Transcripts For SFGTV2 20110906

>> alright. good morning. it is a beautiful sunny day here in the bayview, right in the heart of the baby. is a great day to be here. we of great things we are talking about today. i am the director of public works for at least a little bit longer. happy to be here with this great group of folks behind me. i am going to introduce the folks who will speak, but just a little context here. there is a lot -- there are two themes coming together here we are talking about today. one of the themes is our neighborhoods. neighborhoods of san francisco are what make san francisco. for those of us who live here, they have an identity. they have a character. we want them looking good. the commercial corridors in our neighborhoods are the lifeblood of the neighborhoods. it is where we come to shop and to be and to walk around. it also happens to be were the greatest need is in terms of keeping the city clean. we want to be strategic about where we deploy our resources. said that is one of the themes here today. -- so that is one of the themes here today. the second theme is jobs. when maoyr lee -- mayor lee came into office, he recognized that as one of his priorities. we have a great, new, strong ordinance, a new law in place. the one thing the mayor has been singing from day one. we need to think beyond construction. we need to think about the private sector, elsewhere in the public sector. neighborhoods and jobs coming together is why we are here. without further ado, the man who is responsible for all of this and has been leading this great city very well for the last seven months or so, our mayor, ed lee. [applause] mayor lee: thank you, ed. thank you, public works. as you know, i used to head the agency. thank you. you have been helping keep our city clean and keep the projects going and keep the employment that is so vital to the city up and keep the projects going to full completion, whether it is generally hospital or the library programs. i also want to think -- i also want to thank supervisor cohen. this is about promises we have heard from many, many years. and i want to thank her for being aggressive on this, because these are old promises that our city has made to communities like the bayview for many, many years. it takes new talent to keep those fulfilled. so, her office, with the mta getting their funding, and the department of the nine men -- putting all this funding together to work on the corridors program and to work with redevelopment and work force development to make sure we are there as well. these programs combine to hire san francisco residents, to use a very valuable program verysf -- very valuable program called sf shine. and to work with a nonprofit she heads up. combining all that fulfills a promise that supervisor cohen and i have been talking about for a long time. how do we get back to cleaning up our streets? business facades that helps small businesses. how do we bring pride and economic development at the same time, and how do we breed hope in people by locating shops that pay well? we also do that with a principle i have always held, and it is one i have had reflected in our relationship with the labor union. we do it with our labor friends. we do it with their apprenticeship programs. and while we have a pre- apprentice at the -- pre- apprentice ship program if we have an apprenticeship program. that apprentice ship program has been one in that opportunity to work with. the local labor unions have always found a way to work with the city. they have found it this way, and working with us and freeing up their resources to help establish a mission neighborhood district center and having a nonprofit host their pre-apprenticeship program, they are providing financial resources as well as their apprenticeships rules directed program. we have done this the right way. i know everyone put a lot of valuable time into making this sunrise and putting all the funding together with the various departments coming together. what we have in store will cover 175 blocks in the city. the most gritty, i get the most sensitive ones that are commercial -- the most ready, yet the most sensitive ones that are commercial corridors in the city. they have already been through the hiring process. these individuals a proven they want to show up to work. it is a world-class economy, and to let folks know the folks who will be cleaning streets, removing stickers from polls, cleaning graffiti, i want you to know, you are part of a world- class city. you are part of a work force that keeps our world-class status here. i do not want you to think you are just part of a street cleaning program. you are not. you are part of a world-class city. just like the labor union, the department of the environment. we take pride in connecting everyone up. it begins in our neighborhoods. but it ends with the whole city's world-class status. and we could not do this without everybody feeling the same y. they are part of the work force, some 26,000 people that served in the city, and they are part of a world-class standard. so, i want international tourists to be visiting this restaurant and to know that it was part of sf shines, part of a program at the neighborhood level, but they have world class people to serve them better part of our revelation of businesses along the first street corridor, and i am so proud to be down here to kick this program off with supervisor cohen, knowing that it has the world-class touch to let. we have been feeling isolated, disconnected. we do not want that to happen. we want to make sure that those on third street feel a part of the. we did this with the renovation of the t-line. it is an old promise, being led by new leaders like malia cohen. thank you for all the departments of come together on this. we have been talking about this for many months. especially last year when the budget had to be cut for the corridors program. we said, we are not going to let that stop was. mohamad talked about this, saying, how are we going to restore pride? we have to do it through at job creation. have to do it the right way. everyone has had combined efforts. even the puc, with their money, they know keeping track out of the water