Transcripts For SFGTV BOS Budget And Finance Committee 62916

>> good afternoon everybody. welcome to the san francisco board of supervisors budget and finance committee meeting for wednesday june 29, 2016. my name is mark farrell. i am chairing the committee and joined by the vice chair katy tang and supervisor wiener and thank the clerk and staff from sfgtv for covering the -- meeting today. with that madam clerk do we have any announcements? >> yes mr. chair. please silence all cell phones and complete speaker cards and documents to be part of the file should be submitted to the clerk. items acted upon today will be on the july 12 board of supervisors agenda unless otherwise stated. >> okay. madam clerk will you call item 1 and two together. >> item 1 resolution determining and declaring that the public interest and necessity demand the acqusition improvement and accountability and conversion of "at risk" multi-unit residential buildings to permanent affordable housing and performing need the seismic, fire, health, and safety upgrades and other major accountability for habitability to be financed through bonded indebtedness in the amount not to exceed $350 million and item two is ordinance callng and providing for a special election to be held in the for proposition a. >> thank you madam clerk.y we know have speakers from supervisor peskin's office and controller office and well so supervisor peskin's office. >> thank you supervisor farrell and supervisors. thank you for your consideration of this item today and apologize that supervisor peskin could be here for the discussion this morning so i wanted to give a brief overview and context of the bond measure itself and the repurposing and we have some amendments that we would appreciate someone moving today. i understand that supervisor kim was prepared to move them and when she joins us hopefully we can do that so almost 25 years ago voters approved a $350 million bond measure aws theoried by supervisor tom shay which provided loan tiewntsd for seismic strengthening and retroactive mace ron ree buildings citywide. $200 million ion was approved and 156 of the funds repain. supervisor peskin's intent has been to expend the uses for the market rate tranche to include the acquisition and improvement and accountability of "at risk" multi-unit residential buildings and properties and allow non-profit affordable housing housing developer to convert them to permanent affordable housing through the acquisition and program. and scope would be expanded to include fire, safety and electrical plumbing upgrades and allow are if the preservation of at risk housing. these opportunities exist in neighborhoods where the city has experienced a disproportionate loss of housing and toin toin and knob hill and mission and other areas and a fire displaced many families. we of course, with a group of non-profit housing developers and staff to determine how the expanded loan program would be useful for the short and long-term preservation of at risk stock in san francisco. feedback from stakeholders for the program that made the program less usable brought forward amendments that supervisor peskin is introducing today. the original unb bonds loan program had modest praifz of the out of of the $156 million set aside $105 million remains. we are prose position amendments that would increase the capacity of the program and widen the base of potential users. this program would be allocated at interest rates equal to 1/3 of the city's true interest cost of the bond series and segment for deferred loans: program would continue to be issued at 1% beyond the city's true interest rate for the amendments for your consideration are intended to expand the uses of both funds within the overall umb program. in the first draft of the bond measure weed included a couple standard bond and transparency provisions that voters are accustomed to seeing but not included in the original 92 bond measure. i want to thank stakeholders and staff that hustled to put together a creative and usable and effective tool for the housing being do -- stock and all of our staff and all of who are available here for questions so thank you for your consideration and i will distribute copies of these amendments to you today. >> okay. thank you. supervisor tang. >> thank you. thank you very much for this presentation and i am really glad to hear that there has been efforts to repurpose this original go bond measure. i know that as was mentioned in the intro remarks that there has been less of an uptake on the market rate program given we charge 1% extra for the interest rate. there's also 1.5% additional bond origin eagz fee to cover mo hcd costs and i think this is a great intent but i want to make even for the market rate program there is the interest to use this, and so i don't know if you could further elaborate on some of the conversations you've had and what some of the ideas might be and the interest rate a loan and the origination fee are a deterrent. >> so might be a question for jamie to address as well but with conversations with the mayor's office of housing and oewd it sounds like the market rate program would be able to be utilized for housing projects or infrastructure, accountability. i know there was a project pier 70 that the mayor's office was able to use market rate funds so the anticipation is my understanding from oewd is that they will be seeking to put together a short list of projects that these funds could be used for. >> okay. but the additional interest rates would still apply compared to taking out a loan from a private bank? >> that's correct. >> okay. >> that's correct. >> okay. well, -- okay i look forward i guess to see this progress and whether it will be taken advantage of so thank you. >> thank you supervisor. >> colleagues any further questions? okay.in we have the mayor's office of housing. did you want to present on this item i understand? >> good afternoon kate hartley from the mayor's office of housing. we support this ballot measure and the seismic safety program with respect in respect to the affordable housing component and offers an interest rate which is a third of the cost to the city so for us it's fantastic. we've had great success over the last year with the small [inaudible] program and see the low interest low cost funding as something that will allow us to continue on to expand the program and to bring even more resources. last year we closed on 54 units on the small sites program and have another 58 in contract and another 70 on deck in the under writing process so there's actually a lot of activity and with that lower interest rate we will be able to replace the conventional debt financing that we use right now at 5.5 percent and provide loans at a point or one and a quarter or one and a half percent so we think it's really great, and given the amount of money available the pipeline that we have we would also ask the board of supervisors' consideration to help us properly staff this with another staff person dedicated to these projects so that we can get out there, compete in the marketplace, get the money out on the street and preserve more affordable housing so thank you and we're available for questions. >> okay. colleagues any further questions? supervisor tang. >> thank you. so the budget analyst had made a recommendation which i am sure -- or i guess someone other than mr. rose will speak to, but it was that the board of supervisors may want to consult with h mo dc and definition of which properties qualify for the loans and i don't know if that is in the works or agreed upon and whether it's an amendment you think we should take today? >> yes. we are definitely going to continue to work with them to further identify small site properties in particular in the various neighborhoods prioritizing the neighborhoods that they feel that need the most work so the ones that i listed and that work will continue, yes. >> okay. so do you think we should amend that into legislation or something you're doing? >> i think that would be the scope of work that happens outside of the proscriptive confines of the bond measure. >> all right. thank you. >> okay. with that should we go to the budget analyst report and then the controller's office office. >> mr. chairman, members of the committee debra new man from the budget and legislative office. as noted there is $156 million remaining in the market rate portion of the program. our report does not address the amendments that are being put forward. if it were only the market rate portion of the program we note there would be no net new fiscal impact to the city because that authorization has already been provided. rather this would merely expand the availability of those funds to be used for other projects. because when we were preparing this the office of public finance did not have many of the specifics. we cannot estimate the number of bond issuances, the timing of bonds or what the interest rates or related costs would be. however, for the market rate portion there would be also no additional levy on the property taxpayers to repay debt because they would be fully cost recovery within the cost. as you mentioned before the additional 1.5% loan o rejation fee and top of the interest cost. as you note there is no definition on the market rate side what is permanent affordable housing but my understanding is just discussed at the office of the sponsor will work with the mayor's office of housing and community development to come up with a definition. our recommendation it is a performance decision for the board. >> thank you. thank you very much. colleagues any questions for our budget analyst? okay.in the control office is here as well. >> go good afternoon. i am with the controller's office of finance and we agree with the preliminary figures and comments from the budget analyst office. one thing we wanted to point out is in regards to affecting the capital plan and the city's current general obligations under the go debt program we do estimate that the issuance of the below market rate loans would have a cost on the tax levy seeing that the tax levy is the pledge to pay back general obligation bonds. the bonds we would anticipate to issue would be first dedicated to the below market rate programs for these loans and would be sold in batches of $35 million a year at most which is a provision that was adopted in the 1992 ballot measure. this would be result in a net cost to the city after applying the loan payments that would be repaid by the loan borrows so there is a dollar impact to the tax levy and this would impact the capital plan. thank you. >> okay. thanks very much. colleagues any questions for our controller's office? okay seeing none we'll move on to public comment. anyone wishing to comment on comments one or two please? please step forward. >> good afternoon supervisors. peter cohen counsel on community housing organizations. we're support of this. it's a great opportunity at the right time and make efficient use of funds authorized by the voters and if you will are sitting unused and we could put them into context. acquisition rehab is an personality strategy to complement the new construction particularly as seeing more of existing housing at risk of speculation and tenant evictions. this is happening citywide and the program that's mayor's office of housing and community development talked about couldn't come at a better time. also to note these program and other acquisition programs are mixed income and taking existing building and its income profile and trying to map and extend to the future so it gives a broad opportunity for folks in existing housing and making it permanent