dollars if you pay at the clubhouse. there is an 18 hole course this is free. du see that shot? i won! am i was not very good now i have a huge respect for disk ball player its is difficult but fun. thank you for joining me in the excelsior this is goldenate adventures.

and similar devices is prohibited. please be advised that the chair may order the removal from the meeting room of anyone using a phone or similar device. public comment will be available for each item on the agenda for comments on matters that are not on the agenda. there will be an opportunity for general public comment. participants who wish to comment will be asked to come forward one by one and speak clearly into the mic. each speaker will be allowed three minutes to speak. alternatively, members of the public may submit public comment by email to environment at sfgov. org comments submitted by email will be forwarded to the commissioners and will be included as part of the official file. i will now call the roll president juan. here. vice president sullivan. here. commissioner on here. commissioner bermejo. here. commissioner hunter's. here. commissioner tompkins. here. commissioner. yuan. here. president. juan. we have a quorum. wonderful. we have a full board. next item please.

the next item is the consent calendar. items two through four. item two is the president's welcome. item three is staff introductions. and item four is approval of the minutes of the september 23rd, 2024 commission on the environment meeting. great. thank you. good evening. item two is the president's outcome. i'll start with the commission on the environment. acknowledges that we occupy this unceded, ancestral homeland of ramaytush ohlone peoples, who are the original inhabitants of the san francisco peninsula. we recognize that the ramaytush ohlone understand the interconnectedness of all things and have maintained harmony with nature for millennia. we honor the ramaytush ohlone people for their enduring commitment to our mother earth as the indigenous protectors of this land, and in accordance with their traditions, the ramaytush ohlone has never ceded, lost or forgotten their responsibilities as the caretakers of this this

place as well as for all peoples who reside in the traditional territory. we recognize that we benefit from living and working on their traditional homeland as uninvited guests. we affirm that their sovereignty, rights as first peoples and wish to pay our respects to their ancestors, elders and relatives of the ramaytush community as environmentalists. we recognize that we must embrace indigenous knowledge in how we care for san francisco and all its people. commissioners, department staff, members of the public, welcome. today's presentation docket includes staff introductions, a presentation of the johanna ward environmental service award to jack macy. presentations on the department's forthcoming grantmaking and the san francisco carbon fund. an update on 2024. bay grant programs, and a potential vote on a resolution urging the board of supervisors to pass on an update to the all

electric new construction ordinance to include major renovations. and before we begin, i would like to congratulate commissioner bermejo, who has been reappointed to the commission and was sworn in today. congratulations. and with that, let's get started. commissioners, i'm happy to do a staff introductions. if i can ask all the cac fellows to come on up. so, commissioners, we have our latest cohort of california climate action corps fellows, and in no particular order, i'm going to call you up by name, but just come on up and introduce yourself. we have chloe kirstein, tatiana cisneros, lily byrne, erika montano, bridget chang and summer polster. if you wouldn't

want to come on up and introduce yourself. hi, it's mike, okay? yeah. hi, everyone. it's nice to meet you. my name is summer polster. she her? i am one of the cac fellows. i recently graduated from uc berkeley. i'm really passionate about decarbonization. zero waste. i'm excited to be working on the commercial zero waste team and helping our san francisco's reduce their waste. thank you. hello. my name is lily burn. i recently graduated from colorado college where i studied biology, ecology and environmental studies. this year i will be working at the intersection of urban greening and racial equit, focusing on projects related to volunteer engagement, community partnerships as well as targeting initiatives in environmental justice neighborhoods. i'm particularly excited about a dune restoration project, where we'll be combining ecological restoration with community driven project excitement. thank you so much.

hello. i'm erica tarnow, i'm a recent sf state graduate where i studied environmental studies and women and gender studies, and i am also part of the same team as lily, where i'll be working on urban greening projects along with racial equity intersections. and i'm looking forward to working with communities in sf and just serving them in general. thank you. hello, commissioners. my name is chloe kerstein. i recently graduated uc santa barbara with a double major in environmental studies and writing and literature with sfp. i'm on the environmental education team and this year i'll be working on environmental outreach with youth working, especially on climate stewardship. i'm very excited for the climate action youth summit in april, which i'll be working on very closely. we'll have climate leaders from all over san francisco, and i'm just

really looking forward to celebrating all the amazing woru guys so much. good evening commissioners. i'm so happy to be here. my name is tatiana cisneros and i will be working with the environmental education team this term. i am really excited and grateful to be working on environmental curriculum development for the k through 12 schools that we work with, as well as contributing to the organization of the 2025 climate action youth summit. i am extremely grateful to be able to have this opportunity over the next 12 months for how it's going to shape my career prospects as i am becoming a prospective law student here in the city. thank you. hi. hi. my name is bridget. i am currently

a graduate student at harvard university. getting a master's in sustainability and also a focus on food systems and corporate sustainability. i'm currently a fellow with the commercial zero waste team, and i'm really looking forward to working on some food waste and reuse projects. thank you. how about a round of applause for all our fellows? commissioners, i also have one other staff introduction to make, so we'll be recognizing the accomplishments of jack macy as he gets ready to depart from his position. concurrently. we were running a recruitment for his position to minimize the transition time, and also to have the new person be able to, you know, shadow jack around and pick his brain as long as they can. i'm very pleased to announce that today we are making the appointment to the program manager for the zero waste team, and it is none other

than soko made. so soko is going to go over her storied history with the environment department. but soko has been with the department and working on environmental issues for more than 15 years, and i'm so proud that she's going to be following in jack's footsteps to lead the zero waste team as they move forward into their next endeavors and soko, if you want to take it away. good evening commissioners. thank you so much. ty. thank you to jack as well and to most of my team that's here today. and also the department. this has been a really long journey for me. it wasn't something i anticipated ever. so to be able to stand up here today and say that i am stepping into the zero waste program manager role is huge. i'm really i'm deeply humbled

and grateful, and i hope that i can continue the good work that came before me. and also have you know, share my vision and share the rest of the team's vision as we move forward. so thank you all. and, commissioners, that concludes staff introductions. thank you. director drew. the final item in the consent calendar are the minutes. so commissioner, we have an action item on the consent calendar. is there any discussion or changes to the draft minutes? if not, do i hear a motion to approve the minutes? i move, thank you. second. grea. we have a motion by commissioner tompkins and a second by commissioner hahn. hearing no more discussion. let's open up for public comment. are there any members of the public who wish to speak on items two

through four of the agenda? madam president, we have no speakers. hearing no further public comment. public comment is now closed. please call the roll on item number four. president. juan. i. vice president sullivan. i. commissioner. on. i. commissioner. bermejo. i. commissioner. hunter. i. commissioner. tompkins. i. commissioner. yuan. i. great. the motion passes. next item, please. the next item is item five. general public comment. members of the public may address the commission matter on matters that are within the commission's jurisdiction and are not on today's agenda. are there any members of the public who wish to comment on this ite? madam president, we have no speakers. thank you. hearing no public comment. public comment is now closed. next item please.

next item is item six. presentation of the joanna wald environmental service award to jack macy, speakers. ahsoka made city government zero waste. senior coordinator james slattery construction and demolition zero waste senior coordinator hillary near commercial zero waste senior coordinator alexa keilty, residential zero waste senior coordinator and kevin drew. this item is for discussion. thank you. commissioner bermejo, would you like to present the environmental service award? it is indeed my pleasure to introduce the joanna wald environmental service award to the amazing jack macy. thank you so much. jack macy is retiring after an amazing 30 years of service with the environment department. he is an internationally recognized, zero waste visionary and leader in developing and managing groundbreaking composting, recycling and other zero waste policies and programs. prior to his work in san francisco, jack

developed and directed a model statewide composting program in massachusetts, achieving a statewide landfill ban on yard trimmings. he led the development of san francisco's internationally awarded and the first u.s. large scale urban commercial and residential food composting program that has become the model for many jurisdictions around the world. i will add, since the inception of the composting program, san francisco has recovered 2.7 million tons of organics from the landfill. jack's leadership has also led to san francisco's other trailblazing zero waste policies, including mandating compostable or recyclable food service ware, banning polystyrene foam packaging, introducing the first plastic checkout bag ban, mandating

resource recovery from construction and demolition debris, and having san francisco's climate action plan include a consumption based inventory and zero waste targets in 2010, jack received the recycler of the year award by the california resource recovery association and five state and national awards for san francisco's organics recycling programs. san franciscans have been honored to have had a public servants like jack, who worked tirelessly throughout his career to embody the department's mission of advancing climate protection and enhancing quality of life for all. on behalf of the commission, we thank you, jack, for your service, for your unwavering commitment to the environment and making sure that

we all live in a better world. thank you so much. and i think. and i believe we have some amazing we have staff speakers right. hi commissioners hilary near commercial zero waste senior coordinator and i had a little flashback walking from bart past the doors of our old office on grove street. it remembers it. i joined as an intern in 2009. walking into those those doors that miraculously fit our entire staff, and jack popped his head out from past a huge stack of disposable foodware and compost tomes to greet me and take me to lunch and welcome me as the, you know, new person implementing mandatory recycling and composting at its inception. and i just couldn't have imagined how much i would learn from the

other side of that stack of disposable foodware just listening to the other side of jack's phone calls was a lesson. those are the old days right now. we listen in on teams calls and you know, debriefing, mandatory visits, like, how do i do this? and there's no space for a green cards. so jack was a wealth of information. i'm so, so grateful to have honed my voice as a public servant in his council. and yeah, and many of us have, you know, been impacted by that. i also, you know, remember so many tough conversations like taking on stakeholders like the expanded polystyrene manufacturers in rooms like this and talking to lobbyists and others. and he always brought such compassion, you know, and vision. and marrying those is a really challenging thing to do. hold a zero waste reality. and the fact that it requires a lot of hard change. and he always somehow

managed to hear everyone out and also hold this really firm vision that required some tough decisions. i also want to, you know, sorry, not sorry. jack, invoke your mother who said grace happens when you know we get together. i'm going to quote a wrong now when we served together on behalf of our world. grace happens. and so joanna macy, from that i want to, you know, recognize jack's graceful leadership and really grateful to have been under his mentorship and toasting today, his retirement. i know we're a motley group of change agents, and we will weather this transition and our new leadership will welcome it with with the grace that he's he's modeled for us. so thanks for allowing us to recognize him today. and yeah, thank you. jac.

