Transcripts For SFGTV Treasure Island Development Authority 20240712

Meeting will come to order. This is the july 16, 2020, special budget and finance committee. Im sandra lee fewer joined by the Committee Members walton and mandelman. Our clerk is linda wong who is assisted by brent. I would like to thank sfgov for broadcasting this meeting. Madam clerk, do we have any announcements. Yes, this the board of supervisors and Committee Room is closed however members will be participating in the meeting remotely. This precaution is due to the state, federal, and local orders. Committee members will attend the meeting through Video Conference and participate in the extent as if theyre physically present. Public comment will be available on each item on this agenda. Channel 26 and sfgov. Org are streaming the number across the screen. Committee members have an opportunity to speak during Public Comment meeting, you can call 4156550001, meeting i. D. 1463207645. Press pound twice. When connected you will hear the meeting discussion and you will be muted and listening mode only. When your item of interest comes up, dial star 3 to be added to the speaker line. Best practices is to call from a quiet location and turn down your television or radio. Alternatively you can submit Public Comment in the following ways. Email myself at linda. Wong sfgov. Org. The email will be forwarded to the supervisors and will be part of the official file. Madam chair, this concludes my announcement. Thank you very much madam clerk. Can you call item 1. Yes, chart amendment, adjustment of baseline funding. It will not take in account certain changes in city revenue, resulting from voterapproved business taxes on the november 3, 2020, ballot. The municipal transportation fund, the park, recreation and open space fund, the children and youth fund, the Library Preservation fund, the Housing Trust fund, the Public Education enrichment fund, and dignity fund and street Tree Maintenance Fund at an election to be held on november 3, 2020. Increase the Small Business exemption for the gross receipt test to 1. 5 million and increase the annual Business Registration fee on businesses benefit from this increase, modify the gross receipt tax rate, repeal the payroll expense tax, increase the tax receipt tax for certain taxpayers for 15 years, and impose a general test on the gross receipts, and the commercial rent ordinance and make other changes to the citys business taxes. Item number 3. Ordinance to business and tax regulation code, motion ordering submitted to the voters in an ordinan ordinance amending the business and tax regulation code to modify the gross receipt tax rate, repeal the payroll expense tax, increase the gross receipt tax on certain taxpayers for ten years if a Court Strikes down the homelessness gross receipts tax ordinance, impose a new general tax on the gross receipts from the lease and certain commercial space for 10 years if a Court Strikes down the early care and education commercial rents tax ordinance. Identify number four, business and tax regulations code, business tax changes and item number five, Initiative Ordinance, business and tax regulation code, business tax changes. Meeting i. D. Is 1463207645 and press pound twice. Press star 3 to line up to speak. Please wait until the system indicates you have been unmuted and you may begin your comments. Thank you very much madam clerk. Colleagues, i want to provide a brief overview of how this meeting will go today. I will first be calling items 1 through 5 together as they are all related. Item 1 is the Charter Amendment that would exempt charter mandated set aside funds to taking into account certain changes in city revenue, resulting from voter approved backstop taxes that will be discussed in items 2 through 5. I will move to include this amendment in the business tax measure, rather than leaving it as a separate ballot measure. Items 2 through 5 are different versions of a proposal to change the business tax structure and accomplish a number of goals including providing relief to Small Businesses and industries impacted by covid19 by reducing their tax burden and helping them recover. Unlocking the hundreds of millions of dollars that the city has already collected from business taxes for child care and Homelessness Services but is unable to spend because of the ongoi ongoing litigation that was approved by voters in 2018. Completing San Francisco transition from a payroll tax that incentivizes local hirings to more progressive gross receipt tax where more higher earning businesses pay more. Items 2 and 4 were introduced by the mayor and items 3 and 5 was introduced by president yee, supervisor peskin, supervisor haney and myself . In a few minutes, ben rosen field will be presenting on the similarities and differences on this version. He will include an explanation of the amendment that i will be introducing for item 3 at president yees request. I will introduce these amendments once we had a chance to hear from the controller and members of the public, but first i would like to give president yee a chance to speak about this proposal in todays amendment. I also want to thank president yee and his staff for your leadership and your hard work to make this proposal as strong as it could possibly be. I want to extend a huge thank you to my colleagues, supervisor peskin and supervisor haney for making this happen and Ben Rosenfield for all his experience along the way. President yee, the floor is yours. Thank you chair fewer. Im going to thank you for your ongoing leadership as the chair of the Budget Committee. So, as chair fewer mentioned, i joined not only chair fewer but supervisor peskin and haney to bring forward a long overdue reform to our tax system by repealing the payroll tax and replacing it with the gross receipts system. This is the process that started in 2012 when our city leadership made a decision to move our citys business tax from a payroll system to this gross receipts system. The system was seen as a more equitab equitable, as more municipalities have adopted it. The voters saw the logic in this and passed the Reform Ballot Initiative then. However, the 2012 reform did not completely remove the city out of the payroll system and all parties at the time knew that we needed to address this at a future date. I will have to say that the future is now. We believe that this measure also needs to respond to the unprecedented economic crisis we are in with a fair equitable recovery program, especially for our Small Business community and our most vulnerable residents. This is why were calling this is the Small Business and economic recovery act. You must recognize that this Health Emergency only made existing inequities worse and the economic burden is not carried evenly. Who is hurting the most right now are families, small entrepreneurs and familyowned businesses. When we talk about recovery, it cannot be just for a field. You must start from the bottom up. We need to provide immediate relief to the hardest hit industries and businesses and also provide a responsible sustainable Funding Source for San Franciscos economic vitality. Our initial proposal we introduced weeks ago was a starting point. Today we are making a good proposal to a better proposal. Were offering amendments to strengthen the measure that reflects the numerous feedback that we heard throughout this process, particularly from labor, labor leaders, Small Businesses and community advocates. I want to provide a brief overview of what were proposing in amendments today and then allow our city controller to present further details. One major element to the measure is the ability to unlock funds already collected to the city, our city, our own initiative and also our early care and education for all. As you recall these two were passed by voters in 2018, but these voter backed initiatives are currently tied up in litigation. This measure will free up 300 million for the general funds by placing a stop tax that only goes into effect if we lose the court cases. We are extending this backstop tax to 20 years and well also incorporate the Charter Amendments to ensure that the revenue generates for this is not subject to baseline reductions. This will allow the refund of claims and support the general fund and freeing up the dollars intended for Housing Support and also for early care and education support. We are proposing to exempt more businesses from the tax by excluding Small Businesses making 2 million or less, not 200,000, but 2 million or less. This will benefit approximately 3,100 Small Businesses, many of which are barely getting by right now. Small businesses making less than 1 million. We will also see a reduction in the registration fees. We are proposing to provide significant tax reduction to more industries that are hardest hit by covid19 like hotel accommodations, Food Services, restaurants, and manufacturing. Over the course of the next few years. Lastly, it is clear that the economic the economy recovery is going to be prorated, protracted i mean. Therefore we are proposing that no tax increases are considered until january 2022. There will be a small phased incremental increase to the tax rate for Large Industries. Future step increases in 2023 and 2024 will be tied to economic recovery triggers. If the economy were not recovered yet. The tax Rate Modification will then be deferred to the following year. Our economy is entering what i call unchartered waters. We want to remain nimble and have the flexibility as a city to pause any increases by a reporting requirement so the controlling can provide recommendations to the board if taxes need to be further deferred or reduced due to Economic Conditions. Those are the amendments we are reviewing today and i want to emphasize that the board of supervisors maintain the power to defer or reduce taxes. We did this because recently we did this most recently with the vacancy tax. If Economic Conditions do not improve over the course of the next few years, the board can adjust the tax rates accordingly. You can also take a closer look at industry specific situations to provide a more tailored approach to rate changes. I truly believe that the updated measure is balanced, but brings immediate relief to those who need it the most, while offsetting the cost to many Large Industries that are less cost sensitive. I want to be clear that we will be making difficult budget decisions this year. There is no way to avoid that. With this measure, we can minimize the impact. We can prevent massive cuts to critical public services. Reinvest in jobs and Community Revitalization that is so desperately needed and to lift us all out of this devastating pantoja and pandemic and economic crisis. I dont want anyone to get the impression that this will solve all of our budget problems, but without it were going to be in a much worse place. That is something that none of us can afford. Colleague, i hope i can count on your support on this measure and before i hand it back to chair fewer, i want to appreciate the work of controller ben, ted, our chief economist, and our City Attorney team scott for their work and their creative collaboration. I again want to thank the other sponsors in this, for this measure. The supervisor peskin, fewer, and haney who worked with me on this Small Business recovery economic recovery act since the end of last year. I also want to thank their staff from peskins office, fewers office, haneys office, and my own staff. Are there any comments from the other sponsors before i turn it over to our city controller Ben Rosenfield . Supervisor peskin. Thank you president yee. You have taken all of the words of thanks out of my mouth, but i want to give you actually some words of thanks. This was a very, very complicated endeavor long before covid19 hit. We knew that it was going to be the project for 2020s ballot and we had to take some time off after the pandemic hit. You have really steered this across some really stormy unlikely seas and you done it with elegance. You kept your cool, which i have not. I just cannot thank you enough for the way you managed this and let me concur in my thanks and i will shout out my colleagues, and my staff. Thank you to the incredible staff that double checked everything and kept us on course and to budget chair fewer and supervisor haney, thank you. It was an Unlikely Group of four people, our measured president , our budget chair, and supervisors haney and myself. We brought this all together from different perspectives. To our controller and to ted eagan and the controls team. Thank you so much. To the tax team, way to move it incredibly fast as it changed and morphed in many ways. To people in labor, small busine business, as well as the chamber of commerce. I dont want to put words in the chamber of commerces mouths, but i think theyre coming around to the fact that president yee said, we have a fair and balanced package thats a long time in the coming. Thank you president yee for your extraordinary leadership. Thank you, i echo all of those accolades for you and your leadership. A few months ago, i understandably thought this was going to end and we didnt have the capacity to come together and make this happen, but because of your work and your leadership and your staff and chair fewer and supervisor peskin and the controller and the City Attorney staff, who have been working so hard on this, here we are. This is a really important measure generally for the future of San Francisco and its an essential measure for this moment, for right now. We need this to make investments in our critical and essential services to provide tax relief to Small Businesses and to create a structure that will ensure a strong economic recovery, which has to include investments and services and workers and you know, makes me hopeful for what well be able to do in the near future, not just with this revenue and structure, but as a team and as a board, working collaboratively. This is how it gets done. So thank you again and i know that the prop c, big c, little c, labor, on so days the chamber, were all also a part of providing input into this. I would just say as one of the four supervisors who was most closely connected to it and i shared this with the other supervisors, i really hope this is something we can support unanimously. This is a reflection of the best work that we all did on behalf of the rest of the board. It really should get the unanimous support of this board. Hopefully, ultimately of the mayor as well and of the voters of San Francisco. Thank you again for all your work on it. Its really extraordinary and lets get it done. Thank you chair fewer for your leadership and i know you know firsthand from these Budget Committee hearings that we really need this. You can imagine what it will look like in terms of investments and so many critical things without this measure passing. Thank you Budget Committee for your leadership. Chair fewer, did you want to add anything before we turn it over to ben . No president yee, but i like to give the opportunity for sophia to add questions or comments if she would like. Thank you chair fewer and president yee. I wanted to convey the mayors heart felt appreciation to the four of you for a collaborative process and im appreciative of these amendments today and in particular, as we can work our way through this economic recovery. She is reviewing those now and we do hope that we will be able to support this measure and we will be in touch. Thank you. Thank you very much. So president yee, absolutely. I think it is time to call the controller up. Do you agree . I agree. Great. So if we could have the controller, mr. Ben rosenfield. Good afternoon. [indiscernible low volume] i cant hear you. Thank you for having me here today, im Ben Rosenfield, the controller could you speak a little louder or closer . Is that better . Yes. Okay, thank you for having me here today president yee and chair fewer asked me to walk through the two measures that are here before you today by looking at places where theyre different and where theyre similar. Ill run through the different components of the tax. Its a complicated package that defines our second largest revenue in the city. [inaudible] to start with, the two taxes share a number of the same features, ill briefly highlight those and then run through each in more detail. Both measures fundamentally unlock the revenue that the city has been collecting for big and baby c. Since those taxes were adopted by the voters in 2018. It makes that revenue available despite litigation thats ongoing by creating a backstop tax that would go into effect, should the city lose that litigation and from which refunds could be paid. Secondly, both measures complete the retirement of the citys payroll tax and replace it with a revenue neutral increase to gross receipt rates, getting to a single tax system to the city, opposed to our current hybrid of both. Third, both measures provide permanent tax relief for Small Businesses and they provide temporary tax relief over the next several years for targeted industries. Both measures equalize rates for the information sector, effective in 2021, by moving them to the same rate schedule, the Financial Services, professional services, white collar industries. Both measures increase rates on certain sectors overtime. The timing and the level, and the breath of those increases vary. Ill talk through those. So to briefly describe and i think president yee already hit these major points. The measure that will be moved today, increase the Small Business exemption to 2 million. Secondly, the amendments today expand the interest industries that are subject to temporary tax relief in the boards measure, to include hospitality, food, services, arts, and recreation. With that expansion, the temporary tax relief closely proximates that which was originally proposed in the mayors measure. Third, reduce the level of the ultimate tax rate increase which was what was proposed two months ago. It phases those increases in over time. So rate increases in the initial version where a 30 level for Many Industries and would have gone into effect immediately in 2021. The changes here today reduce that ultimate increase to 15 to 20 percent, depending on the industry, and it phases those increases in not immediately, but beginning in 2024 and then taking steps forward in 2023 and 2024 as well. As president yee mentioned, there are measures added to the increases that delays the increases for a year if gross receipts in the city have not recovered. The amendment also extends the duration of the backstop from 10 to 20 years and as chair fewer mentioned, merges the charter baseline chain where the backstop tax into the measure. We have talked about the big and baby c backstop measure, but to recap it as you are all aware, many businesses in the city are paying big and baby c taxes. These are taxes on gross receipts for a larger company, commercial rent in the city, adopted by the voters of 2018. Were in the midst of litigation, challenging those taxes and as you know, my office has impounded funds were currently collecting should we have to pay refunds, should we lose. The measure before you create as backstop tax that solves that issue. The backstop tax which is informed very similar to the taxes established in baby c, but as a general tax would only go into effect if the Court Strikes down big and baby c. It would be replaced by a new tax. The information sector measures would be increased the rates paid by the information sector would be increased to match those paid by schedule 6. As both the president and chair fewer noted, the measure does provide additional tax relief for smaller businesses in the city. Registrations paid would be reduced. Additionally, the Small Business exemption, which is currently approximately 1 million with the increase. Under the mayors current proposal in front of you, the Small Business exemption is set at 5 billion, which would exempt other businesses from the tax. There is an exemption of an additional 3,100. Thats 20 of current taxpayers would be exempted. Both measures presented tax reli relief. The amendments to the boards version expand the universe sector to which the tax relief would be provided, and that would include manufacturing, retail, other services, hospitality, Food Services and restaurants, arts, entertainment, recreation centers. For those sectors, there would be a 50 reduction for adjusted rates on the first tax years of 2021 and 2022 and then a 25 reduction in 2023. With this change, the temporary tax reduction between you is largely similar, with the only exemption is the mayors version had economic triggers. The mayors initial proposal proposed Financial Services and Administrative Offices, those at the heart of the white collar businesses. There are significant amendments to the boards proposal today, the increase and the timing of it. In the amendments, a broader set of sectors would see increases of between 15 and 20 depending on the sector, down from a 30 increase in the initial proposal and rather than occurring in 2021, a month after the passage of the measures, these increases could now be delayed and then steppedup. So an initial step in 2022, 2023, and 2024. The last two step increases in 2023 and 2024 would be deferred by one year if the tax conditions are not met. I included the uplift and schedule by sector and appended to this report. Just to highlight some of the key revenue and spending impacts that result from the measure. The backstop tax feature in the short term would permit the city to spend 1. 