From customers bringing in their own food web. We encourage extensive Educational Outreach programs to be provided especially considering high tourist areas. Up to 90 of those visitors are tourist. We would urge you to consider the need to balance environmental and economic sustainable, so our local businesses that are struggling to survive are not pushed out of the city by lack of flexibility and closed by these type of regulations. Thank you so much. Hello. Thank you. My name is john borg. We are a Small Business based here that makes and supplies custom foodgrade, stainless steel, reusable food wear and drink where alternatives instead a Single Use Plastics or compostables. We are a wholesale supplier who sells to venues and restaurants in bulk for them to set up their own reusable programs. We have been operating over a decade supplying venues, businesses of all kinds, schools, nonprofits events, restaurants with stainless steel cups, bottles, food containers, utensils and straws in bulk to help cut waste at its source. We are currently working on developing new products for to go food containers. This is definitely a developing area and more solutions there are Better Solutions and talking to a lot of our Small Business. We are working on developing new products for this area. Having worked with stakeholders on all sides of the issue, Small Businesses, nonprofits and activist groups, largescale events, government institutions, Health Policy professionals, publish policy makers, you name it. Ive heard a lot of the issues that have been addressed in the i believe this is the most sensible and comprehensive approach i have seen so far to cutting single use food and drink packaging. It minimizes impact on Small Business and maximizes reduction at meaningful scale. I can appreciate some of the apprehension some people might have. We have seen this happen before not long ago with a concerns about the plastic bag bans. A lot of the concerns that got brought up did not come to pass and stakeholders like all of us in this room Work Together to solve those concerns. The program was a staggering success and expired it is time for us to do the same thing for single use food and drink where services are our systems are wired for ways. We can do this together. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good afternoon, commissioners. I am ruth abby with californians against waste. We are a statewide environmental organization, the oldest in the state that focuses on ways prevention and recycling. We work in the state legislature and statewide bills. We also work with local communities on innovative policies that we can model statewide. As you are probably aware, San Francisco has been a leader in zero waste legislation at the local level and has partnered with us to expand these initiatives statewide. We are looking to california to lean on these issues. If were going to look at california to lead we need San Francisco to lead because of its prominence in zero waste. Its demonstrated ability to innovate and show transition to a community and a world. We are very much in support of this ordinance. We think it would build on the very successful bag band that was innovated in San Francisco and then expanded. We look forward to supporting this, refining the issues which are all over and just like the grocery store, single use bag band, a cup charge or reuse onsite is something that we know san franciscans can lean on. In 20 you very much. 1020 thank you. Next speaker. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Have owned and operated restaurants in San Francisco since 1973, have a fairly long perspective on this issue. Clearly everyone in this room is supportive of reducing waste, and i think we all agree that it is a good idea. However, i think the legislation, as written, is too much too fast. I have not had a chance to review supervisor peskins adjustments to the proposed legislation, that does impact some of my comments here. I cant say the following. There are a tremendous number of things that the director is going to have to determine by issuing ordinance, weve got to give them time to issue it so the restaurants know how to do it. There is also an Environmental Impact study that says that should take place between 1824 months after the legislation is introduced. I think i should take place before the legislation is introduced so we can see what it has to say. Clearly it is practical and positive to do some of these things. A year ago we introduced these plastic straw initiative. I think while many of our guests have not been happy with the paper straws because they fall apart, it is a workable solution. People are coming up with solutions to the problem. This does not at all address take. It does not address to go orders. To go now represents 62 in some restaurants ability to serve people. There are also a lot of unintended consequences, what is the cost to restaurant tours building space, who are providing a dishwasher for thank you. Brian hayes, been in business here in San Francisco. I think you very much for your time. Im strongly against this is a Small Business. Im about as small as you can get. Ive got to go outside of my story to change my mind, we are to go, and we are in a tourist