to ensure that the entrance ways and elements of the business are accessible for persons with disabilities. so this legislation as i mentioned was created locally in 2016 to really help local businesses kind of get ahead of the threat of the lawsuits. so it focused on placing the public accommodation. these are businesses that serve the public and are generally included in the accessability business entree program. you can see the list of the different types of businesses that exist in terms of providing

public accommodation. they include everything from bars and restaurants and hotels to grocery stores and daycare centers. but ultimately it's a place that the public will enter to purchase goods or services. for the legislation, what is required is to come into compliance with the legislation. so property owners are required to submit initial forms and do pre-screening forms to certify their building does not qualify in the program. there are waiver forms for property owners who believe the building complies with the program requirements. and then ultimately a category checklist compliance form for property owners who really need to renovate to come into compliance with the ordinance. this form is completed by inspectors that are licensed

engineer architects or certified access specialists as part of the site inspection. in order to come into compliance, you have to secure building permits and renovate the property. if the construction is required, the owner is ultimately responsible for securing the necessary building permits and renovating the property. i will note, we understand in some cases, the relationship between the property owner and small business owner is nuanced and there may be times where the small business owner may have as terms of their lease aspects of the requirements to make their building come into compliance with either this ordinance or language related to the ada compliance. i will note, again, as we get into enforcement, ultimately, where dbi is focused its attention is the property owner. that's where we take enforcement

actions against. currently, this is really a big reason why we're making the changes to the legislation. we currently have 11,398 addresses that are non compliant, which equates to about 5,589 individual property owners. the current deadline for the program to be able to come into compliance is september 1st. as i mentioned, there's interdepartment team working together on the deadline extension and looking at the program in general. so those actions will be forth coming. so the legislation, what it does, it is pretty simple. it extends the deadline for property owners to come into compliance by two years. as you are well aware, we have been through and continue to be through a global pandemic. one of the areas we felt was

important was to extend the program for two years to make sure with the high number of people we have, our businesses out of compliance, to give them the opportunity to come into compliance. the first step as i mentioned before, submit a compliance checklist. we're moving the date from september 30th, 2021, to a year later. and we're doing the same, keeping the same sequence with the previous legislation to the current -- i should say, how the current legislation is drafted now and how it will appear if it is passed by the board of supervisors. property owners would need to file the application for a building permit about three months after the deadline to submit compliance. ultimately, they're required to obtain the required building permit by the end of

september 2023. so, we are not just going to enforce an ordinance. we are also going to have a robust outreach and engagement strategy with property owners. part of our key element is communication will be done with property owners because they're ultimately the ones responsible for compliance. they're also ultimately the entities we hold accountable for their properties. so in doing so, we're partnering with the mayor's office, city administrator's office, office of small business, the mayor's office of disability and other departments working with community groups and organizations to leverage, reinforce and expand our outreach. and certainly interested in hearing from you about ways the be effective in terms of being able to outreach both to the property owner community and

small business community. we will be using repetition and strong marketing to capture attention and spur action. and our communication is designed to funnel owners to a website for compliance information and instruction. our intention is to make the information available online so it's easier for property owners to be able to submit their information and that is something that will start to come. for those familiar with mail campaigns of any kind, we're really going to try to do a chase program here, direct mail and e-mail chases to follow property owners and make sure they are coming into compliance and do it around every sequence of our -- every stage they are required to submit documents or permit. and ultimately we're going to create a new brochure and we

have a strong outreach strategy that centers around property owners and getting the word out to many different entities, including to you tonight. so with that, i'll stop sharing my screen and be happy to take any questions you have. >> thank you. commissioner dooley? >> i'm just curious about by extending this further, how does that affect in any way the businesses that are not in compliance in terms of being sued in the meantime? do you have any comments on that? >> would you like me to take that one?

