>> clerk: president casciato, we may now begin the retirement board meeting of october 13 at this time. this meeting is being held virtually with all members and staff participating today via teleconference. this will ensure the safety of

the sfers board, sfers staff, and members of the public. while this technology allows us to hold these meetings via teleconference, it may not be as seamlessly as we would like them to be. a reminder to board members and staff to mute microphones when not speaking to minimize background noise. president casciato? >> okay. thank you very much. roll call, please. >> clerk: thank you. [roll call]

>> clerk: president casciato? >> yes. can you call the next item, communications? >> clerk: yes. item 2, communications. to protect the employees of sfers and the public, this meeting is being held remotely. board members will attend this meeting through video conference and participate in the meeting to the same extent as if they were physically present. public comment will be available on each item on this rand. each speaker will be allowed two minutes to speak. comments or opportunities to speak during public comment hearings are available by phone by calling 415-655-0001, access code 146-491-7791, then pound

and pound again. when connected, you will hear the meeting discussions, but you will be muted and in listening mode only. when your item of interest comes up, press star, three to be added to the speaker line. best practices are to call from a quiet location, speak clearly and slowly, and turn down your television or radio. president casciato? >> okay. thank you very much. are there any other communications? director huish? >> clerk: public comment? >> public comment, too. >> clerk: thank you. callers -- >> i just want to see if there's any other communications. >> no, no further questions required communication. >> okay. thank you very much. okay. go ahead. >> clerk: thank you. callers, if you have not already done so, please press star, three to be entered into the queue. for those already on hold, please wait until the system

indicates you have been unmuted before you begin your comments. moderator, are there any callers on the line? >> operator: madam secretary, there are no callers on the line. >> clerk: thank you. public comment is closed. president casciato? >> next item, please. >> clerk: thank you. item 3 is a resolution to allow the board to meet via teleconference for the next month. >> good morning, commissioners. this is a resolution for board commissioners to be allowed to participate via teleconference remotely expired at the end of september [indiscernible] to extend this, the ability for board members to participate in

public meetings remotely, and in this item, we have details of what the state legislature passed. it's assembly bill 361, and just at a very high level, what it requires is in order to continue -- for boards to continue to allow board participation remotely, at least every 30 days or monthly, the body, in this case, the retirement board, must approve a resolution, and you'll see the resolution is based on both state and local executive orders as well as public health orders, and it requires the board each month to justify why it would continue to allow board member participation in public meetings remotely. and so we have prepared this standard resolution. the city attorney has reviewed

both the materials as well as the resolution, and as you see, it requires that both the president of the retirement board and the executive director sign off on this resolution monday -- monthly, rather, and so i would recommend that the board approve this resolution. darlene will circulate the resolution after she signs it for president casciato's signature and my signature, we will do it again both for the public health orders that are both state and local -- >> so moved. >> okay. there's a motion. i need a second. >> second. >> there's a second by

commissioner bridges. public comment. >> clerk: members of the public, please press star, three to enter the queue if you have not already done so. moderator, are there any public callers on the line? moderator, do we have any public callers on the line? >> operator: madam secretary, there are no callers on the line. >> clerk: thank you. public comment is now closed. president casciato? >> next item, please. >> clerk: roll call vote? >> oh, yes, roll call, please. [roll call]

>> clerk: thank you. we have five ayes. motion passes. president casciato? >> okay. item number 4 is next, and we need public comment before going into closed session. >> clerk: item number 4 is closed session. moderator, do we have any callers on the line? >> operator: madam secretary -- >> clerk: moderator, can you repeat that? i'm sorry.

i did not hear you. >> operator: madam secretary, there is one caller on the line. >> clerk: thank you. caller, please state your name. your two minutes begin when you speak. >> hello, trustees. this is fred sanchez with protect our benefits. i know this is a very difficult decision and times, and protect our benefits just want to remind you that we're on the record as strongly in favor of chief investment officer separate from the executive director. the system works great now. it's not broke. try not to fix it. we just have to be creative in how to get the proper funding to do this. thank you very much.

>> clerk: thank you for your call. moderator, are there any further calls? >> operator: there are no further calls. >> clerk: thank you. public comment is now closed. president casciato? >> okay. we'll have everybody go to log out and then log in to 4-a, closed session, 4-a. thank you very much. >> bridges, present. >> driscoll. >> present. mr. ghandi. not arrived. commissioner held fond. >> present. >> commissioner safai. commissioner stansbury is not

attending. >> is there any commissioner to make a motion regarding the closed session whether toditiono disclose or not. >> i move we do not disclose items from session a or b from the closed session. >> second. >> commissioner bridges and commissioner driscoll seconded. any discussion? if not call the roll, please. >> public comment? >> public comment go ahead. members of the comment who wish to comment on this item should call 415-655-0001. access code (146)491-7791. pound pound. if you have not done so please press star 3 to line up to speak. the prompt will indicate you have raised your hand. wait until you are unmuted to begin your comments. state your name and make your

comment. you will have two minutes to comment. do we have callers on the line? >> there are no callers on the line. >> public comment is closed. >> thank you very much. item 5, please. roll call vote. >> roll call vote now. >> bridges. >> aye. >> driscoll. >> aye. >> ghandi. absent. heldfond. >> aye. >> president casciato. >> aye. >> four eyes, motion passes. -- four ayes. motion passes.

>> item 5. general public comment. >> are there any caller on the line? >> i can read an e-mail received from john simpson. at your september meeting. >> mr. harris did you want to read the e-mail? >> can you please read it for the record, please. >> e-mail from john simpson. september 1st meeting the executive director told you to give a self-evaluation. that is no evaluation. when it comes to answering questions how you are investing our money, give yourself a failing grade. when it comes to investing

because in the past 10 years you have not outperformed a passive investment on the sec500. b minus. at the september meeting a member sent you a letter to read in public comment. you refused to listen to the contents of the letter because it contained more than 150 words. it took the executive director a longer time to count the words than it was read. i hope next year i can give you a better evaluation. 46 year member. callers if you have not done so press star 3 to be added to the q. those on hold wait until you have been unmuted. do we have callers on the line?

>> madam secretary. there is one caller on the line. >> thank you. police say your name. your two minutes begin when you speak. >> commissioner cassie o this the mic. san francisco police officers calling to ask for assistance on behalf every tired police sergeant joncmcmahon. he received industrial disability retirement in 2019. not qualified for service retirement. received the minimum 50%. the matter was referred to workers' compensation appeals

board. in august of this year he received a much larger award. in or to get that upgraded award, the matter has to go on your calendar. i have twice in writing requested in august and september that the matter go on calendar. i sept a cover letter and supporting documents. i am asking for help and assistance in bringing jon mcman's request to the board. thank you. >> thank you for your call. do we have any further callers? >> madam secretary. no more callers. >> public comment is now closed. president cass casciato. >> we may have a quorum problem

in less than an hour. let's hit as many action items as we can. 6. >> 6 action item approval of the minutes of the cent 8, 2021 retirement board meeting. >> move to approve adoption. >> second. >> moved and seconded. any public comment? >> press star 3 to be added to the queue. any caller on the line? >> madam secretary, there are no caller on the line. >> public comment is closed. >> roll call, please. i will entertain a motion to approve. we have a motion. >> roll call vote.

sorry. >> driscoll. >> aye. >> ghandi. >> aye. >> heldfond. >> aye. >> president casciato. >> aye. >> we have five ayes. motion passes. jay, what action items do we want to make sure we get through today? we need to do consent calendar item 7. we have item 9, which is a recommendation for action. then i believe that is the only two remaining action items. >> item 7 then. >> item 7. consent calendar.