area. Tourists from new zealand, and germany, they dont understand to bring their own things. I think there should be an exemption for tourist industries mr. Peskin, as a supervisor, of the tourist industry district. Mainly tourists. Trying to explain the straw, and apologize for the straw, and this and that. They dont understand that. We had a german fellow the other day that was livid at the cost of a drink. He was really upset about it. I think we all support the environment, and you know, i think it is fantastic. I think we need to be realistic. In peskins district, go look for yourself. Dont take my word. Pier 39. Go upstairs on pier 39. It is empty. It is empty. Small businesses are stressed to the max. This is the only city where you see a traffic jam going out of the city during the morning rush hours. All of these buildings that used to be Business District buildings, now they are becoming condominiums, it is so business unfriendly. They mention plastics here. We are talking about paper. We proudly went to compostable paper. If you have a problem with 10 of the compostables going to waste yard, start there. Make it 95 going to be recycled and compostable. That is where the problem is. Not adding another tax to the customer. Thank you very much. Thank you. Good afternoon. My name is angie, i own angelenos deli and the richmond district. Im here to say, it is so difficult to do business in this city, it is becoming so expensive. I have been there since 1983. Every month i am wondering how i can possibly continue . Just because a minimum wage, all of the fees from the Health Department to the outdoor tables and chairs permit, to our utility bills being so much more because we are commercial, as opposed to residential. Needless to say, if someone comes to my store and buys a to go coffee and three half paint containers that is an additional dollar that i have to charge them and im not sure where this. 25 cent is going to go . May its for me to keep. Then i have to explain to the customer im so sorry. I mean, Everyone Wants zero waste, i dont think this is the right time. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. I actually have a document i would like to refer to. You can put it on the overhead if you would like. Flip it around. It has been a while since i was in the Community College speaking thing. We can also submit it to the commission for public record, at a later time. Think if you just handed around to them. Thank you. I dont usually print. I would like you to have it. Should i start . My name is samantha sommer, we have partnered with an San Francisco department of the environment, and dozens of other and providing Technical Assistance to help food business operators voluntarily transition to reasonable food wear. We have food businesses do with this ordinance is proposing to mandate. We have extended experience working with Business Operations that developed our best practices for reducing risk disposables while achieving cost savings. Data collected from close to 200 diverse food Business Operations and institutions with large cafeteria style dining show even with the initial set up cost of purchasing reusables, dishwashing capacity ongoing cost of labor, washing and replacing lost or damaged reusables they have all saved money. Annually. This spreadsheet, oh good, you can see it now, that is 15 businesses that are certified with the recent disposable program. During a pilot in 20132015. What you can see here, is these 15 San Francisco businesses accomplished 38,000 pounds of annual waste reduction. If youve ever that is a lot of practice packaging. With 183,000 in annual net cost savings plus 3. 8 million pieces of disposable packaging eliminated. Since i only have a little bit left, after a business completes the packaging makeover, their overall reaction challenges they expected as barriers are really important challenges, in the beginning. We are easier to overcome than expected, they are happy and sustaining operational changes, because they see they and we have Great Customer feedback. Thank you. Good afternoon, commissioners. My name is grace lee, and speaking in support of on a recent disposable specialist. I worked with dozens of food businesses doing hundreds of transactions per day to new york sized yogurt shops and donut shops. I want to share one special story we use to provide insight on how perceived and actual challenges can be overcome. Honolulu barbecue went with the most functional and cheapest options for food where which ended up being 14 different single use plastic containers for dine in and take out. She had no idea until we analyzed her food where purchasing that she would be spending 6,000 per year. And buying compostables that would be so much more. Who is going to wash the dishes, especially since they refuse to watch them, she switch. Where will i collect these dishes . Where will i store the new dishes . This is going to be more expensive and how will my customers react to the changes . This is what we did. We switched her to 100 reusables for dine in, and that changed, cut her packaging budget in half. From stephanies own words, she wanted to save money and save the environment, she took it upon herself to wash her own dishes. She bought enough reusables