>> the commission on the environment. the date is may 23, 2023. the time is 5:00 p.m. cell phones are prohibited. anyone using a cellphone maybe removed from the chambers. please be sure your device is silent. public comment will be available for each item on the agenda. for comments on matters not on the agenda, there will be an opportunity for general public comment. the person will be asked to come forward one by one. each speaker will be allowed 3 minutes to speak. people calling in to speak, call

415-655-0001. enter access code dial: 1-415-655-0001 • access code: 2594 606 8619 • password: sfgov speak clearly. i will now call the roll. >> president ahn? here. vice-president, wan? commissioner stephenson? here. >> i will start with the land

acknowledgment. the commission of the environment acknowledges the homeland and recognize the mother earth and as well as all other people who reside in their territory. we recognize we benefit from living on their land and wish to pay our respects to the ancestors and elders and the environment of the community. we must embrace indigenous knowledge around how we care for san francisco and all its people. thank you for attention during this important

acknowledgment. welcome to tonight's meeting. we should know that the world's meteorology cal report according to the forecast there is a 98% chance that one of more of the next five years will be hotter. we simply adhere to sustainable practices and make sure we continue our mission here at the department of the environment on commission and be sure that residents lead by example. today we will hear a number of items related to this including grants, contracts and programs and commercial reuse program which will provide $500 to transition away from single use food ware and towards reusable

and to lowering cost and lowering refuse rate. we will hear about this in today's hearing. being green is economic cal to be sustainable. the truth is adopting sustainable practices is a cost saver at the end of the day. it's up to us at the department at the commission to promote these opportunities to ensure that all san franciscans have the information and resources to get involved. before we get started, i want to note this is our first meeting without our long time commissioner johanna wald. we will hold a service for her sometimes later this summer, and this marks the final note of commissioner stephenson and it's

been a pleasure working with you and we'll learn more about your record in a meeting. we'll go to public comment first. >> are there any members that wish to speak, if so, please come forward and speak clearly into the mic. >> we will have general public comment on item 4 on the agenda. seeing none. members of the public who wish to make a public comment press star 3 to be added in the

speaker queue. those on hold, please wait until your turn to speak. seeing none, public comment on this item is closed. >> thank you, next item. >> 3. approval of minutes of the march 28, 2023, commission on the environment meeting and approval of amended minutes of the march 7, 2023, commission on the environment special meeting. explanatory documents: march 28, 2023, meeting draft minutes; and march 7, 2023, special meeting amended minutes. (discussion and action) commissioners, in addition to the minutes, we are asking the commission to approve a change to the minutes of the march 7th meeting, the administrative code requires those persons attended the session to be included in the minutes and this is here for your consideration.

>> any changes, commissioners? if not, can i have a motion. >> motion. >> a motion from commissioner wan, second from commissioner stephenson. public comment, please. are there any members present that wish to speak at this time, please come forward and speak into the mic. seeing none, we'll seek remote public comment. >> members of the public who wish to make a public comment on this item, please wait to speak to your item in the queue. those waiting to speak, please wait for your turn to speak. we have one caller in the queue.

hello, caller, your three minutes begin now. public speaker: can you hear me? >> yes. >> i have no issues with the march 28th minutes. thanks very >> there are no other public speakers. >> >> roll call, please. >>clerk: [roll call] >> with that, it passes. next item, please. >> the next item is item 4. 4. general public comment. members of the public may address the commission on matters that are within the commission's jurisdiction and are not on today's agenda. we'll begin with public comment here in the room and then to remote public comment. are there any members from the

public here in the room wishing to speak, if so, please come up one by one and speak into the mic. public speaker: hi, my name is alara and i was here two months ago and a neighbor wants to turn a business into a park and another into a parking lot. since i was here, we won an appeal hearing monkey brains who falsified a permit application in order to put up an iron gate in order to start building their unpermitted parking lots on lands that they have legal rights to. because of this, our

supervisor is finally paying attention to and requested the city attorney to look into this property that is being taxed, assessed, but the fcc is a company that was involved years ago. i want to share some statistics with you of the general plan specifically about the mission district that the mission has a deficiency of open space serving the neighborhoods. analysis reveals that a total of about 4.3 acres of new space should be provided in this area to accommodate expected growth. the mission has family households with children nearly

50% which is highest in the city. in addition to that, second street which abuts one side of this parcel is designated a slow street which is right where monkey brains is expected to have their entrance/exits. in addition to that, there is this development proposal for six story 19 apartment unit building on the other corner. and in addition to that, we have up to this point now more than 2,000 signatures in favor of the greenway with commons such as the mission needs more green space and monkey brains can go eat a brick. [ laughter ] i want the greenway to be a reality. i live across the street from parcel 36 and have desperately wanted something beautiful done to this for the

last 16 years. this should be a park, not a parking lot. i'm a lifelong resident of the mission and we need this open space available now. hopefully more this summer is going to happen and we'll have more answers from city officials regarding the future of this parcel. >> thank you for your comment. are there any additional members from the public in the room who wish to speak on this item? seeing none, we'll proceed to remote public comment. >> members of the public remotely who wish to make a public comment on this item, please hold in the queue for your turn to speak. >> you have one caller in the

queue. hello, caller you are unmuted. your three minutes begins now. public speaker: thank you. my name is paul and where we get our hetch hetchy water. i pointed out that the sf puc has terrible policies related to stewardship to the tuolumne river and in a state of a delta. finally in my comments that pulled out that you have study sessions with the sf puc and i thought that was a great idea and i wanted to encourage you to consider doing that. a very timely issue being considered now. it's called the tuolumne

river agreement by the agencies and for the water control plant which the state water board adopted and have yet because of lawsuits from sfpuc. the voluntary agreement was ruled out in the past. it just didn't cut it. the science did not back it up. but our governor, mr. newsom is adamant that it be studied again. we are wasting precious time. the sfpuc without its own analysis keeps touting it even though the science doesn't show it. i would like you to join the discussion with the sfpuc on the water plant. we need judges to rule where the science stands,

and who is more accurate about what needs to happen to restore the tuolumne river and the bay delta. the sfpuc has manufactured a practice and they have never left in four years and put water in storage. they are planning for the design drought, a mega drought that the recent climate change study that put the 1100 years of data and 25,000 assimilated model runs could not produce the drought as severe drought but they are sticking with it. i have made my request and appreciate all that you do. thank you. >> >> thank you for your comment. seeing no additional cards in

the queue, public comment on this item is closed. >> thank you. next item, please. >> 5. presentation of the commission on the environment - environmental service award to commissioner heather stephenson. (discussion) >> vice-president wan, the honor yours. >> i am so honor to recognize my colleague mr. stephenson. it comes 12 years to the day after first appointed to the commission on the document back in 2011. after three terms as a commissioner, has had a long lasting impact on the commission in san francisco. a long time

member at the operations committee which i had the honor to serve with you for i don't know how many years, i actually lost count. as an enter entrepreneur and professional and instrumental in building and sustaining the processes on business organizations. on the operations committee, she has also helped the department to bring clarity to the annual budget process which is not always so fun but definitely has a huge impact. heather as commission president coinciding with the covid-19 pandemic and as we transitioned to virtual public meetings and helped the department continue its progress on initiatives from green business and essential working right to the climate action plan. heather also

facilitated the department racial equity plan and indeed equity and opportunity for women have been central theme in heather's approach in her service and leadership. this only partially captures heather who has not only been a business and environmental leader, but a true friend to everyone who has served on this commission and i'm so proud to be alongside with them. and filled with enthusiasm and compassion for all. a tireless and momentous advocate and true -- happy retirement and we will miss you. [ applause ] >> heather, we would like you to

speak. >> commissioner hunter? >> heather, i would like to say thank you and you have an amazing leadership style and you lead with empathy and focus. at the end of the day, those are the two most important things that a leader can have. you care about staff and all of your fellow commissioners that truly care about the city. if everyone cared like you do, we would be a better city. it's been a pleasure serving with you. >> i will chime in. i remember when i joined the commission some years ago, heather was one of the commissioners that it was just really clear based on her experience here on the commission and enter entrepreneur that she was an

adult in the room and just really made me want to emulate her on the commission. in addition to that, just a lovely person. it's really tough to lose you after all of these years and hope to live up your future. [ laughter ] >> commissioner stephenson, please grace us. >> i have notes in case i forgot. thank you for that, that was really beautiful. i really appreciate all the words. when i joined the commission 12 years ago i had no idea what i was doing at all. i came here because i had a business and mentioned where i was doing climate work in any other day-to-day life and sold that business and as i was getting enrolled in another part of the walt disney company, i didn't know how to get involved in the environment and then when i put

my name to be a commissioner and when the mayor gave me this position, i sat down and joined the meeting and didn't know what my role was to be here. most of you have probably heard me say this before, in a start-up world, you decide what you do in the morning and then implementing the choices to see if it worked and then you iterate on that and i got here and everything seemed so slow. i didn't know what i was supposed to do. i didn't know how to work in this environment. but, you know, i sat here and i kind of didn't speak for two years, roughly and most know that's not easy for me. and when i did start talking mostly

what i was focused on was consistently asking about where is the city and i was focused on how do we get there faster and whose got the power to get to where we need to go and working on the department on theronment collaborate so much with the city and it was hard to identify where that was. after time, you start seeing how the seeds that are being planted over here start to bloom over here and things come to fruition over time. so i got to see moments where people came up and gave public comment and the item would be raised and eventually we would put it on an agenda and would eventually become something we passed in the city and eventually it was part of the dna in the city. i got to

see that whole progress and transition happen. and i realized that i think not only this department or this commission is full of teeth, but they were a muscle for the city. that we lift up the city, we are pushing the businesses forward, shepherding the residents to do things and making the departments do what they are supposed to do and using this muscle to build this department and commission to really do that important work. i'm really really proud of the work that this commission has done and i have done with my fellow commissioners. specifically i'm proud that years ago we got the city to work on the climate plan and working through an incredibly difficult time and there is a path now and that money is coming right now. i'm

as you opened up with your president's welcome, is absolutely vital that we are moving this work forward and while planting these seeds and using our muscle that we do it really quickly. my request to my fellow commissioners is i want to plant a little bit of my impatience in all of you so you are asking where the teeth are and moving the knife and the progress in this and moving it forward. i'm incredibly honored to be able to sit here with all of you and incredibly proud for the award. thank you very much. [ applause ] >> any other discussion? if not, maybe we'll move to public comment. >>

public speaker: hi, commissioners, i want to thank commissioner stephenson for your service on behalf of the environment department. she served as president of the commission during the pandemic while being a mother. i'm a parent, and i know that's no small feat and you are continuing to show up. this is no small feat. we recognize that. in my personal experience working with you around food waste production back to 2019 which feels like decades ago. and came to our summit as a keynote speaker and we announced san francisco's involvement to cut on food waste by 50%. that

was a pivotal point for us because you came out with this collaborative alongside the state of washington, portland, seattle and oakland and state of california and we have a number of those who have joined and a number of grocery stores and producers who have joined to cut waste and food co, raleys, and you really kicked that off and we thank you and we appreciate you, and we thank you for your tireless service. >> >> is there other public comments? >> seeing there is no additional

members proceeding to speak on this item, we will proceed with virtual public comment. >> members of the public participating remotely wishing to make a public comment on this item. please wait for your turn to speak. >> we have one caller in the queue. >> hello, caller, you are unmuted. your three minutes begin now. public speaker: great. i too want to say thank you to commissioner stephenson for your years of service. i believe it was a year ago that

we would see a very small amount of an iceberg and on the surface and what is below the surface and to how much we see based -- and [inaudible] we see a small amount of time committed by the members of this commission in public sessions been in fact the time commissioners spend between meetings, behind-the-scenes, and in departments and with others to advocate for the environment and our shared outings. commissioner stephenson has and i appreciate her for that and want to thank her publicly.

and at a future meeting -- anyway, thank you very much for listening. thank you again for your service. >> thank you for your comment. seeing no additional callers in the queue, public comment on this item is closed. >> thank you. >> i want to personally thank you, commissioner stephenson. it's rare to find people as a policy maker and i have learned a lot from you. i hope this is not good-bye. i hope that you will be back in many ways and in a role as well. with that, maybe we should pause for a portrait with everybody.

