Is this working . What a Beautiful Day in San Francisco. You know, if you go to city hall, it is so packed. Everybody is celebrating 88. Were here and going to be celebrating this new project. I am the director of public works here at the city of San Francisco. I want to thank you all for coming out our chief and mayor for coming to celebrate this milestone. This facility will be a facility that will serve our First Responders and we are very excited about it. Just last week around the corner we celebrated the new deployment facility and that is a project that will be completed in 2021. That project also is going really well. Then today we are celebrating another Capital Infrastructure project here in the bayview. This job is not only about serving our First Responders, but will also give a lot of people from the community jobs. It will be able to give a lot of our contractors an opportunity to participate in bringing supplies. Of course make our city more resilient. Its also been one of several projects that the southeast sector of our city has been benefitting from. Just in the last two years or so we finished the medical examiners building, the two shops for large and small vehicles are right around the corner. Coming up soon is the new Southeast Community center. So a lot of good opportunities here, and its great that the partnership that we have with all the contractors and all the city departments, that were all working together to really improve San Francisco. As you all know, today is very, very special because its the Traffic Company and Forensic Services division that will be in this site. The building itself is going to be over 100,000 square feet and 100,000 square feet is huge. Its two storeys as you can see. More than three quarters of this lot will be a building with a twostorey building. Were invited about that. Inside the building will be many labs that would be used to help solve crimes. Also our Motorcycle Police department, they will have their vehicles here but well also have offices for them so that they can do their administrative duties, which is highly essential because now theyre spread all over the place. This building will change that. This building will also be a hightech building. Our crews have been working very hard. As you see this pile of dirt behind us, right after this ground breaking, next week well be levelling it out. All that dirt actually is going to be on site here. This area is a little bit of a low land, so were going to be increasing it by 2 or 3 feet high. So were keeping the dirt. Were recycling. As you know, our city leads the nation in recycling. Were following a lot of the building technologies. With that said, the team that has been working on this, i would like to say a huge thanks to clark construction, our architects, h. O. K. And m. I. I. Have been on this contract. Some of our subcontractors, i just want to say thank you because this new facility will make San Francisco much safer and put us into the 21st century building. Isnt that a great opportunity . [ applause ]. I can theres a lot i can say because im excited about this building because i personally have worked in this area for over 30 years. The Public Works Department yard is just up the street. So every day we see these changes. Were very excited. In the capital plan the mayor is putting money for us to look at more opportunities to do more projects here. With that said, i would like to call her to say a few words and thank her for our leadership. Our city is changing in the right direction. Lets call mayor breed and give her a big hand. Mayor breed. [ applause ]. Mayor breed thank you. Mohamed is really excited about this project, isnt he . Hes always excited about projects that move the city forward in the right direction. San francisco is in earthquake territory. And its not a matter of if but when the next big one will be prepared. So we have to be prepared. More importantly, we have to make sure that our Public Safety officials are in seismically safe facilities so that when theyre trying to help the citizens of San Francisco, they dont necessarily need help themselves. We know that the Traffic Division and the Forensic Services division are located in buildings that are not seismically safe. Especially with the Traffic Division and motorcycles and their need to get to people and help protect people throughout San Francisco, thats going to be critical. If we have a next earthquake and something happens, how are they going to get their motorcycles out . We have to start thinking about the future and ways to protect all of our citizens, especially making sure that our Public Safety officials from the police and the Fire Department and other departments can get out there on the streets and protect and save lives. This project, along with so many other amazing projects that weve done in this city, were headed in the right direction. The new Public Safety building that just opened in mission bay is absolutely incredible. The medical examiner building that just open not too far from here is amazing. Station 49, the firefighters are going to get a new stateoftheart building. We just cut the ribbon on station 5 and 21 for the Fire Department to make sure that our First Responders have seismically safe buildings that are just really outstanding and worthy of San Francisco. Now, moving forward in the capital plan finally, after the voters approved a 2014 ether bond, we are finalley here breaking ground, ready to get this building built, not only by 2021 but also on budget, right mohamed . On budget. I dont see many claps for on budget. So