Public comment. Please come forward feel free to line up and every speaker will have two minutes. Feel free to get us started. Im a me member of a volunter organization of psychiatrists, therapists, attorneys, family members and others on behalf the severely mentally ill. Demanding treatment before tragedy and i find it encouraging that attention is finally focused on improvement but both bills right now failed to tang int take into accounts y aspects of why our system is dysfunctional. Theres less visible severely mentally ill who live with family members and attempt to ward off disaster for their loved ones and bear the brunts of death threats, visible and physical abuse and disruption of their entire lives attempting to protect their family members. Yet, we have advised by representatives of the department of health to let our loved ones to be destitute to they qualify for services, that is evident. In the 1990s, there were over 100 beds in sanfrancisco and now there are 22. There were four psychiatrists, five primary care doctors and 30 nurses that had a 90 success rate at being able to place people in long. Term stable housing. The entire staff was laid off in the facility and repumped in 200repumped in2004 and these bi, have no mention of numbers or a timeline for how to restore acute, sub acute and pes beds and those who get hundreds of millions in tax breaks. Thank you so much, next speaker, please come forward. Im concerned about the weakest in the system, similar to the woman on the street. This woman on the street, waiting for somebody. As a resident board member, ive also been a consumer Mental Health service this is San Francisco. So, several months back, even before Mental Health sf was announced, i was working with the treatment on demand council and a small group of us met with hilary to tell her about treatment on demand, why it was so important and why she should support it. And she said, oh, you like treatment on demand . Have i got good news for you. Dont tell anyone yet. We have this idea for a universal Mental Healthcare program in San Francisco. We were thrilled to hear about it and weve been on board since. I was part of a group that hilary and others and matt consulted with for in put. Ive been a strong voice asking for more mobile outreach. I was listened to and thats been part of the program and the navigation component is a crucial park. I want to see this passed. Because i want to see this passed, id like to make the following recommendation. Im really afraid that you are going to be coming headtohead with urgent care sf and the Mayors Office. Because i want to see this passed, i hope you will consider possibly bringing it to a vote with the board of supervisors. Thank you so much for doing this, supervisors. Thank you. Thank you, next speaker. Good afternoon, i am a member of the senior disability action and i was the first promoter peace and creation. Where should i start. Maybe ill start with me. I went to the previous for confession and i said should you go to someone for counseling so i went to kaiser to try to get an appointment and i got the application and i got there. You are not psychotic. Were not going to see you. Im still waiting. Im here to support you because everyone knows its a San Francisco and hugged and kiss a leper too and we should too. I said thats everyone. So i am supporting you guys and also, not always with senior disability so there are 4,000 people on that email plan so i can tell them. I would go back and i had a social welfare background but if i would go back and be a case worker too. I know my housemate has an 18yearold son and im encouraging her to get him into the healthcare field. It branches where theres a will theres a way. Outside you have the nurses and the sheriff help that poor lady who fell down. We have a way. We have to have the will so include everyone exclude no one. Include everyone, exclude no one. Healthcare now Mental Health. San francisco. Hi, my name is veronica forbes. Ive been a social worker for nine years. I am a Community BehavioralHealth Specialist homelessness expert and the original Program Manager of the navigation center. In San Francisco, my clients waited one to throw months in jail or decompensating in the streets or shelter from Mental Health and drug abuse services. When someone seeks help and is put on a wait list, theres a very narrow window of time to make a difference and when missed, it takes months to years until the theyre ready or able to seek help again. All the while, theyre spiraling downward in their ability to function yet San Francisco makes cuts to the Mental Health rehab center, Residential Care facility and acute diversion units and im here to tell you all to support Mental Health sf because living people with Mental Illness and drug addictions in the streets or criminal enforcement system is ineffective and its dangerous and its wrong. Hi, my name is wind could haveman and im Vice President of aft2121 at the city college of San Francisco. And we are grateful you have crafted this legislation and we support it and i want to talk as a mother of a child that has severe meth illness. She is doing well today. Shes 37yearsold and shes had four episodes such that she was 5150ed. She has chemical dependency issues and schizophrenia diagnosis. Today shes leading a healthy, full life with friends and a meaningful job and shes a social justice advocate for climate change. The reason is because she had the resources that she needed. She had the when she was in