5 billion over the next two years. This is comprised of 1. 2 billion that would be dedicated for Child Care Services and also the repayment of 300 million in funds to the general fund that had been advanced to those programs in the last several years. In the longer term beyond the budget period, the rate restructuring would generate ongoing revenue. There would be 20 million on full phasein, while the direct general fund would approximate 100 million. That 100 million ultimate increase does not capture the full value to the city, though, financially of the change, which would also include limiting losses in revenues from the tax base. We believe the shift will avoid the losses and obviously the spending benefits [indiscernible]. With that, i will stop and see if i can answer any questions. Colleagues, any comments or questions for the controller or for your colleagues, authors of this legislation . No comments or questions . Wow. Okay. Thats great. Supervisors, authors of this ordinance, do you have any other comments that you would like to add that perhaps mr. Rosenfield covered or you would like to go more in depth. I think mr. Rosenfield did a good job in explaining and i dont think we need to go into more details at least i dont think i do. I see supervisor walton in the queue. I want to thank you and all of my colleagues for all your hard work on this. The way everything was presented today, i know it seems like this was a simple process. I do want to thank you all for doing the hard work and being able to bring it to us in a package where everything is already set up and we have all the information that we need and appreciate your hard work. Thats great. I see supervisor mandelin in the queue. Thank you to everyone who got here. Its an important measure on our ballot and definitely needed. Thanks for your hard work. Wow, this is great. Were all in agreement. Madam clerk, lets open this up for Public Comment, items 1 to 5. Clerk yes, madam chair, i wanted to note there are six supervisors participating in this meeting. We are a special meeting of the board of supervisors. Operation, please let us know if there are any callers. Please press star three to go to the queue. Please let us know if there are any callers wanting to comment on items 1 through 5. Operator there are 10 callers in the queue. I will unmute the first caller. Im the organizer of [indiscernible] and i have children and am speaking to the proposal. We worked hard to collect signatures on the ballot [indiscernible] big businesses have captured most of the gains of the recent Economic Growth and it is time for them to pay their fair share. I was a stayathome mom before i started working and that was because of lack of child care. I you brought my daughter to work with me because my agency allowed me to do it. When i wasnt able to do that, the first payment was a shocker. It required all of my money so i had to find another option. A lot of families like mine need to work. With covid19 this is not possible. People are being asked to do more for less. We are being asked to keep doors open. The city invested in [indiscernible]. You can help us write now [indiscernible] i also anticipate that the mayor will support this because safety and the wellbeing of our children cannot wait. Thank you for your time. Clerk thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. I am a member of [indiscernible] i live in San Francisco and i have two toddlers. Im here to talk about my experiences with child care. I appreciate all the support i heard with the fall. I struggled finding affordable, goodquality child care with my first child. The wait lists were long and i never got a call back. Then i got the surprise that i was pregnant again with my second child. So i started crunching numbers, but there was nowhere i could afford child care with two babies. To make things worse, i quit my job. My husband and i sold our home and we went to live with family to afford living. I found work to allow flexibility to work with my two kids, but when covid hit i wasnt able to do my job. I was no longer contributing to the economy or helping my family. Without child care, i couldnt go back to work. [indiscernible] its important that i keep the wellbeing of my children and my family. The first five years clerk thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. We thank you for your expansion of the Small Business exception and an inclusion of industry sectors. These amendments are welcome and they help to reduce the negative fiscal impacts on already struggling businesses, but we are concerned about having major tax increases on the November Ballot and the making of a multiyear recession. There are more san franciscans out of work than the Great Recession of 2008. As we try to navigate the Global Pandemic, covid19, and the hundreds of thousands of global employees that continue to face layoffs, we must be sure we are building a stable economy. It is also imperative to note that San Franciscos economy is a big ecosystem. There will be shockwaves through our industries. We thank you for these amendments and thank you all for your time. Thank you so much. Clerk thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. I am the director of Public Policy of the golden gait restaurant association. Were calling in to say we are very much appreciative of the work done to todays proposal. We remain concerned about the overall state of San Francisco and caution that now may not be the time to raise taxes on any business sectors. We are concerned to address the homelessness issues in San Francisco. Thank you for your time and we look forward to measures to support Small Business. Clerk thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. I am considering child care an important need. I am chairing work for a friend of mine. In this time we need a lot of care for our children and i hope you will support us in approving these things. It sounds like the supervisors are really truly thinking about the community. I would like to thank you for your work. This is the manager of the Small Business commerce. I would like to thank you for the expansion of this for Small Businesses who have been impacted by covid19 as well as the expansion of the threshold to 2 million which includes a lot of highly vulnerable Small Businesses. While tax policy is rarely directed to injure Small Businesses, we all know that different policies can have both predictable and unforeseen circumstances for Small Businesses. Thats why its important to take care when weighing decisions even for Small Businesses. As everything is connected as an ecosystem in San Francisco, when the government has to tighten its belt and expenses rise, they have to tighten their spending, which we do need to remember can impact our Small Business community. Overall, i thank you for your consideration and narratives which are very encouraging for the support of Small Businesses in San Francisco. Im calling to say thank you for supervisors addressing this issue and taking this seriously. Child care is essential to the functioning of our society to allow our people to work and for the children to be in care with quality and education. As one speaker said before, those first five years are imperative to their future success. Thats what we do is offer that support for families and children and theyre desperate for that care and support right now. Im asking that you unlock the impounded gross receipts tax. We appreciate your support and we know you care what happens with this community with the characteristic and the community. We run a Business Incubator program to help more people become child care providers. [indiscernible] these women make minimum wage. Most of those dependant on the economy need child care. [indiscernible] expanding access to child care. There are 3,500 children on the San Francisco wait list. Ive heard that the funds will harm the Business Community and this is simply not true. Child care providers are the Business Owner owners. So support Small Businesses, we must release these funds. We thank the supervisors for bringing these items forward. I just wanted to voice my appreciation for the amendment made and in particular for those helps the retail and the arts and restaurant community. As a member of the local board, we continue to be concerned about the greater implications. The overall implications are very complex and we need to be super thoughtful before implementing any new taxes on San Francisco right now. Thank you for hearing my opinion. Clerk thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. Hello. Thank you very much for having me [indiscernible] i want to be sure we are mindful. We are living in a time when bisss are being vilified for doing businessusinesses are bei for doing business here. My mother has been here for the last 32 years and shes someone who contributed for all these years. There is a feeling overwhelmingly that no matter what you do, youre punished for doing it, if you employ people, you feel a level of punishment. The same goes for if you have an ambition of buying an apartment or a home, you still feel that. Were in a time now of people fleeing the city and leaving the city. Im talking about people that are creating in a lot of ways the fabric of our city, the city block that we walk, the things that make San Francisco this amazing place to live. Im born and raised here, so i understand a lot of the needs of the people in my community. I do think a lot of these things are important. I would like the supervisors to think how businesses are treated in San Francisco. Clerk thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. Good afternoon, supervisors. The Hotel Council has been devastated by covid19 pandemic and the orders that have surrounded that. We have come to a halt and our employees are not working. We appreciated the amendments in the meeting that would provide short and longterm relief for accommodations and hotels. However, many of the initiatives would hurt us at a time when were at our lowest being able to provide for our cities. Anything that would cause more taxes would be concerning. We appreciate the adjustments you made for our industry. Clerk thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. Hello [indiscernible] im an essential worker. Ive been on the waiting list since my child was born four years ago. Im doing the best i can to support my family. Some days i have to take my daughter to work and other days i have to leave her with a family or friend. This is not the way parents should have child care. This is why i will continue to fight for all those currently and continuing to be on the waiting list. We need this funding and our lives depend on it [indiscernible] i was calling in and asking for support. After telling me story and explaining the high number of children on the waiting list and how crucial child care is, the city and we agree that child care is essential for the economic recovery. Our children are growing and they deserve access to child care that will provide a safe environment. We are asking you, please support this and help us now because child care is always essential. Thank you for taking the time to hear from the public. My name [indiscernible] all the hard work youve done to help streamline Small Business with regard to the payroll and clarifying that and making it more streamlined [indiscernible] we are cautious of raising taxes on other businesses. We need the businesses to stay in our city and we need the funding that these businesses and their employees provide. Make sure youre taking a nuanced look and we continue not to drive businesses, home owners, and businesses out of San Francisco. Thank you. Clerk thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. I am calling in support of the executive tax because we need to support our frontline workers during the pandemic. I am the cousin of a Healthcare Worker and they have not been supported during this pandemic. We are afraid if we dont flatten the curve there will be a second wave. As a Family Member of a Healthcare Worker, i support the tax because greedy corporations because they greedy corporations need to pay their people more the overpaid executive tax can up to 140 million. We need to support our frontline workers during this pandemic. San francisco needs to be ready when the next wave hits. This is a vote in support of frontline workers. This shows that you value the working class san franciscans over corporate greed. Please support this tax. Thank you. I have been a resident of the bay area for 20 years. I work with Healthcare Workers every day and im asking you to prioritize the needs of when is during this pandemic. Big corporations are profiting while momandpop stores are shuttering. These companies will not leave San Francisco because they are being taxed a small percentage. We shouldnt stop this because were afraid they will leave. If they can pay executives Million Dollar salaries, they can pay their fair share. Cities around the country are preparing for a spike in the curve by stocking up on medical equipment and hiring First Responders and other Healthcare Workers. This is a vote in favor of Healthcare Workers. A vote in support of this tax shows that you support the hard work of everyday san franciscans over the corporate profits and their bottom line. Please support this overpaid executive tax. Thank you. I would like to remind people in the queue that we are hearing Public Comment on items 1 through 5. When you are speaking about the overpaid executive tax, that is items 6 and 7 and we are not taking Public Comment on that now. If you would like to comment on items 1 to 5, please stay in the queue, otherwise, please wait until we have introduced the item and Public Comment for items 6 and 7. We are now hearing Public Comment for items 1 through 5 only. Thank you. Im calling in because im a resident of San Francisco and a working mom. We are experiencing quite an upending of our lives during this pandemic. I wanted to say that i have been working and provided child care for a number of years and i have supported a number of organizations in the child care industry. I do wonder, however, if it is possible for the city of San Francisco to get its budget under control without increasing taxes. In the face of covid, many are fearful of a future economic downturn. Child care and Early Childhood education are absolutely important. It is important that during a downturn the city would like to squeeze us. Perhaps the supervisors could cut their salaries to cover these costs. Your proposal to tax your way out of this are essentially kicking all San Francisco working families while down. The most recent review of this demonstrates that San Francisco has a larger budget than larger cities. There is no reason for you to raise taxes, especially in an economic crisis instead of getting a handle on spending in San Francisco. Clerk thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. Are there any other speakers . [indiscernible] im an essential worker and i am struggling because i dont have child care for my 4yearold son and i am [indiscernible] and also i want to make sure that child care is essential for the economy recovered. Its important that we get the funding [indiscernible] to spend more for child care. I support the proposition. Clerk i wanted to note that there are five callers in the queue. Thank you very much, board of supervisors and this particular committee for allowing us a chance to voice our thoughts on the action that you are about to take. Ive been a resident of San Francisco for over 20 years. I have worked in a restaurant for two years. I want to give a sense of understanding of what it is like to operate a Small Business in San Francisco. I applaud the reason for the action items that we are discussing now and the need to support child care and the other items. The pandemic has exposed that the goose that laid the golden egg is a valid metaphor for this. My heart and my wallet, frankly, has always supported those in need. The reality is the pandemic has exposed that to operate a Business Needs more than just a good heart. When we see Large Businesses leave San Francisco to put a gross receipt tax on the level that exists on these particular action items will be the wrong way to go. The reality is these businesses will not survive just because their taxes are less. They need to survive because there are customers. Clerk thank you for your comment. Next speaker, please. Madam chair, that completes the queue. Public comment is now closed. I want to thank my colleagues for reiterating this. This measure doesnt include taxes for Small Businesses, but tax relief for Small Businesses. We are very concerned about the support needed for Small Businesses. We support our Small Businesses. They are the life blood of our economy and city and they are struggling right now. All the services we put together for child care are things that our residents benefit and rely on, including our Small Businesses, Small Business owners and workers. Taking a huge hit in those things is only going to hurt our economy more broadly. I just wanted to reiterate that as im sure other supervisors would as well. Colleagues, would you like to add comments . Just a short comment. Thank you, supervisor, you hit the nail on the head there. We have used this initiative to help these businesses. If you look at it carefully, if you see the current tax that theyre paying, they would pay less in the future. There was acknowledgement of the fact by quite a few people that are worried about other issues. They understood that what we were trying to do was help the Small Businesses. Thank you. I hope the committee will make those amendments. After the amendments you have to come back to budget . Yes, it goes to a special budget and finance meeting of july 21. Thank you very much. Without further ado i also wanted to mention that our City Attorney is also that assisted us with this is available for comments. Colleagues, you should have a copy of the amendments. These amendments would expand tax relief to Small Businesses and impacted industries, specifically but exempting Small Businesses with gross receipts of 2 million or less and expanding tax relief to more entries affected by covid19 there would be a delay of tax increases to january 2022 with future increases in january 2023 and january 2024 based on economic recovery triggers. [indiscernible] finally establish reporting and look back analysis by including reporting from the controller and chief economist with treasurier to analyze the implementation of the measure called i have a rollcall vote, please. [ roll call ] [ roll call ]. Now i would like to make a motion to table items 1 and 2 and file items 4 and 5. Could i have a roll call vote, please. [ roll call ]. Can you please call items 6 and 7 together. [Initiative Ordinance business and tax regulations code tax on businesses with disproportionate executive pay] sponsors haney; ronen, walton, mar and preston motion ordering submitted to the voters an ordinance amending the business and tax regulations code to impose an additional gross receipts tax or an Administrative Office tax on businesses with a greater than 100 1 ratio of the compensation of the businesss highestpaid employee to the median compensation paid to the businesss employees based in the city; and increasing the citys appropriations limit by the amount collected under the additional tax for four years from november 3, 2020, at an election to be held on november 3, 2020. [hearing Initiative Ordinance business and tax regulations code tax on businesses with disproportionate executive pay] sponsors haney; ronen, walton, mar and preston hearing to consider the proposed Initiative Ordinance submitted by four or more supervisors to the voters for the november 3, 2020, election, entitled ordinance amending the business and tax regulations code to impose an additional gross receipts tax or an Administrative Office tax on businesses with a greater than 100 1 ratio of the compensation of the businesss highestpaid employee to the median compensation paid to the businesss employees based in the city; and increasing the citys appropriations limit by the amount collected under the additional tax for four years from november 3, 2020. We have supervisor matt haney as the speaker. Thank you so much, chair fewer, and to the Committee Members. Colleagues, today with my cosponsor cosponsors well have for your consideration the c. E. O. Tax. During this pandemic, americas billionaires saw their fortunes soar by 434 billion during the shelter in place. Jeff bezos and muck zuckerberg both had the biggest gains. Knees billionaire gains are billionaires becoming more billionaires. With this pandemic even as the economy and our Small Businesses grapple with the worst economic crisis in recent history, there is still tremendous wealth in our society and our city concentrated in the hands of the f few. Companies paying these out can see the cuts to essential services that we are facing as a city. Im looked at the department of Public Health and homelessness budget and the kind of cuts and what impact that would have on our city. Were just beginning that conversation of many hard choices. What we are proposing today is a simple and straightforward measure that can help us get through this crisis while also. If the measure passes any company that pays their toppaid employee 100 times more than their medium worker will have a 0. 