i just want to thank everyone whos here today with us to celebrate this milestone and just raise the profile of how significant it is to get these projects done. In fact, the voters have been really generous because through the work of the capital plan and under the leadership of our city administrator, weve been able to bring the bond for these projects forward to the voters in a responsible way, without raising property taxes. I know they usually love that. Which is why in march of next year, well be bringing forward another bond to continue the great work that were doing to make all of our buildings seismically safe throughout San Francisco. This is a great step in the right direction. I want to thank d. P. W. And the Capital Planning committee and all the contractors and people that are going to make sure that this is not only a beautiful building, but one of the most environmentally friendly buildings and it will be a safe, great place for so many people who serve our city day in and day out to work. Im looking forward to it. Im sure these guys behind me cant wait to use a nice bathroom for a change in a great facility. With that, i want to take this opportunity to introduce the supervisor for this district, supervisor walton. Thank you so much, madam mayor. First of all, good afternoon and welcome to district 10. Youre actually in a place that is going to be very well protected in the future in San Francisco. As the mayor mentioned, we have crime lab out here now in the district. Were going to have keep your fingers crossed everything goes according to plan our evidence facility. Naturally we have the Traffic Company and Forensic Division that is coming right here. Our district is going to be well protected, which is exciting for us. Any time we can have Brand New Community gems that are going to be in our district, we get excited about that. So i want to thank everyone for coming out here today. I want to thank the commitment from the voters. Thank the mayor for her commitment and dedication to district 10. I want to of course thank mohamed who is a constituent here in district 10 and who worked very hard to make sure that we have the opportunity to bring facilities like this here into the district. I want to thank the chief for his partnership on all the work and for looking at district 10 as a place where we can bring stateoftheart 21st century facilities to the district so our police and Law Enforcement can be a staple in the community. Were all excited that this will be here in 2021 and we look forward to all the seismically safe opportunities were providing here in district 10. Thank you all for coming to the district and thank you for being here this morning. [ applause ]. Okay. And now lets hear from the chief of police, bill scott. He is a big partner with public works every day, 24 7, all of the partnership we have with the Police Department, thank you for everything that you do to support public works. Thank you for everything you do for our city. Welcome, chief scott. Thank you, mohamed, and thank you for your partnership. First of all, i have a lot of people to thank here. Mayor breed, your leadership and commitment to this Police Department and city is just off the charts. This is a Long Time Coming and it took vision. It took commitment. I just want to thank everybody who made this happen, beginning with the mayor and the director, all the contractors that will take part in this. The officers that are standing here behind me and onto the sides, this is for them. These are the frontline people that do the work. They keep our city safe and they deserve seismically safe facilities and facilities that are stateoftheart as stated. We thank you for appreciating our work and your gratitude for voting to allow this to happen. This facility will not only move our department into the future, but through the advanced services that have been built into this project, we will be better able to serve our city. It will be seismically safe. Our employees will be able to respond to major emergencies quickly and efficiently. And as supervisor walton said this part of the city is excited to have us here, and we really appreciate that. Our crime lab will be fully modernized to accommodate evolving technologies and employ sound scientific principles to process data. At the end of the day this is about keeping our community safe. We thank everybody for making this happen. Our elected leader, the voters, the architect, the engineers, the consultants. Finally, we thank you, the people of our city again for allowing us to be here and making this happen. Thank you. [ applause ]. Okay. Were going to go over to where the shovels are and we will throw a little dirt and then these contractors can get back to work. Right . All right. [ ] it is nice we can do this outside. It is so nice out. It is 110 degrees in sacramento. We have this weather ten days a year, maybe, but now with global warming, it is 30 days. We are here to talk about affordability. It has got to be one of the number one issues for you. Housing, homelessness, cost of living, it certainly is for the state of california. Thank you for hosting us, thank you for allowing us this opportunity to dialogue with some people who have beneficiaries of your leadership and the work that has been done at the local level to address the issue of affordability. Not just as it relates to the issues of rent, but also for homeowners, which all of us aspire to be. I am still aspiring. [laughter] can you take advantage of your own Home Loan Program . I wish. [laughter]. By the way, you do. And then after taxes, its