>> you are watching san francisco rising with chris manners. today's special guest, carolyn mante. >> hi, i'm chris manners and you are watching san francisco the stow about restaffing rebuilding and reimaging the city. the guest is carolyn manteto talk about the organization is helping to preserve the city cultural heritage and architecture. welcome to the show.

>> thank you for having me e. >> good to have you here. >> can we talk bat the history of your organization and the mission. >> sure, thank you. san francisco heritage started 51 years ago and the main mission is to preserve and enhance the architectural and cultural identity of san francisco. when it started out the focus was really on the buildings, historic landmark listings and really concentrated on downtown area with all the development happening. our organization was raising a reg red flag with historic landmarks in danger and victorian mansions so a hallmark of our organization is moving these victorian mansions in the way of development to inwestern addition neighborhood and other areas to get out of the way of development and preserve them. our organization was around before there was the historic preservation commission of the city so we were at the

forefront drawings attention to historic preservation, landmarking and over the last 51 years we have seen how there are more then just buildsings in safeguarding the city cultural resources, there is also small businesses and the different neighborhood icons that make a neighborhood special, so our outreach has really-it is really come full circle in a way because it moved downtown into the neighborhoods and now with the covid epidemic it is really going back to downtown again looking at how we can play a role in the economic recovery and revitalization of downtown san francisco. >> that's great. so, now i understand your organization is also responsible for maintaining a couple properties. could you tell us a little about those? >> yes, our non profit was gifted in 1973, the historic (inaudible) house. it is now a historic house museum

but this was a family since 1886 built this victorian mansion in the same family year after year and one of the last resident of the family when she passed way gifted the mansion to san francisco heritage so since then we have been running this historic house and the home of our office. in 2018, one of the long time members nor aa lasten gifting a building on the e h-as hate polk became a commercial corridor after the earthquake, the owner at the time, he raised the house and put 6 store front underneath in order to take advantage of the commerce so we are in

charge of the house on the corner and it has been a wonderful way to get new numbers, new audiences interested in the work of our organization. during the pandemic, we have been using it as a artson residents and partnering with different bay area artists as well as cultural institutions, cultural districts and then one of the storefronts we converted into a pop up galleries so gives a opportunity to raise awareness of the importance of the art and cultural resources in san francisco. >> that's fantastic. so, now, let's talk about legacy business. what does the designation mean? how does somebody get add today the legacy business registry and what benefits does being named a legacy business? >> i love this program. it was started by san francisco heritage and adopt ed by the city and run by the office of small business but the program looks what are the

businesses really contributing to san francisco and the neighborhood. when we started the first focus was bars and restaurants but over the years it exb panded to include other businesses so these are places that contribute to the character of a neighborhood, so sam's grill downtown, the amazingarian press in the presidio. book stores like city lights oergreen apple recently named. this year we had a lot of attention on the legacy business program. we put out a contest to the public of what you think should be the next legacy business and one of the businesses that was recommended was the club deluxe, jazz club on the corner, and 2 or 3 days after we launched the contest, the owners announced they would have to close. the rent was driven up, they couldn't afford it, coming out of the

pandemic so we worked at speed to get that application submitted with them and that status convinced their landlord to negotiate with them a lower rent and this way they have been able to stay, there was a lot of social media support around this, so when you become a legacy business, not only do you get marketing and business support from the office of small business, but you also eligible for grants and we work closely with the legacy businesses as we do our work for san francisco heritage. >> that's great. so, apart from architecture and buildings, you also work with cultural districts, and the castro theater strikes me as a place that is both. a beautiful building and cultural hub and center. what has been happening with the recent acquisition by new owners; >> it is leased to another planet entertainment

and been in contact with planet entertainment by the castro theater is historic land mark building. it is recognized as a very important architectural monument. one thing-one of the main activist organizations of the preservation of the theater we work together with supervisor mandelman on a interior landmark historic landmark designation for interior, but what happened over the is summer and people learned is there is a lot of concern not just by san franciscans but people all over the world, movie directors, stars who are very concerned about the risk to the