1 surcharge added to their benefit. If the Top Executive makes 200 times more than the average employer, then its 0. 2 surcharge, 300 times, 0. 3 and so on capping at 0. 6. Our tax is modeled on a similar surcharge thats been implemented in portland, oregon, maine, washed, and nationally there are similar proposals to deal with rampant income inequality. This tax will raise up to 140 million every year which will allow the city to hire hundreds of nurses, doctors, Healthcare Workers. The Healthcare System is stretched and strained responding to emergencies, the already existing emergencies of Mental Health and addiction, but the very threatening and real pandemic that were facing as a city. This incentivizes companies to invest in their workers. Businesses can avoid paying the tax by paying their executives less or by raiding their employees wages. Companies that can afford tens of millions of dollars for salary sincere can afford to way their share in taxes. Executive daerls have risen by 900 . Big businesses all over San Francisco have the chance to be on the right side of history. This is a modest tax. Its going to go to the bestpossible use at time we need it more than ever. Its going to go to companies that are doing well and paying people a whole lot of money at a time we need a little bit more support. There are two amendments im proposing for the committee to adopt. The First Amendment adds the word managerial capturing the salary of the highestpaid executive in the company. The amendment appears on page 1, lines 6 and 17, page 2, line 25, and page 23, lines 15 through 16. Secondly, the Second Amendment caps the tax at 0. 6 instead of 1 , capping the tier at 0. 6 is a reasonable amendment adopting these amendments will not reduce the revenue range. The range will be 60 and 100 million. [indiscernible] these are the amendments im asking for the committee to adopt today. Im hoping you will support this measure. It is critical to help our economy address the needed investments. I want to thank our labor and Community Partners that have worked on this, our cosornss, and especially to the local Labor Council and all of the nurses, doctors, healthcare professionals, and front line workers for their support. I just want to clarify one thing because i know this comes up a lot. This is looking at total compensation which includes stocks and other types of compensation as it relates to the toppaid employee. That toppaid employee can be anywhere when looking at the medium salary, we are looking at that of those folks in. Thank you very much. Any comments or questions from my colleagues at all . Madam clerk, please open it up for comment. Clerk operator, can you check if there are any speakers. Can afford to pay executives millions a year can afford to pay their fair share in taxes to help us recover. The pandemic is over and cities are preparing for a spike and hiring nurses and First Responders and this measure not only raises much needed funds to fix the cracks in our health care it incentivizes companies to invest in their workers and not just executives. Business will not leave San Francisco because of this. Its not going happen. Its not true. San francisco is one of the most desirable cities in the United States for companies to be located in. A small surcharge can be avoided by investing in workers will have little to no impact on companies that can apay to pay their ceo millions of dollars. Businesses can avoid the tax by paying their executive less or simply raising employees wage. The executive tax only applies to companies who pays executives millions a year so please support supervisor haneys executive tax. Thank you for your comment. Caller hello. Im a resident of San Francisco. Im an active member of the Filipino Community Development Corporation and [indiscernible] program. I support the executive tax because i believe that big or Large Companies that can afford to pay executives billions of dollars can afford to pay their fair share to help us recover. The pandemic isnt over. Many are preparing for a spike in the curve and stocking up on medical equipment and hiring doctors and nurses and First Responders and other essential care workers. San francisco needs [indiscernible]. Executive salaries in the United States have skyrocketed by 40 but regular worker salaries have only grown by 11 . We [indiscernible] thank you and god bless. Thank you for your comment. Next speaker, please. Caller good afternoon supervisors im with the San Francisco chamber of commerce. On behalf of the chamber of commerce we appreciate the input and have seen the ceo tax and transfer tax did for the receive the same attention. We cannot have a oneoff tax we need to keep balancing the needs of where we are in the economy with the addition of new taxes. Taxes makes doing business in San Francisco difficulty. They have seen anchor businesses left and several businesses have allowed businesses to work remotely to leave to other cities and states. Further, while intended to affect Large Companies the pay doesnt exist for the larger companies. This tax will however, affect some of our more Medium Sized Companies in retail and hospitality. We have to be thoughtful of implementing more taxes during an employment crisis. Thank you for your comment. Next speaker, please. Caller hello. Im roxanna and im a registered nurse working in labor and delivery in San Francisco over 15 years and an active member of the california nurses association. I actually went to school in San Francisco all the way from prek to getting my b. S. N. And as a registered nurse i see how economic inequality impacts the health of our patients and our communities every day. San francisco is the most economically inequitable city in the country and that takes a toll on our collective health. I support taxing overpaid executives because we need this money to help support Front Line Health Care workers as we deal with the current pandemic and because San Francisco needs to be ready for the next wave. This measure raises muchneeded funds to help our health care and it also incentivizes companies to invest in their workers not just their executives. Although i can see where some companies would be hesitant, this measure would only make it so that the businesses start treating executives and employees fairly. Thank you for your time. Thank you for your comment. Next speaker, please. Caller hi, my name is deanna chan. A member of local 21 and resident of San Francisco many years and an occupational therapist for the city and county for the last nine years and have been deployed to the front line since april as an essential worker. I have been servicing the temporary housing shelter. I can tell you first hand the supplies are very low and reuse ppe as much as possible and we front line workers need help. As an essential front line worker i support the executive tax and we need the money as we deal with the pandemic head on. Its clear the pandemic is far from over and its time for all to help. As others have noted we believe Big Companies that can afford to pay executives billions every year can afford to pay their fair share in taxes to help the response. The tax only applies to companies who pay their executives millions a year. It will not affect Small Businesses. Please support supervisor haneys overpaid executive tax. Thank you from the front line. Thank you for your call. Next speaker, please. Caller im britly and ive been in district 6 all my life. Im calling to support the overpaid executive tax. I think its important we help our Health Care Workers especially due to the pandemic. They need our support in this small surcharge on massive businesses producing millions annually for a health care. I also like how it incentivizes money to raise employee wages if the businesses want to avoid the tax. Massive businesses like amazon and ceo jeff bezzos are benefiting and Health Care Workers are working to keep people alive. Thank you. Thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. Good afternoon. My name is mr. William. Im an organizer for local 22 in San Francisco. We have Health Care Workers in california and 20,000 work in San Francisco. As a Health Care Worker representative we support the overpaid executive tax because we need to help the Health Care Workers with appropriate medical equipment during the pandemic and be able to hire more Health Care Workers. Its time those to help pay their fair share to help the San Francisco economy and to invest in San Francisco and the best way to do it is through this tax. We need the for instance board of supervisors take ownership and leadership and follow. The we are living in an a capitalist in crisis. They need do their part. We cant afford to cut 250 million to the department of Public Health in San Francisco. Please support the supervisors overpaid executive tax. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Caller hello, supervisors. Im [indiscernible] and im a member of San Franciscos [indiscernible]. I am calling today in support of the overpaid executive tax. Frankly we need the money. Were in a crisis and one thing is if a company can afford to pay millions to their executives and can certainly afford to pay their fair share to help us recover in this crisis. And from people who profit from this city and substantial resources they can help afford to pay their fair share to get us back on our feet. And we can see them avoid it by raising employee wages. Thats another option, right . Folks would be able to pay their own way. Right now cost of living so high in San Francisco and we know executives are overpaid. Maybe it will help incentivize them to behave in a new humane manner. Saying that, they can fair their fair share and make adjustments to help the rest of us and the city out. Their fair share and make adjustments to help the rest of us and the city out. Their fair share and make adjustments to help the rest of us and the city out. Their fair share and make adjustments to help the rest of us and the city out. Their fair share and make adjustments to help the rest of us and the city out. P their fair share and make adjustments to help the rest of us and the city out. A their fair share and make adjustments to help the rest of us and the city out. Y their fair share and make adjustments to help the rest of us and the city out. We have to do what we can to increase the revenue and id rather see revenue increases rather than budget cuts. We know it has a negative affect on improving the economy. It backfires. Bebest the best way to come out a crisis like this is increase spending not budget cuts to help the economy quicker. I encourage you to help support this machine measure and move it forward. Thank you. Thank you for your comments. Before we take the next speaker i want to note that there are 20 callers listening and 10 in the queue. Next speaker, please. Caller im Sarah Larsson a member of local 21. I work for the department of Public Health and were facing budget cuts and weve been under staff for a long time. Were going to need money from some place. It seems like for a long time huge corporations have gotten a lot of special deals in order to be here. Its time for them to give back. These executives can afford to pay and they should pay because theres no other city like San Francisco and i dont think that because a bunch of overpaid executives getting dinged for a little bit of money all corporations will move out. In fact im sure thats not going happen but this pandemic isnt over. We need to take decisive action. We need it now. This isnt on Small Businesses. This is for huge corporations and theres a lot of them here. Its very overwhelming when you consider the disparity and the haves and havenots and front of line workers will be called upon. Youre going to need us. Everybodys going to need us. Please help and vote for this. Thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. Caller this is michael soto with the National Union of Health Care Workers calling in favor of this ordnance. It address the dual crises of the economic downturn and pandemic and make sure the city has the support it needs for front workers and First Responders. Many Big Companies such as those mentioned before are saving money by having workers telecommute and having offices and other facilities go unused and similarly in the Health Care Industry hmo and ppos are Bank Windfall because people are afraid to go to the doctor but theyre still collecting premiums. This is something we know big business can afford and cant afford economic inequality to increase and those with the most need to step up and help the most in this time of need. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. Next speaker, please. Caller hi, supervisors, thank you. Im John Mccormick i work in the tenderloin and wanted to call in support of this important legislation. Not cutting social services is unnecessary and thank you to the supervisors who are proposing taxes like this. Thank you so much. Thank you for your comment. Next speaker, please. Caller can you hear me . Yes, we can. Caller im Cynthia Gomes and im a research analyst. Im calling in support of the overpaid executive tax as some have commented and shared the need for resources is acute and will only continue to flow this measure raises funds and incentivizes companies to invest in workers and executive salaries in the United States over the last 30 years has skyrocketed by 940 and regular worker salaries have only grown 11 . Members of unions who work in the hotel and Hospitality Industry can tell you all too well whats that done to their standard of living. This something that say small surcharge. If Companies Choose to reinvest up their workers they can avoid the tax raising employees wages and its not a tax on Small Business businesses. We urge you to support it and thank you for your time. Thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. Caller good afternoon im cheri chan. Im the union member for sba local 1316 and as we all know the provider essential worker for our county and community. So during the covid19 were trying our best to serve this community and take care of seniors. We love this city. We love San Francisco. However, the cost of living is extremely high. Today im asking supervisors and the mayor to stand on our side to help us to get more funding and our children and community. Downtown, i support the overpaid executive tax. Thank you, god bless you and stay safe. Thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. Caller good afternoon. Im a San Francisco resident. Big companies can afford to pay executives millions of dollar salaries every year can afford to pay their fair share in taxes to help San Francisco recover. This measure not only helps raise funds and incentivizes companies to invest in their workers not just executives. San francisco is one of the most desirable cities for business and according to our record it has the highest density of billion airs of any city in the world thats why theres no truth businesses will leave San Francisco because of this small tax. This is not an attack on Small Businesses. It only applies to companies who pay their executives millions a year. Please support supervisor haneys overpaid executive tax. Its the right thing do. Our people need support from those who have more. Good afternoon supervisors. Thank you for taking time on this important matter today. I had conversations with some businesses and one of the businesses have recently said i wish my taxes we lower and i said to what level and he said maybe back to 198 6 then i pointed out he actually paid more taxes in 1986 than now in 2019. Its easy to avoid this tax. I think corporations have gotten too greedy. Theyve gotten so many breaks at the federal level and various state levels and not participating fully in everything they take out of the economy globally. We dont tend to look at the infrastructure when businesses come into town. They come into San Francisco with a full vetted infrastructure, water, electricity, all this stuff they dont invest in. They just take. And i think that its time for them to pay their fair share to get us through this pandemic. It is their moral responsibility and its getting a little old. I get it. Were doing things to help Small Businesses along. Theyre exempt from this tax. Large companies have a responsibility to help the communities theyre in and not just take out please, support this initiative. The Labor Council is 100 behind this initiative and thanks for your time, today. Thank you for your comment. Next speaker, please. Caller my name is teresa rutherfo rutherford. I with my coworkers and front line workers support supervisor haneys overpaid executive tax measure. This is a matter of equity and a matter of Corporate Responsibility because also its a matter that businesses use the resources of the communities they are existing in and built their resources off the backs of the community. Usually when they move into a community its already fully structured. Everything is there for them. The roads, the water, the Public Servants ready do their bidding. They come and enjoy and build off that. They dont bring anything in except to come and enjoy and benefit from the name and from the value of living in one of the most well known, well sought after cities like San Francisco. Business use resources of the responsibility have a responsibility to give back to the community otherwise all their doing is abufg abusing and taking advantage of the city and the people that do the work. They have a Corporate Responsibility. They have a social responsibility and it is equitable. Its shameful ceos make 940 on their salaries while front line workers who do the job, who deliver the services, front line workers in this pandemic who put their families on the line and their lives every day barely make 11 over 30 years. Right now in the city of San Francisco we are being asked as front line workers again to give up the little money we have, the little salaries we earn where the ceos are not being asked to do anything. So right now, the way to go and the way to do this and the way to bring equity and put your money where your mouth is is to hold the ceos accountable, is to have them give back to the communities they have lived off and benefitted off. I fully support the overpaid ceo tax measure and make it work and its not just about workers but about San Francisco and San Francisco thriving and it only thrives when some of the highest paid people benefiting in the world give their fair share and stop raping the community of its resources. Thank you. Thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. Caller hello. Im a member of c. N. A. Im a delivery nurse at Kaiser Hospital for the last 40 years. During that time ive been the attending nurse between 5,000 and 6,000 babies. Thats my best estimate. I am in favor of this proposed tax. Its very specific and i dont see it will harm a huge number of people because there are not a ton of executives making more than 100 times than what theyre median worker is. What id like to mention is the fact that some will use possibly used to fix some of the cracks in the. Cracks in the. One of the cracks in the i can see though i dont like to speak abo about it because its embarrassing and sad and humiliating is i have an adult son im paying 800 a month to pay an insurance policy for him with kaiser. Right now my income has dropped 30 of the usual amount per month but i continued carrying this insurance policy for him because my son sadly is a drug addict. So my great fear is that should he need attention or decides to come out of his denial and get treatment, hell have nowhere to turn. So i think there are plenty of cracks in the cracks in the we can look at and share this money in a way that would help everyone. When you help the least of your brethren youre helping everyone. