Transcripts For SFGTV Mayors Disability Council 20240711

It is captioned and sign language interpreted. Mayors Disability Council i did not hear. Generally held on the third friday of every month. Please call the Mayors Office for disability for further information or to request accommodates at 4155546789, for voice mail or email at mod sfgov. Org. The next meeting will be held on friday, november 20th from 1 00 to 4 00. [inaudible] also for our Council Members, we hope that members of the public will take advantage of this calling opportunity to participate remotely. [inaudibl [inaudible] if email, its at mdc sfgov. Org. You can also watch the cable cast on your television by going to channel 26. When youre ready for your public testimony, please turn your television down so you can follow the prompts on your telephone. You can listen to the meeting and be in sync with the live meeting when you make your comments. To provide your comments, the telephone number is 4156550001. When you hear the prompts, please enter the meeting id number. That number is 1469958608, press pound twice and you will have joined the proceedings. I am hoping that somebody who is helping us with our tech will running some sort of a banner on those instructions because i dont know if everybody was prepared to write them down. Were working hard to not leave anyone out of these proceedings. If you are experiencing problems, we do have a person to assist you. Their number is 4155546789. You can also email mod sfgov. Org. There will be plenty of opportunities to provide Public Comment during the meeting. Public comment is limited to three minutes and we will let the participants know when the three minutes have expired. I will be identifying those opportunities for Public Comment when i go through the agenda, which i am just about to do right now. So, we will have lets see. We will have a presentation from 1 40 to 1 55 from the Mayors Office on disability. Nicole bohn will be reporting to us on what shes been up to and then we will have a presentation on Public Transit changes related to covid by muni services, sandra, the mta by aaron and jonathan as well. One presentation will be on essential trip cars and para transit resources. Public comment is welcome after that m. T. A. And muni presentation. Then we will follow with the closure of the Golden Gate Park, the j. F. K. And golden gate drive and park and that will be presented by sarah jones and Public Comment will be welcome as well there and following Public Comment related to the presentations, there will be even more Public Comments scheduled from 3 35 to 3 45. So those of you who are interested in participating, please make note of that and i will also announce Public Comment availability when the presentations have completed. All right, back to the agenda. Are you going to do roll call . Ill do roll call. Okay, thank you. Thank you helen. So when i call your name, if you are here, please say present. Helen pelzman, youre here. Present. Alex madrid okay, alex is present. Denise senhaux. I believe denise is going to be on the phone. You may need to unmute yourself from the phone. It may take us all a while to get use to this. Do we know her phone number at all . Yeah i got it. Sam, i dont think [inaudible] i can just share it with you. I need the number so i can tell who needs to be unmuted. I dont know. Okay. Okay, well do that. I just got a text from denise and she said shes on the call. Okay, thank you. You need to be unmuted . No. Ill text her back. Im need her six numbers of her phone numbers to know who to unmute. Okay, im sending you the contacts right now. In my email . Okay, while were doing that, tiffany yu. Present. Orkid sassouni. Present. Helen smolinski. I know helen has been having difficulty getting in so james, when you get a chance, i know youre busy with stuff. Can you try to connect with helen by email and find out how to help her . Helen smolinski . Yes. Ill send her another invite right now. She says its not recognizing her email. The next person is also probably on the phone is kate williams. Kate will be participating at 1 30. Okay, so shes not here now. Okay. Then we are done with roll call. [inaudible] i need to get denises number to james. Just a second. Im the only one with everyones Contact Information. Im sorry everyone. I guess i should just apologize to whomever is participating from the public because this is our First Virtual meeting and were kind of learning as we go. Okay. Reading an approval of the agenda. I pretty much read the agenda. I think usually something thats done by the clerk. Okay. Why dont you go ahead . Ill do it formally and it doesnt hurt to do it more than once. So, just at the beginning, a reminder to all of our guests today to speak slowly to assist our captioner and interpreters. So following the reading and approval of the agenda, there will be open Public Comment for items that are on todays agenda and within the jurisdiction of m. D. C. We welcome the publics participation during Public Comment period. There will be an opportunity for Public Comment at the beginning and end of the meeting that helen has already gone over, as well as after every major presentation on todays agenda. Each comment is limited to three minutes and the council will respond to your comment following the meeting if you provide us with your Contact Information. You can do that by emailing mod sfgov. Org. Ill repeat that. Mod sfgov. Org. Put comment feedback in the subject line. Helen has already gone over how to provide comments. Ill do it just one more time. To provide your comments, dial the telephone number 4156550001. When you hear the prompt, enter the meeting id 1464845905. Then press pound twice and youll have joined the proceedings as a listener. Youll be prompted when its your turn to make comments. Following Public Comment there will be a cochairs report and then a report from the Mayors Office on disability, and then well get into the substance of the meeting with a presentation on Public Transit changes related to covid and the impact on people with disabilities. Then there will be a 15 minute break. Then there will be another session on the closure of j. F. K. Drive in Golden Gate Park, followed by Public Comment. Then there will be another time for general Public Comment for items not on todays agenda. Then a respondent that has come into mdc will take Council Member comments and announcements and then we will be adjourned. Okay. So we are we need to ask for an approval of the agenda. Who would like to read approval of the agenda . Second. All agreed . Probably use our voices, i dont know how i even count people. Okay, moving on. I also want to take this time to acknowledge our privacy [inaudible] he unfortunately had to resign his position for personal reasons and i have been joined by alex madrid who has rece recently just to take stevens place. Alex, you can wave your hand or something so people there you go. We look forward to working with alex and the council. Excuse me helen . Sorry to interrupt but i believe were scheduled to take general Public Comment before the cochair report. Oopsie, youre absolutely right. That was my mistake. I apologize. Is there someone who would be interested in making a Public Statement . Anyone interested should hit star 3 on their phone. We have one person with their hand raised. I can unmute them. Hello caller. Hi, my name is will. Im calling on behalf of a Nonprofit Organization thats dedicated for advocating for more accessibility and preventing lawsuits. I really first would like to say i appreciate all the efforts you are making to create this virtual meeting. I realize that its difficult to get the kinks out and its really worth the effort and its wonderful to have this meeting opportunity available despite the crisis. I today just wanted to throw out a few ideas for potential future discussi discussions of council, with respect to your interest and priorities of course. Okay, sure. You have three minutes. Okay, so i will be brief. All right. So first then, there were news reports yesterday that General Motors who has been testing driverless electric vehicles on the streets of San Francisco with a safety driver at the wheel and apparently yesterday General Motors announced they had been given permission some time this year and San Francisco has removed the safety driver. I know that im certainly we heard concerns from people who are blind and those with low vision about the onset of driverless vehicles in the city and of course silent electric vehicles are perhaps of even more concern for people with vision difficulties. So, im sure there will be much discussion in the city about this announcement, so i wanted to express some concern about how this may play out for citizens with blindness or low vision. Second, the City Shared Spaces Program you are probably familiar with with the parks and sidewalk dining. Those are two programs that have been in place for years and have very strict permit requirements and accessibility requirements. The shared Spaces Program now for the crisis has some very good guidelines for accessibility. The issue of enforcement seems to be night and day. There is a lot less compliance, frankly. So weve been looking into ways to encourage better compliance so everyone can take advantage of these shared spaces and i did find that there is a 311 page which people can submit complaints when they find an accessible outdoor area in the city. Apparently thats then being referred to the Entertainment Commission for investigation and if they are not able to attain accessible compliance, then they can refer the case to the public works or to the Mayors Office of disability. So i hope the Mayors Office of disability will be in touch with the Entertainment Commission team on these cases and you know, we plan to start submitting some of these requests ourselves on the stuff that were observings and hearing from members about. Lastly, measure h is on the ballot. Its designed to sort of streamline permitting for Outdoor Dining and spaces like that. It seems like an a goal. If it does pass, i hope there is follow up to make sure the enforcement of accessibility doesnt suffer from the streamlining of the process. Thank you very much for the opportunity to speak to you and i look forward to listening to the rest of the meeting. Thank you. Yeah, i appreciate your comments. Those are all really, really important issues. If you leave your Contact Information, we will i would really like us to follow up with you before our next scheduled meeting. So, look for us to be reaching out. Thank you very much. Okay, any other Public Comments . We have more, ill unmute the next one. If i would like to make a Public Comment, can you hear me . Yep. Im a resident of San Francisco and i have a movement disorder, a disability. I have a placard. I really rely on j. F. K. Drive, any of the Parking Spaces on j. F. K. Drive to have access to Golden Gate Park. It would be disastrous for me, i wouldnt be able to go to the park unless i could have access to a nearby parking space. So i really object to j. F. K. Being closed. I think that Golden Gate Park should be welcomed to all of our residents, not just the ablebodied on bikes or walking. Thats what i have to say. Thank you. Thank you. I really appreciate your comments. I will point out that our agenda oops, apologies. That we have a presentation specifically regarding that issue and if there are other participants who are calling for transitrelated issues and the closure of j. F. K. And Golden Gate Park, i would ask that you wait until we had those presentations, if thats okay. So, is there anybody else who would like to make a Public Comment . We have two more queued up. Ill unmute them one at a time. Hello caller. You have been unmuted. Yes, hi. My name is zack. Im a disability advocate in San Francisco. I publish on youtube videos a. D. A. Violations that you can find. I dont know where to start with how much this department has failed the Disability Community, and i mean failed with a capital f. You canceled all of these meetings or you followed the mayors direction to cancel all of these meetings without a peep of putting them back in place. On may 12th, you had a Public Meeting online where members of the public were visually able to attend on video and now you are making us provide a 10digit password and you didnt announce how we could get in line for Public Comment. That virtual town hall was deleted, although i asked for the Public Record of that meeting. During that meeting, we were told that city bank donated money for p. P. E. , those records are requested immediately. They have not been provided to me even though those are Public Records in the public interest. Those funds were not released until july 13th, they were announced by your department with a website that i could not find out how to get the p. P. E. From that website. It was a bunch of advertising on how to donate to the public authority. Complete manipulation of our community. Additionally, i made requests for grievances. Ive been filing with your department back in january of 2020. I believe it was january 31st. Those Public Records have still not been provided to me eight months later. The Deputy Director debra cap lan has done an atrocious job in protecting our rights during covid while many of us are sick and dying. This department is not doing their job. Theyre not following the protocols on their own website for the grievance process and how youre supposed to provide signed resolutions when you advocate on our behalf for an a. D. A. Grievance, signed resolutions. Theres suppose to be a reconsideration. Your job is not just to forward a complaint to a department. Your job is to investigate that complaint and to make sure that we have access that is being denied to us. This department is not protecting the disabled. Theyre not even coming close. I am extremely concerned of this state of affairs. I will be continuing to publish on my website, on youtube, and the newspaper, because im also a journalist, everything i can possibly to expose the corruption and the failure of this department to protect our disabled community during our direst time of need. Again my name is zachary, please follow the stuff that i post so that the public can get involved. I received