hey, commissioners. alexa kelty, i'm the zero waste senior coordinator for the residential team. and i, i've had the honor and the privilege to i think of myself as the first graduate of the jack macy university. i started at the department in 2001, and he's just been an incredible mentor. i mean, i feel like i hit the jackpot. it's been the most incredible learning experience, learning under this, this individual who has such a wealth of knowledge. and i'm still learning to this day after 23 years. and there's three things that come to mind. jack pioneer, he is the first to kind of coin the term in the united states. zero waste. and look how how common this term is. and it's spread. i mean, new zealand was some of the first in australia. but really here on this continent, jack is with his colleague robert haley really

started it because when i started in 2001, we were the solid waste management team. so we've really come a long way. second tenacity hillary described holding on to the vision and i had to look up the word tenacity in the dictionary one more time today. it's about holding tightly a vision and not letting it go. and that is jack to the core. tenacity and perseverance. just like will, you know, puts his head down and makes things happen. and it doesn't matter if it's a decade struggle, he will continue. and i think i've really learned from that. and i just can't thank you enough. you're like family to me, jack. and i just grateful he's receiving this award today. thank you. good evening again, commissioners. when i, i first remember jack when i called him to interview him for my master's project at the university of san

francisco. i was doing it on composting, and i never thought that i would end up working with such a trailblazer. he really embodies what it means to be a public servant. i have learned that to be an environmentalist, you don't just have to hug trees. you can actually work on policy that brings about change. and i'm forever grateful to jack for that because it helped me find where i need to be and understand what kind of environmentalists that i can be as well. so, jack, i know that we've had our ups and downs, but overall, i think you've been a great mentor and solid rock for our team and we will forever be grateful for that. so thank you, jack. and then we have one speaker, kevin drew will be joining us through webex. let's see. hello there. can you give

me a sign if you're hearing me, we're able to hear you. okay. good enough. i'm coming to you all the way from brazil, jack. but i just wanted to thank the commission for bringing this motion forward, because it sheds light on an amazing colleague. as you've already heard, jack macy, who? and in so doing, it reflects approvingly on the department. the city, the state and the nation. for crying out loud. and those last three, the city, the state and the nation need all the help they can get and all the positive recognition they can get. and it's jack's commitment to our shared environmental that reaches around the world. he's carried the department and all of his colleagues with him as he's pushed through some of the most amazing, creative and beneficial environmental programs in the world. you know? fan three we've already talked about short for fantastic three was our humble little, you know, system that picked up discards from

businesses and residents alike. and it was jack's brainchild, really. we we've diverted almost 3 million tons in creating this incredible compost, but also keeping that methane from coming out of the landfill that would have would have happened. i mean, it's a double it's a double word score. and it's his commitment to regeneration and recreation that really sheds a light on san francisco and our foodshed, because all of that compost went back into the ground to grow the food that we're so famous for. again, that's one of the ongoing kind of like impacts that jack has had that you kind of don't see in the first on the on first surface, few people would have recognized that 30 years ago. what we were doing. but jack had it in his mind the whole way. and he just really delivered it. and now it's the statewide norm. all 40 million people in california are living jack's

vision, if you can imagine that. and down here in brazil, we're doing that. we're trying to pick up and run with it. two, two, two. the city of sao paulo and the country of brazil have seven different projects. they're replicating what we're doing in san francisco. so as much as jack has given to these kinds of glitzy programs, there's the nuts and bolts that he did as well. he concocted and made real tools like zero waste goals, plastic bag bans, compostable product specifications, creating regenerative landfill and compost facility agreements, and dozens more. details. those are the details that it takes to take an idea and painstakingly make it a reality. jack was a master at getting those details and making that painstaking as some of his colleagues have referenced the painstaking, sometimes listening to his phone calls were painstaking in their own way, but he's given much more to this city than than than than those things i could go on forever, but i won't. i want to

tell you one more important thing that hasn't been mentioned here. we, his spirit and generous energy. jack was and still is a joy to work with even in these final days. his spirit and generous energy is a wellspring of positivity for all of us who've worked and played with jack, and he has done all that and more. the much more is his contributing contribution to the california resource recovery association's annual conference. cra is the oldest recycling association in the country, and they put on a pretty shit kicking conference every year. and part of that is a huge extravaganza, a dramatic musical that's spearheaded by the players over in the east bay with singing and dancing and carrying on an epic sword. and jack has shamelessly put in hours and hours of energy and levity to support and represent what we all do in this amazing, dramatic fashion. and he

contributes to united, uniting the city, the state and thereby the planet with each other. through this exchange of collegial fun and games every year and jack is going to be tremendously missed. i don't know, he doesn't have to stop doing that. so maybe we can get him back. i think that just his creativity and energy have brought the department together, and the zero waste team in amazing and mysterious ways, allowing the city and the department to have an outsized impact on the nation, on the city and the country and the state and we are so, so thankful to jack for that. and i appreciate jack and the commission taking time to make this recognition, because it's really important to all of us. thanks. covid. oh, i see okay.

any commissioners anyone has comments? i do i just like to say thank you jack. and one kind of anecdote of the impact that you left for generations beyond is when you talk to students in san francisco and you say, what is the green bin for? for without hesitation, compost. and it's just a given. and that's something we can't take for granted, because that happens here. but it needs to happen in other places. so you've really set the green standard and what, you know, recovery and caring for the planet should be. so yeah. yes, commissioner, i just want to appreciate you for always your kind demeanor. generally, i think when i first stepped on this commission and i didn't know very much about zero waste itself, so never felt like a dummy asking you questions and you cheerfully always answering in a very not just collegial, professional manner, but, you know, in a friendly kind of positive tone that i've always known you to have. thanks, jack.

thank you. yes, commissioner salazar, i want to chime in. i don't see joanna walden in the audience, but i'm sad that she's not here. because if she was, she would have a lot to say in a very eloquent way about all the great, great things, a lot of great things about about you, jack, just in terms of my own. thoughts. we have achieved a lot in terms of zero waste in san francisco, and it's not just because of good ideas, it's about execution by really high quality public servants. and i can't think of anyone who's a higher quality public servant than you. and you never were. i was always i always felt free to ask dumb questions about what could be recycled and what couldn't. so thank you for that. as well. thank you, commissioner bermejo. yeah, well, thank you very much for everything because your impact is not only local, state, national, but it's global. so thank you for what

you've done. and we would be honored to present to you. oops. oh i broke your award. no okay. and so after public comment we will be doing a photo and presenting the award. yes. so once again on behalf of the commission, really thank you for your leadership, your commitment. i think the staff says it all. how grateful you have been to not only to san francisco, but also beyond the state, beyond the country, the difference that you make. so thank you so much for improving the quality of life of human beings. thank you. and hearing no further discussion, we can open up for public comment righ. are there any members of the public who wish to comment on this item? yes. let's have a little train. perfect. okay, i'll go first. thank you for having us tonight, commissioners. my name is monica wilson. i'm with gaia, the global alliance for incinerator alternatives, and we're extremely proud that jack has been a long time board member of

gaia. and i wanted to emphasize the global impact of what jack and san francisco have achieved, because in this moment, it has a bigger influence than ever before. there are governments all around the world who are recognizing and committing to preventing methane from organic waste in landfills. and who do they turn to? who do they look to? who can show that we can not only set high goals, we can learn about how to improve and constantly set a higher bar. and that's san francisco. so i'm really grateful to youjack, to e department. and thank you so much for being many. the compost hero to many, not just myself, over the last few decades, and for just being so persistent in in moving this work forward. thank you. hello, commission and commissioners. and jack, my name is miriam gordon. i'm the reuse

program director at the story of stuff. and i've been working in the wonky weeds of reuse policy with jack for a very long time now, many, many years. and so he's also been an innovator, not just in the waste management side, but on the waste prevention side, helping me to launch an ngo, local government partnership program called rethink disposable and sitting in many, many, many meetings trying to figure out how we bring reuse to our communities through policy. and it's just and i've been on so many panels with him and i've seen throughout the many conferences where i've seen him in a leadership role, being recognized, representing our city. i'm a resident of san francisco, representing our city

on the, you know, national stage and showing how innovative and how creative san francisco can be. so just on a very personal level, it's been such an amazing journey working with jack. so thank you. good afternoon. members of the commission. i'm ruth abbe, i'm a long term colleague of jack's. i'm here to just amplify and attest to what you've heard and what you've all talked about, which is his global leadership. i've observed that on trips to rome, his local leadership, not only in san francisco but in berkeley, passing, cutting edge policy and just wanted to emphasize the qualities you heard about grace, tenacity, leadership and attention to detail. i support the department behind the scenes

as a contractor since 2001, with 50 of my colleagues doing a little bit of extra work that, to amplify the work of your staff who are amazing and talented and, you know, rule the world. so i wanted to also say that i've been up close and personal to see jack cut that rug at the northern california recycling association players, and you won't be able to keep him off that dance floor. so thank you very much for this, for giving him this award. are there any other members of the public who wish to speak on this item? good evening, commissioners. i am chris otoshi. i am the zero waste city government assistant coordinato. but right now i'm going to speak. just as a lifelong resident of san francisco. and i know i've told this to jack

before, probably many times, but i got and blessed to have lived in my entire life with a compost bin and i didn't really realize the true impact of that until i went to college in uc at uc san diego and like, without even knowing, like who jack macy was during that time, and then coming back to the city and realizing like how like how much of an impact i know that makes on the younger generation. i know it really impacted me, and it's what really got me into this work. and so i also feel really grateful to have gotten to work with jack over the past two years. and i just hope that as a zero waste team, we can continue to make him proud and continue his vision. thank you jack. are there any other members of the public who wish to comment on this item? maybe

not a member of the public, but i kind of want to say a few words. you just stand right there, jack. it has been such a pleasure to work alongside you. these these last few years. if we can just even encapsulate all we've heard from these amazing people, you know, we can almost capture them into kind of like legacy and leadership. it's just two simple ways to kind of capture everything your legacy and impact. you've heard from countless people today and countless people that are not even in this room of the impact you've had throughout the world. and that's because of your vision and your perseverance and your tenacity that everyone has so eloquently stated. but i wanted to focus on the leadership part and how that leadership connects to legacy, because if it's any indication from the amazing people in this

room, the amazing people that are not in this room, you have left a profound legacy and connection on individuals that are going to carry forward your work and carry forward this work into the future. carrying the jack legacy. jack macy legacy. and that's something to be in awe and proud of. you have all of these people here that really love you and care for you on a deep, personal level, and that doesn't come just because of a position or a title that becomes because of the individual and what that individual displays day in and day out, which is a caring demeanor that you care for everyone that you come in interact with, you care for the environment, and you're passionate about all the work you do. and that's been embodied through all the testimony you've heard today and the testimony that was left unsaid that we would be here for days if we had

