Years. My whole existence has been in the tenderloin until we were redistricted into district 5 the tenderloin became district 5. I moved south of market and lived there before. I have been a long time activist and advocate. Im a person a long time survivor living with hiv and clean and sober 20 years. I believe it is time for a chink. I have been degree street politics the whole time. Came to San Francisco in 1982 and hit the streets rung because of the confusion and anger and segregation and the whole gammet in the tenderloin and oppression and Homeless People on the streets. We have the same issues in the tenderloin now that were 40 years ago. It is time for a change. Im in change im ms. Billie cooper and hope to win your vote or hi, out there your vote, people in tv land because i know what we need. Thank you ms. Billie cooper. Next candidate in the Opening Statement system cherelle. Good afternoon im Cherelle Jackson and running for district 6. Im dedicated and committed to serving our under served communities to be a strong voice for this district. I want to ebb serve our seniors, disabled communities as well as those that are veterans. I want to continue to make sure you have an understanding of the work and my backgrounds that includes a member of the tenderloin working with labor and they have an advocate. Cochair workers with disabilities the Womens Committee as well. Serving on the social economics committee. I do a lot of Work Community activism making sure Homeless Individuals have the resources they need in order to thrive and placed in good how longs. I have done work being the executive producer of my own pod cast and making sure that provide my time to help those who need at this time most and ensure weup lift folks where they are at. Thank you. Next honey mahogany. Thank you im running for district 6 supervisor. I grew up in San Francisco. My family did in the they came to the country as refugees from a long war. My father at the time was a medical student studying in greece and protested against the Ethiopian Government revoked his citizenship and lost everything. He and my mother came to San Francisco to build a new life. When they came they believed in the american dream. Through work and education you can do anything. My dad instead of being able to continue his work in medical school no credits transferred worked 30 years as a taxi driver and they sent us to catholic school. My family was religious and thought it was the best way for us to move forward. I did not agree with everything but i believed being a person for other, being of service and being the change you want to see in the world. I got my msw from berkeley and working to get folks off the street and into recovery and helping those who were incarcerated rebuild their lives. Thats why i have done the work over 20 years it help make San Francisco a better place. The cultural districts. Saving small accidents and more. With everything that happens in the country now, we need San Francisco to be a refuge for people not just from all over the country but all overnight world but from other accomplices in the country. Thank you. [applause]. Finally for Opening Statements matt dorsey. Thank you very much. I want to thank the league of women voters and also i realliment to thank ucsf it is personal one of the proudest things i did in San Francisco politic in 2019 i had the opportunity to stand shoulder to shoulder with ucsf leaders like stan, valerie and john to take on joule labs when they respondent millions to change San Francisco law to sell vaping device its means a lot to be here. It was the convergence of a Public Health crisis in drug over dose death in my journey and recovery prosecute addiction that moved me to ask the mayor to consider me as her appointee to the board of supervisors for a job i never thought i would. Or have. Having the opportunity to be here, gives me, i think a rare and unique voice on the board of supervisors against the back drop of a record shattering crisis that is deadly as covid19. I have said i will not be a single issue supervisor or candidate. If there is a single issue to make progress on a multitude of things in San Francisco, getting more people in recovery would make a meaningful difference and enable our city to be worthy of being the city of st. Francis. Thank you all. Now we are moving to the questions that were submitted by odd jens in advanced. How have you defined Affordable Housing and what specific actions will you take to increase Affordable House nothing district 6 . For this question i will begin with cherelle. We need to make sure it is affordable for me im looking at working clasdz and lower income individuals and making sure that when the job they are obtaining can they afford house nothing that regard. If they cant that means we need to make more available. And that is a mile mark in my respect. Especially for seniors and lower income individual who is have a hard time obtaining housing because it is market rate. Because of their fixed incomes. I want to ensure we provide enough Housing Available for them to obtain it and needs to be affordable. Thank you. Mahogany. Thank you for this question. Truly, for me Affordable Housing means when working class