supervisor avalos? >> present. >> avalos present. supervisor breed? >> here. >> breed present. supervisor campos? >> present. >> campos present. president chiu? >> present. >> chiu present. supervisor cohen? cohen present. supervisor farrell? >> present. >> farrell present. supervisor kim? kim not present. supervisor mar? mar not present. supervisor tang? >> present. >> tang present. supervisor wiener? >> present. >> wiener present. supervisor yee? >> present. >> yee present. mr. president, you have a quorum. >> thank you. ladies and gentlemen, could you please join us in the pledge of allegiance? i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america, and to the republic for which it stands; one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> madam clerk, do we have any communications? >> there are no communications today, mr. president. >> all right. could you read the consent agenda? >> items 1 through 8 comprise the consent calendar. these items are considered routine. if a member objects, an item may be removed and considered separately. >> colleagues, would anyone like to sever any of these items? roll call vote on items 1 through 8. >> on items 1 through 8, supervisor campos? campos aye. supervisor chiu? chiu aye. supervisor cohen? cohen aye. supervisor farrell? farrell aye. supervisor kim? kim absent. supervisor mar? mar absent. supervisor tang? tang aye. supervisor wiener? wiener aye. supervisor yee? yee aye. supervisor avalos? avalos aye. supervisor breed? breed aye. supervisor kim? kim aye. there are 10 ayes. >> those ordinances are finally passed and resolutions adopted. [gavel] >> item 9. >> item 9 is an ordinance appropriating $4,515,000 from the general fund reserve to the mayor's office of housing in the amount of $2,515,000 and to the arts commission in the amount of $2,000,000 for fiscal year 2013-2014, establishing the nonprofit rent stabilization program, and placing these funds on board of supervisors reserve pending a report from the nonprofit displacement work group to the board of supervisors. ~ work group. >> colleagues, can we do this item same house same call? without objection, this ordinance is finally passed. [gavel] >> item 10. >> item 10 is an ordinance ordering the vacation of a portion of west point road and various public service easements for the hunters view phase 2 development; quitclaiming the city's interest in the vacation areas to the san francisco housing authority; reserving easement rights for the benefit of the city for its utilities; accepting a department of public works order concerning the street vacation; authorizing official acts in connection with this ordinance; and making environmental findings, and findings of consistency with the general plan, and the eight priority policies of planning code, section 101.1. ~ development. >> supervisor cohen. >> thank you. thank you very much. colleagues, i just want to thank you again for hearing this item at the committee as a whole last week and wanted to take an opportunity to remind you of the importance of this particular item. while it seems like it's a routine item, it's essentially really to rebuild public housing, specifically the hunters view public housing development. this is the first of our hope at sf projects to begin rebuilding. the first phase has been completed and families who once lived in deplorable conditions are now enjoying new affordable housing units. the street vacation was necessary to allow us to begin the construction on the second phase of these affordable and public housing replacement units. everyone in the city is experiencing the impact on the rise of housing costs, but the individuals and families who live in public housing actually are hit even harder. this is critically important to projects that have been vetted with the community and i am asking you to support this street vacation. thank you. >> colleagues, any further discussion? let's take a roll call vote on item 10. >> on item 10, supervisor campos? campos aye. supervisor chiu? chiu aye. supervisor cohen? cohen aye. supervisor farrell? farrell aye. supervisor kim? kim aye. supervisor mar? mar absent. supervisor tang? tang aye. supervisor wiener? wiener aye. supervisor yee? yee aye. supervisor avalos? avalos aye. supervisor breed? breed aye. there are 10 ayes. >> this ordinance is finally passed. [gavel] >> item 11. >> item 11 is an ordinance appropriating $1,387,500 of general fund reserves to the department of public health to provide homeless outreach services in fiscal year 2013-2014 and placing the $1,387,500 of general fund monies on budget and finance committee reserve. >> supervisor farrell. >> thank you, president chiu. colleagues, today we're voting on a targeted supplemental appropriation for outreach [speaker not understood] back in february. this supplemental will significantly increase the kas paythv of our homeless outreach team adding up to two teams immediately and also add additional shelter and housing services that are desperately needed. this targeted investment will put more homeless outreach team with members of the highest need and assist those living on the street with additional shelter, locations for them to stabilize their health. as we continue to take a deeper dive on the homeless issue here in san francisco as a board, i know there are a number of policies and programs that will be contentious over time. but in speaking with all our department heads and staff, as well as service providers, there was definite agreement that our homeless outreach team was under staffed and underfunded even though they provided a crucial service here in san francisco. with over 4,000 people sleeping on our streets on any given night here in san francisco, our homeless outreach team currently has only 2 to 4 people out on our street, simply not enough. one of the first steps towards impacting homelessness he here in san francisco is increasing