>> move to accept. >> second. >> moved and seconded. any public comment? >> press star 3 to be added to the queue. moderator, any callers on the line? >> madam secretary, no callers on the line. >> publish comment is closed. president casciato. >> roll call, please. >> bridges. >> aye. >> driscoll. >> aye. >> ghandi. >> aye, heldfond. >> aye. >> president c asciato. >> aye. >> motion passes. >> item 9. >> action item.

recommendation to transition sfers current investment in a passive russell 1,000 value strategy to an active esg-enhanced strategy managed by black rock. >> since march that it become a net zero omitter by 2050, staff has been mind full to achieve this ambition. concurrent this is ongoing managementful our public equity portfolio. we discussed many times, data returns aren't enough to meet expected returns we have to earn alpha. during the annual equity update in april we cited initiatives two were to work on the passive

strategy. despite the focus on active strategies, passive strategies continue to play an important role in the equity portfolio to provide low cost exposure to the public equity market the large capped which is most efficient and provided liquidity. we talked about the tension to earn high returns and provide plan wide liquidity. over the past few years we evaluated a number of strategies systematic, somewhat passive, that allow for the little bit of al take generation. -- alpha. we are still maintaining the low cost exposure in liquid strategies. second, the esg team to integrate esg considerations.

this is focusing on engagement with existing managers. proxy voting and explore esg strategies. my colleagues will tell you money managers have recognized the commercial opportunity and have been promoting esg strategies. in the public market the constraint variety. however, as we explored strategies in both areas again expanding the passive mandated strategies it is apparent that we have an opportunity to evolve passive mandate with black rock to achieve both initiative also. black rock through barklay grown investors has been larging for s since 1998. this is important for us given

we have so much growth oriented this is a diversifier focusing on value investing. over the years we have interaction with the black rock team probably monthly we have come to appreciate their active systematic strategies and commitment to esg matters an the the firm level. they have been there since 2008, earlier than their competitors. unlike most systematic managers to provide esg strategies which often are overlays or constraint based. black rock focuses on proprietary research and integrates to the alpha process with focus on climate risk. black rock is managing esg fund in a system way since 2015 which

puts them many years ahead of competitors. after much diligence we recommend transition about the strategy managed to enhanced strategy. the idea is to expand opportunity for alpha200 basis points and maintain liquidity towards net zero carbon emissions by 2050. >> thank you, curt. today we are recommending transitioning current investment with the value strategy to active esg enhanced strategy. [ inaudible ] the active strategy we recommend as part of the black rock

systematic strategy. the considerations to drive the alpha. the esg fund benchmarks since october 2015. block rock customizes. they expect returns to be filed with these strategies. black rock has been. [ inaudible ] since 1998. we recommend they continue to manage the account. transition from passive to active portfolio. the annual tracking will increase 10 basis points to 200 basis points. the version changes the guidelines. black rock's platform is managing u.s. fund since 1990. the strategy.

black rock began research in 2013. they integrate insights into the strategy. the esg version in 2015. five to 20% allocation to esg insight. the esg version 40 to 60%. provide historical returns. the return follows the esg has improved over the last several years. over the last five years esg has reached the benchmark. 50% less carbon intensive than the benchmark. carbon intensity will vary over time. can expect a portfolio less carbon intensive than the benchmark. over time the market de

warbonnizes. they expect 30% less carbon on intensive than benchmark over the last several years. the emission reduction target to reduce future emissions associated productivity gains. given the focus on climate risk the chief fund is well aligned to be a net zero by 2050. the volume active esg funds. the goal is to increase the alfha with more esg in the portfolio. the tracking will increase from 10 basis pointings do 200 basis points. lastly, we closely cooperated with the esg teams. andrew collins is on the line. over to the board for any

questions. >> i want to understand what aspect of the recommendation. the current tracking for the project is zero, correct? >> yes. >> that is fine. willing to take on 200 points to tie into the other topic in a few minutes. reasonable expectation that the 1,000 value benchmark we are hoping for alpha of 1.4? >> we expect 100 basis points or so with alpha. >> i am looking at historical returns which is no guarantee. >> no guarantee definitely. >> the trade-off return here.

200 points tracking is fine. turn to the risk management port fellow use is -- portfolio is this worth doing besides better aspiration by 2050 to get tarbon tracking down lower. 200 is for 100 basis points of return? >> we have out performed and that is a risk we are taking on. >> the reason behind be the recommendation. thank you. >> commissioner driscoll it is important to note liquidity is the same. it is going to be separately managed account. we can liquidate within a day. >> here we expect for that incremental alpha, this is

incremental more volatile than the one we have. considering the context of our overall portfolio we think it is diversified away. i can't describe as double bottom line. we are cheating a couple things. in terms of carbon aspiration, increasing probabilities for alpha. not compromising liquidity for exposures. >> good point. value benchmark to diversify to the growth field in the rest of the portfolio. >> thank you. i see all of that. hopefully we will be able to maintain the current lower management fee. maybe that will happen as well. thank you.

>> you don't want to negotiate against tom. >> block rock has a strong research team that we can benefit from which is phenomenal. >> i agree, commissioner bridges. i appreciate their strategies. >> they are known for that. a lot of work they do is quantitatively based. the strategies with an alpha. like curt mentioned we have seen this with other strategies. mixed strategies. i think it is all very positive. >> i concur. i wanted to point out i tollly agree. >> we support 100% transition of

the 1,000 strategy to the esg by black mark. >> second. >> moved by driscoll and seconded by bridges. public comment? >> thank you. press star 3 to be added the queue. are there any callers on the line? >> madam equity, no callers on the line. >> public comment is closed. >> thank you very much. roll call, please. >> mr. bridges. >> aye. >> driscoll. >> aye. >> ghandi. >> aye. >> held fond. >> aye. >> president casciato. >> aye. >> we have five ayes. motion passes. >> item 8, please.

investment committee meeting report. >> item 8. discussion item. investment committee meeting report. >> in your minutes what it did on the september 15th meeting. they stopped the presentations to put it off for a while. we got it done. i will take this opportunity to underscore our conversation earlier that the upcoming and i haven't talked to curt about this. i do want to give a heads up. what day was that on november? >> november 17th, correct. >> the next meeting which was planned that another informative subject matter. we might have to defer that for

a board situation in terms of like we did last time. we will get the information to you as soon as possible. we might have to be doing some talking to potential candidates. that is what it is. same as it was before. we will do this china thing on the basis it is very important. i am happy to answer any questions. >> thank you very much. report is submitted. information only. public comment, please. >> thank you. callers. reminder to press star 3 to be

added to the queue. moderator, any callers? >> there are no callers on the line. >> thank you. hearing no calls. public comment is closed. president. item 10 please. >> 10. discussion item. risk review for sfers total plan. >> this is risk reviews. last year we introduced new allocation policy with substantial increases to public and private equity. as a result our risk as measured by projected or forecasted volatility increased 10% from 12.8 to 13.8% today. more than 85% of the risk is attributable to public and

private equity. the higher volatility requires dim get risk management and monitoring and managing of key concentrations and keen eye on liquidity. this is the second leg of the risk review. today our presentation will cover the risk exposures with a particular focus on considering the sfers exposure and what happens. presentations put together by anna and brady. he joined us in february of this year after spending four years at uc investments working as operation investments working in private investments. prior to u this he worked as senior research at the emerging markets private equity

association in u.s.a. c. masters in political development from the lemon school and ba the global studies from santa barbara. i will turn it over to you and brady. >> thank you, curt. i am trying to share. i would like to remind our risk framework -- about our risk framework that we put together about three years ago with three main pillars. first as chris mentioned liquidity. some things we consider very carefully, very diligently because we are large investors in private markets.

we are active investors. we will talk about that. part of that active investments is that we believe in liquidity premium and harvesting premium. liquidity is first. second is some things that curt mentioned total strategic asset allocation we spent most of 2020 with nadc and allen martin to make sure that we understand the risks that we are taking. we understand how much risk we are comfortable to take for the total plan. we increased the risk that we feel we need to take considerably by 10% last year with larger allocations to equities, to growth. so we added to where we felt we can get more returns. we also added to leverage.

with that i will introduce complexity, more risk. we had to build even further risk measurement and monitoring for the total plan. that is the third one. you can see substantial comprehensive reports. we are not going through each page. even that is just a subset of what we do. just to introduce technologies we use and departments that we work with to get this type of report analysis, you met our total portfolio risk partner. we work closely with black stone and wilshire. that is just a sub set what we can do. we cannot show everything.