>> ahn

>> >> >> all right. with that, next item, please. >> 6. staff introductions. speaker: tyrone jue, acting director. (discussion) >> commissioners, this is the fun part of our agenda where we get to introduce the new staff that we are welcoming into our environment department family. i'm going to call you up at the same time and if you wouldn't mind coming up and introducing yourself and what you are working on, that would be wonderful. we have lena becker man, nick

kessner. >> hello commissioners, my name is erik flores and joining the san francisco environment department as a coordinator engaging local businesses and community residents. thank you. >> good evening commissioner, my name is benny, joining sf environment on the climate team as a coordinator focused on residential buildings and will be presenting later on our grant. >> good evening, commissioners, my name is nick kessner, over seeing in parallel work and

strategies to meet our common action goal. nice to meet you. >> good evening, commissioners, my name is alena beckerman joining as a coordinator. i like forward to working with you. >> that is the new staff. let's give a round of applause >> [ applause ] . >> any discussion, commissioners. if not, public comment. there is public comment in the room, once this public comment is proceeded by virtual public comment. seeing none, we'll go to virtual public comment.

please hold until it is your turn to speak. >> seeing none, public comment on this item is closed. >> all right. thank you. next item. >> next item. 7. review and vote on whether to approve resolution file 2023-06-coe, resolution authorizing environment department climate and clean transportation grants. sponsor: tyrone jue, acting director. speakers: cyndy comerford, climate program manager; and henna trewn, clean transportation program manager. explanatory document: resolution file 2023-06-coe. (discussion and possible action) >> >> commissioners, as you know, this commission south sought grants -- and there are two that we are considering from this

commission and there is a grant with a possible group to lead that effort. i'm going to be going to benny to present this. >> hello again, commissioners. my name is benny, presenting on behalf of cindy, very excited to be presenting on the climate equity hub. we also have here tony, and selena wood on behalf of bayview hunters point advocates who will be the recipient of the grant. i will have them say a few words if that's all right. just to give a very quick background, the idea of the climate equity hub. we had this large stakeholder engagement process to do sort of a depth analysis of the environment within the city. it was decided that we needed a

coordinated hub and body to house the information on to electrify and incentives that are available and workforce announcement to really ensure the equitable component of this transition. we conducted a competitive solicitation and i'm very excited to say that we tentatively selected bayview hunters point community advocates along with their partners for this grant. bayview hunters point advocates, their programs combine community organizing with direct advocacy and their services and also implementing a separate grant for us that is an environmental justice grant focused on decarbonization and pilot

process in bayview hunters point. >> good afternoon, i'm with bayview hunters point advocates and working with advisors and staff across the city on the development establishment and fulfilling the goals of the climate equity hub. the bayview hunters point neighborhood has a history of industria pollution and home for san francisco's black and brown community and now asian as well. that's a starting point for the climate equity hub and trying to demonstrate the intentional and restorative justice especially

the black and brown population who have received the worse of racism by offering the leading road of developing and establishing citywide climate equity interventions, remediated by the network and guidance and analysis and implementation planning to create a hub by promoting decarbonization. and looking at these structures centered on these principles. one, community education and advocacy is best addressed by those in the community with deep roots working from the ground up

and working with the fossil fuels that impact the community. so it's important to work from those communities and with those impacted populations to develop these means and try to advance our decarbonization goals. by centering equity in this work means preserving the rights of the communities of color and allowing the community to stay in their homes and build on their economic rights and small businesses and workforce and improving capital. i think too monkey brain should eat a brick. >> [ laughter ] >> greetings directors and commissioners. i want to underscore some of the barriers

to specifically working class communities and cost is the most obvious one and the permitting process alone creates obstacles that can be burdensome in general. but intentional and systemic barriers and workplace practices and including discrimination are problematic as well and even eviction and this creates issues for general residents. we wish to come up with policies to specifically address these problems and dealing with racism and building trades and this is just the beginning of the iceberg and we hope to make them explain themselves and make themselves clear on what the real problems are and hope to work on these

issues and work towards the goal of the actual climate equity and not something that seems superficial. thank you. >> >> thank you. >> thank you, good evening, commissioners. i'm the program manager for the department. i am presenting today a grant that we are awarding into action, a non-profit committee that works with the community and economic development services and we have from the department of the organization that will speak after me as well. the $150,000 award is funded through the ev ready community's blueprint grant awarded through the committee last year and will

work on electrification development for working on a grant in a plaza in bayview hunters point. we will share more information about this grant. the grant is for a seven month term to align with our partners and time to extend for additional time. we look forward to working into action and improving access to charging infrastructure due to this grant work. we appreciate your consideration. >> thank you. i'm here to give more a little bit about into action. we work with individuals non-profit and for profit entities. we serve through three program areas which are community and economic development and place activation. we have worked with the san francisco unified school district, port of san francisco, sf environment and san francisco

county and transportation authority as well as many other organizations. we are engaged from strategy and initial scope to completion, and average five community events a week and our group with community knowledge bank and makes us a very knowledgeable and strong partner with sf environment. thank you. >> commissioners, that concludes our presentation both staff and our partners are available for questions. >> we'll start with one. i'm curious, have the grantees presented today? and the advocates? excellent, that's the collaboration live to see because it's part of the collaboration that works too. other questions or discussion from commissioners? >> yes, commissioner hunter? >> just on the community equity,

for a long time, for it to get started. in this future, i would love to hear more about the organizations you partner with specifically with collaboration on environmental issues that's how we are going to make progress. i know through a variety of organizations shown interest in the hub and partner with those organizations. >> i will just note briefly that we were intentional in the application to be pretty open about here is our broad network about collaborators and to be determined in the first few months of this process to reach out to other applicants to the folks of interest and there are a couple e-mails on my phone right now of other applicants on this process who could be, also because we want to be intentional on building a network of communities that are

trusted in vulnerable neighborhoods across this city. we take that seriously that that kind of trusted history and outreach leads to more product outreach and we'll work with staff and present that to you as we develop the hub. >> yeah, and just to quickly add to that, one of the first tasks of the climate equity hub is to put together the advisory board and that will be built into the structure of the hub and will have oversight on operations. >> commission, we are happy to come back to give you an update as we are making progress. >> any other discussion or questions? if not, could i have a motion to approve this resolution? >> i will move to approve. we have a motion from commissioner sullivan and second from commissioner hunter.

with that, i will take public comment. >> we have public comment now in the room, please come forward one by one. seeing none, we'll proceed with virtual public comment. >> members participating remotely wishing to make public comment, please wait in the queue until it is your turn to speak. >> we do have one caller in the queue. >> hello, caller, you are unmuted and your three minutes begin now. public speaker: can you hear me? >> yes. >> i want to say that i support this grant and most of the

district 10 in particular and the diverse communities from portrero to bayview hunters point and everything in between. i'm sure with this involvement, that with collaborators that it will be used effectively for this purpose. i wanted to say thank you and i support this resolution. thanks. >> thank you for your comment. >> seeing no additional callers in the queue, public comment on this item is closed. >> all right. >> roll call, please. >> >>clerk: [roll call] >> >> with that, the resolution carries. >> next item, please. >>clerk: 8. review and vote on whether to approve resolution file 2023-07-coe, resolution authorizing environment department clean transportation contract. sponsor: tyrone jue, acting director. speaker: henna

trewn, clean transportation program manager. explanatory document: resolution file 2023-07-coe. (discussion and possible action) >> commissioner, for contracts over $1 million we are required toing to the commission for approval. tonight we are bringing a contract to mentor our citywide community program and our clean program transportation manager will talk more about this program. >> good evening, again. so sf environment host the pretax community benefit program for county staff and we historically our most recent contract for the program to wage work and through department work order. our

current contract with wage works started in 2015 and expires in june of this year. we consulted a solicitation for a new contract and the environmental panel selected wage works for a new $5 million contract. this contract includes benefits for employees, account incentive management and provide the software to run the program. >> we pulled together a quick chart to demonstrate how this program has worked over the past few years. we graphed the number of city and county staff who are enrolled over time since the start of the current wage works contract and there has been an increase since the enrollment and interrupted by the covid-19 pandemic. there are employees currently enrolled in the program and we plan to

reach out to the employees and as more staff return to work, we expect the increase to this program to continue. i'm available for questions. >> any other discussion? all right. seems pretty straightforward. can we have a motion to approve it. >> i move approval. >> we have a motion from commissioner stephenson. now we'll go to public comment. >> would anyone in the chambers wish to provide public comment? seeing none, we'll go to virtual public comment. please hold in the queue until it is your turn

to speak. >> we have one caller in the queue. >> hello, caller. you are unmuted. please begin to speak now. public speaker: hello, assuming that you are able to hear me. i was interested in this presentation on this item and the graph that shows the employee participant and the count, and not the number of eligible employees. so that's something that i would be interested in understanding the number of eligible employees that are the percentage and to

have a discussion and mention this discussion with staff on strategies to increase and by a particular benefit program. thanks for listening. >> >> thank you for your comment. >> seeing no additional callers in the queue, public comment for this item is closed. >> please call the roll. >> >>clerk: [roll call] >> the motion passes. next item, please. >> >>clerk: 9. update on racial equity progress report. sponsor: tyrone jue, acting director. speaker: lavanya deepak, racial equity coordinator. explanatory document: racial equity action plan. (discussion) >> commission, this item before you is probably appropriately

timed for commissioner stephenson's last commission meeting as racial quality is part of her work. we have done a lot of work embedded within the policy and throughout the organization. with reference to the policy work we have made progress and one is to increase the diversity of the department through leadership role in the hiring process, hiring positions through internal and external racial equity work and to implement and support on going racial equity action work and goals for the employee plan. the commission last heard a progress report at the september meeting. now i'm going to turn

it over and everyone knows who is the project lead and happy to report the equity coordinator and has been leading our work and will talk about our work over the next six months. >> thank you. good evening commissioners. pictured here are the racial equity leaders for the department. i have been on the journey with them. if you look closely, that's me taking the picture and i'm reflected in there right outside this building and want for give you an update on this plan. this is not a report but a show and

tell. the department efforts and the action plan. this is what we submitted to the office of racial equity and what are some we shared with the department last year. like in previous years, we wanted to bring this to you. section no. 1 is hiring and recruitment. in the past, the department sent out announcements and diversity and recruitment channels and california network and environmental justice list, hbcu's and the city's equity network and with data from that recruitment and the percentage of african americans grew by 1%.

the current upcoming vacancies so plan to plan the career paths and emailing all job posting to staff and there has been a dissertation of acting roles for equal opportunity leadership and staff in line for promotion. when a department does a discipline and separation, it is difficult to retain staff of color. there is more structure for pss employees and there are eight positions from exempt to pcs and all of those six are converted and for staff

positions that are not able to be converted or do not have stable funding will help with this action. will the acting assignments have provided leadership opportunities for those who might not have happened before and staff members including management and supervisors have completed or will be completed by june 2023. the clock is ticking. a racial equity scan of their work. we have scans completed already. we will follow up with a staff survey to see if manager demographics have changed because of these efforts. >> mobility and professional development, we found there was

a lack of professional development opportunities and last year focused on employees performance reviews making it more accessible and equitable and will look into this for staff and availability of opportunities. i was part of the series not many years ago when i presented about the program. the 99 cohort and this was extended from 2 to 3 years and gives staff the opportunity to attend trainings and utilizing the tuition money and utilizing long-term positions in the department that they might be interested in. action to organizational structure which is close to my

heart to ensure that staff understand racism and address racial disparities in their work and in their workplace. the department required all staff to go to significant amount of training like topics like micro aggression and followed up in meetings in smaller teams and one in coaching of manager and staff of color. that was between 5-8 hours of learning to this work. this will help us assess the organizational culture and equity training. so all in all, we are doing well as you can see. right now the demographic shows

the breakdown that we have more staff of color throughout the organization. salary breakdown by ethnicity shows that staff of color are catching up to white colleagues and some of the data is weighted due to staff leadership positions. a break down of new hires and promotion shows in both categories. we know we are doing well and we want to start building this baseline data going forward. and traveling in the right direction and there is a ways to go. we also want to learn from our departments. we are looking to learn how departments use the data from different stages of recruitment and how they have been updating minimum qualifications for entry. and we are also looking to learn how departments ensure

diverse and equitable leadership within the constraints of limited positions and pipeline that might not be diverse. and we are looking to learn how other departments develop guidelines for in-house mentorship programs. we are learning from staff. the racial equity work would not be possible without the help of these three steering committee members. i will take any questions the commission has. thank you. >> i have one initial one. i remember there were surveys. >> we did do that survey and that gave us a baseline on what

to do. in the fall we are going to redo a big portion of the survey and add more things so we can also keep tracking it annually. >> questions or comments. >> when you mention about resources, is there a budget or goal invested into this plan to continue to support the efforts? >> thank you for the question, commissioner wan. as part of this from last year, we did prioritize resources towards racial equity. the position that was one of the funded positions that we chose to prioritize all by department priority and in addition we allocated an amount of resources towards the training this year that were the result of those dollars. we are going to through our budget process right

now. we have advocated for additional resources to continue this work to continue the position as a senior racial equity coordinator which has already paid dividends in allowing us to advance our work and we have additional funds in our budget request for additional resources for continuing our training. i think we'll find out in another week what the status is of those questions in the mayor's budget. >> we'll get an update? >> absolutely. >> and the articulation was really clear on what you had to do and what you did and the follow up on the undertaking of the department is great. i appreciate the presentation. >> thank you. >> thank you, commissioners. >> thank you. with that, this was discussion only, but we are going to public comment on this.