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. Next speaker, please. Caller i know a couple callers said this would not adversely affect Small Businesses but that is not the case. An impact on any part of our Business Community can shake our entire local economy. We have around 95,000 businesses here in San Francisco. A huge am of those are Small Businesses who rely deeply on our larger employers and the employees that come and patronize our vibrant and diverse Small Business community in San Francisco. Number one the impact i heard businesses talk about during covid19 might be the impact from losing the large employers and their employees in our city when theyve gone to work from home. You may think its your daily sandwich that supports the little shop down the way but theres a tight margin of payrolls and taxes and fee is the catering order from the company down the road. Ironically this is not going to be just the Top Companies who pay the tax. Theyre compensation ratios in San Francisco, as we all know, were the broad base of compensated tech employees which can leave and this will fact brick and Motor Companies who have already been drastically impacted by covid19. The number one Small Businesses need to provide are customers. We know who they are. Theyre the employees of large employers and the folks who have these good paying jobs to pay the high prices of San Francisco often created by the regulations we have here. We cannot continue to think San Francisco is so appealing that businesses will not leave. We already saw businesses start to recognize this negative cost benefit in San Francisco and begin to leave this last year. We are experiencing unprecedented unemployment in San Francisco and this is absolutely not the time to be implementing hasty oneoff and unprecedented taxes. Thank you for your time and consideration. Thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. Caller hi. This is Rudy Gonzalez with San Francisco Labor Council. I want to thank the chair of the committee, supervisor fewer for her leadership and coauthors and cosponsors. I heard a fair amount of context. I think i would agree with the last person that commented from the chamber. I think a smart tax like the overpaid executive compensation tax actually will chip away at the inequality and the simple fact is minimum wage earner and company in San Francisco can have a ceo making upwards of 3 million and so they have a choice to make. They can help the taxes and attic inequality that draws on resources especially during a Public Health pandemic and raise the wages of workers and put money in the pockets of those workers that generate and stimulate the local company and help the same Small Businesses. The alternative is they could decide to keep their large executive compensation and contribute as an organization to the very services and City Infrastructure that they are going to need to successfully recover and that spans Public Health and infrastructure and all the various aspects of the city architecture. I think its a smart, progressive way to chip away at income inequality and smartly resourcing and focussing funds to desperately needed City Services to no surprise unfortunately with the city framework we have thousand of f. T. E. Vacancies that are plaguing short staffing and high degree of work for our current staff and we just take it as a given that these noble Public Workers will shift right into the service mode and [indiscernible] and all the critical needs we have as a community. If you support this tax thank you for your comment, sir. Next speaker, please. Caller madame chair, thats the queue. Thank you very much. Any more comments . Supervisor hanney. I want to thank all the callers who just expressed their opinions and mostly support. All the members of the community. I also want to shout out all of the essential workers and their representatives who called in. I think weve had a huge amount of support for this measure. Some essential workers, front line workers and Health Care Workers and Hotel Workers on the front line who are protecting us and saving lives and they know that even now we dont have enough services, enough staffing ratios, enough support for them. The idea that they would be asked to take a greater hit and they and their colleagues serve more people at longer hours as the same time we have dozens and dozens of billionaires in our city and have Companies Making tens of billions more even during this pandemic is unimaginable. This is not a hasty or onetime or oneoff, im not sure what that means. Its a permanent tax in that were going to pass it and the voters approve it it will be a permanent tax and a targeted tax only on companies who are able to pay their executives tens of millions of dollars. I guess everybody wants to hide behind Small Businesses. These are larger businesses doing very well and paying their executives over 100 times that of their need door median worker. Its a modest tax at a time when our city needs it more than of. When i talk to Small Businesses, what they say is they want to see us have effective and adequate City Services that address Mental Health, street cleaning, homelessness and it shunt shouldnt be on their backs. The services should be delivered and provided by those who can afford it and doing well and asking for a little bit more help from them to address the crises and the pandemic and not balance every budget and every cut on the backs of our heroes who are saving lives right now. We should have their back and should ask a little bit more from people doing very well. With that i hope you take the amendment and move this measure. Thank you very much. So Public Comment is closed on item 6 and 7. I think we have some amendments we should vote on so id like to vote to move those amendments. Can i have a roll call vote, please. Clerk yes. [roll call] id like to make a motion to move this as amended to be continued to the next regular budget meeting on wednesday july 22. Could i have a roll call vote, please. Clerk on that motion. [ro [roll call] you have three ayes. A motion to file item 7. Clerk on that motion. [roll call] you have three ayes. Thank you. Madame clerk please call item 8. Clerk the proposed initiative to the voters for the november 3, 2020 Salt Lake City entitled business and tax resolutions code stockbased compensation payroll expense paid at companies and publicly traded groups to increase the citys appropriations limit by the amount collected under the tax for four years from november 3, 2020. Members of the public who wish to provide Public Comment should call 1415665001. Metting id 146 320 7645. We have supervisor gordon mar or his legislative aide. The floor is yours. Thank you for hearing this. Im a legislative aide for supervisor mar. He not able to be here as is also serving [indiscernible] meeting today as well. The act has already been submitted to the ballot with the signatures of members of supervisors and is not subject to the vote in committee today and as a policy has been in discussion and consideration in various forms over a year now. Well try to keep this informational hearing brief today. We proposed the measure for a simple reason. We cannot balance our budget or close our multiyear deficit on the backs of city workers or on the backs of the vulnerable communities who rely on our programs and servic [technical difficulties] and the proposal was last year referred to as an i. P. O. Tax. To be clear its not a tax on i. P. O. S. Its a tax on compensation and most clearly understood and described as such. For the revenue estimate on the controllers file this would raise between 50 million and 150 million annually in new revenue for the city and county of San Francisco. It does this by restoring 2. 15 the tax rate public Companies Pay on stockbased compensation. This is similar to a Corporate Tax rate cuts in the sector. Stock base compensation is on the value of equity interest and stock, stock options, restricted stock, restricted stock units, stock as a result of Employee Stock purchase plans. Corporations that currently pay the tax and have stock based compensations as part of their expenses would face a tax increase on the stockbased compensation. Corporations paying the Administrative Office tax are also subject to this tax and the tax would only apply to Public Companies and i do want to note the measure has been written and could go into effect regardless of what else is on the ballot in november. Just to summit up, what we are taxing here is not new. Stock compensation is a form of payroll and already taxed and the rate were proposing is also not new. Its the same rate the companies paid a decade ago not only on stockbased compensation but all forms of payroll at that time. Were proposing to restore the rate for stockbased compensation and theres a federal tax break on stockbased compensation. Not only are the companies not paying a rate locally they use to it get a break federally. And with the proposal we believe and want to say that fiscal responsibility doesnt require us to be [indiscernible] it requires us to be creative in advancing Revenue Strategies to protect our budget in the long term and address the economic inequality and on fairness from homelessness to Housing Access to hunger. That means asking corporations most well off the most resilient to the current crises who too often have been given breaks in policy after policy to pay their fair share. Thats what the stock compensation tax does. Im happy to answer any questions but id like to thank supervisors roanin and peskin and [indiscernible] and others for their work in preparing this measure. Thank you. Thank you very much. Seeing no colleagues in the queue for questions or comments, lets open this up for Public Comment. Can we have Public Comment on item number 8. Operations is checking to see if theres any callers in the queue. Operations, kindly let us know if there are any callers that are ready. If youve not already done so press star 3 to be added to the queue. For those already on hold please continue the wait until the indicates you have been unmuted for your comments. Please let us know if theres callers wishing to comment. Madame chair, there are no callers in the queue. Public comment on item number 8 is now closed. If theres no comments and none in the queue, id like to make a motion to file this item. May i have a roll call, please. [roll call] there are three ayes. Is there any more business before us today . Clerk madame chair, we have no further business. We are adjourned. Thank you. This is a huge catalyst for change. It will be over 530,000 gross square feet plus two levels of basement. Now the departments are across so many locations it is hard for them to Work Together and collaborate and hard for the customers to figure out the different locations and hours of operation. One of the main drivers is a one stopper mitt center for permit center. Special events. We are a one stop shop for those three things. This has many different uses throughout if years. In 1940s it was cocacola and the flagship as part of the construction project we are retaining the clock tower. The permit center is little working closely with the Digital Services team on how can we modernize and move away from the paper we use right now to move to a more Digital World. The Digital Services team was created in 2017. It is 2. 5 years. Our job is to make it possible to get things done with the city online. One of the reasons permitting is so difficult in this city and county is really about the scale. We have 58 Different Department in the city and 18 of them involve permitting. We are expecting the residents to understand how the departments are structured to navigate through the permitting processes. It is difficult and we have heard that from many people we interviewed. Our goal is you dont have to know the department. You are dealing with the city. Now if you are trying to get construction or special events permit you might go to 13 locations to get the permit. Here we are taking 13 locations into one floor of one location which is a huge improvement for the customer and staff trying to Work Together to make it easy to comply with the rules. There are more than 300 permitting processes in the city. There is a huge to do list that we are possessing digital. The first project is allowing people to apply online for the a. D. U. It is an accessory dwelling unit, away for people to add extra living space to their home, to convert a garage or add something to the back of the house. It is a very complicated permit. You have to speak to Different Departments to get it approved. We are trying to consolidate to one easy to due process. Some of the next ones are windows and roofing. Those are high volume permits. They are simple to issue. Another one is restaurant permitting. While the overall volume is lower it is long and complicated business process. People struggle to open restaurants because the permitting process is hard to navigate. The city is going to roll out a digital curing system one that is being tested. When people arrive they canshay what they are here to. It helps them workout which cue they neat to be in. If they rant to run anker rapid she can do that. We say you are next in line make sure you are back ready for your appointment. We want it allinone location across the many departments involved. It is clear where customers go to play. On june 5, 2019 the ceremony was held to celebrate the placement of the last beam on top of the structures. Six months later construction is complete. We will be moving next summer. The flu building the new building will be building. It was designed with light in mind. Employees will appreciate these amenities. Solar panels on the roof, electric vehicle chargers in the basement levels, benefiting from gray watery use and secured bicycle parking for 300 bicycles. When you are on the higher floors of thing yo of the buildt catch the tip of the Golden Gate Bridge on a clear day and good view of soma. It is so exciting for the team. It is a fiscal manifestation what we are trying to do. It is allowing the Different Departments to come together to issue permits to the residents. We hope people can digitally come to one website for permits. We are trying to make it digital so when they come into the center they have a highquality interaction with experts to guide then rather than filling iin forms. They will have good conversations with our staff. I went through a lot of struggles in my life, and i am blessed to be part of this. I am familiar with what people are going through to relate and empathy and compassion to their struggle so they can see i came out of the struggle, it gives them hope to come up and do something positive. I am a community ambassador. We work a lot with homeless, visitors, a lot of people in the area. What i like doing is posting up at hotspots to let people see visibility. They ask you questions, ask you directions, they might have a question about what services are available. Checking in, you guys. Wellness check. We walk by to see any individual, you know may be sitting on the sidewalk, we make sure they are okay, alive. You never know. Somebody might walk by and they are laying there for hours. You never know if they are alive. We let them know we are in the area and we are here to promote safety, and if they have somebody that is, you know, hanging around that they dont want to call the police on, they dont have to call the police. They can call us. We can direct them to the services they might need. We do the three one one to keep the city neighborhoods clean. There are people dumping, waste on the ground and needles on the ground. It is unsafe for children and adults to commute through the streets. When we see them we take a picture dispatch to 311. They give us a tracking number and they come later on to pick it up. We take pride. When we come back later in the day and we see the loose trash or debris is picked up it makes you feel good about what you are doing. It makes you feel did about escorting kids and having them feel safe walking to the play area and back. The stuff we do as ambassadors makes us feel proud to help keep the city clean, helping the residents. You can see the community ambassadors. I used to be on the streets. I didnt think i could become a community ambassador. It was too far out there for me to grab, you know. Doing this job makes me feel good. Because i came from where a lot of them are, homeless and on the street, i feel like i can give them hope because i was once there. I am not afraid to tell them i used to be here. I used to be like this, you know. I have compassion for people that are on the streets like the homeless and people that are caught up with their addiction because now, i feel like i can give them hope. It reminds you every day of where i used to be and where i where i used to be and where i how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like us i once was lost but now im found was blind but now i see twas grace that taught my heart to fear and grace my fears relieved how precious did that grace appear the hour that i first believed good afternoon, everyone, and happy pride. Thank you for joining me today. Im caroline weisinger with San Francisco pride. I am Claire Farley and were so happy to have you with us here today to celebrate pride at home. The official lgbtq kickoff. You heard from breanna sinclaire, world renowned opera singer. Shes such an inspiration. Thank you so much, breanna for joining us. Yes, she was so incredible and we have great performances today by the gay mens chorus and the lesbian and gay and freedom band. We are here in San Francisco but streaming live around the world so we have viewers from everywhere. And we hope that youll share with us on how youre honouring pride this year. Post that youre watching by sharing the prideathome and lgbtqpride, month. We thank our cohosts for partnering on this special event and mayor london breed. San francisco pride. The office of Transgender Initiative. And sf clear night life fund. And the s. F. Coalition. We know that San Francisco is home to the largest pride celebration in the country. And in june its always a time to come together and to honour our history and celebrate pride in ourselves and our community and including trans march and the Pink Triangle which will be lit up this year with l. E. D. Lights and so many more events. So we encourage you to visit www. Sfpride. Org for all of the events happening in june. And as president of the board of pride, i know how important it is that we celebrate pride and that were having a milestone this year, this is our 50th anniversary. So even in a pandemic were honouring the history of this organization and what we both celebrate and fight for in our communities. And in this particular moment were really focused on making sure that were centring the voices of black lgbtq folks and theres a lot of unrest in our community, but one thing that we want to remind folks is that our lgbtq members face some of the most harshest criticisms and scrutinies of anyone in our community. This is a time that we could come together and demand that muchneeded change. This is where we come together and support each other. But in this event and for our organization right now it is important for us to amplify our black lgbtq voices. This is an opportunity to look at our deep history of resilience and those who have paved the way for us and to take action. Yeah, thank you, carolyn for that. I agree this is a time for us to forward the work of our ancestors and our trancestors. And were all coming together to share pride at home and sharing our love and support for each other. And were all doing our part to stop the spread of covid19 and to make sure that our Health Care Workers and essential workers are safe and healthy. Later in the programme well also have a special Panel Discussion on the s. F. Area covid relief effort so we hope that youll get involved. We have a very, very important discussion with clear and transblack leaders on the current moment that we are in and how communities are showing up to address our countrys long history of racism and violence against black lives. But, clair, i am proud to bring our special cohost who may love pride more than me, i doubt that, but the first black mayor of San Francisco and continues to show up for our community. She continues to have San Francisco lead the country in responding to covid19. Black and brown communities are most impacted by covid19 and this is especially true for our trans and queer communities and seniors and adults with disabilities. Yeah, were so excited to have mayor breed with us and with her work which has contributed a contribution of 75,000 to support lgbtq food relief. And, furthermore, those dollars are critical to support the community through this pandemic. Also im so grateful to work with her every day to support the incredible initiatives for our Trans