This is the Fire Commission regular meeting october 25, 2023 and the time is 5 04. This meeting is held in person. Members may attends to observe and provide Public Comment at the meeting location or by calling 4156550001 and access code 2661 746 4664. The password is 1234. Members may address the commission up to 3 minutes per item. Ensure you near a quiet location and speak clearly. Turn off background sounds. Wait for the item you would like to address to be called had prompts press star 3 to be add for a queue. Callers hear silence when waiting to speak. Operator will unmute you. You may watch live at www. Sfgov. Org item 1 roll call. Nakajo. Present. Vice president morgan. Present. Commissioner feinstein. Present. Commissioner fraser. Present. Commissioner collins. Present. Chief nicholson. Present y. President nakajo will read the land acknowledgment. The San FranciscoFire Commission acknowledges that we are on the unceded ancestral homeland of the Ramaytush Ohlone who are the original inhabitants of the San Francisco peninsula. As the indigenous stewards of this land, and in accordance with their traditions, the Ramaytush Ohlone have never ceded, lost, nor forgotten their responsibilities as the caretakers of this place, as well as for all peoples who reside in their traditional territory. As guests, we recognize that we benefit from living and working on their traditional homeland. We wish to pay our respects by acknowledging the ancestors, elders, and relatives of the Ramaytush Ohlone community and by affirming their sovereign rights as first peoples. Item 2. General Public Comment. Members. Public may address the commission up to 3 minutes within the commissions jurisdiction this does in the appear on the agenda. Speakers address to the commission as a whole and not individual commissioners or personnelful commissioners not to enter in debate or discussion with a speaker. The lack of response by the commissioners or Department Personnel does not necessarily constitute agreement with of statements made during Public Comment. Good evening. Everybody. I guess you know me. I was really i didnt want to come ball thank you once a month to address the Fire Commission is important. The thing i want to tell you this dont play with fire. It is important for you to pass the message. You burn yourself this is the end of the story. When i want to actual is that the picture is everybody will going to understand that one must own oneself. So once you understand and you pass the world you own yourself. You were [inaudible]. Nobody told you that. Look at the sky its is easy to understand i dont want to be specific but dont play with the element it is or fire own yourself, thats it. It will raise the level of respect. Anyone else . Nobody is approaching and nobody on the line. Public comment is closed. Secretary. Item 3 approval of the minutes discussion and possible action to approve the october 11, 2023 regular meeting minutes. Madam secretary i will take Public Comment. I dont see anybody propping the podium and well is nobody on our Public Comment line Public Comment is closed on this item. Commissioners. Thank you very much. Vice president morgan. Second. Thank you very much commissioner fraser. President nakajo how do you vote. Aye. Commissioner feinstein . I should recuse myself. Commissioner collins . Okay. The motion does pass. Thank you. Item 4. Chief of departments reporter from Jeanine Nicholson on current issues, activities and events Went Department since the Fire Commission meeting on october 11, 2023 including brjs academies. Events, communication and out roach to gentleman agencies in the public. Report from Administration Deputy chooefr shayne kaialoa fleet status updates, finance, support service, home land security and update from cap aint edchu and report from ems and Community Paramedicine sandra tong on ems and Community Paramedicine divisions. Thank you very much. Good evening, chief nicholson. Greetings president nakajo. Vice president morgan. Commissioner fine stierning fraser and collins. Command staff. Chief nicholson. This is my report. Since our last meeting on the 11th of october. A peck preparations condition. And chief brown and chief tong leading the way for us. In meetings and i partook in a meeting with the secret service and a multitude of other government agencies. Last week. Sort of a practice table top. And then we did another one with the d. Emergency management. So, for you know situations that could a rise doing apeck. A peck is the biggest thing to hit San Francisco since 1945 United Nations being here huge deal. Plenty of impacts to the city traffic wise and otherwise. But it should bring a bunch of money over 50 Million Dollars for that week alone and then who knows how much more after that with all the meetings with ceos and heads of state that will be occurring here in San Francisco. I went to the california chiefs Conference Meeting down in ontario, california. Chief kaialoa also attendsd and made good connections and went to good meetings. It was nice to get out and see the chiefs in instead of our squares all the time. So, and we have really good reps with other departments throughout the state. This past weekend. Quick tower 90th celebration, Speaker Nancy Pelosi in attendance as was the mayor and president supervisor peskin as was a