>> i will begin the public comment in the room. once in person public comment has completed in the room we'll proceed to remote public comment. would anyone wish to speak? seeing none, we'll go to remote public comment. please hold in the queue until it is your turn to speak. seeing none. public comment is closed. >> next item. >> 10. update on the clean transportation program. speakers: henna trewn, clean transportation program manager; nicole appenzeller, senior clean transportation specialist; and anna sciaruto, clean transportation specialist.

>> this item is for discussion. >> good evening, commissioners. i'm excited to present on this item and identify some key projects. we will walk through an overview of our goals and another major grant program that we outlined this month and outline a few stream work that is identifying our priorities and next year. the purpose of the transportation program at the department is to coordinate implementation of the 2019 vehicle road map and electric vehicle and with the action and climate action plan. the team that has worked on this program has grown from one 1/2 staff to three full-time staff this year and we are recruiting an additional team as well.

our program focuses on the city's greenhouse gas emissions and while the city's priority is to get people out of cars and onto public transit, we know that mode shift alone is not enough. there will be vehicles remaining on our roads for the longer trips. these vehicles are what we are thinking about prioritizing to electrify for our program goals. to electrify these vehicles, we need to have the infrastructure

to meet the demand. we conducted a study on council on clean transportation. we found we needed 700 more public level chargers and 100 more fast chargers across the city to meet the demand in 2030 for our transportation goals. and we are supporting these transitions and achieving these targets. the map on the right hand side of the slide helps to drive the focus of investments targets across this city. >> so one of our key programs that this team manages to support is chargers and bike adoption and the commission awarded the city last year and for actions with the road map

which is on the right side of the slide. we have made progress in launching these tasks. i will hand it to ana to talk about the e- bike pilot. >> good evening, commissioners, i'm a clean transportation specialist and i will be giving an update on the e- bike program. sf is planning a new program to e- bikes. each cohort will have 15 e- bikers, which is our pilot group and 15 drivers which is our co-group. we'll be using a combination of surveys and informational interviews in an app system to

track and analyze and compare the data from e- bike delivery to the delivery made with cars and we are looking at vehicle miles travels and greenhouse gas reduction. and in terms of timeline, each cohort will run for three months and one month of training for the e- bike training and one more for off loading and then those who work on the pilot will get to keep the e- bikes. you can see that our response has been really encouraging. we have received 173 applications across 21 zip codes. we saw a high quality amount of

applicants and we are going through all the applicants and our cohort is scheduled to launch next month. >> hi, i'm nicole. as part of this grant, it is funding and hoping to make it easier for the san francisco. i will be doing that as a central point of contact for electric vehicle charging service providers, the public, the utility representatives, and working across all stakeholder groups to identify challenges and help problem solve solutions. one of

my first objectives will be to do a challenges assessment identifying paying points in the process to deploy public chargers and identifying locations for get them in the ground and propose the grant implementation across these projects and will share about another project next. the grant also provides funding to install a public charging fast charging hub in a disadvantaged community. this ev charging hub will have multiple parking available for the public to use and we are working with our ev charger company and in order to provide engagement in each step of the

process. and into action we'll lead an engagement to ensure the community is involved in the selection and design of the hub and we are planning to engage with the bayview hunters point community for addressing a charging desert and look at the impacts of this project and taking community input to select the site and as well as community meetings to ensure we are providing updates to our community and incorporating their feedback in the process. >> finally, outside of this california energy commission grant, we are also doing work to assess overall ev network build-out. along with sf mta, we are working with partners at the international council on clean transportation to develop

an analysis of charging across this city. in order to assess our charging projections. so per the map that shared earlier, we know where we need to go for 2030, but we want to assess the latest in the market to determine if we need to increase any charging projections or potentially look at different charging typologies and as part of this project conducting a cost benefit analysis and looking at five charging types from single family homes, multiunit homes, commercial charging, off street charging and on street charging or curb side charging to assess where we should put our limited funds and resources for this city. again we are working in partnership with sf mta as well as working as closely with sf puc to identify where we need to go

next with our charging expansion. as we wrap up that analysis this month, we are developing a communication plan and planning to hold a joint briefing with leadership at both sf puc and sf mta to identify the findings of this analysis as well as come up with our recommended next steps. we are really excited to share those recommended next steps with all of you once they are available. i will turn it back over to hana. >> thank you. building on this planning, we will work with additional resources to have further planning and working on this infrastructure. and following the federal and state transportation funding plans and making sure we are taking

advantage of the billions of funding becoming available in the next coming years and there are at least three grants and including a charging federal grant that offers $15 million led by cities. and there are proposals led by partners and we are working on a contract with selected partners to come up with a comprehensive application to submit for this opportunity. we are similarly exploring with partners for a state grant. >> to seek these grants, and

local participation, we need to focused on the communities that are already prioritizing across these neighborhoods to be sure we are serving them. going into the new fiscal year, one thing that our team will be doing is continuing to convene with other city agencies to identify project proposals and identify cites for future funding realms for what we are learning with this. we'll close out here and take any questions the commission has. >> that was great. i appreciate the presentation. it's 700 is the goal? >> 700 which is 2021 what the landscape looks like then. >> how many have we done since then? >> it's a good question. i don't know if we have that data.

maybe nicole? >> the 700 number is based on our existing chargers. we took into account the chargers that have been added since the 2021 studies and we know we need to do 700 more chargers to keep up with that demand. >> how many does this grant give us the 2.5? >> $2.4 million grant directly funds equipment for 8 fast chargers and in disadvantaged community. the grant is meant to deploy 100 two level chargers and as a mapping tool and meant to track that we are reaching that goal by tend of the grant. >> do we have the number about x

dollars to meet the equipment project. >> the equipment is something we can calculate but the grade infrastructure cost will depend on the sighting where we are putting the chargers. >> i know i have had different conversations with companies that are putting themselves out there like for an airbnb for a charger and you get this curb side charger that is a revenue for those that own the property and also a lot of collaborations that i'm sure you are already talking about. >> one of nico o'le's rules is to identify those chargers. >> and wanted to say that you are using the definition for the population and my recommendation

from a policy committee meeting with commissioner sullivan was the west side did not have enough charging station. i think it would be helpful to see before and after snapshot of how public charging is becoming more accessible throughout this city. as i remember from the community meeting, we saw dots disbursed but the west side didn't have as many charging stations. i know of course planning department has its own ej map too that is developed but largely concentrated on the east side. i think there is a balance to strike between all of these definitions and mapping tools. >> yes, there is a number of tools and definition that we use. for example with the federal charging infrastructure grant, they encourage us to use the department of transportation

mapping tool and that has a slightly different area in terms of what they are mapping. >> i would like to thank you for the presentation. i really like to see the team doubling to three. you guys have a really really important job. i don't think there is anything that we do with the city that is more important than achieving the climate goals that we have than what you are doing. we know this is important and especially with mass transit hitting some cliffs in the future, what you are doing to electrify private vehicles. and working to achieving some goals within the climate action plan with electric vehicles for adoption.

we know what those 2030 goals are. do you have any information for how we are doing versus those goals recently? >> yes, thank you for that question. there are two goals in the key climate action plan and we want to reach 100% of car sales for being electric vehicles without increasing those numbers of regular vehicles on the road and wanted to see those to be electric by 2030. based on the numbers we have seen from the california commission, that our zero emissions population and we are about a quarter of the way of reaching our goals if you use those metrics.

>> got it. i think those numbers get updated quarterly. we hope that you will come back to speak to us about this again. >> yes. >> first a clarifying question. is it a cohort or multiple. >> it will be 30 e- bikers but each will have 30 bikers and 30 bikers for a total of 60 participants. >> i do not believe in the private automobile. i believe bikes is a way to go. you mentioned safety is one of the areas where you will be capturing results. throughout this city, biking is a huge issue. one of the reasons i don't ride a bike is because i

have been in multiple accidents now. when it comes to safety, how in depth will you be going to make sure we capture the true experience for these bikers? >> we have planned for three surveys throughout each cohort. so we'll have a baseline survey that will test folks feelings of biker safety prior to their training, and we'll have a mid-survey at two months into the program. after they have more awareness of bike lanes and safer paths to use and now that they have training in the program because we have training for the first month of the cohort and throughout the training so if they have questions about the bike paths

to use, there is training for that as well and throughout the surveys, we'll be able to capture the persons experience. >> in that midpoint survey, capturing any particular corridors or avenues or streets that they don't feel safe on. for instance, valencia is under going this work and that would be great. >> thank you. that is a great suggestion. >> i was going to add working closely with the transportation authority and others in the city to make sure this work is reflected on the survey questions we are asking and the data is shared among our partners. >> and partners on the bike coalition as well.

>> >> i know this is about the report quarterly and on the action climate plan, where is that for anyone to get that information. >> thank you for the question, commissioner. you are right on queue. we are right on track to have on the dashboard by the end of the fiscal year and working to june 30th to have that information up and running. we did request money from the mayor's budget to continue that dashboard. we paid for the development, posting and the website but it takes a little bit of funding to maintain it which is something we want to do. we'll bring it back to the commission. you won't be here but it will be publicly accessible. [ laughter ]

>> all right. let's open this up for public comment. >> thank you very much. >> for sf govtv please speak directly into the mic so you can be heard clearly. >> is there anyone in the room wishing to speak to public comment? seeing none, we'll go to remote public comment. members wishing to speak during public comment, please hold in the queue. >> please wait until it is your turn to speak. we have one caller in the queue. hello, caller, you are unmuted. your three minutes begins now. public speaker: great, can you hear me? >> yes. >> the computer wasn't happy, so

i went to the phone. i hope this is better. although i'm still getting some feedback. >> yes, we can hear you okay. >> anyway, on this particular shoe of the ehv charging, i suspect although i hope i'm wrong, that the biggest road block may well be pg & e with their continuing demands for intervening facilities and delays in processing requests for new hook ups for these types of projects and other public projects. so i hope the staff will be working very closely with the puc power enterprise staff under barbara hills very capable leadership to identify and work through the pg & e

delays obstruction and then whatnot that may well exist here. also speaking out loud if there are opportunities to explore this on a more regional basis and i know in the room that we have some leadership involved with the air district and dcdc and other agencies and where there is an opportunity to regionalize a solution would be helpful. those are my thoughts. thanks for listening. >> thank you for your comment. >> >> seeing no further callers in the queue, public comment for this item is closed. >> thank you. >> thank you for presenting today. >> next item. >> >>clerk: 11.update on refuse rate-setting process and review and vote on whether to approve resolution file 2023- 08-coe, resolution encouraging the refuse rate administrator and the refuse rate board to approve a refuse rate adjustment for rate years 2024 and 2025 that helps san francisco advance its zero waste and related climate goals. sponsor: tyrone jue, acting director. speakers: jay liao, refuse rates administrator, controller's office; dave hilton, senior

project manager, hf&h consultants; jack macy, zero waste program manager, environment department; and jon braslaw, director, recology, inc. >> this item is for discussion and possible action. >> commissioners, i will be brief. we have a variety of presentations and then we'll hear from our partners at recology and 0 waste team. this is a new process that this commission has started to go through at the refuse rate process which was changed under proposition f. the purpose of

this change is to have the commission learn more about what's been happening during these last few months of the rate setting process and the proposals and commissions around 0 waste which is a priority for us in the department. first i will turn it over to jay to give us an overview of where we are and the rate setting process. >> good evening, commissioners, jay, administrator of the comptroller's office. today i'm going to talk about where we are in the process. in the last commission hearing, we gave a presentation on how this process will be unfolding. i won't get into too much detail but talk about where we are and

public comment on the refuse rates and the analysis of recology's proposal and some of the initial changes going into the proposed rate order. there are a few items that we are still hashing out and to give a sense of where we are and some of the questions the commissioners had in the last meeting particularly around questions about how did these rates compare with other cities, what's the reasonable profit margin, how are you managing costs, are you updating inflation factor and how do you validate reporting. we'll try to address some of those here as well and we'll also try to highlight a few of the program changes that i think are most relevant to this commission. >> so this is just a quick overview of the rate process to

give you a bit of a refresher, we received a recology report and we are developing the analysis and rate order. we are getting commission input from this commission and the sanitation streets commission which are required by prop f. we are also getting public input through these hearings and written objections. once we have pulled all that together, that rate order goes to the refuse rates. so as part of building the public record, we are not doing everything just through the hearings, but we wanted to be transparent and we have this interrogatary process and getting written responses. we take these questions and responses and they are listed publicly on weekly basis. there

are three forms of requests, scheduled request which tracks the status of completion and the exhibition which needs additional information which is not captured in these schedules and clarifying requests and justified summation. we have responses from recology, 49 responses, 150 questions, 144 responses. in addition to that, the department has also made some requests that we track as well to recology and 25 have been responded to in terms of outreach, we have been doing campaigns and social

