Transcripts For SFGTV Government Access Programming 20180209

Secretary will call the roll. [roll call] actually, commissioner, please turn on your microphone. Thank you. Ok. Great. [roll call] and i believe commissioner chow has an announcement. Yes. As many of you may know, but others may not, i want to just acknowledge all the work that commissioner [inaudible]. He had resigned for personal reasons as of the beginning of this month. For that reason we have made adjustments until we have election of officers. As you know, he was Vice President and with the concurrence of the commission, we will not vote for a new Vice President until we reach march. And meanwhile, however, dr. Patings assignments, i would like to publicly make the following assignments in place of where he was. As he was chair of community and Public Health committee, ive appointed commissioner loyce to be chair of that committee. He is currently a member. And commissioner bernal will join him as a member of that committee. Dr. Pating was also on laguna honda and i will take his place on the laguna honda committee. So, those are the announcements for our Committee Assignments until we have our election. Thank you. If i may, commissioners, commissioner chow was reappoint by the Mayors Office. So, we have him for another four years which is cause for celebration. Thank you. [applause] lets move on to item number two, which is approval of the minutes from january 16, 2018. Minister, a motion is in order, please. Second. Ok. Are there any corrections to the minutes . I want to thank dr. Sanchez for actually helping chair that meeting. Who did apparently a sterling job in having it adjourn in half an hour. So, thank you, dr. Sanchez. If there are no corrections, well vote. All those in favour, please say aye. Aye. All those opposed . The Commission Meeting of january 16 minutes are accepted. Our next item, plea. Item three is the directors report. Good afternoon, commissioners. I want to, a knowledge that we have several members of the San Francisco State University Nursing Programme in our audience today. Just wanted to give them an acknowledgment for coming to the [inaudible] what happened. Also were tracking the issues as the federal government impacts us on our Health Care Services and so just to let you know, we are following this issue as it is changing every moment. So we are following the cost of 340bs and some of the potential reductions of that and the impact of the mandate of the nonmandate and status of our family community, status of Community Health centres. Were also impacted by this and the fact that we do receive dollars from the federal government for our Homeless Services in the city and we recently had our Deputy Director with the San Francisco clinic consortium in washington, d. C. To make their visits to advocate for the Health Centre funding and so were tracking all of those three areas. I suspect by the end of next month, we can probably come in and do a Financial Update for you. Just depending on where things are and we know that the potential of another closure of the federal government could happen and so we do really want to work closely for all of our providers who are dependent on federal funding and closely in communication with them. So that is the update for the federal government side. I want to let you know that we are focused on syringe disposal and so one of the policies that weve made internally is any out reach worker that is hired by the departments funding, at least for the next year or so, will have to have part of their work will be disposal. We recently hired six additional individuals who will do engagement in the community and one of their responsibilities will be syringe disposal. In your report today, it shows how weve collaborated with other City Partners to place five disposal kiosks in this last year and we currently have 17 out door syringe disposal boxes and in your report, there is a map of all of their locations. I wanted to also let you know that we have received a 6 million grant for dental transfornight fight childhood tooth decay and this will allow us to target highvalue care, improving access, utilization Performance Measures and to also increase the use of Preventive Dental Services for children. And to prevent and treat more Early Childhood carries and increased continuity of care for children. This is an Important Fund for us and we have several partners in the community. As you know, weve seen some of those reports previously in front of the commission. That is the end of my report, commissioners. If there are any questions, ill certainly try to answer those. Commissioners, any questions from the directors report that you would like to ask . Director, i only would ask if you could just speak on the dental transformation in which it seems to be under a medical programme. Is that it we would then weve had an initiative over the last several years. How will this coordinate with that initiative . It is a part of that whole coalition. Its a waiver dental care waiver that we applied for. Oh, great. So all of the partners that both you and i have [inaudible] in their events are part of this whole coalition on dental care for children. So theyre participating and some have been funded through this process. Commissioners, if there are no other questions, then well proceed to our next item. Item four is general Public Comment and i received many requests, but the requests are all specific to item seven. I just want to make sure that there is no one else that would like to speak to