>> yes please, regina. >> this is the challenge of dealing with accessibility. we have the accessible business entrance program. and this legislation and it is important to think about this legislation as a program to help property owners come into compliance with the ada and making it accessible. the ada has been in place since 1996, somewhere around there. during this time, all -- any time a business is occupying a space that may not have an entree way that is compliant or a property owner, that obligation has been there and that obligation continues to be there and even though we are extending this out, it doesn't

necessarily change the obligation of both the business and property owner in relationship to accessibility. it didn't -- with the original business -- the timing of the original business entree program, it -- businesses still need to know what they may need to do to make their entree way compliant for themselves. if the property owner is not taking action, they may need to know that they may need to find equivalent facilitation. so in some ways, this is part of what the joint communication is going to happen. dbi is going to be working and communicating with the property owners and we're having conversations and developing a parallel program for the businesses to make sure they understand even though the

obligation is on their property owner. they still may want to do -- we're highly recommending still doing an inspection for the interior and entree way because they still may need to protect themselves during the time frame of which the property owner may take to comply with it. again, it's readily achievable. it's a readily achievable obligation. a business readily achievable obligation may not be as high as the property owner's obligation is because of the value of the property. i don't know if i'm -- if i answered your question. but question, commissioner

dooley? >> thank you. >> okay. any other commissioner questions? don't see any other questions. let's check in on public comment. >> no one raising their hand for public comment. >> seeing none, public comment is closed. commissioners, this seems like a no-brainer to me. i will make a motion to approve the legislation. >> i'll second. approval of the legislation. >> okay. motion to approve by president laguana and seconded by commissioner adams. (roll call vote)

motion passes. >> thank you jeff. i appreciate you coming and making the presentation to us and thank you for your work on this. >> thank you commissioners. have a good night. >> thank you jeff. >> next item, please. >> item 6, update on employee retention tax credit, the employee retention tax credit is a refundable tax credit designed to reward and encourage businesses to keep employees on payroll. it's a discussion and potential action item. >> commissioners, you have heard me talk at length about the employee retention tax credit, simply by filing a form,

businesses can get $33,000 per employee -- up to $33,000 per employee and what a huge opportunity that is for our businesses. you have heard me talk about the fact that nationwide only 30,000 businesses have availed themselves of the employee retention tax credit. as a reminder, we have 100,000 small businesses in san francisco. not even one third of san francisco's businesses nationwide have applied for the tax credit. it's a huge, huge massive opportunity and i would love san francisco to be a leader on applying for this tax credit, especially with all of the businesses that are struggling with rent and struggling to get back on their feet, the employee retention tax credit is something that is just lying out there, doesn't rely on banks or funds that could run out.

it is simply something businesses can do. the complexity as we have discussed is it is complicated to apply for the tax credit. i -- you may recall we had oawd in and we brought up the issue with her. she followed up by directing her staff to create a program for outreach and education for small businesses and there is now a website up and chamber of commerce has followed up by putting a website up with lists of a few cpa's with multi language support. there's a document that oawd has created with multi language support and it is all good and an important step in the right

direction. with that said, even with these programs being up there and education on how to do this and even with the fact that there are cpa's with multi language support available to help them do this, i think we all know that the businesses least likely to benefit from this program, even after outreach, the ones with no money right now and those businesses are disproportionately going to be in communities of concern, they are going to have language is going to be a challenge for them, money is going to be a challenge for them. what i would like to do with this commission's approval is issue a resolution requesting oawd create a program, a funded program to provide grants for

businesses, specifically for the purpose of filing their employee retention tax credit tax returns. in my experience, this costs about $150 per employee. the precise amount will be subject to whatever oawd negotiates with the provider. but the resolution would simply be that oawd create a pilot program to see whether or not this would help us help some businesses that otherwise would not have availed themselves to the program. in other words, we're going to grab small businesses and pick them up and drag them kicking and screaming to the employer retention tax credit promise land and with a very tiny minimal almost insignificant

investment put tens of thousands of dollars in their pockets and do something to directly impact and help our small business community. this is the single most effective thing that the city i think could possibly do, it generates the highest return on investment of any program i have heard of since i have been on this commission. i think that the city does and can do a lot of great things. but i can't imagine anything that would be more impactful than this. so the update is -- well, you heard the update. what i would like to do is make a motion that we draft a resolution. we have to give notice to draft the resolution and then notice before the resolution. i couldn't just pop a resolution on all you guys. we had to talk about it first.