lgbtq and film programming at the castro theater. another planet hosted community stakeholder in august, and it was so moving to see the number of people who took the microphone-everyone had two minutes to say their testimony of what castro theater meant to them and those testimonys showed this building is contributing not just as a architectural monument but plays a role in the lgbtq community that is irrelaceuble able. >> it is beautiful theater. >> it is. my involvement in the theater raised awareness to not only the castro theater to be emblematic of the lgbtq culture and history but also there are many other sites in the city that also contribute to the identity. that is why so many people come to san francisco as a place

of freedom and diversity so in my previous work i worked at the world heritage center, so when i joined san francisco heritage i was thinking why isn't san francisco a world heritage city? for the architecture alone it could be inscribed. golden gate bridge to name a few but the city is so unique in the architecture, the mansioned and historic landmarks so hoping to start a conversation on that with city stakeholders this year. >> that is great. let's talk about your relationship with other agencies. you mentioned economic and office of work force development and planning commission. how do you unt integrate to them? >> these relationships are essential. we are working with office of small business for the legacy business program and the planning

department is really one of our most crucial relationships. we meet quarterly with them and we really see how we can support not only historic land mark listings and historical cultural context statements, strategy for culture districts and city survey among many other activities that really are of concern to both of us. for the office of workforce development, i attended a etmooing recently that the chamber of commerce organized with them on the downtown revitalization and a key goal in that meeting and in the downtown revitalization is to make sure that the city historic culture resources play a key #r0e8 in the economic recovery and revitalization especially after the pandemic. the office of workforce development has the city build program which is admirable program where youth are trained in construction techniques for

rebuilding and especially with the new housing legislation, and we really want to see how can that workforce be expanded to include training in historic preservation. we have so many victorian homes, historic buildings and other places that really need a skilled labor force to make sure that they are preserved and that they help keep the special identify of the city. we really value these relationships, we meet quarterly with the various organizations and we are really grateful for grants of the arts we receive and other supports so definitely that is a key relationship for san francisco heritage. >> the city build is great. i like that a lot. thank you so much for the time you have given today. appreciate you coming on the show. >> thank you so much raising awareness about san francisco heritage. we hope the people watching will join us in the mission to help keep san francisco special. thank you.

>> that's it for this episode. we'll be back shortly. i'm chris manners, thanks you're watching san francisco rising with chris manners. special guest is david chu. hi i'm chris manners and you're watching san francisco rising the show that's about restarting rebuilding and re imagining our city. i guess today is david chiu, the city attorney for the city and county of san francisco , and he's here today to talk to

us about the opioid crisis, reproductive rights and the non citizen voting program. mr chu, welcome to the show. thanks for having me on happy to talk about whatever you want me to talk about, so can we start by explaining the difference between the city attorney's office and the district attorney's office? i think it could be slightly confused. that is a very common fusion with members of the public so um, if you get arrested in san francisco by the san francisco police department, all criminal matters are dealt with by the san francisco district attorney . we handle all civil matters on behalf of the city and county of san francisco. what that means is a number of things. we provide advice and counsel to all actors within city government from our mayor. every member of the board of supervisors to the 100 plus departments, commissions boards that represent the city and county of san francisco. we also defend the city against thousands of lawsuits. so if you slip and fall in front of city hall if there's a bus accident

if there is an incident involving the san francisco police department, we defend those matters. we also bring lawsuits on behalf of the city and county of san francisco, where most famous for litigating and obtaining the constitutional right to marry for lgbtq couples have sued gun manufacturers, payday lenders, oil companies, you name it, who are undercutting the rights of san franciscans and the city and county of san francisco. so now moving on to the opioid crisis. i understand you've had some success in court, um, dealing with manufacturers, distributors and pharmacies. could you elaborate a little bit on that for us, so the opioid industry and by that i refer to the legal industry that prescribes pain pills. um over years. uh, deceived americans and resulted in literally thousands upon thousands of deaths and tragedies that we see on our