descendant of the coits. So, and yea. A fun event. That day i went to the first respondeder career path way fair held in city hall. And city emt had a let to do with that. But organizing it but it was basically First Responders fair, so wild land firefighting, table for them. Police. Chp. Bay emt will, also sorts of organizations came together. Mayor was in attendance at that. At st. There was a nert drill with volunteers several us went to. And great job organizing by kathleen tom and everyone else and i sure do appreciate the nert volunteers because well be needing them and they have deployed over the past several years during covid. Also on friday evening im sure chief tom and kaialoa will hate this there was a banquet in their honor in china town they were both honored. And it was well attended and nice banquet and commissioner fraser was in attendance. Thank you for this. Upon plenty of political folks the mayor came by. They were morified about it but it was not bad. It was fun. Yea. Fun. So that was nice. And then i met with the new cest 9910s at ems. These other young people that went through city emt and internship on the ambulance. Another class of them in this may be our fifth of folks it is clipping along at a good pace. Great work being done. Today met with the bfa, black firefighter association. Path way stuff. Also met with am homelessness and supportive house to tighten up the Community Paramedics getting access for folks. We also met with a new nonprofit put together by retired firefighter, the ems Behavioral Health foundation. They offer Financial Support and other peer support for folks that are having challenging issues. And so it was a good first meeting and look forward to collaborating with them. Met with supervisor chan on emergency firefightering water supply system. And that was a productive meeting. In addition, last week a week before last we had a boot camp for perspective h2 candidates they were close to 100 young people there. We did 2 sessions. And it was a good way for them to take their own temperatures to see when they are ready for. And get their hands on equipment. And so yea we will fine tune it a little as we move along. But had some stand out folks there. And then we were all city departments ordered to look at budget cuts the budget cuts of 3 . As well as 2 positions that Unfilled Positions this we can put and that will not be reinstated ever. So. We are having internal conversations about that. And we will be certainly push back on a lot of this and let you know how it goes. But we dont have any, there is no meat on the bone or flesh on the bone. There is nothing. And so we will have those conversations with the mayors budget office. America has been working on that as well. And then left but in the least, you likely all saw that news from yesterday crews had their av permit revoked by the dmv. Which you know came out of an accident last month that severely injured someone. And so we are continuing to meet with them. To go over incidents that have happened so we can you know sort of inform them and we are working with their engineering and policy people, and others are. To make sure that that um things are safer. And so, that concludes my report for now. Thank you very much. Chief nicholson for your report. Public comment on chief nicholsons report. Well is nobody approaching and nobody on the comment line yoochl thank you, Public Comment is closed. Commissioners any questions or comments through the chief. Commissioner collins . Chief nicholson, how do crews explain the accident . How do they explain the accident . Yes. What is their position visa i have the accident involving their vehicles. Joy think chief can speak to this he has been in meeting with video and explain when they see and we explain when we see from our operational perspective and this they had no understanding of at all. There is also this accident where the woman was run over and dragged which is another story. Go ahead chief. Deputy chief, good afternoon or evening president nakajo. To clarify i was speaking to the incident with crews at fifth and market or over all explanation . I think the incident at fifth and market is the most recent. My understanding from reports this have been begin previously, is that there is not complete comprehension by cruise or way mow about the potential severity that we are addressing. I guess my real question is, has their position changed given the most recent incident . So we did meet and discuss the recent incident it is on going investigation by the Police Department, et cetera, we are not investigating it as the Fire Department we brought our point of view to it. I do have trouble speaking for the companies but my reaction to their reaction in general is the dissect culturaly. So with the incident we are speaking on, the car did what it was programed do and did what the engineers thought was appropriate for the incident and obviously, it was not. And we brought that to light in the meeting and discussed our concerns about what happens at that incident and others that occurred. In general, when i see is a group of people who are deeply tieed a technology or working to make it do a thing. Drive through the San Francisco, delivering passengers. Safely and when than i encounter education and novel case or anything that is not currently