the need is everywhere. >> put a face on that? >> there's the working poor. >> absolutely. you hit the nail on the head. it's the working poor. most of the families coming to us for services are the working poor. they have jobs or hat jobs but aren't making a suitable living wage so they need assistance. it's not just the assistance they might get through the second harvest food bank or st. joseph family center. but it's like the cal fresh program which is the new name for the food stamp program here. >> for those to qualify, i mean the income level is so different when you live in california or iowa, let's say. so you have less of a chance making it earning that same amount of money in california that you do in iowa, hence you're getting longer lines and those lines aren't diminishing. >> that's true. the federal poverty level is muchl, much lower than what it costs to live in santa clara county. there was a study just done that i think the average for these two counties, a family of four, costs in the range

i will started this to help people get the resources they need. thank you. >> madam president and esteemed panel, i represent arriba juntos, a case manager for the 35 nursing assistant, training students for an excellent career. we support them on many different levels. i would like to express this in my language, which arriba juntos opens their hands to many different communities. [speaking foreign language] >> this would greatly hinder. once again, switching to english. >> with due respect, we strongly oppose listing the panel to review, with the very nice and common judgment. thank you. >> i will keep calling out names. oscar tang, [unintelligible] tracy brown. >> good afternoon. i am the director of empowering the mission -- we are against this project. they are the fiscal sponsor but also the partner. we partner with the community response network, dealing with a high-rescued in the city. this project is not only -- but only is this gentrification, this is a project that doesn't really meet the needs of that area. as the previous gentleman sai

how do you balance the needs of the residents with the needs of the restaurants and bars? >> i moved into my neighborhood in part because we have such a wonderful vibrant nightlife. san francisco is famous for our restaurant scene, are seen, club scene. -- are sbar scene. we have had too much violence around these nighttime venues. i have passed several pieces of legislation to address the security and safety needs of neighborhoods. we all support a healthy, vibrant nightlife. but we also support a safe nightlife that complements our neighborhoods and is not in competition with our neighborhoods. >> what are your thoughts on the city's economic development? what would you like to change about the approach to developing the economy? >> as a city, i do not think we have been good at creating jobs and economic development. there are things we can do to make life easier for businesses. businesses are the lifeblood of our economy. over the past few years, i have helped to eliminate dozens of fees that have been nickeling our small businesses to death. i have been pushing for mo

the east bay, north bay, and south. we have to invest in our schools. we need a mayor who will be in education mayor coming use the bully pulpit for that purpose. we have to invest in services that wraparound families and make sure we're not cutting funding to parks and recreation centers and after-school programs. fundamentally, we have to do with far better job of keeping the jobs we have been losing. over the past couple years, we have lost 30,000 jobs, hundreds of companies. this is why have been proud to fight to keep companies like twitter and san francisco come to fight for the next biotech company, clean technology, to fight for the 80,000 small businesses and stethoscope and the several hundred new manufacturing companies. i hope everyone may take a chance to visit my website and see my plan for jobs and the economy and all of the policy papers we have and how we build a 21st century city. >> i hope you will visit my website. i have the education, down payment loan assistance, condominiums, or reform, but let's get real, san francisco has lost its blac

i think that both you and the director can dissect where our needs are. and then go from there. >> who pays for the testing? >> if it is testing outside, dhr pays for it. if it is something that we are doing, essentially what happens is it is internal testing. people are participating in interviews and interviewing -- and going over resumes. the bottom line is that there is no increase in cost as a solution to opportunity. >> thank you. commissioners? any questions additional? >> thank you. >> thank you. >> item 5b, update on proposed legislation. >> good morning, commissioners. i am the manager for public affairs legislation. i provided in your packet a november highlight summary, similar to what you saw last month. you may note that this ordinance that supervisor chu has introduced actually received some coverage this morning in the chronicle -- "chronicle," business section. about the accessibility of not reaching it. the acting director is putting together a brown bag briefing. we are organized to do that probably by the end of this month, to bring peo

whatever happens with the boat house, it needs to be local. the workers need to be local. hopefully a nonprofit set up and something -- and not something that is geared towards profit. please make sure that you say the stewards of this area. i do not think that our city and tim have agreed on anything ever. when he and i are both coming up and raising strong concerns that the sfpuc needs to stay this land, this is a powerful statement. thank you. >> good afternoon. i am the superintendent of recreation and community services with the rec and park department. one year ago, our apartment entirely restructure the way that we deliver recreation services. prior to that, we were limited in scope of programs we could actually offer. you have a recreation director at the center. if that recreation director like tennis and soccer, that is what you got. he did not have much of a choice. we cannot be responsive to what community needs work. our new model allows us to be responsive not only to community needs but the different properties and communities ar

