. i will start the count down from 55432, one. welcome to the small business commission meeting on february 24th 2025. the meeting is being called to order at 4:32 p.m.. >> this meeting is being held in person in city hall room 400 and broadcast live on s.f. gov tv. the small business commission thinks media services and s.f. tv for televising the meeting which can be viewed on s.f. gov tv two or live streamed nsf gov tv.org. we welcome general public

comment at the end of the meeting and there will be an opportunity to comment on each discussion or action item on the agenda. public comment during the meeting is limited to three minutes per speaker. an alarm will sound once time is finished. speakers are requested but not required to state their names. s.f. gov tv please show the office of small business site. i think we are on the wrong side. are we on? it's okay. all right. oh wait. sorry. do i need to you could you just. >> yeah, you could just read the. oh, okay. today we will begin with a reminder that the small business commission is the official public forum to voice your opinions and concerns about policies that affect the economic vitality of small businesses in san francisco. please call item one. >> item one roll call. commissioner benitez here. commissioner cornett is absent. commissioner nickerson present

. commissioner herbert present. president here we hear commissioner ts cardenas absent and vice presidents as in as is absent. >> president you have a quorum. thank you. the san francisco small business commission and office of small business staff acknowledges that we are on the unceded ancestral homeland of the remington alone who are the original inhabitants of the san francisco peninsula. as indigenous stewards of this land and in accordance with their traditions the raw material alone we have never ceded lost nor forgotten their responsibilities as the caretakers of this place as well as for all peoples who reside in their traditional territory. as guests we recognize that we benefit from living and working on their traditional homeland. we wish to pay our respects by acknowledging the ancestors, elders and relatives of the raw material owning community and by affirming their sovereign rights as first peoples. please call item two price for

item two. we're actually going to move agenda item five. we're going to take agenda item five as agenda item two. so approval of draft meeting minutes. >> so approved item five approval of draft meeting minutes discussion and action item the commission will discuss and take action to approve the january 27th 2025 draft meeting minutes. >> um commissioners any minute. >> okay i move to approve meeting. i second. >> first we got to take public. we have to oh two do we have any questions here for the draft meeting minutes seeing the questions. um, any public comment about the draft meeting minutes? no. seeing no public comment? um, public comment is closed. now i can take the commission motion like i was saying. >> i'm kidding. i'm sorry. i moved to approve the minutes i second motion to approve the meeting minutes by commissioner dickerson seconded by commissioner herbert.

i'll read the role commissioner benitez yes. commissioner cronuts absent commissioner dickerson. yes. commissioner herbert yes. president huey yes, commissioner. it's kurt. dana's absent and vice presents is eunice's option absent motion passes and now we can go back to item two. okay, great. thank you. >> item two approval of legacy business registry application and resolutions. this is a discussion and action item. the commission will discuss and possibly take action to approve legacy business registry applications presenting as richard grillo legacy business program manager with the office of small business. >> good afternoon president huey. commissioners city staff members of the public. i'm richard carrillo. legacy business program manager. i'd like to acknowledge michelle reynolds, my colleague in the office of small business who provides beneficial assistance to the legacy business program. >> as a captive i have a powerpoint presentation before

you today our five applications for your consideration for the legacy business registry. >> each application includes a staff report, a draft resolution, the application itself and documents from the planning department. the applications were submitted to planning on january 22nd and heard by the historic preservation commission on february 19th. >> item two a is the greg angelo museum. the business is the home and studio of acclaimed artist greg angelo herrera. since 1989 which has evolved into an art lab an immersive experience located in a mediterranean style house in the balboa terrace neighborhood, the greg angelo museum was recently declared san francisco's historic landmark number 318 branded as an immersive experiment experiential art museum. the house boasts 27 thematically different rooms all of which have been significantly remodeled

remodeled through the museum welcomes locals and visitors alike. by appointment only on one of their introspective journeys where fantasies become realities the many experiences here will ignite your senses, awaken your imagination and arouse wonderment. >> the curriculum museum is a sanctuary of hope, healing and belonging for all. >> the core featured tradition that business must maintain to remain on the legacy business registry is museum item to be as hamano sushi the business is a japanese restaurant and no evali established in 1990 hamano sushi specializes in remarkable cuisine featuring various dining experiences. there are a la carte menu offers sushi sashimi rolls and cooked japanese dishes. omakase udon dining is a curated multi-course sushi experience led by the chef.

featuring high quality seasonal fish often sourced from japan's tohoku market is a career style dishes include a variety of small bar style plates designed for sharing for an elevated dining option. enjoy the premium chef's counter experience to complement your meal beverages or carefully curated including a fine selection of saké wine and beer. the core feature tradition that business must maintain is restaurant featuring japanese cuisine. >> item two c is one union recording studios. the business was founded in 1994 at its namesake location one union street in the embarcadero neighborhood where it is still located today. >> one union recording studio is a san francisco's premier audio post-production facility that delivers audio recording, mixing and editing for television radio and film. one union prides itself on bringing projects to life

working on notable films such as toy story, a bug's life, fruitvale station and milk. between the state of the art facilities, a well-appointed environment and most importantly award winning talent they see your project through to its fullest potential. one union recording studios is known for its professionalism and dedication to high quality sound production. >> through valuing vision and endless possibility they ensure your imagination remains inspired through every step. >> the core featured tradition the business must maintain is recording studio. >> item 2d is phaedrus. the business established in 1979 is san francisco's largest independent bmw and mini repair specialist. with over 23,000ft2 of shop space in the van ness avenue corridor, phaedrus provides a full spectrum of auto services with the latest diagnostic

technology including suspension repairs, engine repairs, coolant system flush and repairs condition based service or kbs inspections oil and filter changes and more. the building constructed in 1914 is an example of art nouveau architecture and has a distinctive large central arched window. it appears eligible for the listing on the national register of historic places. >> the core feature tradition that business must maintain to remain on legacy business registry's automotive services . >> item two e is rims and goggles. the business is a retailer of high end luxury eyewear that was founded in 1975 and located in the presidio heights neighborhood. rims and goggles focuses on unique and independent brands that are not commonly found. >> celebrating individuality these brands take pride in offering frames that radiate

uniqueness presenting a treasure trove of distinctive designs that allow wearers to express their own personalities. rims and goggles is a destination in store for those in search of eyewear that truly reflects their style and character. >> step into a realm of artistry and innovation with independent eyewear and elevate your eyewear experience to unprecedented heights at rims and goggles. >> the core feature tradition the business must maintain to remain on the legacy business registry as optometry. please note that rims and goggles provides optician services and has an onsite laboratory where we using optometry as a catchall category that includes optician and eyewear services. >> all the businesses met the three criteria required for listing on the legacy business registry and all have received positive recommendation from the historic preservation commission. legacy business program staff recommends adding the businesses to the registry and has drafted a resolution for each business for your consideration.

a motion in support of the businesses should be framed as a motion in favor of the resolutions. thank you. this concludes my presentation. i'm happy to answer any questions and there are business representatives president who may wish to speak on behalf of their applications during public comment. >> right. thank you very much rick. commissioners, any questions? >> how about we take public comment first? >> any public commenters feel free to step up to the mike. >> hey, i'm greg angelo and i've been in this room a lot the last few years with historic preservation. i never thought in my lifetime that we'd become a historic monument that was completely not something i ever thought about. >> it's been amazing as an artist really working in the city to now be i guess honored with this legacy business meaning that we've been serving

over. i think i've been really serving 40 years but legally 36 years and and i feel like i'm just getting started. so it's truly like today i'm just feeling like there's so much to do, so much to accomplish. i still feel like i'm that 19 year old kid that started and i'm just grateful for for what the city is doing to push businesses and culture and arts forward. you know everyone says a city is about that but the last five years it hasn't really felt that way. so i'm glad we survived and that we're here and there's people like you that are doing the good work. so i appreciate it. >> so i got to say for now great. >> thank you. any other public comment? >> no. okay. and seeing no further public comment public comment is closed. commissioners comments and questions. commissioner herbert.

>> hi mike. hello. you. >> i'm just really excited to see all of you here and especially hermanas sushi because i've been going to hermanas sushi for years before i had a kid. now i have a kid. it's very you know, it's an expensive habit that you've gotten my kid into but it's just outstanding sushi and i've been going there for like 25 years probably so i'm really happy to see you here. >> thank you. commission and she's really good to have you all here today . when i think about you know, these last five just piggybacking off of what you said about the last five years with arts, i think it's just interesting how over these last

five years we've it was really more about survival and i think people just forgot the importance of the arts and now that we're at a point now where we're breathing again investing again in making businesses a priority. you're probably one of the most important because art brings life expression feelings of love and appreciation and it's a gathering and i just want you to know that you deserve to be here and be honored and just appreciate all that you have brought to this city. all of us. when we look at these legacy businesses, there's a reason that they're called legacy. there's been an imprint that you've put in the city every single one of you and i don't think it should ever be downplayed or or or felt like, you know, it wasn't deserved because behind the scenes when

nobody can see you, you're working those long hours, you're doing things and it's not your money as good. we want it to be lucrative but that's not your initial purpose. like you want the expression and then it's nice to get the expression with the money but i just i just want to say to every single one of the businesses represented here today you are appreciated. you are a light to this city. all of us that are here are small business owners and we are thriving to receive the legacy on ourselves. so it is an honor to be here today and honor you today. so again, thank you for all that you have done for the city of san francisco. >> commissioner benitez yes, and to piggyback on commissioner dickerson's comment about the arts, it's really great to you know i'm a retail owner myself and we've

seen a lot of restaurants and things like that where it's a very fast paced industry and it's really great to see the arts here help slow things down and really think about what's important as you just move along. so love to see all that and then also with know sushi been there you know many times a good handful of times over the years a really great offering and service and really glad to see you finally get that legacy business not so congratulations to all the businesses keep working hard and congratulations and wishing you much more prosper in the future . >> congratulations to all of you. you know, even though we haven't voted yet, i have some feelings about how we might end up voting. >> you know, i just wanted to i guess share with with greg angelo. i took my family there like i don't know, maybe last year or so like we did. a friend of mine, jade was