for a variety of income needs over time. i'm going to be very short here today but there's a few representatives that are here from different housing organizations that have been implementingly small sites programs and doing acquisition rehab that can tell you concretely about some of the opportunities to use these funds so again we thank you very much and hope that you support this going forward. >> thank you. next speaker please. >> good afternoon. tracy parent. director of the san francisco community land trust. we specialize in the acquisition and rehab of small apartment buildings especially those at risk of being sold on the market to private speculators who have the cash available to come in, invest the money in the work that needs to be done and flip the buildings evicting the existing long time low income residents and reselling them or renting to higher income households. we support the expanded use of the bond program to include acquisition rehab of rent control buildings in need of safety and for low income people because this will achieve a triple community impact of not only improving safety but preventing the loss of affordable rent control units and eviction of long time lower income residents from the buildings. to give you idea of the opportunities we're seeing across the city i did a scan of the listing service and besides the two buildings that the land trust successfully required and renovated that were on the city's soft story retroactive list i have found immediate opportunities and two small sites in the inner sunset apartment buildings over garages. i have one 15 unit nblg cal hallow a neighborhood under scerved and one in the central richmond and one near north of pan handle so there is immediate opportunity to apply the funds across the city to help with the triple community impact. thank you. >> thank you. next speaker please. >> good afternoon. my name is carolyn fang and the director of community real estate at mission economic development agency and we serve one of the highest impacted neighborhoods by displacement in our city and we focus primarily on mission district as well as the surrounding neighborhoods and as colleagues have pointed out as well as kate hartley from the mayor's office of housing and community development we have over 30 units within the mission district alone in the pipeline that are a part of this program looking to close and be acquired so the tenants are no longer at risk of displacement and looking at many more building this is year and within six month this is program just within the first six months of this year already saved close to 30 units in the mission so this program really does are a rapid success rate of serving tenants and of the buildings we're looking at in the mission at least three to four of the buildings were buildings that are currently listed asicizically needing retrofit and the owners were under the requirement to retrofit by 2017 to 2020 and part of the reason for selling the building they couldn't afford that along with fire sprinkling the building and we encourage the repurposing of the funds to help owners otherwise selling the building because of that requirement to the right owners and to the right owners are the non-profit owners and help the tenants stay in place. thank you. >> thank you. next speaker please. >> thank you supervisors. name fernando with the council on community housing organizations also urging you to support this very important measure. one of the things that it does it extends a lot of the work that this board has committed its to over the last few years, both in strengthening and funding acquisition programs including the small sites program that just rolled out a couple of years ago and now has eserved lose to 100 units throughout the city as well as strengthen our soft story ordinance and bringing buildings up to code and preserving them in perpetuity both as seismically safe buildings as well as for the tenants who are there and i want to reiterate a point that tracy parent made earlier about the triple bottom line that this will achieve. one, improving the safety for buildings throughout the city, two, preventing the loss of rent controlled housing and three preventioning the evictions of long time tenants. again thank you very much. we urge you to support this measure. >> thank you. anyone else from the public to speak on item 1 or two? seeing none. public comment is now closed. [gavel] . okay colleagues we have these items in front of us, some amendments requested by the project sponsor. they're non substantive so we can move them on? >> any amendment requires another hearing so you would continue to the next budget hearing. >> with that could i have a motion to adopt the item and move to the next budget and finance committee. >> so moved. >> moved by supervisor tang and seconded by supervisor yee. >> for clarification mr. chair move it forward to july meeting. >> yeah, the next scheduled meeting. motion and a second and we can do so without objection. madam clerk would you call item number -- the item sponsor here. okay. why don't we go >> >> [gavel] okay welcome back from recess from our regularly scheduled budget and finance committee meeting of the san francisco board of supervisors for wednesday 29, 2016. we just concluded items one and two and madam clerk please call three and four together. >> motion ordering sumbitted to the voters at an election to be held november 8, 2016 an ordinance amending the business and tax regulations code to increase the real property transfer tax from 2% to 2.25% on properties with consideration or all at least $5 million and less than $10 million from 2.5% to 2.75% on properties with consideration of value of at least $10 million to less than $25 million and from 2.5% to 3% on properties with consideration on value or at least $25 million and increasing the city's proamgdzs limits from the amount of tax increase for four years from november 8, 2016. number 4 is resolution reclaiming the promise of free higher education in the city and county of san francisco residents or working half-time in san francisco and by supporting educational costs for enroll students in receipt of state or federal financial aid. >> thank you madam clerk. these items were sponsored by supervisor kim and i turn it over to her. >> thank you chair farrell and members hearing this item. our office requested that the city attorney requested two ballot issues for us as a way to increase the general funds to fund bo -- potential issues to make san francisco better and i introduced legislation to do this very thing and generate funding to make san francisco the first city in the nation to make credit classes at city college free for all san francisco residents. it was important to me as we move forward that this proposal not unfunded mandate but have all the componentses for success. one ordinance of the intent to make community college free in san francisco, two revenue generating measure to make sure those profit or have profit friday changing san francisco and contributed to our luxury housing market may a little bit more to help project and improve our city and third, create an accountability measure that will create the financial vessel into we can place what we're calling our mansion tax ballot measure dollars with provisions that funds are respond responsibly and intended to make city college free as it was in 1983. the intent resolution today expresses the board's intent to fully fund the free college proposal with the revenue generated by the mansion tax which we're hearing today as well. i want to thank my colleagues who added their names on as cosponsors and support of this resolution. supervisor avalos, campus, mar, peskin and scpee recognize supervisor breed who is supporter for the measures as well. the mansion tax before us today is a modest real estate tax increase for buildings five, ten and 25 $25 million and above. it will we are doing a modest increase by quarter percent on each of the categories and creating a whole new bracket at 3% for cities of sale $25 million. it's worth noting in san francisco there is a mansion tax and 1% surcharge paid by the buyer of residential sales above $1 million. this proposal if approved will generate on average $44 million a year according to our city economist report that we could use to make life better in the city for the resentses whether it's affordable housing, muni, parks, public spaces and trees and libraries and other services we want and need and generating through times through this vehicle what we need to make city college free for all san francisco residents: the last component of the proposal is the free city college fund which the city attorney is the process of timizing today and serve as the actual financial vessel to hold the new revenue and include provisions to ensure that the money is targeted for supporting free city college for students for graduates of the public school service to seniors who are lifelong learners and parents and adults and nontraditional students going back to school to advance in their career or get their associate's degree and will serve as a reserve so understanding that the transfer tax is volatile on years that we have less we will have a reserve fund which will ensure we can continue to make city college free and on the years that we have an up cycle we can set aside dollars for the down years. education as all of us know is a key to upward mobility, financial stability and the tool we know work to help low income wage earners increase earning potential. we have learned on average that an individual who gets an associate's degree at city college makes on average slightly $10,000 above an individual with just a high school diploma. when we talk about affordability we often talk about affordable rent and home ownership. however, another key component of affordability in the city is to ensure equitable educational opportunities for folks to rise in their employment potential and earning potential. many of our low income communities have been decimated by the exploding cost of living here in san francisco and rapidly displaced out of the city and homes. we also understand that many have continued to work here and attend city college as one of the last affordable opportunities to attain higher education so we want to examine part time workers in san francisco as an option as well. i want to acknowledge the controller's office who is here and work closely with our office to my chief of staff ive lee and working on this proposal for the last seven months and to the groups that worked with this and crafted the initial proposal in terms how we would spend down the funds and what a free city college program would look like and recognize chancellor lamb and the board of trustees at city college for working with the controller's office and our office and ensure this mechanism will work into the long-term and disembers terms from city hall into city college. free college is one of the ways to protect san francisco for san franciscans and i understand we have many items to speak from the public on this item as well so of course want to take comments and questions from board committee members as well and i believe we also have a presentation from the controller's office and the city economist. >> supervisor kim it's you're item however you like proceeding or public comments it's your call. >> great. thank you chair farrell, so i will ask teddy again who is the chief economist to do a brief presentation on the study of this item. >> thank you and good afternoon supervisors. ted egan controller's office of economic analysis. we issued a economic impact report on item and i