our engagement with the homeless population coupling that with increased outreach services and the supplemental does just that. the homeless outreach team is a bit of background also known as the hot team as the dph's outreach management program consisting of city civil service and employees and nonprofit contractors. they perform outreach to bring homeless people with health, mental health and substance abuse issues into dph's emergency stabilization rooms and other temporary settings and case management to link them with appropriate treatment and housing opportunities. expanded homeses outreach team will be placed to address the most difficult and chronically homeless individuals in need of chronically care management and be better able to respond to neighborhood needs which we all view as important for short term localized intervention. and last but not least, the finance committeing meeting there were certain questions in regards to the process ~ undertaking the supplemental. this supplemental was introduced over obviously a month and a half ago and before that introduction i spent months meeting with city leaders and aver service providers who work with the homeless population who agreed the hot team was under staffed and underfunded ~. after the introduction we worked with dph and service providers to come up with a plan for how the resources would be used and i am still very much commit today this process. i want to make sure it is very clear and do support and will lead the efforts to establish a working group after the supplemental to further hammer out the details going forward. this working group will have member from the dph hot team, managers and staff, staff from my office and any one of your offices is welcome to join, as well as homeless advocates and service providers. and that's what the working group will accomplish. we should depend, in my opinion, on the experts in dph who do this work every single day to have a strong voice had you they feel the fund should be implemented with input from community service providers as well as our offices ~. the goal is supplemental from day one was to increase the kas pa it of the homeless outreach team to get more homeless individuals off of our streets and into housing shelter. what i heard loud and clear is that the increase in the team also needed to be coupled with an increase in services to offer and i did and will continue to rely on the expertise of the dph staff who have been successfully operating this team for years. as from advocates and service providers as well who are on the ground assisting our homeless population every single day. i firmly believe that they are an investment and target investment and our homeless outreach team will drive a positive impact for our homeless population not only throughout our city but in our neighborhoods where we can be responsive as supervisors as well. there is no silver bullet here as asv but we know it takes a comprehensive diligent approach and colleagues i ask for your support. >> supervisor avalos. >> thank you, president chiu. and i, despite the story about [speaker not understood] being exchanged last week in committee, i really do appreciate supervisor farrell's focus on homelessness in san francisco. it's something that's been on my mind a lot lately. actually i was considering doing just what you did in terms of a hearing on chronic homelessness and our ten-year plan. so, i really appreciate your efforts. and what i've been seeing over the past several years, in fact, a growing increase of people in the civic center area and other parts of san francisco as well, it's been an arab you any district. i'm hearing a lot from people where i didn't hear a lot from people before about homelessness in direct 11. it was there, but not quite as prevalent as it is now. so, i think we really need to make sure that we are providing, you know, the right tools to be able to look at homelessness and to address it adequately. my concern both of us in committee tried to see if we could actually get a different plan moving forward. my concern overall [speaker not understood] the story about barbs being exchanged, it was a policy discussion about how we can look at our homeless services comprehensively in a broadway. and we're actually going to be making investments in one part of it. what are the investments that we're going to -- that we anticipate to be making in other parts in order to have a comprehensive approach. i thought that addressing just through the hot team homeless outreach and the stabilization bed which is what the supplemental is about is actually something that we should be doing, but i also wanted to make sure that we were looking at the same time at other services we would need to be putting in place as part of a comprehensive plan. the ten-year plan to abolish homelessness talked about a continuum of care. so, really actually looking at one part of the continuum. we're not necessarily addressing the other parts that are going to be part of the overall approach. and then this investment that we're making of 1.3 million is actually to get us through the current fiscal year. if we were to annualize it, i believe it's $6.3 million, i think is what is in the dph's powerpoint they presented. so, that's a significant increase. but i'm okay with increasing funding for homeless services despite concern that people say we're spending too much on it. i just want to make sure if we're doing like $6.3 million increase, he we also want to bring in other services as well with the overall price tag going to be? we're making lots of decisions about our budget already. it seems like we actually haven't fully landed on what the overall approach is going to be and the overall cost is going to be, of which this amount of money is going to fit into. so, that is my reasons why i voted against, but, you know, asking around where i didn't feel that there was, you