doing a magic show there and so that was super cool that like we got to see jade in your in your home really. and i brought some of my family who had never been who just kind of moved here from kentucky i guess. and so that was like a real trip for them. this is like a san francisco experience to take them to the greg angelo museum and to see the magic of jade and like you know, to to just be like surprised by what the evening's going to bring. so i suggest everybody bring their family. they're like don't tell them where you're going. just tell them you're going over to someone's house for like, you know, some i don't know or d'oeuvres or charcuterie or something. there's going to be a cheese board somewhere and and then you show up and they just are like completely amazed by what is going to happen and like it was the best experience and you know, it's one of those experiences that i really feel

exemplifies what san francisco is about. you kind of show up and you kind of expect one thing and then this whole other universe unfolds for you and you know and i really got to get pulled into it because i think you were part of our artwalk and like sharing kind of like what you do with people at the artwalk and and and i was like this is so cool. i got to go myself and once i did it was like i want to do this. i want to make my house the great again, you know? >> so and i live really close so maybe we could do a tunnel or something but um so yeah, i'm glad i get to you know, let you know and and appreciate you know, just say thank you for fantastic evening that i think continues to set in my mind. well i think congratulations to you all and all of these

businesses i could go on and talk about in depth but i will not keep you all here because i think you should go out and celebrate with your teams and your staff and your families and and yeah, enjoy being a part of this wonderful club of legacy business founders and owners and and people who are part of this amazing chain i think of like san francisco really. so i think any other questions are comments from commissioners seeing no further comments or questions. i think we can go ahead and take a motion and motion that we vote in every single one of these businesses. >> so every single one every single one i second that motion motion by commissioner dickerson seconded by commission commissioner benitez i'll read the role commissioner binnie does. yes. commissioner cornett is absent. commissioner dickerson yes. commissioner herbert yes.

president huey yes. commissioner t's cardenas absent and vice president is absent. >> motion passes. congratulations. >> thank you. thank you very much. okay. >> remember this case is i really appreciate what you said you thank you very much. >> yeah. item three san francisco municipal transportation agency s.f. mta funding working group summary this is a discussion item as if mta will provide an update on solutions being currently being discussed to address the agency's $320 million budget shortfall in fiscal year 2627 and share an update on the muni funding working group efforts to date presenting today we have a mandate you can with sfm to

come up and help you. >> hi welcome amanda. >> okay. thank you so much. good afternoon and president huey i don't know if the vice president is eunice's here or not but i will welcome her as well. dr. tang and commissioners, thank you for making some time for us to speak with you. this presentation is coming out of a briefing that i offered to director tang and some of the staff about some of the particular challenges we face at muni. >> and so i just wanted to bring you all up to speed as our partnership with the small business community is so important to the sfm, mta. >> my name is amanda egan. i represent the office of the chief of staff and i'm just before i start i did want to just take a moment to recognize and thank all of you for your public service. >> it is a testament to how much you care about this city and that you care about the small businesses that really make our city so vibrant and dynamic that you volunteer your time to serve on this commission. so thank you for believing in

good government and being a part of it and for taking care of our small businesses. >> we really appreciate it. >> okay. so the agenda i wanted to share today it was a couple of things. one is we have a new leader at the mta so i just wanted to tell you a little bit about her because that's a pretty big deal for our organization. second is share some info about the muni finance same challenges we face and then third get your questions and sort of have a discussion answer answer any questions that i'm able to so maybe you've seen in the papers i don't know if you have that. julie kirschbaum last tuesday was sort of appointed to be the next director of the mta by both mayor lurie and also the f.a. board of directors. >> julie is a person who has worked at the agency for a pretty long time. she's been with mta since 2007 and she served as the director of muni from 2018 to 2024. so that was right through the heart of the pandemic and all the uncertainty and all of the challenges she navigated to

make sure that even in the darkest days of the pandemic muni was still delivering the essential services of getting the people to where they need to go in the city. and so this was i think the board and the mayor felt someone we could really count on with some of the challenges that are coming to be a really steady hand for the agency. she has two decades of experience in transportation and i just wanted to share with you her priorities the immediate priority she's setting out for the agency and so that is to rebuild trust with communities across san francisco clearly to focus on ensuring the financial stability of the organization which is so important and then also just supporting the staff the amazing people 6000 people all across the city who are the operators who drive the busses or the mechanics who maintain our facilities or who make the signs so we all know how to drive or how to bike or how to walk around the city. all of these services are what

allow this city to keep moving and stay connected. and so she really is placing a priority on just caring for the staff and that's really important to see to. >> okay. so just want to take a moment as we think about economic recovery of the bay area downtown recovery in san francisco just to make the connection that really the economic recovery of the entire bay area is connected to the success of muni and that it is over half of all the transit trips in the whole bay area are on muni and over half of the transfers from bart to muni or you know of any interagency transfer involve muni and 60% of all trips starter and in san francisco and i just wanted to put this quote that was so compelling from our chief economist that we will not have an economic recovery in san francisco unless we have a solvent transit agency. it is really that important.

>> the good news is that we have been investing in muni and these investments are really paying off. we have invested in over 100 miles of improvements to that we called our muni forward program to get the bus out of traffic to make sure if you choose to ride muni you don't have to sit waiting in a line of traffic that you get really high quality service that people feel safe on the and that's really important to us and we have our muni transit ambassador program that's really to welcome people and guide them and help them navigate and be kind of a presence on our vehicles to make people feel that they have someone that they can turn to if they feel uncomfortable. all of those have questions. also customer information has been really important to us to make it a more convenient experience to make sure you know when the bus is coming and you can kind of plan your life around that in a way that feels like a pretty high quality of service. we've also heard loud and clear that people want the stations and stops to be clean and feel safe and so we've invested significantly in cleanliness

and maintenance. the delays in our subway system are down something like 60 to 70% compared to pre-pandemic and that is because we have invested in proactive and preventative maintenance and really embrace a culture of continuous improvement at the agency and the fix that weeks that you'll maybe you've maybe experienced so we can get ahead of problems rather than waiting for those to come. and i'm really proud of the numbers that have come out of that work and then employee mentoring and continuous improvement has really been another hallmark of our success. >> so people are coming back to muni of course we saw a huge dip at the beginning of the pandemic as people were concerned and they were trying to wrestle with that public health guidance to stay apart from each other and they were uncomfortable and concerned. our ridership has very interestingly almost entirely recovered on the weekends. >> it is really that sort of societal shift we're seeing we're not seeing five days a week back in the office and that represents why weekday is a little bit lower.

i don't know if you know people who are sort of you know, some days going the office, some days working from home. that's kind of what you're reflecting seeing in these numbers. >> but this is what i really wanted to share with you is that we have received in 2020 for the highest customer satisfaction ratings that muni has seen in 20 years last year. >> so coming out of that global pandemic we were able to make these improvements to get some of the highest customer satisfaction ratings we've seen in the history of this agency. >> so we're really proud of that progress that we have really focused on the customer experience and that's been our north star and that we have worked to make muni fast, frequent, reliable, clean and safe that has been sort of our guiding light. so we are quite protective of that progress and it is why these financial challenges are so particularly challenging now and why we really want to engage anyone who's willing to be part of the conversation and how do we solve this problem together and keep our transit

system strong. >> so the challenge is just to underscore for you in this coming fiscal year that starts in july of 2025 we have a $50 million budget shortfall and there's been some conversations right here in this room with the board of directors of mta about how to problem solve for that number. the bigger number that we are really needing to do a lot of work around is the f y 26 a starting in july of 2026 that's the 320 million maybe you've heard of the sort of fiscal cliff people talk about and that is really what they're talking about. that's that's really what a lot of that one time relief funding that we received during the pandemic from the federal government and the state government runs out and is depleted and that's what's causing that fiscal cliff that we need to them really problem solve around. >> so some of the reason i mentioned transit use is down somewhat so transit fares are down somewhat parking use especially at some of our downtown garages tracking with that less five days a week downtown is down the general

fund growth is a little bit slower and we get a big portion of our budget from the general fund and that relief has run out and then just sort of a structural challenge which i'm sure you all can relate to which is that costs with inflation rise faster than the traditional sources of our revenue. so there was even a structural deficit before the pandemic that we were trying to problem solve for and it's just so much more dramatic now because of those other funding sources lagging. >> okay. so we did convene in september of last year this muni funding working group and that was really meant to represent a whole bunch of diverse stakeholders. so comptroller's office and mta are the code conveners and then we have folks from the mayor's office. we have organizations representing labor business advocacy groups, the associate board directors of course the assaf board of supervisors in the room and the idea was to ask this group to come together, really roll up their sleeves, really get into the

numbers and make some recommendations for how we can move forward and how we can tackle this financial challenges so sorry i'll just say one more thing about this which is that the group looked at in the fall sort of the nightmare scenarios of what the cuts would have to look like if we don't solve this funding challenge. i also looked at, you know, some some service cuts. we've also then looked at what are the revenue options, what are potential taxes or fees or other options we could put forth together to solve this and then are even though we are limiting we're in a in a world of limited resources, are there some service enhancements that are particularly important to the community that we still should have on the table although they would be modest? okay. so i want to walk you through a couple of different options just to kind of catch you up on what the group has been discussing in terms of all these funding options we might piece together to solve this

problem. and i want to say none of these ideas are endorsed and none of these ideas are easy but we just do want to share this information with you by way of just working to solve problems together. so we kind of separated like larger dollar amount ballot measures and smaller dollar amount ballot measures as sort of two that we'd consider and maybe some of you are aware there's conversations at the metropolitan transportation commission about a regional measure that would be a multi-county because of course bart and caltrain and other transit agencies in the bay area are also facing funding challenges and need to raise revenue. so that would need to be a regional collaboration like a regional revenue measure. there's also the option of doing like a local sales tax measure in san francisco of course we've done this before or local parcel tax those are some of these ideas on the table. we are also talking or thinking about maybe you all remember there was probable there was in november that did not pass that was like a ride hail autonomous vehicle tax.