drainage system, that will all flow in when it is raining, they will be a better performing utilities commission on this. so, they put their money in. everybody has done is the right way. mostly, i am proud of all of the residents here giving up hope that they can have these jobs that are modern jobs. with that come my congratulations to everybody. congratulations to all the department's. -- with that, my congratulations to everybody. all the 175 blocks to bring all level of planning, and a level of civic pride. thank you very much. [applause] >> thank you, mr. maher. he kind of breeze over it, but i do want to note -- when he took office, he was facing a more than $300 million deficit he had to close. building the budget, he was focused on cutting in a way that was responsible. but it was mostly a cutting exercise. when we went to him and said, we actually need to grow, sir, it took a lot of courage for him to make an investment as part of this budget. which he did. that, you could say, was may be the easy part. he proposes the budget, and then he has to turn to the board. the board was faced with a lot of demands for a small amount of resources. supervisor cohen was a great leader. they saw the value in this investment. investing in our neighborhoods, investing in our people be buying -- investing in our people. so, i do not want that to be lost in the fact that the mayor and the board have taken a courageous steps in making those dollars available. representing the board today, we're in her district, you're great supervisor, supervisor melia -- supervisor malia cohen. supervisor cohen: i want to talk about mayor lee. he is so may your role now. there was a time when he would go to the microphone and say two or three sentences. those days are gone. he took all of my talking points. i want to commend his leadership in office, what he has been able to to. he has honor his commitments. everything he said he is going to do, he has done. i just want to also acknowledge -- thank you for being a business on that the third street emerging corridor. you've made donations for a lot of our meetings. this is a beacon of hope. we are not stopping here. we are working along the third street corridor. steps that we are taking today are going to assure that folks who come to san francisco are going to come along the corridor and shop and spend their money and be able to see and feel the committee -- the community we have here. we will not be deterred by negative energy. we will continue to move forward in bill. i am glad to see the bayview here. it is today we kicked off the ambassadors program. -- yesterday we to adopt the ambassadors program. the commitment we have to the community is on wavering. we are going to be here. i will be here with the department heads the banking or screaming, they will be here. hello? 35 members. this is local hire at its finest. at one to introduce vivian. everyone needs a visionary. everyone needs a visionary on their team. she runs the sf shines program. i also want to acknowledge our third street management corridor. we and many partners year that will make this community robust and drive. with other partners. we have these san francisco housing development corp. i could go on and on. it is important that we continue to show thankfulness and a strong sense of gratitude. we do this work on a daily basis. i want to come out here and reiterate my commitment. is on wavering. i will be here in good times and bad. i will bring it the mayor and everyone else with me. i want to let them know the role they are playing along third street is important. you are, in many ways, the ambassador. it is important we keep the bayview clean and make it sparkle and shine. when we start to see pieces of trash, that sends a message to the residence that we do not care. today, we are watching and we are taking back third street. like i said, one block at a time. thank you, everyone. >> thank you, supervisor cohen, for your leadership. i will not be coming kicking and screaming. and just so you know, the mayor already gave me your list of concerns about the muni coming through your district. the supervisor talked about this program, and putting folks to work is really resuscitating a program started years back. the reason why this is called a partnership is because it is not just about the city coming in and clean. is about a partnership with our businesses and residents in these corridors. in each one of these corridors, we work hard to establish relationships with the merchants to help educate in terms of responsibility for keeping the city clean, and to work with them to find out what we needed to jointly, collectively to make the city as beautiful as it is, to make it the world-class city the mayor spoke about. we have a great partner right here in the bayview. i want to ask a representative -- she goes with the bayview renaissance center and the bayview merchants association. >> good morning, afternoon probably now. thank you, ed. i am the vice president of the bayview merchants association. as you ever heard from the mayor and ed and are supervisor, revitalization is about a lot of things. is about a lot of moving parts. is about a lot of relationships and things happen simultaneously. the work we are doing with the apprenticeship program, the things we're doing as bayview merchants, we are a robust group, and the work that the redevelopment agency and the mayor's office is doing with sf shine, all this work happens together. malia also referenced our community partners. revitalizing neighborhoods means all that were. and growing up, our mothers and fathers told us to where our best to sunday church. -- wear our best to sunday church. how things look matter. people need to be proud of how they look. vivian, we love you. this sf shines program is vital. you have appetizer's for as -- for us. we have merchants available. wheat thank you so much. this program, the work we are all doing together is going to make as the thriving bustling commercial corridor we want to be part of. i want to thank the mayor's office and dpw. thank you to james. we will continue to do the work. thank you. [applause] >> thank you. so come that you have heard from the people who brought