like, student loans, rent, and this is crazy. So lets talk about that. You guys feel the same way, i imagine. You are a firefighter, you just came here for a very short period of time, eight years later, youre still here from illinois and chicago. Still here. And you spent 22 years as a Deputy Sheriff,. I cant believe you retired. Early. [laughter] and you have nothing in common on this topic with them, but you want to have something in common, and you want to be a beneficiary of the program you have all been able to take advantage of. Why dont we talk about that program and mayor, maybe you can set the table on what that loan program is all about. What is so great about the programs that we have in San Francisco is it is not only the first time down payment assistant program, which we know can help people to get a significant amount of money to put as a down payment on a home, and not necessarily have to pay that loan back right away. Theres also the teacher nextdoor program. Sometimes there is just an additional amount of money that you need to put you over the hump because the cost of living here and the cost of purchasing a home is really challenging for so many families, and i know that, you know, when you say, you know, you have a family of four making 200,000 a year, people think, oh, my god, 200,000 a year is a lot, but just think about it. With kids, with the expense of living in the city, it is even hard to save money to put a down payment on a home in the first place. So having an option like this can be absolutely incredible. So we in San Francisco have made a lot of changes. We have put 600 dollar 40 will housing bond, the largest Affordable Housing bond without raising property taxes, that will provide Additional Support for programs like this so that we can really get to a lot of our middle income residents and get to our educators and or Public Safety officials, and the people that are really struggling to afford to live here to making sure they there are easy ways to get access to resources. It is critical to making sure our city remains diverse. It is important. Lets talk a little bit about , and the Practical Application of what the mayor set out. You have been a firefighter in San Francisco for three years. Four new four years. And you were able to navigate this lottery process. Tell us more about that and what ultimately transpired and why you are sitting with us and why you think it is so damn important. Im happy to be sitting here on the other end of this program i am a firefighter of San Francisco. I had friends who came who went to the program and i know that that would be my only way to stay in the city. My mom and dad live here and i grew up here, i was born and raised, i have had so many friends and coworkers leave San Francisco to as far as idaho to find Affordable Housing. And my own fire academy, i would say about half wherefrom here and a quarter are still with here. It is still unfortunate that folks who want to stay cant, but i lucked out, and some of my classmates lucked out where we got this program through the city. I havent even got a chance to personally thank you so thank you. I have a wonderful home in silver terrace, i love it. I love it to death. A great view, it is my dream home. I cant wait to go home every night every morning after work. This program is a help for a down payment and there is no way i would have been able to pay them for the down payment. The amount that you need to compete in this market is astronomical and even with the program, as im sure other people no, the only thing that really helped me was my program. If i didnt have the money from the city, i have been eyeing it for years. It is at it it is competitive. It is competitive. We put additional money in a couple of years back for First Responders, you know, basically trying to get more First Responders to live in the city and theres additional money for that and so the money goes fast. Yeah,. Even with that, use it still has to be a lottery because theres not enough money to go around. Mine wasnt as large as some of the other lotteries that i saw on their, and some of you guys the odds were a little stacked against you guys a little more than i was, but still, it was still really tough i was doing it i knew about this program for a while and i think i had about three years trying to go for it and do it. Even with this program, you still need enough down payment on your own and help from all corners of your own community. I scrounged and i saved. A lot of trips i didnt go on, a lot of nights out i didnt go on , and i lucked out. There is not no other way about it. You lucked out for whatever reason and you decided that you had had enough of the winters in chicago and you came out west. I did. But you didnt expect to be out here this many years. No. I moved from six from chicago about five years ago and i thought, it will totally be a temporary thing, so did my family, and eight years later, im still here in San Francisco as a teacher. I am teaching second grade. My name is cheryl and i closed on a condo in Outer Mission around the 4th of july weekend just recently. It is very close to your school. It is very close to the school and the children that i serve. It is a 16 minute drive every morning in rush hour traffic. It is amazing. Thank you to the Mayors Office of housing. It has been an amazing learning experience similar it is a Lottery Program and it was a good three years that i was trying, but you just keep pushing forward and you keep trying and one day you get lucky and i did. After that, it was a whirlwind process with the