to last during a rush and she washed during the slow periods. She spent about three and a 50 on new reusables and eventually with a 3,000dollar annual cost savings from food ware purchasing, she invested in a reusable dishwasher with no profit loss. We set up collection stations. We found stackable wears and she did not need to buy many takeout containers so this open up space. Customer started asking for reusables and started bringing in their own containers for takeout. Honolulu barbecue in Alameda County great, thank you. Next speaker, please. I am lindsay. I am in support of this. I come to you with both a solution and stories about talking to the professionals i talked to so far. Dispatch good offers reusable containers to restaurants where they can rent them at the same price point as a single use container, its a really good option for restaurants that dont have additional facilities prayed we innovate with food delivery apps so you can check that option when youre checking out the food delivery app. When we Start Talking to restaurants about what the best product for them would be, they have continually said the same thing. Food delivery apps were changed in the nature we are trying to come up with a solution that works for restaurants, and for food delivery apps and the customer. The food Delivery Driver can then pick up the reusables on the next row. Route. We are piloting, this month, with four major restaurants downtown. The first restaurant i met with, he told me about his favorite beach in japan being littered with Single Use Plastics and how the single use plastic container he was using. He looked at me and was like can you help me . That is when i shifted my perspective to thinking i was solving a problem for the food delivery customer to realizing where solving a problem for Restaurant Owners. I think this will help accelerate that and to make customers opt for an option that Restaurant Owners really want, too, which is something besides a ton. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. s. My name is nicholas, my wife and i own and operate a wrecking ball roasters. We employ 27 people, by my back of the napkin math that we produce about 120,000 cups of coffee in the past 12 months. We are absolutely in favor of this ordinance with some caveats. Two main ones, one of them, i say this and a lot of other settings, it is something we can test it first before we roll it out citywide. Is there an area we can do a pilot project. Are there a lot of unintended consequences. Great doing it on a larger scale will create difference for the economic force, and that is something that i think would be a responsible way of going about it. I second caveat, as with the strawman, what ended up happening was that through good intentions, we ended up further marginalizing a marginalized community over a disabled community, disabled residents here in San Francisco. As you all are aware, that is the one area with this straw band that has been the most angry, and rightly so. This was something that was passed with certain objectives in mind, but without an eye with how it would affect our most vulnerable residents and citizens. This ordinance has the same potential of further marginalizing folks that are already suffering a lot. I think there is a way to approach this, in a smart way that is a little more nuance. I do think a test pilot might be in order. Otherwise Small Business, the Small Business we are in favor of the ordinance. Thank you. Great, thank you. Next speaker, please. Hello. My name is friday. I am a 15 year resident, homeowner, a Small Business owner in the city. I have been working with another number of Small Businesses with the work that i do. I just want to say, reusables for dine in make sense. When a business has to buy disposables, they cost money. They take up valuable space and what is a very small city. They take up shelf space, they also take up a space. I have seen businesses that complain about the number of bins that they have to have. Theres not a lot of space to bring bends in and out. Nobody wants, but here we are producing to find a lot of it. They also inventory disposables how to become monitored consul he prayed that takes time for employees to do that. They also have to be. That takes shipments, and big trucks stopping double parking in the middle of a Business District. Youve heard a number of people talk about later. That leader ends up in front of businesses which is not good for business. As a consumer, i bring this cup with me everywhere i go. I bring it to the airport, i put it in my backpack, i do that for my son, i do that for my husband , and just yesterday when i was in a business in my neighborhood, having lunch, my son who is five, could not use the chopsticks, so they brought him a plastic fork. Instead i pulled out my own reusable fork, from my purse. While i do not mind bringing my own cup everywhere i go. When i choose to dine and, it feels like a burden that i my own reusable cup. That seems like there is a plate that they are cleaning, theres is a cup are cleaning thank you. Next speaker, please. Good afternoon, commissioners. I know each one of us over here has a story. I truly dont. I am a Small Business owner, in San Francisco, but let me