an email from someone trying to attend this meeting and cant get through because of all the accessibility barri barriers. Thank you. Thanks zachary. We are trying our best with accessibility. I know, its been a struggle. Were doing the best that we can. So, if any of you have been unable, please i guess, is there any other option. Im asking our tech support, are there any other options for them to access the meeting . Just through your phone or the attendee link. [please stand by. ] do we have anymore Public Comments . My name is james. Im with tenderloin peoples congress. Im not sure if this is time im supposed to have a comment. What i want to talk about is the Meeting Service to the tenderloin. I know we supposed to be getting the 27 back. Most of us who are seniors have arthritis we can barely walk down the hall. We have to walk to get to 27. When are we going to get 31 back . All of my things that i have to do, such as prescription, etcetera, are to the east. 27 is going to the west or to the south. Now im supposed to Say Something or do i wait until item 3 . I dont have a service that gives me sfgov tv. I dont have anything to go across. I was not able to get in your meeting. Im terribly sorry. We will be having presentations. This meeting is pretty much dedicated to transit challenges being faced by the disabled community. I would encourage people if they want to comment on that to do so following presentations. You want to comment now, go ahead. Thats the way we had hoped this meeting would go. I dont know if we still have callers . Yes, we have two more. Hello, this is bob, can you hear me now . Yes. Finally. Ive been waiting in my speaker and has been open and somebody else always speaks ahead of me. You folks at m. D. C. Need to practice this. Those on the line waiting dont know whos next. My phone was told im open to speak and somebody else speaks. Thats a problem on your end. I was the second person to receive an award at the beacon of light from an earlier version the Disability Council when gavin newsom was the mayor i received reward from caltrans from the metropolitan Transportation Commission and even received word from caltran. I got an accomplished record. The mayors Disability Councilmember need to get involved outside waiting for m. D. C. Meeting. M. T. A. Seems to be using accountant approach. They look at numbers. How many people does this serve. It ignores the right and priority of people of disabilities. One example ill state, the current head of m. T. A. When a private citizen suggested lets cut off the jline at market and church. As a private citizen, prior to covid, now that seems to be like a miraculous response to save time for people wanting to go downtown. Whats ignored this means people with disability get off at church and market, go uphill, cross market then go uphill market to the elevator. Nam elevn Church Street station. Thats a lot of extra time. M. T. A. And the staff are looking at this from a numbers viewpoint. Not from a right viewpoint, not from the needs those who most need m. T. A. Im suggesting m. D. C. Members really look at what is your responsibility. Years ago the San Francisco civil grand jury did a report how that version of the mayor Disability Council never forward any policy or recommendation, mayor brown or newsom. You need not to be passive. You need to come up and say whats going on and take it directly to the mayor. Please. I will comment later on other specific issues. Im saying, people with disabilities, whether on pair trparatransit, you need to be actively involve the and not pass everily sitting there. You got to walk out your caller system. Nobody knows whos priority. We get told lines are open and go ahead. Suddenly somebody else speaks. Thats not professional. Thank you. Thank you, bob. Our next caller . Hi. Im a former m. D. C. Councilmember, probably close to almost six years ago. Im also serving at motown moto and east bay paratransit. Im saying hi and its been a long time that i seen the councilmembers and just kind of looking forward to the presentations regarding San Francisco transportation during this pandemic. Thank you. Thank you. Welcome back, i guess. Do i have any mr. Speakers or. Thank you to all the Public Comments. You will have time to address the transit issues a little bit later on this afternoon. Right now were going into cochair report. Im going to be speaking on behalf of the work that myself and Steven Hermann did over the past six months. One of the highlights we designated july as disability pride month. We didnt, actually, we cowrote a proclamation and the mayor designated july as disability pride month. Tiffany yu whos a councilmember, did lot of work on this. Even know it didnt end. The event we hoped because of covid, its still in that significant. Its been an established period of time to address or hopefully in the future will be addressing issues that of critical concern to the Disability Community. With in proclamation, we also put in a request which we are hoping will be confirmed to have a roundtable meeting with members from senior staff in city hall. Your comments today about the needs of disabled and the fact that we need to be more engaged and we need to get greater awareness, particularly in city hall, we are trying to get that done. The effort has been made on the m. D. C. Side and we are hoping that we will hear back from their office soon. In addition, we have presentations at the beginning of the year, in february from mohdc with regards to subsidized housing for disabled residents in San Francisco. That presentation was done by maria benjamin, the council had quite a number of comments and frankly issues relate to that presentation. We submitted a number of questions to mohdc and have followed up. We have not received any comment back from them but we are continuing to fry to get their attention and get back to us. We also have presentation regarding Employment Opportunities for people with disabilities and our members of our council and subcommittees on employment are still continuing to pursue that. Myself and stephen as members of vice cochairs of m. D. C. , also participated in many, weekly and biweekly, d. A. A. Emergency operations, activities and calls and try to make sure that the voice of the disabled members of the disabled community are registering regarding efforts following in the middle of covid. That is pretty much it. Right now, we are going on to a report from nicole bohn on the Mayors Office on disability. Take it away, nicole . Anybody see nicole . There you are. Nicole was having trouble hearing. Do you need to speak from the phone . Do we need to recognize your phone nicole and unmute the phone call . Im seeing chat messages from nicole. Shes on the phone. [indiscernible] well get this solved in just a minute. James, were you able to get her on the phone . She said i will come back. Thats the message from nicole. Which we will do. This will be very timely. Our next information item or next presentation will be from the muni Core Services by Sandra Padilla m. T. A. And on essential part and paratransit by Erin Mcauliff and Jonathan Cheng from the m. T. A. We will now hear from them. Hopefully they will be able to get on the platform. Good afternoon, this is erin. Are you just on the phone or do have a video access . I have video access. I wanted to remind the councilmembers that for each presentation, you are limited to two questions. Thanks. I see sandra. I cant hear sandra. This is tiffany, nicole was wondering if she can have her phone number unmuted so they can provide the report . What are the first three number of her phone number . First six numbers. 4157224 i thought we were moving on and hearing presentation from m. T. A. And muni and we were going to get nicole afterwards. [indiscernible] im going to move that we go ahead to our presentations and well wait for nicole to present the m. O. D. Report following the muni and m. T. A. Presentation. So erin and sandra, are you able to access our platform . I can see erin, hi. Hi. This is jonathan, can you hear me . We can hear you. I cant see you. Your video is on. Hold on, i guess were waiting for sandra to start. I was thinking maybe i can do my presentation and when sandra able to connect you and erin [indiscernible] my name is Jonathan Cheng im paratransit planner at m. T. A. Paratransit operates riders with the same Service Hours as before. Access is operated at about 40 of the prepandemic level. We have implemented a number of Safety Measures including scheduling up to two riders max per trip, increasing vehicle cleaning as well as assigning ppes to all drivers on a regular basis. Due to the lower ridership, performance has improved. Were seeing about 98 to 95 performance. Our group band service has been suspended they are not providing that type of activity. We are continuing to work closely with the centers to stay up to date about their reopening plan. Taxis is operated at about 8 of prepandemic levels. Sfmta Taxi Services has been working closely with Taxi Companies to provide ppe to the companies. We lost the essential trip car program which erin will provide more detail about. Paratransit is work with the council and have been hosting regular meetings online with members. We encourage anyone to attend those meetings. Could you repeat that Council Please again . The paratransit coordinating council. Could you make sure that you send us that Contact Information . Of course. We need to distribute it to people who want to participate. I will. Are you done . Thank you. I really appreciate everybody patient here. Erin m mcauliff. Hi. [indiscernible]. [become noise [ would everybody mute please . Allow the speakers to speak . Thank you. Our Program Provides up to 60. To date, we received 3027 applications. Our paratransit staff has done a great job setting the debit card process. 2252 participant have activated debit cards. This program largely possible [indiscernible] while our agency is facing 100 million deficit, we were able to create at new program to create a lifeline during the pandemic. We mitt an application to the lifeline Transportation Program in order to extend the program. Now that were on the six month mark, how the program is working and what changes could be made. Our understanding now from our outreach, participant feedback, theres a need for allotment for some participants to account for longer distance of the trips. Thank you. Were still waiting for sandra. Are you available . Has anybody spoken to sandra . I understand she was trying so start her laptop or reenter the meeting . I do not see her name. Indi do see her here. Jim, is there any way you can get through to her . There you are, hi sandra. She needs to be unmuted. Good afternoon. Inapologize for the difficulti difficulties. My computer is overheating because its so hot. I have a slide to show here. At this meeting, there wasnt going to be a presentation. If you can post to the website. We will hear from the public. I would prefer that we post it somewhere. Good afternoon. Thank you so much for your time. My name is Sandra Padilla. You need to slow down little bit please. Thank you. Im here today to speak to you about how we have made our service [indiscernible] in the face of the pandemic how we accounted for people with disability thinking through the constraints were facing result in the service planses that we have in place. I will start off by sharing with you as part of our Muni Service Equity strategy. In 2016, we were able to receive anonymous tagging data that allowallow us to see people usie free muni for senior who have low and moderate income programs are using the service. What we found is, you wont be surprised, seniors and people with disabilities [indiscernible] if there wasnt just a few routes that were used, people are using the entire system to get around and get to what they need to do. The second thing that i want to share with you, i want to share more about the constraints that were facing. Many of you might be wondering why all the system systems sys t place. First one is that in order to facilitate physical distancing on board, we have limited the capacity on our buses and transit vehicles to approximately one third what we were able to accommodate before. That means that in order to move same number of people before, well be able to transport with one bus, now its three buses. The second factor is that in order to protect our operators and the public, we have choose our operations. In order to you might have that you could be on the bus and you would see that the operator of the bus [indiscernible] in order to protect the safety, weve changed that now so that when an operator shift is over, they will go out of service back to their division. That adds up to about two hours throughout the day and one of the most busy time of the day when the buss are not in circulation. It also means that before we might have one same bus doing all 18 hours or 24 hours of the route in service. Right now, it takes us two buses to cover 18 hours. The third factor is that in order to devote all of the facilities to cleaning and capacity that we needed, we have to modernize our rail service. Currently we also we had reached point where well bring back rail. We encountered some operational difficulties and have had to go back to busing rail for at least end of the calendar year. Thats another reason why we are limited in how much service were able to provide. We usually provide that service on buses. Those are the major factors in are limiting our capacity to provide service as we usually would. Those factors are Muni Service Equity strategy routes. Those are routes that we identified that are critical to connecting neighborhoods that meet certain criteria, having high concentration of people with low income, high king concentration of people of color and Affordable Housing. In addition to the neighborhoods that we have, an accessible route overlay. Those we came up with based on the data that i described earlier. Thats identifying which of the routes are most used by people with disabilities and some of the routes i looked at those routes are high ridership routes. Other factors that we take into account are major corridors. We also monitor ridership. We have ways to detect loads, how many people are on a bus at a