but i would like to make a motion that we draft a resolution encouraging the oawd to create a pilot program to fund doing -- helping small businesses get these tax credits. that's the motion. and if you have any questions, you know, i'm just trying to move quickly through this. if you have questions, by all means. but commissioner ortiz-cartagena? >> not necessarily a question but i want to commend you. you have been campaigning for this and i see it on the streets now.

i appreciate that. we could do the resolution like you just mentioned, some component of equity in some of the corridors to be in the resolution if you don't mind. >> absolutely. so i'm reminded, i can't make a motion until we've had public comment. so we'll await to see if there's any other commissioner questions or feedback or comments. >> great job in having oawd and our office to blast it. i got the public library to blast it as well. if you think this is the next step for having them focus towards making a more concentrated effort here, i'm in support.

>> wonderful. okay, i don't see any other questions. any public commenters on the line? >> no one on the line for public comment. >> okay. seeing none, public comment is closed. i would like to make a motion requesting oawd to create a pilot program to help our small businesses apply for and obtain the employee retention tax credit with a focus on communities of concern and commissioner ortiz-cartagena, i would invite you to help me with what precisely additionally you would like me to add to the motion. >> to make sure they are translating the information available in spanish and the various languages at the same time.

>> multi language support. of course. we'll fix it in the mix. do we have a second? >> i'll second it. >> thank you. sorry. all right. (roll call vote) motion passes. >> perfect. >> i think you forgot me. >> i did.

commissioner zouzounis. >> yes. >> motion passes. >> thank you all for your support. we'll have a resolution for you to review and vote on at the next meeting. next item please. >> item 7 approval of draft meeting minutes. an action item. >> commissioners, are there any comments or questions on the minutes? okay. are there members of the public who would like to make comments on item number 7. >> there's no one on the line for public comment. >> public comment is closed. commissioners, do we have a motion? >> i move to approve the minutes. >> moved by commissioner dooley. >> i'll second. >> seconded by commissioner adams -- >> no, ortiz-cartagena. >> sorry, i can't track on this very well. >> you'll get it down soon enough. >> all right.

(roll call vote) motion passes. >> great. next item please. >> item 8 general public comment. a discussion item that allows members of the public to comment on matters within the jurisdiction but not on today's calendar and suggest new agenda items for the commission's future consideration. >> any members of the public who would like to make comments on any item not on today's agenda? >> there's no one on the line for public comment. >> public comment is closed. next item please. >> item 9 director's report,

update and report on the office of small business and small business center, department programs, policy and legislative matters and announcements from the mayor and regarding small business activities. this is a discussion item. >> good evening commissioners. matthew, if i could get the ability to share my screen please. commissioners, i'm going to share my report. i do have some bit of information that i would like to make sure you see. but we'll follow up with a more thorough memo for you.

all right. hopefully you can see this. i first want to start off with just information from the office of small business and business assistance center. starting this week, we are reducing our in person services from -- instead of five days a week, to three days a week. this is a direct result that one of our business counsellors has accepted another position and so therefore is no longer here. we will have in person services tuesday, wednesday and thursday. 9:00 to 5:00 and monday's and friday's, our services are available by phone and e-mail. and then today the mayor announced an investment of

$42 million to support san francisco work force development to help approximately 10,000 seeking employment. and it is going to focus on areas that support -- it's going to support neighborhood satellite and specialized job centers and in terms of finding jobs with those -- through those entities. jobs that are targeted for serving transitional aged youth. develop pilot programs for the vulnerable community and work force development for san francisco's black and african american communities and this announcement came out right before the commission meeting so i will be forwarding you the details. but just to make sure you are aware of that. the next thing i want to bring

to your attention, as we start to kind of work through our deadlines of -- our deadlines through waivers, deferrals, that were there to help small businesses manage their cash flow, want to just bring to your attention we will have at this point, the planned end of the commercial eviction moratorium will end september 30th. we just talked about that through item number 2. and while the first tier of businesses that will be directly affected by obligation of paying back rent is tier 4 i believe it is. and that is businesses that have 50 or more employees.

so, that basically, the rent will come due october 1st. then november 1st are going to be two years of licence renewal and one year of business registration renewal. businesses -- businesses that have a place of entertainment will not need to pay for their licensed renewals and any associated licence. so if it is a place of -- (please stand by...)

