Review this count and ensure that its not stale. So eventually through the process of usdoj recommendations implementation, we may have discovered actually we have to change a policy to do this one thing, even though the recommendation doesnt necessarily call out that theres specifically a policy change that needs to happen. But there may actually be a resulting change that needs to happen from the work of starting the implementation of a particular recommendation. So we are going to take this back and do a more thorough dig on those kinds of items and make sure that we have a very clear picture of which recommendations are impacted by policy. Thank you. Vice president taylor. Thank you. This last page is good and theres more questions than you anticipated. Yes. When you come back and do that deeper dive can you report on not only what the correct numbers are but of the correct numbers where are we in terms of our implementation of changes . Yes okay. Yes, chief . I would just like to add, those numbers will be a living document as commissioner taylor and elias are well aware of with our work on the bias dgo which led to other dgos that werent necessarily on that list. We anticipate that there will be more of that. Well dig into a dgo and recognize we need to change another one to make that one make sense. So it will have fluctuations on that. A good example of that is 5. 03, as you all know. It was slated in the schedule already, but it made sense to marry the two. Great. Okay. Thank you very much. Thank you. Next item. I have a comment online item 3 this is Public Comment online item 3 you said . Okay. Public comment just on item 3. Not general Public Comment yet. Just item 3. Seeing none, its closed. Line item 4. The general Public Comment. The public is welcome to address tonights commission on subjects that are not on the agenda. They shall address the remarks to the commission as a whole and not to an individual. During Public CommentNeither Police or dpa personell nor commissioners are required to respond questions presented by the public but may provide a brief response. Individual commissioners and personnel should refrain from entering into debates or discussions with speakers during Public Comment. Okay. Finely. Thank you. My name is daniel pais. We have a new district attorney. And you are the board of supervisors. All right. 62 years on this planet, i spent 47 involved in politics, starting with the Mcgovern Campaign in 72. I was also a volunteer coordinator to pass the equal rights amendment to the constitution while living in texas. I am a cofounder of queer nation San Francisco. Politics is my passion. And if theres one thing i know its politics. In all those years ive never seen a more incompetent campaign than that against bodine by the establishment specifically the Police Officers association. They ran a trumplike campaign. Dirty, personal attacks, much like the ones they used against jeff even after he died. Just like Trumps Campaign and attacks against john mccain. It used to be the norm that attacking the dead was considered trashy and low class behavior. But without the poas immature crapslinging campaign and without the mayors appointment as interim da the powers that be would have probably gotten their way. Remember breed only won by a squeaker against jane and mark. Her first big political test this election failed miserably. She doesnt have what it takes to be the mayor. The brains the political astuteness or high character. She is weak. To her allies reconsider your options. The poa is feeding like maggots on the rotting corporation that corporation corpse that is the past. The poa needs higher iq and lower blood alcohol level counts. Next speaker. Any other public speakers . Can i get the overhead . Yes. [off mic] there should be a button. My time speaking tonight is three minutes. And i appreciate all this that i have here. The forum that i have. And speaking about this statue i would like to put up in memory of mario woods. This is a memorial drawing i have to the time that we spend here for mario woods and stuff. And you know, i really appreciate this because when you come down here and everything, when you speak into the mic, when you see the pledge of allegiance, because this is what they are doing. They are pledging allegiance. Its not like the national anthem. But this pledge of allegiance. And we all are americans. And mario is a hero. Hes a martyr. And when mario woods was spoken occupy by can because of the wardrobe malfunction, she said, you know like she said a lot. It was like a pledge of allegiance. So this football hes putting here and mario woods and everything, you know. When i was a teen, what happened in chinatown and everything, you know, i was walking down polk street, and this girl said help me help me and i said no youre crazy people right there by all the homeless people. Why are they looking at me . Im 7 years old. But you know, i was really lucky that i was able to be there because i could do something. She says really, he broke my window, i was just driving down the street and he takes my phone. You know . Its a very dangerous thing to have 100 waving it in front of these people. And i say, you know, i was really afraid for her at that moment, because he really gave her a dirty look. And i said ill take care of it, ill take care of it. And you know, when it comes to the police, youre really lucky to have them around when you need them. You could take this off. Its all right. I wouldnt