i am a member of the friends of joe dimaggio playground. thank you for your patience in this very complicated issue. our board does not just recommend this, but enthusiastically supports it. why should you care? it is an interesting case study. joe dimaggio playground was one of the first playgrounds in the city of san francisco we had the first publicly financed pool in the city. when they put it on par koran, it was because of the strong system. george christopher was only in office two weeks when he found out that this was a way of too much, and he was tired of them dickering round. when the neighborhood boggess, it ended up on joe dimaggio playground. we have been working to try to make this better since 1999. that was willie brown's term, thye -- the dot com boom, and we started and to try to figure out what to do. it was in 1999 when kids today in high school were just toddlers when their parents formed this, we started working on that. when i hear people say that we should look at this along, i really want to go ballistic, because i

for the library and joe dimaggio playground master plan. chairperson mar: this item is sponsored by the mayor and president chiu. >> item 2 is a resolution of intention to vacate a portion of mason street to improve the area. presidend ct chiu: i want to thank the members of the public who are here. the north beach library has historically been one of the most overused libraries -- library branches in the entire city. it is one of the three top libraries used in the city. in many dimensions, the library has not been adequate to meet the needs of the community. it has not been accessible to a lot of folks, including our disabled communities. it has simply been an inefficient branch library. for almost a decade now, there have been planning meetings and community meetings to move forward with a new design. i think the design we have in front of us, which was approved by the planning commission last week by a vote of 7-0, is a wonderful design we need to move forward with as quickly as possible. north beach library is the last library to be re

and two of them have clubhouses, dimaggio and helen wells. and we have liaisons to the parks. and last monday -- i'm sure -- i think it got to your office by monday afternoon, one of our -- helen wills person showed up to help clean the toys and they weren't allowed in. they lugged up the hill all of their cleaning supplies and got there and were told they couldn't clean the play room for the children because they needed to be fingerprinted. so i understand if you're dealing with children and everything. but the little things, i would really like to see us all work together. everybody on our board and other neighborhood boards around us want to be able to use the clubhouses for other things, to raise money, to get parents' days out there and we have facebook followers on friends of the park, friends of joe dimaggio park. they would be willing to go out there once a month and d.p.w. is great. i think if we can get this done and start it as a small seed and go around the city, neighborhood by neighborhood and mary ann bert chely is the bomb, she's awesom. she connects on every l

christenson said, -- joe dimaggio park. i appreciate all of the different community-based groups in sherman elementary, and all of their efforts to plan very carefully in this beautiful park and library. i also know that the lighting, i appreciate the architectural perspective when how this has been designed, and a note as this has been width to demolish an old building, as supervisor wiener said, there was significant discussion, so i disagree with that point of view. this hearing is not about that. we heard about that last year. but the design, lighting, the specific space for the teenage room, this is even a much better space for the young. but i will say for the young and old that are here today, so i am really pleased with the community efforts and by the leadership of david chu on this, as well. supervisor chu? supervisor chiu: i really want to thank those of you who have expressed concerns about this project. i think this project is better because of it. because of the issue of race, you have forced the city and othe

between lombard street and columbus avenue for the purposes of the north beach public library and joe dimaggio playground. supervisor chiu: colleagues, roll call vote? >> mirkarimi aye. wiener aye. avalos aye. campos aye. chiu aye. chu aye. cohen aye. elsbernd aye. farrell aye. kim aye. mar aye. there are 11 ayes. supervisor chiu: this resolution is adopted. next item. >> item 16 is a resolution authorizing the department of emergency management to retroactively accept and expend a fiscal year 2010 community oriented policing services grant in the amount of $750,000. supervisor chiu: colleagues, same house, same call? this resolution is adopted. >> item 17 is a motion appointing supervisor cohen, a term ending june 30, 2012, to the association of bay area governments executive board. supervisor chiu: can we have a motion to recuse supervisor cohen? without objection. roll-call vote. >> mirkarimi aye. wiener aye. avalos aye. campos aye. chiu aye. chu aye. elsbernd aye. farrell aye. kim aye. mar aye. there are 10 ayes. supervisor chiu: the motion is approved. colleagues, why don't we skip over o

i know it's also making an impact at the library, at joe dimaggio park, and i wanted to also let younow that you're not only helping families to get access to vital services, but you're also -- those public faces, when you invest in schools and parks and libraries, you're also investing in community meeting places. it's through those places that we can get to connect with each other as neighbors, and also connect with our city. and because of that work we now have more volunteers and more parents interested in giving back to their parks and back to their libraries. i just wanted to say thank you very much. and i want you to continue working and we will continue to respond to your investment in us by working as communities to support -- support our neighbors. thank you very much. >> thank you. al thank you fothank you for mat the community of folks that we all represent get served. thank you. next speaker. >> thank you, guy, for coming. my name is ken. i'm an

examined as part of the comprehensive environmental impact report for the north beach library joan dimaggio playground project. which was recently approved unanimously by the planning commission. i do appreciate the efforts of the historic preservation commission but as the administrator of the largest capital improvement program in san francisco's library history, i feel i also have the responsibility and obligation to deliver library buildings on time and on budget to the public. another layer of reviews that require more meetings, costly presentations that delay the opening of our branch library is not a good use of taxpayer dollars. thank you. >> thank you very much. any questions? thank you. next we will hear from mr. ginsburg of the recreation and parks department. >> good afternoon, supervisors. i'm going to jump in where my colleagues left off and suggest that, that the launching point for the conversation really, truly is about balance. the san francisco recreation and park department oversees 220 parks and playgrounds in the city, including two properties outside the city, park sh

it happened just after 9:00 last night on the train tracks near ferry street and joe dimaggio drive in martinez. officers found the driver trapped inside the flipped-over truck. first responders had to use the jaws of life to pry him out of that mangled metal. a helicopter then flew him to the hospital and he is expected to survive. now investigators are trying to figure out what led up to the crash. >> we had four eyewitnesses so far and obviously we're going to be looking for more. it's under investigation so we're curious as to how it happened ourselves. >> it does appear at this point the truck was completely blocking the train tracks when the crash happened. >>> one of the first wildfires of the season is expected to be 100% contained this morning. the met fire broke out thursday night in monterey county, just east of soledad. so far, it has burned about 830 acres. as the last night firefighters had the flames 85% contained. no homes were damaged but a barn did partially burn down. cal-fire says the fire started after a high winds caused power lines to touch, sending sparks down t

suzanne dimaggio of the asian society. >> thank you and good morning. and thank you for that introduction. let me begin by saying how thrilled we are, me and my colleagues, to be part of one of the inaugural events at this fabulous new building. we hold our partnership with usip and we look forward to continuing our work together. let me begin by thanking members of the study group who put this report together. several of them are here for our discussion in addition to our director hassan abbas who i will introduce momentarily. we have christopher candland from wellesley college and our special guest and our special guest is najam sethi and travel away from pakistan today. i would like to extend our gratitude to the late richard holbrooke who served as chairman of asia society for seven years prior to becoming the u.s. special representative for afghanistan and pakistan and we dedicate this report in his memory. the asia society established a study group to assess the political, economic and social developments and challenges faced by pakistan today. it