will return you through the report. transfer tax is all sellers of real property in the city pay and progressive tax and from 0.5% up to 2.5%. the proposed legislation is for properties over $5 million and raise the rate highest to 3%. it's a general tax used for any governmental purposes and approved by the voters like any tax increase. this is a table indicating the current transfer tax rates and the proposed rates. you will note that the rates only go up for properties sold in excess of $5 million. we estimated on the property sales for the past eight years in the city that this tax would generate in today's price bs $44 million a year. there is some variation in that during years where there's little turn over in property real property transfer tax is low. the additional amount of this is on the order of 5-10 million and in higher gleers excess of 70 million but average is $44 million a year we estimate. just touching on the fact that the bulk of this increase will come from -- we project will come from properties that sell for more than $25 million a year. for the most part this is properties that are not residential properties, certainly not single family residential properties but commercial office properties so our economic analysis focused on the nexus between the higher tax on commercial properties and the economic consequences of that particularly as they relate to impacts on office tenants. >> mr. egan if you could stop you there madam vice chair with a question. the last point you made -- supervisor kim described in this proposal refers to it and consistently referred to as "management tax." my understanding is that 90% of the revenue from this transfer tax comes from commercial properties not from residential properties and that's not an argument for or against the tax. >> >> one can reasonably support a tax and 90% is from commercial, 10% from residential but if my numbers are correct it's not a mansion tax. it's largely a commercial property transfer tax. >> supervisor we're not able to slice the transfer tax by the precise use of the property but only the price of the property. however, looking at what the most expensive single family residences in san francisco have sold over in the last five years relatively sold for excess of 25 twidle. i think it's fair to say the most expensive houses in san francisco would pay higher tax under this proposal. i think it's also fair to say that other large commercial properties would pay more under this proposal. >> so do you have any even estimate of whether the break down between commercial and residential? because the controller's office actually -- when this was announced by a mansion taxes we were informed it was generate $3 million a year because there's not that many homes that sell at that level but once it was clear it went to commercial property as well and the number went up to 30 million so could you give me some sense? >> i might refer to them and as done more work. with this i am just introducing the proposal as introduced. >> perhaps the controller's office could comment on that. >> supervisor, i am from the controller's office. i don't have precise figures here but typically the largest transactions are commercial particularly commercial office buildings, particularly in the $25 million and up range. i would be happy to go back and review our figures and get back to you. >> we're being asked to vote on this today and portrayed in one way. the controller's office told my office when it was introduced that 90% of the revenue was from commercial property so we're being asked to vote on this today and described in a certain way so i would like to have that information. obviously the controller's office provided us with that information orally so i think the office would i mjs have that information. >> i would happy to get it in the next few minutes. >> that would be great. thank you very much. >> thank you and supervisor wiener your question deemed that deem a mansion tax and includes large buildings and it's a real estate term and the substantive what what you're voting on is a real estate transfer tax as in the agenda. i think the campaign is a different question than before us today but we're asking for a increase in real estate property tax of buildings $5 million and that is what is before us today and ask the members for support of the item and proposing the funds are used and the resolution of the intent before the committee today and portion is to be used to make free college for san francisco residents. thank you. >> i would note that an office building is not a mansion under understanding of the english language. it's a mansion is a residence so again it's a transfer tax. it applies both to commercial and residential as i understand it. a significant majority of the revenue comes from commercial and that it is what it is but to characterize it as a mansn tax is just -- it's not accurate. >> thank you supervisor. again i want to reiterate that what is before you for a vote today is an increase in the real estate property tax of properties $5 million and above and nothing refers to a mangsz tax at budget committee today. that gets discussed during the process of a campaign but what is before the budget committee is a real estate property tax transfer tax increase. thank you. >> supervisor wiener to your question while i don't have a precise figure of break down of properties in excess much $25 million of residential and non residential our analysis believed it would occur through the impact of commercial properties and how the potential tax increase would affect the economy would lower the capital gain of seller of property would receive from the property. this would tend to slow down the sales rate of commercial and high end residential and affect the real estate in a negative way and reduce the amount a buyer would offer for the property and face a higher transfer tax in the future. because of this and because office tenants are sensitive to prices we felt it was unlikely the tax would be passed on all to buyers and large owners if they own a building and selling it in the city but may defer the sale and we believe they will brunt the tax and little of the tax will be passed on to buyers of large properties and particular the office using tenants. nevertheless we don't have the data to do that and ran modeling sales and too much of the tax would be tassed on to sellers. >> >> the net of all of that is a fairly small economic impact. we estimated that the $44 million tax would affect the city's gdp at most minus .. 1% of the city's economy. over a prent year period and some of the tax would be passed on to office tenants and raise occupancy cost in the city and make the city a less competitive place to do business and loss of 20-70 private sector jobs and .01 of jobs in the city and consequence of the fact that office tenants have less employment and contractors would hire more people because the revenue would go into the city coffers and generate an economic boost that partially offsets the economic harm of the higher tax. when the total job employment picture is considered private and public sector we projected this tax increase is a net positive, between 100 and 200 jobs and weighing the growth in public sector employment, the growth of private employment funded by the city versus private sector employment because of the tax. that is essentially the main highlights of our report and happy to take questions from the committee at this time. >> thank you. this is not the first time the board of supervisors has put forward a real estate transfer tax before the voters of san francisco and we know there was an increase that went forward in 2010 and authored by supervisor john avalos and in that economic impact report projected a losses of private sector jobs that would out weigh the public sector benefit through net losses through 2030. have we been able to study the imppact of 2010 to check back on some of the projections stated in that 2010 report? >> supervisor we have not retroactively gone back and isolated that new piece of legislation and the context of the economic changes since that time. obviously the city has a great deal of economic growth during that period so the effect of the tax increase which we protected would be very small would have been swamped by everything else that happened. we always try to project the economic impact if you pass the policy if you don't basis and we have i think if i recall correctly from the report we assumed a great deal of the tax, maybe 90% of the tax is passed on to office using tenants. we know more about the city and have more data about the market today so we don't think as much will be passed to tenants of offices in the city and consequently largely reduce the land value which has a smaller economic impact. that's the difference of the finding versus 2010 report. >> thank you very much. seeing no further questions or comments from budget committee members i wanted to allow -- i believe that we have -- i do know that the vice chancellor and administration is here today. i wanted to give him an opportunity to speak if he wanted to before public comment. >> madam chair for mr. egan another question. in terms of how much this additional tax is projected to produce, the range -- i know you have -- there's a bar chart but not exact numbers. my understanding and you said this in the report transfer taxes are one of the most volatile sources of taxation. this tax is not a special dedicated tax. i believe under state law it can't be so it's a general fund tax. whatever the proceeds of this tax will go into the general fund and will have to be appropriated by the board of supervisors and the mayor each year for whatever purpose any future board or mayor want to appropriate it for. this revenue is not legally dedicated to free city college or any other use. it's an annual budget appropriation, so what is the range? i know you may have to estimate but if you look back historically what we could expect with the ups and downs of the real estate market? >> last eight years have been very large -- a period of large ups and downs of the real estate market in san francisco but if i recall correctly and this is approximate. it's probably five to 10 million extra at the minimum to maybe 70-90 million at the maximum and again that is looking backwards. the future could be different but we estimated it's average of $44 million a year but significant fluctuation around that. >> right. so there could be a year that brings in $5 million. >> additional, yes. >> and up to $70 million more? >> yes. >> if there's a bunch of large commercial buildings selling for example. >> that's correct. >> and that's been -- my understanding is the annual projected cost of this program would be about $13 million. that's the number being conveyed to me. >> and we do have city college chancellor here to address that question. >> okay. i think it's just important for the public to understand that this money is not required to be used for free city college. the board and mayor will have to make that choice every year going into the future, and i know in an ideal world the good years would be put in reserve and pay for the bad years but that is not required, and it can't be required under what's being proposed, and so in a good year if get 40, 50, $60 million we could be -- i don't want to say "could be" but this is broad future boards and really responsible and into a special free city college budget reserve and that's the responsible thing to do but we can't require that so if the good years are spent on other things and we know in our budget process there are so many pushes and pulls to spend money