Community from housing to rental assistance, to our lgbtq Senior Services and to support our local organization, our arts and working to fight for lgbtq rights across the country. Welcome, mayor breed, were so honoured to have you join with us today. You know, for us i know that, you know, for us that my work is really focused as the director of the Transgender Initiative and working firsthand to fight discrimination both in San Francisco as well as across the country. One of the bills that we worked on recently with the attack on health care and the access to health care. So for us we really see this as an opportunity to encourage and to welcome, you know, such a fierce ally. And i have had the chance to march with her during pride last year and it was such a fun time. Dont you think, carolyn. Im sad that we wont see what float shed have this year but i am happy to welcome mayor breed to the programme. Welcome, mayor breed. Mayor london breed thank you so much and thank you so much for having me here today. And carolyn, i dont know, we may have to battle over who enjoys pride the most. Im ready to battle. [laughter] mayor london breed but i will say that im so happy to be here with you all. It has been a really challenging time in our city and our country. And especially many of us as African Americans who, sadly, have had to live with this hurt and this pain for so long. And i know that especially African Americans who are part of our Transgender Community have had it really worse than so many other people as it relates to discrimination, housing and a number of other issues. And i will say that the ability to come together with all of you to celebrate pride, but to also call attention to the injustices that exist in our society, it means a lot because this community has really been leaders in fighting for rights, and for so many people, not just folks who are part of the Lgbtq Community, but when we have continued to go out there and to advocate and push for reform, youre standing right by our side. So, carolyn, im so excited about your leadership with pride. It is so needed at this time more than ever. And i am i am so grateful that clair is part of my administration and pushing the Transgender Initiatives and you know that San Francisco has been a leader on these initiatives. It does have everything to do with clair working with the community to advocate for the resources that are needed. And so as we celebrate pride its a little different this year. I know that you are all feeling it. Its not just because of covid19 and the fact that we cant get together. And i actually had a new outfit so im so mad. Ill have to wear it on one of these calls because i have been waiting for this for the longest. But its not that we cant just get together and celebrate and be around each other and feel the positive vibes and energy, its also a lot of whats happening in the country. And it goes back to when i think about San Francisco and its history and my own personal history with pride, and my first pride parade, in fact, was when i was in high school. And i remember watching pride. It was in front you guys remember woolworths was actually where the gap is. And so i was watching the parade and i just was so inspired and so excited. I never felt so good about how the energy in the air and the fun and the excitement and the celebration, it just made me so happy. It made me feel so good. And thats what i always thought that pride was about. It always brings people together to support and to uplift one another. Even though even though we know that the Lgbtq Community continues to get disrespected and discriminated against, even with the person, sadly, who is occupying the white house. It is a disgrace. And it means as far as we have come with having the first office of Transgender Initiatives and all of the things that we need to push for in San Francisco, we have such a long way to go. And i want to say to all of you, thank you so much for your courage. Thank you all for continuing to speak out and to fight for your ability to just know who you are and to love who you want to love and to do anything that you deserve to be able to do in life. We have as you know here in our country, a really horrible history around discrimination. If someone is not of a certain look, a certain race, of a certain attitude, oftentimes they encounter discrimination in ways that people who never have to encounter that can never really fully understand. They can empathize but you can never understand. That people who are African American, those who are targeted because theyre transgender and attacked physically, because of who they are, it is so tough. And so i think that what i appreciate about now is that there are others who may not completely understand it. But they empathize and they want to be a part of pushing for change. And i never have seen it to this capacity before. And i know what i was also excited about is the fact that pride was the committee said, you know what, we cant celebrate together, come together in the same way, but were still going to celebrate. And were going to still appreciate this. This event has been around for 50 years. Calling attention to the need for the push for equality. The continued push for equality. And so were not going to just sit silently by and wait for something to happen. We are going to do something about it. Were going to be a part of the solution, were going to lift our voices in solidarity to the injustices that we know that have plagued our city and our country for far too long. So this is why im so excited about what pride will represent this year. A celebration of hope. A celebration of optimism for a better future. Because i cant even imagine what it feels like to travel somewhere in the country and to be basically turned away because of who you are or who you love. And the reason why i fight so hard for what we need to do to change things is because i want San Francisco to continue to be the model, to continue to push forward the kinds of policies that are going to correct the systemic racism that have plagued us for far too long. We are in this together. We are better when we support each other, when we have one anothers back, when we lift each other up. We are better. No more excuses and no more pointing the fingers and telling them what they need to do. We have to do it. We have to roll up our sleeves and do what is necessary in order to move things forward. I want to say to the pride committee, thank you for your work and your advocacy and all that you continue to do, despite, i know, the criticism. And the disrespect that you get with the work that you are trying to do in order to support the community. I want to say thank you for hanging in there and doing everything that you can to make pride a success in San Francisco. I want to really appreciate and thank the office of Transgender Initiatives who are continuing to push the envelope. So many of the folks and the advocates out there and the investments that we have made, we know that its making a difference. And i want to congratulate the grand marshal who will represent at the pride parade that may be a virtual or a protest, im not sure what it will be. But in the back end were going to lift up our voices and make sure that were heard. So i want to thank you all so much for everything that you do to really uplift the Lgbtq Community. I will always be there with you, right by your side, push wag we need to push in order to get the job done. Thank you all and happy pride. Thank you so much, mayor breed. Its such an honour. And i know that you had a special proclamation for today mayor london breed yes, see, thats why i love clair. I do have a special proclamation that i want to present with Carolyn Wysinger for all that you continue to do are you able to pull that proclamation up, clair. Yeah, its on the screen. Mayor london breed its on the screen . Great. What were going to do is to declare it pride month in the city and county of San Francisco. Let the festivities and the advocacy begin. Well, thank you so much, mayor breed, on behalf of the s. F. Pride board, i want to thank you for always be a great ally and always being a Good Community partner. And always standing in the gap and ready to work with us when we need your help or clairs help or anyone in the office. And thank you for planning pride month and being an advocate for the community. Mayor london breed thank you. And i cant wait to hear breanna sing. Yes, she has an amazing voice. Now were going to kick it off to the official band of San Francisco, the gay and lesbian freedom band. [instrumental music playing] [instrumental music playing] [instrumental music playing] i left my heart in San Francisco high on a hill it calls to me to be where little cable cars climb halfway to the stars the morning fog may chill the air i dont care my love wait there is in San Francisco above the blue and windy sea when i come home to you San Francisco your golden sun will shine for me thank you. So now well go on to our incredible panelists who are doing so much vital work in the community and, mayor breed, i know that you have to go and continue to save us from corona, but i wanted to get in one question with you with our panel today. And to check in with black folks in this pandemic and the demonstrations and Racial Injustices that its important to check in with how were feeling and coping. So, mayor breed, what is one thing that gives you hope and one thing that is giving you joy in this moment . Mayor london breed i think that what is giving me hope is that there are people who are not African Americans who are fighting for change like never before. Now i want to just also Say Something about that. Part of it is that we appreciate folks who are allies, but what we what i want to caution people against is check your privilege. Because its not about you. Its about what African Americans have had to deal with for our entire lives. And so be careful about how you come at black people right now. Because we appreciate the support, we are grateful because we want we are all in this together and we want people to be there right with us. But the reason that it is the way that it is is because this whole thing and whats been happening in San Francisco, while i appreciate the protests, it makes me very uncomfortable when nonblack people try to tell me what to do for black people. Its offensive. So just, look, im mayor and call me out, you know, protest, do whatever, but be very careful about how you talk to me when it comes to the people that ive worked for and lived with my entire life. It gives me hope that so many people are finally woke and paying attention. And care about Racial Injustice like never before. Especially if you are someone who, unfortunately, has experienced it your entire life. This is an opportunity for us to change. But make sure that you remember that its not about you. Its about all of us and its about real change. And so lets get rid of the negativity and lets focus on what were going to be able to change and how were going to make a difference. How were going to come together like never before. Thats what gives me hope. And watching the new generation step up and to be advocates and push and fight because they want a better future. Thats what were doing this for. And we will go through this very, very difficult time. And what my hope is that a blessing will emerge from it. That we will emerge stronger, better, more resilient than ever, and rid our country, our city of this racism, transphobia, of all of these things that have torn us apart for far too long. We will have an opportunity now to rid our country of this once and for all. This is our moment. All right, mayor breed, i am used to having you have one sentence answers. One thing that gives you joy in this moment . Mayor london breed well, like it gives me joy that i see so many people out there really genuinely hurt and upset and willing to help fight. And i hope that they are consistently in this for the long haul. And it gives me hope that people are finally paying attention and there could be change. I mean, think about it. In the past with george floyd, people have said elected officials, even police officers, have said that the murder of george floyd. Do you think that would have happened before . Because thats what it was. And folks are finally calling it out for what it is. And what gives me hope is that people are changing. People are changing. Theyre changing their hearts. They see george floyd in that moment where he cried out for his mother everybody in the black Community Know that mama the way that he called out for his mom. If im in trouble, thats how im going to call out for my grandmother who i called mama. When i was in trouble, mama you call that call. And i know that his mom is not alive, but everyone knows that call. And when you think about it, you start to look at him like your son, like your brother, and you everyone in this country knows that if he was white that would have never happened. And thats the problem. And it gives me hope that people are finally woke on this issue. All right, well, thank you so much, mayor breed, for always being a great advocate. I know that you have to go but we thank you again for joining us here today. Mayor london breed thank you. And thank you everyone for your work and your advocacy. All right. Lets go on to our next panelist, the new executive director of the National Centre for lesbian rights. Im so excited to finally to emeet you. You know black folks, we meet somebody before we meet them because somebody knew them. Hello, and so what is one thing that has give you joy and one thing that is giving you hope . My goodness. I would say that joy and hope. Im not sure if you can hear right now but i was in oakland and right now im listening to car horns. And i think that its beautiful right now that folks every day were hearing that there are folks out here doing something and thats giving me a great deal of hope and a great deal of joy. Im also really proud of looking at what our community is doing because we have an opportunity here to change something. You know, black folks have contributed a great deal to this country. And we havent always been able to benefit from it and we are finding ways to make that happen. And that gives me a lot of pride, a lot of joy, and a lot of hope. Im thrilled to be part of this movement and to be one of us. Thank you. And next we have tuquan harris on, a member of the San Francisco human rights commission. And, tuquan, i love your blazer. What is one thing that is giving you hope and one thing giving you joy . Smelling all of the flowers. Dreaming and taking care of myself. And, you know, revelling in it all, celebrating pride and the legacy of this. And so one thing that is giving me hope right now is the coalitionbuilding work that ive been able to lead and to also to be a part of, with our black Trans Organization in San Francisco and the greater state area, the larger Coalition Work that the Trans Initiative has been leading here in San Francisco. So thats been thats been an excellent opportunity. What has been giving me joy is our youth. Our young folks who are putting so much energy and fierceness out into the world. Our young queer folks of colour and our young trans folks of colour who ive had the pleasure to work with through my fellowship at h. R. C. And i feel like theyre the ones who are giving us hope and inspiration of how to really, you know, to challenge antiblackness and challenge oppression. I think that theres been a lot of intergenerational dialogue and support between the community that has been great. So those are all of the things that are kind of keeping me sane. And hopeful during these challenging times as a black queer many, so thank you man, so thank you. Next we have aria with the transgender cultural district here in San Francisco. Hey, aria, what is something that is giving you hope and something that is giving you joy . Hi, thank you for having me. Um. One thing that is giving me joy at the moment is seeing people support the leadership of black trans women, in particular now. And ive been getting tweeted from different celebrities and influencers. And different media sort of covering our work. And i think that for those of us who have been black before it was popular, l. O. L. [laughter] and have been outspoken about the leadership of black people, it is amazing to see that cultural shift. And i think that it gives me hope that more of our efforts, specifically with queer and trans communities will be three times more effective because now black people will be in it. Okay, thank you so much. And i just like i said wanted to check in with the wellness because i think that right now in this moment that wellness for black folks is so very important. And we mentioned a bit earlier about the nexus and where we are at this moment, right between the pandemic and basically an explosion in i would say feelings in regard to Racial Injustice. I think that one thing that has kind of triggered me a little bit is that im a person that is 41 years old and i have lived through so many different murders and the beating of rodney king. And through so many people who have not received justice, and to see people who are just now waking up. Im thank half that were seeing more allies on the front lines but it triggers you just a little bit. My question is, how does this moment affect you as an Lgbtq Community leader, specifically, you know, that you see people, nonblack folks, who are saying that we shouldnt celebrate pride and this should be about black bodies. First of all, black queer people are real and pride started as a black body and we have seen the white washing essentially of pride. How does it effect you as a black Community Leader . What are the connections or the differences that you see with the violence with black colour and other communities of colour and trans and lgbtq folks . Ill start back with aria. What are the connections that youre seeing and how it affects you as a leader . I think that, if im to be quite honest, pride has not always included us. And i dont mean the institution of pride, i mean, sort of the annual once a year, everybody is coming together and they wear their rainbowcoloured outfits and celebrate and get drunk. And party and celebrate their freedom. That opportunity has not been for black people has not been the greatest. In this country and around the world. So i think for me, as a black trans woman leader, im experiencing more hope than i ever have because people are highlighting our experience and specifically showing how not only do we face murder by the state as all black people do, but we also experience murder from other black people. And we also experience incidents of violence and systemic oppression and institutional violence. So i think for me im carrying that weight. But i feel like at the end of the tunnel that theres a light for us to finally to be liberated as people are actually talking not just about our pronouns, but evolving that conversation. And moving past what is trans and into pronouns and moving to something a bit more inclusive of trans people. Okay. The same question to you, imani. I know that your work is more on the legal battle, but at the same time you all do a lot to support creating policy or upholding policy for lgbtq folks. And, of course, im sure that its a little bit different to be a black leader of such an organization. So what are the connections or the differences that you are seeing in your work . Sure. So we see how at every turn that black people and people of colour, lgbtq people, are disproportionately and negatively impacted. Were seeing that because we are in a Global Pandemic and were seeing that play out there. But i also thought that it was a really important part of the question. Aria did a wonderful job talking about it. You know, we talk about pride and we talk about cancelling pride. Theres ownership there that i think that we really need to reevaluate. Like, pride was started by black trans women. This is a movement that we shouldnt be saying that there isnt, you know, we can cancel pride now to concentrate on Racial Justice when some of us every way that we can celebrate pride is concentrating on Racial Justice. So even that question, even that phrase is showing just how we lack an intersectional analysis in the ways that we celebrate pride. Pride that was started by black and brown trans women. So i think is something that we need to consider when were thinking about how it can be more intersectional. And this is i think that im happy that the conversation is happening because, you know, were going to get better when we get better. And the more people that are part of this conversation, the better. I think that it can be a bit triggering for folks that are always aware of this dynamic. But, i think that now is a time to think about, you know, while this is going on, we are also in the midst of a Global Pandemic. And who are the people that we are treating like essential . And how are we treating them as essential . You know, are we putting them in the line of fire . Or are we taking care of folks . You know, the fact that this is happening during pride month or pride season, there are a lot of ways that we can look at this and to look at how disproportionately the most underrepresented folks are being treated during this time. Were seeing how we know that in a time that were looking at violence by the state that people of colour and queer and trans people are dispro portionately disproportionately likely to be harmed and to be killed, to be murdered. And there wouldnt be any justice for that. So an intersectional analysis is incredibly important during this time. And thinking of having that during pride, i mean, this is the time to do it. This is what pride should be. Okay. And, i have been a human rights commissioner in the city of richmond, and sometimes people go, what do you guys do. What are some of the things that youre seeing that may be different or affecting your work or things that the commission would be proposing or working on in regards to black lgbtq communities in this time . Hello, everyone. First off, i want to start off by saying that if the movement isnt intersectional, i dont want to be part of it. All of our movement and work needs to be intersectional and h. R. C. Has always been a leader and have always been the champion. I dont think that people really Pay Attention to our work. H. R. C. s funds, 1. 