[ inaudible ] it cannot be shared publicly. we do review on an ongoing basis. risk management is the core of what we do day in and day out. what you see in front of you is the result of all investment teams. there is a touch point for every team member. obviously, brady is our risk analyst put all of it together. all investment team members contributed. many thanks to them and cambridge and abc for reviewing that and adding to the risk analysis. i am going to speak the first part on the performance and risk assessment. chris mentioned the risk tilt that we have and performance was

covered last time. [please stand by]

>> -- knowing, again, that there is justification coming from the number managers that they had. we increased our sales over the last several years to payoff. page 24, performance distribution, let's look right at the bottom right of the portfolio -- of the table that we're referring to. number 27.2 is the accumulative active return over seven years,

so public equity portfolio outperformed the msci equities by 27%. out of that 27%, 17% was due to active selection, and 10% came from stock selection, and some of this selection was driven by our managers, and some of it was driven by us where we put more weight into health care and technology. so we just -- from here, we see that the bulk of the performance came from stock selection, and we can conclude that [indiscernible] till paid

off. you could see that this tilt in public equity portfolios paid off over the longer term. on this health care, if you look at the row that says health care shorter than one year, it doesn't benefit, but the sector tilt benefited us. sector technology, longer term, the portfolio added more than 8% in accumulative outperformance in information technology and #.3% in health care. so overall, you could see that a large part of the

outperformance came from the two sector tilt. and the last number four tilt that are intentional in the total portfolio is our [indiscernible] tilt, and you can see here that throughout all time horizons, our health care and technology outperformed the cambridge and it outperformed our total equity, as well. coming back to the fourth tilt, the fourth tilt is our geographical tilt, and this is the tilt to china.

this is 13.5% or $4.4 billion. we're including our exposure to hong kong and taiwan, and this is a considerable tilt, and we're managing this very closely. as kirk mentioned, we're scheduling an i.c. presentation to cover the investment and market in china. intentional tilt, underwritten very carefully with what we believe are one of the best managers across public and private equity. you can see a lot of it is coming from public and private equity, and most of it, a big

exposure, is coming from private equity and public equity. 27 gives us shorter time frame for china managers. they returned 22.88%, outperforming msci equities, which is our benchmark, as well as the s.m.t. china managers has delivered 14.4%, outperforming cambridge essential benchmark by a wide

margin. so we monitor this tilt and this intentional risk very closely, and the quality of our managers and selection is paying off. so with that, i'll stop and will pass it onto brady who has the trust on the scenario analysis, the key asset of our portfolio and how we continue. so brady, let me know how you want me to proceed.

>> [indiscernible] if you want to jump to page 46. so they've -- and good afternoon, everyone. as ana discussed, we have manageable risk in our portfolio, and one of the ways we assess that is doing a stress test and scenario [indiscernible] and then we'll also be looking at historical scenarios. so, for example, what would happen to our [indiscernible] portfolio as it exists today in the case of a [indiscernible] environment. we are running all of these out of the platform that ana mentioned earlier, but i'd like

to mention it's just one subset of stress and scenario modelling that we do, and they monitor press closely, so i think it should show where we have relativities and where we do not. so jumping into the single market factors, [indiscernible] we are most sensitive to equity drawdowns in the equity heavy portfolio. e.m. currency, we'll be talking about that, as well. another quick note is we have adjusted our privates from this

platform to better align with our empirical track records of private through these solutions. ana, if we could jump to the next slide. so looking here, in this case, we looked at if the [indiscernible] would rise up 40%. now, we looked at that number, and the rest of these number in the market factor stresses because they're between two and three standard deviations between what we like to expect normally. that's meaningful drawdown, and it's one that we'd normally see. it's not something [indiscernible] that is way out there, and it's quite likely to

happen, and so we are not stretching too far. if we look at what's going on with publics here, that's sort of what you'd expect. private and real assets, about 40%, and then, about 26%. ana, could we jump to page 52? so here's the emerging market's currency index. it tracks the currency exposure of the constituents of the e.m. equity index. so the implication there that

whatever is in the equity index, china now makes up 35% of the total index, and emerging asia as a whole is a vast majority, so it's a really, really heavy part of the index. as ana just mentioned, our china exposure is a meaningful and important overweight in our portfolio. so the way that you can read or sensitivity is sensitivity to our china overweight. you can see that in our public equity book, which would be down 26% in the case of a 26% e.m. currency drawdown.

the way to read this is one way to see our sensitivity to china. so i think from here, we can jump down to our historical stress tests. yes. here, we look at what would happen to our current portfolio given recently correlations between s.f. classes and significant scenarios between light tech melt down and the g.r.c., the subprime crisis because we have a [indiscernible] and because egfc, we think this is a perfect storm. so here, we can see the

portfolio. we see we have a lot of equity in our growth portfolio [indiscernible] public equity is drawn down nearly 30%, as well, because it's a growth equity that's in that portfolio, and here, we see that we have a small bounce from public fixed income. we don't know exactly where correlations would be in a situation like this, but for what it's worth in this case, we had a little bit of benefit from diversefication. so again, i think this is probably what we would think of, just a worst case scenario,

and we do have another [indiscernible] that runs another stress test but actually uses forward looking assumptions, and they're in a worse case scenario that actually lined up really closely with this. in that, public equities would be down about 50%, public and private would be down about 33%, and our total portfolio would be down about 33%. the thing i'd like to emphasize here is it feels quite painful to look at that 33% drawdown, but this 'em -- empirically did happen, and it's about as bad as what we are thinking

through. with timeline, i don't know if ana had anything to add or if there are any questions. >> this is what we've prepared? we're standing by if you have any questions. we know it's been a long meeting. >> any questions of any commissioners? >> i have two sets of questions. let's start with this last chart. if there were another incident like the subprime, and there were another significant drawdown, in your estimate, the other large tool here is the liquidity -- i feel what you call the liquidity plan, where you've broken-down the assets and the highly so-called liquid and illiquid. if this scenario were to cure, what is our challenge in terms of liquidity? will we be okay?