streets every day when it comes to the addictions that folks are experiencing. many of the addictions really stemmed from what happened over a decade plus period where the prescription pain industry marketed prescription pills in ways that were false. we were one of thousands of jurisdictions around america that brought a lawsuit against the opioid industry. but we've had a particular set of successes that others have not. ah we initially brought a lawsuit a few years ago against every part of the opioid supply chain, and that included manufacturers, distributors and retailers, including pharmacies over the course of four plus years. a number of these corporate defendants settled with us. we've as of this moment brought in over $120 million of cash and services. to the city to help address the root causes of what we're talking about. but a few months ago, we had a really historic verdict against the

pharmacy, walgreens and their role walgreens was responsible for literally over 100 million pills, flooding the streets of san francisco over a period of years where they flouted federal law that require them to track where they're pills were going to. they had a what? what we refer to as a phil phil phil. pharmacy culture where folks would bring in their prescriptions, and the pharmacist would just fill them without checking why someone was coming in multiple times without checking why certain doctors were seen a 100 fold increase in the number of opioid prescriptions that they were prescribing. so we had a historic judgment against walgreens recently, but it's been a very intense lawsuit. and we know that will never bring back the lives that we have lost to opioid addictions. but it's critical for us that we get the resources that we need. maybe one other thing i'll mention because it's often confusion. a

large percentage of folks who are addicted to street level drugs say heroin or fentanyl started their addictions. with painkillers, opioid medications that were prescribed through doctors provided through pharmacies and so literally the suffering that we're seeing on our streets was caused by the opioid industry over many, many years and has created the significant crisis that we are dealing with right now. right right now moving on. i understand after the recent supreme court ruling, striking down robust as wade that you've put together an organization that's designed to help mm. provide free services to people who are both. seeking abortions and providing them can you tell us about the organization? sure so, um, before the dobbs decision came down, but after we learned about the leak from the supreme court about the draft that suggested the decision would be as bad as it has turned out to be, um, i reached out to leadership from the bar association of san francisco

because we knew that if that decision came down there would be tens of thousands of patients around the country as well as providers whose legal situation would be in jeopardy. women doctors, nurses who could be subjected to lawsuits who could be arrested who could be prosecuted, particularly in red states? 26 states where rights are being rolled back or in the process or have already been rolled back because of the dobbs decision. so we put out a call to lawyers all over the bay and frankly, all over the country, and as of this moment there have been over 70 law firms that have answered our call to be part of the legal alliance for reproductive rights who have committed to reviewing cases and providing pro bono assistance to patients and providers who are at legal risk. we also are looking at potential cases that these lawyers can bring against various states. in these areas that are looking to deprive women and patients and providers

of their of their rights. um it is a very dark time in america, and i'm really proud that that barrier attorneys, the legal community care have stepped up to answer the call. it's very important that's great. so now the non citizen voting program that was passed by voters just for school boards has faced them court challenges recently, but it was in place for the most recent election that we've had. how do you see that situation panning out? in fact, it's been in place for now. five school board elections. um so a little bit of background in our san francisco schools over one out of three kids. has a parent who is a non citizen who doesn't have a say in the election of the policy makers that dictate the future of our san francisco public schools, and so over a number of years, there has been a movement to allow immigrant parents to vote in school board elections. few things i'll mention about that is our country has a very long history

when it comes to allowing immigrants to vote. from 17 76 for 100 and 50 years until after world war. one immigrants were allowed to vote in most states in our country on the theory that we want to assimilate immigrants in american democratic values and institutions, and it wasn't until an anti immigrant backlash in world war one that that sort of ended. but in recent years, um cities across america have allowed this to happen. in fact, at this moment, believe there are over a dozen cities that have voted to allow non citizens to vote in a number of context. now, this is particularly important in our schools just given how challenge our schools are, and given that we know that when we engage more parents in her school system, regardless of their citizenship it helps to lift up our schools for all parents. and so in 2016 the voters of san francisco past about measure that allowed this to happen. unfortunately earlier this year, there were

