>> i am noreen wheaton. while humans share binocular vision, like most bards, vision acuitier to ability to distinguish details of some bird spee 2 1/2 to 6 times better than hue mans and to know how our vision compares with that of birds is difficult and we must use anatomy and behavior to compare bird's ability to see with our own. also, each species vision has evolved differently depending on the environmental conditions in which it survives. so how are other eyes different? for one, most species of birds have huge eyeballs. some raptor's eyes are 15 times the size of ours. we can only see a small portion of the bird's eyes on the surface. if our ice were proportionately the size of owls, they would be as big as baseballs and weigh 2 to 3 pounds. in both hue mans and bird, the innermost layer of the eyeball is the retina which consists of light sensitive cells, the rods and cones. eyes consist of large pupils and highly curved cornea that provide a bright image to the retina. unlike human eyes, the retina

as noreen said, as many as a billion birds are killed across the country every year. one of the reasons most people don't really grasp the scale of this issue, i am sure most of you have heard a bird hit a window. almost everybody has. people think this is a rare event. think how many birds have to hit windows for many, many people to have actually been there to experience it. almost every building in the country killed some numbers of birds. homes are estimated to kill between 1 and 10. obviously large buildings kill larger numbers. as ann marie mentioned, san francisco is address iing conces to other large cities. it is no coincidence as you can see here that chicago is on the mississippi flyway. toronto across the great lakes as of january 1 of this year has mandated bird friendly construction. and originally had voluntary guidance and those became mandatory this year. minnesota is developing bird friendly construction standards. san francisco is there to lead the way. the guidelines that i have seen develop by the planning department are far more detailed and thou

i had the good fortune to start working at the port with monique and noreen ambrose, who was such an expert, and it was through her tutelage and your amazing patience and the patience of your staff that i came to appreciate all of the common law principles that really guide the port in our day-to-day activities. it is really a very rich history of law. i think we are really serving the public in some extremely important ways. i just want to apologize that we are always coming to you seeking special treatment because that seems to be what we do in san francisco. i think you brought to the job a very strong environmental ethic. i know that had to be the case, and i did have a chance to work one of byron's reelection campaigns, and i know what a great guy he is. i know is that reputation and the reputation you have built at the commission, it was really with your concurrence that we were able to get through some of the things monique spoke about. this most recent bill is going to mean so much, so you were firm and fair and always listened to us patiently, regardless of the crazy ideas t