>> yeah. >> that's a good question, and we certainly look at the drawdown in conjection with liquidity, and we likened the analysis, if you'll remember, with a haircut, a haircut knowing that there could be drawdown from the assets that we would like to use in the liquidity pool. so our liquidity analysis includes stress tests on the m.a.e. of the liquidity pool that we'll be drawing. i think this is also interesting. we're okay now. the one thing that we need to

be careful of is -- for example, two or three years, and most of the pension obligations will be coming from the fund if that happens at the time of this market stress is going to be quite challenging, as we also outlined in the liquidity presentation last month. >> the bottom line or answer to your question, commissioner driscoll, is yes. with the haircut [indiscernible] the scenarios we actually are actually [indiscernible] than what we presented here, but the answer is we're able to handle these scenarios presented today as presented in september will

[indiscernible]. >> perhaps i is could have brought that liquidity report to show that with all the things that we're trying to achieve with the issue of return [indiscernible] i want to reconcile those two numbers. >> very good question. [indiscernible] actually, the volatility that was actually realized by the fund. >> ana, you cut out for a

moment. just to confirm, slide 16 is what's been realized, correct? >> right. >> all right. that's what's important. this issue is if our goal is one of these returns is 7.8%. i'm going to kind of have to go over very quickly today the informal survey that was done of us last year about what our risk tolerance is as a board. if we want to achieve a great rate of return by drives contributions and our funding ratio, we have to decide where we're going to take the risk, given we must maintain liquidity at a certain level. it's going to push us into the more volatile public equity areas, which is then very

successful for us, as well. i ask the questions this way to make sure we as a board understand the differences between risk and volatility and how the demand to maintain volatility will be accomplished. what do we really -- do we have a common understanding of what we mean what we say risk. our staff is going out to execute and achieve with all the tools and tactical controls they have, we'll understand what they're doing, and at the same time, we can tell city hall hey, look, we're ready for some drastic times before we start selling off assets that we don't want to sell. so that's a long winded

question before i try to figure out if there's a way to show the small improvement after so we can see how we're on track and managing the risk, not just the excellent results over the last 20 orthat's been particularly on those charts on pages 28 and 29. thank you. >> the other thing that you'll see on the risk side, there's annual presentations by each asset class, and they present a lot of [indiscernible]. >> i'm going to take back to comment back to another subject based on some comments on china

and our exposures there. i think the comment i made before about the i.c. maybe being moved from the 17, i think the last couple presentations, china keeps coming up, and as an educated board, we have advisors that we bring in. so president casciato, as we've just been suggesting, let's work the other item around that and hold investment to the 17 but possibly find a date -- clerk -- you have somebody presenting, right? >> right. and look, we can be understanding and be flexible

here. we have some speakers arranged for the 17. that said, our intent for the investment committee on the 17 is not for it to be super super lengthy. their schedules are just limited, but we can find a time. >> we can do it, right? we can find it for the 17? >> yeah, i think we can if we commit our day to that. >> okay. >> our time that day. i would like to keep it on the 17. >> yeah, because that's the purpose of the i.c. is to give the board members what is

topical and clinical and relevant to our success. >> let's see how many we can get commitment to. >> just plan on doing the china for the i.c. on the 17, okay? >> sounds good. >> okay. sorry for that. >> no, that was excellent. we need to do that. >> but great presentation, brady. >> chairman casciato, before you leave this topic? >> yes? >> i did want to advise the challenge -- and i advise a lot of public funds. the challenge is to be able to achieve the actuarial rates that you have to amortize the liability. you have to understand the risks you want to take and the

effect on the portfolio is. this is very much state of the art, because for most plans, integrating public and private assets, you have the staff that can get beyond the numbers and break this down into the kind of levers you pull, so i did want to add, from my standpoint as an advisor, this type of analysis is as strong as any i've seen, and it's critical in this environment. you can't do what you want to do without taking risks, but the risks you want to take need to be really monitored rigorously as staff has done here. >> thank you, alan. appreciate it. any questions of alan? again, at this point, let's take public comment and we'll move the agenda as time is running short. >> clerk: thank you. a reminder to any callers to

press star, three to be added to the queue. moderator, do we have any callers in the queue? >> operator: madam secretary, there are no callers on the line. >> clerk: thank you. hearing no callers, public comment is now closed. president casciato? >> let's take item 11. >> clerk: item 11, discussion item, chief investment officer report. >> thank you, president casciato. i will be brief here. a lot of what i would otherwise state is written here. what we covered in july and august that the markets were at a bit of an inflection point, and we saw volatility in the

market because of covid and the on going regulatory events in china to potential budget showdowns, and the potential advising inflation and interest rates. later on in the c.i.o. report, i won't go through it here, one of the more notable events was the fed decision that they would begin tapering, which is the first step in reducing monetary stimulus. the effect will be dependent on inflation measures and unemployment measures, both of which the markets are beginning to focus on, so those will be two things that everyone participating in the markets will focus on. given that there was a downturn in the market, sfers was down

an estimated 85 basis points for the month. for the quarter and for the fiscal year, we estimate sfers' assets to be up about 4%, and what has been true for quite sometime [indiscernible] notably, that 3% for the quarter is ahead of a 60-30-10 portfolio and a 60-40 portfolio. counter year-to-date, sfers is up an estimated 18.1%, again, led by private equity, and again, comfortably ahead of a 60-30-10 portfolio and a 60-40

portfolio. sfers assets at the end of the quarter are estimated about 36.1 billion. so quickly, in terms of an update on board approved investments, at its meeting on june 9, retirement board approved up to 50 million to [indiscernible]. the fund is classified at a venture capital investment within sfers venture portfolio. next up, sfers allocated 40 million to be invested in [indiscernible] closed on september 21, 2021. these investments will be classified also as venture

capital within sfers' private equity portfolio. next at its meeting on february 10, 2021, the retirement board approved in closed session an investment up to $25 million in cbs-1lp, the investment of 25 million in cbc-s-1. it's classified as a coinvestment, the first with cbc group. two more. at its september 8 meeting in 2021, the board approved total investment of 12 million classified as a venture capital investment within sfers private equity portfolio. and finally, at the meeting in -- on august 11, 2021, the

retirement board approved in closed session an investment up to 50 million in hcp studio fund lp and up to 60 million in studio fund sfers. 50 million to hcp closed on september 3, 2021, and it's sfers' first investment with hackman capital partners. two more items, one of which we've discussed, but i will turn my attention to personnel. i noticed in august we posted for a senior portfolio position and buyout equity. we began interviewing for those positions last week, and we'll have more next week, and we are pleased with the candidate pool. in addition, we are taking our

first steps towards the career steps and additional resources, and we're excited to begun we're posting for manager positions and these positions are new and effectively serve as second in charge within the respective assess classes, so we're extraordinarily grateful to all of the work that went into each of these positions by our director, jay huish. we're grateful for your efforts here, and we're grateful for the support that we've had from the board of supervisors and the mayor, as well. this is a big undertaking, and i know there's a sense of urgency among all of us to get this done, but we need to get it done the right way. it's going to be an effort

among staff. there's going to be about ten of us doing all the interviewing, so in addition to our day jobs, we'll be doing a lot of interviewing over the next several months. since we're hiring a number of positions over the next several months, there's a risk of cannibalisation, and finally, you've met some of our investment -- additional members of our investment staff. adding six new people to a group of 20 today is a real cultural challenge, so we'll make sure that these people have the technical skills, but it's important that they fit culturally, so bear with us as we go through this process as we're super, super excited. lastly, and we've acknowledged

it already, we have scheduled our next investment committee meeting on november 17, during which we'll focus on the investment regulatory changes going on in china. we'll be joined by the cofounding partner of asia alternatives and a global strategist for jpmorgan inside strategy team, so that brings both a public market and private market perspective. so i'll pause there and answer any questions the board may have. >> any questions? hearing none, public comment, please. >> clerk: thank you. callers, if you haven't already done so, please press star, three to enter the queue.

operator, do we have any callers on the line? >> operator: madam secretary, there are no callers on the line. >> clerk: thank you. >> we'll go to the deferred compensation calendar, and since we always put this at the end of the calendar, next month, let's give them a break and put them at the beginning of the calendar. item 12? >> clerk: item 12, discussion item, sfdcp committee report. >> thank you, madam secretary, mr. president. the committee report stands submitted unless there are any questions from the board members. >> any questions from the board? public comment, please. >> clerk: thank you. moderator, do we have any callers on the line in.

