money. thank you. >> welcome, everyone. >> my name is executive director adam van de water we're the parties and owner of this glorious building a welcome i say grand opening of the

restaurant (clapping.) we're going thrilled to have a break in the brain and together with you all and with a number of you look at the backdrops this is the first restaurant with an offer sized building (clapping.) exciting. >> this public safety is not only a connected to a lot of activities in the neighborhood in downtown thursday and crossing the great work some of the proposed development activists behind us and of other tenants in the building with sf and little bus in the back and the enclosures parts of that love that we have the largest building in san francisco and really coming to life not only in the grandist center but the community. and we're excited to

welcome. >> (calling names.) >> to the neighborhood and our high expect italian mexican can you design and a lot to come here about 5 or 6 years of planning first and went through all the construction work to get here welcome, everyone and introduce first to your district 6 supervisor supervisor dorsey. >> (clapping) so welcome to district 6 everybody i'm so honored to um, be here and thinking when i come to this area i have this feeling by the time i speak there's going to be so many activity and we have down to a restaurant and the destinations all that is the work done safety day and

advocate day his team he, of course, oewd and the small businesses and hair team this is a think an example of kind of business that has made my decision as a supervisor the most facilitating career of my life and in italy sit down so actually got a nice i walk by this - so i see me here a lot i'm looking forward and i don't know if the mayor is here i want to say how grateful i am to mayor london breed for the leadership she's brought to this city and how as a district supervisor for over three years how grateful i am to see the come back back underway in the city i talked about this a career decisions all the

restaurants opening up in south park in the area am so proud of london breed for the leadership she brought and grateful for that and wish she was (laughter.) [off mic.] >> all right. [off mic.] >> shall we - >> go ahead. >> a (clapping). >> to say i said product yesterday and want to thank y - and goes beyond the restaurant. it's a italian and mexican can i commissioner

satinder - that present people come together and i want to thank for the opportunity and always building in the city and always the best place in the world thank you for the (inaudible) and thanks to the community of san francisco and my friends and a beautiful man and. >> (calling names.) >> to everyone my friends and family. thank you. (clapping) >> the mayor is think her way

we'll have a little bit of ribbon cutting why i started your career talk about that and some of the light rail vehicles for muni and that is proprietary they're here at the transit center and standing on top of the sidewalk and supervisor dorsey will be light rail and hope to bring passengers by train and wonder if you can speak a little bit what is in our restaurant the cuisine and the concept. >> yeah. of course, one of the days um, food is only a way to bring people together no? >> and when we see colors and

we bring community together. so we are here not only to have food but the experience to connect and um, people who have families and the pasta and working days and in the south tower anywhere like today somebody (laughter) i don't know everything is - brings people together. >> (multiple voices) (clapping) people here with xrshgsz and life and again this is about

goes beyond the restaurant. we want to provide actually (unintelligible) bring people of (unintelligible) the wine and the pink and the white and (clapping.) (unintelligible) i want to thank emigrates especially the staff of the - i'd like to mention everyone's name from the people working here from without the community support i wouldn't be here today so. thank you, again. (clapping). >> hear a lot about downtown

and the recovery i can tell you we've had more restaurants opening and thank people with the vision like dra i don't have beautiful new restaurants in downtown and have about 15 thousand residents that wake through here as well and hope to keep your seats full and invite the executive chef marco (clapping.) eat here and i don't know italian and mexican have done this often. >> right. >> thankful to have this restaurant and been here 15 years and mexico 8 years so i have been here and grew up with the pasta, you know, so then

opportunity to have culture. >> works well and and it is amazing and i'm so happy in san francisco (unintelligible) all of the cultures we see have here and happy to work here. tell people what they can expect. >> 18 now or thirty in the traditional italian lasagna. >> we have like. >> (calling names.) >> par shall think we have the butterflies and other one is with yeah have with some onions

and caribbean sidewalks work really good. >> try this and (clapping.) oh, by the way, today is marco's birthday. >> yeah. (clapping). >> happy birthday to marco. >> a quick happy birthday. >> happy birthday to. >> happy birthday to, happy birthday dear marco, happy birthday to you