general Public Comment, which is about items not on the agenda. Ok. We can move on from item five. Which is a report from the finance committee from earlier today. Commissioner chung. Good afternoon, commissioners. The planning and finance committee met today before the Commission Meeting at 2 00 p. M. And our agenda is nothing but contract approval a. Youll find the consent calendars with the new contract as well as the contract report that we would like to vote on. Commissioner chung, im just noting that there was one change, probably the other commissioners didnt notice, but you corrected the oh, yeah. The term . Yes. There was one slight adjustment with the contract terms. So, what happened is there is there are about four to five contracts for Substance Abuse services and, you know, Behavioral Health. One, they are supposed to, like, have the same contract term, but one of them has a misprint so weve asked them to correct that to reflect the consistency of other contract. Its supposed to be from august 18 to 2022. Yeah. 2022. Thank you, commissioner chung. Commissioners, any questions in regards to the finance committee report, on either any of the items or anything else you would like the ask . If not, then we will move forward to the consent calendar. The consent calendar is the items before you. Are there any extractions from the consent calendar . Might note that three new contracts are related to the i. T. System and well have a report on the i. T. System later on this afternoon. Seeing none, were prepared for vote on the consent calendar. All those in favour, the consent calendar, please say aye . Aye. All those opposed . The consent calendar has been adopted. Well go on to our next item, please. Item seven is a resolution evening dorsing the San Francisco Safe Injection Services Task Force Final report and recommendations. This was presented to you the topic of the task force recommendations, whats presented to you on november 7, 2017 and you requested a resolution to be brought back to you and this is the resolution. Right. Commissioner, this is at a request that there be a resolution, but may endorse the Task Force Final report and recommendation. So, it is now before you and will be presented by ms. Logren. My name is eileen logren and i work in the department of Community Health. Thank you for your time and the opportunity to come back here today, to follow up on the presentation from november 7. Its the Safe Injection Task force recommendations that were presented. Im here to follow up specifically on the request and the resolution to support the recommendations and the operation of Safe Injection Services in San Francisco. You have a copy of the resolution in your packet, which outlines the process of the task force, the information that was presented last in november and the recommendations. You may have seen also that in other cities, similar conversations are happening. Just last week, nsdad, a National Hepatitis organization came out with a statement called a call to action. And it is a call to action to acknowledge Safe Injection Services and for other cities to consider this as a mechanism to meet the needs. This is a motion put before all of you to endorse, ask for the Health Commission to endorse Safe Injection Services in San Francisco and for supporting ab186 and to support the implementation of Safe Injection Services. As i said, you have the resolution before you. And im happy to answer any questions that you may have. About the resolution or presentation from november. Thank you. Commissioners, we do have public testimony, which id like to call before then, we ask staff for clarification or recommendations as you may wish. And then we cans review the resolutions. I will call five names in succession. The secretary will actually time the twominute testimony per person. And when the beeper goes off, please just know that means your time is up. Ok. So, first would be the following, dr. Alan cooper, holly bradford, kyle, top dollar and biscud and that could be in any order, please. Hi. Im dr. Alan cooper. Member of d. S. A. , which is taking an active interest in this. I practiced Liver Disease for over 40 years, mostly at stanford. More recently at health right. Ive taken care of hundreds of patients with hepatitis c. A few facts you may not be aware of. About 10 of people with hepatitis c have no known risk factors. Why is that important . Hepatitis c is a slowly progressive disease, usually 20 years after the infw ex no symptoms. They show up at a liver clinic, very sick, with cirrhosis, needing a transplant. How did they get it . As i said, they had no risk factors. These were basically if people going about normal life. They could be your children. Your grand children. People who might have gotten stuck at a playground, in a sandbox. Could be an adult cleaning up outside their house who got an inadvertent needle stick, didnt notice it and 20 years later show up needing a liver transplant. Hepatitis c costs about 80,000 to treat. Liver transplant, depenting on who your insurer is, 500,000, plus or minus. And then you have a shortened life span. Taking immuno suppressive drugs for the rest of your life at great cost and considerable risk. Getting these needles off the street is imperative. A programme like the Safe Injection Sites will help. Probably wont help thousands of people in the year, but one or two innocent people, like your children, or your grandchildren, may be protected by a programme like this. Thank you. Thank you. Next, please. And you can actually all line up