tell you some of the things im sure you already know, and if you dont maybe i can refresh your memory. Our labor costs in San Francisco in the last four years went up 30 , according to the labor board. In 2019, the Restaurant Business has graded San Francisco the worst please to open up a restaurant in the country. According to a professor, the university of denver from business college, San Francisco is the number one tech city in the world. However, you have seen more restaurants fail than anywhere in the country. If youre in the Restaurant Business in San Francisco, you are in the toughest market in the country. In the next ten years, there will be a giant shift in the restaurant industry. We have created the second most expensive city in the world to work and live in. This is a list, of our restaurants going broke in the last three years. I know i have a few more seconds, union street got closed. The Commonwealth Club closed after nine years. Mission beach cafe closed after 12 years. The goldfish, 23 years. The ely cafe, 30 years. I could go on and on. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Hello. My name is carolyn, i am the programs director, we are a group that carries out research and we do that to support policies an educational campaigns. Last week i was part of the project that was mentioned earlier, we did this in partnership with another local group, and we collected over 300 samples in the bay, and outside of the golden gate and all of those samples had micro plastics in them. Many of those were the really small particles and a lot of those were plastic fragments. These are larger items breaking down and entering our waterways. When we are looking out the sources, we are understanding the pathways on the sources. We can link them to singleuse plastic items. Alongside that research, we generated a recommendation report where we got experts and stakeholders together to look at the science and generate some recommendations. One of the top recommendations coming out of that project is to support policies that reduce single use plastic items in communities. Like we heard earlier, we are a community that others look to for guidance and for examples of how to reduce plastic in our communities. We are a leader in this, we arty know this. We have another opportunity to lead on this, im really excited to be part of this. I hope you will consider the ordinance that is proposed. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Hello. My name is dave hagerman, i am the native san franciscan and fortyyear entrepreneur Small Businessman in San Francisco. I too have restaurants in the Fishermans Wharf area, which has already been noted at 90 tourist oriented, no one is bringing their cups down there. Its going to be an incredible burden for the Small Businesses take outs, and other restaurant operations. This proposal just adds additional costs to our overburdened Small Business community in San Francisco including increased cost of goods and labor cost. Representing one more shot into the heart of Small Business in San Francisco. The question is, is this the last straw that will finally break the back of Small Business in San Francisco . Thank you. Next speaker, please. My name is karen, i am the program lead for surfrider San Francisco, ocean Friendly Restaurants program. For the past almost two years ive been working with restaurants around the city to be recognized as ocean friendly which means that singleuse plastics, reusables only for all onsite dining. In compostables for disposable to go ware. I support this ordinance. I have worked with restaurants, as we mentioned we all want to move away from single use. I think Restaurant Owners do too. The issue is providing easy tangible solutions for those Restaurant Owners. Helping them switch over to compostable plastics, or compostable paper to go where. It has been more of a consultation on what products they should switch to, not a question of whether they should switch. I think this can be really similar. We had some examples of some solutions on collections of these reusable items. Of course we will have to work out the logistics, to go districts. I think if we all Work Together with the Restaurant Owners, we can see that. I just want to reiterate, this is not meant to be on Small Business owners. The bag ban has seen huge success and i believe this can, too. Thank you. Next speaker, please. My name is donald courtney. Im a very Small Business owner. These kiosks in tourist areas, i compete with people who just set up real tiny tots. I compete for 25 cents. Twentyfive cents means a lot to me. That is competition i live with. 170 comes in that doesnt have to pay that 25 cents, i have to pay that 25 cents on top of my rent, on top of my labor, somebody comes in and throws in a business right next to me, doesnt have any overhead, doesnt have much expense at all, and you dont pay that 25 cents, it is just one more competition i have to live with. It just makes life very difficult. I consider pleading you not to add another ordinance to my business. Thank you. Any more members of the public . Come on up. I too am a fourth generation san franciscan and a Small Business owner here in San Francisco. I have a business in the downtown market. As