general bruce palmer, four star general who was westmoreland's classmate and general laborers who was his deputy and succeeded him, general fred whyand became chief of staff and general bill davidson and many others who saw this was not working. so you have to say why was he allowed to continue? hard to explain that. shouldn't have happened that way but a partial explanation has to examine the people above him who had the authority to replace him or directors operations in a different manner. you start with lyndon johnson. in my estimation no knowledge of military affairs in general and in many ways rather obtuse as well. robert mcnamara the same. then general earl wheeler. in my estimation he is a major part of the problem. essentially a staff officer. low command experience and none in combat and he has been to the north. westmoreland's idea that fire power is a way to conduct this work so he was no help. i speculate -- i will go farther than that. i assert that these main people in the chain of command who had the authority to replace westmoreland or direct him do something differe

contract and to install all five generators. given the recommendation on the following, page 5, dpw did not require a competitive bidding process for the work and is, instead, seeking an amendment -- as you know. the reason is, rubicon has begun cancellation of the five generators and has undertaken a new competitive prophecy at this time, which will cost more than what is needed to complete the work. we find that explanation to be reasonable. supervisor chu: let's open this up for public comment. are there any members of the public that wish to speak on item number one? >> good morning. my name is douglas. i want to make it for the record that i worked at general hospital for 20 years, which prepared me for my current activities. i am opposed to this. usually i support items like this. the reason that i oppose it is that it seems, to a common sense person like myself, if you have an emergency situation, why would you be asking for $18 million? in my opinion, repairs to the generators should have been done a long time ago. it pr

general bruce palmer referred to earlier was by then serving as deputy commanding general of the u.s. army vietnam. in may of that year, general palmer told him he really had a thick disagreements with west ham hound resorting he was doing it. later, general palmer collaborated on those views in an interview. it was just a mess. we were losing and trying to put it together and it just wasn't working. there just wasn't anything that was working. in december 1967, bunker submitted this secession. we still have a long way to go. much of the country is still in the hands of the enemy can still scheller behcet's and commit acts of terrorism in the secured areas, still large-scale attacks, most of the populace has still not actively committed itself to the government into d.c. infrastructure still exists throughout the country. that was what westmoreland hunter show for three years in command of u.s. forces. by the end of 1967, remember katzenbach, a crude sense of siege was descending on the white house. i know i come even general william, architect of the search industry concept and appro

you are now with the general public comments. >> if there is not any general public comment on an item that was not on today's calendar. seeing none, the general public comment is closed and the meeting is adjourned. captioned by the national captioning institute --www.ncicap.org-- >> good morning. welcome to the regular meeting of the budget and finance committee. mr. young, are there any announcements? >> please turn off all cell phones. if you wish to speak during public comment, please fill out the speaker card and return it to myself. any document should be submitted to the clerk for the file. anything discussed today should be brought up for the full board on october 25. >supervisor chu: thank you very much. please call item no. 1. >> item #one. resolution authorizing the director of public works to execute an amendment to the emergency public work contract to install a new, permanent emergency electrical generation system at san francisco general hospital to increase the not to exceed amount from $18,000,000 to $20,500,000. >> good morning. my name is ron alimeda. i am the progr

we basically give everything that we generate to the general fund through discount rates. if we have to increase manciple ratunicipal rates in order to cr this, then it deprives the general fund of that money as well. it looks like the way to follow through is an reserves we have to front end any risk of that we carry, in essence, is a general fund obligation. did i get that right? >> i think that is a fair statement. slide 12 shows you what the magnitude of the problem was, regardless of whether cca is a good idea at this time or not. there are very few choices except for power rates and cutting costs. in the budget and 10-year capital plan that we performed -- presented, we are ready cut over $220 million worth of capital needs in the last 10- year capital plan in order to help solve the structural support paul -- short fall. to g>> that is one reason why ty did is helpful to get this in front of the board in the mayor. there is a ripple effect, which makes this a potential charge against the general fund. we're not the people that do of the board is appropriate. commiss

but a general order is exactly that, a general order that has to be followed and complied with by all the offices. i really think that it is important to highlight some of the key things that are required. interaction with youth, their specific expectations in terms of how every member of that department interacts with young people in the city and county of san francisco. if i am is a police officer and want to be in compliance with the spirit and the letter of this general order, i would be thinking about how my actions as a member of the department essentially followed this tenet of that interaction with young people. communication with the community, one of the things that i have seen as captains have rotated in and out of different stations is that some are better than others at providing crime data to their district station. now, once this goes into affect, if you are a captain in any station, you have to have a plan for compliance. you have to know that, you know, providing crime data or communicating with all members of that community is not something that is desirable, which i