mind being on the camera. You know . Like when it comes to getting down here and being able to speak to you all and be here. You know . Its so blessed. Its a blessing, you know . So you know, as i walk around the corner following the guy, you know ill take care of it. Who shows up but the police, four of them. Unmarked car. And i say help me, help me, help me. One second we had them down. And you know, they were so good what they did that day. You know . And i was too. Im a hero in my own eyes. Thank you. Your time is up. Thank you. [laughs] just hand it to all right. Thank you. [off mic] all right. We are ready for our next speaker. Thank you. Today is my mothers birthday. Happy birthday to her. [off mic] we need our next speaker. Im sorry. Okay. Good evening. Hi there we need the mic please. With the Public Defenders Office. Im focused on Police Misconduct among other things for a couple of reasons. I want to sort of go back to the basics for a minute. Or ten seconds perhaps. Number one is because Police Misconduct undermines public trust in our systems. Number two, it jeopardizes individual case integrity. Number three, it victimizes the individuals that suffer directly from misconduct. And number four, it devalues the work of so many, many good cops. Last week a commissioner opined people watching the meet would feel unsupported of discussion of the 79 reports of misconduct in the dpas 2018 annual report. It struck me in a couple ways. First its important to note that those 79 cases are just from the folks that had the wherewithal and courage to not only report to dpa to follow up. Second the point of the information is to allow everybody to see it and talk about it and digest it. The third the innocent victims might feel unsupported to hear the commission questioning a relatively short discussion on the topic. And then last its because those honest and wellintentioned and respectful and peaceful and hardworking Police Officers should feel great that misconduct in their ranks is rooted out so that they dont suffer the discredit that comes from it. I wanted to ensure that you all saw the study that was published by the Sacramento Bee and other out lets this weekend. And i have copies of it. This is a problem. The fact that many police have convictions and pending cases and we are not focused on making sure that those criminal convictions and pending cases are disclosed that we have a system for disclosing it, at least in active cases that those police are involved with, is a problem that we all need to come together and solve in my opinion. After personally witnessing all right. I will stop there. You have thirtyseconds. I have 30 seconds . Okay. Thank you. After personally witnessing pd perjury not so long ago the judge put out a call to all of us. He asked how do you protect the integrity of the judicial process to ensure he find that is presented in court is truth . I think this is a call for action for all of us who care about that integrity and that truth. And so okay. Now your time is up. I want to hand out. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker. Good evening. Good evening commissioners. Did you have a comment to this last just quickly. I want to be clear and defend my fellow commissioner a little bit. I dont think anyone on the commission has an issue with dpas report. In fact, we are the one who asked director henderson to give us that report of the 79. We are the ones asking for the information. There was a discussion last week about the way certain things in the report were represented. And thats what the lively discussion was about. But theres no impression we all wanted that information and we asked for it. I dont think any commissioner was trying to suggest that any bidirector henderson giving us that information there was something improper about it. We all wanted it and we asked for it. Commissioner mazzucco you may have missed a point there. I agree with you. The Police Officers one bad Police Officer makes it bad for every other officer in this department. And ive heard that mantra for years. But the officers are not feeling supported. Because they do a lot every day that we dont know about and you as a public defender coming here and you raise these issues because your job is to be a public defender, you raise those before the judge where your client has a case pending. But the constantly are taking this negative nobody ever focusing on the positive. So in order for us to bring change, its difficult to bring change when we are continually hammering on the negative. The negative is recognized. You would be surprised that we do as a commission. But the reality is theres a certain that seems not to want to let it go. You as a public defender represent people who have been accused and sometimes wrongfully. It happens on both sides of the aisle. Commissioner elias. Thank you. I wanted to thank you with bringing up the point with respect to 79 instances because i think i lost sight of that. 79 instances out of a police force of 2,000 what is it 2300 . So you have 2300 officers and 79 instances in one year . The odds are great in terms of theyre not being a lot of instances of misconduct. So it is very low. And so i think that thats why its important for us to take a deep dive into the sort of few instances that are recorded and really explore them. So thank you for reminding me about that. Okay. Well resume Public Comment. Thank you. Good evening commissioners, chief scott, director henderson. Im here to ask sfpd