to, to have all of that testimony here in this, in this meeting. so it's been a treasure and honor for me to work alongside you. and i know for everyone here, and it is not over yet. and we all know you're not going very far because this work is too important to you on on a personal level, and you're too important to the movement that we still need to move forward with. so thank you, jack, for everything. oh, wow. i well, i just want to give you all commissioners a deep thanks gratitude. it is it's very humbling. and thanks to my colleagues and all those that spoke, i know it's probably getting late, but i guess i did want to say a few things. you know, it's really an honor to

get this award, and i love it. as you were saying, mike, that johanna's name is on it. that makes it really special because she was an amazing commissioner and i really appreciate, you know, the dedication that we all have, including you as commissioners, to the importance of the environment and to the vision of a healthier environment. and, you know, from the vision down to digging into the details. so i just want to say that, you know, this, this experience that i've had with the department and the city has been so much more than a job or career. it's really been a passion. a lifelong calling, a mission. and it's given me a deep sense of purpose and meaning. and i feel like that is really important in life that the work we do, we really it's really important to feel that sense of passion and vision. and when i came to san francisco

from massachusetts, 30 years ago, i had a vision. i had gotten the state of mass doing yard trimmings, composting. but there was so much more. we got to get the food out. and so i actually saw the opportunity in san francisco. there were particular aspects of san francisco's situation combined with state policy that i thought this could happen here, you know, easier than a lot of other places. so i just feel so fortunate that i was able to come, you know, thanks to sharon maves, who hired me back in 94, and to have been part of the journey and working with so many wonderful people. i certainly didn't do it alone. i just was a part of the process. and it just it was it was tremendously gratifying. and this work has continued to be so gratifying because it keeps the challenges, keep evolving. the environmental challenges we face are huge and we make progress. but so much more needs to happen. and so i guess i just want to say, you

know, it's important. i just sort of say this to everybody that having a sense of purpose and agency is important. and there's we've made we've accomplished a lot, but there's a lot more to be accomplished. and one of my mottos. it's a word that i've held for a long time. it's often part of my passwords is the word bold and the. but that's not the only part. so you're not gonna be able to break. but being bold and there's a girthy quote that i'm not going to rattle off. but, you know, if you have if you can be, if you can be bold, if you can do it, go for it. and you don't know if we're going to succeed and we don't know if we're going to succeed in fighting the climate crisis. but we have to keep keep fighting. there is why there's big challenges. there's so much there's so much opportunities. and we take the small victories as we can and we keep, keep our eyes on the prize for that larger, larger vision. i want to give a deep appreciation of

gratitude to all the colleagues that i've had, my current and all over the years. i see some old faces. hi mary, and it has just been it this working with the city, and especially with the department of the environment has just been a wonderful experience. it is the best organization i've worked in by far and incredible culture, wonderful people, and i just kept, you know, i wasn't planning on leaving, but, you know, there are compelling circumstances in my personal life, my need to be with my wife and her changing circumstances. and as ty said, i am passionate and committed to zero waste and the environment. so i'm going to find ways to stay connected. so you might see me possibly again, or hear from me. so, you know, i think, yeah, i just want to i think that kind of i think that

really covers i could go on and on, but i know it's getting late. so thank you all. so very, very much. thank you. so public comment is now closed that we can take pictures and all that. right okay. great. and. we were. oh yeah. should be okay. all right. 321321. start

snapping. all right. should we get. do we want to get some staff that wanted to jump up and do i need to like go out slightly larger. yeah. yeah. oh yeah. yeah. we'll. go back. i don't want to. i don't want.

to. should we get out? yeah. you guys are more than welcome. no, it's like fema out. yes. right. yeah. okay. everyone should be in it. thank you. okay. yeah. so thank you. once again,

jack, for all your contribution and commitment to us. our next item, please. the next item is item seven, presentation on the department's forthcoming grant making speakers. melissa fondakowski, senior grants and communication coordinator. this item is for discussion. with the arrow keys. yeah, yeah, yeah, with the arrow keys. there you go. yep. okay, great. good afternoon commissioners. my name is melissa fondakowski and i am the senior grants. and communication coordinator at the department. this presentation on the department's forthcoming grant making cycle is an invitation to the commission and the community to provide some feedback on the department's grant making efforts. earlier this year, during a presentation, charles sheehan gave, the commission asked several good questions about what our next grant making cycle would look like, and we're here

to provide some answers to those questions. the department seeks to become more transparent and inclusive in its grant making processes, and we really want to support the success of the organizations and the projects the department funds both by building trusted relationships with the organizations and by being in alignment with the city's grant management policies and guidance. sf environment has been making grants through its zero waste program and environmental justice programs for decades. in 2013, the department began releasing grant funding opportunities. in two year cycles. the most recent cycle, which is actively funding projects through 2025, was the first time that the organization conducted a program wide rfp that proactively focused on funding projects in direct support of the climate action plan. the program wide rfp included funding opportunities across seven categories zero waste carbon fund, environmental justice, and climate toxics reduction, and healthy communities and other

environmental education engagement, decarbonization and community projects of the 24 projects funded during this past cycle, 13 directly support the climate action plan. in the forthcoming cycle, which we hope to release by the end of this year, the department is hoping to take a similar approach. the estimated available funding for this round is approximately 1.8 million, which may support up to 40 grants across five categories environmental justice, toxics reduction and healthy communities, zero waste education and engagement, and decarbonization and electrification. and now i'll go through each category with some more detailed information. as i mentioned at the top of the presentation, one of the reasons we're presenting this today is to respond to some good questions raised by commissioner on during charles presentation for the acceptance of the 1 million epa grant by the commission earlier this year. the grant stipulates that sf environment must provide a

portion of the funds to support community led climate action projects in that regard, environmental justice grants will support projects that eliminate health inequities and environmental burdens in vulnerable communities through education, collaboration and by promoting environmental solutions. the available funding for the environmental justice justice grants is approximately $250,000. the team hopes to award between 5 and 10 grants with an award range between 25 and $50,000. the funds for this category, as mentioned, come from the epa's 1 million government to government grant award, won by the san francisco environment department in late 2023. the focus for these grants was determined by community listening sessions conducted in early 2023, which were submitted as part of the proposal to the epa for the award. all projects will be community led, neighborhood level projects advocated by environmental justice communities. a few examples of the types of projects are conserving,

improving and expanding open spaces in urban forests. sustainability and environmental justice. education, electrification, job training across a range of e-mobility devices like bikes, scooters and cars. culturally relevant environmental outreach and education and engagement like workshops focused on cultural food cultivation practices, reuse and more. overall, the goal of these environmental justice grants is to build capacity around climate action, healthy ecosystems, and continue to advance environmental justice by empowering communities. toxics reduction and healthy communities grants will support projects that reduce human exposure to toxic chemicals. the available funding for the toxics reduction category is approximately $75,000. theeam hopes to award up to two grants with an award range between 10 and $75,000. the funds for this category come from zero waste

funding, and can be used only for toxics reduction. the focus of these grants was determined through conversations and feedback from past grantees, businesses, and community members who expressed the high costs of transitioning to nontoxic products and can include topics such as preventing pollution at the source, promoting the replacement, and use of safer alternatives to toxic products, protecting workers, and protecting overburdened and vulnerable residents from toxic exposures. as well as public education on all of those topic. zero waste grants will support projects that reduce material going to landfill or into our refuse streams. the available funding for the zero waste category is approximately $720,000. the team hopes to award between 10 and 17 grants, with an award range between 5000 and $100,000. the funds for this category come from zero waste

funding, and can be used only to reduce waste. the focus of these grants was determined through feedback received from zero waste event workshops and meetings with event owners around the barriers to zero waste for large and small scale events and can include topics such as reuse and repair workshops, promoting and implementing zero waste events, and tool and other lending events. environmental education and engagement grants will support projects that educate and engage youth, seniors and others in environmental education and engage these groups as environmental ambassadors. the available funding for the environmental education and engagement is approximately $300,000. the team hopes to award between three and six grants with an award range between 25 and $100,000. the funds for this category come from zero waste funding and can be used only for education and engagement around waste reduction, recycling, composting and reuse. the focus of these

grants was determined through continuous community feedback received at events and through communications with cbos regarding educational projects that can build upon the work. sf environment does and can include topics such as neighborhood based climate volunteer programs, environmental train, the trainer ambassador programs, and youth led climate action project development and implementation. just to name a few. decarbonization and electrification grants will support projects that accelerate decarbonization and emissions reductions. the funds for this category will come from the san francisco carbon fund, and the focus for these grants is currently being determined. in the presentation that follows, my colleague amita will dig into the carbon fund with more detail. the carbon fund significantly increases the department's potential to fund climate action work that doesn't often have funding available for community grants. while the epa grant funds are available for

this round, those funds are not a constant. therefore, topic areas such as biodiversity and healthy ecosystems, electrification and building decarbonization, clean transportation and community engagement that is not focused on zero waste are often underfunded and subject to the changing trends of federal and state grants. tracking and monitoring sf program teams currently monitor and track grantee projects through grant agreements, work plans, invoices, check in meetings, final reports, photos, and a lot of other methods to document work, which are part of our current current processes and procedures. the team is now in the process of updating our guidelines based on the controller's new nonprofit grant management policies and procedures to develop processes for our department that are compliant while also ensuring low reporting burden and low barrier to partnership with the department. this includes supporting grantees and building capacity to effectively do business with the city. additionally, as in all of our

programs, sf environment has an emphasis on racial and social equity. in some cases, our funding sources are tied to supporting environmental justice communities like the epa, government to government grant, and part of our tracking effort is to ensure we meet our funder requirements. the team is currently. i'm sorry, that's an extra. moving on. apologies. the next steps on november 14th. san francisco environment is hosting a networking opportunity for current past, and potential nonprofit and cbo grantees to learn more about the forthcoming grant cycle, connect with each other and sf environment staff, and hopefully many of you commissioners will be able to join for this opportunity. a cbo survey, which will contain a few questions about cbo funding needs and priorities moving forward, will be shared with the attendees, as well as san francisco environment's larger cbo mailing list to help inform our grant making. the rfp, as mentioned at the top, is