>> operator: madam secretary, there are no callers on the line. >> clerk: thank you. hearing no calls, public comment is closed. president casciato? >> item 13, please. >> item 13, discussion item, sfdcp monthly report. >> thank you very much. that will be a nice change next month. it'll be our quarterly report, so that will be a nice one. i will be brief in my comments. i'm aware of the hour. first is the stable value crediting rate, which has increased to 1.71%. this crediting rate is guaranteed for the entire q-4 and will reset for q-1 this year. they will value wholes just under 1 billion and is the most conservative fund in the

lineup. as of august 31, the fund is just shy of 5 billion, and you can find the fund performance in the attachment activity report starting on slide 10 in the item 13 materials. as a reminder, the plan is 100% contribution dollars that employees have made to complement their pension retirement. sfdcp funds are chosen to be liquid. shifting gears, october is national retirement security month. as you may recall, the plan usually conducted a seminar at the main library, and it tends to result in standing room only. since the pandemic, all seminars have been virtual, and

we have seen an uptick in webinar attendance. to date, nearly half of the stainless steel travel mugs have been awarded, leaving around 50 more for early entrants. you can see the criteria before you in slide 3 and the prizes on page 4. in fact, the whole presentation deck has been prepared so that the whole board has an avid glance board at the actual activities campaign. this is also our first prize raffle approach, so i anticipate some learning from this maiden voyage. we also announced our first woman planning and retirement seminar, which launches soon.

an e-mail campaign to nearly 24,000 active participants in also underway, with the first one last week and the second one sent yesterday. open rates have been normal, but conversion rates, when a reader clicks a link, has been strong, about 5.5%. you can view these on slide 7, and lastly, our five-minute videos can be found on sfdcp.org. finally, what i would like to highlight is our partnership with other city departments in helping us promote national finance security month. the month of october is, by design, as employees are in a benefit state of mind due to health services open enrollment. the plan has been blessed with steadfast supporters and partners such as safety,

d.p.w., and h.s.h., but this year, we've also been fortunate to have the city administrator, p.u.c., department of human resources, to spread the word through their own e-mail, newsletter, or webpages. i look forward to continuing interdepartmental support. that concludes my update for this month. i am happy to answer any questions regarding the plan. >> any questions of diane? hearing none, public comment, please? >> clerk: thank you. a reminder to callers to press star, three to be added to the queue. moderator, are there any callers on the line? >> operator: madam secretary, there are no callers on the line. >> clerk: thank you. hearing no callers, public comment is now closed. >> okay. thank you very much. diane, thank you very much. see you later in the afternoon.

>> thank you. >> okay. administration calendar, item number 14. >> clerk: item number 14, discussion item, personnel committee report. >> okay. since commissioner stansbury is not here, we'll just accept it as submitted. public comment, please. >> clerk: okay. public comment, please. moderator, are there any callers on the line? >> operator: madam secretary, there are no callers on the line. >> clerk: okay. public comment is closed. >> item 15. >> clerk: item 15, discussion item, 2021 review of economic assumptions negative sign yo tests. >> thank you very much. i do ask commissioners to ask questions at any time leading up to the november meeting, and bill, do you have the -- there

we go. thank you. >> good afternoon, commissioners. given the hour, i'll move through this very quickly. let me know if there are any questions. we had presented information back at the august meeting. the updates here first in terms of the projections [indiscernible] which added to about $1 billion in assets compared to these finer projections, so we're looking at slightly better results and slightly higher funded status endings projections. in our august meeting, we had recommended reduction in the discount rate and looked at three alternatives. the commissioners asked for some information about what would happen in some negative

investment scenarios, and so that's the primary information in this presentation. we did review the information from the august meeting that led to that recommendation. we had also included in our recommendation some changes to the amortization schedules in different situations, so we put together this -- these quick summaries in each of the situations. normally, we have the baseline news investment returns equal to the discount rate. since we are comparing four different discount rates, and we didn't want the investment

return to cause variations, we just picked a round number, 7%, to use for all of the discount rate scenarios, and so there's -- you're not going to read anything in particular here. we just wanted to make sure we had an apples to apples comparison. the members contribution rate after cost sharing and funder contribution rate after cost sharing. the member rate is a different scale than the employer rate, so they're not directly comparable, so looking at these, make sure you take that into account. we did put the before cost sharing line on here for the member rates, and you can see whether they're getting adjustments added to their

sharing rate. [indiscernible] with the retiree health care trust fund contributions, special contribution we talked about last time that only applies to the city. this is the negative scenario. i'm just going to jump through these and get to our conclusions, and then take questions. the lower the discount rate, the higher the contributions, and that causes assets to accumulate to larger amounts. in terms of funding ratio, in the baseline scenarios, all of them are above 100% at all discount rates, and the negative scenarios, they drop

below 100. none of the scenarios got above 11.2%, which is what it is right now. so with the good investment returns, we're going to see that go down, and even with these negative scenarios, it doesn't go back up. with that, i'll take questions

[indiscernible]. >> thank you. any questions of bill? >> i have one question of bill. >> go ahead. >> months ago, it was, when you made a recommendation of the discount rate the board should use, which we did not, has kyron changed the discount rate -- as our consulting actuary, have you decided in any way to change what the recommended discount rate was that you told us a couple months ago? >> no, we haven't made any change to our recommendation.

we think that you should use your recommendation rate at least to 7.2. >> fine. this incredible year that we just had. in fact, our funding ratio has jumped up so high, you had not changed what you recommended our discount rate? >> not from our august meeting. >> right. in terms of how you got to that 7.2 number several months ago. >> right. >> thank you. >> thank you. any questions of bill? bill, if i could just ask you

if there's a possibility if maybe there could be -- maybe you could work on a one-pager sort of a one-page graph of the discount rate of how it works as if it were being presented to the public in order our members can clearly understand how it's working and when it moves up and when it moves down? is that a possibility, maybe some type of schematic? >> yeah, we can work on something. >> maybe we can talk offline about it. >> yeah, we can talk offline about what it mean. >> and as jeanette talked about, we will bring this back

as an action item for the november board meeting for the board to make a decision. kyron is only recommending a change in the return assumption. they are leaving the rest of the assumption where they're at, so this was in preparation of being brought back next month, and then maybe result of that decision, we could probably something for the public to show the impact of the action that the board took, however, kyron is recommending that it be lowered to, at least what bill said, 7.2, and maybe we could work on something we could put on the board's website to explain the action on employees as well as employers. >> good. thank you. yeah, let's talk offline about that. maybe a nice picture would be

helpful. appreciate it. any further questions of anybody? public comment, please. >> clerk: callers, if you have not already done so, please press star, three to be added to the queue. moderator, do you have any callers on the line? >> operator: madam secretary, there are no callers on the line. >> clerk: thank you. hearing no calls, public comment is closed. president casciato? >> clerk: item 16, discussion item, executive director's report. >> commissioners, i'll keep this brief. we an update on our office

