>> welcome everyone, thank you so much union community for coming out of support of some incredible news that we have to share today. i would like to get started right a wai, i'm marissa rodriguez with the alliance and i have the pleasure of introducing our mayor, mayor london breed. thank you. [applause] >> thank you, and good afternoon, everyone. it's great to be here in union square. you know over the years, we have seen a lot of changes in our city. no one could have ever anticipated that we would experience a global pandemic

that challenged us like never before and what we saw during that pandemic is san franciscans coming together and rise to the occasion. and the city was applauded for our efforts at the time when we made fast and swift emergency divisions to to help safe lives. that's what san francisco is about. now what we're seeing all over, is others who are trying to define what san francisco narrative is. and we know that like any other major city, we have our challenges. we know like any other major city, they struggle through the pan demic and some cities may be coming back faster than we are. but we also know that unlike other cities, this is san francisco one of the most beautiful cities anywhere in the world. and when we come together, and we make the kinds of decisions necessary to improve the lives of people in this city, we know

what is possible. making the investments to this downtown corridor. now we know that, it's not just because of the challenges of what happens in san francisco, that the downtown san francisco area struggled. retail is struggling all over, things have changed online purchasing and taxes and other things and you can count to and talk about that contribute to the challenges of this. which means as a city, we have to think differently. we can't just focus on limiting what can happen downtown, only retail, only hotels. we have to think about how we integrate the various spaces in order to provide diverse uses of how downtown comes to life. not just during the holidays when macies may close at 9:00 o'clock.

but year-round, activities, housing all of things that make for a thriving city. so part of that, means we have to do a few things. number one, we have to change the landscape and policies. supervisor peskin is not here today but we're working hand and hand providing retail, providing office, providing lab space because we know that bio tech and artificial intelligence is growing industries in san francisco where we have the talent, it's why everybody wants to be here. there is a reason why the state of california has by passed germany and become the fourth, the state alone, the fourth largest economy in the world because people want to be in san francisco because this is where it is. this is where the talent is. and part of what we have to do

is we have to make changes. we know what the problems are, we're not blind, we're not immune from the challenges. we know people are struggling, we know that they're struggling in addiction, these are conditions that i grew up lived in my life in the city not too far from this downtown. so the investments are important, the changes to our city are important. how we work together to provide safety for the people of the city is important. and today, we're here with our ambassador with our police, with our businesses with our communities, to talk about a few of those changes. the vacancy rates here are high. what do we need to do? we need to make it easier to do business in the city and we

need to make the conditions. and this along the corridor from the cable car all the way to union square. and they they look and they wonder where are the other stores to go to? what are the other things that i can see in san francisco. for that corridor the city and county of san francisco is pledge to go make a 6 million dollars investment. now what will that do? that will be street improvements to change the conditions to make the sidewalks wider, the streets more inviting easier to get on the cable cars. the other thing that it will do is provide support for those who want to start businesses along that area. we sources around tenant improvements. we're waving, we are waving fees when you want to do

business in san francisco, anywhere in san francisco so that we get rid of the bureaucracy and expense of starting your own business. but in this particular corridor, if you want to conduct business, if you want to open a new store, our goal is to provide you the resource in order to do the build out necessary to get business going in this corridor. i'm really proud what we do with third and nucome there used to be a high vacancy rate and because we made investment, businesses that are for the community and by the community, we have seen those store fronts filled with hair chops and a fitness location and restaurants and other things that the community wants. and we need to do that not only

create opportunities for business but create jobs and a safer more secure environment not just downtown but all over the city. i'll be talking when i announce my new budget when it comes out at the beginning of june. we know it's going to take investments, policy changes and it's going to take working together with the community to really, in a light that we experience here today. and before i turn it over to our police chief, scott. let me say what happened recently jpmorgan chase was not sure that we were going to come back to san francisco. we came together and made a number of commitment to ensure that their experience was a good one. and after that convention i got

a letter, saying how grateful that they were to see the changes that the city and investments we're making to clean up the streets and keep people safe. they saw that we made improvement and they're looking back to come back next year. but it's not just about jpmorgan chase and what they do, revenue help us to invest the resources to deal around homelessness and other issues to continue to plague our city. we need tourism, we need business for job opportunities, we need the tax base and the people need employment opportunities and opportunities to start their businesses. so yes, we are going to focus hard on our economic recovery and we're going to focus hard on making sure that people understand what we are as a city, not what others say we are. we're going to focus hard on making sure that every person in this city, is safe. and i know, that this is a very