(clapping.) east lansing you're mayor mayor london breed want to say a word before we cut ribbon. >> anything like great food in san francisco and introduce two of my favorite food italian and mexican food one can you design i can't wait to see what it tastes like in the environment even coming up to this area was seeing this beautiful restaurant will be a designation bus we know san francisco is a designation but more importantly we know that downtown will be a 24/7 neighborhood where you work where you work and play. i i can imagine this place is eating and drinking and enjoying the sricy and happen to be here and congratulate you think is upcoming quality and thank you

for investing in san francisco we know you have one other restaurant that's been here 10 years and another one to come and what you're doing to make san francisco vibrant thank you for investing in the city we look forward to supporting you. >> (clapping) all right.- >> (multiple voices). >> i didn't know. >> we're excited. >> (multiple voices). >> yes. yes. you want to join us now all right. are we ready everyone? >> yeah. >> ; right? >> notices example

>> there is a lot of unique characteristics about visitation valley. it is a unique part of the city. >> we are off in a corner of the

city against the san francisco county line 101 on one side. vis station valley is still one of the last blue color neighborhoods in san francisco. a lot of working class families out here. it is unusual. not a lot of apartment buildings. a lot of single family homes. >> great business corridor. so much traffic coming through here and stopping off to grab coffee or sandwich or pick up food before going home. >> a lot of customers are from the neighborhood. they are painters or mechanics. they are like blue color workers, a lot of them. >> the community is lovely. multi-racial and hopefully we can look out for each other. >> there is a variety of businesses on the block. you think of buffalo kitchen, chinese food, pork buns,

sandwich. library, bank of america with a parking lot. the market where you can grab anything. amazing food choices, nail salons. basically everything you need is here. >> a lot of these businesses up and down leland are family owned. people running them are family. when you come here and you have an uncle and nephew and go across the street and have the guy and his dad. lisa and her daughter in the dog parlor and pam. it is very cool. >> is small businesses make the neighborhood unique. >> new businesses coming. in mission blue, gourmet chocolate manufacturing. the corridor has changed and is continuing to change. we hope to see more businesses coming in the near future.

>> this is what is needed. first, stay home. unless it is absoluteliness scary. social distancing is the most important step right now to limit spread of virus. cancel all nonessential gather everythings. >> when the pandemic litly land avenue suffered like other corridors. a few nail salons couldn't operate. they shut down. restaurants that had to adapt to more of a take out model. they haven't totally brought back indoor seating. >> it is heartbreaking to see the businesses that have closed down and shut because of the pandemic. >> when the pandemic first hit it got really slow. we had to change our hours. we never had to close, which is a blessing.

thank god. we stayed open the whole time. >> we were kind of nervous and anxious to see what was going to come next hoping we will not have to close down. >> during covid we would go outside and look on both sides of the street. it looked like old western town. nobody on the street. no cars. >> it was a hard eight or nine months. when they opened up half the people couldn't afford a haircut. >> during that time we kept saying the coffee shop was the living room of the valley. people would come to make sure they were okay. >> we checked on each other and patronized each other. i would get a cup of coffee, shirt, they would get a haircut. >> this is a generous and kind community. people would be like i am getting the toffee for the guy

behind me and some days it went on and on. it was amazing to watch. we saw a perfect picture of community. we are all in this together. >> since we began to reopen one year later, we will emerge stronger. we will emerge better as a city because we are still here and we stand in solidarity with one another. >> when we opened up august 1st. i will not say it was all good. we are still struggling due to covid. it affected a lot of people. >> we are still in the pandemic right now. things are opening up a little bit. it is great to have space to come together. i did a three painting series of visitation valley and the businesses on leland. it felt good to drop off the paintings and hung them. >> my business is picking up.

the city is opening up. we have mask requirements. i check temperatures. i ask for vaccination card and/or recent test. the older folks they want to feel safe here. >> i feel like there is a sense of unity happening. >> what got us through the pandemic was our customers. their dogs needed groomed, we have to cut their nails so they don't over grow. >> this is only going to push us forward. i sense a spirit of community and just belief in one another. >> we are trying to see if we can help all small businesses around here. there is a cannabis club lounge next to the dog parlor to bring foot traffic. my business is not going to work if the business across the street is not getting help. >> in hit us hard. i see a bright future to get the