certain hour. We also do inperson texts and we heard back from customers to let us know when buss are getting crowded. When we have more resources we make a decision about crowds that we need to address and adding more service. Or whether we can bring back a new route. Those are the things that we have. Two other factors are geographic distribution. From the beginning we only had 17 routes. We made sure that every single neighborhood was within a mile of a transit. We are now getting closer to half a mile i. In normal times we have a standard of quarter mile. The last factor is essential destination. Making sure each neighborhood, especially neighborhoods where people are less likely to have other options are connected to hospitals, Grocery Stores and other essential business. Thank you, i will open up now for questions. Just to remind participants who are listening, the council has chance to ask questions. We will open it up to people who are in this meeting. I will start off. Sandra, when you were talking about how you approached your decisionmaking for where the routes are going, was that a decisionmaking base on traffic prior to covid or during covid . I would imagine change in transit activity would be very different. I wanted to know if how youre monitoring the change in transit patterns postcovid, not prior. Yes. Even before we went into the shelterinplace, we have available the data. Our express routes dropped. This is an example of us monitoring in realtime to have sense whats crowded and whats not. Because our title vi process, we have ridership demographics for each line. Using common sense knowing what was going on, that many of the people work in offices got to stay home and many other people work in hospitals, that also helped us prioritize which routes we thought were going to be critical. That was the first time we went down to 17 routes. We made sure there was a grid, we made sure key connections stay well connect. Because we have pretty good way of checking ridership and feedback from customers, thats how we shaped that on. What happened last week, which routes were crowded, we know every time you ride 311 and talk to your district supervisor, that feedback comes to me and my team. We take into account not just how many pieces of feedback we get. How many are participating or or are you involved in hat decisionmaking . For the most part, this decisionmaking has been operational. We havent reported to our board. We dont have a body to which we are running these things through. They are temporary. In the spring, we will be doing an assessment and that will include a significant outreach component. At that stage, we will be engaging with many different communities including the community of disabilities. I wanted to followup. Is there a way in which the participants here today can contribute to your decisionmaking in realtime and have their experiences be folded into how youre doing your programming . If not, how can we make that happen . Absolutely. As i mentioned before, every time [indiscernible] [background noise] would you repeat how to get in touch with you, the name and your Contact Information and also provide it to the m. D. C. So we can post it. I would encourage you, just as a followup, to consider having some kind of established level of engagement with the disabled community about transit, especially during covid. I will open up questions for the rest of the councilmembers. I have a question. [indiscernible] i want to make sure i understood all the components. You want to know what our protocol is for line boarding people with disability who use wheelchairs. Yes. Our protocol right now is that anybody who request to board we have backdoor boarding, the policy states that anybody who request to board through the front door should be allowed. In terms of assisting patrons with wheelchair procurement, we have enhanced ppe so they resume the duty. In term of training, the Accessible Services team has a person who train them on these duties parts of their job. I want to followup with that. Im sure lot of people have an experience. From my particular experience [indiscernible] understood. I fail to answer your question about what to do. Best way to report these things is to 311 to make sure its documented properly. That gets flagged as an issue if you note that, it gets flagged not just my team and the division where the operator works etcetera. That is the best way to do it. I would encourage you to do that. Only way were going to get better in eliminate this [indiscernible] with paratransit, i know some of the people are now taking paratransit before covid1 covif youre not using a paratransit, three times a month, it will be terminated. Did you guys review that or is that a plus for covid19 . Thank you for your question alex. Thats never been a policy where if you dont use paratransit that you lose it. We understand that riders are not using to use paratransit now because of the covid19 situation. We are still doing recertifications as normal. No one is being paratransit is not being terminated because theyre not using. Cochair madrid thank you. Cochair pelzman other councilmembers, do you have questions. Yes tiffany. Councilmember yu thank you for your brief remarks. I had a question about the underground muni. I was curious if you were able to provide Additional Information as to the holdup of why its probably not going to be until 2021 until the underground muni opens . Yes. The short and brief explanation is that when we brought that rail on august 22nd, we had to we were running slow on the subways and we had service interruptions. Thats because we discovered that when running normal service, we were having issues with overhead wire. Theres been very detailed information on our website. Basically its part of the overhead wire, kind of splicer. Ones we purchased are defective. We purchased and replaced them all over our system. We had to wait for shipments, we had to special order them and wait for them to get manufactured to our specification that we shipped from europe. We had to install them. All of those are the thing that add up to us not being able to bring back rail service for you until early next year or end of this year. Councilmember yu thank you. Next question is about the taxi thing. Im just curious, it sounds like going through reassessment now, figuring out if they can be extended. I wanted to better understand what the time line is on that . Sure. The program will stay in place for now. We are hoping as long as paratransit demand is down, were able to pay for the e. T. C. Program. Hopefully by end of 2020, were hear about the lifeline funding. That will help us assess whether well extend it further or if we can use that funding to extend the program with the existing allotment. Cochair pelzman if people are holding up their hands to be recognizes, if youre on the phone, you cant, you can send me a message and i will then call on you and hopefully you can pose your questions via audio. Please go ahead. I think that some of the comments for sandra [indiscernible] im signing slowly because i just hurt my shoulder. A week ago, maybe two weeks ago, i finally was riding Public Transit for the first time. There was some issues, for example, i depend on an app for time schedule to note when muni will be arriving. Thats what i depend on to be able to tell when muni will be there and when a muni comes by that says in service, its challenging again thats happened a few times. I had to wait a couple of lines past me by before i was able to figure out. There was a notification on the application and so, it resulted in me having to walk quite a distance. I dont know it theres way to have information about if this job is not available, perhaps we can go to another stop. What the structure is for this. There doesnt seem to be any Clear Communication for that. I also are i also have a ca. It is hard for me to know whats dependable Public Transit system and which one i can get on and ride. Its quite confusing. A bit of positive feedback, i cant say this for others, for myself, very impressed with the use of the Yellow Jacket. It helps me with knowing there was support on the bus. I think there was a few stops that had folks in the Yellow Jacket mostly in the busy area of transit. Theyre in the back of the bus. I think they are available for someone to get on and off. I think that theres an issue with the red zone. Theres a lot of issue with people crawling over and blocking the access in the red zone for the transit system. People cant actually the bus can actually create an accessible platform for people to board who need it. That something that causes undue stress on the bus drivers and creates layered frustration for those of us with disabilities. I think that should be something that can be shifted. I think lack of communication not able to get off and board a bus easily, i think some of those are compounded issues that require attention and perhaps muni can have flexibility to notify the public about what the Transportation Options are so we can board safely. So, predictions. I will be the first to admit that our predictions are not to the standard that we usually keep. Especially with the buses that providing rail service. Normally, we only choose service about three times a year. We have changed Service Simple times since march. That takes us at least two weeks. Its been challenging for us to keep up. Its something that we are always working very hard on overtime, not overtime, its something that were starting to keep accurate as possible but something that also has been harder to keep up during this emergency. The tradeoff that we made, we believe that its better to put in more service sooner than wait for everything to be perfect before adding the service. Those are tradeoffs that weve had. But especially with the buses providing rail service now, we do not have as accurate predictions as we should. Were organiz were working. In terms of stop changes. If we change a stop for stop changes, any time we have a planned stop change, we do go into the next bus and we enter a message that says, use this other stop instead. Theyre making some changes related to construction. That onerous is put on the contractor. Im not sure that they always do the best job. Something that we can be working on to regulate better. In term of red curves, that has been another tradeoff. From midmarch, we went to shelterinplace, we suspended tracking enforcement. One of the reasons was that we were in an emergency situation, we did not want to be penalizing people with transit tickets at a time when people were suffering economically. We were also having a great deal of anxiety. In addition we had also a lot of officers that either ill or happen to be home with their family. Ewe have returned to enforcing curb parking policy. Thank you for following up with the contractors. Cochair pelzman , are you done . Thats all i had to say. Theres quite a few issues that create barriers. Just trying to figure out how to navigate the system. This isnt an untenable situations. There are areas for improvement. I want to make that note. Cochair pelzman any other councilmembers interested in posing questions . Im waiting to see if you are sending me any messages. Jim, are you hearing anything from anybody . We have two callers. Cochair pelzman no other councilmembers reaching out . Im not seeing anyone with their hands raised. Cochair pelzman lets open up to Public Comment please. First caller . I want to address accessibility issue at this meeting. Looking at the sfgov tv website, the mayors Disability Council thing at the bottom of the screen is cutting off all the images in the bottom row. The names of the images. I cant tell whos speaking if their video happens to be in the bottom row. Also the names are like in a really tiny font. I want to add, thank you stuff to some of the things people are saying. If i cant see their names, its really hard. Also the scrolling star 3 callin number is really hard. It will be much better if that was stationary. Im still receiving an email from somebody whos trying to get through this meeting and has not been able to. Thats all i want to say for that. Can i lead with my Public Comment now . Cochair pelzman sure. Thank you so much. I appreciate that. I dont know where to begin on i believe it was Sandra Padillas presentation here. First, i want to comment on this problem of m. D. C. In general with this horse and pony show as i see. Where departments come give their presentations, they say how great everything is. Theres no problems, you dont hear from advocates in the community. You dont hear from senior disability action and other important voices that are very critical of whats happening right now. First of all, i like to point out when sandra said, they encountered operational difficulty with opening the light rail. That is the most ridiculous summarization what happened. The news reported from the sf chronical, muni closes light rail following coronavirus case and equipment failure. Drivers are not being kept safe and the equipment is not operated correctly. That is why they closed the light rail. Its because they screwed up and they dont to say that. There are meetings where disabled people can give their feedback to sfmta. Its disgusting that im having to use my Public Comment time to inform this body of those meetings when that is exactly what sfmta staff should be doing. Those meetings happen monthly or bimonthly. They are useful. Additionally, i would love to connect with anyone that is reporting problems and access with sfmta. I have filed a lawsuit because of how difficult it has been for me and my wheelchair to board buses and how broken the a. D. A. Grievous procedure is with sfmta. Its really sad that im actually being able to address this issue better with a lawsuit than with this body, which i would protect the right of disabled people. Youre having hard time getting on a bus, please ask this councilmember, Mayors Office on disability, i give you information to pass my Contact Information along. You can find me on youtube. Additionally, i would like to point out that the grievance a. D. A. Process stands now, it focuses only on driver discipline. Punishing drivers. That is not the solution. We need to educate people, create positive reward