reopening, and we anticipate bringing everybody back to the office at least on a part-time basis on november 1, and we are making sure that we have enough safety supplies and cleaning supplies and protective equipment to make sure that everybody feels protected. we have very few folks in our department who have not yet reported that they've been vaccinated, but the city, as you understand, has been dealing with this on a larger basis with some of the larger departments. the final issue that i will bring up, and it's a discussion that i've had with a number of board members, what the city is focusing on now in their labor negotiations, and i believe there was a request from labor,

is there be an inspection of all of the city facilities where you would have staff return to work to make sure that they have proper circulation or ventilation and those types of safety issues that are being raised by staff returning to work. and i will say, since we leased this building, the department of real estate has done the assessment for our floors? we have raised concerns of even prepandemic, that there's certain times and certain areas in our department that seem to have a lack of air circulation? it's a closed building. we certainly can't open any windows, so i wanted to alert the board that this is a consideration that we will continue to have each month as we will determine when we return safely to live in-person board meetings with all the

board members present, and so i will keep you updated as to where you're at with that. so i just wanted to notify the board that the city real estate's request is looking at the air circulation in every area of the city where staff would be assigned to work. with that, i'll be happy to answer any questions. >> any questions of jay? jay, just one comment. i heard an interview this morning regarding jean frazier at citigroup, and she's wrestling with all of these same types of issues, and it's quite innovative, what she's planning, so it might be worth looking at her remake of citigroup in these post pandemic times. >> okay.

thank you. >> yeah, it was interesting. if there's no questions -- joe, go ahead. >> one question. >> okay. >> yeah. jay, i know the building owners contract with the janitorial service to do all the daily cleaning. i'm just wondering, do you think they're as thorough and complete and appropriate for all of our staff at sfers, but whether we want to go back over ourselves and wipe down with a very powerful disinfectant? >> we, as part of the safety provisions provided by the city over the pandemic, have the lysol wipes and materials that we can wipe down common areas, kitchen machines, and other areas, so the protocol for

staff returning as it stands right now on november 1, is we would urge people to wipe those areas down before you use it so you don't count on someone wiping it down after they used it. the cleaning services, we have, over a couple of incidents over the pandemic, have requested they come in and do a deep cleaning for certain areas where we believe there may have been someone come in who was either exposed or had some exposure to covid. and currently, the thinking is, they have these machines that will come in and sanitize areas similar to what they use in airports, but the science i don't believe supports that that is really the danger of contracting it from surfaces. that being said, we're still going to have, you know, the plexiglass protective barriers in the member services area,

we'll have it here -- when i say here on the sixth floor, not really in the office, but on the sixth floor in the reception area, we'll have it around darlene's area in the board room because eventually, we will have the public coming back to in-person board meetings, and we cannot, at least currently, require them to be vaccinated in order to attend a board meeting. [please stand by]

>> board evaluation survey. we are in arrears on it, correct? >> we haven't done one for two years. >> we need to get that done. if the committee is having trouble, go with two. >> right. supervisor safai is chair. commissioners ghandi and bridges are on the committee. we can proceed. we have some other governance agenda issues friend friending

-- pending. getting this out to get the results back to the board should be the highest priority. >> okay. are you going to contact him? we can talk offline. >> we will try to get a meeting going over the next couple weeks. >> thank you. >> we should have that survey back for the november board meeting. >> that may be tough. committee meeting going and distributed and responses back. the governance may be pushed to november. certainly before the holidays, yes. >> thank you very much. public comment, please. >> reminder, callers, press star 3 to be added to the queue. >> there are no callers on the

line. >> public comment is now closed. >> thank you very much. item 17. >> item 17 discussion item. retirement board members good of the order. >> any good of the order issues? commissioner bridges, anything? >> nothing for the good of the order. thank you very much. >> okay. >> commissioner ghandi. >> nothing for me as well. >> commissioner driscoll. >> thanks for asking, i made my earlier comments. >> commissioners i don't have anything and i will entertain a motion to adjourn. >> public comment, please. >> callers if you have not done so press star 3 to be added to

the queue. do we have any callers? >> there are no caller on the line. >> public comment is closed. >> thank you very much. this meeting will be adjourned. thank you. >> thank you, mr. president. >> good night everyone.

>> my name is alan schumer. i am a fourth generation san franciscan. in december, this building will be 103 years of age. it is an incredibly rich, rich history. [♪♪♪]

>> my core responsibility as city hall historian is to keep the history of this building alive. i am also the tour program manager, and i chair the city advisory commission. i have two ways of looking at my life. i want it to be -- i wanted to be a fashion designer for the movies, and the other one, a political figure because i had some force from family members, so it was a constant battle between both. i ended up, for many years, doing the fashion, not for the

movies, but for for san franciscan his and then in turn, big changes, and now i am here. the work that i do at city hall makes my life a broader, a richer, more fulfilling than if i was doing something in the garment industry. i had the opportunity to develop relationships with my docents. it is almost like an extended family. i have formed incredible relationships with them, and also some of the people that come to take a tour. she was a dressmaker of the first order. i would go visit her, and it was a special treat. i was a tiny little girl.

i would go with my wool coat on and my special little dress because at that period in time, girls did not wear pants. the garment industry had the -- at the time that i was in it and i was a retailer, as well as the designer, was not particularly favourable to women. you will see the predominant designers, owners of huge complexes are huge stores were all male. women were sort of relegated to a lesser position, so that, you reached a point where it was a difficult to survive and survive financially. there was a woman by the name of diana. she was editor of the bazaar, and evoke, and went on and she was a miraculous individual, but she had something that was a

very unique. she classified it as a third i. will lewis brown junior, who was mayor of san francisco, and was the champion of reopening this building on january 5th of 1999. i believe he has not a third eye , but some kind of antenna attached to his head because he had the ability to go through this building almost on a daily basis during the restoration and corrects everything so that it would appear as it was when it opened in december of 1915. >> the board of supervisors approved that, i signed it into law. jeffrey heller, the city and county of san francisco oh, and and your band of architects a great thing, just a great thing.

>> to impart to the history of this building is remarkable. to see a person who comes in with a gloomy look on their face , and all of a sudden you start talking about this building, the gloomy look disappears and a smile registers across their face. with children, and i do mainly all of the children's tours, that is a totally different feeling because you are imparting knowledge that they have no idea where it came from, how it was developed, and you can start talking about how things were before we had computer screens, cell phones, lake in 1915, the mayor of san francisco used to answer the telephone and he would say, good morning, this is the mayor.

>> at times, my clothes make me feel powerful. powerful in a different sense. i am not the biggest person in the world, so therefore, i have to have something that would draw your eye to me. usually i do that through color, or just the simplicity of the look, or sometimes the complication of the look. i have had people say, do those shoes really match that outfit? retirement to me is a very strange words. i don't really ever want to retire because i would like to be able to impart the knowledge that i have, the knowledge that

i have learned and the ongoing honor of working in the people's palace. you want a long-term career, and you truly want to give something to do whatever you do, so long as you know that you are giving to someone or something you're then yourself. follow your passion and learn how to enrich the feelings along >> i went through a lot of struggles in my life, and i am blessed to be part of this. i am familiar with what people are going through to relate and

empathy and compassion to their struggle so they can see i came out of the struggle, it gives them hope to come up and do something positive. ♪ ♪ i am a community ambassador. we work a lot with homeless,

visitors, a lot of people in the area. >> what i like doing is posting up at hotspots to let people see visibility. they ask you questions, ask you directions, they might have a question about what services are available. checking in, you guys. >> wellness check. we walk by to see any individual, you know may be sitting on the sidewalk, we make sure they are okay, alive. you never know. somebody might walk by and they are laying there for hours. you never know if they are alive. we let them know we are in the area and we are here to promote safety, and if they have somebody that is, you know, hanging around that they don't want to call the police on, they don't have to call the police. they can call us.

