John will remember and probably agnos as well that the only alive black republican in the world ran booker t. Center. His daughter and his son and it was amazing how this was designed and people participated. Jim stratton was here and he was the booker t. Washington executive director. A mean son of a bitch but in every way and when in College London the organizations called i guess you would call them alpha, calpa, all of us. This is where we played when there was a fraternity league going booker t. Is where we did exactly that. We didnt know about all of the People Living out in Hunters Point. They were foreigners. We didnt bring them over here because we had a black community that was incredible and booker t. Was near the center of that black community. And it was just a wonderful thing. And to now have it redone to seat it this day in age, it is a godsend and and to have it redone in this day in age, it is a godsend and as said, you can look to do with the right kind of resources, the right kind of leadership and the right kind of dedication in a city that is dedicated to facilitating. And booker t. Suffered through all of those years and all that approval and all of the other places can learn from booker t. And do it with greater speed. Mmhmm. But not with any more love. Thank you. [ applause ] as most of you know or most of you dont know, this center is broken into two parts. We have our Community Center on the far right here. And then we have the housing complex which is where everybody is over here. Were where the 50 units of housing are. And that housing is named after a gentleman named john burton since ive known when i was knee high. He was knee high, too. He wasnt an adult yet. This was the john burton housing complex funded largely by the john burton foundation. And wed like to have john come up and say a few words. Please, sir. [ applause ] whew. And while johns on his way up, id like to mention that rick moriono is here who is the president of the board of directors of the john burton foundation. Whew. [ applause ] thanks a lot, larry. I would first like to thank our board members, rick and mariono who played a big role. Because he knows development and trying to help pat through some of this snake pit stuff that they go through, including the fact that one of the city agencies was not going to elect it wasnt the Mayors Office. He told us that thats giving it to him. But they would not let us park cars because there was a little piece of paper that hadnt been signed. And pats very polite. I would have said, screw them. Tow the mayors car away and see how he gets there. But rick mariono and there she is. Who . Who else is here . Who . Tammy. Oh, yeah. Tammy and i had a stroke. I dont remember. [beep] and this is us talking. I was a ymca kid. We were playing in the tenderloin. We were playing basketball at booker t. Probably the most troubled guy was jones and willy will remember. This was west side that had a church and gym. First united presbyterian had a gym. A lot of churches had gyms where young kids could play. And it doesnt happen anymore. In the rebirth of this, its just a really great thing. And im so happy that we could be part of it. Because this is going to be a real Community Center. And i believe after the neighbors around here and pat will tell you how many were supportive and how many werent. No, i dont know that much. But people will see what can happen when a Community Gets together and does something for young people. It improved the community. And as the mayor goes, they could build homes not for people that do not have homes. So there is a big difference. Im proud that we were part of this. Ive known larry, you know, worked with pop herman and willy going back to the corpses the corps days and senator weiner who took over my district, twice removed i think i was. So thank you for being here. Youve been introduced. Jeff . All right. I dont have to introduce jeff sheehy again. Thank you, larry and pat. You went through a lot to make this happen. Lets hear it for them. [ applause ] folks, there was one former elected official that im sorry i forgot top introduce, but we have mayor art agnos with us today. [ applause ] talk about going through beep beep we had to seriously deal with a lot of bureaucracy and policies that didnt necessary conform to what i saw happening. So i had a lot of dogfights with a lot of different people and one i had a dogfight with and i just saw him, olson lee. There he is down there. Id like to now introduce our supervisor, supervisor london breed, who is also president of the board of supervisors. Good afternoon, everybody. Today is a day of celebration. And ive got to say, this feels like a coming home to me. When i not too long ago when i was 14, this is where i came when you were, woulding in the mayors Youth Training and employment program. So my first job, i had to come here in the gym and do my orientation to get paid. And whats interesting is you learn about the city because theyre paying you, so you have to sit there and listen. And you learn about people like willie brown and john burton and art agnos and their history here in the city and trying to change policies in order to make our city better. And i never thought that here today we would be celebrating something so incredible that you all laid the foundation for us to do. So i just want to pay respect that youve done your entire careers to make this happen for the city. Its amazing. Its beautiful. And what is even more amazing about this place is we have been able to use our neighborhood preference legislation for the Affordable Housing here. I have just got to say, ron cane, my buddy here born and raised in this community now lives in this community. And i cant be more proud for the work that weve been able to do to make that happen. [ applause ] you know, it took a lot of blood, sweat and tears. I want to thank everyone for the Mayors Office for the hard work youve done and the 10 million and the tax credits. I want to thank jeff krzyesnski