project is not only -- but only is this gentrification, this is a project that doesn't really meet the needs of that area. as the previous gentleman said, there were people around the block, and there was a huge line. to have units of high-income individuals who will be living next to -- some people are homeless, there is traffic. this will cause a serious problem with these people move into these units. we're very concerned. the young people go to the safe haven in the evening, and i don't know the list of complaints that will happen. i can already see the problems that will take place in this community. the entire community is against this project. the gentleman who is the owner of the property, he made an announcement. it is obvious in this room and the overflow room outside that the community is against this. there needs to be some serious dialogue and conversation, for the folks in the community to understand what is going on. >> i am the co-chair of the community advisory board. i am here to talk about the impact that the proposed housing will have. those with the great -- the late hou

in my view, the project needs to move forward with all due haste. the last thing we want to do is provide the federal government with any sense that our commitment to the project has wavered. i do not think it has, and i look forward to continuing to work with the mta to make sure we complete it in the timeline and for the money that is at this point agreed upon. i should say about the budget -- i am very glad the issue of the increase from $1.3 billion was in greece -- was clarified. we are partially responsible for that. my own team was at those meetings insisting we should have a decent contingency. that is because i think it is much worse to come to a set of elected officials with a surprise after the project has already reached its budget because we did on approved inappropriate contingency. it also means it is just a contingency. we are not obligated to approve it. there are precedents for projects in san francisco not using their contingency. i am hoping we can do something similar in this project. it is a complex project, but the point is it

but at that time, there was the right approach to fulfill the energy needs, the electricity needs. it came out that that current is the more appropriate solution. now more than 100 years later, we learn the d.c. of the future, because it brings us to the possibility to connect areas where we have vast amount of renewable energies, but far away from the low centers. there's the benefit and advantage of transmission technology. >> in the united states, there's been a row manhunt sizeation -- row manhunt size -- because of technology, and they've done amazing things, all beginning humbly in the real metaphor call garage and then rising to become great innovators and changers of the world. but there is this romantic idea now that it is a teenager in a garage that's going to save the world. how do you deal with that teenager in the garage and get him into siemens, or her into siemens and listen to them? how do you find the kid in the garage and know that he's got the right ideas? >> that's a very good question. i think everybody would be lucky to find those kids who have a really good id

it is good for us to know what the health care needs of the city are going to be in the next couple of years or long term. so, making sure those who do planning and other things, that we think strategically about the need citywide and also neighborhood by neighborhood. and we were able to do that and pass that legislation as a district-elected supervisors, even though this is legislation that impacts the entire city in the future of health care in san francisco for many years to come. i think it is possible to do both. it is definitely possible. >> let's talk about budgets. the city is faced with tough budget decisions. including where to make

the money needs to stay for the employees. thank you. supervisor chiu: thank you. next speaker. >> i work in the intensive care units. every winter, we have people who are young, have small children and were brought into our intensive care unit because of septic shock caused by systematic threat of infection, which is often developed by a simple conditions such as pneumonia, lung infection, or flute -- flu. if the condition is severe, these patients often face death. life-threatening illness can be avoided if those patients could visit a clinic to get antibiotics or even if they could, in the er before completely collapsing appeared however, most of those patients hesitate to come in for a very long time because they could not afford the $3,000 for the visit. instead of getting medical care, they just hope for a full recovery, which does not happen until after weeks of hospital stay, or sometimes it never happens. it was heartbreaking to see young wives or children at the bedside in fear of losing their husband or father. it is always painful to see these because i

it is not enough to extend the expiration window for funds placed into expiration accounts. we needensure that the health care expenditures required by the ordinance are actually used for employee health care needs. we recently had a worker come into our clinic, and she had incurred a health care expense, and she was trying to find a way to pay. her san francisco employer -- [bell rings] supervisor chiu: thank you very much. next speaker. >> good afternoon, supervisors. i am here representing our workers said that represents young and immigrant restaurant workers. we are also a member of the progress of workers alliance, which is nine centers in san francisco that represent different communities and different industries. as you know, we have worked on the issue of wage theft that many of you -- not many, all of you took the pledge to end wage that -- theft. this is also a form of that. these hard-learned dollars are not going to cover the medical cost for medical needs that they are entitled to. as a worker center, day in and day out, we see cases where workers are coming in where t