conservative organizations that came to san francisco to bring a lawsuit to try to overturn this , and i should also mention it is obviously the perspective of our office and our city that this is constitutional. nothing in the constitution prohibits non citizens from voting. and in fact, there's an explicit provision in the constitution that allows chartered cities like san francisco when it comes to school board elections to be able to dictate the time and manner of those elections. and so, uh, we are involved in litigation on this issue. there was an initial ruling that was not good for us that essentially said at the trial court level. we shouldn't allow this. um we appealed it up to the appellate level. the appellate court made an initial decision to allow this past november election to proceed as it has for the last previous four elections. we're going to be in front of that court soon. stay tuned. we'll see what happens. it was good to hear that the city was able to

reach a settlement with the center for medicare and medicaid services are meant laguna honda could still operate. how did you manage to reach that agreement? it was not an easy conversation . just a little bit of background. so laguna honda has been an incredibly important institution in san francisco for 150 years, taking care of our most vulnerable patients are frail, very elderly patients, many of whom are at end of life. and a few years ago, there were some issues in that hospital. some violations of rules that we very much want to make sure don't get violated. there were folks that weren't using proper ppe, who are bringing cigarette lighters into the facility, who might have brought some contraband into the facilities. we have zero tolerance for that and have made that very clear. we self reported some of these violations to the federal authorities. and unfortunately from our perspective, they took the very disproportionate step of ordering the closure. the permanent closure of lugano, honda. problematic on a number

of reasons. first and foremost, there are just no skilled nursing facility beds not just in california but around the country. after their order came down. we literally were putting 1000 calls a day to skilled nursing facilities around california and around the country and could find nowhere to move the 700 patients that we had had in the gonna honda but just as disturbingly as we were forced to start moving some of these patients, a number of them died. there's a concept in medicine known as transfer trauma. when you move someone who is that frail and unfortunately, folks folks died and we were at a point where we were five weeks away from the deadline for the federal government. that they had provided to us to close the facility. so uh and we have been trying for months to get the federal government to reconsider their action, so i was compelled to bring a lawsuit on behalf of the city and county of san francisco and very pleased and appreciate that we were able to

come to a settlement whereby transfers will be delayed at least until next year. we're going to have at least a year of funding. to keep the facility open, and hopefully we can get back up on our feet and ensure that no future violations occur because this is an institution that has to stay open for the good of these patients. quite right, quite right. so finally, congratulations on winning an important public power service dispute with pg and e. um why is it important that the city's rights as a local power provider maintained well, so san francisco has been a local power provider for decades. we are fortunate to have access through our hedge hetchy hydroelectric system to provide electricity to a number of providers, particularly public recipients of that. and unfortunately, pg any has used its monopoly when it comes to private electricity to try to stop that, and to block that, and from our perspective, they violated federal law in adding literally

tens of millions of dollars of expenses to san francisco and institutions that we're trying to ensure um, public power infrastructure. put years of delays on our ability to do this, and so we had to bring a number of appeals in the federal commission. ah we were successful in those appeals, and there was a decision recently that basically held the pg and e could not use its monopoly to unfairly delay or add tens of millions of dollars of cost. to the city and county of san francisco, as we are trying to move forward with our vision of public power. clearly pgd has not been able to serve not just san francisco but northern california. well we all know that with the wildfires with its bankruptcies, with all the issues that they've had, we think there is a different model to move forward on and we are grateful to the court. and providing a ruling that allows us to move forward. well thank you so much for coming on the show. i really appreciate the

time you've given us here today. i appreciate and thanks for your thanks for your questions. thank you. well that's it. for this episode, we'll be back with another one shortly for sf gov t v. i'm chris manners. thanks for watching. yeah.

[music] >> san francisco is known as yerba buena, good herb after a mint that used to grow here. at this time there were 3 settlements one was mission delores. one the presidio and one