system, additional testing, additional Driver Training as of now, drivers do not get adequate training for disability access. We need to support them in this hard time where they are being exposed to a virus thats deadly and trying to serve our city. Thank you. Cochair pelzman sandra can you share with this council Contact Information for that group of disabled representatives that zach mentioned and be sure that we have that Information Available on our website. Yes. I can. I will add it to the text and i wanted to say erin [indiscernible] cochair pelzman we need the name again and also how to get in touch. You can email matthew west. Cochair pelzman lot of participants may have difficulty writing down things quickly. If you can do it slowly right now, you id appreciate it. Matthew and his last name is west. His email contact is matthew. West sfmta. Com. The name of the Advisory Committee is multimodal accessibility Advisory Committee. Maac. We call it maac for short. If you email him, he will send you the information for the regular meeting. Cochair pelzman is he the Program Director for the maac . Yes, cochair pelzman thank you very much i appreciate you providing that information. May we hear from the second caller . Thank you, this is bob. Im also paratransit user. Comments both about the planning for muni shutdown redoing as well as paratransit. When muni really shortened its roots it canceled such lines as the 5, 21, 33, 43 and the 45. I quickly pointed out what that meant was there was absolutely zero muni access to st. Marys hospital. Difficult access to the former Childrens Hospital out on call street and the 28 line was shut down. To get that to that california street address, you have to go downtown and come back out on the one. I pointed out an email to upper muni management and the board. No response. All when i contacted senior and Disability Advocacy Group and theyve raised thee questions then suddenly muni changed its tune and started to have service. As far as paratransit, theres something even worse. Last year, cabs and paratransit were relegated forced to use only the curb lane. The curb lane of market would have skateboarders, bicyclists, segway users, people riding scooters, escooters, all in that curb lane. Muni buses in te center lane. Last night, i asked staff if i get on a paratransit ride at market and second to go out to church and market, the paratransit vehicle would have to travel the entire distance in that curb lane with bicyclists and skateboarders and segway users, i was told yes. Were going to be forced to ride with various other slower hard to see motor users and thats going to work paratransit is a slow ride and subject to all sorts of possible minor collisions as those vehicles bump into the paratransit van, the or the cab. Somehow, the m. T. A. People who thought of this, didnt think it through thoroughly. Im giving you few examples how inadequate the awareness what are key destinations, such as st. Mary hospital. It was a numbers game. How many ride and whats the revenue. Not who needs to get to st. Marys or Childrens Hospital. Its number and numbers, not people right to travel. Thats been the predominant. Same with paratransit vehicle. If im at the lgbtq offices, i want to go downtown in paratransit, that paratransit vehicle would have to go in the curb lane all the way from octavia market down to second and market. Which again, it seems like were being forced to go the slowest and have the most likelihood of a minor collision, somebody bumping into us from the skateboard segway, bicycle, whatever. Theres got to be thought force on to m. T. A. To think about the rights of people with disabilities, not their dollar number ridership. Thank you. Cochair pelzman thank you bob. Do we have another caller . Yes, we have three more. Hello. Im calling from the outer area. From 30 years we had the problems of the streetcars stopping at sunset boulevard some at 19th avenue forcing everybody to get off the streetcar and wait for another streetcar and then the streetcar turns they call it switchback. They turn the streetcar around to make it easier for the planners to get people more from downtown out. People pay their fare to go to the entire route even to way out to the end into ocean beach. Its an extreme hardship for person with disability to be forced out of a streetcar and have to wait unknown amount of time for another streetcar to come along. One time, long time ago, i was driving on a saturday night, it was very foggy, i was on judah avenue. There were two streetcars attach to one another at judah and 19th avenue. It was after a baseball game. It was really foggy. I saw all these people in the middle of the street. I saw what was happening. They were forcing all these elders who attended the ball game via muni, they were forced to get off the streetcar 10 30 at night in the cold fog and send those two streetcars back downtown and then have each elders wait for the next streetcar. At the time, i made a big fuss about it. We were between supervisors, our current supervisor was deposed. He was able to get a Community Meeting with the head of muni at the time. He promised that these switchbacks would stop. They did not stop. They have been continuing up until the present, nobody has any respect for the people of ththe elder. Maybe because were not well organized but its unconsciencable. Im trying to put this to those of the m. T. A. So when the streetcars come back, do not continue this practice of the switchbacks. We pay our share, full fare to go all the way to the destination. They should not be kicked off at 19th avenue or sunset boulevard. The streetcar should go to the end. Please do something about that. Furthermore, i like to draw your attention, that all of this bus Rapid Transit thats implemented for who knows whos making decisions to give these multibillion dollar contracts, busy work to contractors we dont know who they are friends of. This is putting people with disabilities lives in extreme danger when you take the muni and you put it in the middle of a busy road that is a highway leading to goldengate bridge, for example. You think that people who are hurrying home are going to want to stop for a person who fallen out of their wheelchair in the middle of the street . I have three times in my life picked up a person who has fallen into the gutter at an intersection and all three times that i did, im disabled, i can still drive and walk a limited amount, each of the three times that i got out my car to lift the person who fallen from their wheelchair into the gutter. The other drivers honked instead of getting out their cars to help me lift the person out of the wheelchair. This is so crazy that this is going on, if they wanted people to get downtown faster from the richmond, they can add a few buses from the line. When a streetcar or bus or the bus is right along the curb, a person gets from the curb, they step into the bus. If you put the bus in the middle of gary boulevard or middle of van ness a avenue the person has to get to and from this busy road and risk their life to fall of of the wel wheelchair. We wish you stop promoting this bus traffic transit. Thank you. Cochair pelzman thank you. Next caller please. This is roger. President of the transport Workers Union local 258. I want to highlight what the riders, passengers have been stating. One of the ways in which we can provide better more Accessible Service for the wheelchair community, for the atrisk community, for the community that are special needs community, by bringing back the light rail vehicles back on the surface. We have been pushing and pressing the agency to bring back the light rail vehicle service. From what i understand, sfmta is the only Public Transportation system in the United States of america that has completely shut down its light rail vehicle service. Why . We have no idea. When i say we, i mean local 258, light rail Vehicle Systems are bigger. They are stronger. They have more space for passengers. They are safer for the operators. By bringing back the light rail vehicle system, and the service back on the surface, well create more social distancing, more public vehicles out on the streets and less crowding on the buses. Lets take pressure off the buses. One of the ways we can assist the Elderly Community, the wheelchair community is by bringing back more service. We have plenty of vehicleses that are sitting around in the parking lot. That is dangerous because the longer a vehicle sits, it creates more rust on the parts. Aside from that, vehicles sitting down for years and years, which is where were going when this at this rate, is dangerous not just for the vehicles themselves but for the general public. We have vehicles that are going to be out of service for way too long. We are highly encouraging anybody and everybody to please reach out to the sfmta to the board of directors, to the director of transportation, director of transit, to bring back more these vehicles in order to provide more service. If you dont believe me that there isover crowding on the buses, hop on the 38 gary and you will see the amount of overcrowding that is occurring. In regards to one of the speakers that spoke earlier, i believe it was zach in terms of disciplining the operator for lack of education when it comes to the Elderly Community or special Services Needs community, hes right. We dont need to continue punishing and punishing the operators because punishing isnt going to get to the root of the problem without educating our fleet, without educating our drivers and operators. Please push forward the idea the notion and the belief of educating and retraining the operators so they can understand what the special needs are of the special communities that we are talking about. Whether its the Elderly Community, the sick community, the community dealing with wheelchairs, etcetera. Im in full support of what the general riding public is stating here on this call. Thank you. Cochair pelzman thank you. I think it may be we can find an opportunity here to bring some of the people who are participating in this meeting to possibly engage and educate your colleagues and fellow drivers about some of the needs Disable Community has in transit. Is that something you will be willing to consider . Yes. Cochair pelzman please make sure you leave your Contact Information. That will be outstanding. Thank you very much. Alex . Cochair madrid im not sure if the message in the chat. Cochair pelzman do we have another speaker . We have two more. Can you hear me . Yes. Couple of things. First about the paratransit thing. We really appreciate it that the sfmta, implemented severe cuts in service, accessible trip card which for seniors and people with disabilities. Because of the cuts were unable to use the muni servic muni. Muni is free for people with disabilities and seniors. You have people qualified for it, because of the Service Level was cut, [indiscernible] paratransit for the certified users, charges 2. 50 for one way trip. Cochair pelzman somebody please mute yourself. Thank you. Please go on. About Driver Training. I highly recommend and encourage for this committee and other stakeholders to work with the operators, to work on the Training Program and ensure Proper Service and face Proper Service. I havent heard any training that have addressed this issue during our pandemic. I agree, punishing the operator than working with the operators. Theyre in a bad situation where they trying to make it safe for everybody. Then whole issue about masks and not masking and etcetera. I have not seen training for it or clear plan how to keep both the operators and the riders safe. I think thats also very important. I think thats it for right now. We do have Public Comment again at the end of the agenda right cochair pelzman right p. P. P. Our next caller please. I live in district 7 i have two topics. I have an adaptive bicycle that is two wheels in the front and its white wide. The south side of twin peaks, theres no accessible way to access twin peaks on that side. I seen People Struggle with children on the back of an upright bike. You have to go curb around the end of the gate on a slope dirt path and over another curb. I have tipped my bike over at least one time attempting to do this. I would just advise, we can open one of the gates, put in in one of those big orange things to let people ride through without having to go over this awkward side path. My other question is about disabled cycling access to the alameda parking lot. Because there are no bike racks in alameda parking area, i cant access the market because i cant bring my bike into the area. I like it in between the rings of stall. It will be very easy to take out a few Parking Spaces and install accessible widely spaced bike racks so disable people who can access cycling. Those are my main points. Cochair pelzman i appreciate that. We will provide the Contact Information to all of you from everybody. Thats going to be the simplest way to do it. If i can interject, if you want your Contact Information given to the m. D. C. Members, presenters or m. D. C. Staff, please send us an email to mod sfgovtv. Org with your contact info. Thats the electronic way to fill in the card. Cochair pelzman i will repeat that again. For all of the people who have called in today and would like to have their questions responded to or to continue this dialogue, i really need you to send your Contact Information to mmod sfgovtv. Org. Our next caller. That was our last caller. Cochair pelzman okay, were ready for a break for 15 minutes. Following that 15 minutes, well have our second presentation or we will have a presentation from the Mayors Office of disability director, depending on what her availability is. Then we can get to the j. F. K. Drive closures. I no thats an issue lot of people very concerned about. Take a break for 15 minutes and hopefully well able to reconnect virtually. Thanks to everybody for your presentations and your jim, who am i supposed to that will be sufficient. They are listening and watching, so that will be sufficient. Okay, thank you. Okay, thank you to our participants and audience. I hope you had a good 15minute break, and we are back going back to our former agenda item which was a presentation by nicole bond, the mayors the director