on worth while programs and get to i bad year and only 5 million and honor the commitment to go into the general fund to pull non transfer tax money to pay for it and again it's an argument for or against but the reality so we're straightforward with the public. >> so in response to your question supervisor we're building a reserve into the fund and that vehicle is drafted by the city attorney today but the expectation by this commitment and voting for this resolution of intent to prioritize funding for city college is that every year on years that we vup years the board of supervisors will put into the reserves funding for down years, and that will be in a separated fund to ensure that we can make city college free for years into the future but we did want an annual disimbursment process to evaluate how this is going with city college and insure that the funds are properly spent down. this insures there are accountability mechanism with the city and city college to make sure that the program is working as expected and funds are spent down and i wanted to bring up the vice chancellor who is here today and how much this proposal would cost in today's numbers and to present on any other information that city college has. >> thank you supervisors. ron gearhart and the vice chancellor of city collegeof san francisco. i am here for chancellor lamb who is out of the office this week and appreciate our appreciation to supervisor kim's office and support and cosponsors of the bill. to answer some of the questions we view this obviously supportive but view this as really an instrumental effort as part of our enrollment management plan moving forward and restoring approximately 1/3 of the enrollment that we once had some five, six years ago, so in terms of our operations it's very much in our eye and mind's eye in terms of planning and appreciative of the support. related to the questions in terms what the projected costs may be. that's difficult to tell because that is really dependent on the participation rate, those that live and work more than half-time within the city and county of san francisco. there's various scenarios that the city controller's office costed out and extrapolated that we were involved in on the back end, but particularly my office was involved on the back end to formulate some of the modeling but right now it's difficult to tell because on the high end in the controller's office's memorandum there was a percentage there if 15% of the eligible population were to participate it would be one number and from our perspective while that's definitely in the range of possible that's probably at the high end in terms of in reality what may come forward, so you know i don't have a defined answer to your question in terms what the realistic or expected costs is. that is really dependent on the participation rate that we see as a result. >> do you have a range? >> well, in looking at perhaps what experiences have shown us in other areas of the country that have seen this there's one example where the particular college saw somewhere around a 10% increase in enrollment or partly attributed to that effort so that's one range or one example to perhaps draw from. again that's a different area of the country and different demographics. >> but in terms of the cost -- i'm asking in the range of costs? >> in terms of the ranges of costs right now approximately 80% of our student population come within the city and county of san francisco. based upon our 100% enrollments right now we're receiving about $13 million in student enrollment fees so somewhere along 80% of that in terms on the higher end. >> yes thank you. so because it was stated in the resolution on item 4 so i just want to confirm that roughly based on an estimate about 20,000 students with credit courses costing about $46 per unit, the estimated cost is about 13 million so that's a rough now point and time cost. >> yes right. >> and of course enrollment could increase. >> we are hopeful. >> we obviously hope so. okay. because i think at least for me it would be helpful to see you know some more fine tuning of the cost estimates because even though this is a concept that i know many of us support very much i would like to see more details on what it would cost to have city college be free so i know that the resolution is supposed to be more general in nature but if we could really work out some of the details get that before the full board that would be helpful. >> supervisor tang just so we can take sure that the questions are answered for you what specific details are helpful in learning? we know that currently they're generating 12.$9 million from fees from students and 100% of the student body today and 80% list san francisco zip code and in parts of the country made efforts to make it free and the maximum -- i i think the maximum was around 20%. >> >> 20%. >> so somewhat lowering that to be realistic -- perhaps quell our enthusiasm. >> okay. what other details would be helpful because we want you to get answers to the questions? >> for example the other part of the resolution states it's not just san francisco residents or those working at least half-time in san francisco so do we have numbers or estimates how many students would qualify under that, where the overlap is between residents versus those who are working part time? how would we verify that? those details would be more helpful. >> thank you supervisor tang. >> are there any urt questions for our vice chancellor? great. thank you so much for being here today. >> thank you. >> thank you for working so closely with our office on the details. we still have much to work out in terms of the mechanics, how the fund would work and will work with the chancellor as we do the actual funding vehicle that comes before the board in july so at this time through the chair i would like to open it up for public comment and i did want to recognize that we have the president, alyssa messer here and board of trustees yes and i believe you're the only trustee here. oh i'm sorry. right in front of me. trustee bridget avala is also here and i ask that you speak first and i will call up the rest of public comment cards. >> thank you trustee davila and for being here and the strong support of this measure. >> thank you. i want to say that the board of trustees feels strongly this would be helpful to city college at this particular moment and time. it's no secret what we have suffered over the last few years in terms of a roag accreditation and loss of 1/3 of our enrollment but not only that. i want to speak more personally about this. i am someone that benefited from a free community college and i was actually working at a factory when i got out of high school, and where my mother worked at and i was able to go to community college and on to uc berkeley and i think it make a tremendous difference in a lot of the students that could use free city college. one of the issues also is a lot of students on financial aid already have free or reduced enrollment and the problem with that is books and i also teach at san francisco state. that's my day job and i know what a struggle it is for books and other materials, the computer and everything else, so this would reduce a lot of that impact on students and make a huge difference. one last thing i want to say regarding the other part of this which is the so-called mansion tax. as a homeowner i am paying parcel taxes looks like i will be paying more taxes and i want to say this is one way to really spread this across the city for the benefit of all the residents of the city. thank you. >> thank you trustee. thank you so much for being here today. >> good afternoon supervisors. thank you so much for working on this important issue. not that long ago -- i'm sorry. amy bacharach trustee san francisco city college. not that long ago all public education in california was free. it was a time when we valued education and our educators when we recognized that an educated population was immensely beneficial to the entire community and our society and when our budgets reflected our priorities which is what they're supposed to do free public education is well known to be a cornerstone of our economic and progress as a civilization and today's competitive world there's no reason why the college which is extension of the public k-12 system shouldn't be free for all. if we want an educated population we must show that in the budget and priorities. i urge you to vote in favor of the future of this great city and yes to prioritization funding for free city college. thank you so much. >> thank you. and i see ms. messier and tim kelly -- >> just for a moment of clarification tim kelly is the president. i apologize. >> we know so i will turn it over to him first. >> thank you mr. president and my apologies. >> no problem at all. alyssa is the driving source in this campaign so i understand that and yes the modest increase in the mansion tax if you want to call it that or real estate transfer tax to have those who can afford it at the most to put into the cities and deal with issues of inequality in the city is critical and we're in support of that and the free city college campaign you know i have heard somebody say it was an idea whose time has come from an idea -- it was already here before. it's been here a long time and actually not just in california but also all around the country. i went to school for free when i first went to college in new york city and then had increases in tuition and we've seen this as a pattern that went on for years and we need to unravel that pattern and make it go back and a lot of people have been speaking about this. president obama talked about it, bernie sanders and hillary clinton have plans to make college affordable and the state of tennessee has plans and san diego has its plans and having city college -- having san francisco have its own plan that would be in its progressive tradition to make sure that we can get everyone to support and to go to college is critical. these proposals together mitigate against the growing inequality in the city and bay area and nation and we wholeheartedly support them and i want to thank you supervisor kim. >> thank you to the vice president and ms. mezier. >> thank you supervisor kim and thank you for the care and concern for city collegeof san francisco and is ongoing and you have stepped up for that and we thank you and thank you supervisor kim for taking the lead on this. there is two pieces of legislation and the resolution and the transfer tax and a perfect combination and we have a modest change in the transfer tax and on the 25 million raising a half percent. it's a progressive tax. it's an appropriate tax and do more than just fund this initiative to make city college free, much more, if we go up to 70 million in some years and that's a smart way to go for san francisco and additionally the free city college initiative is a smart way to go for san francisco and especially for our students because we know how much they're struggling and we know how hard it is to remain in san francisco take the steps to get an education and how many obstacles there are. this takes away some of the obstacles for them and making college more sebl for them and additionally and there is no doubt about this city college has lost enrollment over the last years because of this crisis and this is a way to step up and ensure that city college can return to its rightful size and once again serve all of san francisco so that's very important, and it would also be huge for san francisco in general so this is really a win-win-win-win-win situation where we could be making a tremendous difference in the