to report to the commission and public about the lead program, Law Enforcement assisted diversion. This program was molded after seattles awardwinning program to refer drug offenders. To Community Based health and social services as an alternative to jail and prosecution. Programs like lead are exactly what we need to improve the Health Status of participants and end the cycle recidivism. So far the program appears to be unutilized and appears to those arrested for low level drug offenses are by and large black and brown people. They dont participate in the same rates in the lead program through referrals or social contacts. I have a chart that illustrates that Racial Disparity. Bring that out. There we go. Wrong way. There we go. The whole thing. Okay. Thank you ms. Brown. Theres a thing on the side. Yeah. Times up. Sorry. [laughter] thank you. Well give you an extra 20 seconds for being technologically challenged thank you. The Racial Disparities are kind of the opposite of what we do expect. So normally onethird of participants are black and nine percent are latin while more than half are white. Similar disparities exist for those referred to lead instead of those who are booked. Recently published at the Public Defenders Office. And i brought copies that push back on the citys representations to the board of supervisors that they were arresting mid to high level drug dealers. The data showed they werent. It revealed 93 percent of people in the operations were black or brown. Weve heard that referrals to lead dont happen after 5 00 p. M. Because of the parole dont work after 5 p. M. I think the data here prompts us to at least should prompt the commission to take a hard look at lead starting by sfpd to present on the topic focused on the Racial Disparities the number of participants compared to the eligibility ones and all validation measures. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Commissioner elias. Thank you. I appreciate that. Can we grab a copy . Copies . Thank you. The lead program i think ive spoken several times about the program. Because i actually was the attorney at the Public Defenders Office when we tried to implement this program from seattle. And i had the opportunity to travel to seattle and meet the lead team there who had created this program. And its a nationallyrecognized program and being implemented in other major cities like atlanta, new york different cities like that. So i think it is a great program. And ive spoken to the chief about the Program Prior to joining the police commission. And i have to say that the chief actually he was committed to sort of making sure that the program succeeded. I know one of the issues was officer buyin in terms of having a new program and getting them to buy into the program and make these referrals. Because from the officers perspective what they were feeling is its like another drug quarter where they refer people and nothing gets done and they arent seeing people actually utilize the services but rather return on back to the street, which sort of gave the officers they lost hope in referring people to the program. So i know that that was an issue. And sort of the Racial Disparity was an issue in terms of the referrals when i had left the program more than a year ago. So i would ask you chief to give us an update and status on the lead program. And ive said how hsoc resembles that program by taking people and rather than arresting them providing them with services and giving them more hand holding and resources to sort of navigate through the system rather than just giving them a court that says hey, show up here. So i would like an update on the status of the program. Because i know it was grantbased and i thought it was three years. There was extra funding that was unused. They are rolling through that. Do you know what the Expiration Date . The end of this fiscal year, june 30 of 2020 so yeah. As of june 30 you have to reply . What happens . Or if the program is being successful given the evidence of the program, we have to find a way to fund it. The Police Department did not get any funding for lead. So we are on a our own like we often are in terms of that. Its through dph. It was like 2 million. It was a big grant. It was almost 6 million. I know it was a couple. Million. The program. I was like can i get that . The dph would like to support there was a lot of funding because its a multiagency. Its the Police Department dph its glide. Theres other agency. So they were at the table when this program was sort of implemented. So again, i would like an update of status. And i do want an answer or analysis of the racial composition in terms of what type of people are being referred to the program and why there are sort of some Racial Disparities that may or may not be existing with respect to the referrals. And its only in the tenderloin and mission district. So its not even throughout the city. Its two very targeted areas in the city that are participating in the program. Commissioner hamasaki. Thank you. And thank you for bringing this to our attention. I know that commissioner elias has spoken about this many many times. And so i would actually go in the quest for a report on this. It does sound like a new and innovative and potentially productive program. So we obviously all want to learn about things that work, where theres room for improvement and especially if we are coming up on a funding issue in the middle of next year maybe its a time we took a look at