Brown, ryan lamb, nopulo. Did i get it . And dean preston for attending tonights forum. Thanks to all of you also. Well start off with one minute Opening Statements in alphabetical order. Miscellaneous brown, tu may begin you may begin. Im vallie brown and the privilege of being your district 5 supervisor for this last year. For over 25 years, ive been your neighbor and ive been an activist. I have helped make sure that we keep a Neighborhood School open in the violence in this district. And also work to make vibrant and safe neighborhoods. Ive been sole endorsed by the San Francisco democratic party, San Francisco firefighters, s. C. I. Local, planned Parenthood League of conservative voters and many other committees and San Francisco political committee, too. And also state and local elected leaders. And since ive been in office, i have passed over 29 pieces of legislation. I fought to keep but we have so much more to do. We have to fix muni, we have to build more Affordable Housing and we also have to solve the homeless crisis. So thank you u. C. F. And the league of women voters for having us tonight. Okay. [applause] mr. Lamb. Hello. Hello. My name is ryan lamb. Im running for district 5 supervisor. A little bit about me. I emigrated to here in 2003. My professional history includes, i was a former political journalist, a High School Tutor and also a former businessman. And the reason im running today is for three points that im really, really passionate about. And thats maintaining the cleanliness and safety of district 5, having fixing our affordability crisis and i promise a decrease in homelessness. And fighting for local businesses to mr. A Strong Economy to build a Strong Economy, where the American Dream is a reality and its true. Thats me, ryan lamb. Thank you very much, mr. Lamb. Ms. Omara. Im go to try to be really quick. 60 seconds isnt really long to introduce yourself. But ready, set. So, hi, everyone. My name is nopulo omara. Im the mother of children, whom i have raised and coparented in San Francisco. This is my first neighborhood in sunset. I lived here for eight years and still know most of my neighbors. And tiff run into some of them, our children went to the same day ericas together, small village. I have a long history in this neighborhood. To be very quick, the reason why im running is because all of my children are millennials. They range in age from 11, 19, 23. The oldest being savannah, graduating in prelaw and computer science. When our children graduated, come out of school, they cant afford to pay the rent here. And its just not my children affected. Any child of college age, 18 years old or millennials cannot. Thats the main reason im running. Prioritize housing, expand housing. Improve the Performance Index in Public Schools. Thats just some of the matters. Thank you. Thank you very much. Mr. Preston. Thank you. Haney, everyone. Im dean preston. Im running for supervisor because the status quo in San Francisco is just not working. With the least affordable city in the entire country, with staggering inequality. And we are absolutely on the wrong track. District 5 deserves an independent leader with a track record of accomplishments, ready to take on the root causes of our problems. I have never been a city hall insider. Im a civil rights and tenant rights attorney. I founded the statewide tenant rights group, which led the fight to save rent control when it was under attack. Im a democratic socialist, who believes everyone deserves Affordable Housing, health care, fair wages and equal access to power. I have been on the frontlines fighting in district 5 for the last 20 years and my campaign is about taking bold steps, a Green New Deal for San Francisco, free Public Transit, a public bank to reinvest in our communities. And social housing to reverse displacement. We cannot afford the status quo. We need to rethink whats possible in our city. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. [applause] now were going to begin with the questions asked from the audience. The first question will be very good in giving us an idea of how you see or how you wish to approach the position of supervisor follow district 5. Could you tell us what specifically will you do to engage with district 5 residents, when it comes to quality of life issues like development, Public Transportation, homelessness, and public space. And the first ms. Brown, you get this question. I have done a lot in a year perform i have passed 29 pieces of legislation, housing. I actually legislated housing with 20 affordable. At the time that was the highest inclusionary housing in this city. I have also the Affordable Housing. So i identified public and private sites, so we can build 100 affordable. I also put 40 million with my colleagues supervisor fewer to buy buildings, that people were being evicted. We bought a building on shader, all seven units, everybody was saved. To these are some of the things ive been doing. Rivals been working on homeless. I navigated the first center for vehicles. We know thats our biggest increase in homeless. I actually today cut a ribbon at st. Marks church to make it actually its a resting place for homeless to go in the daytime. So theres many things that i could do. But the minutes to tell you the minute is too short. Thank you. Mr. Lamb. One thing i take pride in is transparency. You can access my teams number, my email. All of my policies and when it comes to affordability, homelessness, me personally i was formerly homeless in 2017. Im the only candidate with a wellrounded knowledge of homelessness crisis thats gone up for what