you can imagine i see visitors and locals alike. I have practiced sustainable methods for my business, for the eight years we have been open. Recycling menus, coasters for cocktails, not using linens and actually having my Waste Management come out of recycle bins that are as the size of residentials. Im in big support a finding ways to not put any additional burning into our landfills and our wastewater. I also want us to give full consideration to the rollout in terms of its timing, and the impacts. I support a lot of what has been said about doing test markets, and to take a look at what are some of the repercussions we have not considered. The one that was mentioned with straws is a very good one. I also want to get really clear and be very understanding with the ordinance of what is the 25 cents, what item. If i have a package a happy meal, what is going to be charged for 25 cents when there about seven items in that package. To the person packaging the item at 4. 00, the burden of that additional cost to the individual that is coming from a low income community. The other is, while i may be very interested in sustainable practices, does not mean my coworkers are as well. I am concerned that while we are going to put a burden on the businesses to charge 25 cents, i am concerned there will be a counter act of not going after not compostables that are more expensive because they will be charging the people for them until they would just find a cheaper method of charging, because it is no longer seen as a positive thing that we are offering a compostable as an alternative. Thank you. Thank you. My name is moses. I am the ice cream business. I believe you all know that i volunteer. The only thing i have a problem is that, how can i tell the tourists to bring your own cup . It is ice cream. How are we going to give them a reusable cup . If we want to charge them 25 cents because it is a tourist area. This is a tourist trap. Trap. Trap. I dont think that is right. I think whoever uh suggested, they have to come up with a solution. I think it is totally ridiculous. That is all i can say. Thank you. Any other members of the public . Anybody else want to speak on this . Okay. Public comment is closed. Commissioners . Commissioner ortizcartagena . Thank you everybody for speaking today and coming out here. I think everybody in the room once to go to the actual same place. I think we just have different opinions on how to get there. If youve seen recently in the news, very successful restaurants have been closing down and dropping like flies here in the city. As a Small Business owner i know how hard it is. Although the legislation is well intended, i know it is, its just further onslaught of those things that Small Businesses have to bear. I recommend instead of mandating things like this, they should incentivize it. Small businesses should do this voluntarily, and the city should put some skin in the game and say hey, if you do this, and you comply with Something Like this, we will offer some tax at the end of the year. Small business should not bear the responsibility for a cleaner San Francisco in the future. Its all of our responsibilities. Commissioner dwight gulf i agree we all have the same goal in the mind commissioner dwight . I agree we all have the same goal, the devil is in the details. To try and minimize the Financial Impact on Small Business which it could be considerable. Just the logistics. Were talking about a radical change in our culture. I think, you know, we would all love to be able to say were going to write legislation and we are going to enact that radical change in our culture. I dont think its going to work that way. Theres going to be a lot of pain and fallout in the process if we go about that approach. We may have some a recoverable damage. When businesses go out of business, they dont wake up the next day and think theyll start their business again because things are better. When they are gone, they are gone. We are seeing that at an increasing rate in the city. I dont want to push it over the edge with a piece of legislation that while well intended, it is one that is such a radical change in behavior that while i would love to see his take a leadership position, i do not want to do it at the expense of the Business Community here in San Francisco. Commissioner laguana . One thing i have been relieved to hear from all parties is there seems to be a general recognition that we have to move this direction. Weve got to make changes in society, we have to make changes in culture. We have to do something aggressively about making things better for the environment. I think even among the folks, that we have heard from today, that are in opposition to the legislation, it was encouraging, refreshing to hear that they have made efforts to reduce their waste and by the same token, it was encouraging and refreshing to hear for example the lady from surfrider, and openness from the people proposing the legislation to Work Together with the Business Community and try to make things better. One thing that seems, uh, one point of clarity that i noticed among some of the speakers there is confusion about who bears the cost of the legislation, the 25cent fee is kept by the business owner. However, one