it as a commission and heard more about it. Vice president taylor. Yeah. I want to join them. I think the issue is not so much that its a third because you can say black people are a third of the program but given the small percentage of the San Francisco population and given the large percentage of the incarcerated population, that is concerning. I know you shared these concerns when i was talking about the templates. Every little thing we do in terms of how we present who minorities are in the city, all those things we internal lies so to have pamphlets to know your rights that have black and brown people on them, but in the program like lead which gives people a Second Chance you have a relatively small percentage considering the population thats actually in the jails. We can do better as a city. So every little thing that we do as a department, as a commission to instill in people okay, you are either valuable or you are less valuable i think is really important. And, you know down to the pamphlets that we have on know your rights. We should have as many white people as they do brown. Like scholarships should not just have white people on it. So i know you agree with those things. I would like to delve people. We do ourselves a disservice if we are not giving our minority population the same chances. Thank you. Next public speaker. Good evening. Good evening. Drives me crazy i would like to use the overhead again as usual. Im here concerning my son. Can i fix this . Its hard to fix. Other way other way. Dont start my time yet. All right. Lets go back. There you go. Yes. My son was murdered august 14 2006. And i come here every day i mean every wednesday. I am still saying that my sons case isnt solved. And what is it that we can do to get it solved. And its been 14 years now. And im not of resources about what to do anymore. I know i have my investigator. I know i do all the things that i do. But i was wondering if theres anything in the law that can change that can solve these homicides for mothers like myself. So that i wouldnt have to come here like i do every day i mean every wednesday and bring this up. As i say all the time i always bring up not just my sons homicide but all the other homicides because we want a healing circle of mothers and fathers who have lost their children. And some of these people on here are mothers of children of mothers that i stand with all the time. But i want to bring it back concerning my son. I want to let you know that my son had two parents at home. This is his father. This wasnt a one singleparent family. We raised our children well. We did welby well we did well by them. We paid school constitutions. Tuitions. We did what we had to do. Still the world took my son from me. I want you to know he had his father and his father was home with him. We were both there at the funeral home that day. I bring this because everybody these names are down of all the perpetrators who murdered my son who were there that day. I cant say which one pulled the trigger. But i can say all of them were there. They have the names. And i dont understand why the case isnt solved. Because they say no witnesses. When you have former mayor gavin newsom saying i know who killed their son the da knows who killed her son, the police know with the exception of no witnesses. When are we going to get these witnesses . How do we go about getting them . No one comes forth. Is my son case never going to be solved . This is what the perpetrators last name my sons lifeless body laying on a gurney. And i am so tired of it. Thanksgiving is coming. Christmas is coming. What am i going to do . Thank you. Thank you. The tip line is 415 5754444. There is a 250,000 reward. Any other Public Comment . Okay. Public comment is closed. Next item, please. Item 5 Public Comment on all matters pertaining to 7 below, closed session, including Public Comment on item 6 vote whether to hold item 7 in closed session. Is there any comment about the commission going into closed session . Public comment is closed. Next item. Item 6 voting whether to hold item 7 in closed section. Action. Is there a motion to go into closed session. Motion. All in favor . Aye opposed . It carries unanimously. Okay. We are going okay. We are back in public. We are in open session. Yes. Line item 8 vote to elect whether to disclose any items on 7 held in closed session. Action. Is there a motion not to disclose . So moved all right. All in favor . Aye opposed . It carried. Next item. Line item 9 adjournment, action item. Is there a motion . So moved all in favor . Aye opposed . Thank you all. [stand by] good afternoon everyone. The meeting will come together to order. This is november 21st, 2019, special meeting of the budget finance committee. I am chair of the committee. I would like to thank San Francisco government tv for broadcasting this meeting. Colleagues, can we please have a motion to excuse supervisors Catherine Stefani and Raphael Mandel and . We can take that without objection. Thank you very much. Are there any announcements . Silence all cell phones and electronic devices. Completed speaker cards and copies of any documents to be included should be submitted to the clerk. There are eight supervisors in the chamber. We are now convened as the special meeting of the board of supervisors. Call item number one. A motion for an election to be held and an ordinance amending the business and tax regulation on persons keeping ground floor commercial spaces and commercial