crisis she had them after she was in crisis and before she was in crisis. She was lucky because she had a tiger balm and the mom that had resources. When i pass young people on the streets or even not so young and in their 30s or late 30s, and i see my daughter could have been that if it werent for the resource thats she had available. Thank you for this legislation. Dont compromise. Hi, my name is victoria and i represent a compassionate day. We are activists working on animals and environmental issues. Although Mental Health is not our area of expertise, we all have members touched. It is in compassionate and dignity for all and a snub of membera number ofmembers wantedr support. Thank you so much for your work. My name is liz, ive been working with homelessness and Mental Healthcare for the past nine years. For the past five years here in San Francisco including at places like tenderloin housing clinic, Progress Foundation and saint anthonys. When i was contacted by caro lena from ronens office and she asked me to i had a experience with my friend who was in San Francisco very depressed, not bad enough to need to go to the hospital but struggling and he was staying wit staying with med shuffling around to get access to services. He worked in an acute diversion units that provide residential treatment of and connect them in care so we knew the system and i knew the system and we made every effort to get him connected to care he needed to get back on his anti depresents. Like said, he wasnt bad enough to go to the hospital but most days he was too afraid to leave the house. He was dead by my second meeting. This is the system were in. Most people do not have those resources. They do not know the system as well and they do not have people who will fight as hard. If someone like that cant get access to care under the system we have, we need oversight and we need over tight outside of the d. P. H. System in order to ensure things like this dont happen. Thank you very much for doing this. Hi, everyone, my name is Jennifer Steen and im here today to say some things that initially i said i wasnt going to say. I wasnt going to say that we need Mental Health not handcuffs. During the rally someone fell on the steps and it was nurses who rushed to her aid. When the deputies came they said dont move her, how was she supposed to get help sitting in that place. Nurses make an assessment because were trained clinicians and we were able to decide it was medically safe for her to move. We had noise outside these doors of this chamber and the deputies went too far. In the psychiatric emergency room, i have seen police and sheriffs and Highway Patrol men and bart police and any other Law Enforcement who might touch someone in the city of San Francisco come in and ask us to do our jobs, which is to serve in a crisis and help people with their Mental Healthcare. In those moments when they enter our room, they know we are the right people on the job. In the streets, in peoples homes, in the neighborhoods that we serve, our clinicians arent there. One of the tenants of Mental Health sf is to make sure that trained clinicians are responding to peoples psychiatric emergencies. Trained clinicians, not people who are trained to kill. We have to make sure that as we work with the Mayors Office that trained clinicians are sent out every single day to save people and to respond at the appropriate manner and the appropriate care. Not rough, fast, over zealous because they are never going to hurt someone by accident or on purpose. Hi. My name is cheryl shang and i work with team dc organizing. My story my story. Couple years ago, i was homeless in the street addicted to drugs. I got psychosis and i was 5150 eight times. When i was in the hospital i would plead with the doctor in the psychiatric ward to please keep me. They would let me out within 24 hours. Had there been treatment on demand it wouldnt have occurred over and over and over again. Theres people out there and they need help. They need help. They need treatment on demand. They have a right to live again. They have a right to recover theyre human beings. I am a human being. I went back to the dock or to thank him and also ask questions, why do you keep letting me out and the doctor said because there was no place to put you. There was no place to put you and when a bed did come available, i kept you because you kept coming back. You people are one of the lucky ones he told me. People shouldnt have to get Mental Health by luck. By luck. We should be treatment on demand for all. Every individual perso single p. I thank you so much. I thank all of you so much for doing this. Look at me. [applause] were not throw aways, we can thrive when we get the treatment that we need. Thank you. Good afternoon, supervisors. My name is Curtis Bradford and im cochair of the tenderloin people congress. So, im here today obviously to speak in favor of Mental Health sf. Thank you for hearing our input and incorporating that in the version that we see before us today and we have the the right solution for the crisis. I want to say that i agree with David Elliott that i think theres prefer able action options goinactions tothe ballo. If we want to go to the ballot we will fight and win. And were willing to do that. I would call on the other supervisors now and the mayor to think about that. They need to work on that and we need to pass it as legislation not only because its a better way to govern but also because the crisis on our streets demands action