thing i think the people proposing the legislation should consider. In my industry we get a lot of fees, sometimes by law we can keep these fees. That is still, to an extent, a distillation among consumers when they have a variety of different choices against choosing our business. I think it is a fair concern for them to bring up. The challenging aspect for the position we are in, is that we are the ones i have to somehow bring all of this information together and then make a meaningful proposal to help improve the legislation, help make it work better for business , its extraordinarily challenging. I just want to say for myself, i dont run a restaurant. I really appreciate those of you who do who came down and spoke about the impact on your business and the folks advocating legislation. I hope youre listening as well. A couple of items that seem relevant concern to me. One is the gentleman spoke about the impact on the disabled, certainly in my neighborhood, theres a lot of shutins, elderly people, they might not necessarily qualify for sbi. I think even folks that are on sbi, i was once homeless. I didnt necessarily whip out my food stamp card every time i went to go buy something. I think there could be more nuance in the legislation about how we deal with folks in lower income. There should maybe be more conversations about that. The labor cost and the general pool labor, i can tell you for myself, as a Small Business person, there are folks i want to hire, unfortunately, those folks are not available to be hired. So, that is an ongoing challenge that we are facing in which we are understaffed relative to where we want to be. San francisco has historically low unemployment pool. So for businesses that would have to hire an additional staff person such as a dishwasher, or somebody to deal with this, i think that is a legitimate concern that needs to be addressed. I dont know if it is possible to address it within the legislation. I think it is a reasonable concern. You know, one thing im still sort of struggling with is we heard a lot of testimony about folks that have been working with businesses and it has resulted in a lot of cost savings. There seems to be some tension between whether there is actual cost savings or its more expensive. We are hearing from Business Owners that presumably want to save that money. From my position, its a little hard to ascertain. I imagine there is a broad cohort of businesses, and for some there will be big savings and for others to be its an increased expense. I tend to agree that there needs to be more consideration of where the delineations are for these different businesses. Maybe that is outside the scope of how legislation is drafted. It would be certainly wise, i think, if we could do our best to figure out where those delineations are. The gentleman who makes the candy bars, he indicated he would love to go with a more environmentally sustainable practice. He cant, because his competitors have a cheaper option available to them. Clearly, foz will that case, reusable is more expensive for him. So, i feel like i need to understand more about where these delineations are. Making sure, as we move in this direction that i think we absolutely have to move forward. It is imperative for our society that we make these changes. We also have to understand that there are people, with the children, and families, and businesses, and they are struggling. If they are a Small Business operator it is why we are here on this commission. We hear about this constantly what a struggle and challenge it is for them. I would just encourage those of you that are in favor of the legislation to take as much time as possible to hear what is going on for them. I strongly support commissioner zouzounis comments, and commissioner ortizcartagena. If you are going to put yet another aloneness on Small Business to be the leader of these changes that we want to see there should likewise be a reduction, or some other mitigation, or uh some form, and i think it should be within this legislation so that it is clear. Some form of tradeoff. Whether it is lower litter abatement fee. That is one example. Right. It has to be a tradeoff here. These businesses, uh, i dont know any Small Businesses that are not under severe stress and challenge. So uh, i think uh we need to make more of an effort to support them through this transition that we all want to see. It cannot all be on the back of them. Thank you. Commissioner yee riley . Yes, after listening to all of the speakers i think it is clear we all support doing the right thing for the environment. It is loud and clear that we need to give more thought to the tourist business, as well as the to go business to come up with solutions so they can comply with this legislation. Thank you. Commissioner 1028 . Thank you everybody for your input, public and fellow commissioners. I think equity is paramount in the environmental movement. While i appreciate a lot of opinions, and case studies presented today. If you havent worked behind the counter, or register, or if you are not that low income person who buys a 1. 