districts and for neighborhood commercial [indiscernible] thank you very much. Supervisor ronen . I am happy to make a motion to move this. Great. Thank you chair fewer members of the special budget and finance committee. I dont think i have ever been more nervous to talk about something given the amount of work it has taken to get to me. First and foremost, thank you again on behalf of supervisor peskin. His regrets for not being able to be here today. The letter in the legislative file speaks to that. For members of the public, by way of brief background, this was last at the budget and finance committee and we made a number of amendments based on feedback from stakeholders as diverse as the chamber of commerce, to merchant groups, the members of public and commercial brokers who we spoke with. We spoke with supervisors who have expressed concerns. Those amendments are geared and making sure this will not be affecting individuals and landlords. We are trying to do the right thing to activate our storefront so in order to do that, we inserted additional exemptions for vacancy. For instance, if the department of building inspection is continuing to consider a permit application, the property will not be vacant from the time of application to issuance of the permit. And for a year after the issuance of that permit, so you can engage in those actual improvements and improvements to your property. We have proposed a deadline for the City Planning Department to act on a conditional use authorization. If that conditional use is not decided one way or another within six months, the property would not be assessed in that tax year. We have done other things to accommodate concerns, most recently we amended to provide that if a tenant goes out of business with additional time left on a lease that they are not going to be punished for the additional remainder of that lease and the tax cannot be assessed for the remainder of that lease. We have amended to provide a two thirds threshold for amending this at the board of supervisors provided it is consistent with the intent of the measure and to the extent that there are outstanding concerns or unexpected anomalies in the way this is implemented down the line. I think that this should provide some comfort that we can amend to improve and make sure this tax provides its function. I want to thank the Small Business commission. The office of Small Business director for their wholehearted support of this, which is actually the end result of a lot of work with the department and the commission to accommodate concerns that they had again to the stakeholder commute community, i would also like to thank cosponsors ronen walton and haney, and as a final statement commercial rent control requires an amendment to state law and i truly believe this is the most powerful and effective tool that we have to stabilize rent for existing Small Businesses. For perspective Small Businesses that need more leverage to bring those rents down and to engage in lease negotiations, and ultimately to try to get these vacancies along our most vibrant commercial corridors built. I am available for questions. Thank you very much. Would this be a good time to make a couple of comments from the conversations we had . Yes absolutely. I had good conversations with the sponsor. I just wanted to put on the record i know that the timeline of everything is condensed because for many different reasons, but we dont have time to make any additional amendments now before we would put it on the ballot, but i want to talk about some of the things that i thought were important in terms of the conversation that can be considered either internal legislation because of the timeline that we had to get this on the ballot. One of which is more of a technical thing as we are calculating the tax, the way that the legislation talks about linear footage along the public rightofway. I wanted to ensure that we are also not including an ingress or egress that is not related to the business itself. Often times our commercial storefronts on public rightofway his have a walk up to an apartment above the business. It has nothing to do with the business so we want to ensure it is clarified in the legislation that the tax is not being applied to the business for a space that has nothing to do with the business. We will work with the project sponsor on that. Secondarily and this is a lot more important to me as well, is that one year construction period. Understand that the allowances that are made in this legislation to discuss the permitting conditional use, so on and so forth, with the businesses, for instance, in my district often are not always fully capitalized. Or always not coming with everything that they have to the table. And often that means slightly longer construction period, or sometimes disruptions in that construction period that are or not the intent or the fault of the Small Business itself. And talk through that with the project sponsor for the sponsor of the legislation. There are a few realworld examples in my district where either the business partner, one of the Business Partners walked away from the field temporarily and they were able to find new capital to finish the project or simply they were waiting to have the savings enough so they could finally finish the work at hand. And in each scenario took a little longer than a year. My request would be for the sponsor of the legislation to consider an 18 month period for construction. I think that