applause good morning, everyone. Were going to get started now. Thank you for attending todays announcement. My name is adrian, im with immigrant affairs. Let me first start by introducing the other partners for todays initiative lunch. First of all, the San Francisco foundation, dr. Sandra hernandez and tessa rivera, [speaker not understood], Senior Program officer for immigrant rights and integration, walter and alise fund, also known as the haase senior fund. Pam david, the Wallace Alexander gabode foundation, stacey ma and thomas, concerned with immigrants and refugees represented today by felicia barto, deputy director. Also present today are commissioner canali vicechair of the San Francisco immigrant rights commission, city librarian, luis herrera, [speaker not understood], and clementine of the african advocacy network. So, let me provide first of all just a little bit of background on the initiative. In 2008 while serving as city administrator, mayor ed lee created the office
The transformation of a once dilapidated pier into an exciting new space for out door recreation. ~ i wish i could be with you on this special day to enjoy Otis Reddings rendition of his fathers dock of the bay. Pier 36 was condemned due to deterioration. Democrat laytion not only removed environmental hazards in San Francisco bay, but opened the door for enhancing the connections between san franciscans and our beautiful waterfront. I have been proud to fight for federal resources to fill fa sill tate for the south beach neighbors and all of San Francisco. Today the brannon street wharf with its public space is new park has become another jewel along San Franciscos magnificent embarcadaro. The open spaces and plazas will provide a safe and healthy environment for San Franciscos families and children to gather and the interpretive exhibits including the beautiful portrait of wong fu yen will help visitors and residents learn about San Franciscos rich labor and maritime history and vibr
The [speaker not understood] foundation, the haase junior and senior foundations, as well as the Asian Pacific fund amongst many other foundations that are assisting us. This is a 1. 2 Million Initiative over the next three years with the city providing about half of the funding and the foundations stepping up with the other half. But the real work is going to be done at the community level. The Community Organizations that are going to be working with us on numerous and they reflect all the different ethnicities that i just mentioned. But i want to mention a few to give them some special thank you because theyre stepping beyond what theyve traditionally done and going into the mold of going beyond just the citizenship count and now into services into this new orientation and training, and that is [speaker not understood] for the elderly, one of the lead agency. Thank you, annie, for leading that. Youve been a wonderful collaborater with us. The asian caucus, Asian Pacific islander out
Understood] Community Resource center. As well as the african advocacy network, the arab resource organizing center, myob which is the [speaker not understood], the Southeast Asian community center, [speaker not understood] media, of course San Francisco immigrant rights commission. Well, ive often said in many speeches that our immigrant population is important. Well, over a third of our population are immigrants and we acknowledge that. But i dont just want to say it as an announcement. Everybody knows that. What we want is full participation. We want people to not be afraid or not be meeting as many barriers as they are today, from activating themselves in full participation. And i do want to have people of all languages and all heritages telling us how they want our parks to be managed, how they want community safety, how they want transportation to be had, all these things everybody else gets to do, and they weigh in pretty heavily. But i want full participation of that. And until
I have been a cable car grip for 21 years. I am a third generation. My grand farther and my dad worked over in Green Division for 27. I guess you could say its blood. Come on in. Have a seat. Hold on. I like it because i am standing up. I am outside without a roof over my head and i see all kinds of people. You catch up to people you know from the past. You know. Went to school with. People that you work with at other jobs. Military or something. Kind of weird. Its a small word, you be. Like i said, what do people do when they come to San Francisco . They ride a cable car. California line starts in the financial district. People are coming down knobbhill. The cable car picks people up. Takes them to work. There still is no other device to conquer these hills better than a cable car. Nobody wanted to live up here because you had to climb up here. With the invention of the cable car, these hills became accessible. He watched horses be dragged to death. Cable cars were invent in San Franc