targeted for release by the end of 2024, and that concludes the presentation. thank you. commissioners, is there any questions or discussion? i think it's pretty clear. thank you for your presentation. let's open up for public comment. are there any members of the public who wish to comment on this item? madam president, we have no speakers. thank you. hearing no further public comments. public comment is now closed. next item please. the next item is item eight. presentation on san francisco carbon fund. the speaker is sharda mehta, community partnerships and engagement program manager. this item is for discussion. thank you. good evening commissioners, i'm shrestha mehta community partnerships and engagement program manager at the department. while some

commissioners may have heard about the carbon fund in the past, when shawn rosen moss, who retired a few years ago, managed the program and presented on it, i know we have some new commission commissioners, so we thought it might be a good time to provide some background information on the carbon fund and some updates. san francisco's carbon mitigation program is a city ordinance requiring each city department to contribute 13% of the actual airline ticket price for all travel into a fund that we refer to as the carbon fund. eligible expenditures related to the carbon fund include any projects that reduce greenhouse gas emissions in sf bay area, and the administrative costs to support carbon reduction projects or programs. these can include grant funded projects or projects that are implemented by sf staff. the ordinance was

adopted in 2007 under mayor gavin newsom, and we've had a few grant cycles which have been staggered to allow for growth of the pot of funding. because the carbon fund is dependent on air travel, the fund fluctuates year over year for example, we saw a dip due to the pandemic and numbers have slowly picked back up to pre-pandemic levels. we also typically see dips in the fund during times of economic downturn, where travel is viewed as nonessential, travel of city staff is viewed as nonessential. carbon fund dollars roll over when no grants are made, and in some cases, we have waited several years to allow for the pot of funding to grow so that we could award larger grants and

or more grants. and this is a snapshot of the amounts that were awarded in different calendar years. overall, we have awarded approximately $1.7 million in carbon fund grants, and there were a total of 36 grants. there are a wide range of projects that have been funded. a few examples include community gardens, tree planting, congregation greening, fruit tree planting, a biodiesel biodiesel project, and environmental justice building. decarbonization projects. there are a variety of measures related to previous carbon fund grants. metrics that we've we've been able to sequester 3000

metric tons of co2, engaged a few thousand volunteers. we've reduced runoff and planted thousands of trees and plants. projects cover sites all across the city. there are also several current carbon fund grants that will each have their own metrics. for example, one current environmental justice grant includes the installation of a heat pump system at a community center and the distribution of induction cooktops and cookware to families, and so those measures are not included on this slide, but will be included when we receive the final reports for those projects. and they wrap up in grantees, typically report on their metrics in the grant reports as melissa mentioned in her presentation. there is a current balance of $578,498 in the carbon fund, and while we haven't determined the exact amount that will be released in

this grant cycle, or the types of projects that will be funded, we do have some overarching priorities that will guide the criteria development. for example, we want to continue to align projects with the san francisco climate action plan goals and support community led initiatives when needed. we will provide staff support and technical assistance to support these carbon reducing initiatives. and as with all of our work, racial and social equity continues to be a focus. so we'll prioritize projects that serve environmental justice communities and other marginalized populations. and you heard from melissa that there are some areas of our climate action work that don't currently have consistent funding available for community grants. and so examples include our biodiversity and healthy ecosystems work, our building, decarbonization work, clean transportation and community

engagement work that is not focused on zero waste. so we're taking a look at how the carbon fund may be able to support some of that work and still align with our overarching priorities. and as melissa mentioned, community engagement has helped us identify our environmental grant priorities. and it's the same. the same is true for our carbon fund. we'll continue that engagement through our cbo networking event in mid-november and our cbo survey that will be launched around then as well. and our staff will also be conducting interviews with cbos to have deeper conversations with them. so we'd also welcome commissioners feedback as we continue to refine our carbon fund and overarching grantmaking strategies. thank you. thank you. just a quick question. so when will the carbon fund grant making process start? like also

the end of the year or has a different timeline? it has the same timeline. it will be launched at the same time, and we're still collecting feedback from through the through the cbo survey. we're collecting feedback around some of those priorities. but as i mentioned, there are a few areas that of work that are unfunded. and the carbon fund, as long as it's in alignment with our climate action plan goals and supporting community led initiatives that we're looking at. thank you. yeah. commissioner, any questions or discussion? great. thank you for your presentation. let's open up for public comment. thank you. are there any members of the public who wish to comment on this item? madam president, we have no speakers. thank you. public comment is now closed. next item please. the next item is item nine. update on 2024 bay region

programs. the speakers are loyal to energy program manager cara battista rao, senior energy efficiency specialist, and ryan ramos, senior energy efficiency specialist. this item is for discussion. hi. good evening, commissioners tyrone alice, good evening, i'm lowell tew, i'm the program manager for the energy team. and this evening i'm joined as alice mentioned, i'm joined by my colleagues cara and ryan to provide you with the annual update on the progress of the bay run programs. the bay area regional energy network. and. but before i get into the updates, i'd like to provide you a little background on the evolving energy landscape. since our last presentation in september 2023, electricity prices in california have surged, making our electricity prices the second highest in the nation. this rise in rates

reflects the fact that utility costs in california includes much more than electricity generation and distribution, high electricity prices highlight the important need for energy efficiency, emphasizing the significance of our team's ongoing efforts. improvements such as lighting, insulation, high performance windows significantly improve the comfort, safety and, more importantly, the energy use of that home for instance, an article in the san francisco chronicle recently showcased a family that managed to cut $2,600 from their annual pge bill. the family achieved the savings through energy efficiency they installed building insulation, led lighting, a programable digital thermostat as well as changing

their habits on how they run their dishwashers and charge their electric vehicles during off peak hours. additionally, the family opted for to install an electric heat pump, water heater. the savings from the energy efficiency helped offset any potential cost increase associated with adding a new electric appliance to their hom. at the heart of our daily work, we're helping san franciscans save money on their utility bills. as you soon discover, the energy team offers a range of different bay ran programs that provide generous rebates and project management services to both residents and businesses, not only in san francisco, but also across the entire bay area. our team of building science professionals is dedicated to assisting community members to understand that utility costs are not fixed. instead, they

have the power to take action and make a difference and manage that cost. so now i'll turn it over to kara, who is going to review some of the barren commercial programs. thank you, lowell, and good evening, commissioners. i'm kara batista. i'm a senior energy efficiency specialist, and my role is to lead the implementation of byron's small business programs. as lowell mentioned, byron is the bay area regional energy network, and it was authorized by the state regulator in 2012. it's a program administrator of public ratepayer funds. so byron covers all nine bay area counties about 7 million people and almost 100,000 small businesses. byron represents a more regional approach to reducing energy use and greenhouse gas emissions, as well as helping businesses and residents to cut utility costs.

byron has three goals. the first goal is to reach hard to reach populations. the second is to pilot new and innovative programs that have the potential to scale, and the third is to run programs that investor owned utilities don't run. so based on that background, byron is a critical partner to s.f. byron builds our internal capacity, employing nearly eight full time employees. it's one of the most reliable instruments that we have to help our residents and our businesses save money while achieving our climate action goals, and these actions includg environmentally harmful refrigerants from our small businesses. fiscally, byron's annual budget is 19% of the department's annual budget. and so now we'll talk a little bit

about some of the programs. byron business is a regional energy efficiency program that brings big energy savings to our small businesses. s.f. leads the administration and implementation of this program, which serves all nine bay area counties. the program has a very strong focus on equity. we exclusively serve businesses that are hard to reach, and that means that they could be businesses located in a disadvantaged community or on california native american tribal lands, or business owners who speak english as a second language. byron business has a $3 million annual incentive budget, and the program has a very innovative pay for performance approach, which just means that we only pay for actual energy savings that we measure at the meter, and that helps to protect the ratepayer funding. 2024 has been a very successful year for byron

business. this year we've received 259 project applications, typically for lighting and refrigeration measures at businesses. and this is across all nine bay area counties and 11 different commercial sectors. so things like offices, beauty salons, auto repair shops, retail corner stores and restaurants and bars with our 259 applications, we've also completed 189 project installations since june of 2023, and we have more installations currently underwa. on average, a business saves about 6500 kilowatt hours each year, and that translates to about $2,000 in electric savings per business per year. our average estimated incentive is $14,000 for each project, and all of this success is a result

of ongoing collaboration between our our installation contractors, our byron county representatives and our other program partners. and finally, next year, we're going to be working with a new company that supports us with engineering and implementation support. so i wanted to share a highlight about a local business. byron business completed a lighting and refrigeration efficiency upgrade at oak hill market. and this is a family owned and operated market in the lower haight. the store is projected to save $5,000 annually on their utility bill, and sammy hatter, who is the manager at oak hill market, his quote here is that the lighting in the store is much better and brighter, the refrigerator makes less noise, and the whole process was extremely easy. and now i'll talk about our newest byron

program, the byron refrigerant replacement program, or br for short. br is an equity program that serves food and floral sector businesses that are in low income and disadvantaged communities and that have refrigeration systems. today, most common refrigerants are called hydrofluorocarbons or hfcs. hfcs have a very high global warming potential, meaning that they're very potent heat trapping emissions that are exponentially much more powerful than carbon dioxide produced when burning fossil fuels. so the br program aims to fix refrigerant leaks. we replace high global warming refrigerants with lower global warming potential refrigerants, and we also optimize refrigeration systems to be more efficient. we are currently conducting three pilot projects in san francisco. in september, we did our first

pilot projects on site assessment at haight and cole liquor, which is an independently owned convenience store, and we're now looking at the project scope of work. and later this week, we'll be doing our second on site assessment at our next pilot project in the mission. so these pilot projects are going to help us to fine tune the program's rules and processes to help ensure a smooth, soft launch of the program. in the first quarter of 2025 to the broader bay area. and during that soft launch to the region, we will complete an additional 17 projects. so now i'll turn it over to my colleague ryan. thanks, cara. good evening commissioners. my name is ryan ramos. i'm a senior energy efficiency specialist with the department. you may remember me from the august commission meeting for the fix let sf program. i lead both the fix let sf program and the bay run residential programs. i'll begin with the multifamily program. since 2012, the bay run

multifamily program is the longest running multifamily energy efficiency program in california. it's also the first multifamily program to provide rebates and technical assistance for electrification measures. this year, the program has enrolled 188 units to date, with an additional 164 units scheduled for completion before the end of the year. out of the 352 units served in 2024, over 95% are considered affordable housing units. most of these projects leverage other energy programs, such as the state's low low income weatherization program and the california energy commission's statewide equitable hot water heat pump program in order to deliver the most comprehensive mix of energy savings and electrification to these properties and tenants. the stacking of these rebates drastically reduces the costs, particularly for affordable housing developers and operators. the bay run multifamily program is the only program that comprehensively