now. People are dying now. March 2020 is a long way off. Im calling on all the supervisors to sign onto the sf legislation now. Sign on as cosiners now. Lets pass it on the board of supervisors with unanimous consent and im heard to hair the mayor is having conversations with us. I call on her to continue that and work with the board to get the best version possible but i also want to say it needs to pass the board with enough that we can make sure it gets implemented and makes a difference and theres oversight because i dont trust the system to implement it without that so thank you for doing this and lets get it done and pass it now. Thank you. My name is cw johnson and i just want to applaud all your efforts. This is the most progressive proposal i have seen in a long time that supports meth health so let me get down to it and i speak as someone who lived with meth Health Challenges most of my life. I believe having two proposals does not make sense and the Mayors Office and the board of supervisors cannot continue to operate in the world of provision. We know people who are struggling with Mental Health challenges that are homeless and need help right now. Im support Mental Health sf because its comprehensive and it doesnt address all the needs of the people. Thank you. Good afternoon, supervisors, my name is judith and i work for the San Francisco department of publichealth for 20 years. I was the founding director of homeless connect and im a member of the Moment Health board and today im speaking as a mother of a son who three and a half years ago ended this system empty and he was beaten by eight Police Officers during his first psychotic event. Since he has been in the system he has had seven placements and he has been 5150 three times and this is the child of someone who knows this system and can help him access this system. This system is really broken and i appreciate so much that you guys are moving forward quickly on this legislation and if someone said earlier every second makes a huge difference in not only someones lives but whether they continue to trust the system. As i was waiting on mine, i received a text from my sons intensive case manager and he, for the first time in three years, formed an attachment to tell me that theyre moving him to another intensive case manager and this is what we do in this system theres a program in 2003 they did away with their Mental Health institutions and committed to keeping people in the community no matter where they are in the Mental Health spectrum. I urge you to look at this model and i thank you. We cannot wait a moment more. Thank you. [applause good afternoon, tar from the executive board of harry milk club. I want to thank the supervisors here and the people in this room that brought this proposal to the place it is right now. I think its important to reflect on the fact on how government reacts to crisis. When our countrys attacked, the government responds with full force. Will we endure an earthquake here in the city, the government responds with full force. What we learn from the aids crisis was that populations that are disenfranchised are left to the cold and it takes a ground swell of support to get the response of the government. Were also explaining the same thing here and populations that are facing to address and we have to go full force. My own father spent his 70s as a homeless alcoholic in new york city. Despite the fact he didnt want the family to help him it was frustrating to see what he was going through. A city with a resources like new york not delivering a solution. San francisco also has the resources. We have billions of dollars transacted in these this is eye crisis that we have to put full support behind and Immediate Response to. Thank you. Hi, my name is general he will holland and give been a practitionepractice tishpractit. Im representing myself as a practice nish tepractitioner an. In the 80s we had two years in a halfway house. We have maybe three months. This is a psycho social issue. The Mental Health that i see with people has to do with the race, classification or identity in the world and how theyre seen and how theyre recognized for what they suffer with. I dont believe its just a medical condition but it is very disabling and we need this sf Mental Health right now. I do want to tell a story about board and cares. I dont know if people know what theyre. Theyre part of the Mental Health system and theyre going away. They have 23 beds and theyre closing december 1st. I have a client though has to go to antioch. She was at Napa State Hospital for 15 years. She gets really psychotic and she hits people and shes isolated. Shes done really well in intensive Case Management services and the Mental Health system since she left locked. I dont know what is going to happen. Antiok is supposed tantioch ise services than here. I want to thank everybody who worked on this. Good afternoon, my name is fatty anfatima and im part of e treatment on demand coalition. The majority of the clients that i work with are incarcerated, poor and working class, black and non black people of color, with histories of systemic and interpersonal trauma and im here to share my support for Mental Health sf. Which was collectively informed by both front land workers and people and communities with lived experience. Its clear theyre relying on the current Mental Health system and Law Enforcement doesnt work. Otherwise we wont need Mental Health sf to address this crisis but we do. Continuing to re