5 million to transled organizations, black transled organizations and organizations in San Francisco, we have been doing this work and we have been part of it. So, hello, world, welcome, were here. And weve also been centring and having antiblack conversations. Last year we partnered with the transgender district and other black leaders in the community to talk about antiblackness and antiblack sentiment within the government and we have been doing this work for a really long time. I have only been here for a year but my work speaks for itself. And as covid9, you know started, and h. R. C. In 2014, we actually supported a lot of the black trans and trans work through a Needs Assessment and i was able to get 1. 5 million to those organizations. H. R. C. Have always partnered with the communitybased partners to make sure that their leadership and their work is done. So when covid happened, h. R. C. Made sure that we funded the justice to work with formerly incarcerated trans women of colour to make sure that those folks have housing, stable housing, supportive housing. You know, like covid didnt really change anything. It just made everything worse. All of these things you know, the disproportionate of homelessness with trans and lgbtq folks was already there. I have been centering and having a lot of Community Conversations around how to support for nonprofits, and supporting health and wellness of our Diverse Communities here in San Francisco. And our Advisory Committee still is committed and our commission is still committed to doing this work. So h. R. C. Has been doing a lot of intersectional work and i welcome folks to, you know, to meet with our organization and to partner with us with this work. Because its important to recognize too that im a black man and i have a privilege and i work with government. Were here to partner with folks and not to lead them and were in community and were in partnership. Thats the important thing that i want folks to know. Okay, well, i want combine a couple of these questions and really talk about black lgbtq folks in the concept of a larger demonstrations, these larger protests around violence against black bodies and how sometimes it leads to the erasure or ignoring the death of our black lgbtq folk. One thing that a lot of folk are not talking about is tony mcday who was a black transgender man who was killed in florida, i believe the same week as george floyd. I think may 27th. And you can see a lot of protests around george floyd and mentioning bree ana taylor, but what i have seen on the whole is that people are ignoring tony mcday. You saw the last week there was a video where a group of transgender men attacked dianna dior, who was a black transwoman, in the centre of the george floyd protest. So can we talk a little bit about how sometimes not sometime its theres never enough fervour around black transness as around others and how dangerous it sometimes is for black lgbtq folks in these movements when there is rage. I want to start that with tuquan. What do you see in regards to the way that were treated both in this and when were also standing with our heterosexual brothers and sisters . I would say that just black and queer is like being invisible in the world. In the larger mustment and within movement and in the black community. And not to say that everyone in the black community demonize it is the black community. And so i want to lead with that. And that theres work to be done in the black community. But sometimes, yes, being queer, i am ignored. But i also have a lot of privilege too as being here. And when it comes to folks theres a deafening silence that permeates within our, you know, our black community, throughout the world. Which is, you know, tiring. Its depressing. And its stressful. Its disempowering. And i think that we need to do a better job at the community to uplift and to center our black transand folks in conversations around violence and sanctioned violence and interior communal violence and violence from just those different nuanced things. So i think that theres a lot more work that needs to be done. I think that is really sad that we still have to, you know, to beat the drums. You know, to talk to people about recognizing our livelihoods livelihoods and that we are important people. So i think theres a lot of work to do within the black community and the Lgbtq Community to really center black folks. Im happy that we have been able to lead a lot of that talk here in San Francisco. All right. I know that you post a lot about, you know, violence against black trans women from black folks. I know that our good friend ebony in sacramento, i believe this was a bit after george floyd, and i was talking about the death of nina and how there wasnt as much rage around that. So what are your feelings around the ignoring of black lgbtq folks, specifically black trans. And the violence that we sometimes face within the movement . Yeah. I think that a huge part is when we are murdered as trans people, that people find a way to mentally to justify why we are being murdered or why were being attacked. So even with the situation with this and folks are having a conversation around that video where 12, 15 grown men were beating on this girl, obviously trying to kill her. This is not the reason that she survived is because the cornerstore owner let her and into the back and told everyone to get out, right . I think that whats important to know is that there is a way in which people are very much attracted to marginalizing and justifying violence against trans people as if we are doing something wrong. We have seen this in it correlates part of why black lives matter was birthed and by others is because there was a way in which black men were murdered by the state that it was sanctioned, right, because people were like, oh, well, they had a knife or they were at the wrong place at the wrong time. They looked suspicious. They shouldnt have worn a hoodie and they shouldnt have done this or done that and they shouldnt have been jogging at the construction site. Like, theres always a defense. And i think that especially happens with black trans people. Especially when were murdered by men. The idea that were tricking people, that were deceiving, that were lying, that were and all of these things. And that we brought it upon ourselves. And im hoping that, you know, that justice is brought for tony mcday who was murdered by police. And i dont think i think that there is a tendency in our world, our world is still very patriarchal and so when a man is murdered, right, no matter what, its always going to have more sort of significance in the media than if youre a woman or a trans person or gender nonconforming. Were seeing that in our own movement with black lives where, you know, Brianna Taylor was murdered in her own home and so was a black woman murdered in the ambulance, right . Those kind of, unfortunately, those moments and those incidences dont bring us together the same way as when a black man is murdered and thats partly because one of the origins of White Supremacy is patriarchy, right . And so whether were dismantling White Supremacy we have to evaluate ways in which were activated and we give value to different bodies as part of that. And, yeah leave it there. I could go on. [laughter]. No, no worries. So i want to go over to imani and ask, you know, a lot of this as aria mentioned rests, on White Supremacy. And we as a country have not really acknowledged the original sin of slavery. What would it take to finally fully acknowledge that original sin but to make reparations for it. And what does that look like, especially for black and queer people . Its something that we have never seen done before, but i think that a lot of us have put some thought into this. And when i think that when a lot of people hear reparations what they go to is that, oh, this isnt fair, that things are okay. But theyre ignoring the fact that there are repercussions. Slavery happened, but there are things that have followed that. You know, talking with someone yesterday about the g. I. Bill and the ways that some of our policies were instituted. So there have been so racism is built into the fabric of our institutions. And so the people that were able to benefit from slavery have continued to be able to benefit through generations in ways that brake people and people of color just havent been able to do that. And this would make it possible to even the Playing Field for folks. Because when we think about what institutional or institutional racism and how that has made it more difficult for black people to develop generational wealth and how we have seen that, how we have seen that play out in having negative Health Outcomes and not having economic security, and not having a resource allocations in our neighborhood, not being able to own property and then to not have equity in the homes that we own. This is a direct result of the way that our racist institutions have been instituted, but that continue to build on each other. And so reparations dont come out of nowhere. And its important to look at were talking about systems here. Because i think that immediately what people point to are individual black folks that are doing okay. And we have to look at this in a different way. Because when we look at black folks as a group we know that were disproportionately and negatively impacted by any by every system that we have. So reparations would be a way to even the Playing Field. Because right now, you know, its just too its difficult for black people. Its unfair for black people. And we see that playing out. Okay, well, i want to stick with you here with this then, imani. What are the culture and behavioral shifts that you want to see happen this this moment . We have the whole world protesting and plus london and other countries. And what should we look for to start evening the Playing Field . Sure. So, you know, right now this just like what we have right now just isnt working. And thats what we need to move for. You know, theres talk about defunding police. We also see that when any other institution doesnt work that we do put an end to that. And thats something that we need to think about and how were taking care of our communities. Because theres many, many instance where is our communities have been able to take care of ourselves without this institution of policing. And i want to talk about that again. Were not talking about individual police officers. Were talking about an entire system of policing that includes incarceration, that dispro portionately is impacting black and brown folks and lgbtq folks and lowincome folks. All of these things together. So we need to we need to do something so that were leveling the Playing Field for folks. But also just making making access to resources more accessible to the people that need them the most. And that can look a lot of ways. You know, i love seeing that were looking at protesting, what that looks like, and organizing in sort of a larger context that is often able to include more people. But also, you know, seeing from our leaders and seeing what it looked like to have leaders like our mayor show up during a time like this, we havent always had support of our leaders. Were seeing some of that now. So i feel really hopeful thats something that well see something change. But, lastly, i want to also say that we want to see what happens next. We want to make sure that the next thing that happens is actually getting us closer to liberation. You know, its imperative that the results of this is going to end and seeing fewer of black and brown People Killed in the hands of the people sworn to protect us. That well see fewer people being incarcerated and wrapped up in systems that are black and brown folks and lgbtq folks. That this actually has to get us to a better place. We dont want to see the same things that weve always had when we have someone as a liaison and someone speaking on behalf of someone. And we want to see the systems change, not pinpointing one individual person about how their life is better. Well, aria, imani brought it up and we talked about it yesterday, brought it up to defund the police. What are the culture behavioral shifts that you would like to see, policy, behavior shifts . What do you think that is going to be or needed to come out of this moment that were in right now as far as seeing equity and assets change . Sure. So carolyn and i were on the commonwealth and i said that mayor breed does need to work towards defunding police. I got an update last night that she did a tweet that shes working in partnership with supervisor shiman and walton on legislation that will move funding take something funding from the San Francisco Police Department to African American communitybased organizations. And alternative forms of Restorative Justice in our own communities. Which i think that is amazing. I think that its incremental. I think that theres obviously that more can be done. But, yes, i think that is a step in the right direction, especially in San Francisco. I think that in context of movement, what can be done around the world, obviously, supporting black transled efforts in the community. You know, were celebrating pride and we make this reference quite often but i want to make it very plain. The reason why many of you tuning in have the liberty and freedom that you do is because of the labor of black trans people and black queer people. And it was black queer and trans people who led the riots at stonewall and led the riots in l. A. , and we have always been a part of the fabric for the movement for black lives long before there was a term for it. Because we are our experiences of being black and trans or queer and woman or male compounded, right . So thats how we see the world. And i think that oftentimes in the Queer Community that we glamorize rioting. And then we are heavily critical when black folks are rioting right now. The reality is that a riot is a riot and riots have been a huge reason why we are able to celebrate pride. And i think that should be acknowledged. And i think for those celebrating pride Going Forward that we have to center black, queer and trans people until we are no longer the most impacted. And stop erasing us. This is also something that has been very consistent. We are consistently erased from our labor, from our place and space in these rooms. And we are often not allowed to be these spaces even today. And we have to stop it. We have to move past this. Were not playing the oppression olympics. When we say that black lives matter and we say, you know, elevate the voices of black trans women, if you elevate the most impacted people then everyone will benefit. Its not a contest. So when i met with resistance from other people of color who are not black, it is it is inhibiting the work that we can be doing and coalition with each other. Thats my piece. Former San Francisco pride board member says that you go for black people you go for everybody. When you solve it for black and queer and trans people, you solve it for everybody. Tuquan, what are the key policy shifts that we would need to see coming out of this moment to increase equity and access . Yeah, i just want to lean into what is going on in San Francisco. I think that my director cheryl davis and walton have been doing a lot of Community Roundtable work, specifically for the bayview community, for sunnydale and for the Tenderloin Community and for philmore and i want to center a lot of the work, typically for black and overpoliced communities historically. I know that walton is working on a platform around Police Misconduct and hiring of police folk. I think that there needs to be work also around bias 311 calls. Those have been, you know, that has been a huge issue within the bay area. In particular i know that barbecue becky and other occurrences throughout the country that we need to speak to. And defunding police, of course. And i think that there needs to be a radical reenvisioning of what black policing is going to look like for the community and how to give sovereignty and autonomy to those communities to police themselves. Not even police themselves, but to be safe and to be well and, you know, together in community. I think that those are key platforms. And then also like for the general movement, i think that supporting and, you know, funding black lives matter and blackled organizations and efforts that are against antiblackness and antiracism and against overpolicing and police abuse and police brutality. I think that there needs to be a lot of training and education done for a lot of our staff and folks living and working in the city and county of San Francisco. I want to thank you all for joining us on this very important panel. We wanted to make sure that we were hearing the voice of black lgbtq folks. I want to make sure that in this moment that black lgbtq folks are seeing and are being heard and its our job to do that. Because we dont always get it in these spaces. So thank you tuquan and aria and imani, we will continue to do our best to amplify the organizations. So go to www. Sfpride. Org and you can donate, and for all of you nonblack and white folk i have a resource list of antiracist books and all of the things to help to break down this White Supremacy and antiblack racism within our community and within the larger community. So once again, thank you to all of you. Thank you. Happy pride happy pride yeah, thank you so much, carolyn, that was such an incredible panel and thank you all so much for joining us. As you mentioned, i really think that it is important, you know, as a white person that we take accountability that we have our own conversations with the community and other white allies to really do the work. And as you said to really look at how were funding and supporting blackled organizations. So, please check out the transgender website as well as the organizations organizationsn mentioned. Now its my honor to so were also going to be doing this really special recognition of our Health Care Workers who have been doing such incredible work on the front lines to keep our Community Safe during covid. We know that as we move through this new time, you know, it might feel that we could just go out and go back to usual, but we need to make sure that were continuing to wear our masks and to be mindful, especially for those Health Care Workers that are doing the work. So now its my pleasure to introduce the gay mens chorus. Thank you. [instrumental music playing] you with the sad eyes dont be discouraged oh, i realize its hard to take courage in a world full of people you can lose sight of it all and the darkness inside you can make you feel so small you can be the backlash of somebodys lack of love but i wonder what could happen but i see your true colors shining through i see your true colors and thats why i love you dont be afraid to let them show i want to see your true colors i want to see you i want to see you i want to see you be brave show me your smile dont be unhappy cant remember when i last saw you laughing if this world makes you crazy and youve taken all you can bear you call me up because you know ill be there ill be there say what you want to say and let the world fall out honestly i want to see you be brave say what you want to say and let the words fall out honestly i want to see you be brave dont be afraid to let them show your true colors your true colors your true