is it eight years straight. In my campaign i promise a decrease in homelessness. When it comes to Affordable Housing, i want to build 100 plus units in district 5. Yeah. Okay. Thank you very much. Ms. Omara. If you could go over the question again. I wanted to make sure i understand every point. What specifically will you do to engage with district 5 residents, when it comes to quality of life issues like development, Public Transportation, homelessness and public space. Okay. Perfect. First of all, i just warranted to make it very clear that im in disagreement with ryan when he says he knows homelessness from firsthand experience. I didnt share this as part of my bio. But its in the department of elections bio that ive let everybody know is that i did actually experience homelessness. And that was after living i lived in the inner sunset, a few blocks down from here for about eight years. I experienced homelessness for a year, with three young children, by the way. And i was actually doing my masters at the same time, with a newborn baby. So im very, very familiar with that. Not only that, i also worked as a case manager in the city in dual diogenes programs. How to tackle the problem of homelessness, well, expand housing for one. Have better renters rights, create better renters rights, such as the work dean worked on with prop c. Youre going to have better quality of life if you restrict landlords, especially corporate landlords in terms of gouging. Sorry. Okay. Okay. Thank you very much. Mr. Preston. Thank you, well, in terms of engaging neighbors, well continue doing what weve been doing. Our campaign has knocked on thousands of doors, talked to many of you about the issues that matter most in the district. And, you know, what were hearing is that people are fed up with a city with a 12 billion budget and cannot seem to meet the basic needs of what folks in the district want, Affordable Housing, to be able to get on a bus without being so crowded that you cant get on. And to have basic quality of life. Most of these problems are caused because someone is getting rich off of these problems. We have dysfunctional Public Transit in part, because of private companies that are privatizing our Public Transportation system. We have unAffordable Housing because a small handful of Corporation Investors are making money, by making housing unaffordable. To the folks in this room, the people who live in the district. Well continue to take those folks on, to make this a liveable city. Thank you very much. Im sorry. If im looking kind of befuddled up here, its because this thing keeps going down. [laughter] and i dont know exactly why. Okay. But im going to continue. Okay. Well cull come up to question two for mr. Lamb. I believe that we should stay on the issue of housing in district 5. Do you believe, and if you do believe, how what ideas do you have for speeding up the permitting process for creating more housing in our district . Okay. One thing about building housing, i think it should be based on supply and demand. We have candidates on the stage that just want to build as much Public Housing and Affordable Housing as we can. Some people actually suffer from that. I think its more about planning and taking the time to plan, to make sure that this Affordable Housing is going to be good for district 5. I mean, if you look at the 350 building project. I know vallie has reached out to them. We have to build so much we have to build more Affordable Housing right in front of their front yard, by cutting the trees and building more units. I think its more about planning and making sure we have enough Affordable Housing, based on supply and demand in district 5. Thank you very much. Ms. Omara . Well, i think the amount of housing in San Francisco far heds the supply. Theres deaf huge kha chasm. The millennials between ages 18 and 25 are the ones most affected by it. And thats important to consider. And thats not to disclude seniors. So what my suggestions are, prioritize housing and expand it reintroduce certificates of housing for formerly marginalized communities like africanamericans and brown in the fillmore district or hunters point. Really protect our renters and tenants right will go a long way, by repealing hawkins, for instance. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Preston, how would you speed up the permitting process . Would you speed up the permitting process for housing . And hopefully create more housing and also protect existing houseing. For Affordable Housing, sure. And i think we need to distinguish between Affordable Housing and marketrate housing. Marketrate housing is in San Francisco today unaffordable to most working class people in this city. We need to look at the fact that as a city, we have built nearly double the goals for marketrate housing and not even half the goals for Affordable Housing. So i will be proudly the Affordable Housing supervisor, if i get into office. I believe thats what our city desperately needs right. I do not subscribe to the theory that building housing, that costs millions of dollars, will trickle down and benefit lowincome and working class people. It hasnt worked in San Francisco. It wont work. I will Prioritize BuildingAffordable Housing. Thank you. Thank you very much. [applause] ms. Brown. Could you hold your applause until were all done. Thank you. Well, when you look at housing in district 5, we have created 430 units in ten years. Now you tell me if that creates a housing crisis. 