>> the passage of a general order 1.08 will be replacing general order 3.11. >> ok, should we take a vote? >> roll-call vote. >> on the motion to adopt g.o. 1.08. >> aye. >> aye. >> aye. >> aye. motion passes 5-0. [cheers and applause] >> thank you. >> chief, this is a wonderful accomplishment. obviously, there is enormous enthusiasm and support behind this. while we have everybody's attention, maybe you could let everybody know when the department will have this up on the website anti easiest way for people in the community to access this on the department's web site. >> first of all, for everybody that is here in anybody watching on television, which were many that collaborated in this order, i cannot tell you how much i really, really appreciate it. it was quite a process, and it was a lot of fun, but it was a lot of work. it is huge, and thank you for coming here tonight to support it. i will work tomorrow. i am not a huge computer person, but we have people that are. so i will work as best as i can to get it up. and when it is on the web site, if you go to the sfgov website unde

. >> reported the general manager. >> good afternoon, ed harrington, general manager. i have no items to report. i am here to make note that in previous meetings, there have been in discussion by commissioner moran to have workshops at times, and we have items that need it thoughts. we're trying that today. item 14 is a workshop to the commission on land use policy. i would love to hear your feedback after that to see if those are the kinds of workshops and the way to present its, and i would like to get your thoughts on whether that works for you. today, we will try that and see if it works. we're trying for something closer to the kind of discussion we had at our retreat, where there is more resolved conversation before we have actually britain's sunday down as a policy. president vietor: with the idea be that we would have a workshop and then at the subsequent meeting we would have a resolution or action item necessary or recommendation to come forward? >> we would headache recommendation, resolution, policies subsequent at the next meeting. it would dictate how muc

to his left is major general melvin species. he is the deputy commander of the marine force in camp pendleton. he has been working with us and really driving the scenario we have had on the tabletop exercise of medical search. how do we deal with the large number of casualties if we have a large catastrophic earthquake. to his left would be rear admiral jerry huber. he is the commander of the expedition nature strike force and part of the third fleet and the navy, as you know, the third fleet, they're coming in today. will is one ship already here and he is here representing advice admiral beman and advice admiral beman would be here but he doesn't fly in until 1700. the third fleet has been terrific in this whole process. i want to thank the u.s. naval services that are represented here today, but i also want to thank this wonderful committee i have, we're all volunteers. they have day jobs. i think our day jobs have become our night jobs with fleet week because we believe it's very important. and there is an aspect of what the

attorney general?o claim he first heard about operation fast and furious in may of this year, new documents obtained by congressional investigators show otherwise. on october 18th of 2010, holder was informed by his deputy that prosecutors were preparing indictments in the case. but it doesn't end there. several months earlier in a july, 2010 memo, the director of the nation's drug intelligence center tells holder so-called straw buyers in operation fast and furious are, goes, responsible for 1500 firearms that are then supplied to the mexican drug cartels. >> not everyone is surprised holder finds himself emersed in scandal. >> eric holder has a long history of mismanagement, scandalous decisions and deadly decisions. i people who put him in that appointment in the first place bear blame. they have to answer for their bad decisions because, look, with eric holder, the writes was on the wall. there was no question that you were going to get anything other than an obstructist, corruptacrat in office and

he suggested a new title for the general. washington's response to this situation was his farewell orders to the army of the united states. he wrote this after most of the continental army had been furloughed. they marched off without a victory parade or even a state of gratitude from congress. some biographers have dismissed the message as a collection of platitude. it is no such thing if you read it that it came from a man who is trying to fend off lifelong in betterment. washington told his men to their achievement against the most powerful nation on the globe was little short of a standing miracle. men from all parts of the continent had become one patriotic a band of brothers. another miracle. he professed one more time his attachment in friendship he hoped the country would eventually pay them what they deserved. no one else is secured by their courage and devotion such innumerable blessings for others. at west point, a group of one furloughed officers decided to write a response for the farewell statement. they appoint

