Clerk at victor. Young sfgov. Org. If you submit via email it will be forwarded to the supervisor jz part of the file. You may send comments to u. S. Mail in city hall, 1 dr. Carlton b goodlett place, room 244, San Francisco california 94102. Please silence cell phones and electronic devices. Documents to be included should be submitted to the clerk. Items acted upon today are expected to appear on beard board of thank you, i like to make a motion to excuse supervisor ronan from today s meeting . On the motion to excuse supervisor ronan from todays meeting, on the motion, supervisor preston, aye. Supervisor safai, aye. Vice chair walton, aye. The motion passes without objection. Thank you. Please call item 1. Item 1, motion approving rejecting the president of the board of supervisors Aaron Peskins nomination of Gilbert Williams to the Planning Commission, term ending july 1, 2026. clerk of the board charter, section 4. 105, provides that this nomination is subject to approval by the board of supervisors and shall be the subject of a public hearing and vote within 60 days from the date the nomination is transmitted to the clerk of the board. If the board fails to act on the nomination within 60 days from the date the nomination is transmitted to the clerk, then the nominee shall be deemed approved. Transmittal date february 27, 2024 y like to note the intent to schedule as a Committee Report for tomorrow board of supervisor meeting. Thank you mr. Clerk. Now well hear from nominee for appointment, mr. Gilbert williams and you have two minutes. Thank you. Good morning rules committee, vice chair walton, supervisor preston and my District Supervisor safai. My name is Gilbert Williams and appoint today the San FranciscoPlanning Commission seat number 3 to complete the term of commissioner gabriela ruiz. I would like to public thank commissioner ruiz for service to our city and recognize her commitment to community. We both share a love of our city and understand the value of listening and lifting up marginalized voices. It would be a honor to continue her work. I understand that the beauty of our city is in a diversity of our residents and protecting and enhancing the cultural richness is something all san franciscans should work towards. I like to thank supervisor aaron peskin for nominating me and values and honoring Community Voices that put my name forward to enhance diversity and commune tee voice on the San FranciscoPlanning Commission. Also would like to thank all those who are here today to support my appointment. Little about myself and why my appointment to the Planning Commission will be a positive addition and strengthen a diversity and viewpoint of this very important deciding body. I was born and raised in San Francisco. I attended Public School, k12. I had the adventurous experience of being part of the Busing Program to integrate the Public Schools attending schools in china town, putrara hill, mission and potrero and acselsier district. I found a career path in the building trade. I enrolled in the Apprenticeship Program and worked all over the city in commercial and residential construction. Just a few projects i worked on as a union carpenter. Because of my entrepreneurial spirit i enrolled in San Francisco renaissance, graduated and earned the general Building Contractor license. For two decades i worked as a contractor working with projeths renovation, repair work, new construction for the past 4 years i have been a carpenter with our city and department of public works. In 2010, i was one of the 1. 5 million californian who lost their home to for closure. Eviction as a home owner or tenant is a devastating personal experience. I was fortunate to have the support of family and community to help me through this period. I found a few purpose in healing working with City Wide Community of neighbors who lost their homes or in danger of losing home. Through this experience i educated myself on the issue that caused the wave of for e closures and thousands of evictions that impact our communities all over the city. Through the education i began working voluntarily to keep my neighbors in their homes through direct action advocating at the city and state levels. In addition to helping my displaced neighbors i began working with community members, non Profit Housing developers and the Planning Department to plan is and advocate for hundred percent Affordable Housing projects in district 11 beginning to 2015 to the present and happy to report the fist two hundred percent Affordable Housing projects in district 11 in 20 years are completed this year. These projeths will be the home for hundreds of families and insure affordable renlts and dignified stable housing that our city desperately needs. Als participating in the Excelsior Outer Mission neighborhood strategy as a leader and advovocat under the San FranciscoPlanning Department in 2018. Confirming my appointsment to the San FranciscoPlanning Commission, you will be confirming a community leader, union carpenter, resident who experienced displacement, a native san franciscans and maybe the first appointment to the Planning Commission from district 11. So many call the forgotten district which encompass the most children in San FranciscoUnified School District and most Diverse Communities of the city. If confirmed i will work to find Common Ground with fellow commissioners, adhering to city general plan, always working towards equity and common good. Bringing with me a value system that centers around people and communities that make up our vibrant city. Thank you for your consideration and for your service to our city. Thank you mr. Williams. Colleagues, do you have any questions or statements . Supervisor preston. Thank you chair walton. I just wanted to first off, great to be here in the rules committee sitting in for chair ronan and just thrilled to see this nomination. I just want to say in addition to all the things that mr. Williams has talked about, not sure if you remember, but i think we met during thewhen i was head of tenants together and we were working to prevent displacement from foreclosure back some 15 years ago and your leadership mr. Williams on not only talking about your personal experience in terms of foreclosure, but channeling that personal experience into incredibly powerful advocacy that i think made a huge difference in neighborhoods in San Francisco and also across the state, so i want to thank you for all of your Affordable Housing work and sometimes it is not necessarily the biggest thing on our resume, but it is something we do as volunteers in our community that has really a outside impact and i want to recognize that part of your work. Thrilled to be supporting you and hopefully the whole board is and looking forward to you being on our Planning Commission. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you supervisor preston. Supervisor safai. Thank you. Thank you mr. Williams for your activism in San Francisco over the last number of years. Definitely have been thoroughly engaged in a lot of conversation around planning. Just wanted to give you a opportunity to say a few words what you think some of the key goals and roadmap are to achieve the Housing Element of 82 thousand units over the next few years and what you think your role is in that on the Planning Commission. Thank you for the question supervisor safai. Yeah, it seems like a monumental task. Im not sure how realistic that number is, given the history of Housing Development in our city. I think the fact that we havent succeeded in building our Affordable Housing requirements is something that is concerning. Yeah, i think it is a huge challenge and will be interesting to find out more as a commissioner. In terms of the goal of 46 thousand units of Affordable Housing, out of the 82, do you see what kind of roadmap to get there and achieve that . Well, we need funding. We need funding from the state, the federal government and a permanent source of funding to achieve that goal. Not only for now, but for future Affordable Housing. I think thats pretty much the bottom line with Affordable Housing. We just passed the housing bonds, so hopefully that will be a good benefit. I know supervisor preston a number of years ago ran, i think proposition i, is that right . Unfortunately this mayor has not dedicated the funding to doing acquisition. We have tremendous opportunities over the last couple years, but particularly this year with many of the largest Property Owners going into foreclosure, so those funds would have been funominally important to achieve that and acquire those properties. Some that will come in front of you. I think that not many affordable projects are going to come in front of you, compared to the market rate projects, so i just want to give you a opportunity to see how you approach that and balance that out with the goals of affordable house. I think each project i look at individually to make sure that our Small Businesses and our neighborhoods are not impacted negatively. I think thats important. Someone has experienced displacement and understands that sometimes those impacts arent seen right away. They happen over time, and so yeah, i have to take each project individually. But im very concerned about displacement for our Small Business community and also for our residents. I think that should be priority number one to protect our existing residents in their homes and make sure we dont set up a situation where we create more homelessness. What do you think about the upcomingwe are going through the process of upzoning and adding density decontrol, Planning Department in particular who you will be overseeing and interacting with has made some recommendations to add significant height all over San Francisco as well as removing density to achieve a significant number of units, which in many cases can be additional affordable units, depending upon the size of the project and requirement of inclusionary and which density bonus programs are used. Just want to give you a opportunity to talk about that. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah, i think again, im concerned. Im concerned about the impacts to Small Business. We just came out ofwe lost hundreds or thousands of businesses across the city and i think a lot of Business Owners just like getting back on their feet seems like to me. And so i would just be really concerned about negatively impacting our Small Business community. Outside that, i have to look more intoi dont know all the parameters around the upzoning and so, i have to look into it more. A lot of the upzoning is along commercial corridors where in some places there are not Small Businesses. One areas come into our district is onstarts on 19th avenue and goes all the way down and some cases they are talking about 65 feet to create the opportunity to build some apartment buildings with higher density, so that is happening all over San Francisco, so that conversation is really being pushed. Particularly, that is something you will be taking on as a Planning Commission, so the idea is more about how adding height and density impacts, our goal to achieve the 82 thousand units and the impact on the neighborhood and neighborhood character so that is what the question is about. Yeah. It is a huge question. It seems like all this upzoning talk andthere is a lot ofwhat i found is there a lot of communities that havent really been informed about all these changes. I was at a Planning Commission meeting last month where a lot of residents from all over the city were surprised about the scope and of all the changes that are being brought forward, and so again, i think the community should have a say. I think the people in our city should have a say on those huge type of changes that impact their own neighborhoods, and so i would listen to those voices in order to make my decisions. Okay. Thank you. Appreciate it. No problem. Thank you supervisor safai. I dont see anymore questions or statements from board members. Can we have Public Comment, mr. Clerk . Yes. Members of the public who wish to speak on the item should line up to speak at this time. Each speaker will be allowed two minutes thrmpt is a soft chime with 30 seconds left and louder chime when your time expired. Hello board. My name is [indiscernible] i have been doing Community Organizing in San Francisco for over 25 years, and i am here in support of gilbert, because i feel like working with gilbert over the last i dont know how many years, last count, gilbert always has a open ear to the community and always about problem solving with the community. I think that is what the Planning Commission needs. Someone who isnt just thinking about themselves, but someone who has not only the experience, but also the record, the track record of engaging all our San Francisco community to be a part of this Important Development within our city. Especially during these times where there is so much houselessness, where so many businesses, Small Businesses arent thriving and so i just want to really uplift gilberts skills and being able to work collectively to bring forth those voices here to city hall. This democratic city of ours. Thank you. Supervisors, chinatown cdc here in support of gilbert appointment to the Planning Commission. We need a Problem Solver and listener, we need a strategic thinker and i think gilbert brings all these things to the table and brings the experience of a native san franciscans which for a lot of us that have come later in life to the city, is really powerful when he speaks and relates to the issues that we see every day. I am excited to kind of bring the support of chinatown cdc and the broader api community to gilbert and his work on the Planning Commission, replacing our very own gabby ruiz and wanting to see more diversity of experiences and the diversity of people on the Planning Commission so we can tackle the important issues supervisor safai brought up with the Housing Element and a roadmap for the city, which will be complicated and i think an approach that says i will look at everything, i am going to really take everything into account. Im going to listen and try to not apply one size fits all approach to my decision is can going to be really powerful and so im excited for gilbert to take the seat on the Planning Commission and again, in full support of his appointment. Thank you very much. Good morning. Happy monday. My name is [indiscernible] here in full support of Gilbert Williams. I had the pleasure working with gil grt over the last 5 years as a Community Organizer and i think something that stands out to me other then echoing everything said before me is, gilberts commitment to build the leadership of others and i think that is really important. I think we need a commissioner who can not only bring his own solutions to the table, but actually really take into consideration Everything Else that is said. I really urge you to support him and so he can go to the full board and hopefully can get appointed to the commission. I want to thank you for giving him this opportunity. Thank you. Good morning vice chair walton, members of the rules committee. Charley, i first met mr. Williams 10 years ago at Community Gathering the people summit. This is is event where every day people come together in order to articulate a longterm vision