challenging time and a emotions are really high. but at the end of the day, we got to start somewhere. san francisco is not the loom doom that people say it is. we have come back from earthquake and pandemics and there is no doubt that with the investment that we're going to do together, we'll emerge stronger than we have before. and with that, i want to turn it over to our police chief bill scott. thank you. [applause] >> good afternoon, thank you mayor for your leadership. this is a team, this is a team effort and there are too many names out here to call so i will not call all the names. but what i will say, there is a lot of people standing in front

of you that are behind the scenes that are changing the precipitation of the city. and let me start by saying with our ambassadors, our welcome ambassador that's are standing behind me. all the people that make the experiences of being in this city a good experience. and that's what this is about. i'm here to talk about what we were doing thanks to the mayor's leadership. to make sure that we invest in the san francisco police department. just recently the mayor put forward a 25 million plus dollar budget supplemental, this has never happened before. that is tremendous, you see officers all over in foot beat,

officers in tenderloin, in union plaza, we have ambassadors all across the city. we have to sustain that effort because the sustainability is part of our success. i'm going to say that word over and over again. we have chief murphy, commanders and deputy chief from bart police. we have a partnership thanks to our mayor and governor with chp not to far from here. all of those things matter, because we want people when they come to this city, when they're getting to the city to enjoy the experiences on our public transportation. to enjoy their experiences as they walk to where ever they're walking to.

when they park their cars make sure that they don't come back to broken glass. those are things that are important and things that we're committed. statistically year to date, we're doing better. let's make no mistake, the biggest crime is theft, the biggest crime category. we're down about 1,000 crimes. now statistically that's better, but if you're one of the 10,000 people victimized you probably don't want to hear that. if you're walking around anywhere in the city, and you have a bad experience, you're probably don't care about statistics. so we have to minimize those bad experiences. that does not happen without people. that does not happen without investment and without leadership. we need you all to support it. we hear all the time we want

more from this dipt. we're up to the challenge. the mayor and i stood right here in 2021, after one of the worse nights in my policing career when these stores were looted. she made a commitment and she made a commitment and i believe we. people felt better, this last holiday season, as far as the experiences in this union square. not to say that we're perfect, i want to be clear about that. but i've heard day in and day out that things got better. what i pledge to you is your police chief, that we have the mayor's back, we have your back and we're going to continue in that direction.

to members of the san francisco police department are with you and we need you to be with us. thank you for being here, thank you for all the people that have made things better. we have a lot of work to do. thank you to the leadership of the mayor and with that i want to turnover to amanda, the board chair of msmta, thank you. [applause] >> thank you, chief scott. good afternoon and i want to being here. thank you for caring about our city and being invested in the recovery of our city. i work downtown, i work downtown for over two decades. very close by here on o'farrell street for several years. i now work on sutter and montgomery. i think it's fitting that we're talking about street. two of our famous cable car

lines run powell street. the cable has to each end of the line, go on down to market street and it has to get on a turn table and has to turn around, it has to diverse direction. what we're talking about here, is hoping for that same turn around, we need the reverse direction and we need to get back on track to recover downtown and to be the great city that we know that we are. the sfmt a knows that a driving powell street is critical to downtown's recovery and that's why we're happy to partner with the mayor. 6 million people ride our cable cars every year and this year is 150th anniversary of the invention of the cable car here in san francisco and we hope

millions and millions more will want to come to ride on our cable cars. just today i saw the people lined upright around the turn around wanting to ride our cable cars, wanting to be here. this is going to improve the street escape and design and create a welcoming connection between a transit hub at pal street maoun' and bart welcoming people into this iconic neighborhood. now it's easy to become discouraged and demoralized given the challenges that we face. what gives me hope is how much dedicate asked thoughtful people are not giving up in downtown, instead they're double iting down and rolling up their sleeves and leaning into this challenge and trying to figure how we solve this. i was privileged to attend an event a couple of months ago with our next speaker, and i

was inspired by all of our ideas, all the ideas that are out there around entertainment and events and activations how we bring people back downtown and how we create the economic recovery that we all want. i'm proud to introduce the marissa rodriguez the ceo of alliance and i'm interested to hear what she has to say about how we get on track. thank you. >> thank you so much, amanda. i appreciate that and i appreciate all that sfmta is doing to support us. today, it's so important, it is so critical, we are at a turning point. we are 12,000 hotel rooms here in union square. we are the retail hub here, we are restaurants, the theater