colors youre beautiful and in your history of silence i cant remember i saw you laugh if the world can be anything your true colors shining through i see your true colors and thats why i love you so dont be afraid to let them show your true colors the colors are beautiful i want to see you i want to see you i want to see you be brave i just want to see you oh, i want to see you dont be afraid welcome back. Thank you so much. And now its our honor to welcome senator scott wiener to our special. Welcome, scott. Thank you, thank you. Thank you for having me and thanks for everyone who has made this virtual pride celebration a reality. And we have a saying in the jewish faith next year in jerusalem and i will send out next year in city hall because well get past this pandemic and well be able to celebrate pride together. I look forward to that. But in a way what we have learned from the new temporary Digital World that were living in is that even though were more distant in a lot of ways that it has allowed so many more people to participate. People who physically arent going to go to an event or whatever, can now still participate. So its an interesting dynamic where im hoping that as we come out of this that we have even more people engaged in our community and who will stay engaged, even though well be back in the physical plain. So i saying happy pride now is a little bit muted. This year has not been the happiest of years given the pandemic and the health and economic catastrophe that its created. And the disproportionate impact on people in communities of color. And then, of course, the mass mobilization, and the protests that are so important in responding to the violence. But beyond police violence, the broken criminal Justice System or the racist criminal Justice System. So these are not happy times. But they are going to be productive times. Because we will come out of this stronger. What were seeing in our community now and in the world is a spotlight, a very bright spotlight, on inequities and injustices that have been with us for a very, very long time. Health inequities and Health Disparities are not new. Denial of access to health care is not new. African American People going to the hospital and being treated less seriously in some instances than white people, thats not new. Its not new that people are being that particularly our black community is being mistreated and killed by the police. Its not new that we have mass incarceration that is tearing apart communities. Not all of these things are new. But the pandemic and the George Floyd Murder have allowed massive spotlights to be cast on these longstanding inequities and as we protest and organize, what we need to make sure is that as we come out of this difficult period, that we come out as a Better Society because we have the power to do that. Thats really what pride is about this year. Yes, weve come together and celebrate the progress that we have made as an Lgbtq Community. But understanding that so many are being left behind. And remembering and weve all been, you know, many of us have been guilty of this. You know, we celebrate every year on pride but we dont emphasize enough that pride grew from protests and riots, from stonewall and the pride is the end of the protest. Were getting back to our roots and thats important. Well continue our work in the legislature. We have passed some Aggressive Police reform measures and were going to continue in that direction. We are working hard to pass this year the legislation to ensure that trans people who are incarcerated can be held according to their gender identity and not forcibly held according to their birth gender which can be so dangerous, particularly for many transwomen. Well make sure that queer people dont get shoved on the sex offender registry for having consensual sex, which is happening in california today. And were going to continue our work to reduce mass and mass incarceration by shorting sentencing and by having more alternatives to incarceration and by focusing on root causes like Mental Health and addiction. So we have a lot of work to do in the community, here in San Francisco, and a lot of work in sacramento. Its such an honor to represent this community and the california state senate. Thank you for that honor. I take it seriously. And it is such a public trust that i feel every minute of every day. And i look forward to the work ahead and well make some change. Happy pride, everyone. Thank you so much, scott. Were so glad that you could join us. In quick closing, if you could share what gives you hope, hope this season moving forward with what weve all been moving forward through . Great well, thank you all so much. And now were moving forward in our program. Carolyn, anything that you want to add just in terms of kind of where were at in this moment, and how youre planning how pride is planning to be different this year . I thank where we are in this moment is that partially what were doing right now is to amplify our black Lgbtq Community. And, you know, theres some things that were trying to work on at San Francisco pride and just how we can be a part of pushing forward for this change. So i encourage everyone to continue to watch our social media and watch our website and were giving every bit of information that we have as far as what were doing as an organization and well share with you as quickly as we can so you can join in and work with us in this. Great. And well, in speaking of pride and Lgbtq Community, we have our only out gay supervisor, supervisor Raphael Mandelman with us, representing district 8. Welcome, supervisor. Hi, clair, hi, carolyn. Let me go get my rainbow mask too. Right. I remind everyone as youre out this weekend to wear your masks, everybody. Yes, i ordered mine and its still being delivered, its a rainbow mask for pride. But a great tip. So we were hoping that you could share, you know, what are you hoping, or what are your hopes for how people celebrate or recognize pride this year . And what are the work that youre doing to support the communities during this really difficult time . Well, i do think that marching for justice is a great way to celebrate pride. And i wanted everyone to wear their masks and to stay six feet apart. But doing all of those things the best way to celebrate pride is to honor the spirit of all of those who have gone before us and to try to make this a perfect union. This is a very bittersweet pride. The senator talked about we are months into a pandemic that is claiming the lives of more than 100,000 americans. We have a disproportionately people of color, you know, i think that weve seen all of the inequities and the problems that have been lingering in our Society Coming to the fore through that pandemic. And then most recently, you know, the murder of george floyd has reminded us of the countless murders of so many people of color over centuries that continues unabated to this day. So its hard to be super happy with all of that. But but im being told that i need to wrap up. But i do think that it is sweet that theres been a collective rising up of americans of all orientations and all genders across this country, rising up. Theres an election this year. We can make change. We can make a difference. We have to give folks hope. The way to give folks hope is for us all to come together and to take back our country and to be in a more just place. Well have a happy pride next year if we do the work now. Thank you so much, supervisor. Were so glad that you could join us and we look forward to the work that youll continue to do for our city. So, thank you so much. Now its my honor to introduce our next panel really focused on the direct response to lgbtq covid relief. And this work has been led through the s. F. Lgbtq coalition, working to provide food, rental subsidies and tons of additional resources. So please go to bayarealgbtcovidrelief. Com to learn more and to get access to community resources. Now ill kick it over to michelle meow, and the michelle meow show and the Commonwealth Club for our great panel to talk about some of the work that local communities are doing to give back. Over to you, michelle. The michelle meow show here for the Commonwealth Club. And its az for the lgbtq, and everyone in between. Im also a member of the board of governors for the Commonwealth Club of california. Our program tonight is a special conversation around the San Francisco bay area covid19 relief fund in which a coalition of leaders and nonprofit organizations have come together to provide relief for our most vulnerable and marginalized communities. And so im proud to introduce to you some incredible people who are part of our community such as clair farley with the office of Transgender Initiatives, and angelina with the bay area, and nicole santa maria, and jeff beck. Welcome, everyone, to the program. Your thoughts on the question as being a leader with the San Francisco bay area, and making sure that all voices, you know, come together for this, all folks are represented. Yes, thank you, again, for having us, michelle. I think that it only intensified and magnified the marginalization that happens. And particularly to people of color and particularly to trans. And so the Silver Lining is that it brought us together in a way, in a boundless world of zoom or whatever, for us to come together. So the coalition is from that mission that we can come together and do this together. And to center our efforts around those that are left within the margins and to be led by these who are usually on the margins. So thats how the coalition is able to stay effective and successful. Since covid as a whole has created a lot more disparity for the Lgbtq Community at large, and, you know, theres many instances where from an operation standpoint, whether its free food or Fund Allocation that the Lgbtq Community has been a namesake and has been getting bits and pieces. And our funding has been cut and asked to go to general resources, which could be a part of our indiscernible and they are asked to go to a particular center that supports lgbtq folks. But that doesnt mean that transfolks will feel comfortable and can access those. The same with trans latin x. So it seems seems that the dimec ally element is at play and its also brought us together, whether its the coalition or the Artist Coalition or the various things that happen. And were coming together to show the greater world that this is one community that we have. Anyone from the panel who would like to add to that . Jack . From our perspectives weve really had a front row seat to seeing how people in the Queer Community have really stepped up to meet this challenge. And it has been so inspiring to see people coming from all parts of the Queer Community to really step up and to support those who are most vulnerable. And we have seen people not only volunteering, but, you know, Financial Support was really slow moving at the beginning. So a lot of people who were volunteering to deliver food and to deliver medicine, they also stepped up to pay for those resources themselves out of their own pockets. And so its really been inspiring to see the Queer Community step up again after a long history of stepping up to create nonprofits to care for our most vulnerable when were hit in an epidemic. Or, you know, hit through systemic injustice. So its been really been inspiring to see that happen with covid19 as well. Nicole and aquira, we would like to hear from you on how covid has impacted our communities and views. Well start with nicole. Well, im going to recall what has been said. But one of the things that i really believe that is very important to mention is that we are trying to focus in not ordering our community. Because it is very important to perceive in being with our feet on the ground. That were all for that community. That we are part of the community that we are serving. So in that sense the way that for example, the latina x members that i belong and now that i have the opportunity to serve in this position they am now that it is also the story, my own story as well, are flecting reflecting or mirroring the Life Experience of my older trans folks and the intersex community. So on the community right now in this process of covid19 has been very challenging for us. So thats a very huge impact because there are many different ways that people can not access their resources that we are trying to serve. So, for example, and also it is for me covid19, one of the things that the impact has brought to us is that its denounced of our marginalization and this on the situations on underserved communities. And its also an allowance on how we can come together and how we can position ourselves in bringing as you mentioned before, the voices of us, you know. For me right now we are. And so in that sense i would like to highlight these new opportunities and this of covid19. Because were seeing people who are not Latina Community and who are not having access to, for example, the funds to rent, for example. Because they dont have documents. And many of our grants and many of our funds are very restricted in, for example, for not everybody in our community. Especially undocumented latina x community, it is having that paper to feel as united. So continue the challenge of being in all of these intersection uponnallities and all of the identities that we embrace as a community, it is important for me to highlight and to mention that this is a challenge that since stonewall that we have continued to see where black and latina trans women were leading these, you know, the efforts, this community effort, and were still in the margins and not navigating these challenges and these issues. So, yeah, it has been it has been based in other voices but those other voices, we are the mirror of them. So we are those voices. So we are trying to uplift it, you know, to come together really and to try to create a better response of all of the challenges that life can bring us. That have brought us in this. Just to i just think that the panel from the perspective and as well as bringing the coalition together. And for me its covid19 is just a reset button. Often times, often in research, we prioritize the most the least likely marginalized population first. And at this point, like, we have trans leadership and trans women that are leading and our trans women are leading and were more visible right now. I believe this is like a call to action for us to have the capacity and to have the skillsets and to have the connections with the community that is a part of the community to step up. And advocate for our community. You know, ive been hearing this thing about covid19 is like the new h. I. V. A lot of h. I. V. Services are being are has been tailored to include the onset of covid19. And subsequent issues that we are facing and which continues to marginalize us in our research programs. So at this point its like this is an opportunity that we have to step up and to be these leaders and to advocate for our community. And, you know, now we dont have to have a framework that was adapted from some other community that we can see that is not a representation of us. Yes, thank you, thank you so much for that. And these are the types of conversations and points that we could bring up, right, that are specific to our community. And to have San Francisco and that sometimes leaders can do a little more and we have to for our communities. Yeah, i know that is a really great point. And really speaks to what the panel has been sharing. You know, in San Francisco we have that more than any other city and more trans and lgbtq programs and were meeting the efforts in equality. But we always have more work to do. And, you know, this coalition really came about because we saw that gap. You know, we saw our lgbtq seniors not be heard, we saw many folks on the fringe that werent actively Getting Services and benefits. And so we really looked at how can we have a regional approach, both in terms of advocacy on the state level because most of the programs and the organizations are not funded outside of the city dollars or these general fund grants. So they dont have access to foundations or other funding that so many nonprofits are relying on. So we really looked at calling on the governor to support housing and employment. And the efforts. So when we think about how to keep people sheltered and in place when theyre living in an s. R. O. And dont have access to a place to refrigerate their food or theyre evicted and living on the streets, all of these things were already happening. You know, we know that trans folks are three times more likely than the general population to be unemployed and six times for trans women of color and 10 times more likely to be homeless in San Francisco. So these were all of the efforts that we were working to fight. Thats what happened with the last recession. I was in the middle of the economic work and i saw the impact of that recession. And so i think that what everyone has shared is that this is a reality that folks experience every day. We know that its going to just double. And so using our voices to lift up, that we have to have equity in the response, i think that it is so key because a onesizefitsall doesnt work for everyone. And so thats where these innovative approaches from, you know, our partnership with open house and monanique, to the efforts to make sure that we get groceries delivered by volunteers, to the work of making sure that we get housing subsidies to trans folks that are potentially going to be evicted, to the efforts around, okay, this needs to be a regional approach. We need to look at what are we doing as the bay area, and not just relying on what can San Francisco do. And then, you know, obviously, to nicoles work with ella to say, okay, how can all of these other programs, you know, the potential federal funds, those are not flowing in the community. So how are we making sure that when money comes in, whether its through our coalition or through other efforts, how are we centering with the color and latin x folks to make sure that those resource goes where theyre needed. Panel, please jump in, and lets talk about that. I mean, i think that its so important for people to understand that its not just another relief fund, you know, that is put out there because there are so many relief funds. But, you know, every single opportunity where youre supporting a member of your community, the lgbtqi community, especially with a fund like this. So anyone can jump in. Remi . Even if there is something to be recognized about the bountiful of the encourage and movement and organizing that kind of springs from the San Francisco world and into the rest of the world. But one of the reasons that we have kind of jumped into this is because we are outside of that. We are based in oakland. And the perception is that the bay area is covered by San Francisco. But one of my primary reasons to spearhead this is to get that inspiration from San Francisco. And to kind of have other city agencies support us as a community and not prioritize us. If not, at least tag us to get the funds and the resources that have traditionally been devoid of any of that. So i think that is to be recognized. And the other aspect of what we are going to need is a need for such a scale is because as nicole was touching on it, we have the trans and Queer Community, and the majority of the community is okay. Theyve been able to hang on to their jobs. Im not generalizing, but im saying that the need that we saw was in the greater community. So we march towards the greater good for the greater number of people. And the data as we look and i keep using the word data but i shouldnt generalize it that way, but we have seen all of the submissions and the comments, we have seen how Difficult People have been at getting through and still saying resilient and saying that i lost my job but still taking care of our kids. And the coalition came together to recognize not only the economic reality but the emotional priority to say and to show that youre not alone and that god knows that were all so isolated. This takes it to a different level. But this coalition had the spirit to say youre not isolated, here we are working together and trying to get what we can and balancing the reality of the world where everybody is trying to go for the same pot of gold to say actually this is what weve got and this is what well share. You know, and we might not fill our stomachs, but at least we can share and have a few morsels. I want to chime on that, and especially with the conversation we have talked. And just like like this year and like last year we Just Launched our trans home and when i hear rumors or things that people are thinking about deficits and, you know, trying to cut back stuff and i wonder if this is something in the deficit. And just judging from the fact that we are already marginalized and this is like a big victory for us. So my