i say all have been approved use the point of sale isn't the heart of this particular one but i forgot to mention that because it's on a different cycle.

there is tobacco, so to give you an idea of what's coming ahead for our smallbusinesses. this includes caterers, bakers , all those various businesses that aren't places of entertainment or restaurants . and then i'll be forwarding you information. but with the announcement, the storefrontvandalism release grant application is available . you had heard during the budget period you heard supervisor mandelman's legislation that

created this grantsprogram . this is life for businesses citywide. as exports has established a sender program and the port along with mission economic development agency and mike with our office held a workshop for those who are interestedin becoming vendors . there's 17 locations along the port in which individuals will be able to vend both merchandise and food. though it needs to be noted that food has to follow our mobile food and pushcart regulations to be able to sell food or beverage on the port. and i do believe i forwarded to you but also in our last e-news letter, the city is conducting

a language survey so this has been important to for us to spread through our network. to try to get individuals to fill out the survey. it's been conducted in12 different languages . get feedback onimprovements for city services . for individuals that don't, where english is not their primary language. and then lastlyon the programmatic side as an fyi , the sba is celebrating the small business week this week. and because the pandemic, the traditional month of may for the last 2 years, they did not celebrate small business week sothey're doing it now . to bring that to your attention andof course commissioner zouzounis, ifthere's anything you would like toadd please do

. on the legislative front , legislation has been heard . the first year freefor storefront or storefront businesses . that path, the board of supervisors last tuesday and again just a reminder that the implementation dates for that is begins november 1. so any new business that starts and register their business november 1 between november 1 and october 31st next year. will has a storefront business will be potentiallyeligible . and again, formula retail is not eligible for this. and that you your question earlier , commissioner. and businesses want to open a second location so it's also providing a chance for

businesses that want to grow and expand are also eligible to partakein the first year free . so we will definitely be working and advising businesses that come in who will be eligible for taking advantage of that. the tax and the treasurer's office is the program, the agency that's going to be managing the program so we wil definitely be working closely with them . and then legislation that has been referred to the commission just recently is an ordinance that amending the administrative code to revive the local business enterprise and nondiscriminationand contracting ordinance . i'm not going to read through this but it is addressing, it is some of the key light highlights is it is going to be increasing thresholds. lbd certification thresholds.

it is compounding amentor protigi program . and one of the items that i know that the commission several years back heard is requiring the crime in terms of making sure the payments are aligned and the city is aware of payments that need to go to lb ease because often, they were holding out on paying the lb ease in a timely manner. so those are a fewthings and so this legislation has been referred to the commission to hear . in addition, the house code, thevarious cannabis sunset dates .

because of the covid-19, medical cannabis dispensaries they were allowing them to deal with the transition, or extending out that timeline to january 1, 2023. that those that have the temporary cannabis business permit have an additional 120 days for december 31st 2022. and then there is an extension of the cannabis event permit pilot program through 2023. and then the planning code requirements for laundromats andon-site services , and then recently, legislation that was introduced this week but we don't know if it hasn't been directly referred yet. an ordinance ending the sunset date for the cannabis oversight

committee to january 2025 . and then the weightsand measures , it turns out initially amanda freed who had mentioned to you i think back in january had noted the weights and measures fees which are billed at the end of the year couldn't be aligned with the march date. that we thought it was the state regulation but it's about not the case. so therefore, we will be aligning the weights and measures be with the march annual license fees. so again, just that's clean up. so that businesses have their consolidated license. one more item to add to the consolidated license so there isn't any misstep on whether

certain things were paid or not paid . those are the primary highlights i'd like to make for youtonight and with that, i will take any questions . >> do we have anyquestions . >> that's helpful. thank you, did you send that to us? >> i will be. >> thank you. >> any other questions. is there any public comment. >> there is nopublic comment . >> president: public comment i closed . >> item 10, commissioner discussion and new business.