bundles energy efficiency and building electrification, making it the most effective, most impactful residential electrification program in the region. now i'll turn to the bay run single family program. the single family program has undergone a significant revamp that will focus on the most that will focus on more comprehensive weatherization in underserved communities. the new program design will launch in a limited capacity in early 2025, with san francisco likely to be part of the early rollout. moreover, the energy team will look to layer electrification rebates and incentives onto the bay run single family weatherization measures through the state and through state and federal funding. within the program, the energy team works closely with the climate team to deliver deeper retrofits to communities in need. for example, the participants in the direct install heat pump water heater program in san francisco's southeast communities will be the first residents served by the single family program. now i will turn it over back, turn it

back to lowell to see what's next for byron. thanks. thank you, ryan, and thanks, kara. now i'm going to share just a little bit of our priorities. what's in store for 2025? first, we are going to update the bay strategic plan, which was developed originally in 2020. now we are laying the foundation to update the five year plan, which aligns perfectly with the refresh of the update of our climate action plan. the goal is to ensure the bay strategic plan is closely integrated with the climate action plan update, movingyí forward, the next priority for the coming year is demonstrating our value to our funders, lawmakers, ratepayers. in july, there was an effort in sacramento to reduce funding for energy efficiency and low income rate assistance programs in a bid to slightly lower monthly electricity prices. thankfully, the lawmakers chose not to

pursue that course of action. however, they have committed to revisiting this issue next year. so in response, byron, in collaboration with a diverse group of interested parties, is developing a strategy to clearly illustrate our value to them and their constituents. our third priority, as karen mentioned, is to fully launch the bur byron refrigerant program. and the last but not least, our fourth priority is to continually improve all byron programs to reduce administrative costs while enhancing customer experiences and maximizing their benefits. in closing, thank you. we thank you for your time. the team is committed to improving energy affordability while advancing energy efficiency and equity every day. energy efficiency is the most cost effective strategy for tackling rising electricity prices. as

such, byron stands as a very important partner in creating a future where no one has to face energy cost burden today, tomorrow and beyond. thank you. thank you for your very detailed presentation. commissioners, do you have any discussion questions? yes, commissioner. i guess it seems like a lot of the programs are kind of voluntary opt in by some of the businesses or residents. are there mechanisms that are kind of obligating some of these targets to implement these based on legislation or rules that require them to do so? yeah, yeah. so it's a great question, commissioner, with these ratepayer funded programs, they are voluntary. so i think what another the there's the carrot and the stick. so the stick

would be through like the building codes and improving the those type of like appliance codes. like i mentioned building codes. and then the carrot would be look we have money to help you implement some of these code changes so that, you know, the pairing of the two is really to try to advance, ensuring no one is left behind. thank you. yes. thank you lowell. great presentation. i know it's only part of what you're doing, but electrification is part of this program. and i want to just ask you what what do you think are the biggest impediments to electrification? because we hear anecdotally how hard it is for people to who who want to switch from gas to electric and there seem to be a lot of lot of ideas about why it's so hard. so what do you think are the biggest impediments? yeah. great question, commissioner sullivan. i think there are like three categories. i think there is the grid capacity that's an issue. then there is the cost. then

there is like the awareness of the benefits. so, you know, the energy team really focuses on the last two pieces. you heard from kara and ryan. their their teams are out there raising the awareness around efficiency and electrification to bring that cost down. we have the rebates. we have the projected savings. right? if you apply efficiency, you'll get this return on your investment and then you can reinvest it into electrification. so that's the story we're trying to build around each and every multifamily, single family and small business. thank you. thank you. yes, commissioner. on is it possible to get excuse me, a map of say like outreach being done in certain wherever it is locations. i know there are probably privacy concerns. we can't, like, isolate. i imagine individual households. but is that possible to see in the future, too? yeah, yeah, i think

yes, the short answer is yes, especially for the better in business program where it's a contractor driven program. so we have we're basically relying on the installation contractors and their sales staff to go out to these commercial corridors. and it's really clearly defined because like karen mentioned, the small business program is focused on really serving the hard to reach. and a lot of those are in disadvantaged communities. so a lot of the focus for the contractors have been within the disadvantaged community. so we can show you the map of where the outreach has been and then where the projects have been installed. so we can do that for the multifamily, it's a little bit trickier. the good news is the multifamily outreach is really a word of mouth. as ryan mentioned, we have like almost 13 years and this is the longest running multifamily program in california. and we have had the success and the relationships with the owners, the operators

and the developers where we really don't have a lot. we don't do a lot of the outreach to get the projects the, the these parties already know about us. so what we bring in is a technical assistance and the awareness and the analysis. so if we have someone who's interested in electrifying one of the multifamily buildings, ryan and his colleague mira would go out there and provide them with a computer model of what you would expect to save in terms of electrification. mira and ryan will help identify some of the challenges and help develop some of the workarounds and solutions. so we can also show you where our success our projects are coming from, but not necessarily the outreach, really. maybe another way of asking the question i was trying to get at was can you immediately off the top of your head, identify gaps in the outreach that you wish you could go after and that's the reason why i asked. sure. i'm sorry, is sometimes like a quick cut of

like, okay, you know, x neighborhood is missing out or, you know, y property should be addressed. but yeah, i'm wondering if you have. yeah, i think so. i think i think to your point, if you were able if we were to map out some of the outreach efforts, i think that would be clear. we haven't done it yet. thank you. any other questions? thank you for your presentation. let's open up for public comment. are there any members of the public who wish to comment on this item? madam president, we have no speakers. all right. the public comment is now closed. next item please. the next item is item ten. review and vote on whether to approve resolution file 2020 4-090. a resolution urging the board of supervisors to pass an update to the all electric new construction ordinance to include major renovations. the sponsor for this item is cindy comerford. climate program manager. speaker nick kisner, senior buildingnization coordinator. explanatory

documents are all electric. renovations policy proposal and resolution file 2020 409 co. this item is for discussion and possible action. good evening commissioners. my name is cindy comerford. i'm the climate program manager and i'm here to introduce our next item. we're here to give a very brief presentation on our all electric major renovation ordinance and ask for your support in form of a resolution. so just to give a little bit of background, my colleagues, nick kestner, myself and barry hooper came to present to you in the spring. in the spring we gave you an overview of the building operations chapter of the climate action plan. we talked about our implementation, which predominantly focuses on building decarbonization and we also gave an introduction to our major renovation ordinance. our major renovation ordinance is meant to be a companion to our all electric new construction ordinance. it basically closes a loophole in that ordinance for

construction projects that kind of mirror new construction to make sure that they're not installing any fossil fuels or natural gas. so since then, we have had two major updates. one, we have a sponsor for that legislation. so supervisor mandelman is sponsoring that legislation. and based on his sponsorship, he asked us to do some additional outreach. so over the last couple of months, we've done some additional outreach. and that outreach has resulted in a couple of modifications to that ordinance. so nick kestner is going to give an overview of the ordinance and talk a little bit about the changes we've made since our last presentation, and then we're hoping to get your support in a form of a resolution. the legislation should be going to the board of supervisors, hopefully in the next couple of weeks, and we're hoping that we can get it approved hopefully by the end of the year or early january. and so with that, i'm going to introduce nick. thank you. good evening commissioners.

nice to be here again. that loophole is also a great opportunity. i just want to emphasize before i begin, if you are gutting your building or have an opportunity to get all new systems and make a lot of structural work, what a great time to save the money on the gas equipment and invest it in electric equipment, because you're going to have to do that before our 2040 climate neutrality target anyway. and so in this way, you can kind of get the benefit of that renovation. so what are we talking about here? you have the image in front of you. we have new construction projects that look very similar to major renovation projects, because some of the latter actually involve a complete gutting of the inside of the building, structural alterations, new equipment going in in this case at 100 van ness. we were even reskinning the building. so in those situations you can just very dramatically see that a major renovation project might be that in name only. but actually, in terms of the work that it's done, it often mirrors a new construction

project, which is which was the motivation for us expanding the policy. the other area where we see a real need to improve what we passed in 2021 is the situation that happens during additions, where an expansion or an addition to an existing space is not treated as new construction, even when, as in this case, you might have completely newly renovated or newly constructed high rise attached to an old existing building and therefore being exempt from the existing policy. so here we have that missed opportunity that i was talking about at the very beginning. that high rise could have been all electric, but because it was connected to an existing building, the policy did not apply. so as a quick reminder, the new construction policy requires that your heating and cooling, hot water systems, cooking and drying are all electric indoors and outdoors, and that gas piping cannot be

added at a later point in time. and what we're now talking about is adding those same requirements to major renovations, which we define as projects that get new mechanical systems and that have substantial upgrades to the interior, which usually means structural work, moving walls, that kind of thing. this might be a more familiar example to you in your neighborhoods. this is an example of a gut rehab or a gut renovation in a residential space. so once again, the major systems are being updated. and for residential setting, you might think of the building as being unoccupied, because the amount of work is so great that you can't spend the night there, or maybe even the day. as you'll remember, the original or the current ordinance has some exceptions built into it that would carry over to the major renovations policy. so the first is one of technical feasibility or technically infeasibility. if

the project cannot be made all electric because of some technical infeasibility, then an exception can be made by dbi and a mixed fuel in other words, a gas containing project can be approved. some examples would be that the energy code doesn't allow the all electric project to move forward, or the utility infrastructure isn't there. as you mentioned, commissioner sullivan, or there's a physical space constraint that makes it impossible to include the heat pump technology, the electric technologies, where there once was gas equipment. the other exception that's already built in is one for a commercial cooking process that cannot be done except with gas. and in those cases, a gas line can be run to that particular process, not to the building. as a whole, so that that gas process can continue in the otherwise all electric building. really important to point out, those exceptions currently only apply if the problem goes away. if you choose a mixed fuel building. so

as a simple example, if you need to make electric service upgrades for a mixed fuel, i.e. a gas building, as well as for the all electric building, then those costs assuming they're similar, are the same and you don't have a basis for an exemption in that particular case. but if the all electric construction construction requires a service upgrade and the gas construction does not, in that case, you might have a basis for an exception. any questions? i'll pause briefly to make sure that that is clear. so as cindy mentioned, we've done a bunch of outreach on an ongoing basis. the building operations task force, which i chair is involved, was involved in creating the ordinance. so we did not do this in a vacuum, but actually worked with stakeholders from the building industry, from cbos, city departments, nonprofits in the environmental space, all kinds of stakeholders who have met with us on a monthly basis and are actually still working with us right now on our next policy,