we can get you more details, but that is the general sense of it. commissioner moran: i forgot about the minimum level. it might make more sense for the sheet to reflect 20-30. i think part of the benefit of having a small one is that you have a second group of people, but if the first group doesn't sign up, you have the first group to fill ain the void. if we put the term sheet as 20- 30, i think that states the state of affairs at the moment. >> and that is fine with me. a final point, i know there is possibility of losing a quorum. i understand that we are talking about complicated issues, their questions that remain. this is about lafco and the puc saying to the board of supervisors and the mayor, consistent with the mandate, we have put together what we believe are the best terms possible right now so that the board and american have that discussion -- and the mayor can have that discussion. some of the issues that have been raised, you have to resolve them today. there will be opportunities for us to resolve them, and many of the issues have t

seeing none, general public comment is closed. commissioner sugaya: i did have a meeting i should have mentioned with the mayor's office. they filled me in on the activities involved with oscbmc. my question was whether there was discussion in the mayor's office or the agreement they are trying to forge with cpmc regarding psychiatric man's, and he said there was none. i think that is a real concern and people here need to contact mr. young in the mayor's office. that would be the starting place, i think. i am just expressing my concern after having visited the general hospital psychiatric emergency facility. i think we ought to urge the mayor's office to take this into consideration while they are developing their agreement. president olague: we both went to s.f. general to take a tour of the psychiatric wards. it was a humbling experience for me. there was a lot i did not know about the way the things work. i think this is a bigger issue than cpmc. this is something that the looking at seriously, how psychiatric care in san fran

of funds to the general fund. this went straight to the pc. we get the revenue for it. -- it went straight to the puc. >> is your microphone on? >> the city attorney's office. when the charter amendment in proposition e, it was changed so that the commission not only determines the surplus of the water department, but it also has to be determined to be surplus for the power enterprise and the waste water enterprise, and one of the things i know we need to work on is creating an appropriate process for making that about erasion -- for making about that. >> there was something on a portion of that parcel, so we cut that out, and now that is a waste water assets, and the remainder of the property was sold to the recreation and park department and the mayor's office on housing. commissioner moran: it does strike me as the easiest to use. how do you go outside of policy and be true to the policy itself? >> i think that is right. i think we could come up with at least as strong man of some general principles and some va

general motors as a corporation had a hard time admitting mistakes. i think that's a lesson to be learned. not so much their senior executives and private, but the corporation itself was very resistant to any kind of criticism or suggestion that maybe they should do things differently. their ceo, rick wagner, grew up in gm. he had the perfect gm resumÉ being groomed from the top for years. he was a defender of general motors. when gm was attacked, rick and his people defended it. in hindsight, perhaps some of the criticisms and some of the suggestions that gm needed to go in a different direction weren't heated. they fought change rather than embracing it. the ford motor company was a smaller version of gm operationally; same structures, same global strategy, but the difference is controlled by the ford family, the descendents of the legendary henry ford, so they could make some adjustments based on their leadership, which, at the time, was bill ford jr., henry ford's great grandchildren. bill ford after becoming ceo, learned pretty quickly that his c

it will be heard on the general calendar. is there anyone who wants to make public comment on the consent calendar? president buell: someone raised their hands. >> please come forward, if you would like to make public comment on the consent calendar, but not balboa. public comment is closed on item 5. president buell: moved and seconded. >> we are now on item 5 b. balboa park improvements -- a word of construction contract. >> commissioners. in the capital planning director. this item is the continuing from our last capital committee meeting. due to an inadvertent mistake with the agenda item, we are back to let you know we would like to proceed for the balboa park project. that project will include an expanded playground, improved pathway system and complete renovation of the tennis courts, as well as fencing improvements and other improvements that will improve the use of the park. >> we do have public comment on this. christine? >> hello. in an exchange student from germany. i would like to comment on the balboa park impro

they removed a prohibition on wind generation urban bird habitat and said, required any wind generator be monitored going into the future per existing regulations. last week, supervisor mar signed on as a sponsor and davidchiu signed on as a co-sponsor and it was an ant -- unanimously approved on first reading. commissioners, you heard these ordnances on june 23rd which would amend the says zoning map, planning code, but these speak to improve code readability of the board approved on first reading. there were no new introductions this week and the zoning administrator asked me to give you an update on the board of appeals. there was one item this week of interest. it was on the in street, the restaurant called the brickyard. this was the third hearing on this appeal. the last hearing was intended to allow them one final opportunity to meet with neighbors and submit modifications. two alternatives were submitted by the permit holder. the first involves permit a closing all but one of the five patio doors. you may remember at your hearing, you required to doors to be permanently closed

