Transcripts For SFGTV Mayors Press Availability 20240713

Cases of those who have been diagnosed with covid19. And sadly, we have lost 17 people. There are 17 people who died as a result of this virus as of today. As a reminder, you can visit data sf. Org for the full tracker with information on what who has been diagnosed, the number of tests and other resources that are available or any questions you may have. And i want to just start today by reminding us really how far weve come from the very beginning. Weve made it our mission to slow the spread of this virus, to help those vulnerable populations, to keep people safe and were continuing to do all we can to do just that. Were still dealing with the number of cases in San Francisco and we also know that there will continue to be challenges and we will continue to see increases in the number of cases of the coronavirus as we continue to do testing. You know, it may seem like this will never end, but it will come to an end. And i want to be clear that although you may hear about San Francisco and how well were doing, that we are flattening the curve, now is definitely not the time to let up. I read a really great article in the San Francisco chronicle this weekend that talked about the spanish flu in 1918. Almost 100 years ago in september of 1918, the flu, the spanish flu hit San Francisco real hard and the city that we know and love, the resilient San Francisco, stepped up, reacted, closed schools, closed churches, required people to wear masks as this particular virus killed millions of people throughout the world and in the united states. Over 500,000 americans and 50 Million People worldwide. And so as San Francisco started to see based on its quick action, there were changes and we started to basically they probably didnt call it flattening the curve at that time, but thats exactly what they did. As the number of cases and deaths declined in november of 1918, they declared victory and went out in the streets, they party, they celebrated. Everyone was happy. They threw off their masks and moved on with their lives. And two days later, almost 2000 people died. And in addition to that, they dealt with this real challenge all the way into 1919 when people continued to be infected. The virus came back with a vengeance. And, unfortunately, it did take some time to get people back into a place of complying with the orders in order to try to protect Public Health. The gains they had made on the front end were all basically lost because they moved too quickly. And i tell that story about history to remind us that we need to look at what has happened in history to make sure that were not repeating the same mistakes. We are not asking you to shelter indoors, to stay at home and also expect that, you know, this is something that is comfortable for all of you. We know this is very challenging. That it has a Significant Impact on not only our physical health but our Mental Health. And yesterday i, with a doctor, we hosted a webinar to talk about our Mental Health and the challenges with family, with children, with isolation and with a number of things. And we wanted to make sure we had a resource available to the public to deal with that. Anyone can log on or call 311. If there is any information that you may need or someone to talk to during this very challenging time because the fact is its not over. There is a light at the end of the tunnel. We will get through this, but it is going to require time and its going to require patience like never before. I dont believe anyone on this earth has ever experienced anything like this before. As i said, the spanish flu was over a century ago. And here we are dealing with a pandemic of the same proportion. And i know that you would think that, especially in a place like San Francisco where we have cpmc and kaiser and ucsf and San Francisco general and all of these incredible hospitals and Research Labs and doctors and all of this great science and technology that 100 years later we should not be in a situation we are in where were requiring people to stay at home. But the fact is we are. Public health is in jeopardy. And because of your work and your compliance with this order, we have done a great job and maintaining even as we see the number of cases increase every day, even as we see the number of, sadly, deaths continue to increase. Were still in a better place and it has everything to do with the people of San Francisco for the most part complying with the orders. Now is not the time to let up and get comfortable. Especially as we see the weather has gotten a lot better. Everyone probably wants to go outside and hang out. They want to see friends, family. Unfortunately, this is not the time to let up. And were still in this. We still need to get through this. And we still need your cooperation to do just that. I want to express again my appreciation. Of course, do what you can to get your fresh air and take your walks. Make sure youre taking care of our Mental Health as well, because that is also a critical thing that we will need do in order to get through this together. So thank you again for cooperating and i want to talk a little bit today about the future. And what you know San Francisco looks like as we begin to reopen our city. I want to be clear, we dont know when that is going to be, but what we do know, its going to be different than what it was before. The governor talked about in his press conference yesterday that there will be changes and we need to prepare for those changes, because we wont be completely out of the woods as it relates to this virus even as we gradually may reopen the city. There is still a twoyear time period almost before we could even maybe have a vaccine. And so we just have to be mindful that its important that we live in reality, we live in reality with what we have in terms of our capacity, in terms of our equipment, in terms of what we can do around testing and the kinds of things that are going to help support our communities. And also we marry that reality with science, with data, and we make good decisions in order to protect Public Health. And as we come out of this, what does that really look like . What are some of the things that were going to need to do to continue to protect the public . As i mentioned before, we have Incredible Health institutions here in San Francisco and many of you are familiar with ucsf and amazing doctors and clinicians and researchers, the work they do is world renowned in terms breakthrough science data. In fact, one of the things weve been talking about, is contacttracing. Because part of what we want to be able to do once someone is diagnosed, its easy to, of course, check in on their family and the people that are immediately around them and to test them. That has been happening already here in the city. We reach out to the folks that theyve connected with or may have been in touch with. And the way that our contracttracing contacttracing system has been set up will provide us another tool to expand our capacity so that we can do more outreach to not only find out exactly who that patient has been in contact with, but we can also check on them, check on their symptoms and with increasing our Testing Capacity because they go handinhand we can have people tested. We can have people tested that may have been in contact with someone who has been infected. Because our goal is to chase down all of those people and to either help them if they are covid and get them into quarantine, or to basically give them the relief that they are not infected. And, of course, to continue the social distancing and other things necessary to keep people safe and to keep themselves safe. So contacttracing is something were launching and what is amazing about