>> hello everyone. thank you so much for being here today. welcome to the 2022-2023 san francisco youth celebration. give yourselves a round of applause. my name is emily nguyen the chair district chair on the san francisco youth commission. i feel grateful to be here today to celebrate this incredible group of youth commissioners. there is no way that i can incapsulate everything we accomplished together in a 5 minute speech, but i'll try do my best. when i first stepped into city hall for the first youth commission meeting, i knew nothing about government but now it is one of my greatest passions. little did i know how much we would accomplish as a team and how much the youth commission would mean to me. seriously

though, it has got ten to the point where family and friends are concerned how much time i spend in isthe building. coming back from the pandemic a main goal is bring back the youth commissionism we interacted with youth from all over the city through office hours, our budget town halls and our community events. from passing out candy to youth at the great-to teaching third graders about local government and district lines to tabling sunday streetss, we have been able to center youth input and engagement in our work. another main goal was to have all our work and all our legislation be rooted in empathy and personal experiences. growing up next to freways my whole life, i'm so grateful to have gotten there opportunity to explore the central freeway on the youth commission and to speak on a panel with senator scott wiener about the

freeway harmful impacts on youth and are marginalized communities. we priortaz issues thatd mat to us. we advocated for more transit stops and frnd lestreets. mew free muni for all funding and embarking to make bart more youth frndly and youth accessb. additionally, we are working to advance 16 to the 2024 ballot to champion youth civic engagement. lastly, we are exploring how to make juvenile hall more rejuvinated. we held a hearing meeting with several departments and district offices and hearing from constituents to advance the issue. all this work and much more culminated in a 75 page budget policy report with 16 recommendations to the board of supervisors. making this report in under three months was probably one of the hardest things we ever had to do together, but we did

it and we did it together. this youth commission achieved so much this year, but most importantly, we made life-long memories and lifelong friendships. commissioners dedicated them sevl jz gave their all to the youth commission. i can't count all the hours we spnt in city hall arguing about legislation until ten p.m. on a school night or working on youth commission legislation instead of homework. grateful to say i made lifelong friends and lifelong partners through the youth commission. i firstly want to appreciate vice chair barker plumber for all the support this term. thank you for all the 10 p.m. phone calls to plan town hall meetings and presentations and thank you for being the best partner i could ever have on the youth commission. can we give commissioner plumber a round of applause? [applause] i also want to appreciate our

staff for all their hard work and endless dedication to this youth commission. we cannot have done everything we did this year without their hard work and their expertise on organizing and government. can we please give them all a round of applause? [applause] all and are all i'm so proud of everyone and everything we accomplished this term and grateful for all the memories. you all make the youth commission what it is. can we please give every commissioner here today a round of applause? [applause] thank you everyone so much and now i'll be passing it off to commissioner barker plumber for his speech. [applause] >> thank you chair nguyen and thank you all for joining us today as we celebrate the work and accomplishments of the 2022-2023 san francisco youth commission. it has been a busy year to say the least. it is kind of surprising to think it was les then a year

ago we were on this very balcony with our mayor getting sworn in to serve and during that time we focused on service the young people of san franciscoism i want to say one statistic that i was really surprised by at the end. one of our staff members added up all the hours youth commissioners have put into public meetings here in san francisco, whether that's the commission or our subcommittees, and a totaled to over 138 hours of work youth commissioners did here in city hall representing young people in the city and county of san francisco and that is really important work we all partake in and something i'm really proud i was able to do alongside all you, so thank you for that opportunity. i want to say one thing of what i'm most proud of us doing this yoor, which is really the yurk we did investing our time, our energy and connecting with our communities. covid has been a

difficult time and people got disconnected in this city because of isolation and because of people's individual struggles and the work that not only the youth commissioner is doing, but our mayor is doing and many of the elected leaders and appointed leaders in the city are doing to reconnect with our san francisco community is so important and something that i'm very proud we were a part of. so, i want to really introduce and welcome someone who i think really understands that. who understands the importance of connecting to these communities, listening every day and that is our mayor london breed who is a personal inspiration and someone the youth commission learned from over the past year in terms how we can connect with our communities and how we can create a good coalition to fight for the best san francisco we can, so thank you so much. [applause] >> thank you. thank you for