that's just one of the ideas under discussion like a commuter benefit clipper card where larger employers would purchase a clipper card or a transit pass and then that would become a benefit for their employees. that's another kind of option a couple of different varieties of parking taxes and parking fees and then this one that's a utility user tax on things like use of electricity or use of gas those those uses would be taxed and there's that's an existing one that would just be increased slightly for this particular option. >> we've also talked about just maximizing existing programs and one of the things that we've heard repeatedly is that people are very frustrated at the perception that other people aren't paying for muni we heard this through a lot of the budget outreach that there's a perception of fare evasion. of course we're studying and we have a sense of the the numbers

but it is important and in terms of building trust that sort of we all pay our fair share so we have deployed our transit fare inspectors to really just encourage people to pay their fair share and to understand the different options for getting a monthly pass or daily pass or whatever it is. there's also a bit around parking optimization which really sounds pretty dark parking optimization but this is things like increasing from a maximum of two hours ability to pay for parking to maybe you could pay for four hours of parking like adjustments like that that could help both raise revenue but also sort of respond to better and maybe custom more convenient customer experience for people. and then we've also talked about increasing the residential parking permit program. >> that program was originally put in place to balance supply and demand of a limited resource which is parking in

the neighborhoods and so it's actually designed to make it easier to find a parking spot by just creating a program with the stickers in some cases that the program in some cases we're seeing very, very high demand rates for parking where even though people might have a sticker they're still finding it really hard to park in their neighborhoods. so this would be a modification to allow people to more easily to better balance the supply and demand and then same with paid parking on sundays and into the evenings to meter those times so that people could we could better balance supply and demand and make sure people can find a parking spot . okay. and the finally this is the last big ideas slide as these are post 2029 ideas. these are kind of big ideas that will take a lot of community collaboration and feedback before we would even really think about pursuing any of these in a serious way. but looking at visitor parking citywide charging for short

term curb use this is one idea that came up from the muni funding working group is like well what about are we charging for like you know amazon deliveries and if they're using the curb for short period of time maybe they could pay a fee or maybe if someone's having their dinner delivered by uber eats driver or something maybe they're using the curb, maybe they should pay a little fee, something like that. joint development is something that we're really excited about and this is just recognizing that us mta actually owns a lot of property around san francisco and there's potential to develop that property in a way that both meets the city's housing goals by creating new housing supplies. >> so maybe you've heard of our potrero yard or we're developing in the mission and then there's presidio yard over by geary and masonic that has a lot of potential and all over the city we can show you a map if you're interested. so create more housing and create a revenue stream to support transit. we're really excited about that but it just that will not solve our immediate budget shortfalls but it's a little bit of a

longer term idea and then road pricing congestion pricing have been on the table and discussed and studied year for years and you know would take a lot more conversation if those were to be developed. we're just looking at them as one of many potential solutions . okay. so just want to say a few more things that i want to stop and hear your questions. >> there's no single silver bullet idea here. there's no one thing that's going to solve the entire funding gap. so we are going to have to look at a package of potential revenue sources hopefully minimize cuts but there may be some efficiencies and cuts that we have to look at as part of a package of meeting that are very, very significant $320 million goal and that we really need people's perspectives on how to do this. they're really sort of not too many easy decisions left and this is why we're coming to you all and so many of your your neighbors across the city to

share this information so we can make these tough decisions together. >> so just a couple of things on the horizon i wanted to share to get a better sense of where people are on some of these measures that i put out there. you know, like a parcel tax or a sales tax or all these different ideas. the metropolitan transportation commission did some polling. that's something i could share with you as a follow up. i don't have slides on those but if you're interested to learn what they learn that's available and we're also going to be looking at working with the county transportation authority on polling some of those local measures as well so we can get some sort of more more san francisco specific data. the last muni funding working group meeting is going to be next month in march and that is going to be the dates not yet set but we would invite you all to participate when it is and you can i can work with your secretary or your staff to make sure we get that info as a follow up to you. and those materials are all online and we're going to be working on putting together

kind of a series of those packages to consider and then looking at like the pros and cons and who benefits and who is burdened by those different packages trying to narrow down the packages and then the ideas bringing them to our board of directors and april at the board workshop for the board then to say okay that's the package, that's the direction we really want to pursue and and then of course that's for the longer term but there's also this immediate need by you know by july of this year to solve that shorter term budget gap. so that's in real time iteration right now with the board of directors looking at what how could what could we piece together to meet the 50 million gap? >> okay. so i'll just put out some questions for discussion and here for you all i'm really curious what questions you have about the revenue options that are under consideration by the muni funding working group. >> what feedback or advice would you want to share with me that i could bring back to the muni funding working group as they look to kind of close out their process by march of this year and then to the larger

themes and priorities of director kirschbaum what would it look like to start to rebuild trust with the business community in san francisco? i think that's a really important question we all need to ask ourselves and how can the sfm to be a better partner to the groups that you represent? >> so that's what i wanted to share with you all today and i'm available to answer your questions and thank you for your attention. >> thank you very much amanda for for the presentation. >> this was this was a lot for a lot of detail. >> yeah. no thank you. i appreciate that you came and wanted to, you know, share all of this at this point and i'm going to open it up for commissioner comment and questions. >> commissioner herbert, thank you for the very good presentation. those are really comprehensive. i had a question about let's

say there was a tax that would it be what percentage of so how would that work? >> would it be a sales tax or and then let's say it was i mean i'm not familiar with how much you can tack on to the existing sales tax but let's say it was half a percent or quarter of a percent. >> how much revenue would you forecast for i mean this kind of really on the back of the napkin kind of conversation but like what how how quickly would you use forecast during that making the 50 million if you added a percentage to the sales tax? i mean that seems like the most straightforward way to cover it. >> yeah. so a couple so a couple of couple of questions in there. so we are looking at a whole so

many options you know so there is one that's looking at an eighth cent sales tax a quarter and a half so i think up to 7/8 and sales tax there's some that there's some conversations it gets really complicated about the idea of a variable rate. so if you did a regional measure that the rate that would be on the ballot in for example like alameda county might be different than the rate on the ballot in san francisco because maybe the san francisco voters would vote for a higher measure. so there's just that's all the so live right now in terms of all the different options under consideration all of this the idea is towards the november of 26 ballot measure or maybe earlier in 26 but that's really what sort of the conversation is circling around because for that regional measure for example, you would need state authorizing legislation even to put a regional measure on the ballot in november of 2026. so none of those options would

come online in time to solve the $50 million challenge that we have for this coming year. but just you know, to give you a sense of the ranges because they're just there's so many just different ranges we've been considering but like that regional measure the number we've been tossing out is that san francisco us portion would be about 80 to 90 million. that would come from the regional measure like one of the more likely scenarios and then you know just depending if it's like a quarter cent sales tax or if it's a half or 70% you know it can be on the low end. i think our numbers were you know, 90 million or something up to you know in the high hundreds. >> okay. and then thank you. and then what does that 50 million cover like? is that salaries is it mechanical or maintenance? is that you know, making the busses look good or you mean the short the 50 million

shortfall that we face? yeah. yeah. so i mean that's you're hitting like right now you're you're you're sort of naming the problem that we're trying to solve is how would we address cutting that cutting enough services programs whatever it is to meet the 50 million. so for example again right here in this room on february 4th it was brought to the mta board a scenario to cut 15 million in muni service that would be about a 4% cut in service and those are three options presented for doing that and the board said please go away and come back with other options. >> we don't like we don't like those options. so and as you could imagine so it's it's it's tough at some point too it's it's tough to meet those numbers when there are not things that people want to cut. yeah and it kind of seems like you have to spend money to make

that money back if you want to make it attractive with like you know, really great seating and you know all the good stuff so i'm just full of questions. >> i don't have any you know that's all i know. that's great. and you know, just just one idea. i think that we're hopeful about is the transit fare revenue optimization. i put up there. so that is really by sort of deploying some transit fare inspectors and just being a bit of a presence is reminding people that, you know, they're expected to pay their fares. we are we saw in october of last year some of the highest transit highest transit fare inspection numbers which feels responsive to the feedback we heard from the community that they want everyone to pay their fair share. and so we're hoping to be able to share the revenue impacts of of that investment fairly soon but that you know it's a it's not $50 million right you guys are still taking cash right? >> yeah yeah.

what other thank you. >> thank you. thanks for the questions i think well our commissioners maybe might be generating some questions. >> i have a couple i'm wondering like things like the free transit that was offered for chinese new year as well as you know as well as free parking at portsmouth square like things like that but you to help people kind of see how they can can use you know like as a little trial or like as an incentive to start using transit are there numbers on whether those help boost ridership or confidence in ridership? >> yeah i, i don't have the numbers off the top of my head. i know we were definitely tracking that this past weekend or two weekends ago we were tracking the numbers of the you know so of all of that subsidized transit and whether

that was something that boosted ridership, i think that there was an observed effect. i just don't have the specific numbers. but yes, i mean in fact we've we've launched this whole kind of customer experience initiative as a mta muni which is really around putting that customer experience as the north star recognizing that taking a transit trip involves so many steps. it involves like figuring out what line you're going to ride and then like learning where the bus stop is and then figuring out payment and then once you're on the bus where do i get off the bus? and there's just so many things that maybe people who aren't as familiar with transit need to kind of learn and figure out. and so that's what we're trying to to work through as a support people all the way along that journey so they have a really pleasant experience and then they would they would come back to to riding muni. so that's one of things we're really excited about is sort of helping people learn and be be

more accessible to people who may not have like grown up here or just don't understand as well how to ride the system. yeah i think it can be very intimidating like i have a shop in chinatown and so i get to see a lot of tourists every day coming through like regional tourists as well as you know international and domestic tourists. and i think you know and i take transit into the tea station often and as well as like sometimes just getting off downtown and walking in and you know, i try to do it kind of as if i've never done it before and just go and i just kind of observe how people you know, experience transit, right? because i kind of think about like the relationship between transit with our tourist experience and it's like you know how seamless is that experience? like if i'm planning a trip to san francisco and i'm not going to rent a car, is there a possibility for, you know,

multi-day passes which i know there are but it's just kind of like that information i think is maybe not as readily accessible as i think we believe it to be and like having full package kind of like experiences that where you know i'm in chinatown and i often people will ask me like well where do i eat? and i'm like okay well if you want to stay here you can walk to this place but if you want to go to these places you know i'm oftentimes telling people oh check out the tunnel tops like that's a beautiful part of the city that's often not on our tour guide book yet. right. and so it's kind of like how do we create those experiences for people, you know, and have our infrastructure be outcome driven? and i think this is kind of the moment right now that we're really thinking about like you said, you know that customer experience and that like outcome that we want and and i think somehow deepening the