lives of our students and their communities, in the lives of our community college because it's san francisco's community college and making that investment for our economy. it would be huge and then finally what it would mean for the state for the larger movement to make community college free? that would be amazing and thank you for your support. >> thank you and i want to recognize your group. when we first proposed the luxury real estate transfer tax back in december our office spent time how the funds could be used to make san francisco more affordable and equitable and a proposal and great use of some of the funds and again because there is flexibility and not a set aside and used for affordable housing, to fund important improvements to the city that so many of our residents depend upon. i see the next speaker in line and call you up and tim paulson from the san francisco labor council. [calling speaker names] >> okay. my name is san jose and jobs and justice. both my sons attended city college and i was on a board of education in action and i fell in love about city college and calling the important multirationale institution in san francisco. now i will read comments from charlotte hunt who couldn't be here and in the city college child development, a student, tenderloin resident and a mother. this is her message "because of the cost of living in san francisco i struggle to feed my family but can't get food stamps or support. this means that money spent on furthering my education is instead spent on food, housing et cetera. i attend child development class and funded by city college is great example of free education with child care that is much needed and i got eight other mothers to attend this class. expending -- expanding free education would allow for me and other moms to take classes that are not free currently and spend more money on food and child care while going to school. in closing please support moms like charlotte and give them hope for a future which they deserve. thank you. >> thank you so much. mr. paul son thank you for being here today. >> >> thank you supervisors. tim paulson and the executive director of the san francisco labor council and 150 unions in san francisco and we have some of the wildest democracy that you could have see as i am sure all of the supervisors experienced over the years but there's one thing that everybody is agreeing on whether or not it's the construction workers, public section workers janitors firefighters and the labor council is unified supporting this measure as we go forward. we know that the financing was a question whether we talked to you and i think we have a mechanism we could use to make sure that free city college becomes a reality so i want to remind everybody and saying we're excited about moving forward on this. this is something again that san francisco can lead the way on as we did on other piece of worker and citizen legislation in san francisco so i urge yes vote on both these items today. thank you. >> thank you. >> hello members of the budget and finance committee. my name is jal hand dro and here in speak of my union and make city college free. as we deal with the housing crisis in history and support the communities struggling to make ends meet and the government that, wos and listens to the people and city college was envision said a free service to nurrish and uplift the minds in our communities and we must continue to uphold that promise. i personally as an undocumented immigrant that graduated from high school didn't have the guidance or resources to go to college. had it not been for the community college i wouldn't be able to learn to navigate the complexities of higher education and apply for scholarships and gaining the confidence to continue studies and graduating with a bachelor's degree. today i stand here as a professional who is proud of what a community college offered me. making city college free will greatly benefit our working class communities and help to nowrish the young professionals of tomorrow. our union represents workers who are immigrants from communities of color and work class. 45% of our members' children that go to college go to public community colleges and 27% go to csu colleges. they rely on these services to continue the academic growth and making it free will greatly impact their lives and the lives that come from low income families. educating the present and future say public responsibility. let's make city liege free again. thank you. >> thank you so much. our former youth commissioner. thank you for being here. >> thank you jane. thank you supervisors for having me. as i am sure you know san francisco has the fastest growth inequality in the united states as well as the prize winner of having the most expensive real estate in the u.s. and i know the free city college and mansion tax will attack issue. as beautiful tourists came to the city the wealth and inequality could be more stark. i'm a success story and as a graduate and has a job and transgender and without support going to college was hard. if this plan was a reality then i could have gone back earlier and got my life back on track. i know that many undocumented and disabled and lgbt and those with barriers and accessing higher education continuing seeing getting a bachelor's degree much less than a masters a distant dream. i encourage you to support this legislation so we can support all of our students and residents. thank you. >> thank you ms. satillia. >> good afternoon. sfcc has been my second chance. in high school i went through a disconnection of my studies. that resulted into not being able to graduate high school on time and deciding i would enroll in ccff as i got my diploma and accepted into sf state. >> >> it has been one of the best decisions i made in my life. my professors care about my success just as i care about their well being. the community fighting against the genifz in the city is still present there. many of students we work attend there and it's vital to making it free and eliminate the struggles that students go through in the city of san francisco. if san francisco is rooted in being an equitable city that a free school suggest a big step towards that. thank you. >> thank you so much. >> hi supervisors. my name is thomas wright. i'm a city college student and i live in the tenderloin, and basically i just want to say that inequality is prevalent these days and i think there's more emphasis on making money that you know -- then like things like character and moral, ethics and things like that, so i think this would be a good thing for city college -- for san francisco to be -- take a leading role in this and by making the education free for opportunities for people who are lower income, so please support city college and the mansion tax. thank you. >> thank you mr. wright. >> hi. my name is duane with ko r scpe. i believe if we have free college classes the students can focus more on their studies than the financial part and i think they will be better achievements. i support it. thank you. >> thank you. why don't i call up the rest of the name cards that i have. [calling speaker names] >> thank you supervisors. i'm a community organizer with community organize partnership and our mission is help homeless secure housing and become self sufficient and that is crucial. for homeless individuals to be self sufficient we need the tools and resources to make that happen. poverty and inopportunity are barriers to achieving that pattern to self sufficiency. higher education is a necessity in gang stability and integrating with the community. we see educational opportunity as not only providing a pipeline to self sustaining employment but brings hope, opportunity and community to those that have been marginalized with the experience with homelessness. providing free city college creates that opportunity and hope and community and foundations towards achieving self sufficiency and improving the quality of life of formerly homeless populations and encourage support providing education to citizens in sang fran and strengthening our community and pass you to pass the real estate transfer tax and fund city college for all. thank you. >> thank you so much. >> good afternoon. my name is roger scott. i have been a teacher at city college since 1972 and have been on the executive board except for one missed election since 1974. i have come before this body on many occasions and this is probably the least controversial issue i ever addressed. i think splawt our backward mayor might be supportive of this issue. although i don't consider him of ally of affordable accessible education. it's been most of my life has been changed in a positive way from the opportunity to attend accessible and affordable higher education. i was a juvenile delinquent in high school, kicked out of school six times in five semesters yet i lived three quarters of a mile from texas tech and i was able to go to school there for $25 a semester and i had a bachelor's degree by the age of 20. i've been lucky to attend public higher education over the years, and i never had to take out a student loan, and for me it's particularly -- it's outrageous that our graduates of, recipients four year degrees owe $30,000 on average and roughly up to $90,000 and $100,000 in many o occasions. i urge you to pass both issues. i think they're a great step toward true democracy and without economic democracy there can be nor political democracy in my view. thank you. >> thank you so much mr. scott for being here. >> hello. i am a refugee from ukraine. after one year of studying in university in my native city i had to move because i am gay and it's dangerous to be gay there. gays are prosecuted. i like my studying and it was interesting for me to be starter day after day and now i want to continue my education. as a refugee i am not able to pay for city college and i don't have a good paying job and the main reason i can't ask for help me. they were religious and after my coming out they said they don't want such a son and don't want their son to be gay and it was a mistake to keep my allieve so i have to -- alive so i spend time paying for rent and college and food and books and instead i could time to study. i have a desire to study and to be a professional. that's why i hope i can make sure that city college is free. thank you. >> thank you so much for being here today. >> good afternoon supervisors and supervisor kim i want to thank you for your vision and leadership on this matter. growing up in a working class family i often would hear my mother say "if you have to ask the price you probably can't afford it" and i know that's rather simplistic, but as i reviewed the real estate aka mansion transfer tax i would be very perplexed thinking that this very, very modest increase of a .25% to .75% would provide serious hardship on any mansion, owner or significant commercial building owner. i think about how i don't dare ask here in san francisco how much it is to rent a modest one bedroom because again i know it's clearly out of my range. rents have increased between three to 400%. that i deem as hardship. when i think about the potential is and what the goal is for this fund -- where this new funding, free city college, i am even more inclined to support this real property transfer tax and i would like to think -- pause and think if the wealthiest amongst us would dare to ask "how much will it cost not to provide access to higher education?" well, then i would have the opportunity to answer in my mother's fashion "if you have to ask the price you really can't afford it." >> thank you. thank you for being here. >> cathy burric. i'm not sure