this work, a lot of students at ucsf, some of our Disaster Service workers with San Francisco, some of our librarians and other city workers will be trained to do this work. And there will be an app to help facilitate this. The app will allow people to keep track of their symptoms and to check in with people who are monitoring their condition. And also determine whether or not they should or should not be tested. And i want to take this opportunity to really thank again ucsf and there is a couple of other folks. I think dr. Colfax will talk a little bit about the partners that we have in this particular effort, but i really would like to thank the folks who have come together with us to prepare this contacttracing system and the apps and the work necessary in order to ensure that we are really getting to the bottom of those who are infected and helping to support them. And we have done some level of that in our shelter at msc south. This is how we were able to discover so many cases. The department of Public Health set up a system there and they were able to test people quickly and based on the two initial individuals who were tested positive, we were able to trace their steps back to this particular shelter and do the work necessary in order to identify the people who they had been in contact with, which led to what we have seen as it relates to m. S. C. South. Again, thank you to the department of Public Health. Thank you to our city team. Thank you to ucsf and your medical staff. I want to also just talk a little bit about our plans to expand testing, because, again, contacttracing as well as testing go handinhand. Increasing our Testing Capacity. We talked about that on monday. We do want to appreciate ucsf for their willingness to run the tests, but the biggest challenge they and so many other folks throughout the country have had are access to the appropriate swabs in order to initiate the test in the first place. And we want to appreciate just so many incredible public and private partners that weve been working with to try and make Testing Available as much as possible. Many of you know that we provided city test s. F. On our peers with the partnership with the port to help get City Employees tested as quickly as possible. The feedback from City Employees is incredible. The response and the ability, you get your time, you go in, you get tested and you get your results back quickly. People are so appreciative of that. So i just want to, again, appreciate and thank the department of Public Health and the work theyre doing with the private sector as well to get these tests up and running. Today, we want to announce in addition to pier 30 and 32, we want to announce another site. Theyre working with the office and the department of Public Health to create city test s. F. In soma. So the goal is to increase our capacity, although i want to be clear this is not someplace you can walk up to. You have to meet the criteria in order to be tested. We just want to able to test people more quickly, get the results back quickly, so that we can make sure that people are prepared to do what is necessary to, of course, quarantine or give back to some sort of plan with their lives as they know it. So, for example, if there is a person who works here at the Emergency Operation center, or there is a person who works at the San Francisco general and they all of a sudden wake up, maybe with a fever and a cough, even though theyre essential city workers, they cant go to work once they exhibit symptoms. So instead of waiting days or weeks to either get tested or to get a response, our goal is to test them almost immediately and to get the tests back as quickly as possible, because if they are not covid19positive, we want them to be able to go back to work as quickly as possible because theyre essential city workers. So that is the whole point of why were expanding Testing Capacity for our city workforce, because we need them in our hospitals, our hotels, on the streets, driving our buses and all of the things that we see so many of them doing. Again, i just want to continue to take the opportunity when possible to thank the incredible workforce in San Francisco. The fact is when i say these people are putting their lives on the line, that is not an understatement. They are putting their lives on the line when they step on the buses and hundreds of thousands of people get on the buses every single day. Theyre putting their lives on the line when, for example, our paramedics have to go out and be physical with someone with someone whose life theyre trying to safe. Theyre putting their lives on the line when they walk in the door to serve patients. They truly are the folks who are showing up in the hotels and working with the vulnerable homeless population. The people who are showing up to laguna honda and continuing to make sure those patients are clean and fed and well taken care of every single day. And i just want to express again my appreciation for the work that so many incredible City Employees continue to do. We want to make sure that were taking care of them. That they have the p. P. E. That they need. That if necessary and they think theyre covid positive, theyre able to get testing immediately. Thats what this is about. Making sure our workforce is prioritized in a way that they are not necessarily put in a situation where they have to choose to just stay home rather than be an important part of our workforce. I also want to express that this Testing Capacity will be made available to people who may not have insurance. People who basically think theyre positive and they dont know what they should do, especially if they dont have insurance. They can call 311 and we will make sure that we connect them with someone who can talk to them about their symptoms and refer them to a testing site. I want to also be clear that with our contacttracing and testing for people who are part of our immigrant community, that this data, this information and what we do here will in no way be shared with anyone. So i dont want you to have any fear about ice or any other federal resource coming in and trying to obtain this personal information and data because we have got to do everything we can to make sure that access to testing, that contacttracing and what were trying to do in order to save lives and get to the bottom of this and treat people and help them determine if theyre covidpositive or not, we have to make sure people feel safe in revealing whatever information were asking for in doing this work. So i just wanted to assure you that this is for this purpose only. You dont have to be afraid if you think that you exhibit symptoms to call 311 and get referred so you can be tested. The other thing i wanted to talk about today finally is our economic recovery. This has been, i know for so many people, really, really very challenging. So today i was on the phone with the 13 mayors total who represent the largest cities in the state of california, with our u. S. Senator Kamala Harris talking about some of the federal stimulus packets and the new packets and the changes they need to make in order to make sure that were actually providing relief to people. So, for example, people who have filed taxes and have direct deposit have probably already received, today, their stimulus checks. But, unfortunately, the people who may not have a bank account wont get their check for maybe even another few weeks. And those are the kinds of things that are completely unacceptable. We know that people need money now. We know that people need groceries now. We know that people concerned about paying the rent, even though we have a moratorium on evictions, we know people are living in fear, people are scared, people dont know what to do when they