know, last wednesday the consensus around the supplemental that morning, i was able to see since then that people are okay with the approach and the plan. while i feel it's not ideal, not knowing what other investments we'll make on the other aspects of our continuum of caron homelessness, i can support this measure today. , and you know, again, i do want to thank supervisor farrell for bringing this forward, but i did want to make sure that, you know, ~ when something is like so complex as an issue like this that we are, you know, understanding the decisions we make now might limit what we're able to do in terms of larger investments we need to make in other aspects of homeless continuum of care. >> supervisor kim. >> thank you. it's always fun to have discussionses around supplemental appropriations ~ because it's a question about our priorities and the budget outside of the budget process. and i want to echo supervisor avalos in his comments, thanking supervisor farrell for his leadership on making sure that we prioritize an issue that i think everyone in this chamber cares deeply about. while the homeless count hasn't necessarily increased over the last 7 years here in the city of san francisco, we certainly -- i've certainly been hearing more from constituents who are seeing more homelessness in the neighborhood. that is largely a result of the fact we have a construction boom in san francisco that we have never seen before in the history of development in the city and there are just less places for individuals to be invisible in as there was previously. and folks that used to stay in different vacant lots or under free ways, where it didn't used to be residential development are now finding new neighbors and new housing and commercial construction projects and they're finding that they have to move into areas where they are more visible. so, i think it is important, i think everyone in the city agrees this is a priority issue and should be prioritized in our budget discussion. i think for me and supervisor farrell knows this in discussions that we've had, my concern has always been on how we spend those dollars. so, i would love to increase the hot team, but as supervisor farrell, my concern has been what are the back-in services that we offer with the outreach team because it's great to send folks out on the street at night and during the day, but if we don't offer them real housing, real services, then it's not helpful to have an outreach worker out there. so, i'm really glad to see that there is going to be this work group that's formed and committed to -- i'm not sure if you feel comfortable making amendment and just putting that within the supplemental ordinance that this work group is going to be developed and created. and just wanted to also really push us to think about how to approach homelessness differently in the city. i think for decades we have treated homelessness as an economic issue, that it is an issue of poverty. and while there are certainly individuals that become homeless because they've lost their job can't afford to pay their rent, many folks that are entering into homelessness. what i see a lot with are most chronically homeless population, that is clearly a health issue ~. but if we do not address the health issues that are associated with homelessness that we are not going to abolish homelessness in the city. and when i did spend time in our shelters, the one thing that really struck me in our shelter system is we treat homelessness like it's just a pure economic issue, where people just need a place to sleep for the night while they get back up and find a job they need to do to get their life going. going. but what i encounter in our shelter system are so many vehiclesv that have multiple barriers, multiple health barriers, whether physical and mental that it's going to, it's going to be, it's going to be impossible for them to rise up out of homelessness until we have real health services in our shelter system. i want to thank [speaker not understood] garcia who has committed to nurses in our shelter system. i think it's going to make a huge difference to actually have medical professional help at night in our shelter systems, not just minimum wage staff that we don't provide adequate training and to deal with the population that comes in our shelter system. our office is sponsoring a yoga program at next door shelter because we think it is important for us to help and support folks be holistickly healthy and to have activities to do at night where there are very little. so, looking forward to continuing to have this discussion around how we prioritize dollars for homelessness. again, i really want to see a couple of things. i would love to see a 24-hour medical respite shelter. happy to see it happen in our district. we need a place for folks to go that need medical professional help, whether it's mental or physical. and would love to work with dph to finalize a permanent spot so that -- so we have a place for hot team members to send folks to 24 hours. of course, as we increase stabilization beds, the one ask i have with dph is we contract with quality property owners. we have in the past contracted with terrible landlords that -- which the city pays for, which we pay for [speaker not understood] that have bed bugs and multiple other code violations and we should ensure in any building that we contract with that we are providing quality rooms to residents who are living on our streets. and, so, overall i think those are some of the things that i'd like to cecum out of the work group long term. this is while not a large supplemental ask for this year, it will grow to a larger amount for the full year and i'd like to make sure that we have a balance of services and outreach team members that come together to solve this really important issue. the one thing i was really glad to see with the hot team, though, it's