. >> what about the city's housing needs? what should the board due to address those needs? >> we are a city that is seventh by 7 miles. we have incredible density. we're the densest neighborhoods on the west coast. everyone wants to live here. that drives up housing prices dramatically. the housing costs are driving out working folks, families, the middle class. we need to continue to reinvest, to build, to develop, and maintain a troop stock of affordable housing. i am committed to increase in more funds so that we can build more housing that can be afforded by folks of all economic backgrounds. >> what about the issue of homelessness? >> in recent years during the terrible economy, we have had to cut back significantly. our social-service net, programs for folks who may have mental illnesses, we have seen many problems become exacerbated on the streets. when you combine that with the fact that we have an affordable housing in most parts of the city, it is no surprise our homeless numbers have gone up in recent years. the city needs to recommit ourselves to the values that

it allowed us to address the directed needs of the people of japan. what the people wanted was to return to normal as soon as possible. meaning they wanted to clear the schools. they wanted to address the human needs of the population. which meant showers. it also meant providing use it to help to relieve the tension and the pressure that had built up on people. now, to the consequent management. while the humanitarian assistance operation is in place, we need to get through an understanding of what goes on. in other words, we needed to build a reactor. we needed to understand what was going on inside of the reactor to anticipate our next move. i think that the value of this conversation is to share with you the kinds of questions that come up in the course of a crisis and how we can answer them. for us, this is to get inside of a boiling water reactor and understand where the key levers are in terms of what affects temperature and pressure. there are four reactors present. they performed as designed when the earthquake hit. in other words, they shut

it is good for us to know what the health care needs of the city are going to be in the next couple of years or long term. so, making sure those who do planning and other things, that we think strategically about the need citywide and also neighborhood by neighborhood. and we were able to do that and pass that legislation as a district-elected supervisors, even though this is legislation that impacts the entire city in the future of health care in san francisco for many years to come. i think it is possible to do both. it is definitely possible. >> let's talk about budgets. the city is faced with tough budget decisions. including where to make cuts and whether or not to increase taxes. how will he make these tough choices -- will you make these tough choices? supervisor campos: the budget is the most important policy document that the city can pass. it reflects the priorities of city government. i believe we have to be creative in how we look at the issue of the budget. it is important for me that certain things happen. i think that public safety has to be a priority in the budget, the

. >> i would really like to commend the previous speaker. i am a worker. we need more business owners like her. the problem, as the situation stands right now and as the proposed amendments would make it, is that she is placed at a competitive disadvantage for doing this. these amendments do not fix the loophole, and they do not help me as a worker. if anything, the possibility of a legal challenge places the amendments as having the potential to make the situation worse for me as a worker. it does not matter whether it, january 1, a rolling year, as long as employers have an incentive to take the money back, they will. right now, they are taking 80% back. i am working for my third catering company so far this year. the employees do not know about this benefit. i asked my boss. i asked my boss' boss pierre they told me it does not exist. i ended up getting health care reimbursement by marching into the vice-president of hr's office and demanding it. since then, i filed a complaint with the city. the company filed a complaint with a lawyer. they are spending a lot

even after the need to be out in the field. the only request that i have here is that somehow if and when they get their clearance and/or orders and/or essentially coordination of how they are going to facilitate their day, that they could be mindful of making those parking spaces available to our paying customers. >> are you referring to the parking lot or the parking meter? >> probably, nation. but as much as any parking around the building, it really gets to be problematic when it is the first push, at the end of the day, or especially at the beginning of the day. >> as far as the garage, i believe i just moved out nine cars. we do not use the garage at all. as far as parking, i will definitely speak to staff about trying to be mindful of that. generally what we do is most of our staff drive to work, and they switch out their cars from the parking lot, and they tend to bring their cars around the building. i will definitely talk to them about may be keeping them a block away. we will see what we can do. >> i think this stake

the paper. investigations that need to occur aren't occurring. we know as lawyers, the standard and sufficiency of the evidence is not a standard for opening an investigation. and yet, we hear from the dna that was a political appointee that there is insufficient evidence to open an investigation. first and foremost, we don't put politics first. that is why this is a job for a prosecutor that knows what she is doing and that has the ability to stand up to interests. and to do what is right no matter how powerful and influential people are. investigation clear is a cloud of suspicion even if the cloud is wrongfully there. everyone is served by a vigorous unit like the one that i had to oversee public integrity and corruption. >> there is often a sense of political corruption in san francisco and very little has been done about it. i looked at the city charter. one of the provisions said that in order to the district attorney, you have to be an active member of the bar five years preceding the election. as you read it down, the city attorney is proh