media output and press release ahead of the refuse rate for the refuse rate board. that is 12 written comments objections submitted and nine related to the commercial and residential. comments are just generally objections to any rate increase. some of the reasons that raising rates already contributes to high cost-of-living. customers who receive credit for cycling material fail for cost and we are accounting for recycling material for costs. costs should not be increased due to scandal and one customer suspicious of the rate increase and saying we should actually

reduce rates. in the public process, we have one public comment. mr. dave patel. he has a number of comments and he requested information on impound accounts. he would support rates that would minimize diversion and the profit margin and would expect a rate increase. in addition to our analysis and proposal, we wanted to touch on a few things. the first few items, jurisdiction and profit margin. we hired h & h consulting firm to present us on these analysis and they will be presenting on these comparisons. i will talk a little bit about managing costs and we'll give

you a summary of the proposals we are considering for the rate order. we'll talk a little bit about the impound affect on the budget and talk about the budget proposal and some of the program enhancement that they are proposing that are relevant to this commission. i will briefly touch on inflation factor which is brief 0 waste. i will bring up dave hilton to speak on these slides. >> >> i'm dave hilton with h & h

consultants and will speak on the comparisons and as well as looking at the profit margin costs. as you can see from this table we put together, we wanted to look at the service of the square mile size and the population or geographic information and similarities in san francisco. we have some of those lists here that we are able to find. the first piece that we wanted to look at was getting into what is the minimum costs to residents for this collection and what is the lowest amount the customers can pay for any of these jurisdictions. what you will see in the chart is that san francisco comes just shy of $7 with the range being pretty high from about $55 down to normally in san diego where it's

currently free. we did not include san diego in our average. so san francisco is about 30% higher than that basic minimum service level. it should be noted that the amount of service being provided varies widely. and san francisco, with that minimum service level comes with 80 gallons of service and others come to 288. as we look at the month cost per gallon and taking that costs and dividing it by the gallon, you will see that san francisco comes to $0.90 a gallon. this is more about the

service level being provided and the rate pick up. these much higher per gallon costs due to the service level at the lowest minimum rate whereas your santa ana, anaheim with this volume you are seeing a cost and basic incentive to higher conversion. so we also looked at commercial rates and want to see what it would cost on that side of business. we do see here that san francisco's commercial are lower than the average. we have 52 for a commercial three card service for the average of $81. we did also want to look at what

the day rates were. we compared the one cubic yard with this service. and san francisco is quite a bit higher with the jurisdictions, but it should be noted this is the public rate and public is eligible for diversion discount. that may not be what many customers see and may be a lot closer to that average just under $83. after we looked at the different rates at how san francisco's rates are, we wanted to look at the cost for recology and whether it was reasonable in other jurisdictions. the recology is equivalent to 91%

ratio. additionally, it should be noted that it presenting an additional cost savings of 2-4% to benefit them. as we looked at the risk management for the benchmark from these collection companies with large -- we found the average there for that profit margin was 6.9%. this is all public companies looking at open market competitive environment, not necessarily just municipal contracts. so it's that competitive environment into the probability of what you see for those companies which are more. we also wanted to take into consideration as we discussed the profit margin request that there is a balancing account which helps to make sure they are not losing too much money and eventually meeting this and

profit margin and recology has also requested that balancing account be met to match 100% below their profit margin. this table to the right of this slide is looking at a number of different jurisdictions trying to find that range for the municipal contracts and related to carlsbad 21% and oakland could be as high at 35%. so that contributes to municipal contract tend to have a higher range and profit margin. but we

believe in reviewing recology for this mark and profit number falls in what we see. with that, i will turn it back to jay. >> next slide, please. >> so, there is just a few points we want to make to address some of the commission questions around managing costs. so there is recology will be addressing how they manage costs internally but the regulator of the operation, there are a few and one that we have through this rate process. we review the rates every 2-5 years. we set the rates every 2-5 years and during that process we are scrutinizing and as you can tell through the interrogatary process we scrutinize every

aspect of the business and looking for places of efficiency and cost savings. the balancing the intent to ensure if there are any unexpected revenues, that these can go to offset costs to ratepayers and help stabilize rates in that way. if there are shortfalls, that we can smooth out the unanticipated costs over time to mitigate those impacts on the rates as well. that's another rate stabilization tool. the other thing we are looking at are cost caps, so certain items, looking to cap some of those costs. one example is recology's initial proposal. they are anticipating a fully

funding pension by the second year and to spread that costs over five years to look at a target over five years that would lower rates in this current term. position controls, they are asking for new positions. some of them we think are addressing some short-term issues instead of looking at a full-time or permanent position shifting it to a project based position that we can reevaluate from the next rate cycle. last is reporting requirements. some of this is already happening. one of the costs that we had less visibility before this rate process was aren't corporate allocations and company charges and recology of some subject --

subsidiaries and meeting the certain level of agreements and allowing us to monitor their costs on a quarterly basis as well. so the next slide is a menu of some of the items that we are considering in our rate order and these are monitored impacts. they are not added because when you combine them together they have interactive impacts and this gives you a sense of the magnitude of changes that each of the items could have on the rates. so a few things we are looking at 0 waste incentive

count, impound account budget and using the impound funds and use the proposed contamination and enhancements and the big one here is the pension costs, and the inflation factor update is a small change. one of the questions from the last hearing was whether or not we are going to update the inflation factors and this is based on the most recent inflation of the next two years and slightly lower than the assumption put out and the recology based on comptroller's projection based from january. this is the revenue requirement for recology to meet their operating ratio or profit

margin. the second column is the dollar change in millions to each of these items and the rate change. the last column is what the single unit minimum rate would be for the minimal service. this should give you a sense of the impact to these changes. we are really talking about dollars and cents here to the rate. so the current single minimum rate is 47. for example, the impound account, the departments are looking for $400,000 more that would change the rates and increase by $0.05 for a single unit. the remaining potential rate impacts that we are working through the are the corporate allocations, some economic factors that we may or may not include depending on whether or

not there is material impact there. and then organics preprocessing what we are working through to determine what those costs would be and in addition to that the rate determination for impacts and counter service level and agreements and some other items as well. so with some of these items, i will jump in a little bit deeper and talk about the impound account and contamination aspect and then going into the 0 waste account that we are proposing here. so the impound account is the account that for ratepayers of funding city run programs for the term public works and environment department including

refuse and rate cleaning services of public works and meeting city's 0 waste goals for the environment department. combined the departments are proposing $24.4 million and $22.4 million and this is a higher amount of rate funding for the departments. this is the breakdown for environment departments 14.7, and 15.1 for 24 and 2025. >> just a little bit deeper. the department budget requests would support 15 full-time positions and 0 waste climate and green building outreach. we are currently working with the

department and the city attorney's office for reviewing nexus. it's part of the multistep or iterative process, and this idea is to shift some of the programs out of rate funding to mitigate some of the risks to the city. the bottom line is the department's budget will still be whole at the end of this, but we'll be moving some of these programs that might close ties to refuse or rate setting to out of the rates. last item here is environment is requesting certain reports agreed upon tasks that memorialize on the rate order and we have been working with the department on identifying those reports and what those requirements would be including them in the rate order. >> next slide, please. the first program enhancement we want to talk about is contamination.

this is kind of a suite of programs. so recology is proposing a waste 0 enhancement in addition for the first year around $400,000, for contamination outreach, $240,000 and a combination of this budget, they think would generate an additional $5 million in contamination fees. the waste 0 outreach conducting site visits to maximize diversion and maximize outreach and will include education and on board camera and i pe expecting to generate fees. some of these are likely to be

retained, but before committing to other enhancement, there are some items we need to resolve before the next year or two around cycle and around technology and around consistent or clear photos and both positives. our consultants have been reviewing kind of first review. there have been some issues in other jurisdictions where there are falls positives in litigation against the providers for some of those contamination charges. we think there is some certain in the estimates because we are projecting everything, but we felt the tie to the additional activity that we are doing to the additional $5 million in revenue, we want to pin that down better. we are pulling that out even though you would

think that would benefit the ratepayers, but we can't meet those revenue estimates, that leaves us a hole in the future to solve. lastly, in customer response and modified behavior, how will customers respond to cameras, our consultants have noted that some residents have in jurisdictions where they have had cameras have privacy issues. the last piece san francisco has a high volume of pedestrians who could potentially damage and contamination costs that for otherwise compliance a payers and we want to be sure that contamination fees are appropriate. the contamination program would review the protocol now and analysis of the

program and with the production of cameras use. we understand that recology has handful of cameras and will conduct whether we are identifying the target outreach to modify behavior. >> organics free processing is an immediate need. recology is looking to organics. currently there is 24% that is non-compostable. they are working with the department steps to remove plastics. in our initial proposal they are proposing $2 million on a ten year lease. this system would not be able to be implemented until the middle of the second year and will cost approximately

$205,000 in the first year and $210,000 for future years. for the immediate solution, we have been working with recology on proposing an alternative which will be using screens and solutions which will be implemented more quickly at a lower cost well over the next couple years. we will be fielding an infrastructure study that we'll be conducting on the long-term solution for organics free processing. the other request the office made is the cost of using sorters for this solution as well. i won't go too deep into this one. i think it's part of public works program, but weekend district clean ups and

this is in addition to bulky items or pick ups. the current proposed program offers only one with no reuse component. the department continues to work against their cities 0 waste goals and climate goals. the one possible option of the program to use that bin in that component and we've asked recology to send that out and share their thoughts on what their impact would be and this is another item that we are still kind of hashing out. the last item here, 0 waste incentive account. so it's the financial incentive account that recology can draw down on if certain targets are met and this will be 2% profit for recology. so this contributes approximately $8 million in each

rate year. this varies depending on the interaction of these other changes we are making and also kind of the expectation of what the ratepayers receive if some of these goals aren't met and some of this funding comes back to ratepayers. right now practices, in the past some of the unachieved funds in account for this infrastructure spending and this was approved outside of the rate process. in addition, the department has proposed modification to the changed targets for the recovered. if recology is not met for target for several years and recology has a recovery rate about 39% in 2014. so that black line is the tons disposed and below that are

other blue lines which were the targets since 2014. recology has been able to meet these incentive targets. so because dwi is not really in coordination with these recover rates, we are looking to spending the accounts to look at other rates. currently in its form, essentially incumbering a set of funds for the ratepayer. recology if it does not have the impact of recovery rates for ratepayers, in addition, the way it's been used in the past it's not as transparent as we would

like it to be and we want to look for another model. and looking at other jurisdictions and what they are doing and consider some of those models which are retrospective with penalties and if recology achieves those targets, they can see the next benefit in the next rate cycle rather than having funds unspent before they have met those targets. just as a note, in this proposal, there is other new diversion contamination investments that's including a trash processes pilot and investments were still working out, but there will be investments in the organics processing as well. that is my last slide. to give you a sense that we are really close to finishing up our rate order probably in the next couple weeks, there are a few

items where we are still working through, but likely to propose some rates either mid-to late next week. i think that's it. i think the next presenters are on recology but i'm happy to take questions or comments from you. >> questions from commissioners right now? >> on the contamination rate, for recology, are these attached to vehicles? >> that's correct. i will have recology address that but that's how it works. >> generally, i have a variety of concerns about the use of this technology. i will save the questions for recology, i

guess. the second point you brought up on the incentive program. you said there is no correlation between the reduction and tonnage in the landfill and the rate, i want to make sure i'm understanding your point on the intent of the program? >> that the incentive programs that they have not been able to meet their target. so there has been no, yeah, if you look at the chart, you know, it doesn't show any -- >> to clarify, as recology does not hit their goal, the program is not currently working to reduce -- >> exactly, yeah. >> thank you. >> i don't know whether to wait until the end until we hear from others or now, but what i'm mostly interested is making sure that this rate process achieves the goal of 0 waste and we use

incentives as much as we can to try to achieve that because i think jawboning people and more information is all good but when it comes to financial incentives that that really works. so, i guess i will wait until the end. >> unless you had a response. >> i don't think we are close to incentives, just this model is not achieving these goals that we are trying to set. so i think we really want to work with the department on what model does while reducing the impact to the cost to ratepayers as well. >> yes, just one more comment. there was a comment about cameras and privacy issues. i think if i'm weighing 0 waste goals versus privacy issues of the camera in a truck, i think i would go with the 0 waste goals to try to balance that. >> thank you.