would be more fair. Anything beyond that, then i understand it would make sense for the consideration of this to take place. I probably should have started by saying, in particular in my district, i look at this from two different ways. From the perspective of the people in the neighborhood that are frustrated with the high levels of vacancies and i think we have one of the highest levels of storefront vacancies in the city, we have worked aggressively to come up with legislation to work with the city, to work with the Small Business community to work with landlords, to aggressively change the process by which businesses can open up. We went through a permitting process where many of the businesses if they are principally permitted, would be allowed to go to overthecounter permits. I think it would be healthy as part of this conversation with this ballot measure to have that conversation. I know that myself and supervisor tang did that jointly but theres other parts of the city that also have those barriers. And im talking about if you are going for a change of means or the use in many cases that have not been permitted prior. And in our district, these were not allowed on ground floor. We change that is part of our process and now there are two or three arts organizations that have co located and opened up, which is added to the vibrancy of the commercial corridor, as well as the vacancies. At the same time, some of the businesses that were going in that were occupying spaces that were a different use did not have to go through the cumbersome process of neighborhood notification because we knew in the end it was a principally permitted business. I think it would be helpful to have a parallel conversation on this ballot measure. I think it would be something that the Small Business community would embrace, and i think it would be a complement not of any contradiction to this legislation. So i am cautiously supportive of this legislation. I think the intent is to change the balance of power with the negotiations between Small Businesses and landlords and i think that is a good outcome. I think it is intended to aggressively deal with our vacancy and i think, as the project as the sponsor of the legislation has said the intent as we wont collect any of this tax, that we will occupy these empty storefronts, and i think that is also very important. I am cautiously optimistic and supportive of this, but i would like to see a few changes that i have asked for incorporated into the legislation, and then also that we have this citywide conversation about streamlining the permitting process for Small Businesses because i think all of us have heard over and over again from our small merchants and businesses that they want San Francisco to be more friendly and more able to open up Small Businesses in a fast manner. So i think that is important. That does not mean completely remove any neighborhood input what it does mean, lets have this conversation if we are going to create a tax, we should also talk about creating less barriers to opening up those businesses. That is it. I just wanted to say those few things and incorporate into the record some of the things that i had talked about with the sponsoring of the legislation that we would like to see incorporated into the discussion , into the final piece of legislation. Alternately that would trail this ballot measure. Thank you very much. Supervisor haney . Thank you, chair fewer. Congratulations and thank you to supervisor peskin for your years of work on this legislation and extraordinary leadership in bringing all of the stakeholders together and taking the feedback and amendments. This is obviously something that is critically important to everyone in the city, to all of the districts that we represent. District six has the highest vacancy rate and it has severe impacts on our neighborhoods when we have so many vacancies. Obviously our Small Businesses are struggling and i feel like every week i hear about a business that is closing or being pushed out because of rent and the way that we can figure out a whole policy agenda to be able to better support them are critically important. It is also, for district six, it is an issue of Public Safety when you have corridors we have so many vacant buildings and vacant stores, and you dont have a lot of activity. There are without people Walking Around her people coming in and out, these are areas where we have a lot of other bad activity that is happening. I hear a lot about areas where we have vacant stories that other suspicious activities are happening there. If we can have more positive things happening, that adds to the quality of life for everyone this is one of the main things we need to do. I appreciate theres more about how we can facilitate speedy approvals and provide a relief from fees. All of that is so important. And also in my district and other districts, theres also a lot of feedback about how we can address some of the other challenges that Small Businesses face relating to homelessness and Mental Health crisis. All of these things together with this vacancy tax will help to create an environment that is more friendly for not just Small Businesses, which is very important, were more healthy and vibrant neighborhoods generally. Thank you for your leadership. Thank you very much. Supervisor brown . Thank you. Just a couple of points. I definitely agree with supervisor safai that probably the 18 month period is probably more reasonable. I also