we have black kids and brown kids who are killing each other on the streets. we need a strong response, and having revenue to do that will be part of my solution. >> first, i would change the charter so we have the immiscible bank of san francisco. instead of depositing our pension fund and the bank of america and letting them take the profits, which they add to what they're getting from their new charge for debt cards, we would get the profit and we would lend the money to individuals and businesses in san francisco. then i would institute a commercial rent tax that would be a lot more fair than the payroll tax that we have now, and also much more progressive than the gross receipts tax. then we would need public power. we need to be creating our own power and also owning the grade. we can do that. p.g. and evil has been proven to be incompetent. this is something we can work on and we have to bring the money back down by progressive income tax. there are many cities that have progressive income tax. it is time to tax the rich. duh. >> ever since i ran a small busine

to be able to follow it up very closely with the people and to understand their needs on the spot we are the i.c.c. we are the red cross what we do is we are closer to people we try to. stand there needs and their needs can change talking about something else you mentioned libya we are convinced today if we need to maintain a presence in libya to be able to understand what the conflict will evolve i hope i hope that the conflict will end maybe but we are rather convinced that we need to stay for a world to understand what might that be the problems in everything they will be some problems in the coming months you know i worked myself with a humanitarian mission in africa for a couple of years in the eighty's and i are where was it anything during the drought and famine and i saw red cross direction and i know that you guys you like giving hard times to authorities well this is not unusual for it is what we are doing hard time but you this is this is the is as per your job so say in chechnya in south a city i would say that you are arguing. thirty's or authorities but given th

so this authorization is the general manager the ability to be nimble in our response. we needbe nimble in this situation. the reason is that they are very tight deadlines that associated when you launch these new programs, and you typically create a rash of entities that are seeking qualification. if you look at the regis situation, the city must register all of our generation that is renewable by july 1, 2012. right now, public utilities across the state and other generation entities are doing the same thing. they are trying to get their facilities registered. so, delays that might be caused by going to the board for approval at what are actually very modest costs could actually result in a loss in value for the city or a loss in terms of financial value or perhaps a loss in compliance value. just a few things to keep in mind about this authorization to go again, these contracts are standard and not negotiable. they are required for full participation in compliance with state law. the deadlines are tight. the delays and risk losing some of the values. costs are very modest. i

>> we will still have the need to go through the system, they will still need to be assessed for theious programs that they do have. we do not to the population, you know -- the population is not going to get any less. we will have services for people in the quality fund who could qualify for alzheimer's day care resource centers. supervisor chu: why don't we go to the budget analysts report? >> members of the committee, if the proposed supplemental appropriation is approved by the committee, the fund that you previously appropriated in the 11-12 budget, the city revenue loss fund, would be reduced by $3,700,001, there would be a balance left. we pointed out on page 5 of our report in the supplemental that there is funding that is continued. the estimated annual cost would be $5,730,000. at the bottom of page 5 of the report, based on december 2014, if you approve the proposed supplemental appropriation, that would be about 2,824,000 below current state and federal funding levels of $5,833,000. supervisor chu: thank you. let's open this item for public comment. i have two cards. >> t

of the city against the needs of your district? >> that is the biggest challenge for any representative, whether it is a local supervisor, assemblyperson, or congressional representative. it is important that i keep in the back of my head that i sit on the city and county board of supervisors. there is a responsibility to the city as a whole. there is no easy way to balance it. you deal with those issued by issue. >> the city is faced with tough budget decisions, including where to make cuts and whether to raise taxes and fees. how will you approach the difficult choices? >> i think the biggest challenge in the budget is the cost associated a city employee pensions and benefits. those are the single biggest driver to our expenses, far exceeding our revenues. i have a single-minded focus dealing with that. for the last few months. we have been sitting down with our various public employee unions trying to come together on a way to balance the city's needs versus respecting the rights of the employees. if we are able to come to some s