of the Mayors Office on disabilities on what mod has been doing for the past few months. Thank you, nicole. Hi. Hi, everybody. So this is my direct report to the mayors Disability Council, and i its written and will be posted on monday, and for the sake of time im not going to read the full report, but for the sake of the council i wanted to highlight a couple of things specifically related to Covid Response and recovery and voting. Ill start with voting and then go to Covid Response. I just wanted to make sure that Everybody Knows that the Voting Accessibility Advisory Committee met on friday and focused on accessible voting options for all of those who are registered to vote in San Francisco. The supplemental documents for that meeting will be posted to the website and will be linked to this report, but i wanted to make sure people know that there are a variety of accessible voting options that are available for residents with disabilities. The Voting Center is now located rather than inside city hall outside, just outside bill graham auditorium at 99 grove. Theres also options for remote accessible vote by mail, curbside voting. There will be voting still at your polling place with accessible machines at your polling places on election day itself, and theres also an emergency Delivery Services program for those who are hospitalized or Skilled Nursing facilities. So again, well send that out so you can take a look at that. Please do take advantage of all the different kinds of accessible ways that are available to vote in this voting cycle. The second thing that i wanted to highlight and bring specifically to the attention of the council is a couple of things relating to Covid Response and recovery where mod has been very deeply engaged since the beginning of the pandemic. Two things i want to draw to your attention and encourage Council Members to consider for the Public Meeting in november or an upcoming thing is to invite the folks from the shared spaces of Outdoor Dining to speak to the council about the way they are looking at accessibility guidance and enforcement. I believe a member of the public also mentioned this earlier in this meeting. I really want to encourage folks to learn more about whats happening with this program. I also wanted to draw your attention to the final report of the Economic Recovery Task force which is live as of last friday and includes a list of very extensive recommendations in Covid Recovery that will we anticipate impact folks with disabilities. So the council is strongly encouraged to consider these information items as part of an upcoming Public Meeting. One more thing, actually, im sorry, that i wanted to also highlight for sure is that in july this past year, 2020, as the Police Commission adapted the department general order for interacting with deaf and hard of hearing individuals. The sfpd is beginning to engage on the development of a Training Plan to assist officers to implement this order, and that Implementation Plan is on a specific timeline, and its a very important training effort that we want to make sure is done well and to the best of our ability. So again, Council Members are encouraged to engage on this issue and consider this also for an upcoming Public Meeting. The rest of my report i will forego, but i will send it to the m. O. D. Distribution and also post it to the website on monday. The m. O. D. Website, sfgov. Org mod, so you can look for it there. And if you have any questions or would need to call with questions, the number is 4155546789. So either way will work. Thank you very much. Thank you very much, nicole. I actually do have a question, which is is it possible to link the portion of the economic Recovery Plan that you think will be impactful to the disabled community to whatever youre posting on the m. O. D. Website . What ill say is ill link to the report the recommendations of our its not organized in such a way where it is readily apparent which initiatives, but i would be happy to talk with the council to think through which of those initiatives, because youre right, theres 42 recommendations right now, so its oh, my goodness. Well read those and maybe post something prior to our next meeting. That sounds fine. Okay, great. Thank you, nicole. Okay, we are now ready for our next presentation, our next presenter, who is sarah jones, and sarah macland and lucas koebin. Excuse me, ellen, im sorry, there are a couple of comments that have come in from people by email. Oh, right. My mistake. I forgot. Yes, please go ahead. Participants we receive voice mail comments on the m. O. D. Phone recorder, and so debbie caplan, the Deputy Director, will be reading those right now, and then well go on to presentations. Thank you. Sorry, debbie. Sorry about the sound quality. I dont know why it is. One comment is from a woman named wendy saying im watching this on sf gov tv and my laptop and listening on my phone. It is really hard to watch this without closed captioning and in such a small window so that the names are not visible. And then one more which says i agree with alex madrid. I have also faced driver discrimination and frontdoor boarding in multiple instances. Rather than spending so much Driver Resources on high occupancy routes, like the 38, i think that nearby routes such as 231 should be reactivated to take the load off the 38. The 2 clement operated on an eighthour shift without split shift and [indiscernible] cleaning. E. T. C. Limits of 60 a month is insufficient for travel means. This needs to be expanded to a higher monthly limit. Second issue is that as a free muni cardholder, i now have to pay more than previously. The other issue is there hasnt been any outreach about e. T. C. To chinese, spanish riders. That is the end of comment that has come in by email. Okay, thank you, debbie. Now our next presenters will be sarah jones, Sarah Madeline and lucas tobin from rec and park. The topic theyll be addressing is the closure of j. F. K. Drive in Golden Gate Park. Welcome. Hello. I think ill start out. My names is that all right, lucas . Yeah, that sounds [indiscernible]. Okay, great. Ill start out. Ill start out. Most parts of sfmta are really focused on one kind of transportation mode. Its transit or its bikes or its the Traffic Engineering people. In contrast to that, its really about holding it all together and working across that big picture and really thinking about it from focus of how well are we as a Transportation Agency doing, fulfilling our purpose of serving, supporting people in San Francisco. Thats why im here today, talking about this topic because this issue and this question of j. F. K. Drive and access to the park is really something that holdings together, not just one piece or one type of travel, primarily its really about how well our transportation system, park overall is serving the community. Thats why im here today. Thats why ive been involved in this work and kind of creating an umbrella with m. T. A. To make sure when were thinking about this issue holistically and topic that were talking about today is about access, its thats staying at the front of this issue. J. F. K. Drive is under the jurisdiction of recreation and parks department. The issue of what kind of travel happens on it and really what kind of travel happens on all the streets in the park doesnt come to the m. T. A. Board of Trustees Board oin the boa. Thats a distinction that is really one that should be meaningful to the people who are affected and it is also we should be seemless across the issue. With that in mind, sfmta and my team has been collaborating with this rec park and with m. O. D. Weve been working with the Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco to talk about really our focus at this point in time, has been about how to make the Current Situation work. By the Current Situation, i mean j. F. K. Drive closed under the emergency order and now museum is reopening. All of this knowing and acknowledging that theres going to be a decision before us about what happens with j. F. K. Drive and what access on it looks like, we need to be both think being how to make the Current System work and what kinds of information and understanding we need as to what might work for the future. I will give a general overview of where things stand in our approach and some of the staff will talk about the specific steps that theyre taking right now. We all know the broad situation, just in case people are not aware with j. F. K. Drive closed. Some of the specific access changes are that sorry, yes . Cochair pelzman i didnt say anything. I thought somebody wanted me to stop and had a question. There are 23 a. D. A. Parking spaces on j. F. K. Drive affected by the car street condition. 18 in the area are close to the museums. We are near the area of flowers and two of them are near the rose garden. The situation that has been established by rec parks for accessing the museum is that you can drive on music concourse, getting to it from mlk. From the south, you can drive that loop. From the north side of the park, you can enter the garage and use the garage. Its that 15 free dropoff time in the garage. Thats the situation we have. One thing i think were all aware of is those j. F. K. Drives a. D. A. Spots are incredibly important for access. It did have disadvantages related to the configuration with the parking bike lanes and things like that. At this point in time, beyond the j. F. K. , theres also a route traversing the lane using j. F. K. Overlook middle drive and m. L. K. Which has been set up general as a temporary emergency period situation. I do want to it reiterate no decisions have been made. We at sfmta do think theres lot of benefits with j. F. K. We also feel strongly it needs to work for everyone. In this period of time, its giving us the space to work things through and see how it can work to the meet that goal of enhancing usability for people with disability. Ultimating it can help lead to better place and better access for all in Golden Gate Park. Some of our shortterm work for vehicle access for a. D. A. , we are looking to find replacements for all of the 18 spaces lost with j. F. K. Were working to get some quick action on that we want to make sure that they are comparable and convenience to those that are not able to be accessed anymore. Also looking to make sure that the museums work with the j. F. K. Drive closure. Weve manage to find a system for that in addition to really making lot of progress on identifying those replacements. Dropoffs, i mentioned this before. We have we very much do recognize the importance of dropoff access close by the museums. Thats what concourse configuration and garage configuration are all about. Also shortterm work to help people in getting to the park. Really facilitating through better way finding. Finds and maps and things that kind of help tell you where youre going. Also just directional signage for garage access and also signage at the muni stops. Theres a large number of muni routes that are serving the park but it is not as [indiscernible] were looking at doing that. Also looking at improving direction via the various websites. In the medium term, theres also a study that is being led by the San Francisco county transportation authority. They are usually referred to as sfmta. I know this is confusing. They are a separate Transportation Agency serving San Francisco. We work with them extremely closely. They are kind of leading its called a study. Its really a convening of conversation around issues of Goldengate Park and access, what opportunities and challenges j. F. K. Might bring. They are going to be coming months, convening that conversation. I made it extremely clear to them that this group is a really important resource to be talking to and a really important space to be working in around that effort. Cochair pelzman can you explain what that means . I think its clear that transit agencies need to hear more directly or have members of the disabled community who are using Public Transit really be much more directly involved in whatever decisionmaking process is going on. I dont think you sit around and try to plan the worst way for disabled people to get from point a to point b. I think what im learning through this particular hearing or meeting is that you guys are trying to help the Disable Community. The Disable Community want you to help them. I think we need clarification on where we can weigh in. We need you to create that opportunity for us. You need to make sure that were engaged. I absolutely hear that. This process and this project has really kind of opened up ways of understanding that i know there was a discussion about the maac. I think we can bring some of the Outreach Strategies and start using more broadly with the community as well. I would agree with that and im committed to doing that. Cochair pelzman we hear from you with the next couple of weeks. Lets say two weeks on how we can bring these interesting voice into your planning and programming process. Is that something you will be agreeable to . Yes. In the meeting . Cochair pelzman we dont know anything about what youre doing. We would need to be informed and there will be we need to know what youre doing and when youre doing and how we can participate. A seat at the table. Absolutely. Ill work with nicole to set up a followup discussion with you. Cochair pelzman you can contact me directly. Thank you. Great, thank you. Im basically done what i wanted to go over except the final note. Lot of our future efforts are going to be discussed within this process that the t. A. S are organizing. Theres couple of areas that are really clear that we need to work on. One of them is around the garage and pricing and management of the garage which i think rec parks is very interested in. Another is about taxis and making it a lot easier for people to access taxis within the park. Another one longer term or kind of big picture issue of the [indiscernible] there are incredible opportunities to usability at Goldengate Park for people with disabilities. To make anything work around j. F. K. Drive, even the past condition of it given what i heard about the issues with the usability of the a. D. A. Spaces on j. F. K. Drive, we need to look at what access and usability to the entirety of this amazing