the building performance standard. we also had two focus groups with kind of the biggest stakeholders in the room, the affordable housing developers, who are obviously very concerned that gut rehabs might become too expensive as a result of this ordinance. and the building owners and managers association, which represents large building owners and also, as cindy mentioned, after the task force developed the outlines of the major renovation, all electric major renovations ordinance, there were some additional levels of outreach to see what additional tweaks needed to be made, and so that includes outreach to affordable housing developers. again, large market developers who are involved in the office to residential conversion space, and also the chinese chamber of commerce. as a result of those conversations, we decided to tailor the approach in three particular existing building situations. the first is that we decided a two year phase in was appropriate for affordable housing developers, so they have a little bit more time to line

up the funding that's required for an all electric renovation of their building stock. the second is a limited reuse of major systems that are installed in the last five years. what that means is if a building. sorry. and this is for, well, this is for large commercial buildings. i'm sorry. i'm actually confusing myself. that's for all in all situations. yeah, okay. in all situations. so if you've just installed a gas system, let's say in 2022 and you're doing work in 2026 and you want to take that gas system out, store it on site, and then put it back into the new building that is allowed for five years, but not after that point. and it's only allowed if you're literally using that piece of equipment. again, it's not about the fact that you've used gas and you bought a new piece of equipment, you sent it to the landfill and you get a new piece that is not allowed. so it's really about saving costs in a very particular and isolated case. and then finally, in the office of residential conversion space,

a mixed fuel building. in other words, a gas using building is allowed if an electric service upgrade would be triggered by the conversion from office to residential. and that's in recognition of the fact that it's really important at this moment in time, and probably will be for a long time to encourage those conversions to happen. since we don't have enough housing stock in our cit. so next steps, i think cindy probably covered most of them, but as you know, supervisor mandelman is sponsoring the legislation. we're finished. we're finishing the draft language as we speak. in fact, we might have already gotten there. and the board of introduction is coming up in the next month or so. so with that, i will open it up to questions and invite you to come back up as necessary. commissioners, any questions? yes. vice president yeah great presentation. and i'm a huge supporter of this idea. i wanted to ask about the feasibility exceptions like how

i'm a little worried about them being exploited down the road, how how how likely do you think the feasibility exceptions are going to come into play down the road? like like grid capacity for example? it is. okay. it's a bit of a bit of conjecture, but let me frame the policy landscape a little bit because i think other policies may start to have an impact on some of these buildings. so we're talking about a subset of renovation projects that might happen in an existing building. right. they could be much smaller projects that we wouldn't define as a gut rehab. for example, in a large office building, you might want to update 2 or 3 floors and you're bringing in a new tenant. so those much smaller projects will be captured by the building performance standard that we're working on right now. and that is basically legislation that will require large commercial and multifamily buildings to meet increasingly stringent greenhouse gas emission standards all the way to zero by

2040. so at some point, the requirements of this ordinance will kind of intersect with the requirements of that next ordinance at which point a lot of these projects will be caught up in the other ordinance, and it will become less relevant whether or not there's an exception built into this one. so that's one way to answer it. do you want to answer in a different way? maybe a simpler way to answer it is you know, we've had the new construction ordinance on the books for a while, and we haven't received an overwhelming number of waivers for this technical infeasibility. so there's no expectation that that trend would automatically increase just because we did the major renovations and if i could just add one thing, you also there's a process that you need to go to get a waiver. you have to have a third party verification and go through a dbi process. so it's not very easy to get the waivers. there has to be a technical assessment by a third party stating that there is some

sort of actual technical or physical infeasibility and as tyrone said, to date we haven't received very many waivers of an ordinance that went into effect in 2021. got it. so you're you're basic. i mean, we have a lot of neighborhoods that are pretty built out in san francisco, you know, noe valley, for example. so your your basic house on 25th street in noe valley that's got renovated. they're not going to that homeowner is not going to be able to say pga can't support my all electric building. you think that's unlikely? i mean if that is true and they can't do it, they'll have a third party verify that and they'll be given an exemption. if it's a, you know, a significant hardship. but there is a process for that. thank you. thank you. any other questions? yeah. just curious what is the percentage of cost increase to go to all electrification versus prior. it depends on your definition. we

like to think more about the net cost because in in all of these cases you're already doing the work anyway. if you didn't know about the ordinance, you would be planning a natural gas. you know, a new pieces of natural gas equipment, and now you're you're moving up to electrification. so the net cost for a for residential like single family home, which is the majority of where this will this ordinance will play a role is going to be in the 5 to $10,000 range and then actually on the multifamily you start looking at a per unit and it becomes even more, you know, the delta÷gj> becomes less oh i see, yeah. but if you were to just start from scratch and you were just deciding to decarbonize your single family home right now for. no, you know, just as a standalone measure unrelated to your own renovation, it would be twice that much, 20, about $20,000. so a lot of these early pioneers that that are part of our home tours or that you might

know from, you know, friends of the family. et cetera. they've they've spent about twice that amount. yeah i see, thank you. that's very helpful. is there any other questions? then let's open up for public comment. wait. i'm sorry. we actually need to approve the resolution prior to open the public comment. do i hear a motion? motion to approve. thank you, vice president. and second. second. thank you. so we have a motion by vice president sullivan. a second by commissioner bermejo. and let's open up for public comment. are there any members of the public who wish to comment on this ite? madam president, we have no speakers. thank you. so public comment is now closed. please call the roll for item ten. president juan. hi. vice president sullivan i commissioner an i commissioner bermejo i commissioner hunter i commissioner tompkins i commissioner yuan i thank you.

motion passes. next item please. the next item is item 11. director's report. speaker tyrone jud. director. and this item is for discussion. hi, commissioners. you have your detailed director's report in your packet. i'm just going to lift up a couple key things that happened during this period. one did want to make you aware of the clean transportation side. we've completed the first phase of our csp grant for e-bike delivery pilot. so we'll be kind of wrapping that up going into that second phase, because we got that second grant to expand the program. i did want to call out that the cao annex, which is a fiscally sponsored group by the california investor owned utilities cal, next awarded $300,000 for to sfe to retrofit three small food related businesses in san francisco with advanced natural refrigerants. so, following up on what you heard from from lowell, our policy and public affairs team has been really, really busy. also, if you have not heard,

there was an ordinance that passed through the board of supervisors through sponsored by supervisor peskin and supervisor preston to develop an e-bike incentive ordinance and essentially just established a new fund so didn't allocate any money or anything towards it, but it established a fund and a mechanism to raise funds to support an e-bike incentive program. so actually, i take that back. it's headed back to the full board or did it pass? it passed pass through lou okay. yeah. it's headed back to the full board. it just passed through land use. i stand corrected and then one other ribbon to give our policy and public affairs team. we got an accept and expend through for deloitte, which is providing pro bono tax services to the city of san francisco to allow us to access direct pay incentives from the federal government. and so through the inflation reduction act, there was a

provision that allowed non tax paying entities to apply for tax credits that were only eligible for individuals or companies that were paying taxes. the ira opened up this pathway to allow governments and nonprofits to take advantage of those same tax credits, and so this is the first time the city has been able to apply for these tax credits. and we got the pro bono services from deloitte to offer their expertise as tax advisers to the entire city to basically see how much money we can, we can get through this new avenue. there was a mad dash to the finish because the filing was actually due a few weeks ago for this. this past calendar year, but we got it over the finish line. we got the accept and expand, and our goal is to access that money for the city, get more money back for the city, for all of our vehicle electrification projects, our solar projects, eligible projects like that, and then hopefully turn that around to encourage more investments in

sustainability. a couple other things that happened. we had exchange programs and events. i mentioned that we were participating with the city of dublin o exchange trip. that was lowell, charles and cindy participated in. we reciprocated that trip and welcomed our dublin colleagues over here in san francisco just a few weeks ago, and it was very successful. we had a convening with the consul general of sweden and the governor's office in san francisco, most recently to talk about building electrification and community engagement. san francisco played host to the world economic forum's urban transformation summit. and so we were part partnering with them on helping them access sites, leading a few different conversations. tomorrow i'll be joining the british consulate for a conversation on ai and the intersections of nature positivity. so we are all over the place spreading the gospel of the great work we're doing here in the city. and just for a

fun note, i'll be doing an electric fireside chat with commissioner on tomorrow to talk about his book advocate. if you haven't, if you haven't read it, it's a really great read. it's a fun read. and then subsequently on wednesday, i'll be doing a discussion at the public library with rosanna sia on coastal erosion in california. so if you have time, come by and join. we'll also have an update on the calendar for our refuse rate process, because we're just starting and we're going to move forward with that, but we're going to cover that in new business. and with that, i'll conclude and answer any questions. thank you. any questions i do concur. it's a great book. i agree yeah i'm definitely interested to hear more about how ai is going to change this sector as well. i will i will have an ai chatbot come by and deliver that report the next time around. no proble.