we'll be right back with more from general pete >>> we're back with major general pete fuller, the deputy commander of the nato mission to train and equip the afghan police and army. sir, i just want to get into a little more specifics on the afghan equipment and what the needs are. what are they, for example, from the helicopter standpoint. what are their needs from the vehicle standpoint and the general soldier's standpoint? >> sure, let's go through the aviation side first. and they had to previously been trained by the russians, the soviets, and they had m.i. helicopters, for examples, and some others. >> those were the attack helicopters? >> yeah. >> so they had the lift helicopters and also the attack. we are maintaining the say capability and the additional mi-17s. we're not going to buy any new ones for them. the reason we did that, one, they already had the trained pilots, two, they work very well in that environment. i mean, afghanistan is very unique environment. >> right. >> you talk about the high mountain ranges they need to go through or the past. so the aircraft works very

wu, who had been stabbed more times than general hospital could count. bleeding out, bleeding to death on the floor. they tried to drag her to safety and be undetected. at some point in time, the son became aware there was also a sister in the house and with two knives raise over his head, he attempted a continuous attack on his mother and the officers. officers engaged the suspect with one shot from the beanbag gun. it did not have the desired effect. he continued to advance and the officers had to fire -- one officer fired two rounds, ending the attack. sadly, the mother passed away at the hospital from her injuries as well as the suspect. it was not until later on that we found out that he had a history of mental illness. however, because of the attack on others, this falls outside will would have been a cit response. anyway, that happened in. the meeting was well received by the community last night. i think people do appreciate the support of in the city and family and the community coming together to discuss these things right afterwards so we leav

so now to the generals. how do you suggest we deal with the guns and money going south as part of this deterrent to deal with this issue? >> thank you for those comments. the full we agree with you. one of the political problems you face is you are trying to get resources out of congress but simultaneously saying the problem isn't very important. their rates, you are simply not going to be able to get the resources to customer and border protection that are required. there is a tension here between diminishing scale of the threat while trying to enhance resources. i also think we owe it to the mexicans to not see the problem as there a threat to us or recognize mutual responsibility. every time i look at seizure raids, arce's rates and cash going south are nonsensical. we don't get at a bit of it. when we take pride in seizing $20 million that is a drop in the bucket. to do that, i stood on the bridge of the americas in el paso and you look at the car is going into mexico at night. you don't see any tail lig

it would only generate $7.5 million needed to repay $19.5 million. this cannot be an answer in and of itself, and that was a question the commission have had prior. the other option we looked at is it the ratepayers pay for it themselves, paid for it not at 11 cents, we just raise the brake a little bit more to be able to provide 100% green, and also recover $19.5 million over 4.5 years. what this shows is we would need to do an average customer rate of 12.7 cents, and that would mean about $9 per month and cost for customers to be able to have 100% free product. and --- green product. it is by far the largest single group of users. if you go to the next largest level, which takes as well over to half of all of the residential consumers, $18.90 per month. the good thing is we could provide 100% renewable product. customers could pay less than $1 per day to be able to choose and select into that. that would actually pay for itself and cover the $19.5 million. it is one of the possibilities. the other possibilities mentioned in the past, but your commi

the policies tailored simply to the general fund. as in the previous financial policy, either of these items can be suspended on an annual basis by the board of supervisors with a two-thirds vote. and they can be amended in future years, as proposed by our office, and then adopted by the mayor and the board by a two- thirds vote. one of the things we talked about at the time that proposition a was going forward was, do we want to codify these policies explicitly in the city's charter? i think our collective decision at that point was, no, let's create a mechanism where we can adopt financial policies as a city. the mayor and the board can adopt them. but if we find ourselves needing to change them, we have a mechanism to change them without having to go back to the voters. this is brought to you in that vein. the third piece of legislation deals with coordinated planning timelines. as we have talked about a little bit here today, the city has been engaging in a host of new financial planning activities and budgeting activities and fu

project, ink -- impacting the generator project. we are up against the $18 million limit. forecasts are requesting a limit of 25 million to replenish some of what was eroded by the additional scope of work. also, in anticipation of encountering other issues on the first floor. right now, the project is wrapping up. when the generators go live, we go to the first floor with turbines, reconfiguring the boilers. we expect to encounter similar issues. so, leslie and in conclusion, support of this resolution will allow us to meet the original objective of restoring reliable emergency power while also maintaining the original schedule with the added benefit of shifting a good benefit of work from the contracts on the rebuild to smaller, local contractors that are advancing the generator project. with a quick overview, i can address any questions. supervisor chu: thank you. let's go to the budget analysts report. >> madam chair, members of the committee, on the bottom of the page, towards the end of page 4 of the report, at the p.w. -- dpw