thing is that im worried about those things as well as that because of covid and the fact that everyone comes along on different parts of their journey, and like receiving Social Security benefits or rather is there, like, depending on the organizations to open and to stay open so they can actually get a 50 stipend or a 50 Gift Certificate to go get groceries and things. These are things that i worry about, as well as growing. We talk a lot about expansion, but to me its just like growth and expansion are two different things. Are we growing organically as a community . Are we coming together and we have resources and are we sharing these resources . And it just at this point it makes me wonder like do we have to, like, were fighting to just to maintain what we already have. And theres not a lot of growth. And i echo the words of jack in the sense of how the revenues, how challenging it is already with the pandemic impacting our organization specifically. And the only translatin X Organization in San Francisco and the bay area in general is really huge. You know, especially because this is the first time that a trans person it is leading this organization. It is in my case it is the first time experience of being on a committee. Ive a therapist so i have been doing therapist my entire professional life. So coming here to this space that had already challenges in, for example, in the funds related and now how that is impacting our organization that it actually is still under fiscal sponsorships, you know. And so because we dont have the amount that we need to have in order to be independent. So our organization, it is still under a fiscal responsive. And we are also struggling to continue to see how were going to continue to provide the services that we have been doing for 26 years. And they have already lost funds when it was not a project. So thats very difficult to sustain. And one of the other things that i have been noticing and also worries me in this situation is that, yeah, it is it is important to recognize the work that we have that we are doing and we have been doing. But not romanticize our resiliency in this pandemic. Because the organizations do the work based on the fwrants and the funds that we get. So it is important to think and thats why im saying that this pandemic is opportunities for some needs that we need to talk and put on the table. So we have to talk about undocumented people, people who are in prisons, people who are sex workers that it is very challenging if the organization, for example, like the ones that we are serving. People who are really invisible. But if we lost funds and we have this already happening. So im thinking how its going to be with this new challenge. The thing that they joined this coalition is because were unaware of our capacities. I think that joining capacities, it is also a thing that is actually giving resources and its better with what we can do in this moment that is a global emergency. But also it is coming to the reality of how our organization, how our organizations have been functioning until today. And how they can preserve after this pandemic with the grants or the funds cut, etc. So i dream that after covid that we can actually not only thrive but flourish after this. You know, because we with transexual women and intersex, it is the Asylum Seeker because i dont even have that status as other people, so it is not only coming to, oh, yeah, were a city and community. Yes, we are. But we need to have support and we need to come together as a community and we need to also uplift our voices to the city for all of the people who are given the funds. And this is for covid relief, but what happens with the organizations. So what happened with the people who are doing the work for the community. Who is going to do the job or the work or serve our communities if the programs are closing or they just get unfunded, you know. So those are the questions that im having. And thats something that covid brought to me. Yeah, yeah. I mean, talk about yeah, i mean, how we did things before and how well do things differently now during this pandemic. The coalition strategy, that was something that i thought that was such a great idea. I mean, how else are we going to be able to serve as many people as possible in our community . And, you know, especially folks who really need it. And we have been talking for so long in the movement on how we need to do a sincere reprioritization of the voices of who we serve in our community. So maybe remi if you want to talk about the coalition itself . I think that the coalition was aimed to serve everybody in the Lgbtq Community. We have different, you know, focuses, with the San Francisco bay area and the rest of the bay area. And california and not the bay area, and then we said not california, america. And not america, the world. And we want to tell everybody. And, you know, firstly my wish is that this can show and, you know, be a new effort to leading and organizing with such amazing leaders. I would say that this should give us a good sense of how we can Work Together and so the sustainability and the life of this coalition needs to continue. And i fully see it continuing. Hopefully we dont have to call it a covid coalition, but for the Lgbtq Community that continues. And so we have always operated like that and always kind of laid down our Guiding Principles where even within our community that we have to emerge beyond this, and we all recognize that. That when we are all fighting in our little pigeonholes that its impossible to kind of put everybody together and say, okay, in the great grander world these are the folks that need help. And it shouldnt matter where those funds coming from or which organization theyre affiliated or considered the Home Communities of. So i think we start with that approach. And, obviously, theres the whole feasability aspect of getting the funds and raising those funds. And, again, each organization that as nicole said is also trying to sustain and operate besides trying to support the community, right . So we kind of juxtapose juxtapod of came up with kind of a framework to say that we will still prioritize trans folks and perhaps kind of take our prioritization of what funds are available. And so as we started seeing the submissions, every submission is equally important and thats the way that weve looked at it. We received over 270 submissions in total, not including all of the streams of input that jack put out and monomi and many folks created. And we kind of decided to spread the wealth rather than not. And to support in different rounds and ways. But we are starting with round one which is focusing on trans folk. And theres no criteria were not looking to verify what their income status is and such. We have a little bit of a stipulation given that most of the funds are coming from the city put forth to kind of verify location and such. But as such we dont want to go down that path where its accessibility and awareness, which is is one of our other Guiding Principles that isnt lost. And then another aspect is the individual interests. We have to i mean, we have to understand that, again, we are i dont want to say that were in this in San Francisco, but there are folks who are isolated, even in the bay. And there are folks that dont have any affiliation with any organization given their own trans journeys or given their, you know, their need to be whoever they are and however they need to be. So our focus has also been individual. I can echo what was said. I think this coalition approach has been incredible and its created a lot of opportunities that wouldnt have been possible otherwise. Theres more than 20 organizations that are a part of this coalition. And each of them has deep roots in the community. It has a wage interface with folks who are most vulnerable and to channel those needs to the coalition. Then we can pool our resources and share our expertise and resources to make sure that people get what they need through the coalition. So thats really been an incredible thing to be a part of. Regarding the fundraising, yeah, weve you know, as remi mentioned, theres been incredible support from the city of San Francisco, but those are not the only folks that were getting requests from. So weve been doing our best to raise additional funds so that we can support folks in the east bay and other folks outside of San Francisco. And weve been doing that in a couple of ways. One, we have been reaching out to our corporate partners. You know, a lot of the nonprofits and in the coalition they have worked with Different Companies at different times to see if theyre able to provide any support. And we have gotten some support from Different Companies and corporate e. R. G. Groups which has been interesting. A lot of companies have been hit hard by this too. You know, companies that are either in hiring freezing or layoffs and the traditional funds they have available to support nonprofits are locked up. So thats its own challenge. But we also created a covid19 registry for lgbtq folks that are submitting needs through the needs form for the coalition. And so were pulling out individual items that people need. And putting them into a registry, almost like a wedding registry. So if someone needs hormone replacement therapy or clean needles or they need shoes or a feeding tube, you know, people can go to the registry and see how much that costs and make a donation to the registry and we can support that as well. Thats been a really effective way to engage folks who want to support this cause. Weve actually had all of the hormone replacement therapy that has been requested has been funded, which is so nice to be able to say. I want to add to that, i love i love the registry. And i cant wait to end the program. I cant believe that im saying that. But just because i want to go and support the fund. I think that you talk about making sure that some of the direct services and supports stay alive. What a great idea. Yeah, i just wanted to add and echo jack with what you have shared that as we come into pride, you know, really join a lot of other voices that are calling on organizations and corporate organizations specifically to spend thousands of dollars or more into the community and to look at how youre giving back to the lgbtq organizations and the covid relief efforts. Because we know that people are giving big amounts for the website. We have been fortunate enough in San Francisco to have the fund to support 75,000 in food relief. And remi and jack have raised an additional 15,000 to 20,000. And aquira is supporting housing relief. So were doing the work. But if you look at the millions and millions of dollars going to other relief efforts we really need people to step up. Great point. Great point. And the website is bayarealgbtqcovidrelief. Com and our distribution partners. And as were winding down on time and its a question for all of you, and that is, you know, i heard a couple of you say in this and its not just about, you know, this pandemic or just about this specific time, but this could be an absolute reset for us in, you know, in our future and ensuring that we create sustainable models to support every one of us in the Lgbtq Community. So i would love to hear your final thoughts on as we, you know, look to the future of whatever that might be, the lgbtqi future. And we look at our community as a whole on how we all get through, you know, this pandemic. But, like, what do you envision, right . Like we are able to help each other and were all able to pitch in and help each other to be healthy. But what do you envision for a feature for the Lgbtq Community once this is over . And we may put that in air quotes because i think that this whole thing will change our lives forever. I will start. Go ahead, aquira. Okay, so, like, in previous, like, previous pandemics and epidemics and it just seems like lgbtqi population has been ostracized in a way that and also in some ways have like demonized us. So im just wondering, like, we talk about how like, the institutions and like our government, our providers, often they create programs or create like policies that is pushing us further into those margins. Im wondering if us having since we have this visibility, if we could start with the framework of looking at the most marginalized populations first and building out from there. Thats my own thing and im just really curious and see who will step up and do it. And, of course, we are the ones that are leading and stepping up and doing this work. But in terms of, like, certain types of city departments or Government Departments that have, you know, us in there as well as or as well as they are allies, how are they advocating for us . And, you know, and then also what is the impact of their voices to these people that are saying that they want to include us . I love that. I have always wanted to say, well, how about we start with not marginalizing anyone. And how about in the next pandemic that all of us have a cushion or a safety or a home or nicole . Im going to bring in equity. I think that it is very important to consider or to have that fresh in our minds. But more than in our minds and our hearts, you know, where the conscience comes from. In the general population and in the general community, you know, it is not only considered lgbtqi and community and just for the lgbtqi communities, its the general population that also i would like to see awaken, you know. People more aware and more compassion. And to be able to start healing journeys in our communities. Because it is for me important to be aware that one of the things that have been happening as the covid and the pandemic and even way before covid, its the need of our communities to heal from the eternal balance against us, against our communities. So how this pandemic can bring up the humanity in all of us and to see the responses that we can come together and to see this common horizon where as akita was saying, you know, that the most marginalized communities can come we all together can lift that mask and lift that mask up in order to prevent the harm and prevent all of these issues that are included and are more visible with this pandemic and this covid. So its a huge journey and it is a huge challenge. But i think that we are the people who are here and many people who are going to see this show are sharing this this horizon and are sharing this dream that we can come to more equity in society where all lives are intuitive. Where all worlds can fit in one world and we can come together not to have, like, you know, an internal crisis. Because in our communities we are always in a crisis. So how we can change that reality. But to put us in major risks and outside of the view of everybody. Because we are always continuing overriding people and ordering people. Oh, yeah, im not there and even in our own community, you know, this is an opportunity to check out our own selves to see the things that we need to change as well in us. But also as a community. This pandemic has changed already everything. So we also need to change within to make the possibility that also the Broader Community can also start a collective change. Thank you, nicole. Really, you have the final word and the final thoughts. Thank you all for being here. I do want to make sure that we recognize and to thank horizon foundation, San Francisco foundation and the prism foundation, formerly the gap foundation, for supporting us and for granting us the funds that we could directly give back to the community. And individuals who can fund and the corporate sponsors. And i think that its important to bring that up because i think to really start looking at nonprofit world in a more practical way, ultimately it comes down to being able to pay the bills, to have a roof over your head and to be able to have food to eat. So, yes, we have struggled for many, many years and decades. But this really brings out that we have to operationalize how we survive when we are marginalized. Of course we dont want to be marginalized. I think to jacks point, the world is in grief, everybody is going through that. So my sense with hope and what i have seen is that people in general are operating from a sense of wakefulness and from fatigue. And im seeing that in the community where someone who cannot they are trying to find a place to stay in a hotel and theyre saying, hey, i brought another bed in this room, does anybody else want it . And its the level of passion and care that we will see in this world, especially in our Lgbtq Community. We need 90,000 more to support everybodys need and we initially had started with a wish of giving at least 500 to everybody who reached out. At this time we have to cap to 20. But i hope 2000. 200. We need folks like clair in city agencies to say guess what im at the table and i dont need somebody to talk about me and i need the funds. 75,000 that clair secured took us to the next level to really say to the community, yes, we are here to support you. And then the aspect around that is resiliency and sustainability and then Truly Holding forward for accountability. Whether thats folks in the Lgbtq Community, white folks with black, brown, transblaze bodies. Or whether its the greater world with the Lgbtq Community, this is the time for folks to emerge and show, and its not necessarily on call, complementary, but its almost required to share the wealth that you have. And finally i would say this as an immigrant and a stranger from a different world and who just became an american, i believe in individualism that this country is based on. And every individual has the right to live the way they want to. With or without covid. And each one of our responsibilities to do that. And i sincerely hope that us being at home and loving ourselves and really have a selfdetermination that well support other individuals and to support. The first way is to donate to our gofundme which is posted. Thank you so much. So lets come together and lets help to raise the 90,000 plus plus, plus, plus, on top of the 90,000 that the bay area lgbtq covid relief dot com. And we want to be there definitely. Thank you so much, michelle and the incredible panel. We look forward to the work with the staff and the incredible coalition. Now its my honor to welcome again the gay mens chorus. [instrumental music] do you hear the message wherever you go from every woman and every man were the generation we cant afford to wait this started yesterday and were already late we have been looking for a place to sing prayer for a melody we have been looking for the world to say you feel the same and go out and say were out there come along with me youre out there im dying to believe that youre out there stand up and take a bow if youre out there broken promises no more cause for war peace and its truly what pride is for we can destroy hunger and we can conquer hate now we can join hands to say i was looking for a song to sing in search for a leader but the leader was me we were looking for the world to change we cant be heroes if youre out there sing along with me if youre out there if youre out there im trying to believe that youre out there stand up and say it loud if youre out there et . Youre out there strong if you believe that we can change the world believe again start to sing we dont have to pay for destiny we should be the change that we want to see if youre out thereet . If youre out there if youre out there and you are there now dream if youre out there if youre out there to believe that youre out there if youre out there now now. Now if youre out there if youre out there thank you so much for joining us for our special pride month kickoff, pride at home. And also thanks to our co history host and our crew and our panelists and performers and mayor breed for joining us. As a reminder we encourage you to continue to take care of yourself and each other. Please donate and take a stand against violence against black and brown women and black transwomen. We have a great list at www. Sfpride. Org that you can donate to. And also we want to remind everybody to stay healthy and safe and remember to wear your mask. And also remember to check out some of the Additional Community events that we have, that theyre working with big projects so make sure to follow them. And to stay informed. And check out the ourtowns. F. Expo in august 2020. And i want to take this opportunity, clair, were here normally at city hall and bring out the whole pride board so everyone can see and give them love. But since theyre not here i want to shout out our board. Our Vice President jake little and our secretary lynn sam, and our treasurer, suzanne ford, and ruth bodet, and nikki comma and elizabeth, and kirby lynch and manual perez and annie. Thank you so much as a board for doing all of the work for this entire year. We also want to make sure that you are supporting some of the amazing events going on prior to pride. Check out