your work and your advocacy and thank you for the great remarks to emily put those into perspective. all the great work that you all did throughout the time that you served as youth commissioners, i bet you didn't think you would be working so hard. but, you were able to accomplish great things in the process. what is interesting about being here today, it takes me back, because just recently i was redoing my retirement forms, and one of the persons who i was meeting with to help understand what was going on said, you have some time that you could actually buy back in 1991, and i said, 1991! wait a minute, i was in high school in 1991 because i graduated 1992. i remember i was a part of one of the first

organizations to bring youth into city hall to learn about policy in government. i completely forgot about this, but it was called the mayor's youth forum. the mayor's youth forum was put together by former mayor art agnus and i like to remind mayor agnus i got to meet him in his office in high school and he laughs about that. the mayor's youth forum was filled with a lot of department heads at that time. people who helped us learn about government and how to make a impact. what is interesting to hear emily talk about the amazing work you all did over the course of the past year, what we did back then pailed in comparison to how advanced you

are in your thought process and how you have taken the positions that you are in and have gone above and beyond to really try and shape policies and to shape resources for young people in san francisco. now, we collected a small pay check and we learned more about government and learned from those who represented government, but never were we given or even asked for a platform to do the kinds of things that you all are doing, because the youth forum i think had a lot to do with why we have the mayor's youth forum that existed then has a lot to do why the youth commission was created. it was created to provide a real platform, because it has been a long time since i have been a young person, even though i consider

myself young at heart, and the experiences that you have are a lot different then what we experienced growing up. how do we evolve? how do we change as a government to meet the needs of young people today? the internet want around when i was in high school. it was just forming somewhat when i was in college. the access to computers were very limited and cell phones, forget about it. those things remember expensive and i don't know if you have seen an original cell phone but it was heavy and had to carry it around in a case and unless you had money you could ntd afford it. when i think what i experienced growing up and what you have access to and the kinds of experiences you have now, it is so important as policy makers that we are not shaping policy for young people based on what we experience. we need to hear the voices of young people based on what you are experiencing today so that

our policies reflects the needs of the next generation in a way that is effective. is more effective in delivering for you at a faster pace then we have in the past. so, i want to express my appreciation to all of you, because it take as lot of time. there are so many other things that you could choose to do. you could-i'm sure you all in looking at your various applications and your resumes and what you submitted, many of you are involved in other extracurricular activities. you have responsibilities at home. you have responsibilities in community and the fact you are dedicating so much of your time to not just make your lives better, but to make the lives better for other young people in this city is stored. extraordinary. it was important we not just swear you in and talk about what you are going to do, but we take a moment to reflect on what you have done, so that you can put

it into perspective and to really appreciate all that you accomplished, because sometimes we do things and then we are on to it next thing and we do something and on to the next thing and we don't take a moment to pause to real ly appreciate the heart and soul watt we put into making something extraordinary happen so today is about that. a day to honor all of you on your accomplishments, especially those who are moving on to universities, including places like howard and washington dc, across the water to uc berkeley and even harvard. it is really a accomplishment to move in this direction and to be able to go on and to take what you learned here in your further studies and my hope is that public service is calling you to a certain capacity. public service is what was my calling. i realized that after

we were seeing changes in the community and i was being exposed to so many extraordinary things, i wanted to be a part of the decision making body that has a impact on community. now, it may be public service for you, it may be making policies, it may be creating the next new cell phone that you don't have to hold, but it is just in you- [laughter] with technology the way it is moving today you never know what it could be. i used to watch the jetsons cartoon and had flying vehicles and now we have vehicless in the city driven without drivers so anything is possible and you are the nest generation that will lead the city and create. san francisco has a history of resiliency and invention. the first television was