>> yes, commissioner hunter? >> you mentioned this at the top. have you received any public comment in support of a rate increase for residents? from residents? >> just from mr. -- pawppel. >> thank you. >> it might be kicked to the next speakers. what is business versus residential. >> that's for recology. >> i will ask them. can you tell me a little bit when you look at the chart of the business rate and minimum rate and we came out very bad compared to sister cities. on the residential side, but we came out pretty good on the commercial side. do you have an understanding of why that is? >> i think recology can address this a little bit better than i

can. i think it has to do. i think you are addressing the per gallon rate here on the residential side. i think it has to do with the minimum level of service that we are requiring of residents here. >> the volume? >> yeah. and i forget whether it's 16 gallon versus a 32 gallon, versus the same. with that, we'll go to recology. thank you.

>> good evening, commissioners, my name is erik boyd. i wanted to take this opportunity to say hello to this commission and express our appreciation thus far and for working with the department. i will answer quickly a couple questions you asked and then to our team to kickoff the presentation. in regards to the cameras, these would be cameras installed in the hopers of the vehicles. once the can is tipped, it would take an image of the contents and then determination could be made upon that. then with that, i'm going to turn it over to terry, our regional controller

for answering any questions you might have. thank you. >> >> good evening commissioner, my name is terry dong from san francisco. here with me is process of business improvement and general manager of sunset scavenger and general manager of golden gate and general manager of san francisco and government and community relations manager. i will be taking the next couple slides and brief business overview of the san francisco operation.

so recology sunset scavenger are the san francisco collection companies and responsible for picking up trash, recycling and organic materials from san francisco ratepayers. in addition the collection companies operate numerous programs that serve ratepayers including the abandoned materials and pick up and outreach program. through our waste 0 specialist, we have ratepayers understand proper sorting and encourage the diversion rate. we'll talk about this later in our presentation. recology san francisco is responsible for processing and disposing of the materials that come to our facility and they come to san francisco facilities including recycle central, pier 96, and organic station and recycling

area and household hazardous waste collection facility and recyclables are shipped to recycles. near modesto and serving 16,000 commercial and 8400 apartments and 139,000 residential. to answer commissioner stephenson's questions about the percentage of commercial from residential to commercial is about 10%. this pie chart illustrated in the slide represents the coast component associated with

operating our business in san francisco. labor # truck cost and disposal make-up 80% of costs to our services. this slide demonstrates our sound bases for decisions and this chart represents the revenue and expenses for the constant dollars. it helps illustrate how recology was able to respond during the pandemic while maintaining uninterrupted service to the city and reduced proportionately in receive. for revenue and expenses and was able to reduce expenses from 146 million prepandemic in 2019 and

slow in volume due to the slow economic recovery in san francisco due to the process of every unit due to the costs of the fixed associated costs and production point when expenses exceeded this revenue with the pandemic impact that affected us all. ultimately this reality is what is driving this 3.6% requested increase in the tipping fee which equals lower tons. the trucks still drive the routes. they are simply servicing less volume because the proportion is made up by the payment of customers which is roughly 3.9%. i will now hand it to my

colleague, general manager of golden gate and operational issues. >> good evening, commissioners, i'm the general manager for recology in golden gate. our outreach is provided on a wide variety of forms for commercial accounts, staff trainings are conducted in person or virtually. these trainings may be conducted in english, spanish or chinese. recology's waste 0 team is conducted in staff in person and virtually in english, spanish, as well as chinese. we conduct property walk through, to conduct property management waste practices and delivery

through mail and posters, and stickers and to ensure they have the waste needed data reports on a monthly or quarterly basis. these reports are critical for the buildings to track their data for environmental reporting and to dramatic programmatic outcomes. in addition our waste 0 team identifies customers at locations and understand their service needs generate high diversion solutions and educational tours at our facility. in partnership with sf we establish goals for specific goals to be focused on and these goals are tracked

monthly. they are also used to align specific tasks so overlap does not occur. an example of this is a refuse compliance ordinance. by ordinance, every customer that falls within this category must be audited every three years and auditing these waste streams and report on the findings. we conduct these audits each year and report this information to sfe and is responsible for reporting back to the customer. will -- listed here are additional opportunities and working with over 1200 customers and conducted 600 audits for the

refuse compliance. it's important to note that the waste 0 document includes that data and documentation allows this to note problems in order to offer assistance, optimize waste diversion and minimize contamination. in addition to direct contacts, recology also offers general outreach through detailed quarterly newsletters, social media posts, postcard campaigns and youtube videos. the most recent youtube was loaded in april and has been viewed over $5 million times and points out the negative effects of landfilling of food scraps. such as an apple core. our application proposes enhanced education outreach initiatives which were developed

in alignment with the priorities and requests. if approved, these enhancements would include a separate annual residential customer service brochure and web content and will include details on all services offered to these different types of customers and sf would have the responsibility of printing out this material. and another outreach to apartment and outreach customers below 50% diversion and this would include two more yards of service with a goal of improving about 57% and will focus on 1,000 accounts per we're within an identified group and require an additional fte.

moving on to continue # -- contamination and several on board cameras systems that you heard about earlier. we piloted these cameras in the last several months. our drivers use on board tablet to document the contamination and this information is reviewed and confirmed by our 0 waste team and directly working with those impacted by this contamination and identifying contamination from specific customer types. they are also responsible for conducting on-site audits at customer locations. as

mentioned our 0 waste reports on this. the proposed contamination enhancement developed with an alignment with sfp priorities and improve our quality of compost and diversion and point of collection technologies. these enhancements would focus on outreach and education through additional compost and training and collateral and will educate customers on the on going contamination. to identify contamination at the source proposing an on board camera system at our collection trucks. with this system, our existing on board tablets, additional drivers will have the ability to capture contamination

at the point of collection and note take customer accounts. this enhancement will add exactly 38 camera systems to our trucks and require one additional fte's to facilitate the program and streamline the contamination protocol to identify the timeline before contamination charges can be assessed to a customer and what a customer will need to do to have the contamination charges removed. thiessen -- enhanced services will be included, if those are not identified, they will be identified in this order. last item, weekend clean up events. recology is holding weekend clean up for residents to offer opportunities for local

disposals and provide more opportunities to bring waste and avoid material being abandoned on the streets. the proposal includes 22 saturday clean up events with the board of supervisors districts receiving two clean up events per year. working in partnership with public works and the department of environment, these events will be located in accessible areas within each district to encourage participation. the proposed costs include outreach to raise awareness and participation, highlight diversion opportunities and proper disposal. with the return of the program, additional program costs will be incurred including driver labor, supervisor head count for program coordination and foesal for a total cost of $608,000 per year. it has been recently requested that it modify the

clean up program to instead provide a three stream drop off program for recycling and organics as well as a greater use component and there are several barriers to offset this event. most notely the cost to the program is more than double for the cost of the initial proposal while not providing a discernable benefit and for those normally that do not put in the three business thus this diversion may be realized and residents already have access to a three bin system as required by city ordinance. so the material they bring would likely already be destined for proper diversion. in addition, this may disincentivize customers from prescribing to the adequate

service if they find they can dumb material for free and largely holding this event and trucks and boxes will be required to be on the ground and fewer available locations can meet this requirement. with that, i will pass it onto marie to talk about organics compliance. thank you. >> good afternoon, my name is maurice, general manager in san francisco for this region. this is the constituent component of the organics delivered to the west wing broken down by the post availability of the piece stock being delivered to organics to

san francisco contains 24% of non-compostable material. recology in san francisco is asking to make improvements within the organic waste stream in order to tip our material of volume organics that is set with minimum contamination threshold for organics delivered to the facility for processing and the contamination basis is done by historical observation and finished compost quality and the market feedback. not pursuing this could jeopardize our ability to do this in the future. included in san francisco rates organic free processing equipment and installation.

recology san francisco works with several of our equipment vendors to establish organic removal solution was designed to a 50 ton per hour for the feedstock and programmatic growth and would be required to process 35-40 tons per hour to effectively recover organics over two shifts. recology believes that the processing system will be capable of eliminating 50% contained within the organic stock and this would be over 5 tons of material per hour. this would still be required to additional processing at the composting facility. an alternative interim organic processer is being proposed as part of san francisco's rate application. the procurement of an organic cleaning system will

take 18 months to complete. recology cannot wait this long as we seek a temporary solution. the interim system will not be capable of processing all the incoming tonnage but target the most contaminated loads and will not only have an impact on the equality but long-term requirements to a permanent solution. the estimated costs to the system is $180,000 per year plus the cost to connect to our building. the interim organic processing will be comprised of a portable electric and back breaker attachments with renewable cutting blades that are designed to cut open bags and releasing the organics from the bags and

based on this, the recology believes it will be capable to process 10-15 tons per hour with the elimination of contamination rate without the use of mechanical reduction. in early may, we had the opportunity to perform the demonstration of bags of organics collected in the portland area and processed 85 organics with favorable results and within a two year period with the images and shown during the demonstration. the images on this slide were

taken in portland and shows the organic trauma on the left and then the trauma on the right and there is the amount of material removed from the two demonstrations. when averaged together the removal rate of 10% of the incoming feed. the refuse rate fee administrator has requested a solution and this would be much more expensive than a deployment of high volume screening technology. in order for sorters to manually sort from organics, recology still believes that a bag breaker as

well as some purpose built with the electrical service grade included in our electrical proposal. the manual sorting will be replacing this component of the processing proposal. essentially, we would be looking at replacing the proposed $405,000 screen from our proposal with 68 sorters on a sorting line. while recology has not managed to account the sorters on the line but would add $1.7 million in labor and operating expenses to the recology san francisco rate application. given the suspensions with the associated head counts this project would be more expensive than recology had originally proposed.

this formally concludes the recology presentation and we appreciate your time. we are ready to answer any questions as to the application and submission in general. thank you. >> i have one question. the number that jumped out to me was the percent of organics that is not compostable. 24%. is that what's going into the the green bin and what's not compostable from green business in san francisco? >> yes, essentially that first slide with the bar graph shows the main components of the organics waste stream. 76% of the material going into the bin right know is considered readily compostable. >> 24%, seems surprisingly high. where is that trended over the

year? is that a normal number for other cities or higher than or lower than? >> i have seen this number and i have been working in san francisco for many decades and responsible for the roll out of the organics program in the mid-90s and we had low contamination rates and as we began to roll the program out and people who are now receiving the recycling organics program are somewhat a little bit more reticent and potentially represent compliance issues which drives contamination. when we look at the san francisco contamination rates, in comparisons with some of the other cities in the region, our numbers are high but substantially better than some of our peers and jurisdictions. >> commissioner stephenson. >> in the cameras situation, it

seems that there were trials that already happened in the pilot program that you already want to implement, or have you piloted a different program? >> currently we are piloting six cameras and similar to what we are proposing here. however over the last 8-12 months our 0 waste team has been providing feedback to improve the quality concerns. so this improved system was kind of designed over that feedback over the last several months. >> that's helpful. >> keep in mind -- >> for people who contaminate the business, who collects those? >> it's a bin if we come by for service and it's contaminated it depends on to what extent. some drivers have the dual chamber truck where we have the black

carton one side and organics onto the and dump it on the other side of the truck. if it contains a certain amount, that will be rerouted to a trash driver if the driver is able to see it before he dumps it. >> if you get a fine, whatever you call it, if the person has the contaminated bin, that's the $5 million we expect to collect. does that money go on their bill? >> a couple of different ways. the streamline process that we propose in one of the exhibits to the rate administrator is really defining that process in making it more streamline and clear to the customers as well as our team to follow and implement. so, if i were a customer that contaminated would get a warning from the driver and place a tag on the cart and

push it in our system that would go back to our 0 waste team and they would review that and confirm whether it was contaminated and send a letter to them saying what the issue was. if it happened again, they would be essentially charged for that contamination and would be equivalent to an extra service on a 32 gallon cart for extra. beyond that, if we couldn't resolve that issue, it would escalate to diversion and escalation along the way and would happen over time at which .0 waste would work with the customer to try to resolve the issue. maybe somebody is walking by putting stuff in there or they put a lock on the cart or they are in a building

with multiple tenants and we provide signage to that nature. it's an on going process. it's not intended just to be a complete punishment, it's a progress. >> and are there efficiencies that you would hope to gain from implementing this in a big roll out in a way set up in a proposal versus doing a small pilot doing exactly what you want to do at efficiency level and what would it be compared to a big thing? >> this is rather small compared to the other two companies. when we looked at this, we kind of analyzed our history and the number of tags and revenues associated and that's how we performed it out or built out the $5 million. when you look at the cameras and what they

would genuinely produce it would be a $15 per month per camera system. it's a lot of work to get that customer if they are truly contaminating at a significant level to a cleaner stream. >> that's helpful and sounds like it's already proposed to be a reasonably sound pilot. >> yes, in our opinion. >> thank you. >> one more question. do you happen to know do they work in other cities, is there a precedent for this technology. >> great question. third eye, they provide a camera system for other vehicles in commercial applications. they previously were just designed for backup cams and view cameras for safety of drivers. they ventured into

this realm and it's fairly new to them and they have tailored towards us. it is still untested. the system we have in place now, we know what the challenges are. this one that they proposed in this new program hasn't been tested. so to be mindful of that. >> >> a couple of other questions. the number that is important to me is the recovery rate number. and so, one question is who is calculating that? is that recology calculate that and does that get audited, does anybody review it? >> yeah, i'm going to defer to maurice. you are talking about the contamination and organics volume?