really want to look at the size of the space because i will take, for example, in my district. They have larger spaces, and they do not want formula retail, but they also have a moratorium Liquor License moratorium, so why restaurants could actually come in, have a Liquor License and probably take those spaces, they are not going to do that. There is no way for them to even get a beer and wine license and restaurants have a hard time making it without be a and wine. When we are looking at having a taxation on certain corridors like that one, we need to look at the details of it. No formula retail, and then no restaurant that could have beer and wine, then what do we do with the larger spaces . I think that is kind of unfair for landlords that if we are restricting them, then how do we work with these landlords to make sure that there are options for them to get people in and also definitely streamlining. That is really important. Theres so many of those spaces where ive talked to landlords and they want to rent but when people come in and they find out it might take them two years to open up, they just do not have the financial ability to do that i think those things have to be in conservation as we move forward. Thank you. Thank you very much. Supervisor walton . Thank you, supervisor fewer. I want to make a few comments in terms of what we are attempting to do for Small Businesses. We definitely understand the issues that exist and how hard it is for Small Businesses here in San Francisco. Supervisor fewer and i are currently convening and talking with our Small Businesses in a working group. One of the conversations is about streamlining the permitting process. I want everyone to know we are listening to our Small Businesses and we are working towards a solution. It is also very real and some of our corridors. Some of it is due to irresponsible landlords and the decision that they make. If you are working hard to get businesses into your community if you are working hard to get a broader investment in your community, nothing is worse than businesses and potential businesses looking at blighted communities and seeing empty storefronts and vacancies on some of our commercial corridors so this Initiative Ordinance works to address that and i just want to thank supervisor peskin for taking the lead on that, and everyone else who cosponsored so this could be on the ballot. Thank you very much. Lets open this up for Public Comment. Would anyone like to speak on this item . Good afternoon supervisors. First of all i want to thank leigh hepner for coming up. He was also at the Council Meeting last week. I also appreciate the fact he understood some of the recommendations. There had been amendments made to this legislation. Not all these landlords are bad actors. Most of them are really good. Some of them have only increased their rent annually. But then you have the ones who are really determined to keep their place is empty for years and years and years. Something has to be done. How long can we put up with this it doesnt impact all your Small Businesses in the area. Also there are less people on the streets. It will make it safer. We have to look at the characteristic approach. We need to have a character. Why is it only that some can do that and others cant . Lets make it apply to every Small Business that wants to open this city. A conditional use hearing, up to nine months, if not more than that plus the cost. It should be must much less than that. Formula retail, fills coffee, a local company. Born and raised in the city. They want to move into a place they have to wait just like everybody else. I think we can look at that. Once again i do think this legislation is good, but the time element of the supervisors that they pointed out can be a problem. On the whole, it is really good to see this moving along. Thank you for all your hard work thank you. Next speaker please. We are a local San Franciscobased company that specializes in street retail. I had been attending a number of these meetings. I attended the last Small BusinessCouncil Meeting where supervisor peskins aid was testifying what this ordinance is and the question was asked county vacancies are there . And supervisor peskins aid it says he thought it was around 3,500. The Small Business council head said, i think it is more like a thousand maybe 500. The reality is, the report im providing to you is what commercial Real Estate Brokers used to find property all the information. It is available on a subscription basis. The reality is, step one knowing what your vacancy problem is is to know how he vacancies you have. Today we have only 148 buildings that are actually vacant, with 323 Spaces Available in the m. C. Zone. All other vacancies are currently under the permitting conditional use process. If you look at the report that i gave you, you will notice that when a property becomes available, it is a 14 month process before the space gets least. That is clearly falling to the problem of how somebody needs to get a permit to get through the process. It takes time. It is not just formula retail. The reality of formula retail needs to change because 11 stores is no longer a big business. To be a big business, you need hundreds of stores. Thank you very much. Next speaker please. Hello. Storefronts maybe reducing potential sales sales and subsequent sales tax revenue and the proposed excise tax on empty storefronts might encourage competition in marketing. Such properties resulting in