city for people with disabilitieses. Cochair pelzman thats why brings us into that decisionmaking and planning process is going to be critical. Im totally with you. I will work with you to make that happen. Cochair pelzman thank you very much. Councilmembers, do you have questions . Do we want to go to lucas next . This is orchid, i need to pause here. I want to make sure that the interpreters can see me. This is orchid, im a member of the council. I work with sfmta. I have big concerns with the garage, the parking issue and the dropoff space. Its not exactly accessible. Theres only one portion that has anything in that area and its also extremely dark. Its challenging to navigate and find a way there. Im thinking about Parking Spaces. I think we need to go back to the original plan. Specifically to think about cyclist. I have concerns because of the closure, the permanent closure and academy of science as well. Parking is an issue. We need to think about broader public use of the park and not just focus on [indiscernible] needs. There are lots of people who use the parking in a variety of ways. This closure has impacted people. There are some things that we need to consider. Cochair pelzman thank you orkid. Councilmember sassouni i think Goldengate Park park and opening it, we need to consider parking space. Ive been attending a variety of events and going to different locations in the park. That garage is one of the worst places in my opinion. Its extremely dark. The door is not accessible. The one going in the park. I think that we need to kind of go back the original plan of opening the park and what parking space looks like initially i use my bike. We need to go back to what the parking was before having accessible parking places and availability to all of the public. Cochair pelzman thank you. I want to remind me who will be needing interpreters that our interpreters will be our service will be ending at 4 30. I want to give a heads up to everybody about that. Do we have any other questions from the council . Cochair madrid [indiscernib le] cochair pelzman were going to go into the next presentation. Cochair madrid i have a question for you. [indiscernible] the first question was about whether paratransit can access. Im going to get the specifics about paratransit vehicle access and i will provide that to you. We have provided an access for transit. Kind of a special lane has been set up so that the 44 bus can get through on music concourse. That is something that we will clarify the ability for paratransit to use that path of travel as well. Of course they can drop off that has been provided too. , also recognizing opening your car door and stepping out, we want to accommodate all disable people to enter and exit their vehicle. Your second question, i believe was the plan for improving accessibility. If i can answer that third question, which was around, what are we looking at and what are we using to understand accessibility and are we looking at a map. I would say, we have because of the discussion about j. F. K. Drive, thats opening up a larger discussion about what we can do to make it a accessible place. Theres been lot of input overtime. Nicole provided it. Thats not something that the planners figure out. Cochair madrid [indiscernib le] were not just looking at the map. We need to be looking at the places with experts about the places and the experts are the people who are on this council call. Its the people who are living it. As we take our steps to improve accessibility, it needs to be in partnership with the disabled community. Cochair madrid [indiscernib le] parking were main issues. They were issues before. They continue to be issues lucas from rec park will be able to talk about the specifics moves that they are pursuing around parking in the near term. Cochair madrid thank you. Cochair pelzman any other councilmembers . Tiffany . Denise . Would you like to pose a question . Kate . Kate williams . Am i forgetting somebody . Just so participants understand, im asking our other councilmembers who are accessing this meeting via the phone, if they have questions for the presenters. Seeing that we dont, i like to move on and before we do, i need to ask the interpreters if they can stay beyond 4 30 . It look likes its going to be a longer meeting than we had scheduled for. I will just let our participants know that if we cant have that extension, we would have to end the meeting. We cant close the meeting unless we have full accessibility for all of our community. Can you stay . Insist jenny speaking, i believe we have a hard cut off at 5 00. We can stay for extra half hour. Cochair pelzman we appreciate it. Thank you sarah jones for dog sucdoing such a great job. I will try to go through what im saying quickly. Sarah madeleine director of public fairs was not able to be here today. Were joined by beverly eng who is the Deputy Director. She may chime in. Im lucas tobin, im a. D. A. Coordinator. We have heard from the Disability Community both before and during covid with the concerns with the j. F. K. Road closures and the impact its having. Rec and park providing for everyone. Part of that access is also and what sarah alluded to, part of that is also making sure that people have access to the information they need in order to get to the park destination if they are coming by vehicle or need to find parking or need coming out by paratransit. Weve heard issues of people couldnt find the right route to the park. As sarah mentioned, weve been working together alongside m. O. D. And m. T. A. To address these concerns that the Disability Community has been raising. During the covid street closures, there were impacts before the covid street closure. They impacted j. F. K. Obviously and sarah mentioned the accessible parking on j. F. K. And as far as those accessible parking spots go, i think that sarah mentioned this, she was focusing on the concourse there are 18 accessible spaces for conservatory of flowers that are also impacted by the closure. Thats 26 spaces all together. While we know all of those Parking Spaces and we are addressing making sure people have information to drive to all those spaces. The main focus of what weve been working on recently is the music concourse area. Especially because museums reopened and academy of science will be reopening. [please stand by] were going to add tour bus parking area and six more accessible spaces on Martin Luther king drive and four more on nancy pelosi so that would get us to the 18 faces that were losing with the j. F. K. Closure. Were having people with knowing where they can drive and where they can go to drop someone off and park or with their paratransit can drop them off. So the other thing that were addressing is the communication to ensure that theres clear Information Available in multiple formats. So, we are going to be providing maps and detailed directions on our website and to the Disability Community and every way that we can and to make sure that people have access to that information. Were also, and i think that sarah may have mentioned this already but were working together with mta on ensuring that google happens and other mapping and navigating tools reflect the current information because we found that some of those tools are giving old information saying some things are closed that are not and not telling people exactly where they can drop someone off or where they can have their car shared driver drop them off. And improving signage throughout the park so people can be districted where they need to get to when theyre approaching and in the park. And the map and directions that i spoke about, those actually should be posted any time now. Theyre just being finalized. What were talking about is an i can share that information with the council. The map and the detailed directions are developing. Those should be posted on our website at sfrec. Org. Could you also you have about a minute left. You will be able to find the map and detailed directions and on our website and and the last thing i want today say that if theres the public can email us directions at rpdinform and at sfgov. Org and they can call 145 8312700 if they have any feedback or questions or comments. They can also contact me directly. Thats all i had to go over. Excuse me, how did they contact you directly . Im at lucas. Tobin sfgov. Org. It welcome back great if we can figure out a way to have frank to your information about accessibility within rec and park on our site. Its just, you know, it will just make life a little bit easier, hopefully for folks. It gets a little crazy trying to track down where everything is located. Theres a theme with my questions and observations and im only going to make one. First of all, thank you for your presentation. Again, do you have or would you consider having members of the disabled community participating in whatever your outreach planning, where the decisionmaking planning occurs within your organization . Within your particular Program Areas . I think it would just make a lot more sense for us to be able to communicate with you directly and as a followup, you were mentioning all of these things that you are planning on doing. Are they done . When will they be done . What is the timeline for having them completed . So, ill answer the second part of the timeline. We are some things will happen more quickly so like i said the information on the website it will up as soon as today and as soon as that is finalized. Were converting the Parking Spaces in the tour bus parking lot that are, as we speak, being converted to seven days a week and those are only accessible on saturday. Theres a decision made a while ago to do that so those are being changed. As far as redesigning that parking lot and designing accessible park north some of pf the areas will take longer but we hope in 30 days well have that. Within what you would say by midnovember . Yes. And then as far as the way finding signage in the park were hoping that that can be completed within 30 days as well. And those are most of the initiatives. The map and the directions will be updated as things are add or if anything has changed but those should be really quickly. If people want to take advantage of weather and get out there. I dont want to promise our westbound guy was able to get them posted today but there was a possibility of that. I would say for sure by early next week. The infor information should bee website. Absolutely, we definitely want to find a way to make sure were engaging and to be more efficient. Its sort of been mdc talks to nicole and we talk to nicole and it sort of is not as efficient as it could be. I think were coming at good ideas and were getting the information that we need from the community but, it could be a lot more efficient. I would love you to contact me directly and maybe some things out or i would share that information with alex and other Council Members who want to participate in this. Thank you, lucas. Council members, do you have questions or comments . I do. You can go first. Do you want me to go first . Or do you want to go . I can go. All right, go ahead. The interpreters are figuring it out. One moment. Go ahead. So just really briefly just a quick comment. I just wanted to issue between the bicycles and the walking at the same time needing muff for Parking Spaces for people who need parking as well. Who need parking close to the museums in terms of access. People like, you know, the under served community is not very well organized often times. Im just curious how you will address that with all the different people using the park. Its important we bring everybody into the conversation and make sure that everybodys concerns are addressed. I will say that one potential opportunity that we have here is that with jfk, with the vehicles and the bicycles and people walking and pushing strollers and things, its a lot going on in one place. We may actually find that things are a little bit safer if we make accessible parking close to commerce street. That is just me kind how did we have the question that do you guys have a disabled working group besides talking to mdc and mod and mta regarding the high dense ability and how contacting and people that are reaching and the city portion is that they mention to say that this is more of an issue regarding accessibility and paratransit and its a little bit concerning and confusing it is true that things happen a lot more slowly than wed like them to. I do feel like were in a great place now where this topic specifically and like you are saying, other topics as well are being addressed and i like the idea. My other role at rec and park is all of our programs for people with disabilities and we just started parents groups for our programs for kids and its something we havent had for a long time and that has been great. So i really like your idea of starting a group with disability communities and looking at these kinds of issues. Mostly, what weve done before is look at program issues of programs that were providing. And is there another part to your question . Yeah. I would like to go back to the issue that working group. Have you considered talking to a chance to be involved in that usage because theyre the ones that provided the service, not the other agencies, right . Yes, yeah. So thats actually an excellent discussion. I mean, we are relying on mta right now and i think you are right that it makes sense if that can work to bring in their director to these discussions because they are on the front, you know, right there driving people and taking them and ive worked with people and programs for 30 years who are coming on paratransit and its the worst feeling in the world to have to cancel a program because the paratransit, you know, gets messed up and they go to the wrong place. For kids on a saturday or for someone to miss a program because paratransit, there was some kind of confusion where they had to drop off. And so, maybe sarah had the comment about this as well how we can really make sure theyre still in the discussions until the theyre clear on the information and they can provide input directly. Do you have something to add . Yeah, basically i what you just said lucas but i just wanted to affirm that this is important to be in these conversations and to