430 units in ten years. And this is apartments. This isnt, you know, im talking about apartments. So when were looking at building apartments, i just dont understand why people, who are tenant advocate, are against apartments. Because tenants live in parliament eapartments. Live in parliaments. Weve been streamlining planning processes. You know when youre trying to build housing in the city or anything in this city, that we have this huge process. I feel like we definitely need to make sure we keep the community input, because thats really important. I have seen many developments become a lot better, after the community input. We also have to make sure that we protect tenants. I dont want to see anyone building anything that displaces tenants. So for me, as were going to have to build housing. And also oh, yeah and also protect tenants. Okay. Thank you very much. Ms. Omara, this next question will be for you. Going along with housing, we also have rent control here in San Francisco. So the question came in, how do you propose differentiating between small and larger buildings, with regard to rent control. And do you propose stronger or more lenient rent control . I think there should be stringent, more stricter laws protecting tenants, with regard to rent control. Currently theres a measure for the state of california, where voters will sign a petition to actually have rent control throughout the state of california. So i think that will be impactful for a lot of the residents, when that ballot measure goes on the ballot. And its its going to come. Its going to happen. And there are restrictions with it. You have to have been a resident since 1995. You it may not accommodate everybody. But its a start. Okay. Thank you very much. Mr. Preston. Thank you. So ive spent the last 20 years protect fighting to protect rent control and protect people from eviction and displacement. Believe me, theres a constant real estatesponsored attempt to rentcontrol protection for tenants. It happens in the city constantly. Supervisors are presented with that and it happens at the state level. And ive been fighting against that and to protect rent control, its the biggest reason that we still have a working class here in San Francisco. I also was the author of proposition f last year, which is the right to counsel measure, which guarantees any tenant in San Francisco the right to an attorney, if theyre facing eviction, so that we dont have our rentcontrolled tenants being fraudulently driven out of their homes. That measure is expected to decrease evictions gradually. It dropped by almost 50 , when the only other city in the country did it, new york. Evictions dropped 50 . So i will be a steadfast supporter of rent control and not supporting any efforts to weak continue. Thank you. Thank you very much. Excuse me. Excuse me. Please. Thank you. [background conversations] how do you propose differentiating between small and larger buildings, with regard to rent control . Do you propose stronger or more lenient rent control . Well, everyone in San Francisco agrees we need rent control. Its something that we fight all the time actually a state level. Because hawkins is a state level, that keeps rent control or doesnt untie our hands. We need to untie our hands for certain things that we have to protect tenants. Until we can overturn hawkins, thats not going to happen. Were always looking at ways to protect tenant. One of the things that i did is i actually funded a housing ombudsman. This is a mediator that any tenant in district 5 can use, if theyre having trouble with their landlord. And this is something i think is really important, because, yes, we give people a free attorney when were, you know, theyre getting evictedded. Shouldnt be working upstream and have someone work with the landlord and the tenant before it gets to an eviction. If anyone has been through an eviction, its stressful whether youre a landlord or a tenant. Im all about working upstream. I funded opendoor legal to also work with people. Thank you very much. Mr. Lamb. Hello. I think there needs to be more lenient rentcontrol laws. That barely covers inflation in the united states. An alternative i think that rent control could expand across San Francisco. And also i think that we should have benefits to defray rental cost for tenants, instead of certain policies. And like what dean said, im for the right to counsel for all. And its usually on a defensive side, if somebody making a lawsuit to you, then you have free attorney to help you in the housing matters. Thank you very much. Mr. Preston, this next question will be for you also on housing, as i indicated, there are many questions regarding this. Tell us about your commitment to building Affordable Housing in San Francisco and what sets you apart from other candidates. What part do you see district 5 being in being part of that solution of Affordable Housing . I think district 5 has been a leader in howing. The numbers as the supervisor points out, is pretty grim over the last decade. I think thats one of the biggest reasons that we need a change and not to be represented in district 5 by the folks who have been in control during that period of underproducing affordable houseing. I strongly believe that our city needs to embrace social housing, a different model of Affordable Housing than in the past. There are other countries that have much more successfully done this than the united states. If you look at vienna, of 0 of the population 60 of the population lives in municipal housing. If were going to see a day in the city where rents are affordable and people have longterm stability, district 5 is a district that will support that. Thank you very much. Sorry, 430 units everything,