relationship with travel and visitor ship you know would really enhance the muni experience and even because those are the people riding muni oftentimes on the weekdays as well and and i think you know driving in the city i've sat in the car not to not okay well this is a comment about my friends who do not live in the city and drive in the city you know sitting in the car with somebody who's driving who doesn't live in the city. it's an experience because you're like please go around these things, you know, and i would rather just like you know, for us to be able to take regional transport systems to be able to seamlessly get off on bart and and hop on the muni and you know i think some of those challenges that we have where our payment systems, our infrastructure, our don't meet

so seamlessly are the gaps that if we could just like i feel like if we could just bridge the gaps in a way that so invisible then you know people wouldn't even realize that they're adopting a new thing, right? and so i think that's one of the the observations is that i love that the numbers for people's feelings about muni have been positively you know have increased but i also feel like as an actual writer i don't know if um i don't know if i see that number reflected in my daily rides yet so i will also have some other things to address in a moment but i'm going to give some space for commissioner benitez or commissioner herbert. >> did you have another comment ? >> i just had a short quick question and have you thought

of partnering with s.f. travel or the hotels? >> okay. okay. yes. i mean thank you for saying that. you know and to your point as well, president hewett when you go to a warriors game and you don't even think about paying for muni because your ticket to the game is your ticket to muni, that's great. that's a wonderful thing. you know we maybe we need to even promote that more but so your take away any kind of barrier to payment or figuring out any of that you just have your ticket and that that's a partnership we have created with the chase center so i think that's great. we've done that kind of partnership with some of the big music concerts in golden gate park where like your ticket to the event is your muni ticket and so that's just bundled into the cost of your ticket and then we're sort of incur then you know then transit essentially doesn't feel like a cost or any barrier at all and then people are you know, encouraged you to use it. so i mean i was just going to reference i guess i traveled last summer and when i checked into my hotel they said here's your key and here's your

transit pass and here's your map of the city, off you go. and it's like okay, that's great. we got a free transit pass now we'll just kind of use that to get around. and so i think i mean i just think that's like that's such an interesting question and i think it there is some history of those discussions. i don't know exactly what the next step is or what the barrier is but i love the idea committee and commissioner benitez oh yeah, it's just kind of a three part question and one of them is very detailed and i know you mentioned it and have the numbers but i know that the fare has increased for muni. i guess at the beginning of the year, correct? >> now i'm just curious if if that increase what that percent increases from january to february of this year, is it the same amount like his ridership also that same increase january, february versus last year? as i know it's a very specific kind of numbers ridership question. it's just more of out of curiosity to see how it might have affected that and also how how has that increase in the fare? what does that play to the shortfall as well like what percentage does it play to the shortfall to help either bring

it down or contribute to that? >> the second question was very related to commissioner hurwitz in terms of yes, have you partner with s.f. travel or even you know i have my phone with me all the time and whether it's like you know, using air or just checking into it or even just working with influencers about saying hey, you know, here's how i get from point a to b and this is a fun kind of way to do it i think you know, it's just an interesting way to to also get you know, buy in and continue to get, you know, public transportation and be accepted in our city as well. >> and then the third question is what cities are doing it well that s.f. is inspired by as well. so who have you look to or who is inspiring san francisco to better the experience? okay, great. i mean this is just this comment is so validating of why we want to reach out to diverse perspective is because some of the just some of the creative things you just mentioned it's like just the outside of the

box thought around like you know, influencers i like i think that's really interesting. >> um okay so let's see where do i want to go first with this? okay increase in fares and my recollection although it's been a few months my recollection of the transit fare increase piece in terms of the overall budget problem solving was that it was pretty small piece my the number sticking in my mind but please don't hold me do it is that the last budget cycle which was adopted in 24 trying to problem solve for about a $13 million budget gap and then the transit piece raising the transit fares piece was i want to say under 5 million in terms of what that increase in transit fares would result in. so it's a pretty small number and i do just want to i think i just want to share with you that there was a lot of thought in terms of the equity analysis of those transit fare increases and that the the product that

is relied upon most by the lowest income san franciscans is actually the cash fare which is currently at $3 and because of that we did not raise the cash for at all so that held what was raised was that you had for historically gotten a discount for clipper which was to encourage clipper so that was 250, cash was three and so it was a little bit of a we're reducing the discount for clipper to raise up that clipper fare product to be equivalent to the cash fare. but i just want to i want to understand a lot of thought and intentionality went into that and has so then you out you'll also asked about what cities are doing like are doing it well and are sort of inspirations for us in terms of specifically what piece in terms of like the budget problem solving or in terms of transit performance just getting yeah yeah.

i mean i would say a hallmark of a great user experience is that you don't even need to like you just walk up to the platform or you walk up to the station and it just comes so frequently that you know what i mean? it's just so seamless in terms of your quality of life and so you know what we have a lot of commenters comments just talk about the experience in new york city for example of like three minute headways or something on the train where it's just common like almost consistently. i mean of course there cities all across europe and asia that have extra ordinarily high frequencies. i will just say this is just fun. this is not an official as of mta response but there's a city that i visited that didn't even just track the arrival of the bus in minutes it was in seconds was like the next train will arrive in one minute and 10s and it was just like blew me away. >> yeah. so focusing on the user experience on the frequency

hour there are many studies from which we draw inspiration and then the third piece was about influencers is that right ? >> and sort of partnerships, yeah. yeah. okay. yeah. so we have it. we have a muni mobile app that people can use to pay their fares. what we are working towards is the ability to and other cities have this now and to not have to have a copper card at all just to use your credit card or your apple pay or even your like apple watch to pay and that's been that that's been a goal for a long time and i think we're working towards that to again eliminate you know any sort of barrier or friction of learning to use a new system to i think to your point, president healey, about just you know, how easy is it how seamless is it for someone who doesn't know very well to just hop on board and we want to make it as easy as possible? >> yeah, i have my clipper card on my apple wallet so and it like makes it almost feel like apple pay. yeah i guess. >> right. okay.

mm yeah yeah right right. um one of the things one of the thoughts that i had this is just maybe separate but was in terms of our wayfinding yeah i feel like you know there's some little gaps that that i've experienced where you know, if i was to meet commissioner benitez at you know powell street station i would love to be able to say meet me by door a or meet me by door 24 versus like on the south side of my i don't know i don't even know my directions but like you know i think trying to have like really seamless like wayfinding inside a station and making the stations also more inviting like i think you know you go to other cities and there are

shops and things in the stations not that we necessarily have space for all these shops or things but you know having the stations be more of a inviting place for people to go and um and even music i don't even mind you know i would love music like as you get off of a station i think there were some talks about if we have wayfinding like you know when you go to the mall and you have the directory like which i am here how do i get to the botanical gardens from this point on and being able to click on something and seeing it that'd be cool but it would also be cool if we even just had you know, put it out there for artists and tech people to come together and figure out like a really cool you know, maybe it's maybe it's that i don't know the the muse day mechanic laughing sal who creates you and tells you where to go you

know i don't know but we make it you know or maybe it's carl the fog and carl tells you how to get to one place to another but i mean, you know, there are so many creative ways i think to make wayfinding um interactive much more culturally relevant to our city um and just easy you know i would love to i mean just even even understanding like which door to exit, you know in order to get somewhere more efficiently would be great. >> um the other piece about safety was i think i had mentioned this before and another and another presentation was that i would love i've noticed that the cell phone service is better on some stretch of the tunnel like where i actually get service now on on this stretch of the tunnel that i wasn't getting before but i also wanted to see if there was just some sort of more obvious call button if there is something happening in a train car that that would at

least alert the driver of the you know, the operator that in a car 30 to be or whatever to have somebody be able to come and check on that car at the next stop something like that would make i think people feel more secure and it not you know i think it's not necessarily to the point of like stopping the whole train and like blaring an alarm but at least just kind of an alert that that makes people feel comfortable reporting something if there is something happening because i've been on trains where something is happening and i am not comfortable like either dealing with the situation or making a big deal of the situation and i've just exited the train and gone into another car but that also doesn't solve for the issue. so i would like to have some sort of um you know just a response you know where

somebody can professionally respond to what might be happening. >> um those are some of the low hanging kind i mean not low hanging those require work but i guess those are some just business owner kind of ideas like i think what you'll find is that the small business commission is generally a group of us who all we do is solve problems all day on the ground and so i feel like coming to us with presentations um i really appreciate this but i also say that like our small business community is so resourceful that if we did an outreach in a really positive way that said we just want all your ideas and thoughts about things and i know we've done that in the past where we've asked for really positive solutions oriented ideas. our small business community is filled with creative problem solvers and we would happily do

this for the city of san francisco. >> um, commissioner benitez actually i have to just note that we have officially lost quorum so we can still have discussion items and take public comment but none of it will go into the public record. oh i have to i have to notice it for the agenda. okay. >> please continue. oh yeah. no, i think you brought it up actually now that i think about it i remember i forget how many years ago but there was a big push to get a lot of local shops into the airport to really represent a local community. is there a pilot program kind of whether it be bart or muni or something on that sort where we have or you have these kind of pop ups at certain stops so that people either stay or where your busiest ports are at that you can take advantage of the foot traffic or the people that are there and have a local presence whether it be retail food or some type of local service to continue to promote just kind of the local

corridors in the city. >> that's so fascinating. i think you're right in that that it feels like that has been pretty successful at the airport at least you can you can see the evidence of that that kind of partnership. i'm not aware of a specific program like that that's an sfm to partnership but i really appreciate that creative suggestion there has. but i mean the the part one of the partnerships we've had with with i don't know if you know this this partnership with the soccer club football club that actually wears the muni logo on their uniforms and then so that's been a little bit of an interesting partnership and i think there's a partnership for beer week if i'm not mistaken. maybe there's like a uni beer at one of the breweries i think that that but i and we and you know there have been a lot of sorry there's been a lot of partnerships like for the muni for our 10th anniversary ten year anniversary we had there was a whole passport that we did that was like go go to all these businesses and get your passports stamped and tell us

how you got there. you can take the 49 to this one or you took the five to that one and so there have been partnerships like that around promoting, you know, business taking muni to businesses but i don't know about any new pop ups at transits stations if that's what you're asking. i, i think it's really fascinating for i love this relationship between kind of like you know muni specifically but also you know, just our public infrastructure because this is all one one thing right? like you bring customers to us you you bring our our staff and our teams to us and you know we're we're also feeling kind of this this transit infrastructure and so like we all kind of coexist together i'm thinking about you know when you had referenced maybe some of the larger corporate offices being able to buy muni passes and one of the things

that small business owners struggle with is creating benefit for their workers and their teams. i think if there was some way because i know like for us we have an oral surgery practice out in the richmond and the richmond feels like this like outer lands kind of quadrant oftentimes when it comes to transit and finding workers and finding staff because you know we kind of like to get off of bart you're dropped off in downtown and then you have to take another trip, you know, into the richmond district and so like it's hard to find work staff. i think like when you get further out into the richmond district in the sunset district um i'm kind of like wondering if there is a way to also be able to give benefit to small businesses throughout the city because i think that's something that would easily um create good uh goodwill with

our small business community to know that we're kind of thinking about them and how we can like offer benefits to their to their themselves as they take muni as well as like their staff and their teams because they're the ones who i feel like a lot of our small businesses are utilizing transit you know so what would those benefits look like in your mind even if it's sort of preliminary brainstorming that you're thinking about? >> um, i mean even if we're able to buy kind of like bundled like discounted rated, you know, fares or bundled kind of, you know, some kind of thing i think employers would be willing to to help, you know, their employees out with with transit like some subsidized kind of transit and things like that um but i don't know i'm just kind of like yeah thinking a little bit about that right?