>> not just the organics but overall. >> i can probably answer but essentially we have a fairly robust scale system and we weigh the trucks in the facilities and the commodity that leave the facility. essentiallily all the recovery rates are the differences between the tons that we receive and recycle and to the landfill. it's very straightforward. the numbers are given to the city and they are in fact audited. >> so it's 39% now down 62%. do you think that 62% is achievable within a number. there is so much detail in your presentation. you are the experts and we are not. can you get back to that number and how would you do it? >> 21% reduction in the overall tonnage represent the closure of a facility. we operate at the

interim facility at the port of san francisco and was shutdown in 2019 and in relation to the tonnage going into that facility is what drove this 20% reduction. for us to contemplate extrapolating 20 percent of the waste stream, that would be a fairly substantial task and would require a significant investment in infrastructure and we would look at improving the existing programs and perhaps removing a significant amount of material from the black cart which the department of environment is in the process of proposing a pilot study which will hopefully educate us and demonstrate what is available to us when it comes to recovery of recyclables out of the black cart.

>> just to reiterate, we do have a department presentation. >> i think i have a follow-up question for the contamination and neighborhood clean up. so, when it comes to continue -- contamination is it a few bad actors or is this a problem with the city where they are not sorting their trash properly? >> i would say it's a combination. it's probably folks that just are not educated and continually contaminating and however there are some larger ones when you look at their volume. >> commissioner asked the question around behavior change to be generated from this.

there is currently eight trucks? >> there are six trucks. >> what percentage have we seen in a change of behavior where this has been implemented? has this been effective? >> i don't know if i have specific examples. i can tieback to those particular trucks, but it's something that we can probably look into further and get back to you on. >> i will ask for an explicit follow up on that one because if it's not effective, i'm not sure we should be doing it's and i'm not sure if staff have any insight but i will leave it for now. the last question i have around third eye, who owns the images that we are sending to third eye. the reason i'm asking is this not the first kind. it's done around the world and we are not the first city being sued for millions of dollars because we are violating the law. what is the agreement

that we have with third eye? >> that's a great question and i don't have the specifics on and i will have to get back to you on that as well. >> i think staff has mentioned a few times on the neighborhood program and how this won't align with us achieving our 0 waste in schools and i would be curious if you have any thoughts at increasing the number of business at the neighborhood clean up? >> we can discuss that during the presentation and come up with a response. >> thank you for bringing transparency to this entire thing. >> sure. thank you.

>> >> i want to acknowledge all the work of our recology partners, and also the comptroller's office who has been leading this and shepherding us through today. the other thing is i want to remind the commission this is a two year rate proposal that is being proposed. i want to put that into context. the last piece is just framing jack's presentation that what staff has put forward in terms of a resolution and this could be a potential action should the commission vote on it. we have taken the perspective to listen to comments and feedback from this commission, looking at our own environmental goals and priorities and proposing our own recommendations about how we proceed and how that's affected in the resolution before you and what jack is going to go over.

jack? >> thank you, director. good evening, commissioners, my pleasure to join you, jack macy, 0 waste program manager for the environment department. so, we are coming back to you two months after presenting on this before. kind of revisiting what our priorities are in this rate setting process and in this context of that resolution for your consideration. guiding light and principal for us is our 0 waste goal which is also now part of our climate goal, and our target 2030 # zero waste target and reduce disposal by 50% which is what we are focusing on making significant progress to and this is in our

climate action plan and chapter 9 of the environment code. so, here are our sort of top priorities that we see increased effort progress being made, and this is ordered in how it's laid out in the resolution in front of you. there are the four areas here. the first is to reduce contamination, and in reducing contamination, there are sort of three strategies and one is to improve monitoring and cameras are an example of that. the other is to utilize contamination charges which has been previously approved in previous rate processes and the other to help clean up some of the compostables before sending to the composting facilities.

and we have specific goals and the other is to test processing trash and then plan for further scaling of trash processing and future is beyond the two year rate period, and finally having some zero waste incentive is important. i will just elaborate for you on some of the key areas. so you've heard about contamination and this has been a growing problem. i think that part of this is a reflection that we have the most comprehensive organic collection program anywhere and certainly in the u.s. and we are kind of a model for many jurisdictions and before actually the state requiring it of other jurisdictions and it's comprehensive because it not only single family but every property in the city. i think

there is a lot of turnover and there is a challenge in keeping control of that. and with contamination, what we are seeing is that it's making it a little bit harder to process that material to be able to market it. we actually have had a change in markets in recent years. they have become much more strict in terms of their quality standards in recycling and composting where we go back to the same year after year and if they are seeing bits of plastic and glass, and the state also has stricter standards. it's about being able to make those marketable products and that sort of contamination recycling and composting and recyclables and compostable trash is another thing and that's keeping us from making progress on this zero waste goal. we would like to see more thorough and consistent

monitoring and the role that the drivers have and the key term is the cameras and if the camera technology can be effective enough to give us really good resolution to be clear on what we are seeing and the raw materials are there, we feel that is a valuable tool. i will elaborate more on that. the value of monitoring is going to be if you use that data to give critical timely feedback to the generators and residents and businesses. and it's to target those people and ultimately there is a consequence. we have had a mandatory composting policy for 13 plus years, and in addition to the outreach and the assistance we give, the

accountability piece, the potential stick, the refuse rate mechanism of the contamination charges which is basically the ability for recology when there is excess contamination and giving people warning, giving people an opportunity to clean up but they won't, eventually to be able to give a financial consequence. that is easier to trigger and has more significance especially for commercial properties that will pay thousands of dollars a month and having to pay a fine in the city system of $100 to $200 is not going to make a difference. contamination charges is going to be a really important tool and that has been used on a limited basis over years and with covid, that was an issue and so it's important to begin

these rates as soon as possible and better handling tools and we need good data if we are going to start charging people more. so camera technology, the images that we have seen to date are not consistently of high enough resolution. you've heard how they are working with third eye to improve that. that's great with technology and always great potential here but we need to verify that those images are adequate for these contamination charges or use of separation of refuse ordinance as we are required to hire a facilitator. so we want to see proof and then we would like to see them used. so kind of a minimum bar here for what we want in the rates is at least a good evaluation of these cameras, and i understand

the refuse rate administrator is hesitant to approve the cameras for the 38 trucks without that verification. i don't know if we'll get that in time, but at least maybe an expanded test would be kind of minimum requirement there. the third piece about contamination is processing and you heard a detail on that. i would say that after looking at what recology just presented to you in talking to them, i would say we would support the alternative. we had kind of generally agreed with the preprocessing for sure and with the original processing they were proposing would lose too much organics and would need to test whatever they do. so a lower cost of a system of what

they are proposing to implement it faster. so we support that. the other thing, i also agree what you heard from maurice saying that the alternative is labor. that's not going to be a job that anyone wants to do is to pick through organics. screens is much faster and much more consistent so i agree with that assessment. it's too expensive and not practical. outreach is one of the things. we've done a lot of outreach over the years and so has recology. one of the things that we are doing here is just making sure, what we have seen is we are not reaching all the residents frequently enough. we want to get on a schedule that every resident is getting a comprehensive outreach package. this is an example of a part of that. at least every other year. so what we've talked about is we work with them in developing a collateral and they

deal with the printing and mailing to all single family residents and apartments next. that's an example that you heard illustrate. that's a key piece of the improved outreach. now we recognize they have a lot of resources staffing funds for outreach and hard to assess for us right now how much additional is needed to meet that requirement. but that is a requirement for us. and i will move on. trash processing. so, the bottom line is this is something that we have actually looked at with recology for years and in previous rate processes there was actually an approved plan to develop trash processing, but that was on-site and contingent that they would get additional land, that's not going to work. what we have seen is we have had no progress in this for a number of years.

this slide here shows based on a 2020 characterization sorting of the trash stream, that more than half of what's going into the the trash business is readily recyclable or compostable. if you look at stuff that might not be readily recyclable or compostable, it's even more getting towards 80%. so i think that the reducing contamination, improving outreach, all of that could help a little bit with what's going on to trash, but what i have seen in san francisco and elsewhere, so long we have a trash bin that is going to help keep things clean, will end up in the trash. we need to process this compostable if we are going to meet the targets. now we have a relatively new

facility in san lleandro run by waste management using state of the art sorting technology and they have the ability to test a large enough chunk, 1200 tons of trash that gives a good range of material and run it through their system carefully to really help us assess the quality of it and this facility makes compost and we want to be sure they can clean up the compost to actually market and that is a little bit of a concern. they are doing it now. all the of the multifamily trash and almost all the trash now in oakland is being processed by this facility. so they have an impressive track record. so doing that test is an important part and we are glad that refuse rate administrators are supporting

that at this point. another piece of that is that with that test and that data, we want to work with recology in creating a plan on how we are going to move forward towards fuller scale processing in future rate years. that's another part of that. this next slide is actually a picture of this facility in san lleandro. it kind of looks like a regular recycling facility and they are using a lot of technology to do separation before they do further processing of the organic composting. the next slide, i want to talk about zero waste incentive and i want to talk about that and to reiterate why we are still recommending this and some alternatives to address some of

the concerns. first off, it's important that there be a financial incentive, and i think the challenge that we've had in recent years is they were tonnage goals that we set when we were trying to get to zero waste by 2020 at one point. remember hearing that? so we had a super steep line going down to zero and it was a little bit too ambitious. so recology has not been able to meet the tonnage goals through this incentive. so we are changing that to based on tonnage to the percent recovery. but it's really about how well, it's much more directly linked to how they are managing the system. what happens if we have a booming economy and it was just an impossible job for them

without having a big trashing facility. we are looking at recovery rate percent. 39% is really low and the biggest reason for that, we peaked at 62% in 2014 is we had a facility that was processing well over 100,000 tons of mostly concrete. you heard the term, concrete, asphalt, that's heavy stuff that was basically 100% recovery. that has been the biggest reason why we dropped down and the other is china closing its doors and ten times stricter than before. what that meant is a lot of adjustments in the processing to get cleaner material which meant more residuals. we saw the residual was the stuff that gets pulled out in the recycling and composting having to go to

landfill having to meet the market structures. what we are talking about here, recology can make some incremental because the first target that we are talking about and we can go to the next slide. excuse all the numbers and the numbers we recommended for the next two rate years had a logic of getting to that bottom number at 71% that recology has to recovery and meet at goals and how do we go from 70%. if we go to the next slide, that's what it looks like graphically and that's a straight line but you will notice that it goes to a straight line in the next years and it's a small incremental step and we are not going to get there in the next two years. that small step is important to

the principal as is the ability if recology doesn't meet it, the system that we've had in place which i would support, recology would recommend a little bit more flexibility if the first two targets are not met go back to the ratepayers and the ratepayers get that back in the next year. if the third and fourth targets are not met, then recology can propose some critical new investments which is what they did over the next few years to respond to the dramatic market changes. we are talking about a shorter rate period and less need but i do think that has been valuable and would personally prefer that but if they don't get the target, they get it back.

next i wanted to acknowledge that it's possible that the rate administrator and the board won't approve the ratepayers funding zero waste upfront even though it's a recommendation. i want to acknowledge some alternatives that we are open to. one is as the rates have gone up over the years, the amount that zero waste fund is based on 2% process is now over $8 million and in the past was around 6. that's a lot and if it was $4 million, that's still a decent incentive. if they met that incentive, that additional

would be allowed and would be a delayed reward. as you will see in this benefit of avoiding ratepayers paying into a fund in the next two years and similar in concept to other cities like oakland that have diversion targets in their agreements and if they are met or not, they are kind of the impact is in the future. it's actually calculated as a rate adjustment in the next year. >> so if you have a target here, if they are below it, then the company loses and they have a penalty and reward system. that's in a broad sense some potential alternatives to continuing the zero waste incentive fund based on percent targets.