dont have access to resources. And even though there are some people that are fortunate enough to be in a situation where they are financially going to be okay, there are so many san franciscans and people throughout this country who will not be okay. So give to s. F. Was what we started as a resource to provide support for food, for groceries in particular, through gift cards and through other resources to those who may not necessarily qualify for other services. And also subsidies and support around rent for people that we can provide support for. So weve raised private dollars into this fund. We have public money going into this fund. It also includes support for our Small Businesses. And we know that there are a number of state and federal initiatives that we hope will have an impact on supporting our communities and making sure that the combination of food banks, of our outreach teams, of the work were doing will actually get to people. If you have any questions or you need any assistance, call 311 so that we can direct you to the right resource. We have a number of programs and information online. I know sometimes going online can be confusing. And some people dont have access to online tools, so if you have any questions, youre a senior and you live alone and you cant get out to get food, you are an immigrant and you dont qualify for food stamps or for benefits in that way, you are someone who basically doesnt know what to do and you need help, i want people in the city to use 311 as a resource to ask for what you need. Dont wait. If there is something that you need, help or support, please contact 311. And also look at sf gov. Org on our website for assistance. That is what were dealing with currently. After we gradually come out of this, there are still going to be challenges. For example, the governor talked about new guidelines for restaurants. Restaurants potentially needing to go to half capacity and what does that mean for their staff . What does that mean for their rent . What does that mean for the food that they need to purchase and what have you . How are we going to make sure that as we try and get back to a level of what we saw before this virus, what are we going to do about tourism . What are we going to do about the hotels and people who work in the hotels. How are we going to make sure that hair salons and nail places, who basically only make enough to cover rent, how do we make sure were taking care of their back rent . How do we ensure were supporting our Small Businesses and people who basically cant look back and meet the needs of the past because theyre focusing on making sure they have resources and money for the future. How are we going to get these businesses back online . How are we going to recover . It is not going to be easy. The city faces a 1. 1 to 1. 7 billion budget deficit. What that means is were going to have to make serious changes. Well have to reprioritize how we spend money. Every dollar matters. Every dollar matters anyway regardless of this situation, but it matters even more than ever before. And so were going to have to make major changes and i talked about last week the Economic Recovery Task force. Supervisor norman yee and i and the board of supervisors president , we put together a task force that will be cochaired by a number of folks, including the assessor recorder. The executive director of the labor council, Rudy Gonzalez and others to begin that process. To begin that process with our restaurants, with our Small Businesses, with our hotels. How are we, as a city, going to change our policies, make our Financial Investments . How are we going to start now so that when we begin to gradually open the doors to the city that our businesses can get back to work . Our people can get back to work. We can get our economy back going. Thats going to be critical to the success of our future. This is a challenge, yes. This is a challenge going on a lot longer than i know many of you had hoped, but i want to also be clear that were working on all of these issues. And we are focused on making sure that were making good decisions so that we can protect both the physical health and the Mental Health and the Financial Health of our city for the longterm. So thank you, all, again, for your cooperation and all that you continue to do to support these efforts. I want to, again, express my appreciation to how amazing people have been. The positivity, the love, the support from one another. It has been truly amazing. I want to be clear. We have our challenges yet. We have our challenges as a city. But i am so proud of the workforce and the people in the city who are working hard for all of you every single day. They are doing the best they can. And following social distancing, which is very, very difficult to do when youre trying to work in some cases, so i want to express my appreciation to them. And so many other folks who are out there trying to make sure that when we say were in this together, were not only in this together, were supporting one another together, were uplifting one another together, were doing everything we can to get each other through this because we will get through this and we will emerge stronger than ever. Thank you. At this time id like to introduce the director of the department of Public Health, dr. Grant colfax. Good afternoon. I am dr. Grant colfax, director of health for San Francisco. And thank you, mayor breed. Today there are 1,013 san franciscans diagnosed with covid19. 9,000 people in San Francisco have been tested. Sadly, 17 people have died of the disease. I send my condolences to their families, their loved ones, their friends and their community. There are 88 patients with coronavirus hospitalized across the city. And about 30 of them are in the intensive care unit. Another 53 people are in the hospital who may have coronavirus and they are awaiting test results. Our hospitalization numbers have been holding relatively steady for the past few days which is welcome news. But again, that could change at any time. Especially as we begin to see expected outbreaks in the city, including potentially in vulnerable populations. As we reported last week, there was an outbreak of coronavirus at m. S. C. South, the citys largest homeless shelter. As of today, 92 guests and 10 staff there have tested positive for the coronavirus. At laguna honda hospital there are now 18 confirmed cases of coronavirus. 14 of the confirmed cases are among staff and four are among residents. All of the residents are in good condition. Of the staff who tested positive, 11 have been in patient care and three have not. All four positive resident cases who are in the south 5 neighborhood. And to date, 329 laguna honda hospital staff have been tested. And 272 residents have been tested. The centers for Disease Control, cdc, remain on site advising us with regard to our response. Across San Franciscos entire hospital care system today, there are 1262 acute care beds and 436 intensive care beds available across the city to meet the demands of a surge. And we are continuing to build capacity in our hospital system. Today i am very happy to announce that Chinese Hospital has opened up 23 new beds to serve patients being discharged from zuckerberg General Hospital and who no longer require an acute level of care, but still have medical needs. Partnerships like these are helping to decompress hospitals so theyre ready for an expected surge of coronavirus patients. My gratitude for the ongoing collaboration with Chinese Hospital. As you can see, we remain laser focused on the Health Emergency in our city, in our region, in our country. We are doing everything we can to reduce the spread of the virus in our community, protect vulnerable population, Health Care Workers, and