i heard my name but i know i turned in a card. thank you for considering this really important issue. i have multiple relationships to city college over the last 37 years, and first i want to speak to you though as a citizen of san francisco and a taxpayer who wants to see my taxes spent to uplift the lives of poor working and middle class people who are neglected by many decisions that have been made lately in these halls. i understand the concern about business and taxing the wealthy, but i want you to understand that a 46-dollar fee for every unit is a terribly regressive tax on the students. when i was a student at city college in the 70's it was free and the only reason i pay taxes in the city is because city college was free at that time. it would be a terrible mistake to not take advantage of lifting the lives of the 99% -- not just the 1% in our city. we can't call ourselves progressive anymore if we don't pass the real property transfer tax and free city college. boston, l.a. and chicago are already looking at it. l.a. hopes to have it by 2017. boston i understand already has the form and i thank those really supporting it and i would hope our supervisors that tend to put business interests before the people that live here to change their mind about the tax. >> thank you very much. i will call the rest of the cards. i have two more. [calling speaker names] >> hello supervisors. jay chang from the san francisco association of realtors and represent the agents active in san francisco and here to talk about item 3, the transfer tax. we want to emphasize we don't have a position on the transfer tax because it doesn't significantly impact our members. less than 1% of the market is affected and one unit out of four years are impacted by the transfer tax. we want to clarify questions posed during the question earlier and provide data. according to the multiple listing service to answer the question the transfer tax would have generated $1.2 million from residential sales. out of $44 million projected by the controller that means residential properties only provide 2.27% of the revenue generated by the transfer tax which means that commercial properties are representing 97% of the remaining revenue. we present this facts and clarification just because we know that in the press it's been referred as a mansion tax. supervisor kim called it a mansion tax in the san francisco examiner but in fact gathers little revenue from residential property and should be a commercial or business tax. thank you. >> thank you very much. mr. shin. next speaker. >> i actually had a quick question. i submitted two public karsd for each item so can i give two items? >> no. we did combine items into one hearing so that's just one public comment. >> okay. got it. >> please speak on both items and we will restart the time. >> okay thank you. i guess i will start here since i have two minutes. i heard arguments come up and i want to address some of the and they stand out and the conversation about mansion and what it means. i feel that is a waste of people's time. i hope i don't hear that and voters are voting on the words of the measure. i i'm a student and going from class to class and telling students about the proposal and not using the world and describing it how it is and property is $5 million or more and students are asking critical and analytical questions and all students have ultimately supported it so i think we should give more credit to the vote toarz understand what they're really voting for and questions about fluctuations in the market and doesn't make sense and $44 million versus $13 million and the projected cost of the tuition and huge surplus and when there are lulls in the market we will clearly have enough money in it is reserve to counter that and there was discussion about the money not being. >> >> not being set specifically for free ccsf and of course it goes into the general fund but we know the program works and report back and we serve this many students and have this many et cetera and we get public support for the program and the voters will demand that the money be allocated in that way so it's inconceivable to me that a future mayor or board of supervisors would take that money away from free city because it's what the public wants and remind everyone this is a really important investment. city college is one of the main places to take esl classes and affordable school for stem in the bay area so the money is made back up when we create people for the market who can actually credibility to the city and to the economy so thank you. >> thank you so much for your comments. >> hello. my name is morgan russ and here with the living wage coalition and here because i am 17 and i i'm going to college soon and our higher education system? this country is a disaster. it is unaffordable and inaccessible to everyone except the uber wealth and he community college is a great option and yet when they can't go to college because it's expensive and graduate with massive debt then we're failing. we need to keep it accessible and affordable to everyone and as people said it's an investment and having a well educated population really does benefit all of us. thank you. >> thank you ms. russ. thank you for being here. >> supervisor jim lazarus san francisco chamber of commerce. certainly no one in the room disagrees with the given that the tuition in california never met the master plan on education from the pat brown era and should have tuition free university at every level of university and college in california. the problem is we picked a tax that's been raised twice in the last five years. seems to be an easy target because it's a tax on commercial building transfers. it's a tax that's volatile and it's trying to raise money for a good purpose, a purpose that this board of supervisors could fund from its current 9.6 billion dollars budget. there's half dozen tax measures pending. you have to choose i assume -- maybe you will choose them all but i don't think the voters will. over $400 million a year of new tax revenue on the table for placement on the ballot. which has the priority for this board and the voters? is this tax going to be a priority? certainly the purpose that you would like to see funded through an ordinance is probably a priority and like ammiano some years ago under writing and education cost of city college is a general cost of the city like under writing the school district's budget and let's get a measure and fund it before the normal process before this body. thank you. >> thank you mr. lazarus. >> good afternoon supervisors. my name is charlie gosh and work on governmental affairs for the association. i would like to echo the comments of the speaker before me and i came to speak on a housing tax, a mansion tax for city college and it's neither. this is a tax on commercial buildings which also include multi-family buildings which are residential buildings which have rents that are high enough and the way the taxes work they get pass by law and whether residential or commercial it will be passed and increase for the residents future or present. we are supportive of the concept city college in general but we don't believe this tax is appropriate and we feel if this debate is going to happen here we at least speak it on the way the ordinance was written and again it's a tax on multi-family buildings and rent controlled buildings and commercial buildings and the businesses that occupy those spaces and we would like to discuss the tax in those terms. thank you for your consideration. >> thank you mr. gosh and i am sorry i have one more speaker card. lee. >> that's me. >> oh thank you lee. >> okay. i took that budget home, that big thick thing home. went to a starbucks last night and it was cold and actually read the thing. i looked at all numbers and what struck me so much is consulting fees. there is one place where you're paying $800,000 to consultants to see if a project can work. why don't you do the project and if it bails use those funds to fix the project. the consulting fees is what is killing it is budget. you take away so -- in fact if mr. yee was going to buy a pair of $10 pants and paid five people each to see if it's the right pair of pants. that's ridiculous. if you take away the consulting fees you can transfer the budget to somewhere else. i mean how many consultant sults do you need to see if the project will work? think about it and over consult somebody and spending money used for other things right away. you might have one person to oversee it and if the project fails you use that money to fix the problem and then you got that much extra money in the budget that you don't have to spend paying someone $60,000 to be on a consulting board. i mean don't you think that's a bit much? i looked at that thing and one project and $800,000. come o you you could give that to the city college and they would be happy. think about the consulting fees maybe. come on. mr. yee dresses nice anyway so i don't think he needs help. you guys have a good day. >> thank you lee. i concur that supervisor yee dresses very nicely. >> hi. my name is terry madsen and i don't know how many other people when they got off of bart and you can walked through the hospitality center that is started outside of the public library and it's a coalition of people who are offering services and they had barbara shop and had food and clothing and socks but there is no free education and right next to city college and the sieving center city college campus, so it made me think about you can give fish but until you teach them how to fish people will need to get fish from somewhere else and we need to think how to educate people and i'm a city college instructor. i work in the community healthier program in the health education department and we did a survey 40% of our students make less than $10,000 a year. 15% make from ten to $20,000 and -- [inaudible] from 20 to $35,000 and 81% make less than $35,000 a year and 38 formerly homeless and 38% formerly incarcerated. we have six students have taken a introductory course at the san francisco jail and accepted into our program for august. they're going to get out of jail and they don't have any money. formerly incarcerated and homeless people don't have money. we're trying to educate themselves to be community health workers and work with the community like we see outside of the public library and the only way they can do it is with free education. thank you. >> thank you very much. >> good afternoon supervisors. my name is sue englander and instructor at city college and i would like to speak from the heart so first of all thank you so much for your previous support of city college and especially like to thank supervisor kim for proposing this extremely generous and important resolution. i always need to tell that you my heart is history and city college is in crisis and needs a new deal. the transfer tax like the new deal is not just well intentioned as many team have accused the visions that we have for society but it's a concrete solution to a desperate situation due to a deaccreditation crisis that the city and this college did not deserve. the old deal is inhumane solution cutting courses which means loss of courses for our students, less r loss of enrollment and state funding and the unwarranted damage from the accreditation debacle to accumulate. the new deal would be human and concrete and set city college up for success and class enrollment, elimination of student department, faculty support and a strong financial foundation. for increase the -- for increasing productive san francisco citizens who can compete in a very sophisticated job market let's vote yes on the transfer tax and its priority for city college and let's free city college. >> thank you ms. englander. >> hi. i am a student at ccsf and i just wanted to say that there is an epic struggle going on between two visions of city college. one is a down size corporate model college, just two year. the other our city college and our san francisco that is can.