the wealthy. we have 24 billionaires'. that's enough. we needousing for poor workers, middle-class families, artists. these people are the backbone and soul of san francisco. they deserve to live here. where will the money come from? a few ideas -- one, a municipal bank of san francisco will get the interest on its own pension funds instead of giving it to bankamerica. second, dumppg &e to have public power. that would give us lower rates. 3, the rich must pay their fair share in taxes. money is being sucked upward as i speak. let's bring it back down. taxes the rich. duh. in this era of white -- right wing at renters and passes aggressive -- it is time for a woman, it is time for a green, it is time for san francisco to woman up and become the city outsiders already think it is. remember, ranked joyce voting gives you the freedom to vote your heart. if my ideas excite you, make me your number one choice. eight other city is possible. -- another city as possible. >> the league of women voters and sfgovtv has partnered to give you statements from

the water. in most of those areas, it is in short supply. we needo take a systemic view of the whole water juice system -- cold water system and not just focus on energy. " we're talking about fresh water. is salt water appropriate for some energy uses? >> if you use walter s. process in water, often you are dealing with tight quality constraints. in the energy industry, we talk about designer water. there are water projects where you deal with salt water. increasingly, we are trying to have pure water to optimize efficiency and get extra oil and gas out of the ground. >> if we move to electricity, the united states has seen a move away from water cooling plants. the ambient temperature is higher going out and going in. to replace fiske cooling tower -- the cooling towers use of a lot of water to evaporate. is this a sensible use of water? is this something that seems good but has a higher environmental price down the road? >> the latest developments go in the direction of replacing water cooling with air cooling. we're talking about more expensive

the proper procedures. even in concert with other evidence, we need to be very skeptical. again, the job of the d.a. is to do justice, not to convict. we need to make sure that our evidence is completely reliable. >> and his use of incentivized witnesses is a terrible practice. these people are in jail for a reason and they become self interest. we talked about getting witnesses from the jail. and we should know exactly what is going on in these jails. people go into jail and they don't come out. sometimes they died. why should we know exactly what is occurring? we should know, just -- they don't have any right to privacy in jail. we should know the truth. maybe he is telling the truth. if he isn't, we know that that didn't happen. >> i think it goes to a training issue. you can put cameras everywhere you want, but at the end of the day, you have to teach how to do things right. i've been a leader in terms of training. i have conducted seminars and conferences around the country including hawaii. i testified at the u.s. senate to teach our legislatures. training is essential. i have trained a law-enf

the old system. we need to broaden the base, reduce the top marginal tax rate, eliminate the difference between capital gains and ordinary income, and do a number of things that will help to promote growth and create more equity within the tax system at the same time, while keeping us competitive in a global economy that is increasingly competitive, and we are losing our competitive posture. host: if you brought the name ross perot. he is one of 14 contenders we're featuring every friday evening. this week we will turn our attention to george wallace. next week, and george mcgovern, and the series will wrap up with our look at ross perot. we hope you tune in every evening -- every friday evening, or check it out online at c- span.org. this twitter comment -- guest: we are currently benefiting from the instability in europe. we are a temporary safe haven, and that is the reason interest on our debt is so low. people are trying to preserve principal. as we have seen in greece, italy, portugal, and elsewhere, o

of whether there are gaps in the role that was needed. how to apply the military instrument is important for military leaders. we can help to optimize the approach the two are trying to take. for us, there was this sense that we were behind. i would suggest that, in the case of a crisis that continues and insurers for the length of time that this did, the roles that we were trying to play was how to anticipate the next problem. feedbac[feedback] the way that this played out, there was contamination in the atmosphere, followed by contamination of the food supply. then there was the water that was running into the ocean. so, our discussions, both with the nrc and the government of japan, how do we understand and characterized assistance to develop a common operating picture for understanding. how do we talk about this? what messages do we give to the population? the challenge was that we had different levels of understanding of these technical issues. that there was disagreement within the technical community in terms of exposure and risk. t

you need to assign someone -- we are blessed the this is a country where you can fail. it is not a badge of dishonor. we have a question in nature. we have every ingredient we need to be the most innovative country in the world. but to be our strategy as a country. that tech community -- i would include the creative community in that. the music industry, motion picture industry -- we are the world to attack innovators. -- world's innovators. >> back to the letter to the deficit reduction committee, with regard to these as they called for the number of employment base pieces for highly educated workers who work permanent -- and at work at the says -- work visas and repeal the number of applicants per country? >> we have attracted the world's best and brightest and we need -- all our forefathers came here for a better life. education is an export of hours. we get these really bright people and we educate them in the math and science and we give -- and then we kick them out of our country. that is crazy. republicans and democrats agree on this. that is not a good policy. we