>> do you have thoughts commissioner that you look like you have a thought. >> i wasn't sure if it because some of these things that this is in my mind i'm thinking okay $50 million then you see this is throwing out we need to be dealing with but so first of all thank you so much for the presentation. >> man that was it was a lot and i feel like you all have tried to cover everything and it's like okay did y'all miss did did you see if we missed anything? but i'm looking at the january muni ridership recovery and i so i do customized personal training and so i have a clientele of people of all sorts you name it from salesforce to at&t to i mean public officials, you name it. so and it's interesting how

when i hear now there's so many businesses are now requiring their people to come back to work. so i know we're on the rise of trajectory of more people riding just the nature of the bigger businesses that are now saying you have to come in. >> so are you are those >> and i'm i'm i'm sure it's difficult to kind of guesstimate that but are you seeing through the trajectory of increase there based on the mandate i know is coming across the larger businesses that are now saying okay, you have to come in to work in the language that i'm hearing is oh my god, i have not driven my car in so long or the time you know, when one of my clients was like i had to use immunity, put my makeup on and i was like oh my god. >> but but that seems to be something that we could be

looking at as well, right? for that increase for the ride sharing recovery. yeah. yeah. i, i don't i don't know if i could point to the data and say you know that's the point at which i'm seeing the increase but i think that that general i mean you're right that's one of the many sort of factors we take into account when trying to project what future revenues look like. but we always have to do sort of, you know, scenarios like an optimistic middle of the road and pessimistic scenario. so we're hopeful but can't kind of count on that necessarily if you know what i mean. >> but there is there any measurement of that or any anything that has been you know, that that increase is that a part of the measured increase of the recovery as the increase of people returning

back to work or have we not seen the meat of it because i know it just well yeah i mean you know i think i mentioned around 75% weekday ridership recovery and then in the 90s for weekend recovery but still the exits from our downtown stations like muni stations like montgomery station power station those are still very, very low. i don't remember exact numbers but the one i hold in my head of the ballpark is i mean those are substantially below where they were. gosh, i heard at one point i would have to get the latest numbers but something like 30 or 40% of pre-pandemic numbers at those downtown stations and that's what's bringing down the overall transit recovery is we're just not seeing the return of that kind of downtown commute. >> okay. >> okay.

any other questions you can tell as business owners we often like when we're hit with like crazy scary scenarios. you know, it's like cutting costs but we also don't you know, you can't cut costs into nothing. >> so it's like we're always kind of brainstorming well what are the positives? what are the ways in which we can like bring things back? so i you know, hopefully the comments from the commissioners have been helpful in in seeing a positive you know like we're all rooting for muni and i think you know our our ears are always open for you know just learning more about the system and how we can you know, hopefully provide good feedback so that you know we yeah we see people taking more muni and that it grows um would it be helpful for us to kind of plug

into networks for further outreach? i know you have a lot of outreach to do in the next like two months or so. um, given that i know what today is i think in the next couple of months or so it sounds like there's a lot to do. would it be helpful for us to i know we're not on public record right now but we can kind of amplify the the need for small business owners to come in and voice kind of like what might be helpful. >> yes. and i will say, you know, this conversation we're on the two year budget cycle right? so the budget was adopted in 24 and the next big budget will be adopted sort of april may of 2026 by the mta board. so coming out of this meeting funding working group and mta board they'll be there's a whole series of outreach and conversations ultimately culminating with the adoption of the the next two year budget. we would love to be able to plug into any yeah. any larger networks of small

businesses that you have to be able to get that information out. and then i mean i really loved how you said sort of think of us as like creative resourceful problem solvers. i guess i'm going to lock that away in my head is like if i need some creative resourceful problem solvers, i'm coming back to the small business community. yeah, that would be that's really, really great and helpful. yeah we are here. >> so, um. yeah. seeing no further questions or comments from our commissioners i think we'll open it up for public comment. okay. and any public comment? yes. yeah, go ahead. >> 3 minutes or 2 minutes. >> three minutes. okay. good evening commissioners richard carillo for disclosure i work for the city in county so cisco for the office of small business. but i'm here speaking as a resident today. >> i'll preface this by saying that i love transit. i wanted to be a transportation

planner. i specifically love intra rail transit so like muni metro but i and i apologize i missed the presentation. i was out in the hallway with the legacy businesses but i'm hoping that this makes sense based on what the presentation was. but you're talking about wanting to build trust and i find that s.f. mta is very frustrating department they just closed a lot of streets without input from businesses and without input from residents and even when residents come to the commission meetings for the transit agency they just get ignored. i live in two post triangle they closed no street and made it a slow street and nobody uses nobody street because the sidewalks and the post triangle there they're beautiful. everyone has potted plants there's bulb outs this big trees everyone's on the sidewalk and you have to drive

on each street to get into parking spots so nobody's on the street and nobody uses it and what happens is it moved all the cars over to sanchez and sanchez is the bike route is an official bicycle route and you have the fire station right there. so now it's all this traffic on sanchez street all this traffic is also moved on 14th street because they did things like did a bulb out on the bus which now the fire department can't reach the building at 400 post avenue and all those cars come down on 14th. so that intersection where i live 14th and sanchez has become like super dangerous. >> i, i have to cross it every day and i fear for my life. i literally feel for fear for my life every time i cross that street and i have to make that second crossing. i do near the fire station and it's just very frustrating for me. i'm very supportive of more funding for as of mta but it's going to depend on the next year and a half building trust

not just randomly closing streets without looking holistically. i know they're doing an elastic study of devo's triangle but i don't trust what the result is going to be because they said well there's all these cars stolen on the street so let's just close the street permanently. let's get rid of all the parking then there won't be any cars that's going to make it any more worse because every time you eliminate a parking spot you don't eliminate a car. those cars are driving around and around and around and around and around and as a pedestrian that's dangerous because they're driving much more than they would be if they just were pulling into a parking spot. >> so i want to see a safe mta working with the business community, working with residents, listening to them, doing holistic studies, doing things that make sense and not just causing chaos. and if you're short money why are you spending money closing on the streets? that doesn't make any sense. so i'm i'm hoping to support whatever you do in november of 2026 and i'll be a voice for that and we'll see what happens. >> thank you so much.

thank you. any other public comment? no seeing no public comment. public comment is closed. >> thank you very much. thank you again president hearing commissioner benita as commissioner dickerson director tang and the secretary bernbach thank you so much for your time and your creative suggestions. it was great to spend some time with you. have a good idea. thank you. you tell your next item we're actually going to continue item four given that we don't have quorum so we will hear status of the san francisco economy january 25th update likely at our next meeting. >> okay. thank you. i think that moved us on to item number six. item six general public comment . this is a discussion item allowing members of the public to comment on matters that are within the small business commission's jurisdiction but not on today's calendar and suggest new agenda items any public comment seeing no public comment the public comment is

closed. >> next item item seven directors report this is the discussion item. all right. good evening. i'll keep this pretty short so a couple of updates you probably read in the news that one of the key things that this mayoral administration has been focused on is with regards to permitting reform and i know that we've all heard this time and time again through several administrations. i think what is different this time around is that there's a true desire to make a really deep systematic changes no bandaid solutions but really solving the core of what has been plaguing city permitting processes for generations doing things very differently that may make different departments uncomfortable all in the name of making the experience for customers better. i know we just talked about that with muni service and that's really our north star as well in this work so i am part of the permit s.f. kind of the

task force that has been convened to work on this so just letting you all know that if you have any suggestions, experiences and challenges that you see consistently come up please do you share them with me? and i'm happy to continue working on those collectively under this permit. s.f. effort and then also wanted to share i think last meeting i mentioned but this person had not joined yet but we had what i called a buzzer beater situation where right before the hiring freeze we had been able to bring on a second commercial leasing advisor position so divine katori has joined our office to be able to provide that expanded commercial leasing support which we found in the last two years has been extremely helpful helped hundreds of businesses in a fiscal year but also resulted in about 40 signed leases and also helped prevent some bad leases from being signed as well.

so we're really excited to have devine join our team and also just wanted to note that morgan heller, who was previously our one of our small business permit specialists she was part of our inaugural team. she's moved on to another position still at the permit center and still helping out with permitting reform. but we are trying to backfill and hoping we'll get approval for that backfill of this really critical position. >> so with that said, we've been also working on the accessible business entrance program reform with supervisor management's office and i think we you might have heard a presentation before but we're really excited about the next phase of this work which is not being so punitive from the city's perspective. >> there's still the ada there's still a requirements under the building code that people must adhere to so those are not going away. but what we will focus on is helping business owners build that relationship with people from the disabilities community

and understanding and recognizing that there's a diversity of disabilities that go beyond just the physical needs and how can we all work together to put forth these improvements that can be cost effective. >> so so we're really excited to work with supervisor management office on that and the accessible business entrance program or form is up at the full board tomorrow for the first full vote. i'm happy to answer any questions that you all might have. thank you very much director. take any questions from the commissioners now seeing no questions from commissioners i also don't have any questions but any public comment? no public comment. all right. so i, i think the next item please item eight commissioner discussion and new business. >> this is a discussion item any items to bring up?