talk directly to people and so i will work with my colleagues at m. T. A. And paratransit to bring paratransit explicit tetity of s issue of accessibility of Golden Gate Park. Thank you. I would just want to add emphasize, sarah and lucas, you need to representatives from the disabled community when you are doing that, not just discussion the fact that this is an issue. All of our experience is trying to get from point a to point b and theres nothing i find more impactful than first person experience. Especially when were having to navigate so many hoops to try to just go and spend a day with our family and friends. I know were hitting you over the head with it but i want to make sure that it doesnt end up being some agency and discussion that we are met with this community and it doesnt have to be mdc people. Clearly we have a lot of people who want to Say Something and we need to move along and i should probably stop talking. Before i do that, i wanted to check in with my fellow members see if they can any questions for the panel. It feels like the community and left behind and our access to nature and for our Mental Health is to be swept under the rug any time there needs to be any type of changes or cuts so i just want to reiterate the more disabilitycentered we can be, the more we actually access for everybody. And, i would like to also point out that it is incumbent on members of the disabled community to commit to participating in these efforts as well. So in the opportunity presents itself, i hope that we have some people who are interested in a contribution and a substantive contribution and we will if you are interested to the mdc website. Someone could they mute themselves, please. Thank you. Im going to go through the list of Council Members. Do you have a question . Kate williams . Helen s. It kind of sounds like the bachelor, doesnt it. Im going to take your rose. I just needed a little levity here. Debbie kaplan, is going to read a summary of the inaudible message that i believe the mod received during this meeting. So, you are up. Yeah, thank you. So, in the last couple of weeks, m. O. D. And m. D. C. Have received 23 messages concerns about the j. F. K. And rather than reading all of them, which i dont think my voice is up for it and why want to cut into people on the phone, ill summarize. The issues theyve raised are, the importance of parka men tee and facilities such as the academy of science and the museum. All the Different Reasons why theyre important. The reduction in parking that is close to these facilities and many people have talked about their difficulties in walking very far. Two or three blocks may seem like not very much to someone who doesnt have a mobility disability, but for some people it means impossible. Parking in the garage is not affordable for many. One person said quote, with the impending close your of jfk after Everything Else one of the interpreters froze. Can someone else pick that up, please. Thank you. So what we heard is quote, this is a quote from one person. Would the impending close your of j. F. K. , after Everything Else, im hearing quote, our fun is more important than your access. Im also hearing that healthy San Francisco is for Healthy People and that obviously doesnt include you. Other issues people have raised is, that they ned to be able to use taxis and lyft inside the park and others have talked about safety with respect to bicyclists. And have described situations where they have been rolling our walking and have had either almost or have had accidents with bicyclists. So, that is the summary of all those messages. This is nicole through the chair. I have to clarify that we will, because we going to make sure that they have a digest of all the comments that you can read and respond to on your own time. Thank you, nicole. I was just going to ask what it was going to be. Now were going to go on to participants and ask them jim or sean, are we ready with callers . Yes, we have about five callers right now. Ok, great. Lets get started. Caller hello, again this is cairo with disability action. Based on how not well the designated bike lines was implemented and being used at jfk, we really emphasize that before you do any closure, the remaining part and the part that does get closed, is totally accessible. And i hear in a lot of comments how we need to get the Community Involved and everything but first of all, we node to get all the government stakeholders on the same table and the same room and discussing this and going through the alphabet its not only park and rec but the c. T. A. , which handles the funding, the sfmta because its all fulton street and the great highway and involves getting there and its not just accessible in size, accessibility means outside too. Getting the m. O. D. Involved, getting the mack involved, getting the tcc involved, do i have enough alpha bets here. Basically, and then, ilrc, rich land senior center, for instance and also get the supervisors involved. Supervisor fewer, she still is going to be until january. Get her involved with it. Get a whole group together instead of we the community have to go first through the mta and then wove got to go through m. O. D. And then to the packs and rec. Get them all together. Do it as a town hall or whatever, a task force or something, really get it together. Because its all bits and pieces and we do not want to end up with another designated bike lane problem. Which evolves, which the mod was involved, the senior and people with disabilities workgroup has come up with a guideline how bike lanes should look like. And i think the park and rec should go back to that and treat some of the problems we are having with that. So p. Basically, get everybody involved at once and set up separate meetings here and there while we got communications between the m. O. D. And park and rec but where theres the communication with the department of rec or community with the m. T. A. So, im for closing the street. Ive been there as a bicyclist and disabled bicyclist. Accessibility should be for everybody. I hate to harp on this but the bicycle line there, even, as a psyche list, doesnt feel safe. So i will not ride in it. I will ride out in the street. Im sorry. That is very badly designed and why want to see that for the rest of j. F. K. Thank you. Thank you. Our next caller, please. Caller hello, my name is Richard Rothman and i have to grow with kai about the bicycle lanes. We were on the mayors Pedestrian Safety Advisory Committee and we went out there and we chose or we suggested to mta how to fix the bicycle lanes and to change it to make it safer for people with disabilities and you think mta looks into it, hell know. They just do what they want to do and to the gentleman who said about that email address, i emailed the address, you didnt answer my questions, you just send me back a form about kova and i didnt ask about that so did will you please answer my emails and not send me back form letters and one thing they didnt talk about is the ferris wheel is coming. Where are people going to park for the ferris wheel. How are disabled people going to get parking for the ferris wheel and also, they didnt talk about the Concourse Authority who controls the garage underneath. They set the rates not rec and park, not the city, and why think that theyll be rolling the rates because they have to pay the bond off by 2038. Theyve been losing money because no one has been in the park. So theres always these issues and then also about fulton street. People want to park on fulton street and walk into the park. How does it impact the neighborhood if you keep jfk closed in the parking so the way you are saying it, the disabled people cant get into the concourse. Youve got about 20 more seconds left. I just wanted to give you time. I know supervisor fewer is going to have, you know, a meeting, you can reach ut to her and talk to her office about it. This needs a lot more planning. Thank you for your time. We are providing breakfast, lunch, and supper for the kids. Say hi. Hi. Whats your favorite . The carrots. The pizza . Im not going to eat the pizza. You like the pizza . They will eat anything. Yeah, well, okay. Sfusds meal program right now is passing out five days worth of meals for monday through friday. The program came about when the shelter in place order came about for San Francisco. We have a lot of students that depend on School Lunches to meet their daily nutritional requirement. We have families that cant take a hit like that because they have to make three meals instead of one meal. For the lunch, we have turkey sandwiches. Right now, we have spaghetti and meat balls, we have chicken enchiladas, and then, we have cereals and fruits and crackers, and then we have the milk. We heard about the school districts, that they didnt know if they were going to be able to provide it, so weve been successful in going to the stores and providing some things. Theyve been helpful, pointing out making sure everybody is wearing masks, making sure theyre staying distant, and everybody is doing their jobs, so thats a great thing when youre working with many kid does. The feedback has been really good. Everybody seems really appreciative. They do request a little bit more variety, which has been hard, trying to find different types of food, but for the most part, everyone seems appreciative. Growing up, i depended on them, as well, so it reminds me of myself growing up. I have kids at home. I have six kids. Im a mother first, so im just so glad to be here. Its so great to be able to help them in such a way because some families have lost their job, some families dont have access to this food, and were just really glad to be we continue our celebration, our Community Celebration here for bubble upper yard. I would like to introduce our executive director from Mission Housing, and hes joining us via video. Thank you so much. Hello, everyone, i want to say thank you for letting us to share this fantastic day with the community. My name is sam moss, from Mission Housing development corporation. One of the developers for the balboa park upper yard. Were standing on the future site of 130 lowincome family units for the community and throughout San Francisco. I really want to thank supervisor safai, the Board Directors of Mission Housing, the bart board of directors as well. Were also standing on land that will eventually be a Brandnew Community center and new bart station and plaza. And its things like these, collaborations like these, that are the most important work that we do in the Affordable Housing community. Its important to take advantage of sites like this. They dont come up very often. With the construction that is as expensive as it is and the Uncertain Times right now, im honored to personally to be able to say thank you for allowing to us help to deliver this Vital Community center. Most importantly, cuhj and the community for sticking together and working together throughout the last five years to make this a reality. Without the tireless work that cuhj has put forth since 2008, i dont believe that wed be here. Its important for everyone that is watching to realize that the standard for affordable Housing Development and Community Organization has been set at the balboa park upper yard. This will be the new norm, engaging everyone that will benefit from the property, and not just those that live at the property, its at the heart of Mission Housings mission and im honored to stand here today and to say how awesome its going to be. And, finally, i want to thank the Mission Housing deputy executive director. I know it looks like i run the company but without marcia, Mission Housing would not be where we are today. Thank you, marcia. And im honored to welcome mayor london breed. Thank you so much, sam. Im mayor london breed. Im so excited to be here with all of you today for the balboa park upper yard groundbreaking. Now this is really a groundbreaking project for the lake view o. M. I. Community. Its one of the second 100 Affordable Housing projects in the lake view community. And that has no small part to do with the people of this community who have fought for years and years for their fair share of not just housing, but 100 Affordable Housing. 131 units. Right here at balboa park. And let me just talk a little bit about how amazing this project is. Not only will there be an onsite child care, there will also be wrap around services for families. And whats so amazing about this project is that we will be using neighborhood preference. So the people of this Community Get the right for the units built in their community. Its time to change how we provide Affordable Housing in communities. It cant just be that we build this housing and then no one who grew up and was born and raise in regard this community has access. We have so many incredible leaders who are going to be working with us to make sure that the people of this community apply for the Affordable Housing and that they get in. Its going to be up to you. But let me also tell you about some of the great amenities of this project because this is how housing should be built. Very close to transit corridors. And were lucky to have a bart a partner in the sfmta, so i want to thank sfmta and i want to thank bart and thank all of our transit agencies for the work they have not only done to work so we could use this property for 100 Affordable Housing, but the work thats going to be provided around reimagining what this plaza looks like. There will be additional bart trains. There will be traditional resources. 