First Responders. We are implementing strategies and developing further Workforce Needs developing further workforce capacity to meet our needs both today and into the future. Programs like the city tests s. F. Are expanding your Testing Capacity. Not only for our First Responders, health care providers, but the for the public who meet the screening criteria. Looking ahead, were expanding our contacttracing capacity. Contacttracing has always been a fundamental Public Health tool. From the beginning of this pandemic, we have emphasized contacttracing. But we need to be even doing more today and preparing for when we need more capacity in our workforce to do this in the future. We are looking ahead. We are building a fastmoving comprehensive system to track cases and support people to prevent the spread as much as possible. This is essential today and it is also essential as we ultimately move out of restricted shelter in place orders into a new phase of fighting the pandemic. As the mayor emphasized, we will need a framework Going Forward that includes strong infrastructure for testing, data tracking, caring for vulnerable populations, and further reinforcing and preparing our health care system. The Health Department will continue to align with these objectives along with other departments across the city. Key private stakeholders and community members. Thats why im happy to announce today a Major Development to help us reach our goals. San francisco, as the mayor mentioned, is creating a first of its kind program to identify the bay area residents who have been exposed to coronavirus and give them access to the testing and resources they need to keep themselves and their families and communities as safe as possible. This expanded contacttracing program will use technology to dramatically expand our ability to find and connect with individuals who may be close contacts of a person with a confirmed case of coronavirus. This capability will greatly strengthen our citys response to the pandemic. It will allow for swifter more efficient communication. Better datatracking and stronger interventions to reduce spread. This Innovative Program is a Partnership Among the department of Public Health, ucsf, and demonctony. They have been working with the cdc on improving contacttracing and monitoring of people who are potentially infected with covid19. Im pleased that San Francisco is helping lead that way. San franciscos Innovative New program will engage with individuals who test positive for covid19 to identify their recent close contacts. Specially trained outreach workers will then follow up remotely by phone or text with any individuals who may have been in contact with the covidpositive patient. These conversations will be voluntary, confidential and culturally and linguistically appropriate. And immigration status will have no bearing on these conversations. Case contacts will receive daily messages or phone calls checking in on their health and symptoms throughout the 14damon tering 14day monitoring period. They can alert Public Health workers that follow up for testing may be required. People who are contacted will need to have confidence that their participation is again confidential, voluntary and based in science and on their families best interests. There have been instances in San Francisco when people may have been unwilling to work with contact investigators. This may be because they do not trust them, do not understand the purpose, or do not have all the information they need to feel comfortable. I want to ensure that all san franciscans have equitable access to this new program to address those challenges. The Health Department will conduct outreach to ensure the public is aware of the program and knows what they should expect if contacted. This new contacttracing program will amass an unprecedented number of key personnel to staff and respond immediately whenever there is a newly confirmed case. They will take action to prevent the spread among contacts as much as possible. This capability, this capacity will enable us to move forward as a city now and after the shelter in place tt order is lifted. We have already begun training a cadre of people to do this work, including as the mayor referred to, san franciscan librarians, the department of Public Health staff, City Attorney staff, and ucsf medical students. Additional trainings are ongoing with the ultimate goal of filling up a citywide and regional workforce. More than 50 people have been trained to date and we anticipate by the end of two weeks that nearly 150 people will be trained to execute this program. Regionally and we hope this is a regional approach we hope that as many as thousands of people can be in this workforce to get the people the help they need who may have been exposed to coronavirus. This new program is currently in a testing phase and it has already contributed to our efforts by contacting people who are close contacts and providing them with the information about how to prevent further exposure. And, again, the new program will augment our current investigation and contacttracing work, which is as i said at the beginning the bedrock of good Public Health. I want to emphasize that contacttracing is just one part of an Effective Response infrastructure. Other components include expanding testing, adherence to isolation and quarantine orders, and continued prevention. The continued prevention that all of you can help with and must help with, including social distancing and wearing facial covering. All of these will be critical in the future to maintaining any gains we make due to our current effort which appear for now to be flattening that curve. I am proud of San Francisco and grateful to the Health Department team, our City Department partners and our other partners across the city, including those at ucsf for creating this ambitious contacttracing project. Together, we are making a difference and saving lives. We will keep going. We must keep going so that we can continue to protect our community as our Coronavirus Response evolves. We are making progress, but there is still a long way to go. As ive said from the start, we are most concerned about vulnerable population. This includes people in longterm care facilities, people experiencing homelessness with chronic conditions who are greater than the age of 60, and others who are over 60 and have Underlying Health conditions. So, please, continue to do your part. Stay home, wash your hands, cover your nose and mouth when you go out with a facial covering, take care of yourself. Call and engage with your friends and family remotely. We will get through this together. Thank you. Director of Human Services agency, trent rhorer, will be making remarks. Good afternoon, trent rhorer, director of Human Services agency. I want to provide you today with an update on the progress were making for housing in the citys Covid Response. As you know, h. S. A. Is directed to provide these Housing Options and under this Covid Response its for individuals who are covidpositive or persons under investigation for having covid who have been tested and dont have a place to isolate or quarantine. These are typically, as you know, Homeless Individuals and individuals living in congregate settings such as single room occupancy hotels. In addition were prioritizing vulnerable individuals who are in the homeless shelter system and on the street. These are individuals age 60 and above or individuals who have Underlying Health conditions that make them especially vulnerable to the virus. In addition, as mayor breed said, we as a city so value the work of our not only Front Line Health Care responders, but all City Employees and nonprofit employees working with the public every day during