no. well i can just share that i was really excited to have been asked to be a judge at the chinese new year parade this year. that was a lot of fun. i got to hang out for a moment with a lot of our city department heads and different people who different people who are you know i guess leading our city right now with a lot of change. so it was it was great. it was a really fun parade and well attended. i would say it was a very well attended parade and then i think it was also what nba all-star weekend. a lot of things happening this that last weekend so i'm excited to see the city coming alive and looking forward to a

lot more events coming up. any other commissioner items out there? i think there probably are some other oh, one of the things that i was kind of thinking about is that you know, for for small businesses one of the comments we've consistently heard from small business owners is that you know, they want to see revenues, you know, going up i mean from just making sure that we get the visitor ship back up. the second piece that also goes along with that is also public safety and you know, the mayor's office now has paul yap as the public safety officer. i think or deputy chief of and i was kind of curious to see if we might be able to kind of see

what their thoughts are in terms of like small business and and if we can just like you know, welcome him into his position as small business owners and commission specifically related to public safety. yeah, like small businesses and the and and you know the things that they experience and how this new coordinated effort might be a really positive way forward for for small businesses in terms of like you know just response times and also proactive like preventative measures if that could be added to that and future agenda. i think those are the only two things that i was thinking. so seeing no other comments from commissioners, any public comment on and on commissioner comments no. so you know public comment

public comment is closed. next item please item nine adjournment as a captive please show the office of small business slide. we will end with a reminder that the small business commission official is the official public forum to voice your opinions and concerns about policies that affect the economic vitality of small businesses in san francisco. if you need assistance with small business matters continued to reach out to the office of small business and also just wanted to wish carlo a very happy birthday on wednesday. >> she's turning ten. congratulations to you so enjoy your day. meeting is adjourned. thank you

>> [indiscernible] it was something i remembered learning in middle school, but it was a far away concept. >> i go to the beach a lot. a lot of plastic on the shoreline and it made be sad to see what is going on and wanted to make a change.

>> i have many [indiscernible] and i would say it is hard to change the mind. especially of those who do not believe in climate change. >> i feel learning about the environment through my a p science courses and i think that made me to not only have the [indiscernible] also help the community. >> hello everybody. >> many interested in the climate action fellowship, i care for the environment and want to make a difference. >> when i had the opportunity joining the climate action fellowship, what made the program special is i could collaborate work with a small group of high schoolers and on sfusd and they are all passionate about certain topics. >> i decided to join the climate fellowship. i wanted to build my project on

my own and contribute to the environment. >> a project is called reducing food waste and school cafeterias, accept not only focusing on food waste, we are focus on the package the food come in and what makes it appealing to students and what doesn't and why kids are throwing it out. so, we are trying to figure out a way to number one, reduce food waste, and figure out ways to reduce plastic coming in, so it doesn't end up in landfills and the ocean which again is very harmful to the environment. >> my project focuses on water conversation. in the design i'll introduce about water resources in san francisco bay area. also suggest ways to protect our water resources, not only at home, but outside the house and with our

community. >> our project called the bridging cultural generational divides and this refers to sort of the knowledge gap between the asian american community and the environmentalism movement. >> what made we want to work on the project is our personal experiences >> we come from a chinese household and found it deaf cult to talk about--i felt relatable what we are trying to do with this project. >> i would like to see reasonable materials, like a set of plastic forks, forks you can bring back and they wash it and you can use it again, and food that hopefully isn't moldy and soggy. something fresh and vegetables for sure, because a lot of food is very unhealthy, which is bad for the students. >> i would say we should

[indiscernible] education and raise public awareness. >> i want people to know maybe your actions can have a impact on those not interested and help get interested in the topic. >> i think we should use a more hands on approach when we want to draw in youth. >> if we bring it to their attention and show the entire picture, maybe they'll start to figure out what they are doing is wrong and one less person is already a change, so maybe everyone will follow them, which is what we hope would happen. >> we have certificates for everyone. >> my favorite part about the program is making a change in the world. i am saying to others and doing something about it. >> i think i was surprised the connection after the program.

i have to realize that i actually can have a impact. >> we really do bring perspectives to this group. >> my parents they would like--i feel happy because they are adopting sustainable lifestyle with me. yes! [cheers] valencia has been a constantly evolving roadway. the first bike lanes were striped in 1999, and today is the major north and south bike

route from the mission neighborhood extending from market to mission street. >> it is difficult to navigate lindsay on a daily basis, and more specifically, during the morning and evening commute hours. >> from 2012 to 2016, there were 260 collisions on valencia and 46 of those were between vehicles and bikes. the mayor shows great leadership and she knew of the long history of collisions and the real necessity for safety improvements on the streets, so she actually directed m.t.a. to put a pilot of protected bike lanes from market to 15th on valencia street within four months time. [♪♪♪] >> valencia is one of the most used north south bike routes in san francisco. it has over 2100 cyclists on an average weekday. we promote bicycles for everyday

transportation of the coalition. valencia is our mission -- fits our mission perfectly. our members fall 20 years ago to get the first bike lane stripes. whether you are going there for restaurants, nightlife, you know , people are commuting up and down every single day. >> i have been biking down the valencia street corridor for about a decade. during that time, i have seen the emergence of ridesharing companies. >> we have people on bikes, we have people on bike share, scooters, we have people delivering food and we have uber taking folks to concerts at night. one of the main goals of the project was to improve the overall safety of the corridor, will also looking for opportunities to upgrade the bikeway. >> the most common collision that happens on valencia is actually due to double parking in the bike lane, specifically during, which is where a driver opens the door unexpectedly.

>> we kept all the passengers -- the passenger levels out, which is the white crib that we see, we double the amount of commercial curbs that you see out here. >> most people aren't actually perking on valencia, they just need to get dropped off or pick something up. >> half of the commercial loading zones are actually after 6:00 p.m., so could be used for five-minute loading later into the evening to provide more opportunities or passenger and commercial loading. >> the five minute loading zone may help in this situation, but they are not along the corridor where we need them to be. >> one of the most unique aspects of the valencia pilot is on the block between 14th street. >> we worked with a pretty big mix of people on valencia. >> on this lot, there are a few schools. all these different groups had concerns about the safety of students crossing the protected bikeway whether they are being dropped off or picked up in the

morning or afternoon. to address those concerns, we installed concrete loading islands with railings -- railings that channel -- channeled a designated crossing plane. >> we had a lot of conversations around how do you load and unload kids in the mornings and the afternoons? >> i do like the visibility of some of the design, the safety aspects of the boarding pilot for the school. >> we have painted continental crosswalks, as well as a yield piece which indicates a cyclist to give the right-of-way so they can cross the roadway. this is probably one of the most unique features. >> during the planning phase, the m.t.a. came out with three alternatives for the long term project. one is parking protected, which we see with the pilot, they also imagined a valencia street where we have two bike lanes next to one another against one side of the street.

a two-way bikeway. the third option is a center running two-way bikeway, c. would have the two bike lanes running down the center with protection on either side. >> earlier, there weren't any enter lane designs in san francisco, but i think it will be a great opportunity for san francisco to take the lead on that do so the innovative and different, something that doesn't exist already. >> with all three concepts for valencia's long-term improvement , there's a number of trade-offs ranging from parking, or what needs to be done at the intersection for signal infrastructure. when he think about extending this pilot or this still -- this design, there's a lot of different design challenges, as well as challenges when it comes to doing outreach and making sure that you are reaching out to everyone in the community. >> the pilot is great. it is a no-brainer. it is also a teaser for us. once a pilot ends, we have thrown back into the chaos of valencia street. >> what we're trying to do is

incremental improvement along the corridor door. the pilot project is one of our first major improvements. we will do an initial valuation in the spring just to get a glimpse of what is happening out here on the roadway, and to make any adjustments to the pilot as needed. this fall, we will do a more robust evaluation. by spring of 2020, we will have recommendations about long-term improvements. >> i appreciate the pilot and how quickly it went in and was built, especially with the community workshops associated with it, i really appreciated that opportunity to give input. >> we want to see valencia become a really welcoming and comfortable neighborhood street for everyone, all ages and abilities. there's a lot of benefits to protected bike lanes on valencia , it is not just for cyclists. we will see way more people biking, more people walking, we are just going to create a really friendly neighborhood street. [♪♪♪]okay, we're going to get

started. >> mm hmm. good morning, everyone. i'm scott weiner of the honor of representing san francisco and northern san mateo county and the california state senate. and today we are announcing new legislation senate bill 395 to give san francisco an additional tool specifically low cost liquor licenses to

reinvigorate and revitalize downtown san francisco. first i want to start by congratulating mayor laurie on a very, very successful weekend here in san francisco and i was exhausted looking at his social media as he was doing between the all-star game and what i think for my recollection is the largest crowd for the chinese new year parade i've ever seen in san francisco is back and is getting stronger and stronger by the day. so thank you, mr. mayor, for your leadership. so we need to continue to build on the progress that we are making and we know that downtown financial district union square south of market yerba buena it is absolutely essential for san francisco's recovery for our economic vitality and for our city's future and not just for

san francisco for the whole bay area. we know there have been huge challenges with remote work and all of the hangover coming out of the pandemic and as years of crime and public drug use that we're working so hard to try to address. and we know that we need to reimagine downtown for the future and have more diversity so it's not just the office but more and more housing and retail and nightlife and food and drink other kinds of recreation entertainment and nightlife is a key part of that strategy. we know we see that when you give people a reason to be downtown, they go downtown. we've seen it with some of the street festivals. the first thursdays are bhangra beats or the chinatown night market. people will come. and so we need to keep building

to give people more and more reasons to be downtown not just at night but to come into the office because there's more to do and there's more vibrancy. we've been working hard. i want to just really thank my colleague assemblymember matt haney who has also he has a select committee on downtowns and he's done a tour of the state because there's a lot of commonality. so thank you assembly member for your leadership. we also were able to pass the entertainment zone legislation that has allowed on front street and other at the warriors arena and other parts of the city to allow outdoor drink and allowing the local bars and restaurants to sell onto the streets. and we want to continue to build on that success too that the state of california is being a good partner to san francisco and other cities in this recovery. we know that when people are trying to open up new bars or restaurants it is extremely

expensive and one of the most significant costs is is obtaining a liquor license. it can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars and we know that and i won't get started on my critiques of california's restrictive liquor laws which hamstring cities in many ways and assemblymember hayne and i constantly work to deconstruct that and give cities more flexibility without micro-management from the state . and that's what we're doing here today. so sb 395 will create 20 new low cost liquor licenses for a hospitality zone defined by the city. and it will just allow some of these businesses to get going in a much more affordable way. and so with that, i want to turn it over to our sponsor of this legislation, mayor lurie. >> and you guys. >> good morning, everybody.