we'll see if there's no further questions. let's open up for public comment. are there any members of the public who wish to comment on this item? hi, thank you all for being here. so it's not really a comment. it's just a question to clarify. you said after the exchange programs you mentioned something about spreading the gospel about something, and i didn't catch that. it was like eco joy or something. why don't you finish your public comment and i'll and i'll answer, oh, okay. okay. go ahead. would you like me to. ye, please. really? it was more

about, as you heard from our recognition of jack macy, our work is not contained within the confines of our seven by seven area in sanr work has impact outside throughout the state and internationally, and we're constantly engaging with everyone from local, state, federal and in the international community to ensure that the great work we're doing here is being spread. thanks for the clarification. are there any other members of the public who wish to comment on this item? madam president, we have no more speakers so public comment is now closed. next item please. the next item is item 12. new business future agenda items. speakers are charles sheahan, chief policy and public affairs officer, and leo kai, deputy director. good good evening,

commissioners charles sheehan, policy and public affairs. the next commission meeting is on monday, december 2nd. we have our commission meeting the beginning of the month in december to avoid the holidays. so monday, december 2nd, we've got a number of items. since we're closing out the year, we'll have the approval and presentation of the bi green report. we may have a presentation on our healthy nail salon marketing campaign. we may also hear about the refuse rate process and the priorities that we have in advance of that really ramping up in january, february, march, april of next year. and so it'll be kind of a prelude presentation. i'm almost going to turn it over to my colleague leo, who's going to dive a little bit deeper into the refuse rate process, as well as the upcoming budget process that will start in early january of 2025. but on that note, i did have a conversation with commissioner juan. as you know, we usually have an operations

committee to review the budget and then a full commission to approve the budget. and there's always three commissioners that kind of get two bites at the apple, and it's a little redundant. what we'd like to do this year is have a full commission meeting in january, a special meeting, maybe january 6th. i know alice will send out a query about the best time and date in early january, and then we'll follow that up with a final budget approval presentation in february for our february meeting. and so that's what we're looking at for january and february. and leo's going to talk a little bit more. so why don't i why don't i let leo come up to talk a little bit more about the budget process and about the refuse rate process, and then we can both answer questions. great. thank you charles. good to see you all. commissioners. so we are gearing up for budget that is

happening. there's both the usual process that we're used to where the mayor's office has a two year budget that it needs to propose by june 1st, and there's many months of preparation in anticipation for that, with certain key work time points that we need to meet this year. there's also the refuse rate setting process, which has a lot of interaction with the budget, because that process helps to determine how much solid waste impound account money will come to our department and dpw, as well as the rates that the customers who need to pay recology will have to pay. so there has been an effort to try to align the calendars as much as possible. but it's still imperfect. and so i just wanted to highlight some key dates as well as kind of take us through some of the processes so that

you're aware of what's expected. i'll start with the refuse rate setting process, because that has formally kicked off. so the refuse rate administrator basically released instructions in september to essentially recology to put forward their proposal for what their budget would be over a three year rate period, which would begin in october of 2026, 2025. so they have been given instructions to start making those projections and determining what their work program will look like and the way that the city handles the departmental pieces is to also include what san francisco environment and dpw need in their budgets as well. when they hear an aggregate proposal for what the rates should be. so

that aggregate proposal is due to the refuse rate administrator in early january. so the way that it works is right now our zero waste staff on the program side have been in a lot of regular direct communications with recology about what they see as priorities for the city. what do we need recology to implement and do in order to help us meet our zero waste goals and meet the city's top priorities? and they've presented to the refuse rate board on that already, and will have some of that information in the likely december agenda item. additionally, we'll have to have determined what we need to ask for in the budget from the refuse rate process in advance of that january date as well. so that means that while our regular proposal to the mayor's office is due on february 22nd,

as it always is, we need to do some of this work related to this particular color of money in advance. so that's where we'll really be focusing over the next like 5 or 6 weeks to make sure that we know what we want to use. impound account dollars for, and to have good justification and support for that moving forward. so in terms of key dates from the refuse rate administrator, they need to present to our commission as well as dpw commission. and so they've asked to come to our january board meeting. so that would be another reason for the commission to meet in january, rather than just the operations committee. and that would be a chance for them to take you through an overview of their process and what they're thinking. and then they would return. they're proposing an april return to share an update on where they are in the refuse

rate setting process at that time, and then they basically iterate from january through through really may, when they kind of have some numbers that stop moving and then they propose and have a series of additional hearings with their board to set what those budget parameters will look like for the refuse rate. and so it's close to the city's timeline, and we should know a lot of information as they go forward, because there will be public information about what they're thinking about, what they're recommending, what they're going to publicly notice in may under prop 218, which they have to mail to all san francisco ratepayers. so there will be information available, but they don't technically have to finalize their process until july, when the board of supervisors is finalizing its

budget process. so there's not a required alignment. but we're hoping that because they started a little bit earlier this year and they're trying to push for some more concrete information that we think will be useful, that there will be some alignment with the city's process and just for context, last time around, because the refuse rate process finished so much later than the city finalized its budget, we had money that the refuse rate board approved that wasn't actually in the budget. so then that meant that that spending got delayed by one fiscal year. so we're hoping that that won't happen this time around. that the that they'll match to the extent possible. so i believe jay liao, who is the refuse rate administrator, should be coming in january to that meeting to share an overview of that process. and they have their own consultant working with them, providing information. they're going to be having their own set

of meetings with community members about the rate setting process. and, you know, we'll be tracking that closely. but we will also want to be clear that it's independent of our work. so that's what's happening with the rate process, with the budget process, we are hearing from the mayor's office that we should get budget instructions a bit earlier than usual this year, so we're anticipating them in late november and thanksgiving, so late that it would be before thanksgiving if they are able to do what they're hoping and that means that they typically give us instructions to cut a certain percentage of our general fund support, and then we would have conversations with all of you in our january commission meeting, and then we would have an additional budget hearing in february to follow up with us having incorporated any feedback that we hear from you and any additional information on the

numbers. and then we would propose our budget to the mayor by the february 22nd deadline. the mayor's office would then take that information, and they would need to propose a citywide budget by june 1st. so that's their timeline for the overall city's two year budget. and again, the city's proposing for fiscal years 2526 and 2627. the rate board is looking at probably three years, although they haven't committed to it only being three years, and their rate year starts in october of 2025. so there's a lot of just challenges with keeping everything aligned and clear. so it's just something that we'll continue to work with them on. i guess the only other thing i would add about the mayor's office process is that they have given us some preliminary instructions and they continue to be very concerned about structural deficits going forward. and they

see revenues increasing just a little bit, but they see costs potentially skyrocketing. and so we're getting information already about what they're envisioning. and so it's hard to imagine that there won't be a cut scenario based on where they are right now. they've asked departments to hold back about 3.5% of their salary, and fringe budgets for staffing because they anticipate eliminating positions later. is their public message. so they don't want us trying to all aggressively fill 100% of our staffing. that's using general fund, because they see reductions as something that's likely to be proposed. and again, that's not tailored for us. there's departments that have a huge percentage of their budget as general fund, including mostly in staffing. we get under $2 million, you know, and the staffing amount is around. i think 1.1 or so in the

current proposed budget for next year. so the reduction would be like in the range of 30,000 that they would be asking us to hold back. and i'm continuing to explore that with them, because we do have very limited amounts of general fund. and so we don't want to continue to whittle that down because it's really important that we have that stability. but it is going to be an ongoing conversation with our analysts over there to try to make sure that we're working collaboratively with the city and following instructions without kind of putting our own financial stability at more risk than needed. so, yeah, i mean, i, i have a graphic, if that's needed, where i can kind of show you stuff, but i think those are the key dates. and we will be talking about budget for i think the next three meetings in one way or another. so hopefully that gives you at least a preview of where we are and where we're heading. just a few

follow up questions. there's a lot of information to download the refused rate. so it will it will start at october 2025. the new rate. that's correct. it would start in october 2025 and we expect it will come in january meeting and then april's meeting. and that's about it. or they will come back after the board. so that's i think they have their own requirements under the is it prop f the require their plan is to come back those two times and then they plan on having one public meeting with their rate board in may, one in june, as well as two in july if needed. so those are public opportunities for that information to be aired. and we would share anything with you that we think is going to impact us or is of particular interest. and we'll try to keep you updated earlier as well. i mean, they begin kind of daylighting their thinking as early as

february and march with a series of public meetings that aren't with their board, but are just with the community at large. but we'll be tracking those so that we can see what they're proposing, and we don't know what they propose yet. right. so we don't know whether it's significant or just minor. yeah, we're still in the process. and the way it works is recology will submit their rate proposal to the refuse rate administrator and included within that will be our projected need within our department and public works budget. as well. and so that package is what will get considered. what makes it a little challenging, as it is every time, is because they're kind of off cycle from our budget process. it requires us to like somewhat take a leap of faith as we're passing our own budget. right? because we have to pass our budget based on what information we have. and so there's a little bit of a timing issue there, but leo is on top of it. and do we expect any mid-year cuts that will have impact on our department for the

general fund? i mean, we don't have that information right now, right? i mean, they're they're asking us to not spend about 30,000 of the current year general fund allocation out of about a million. so there's an impact if we do that. but it's not as significant as some other departments that have just much larger absolute numbers. and we already were slated not to get as much money in the second year. they had kind of reduced funding for some of the prior add backs from quite a while ago, so it's already tighter in that year. and so we're already trying to figure out how do we maintain all the resources we need for decarbonization and the cleaner the landscaping ordinance requirements, where we're trying to electrify the leaf blowers and other landscaping equipment. so, you know, some of that funding is

not there already. and so we're already trying to make that up. so it would be difficult to have to stomach another cut that would take that further down the wrong direction. and one more added wrinkle to all of this is we obviously have an election coming up in november. and so this is assuming the instructions that we've got received right now from the mayor's office as far as what our projections and what our what we should be looking for cuts. but, you know, having gone through kind of different transitions in years past, you know, it depends on the priority of the incoming mayor, because the budget will be during their their time is there. if there is a change in mayor. and so that's just another thing to kind of account for. so a lot of uncertainty at the moment. we have our schedule, we have our existing instructions from the budget office which we will follow until further notice. and we look forward to coming back in december to the commission and updating all of you. thank you. any other questions? yes. yeah. one question. sure. just

to get a sense of how important this is to the to the department's budget, we heard earlier that bay rent is about 19% of the of the department's budget. do you have a guess as to what percent of the budget we're talking about? for the for the refuse rate process? oh, i was about i was ready to say that general funds, 3% of our budget refuse rate is in the ballpark of 40%. i think it's been going down each year because we've been increasing the rate. the percentage has decreased because we've increased the total budget by increasing other sources like grants. but i think it's either 45% or 40% right now. it's a big, big number. and it supports a specific parts of the staff. is that also correct? right. if you think about all the people who are upstanding with jack in the photo, i think maybe everyone but me is largely funded or entirely funded by impound dollars. that's the group. and then for those of us like ty and me who are organization wide because of our overhead model, we're also charging about 40% of our time

toward that. so it's our staffing for like overall department work as well as the zero waste specific work. so it requires really being strategic about thinking what the needs are. they don't want us to come back to them mid-cycle and ask for more. so they want us to inventory everything we need now. and i think it's advantageous to get all of that on the record as well. thank yo. sure. thank you. any other questions or comments? all right. thank you. let's open up for public comment. great. thank you. any members of the public who wish to comment on this ite? madam president, we have no speakers. okay. public comment is now closed. next item please. the next item is item 13. adjournment. the meeting is adjourned. the time is 7:03 p.m. thank you for joining us. thank you. thanks, everyone. odo of. oh, yeah, we do.