this pandemic. We know that their exposure is higher because they are out interacting with the public and we want to make sure that they are safe. We want to make sure their families are safe, that they dont potentially spread infection while going back home. And to this end, we have set up a vast number of rooms for, not only our health care frontline responders, doctors, nurses and other health care professionals, but many categories of City Employees who are reaching the public every day. These include workers in child protective services, workers in adult protective services, our inhome supportive services, home care providers who are providing services to help our seniors and disabled populations stay at home and isolate and make sure theyre safe. M. T. A. , bus drivers, operators. Animal control workers. And then even our Disaster Service workers who are City Employees who are offering to work in our hotels and shelters and our c. B. O. Staff on the front line. This is by far the broadest application of First Responder housing that we know of across the country and really demonstrates the citys care for this population, the importance of their work, and the importance of making sure theyre safe and their families and communities are safe. In terms of progress, an update report on the numbers. First of all in terms of the vulnerable individuals in our homeless shelters, we have completed the process of identifying and offering hotel rooms for our vulnerable persons in our homeless shelter system. These are single adult, age 60 or above who are vulnerable. I can say not all of them have accepted our offer to move to a hotel room. In those cases well continue to reinforce the social distancing in the shelters, the handwashing protocols and all the other Safety Measures that our staff and shelter residents have been trained in. We now have 2100 say it a better way, 2,151 hotel rooms across 14 hotels in San Francisco. 1,271 of them for the vulnerable population i described. And 8 the rest for First Responders and City Employees working with the public every day. We have 874 individuals placed in the 1271 rooms for vulnerable. And continue to see a constant flow of our frontline responders as well as other City Employees into the hotel rooms for them. Our estimated need is still around 7,000 rooms and again i use the word need, and not goal. These rooms and the estimated need is based on the best Public Health information we have. The best information we have from the department of homelessness and Supportive Housing on the population of vulnerable on the streets and in shelters. And we continue to reevaluate those numbers on an ongoing basis and adjust our need accordingly. As ive said many times, the response to our request for quotes and interest in the Hotel Program has been overwhelming. We are now up to 81 hotels who have submitted interest in renting rooms to the city, representing over 12,000 rooms. This gives us the flexibility to increase the number of rooms should we need. It also gives us the flexibility to choose the type of hotels suitable for certain populations. Weve been segmenting populations. One example, for individuals who struggle with Mental Illness or addiction, we have a hotel specifically staffed for them with a size that makes it a more effective and appropriate location for those individuals. As i said, well continue to evaluate the need, continue to be fluid as a public system in response to an environment that is, of course, very fluid and changing daily. Ill conclude with those remarks and open it up to questions . No, im actually turning it over to San Franciscos police chief, chief william scott. Good afternoon. Im bill scott, chief of police, San Francisco Police Department. First of all, id like to start again by thanking our mayor, mayor london breed, for her leadership during is this pandemic. I want to thank our Public Health director dr. Grant colfax for his leadership during this pandemic. I want to update you all on our enforcement efforts on the Public Health order as well as what were seeing in the streets and around the communities of San Francisco today. Weve seen some very nice weather in the past couple of days and with that it has brought more people outdoors to get exercise and probably take care of their Mental Health needs, but with that more people means more instances where people are not engaging in social distancing. As a result, we have stepped up our deployment at our parks, along with park rangers at parks and rec. You will see officers, cadets and rangers at parks we believe people will go to get outdoors today. With that, we havent changed our position on how we are approaching this. For those people that are just out enjoying the fresh air, we ask that they social distance. We ask that they follow the Public Health orders and we continue to stress voluntary compliance. For those folks that have been in this position and been warned by officers and if thats on record, you will be cited. But again, we want to go back to where we started from day one is education. If we engage you, we will make sure that you understand what the seriousness of this pandemic is. And also what needs to be done in order to keep you and your loved ones, your friends and family safe. We have increased the number of sites over the last few days. We now have nine sites that have been issued by San Francisco police officers, the breakdown is four businesses im sorry, five businesses and four individuals. Some of those businesses are businesses that officers had warned previous to citing them. And again as i said several times in these press conferences for businesses, were not going to warn you twice. If we have to go back, we will cite you. For the individuals, again, dr. Colfax has laid out the best advice that anybody can give right now in terms of what needs to be done to keep yourself safe and healthy. Stay six feet apart. If you have to go outside for essential business or if you want to get exercise or fresh air, its recommended that you cover your face. If you have to go to the Grocery Store or any other type of essential business, practice social distancing. A lot of the businesses now have marked outside the businesses to indicate where those sixfeet markers are. And we advise everybody and encourage everybody to Pay Attention to the sidewalks and the locations if you do go Grocery Shopping or to the bank or post office, wherever you go, because it makes it easier for people. And we have had situations where officers have shut down businesses for not engaging in social distancing practices. This pandemic is hard enough as this is on everyone. If you are an essential business, we need your help, we need you to encourage your customers to social distance and if that is not occurring, our officers will close your business as mandated by the health order. If you are out with your friends and family, just a reminder, if you live in the same household, youre not expected to have to separate six feet. If you do not live in the same household, please maintain that physical distance of six feet. Thats what the order says and thats what we remind everybody to do. Its for everyones best interests. This week were seeing a slight uptick in calls for service. We believe that is because more people are out enjoying the good weather and the fresh air. Again, we want to remind everybody, if you must go out, please cover your face and please maintain that social distancing of six feet. If you are a victim of a crime or if you see a crime in progress, if its a violent crime, remind everybody i remind everybody to call 911. If its a crime that has occurred or a property crime that is not of a significant immediate importance, call our nonemergency line 415 5530123. You can also