25 cup of coffee at the corner store, you cannot dismiss other case studies presented today, or potential concerns that people have. I think these line items, they really do add up. It is really important to understand which items that would fall into this. I alluded earlier that both purchases of nuts, or candy that are prepackaged, on premise, and sold, that is a concern. Someone could buy for different items in one purchase that would fall under this ordinance. That is when clarifying question i have. This is a bigger conversation prayed i would love to see San Francisco take it up in that form. Some of the most vulnerable in businesses that are going to be impacted are to go businesses at convenience stores. Actually, demographically, people in trade and military which are some of the biggest polluters and sources of waste. I would like to see, instead of penalizing communities that are on the other end of this, we really look into the Bigger Picture here and talk about it in a global context like it deserves. 1020 thank you. Thank you. I have a couple of questions. Would the spirit of this, i think we are all behind it, 110 . Would you, on this legislation, be open to test programs or pilot programs . Thank you for the question. Actually, i want to turn it over to jack macy from the department of the environment. This is in district seven and being piloted right now. Can i let . That was one of the concerns and the general public. That is something i would like. Good afternoon, commissioners. Jack macy with the department of the environment. You heard about the rethink program, that was quite a success, a few years ago. It expanded around, based on the epa ended expanded around the bay area, a varied every single one we saw was saving money. We were really impressed with that. We appreciate that supervisor yee riley did a budget add back to implement assistance in his district. We are about to launch in district seven, a rethink program to help businesses there switch to reusables. We are looking for sources of funds to continue that beyond the city. We basically have spent many years providing assistance to businesses. Creating a structure that saved businesses a lot of money. Our average restaurant by composting and recycling more. So, we are encouraged by the results we have seen. We are working with them to make sure this ordinance can work, be reasonable, be fair, be effective. It is very helpful for us to hear all of the comments today,. Anyway, i am here if you have any questions. Thank you. Commissioner laguana . I have a couple of questions. You mentioned add back at the supervisors office. What he used the funds for . This will be used to provide direct assistance to businesses. Kind of this rethink disposable model. What do you imagine that direct assistance it looks like what do you anticipate . The rethink disposable, which you heard two speakers from, they have resigned this model over several years. They meet with the business. They look at what they are using in terms of non reusables. They kind of look at how they can switch to them. Dealing with physical needs, in terms of storage and how that will blend in with the operations. Looking at that cost. They actually have calculators, spreadsheets and ways to walk business through. They will actually have a supply of reusables that they can often provide to get a business going. Talk to me about that part, the supply reusables. The end result appears to be cheaper. Yet, there seems to be resistance. It seems like these organizations are helping to bridge that gap. Im trying to understand how that gap is bridge, and whether that is something that can be scaled citywide . They are really the experts, they have been doing for many years. They have a great website and have done many case studies. A lot of Business Owners assume that buying single use, and disposables may be cheaper than buying reusables. When they account for those reusables and the cost of washing and they save money. The return invest within a few months. Theyre getting annual savings every year. These are calculations that the business makes and reports back. This program that you are doing in district seven, which is my district by the way. Im looking forward to washing dishes, what am i going to be doing . [laughter] when will the results be . We are about to launch it. In a month or so we will be launching it. It hasnt started. You know, based on the experience of the hundreds of businesses we have worked with we are confident there will be benefits to that. You know, whether a business goes through them, or not, you know, we have seen that there has been savings. Our approach and implementing ordinances is to provide outreach and assistance as much as possible and help businesses along. We are doing that with everything. We also do that with whatever shape this ordinance ends up as. My next question. Would you be willing to hold off pursuing this ordinance until we see what those results are . I mean, the only reason im asking that is enlisting the public comment. People that had issues with it, there big thing was the implementation right away. You know, we just want to make sure everything is in order. You know, them my other concern on this is the tourist area. That is the tough one right now. How do you address that. You know, what is your timeline with the legislation . I mean, a quick tally of public comment, there were a halfdozen people who were concerned, there were a halfdozen Business Owners who were supportive, then there were about 1. 