people or poor people afford to live that is Affordable Housing. I know this deeply because my family came here has refugees with nothing. When they came here in the late 70s that was possible they were able to find a small apartment in the sunset and crammed 4 or 5 of my Family Member in there and me and my brother were born and my grand mother lived with us we got by. Today, this is not the case. I dont know how people do it now. We are still getting refugees more and more we get more transpeople coming to San Francisco seek to rebuild their lives. Ir met someone the other day saying i came here from alabama i was not safe at home. For me it is deeply concerning we dont have enough Affordable Housing in San Francisco and we need to build more housing at all levels. The city needs to take into consideration how it is building deeply Affordable Housing. It has been my lifes work. As executive director of the transdistrict i fought to get more Affordable Housing and subsidies in San Francisco. When i was chief of staff the at board of supervisors we fought for legislation we passed making sure those sros pay no more than 30 of income toward rent. I worked on a variety of thing to ensure San Francisco is affordable but we have a lot of work to do. Thank you. I just find Affordable Housing the way the state defines affordable is worthwhile of looking at what the Regional Housing needs targets that will be governing how we will Guild Housing the next 8 years part of the 6 cycle Housing Element will do that. There is low housing, which is 50 of ami or area Median Income goes to low income 50 to being 80 . Moderate is 60 ever80 to 120 and sometimes in prop b can go up to 140. I think sometimes we 92ed the flex at because we dont when we are baking manage in the charter how the compel be in years to come. We have aggressive targets and district 6 supervisor one thing i said in my speech after sworn in not enough as a district 6 supervisor to be a reliable voter on housing the district 6 supervisor is the conserves housing for the board of supervisors. If we are going to fulfill the promise of the progressive and ambitious Housing Elemented ever. We have to build supporting housing in our own district but also in every district at all income levels and we are meeting the tarts of affordability the state has set. Im committed to make sure we fulfill the promise of the most progressive Housing Element in San Francisco history. Last question is billie cooper. Hi, everyone. Low Income Housing is when we need. Poor people couldnt afford, Affordable Housing that is number one. I am one of those people and until i got a section 8 voucher to afford a beautiful place in trinity apartments, trinity places that is how im living there. I could not afford that, Affordable Housing is a push back to poor and low income people. Most that live in the Affordable Housing are tech people. You go from third of market up to castro and market, all that is Affordable Housing bmr a poor person cant afford a bmr. I know i know exactly that is happening my street politics an act viv. Im the face of the tenderloin. Lets not forget we cant forget all the other communities in district 6. But we gotta stop leaving out the poor people of we have to get them situated in housing. During this covid scare. So many people were on the streets outside city hall. Sleeping up on palette and a mattress and sometime not sleeping in the tent. Because you are not there, that does in the mean you should not care for People Living below the poverty line. Thank you all. I will ask the audience to hold the applause until the very end. Thank you. Question number 2. What are your plans for bring Retail Business to the area honey mahogany . Thank you, so much. I think it is everyone here should know that San Francisco has been hit really heard by the pandemic before that Small Businesses were struggling. The rents are just too high. And unfortunately, foot traffic is in the what is used to and be not enough to support the rents i know this as a Small Business owner coordinance of the stud. In order to save that business 16 friends and myself put the funds together to save that business from closure. Unfortunately during the pandemic we were forced shut doors but working to bring it back. Unfortunately, there is a lot of issue when is it come to zoning and permitting and the costs that it takes to open a small accident. When it costs more than half a Million Dollars to open an ice cream shop in the city that is a prospect that is something we need to work on. I will continue to work that i have been doing at the Small Business advocate work width Small Business commission and Workforce Development to take the burden off our small buildingses. Thats why i opposed the tax about to be on the ballot and luck low it is getting removed. We have been taxing and hurting our Small Businesses to the upon point they are not allowed survive. We have to do something about it and have to absolutely change the conscience on our streets to support our Small Businesses increase tourism and foot traffic through restructuring of streets and get people back in our Small Businesses and shops. Thank you. So. What im hearing from Small Business owners in district 6 is