this allows the commissioners to report on recent activities, make announcements that are of interest to the small business community and staff allows commissioners to introduce new agenda items for future consideration . >> any new business or updates? vice president zouzounis. >> vice president: thankyou everybody for a long meeting . i wanted to ... i guess i wanted to start a conversation and i don't know if this is necessarily something we can discuss in this body or maybe in an equity committee but i do see the board of the supervisors and the mayor silently us a lot of small business from our network . there's a lot of events that

are elected are going through there, they're helping publicize and opening for a business or a community organization events that have to do with businesses. i don't know if our commission receives invites to those as individuals. or if commissioners receive invites if the office receives invites . my concern is not necessarily that we are at every event that we can help with those small business communities for that small business so that they know their electives are helping draw a dialect parallel to our commission and our office because i think a lot of these businesses, they just see the electives and they show up and that's great and i think we make sure that we can have some follow-up and accountability. so that we can be a resource

those events. i don't see that connection happening and itconcerns me , especially when it's happening, when there's events in communities that can use that follow-up and that resource access . i just wanted to pose that and see if there are actual tools we can create that both whether it's an event or a piece of legislation that relates directly to our purview that it somehow comes before us because i'm also seeing things we made resolutions on or brought up whether it's food access, taxis and there's this other piece of legislation related to that in and our commission never find out. it's never referred or our office isnever notified . that's kind of my big question to everybody is to start

thinking about tools for ways to make sure that those connect back to us. and specifically i think the new business items i would like to hear about our i heard there's some taxi legislation coming or changes to taxis so that's indirectly related to something we asked about. i'd also like the food security task force ... i'd like a formal intro to them by our commission. i think a lot of what we've mentioned around how to business, how to bridge small business andsocial impact as it relates to small business . i would like our commission to

maybe write them a letter or something asking them for anything relevant to present to us. with that said i believe there was also a piece of legislatio . you might haveco-authored that had to do with the free market . they're looking to undertake relating to job training and assistance or food access and i think that'ssomething that our small businesses would love to be part of . thank you. >> thank you vice president zouzounis. [inaudible] >> president: the pandemic started in the last two years and some of that may have been pandemic related but i also think some of that hasn't been exercised.

maybe they were used too inviting us perhaps i appreciate you bringing this u . i see that commissioner abbott. [inaudible] i'm open to whatever we can do. as well as the other points you brought up with respect to ... [inaudible] i don't know how to make that happen so perhaps it'ssomething we can figure out how to do together . commissioner. >> i agree and vice president zouzounis, your spot on.

we need to get notifications on stuff all the time. and this is evenbefore the pandemic . it's supervisors and the mayor's office, i used to get and i know this is from other commissioners, notifications all the time. press releases and stuff.i didn't get onepress release during the pandemic . i had to rely on others for press releases and through the office of small business, thank you director.we used to go directly and they had to go through some third parties. the city can do a better job with our commission and that and mta needs to start stepping up and opening up bus lines to the financial district. commuter lanes, i really would like to have somebody out here from mta explained to me how the commuter lanes which were supposed to open up right after

labor day. i know that helps the financial district but i can't tell you how many times when igo to work , how many stores and restaurants and sandwich shops in north beach and the financial districts are starting to open upand anticipating people coming back to the office . i've had several of our commissioners say they're waiting to bring people back on a limited basis but there waiting to bring people back but there's no bus lines from the westside to downtown . it's not open yet. and an article came out in the economist about a month ago. san francisco leaves all major cities in opening up their major business district .part of that is that we are attacked, and people are working from home. they are working from home but

want to come here and we've got to getthis economy backopen . and transportation is a big part of it . the garages are full downtown. you're not in by 8:00, you don't have a parking space and you start opening up some of these transportation limbs. so there, i said . >> i completely agree. and you know, the work of this commission i think over the next year is going to be focused on how we facilitate that. and really get this recovery back ontrack . at themoment , you pointed out we are buying these numbers. it's a fact and you know, that's something that we're going to have to meet more

about. and perhaps just being more productive but as president zouzounis pointed out ... [inaudible] pushing things forward. there's room forimprovement and i completely agree . i think we need to get that humming. it's a chickenand egg problem . >> i will say i have to congratulate the mayor and the department of health . because we did beat this back our numbers evenwith the delta variance . our numbers are dropping . and san franciscans all of us

should be proud. i mean, yougo into any grocery store, everybody'swearing masks you walk on the buses everybody is wearing masks . no one challenges . and i think we all do this and we all do what is right. we need to split up more and you know, we shouldall be proud of ourselves that we did meet this thing back . and we don't have anyhospitals are going crazy and stuff . but with that said, we need to open up a bit more with that too. i don't want our elected officials to go to waste. what they did is they did a fantastic job with this thing and save a lot of lives and now we all need to come together and get this place open and humming againand be that engine . i just worry about these small businesses and these sandwich shops and stuff.