we can direct them to the services they might need. >> we do the three one one to keep the city neighborhoods clean. there are people dumping, waste on the ground and needles on the ground. it is unsafe for children and adults to commute through the streets. when we see them we take a picture dispatch to 311. they give us a tracking number and they come later on to pick it up. we take pride. when we come back later in the day and we see the loose trash or debris is picked up it makes you feel good about what you are doing. >> it makes you feel did about escorting kids and having them feel safe walking to the play area and back. the stuff we do as ambassadors makes us feel proud to help keep the city clean, helping the

residents. >> you can see the community ambassadors. i used to be on the streets. i didn't think i could become a community ambassador. it was too far out there for me to grab, you know. doing this job makes me feel good. because i came from where a lot of them are, homeless and on the street, i feel like i can give them hope because i was once there. i am not afraid to tell them i used to be here. i used to be like this, you know. i have compassion for people that are on the streets like the homeless and people that are caught up with their addiction because now, i feel like i can give them hope. it reminds you every day of where i used to be and where i am at now.

i'm going to get started. thanks for your patience this morning. i want to start off by welcoming you to the yerba buena neighborhood and to -- yeah. [ applause ] we're actually standing in the east garden of the yerba buena

gardens. so welcome to this area. my name is cathy maupin and i'm the executive direct or of the yerba buena. i also am the chair of the yerba garden conservative that oversees this park. we are honored to have mayor london breed celebrating the launch of the welcome ambassadors program here in yerba buena. yerba buena is a community or a neighborhood i should say, it really is a neighborhood of where culture, conventions and community come together. we are home to world class museums like the one right behind me. we are home to the mosconey center and to the public garden mixed in with live, work, loft, condos, and senior housing. every day, visitors, residents and commuters converge here in yerba buena and we thought this was the perfect backdrop to launch the san francisco welcome ambassadors program. for my colleagues from the downtown community benefit districts, or benefit districts i should say. and i'm speaking specifically of the east cut, downtown, fisherman's wharf and we welcome these ambassadors with open arms. they will be an extension.

[ applause ] they are an extension of the work that our districts are already doing. with our ambassadors, with our clean and safe team, and it's incredibly important as we emerge from the pandemic. we want to thank mayor breed and her team for their leadership and focusing on the recovery of downtown san francisco. without further adieu, it's my honor and privilege to introduce mayor london breed. [ applause ] >> thank you, cathy, and it's really great to be here today to celebrate a program that's really been in the making for some time now. san francisco is coming alive now. i know today is a cloudy day. a little drizzle here and there. the weather that most of us san franciscans are used to. every now and then, that sun is

shining and san francisco is shining bright because what we're seeing as it relates to those who've been vaccinated, 84% of san franciscos fully vaccinated. and, next week, children will be eligible under the age of 12 between 5 and 12, and we are doing everything we can to make sure that that continues. 98% of our city's workforce is vaccinated. incredible. [ applause ] so as we try to keep one another safe like we've done from the very beginning of this pandemic, we also want to keep our economy going. we want to open our businesses. we want to make sure that residents can enjoy san francisco. we want visitors to enjoy san francisco. we want conventions to come back to san francisco. we want this city to thrive and when businesses are open and people are coming back downtown to work, events are happening

our yerba buena center for the arts, that is really part of our economic engine. it's how we generate revenue, but more importantly, bringing people together is something that i love to see happen in our city. now, part of what we've been experiencing as well is what i feel the wrong messaging about what our city is. we're the people who as san franciscans know how to communicate what's happening here. we still have challenges with homelessness. we still sadly have challenges with homelessness and crime. what we have to do is make some adjustments to ensure people who are here get the help and support that they need, but making sure those living here and working here also feel

safe. we can do both and that's why this new program having ambassadors who welcome people to san francisco, who make people feel like we want them here, who make people who live here feel safe. it's why that is so important. a couple of years ago, we launched an initial program. we know that a number of the b.i.d.s, business improvement districts around this area, they have people who are out here doing the hard work and welcoming people and helping to keep the neighborhood clean and safe and we launched a program bringing some of the retired police officers including your old captain, captainen garrity who understand and know these communities and have relationships with our police officers to try and deter a lot

of the activity we know should not occur. we're taking it up a notch. who under the mask will keep a smile on their faces. who will be really the faces of san francisco. so when people are getting off at bart, when people are on the buses, when people are walking to their hotels to the convention center. when people are moving about san francisco. they know these bright orange jackets mean that they can get help. which direction. what do i need to do. how can i get to where i need to go. what do you recommend for the best restaurant in this neighborhood? what's happening in san francisco? that's what they're here to do. provide that level of support and when they see activity that might be questionable or challenging to call the right

people to help to deal with it we know that it's been a challenging almost two years of dealing with the global pandemic; but now that we've gone through it and we've protected one another through this process, it's time to take it up a notch. it's time for us to open the city. it's time to make sure our people feel safe and welcomed here. it's time to clean up these streets. it's time to do the work and it's time to ensure that people feel safe. as we re-open san francisco, placing strategically our community ambassadors. our police officers. our union street folks working as ambassadors as well, it's time for us to work hand in hand in san francisco to really make sure that we bring our city back to life and we make

people feel good about being apart of this city. we make sure that they walk away and say i had a great time in san francisco. i felt safe in san francisco. i recommend you visit san francisco because they have this incredible exhibit at the museum, the dejeoung. this is our city and now it's our time to take care of it to do everything we can in our respective positions to improve upon it. to make sure we're putting our all to it. not just for our economic future, but for the prosperity of each and every one of us. i want to thank so many people who are joining us today including rodney fong and helping bring businesses together. kevin carol from the hotel council, thank you so much and i want to see those hotels packed with people who are coming to the city.

i'm fighting to get all these conventions and other activities and things here, but we know there's so much more work to do. i want to thank our deputy chief and david lizard. so many people working collaboratively together in order to ensure that this city is open for business, it's thriving and we're taking good care of one another like we did throughout this pandemic. thank you all for coming out here today. [ applause ] i always forget my job. and i also want to introduce this supervisor that we have been working hand in hand dealing with so many of the challenges that this community faces, but also we take a moment to. yerba buena as a whole.

and we want to keep it that way and the supervisor who represents this community. supervisor matt haney. >> supervisor haney: thank you mayor breed and for your entire team. one thing we all know about mayor breed is that she loves the city of san francisco and she also loves to show off the city of san francisco. and this community in particular, this part of san francisco has so much to show off to visitors and to the world. we have some of the most important and dynamic arts institutions in the world right here within a block of where we're standing. we have beauty and open space. we have cultural institutions and arts institutions and night life. this is in so many ways, apart of san francisco that we want to show off and when we show it

off, we know there are tremendous benefits to our entire city. this area accounts for billions of dollars in revenue that's being brought to our city and spending that comes here. tens of thousands of jobs, folks who work in our hotels, folks who work in all of the surrounding businesses that rely on the people who live and work here. so when we are opening up and welcoming people and when we are making it safer and cleaner and more welcoming overall, it's something that all of us benefit from. i represent this area here, this is a dense residential neighborhood and this isn't only going to be about a better place for visitors. this is only going to be about a safer place, a cleaner place for the people who live here. i want to thank everybody who has come together for this initiative. mayor breed and the investment and the innovation in the

approach we've taken here. yes, we know that police have a very important role in walking the beat and i want to thank our officers who are here and the leadership. sometimes it's as simple l as just having a friendly face who makes you feel a little bit safer and the folks behind us are going to play such a key role in making sure our city comes back even stronger. i had the opportunity to meet and talk to some of the folks behind me. moana and devonte and they told me that not only are they enjoying a lot of people, but they're getting to experience a lot of these great sites themselves. they're walking around and seeing the table turn around. they're going to stand and be apart of our museums. this is something that i think is a tremendous pride for our city to have people who can welcome and represent the best of san francisco and everyone

here behind me, thank you. thank you to all of the folks from our cbds who do this as ambassadors all over the downtown area. this has been under mayor breed's leadership, a very challenging time. it's been a team effort with all of you here to get us through this and it will be a team effort to make sure we come back even stronger. with that, i want to introduce the next speaker who is from one of our most important downtown businesses and we know that by making this area more welcoming for visitors, we also hope that we can see many of our office workers and city employees as well. thank you, michelle. [ applause ] >> hi there. thank you so much mayor breed and the city of san francisco.