great to see we'll have more nurses on the team and more site specialists because i don't think that hiring someone like me to go out on the street alone is going to solve this issue. again, some of the things i'd like to see in the long term conversation around the supplemental appropriation, but appreciate the beginning of the discussion. do you have concerns about how much of this money is going to be spent on before june 30th? but as an overall commitment to a dollar amount that we are prioritizing to go to the category? i'm happy to support this issue today as long as there is that commitment to have that -- have that larger discussion. thank you. >> supervisor campos. >> thank you, mr. president. i want to thank my colleagues for the comments. i think that it's important when we talk about a supplemental appropriations, that we provide context for the issue at hand and what else needs to be done beyond the supplemental. that said, i do want to sort of provide some context for the fact that i think that it's something that we as a board should be very proud of, the fact that we on the board of supervisors are talking about providing additional resource hees for homeless people and homeless families in san francisco, and i want to thank supervisor farrell for, for leading that because i think that it's quite a statement that in the context of what's happening with the affordability crisis that we are prioritizing some of those vulnerable people. san francisco right nows has the second highest inequality rate of any, any major city in the country. and the fastest growing inequality gap of any major city. and the top 5% of households are making more than 16 times what the bottom 20% of households are making and disparity is even greater when you look at our homeless families. so, i think that it's a very positive thing that we're doing this. i also appreciate that supervisor farrell is geneva convention ~ going to have a working group because i think that will allow us to ensure the legitimate concerns it that have been raised are addressed. i also think, though, that this is only a beginning in terms of the longer term strategy because as much as there's been a lot of hype about all the money that is being spent on homeless services, in the larger scheme of things i think that we also need to understand that there's still a lot of need that is not being addressed. people talk about the $150 million. that's a lot of money, but it's also in the context of an $8 billion budget. and not only that, but we still have a situation where there aren't enough services, enough housing for these families. so, i'm just, you know, glad that the board is doing this and i was proud to co-sponsor and thank supervisor farrell. and i think that is a very positive step. thank you. >> supervisor cohen. >> thank you very much. i think that certainly we all agree that we need to -- that we need more homeless outreach workers and more of a comprehensive approach strategy. my issue with the supplemental is not that we need to be investing more services into -- investing into more homeless services. it's that i don't believe we've done enough evaluation on whether the most strategic investment should be -- where or what the most strategic investment would and should be. i would prefer to address this need in light of additional request that we have been receiving during our budget process so that we can make a more holistic evaluation about the services and programs to augment. i am open to funding services, but strongly, strongly believe that we should be doing this as part of the annual budget process because of the general fund, the impacts that it will annualize over a year. it does concern me that we certainly give a lot of voice to people who are like supervisor kim alluded to, an economic issue, they've gotten down on their luck and they need a hand up. we have no strategy and we give little conversation around people who choose to be outside and who choose that life-style. it's very simple for an outreach worker or police or officer to offer housing or stabilization beds and if it's refused it's refused. that person still remains out on the street and still is not housed. what do we do? how do we address that problem? that issue, that concern? however you want to phrase it, there is just no conversation around that. so, i'm hopeful that this work group will be able to begin to give voice to the folks that, again, choose to be -- to live outside. i would ask that we -- what i think we did last week with another supplemental that we dealt with, that we place these funds on full board [speaker not understood] so all of us have an opportunity to hear the detailed plan from the department prior to the funds being spent. so, we did this last week with the nonprofit supplemental and i ask that we consider doing it again for this particular supplemental. and i also want to just also acknowledge the importance of providing services, much as supervisor kim alluded to, typical health screenings are an important part of providing services, but there is also mental health. want to make sure our veterans are getting the services that they're needing. and one of the challenges this i'm also announcing is people have immigration and/or legal challenges that also have led them to -- on the path of homelessness. so, when we're thinking about service providers, we need to think holistickly and include services that i mentioned before. and also contract with good people, people that are professional. i'm happy to see bevan dufty here in the audience. thank you for your leadership on this. that we contract with professional people that are able to manage not only their shelter, but the occupants. i have constituents e-mail me today of a homeless man peeing in front of their business. so, we have a lot of work to do to get to address the challenge. thank you. >> supervisor farrell. >> thank