>> thank you. senator wiener. well, it's great to be back in union square again after we welcomed hundreds of thousands of people over the last few days. >> i appreciate the shout out to me but it took everybody behind us all of our departments muni sfp, pd, fire sheriffs, all of our departments, parks and rec everybody came together to pull off an incredible weekend for so long. this area has been a a hub for tourism shopping and dining. and last weekend people came from across the bay area and the country and frankly the world to take part in the lunar new year parade and all star weekend. and i was here throughout the

weekend and every time i visited the streets were packed and teeming with people. people were enjoying the shops, eating at restaurants and even playing basketball on a court right here to get our economy going again. all of downtown needs to be at full strength. and this weekend was a great way to get people here. now today we are taking the next step with permanent solutions for this neighborhood by adding 20 new liquor licenses. this legislation will bring new restaurants and bars, new people and energy. downtown san francisco is known for our world class food and culture. and last week we were named the culinary capital of the united states. >> we should be making it easier not harder for businesses to set up here. right now state law limits our number of liquor licenses and

they are expensive and hard to get to. this high barrier sends in and sends the wrong message to businesses that want to come here. well, the message from r administration is san francisco is open for business. that's the message we are sending with this bill. and that's the message our administration is sending consistently. listen to what we did just last week. we launched permit s.f. which will streamline the city's permitting process and help new small businesses open faster. we signed the fentanyl state of emergency ordinance, announced plans and announced plans for a 24 seven police friendly stabilization center so people can get medical treatment and police officers on patrol right here can get back on the street faster. and the board of supervisors land use and transportation committee passed our bill with

supervisor dorsey and supervisor souder to make it easier to turn empty offices into homes. that was just last week the week before that we launched the speedy hospitality zone task force task force with dedicated resources to increase the police presence not only around union square but also around mosconi center and yerba buena center. this bill will allow us to do even more for that hospitality zone bringing more restaurants and bars to our shopping areas and union square and yerba buena gardens. and we will continue to take bold steps to revitalize downtown. this work is urgent. and that's the energy our administration is bringing every single day every day. i'm working with senator weiner, our partners in government and our friends downtown to bring people back to our city. if you're a business owner this is your moment to invest.

if you've stayed away, come back and experience everything our city has to offer. and if you haven't heard san francisco is on the rise. so let's get on board and let's go san francisco. >> sorry. thank you, mr. mayor. next i want to bring up one of our unsung heroes who's had the ms.. mr. rodriguez who the ceo of the union square alliance and who has it's been a rough few years for union square, but i'm optimistic about this neighborhood's future and i just want to thank marissa so much for your incredible work and perseverance. >> so mr. rodriguez. >> all right. union square, how are we feeling? i want to hear you. we just came off of an incredible weekend. that's what san francisco is

about and that's what union square is about. the billboards are still up and what do they say? we don't play. >> we don't play san francisco. i'm so excited about this great opportunity that we are talking about today. why? because san francisco's lifeblood is right here where you are standing. >> the hospitality zone is where we put our best foot forward. it's where we greet our guests, where we welcome visitors not only locally our san franciscans, our bay area residents, our northern californians but internationally all over the world and nationally. this is us. this is what we represent. we can't move. the convention center west of twin peaks we can't move union square in 12,000 hotel rooms anywhere else. it is here and we have to continue to invest. when people come to visit us for two days, three days a convention just coming into town because they've heard so many wonderful things about our world class city, we want to

put our best foot forward and guess what? that is? that is our food and beverage. that is our nightlife. that is the essence that makes san francisco so unique. that is our people. that is our culture. that is our innovation. and if we can't put that front and center right here in 27, 30, 40 city blocks, we are failing and we aren't failing anymore. a light switch went off. the energy is alive. this weekend showed us that our city is all about it. it was in credible and it's going to stay that way. i'm excited for what this means when union square and yerba buena thrive. our entire city does our neighborhoods thrive and we are modeling this opportunity after a successful opportunity in our neighborhoods. let's continue to do that great work. i want to think oh i see them. >> i know they're in it with us. our state partners looks like the irs is behind me. >> that's because we mean business.

we are serious. look at these guys. they're showing up. our mayor daniel, he doesn't play. we don't play. this is real. >> this is serious. this is our city's ability to continue to thrive on the line and we're going to continue to do the work. we're going to continue to make this happen. we love san francisco. we're so happy to be here and thank you so much for all you do to support us. >> and next when i ask up my legislative partner in this effort. assembly member matt haney. >> good morning everyone. don't worry i'm not the tax collector. you know we're world class cities have world class nightlife. and in order for our city to thrive, we need world class nightlife. if you look around what's happening all over the world as cities have come back from the pandemic, they've done it with thriving restaurants, bars and people places for people to come out and enjoy themselves with each other, period.

and what we're seeing in california in particular is the cities that have really invested and supported their nightlife have been the fastest to recover across the state. >> why is that? it's because people now in many cases have a choice of where they go and how they spend their time. we can't just rely on people coming in to our city during the day for jobs at their desk . now many of those folks have a choice of whether they come in at all or whether they work remote people who have choices of places to visit, how they spend their time and when they have places to go out in the evening that are enjoyable where they can build community ,where they can experience arts and culture that's where they want to be not just at nighttime, not just in the evening but they also want to be there during the day. and what we're seeing in our downtowns including in this downtown is we're not just in eight hour downtown anymore. cities that are thriving are 24

hours. they're looking at what's happening during the weekends or looking in the evening and nighttime. and so i want to thank senator weiner for his leadership in understanding that and taking us there with entertainment zones and all of the partners who've come together to ensure that we are making it easier for nightlife can thrive to thrive not harder. our mayor said it our city's coming back. we showed it this weekend. we have to be able to embrace the role that nightlife plays because when nightlife is thriving our businesses do better. more people come and visit. our entire city benefits from it as well. thank you, senator weiner, for your leadership and all of the partners who are here. we are going to get this done and make it easier to make things happen in san francisco. thank you, senator weiner, for your leadership. i'm next. in addition, it's not just about union square.

it also goes south of mark. and i want to next call up jill jo lynnwood, director of external affairs at the yerba buena partnership. >> you know, thank you. thank you, senator weiner. mayor lurie assembly member me and marissa. so fun to work with. >> our organization comes from the other side of market street from yorba buena which is the city's arts cultural and convention district. as you may know, we have 11 hotels. >> and this weekend at nba all-star we were so delighted that we understand nearly every one of those 11 hotels was at capacity. all of our restaurants and bars were sold out. the dawn club, the lark bar, the restaurants within the w hotel, the marriott, the palace everything was booked solid. and our museums and our

galleries were absolutely full . >> the diversity certification that this that this piece of legislation is putting forward to give businesses an opportunity to open that might not otherwise well help us give give businesses another reason to choose to have conventions at moscone center and to choose to visit our museums and galleries and visit our restaurants and bars. our ambassadors work seven days a week all year round to ensure that our neighborhood and union square alliance that the ambassadors in this neighborhood ensure that our downtown is clean and safe and welcoming. so as yerba buena and all of downtown's strong arts, cultural and entertainment community communities are driving our comeback, we are so supportive of this legislation as another signal that

san francisco wants your businesses here and is where your business will thrive. >> and then our final two speakers i want to welcome up the supervisor for this district supervisor danny sauder who will be followed by ben lyman, a member of the san francisco entertainment commission. >> thank you, senator wiener. good morning, everyone. i'm danny sartor, the district three supervisor having the honor to represent union square in our incredible northeastern neighborhoods. and i'm really proud to support this effort. i see it as the next step in the puzzle, the next piece of the puzzle to bring union square back. and on my way over here today saw many of those pieces in action. you know, we have our ambassadors who are working to keep this neighborhood friendly and safe. we have our sfp ready here with a concentration in the new hospitality zone. we have i was told about the

toddler time here in the corner the 200 days of programing that are now in union square bringing people back into this square and giving people more reasons to come here. and i think that is certainly the theme that we've seen in this past weekend. we saw it in winter walk. we saw it on display. when people have a reason to come to union square they love it, they enjoy it. they will come here and that's what this legislation unlocks. you know, we i was researching the legislation and i think it's interesting that it's tied to residents. of course we want to work to bring more residents downtown living downtown we've taken action at the board of supervisors to make that possible. but in the meantime we know that this neighborhood is changing. the office use is changing, the retail use is changing and there's nothing more san francisco than more restaurants, more bars, more nightlife. you know, imagine what this legislation can unlock. you can take the cable car down

to union square and maybe enjoy a mai tai or an irish coffee or hopefully soon soon again in anchor steam. so those are, you know, the pieces as the cable car goes behind us. those are the the the opportunities and the promise that this legislation unlocks. so it's for me it's a no brainer i think for san francisco it's a no brainer for us to support this legislation and for this neighborhood to thrive with this legislation. >> thank you. >> the closer everyone. i'm a big fan of this legislation and you can tell because i wore my most formal puff and sweatshirt today. >> i'm a bar owner and i also have organized many of the bar owners in town into a group. we have about 538 of us and when we talk about downtown we talk about it being almost like the circulator tree system for the whole city. it brings a ton of economic activity tax dollars that get spread out around the city and also a vibe it brings energy, it brings people it brings all sorts of intangible things that then go out into the greater