again, my name is my stel schneider for our amazing real estate team. some of you may know sales force started in san francisco. today, we're so proud to be san francisco's largest employer through these incredibly challenging times by giving more than $3 million to support local small businesses. this year, we also reach an exciting milestone contributing more than $100 million. as i come in each week. it's great to see the city starting to recover. we see people out and about. our employees are coming in. we're so excited to welcome

employees whack to our offices. we've already opened more than 60 offices globally it's really about bringing our company culture to life. but soon we'll open it up for the public and nonprofits to come back. we remain committed to supporting the san francisco community that's been our home for the past 22 years. we're so grateful to the city and the mayor for their support and leadership. so thank you so much for having me today.

now i'd like to introduce the executive director of moad. >> yerba. arts and culture are part of the essence of our city. our from moad to the children's creative museum, these are just a few of the museums in the neighborhood. there is something in san francisco for everyone, but our museums and cultural institutions can only flourish

and continue if we have visitors coming to them. that's why we are thrilled to have the welcome ambassadors helping visitors find their way around the city. there's another reason i'm excited for these hospitality investors. also an investment in our visitors and residents. it's proof that san francisco values you and wants you to feel safe and cared for so you can enjoy your time in the city. i want to thank you again to our madam mayor, to all all of of a great partners today and to all the supporting the san

francisco and head of the government affairs of the california academy and science. >> all right. good morning everyone. good morning, mayor. the biggest question on my mind when i woke up today was, man, i hope this suit still fits me. i haven't warn this in two years. today is a great day for the tourism and hospitality industry for our city on our road to recovery. mayor london breed has been our champion and she has answered our calls for hospitality ambassadors to help our visitors feel welcome, safe, and taken care of when they come to san francisco. our hotels, restaurants, retail, sports venues, theaters, museums and all attractions are open. our gate is open. this past weekend, if you felt

in the city, it was vibrant and check with outside lands and also halloween events on top of this, we are so excited we cannot wait to welcome back our international visitors come november 8th now, our hospitality ambassadors she's probably the best ambassador that the city could have representing us wherever she goes. i think as someone said here before is that when you walk around the city it's that you are welcome and safe and it's a great place to be.

so i would like to invite the mayor to come up here. i want to introduce someone. it's my privilege. mario is one of our amazing welcomed ambassadors. he is a native san franciscan. and you were born at st. luke's in the mission. i just happened to know that. since he was in high school working at places like our homegrown boudine and our iconic cliff house and as a former waiter myself, i identify with you so, with that, i'd like to introduce mario to say a few words and welcome in the mayor. >> good morning everybody and good morning mayor breed. my name is james jeffery.

i am a san francisco welcome ambassador and i am here today with the rest of the welcome ambassadors to present mayor breed with her very own welcome ambassador san francisco [inaudible] >> thank you. >> i'm going to say james. what's so great about having someone like james as an

ambassador is he knows san francisco. and there's nothing like someone coming to san francisco for the first time and running into somebody like james and saying, james, nice to meet you where do i go to get on the cable car and see the best view? and i bet james could tell him exactly what anyway. the point is, these ambassadors are exactly what this city needs. we need people like james and some of the folks who are here that are out on the streets that enjoy this work and what they're doing and that want to help people because that's going to make all the difference in everyone's experience and part of that is it's not just our officers and our ambassadors, it's also all of us and how we greet people

and how we make them feel welcome and how we stop to say if they ask for directions, you know. actually, now, everybody has a smartphone, so people don't even stop and ask for directions anymore, do they. the point is this is going to be great for our city. i'm so happy we're launching it. we want it to be successful. we're hopeful and we're going to keep shining san francisco is a great city and so thank you all for being here. >> thank you, mayor breed and thank you everyone for coming. have a great day. [ applause ]

>> look at that beautiful jellyfish. the way to speak to students and motivate them to take action, to save the planet, they do, they care and my job is to speak to them in a way that they can understand that touches their heart and makes them feel powerful with simple actions to take every day. ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ >> i was born and raised in the desert of palm springs, california. my dad was the rabbi in the community there. what i got from watching my father on stage talking to the community was learning how to be in the public.

and learning how to do public speaking and i remember the first time i got up to give my first school assembly, i felt my dad over my shoulder saying pause for drama, deliver your words. when i was a kid, i wanted to be a teacher. and then when i got into high school, i decided i wanted to get into advertising and do graphic art and taglines and stuff like that. by the time i was in college, i decided i wanted to be a decorator. but as i did more work, i realized working my way up meant a lot of physical labor. i only had so much energy to work with for the rest of my life and i could use that energy towards making a lot of money, helping someone else make a lot of money or doing something meaningful. i found the nonprofit working to save the rainforest was looking

for volunteers. i went, volunteered and my life changed. suddenly everything i was doing had meaning. stuffing envelopes had meaning, faxing out requests had meaning. i eventually moved up to san francisco to work out of the office here, given a lot of assembly through los angeles county and then came up here and doing assemblies to kids about rainforest. one of my jobs was to teach about recycle, teaching students to reduce, reuse, recycle and compost, i'm teaching them they have the power, and that motivates them. it was satisfying for me to work with for the department of environment to create a message that gets to the heart of the issue. the san francisco department of environment is the only agency that has a full time educational team, we go into the schools to

help teach children how to protect nature and the environment. we realized we needed animal mascot to spark excitement with the students. the city during the gold rush days, the phoenix became part of the city feel and i love the symbolism of the phoenix, about transformation and the message that the theme of the phoenix provides, we all have the power to transform our world for the better. we have to provide teachers with curriculum online, our curriculum is in two different languages and whether it's lesson plans or student fact sheets, teachers can use them and we've had great feedback. we have helped public and private schools in san francisco increase their waste use and students are working hard to

sort waste at the end of the lunch and understand the power of reusing, reducing, recycling and composting. >> great job. >> i've been with the department for 15 years and an environmental educator for more than 23 years and i'm grateful for the work that i get to do, especially on behalf of the city and county of san francisco. i try to use my voice as intentionally as possible to support, i think of my grandmother who had a positive attitude and looked at things positively. try to do that as well in my work and with my words to be an uplifting force for myself and others. think of entering the job force as a treasure hunt. you can only go to your next clue and more will be revealed.

follow your instincts, listen to your gut, follow your heart, do what makes you happy and pragmatic and see where it takes you and get to the next place. trust if you want to do good in this world, thattttttttttttttttt

>> the hon. london breed: this is the first event held in city hall since the pandemic, and we are celebrating latino heritage month and san francisco. so i want to say thank