who is here from the mayors Homelessness Office and that we support the most atrisk people to get the opportunity and to get the services and opportunities that they deserve in this community. I mean, this center is amazing. I did a walk through and was almost in tears thinking about this next opportunity for the young again rage of young people, and how this place will continue to change lives for generations to come. And it wouldnt have been possible for two people that ive got to point out. First of all, phillip, and i dont know where re went. There you go. Phillip stone. His family. His family and i dont know where he went. There you go. Phillip stone. His family has been part of this since years ago. He is still doing all he can to take care of this place. So, phillip, on behalf of the city of San Francisco, the mayor and i i took the mayors proclamation and decided to put my name on there. Oh, wait. Too soon . Too soon . Okay. And the city and county of San Francisco, i just want to commend you and thank you so much for your support and love for booker t. Washington Community Center. Thank you. Yeah. [ applause ] and last, but certainly not least, if i get another phone call from this woman and every time the call would be always about the children, always about booker testimony, always what she needed to take care of this community. You know what, pat . People doubted you. I dont know where they went. They doubted that you would get this project done. You went. You shook money off of trees. You contacted everybody under the sun. You made magic happen over the years to get this thing done. And, pat, we love you. We appreciate you. We thank you. Whew [ applause ] [ applause ] now, pat said, as soon as im done with this, im going to retire. You know what, pat . There is still work to be done. Pat has done an amazing job of creating the next generation of leaders to make sure this Community Center is working for this Community Center and thriving. Jerry and lakiesha, theyre here still after many, many years being groomed by pat for the next generation. So i just want to say thanks to each and every one of you. The work and the love that has gone in to making this place happen is a realty. This is what we can do when we come together as a city to make beautiful things happen. This is what is going to change the next generation. This is what is going to change our country. Thank you very much for being here today. Thank you. [ applause ] i am, obviously, going to miss a lot of people to thank, but i do really need to thank the team that put this building together. The architects, we started out steven perry, are you here . And derrick worked on the project and religiously went to all of these meetings and changed things and took the blame when things didnt work and will take a lot more blame when we are done working around to see what is not going to work. The punch list. Yeah, the punch list. At any rate, equity builders has been the developer of this project and have worked tirelessly to make this happen, even though kim kim nash, would you raise your hand, please. Whew. [ applause ] so kims got one of pat scotts hanging up on you because something didnt actually work right. It has been really phenomenal to work with folks. Fisher development came in when our developer quit on us. Whew. And theyve been there with this project. So we still have a lot more work to do with fisher, too. So this project isnt complete. But we will have it complete very soon. Right now were going to do a ribboncutting. And then i want you to explore this new facility. Our staff will take you to see some of the apartments. Youre free to roam around and look at what is going on here. Particularly, take a look at the playground and jimmy johns because now we can fill a really great need in this community for childcare, for those 2 to 5. Its great to look out the window and see these little kids climbing all over everything. So the story is we are a community now. We saw this as a community that needed to come together especially with the hovering list of 3 . When i came to school here, it was closer to 15 . What we have left is a very vulnerable population. We have to fix that. That is our responsibility. We have to make our young people whole so they can survive in this society. Thats where we are with this. So, with that, lets go through to the ribboncutting and then can you get to tour the facility. Thank you all very much for showing up. [ applause ] all right. Good morning, everyone. I am mohammed nuru, the director of the San Francisco public works department. I want to gyp by just thanking all of you by joining us to celebrate the completion of our new office of chief medical examiners facility. [ applause ] just to acknowledge a couple of people that are joining us today i see the fire chief. His wife is here. I see commander laz is r is here, along with commander ewing from the police department. Of course, our sheriff, sheriff hennessee, who will be actually providing security at this facility, tom dewey, the director, and the office of occi. The office of Community Engagement and involvement. Yes. And, of course, all of you. I just again want to say thank you. What a tremendous project this is. It brings me great joy to welcome this new addition to the citys infrastructure to Hunters Point the neighborhood the prom has been in the works for a while. Were glad to have it in bayview. Not only is this facility a worldclass facility, its this facility has been delivered in a very fiscal matter and timely. I think, for me, one of the most important things that we like on a job and it happened on this job, it was delivered with a great safety record. Not one injury in the two years this prom was built. This project is a support project. Its and as the director of the project i want to say how proud hi am to deliver this project. And i want to take this opportunity to thank the Public Works Team in all of the work they did on this project. That was led by city architect