you, president chiu. and colleagues, i want to thank everyone for their comments. and quite frankly, the discussion as well. they weren't here when i first started talking, but i want to acknowledge bevan dufty, [speaker not understood] who runs the outreach team. thank you for all your efforts in this regard. and for working together and offering to continue to work together on what we're discussing here today. so, thank you both. you are indisposable for our city, and thank you so much. i also want to acknowledge something i believe supervisor kim mentioned. part of the supplemental as well to enhance the current level of our homeless outreach team as well to add the skilled nurses and so forth to have hopefully greater impact in our neighborhoods and on the streets. and the broader point as well to supervisor avalos's comments, you know, from my perspective, and supervisor campos said it as well, this is the beginning of the conversation. and absolutely you are my support, you know, to having the conversation during our budget process as well around all services we need to provide here. from my perspective, the first thing we need to do, though, if we're going to have an impact on our streets is get people off our streets. this is a targeted supplemental to impact our streets right now and hopefully have better outcomes for homeless individuals on our streets. i am very much commit today this working group. it's something we've had [speaker not understood] leading up to this and something i'm very much commit today doing going forward. i know dph has commit today that as well as is bevan dufty and i think that is something that is very important. and to one other comment as well that i will say, and supervisor cohen mentioned, certainly there are people, individuals that don't want to accept services and that's part of it, but there are so many on our streets that will accept services. you know, a quick anecdote and part of the drill conversation months ag i was with my children on a sunday morning close to our house grabbing coffee. there was an individual that clearly needed some help. i called bevan dufty at 8:30 on a morning on sunday and said, sorry, i hope i'm not waking you up, first of all, but is there something we can do here? and in three hours later mr. dufty called back and said, you know what, this person is in a shelter right now. thanks for calling. i think there are so many people out there that do want the help and there is a subpopulation that is a little more challenging, but i think an example, a very personal example from my perspective if we have homeless outreach on our streets, we can have an impact for those individuals as well as in our neighborhoods which is something i think we're all cognizant of and want to be responsible for. so, i want to thank everyone for their comments and their support as well. >> supervisor tang. >> thank you, president chiu. and first of all, thank you, supervisor farrell, for really trying to tackle this very difficult issue. and thank you, mr. bevan dufty. i know that he we work very closely with you on some of our neighborhood issues. our district being the border of golden gate park and ocean beach. we certainly have our share of issues as well. i do, i do not disagree with the goals and intentions behind this supplemental. i think that my only hesitation today and really what i expressed as well during the supplemental discussionses from last week, is that like supervisor cohen mentioned, i really do wish that these conversations could be happening in the context of a greater context of our entire budget process, which is only just a few months away. i do believe that there are other continued dialogs to be had, which many supervisors have mentioned today about what is the right mix of services, what is the right way that we should put these dollars to achieve our goals. and, so, i think that what differentiates for me today this particular supplemental between what we had approved last week is this one does come with an annualized cost, a significant one, and what is that going to look like. and realistically, what will be spent down in this particular current fiscal year. so, with that said, again, i want to acknowledge that i do absolutely agree that more needs to be done in terms of our homeless outreach. i sat through a gao committee hearing with other supervisors where we heard firsthand just how significantly short staffed our outreach workers are. and, so, again, today my only hesitation would be around the process and the way that when we consider individual supplementals, we are pitting different issues before one another and creating a significance around certain issues over others and that's the only thing that i have an issue with. so, but with that said, again, i do want to acknowledge supervisor farrell's leadership on this as well as bevan dufty and your office and all that you've done on this. >> supervisor kim. >> thank you. i did -- i think it's really good that we're having this conversation, as always, at the full board. i did want to address the issue of individuals that don't want help. and i've talked to a lot of folks on the street and i've asked them why they refuse services. and in large part the answer i got is because they don't want a stabilization bed at the julian hotel or the civic center hotel or the page hotel. and if you have visited any of these hotels, they suck. they're horrible places. i would rather sleep on the street than be in a bed bug ridden stabilization bed in one of these hotels which are poorly managed and have tons of dpi violation and it's shocking to me that we he spend city dollars supporting terrible landlords. so, that is why one of the things that i talked about, supervisor farrell, there is a strong commitment from dph that we really contract with responsible property own

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