5 folks that were from the Community Helping folks along with this process. I can certainly take that question back to the supervisor. I dont think we are inclined to wait for the results of the district seven pilot, provided we arty know what the result is going to be. I dont want to dismiss the fact that one of the advocates put up a list of just 15. Different types that show different cost savings. It wasnt all one type of business. Some were saving a few hundred dollars per month. What i would rather do is focus on how we are going to mitigate the potential for impact. How we are going to provide assistance to existing buckets of money that the city has to help businesses come into compliance with this. Otherwise, i think we know what has been demonstrated by the advocates across the bay area since 2013, if we want to say lets are doing outreach. Outreach has been going on for about six years, if not longer than that. I dont think that we have a whole lot of time to delay. We are in a horrible situation in this town with restaurants closing. Two tv stations down in los angeles were saying how restaurants are closing in San Francisco and a lot of them are moving down there. Its a lot friendlier environment. San francisco, i mean, we were there restaurant capital of the united states. When you lose that, you lose tourist business. This has a huge effect now. Like i said, i like the spirit of this. I just want to be so sure that when we implement this, it is something that is given back. I live in the castro. Half of the restaurants in the castro have now closed in the last two years. I just want to make sure that there is either a giveback, or something. I tell you. I nervous as hell right now especially with restaurants, and the small coffee shops and stuff, i love going to my local places and they are all going away. I would like to come up with something that is a winwin on both sides. What that is . I dont know. Im trying to get feedback. I like what william said here, you know, maybe if there is something we can get back, or something you said, like low hanging fruit with fees. I will point to the ordinance that was presented, item number three was a recalculation of fees that brought fees down that makes a placket system easier to comply with. Lets not look at this as a stick, it also does not exist in a vacuum. We are at the fate of the restaurant hearing just two weeks ago. If there is an right now for carrots for Small Business, it is right now. I do not think that this ordinance is going to kill restaurants. Im sorry, i dont think so. I look at an email sent out by the California Restaurant Association that disparages this as a tax, which says this is making changes to the bussing requirement that its not making. It says we are changing the straw bam which we are not changing. I look at this and the broader picture and see that a lot of the outreach and fear is being induced right now by other forces and other variables. People that would be happy to see us deregulate all of the Public Health and safety regulation we have in San Francisco under the banner of making a visit easier for businesses to survive. We can do other things to make it easier for businesses to survive. I think the imperative is behind this. If we all see this and get scared about doing this too quickly. We have been out this for 20 years and San Francisco. Our mayor last year sent a whole new list of guidelines of how to get two we have the imperative to do this. We also have the imperative to make it easier for Small Businesses. I commit to doing that to this body. I will find the fee impacts to find pools of money that can help businesses convert. That is stuff we are looking at right now. If some of it is legislative, a lot of it is not. Thank you. I tend to agree that this legislation, and isolation will not be the straw that breaks the camels back. Of course, we hear a lot of legislation. It is pretty rare that anybody comes to us with anything that is actually helpful. It usually tends to be more punitive. It is cumulative. From our perspective. It is hard to not uh, you know, to at least try to find uh, you know, where the middleground is. As president adams said, you know, trying to look for this to be a winwin. The other part i want to acknowledge here is that the businesses keep the fee. It is not a fee thing per se, but there does seem to be, you know, i dont run a restaurant, im not intimately familiar with what is being assessed here. There does seem to be some sort of a change, or something there is anxiety about. Certainly for the folks in the tourist areas, that seems to be, you know, certainly i can understand in my industry win, you know, you rent a car for and its 96 by the time youre done, because of all of these fees that tend to get stacked up. So, i dont think that they are being crazy. But the one thing i will say, is out of all of the businesses that came here to speak, i dont think i heard any of them reacting, as you are characterizing them as, you know fear mongering, or being opposed to the intense, or spirit of the legislation. I would just caution you