30 million from the state invested in this project. Which is just one of the many things that we know that we need to do as a city to make sure that we are building more housing along transit corridors. Its not only efficient for the people who rely on Public Transportation every single day but its good for the environment also. And let me just take an opportunity to really thank Mission Housing and sam moss for the work theyve done on this project. I want to thank bill white and related for what they have done and our sfmta department for working with us to transition this property for Affordable Housing. And i want to thank bart for their partnership. I want to thank our Mayors Office of housing and the work that they have done. It really does take a village. These projects are so expensive. Because its not just about building housing, its about building the infrastructure to maintain this housing for generations to come. Its about redoing the plazas and making it work. Its about the fact that there will be families moving into this particular development and we want to make sure that children have a safe place to play. So so many incredible things. Such an amazing project. And let me also just give credit to where credit is due where credit is due. The leader of this community, supervisor safai, when he first stepped on the board of supervisors, he said that it is really unfortunate that no Affordable Housing has even been built in this community. And he wanted to change that. We are breaking ground on the second affordable Housing Development in district 11 since hes been in office and thats an absolute amazing accomplishment. We are so grateful for his leadership, his partnership, and the work that he has done, not only to provide Affordable Housing but the job center, the library, and the parks, everything that matters to people and families who actually live here. Because of this supervisor, the Lakeview Community is no longer the forgotten community of San Francisco. So, ladies and gentlemen, i would like to introduce supervisor safai. [applause] thank you, madam mayor. This is an historic day and were really excited to be here. I want to start off by saying that rather than keeping this site and just as an empty parking lot or used as parking, we went she doesnt like when i say this but we marched into the Mayors Office but we marched slowly and we said what can we do creatively on this site while were waiting for Affordable Housing to be built. And we came up with a plan for safe parking. There are individuals in this city that are unhoused and that are living in their vehicles and she did not even hesitate. She supported us, myself and the supervisor brown at the time and we were able to create something that has never been done in San Francisco. And thats safe parking for those that are unhoused, living in their vehicles. Were coming up on about a oneyear anniversary of that work and it has been extremely successful. So i want to thank the mayor for supporting us and believing us and allowing us to do something positive with this site while we waited for the housing to get built. Another thing that the mayor did when she was on the board of supervisors that i dont want to i want to underscore, is neighborhood preference. Neighborhood preference says that if you live within proximity, if you live within the radius of this site, you will have first crack at getting into these apartments. That is something that had never been done in San Francisco before, and that is extremely important to the Lakeview Community. About 20, 30 years ago this community was over 50 african american. Today its down to less than 20 . But the children and the families of those families that have grown here and been raised here and prospered here are still connected to this community. They will have the ability if they live in these homes and their families and other neighbors will have the ability to apply for these. And i want to give a special recognition to miss gwen brown who runs our job opportunity center, shes also going to be working on our Employment Opportunities for this site. Shell be someone that we work with at Mission Housing and the Mayors Office works with to ensure that we do the outreach in this community so people apply. Thats a very important thing. Another thing again to thank the mayor, this project would have not been at the top of the pile. We came in and we made the argument that this district has never seen any family Affordable Housing built on any scale. Mayor breed put us at the top. She listened to us and she heard the community and she heard our voices and filled that gap, an additional 20 million to 30 million, first out of the eraf funds and now out of the propa Affordable Housing bond fund. That is what closed the gap for this project and were here celebrating today, a major grant, a transportation grant, that was awarded to this site. Another 20 million. This site is special. This site is important for this community. And we would not have been able to be celebrating this without mayor breed and her leadership and support. So thank you, mayor breed. [applause] Mission Housing related have been wonderful partners. I dont know how many times i had to pick up the phone and call bill witty and work through problems to make sure that this project is going to stay on track, that its going to be built, that it will be family. And then let me make one last point before i end. Another thing that the mayor and i worked on together when she was board president and along with supervisor jane kim, along with supervisor aaron peskin, we updated the conversation about what is affordable. And affordable for whom. So many times in this city people are talking about housing and Affordable Housing just for extremely lowincome families. And you know what, we do a pretty good job of that in San Francisco. And we need to do more. But what we havent done, and what this community has always been has been a community of working people, a community of working families. Im talking about nonprofit workers and im talking about teachers and im talking about muni drivers and educators and im talking about people that get up and to make this city run every day. And because of the work that we did, we have been able to expand the definition of affordable. We have been able to ensure that working families will also be included in this conversation. So that when a janitor applies or when a nonprofit worker applies, they will also be able to qualify for this housing. Now thats not at the exclusion of lowincome families, because what we did we expanded the pie. Instead of having 80 to 100 units we went up to 130, and we did that with a community process. So im very proud of the results here today. Im very happy to be here. I want to thank again related Mission Housing, mayor breed, the Mayors Office of housing and Marion Harris from the district 11 council, thank you for being here. Phylicia thibedeau from one of the institutions in lakeview o. M. I. And i see the folks from community, united for health and justice. I want to recognize all of the Community Work that went into making this possible. This is years in the making. This is something that will be special and lasting and thank you very much, everyone. [applause] oh, sorry, and, yes, our other partner that is very important because were sitting on their land is bart. Bartd has been a partner bart has been a partner in helping us to solve the pusonl the puzzle n reimagining this plaza here. And sfmta was also a part of that, but i would like to bring up miss alicia trouse from bart. Thank you. Hello, welcome. Im alicia trouse, im the bart communications officer, and welcome to our bart station. I love this station. I love how easy you can jump off a train and get on a muni bus. Its a great partnership. And our business is moving people, right, but its also gaining lifetime riders. You do that by building housing right across the street from your station. I want to briefly talk about something that were very concerned about at bart. Its the mobility divide. Youve heard of the digital divide, right . Well, theres a mobility divide. And its perpetuating inequality and the way that you tackle is to build 100 Affordable Housing right next to transit, right next to bart and right next to muni and you make it easy to go to your job and Health Care Appointment and school by doing that. And this partnership is going to tackle that divide. And next i toss it to our bart board of director bevin duffy, who represents district 9, so lets roll the tape. Im proud to join you this morning virtually on behalf of the bart board of directors and my colleagues simon and director jantzidirectjanice lee. We are proud to be here to recognize the Community Leaders that i have known for so many years here in San Francisco who had a vision for what could be done and that we could take this site and develop homes for families that need them and to create a vibrant Meeting Place that brings the Community Together and also to recognize the importance of transit oriented development. What were trying to do at bart around the bay area, which is to build complete communities that have housing and retail and sometimes commercial and great bike and Pedestrian Access and Public Meeting and gathering places. And so i really want to congratulate the Mayors Office of housing and Community Development and also Mission Housing development corporation. And related companies. And sfmta and our transit partner. And so many great things will come as a result of this that well have better seamless transit access and that individuals, including bart at balboa park, you will find a Great Community space where we may have farmers markets and other things that really bring our Community Together. I really want to say that we are extremely grateful to the community and i also want to add to mayor london breed, supervisor safai, supervisor avalos, and the previous supervisor for this district, and really just to say that that the city has really come together to create an amazing t. O. D. Project. Thithis is an important milestoe and were gratified to be part of it and to show the bay area that we can develop muchneeded housing and help to have a more complete community. Thanks. Now id like to introduce bill witty, the chairman and c. E. O. Of related california, one of the Largest Developers of Affordable Housing based here in this great city of San Francisco. Everyone, please welcome bill witty. [applause] thank you, alicia. You know, as the mayor and supervisor safai said, i have been working both in government and in the private sector in San Francisco since the early 1980s. This is the first time the first year that i can remember a big push for Affordable Housing in this neighborhood, which has long been needed. And i think that whats really made this happen you have already heard is that weve gotten to work along with Mission Housing with two of the most Effective Advocates for Affordable Housing, not only in this city but in california. With mayor breed, if you mention Affordable Housing and are about to ask for something, she will typically say yes. Now the answer is yes. Now whats the question . You cant do any better than that. And supervisor safai who has become a friend and colleague over these years, working on this project, and every month i know that im going to get a call from him saying, whats going on. What can we do . Oh, we have this technical problem. Lets figure out a way to solve it. Oh, we have to lobby the state to get funding, what can i do to help. Hes really helped, along with our partners at Mission Housing, in bringing the community into this so that this is not just about bricks and mortar. This is about holistic housing, you know, and youve heard all of the components of that in working with the community. I would also like to thank our staff and silver berg and nick wilder here today for all of the Technical Work needed to work with our partners at bart to make this technically feasible. This is a very challenging site. We have to deal with barts legitimate questions. We have to deal with issues of inaggress and egress to have the services and the site work and the child care, all on a very complicated site. We have a great architect in methune partners and a great partner in cayhill contractors and its all come together to make it happen. And i would like also to acknowledge the Mayors Office of housing who on behalf of the city has worked with us throughout to make sure that all of the funding works together and that as supervisor safai said to close the gap to make the financing feasible. So i look forward to the day when we open this development. In a few years from now we will welcome the residents of lakeview and others for whom this housing was intended. So thank you very much. And now i will bring back marcia contrares of Mission Housing. Thank you, mr. Witty, thank you for joining us and thank you for your kind words. I would like now to introduce jesse fernandez, the Program Manager with Communities United for health and justice. Jesse . Buenos dias, good morning. Im jesse fernandez, im with Communities United for health and justice, were a multireliant program across the district. We are celebrating Affordable Housing, Community Serving here at balboa park upper yard station. This project represents the very best in collaboration between the community and the decisionmakers. And i want to invoke all of the Community Planners who for 10 years have rolled up their sleeves and time and again made the case to make this project possible and have done so guided by a heartfelt communityled process. Our success at the balboa park upper yard should set an example for peoplefocused planning for our ever changing city, to always keep people at the forefront of decisionmaking. I would like to acknowledge the hard work of our former Supervisor John Avalos for working with the community and advocating for necessary resources that are long overdue across our district. Thank you very much. Thank you, jesse. Well, we are at the end of our Community Celebrations. Thank you to all of the partners that joined us today and to everybody that joined us virtually. Thank you to cuhj, for [speaking spanish] the ymca of San Francisco, mayor london breed and supervisor safai, and all of the representatives from bart and their team for their support while coordinating this event. And, of course, our development partner, mr. Bill witty from related company for their understanding and being able to work with us and identify the needs of this community and the families of district 11. We also want to thank our team at Mission Housing for reaching this milestone and a special thanks to our board of directors for always supporting us. Last but not least i would like to send a special thank you to our Senior Communications manager for working on all of the logistics and to make sure that this event was a successful and safe one for everyone who participated. Thank you again for joining us and until the next one