call 311 or utilize the San Francisco Police Department website to report crime. I want to speak a little bit about 420. Our mayor has made it perfectly clear that 420 is cancelled for this year. But i want to reiterate what the mayor has spoken to the public about 420. There is absolutely no doubt that 420 will not occur this year. The San Francisco Police Department along with other city entities will make sure that is carried forward. The area will be fenced off. We will have officers out in full force. If you plan to show up, the consequences probably wont be favorable to you. It includes citations, it includes street closures. Simply said, we want to make it difficult for anybody that is thinking about attending a 420 event. We want to make it difficult in the best interests of our Public Health and that is what with eintend to do what we intend to do. If we have to cite, we ill. If we have to arrest, we will. 420 is off this year. Its cancelled. Please think of the health of if not yourself the people you care about, if youre thinking about engaging in a 420 event in the city of San Francisco. Well be out in full force and well work through the weekend as well to make sure that the health order is being complied with as best we can to stay safe and healthy. With that, thank you. And i think its time to open for questions. The first question is for director abigail stewartkhan, homelessness and Supportive Housing. Director stewartkhan. Are you concerned about the crowding of tents and people in general in the tenderloin . And what measures are you taking to address it . We are extremely concerned about the crowding of tents and the unsheltered population during this pandemic in the tenderloin and across our city. When people are anxious, which many of us are now, we seek connection. This is a natural human instinct and that connection is putting everybody in danger now. I want to thank the healthy streets Operation Center partnership, which is led by jeff cositski because the moment this was declared, they pivoted and starting providing education and ceased any encampment resolutions. What this means is theyre out there every day, the hot team, the Police Department, the department of Public Health, department of public works, rec and park, and many, many others working together to provide information to our unsheltered neighbors, first on the epidemic and their vulnerability, then on physical distancing guidance while being unsheltered and so on. We need people to adhere to the guidance. Were working with a group of individuals on a certain block and tents are moved apart and the next day we come back and another tent has been inserted into the space between the tents. We need folks to stay six feet apart even when unsheltered and to listen to the individuals out there trying to provide information. We care deeply about the unsheltered population and as director rhorer and dr. Colfax have shared, those who are vulnerable over the age of 60 or with underlying conditions are high priority for the city. Soon well be able to begin a very small pilot which will allows us to bring unsheltered individuals inside. We have not gone that yet. And it will be a small resource before we can get to scale. In the meantime, we need everybody sheltered, unsheltered, housed, unhoused to adhere to physical distancing guidance, especially if youre unsheltered and have vulnerabilities. We want to thank you. We know this is a challenging time and we look forward to better days ahead. Thank you. The next set of questions are for mayor london breed. Mayor, the first question is from joyce cutler, bloomberg law. Mayor breed, you and president yee were planning on a rewrite of the citys gross tax receipt and what is the status of that and how will the deficit influence what appears before voters . The fact is when we were planning for a revamp, the gross receipts tax here in San Francisco, we were living in a different reality. And, unfortunately, the focus is going to be on our economic recovery, some changes that we need to make as it relates to how were spending our money currently, but more importantly, there could be changes or revamp of business taxes in general. But, unfortunately, what we had planned before is something that we cant continue to move forward with, especially now in light of our new reality with the economy. Reporter the next question is from sara grossman, huffington post. The San Francisco board of supervisors voted to open thousands of hotel rooms to homeless residents. Will the city do so . I want to be clear with the public. From day one, as we started to talk to people about this pandemic, what we wanted to make sure people understood is how critical it was to provide facts. How critical it is to make it clear to the public what we can and cant do as a city. Just this past weekend there was a rumor on the internet by, sadly, one of our city leaders that said that ucsf had agreed to test everyone in our shelters and the city had not taken them up on the offer. And that was absolutely false. And it was so irresponsible in light of a pandemic when we are dealing with a matter of life or death, to spread false information as a city leader on the internet, is really irresponsible and very tragic at this time especially. The fact is we work handinhand with ucsf. And a statement by the a joint statement between the directors of the department of Public Health and the chancellor at ucsf was put out clarifying what ucsf could do and that was run the test. But ucsf and the city and county of San Francisco and the Health Systems throughout the country are short on the swabs that are required to actually initiate the test in the first place. What we have done, time and time again as it relates to the hotel rooms, is really try and explain to the public the challenges, especially in light of social distancing. Would we like to open the doors of every hotel room and give everybody a place to stay . Of course we would. But its not that easy. The challenges as ive continued to say with the population that we are serving, people who are unfortunately unhoused, some who suffer from Substance Use disorder and Mental Illness, those challenges that these people are dealing with, they dont just go away because there is a pandemic. And so when we look at hotels, we have to make sure as dr. Colfax talked about and trent rhorer talked about, that people struggling with Mental Illness, we need to make sure that the clinicians and the city staff who have never worked with this population before, that they are trained, that they are prepared and theyre able to provide them with the resources and the support that they need. That were not basically opening up and putting 100 people with Mental Illness in the same hotel. Were looking at smaller hotels. We have aroundtheclock, 247, service whether its our staff, whether its nurses. There are three meals a day. There is cleaning. There is management. There are people who call in sick and arent available but we need them for the shifts. There is training that goes into all of this. The work were doing here at the Emergency Operation center has everything to do with making sure that were working with staff in the city and various departments to get them prepared and trained to do this work. But its not easy. And if it were that easy we would have done it a long time ago and other major cities in this country would have done the same thing. We have moved faster and further along than almost any other major city in the country as it relates to housing our unhoused population. Over 700 people have been housed out of our shelters and counting. So im really proud of the work they continue to do. Would i like to do more . Of course. Who wouldnt. But that is not the reality of what we