-14 but actually long-term for lifelong learners and for cultural enrichment and we had a fight nationally and locally so this free city college proposal it counters a piece of that and plays a huge role in that. that's not just about human capital development but human development for all of us and so i urge the vote for us on this proposal and also to reiterate the cuts that have been occurring. a vote no would also support -- unravel down the line again a push towards the 26% cuts to ccsf and the opposite that we envision is a thriving ccsf and increase enrollment that would pull in more students and pull in more classes and bring back faculty and rebuild the college to 100,000 students and this is what we envision so we urge everyone to support that and keep the students community in mind. >> thank you so much. >> hi. i will allen desouza and library and treasurer with the union. thank you for hearing us today and sorry for being late. i was working in the library and today i had a student who is dsps student who many years ago, 15 years ago i was serving across the street at the public library, and he was struggling then and he's made so much progress now at city college working now on language skills and job skills. these are the people who we would be helping and removing barriers from access to city college. another student today in the library was a mother with two children, one in a crib and one sitting by her and she was -- these students -- these are the students who need demolishing of access of fees are one of the biggest barriers coming to city college. i am proud to be a librarian, proud to be serving these students and many more students like them. there are other students out there who would love to have the opportunity but whatever their barriers are are unable and by passing the transfer tax we could remove the barriers and opportunity for them and make san francisco not only a place for education for students but thrive in the city. thank you. >> thank you for being here. you just just in time. are there any other members of the public that would like to speak on this item? i'm seeing none through the chair. >> okay. colleagues public comment is closed. [gavel] >> supervisor yee. >> thank you supervisor kim. first i want to thank the public for coming out and supporting these two measures and i want to thank supervisor kim for being the primary author of this. it's kind of interesting for me to listen to the public because so much of it could have been my story and in fact it was my story. back then when i was getting out of high school the city college was free and it helped me immensely professionally because it gave me an opportunity to actually continue from high school and go to a place where i could continue learning and at the same time for my situation and probably most of the people that go to city college you had to go to work and basically raise enough funding or money to support yourself, and that was the case. in those days when i was going to city it gave me an opportunity to save money actually so i could transfer over to cal eventually and pay for the housing and tuition and so forth, and even then -- want even then, but then there was actually much lower at cal and of course rent was much lower and it was very difficult to make ends meet when you don't have parents that can support you, and so what people are talking about today is even much more crucial that we give people opportunities for different reasons to go to city college whether they can earn enough money to pay just living today or to save up to continue their college career. this is one issue we're not just saying let's make it free and not have a funding source. there's been a funding source identified and by the way if more revenues come in we should be committed to fund other legislation that we should really take seriously that this support free city college. i am supporting both measures today. i hope we will be able to move it out of committee with a positive recommendation, and i also want to say that there's been discussion and we heard today that several people mentioned child care. well, there's a lot of students struggling to go to city college even with kids and a lot of parents out there that told me they can't go because not only it's very hard to pay for tuition, but they can't afford to pay for care while they're going to school, so that's a big issue for many people whether it's going to school -- even in high school it's a big issue, but it's an issue at city college and issue at san francisco state and all of public institutions in san francisco. supervisor kim and myself have been talking about this aspect for several weeks. i'm beginning to talk to the advocates out there about it. there's general acknowledge that child care is an issue starting from city college i mean it goes beyond city college and i don't want to slow things down and what you have for item 4 doesn't include language with -- issues on child care and i was hoping to get it in there so rather than slowing it down i made copies of some language they would like to have in there so what i would like to is first duplicate the file on number 4. okay. and then make amendments to it and continue the item so i will pass out my version and i can tell you where those amendments are they would like to put in, and basically starts with the whereas clauses on page four. i included a couple of whereas clauses. i will read it to the public "a significant additional barrier for children with young children to obtain hiroshima is the cost of early care and education for their infant and toddlers and whereas that additional funding shall support san francisco families with infants and toddlers in order to obtain child care early care and education -- it's on page four -- in order for families to enroll in school and whereas concurrently the critical time in brain development and lace the foundation for the child's ability to learn and develop language skills and interact washingtons. >> >> and whereas additional barrier for families and children to obtain education is the cost of care" and then on page five i meant to add a further resolve, and it reads "that the board of supervisors shall support funding needed to support san francisco families with infants and toddlers to obtain quality early care and education while families enroll -- what i wanted to put in there but isn't in there and add that to the language "families enroll in public funded schools and training or trainings estimated up to be $10 million per year." okay so that would be my amendment. >> thank you supervisor yee, and i have looked through these amendments. i think the whereas clauses make sense and they're certainly true that a child care is an additional significant barrier for parents who attend city college so i would support the whereas clause. my ask is and i understand you want to duplicate the file and is it that you want to keep that in file and move out the rlt resolution to the full board? >> right and move that and continue and flesh out the language for this. >> i see. my suggestion to move it out of committee and not duplicate the file i am actually open to both and do that and keep if in committee. with the further resolve the board of supervisors shall consider and examine proposals for needed support for san francisco families with infants and toddlers to obtain early care and education while enrolled in school or training estimated to be up to $10 million, but if you feel that language is not strong enough we can duplicate the file and keep your language in committee but i would feel comfortable with my proposed amendment moving to the full board. >> i think i could accept your proposed amendment. i also wanted to include publicly funded. >> okay. publicly funded -- >> schools -- publicly funded schools or trainings. in other words, isn't be private schools. >> to our city attorney john gibner. >> deputy city attorney john gibner. the whereas clauses -- if the committee adds those to the pending legislation wouldn't trigger another hearing in committee. adding a resolve clause -- depending whether it's targeted funding towards city college and that is all that was agendized today. if you want to expand the resolution as supervisor yee is proposing and having child care for children would require additional public comment and noticing which is i didn't believe the supervisor was proposing duplicating so that piece of it could be continued. >> question to the city attorney. in our legislation in one of the whereas clauses we did include that in addition to tuition and enrollment fees students face education related costs including room, board or child care cost such as transportation and taxation and supplies up to 3,000 annually so there is language about child care in the original legislation -- i'm sorry, in the original resolution, so this resolve would then trigger a continuance even though we do refer to child care cost as being a potential barrier of cost of attending city college. >> you know it depend whases you want to do. if the new whereas clause is really about city college -- >> just city college students. >> that's how i heard supervisor yee proposing. >> oh i misunderstood supervisor yee. i thought you wanted us to explore funding for city college students? >> my language kept at more general to say -- that's why i said publicly funded schools or training which includes probably big subset of city college students. >> but would include state and public schools as well k-12? >> mostly san francisco state because again if it's a barrier for students to go to city and get caught off and transfer one year from now and not able to go to san francisco state. >> i see. i misunderstand the intent. if limited to city college i am okay with the amendment coming in but if we expand to all students in all higher education institutions then i would prefer to duplicate the file and leave that in budget committee. supervisor wiener and then tang. >> thank you. so just so i am clear so -- we heard from city college before in terms of the projected costs for the free city college program as presented by supervisor kim is around $13 million maybe a little bit less than that, and now this amendment would add -- someone can correct me if i am wrong, another $10 million so it's upwards and pushing $23 million? am i correct about that? i know these are all estimates. >> i think i am duplicating the file and asking for amendments to duplicate the file, so i'm asking for a continuance for that particular duplicated file as amended and so we could discuss that piece of it on another occasion so i think we should keep our focus on the original file. >> okay. i totally understand. i'm just asking the question because it's proposed as an amendment today. i understand you're entitled to keep it in committee but increases the cost to 13 million approximately to 23 million. i look forward to that conversation. i am a huge supporter i think we should have universal or free or deeply discounted child care. access to child care is one of the most significant issues facing our city but a lot of people around the country and huge ramifications particularly for lower income, middle lower class and middle class people and workers so i think it's a bigger conversation