invented here. the first (indiscernible) no one was talking about climate change and what we needed to do to protect our city and our planet. so, that is the kind of invasion that we have in the people who are part of the fabric of our city, and you all as leaders in san francisco represent that. i want to say thank you for your work. thank you for your service, and thank you for all that you have done, and will continue to do for san francisco, but also i know without a doubt that you will go on to whatever university or whatever job opportunity and a lot of the same things you did here you'll carry that with you in those various positions, and you'll do great things, so just be proud of that, take a moment to reflect, and also continue to maintain your very important relationships with one another. i still have friends that i had since i was in kindergarten, and

those relationships are special. you will look back on those relationships and think, wow, we have known each other this long and those are going to be the people that carry you through and sustain. thank you again for being here and all your hard work and commitment to san francisco and congratulations on a successful year for those who are going away to college, good luck and make sure you come back and you work for opportunities for all so you can earn some money during the summer and you can develop some additional skills and for those who are moving on to the next level, whether high school, continuing high school or moving from junior high to high school, continue to do great things and much success and please know this city will always be there for you. thank you and congratulations. [applause] >> can all the commissioners come up front?

>> the stewardship program is a (indiscernible) based program. we work with student kind r garten through 12 grade and work with scrks fusd and (indiscernible) focus on 5 themes. sense of place, plant adapation and animal adaptation, water soil or (indiscernible) depending on the grade level and accommodations the class may need the educators work to adapt the programming to be whatever works best for the class, so they can

gain activities (indiscernible) some don't, we try to meet students where they are at and get comfortable connecting in the space and feeling a sense of ownership and safety within their (indiscernible) >> the first component of a youth stewardship program trip will be a in clasds visit where we go to the school, we give a presentation on the natural history of san francisco, we talk about the concept of a habitat, so what does a habitat contain, understood, water, shelter, space. >> children at this age, they learn best through using their senses, having the real life experience and (indiscernible) students also learn about responsibility and it is a great message for student to learn, if you take care of environment, the environment will take care of you.

>> so, when we finally get the kids outside, we have two main components to the field trips. one is going to be the restoration component where we are working on the habitat and parks by pulling out (indiscernible) or maybe watering, and then the other side of our trip is going to be the educational component, which can range from a nature walk with a sensory theme where we are talking about what we smell and hear, to a focus on plant adaptation and animal adaptations. >> (indiscernible) >> just a great opportunity for students to learn more, connect with nature, and hopefully what they learn from the youth stewardship program they can take with them for the rest of their lives, and they will appreciate their

environment more. hopefully, when they appreciate it, they take care of it more every day. >> (indiscernible) >> so every year we open the application up in the fall. interested teachers can apply for a classroom visit and up to two field trips to the city park of their choice. field trips are 2 and a half hours long and like i said, they can happen in any city park (indiscernible) i'm chanel joyce i'm a firefighter for the san

francisco fire department. i currently am the station 4. in the mission bay districtism lived in san francisco in noe valley. grew up with my mom and i went to high school in san ma te'o. after high school i went to mississippi where i played volleyball in university of southern mississippi. what got me going after college was i was applying to place related to fire and police i loved my experience but my family is home. i grew up here and could not be far from my family anymore i came back. >> i have been a firefighter for 4 years the transition to the fire department has been seam tells is the same. team work and coming together. transitioning to the job med me comfortable that i made the right decision to come become

and work for a fire department that is big in diversity and equality and becoming a fell. i got to be a member at a few different fire stations. each station has their own culture. i worked in places that are xroem and with a young crew and had the most seniority have 3 or 2 years in whatever it may be. learning stuff when people have been in the job for 20 plus years and learning from people got in it grew me to adopt and work with everybody. >> a lot of people will come up to mow and say, thank you for your service noise to see a woman in the fire department. you are doing it. it is nice to see kids waiving look a woman firefighter. they get excited i love that part of the job seeing the excitement that people see.

you are a woman you can do this job. every person has a good experience with the fire department. no one ever spokous they say, they are here. they're do this work and everybody loves them. not everybody gets that in their job. i don't do it for the recognition but niez nice to see people that respect had you do and know you did a lot to get here and you still do to work and you set your life on the line for other people. it is cool.