as a city can do. And what ive made clear time and time again, that every decision we make, everything we do, is going to be based in what is reality. Because its not fair to the people of this city to pretend that we can do something we know we cant. Reporter next question the Santa Cruz Health officer says shes working with counties to craft less restrictive stay in place orders for as early as may 4th. I want to be clear in every decision we make, it has everything to do with facts. It has everything to do with the science and the data. We have relied heavily on the Public Health officials to guide us through this process. And we have done this in a collaborative approach. Weve not just focused on San Francisco. We looked at the entire region and what that means for us to Work Together to make these decisions together because if San Francisco makes a decision and oakland and other surrounding cities choose a different direction, its not going to be good for any of us. The people who work in San Francisco, the people who come to San Francisco for various reasons, they dont all live here. And so keep in mind that its important that as quickly as we want to get back to opening our cities, which i so desperately do as well, we want to make sure that were collaborating with our Public Health officials, thats were focusing on the data, that were strategic and clear about the direction were going in. As i said earlier in my remarks, the worst thing that we can do is move too quickly and then go back to an even worse situation of the number of cases that are diagnosed as a result of it. And so that is really what we want to focus on. We still have a long way to go. I am hopeful about the future and im hopeful well get there, but we want to Work Together in doing that. Thank you. The next set of questions are for dr. Grant colfax with the San Francisco department of Public Health. Dr. Colfax, the first question, abc7. What comes after the testing phase of this contacttracing project . What is the time line and details of the next phase . So with regard to this contacttracing effort, this is happening. We have trained a number of people already on this. So it will continue to iterate as we learn from the early period in terms of how to improve the responses were getting. Well expand our languages. Right now its english and spanish. Were working rapidly to implement a cantonese, mandarin version of this. So its not as though there is a series of discreet phases, its a scaleup. As i said, we hope to have 150 people trained on using this app, in the next few weeks. And it will be an integral part of our efforts Going Forward. Were exploring with regional partners so potentially we could have hundreds if not thousands of workers across the region for us to collectively do better with our pandemic response. Thank you. The next question from s. F. Chronicle. Will San Francisco be mandating face conversation similar to sonoma, riverside and los angeles counties . We know that along with physical distancing, social distancing, that wearing a facial covering helps protect others. So i like to think of it as my mask protects you, your mask protects me. And were looking right now to ensure as much as possible that there is compliance with our face masking recommendations and looking to see whether additional measures are needed to protect people. The next question is from crystal sky link tv. In regards to Contact Tracing program how will the close contact resident be contacted . What kind of information will be asked so they can determine whether or not it is a scam . So working with the app, well be executing ensuring that there is a feedback so that people can use technology to get comfort its not a scam, like you do when you get other notificationings. In terms of the information gathered, its going to be focused on ensuring that the person knows there has been a close contact with somebody who has been diagnosed with covid19. Some very General Information that will be collected, but that will be confidential. And were certainly not going to be asking for sensitive information, personal information such as Social Security numbers, other factors like citizenship status. That will not be asked. What were asking for is the information that we need to ensure that that person is as safe as possible and importantly get the help that they need to manage their exposure and if symptoms develop, they get the care they need. And to keep their family and community fully informed and as safe as possible. That is why well be asking people about their symptoms. We will be asking them about how theyre doing. And again i want to emphasize, this is a bedrock of Public Health and we also know in order to use this tool and for this tool to be effective, we must do this in a culturally appropriate way that is sensitive to the needs of our most vulnerable population. This work will be done through an equity lens as has our entire approach to addressing this pandemic. The next question is from joshua, s. F. Examiner. Does the city have a goal for the number of people they want to test this month across all testing sites, both public and private . And what is the biggest barrier at this time to increasing the number of tests . So the biggest barrier right now to increasing our number of tests is instability of the supply chain. That is a lot of words, but basically, instability of the supply chain, were not able to get swabs. The appropriate swabs for test collection. These are special swabs. You cant use Something Like a q tip. These are swabs that must be approved and media medium which is basically the gunk that you put the swab in to keep the sample stabilized as you transport it to the machine. With our partners, including the partners that were announced today in terms of expanding our Testing Capacity, we have enough machines in the city to do this. What is our rate limiting step are getting the swabs, getting the media. Im hoping that well be stabilizing that in the next couple of weeks. I have to say that one of the Biggest Challenges in our local regional and i believe National Response is a lack of a reliable source from the federal side. I do not know on a regular basis how many swabs we can expect the. The supply chain is extremely unstable. It makes it incredibly difficult to plan Going Forward. But we do have our swabs today to test the people who need it most. Our people who are exhibiting symptoms, our frontline First Responders and Health Care Workers and city workers who are exhibiting symptoms. And other highrisk contact. That will continue. Im hopefulses the supply chain as the supply chain stabilizes well be able to expand the criteria for testing Going Forward. We need to ensure that as we expand our Testing Capacity and testing ability, that that does not become a substitute. Testing is an additional tool and does not replace the vital tools of social distancing and wearing face covering. Does the city have a goal for the number of people they want to test this month across all testing sites . So, right now, my focus is on getting hundreds and thousands of the swabs and media so i can establish a Clear Pathway for expanding our testing. The next question is from s. F. Chronicle. When will the city release neighborhood level covid19 data on cases and deaths . So im working we are working at the Health Department with our data team to develop those maps and ensure that the maps are accurate. And i hope to have this data presented on our data tracker very soon. Thank you. Next question is from aaron, San Francisco chronicle. Regarding the contacttracing program, does this need to be fully staffed before the city can begin to lift shelterinplace restrictions and how many staff people will be needed at that time . So, again, contacttracing is a vital Public Health tool. Were scaling it up. Were working to iterate the contacttracing program so that it optimizes our ability to do this work in a culturally appropriate way. I think as we move forward its a tool that were using now and it will be a tool that we will be using as in the future shelter in place orders are eased, but i cant speculate. We just reached a thousand cases in San Francisco. Community transmission is prevalent right now. So we need to ensure that we expand our Testing Capacity, that we expand our contacttracing capacity, that we maintain our ability to take care of the most vulnerable, including in the hospitals before i can speculate on how much we need of each thing. But right now what im focussing on is using this innovation and this partnership to strengthen our contacttracing effort now and for the future. As i said, we are hopeful that our people trained in San Francisco this effort will not just be limited to San Francisco, that we can train hundreds and perhaps even thousands of workers across the region for a collaborative effort that will help us address the pandemic for the medium and perhaps even long term. As well as what were doing right now. For people who must go into quarantine or isolation, is the city arranging places for them if home is not an option . Yes. I think partners, weve focused on this from the beginning. As weve said, if people are covidpositive and do not have ability to quarantine or isolate at home, we provide them with rooms in which theyre able to do that. I want to emphasize, this is often done with a lot of wraparound services. We do not just put people in a hotel room and say, do what you can. We wraparound support services. We mentioned the food. We mentioned the Behavioral Support Services that are needed in many of the spaces. This is not just the Health Department doing it. This is, again, with our partners at h. S. A. , h. S. H. , d. P. W. Its taking a citywide effort to make sure were supporting people successfully. Not only in their health, but in their daily needs. The next question is from s. F. Bay. How many people in the city have recovered so far . And will the city add this information to the online data tracker . So you can see that our data tracker supplies a lot of information. We are not tracking recovered cases. We are focusing on the people who are the most vulnerable, the people who have unfortunately died from covid19. Were focuses on hospital capacity. I think its important to remember that 80 at least 80 of people who contact covid19 do recover. It can be a rocky course for some people and, unfortunately, some people require hospitalization and hospitalization sometimes in the intensive care unit. You can see about a third of the people require that right now. Unfortunately, some people do die, but most people do recover from this disease. The next question is from wired. In regards to contacttracing, it sounds like youre rolling your own technology here, are you taking advantage of the Tech Industry . We are taking in this case, were using a tool developed in collaboration with the centers for Disease Control and a company. Were using the technology that we need now to do even better. Again in collaboration with the company, the experts, dr. George rutherford and others known in the field. Were using the Technology Tool to meet the community needs. So im very excited about this innovation. Well certain iterate and learn and use other available Technology Tools Going Forward im sure. Contacttracing is essential to reopening the economy. Its also next to impossible to do perfectly or close to perfectly. What about your past experience tells you it will be effective at the scale were talking about . Again, i think we have some of the best people in the country, if not in the world, in the Health Department working on this contacttracing work. Dr. Susan phillip and her team have been leaders in this before the pandemic where we tracked other diseases including h. I. V. Weve learned a number of lessons over decades of doing this work. And, again, i cant emphasize how very important it is to have Community Support to do this a culturally appropriate way, to do it in multiple languages, and to ensure that people who are doing the contact investigation are open to feedback and iterate the importance of this to the people that were reaching. If you look at where contacttracing is needed, the history of Infectious Disease shows this is a key tool. That it needs to be scaled up appropriately. Yes, there are a lot of challenges and times when tracing may not be as effective as each case may not be as responsive as we would like people to be, but if you can gain the trust, if you earn the trust i should say, if you earn the trust of the communitys most impacted by diseases, including covid19, if you provide the feedback necessary, if people feel and see the value of this work, it will succeed. And im confident with the team on the ground and the support of ucsf and the company and others that this program will be a key corner stone of the response. Thank you, dr. Colfax. This concludes our press conference for today. We have private and Public Gardens throughout the garden tour. All of the gardens are volunteers. The only requirement is youre willing to show your garden for a day. So we have gardens that vary from all stages of development and all gardens, family gardens, private gardens, some of them as small as postage stamps and others pretty expansive. Its a variety all of the world is represented in our gardens here in the portola. I have been coming to the portola garden tour for the past seven or eight years ever since i learned about it because it is the most important event of the neighborhood, and the reason it is so important is because it links this neighborhood back to its history. In the early 1800s the portola was farmland. The regions flowers were grown in this neighborhood. If you wanted flowers anywhere future bay area, you would come to this area to get them. In the past decade, the area has tried to reclaim its roots as the garden district. One of the ways it has done that is through the portola garden tour, where neighbors open their gardens open their gardens to people of San Francisco so they can share that history. When i started meeting with the neighbors and seeing their gardens, i came up with this idea that it would be a great idea to fundraise. We started doing this as a fundraiser. Since we established it, we awarded 23 scholarships and six work projects for the students. The Scholarship Programs that we have developed in association with the portola is just a winwinwin situation all around. The Scholarship Program is important because it helps people to be able to tin in their situation and afford to take classes. I was not sure how i would stay in San Francisco. It is so expensive here. I prayed so i would receive enough so i could stay in San Francisco and finish my school, which is fantastic, because i dont know where else i would have gone to finish. The scholarships make the difference between students being able to stay here in the city and take classes and having to go somewhere else. [ ] [ ] you come into someones home and its theyre private and personal space. Its all about them and really their garden and in the city and urban environment, the garden is the extension of their indoor environment, their Outdoor Living room. Why are you here at this garden core . Its amazing and i volunteer here every year. This is fantastic. Its a beautiful day. You walk around and look at gardens. You meet people that love gardens. Its fantastic. The portola garden tour is the last saturday in september every year. Mark your calendars every year. You can see us on the website