so i am glad the intent is keep it in committee because this is a pretty significant change and significant issue. thank you. >> supervisor tang. >> i was just going to say and i think much of the discussion considered already but i would like to keep the resolution relatively as originally proposed because i think that what supervisor yee is trying to get at is really a larger issue that we have to work on as a city so again to make sure that especially because this is a policy resolution with the intent of being accompanied by the transfer tax increase just to focus on city college. >> thank you supervisors. so i would be supportive of a duplicated file that would be in budget committee to further examine funding child care costs for those that are enrolled in public higher education institutions. i concur with all the statements made. quality affordable child care is incredibly important and especially for the students working towards an associate's degree their ba or getting additional training in their careers so i would love to explore that concept at budget committee and support to duplicate the file and the amendments supervisor yee stated. >> okay. colleagues from my perspective i think overall free city college is something i would love to support and open to doing so. i think this dialogue here cemented my feeling this needs to be taken in the context of the larger budget as a city. to do it in a one off and tad amount to $13 million supplemental now or potentially $23,000,000.01 and perhaps it's the right direction to make but i think it should be done in context of the city budget from my perspective and i will say while i am not supporting it today i am open to the conversation and supporting this cause and free city college. i think there's a lot of merit to it and certainly child care and merit as a parent with three young kids and understand the concerns and supervisor kim. >> thank you chair farrell. i appreciate the comments that were made. i hope i can get colleagues support on passing this out of committee today with recommendation so that will be my motion to move this forward with recommendation on both items and what i would just say is that the fund to make city college free will be contingent upon the passage of the new revenue so we don't expect the city to fund this city college fund if this doesn't pass in november so trying to set aside from the current budget picture that only with additional revenue. second, i know a lot of questions and comments came up at committee from supervisor wiener about the committee whether this revenue will be used as articulated today. like many things in it is budget they're no guarantees that something will continue into infinity. in fact many things we funded recently through the budget committee process there's also no guarantee we will fund all of the things forever. with that being said the resolution that is before us today indicates this current board's intent to follow through on the fund and we will follow up with enacting the vehicle that will collect the funding if this real property transfer tax passes in november and also to set aside a reserve fund acknowledging that the transfer tax is volatile source of revenue than other sources of revenue which are more stable and ensure on down years we have the funding to make city college free again and i want to reiterate. we want this a year to year appropriation to the city college program and hold them accountable to make sure that the funds are properly spent down and achieving the goals and increased enrollment, seeing students really benefit from a free community college system, and we will be able to evaluate the program year to year. now i have supported set asides in the past but i know it ties the hands of policy makers and the decisions to make the city the strongest and heaviest it can be. this real property transfer tax. >> >> is to increase funding sources and keep the city more affordable and free city college is one of the strongest proposals we have seen so far coming to the commitment to make this a more affordable city and more equitable opportunity for everyone and maybe in the future after years of this program being in place maybe there will be a charter amendment proposal put forward by this board to ensure that this funding is dispensed for the city college board of trustees the way we're intending it through the proposal today and colleagues i ask for support and move forward both items with recommendation. >> thank you supervisor kim and again i completely hear how you're phrase tg and a separate charter method is a different decision but i understand why we're going about it this way. again whatever the cause for me and the context of the broader budget is where we need to talk about it. again i don't love it and set asides and authord and fair enough but needs to be in the broader budget conversation gardeners and police officers and other issues and i want it in that context and not one off situations and with the tax. generally i'm not a proponent of more taxes. i will support them and are doing so in november and when they're dedicated and companion measures and know when the funding is going and fund vehicle i am open to support but want to make my intentions clear today. supervisor tang. >> thank you and i will echo the concept of free city college is one that i support. i just wish that by the time we had gotten here we had all the details sort of tied up as much as we could for example and how are we implementing this making sure that the folks at city college administering this feel comfortable about it. how will we verify students are, wog half-time in san francisco and what does that really mean? seeing the full range of the potential cost if enrollment goes up for city college? what does it mean in the long-term for infrastructure if there is increase in enrollment which we hope for. i would have loved to see the companion financing piece and set up the reserve policy as well and i don't know what that entails at the moment so i am comfortable moving forward to the full board at this time but i would love to see as much of information possible by the time we get to the full board. >> supervisor wiener. >> so i want to associate myself with supervisor tang's comments. i'm a supporter of free community college and really moving back to a k-14 public education model. i think it's really important. you know the comments i made at the beginning were really not about lack of support for what people are trying to do here because it's a good goal and a goal they support, but more about the way that this was moved forward in terms of you know not really i think making clear to the public that this tax was not in any way dedicated. that it's an annual appropriation process because we're talking about situation where we are asking city college to make this change in terms of moving towards free city college, no more tuition, and yet we're not really giving city college any kind of long-term guarantee that the funding is actually going to be there, so we will see students coming into city college on the belief that there's no tuition anymore that they don't have to pay tuition and then if we have a downturn here in san francisco and if our budget -- if we go through one of our horrific budget years that we have unfortunately had to go through all too often making massive cuts to health and human services and parks and other critical needs and when that happens we know that simultaneously transfer tax will collapse because it always does and it's the most sensitive tax, so we could have transfer tax from this ballot measure that's not even sufficient to cover even half of the cost of the program, and then there will be a request that we take money out of other sources in the general fund to pay for it at the same time that we're faced cuts to homeless and senior services and park gardeners and all of the other things that are so important, so you know and then of course as i understand it when this was proposed there was no work done with the city college administration. they learned about it when it was being announced or shortly before that and fundamentally of course we know that city college has some fundamental financial problems that are really putting at risk the future of the institution. they're not about tuition but are about the inadequate teacher's salaries or inadequate funding for the institution around all the capital needs, so we have a pleasure that accomplishes or may accomplish a goal they think i support and a lot of us support, but does not get to the fundamental challenges facing city college, wasn't put together in a collaborative way with city college and presented to the public in an inaccurate way so i join supervisor tang of definitely supportive of putting this forward to the full board of supervisors but i think it's important as we go forward do it eyes wide open. >> supervisor kim. >> i will let supervisor yee. >> supervisor yee. >> i was going to make a motion. >> [inaudible] >> call the question, yeah. i tell you what. we will take them one at a time because there is duplicated file on item 4 unless you have comments speak your peace and we will go ahead with item 3. >> i wanted to one make comment. thank you chair farrell. in response to supervisor wiener. i agree when you forward a program there maybe an expectation of continuation of the program of the program and we do this every year and senior meals and hiv services and rental subsidies and there is no guarantee it will. >> beyond year one or two and beyond the years. >> >> so to say it's a reason to question funding free city college today because there may not be adequate funding in the future and that is true for many things that we you understand fund and the average taxpayer understands that and fees go up services get cut, faculty get laid off. it's not that we want them to happen but they often happen in these budget processes so i don't think that's a good enough rationale for not supporting free city college today if we know we have the revenue coming in to fund that program this year. again we want to provide some flexibility as this is a new program. we didn't want to make it a charter set aside yet. we want to evaluate how this program would move forward and there was no intent onure part to claim we were solving all of city college's issues and pay raises and faculty issues and the board of trustees has been doing a tremendous job with the administration putting together a assessor's parcelel tax by the voters of san francisco and bringing city college back to where we want to see it. this is one piece and not a magic bullet to solve all of city college's challenges so again colleagues i ask for your support on this measure. >> colleagues any further comments? okay. madam clerk can you do a roll call on item 3. >> is there a second on that item? on item 3 supervisor tang. >> aye. >> supervisor yee. >> [inaudible] >> aye. >> supervisor kim. >> aye. >> supervisor wiener. >> aye. >> supervisor farrell. >> no. >> there are four aye's, one no. >> okay. that item passes. madam clerk on item 4 we're going to duplicate the file so first let's take the duplicated file. the second file and have a motion to accept supervisor yee's amendment into the file? motion and second by supervisor kim. take that without objection. on the duplicated file amended by supervisor yee. can i have a motion to continue that resolution to the call of the chair? motion by supervisor yee. second by supervisor kim. we can do so without objection. [gavel] and madam clerk on the original item 4 roll call vote.

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