storefronts full. >> once people come here i think they really like it. >> if you are from san francisco visit visitation valley to see how this side of the city is the same but different. >> in the bay area as a whole, thinking about environmental sustainability. we have been a leader in the country across industries in terms of what you can do and we have a learn approach. that is what allows us to be successful. >> what's wonderful is you have so many people who come here and they are what i call policy innovators and whether it's banning plastic bags, recycling,

composting, all the different things that we can do to improve the environment. we really champion. we are at recycle central, a large recycle fail on san francisco pier 96. every day the neighborhood trucks that pick up recycling from the blue bins bring 50 # o tons of bottles, cans and paper here to this facility and unload it. and inside recology, san francisco's recycling company, they sort that into aluminum cans, glass cans, and different type of plastic. san francisco is making efforts to send less materials to the landfill and give more materials for recycling.

other cities are observing this and are envious of san francisco's robust recycling program. it is good for the environment. but there is a lot of low quality plastics and junk plastics and candy wrappers and is difficult to recycle that. it is low quality material. in most cities that goes to landfill. >> looking at the plastics industry, the oil industry is the main producer of blastics. and as we have been trying to phase out fossil fuels and the transfer stream, this is the fossil fuels and that plastic isn't recycled and goes into the waste stream and the landfill and unfortunately in the ocean. with the stairry step there will be more plastic in the ocean than fish. >> we can recycle again and again and again. but plastic, maybe you can recycle it once, maybe.

and that, even that process it downgrades into a lower quality material. >> it is cheaper for the oil industry to create new plastics and so they have been producing more and more plastics so with our ab793, we have a bill that really has a goal of getting our beverage bottles to be made of more recycled content so by the time 2030 rolls around t recycle content in a coke bottle, pepsi bottle, water bottle, will be up to 50% which is higher thatten the percentage in the european union and the highest percentage in the world. and that way you can actually feel confident that what you're drinking will actually become recycled. now, our recommendation is don't use to plastic bottle to begin w but if you do, they are committing to 50% recycled content. >> the test thing we can do is vote with our consumer dollars

when we're shopping. if you can die something with no packaging and find loose fruits and vegetables, that is the best. find in packaging and glass, metal and pap rer all easily recycled. we don't want plastic. we want less plastic. awe what you we do locally is we have the program to think disposable and work one on one to provide technical assistance to swap out the disposable food service to reusables and we have funding available to support businesses to do that so that is a way to get them off there. and i believe now is the time we will see a lot of the solutions come on the market and come on the scene. >> and is really logistics company and what we offer to restaurants is reasonable containers that they can order

just like they would so we came from about a pain point that a lot of customers feel which wills a lot of waste with takeout and deliver, even transitioning from styrofoam to plastic, it is still wasteful. and to dream about reusing this one to be re-implemented and cost delivery and food takeout. we didn't have throwaway culture always. most people used to get delivered to people's homes and then the empty milk containers were put back out when fresh milk came. customers are so excited that we have this available in our restaurant and came back and asked and were so excited about it and rolled it out as customers gain awareness understanding what it is and how it works and how they can

integrate it into their life. >> and they have always done it and usually that is a way of being sustainable and long-term change to what makes good financial sense especially as there are shipping issues and material issues and we see that will potentially be a way that we can save money as well. and so i think making that case to other restaurateurs will really help people adopt this. >> one restaurant we converted 2,000 packages and the impact and impact they have in the

community with one switch. and we have been really encouraged to see more and more restaurants cooperate this. we are big fans of what re-ecology does in terms of adopting new systems and understanding why the current system is broken. when people come to the facility, they are shocked by how much waste they see and the volume of the operations and how much technology we have dedicated to sort correctly and we led 25 tours and for students to reach about 1100 students. and they wanted to make change and this is sorting in the waste stream they do every single day

and they can take ownership of and make a difference with. >> an i feel very, very fortunate that i get to represent san francisco in the legislature and allows me to push the envelope and it is because of the people the city attracts and is because of the eco system of policy thinking that goes on in san francisco that we are constantly seeing san francisco leading the way. >> kids know there's a lot of environmental issues that they are facing. and that they will be impacted by the impact of climate change. they will have the opportunity to be in charge and make change and make the decisions in the future. >> we are re-inventing the way the planet does garbage founded in the environmental ethic and hunger to send less to landfills. this is so many wonderful things happening in san francisco.

i feel very fortunate and very humble to live here and to be part of this wonderful place. >> madam secretary, would you take roll?