edgar lopez. Several of our project architects, magnidina royal. I also want to thank our talented construction crew and construction company, clock construction, who did a very, very good in delivering this. And, of course, k. M. D. Architects, the designers of the facility. And, most important, our client and partner, dr. Hunter, and his staff. And i can tell you, with all of the projects in this city, none of them would be possible without the leadership of our mayor, ed lee. Who, ed, before you became mayor, you were at the city administrators office. You will hear from the city administrator today also. But his commitment and his dedication to making sure that we invest in capital improvements, especially towards our infrastructure project. And he has made that a top priority of his administration. And through his leadership, a lot of projects that the city desperately needs are actually happening. So im not going to say a lot of great things that ed has done, but lets hear from him, our mayor, ed lee. [ applause ] why arent you going to say a lot about what ive done . Whats wrong with that . Well, let me say this this is a fun day because a number of accomplishments are made. You know, i see our president , london breed, who is here just sitting down now because shes so busy doing so many other things. But she found the time. And working in partnership with the board is really born when it comes to earthquake safety and Emergency Response. So let me give you the larger picture of why today is so important. We have to get ready for the big disasters. Weve seen it happen. Its gotten really close with the fires up north. And you realize how much things that should, could have been done to prevent that. But we also have the your honors in but we also have the hurricanes in the south. We have manmades and we study them. Thats why so many of our participants today are part of our First Responder agencies and personnel because this facility is that important. When we were in recruitment and interviewing dr. Hunter for this job as chief medical examiner, he asked because he toured the original place. Im sure he mild at the recent news that were getting as many people out of the hall of justice as possible. Well, buried in the basement has been dr. Hunters office for quite some time. He smiled when he sat down with us and said, youre going to help us build a brand new facility, right . Because he cant do the worldclass modern Toxicology Laboratory work at this office that hes commanded to do. He cant have parents and families of people who want to know what happened on any incident be disrespected in the basement of the hall of justice and sometimes waiting for weeks, in fact, months to have some dignity for what happened h. You cant have sheriffs and other people waiting for the same reason. And you cant have less than professional standards operating in that office. And not only did we head up one of the best in the country for that office, we had this office. Thats why i enjoy working with mohammed so much and the city administrator. We had this whole office and the chief medical examiner inform us about how to design this place adequately. Thats with edgar and the k. M. D. Actorra tects architects designed the building. When you involve the professionals, you are going to get a topclass product when you work with them at the top. And when we have the firstclass responders of a worldclass facility, then youre going to get that. But the real conversation is this with supervisor cohens support, with the entire board of supervisors, the conversation started back in 2010, where we want that conversation with the public what should we do better and be prepared better for . And they voted in a very strong, over 70 support for earthquake safety Emergency Response. And they did it twice in 2010 and again in 2014 when we asked that all of our police facilities, our stations, our fire stations, our department, our Emergency Response facilities get upgraded to withstand a major shake. Now we have a worldclass medical Examiners Office that, for all of the reasons i said earlier, the public can trust. We did it, as mohammed said, on time and on budget. Thats why i invest in public works. When we want to get something done, our board and mayor says lets get public works in charge and, with our city administrator, we get the job done. We also get the job done when we work with our partners in labor. And i must say to the carpenters union, to the labors union, thank you, thank you, thank you for making this such a safely built place, but also for your embracement of programs like city build and local hire. Because there are 44 individuals from San Francisco that help build this if facility with allf the work and that is a great milestone for the Bayview Community. Because the saying says around here, if the community doesnt build it, nobody builds it. I know thats the feeling we accomplish right here in this building. And more an more of our public projects will always involve graduates of city build, local hire, the community. Thats how we build things with the communities, with our own hands. Its not just these buildings. Its the downtown building. Its the chase arena for the warriors. When people say we built that, then 2010 and 2014 conversations with the public about general Obligation Bonds and all of the other financial tools that we have to have our voters vote on, theyll be that much happier. When we finish this project and i know our city administrators and our finance officers are really happy. When we retire debt, then we create even more room for the next bond programs. And the public will put trust in putting their votes in on that. Not only did we do it in this fashion, as i said. We involved, yet, another examination that i think is becoming more and more important to the quality of work we do in these buildings. That was the Art Commission. The Art Commission got the first 2 out of this public project, the full 2 . And i know susans really happy she she doesnt