i think i will pause. the last slide the question for you all to answer for yourselves is whether to support the resolution or potentially modify it. so that's the end of my formal comments and i welcome questions. thank you very much. >> i will ask my question now on the clean up. >> you are asking about the neighborhood clean up? >> yes. >> the proposal was basically for a trash collection and we would make that easier for people to trash stuff. what people will bring won't be necessarily what goes in the trash. they are going to bring stuff that is piled up in their garage or doing a house clean up or maybe it doesn't fit into their small business, and that

can be a lot of stuff that could be recycled. they might bring a whole load of yard trimmings. we would only support that if we can have the three streams including recycling and composting and a lot of these materials are potentially reusable and reuse and more environmentally climate beneficial. we have been talking with organizations like goodwill that would be happy to become partner in and help collect reusable materials. so we recognize that there is more of a cost associated with that. not necessarily tripling the costs if you are adding two business because another way of looking at that if if people are bringing a certain set of material, that same volume is going to be the same number of #

business have bins. instead of having large bins with trash is two and two. and i don't think there is an increase cost on that part of it. >> i think you have this down pat. genuinely i would be surprised if someone brought something that didn't belong in the trash and got contaminated or they had to haul it back to their house. is it a point on reuse though is more important. generally i don't mind the increased cost because it's the right thing to do. additionally, thank you for answering all of my questions before i got to them. excellent presentation as always. >> thank you. >> commissioner sullivan? >> not a question but i have great confidence in the team and

i will support the resolution because you are in the weeds, and i think you know what you are doing and i would follow your lead. before i get to the zero waste incentive, i am personally skeptical about outreach for the solution because i think we tried outreach for a long time and i will benefit that those people that get those in the mail will put it in the wrong bin. so i'm with the incentivize and the sources of production and incentives for putting in the green can and recology. is that type of incentive where you say to recology, here is a goal we want you to meet, you figure out how to do it and if you get there, you get this

benefit under the contractor is it some other approach? >> you are hearing a lot of strategies with contamination and processing with tweaking. it is setting that goal for recology to say let's look at what we can do. the rate setting process locks in what recology can charge the customers. but historically, they are not locked into how to spend the dollar because that's not practical. so to some flexibility there. we have seen them make extra efforts or investments to work to achieve zero waste incentives. there were some achievements in the early years of that. so, yeah, i think the fact that these targets are quite modest

increments is sort of a recognition that there is a limitation to how much this could be done. but with opportunities of trash processing in future years, then we can get more gain. but i do think we need a range of tools here that deal with the customers behavior and how this is processed. >> and we have the goal to be reaching 30% and we will come to this again and again. >> overall there is an approach to regulating pollution where you don't try to micro manage everything but you say to the entity, here is your goal. figure out how to get there

because you know how to do that better than we do. in some ways, we think this is the better way to go but on other approaches, we say here is the goal and if you can figure out how to get there, we'll give you these benefits under the contract. >> we can identify a lot of things they can do but zero waste can look at what's happening and easily come out with new ideas and what do you think about this and great, let's try that. >> thank you. >> commissioner stephenson? >> i had a clarifying question. the first presentation we saw that we saw a $4.4 million number on the contamination piece on 2024 but the camera piece was several hundred thousand. how much did the

camera program cost specifically? >> jay will need to answer that. >> it the net of all the contamination pieces and the cameras, the other $5 million around $600,000. >> from the cameras, there is no clear answer about liability with the cameras. can anyone answer that? have we consulted the city attorney's on this? >> we have not consulted the city attorney about this proposal. >> i think it's important that we try to move this resolution

today but would suggest that we add an amendment language to consult with the city attorney's to discuss the recology and city's liability. this is not the type of law i practice but my recollection is that there is no law on trash but for california provision for statute law that i'm not aware of and want to be sure that the city isn't sued at the end of the day. back to the policy, i do agree that this technology is to push bad actors but being mindful of our liability in the city and county. >> one thing that occurs to me is while the use of these cameras are new and evolving, the implementation of our refuse compliance ordinance with our

largest, and for the streams and whether they have exceeding the threshold standards and they are taking pictures and this process has been talked about with our city attorney, and in fact we just put together a package of regulations to further enforce that. so the point being is that we are using cameras, they are just not the same. but using cameras to identify contamination is a long practice in the industry and i haven't heard of liability issues on that. >> i did notice photos earlier even on the packet.

>> we'll confirm with the city attorney to be sure about this liability. >> i don't think there is a huge amendment to adding the word after consulting with the city attorney's office to minimize the city's liability, page 2, line 20, while we talk about using the collection truck cameras, the testing of them whatnot and maybe adding the phrase after improved collection route monitoring line 19-20. >> to confirm compliance with applicable privacy laws. >> i think that sounds good. >> just a point of order, do we make a motion to amend it first and then to accept it as

amended, or do we have to move the resolution first and then amend it? >> charles? >> public affairs. i think what would be ideal was to make a new motion to move and pass on all one. maybe you haven't made a motion yet. so you can continue to talk amongst yourselves before you make that motion. >> do you need me to read that language out again in the minutes? >> that would be helpful, commissioner. in line 20 with route monitoring, comma, and after

consulting with the city attorney's office, to minimize this city's liability and ensure whether the city is in compliance with data protection laws, comma, the rest of the language can follow with the collection of cameras. >> were you ready for a motion? >> i will move to adopt the resolutions with the amendment just suggested. >> second. >> we have a motion from commissioner sullivan, second from commissioner stephenson. let's go to public comment then. >> are there any members of the public in the room wishing to make a comment on this item? seeing none, we'll proceed to remote public comment. members from the public remotely wishing to make a comment,

please wait for your position in the queue to speak. we have one caller in the queue. >> hello, caller, you are unmuted. your three minutes begin now. public speaker: can you hear me? >> yes. >> great, david propel. there are a lot of different elements here with not much time, i will focus briefly on only a few issues. i have made a number of comments on the record and jay fairly summarized them earlier. i have asked for more information summarizing the impound account from the public works department and i am concerned about nexus proportionality and reasonableness as it relates to rates and value of ratepayers and i believe in services that are provided to a payers or where ratepayers benefit from

particular programs or expenses that those costs are potentially appropriate here and i appreciate that there is greater concern to the issue of nexus in this cycle. on cameras, i would suggest that we don't care what you eat or what you read, we do care where you put your discards. so that's the only reason for cameras and contamination charges is to assess whether the discards are going into the correct stream. what people are doing behind closed doors is really not our concern. i can discuss with staff the slides on the impound account, contamination charges, outreach and technology, organics processing and approach to zero waste incentives as to dwi, it's

not just about rates, there are a lot of related issues here. i think the resolution is okay. personally i don't think it's going to have much of an affect, but if it makes commissioners feel good, that's fine. i believe there will be more discussion thursday morning and anyone is invited to listen in. my primary concern is about contamination and processing and facility issues and on privacy, to the extent that the cameras would be on recology trucks and that recology proposal, i don't see how this city would have any liability. it is strictly a customer focused program. i'm not aware that any city employee would have access to any of the cameras videos, photographs, any of that. so i'm not sure that

the city actually would have any liability with regard to it, but again, if that makes people feel better so be it. the more as this process goes on and thank you for listening. >> >> thank you for your comment and there are no more callers in the queue. public comment for this item is closed. >> thank you, please call the roll. >> [roll call] >> >> that means the motion carries. thank you everybody for staying here late tonight for this long hearing and very much appreciate your effort. >> next item, please. >>clerk: 12. director's report. speakers: tyrone jue, acting director; and charles sheehan, chief policy and public affairs officer. explanatory document: director's report. (discussion) a. update on the environment department fy 2023-24 budget. b. update on environment department grants. c. update on the environment department office.

>> thank you, just a couple updates and i will abbreviate them in the interest of time since i know this is a long meeting since i like the director's report at the end which is hopefully sweet. we had the chronicle story and a great highlight about our tremendous work that our zero waste team is doing and our outreach team reaching out to small businesses and offering this service. we are proud to announce with mayor breed with the extension of this program over two more years to provide $500 to small businesses. on the climate action marketing side, we have wrapped up our campaign which you saw. two notable events to cover roughly months and one in the mission district where we had commissioner bermejo speak and

we did in language presentation and commissioner wan was at our latest one in chinatown where we had 120 people attend and we talked about the benefit of induction cooking and climate action plan. i wanted to mention our director position. i'm happy to announce we have selected our finalist for this position, and we have made an offer that has tentatively been accepted. i'm not going to name the individual yet because we still need to do reference checks but really excited to have this person start in the department and look forward to bring him to the next commission meeting to meet everyone. of course i have notes about our parting commissioner stephenson.

i appreciate your time with us and leadership and support through that process and also this process which leads into my next update about the budget. we've had very productive conversations. so you can take that hint for what it is. because i have often said when we've not had productive conversations with the mayor's office relative to our budget, of course the mayor's budget will be released on june 1st which is about a week away. but we are very optimistic is what i will say and looking forward to that budget being released where we will have additional resources allocated with your advocacy in this process. the next update is going to be on our grants which is also

related because i think this was a huge selling point for why we were able to advocate for the funds. we have done a lot of work as charles is going to show you about getting additional federal and state grant dollars, you heard it from hana and there is a lot of money from the federal and state government that we are trying to bring into this city an charles will give an update right now. just in the past few months, he'll talk about we are we are right now. >> sure, thank you tyrone. >> we have the slides up there. a little known secret. the grant team member is actually on the policy of public affairs team. it's not something i talk about very often, but as commissioner bermejo said there is lots of money out there and that is 100% true and we are following that and tracking that money very closely.

and we get asked this question all the time about what are you doing with all that money coming down to the environment. the answer is we are tracking it closely and applying for everything within our scope within the city departments and if it's not within our scope, other city departments will say, pass it on, have you seen this and just a lot of activity throughout the city. i'm going to briefly summarize this. we are tracking everything, and we've already submitted about 6 proposals since november both to the state and to the federal government and one professional organization and we are looking at an additional ten that are in the queue. about half of those are transportation. you saw that from hana. there is a lot of money from ab charging from

the state and the federal government. that represents about half of three fourths of that $20 million that is out there that we are eyeing. we have had a proposal gough out per month and sometimes two per month, and over the next two or three months grant proposals going to the state and federal government. we'll keep you updated. >> yes. just a follow-up question. do we have a time line for when they are announced? >> no, the timeline for the agency what decides who is awarded is different and these are all different agencies within the federal government within california and sometimes it's 2 months, sometimes nine

months and there is a 3-6 months negotiation period. so the timelines are difficult once you submit and want to know if you won or if you didn't win and when you started negotiating. >> so far you have not heard one that is committed yet. >> since then we have applied for six and we have not heard word yet. we are still waiting. >> it gets into the timing issue and all are different dated. generally when you are in negotiation, you are good to get the grant but not guaranteed that we got the money until we got the check. >> one question about the clean transportation, $15 million. that's large related to the funding we have now. would that

double, triple? >> our funding is basically 0. so that's the order of magnitude. we are bringing in money that this city is allocating itself for these structures and that's what we are working on in applying for these grants. the other thing i will say it is a very labor intensive process to apply for each one of these because with the city roles we have to go out with competitive public solicitation every time we get a grant partner now and we have to put out a public solicitation and see who is interested this and score that and put that through the entire process and go for the grant proposal. we did receive three really great proposals that we are excited to move forward with that $15 million funding that we are working on right now in terms of

solidifying the data points of where chargers will go and really putting together this comprehensive package. i will say we have gotten a lot of interest from the private sector wanting to support our organization and there are partners interested in for their benefit and we are getting letters of support and different chambers and coalitions that will make for a very competitive package. >> part of where i was going with my question is this going to be about increasing the staff that's dedicated to this goal or is it more about putting infrastructure in the ground in the city? >> $16 million? >> yes. >> it's about the

infrastructure. it is mainly for shovel in the ground projects. to clarify the scale the $15 million on the list is the biggest this is far and one for $7 million and $5 million. the $15 million is definitely the leader in the pack. >> so we are not going after really small grants where it's not going to have a major impact because it's not worth our time. one of the second criteria do they fund staff and provide criteria for our funding for staff because that's always an issue for us because we go through our checklist every time we look at that. >> that one does provide funding

for staff. >> they are not going to fully fund new positions and we have to look at how long the funding lasts whether or not it makes sense to bring someone on for one year project. we weigh all of those things. >> all these grants are new opportunities. >> these are all new. >> there is more coming out every month. it really has been kind of drinking from a fire hose when it comes to federal and state grants, but we are combing through it constantly and happy to bring our coordinator in that role to help with all the logistics. >> i wanted to say, i don't know who to give kudos to, but i feel like all the presentations today were just great in terms of the visual, the chart, the design of them, i felt like the

information we got is data driven and was articulated in a visual way that made tons of sense. i feel like it's been a big shift in a positive way and wanted to give kudos out while you were giving those reports. >> we'll pass that along. we did it just for you to show you what you are going to miss. [ laughter ] >> then i have one final update. which is related to another project i have been moving forward on with the team. so currently we are at 1155 market, occupy fully the third floor and we have half the second floor. given the hybrid remote schedules we are in the office three days a week. it's very visible that we are not in all at the same time and there is available capacity. so i have been working with the real estate department and staff on consolidating our footprint on

the department and eliminating the occupants on the second floor and moving them up to the third floor and consolidating. i have a quick presentation to cover the highlights as to why i felt like this was a good move for us. >> >> reason no. one is about $500,000 a month in savings for the department. again, more capacity. employees are all working hybrid remote schedules and we have the capacity now to stay on one floor. the total cost for the move is actually quite expensive because we have to break down the cubicles that we have on the third floor and readjust them

with the new adjustable tables. so all the cubicles we have now were at 1155 market and not ergonomic, just old cubicles. we want to have the flexibility of everyone having a stand desk and dual monitors and we'll upgrade. the next slide is how are we getting the $603,000? i have taken care of that taoism real estate has agreed to front us the money because the benefit to real estate is now they can lease out the entire second floor where they were having problems leasing out that second half. we came to an arrangement was i will consolidate everyone if you front the money for the move, the $600,000 and we get to pay that back out of our normal leasing cost if we paid that by occupying the second floor and

we'll pay that back in two years and we'll have everyone on one floor. i just wanted to give you that update that we are going to be moving in the next couple months. >> that concludes my report. >> questions? >> when will that happen? >> probably early fall, late summer is what we are targeting right now. we are getting the vendor quotes and the cubicle quotes on the delivery. i will come back to the commission with a detail at the next commission meeting. >> let's take public comment. >> seeing no members of the public in the room, we'll proceed to remote public comment. members of the public who wish to make a public comment on this item, dial star 3 and wait in

the queue until it is your turn to speak. we do have one caller in the queue. caller, you are unmuted and you have three minutes to begin now. >> public speaker: david propel again. great idea to consolidate. i would ask that you post the presentation and see that happened during the meeting. thank you for the directors report. thank you for listening. >> thank you for your comment. there is no further public comment. >> next item is 13. 13. presentation on commission on the environment survey.