within the aisle so it will be a little easier. Like being at the airport back there. Hi, im holly bradford. San francisco drug use union. We talk about should we come here or not shz because we pretty much know how youre all going to vote. But we wanted to come here from the Drug Users Union out of respect for you guys to say thank you for your bravery, for your willingness to care about the health and drug users in the city of San Francisco. So i dont want to take up a lot of your time. Im here out of respect and out of gratitude and that is why i came today. Our friends in denver created these little safe injection booths and im going to leave one for each of you on this table. I dont know if it is appropriate. I hope it is. Its ok. [laughter] now its done. [laughter] so San Francisco might be the first city to have a supervised injection space, but you would be the first Health Commissioners to have your own personal supervised injection booth. [laughter] and, again, thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you. Next, please. My name is kyle barker. My colleagues, first off, want to thank you very much for listening to us. Its not very often that we as addicts and people feel like we get that. And to not only be heard, but to be heard on a level where something is going to be implemented that will save a lot of lives. Improve and give a lot of second chances. That means the world to us. It allows us to have a shot to improve ourselves to have someone else and to maybe prevent someone from going down a certain road. So, from a guy who grew up in the midwest where i still, you know, have friends and are calling me and surprised that this is actually a real thing. And it is a beautiful thing. You know, its the reason i came to this city. Its progressive. It actually cares and your actions are speaking massively on that. Really honestly, thank you, guys, in the both of my heart and my daughter would thank you, too, to give me a chance to do something to save myself and turn my life around. Thank you, guys. Thank you. Next, please. Yes. My name is and following those would be biscuit, tommy, billy and aaron. Please. I would like to thank you guys for allowing us to be here and realise that there is something that can be done. And i just hope we get to it. Thank you. Thank you. Afternoon. My . Aim kevin. For the record, biscuit is what people call me. [laughter] i just want to thank each and every one of you all for giving us the opportunity to speak with you previously. Im a street musician. That is what i do. And im thinking no biggy to get up and talk for a couple of minutes. And the last time i said about three sentences and i couldnt think of anything else to say. But i mean, you know, it really is means a lot to us. Weve been working with holly, the Drug Users Union, the last couple of years from picking up dirty syringes on the street to passing out information. Helping to educate people regarding drug addiction and its effect on our Society Today and living in the place in gives us opportunity to do something positive and act of positive change regarding this, as opposed to sweeping up more underneath the carpet and keeping it and just putting it on side when it is really reaches the problem the problem has evolved into and it can just as easily be maintained and be something that is uses education tool for not only parents, for children, because and plus it will take a lot of the negativity that is associated with drug use. You know, like well, really myself. The big catch 22 that i see that i failed to mention last time is, you know, the overdose deal where naloxone is ready available and will save people from overdose and it has to be administered within so many minutes of someone having an overdose. If its applied properly, there is no side effects and saves a person and it is a wonderful thing. The education factor of making it readily available to everybody out there as a member of the public, to you know, theres people that time. That in that situation. Thank you. Sorry. Thank you. Im long wind. Thank you so much for listening to us and thank you on behalf of all the drug users in San Francisco. Thank you. Thank you. Hi. I just wanted to thank few approving a safe injection site. Thank you. Hi, my name is aaron. I think a safe injection site would be a great thing because a lot of people feel like they have to go and hide and that is when they usually o. D. And they die, you know . I just want to say thank you. Thank you. And just before the next speaker, let me call laura thomas, alex and michael diskapola or im sorry about that. Michael from the San Francisco aids foundation. [laughter] please. My name is william from the Drug Users Union. I wanted to say thank you again for letting us speak here. I think it is important that education out there, theres a lot of stigma against us. And thats what has us all on the ground and its not going get any better if we dont know whats going on, you know . So i think more information that is out there is better and it is a great thing that is going on. Thank you. Thank you. Good afternoon. Alex, Task Force Member on the supervised injection site. Task force that london breed had and i was fortunate to speak with yall a couple of months ago as well. As you know, im an epidemiologist, ive been doing research around injection drug use in San Francisco since 1993. Our group are the ones that first provided the research in jama, that Needle Exchange helps people reduce sharing syringes. Subsequently we had papers that compared sitings that ha