city and fill us up. if downtown is the circulatory system, union square is the heart. so without union square as union square goes, the entire system kind of depends on it and that's why it's so important to put resources and effort and thought into into this. >> i believe a few things. so one thing is that our downtown is going through a reckoning and we have to bring it back and in order to do so we have to re-envision it. it cannot just be a place where people go to work. i also believe that nightlife entertainment, performance art they're not going to be a crucial part of the of the re-envisioning of downtown. they'll actually be the main driving force for it because without them people simply aren't going to want to visit downtown. and we're talking about people who maybe are deciding whether or not to work from home on a friday. right. talking about visitors from overseas or other cities who would come to union square and shop and enjoy themselves are going to town and we're especially talking about people from there. even san francisco in the greater bay area who maybe never envisioned downtown as a

place that they can go for nightlife. we're going through that reckoning now. a lot of our downtowns went through it in america over the last 2030 years. now it's our turn. entertainment is going to push that. i'm really excited about this legislation. it sends a message that union square and soma are back open and specifically for me a lot of our best nightlife and a lot of our best restaurants and hospitality and clubs they actually don't start downtown or soma. they start in the outer neighborhoods. they start all over the city. but a lot of those operators have felt kind of priced out from downtown just it's really hard for them to get a foothold here and i expect that many people who are kind of thriving in other areas of the city will take a look at this and say now is my chance to move down here. and as far as i'm concerned that's exactly what we need. so i want to thank senator wiener. i want to thank mayor lurie for putting this together and the whole team i know there was a ton of effort put into it. i think it's a step in the right direction and let's go. >> thank you. thank you. that's that wraps it for us. >> we're happy to take some

questions. i don't hurt any barrier. reporter i wanted to ask the mayor. yeah, we're going to work with raphael management board president on that. it's in the early stages but i'm very supportive and look forward to working with him on it. what kind of about what that'll be up to the city will structure how it works yeah well they will go from there that's what they do. a lot of people work for jobs are good work. i want the boundaries be drawn. the city will draw the boundaries and i don't want to speak for mayor.

i know there's been talk about, you know, union square. >> yeah. you ever going? i don't know if you want i mean we just looking at the hospitality zone so union square yerba buena center mosconi center really looking at it as a cohesive group. so that's that's the game plan but we'll work with our legislative partners on the board of supervisors as well. any other questions? okay. yeah, i love this. is there. so you know, i don't know if is really whether it's like marketing later in time your quote. yeah i mean we're we're actually working now to make sure that our public transit systems are still functioning and not collapsing. so muni bar and you know always any opportunity to say this that the public needs to understand if we have inertia and nothing happens muni bar,

ac transit caltrain will all have to enact huge service cuts and we we have to stop prevent that from happening and we will and that's why we're working in the state budget to try to support these systems and also to try to authorize a regional funding measure. other states fund public transportation at a much higher level than california does and so we need to play some catch up. and so we need to shore up these systems and yes, i would love for them to go later. but job one is making sure that we assure them up and other questions. great. thank you so much everyone. >> thank you for thinking(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

>> the vibrant south of market neighborhood in san francisco is deep lee rooted filipino if fluences to shape the cultural identity. soma pilipinas known for [indiscernible] night life and art scenes is home to growing filipino community that thrived for generations. >> soma pilipinas is a community, the village that has been over a hundred years in the making. this is home to many generations of filipino from the turn of the century, to the present.

continues to be a gateway community for a lot of filipinos just arriving from the philippines. >> one of sth most prominent scines is filipino owned businesses become staples in the neighborhood. restaurants like manila bowl and jp restaurant offer [indiscernible] >> we call it [indiscernible] this is my passion. everybody's who came right now. we feel good right here. community is like a family. >> the eatery serve mouth watering dishes and provide a sense of home to the filipino community, preserving traditions passed down generation. >> a filipino restaurant utilizing california ingredients we honor traditional family recipe

[indiscernible] we shop in the market 2 to 3 times a week. we make the filipino cuisine proud in san francisco. >> along with the culinary deliteds, soma philippine ow is home to san francisco top mix aulgists. filipino artistry is a facet of soma pilipinas rich tapestry. the filipino cultural heritage district transformed public spaces into canvases that depict the stories and experiences of filipino americans. >> parlt part of the work we do is support filipino artists to work with community to really create and develop community based art. this is murals and designs that really reflect the rich history, the culture and the struggles and triumps of the filipino community.

>> the presence of the filipino cultural center which offer workshops, language classes and community resources is a testament to the community efforts to preserve and promote the heritage. >> features the [indiscernible] philippines which is a indigenous community weaving textiles and tapestry for hundreds of years so proud to feech were modern ones and very antique ones and showcase fashion from the community and we are inviting everybody to come experience that with us. >> the center not only caters to the filipino community, but welcome all who wish to learn about and embrace this culture. >> we want to develop a cultural district where you have the young generation learn their history, language and culture and where you have also the seniors be part of the cultural and share their stories and their traditions, and continue to grow young in

the neighborhood. >> the intersection of technology and culture in this part of san francisco provides a unique back drop for a thriving community embracing the past while looking to the future. the filipino influence ingrained in soma serves as remindser of the power of cultural diversity and importance of celebrating in our ever changing world. . >> (music).

>> the ferry building one of san francisco most famous that as many of 15 thousand commuters pass through that each gay. >> one of the things that one has to keep in mind regarding san francisco is how young the city we are. and nothing is really happening here before the gold rush. there was a small

spanish in the presiding and were couriers and fisherman that will come in to rest and repair their ships but at any given time three hundred people in san francisco. and then the gold rush happened. by 182948 individuals we are here to start a new life. >> by 1850 roughly 16 thousand ships in the bay and left town in search of gold leaving their ships behind so they scraped and had the ships in the bay and corinne woods. with sand the way that san francisco was and when you look at a map of san francisco have a unique street grid and one of the thing is

those streets started off in extremely long piers. but by 1875 they know they needed more so the ferry building was built and it was a long affair and the first cars turned around at the ferry building and picking up people and goods and then last night the street light cars the trams came to that area also. but by the late 1880s we needed something better than the ferry building. a bond issue was passed for $600,000. to build a new ferry building i would say 800 thousand for a studio apartment in san francisco they thought that was a grand ferry building had a competition to hire an architecture and choose

a young aspiring architect and in the long paris and san francisco had grand plans for this transit station. so he proposed the beautiful new building i wanted it wider, there is none tonight. than that actually is but the price of concrete quitclaim two how and was not completed and killed. but it opened a greater claim and became fully operational before 1898 and first carriages and horses for the primary mode of transportation but market street was built up for serve tram lines and streetcars could go up to the door to embarcadero to hospitals and mission street up

to nob hill and the fisherman's area. and then the earthquake hit in 190 six the ferry building collapsed the only thing had to be corrected once the facade of the tower. and 80 percent of the city would not survive the buildings collapsed the streets budges and the trams were running and buildings had to highland during the fire after the actuate tried to stop the mask fire in the city so think of a dennis herrera devastation of a cable car they were a mess the streets were torn up and really, really wanted to have a popular sense they were on top of that but two

weeks after the earthquake kind of rigged a way getting a streetcar to run not on the cable track ran electrical wires to get the streetcars to run and 2 was pretty controversial tram system wanted electrical cars but the earthquake gave them to chance to show how electrical cars and we're going to get on top this. >> take 10 years for the city to rebuild. side ferry use was increasing for a international exhibition in 1950 and people didn't realize how much of a community center the ferry building was. it was the center for celebration. the upper level

of ferry building was a gathering place. also whenever there was a war like the filipino war or world war two had a parade on market street and the ferry building would have banners and to give you an idea how central to the citywide that is what page brown wanted to to be a gathering place in that ferry building hay day the busiest translation place in the world how people got around transit and the city is dependent on that in 1915 of an important year that was the year of our international exposition 18 million living in san francisco and that was supposedly to celebrate the open

of panama differential but back in business after the earthquake and 22 different ferry boats to alamed and one had the and 80 trips a day a way of life and in 1918 san francisco was hit hard by the flu pandemic and city had mask mandates and anyone caught without a doubt a mask had a risk ever being arrested and san francisco was hit hard by the pandemic like other places and rules about masks wearing and what we're supposed to be more than two people without our masks on i read was that on the ferry those guys wanted to smoke their pipes and taking off their masks and getting from trouble so two would be hauled away.

>> the way the ferry building was originally built the lower level with the natural light was used for take it off lunge storage. the second floor was where passengers offloaded and all those people would spill out and central stairway of the building that is interesting point to talk about because such a large building one major stairway and we're talking about over 40 thousand people one of the cost measures was not building a pedestrian bridge with the ferry building and the embarcadero on market street was actually added in and in 1918 but within 20 years to have san

francisco bay the later shipbuilding port in the world and the pacific we need the iron that. as the ferry system was at the peak two bridges to reach san francisco. and automobiles were a popular item that people wanted to drive themselves around instead of the ferry as a result marin and other roots varnished. the dramatic draw in ferry usage was staggering who was using the ferry that was a novelty rather than a transportation but the ferry line stopped one by one because everyone was getting cars and wanted to drive and cars were a big deal. take the care ferry and to san francisco and spend the day or for a saturday drive

but really, really changed having the car ferry. >> when the bay bridge was built had a train that went along the lower level so that was a major stay and end up where our sales force transit center is now another way of getting into the city little by little the ferry stopped having a purpose. >> what happened in the 40 and 50's because of this downturn we were trying to find a purpose a number of proposals for a world trade center and wanted to build it own the philly in a terrible idea objective never gotten down including one that had too tall

towers a trade center in new york but a tower in between that was a part of ferry building and completely impractical. after the cars the tower administration wanted to keep americans deployed and have the infrastructure for the united states. so they had an intrastate free plan the plan for major freeway systems to go throughout san francisco. and so the developers came up with the bay bridge and worked their way along embarcadero. the plans were to be very, very efficient for that through town he once the san francisco saw had human services agency happening 200 though people figure out city

hall offender that the embarcadero free was dropped and we had the great free to no where. which cut us off from the ferry building and our store line and created in 1989 and gave us the opportunity to tear down the free. and that was the renaissance of ferry building. >> that land was developed for a new ferry building and whom new embarcadero how to handle travel and needed a concept for the building didn't want- that was when a plan was developed for the liquor store.

>> the san francisco ferry building has many that ups and downs and had a huge hay day dribbled adopt to almost nothing and after the earthquake had a shove of adrenaline to revise the waterfront and it moved around the bay and plans for more so think investment in the future and feel that by making a reliable ferry system once the ferry building will be there to surface. >>