the leadership and the vision and the means to implement. now i want to give you an opportunity to hear from someone on the ground. from someone who knows what this work is, what it means, how important this is typical of this city. someone who has been part of the dpw family. >> thank you. good morning. dpw. i am going to talk about my experiences as dpw. it gave me an opportunity. i've learned a lot of things to the corridor. i have also -- we just came up here. while. would put some decomposed granite in these bottles, and came out with some volunteers, and we weeded out the trees and all that stuff, but this has been a great opportunity. i will soon be graduating. when i came in, i was a 99-16. these guys are in the prince -- are in the pre-apprenticeship program. i took pride in my job. sometimes it would be tedious work. i would come out and work hard. you could see the merchants, the merchants will criticize you one way or another. if you are doing a great job, they will say, hey, you are doing a great job, give you a soda pop or water. if not, they will also write in and say, hey, this guy is not doing the job. i have enjoyed myself year. seeing everybody speak, this is a tough act to follow, you know? they also good and positive things. i will say, let's keep san francisco green and clean, do our best as partners in the city, and just keep up a good job. thank you. [applause] >> could not have said it better than that. i want to make sure we acknowledge different people. we have melanie nutter, mitch salazar. he is going to be on the ground. mohammed nuru. this is a great new way we are partnering together. i want to look knowledge the mta, the puc, the office of work force development. thank you for the work you're doing in our neighborhoods. the partnership of the police department, making sure we are all safe. and finally, again, supervisor cohen and mayor lee. thank you. there are so many ways that the internet provides real access to real people and resources and that's what we're try to go accomplish. >> i was interested in technology like video production. it's interesting, you get to create your own work and it reflects what you feel about saying things so it gives perspective on issues. >> we work really hard to develop very in depth content, but if they don't have a venue, they do not have a way to show us, then this work is only staying here inside and nobody knows the brilliance and the amazing work that the students are doing. >> the term has changed over time from a very basic who has a computer and who doesn't have a computer to now who has access to the internet, especially high speed internet, as well as the skills and the knowledge to use those tools effectively. . >> the city is charged with coming up with digital inclusion. the department of telecommunications put together a 15 member san francisco tech connect task force. we want the digital inclusion program to make sure we address the needs of underserved vulnerable communities, not communities that are already very tech savvy. we are here to provide a, b and c to the seniors. a stands for access. b stands for basic skills and c stands for content. and unless we have all three, the monolingual chinese seniors are never going to be able to use the computer or the internet. >> a lot of the barrier is knowledge. people don't know that these computers are available to them, plus they don't know what is useful. >> there are so many businesses in the bay area that are constantly retiring their computer equipment that's perfectly good for home use. computers and internet access are helping everybody in the community and people who don't have it can come to us to help with that. one of the biggest problems we see isn't whether people can get computers through programs like ours, but whether they can understand why they need a computer. really the biggest issue we are facing today is helping people understand the value of having a computer. >> immediately they would say can i afford a computer? i don't speak any english. how do i use it. then they will start to learn how to do email or how to go back to chinese newspaper to read all the chinese newspaper. >> a lot of the barrier still is around lack of knowledge or confusion or intimidation and not having people in their peer network who use computers in their lives. >> the important thing i learned from caminos was to improve myself personally. when i first came to caminos, i didn't know anything about computers. the second thing is i have become -- i have made some great achievements as an individual in my family and in things of the world. >> it's a real issue of self-empowerment where new immigrant families are able to communicate with their families at home, able to receive news and information in their own home language, really become more and more connected with the world as well as connected even inside their local communities. >> if we value the diversity of our city and we value our diverse neighborhoods in the city, we need to ensure that they remain economically viable. equiping them and equiping residents in those areas with jobs that will enable them to stay in san francisco is critical to that. >> the important thing that i see here at caminos is it helps the low income community, it helps the women who wouldn't have this opportunity otherwise. >> the workers with more education in san francisco are more likely to be able to working that knowledge sector. where they are going to need that familiarity with the internet, they are going to find value with it and use it and be productive with it every day. and half of the city's population that's in the other boat is disconnected from all that potential prosperity. >> we really need to promote content and provide applications that are really relevant to people's lives here. so a lot of the inspiration, especially among the immigrant community, we see is communications with people from their home country but we as much want to use the internet as a tool for people to connect within the local san francisco community. >> i think it's our job as public educators to give them this access and give them this opportunity to see

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