that the main concern is Public Safety on the street. It is street conscience. People who are acting out violently and many case in my neighborhood i live in mid market, it is open air drug scenes brazen drug dealing and people acting out often violently. Owner of Harvest Market a friends of mine i known for 20 years attacked and knocked unconscious this is something we have never seenful mark sag on the works a block away at the box was had surge row on his wrist. He talked about this openly attacked he told someone to stop ticking a door. Tony baloneys wife was attacked because she told someone to stop shop lifting. A degree of Public Safety issues i have not seen in the years 14 years i have been in south of market. I think we also have to i think the other thing i talked to big Large Companies about is what we can do to encourage people to come back and stop doing remote work. I know we are a tech heavy city and sometimes that plays out in this being a labor work benefit. But i said, im willing to hope the hood on the gross receipts tax if it means incentivizing people to come back to work. That supports Small Businesses. Hi. Again. Testimony is ms. Billie cooper. I am running for district 6 supervisor. I want to talk about policy and i want to talk about legislation and i want to talk about you know there are people that do and people that dont and for the left 40 years the city of San Francisco has in the gotten it right because of people of color, white people. Asian people, mexican people, there are no businesses for low income marginalized people. You know they said the city, i spoke to machine with the city and they said, ms. Cooper, they need seed money a poor person dont have seed money to start a business the city needs to create legislation and policy to afford people to get up to be able to open a business. I have been here 40 years and i have seen black people and brown people work nothing a business they were just doing working there they did not own nothing. I think we gotta make it cohesive and equal to everybody and not only in district 6 but across the city. We have to help people that realliment to help themselves but cant. So many cant afford a decent meal i was one of those people. When i got my housing my life changed and im so grateful im a United States disabled veteran thats how i got my section 8 vouch and im so grateful. All right. We gotta hit this in multiple ways. We gotta create tax incentives that help out businesses especially those impacted bite pandemic. We need to ensure that we start to invest back in business. And create of a way in which they feel supported. They are able to obtain the resources in order to thrive and make sure businesses are running efficiently. Especially for those defaults. We need to ensure that our that we are addressing Community Safety. I heard a candidate mention that. I agree with that you need to address safety as limp this is one of the things is a concern those in organized crime that affects the Retail Industry especially when you think about the square. You have to address those in a way you provide Community Safety making sure the staff in the industry i work in the retail i know what happens in the stores. And sometime its is in the the very safe conditions for them to conduct business. We have been sure that the security is in place and investment in communities, safety and available ensuring they have resources they need. And making sure that the resources are available for [inaudible] making sure grants are available when folks need for marginalized and low income Small Businesses so they can start up there is a lot we can do in the way we address this so thank you. Thank you. Next question. Could the city create a bus route from mission bay to sfo airport . I will begin with matt dorse y. I think that we could do that. I know that one of the things that plays out in transit often in the San Francisco bay area is we have i believe 27 transit agencies. There is organization in that. I think that there are this is the first this is a refreshing the first time i got that question that is novel. Yea. This is something i would be willing to have a conversation with jeff tomlisten about at muni. I know there are private sector shovels here. That is something that would be helpful to the area. I do im a strong believer in when we need to do in mission bay. Back in the. Com era i worked on barry street when people hit golf balls. This was a place that Jordan Administration talking to ucsf about the growth issues on their campus. And the discussion was, may be we should look at mission bay . I think this is fulfilling the promise of an area that is a Life Sciences cluster and i am committed to make thanksgiving a success. So if a shuttle to sfo or any transportation infrastructure, im committed as i am to the mission bay elementary school. Is that my question, too. Good ahead. I want to say, that would be a gang buster. Air fabulous idea because so many people that live beyond ucsf and alled buildings here and the fabulous apartments and giant stadium who live further down third street most of those people cant afford 16 dollars one way in a shuttle to go to the airport. I remember before all this was here, the 15 the hi