sponsor: charles sheehan, chief policy and public affairs officer. speaker: kyle wehner, commission affairs officer. (discussion) >> thank you, commissioners. it's kind of been a challenging three years with covid going to virtual, going to in person hybrid. amending our processes so grants and contracts are now coming before the commission for approval. we had a director search and we've gotten funding from the board of supervisors to fund the climate action plan. so it made sense for us to ask a bunch of questions in particular two questions with so much change and differentiation does the structure or the system for commission need to be adjusted. that was one of the many questions we wanted to ask, secondly we wanted to get some feedback on how services we deliver, how you are receiving them and what you think of them and for all of those reasons why we did the survey. i will run

through the presentation and happy to take any questions and may be some discussion. >> thank you, commissioners. i will be brief. if you have any questions, please let me know. i will return through the survey results. the materials are provided in sufficient time to prepare for the meeting. one disagreed and we strike a balance to list the agenda materials for the brown act and if we post early. and point of access for reading materials. the commissioner's reported using points only occasionally or rarely. the department does pay about $2400

each year. most commissioners strongly agreed and one was neutral. we want to be efficient with everyone's time. presenters are knowledgeable and well prepared and again commissioners, pretty uniform on this question. department staff follow up on my questions or request in a timely manner. there is more interesting, mostly strongly agreed and one commissioner disagreed. department staff incorporate my feedback and put my idea into action. most agreed two in neutral. i feel i have a good understanding of how the department is making progress on key goals. most commissioners agreed, one neutral and one

disagreed and one didn't strongly agree and we'll look to provide feedback on our commission. i feel department staff follow up on my questions or requests in a timely manner. and transportation and community engagement and environmental justice. i support a hybrid meeting format to allow for public comment. mostly strongly agreed or agreed. the city attorney's office recommended that boards and commission adopt a hybrid meeting format in order to be better equipped to respond to request for reasonable accommodations on the basis of a

new disability. to provide the department funds for streaming and closed captioning. one agreed and strongly agreed and one disagreed. most commissioners about the time to meet. in general can be available for meetings on the following days. followed by tuesday, wednesday and fridays. as charles discussed, this is the time of transition given the departure of several commissioners and thinking about how we can ensure that meetings are efficient and impactful and marathon meetings like tonight a little less frequent and for constitution of grants and whether the commission can remain responsive to needs and most commissioners are in

agreement with the monthly meetings and standing committees to an ad hoc status and unsure about the idea and include written comments about the conditions of written proposals on this slide. and to clarify, we are not proposing that the commission or commission hold regular meetings outside of city hall and the location will not change. and to conclude comments and we don't have unfortunately the data of people who watch the meetings but we have the data of who watch the video recordings on the website and we are able to keep track of that without involving sf govtv and able to record meetings on the audio and not just as polished and

professional and would include the professional closed captioning. with that, i will turn it over to charles. >> this is our last slide. i want to leave you with the thoughts for potential discussion and action and that is of course the schedule and frequency of full commission meetings, how that relates to the policy and operations committee meetings and any other process changes that you may want to make or request regarding commission meetings. >> i will generally say thank you to the both of you. i ask you some of the weedeyest questions and you get back to me. sorry, i'm a little later as we get into the night. every

single request that i have requested, you have made sure that staff has followed up. that is a detail that i find difficulty from my employees. thank you for doing a great job. >> thank you. >> can i ask city hall for the very difficult and challenging to schedule the room? >> it is. there are more commissions now than there were before covid and one of the rooms is off line that we used to use. it's definitely challenging. and then of course there is if you get the room, but do you have sf govtv and they can only handle so many meetings at a time. that's a double challenge, we have to have a quorum of commissioners, a room,

sf govtv and all three are hard to hit sometimes. >> i would like to say thank you for staying on top of the dashboard idea. i think it's important and will help us do our jobs so much better when that information is available. thank you for staying on top of that. >> any thoughts from staff on how soon you want to try to amend our bylaws and meet monthly? >> if the commission was interested, probably at the next commission meeting which would be july. we would bring forward an amended bylaws that you could approve or not approve. we talked a little bit about what that might look like and i'm happy to take any feedback on that and happy to move the policy and operations committee to the call of the chair on each individual committee and so there can be action taken if need to be. we would probably want to keep

the operations committee meeting in january because per our city ordinance we have to have two public budget meetings, and they have to be 15 days apart and we designed the schedule just for that and there is a very deep priority dive that we have to take at that first meeting and what i passed at the second meeting and makes sense to keep the meeting in january. for a full commission meeting we are looking at tuesdays where we are right now because we occupy this tuesday slot right now. other people are steering clear of our uses the every other month. we would be trying to get that for the same tuesday if we move to an every month meeting schedule. that's what would be amended in our bylaws.

>> questions, comments? if not, let's move to public comment. >> seeing no members of the public in the room, we'll proceed to public comment. >> members of the public who wish to make a public comment on this item, please wait in the queue until it is your turn to speak. we do have one caller in the queue. public speaker: can you hear me? >> yes. >> great, david propel again and if you have one commissioner in the room, that would be me. i think the fourth tuesday would work if you go to a monthly

committee meeting schedule in lieu of regular meetings for operations and policy, touching back several hours ago to peter's comment that would still allow for a joint meeting with the public utilities commission which also meets on the second and fourth tuesday in the building down the hall in room 400. >> yeah, i think having fewer items that are focused for both information for the commission and the public, and/or policy decisions for direction from the commission to staff would work by way of monthly commission meetings in lieu of the items that now go to policy or operations or go to the full commission. so it's a different model. it would need a little

time to tweak and blocking of city hall meeting rooms but very doable, and i may follow up with the commission secretary on the particular responses from commissioners. i'm intrigued by how various commissioners responded to the questions that were presented. thanks for listening. >> thank you for your comments. >> seeing no further callers in the queue, public comment on this item is closed. >> all right. next item, please. >> >>clerk: the next item is 14. committee reports. this item is for discussion. >> commissioner, please give us the information on policy. the policy meeting was canceled and the next one scheduled for june

12, 5:00 p.m. >> operations meeting for may 19 was canceled, the next meeting will be held wednesday july 19th in city hall room 408. >> any other discussion? seeing none, let's go to public comment again. >> there are no members present for public comment. for those remotely from the public, please wait for your item to speak on the queue. there is no one in the queue. public comment is closed. >> next item. >> 15. new business/future agenda items. speaker: charles sheehan, chief policy and public affairs

the next policy meeting is june 12th, and the next meeting is scheduled for july 19th. we have been canceling those and stay tuned if we cancel that. and we are looking at the information on the energy efficiency program because there has been a lot of change there and as we saw on the powerpoint that topics that were interested on climate action policy and a few other topics that we want to bring forward. >> thank you, charles. >> any other discussion, question? seeing none, let's go to public comment again. >> again we are going straight to remote public comment. members of the public should now

press staff 3 for the queue. members waiting in the queue for your turn to speak. >> seeing none. public comment on this item is closed. >> all right. next item, please. >> the next item. adjournment. the time is 8:53 p.m. thank you for joining us. >> thank you, night. >> [ end of realtime captioning ] >> >> >> >> >>

>> in the bay area as a whole, thinking about environmental sustainability. we have been a leader in the country across industries in terms of what you can do and we have a learn approach. that is what allows us to be successful. >> what's wonderful is you have so many people who come here and they are what i call policy innovators and whether it's banning plastic bags, recycling, composting, all the different things that we can do to improve the environment. we really champion.

we are at recycle central, a large recycle fail on san francisco pier 96. every day the neighborhood trucks that pick up recycling from the blue bins bring 50 # o tons of bottles, cans and paper here to this facility and unload it. and inside recology, san francisco's recycling company, they sort that into aluminum cans, glass cans, and different type of plastic. san francisco is making efforts to send less materials to the landfill and give more materials for recycling. other cities are observing this and are envious of san francisco's robust recycling program. it is good for the environment. but there is a lot of low quality plastics and junk

plastics and candy wrappers and is difficult to recycle that. it is low quality material. in most cities that goes to landfill. >> looking at the plastics industry, the oil industry is the main producer of blastics. and as we have been trying to phase out fossil fuels and the transfer stream, this is the fossil fuels and that plastic isn't recycled and goes into the waste stream and the landfill and unfortunately in the ocean. with the stairry step there will be more plastic in the ocean than fish. >> we can recycle again and again and again. but plastic, maybe you can recycle it once, maybe. and that, even that process it downgrades into a lower quality material. >> it is cheaper for the oil industry to create new plastics and so they have been producing more and more plastics so with

our ab793, we have a bill that really has a goal of getting our beverage bottles to be made of more recycled content so by the time 2030 rolls around t recycle content in a coke bottle, pepsi bottle, water bottle, will be up to 50% which is higher thatten the percentage in the european union and the highest percentage in the world. and that way you can actually feel confident that what you're drinking will actually become recycled. now, our recommendation is don't use to plastic bottle to begin w but if you do, they are committing to 50% recycled content. >> the test thing we can do is vote with our consumer dollars when we're shopping. if you can die something with no packaging and find loose fruits and vegetables, that is the best. find in packaging and glass, metal and pap rer all easily

recycled. we don't want plastic. we want less plastic. awe what you we do locally is we have the program to think disposable and work one on one to provide technical assistance to swap out the disposable food service to reusables and we have funding available to support businesses to do that so that is a way to get them off there. and i believe now is the time we will see a lot of the solutions come on the market and come on the scene. >> and is really logistics company and what we offer to restaurants is reasonable containers that they can order just like they would so we came from about a pain point that a lot of customers feel which wills a lot of waste with takeout and deliver, even transitioning from styrofoam to

plastic, it is still wasteful. and to dream about reusing this one to be re-implemented and cost delivery and food takeout. we didn't have throwaway culture always. most people used to get delivered to people's homes and then the empty milk containers were put back out when fresh milk came. customers are so excited that we have this available in our restaurant and came back and asked and were so excited about it and rolled it out as customers gain awareness understanding what it is and how it works and how they can integrate it into their life. >> and they have always done it and usually that is a way of being sustainable and long-term change to what makes good

financial sense especially as there are shipping issues and material issues and we see that will potentially be a way that we can save money as well. and so i think making that case to other restaurateurs will really help people adopt this. >> one restaurant we converted 2,000 packages and the impact and impact they have in the community with one switch. and we have been really encouraged to see more and more restaurants cooperate this. we are big fans of what re-ecology does in terms of adopting new systems and understanding why the current system is broken.

when people come to the facility, they are shocked by how much waste they see and the volume of the operations and how much technology we have dedicated to sort correctly and we led 25 tours and for students to reach about 1100 students. and they wanted to make change and this is sorting in the waste stream they do every single day and they can take ownership of and make a difference with. >> an i feel very, very fortunate that i get to represent san francisco in the legislature and allows me to push the envelope and it is because of the people the city

attracts and is because of the eco system of policy thinking that goes on in san francisco that we are constantly seeing san francisco leading the way. >> kids know there's a lot of environmental issues that they are facing. and that they will be impacted by the impact of climate change. they will have the opportunity to be in charge and make change and make the decisions in the future. >> we are re-inventing the way the planet does garbage founded in the environmental ethic and hunger to send less to landfills. this is so many wonderful things happening in san francisco. i feel very fortunate and very humble to live here and to be part of this wonderful place.

>> police call the roll. president ajami. >> here. >> vice president maxwell