♪♪ >> san francisco! ♪♪

>> this is an exhibition across departments highlighting different artworks from our collection. gender is an important part of the dialogue. in many ways, this exhibition is contemporary. all of this artwork is from the 9th century and spans all the way to the 21st century. the exhibition is organized into seven different groupings or themes such as activities, symbolism, transformation and others. it's not by culture or time period, but different affinities between the artwork. activities, for example, looks at the role of gender and how certain activities are placed as

feminine or masculine. we have a print by uharo that looks at different activities that derisionly performed by men. it's looking at the theme of music. we have three women playing traditional japanese instruments that would otherwise be played by men at that time. we have pairings so that is looking within the context of gender in relationships. also with how people are questioning the whole idea of pairing in the first place. we have three from three different cultures, tibet, china and japan. this is sell vanity stot relevar has been fluid in different time periods in cultures. sometimes being female in china

but often male and evoking features associated with gender binaries and sometimes in between. it's a lovely way of tying all the themes together in this collection. gender and sexuality, speaking from my culture specifically, is something at that hasn't been recently widely discussed. this exhibition shows that it's gender and sexuality are actually have been considered and complicated by dialogue through the work of artists and thinking specifically, a sculpture we have of the hindu deities because it's half pee male and half male. it turns into a different theme in a way and is a beautiful

representation of how gender hasn't been seen as one thing or a binary. we see that it isn't a modest concept. in a way, i feel we have a lot of historical references and touch points throughout all the ages and in asian cultures. i believe san francisco has close to 40% asian. it's a huge representation here in the bay area. it's important that we awk abouk about this and open up the discussion around gender. what we've learned from organizing this exhibition at the museum is that gender has been something that has come up in all of these cultures through all the time periods as something that is important and relevant. especially here in the san francisco bay area we feel that it's relevant to the conversations that people are having today. we hope that people can carry that outside of the museum into their daily lives.(music).

>> i started the o was with a financing and had a business partner all ended up wanting to start the business and retire and i did was very important to

me so i bought them oust and two weeks later the pandemic h-4 one of the moments i thought to myself we have to have the worse business in a lifetime or the best. >> we created the oasis out of a need basically so other people bars and turning them into a space and when the last place we were performing wasn't used turned those buildings into condos so we decided to have a space. >> what the pandemic did for

us is made us on of that we felt we had to do this immediately and created this. >> (unintelligible). >> where we would offer food delivery services with a curbside professionalism live music to bring spectacular to lives we are going through and as well as employ on the caterers and the performers and drivers very for that i think also for everyone to do something. we had ordinary on the roof and life performances and with a restaurant to support the system where we are and even with that had terribly initiative and hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt had

to pay our rent we decided to have an old-fashioned one we created club hours where you can watch to online and or be on the phone and raised over one quarter of a million dollar that of incredible and something that northbound thought we could do. >> we got ourselves back and made me realize how for that people will show up if i was blown away but also had the courage but the commitment now i can't let anyone down i have to make the space serviceable so while this is a full process business it became much more about a space that was used by

the community. and it became less about starting up a business and more about the heart of what we're doing. this building used to be a- and one of the first one we started working on had we came out what a mural to wrap the building and took a while but able to raise the money and pay 5 artists to make a design around many this to represent what is happening on the side and also important this is who we are this is us putting it out there because satisfies other people we don't realize how much we affect the community around there when he i want to put that out there and show up and show ourselves outside of those walls more fabulous. and inspires other

people to be more fabulous and everyone want to be more fabulous and less hatred and hostility and that is how we change the

>> you're watching quick bites, the show that is san francisco. and today you're in for a real treat. oh, my! food inspired by the mediterranean and middle east with a twist so unique you can only find it in one place in san francisco. we're at the 55th annual armenian festival and bizarre. this is extra special not only because i happen to be armenian, but there is so much delicious food here. and i can't wait to share it with all of you. let's go. armenia, culture and cusine has had much cultural exchanges with its neighbors.

today armenian food infuses he flavor from the mediterranean, middle east, and eastern europe. >> this is our 55th year and in san francisco we're the largest armenian food festival and widely recognized as one of the best food festivals in the area. we have vendors that come up from fresno, from los angeles showing off their craft. we really feel like we have something for everyone in the neighborhood and that's really what it is, is drawing people to see a little bit of our culture and experience what we experience weekend in and weekend out. >> we are behind the scenes now watching the chef at work preparing some delicious armenian kabob. this is a staple in armenian cooking, is that right? >> absolutely, since the beginning of time. our soldiers used to skewer it on the swords. we have a combination of beef and lam and parsley. and every september over 2000 pounds of meat being cooked in three days. >> after all that savory

protein, i was ready to check out the fresh veggie options. >> this is armenian cheat sheet. it's tomatos and mint and olive oil. that makes summer food. and what i'm doing is i'm putting some nutmeg. it is kind of like cream cheese. in armenia when they offer you food, you have to eat it. they would welcome you and food is very important for them. >> in every armenian community we feel like we're a "smallville"age and they come together to put on something like this. what i find really interesting about san francisco is the blends of armenia that come together. once they are here, the way people work together at any age, including our grandmothers, our grandfathers, skewering the meat, it's fun to see. fun to see everybody get together. >> we call it subarek. it's a cheese turn over if you want.

we make the dough from scratch. we boil it like you do for la san i can't. >> the amount of love and karin fused in these foods is they come in every day to prepare, cook and bake bread, all in preparation for this big festival. >> nobody says no. when you come them, they have to come tomorrow for the feast. >> what a treat it is to taste a delicious recipe, all made from scratch and passed down through generations. it really makes you appreciate the little things. >> it's one of the best festivals. it's outstanding, a marvelous occasion. >> we're outside checking some of the food to go options. i grabbed myself a ka bob sandwich, all kinds of herbs and spices. i'm going to taste this. looking fantastic. one of the best i've had in a long time. you know it's delicious b i have just enough room for dessert, my favorite part.

we're behind the scenes right now watching how all the pastries get made. and we've got a whole array of pastries here. honey and nuts and cinnamon, all kinds of great ingredients. this is amazing. here's another yummy pastry made with filo dough. oh, my god. really sweet and similar, it's lighter. this is what i like. we have a lovely row here. looks like a very delicious and exciting surprise. i'm going to bite into it. here we go. um. this is great with armenian coffee. now we're making some incredible armenian coffee. >> we buy our coffee, they have

the best coffee. they come from armenia, specially made. and would you like to try it? >> i would like to try. >> would you like sugar or no sugar? >> no sugar today. i'm so excited. really earthy. you can really taste the grain. i think that's what makes it so special. really comes out. i hope you try it. we're having a great time at the armenian festival. we ate, we saw, and we definitely conquered. i don't know about you, but i have to go down to the food. check out our blog for so much more at sf bites at tums abler.com. until next time, may the force be with you. ♪♪ ♪♪ >> first of all, everybody is

welcome and we ask two things when they get here. one, that they try something they've never tried before. be it food or be it dancing or doing something. and if they feel like it was worth their while to tell one person and bring that person, that family member, that friend down the street to come with them. >> we're going to have to do a lot of eating so get ready. >> get ready. and you diet tomorrow. i curre emergency medical services rescue paramedic captain i work for the san francisco fire department. i'm first generation mexican-american my parents lived in l.a. and migrateed san francisco. mow and my older brother and young are sister were born in the city what got me here was to be honest, i made a lot of

mistakes when i was younger. grew up in a house that this h a lot of people in i small house. fell throughout critics. my mother and family were -- really big on taking care of others. this fell first ticking care of each other attitude helped mold me to the person i am now. with this said a let of the things from my culture bled in to what i do in the fire service. as far as you know things like having a strong work ethic. working hard. trying to be a good person they are thing this is were instill in the me at a young age with my household. when i got hired i was the look the department. all right. i know this does in the make a huge impact when you look at it on paper. for me as a person i never saw it as a negative. i don't look to how many numbers

of people we have i look to equality of the people we have. right? i had lieutenant that told me [inaudible] he was like, you know 20 years ago that would not be tellerated. well, every step is a step forward. for me, having that officer see this moment and know this we are making strides in the right direction that's how i can make change. i can live in both worlds. right? for me, one of the best feeling in thes world on the ambulance was having someone who we did not have a translator and look at me i would go. -- and just to look at their face and go, well, i made a difference there today opposed to not having the skills or watching people had can't

translate and watching how a strug they'll is to speak their language or abling to community i think brings people a lot of comfort and a terrible situation. my son means a lot to me. my -- family means a lot to me this job has given me the means to take care of them. it has allowed my son the opportunity to have someone to lockup to. and my wife machine to be prud to call their spouse. i think those are all thing this is this department really should be what it is like to put the needs of others before you. latino heritage is about helping others. right. and it is about being charitiable and a sense of family.

>> i finish 11 times. i don't wish no one to be shot, but it is something that i never get over. the wrap around program really changed my life and they was there for me day one and i thank them so much. i couldn't do it without them. >> wrap around formed as a result of understanding early on in my career that what i was doing as a

trauma surgeon was not enough. i needed help. i needed the community that was impacted the most by violence to direct me to understanding what was necessary to be more comprehensive in creating care for patients and to really change people's life course. >> the number of people coming into the hospital were youth. we wrap our arms around the people who come through so we try to equip with not only services, but just love and you know, we really try to meet their needs. >> we helped support them with services after recovery or while they are here, they need services anywhere from

housing to basic needs, clothing, employment. we link to those services in hopes that we don't ever have to see them come back. >> my biggest wish and goal for the future of the wrap around project is that it wouldn't have to exist. that we wouldn't have anymore violently injured people that our job is trauma surgeons would be defunth. >> to see them start walking again, to see them laughing and being happy, to feel like you know what, this happened to me, but i'm going to make it, you know? i think no amount of money can ever pay us for that. >> it is rewarding to intercede

and you know [indiscernible] change the trajectory of a child's life is awesome. we want to give them tools to be productive members of society, and give them a chance to have a future. >> it gives me joy to be able to be a

part of a young person's life and help them map out what their future looks like. you know, you can never get over trauma, but you can live with good amazing life after it and learn how to manage it and stuff like that, so we hope do that with them. >> mike, you know what, i am a manager now at this job. the job you hooked me up, that is impact. that is a heartfelt, you know what, me work want in vain. that work is unmatched so to speak. >> they like family.

they help, they check in, call me, see how i'm doing, you know? and i'm very thankful. they have that good at mosphere where you don't have to be scared, you don't have to feel you all by yourself, because they there and they have been there.