district, we are the heartbeat of san francisco and on top of that, we are the gateway. you see the cable cars go back and forth, that is our life blood, it's so important, visitors come from all over the world. we want our san francisco back downtown, we want our bay area residents here, we want visitors here and we couldn't be more grateful and thankful to our mayor for all of oufr support to supervisor peskin for his support. to our chief of police for all the police officers that i see here to support us. we're thankful to the department heads like our planning department which i see, and sfmta and rec and park is here, i saw the chief of the rangers chief murphy here. we cannot do this alone, we do this as a community all of us,

our voices matter. let's show everybody that it's here to stay and its heart is ba'ath strong. i also want to acknowledge our ambassadors, you see them in blue, making sure that we have a wonderful experience. we are excited that today we're announcing support for our public realm, the corridor, a beautiful park lead something more to welcome all of our visitors and of course most importantly to support existing business, those who weather the storm, like our art galleries that are along the corridor and other businesses, i see tammy over here, i know she has a business there as well. these are real life and real stories this is our community, and we have to make sure that we thrive and we will thrive. i want to thank the board members that are here, i know

the hotel council is here. i see alex of the hotel council, i west inis here, your macy's is here. this is community, saying we are here and we're not giving up. we know that the future is bright and we're excited to be here and we're ready for it. so we look forward to hearing the positive stories that are going to come out of this about union and our future. we thank you for being here, and with that, i want to welcome back our champion our mayor, mayor london breed. thank you. [applause] >> just to wrap up, we heard some of the stories about things that are closing. but what we didn't hear is some of the things that are opening. we didn't hear about the new toys r us that opened at macy's last year and here to stay. we didn't hear about yes st.

laurent r*e expanding and retailers who are here to stay. we didn't hear about banana republic moving into the corridor of the union square area. nobody is talking about the fact that ikea going to be opening the store on market street and other major businesses, cisco resigned their lease, levee here to stay. resigned their lease to remain in san francisco as their place of their headquarters. a number of businesses and companies are not only doubling down on san francisco they're expanding. so while we have a 27% vacancy rate for office space in san francisco, in the biotech and the life sciences, that rate is less than 5% because this is where people want to be because the talent is here in san francisco.

just to put it in perspective, so those are the stories that need to get out such as much as the challenges that we know exist because we know things are changing, we wouldn't stay the same. we will not be the san francisco we were before the pandemic, we are going through this challenging time but we will emerge better. and i'm looking forward for that day. and for those of you who want us to fight against the drug cartel in san francisco, the san francisco police department, has openings so join us and help us fight. help us do something to make a difference. [applause] at the end of the day, we're not giving up, so those folks who don't walk the streets of san francisco that don't live in san francisco but they want to write and comment about san francisco, i challenge you to come to the city and see what it feels like. i challenge you to to go to the

stores that you say are closing which you probably never stepped in. we're at prepandemic numbers at our airport. rising in our hotel occupancy and no we are not where we want to be but we're going to get better and stronger than ever. let's put the positivity out to air. let's not let somebody else write our story and they better write in pencil when they try to write the obituary of san francisco, they have another thing, when this beautiful city continues to rise and become better and stronger than ever. thank you all so much for being here.

>> for us, we wish we had our queue

and we created spaces that are active. >> food and drinks. there is a lot for a lot of folks and community. for us, it started back in 1966 and it was a diner and where our ancestors gathered to connect. i think coffee and food is the very fabric of our community as well as we take care of each other. to have a pop-up in the tenderloin gives it so much meaning. >> we are always creating impactful meaning of the lives of the people, and once we create a space and focus on the most marginalized, you really include a space for everyone. coffee is so cultural for many

communities and we have coffee of maria inspired by my grandmother from mexico. i have many many memories of sharing coffee with her late at night. so we carry that into everything we do. currently we are on a journey that is going to open up the first brick and mortar in san francisco specifically in the tenderloin. we want to stay true to our ancestors in the tenderloin. so we are getting ready for that and getting ready for celebrating our anniversary. >> it has been well supported and well talked about in our community. that's why we are pushing it so much because that's how we started. very

active community members. they give back to the community. support trends and give back and give a safe space for all. >> we also want to let folks know that if they want to be in a safe space, we have a pay it forward program that allows 20% to get some funds for someone in need can come and get a cup of coffee, pastry and feel welcomed in our community. to be among our community, you are always welcome here. you don't have to buy anything or get anything, just be here and express yourself and be your authentic self and we will always take care of you.

>> i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all. >> i would like to take roll. >> please. >> commissioner walker? >> present. >> commissioner benedicto. >> present. >> commissioner yanez. >> present. >> commissioner byrne. >> here. >> commissioner yee. >> here. >> vice are the is in route, you have a quorum and we have chief scott from the san francisco police department and chief