i feel like i'm attacked every day.like encouraging more people in the downtown so i knowa lot of them arewatching . i promised i wouldn't bring this up . if you're in the financial district, go to gloria and montgomery washington. go to some of the small places. help these people out, they really needed. >> thank you president laguana. commissioner zouzounis, i'm going to have to have you take over the meeting. your back? >> president: i had a bit of a power outage here you are back. >> great. fast work. commissioneradams just completed his comments .

i don't see anybody else in the queue. >> president:that's helpful because i can't see the queue . i'm sorry i missedthe rest of that commissioner adams but i got the gist of it and i agree .>> vice president:i'm just trying to get people to go to these small places . more so than in the neighborhoods rightnow . we're just tryingto keep that open .i praise the cityon one hand but on the other hand we've got to get going again . >> president: one thing i'll share is independently i've heard dpw, mta and oewd talk about getting small business

stakeholders together for more input on how to getthese things jumpstarted . and each time it came up i said that's a great idea. let's go. if thosematerialized i'll let you know . we stopped and started and stopped again a joint commission hearing with that mta board that gwyneth and i, chair borden and i had talked about doing. your comments make me realize i should look back with her and maybe we can finally get that off the table because i think there's a lot ofstuff around reopening, around getting streets clean that people want to visit . i think it might be appropriate to check back in with the da on public safety issues.

i don't know if you guys saw the flower shop that was burne . it was in the newsthis morning . it's been there for 100 years and completely burned. director dickinson, do you remember thename of that shop ? >> hanks floral shop. >> president: so we have our work cut out for us. with that being said i have nothing else to say and go ahead. >> i've got one more item. i want to give a shout out and what a great job to the cbd, the new downtown cbd financial district . there might be anybody down there, the streets are the cleanest. our power washing them.

every time i see them i thank them for getting in, the commercial alley is clean. that downtown cbd is the new one in the financialdistrict is doing an outstanding job . there there at seven in the morning. there there at seven at night . and i just think they're doing a great job. it's just so much nicer down there. i had to give a shout out to thatbecause i see themdown there and whoever's running that , they're doing a great job .they've hired some great workers who really do care about keeping the streets clean andi'm so impressed . >> president: theirnew director robbie silver is phenomenal . i had a lovely meeting with him and they have some incredible plans coming up for the holiday that i don't want to be a spoiler and relay what they are

when he told me my job was on the floor, that's amazing. >> you don't see anything out of thestreets there anymore . he's doing a great job. >> president: it's the end of along night so is there any public commenters on theline ? >> there is no one on the line for public comment. >> president: public comment is closed. next item please. >> you are muted. >> sfgov tv, please show item 8,adjournment. this is an action item .do you want toread the closing announcements . >> president: ihave enough here that i can read it .

we will end with a reminder that the small business commission is the official public forum to voice your opinions about policies that affect small businesses in san francisco and that the office of small business is the best place to getinformation about doing small business during the emergency . if youneed assistance continue to reach out to the office of small business .do we have a motion to adjourn. >> i moved to adjourn this meeting . >> seconded. >> seconded by commissioner dickinson. commissioner adams commissioner dickinson . >> yes. >>. [roll call vote] motion passes.

the meeting is adjourned at 7:20 9 pm. >> president: appreciate your patience, long meeting .

>> thank you. thank you, brothers and sisters of the san francisco building construction trades council for leading the celebration by providing these incredible instructions, demonstrations with our citybuild students cycle 35, so thank you, trade students, for being here. [applause] >> again, we recognized earlier this morning, the unions that were here, right, because without them, citybuild would not be here. thank you, and we have district council 16, laborers local 261, plasterers, local 266. masons in the