isabelle wade, one of the founders of the san francisco parks alliance, handled our community outreach and she did a great job. we had meetings with hundreds of neighborhood residents including one of our wonderful supporters jamie whit a kerr, right there, jamie, wave. these residents working with landscape architects cliff low and katy taylor designed this park. later kirsten -- where is kirsten? a city planning and don of parks and rec as well as tradection professionals studied the park to ensure it met all the professional standards required of a san francisco city park ~. thank you, don. and kirsten, thank you, parks and rec. thank you, jamie, and thank you, cliff and katy for all your hard work. the children's play structure will be coming in the next few months. construction of the park is finished. the original plan for emerald park called for cities to buy the land and all the improvements as well as pay for the ongoing matesv. in these times of great stress on the city's budget, this solution proved difficult and we are so pleased to say today, let me reiterate alastair's wo

the blue, green waste since i went back and looked at some of the stacks of papers in 2005, when isabel wade who was running the neighborhood council at the time, thought that this should be along the southern water front, the equivalent of the hurricane way on the northern water front. the port, really, embraced this idea. and even after the neighborhood parks council kind of went away, and gavin newsome had the task force that came up with a vision plan the only entity that moved forward and really embraced this idea was the port of san francisco. and the port has done an amazing job. and in the last six years. to not only plan and strategy the jewels in this necklace but to make it happen, on the first time that the port has been allowed on the general obligation bond was for these blue, green way parks. it has been i can't thank, david bopray and monique enough for the amount of work and energy that they have put into it. i am a member of the sea wag and so i have been working on pier 70 for ten years and i chaired the citizen bay committee and so i have been working on the mission bay p

the parks alliance has been a semi-private entity ever since isabelle wade stepped in my doorway and said, we've got to do more. and matt owe grade i brought in the park avenue katz following and we've honored as much of the promises to them ~ because they work so well on behalf of the rest of the citizenry of san francisco. and, so, i suggest to you that the emerald park as it is announced today in a public-private and semi-private partnership that is occurring will be, i think, the signalling of a new model going forward for the rest of the city. that as we proceed with this incredible investor confidence that the emerald fund has that the housing and development has, we'll also be asking for new types of partnerships to be created because it is no longer just the city that has to run the park system. we have to run it in a better and smarter way. and what can be better is that alliance that we have with the parks alliance. i think -- and i want to thank again the leadership and the private sector oz and alastair, and to your particularly spouses today, that you signal that this me

served on the blue, green, waste steering committee, and during its initial organizing period when isabel wade was there and i am on the board of directors of the bay access and the member of the committee water bay trail. and in 1999, the port asked me to serve on the sea wag committee, and because it felt that the human powered boating would be an important part of the future of the southern water front. and later, when the blue, green way concept came along, the blue, often was meant to refer to the water trail for a non-motorized small boats. and the green referred to the parks, and the bay trail connecting them. and the concept besides the blue green way is to channel the economic change from industrial to mixed use areas, in order to insure the creation and preservation of recreation space in the water and on the land. and the process was not new to san francisco. and it had happened, a long the northern water front when the park was created. our boating and swimming clubs had been originally created in the middle of industrial spaces. and in the late 19th century, the railroad tracks on

they were isabelle wade and karen kid well. i don't know if either one of them is here today. ~ now we have matt owe grade i speaking to you from the merge park trust. i'm sorry, san francisco parks alliance. ~ we can't forget that, they're doing so much. this is our parks -- citizens parks group. okay, lizy hirsch, please come up. we want to raise hands with you. (applause) >> mary hobson. jeff miller. [cheering and applauding] >> okay. and carina bonamo who was -- this incredible playground in the most beautiful park in san francisco, we've already heard that online. it is now officially the most beautiful park in san francisco. [cheering and applauding] >> with the most amazing playground. and this was a dream that carina had. she moved it from a dream. there were splinters in this little wood playground that we had, and carina got a group together, did this in the most democratic way possible, and just has done a fabulous job. thank god. i hope you have many more projects ahead of you. >> thanks, lynn. and i just want to ma

karin woods, isabelle wade, [speaker not understood], and redmond. they have passed on but they left us something really beautiful and we're pleased about that. i just want to say a special word of thanks to all of the community that live here. thank you so much for your dedication to this project, for your patience, for your tolerance as we close bike lanes, we close passage through lanes, we close the sidewalks, we drove piles, we poured cement, we laid grass. it was all worth it, and we really appreciate how tolerant and patient and the cheer leaders that you've been in doing that. so, thank you so much. and a special thank you to the district 6 supervisor who has remained equally vigilant, but also very tolerant and patient, our very own jane kim. please help me in welcoming supervisor kim. (applause) >> first of all, what a treat to have otis redding iii here with us this morning. i am a huge fan. and as an elected official, as a politician, many of my role models are musicians and otis redding is one of them. and he sang my favorite version of