the potential increase in business formation and possibly more favorable lease terms and resulting in the collection of the excise tax on property which remains empty. And excise tax may also have the opposite effect driving up rent while making it harder to market a property if the ordinance amendment were to pass. Exempting nonprofits from the excise tax may equip such organizations with a competitive advantage providing that such spaces are least or sold on favorable terms, however the added pressure to fill the space undermines the justification for the assumed process of the excise tax to begin with. The old bank belonged to a nonprofit in the field of healthcare, but it has remained sheltered, shattered, and empty as an eyesore in the neighborhood for many years absolutely littered with graffiti. Exempting nonprofits from the excise tax does not sound like an equitable a reasonable idea. It undermines the intention of the ordinance amendment for an indeterminate period. Successful business also attracts cereal vandalism. I will stop there. Thank you very much. Next speaker please. Good afternoon. I am the president of the Entertainment Commission but today im speaking as a civilian and a Business Owner in San Francisco. I commend supervisor peskins office and the board for taking a look at how bad actor landlords are affecting the urban life that we have because empty storefronts to affect their neighbours and Small Businesses do suffer from that. I am cautiously optimistic that this might be a solution for compelling the bad actors to act however, i am also a little bit nervous about this and im happy to leads that it is being proposed with the ability to trail amendments. Im asking everybody in this body to really try to game out all the way is that this could backfire and affect Small Business in an adverse way. I think if we do do that, this could be a very solid piece of legislation solid tax to pass that would help. The other thing i would ask while i have your ear here is to take a long look at what policies that come from city hall specifically are causing vacancies in our corridors. Theres a myriad of ones from the inability to open a youth places due to a new places due to permitting process that is frustrating and difficult to manage and also from just the overwhelming cost of doing business for Small Businesses in San Francisco as compared to other cities in california. I think i keep saying this, but they are against us and we are being forced to have less ability to compete with business than ever and i cant say this enough. What is more progressive than supporting Small Businesses over big businesses . Right now it is completely flipped on its head. Im hoping to meet with each of you coming soon to go over ways that we can address that. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Any other speakers . Public comment is closed. Colleagues, any comments or questions . I also just want to add that i think this is a positive step but it is just one piece of it. We i agree that that we need to streamline permitting and also how to get a helping hand in getting tenants. This is just a small piece of it i feel like it is not the whole package, but it is a really good direction. I would like to make a motion to send this to the committee report. So moved. We will move this to the november 21st board meeting. Can we take that without objection . Thank you very much. Is there any other business before us today . This business meeting is adjourned. Shop and dine in the 49 promotes local businesses and challenges residents to do their business in the 49 square files of San Francisco. We help San Francisco remain unique, successful and right vibrant. So where will you shop and dine in the 49 . Im one of three owners here in San Francisco and we provide mostly live Music Entertainment and we have food the type of food that we have a mexican food and its not a big menu but we did it with love. Like ribeye tacos and quesadillas and fries. For latinos it brings Families Together and if we can bring that family to your business youre gold. Tonight we have russelling for wrestle community. We have a tenperson limb elimination match. We have a fullsize ring with barside food and drink. We ended up getting wrestling here with puoillo del mar. Were hope og get families to join us. Weve done a drag queen bingo and were trying to be a diverse kind of club, trying different things. This is a great part of town and theres a bunch of shops a variety of stores and ethnic restaurants. Theres a popular little shop that all of the kids like to hanghang out at. We have a great breakfast spot call brick fast at tiffanies. Some of the older businesses are refurbished and newer businesses are coming in and its exciting. We even have our own brewery for fdr, ferment drink repeat. Its in the San FranciscoGarden District and four beautiful muellersmixer ura alsomurals. Its important to shop local because its kind of like a circle of life if you will. We hire local people. Local people spend their money at our businesses and those local mean that work people will spend their money as well. I hope people shop locally. [ ] welcome. Were glad you are here. This is the regular meeting of the board of education. The San Francisco unified school district. Today november 12th, 2019. This meeting is now called to order. Roll call, please. [roll call] id like to start this meeting by Frederick Douglas who said power concedes nothing without a command. And it never