embedded in the programming in their system; no one is entirely clear how it will react. Soy, every dints when you get to those circumstances where it is new to the program where it is new to the car they refer to the driver, the driver then the engineers fall back on trying to program through and around it to come up with their solution to it. When we are presenting to them is how it impacted fire operations and First Responders and impacts safety generally. Giving our point of view and things that need to be changed. Difference between the driver. Computer driver and the human is that human takes that input and the experience and the relevant background to make more informed decisions. General low. You know despite miles driven, et cetera. What is the reaction if any, of the Business People whom the engineers work . Again i characterizing other peoples mind sets im not a lawyer i imagine that is not acceptable. They are entrusting their Business Plan to the tech untiling and rely on engineer you saw problem presented when we bring a new understanding of the problem it i believe this they are entrusting their engineers with a solution. They expect them to solve for the inability to avoid drive nothing fire scenes and come up with a way to make their vehicles yield to emergency vehicles. And we work with them to create system they will not impact operations. I will speak to that a bit. If i may. Commissioner collins. So, i think that and correct me if im wrong, chief. We have a good working relationship now with the engineering folks and in terms of meeting every 2 weeks and sort of learning stuff. In terms of the higher ups i say that they are entire sort of pr you said it they are sort of you know they have i giant pr machine and it is always deflect and not taking responsibility for stuff . And you can yea. So, that has been my experience with them. But they dont take responsibility and deflect. And deflect and deflect. So. And i think that i money i think that they are financial low in trouble now, too. And you know that may cause folks to do things different low but but that has been my challenge with them. Not owning anything. Well im not telling you combug dont know but when companies over rely on engineering slusz and over look accident and humin solutions; this is what happens. Right. Engineers are trained to think there are Engineering Solutions to all problems. Which we all know, there are not. So i mean bravo. I assume you played a big role in getting the permit revoked per cruise it is a pr disaster. And i would say i have to keep appeal to the people for whom the engineers work. And if that means you know puncturing the pr machine, thats what that means. These are not engineering issues. Not really. I of course we join with other organizations around the country in asking the questions about the safety of autonomous vehicles. This is not a San Francisco issue. This is a domestic and worldwide issue in which we are playing an important part. We are offering real evidence of the problems. And we have been building the reps worrying cities where the avs are operating and encountering the same problems and sharing solutions we arrived at. Most of them suffer the same problem with framework. And dont have control in their municipality or county or city over the operations. But Lessons Learned here that can be transferred to other cities. And not for profit Watchdog National low based are interested in this issue i think you know. Bravo im sure you did a lot to get cruise haltd and their attention and hope you keep at it. We will remain engaged. Yea. Chief . Before you leave the podium, thank you for your report i loved your fradz cultural disconnect that summarized temperature i had a question. Everybody talks about cruise and way mow there is a Third Company i see in my neighborhood zoox. I wondered if they are at the table because they come out of the barn at 15th street on harrison every morning i see them a lot are than i in the discussions at all . Zoox under a different licensure they are testing with a safety driver they are not autonomous yet at all. They have come to us early. They engaged the conversation. They are willing to provide train and in the same as we come with solutions for way mow and cruise, zoox is interested toot adopting the same standards we are building. And offer an appreciation for all of you who are having taken on another huge job you did not sign up for or budget time for as far as dealing with the companies, engineer and it is problems causing to our citizens. Thank you i appreciate it as a commissioner and citizen. Thank you. Thank you. Commissioner collins. Commissioner fraser and commissioner feinstein . Chief . Sorry. I echo that fellow commissioners said and this is another task to under take. And it is complicated and dangerous. And i guess my question is a simple one. How could this have been prevented . How could it have been prevented. I only know what i read in the newspaper. So. I have to rely on the expert in thes field that we go work with, with the mta and others transit engineers and people who have been engaged this long are than we have 2 told the agencies the puc and dmv the way they were going about it would end with the results we are seeing in the street. And so what they recommended a slower press and measured press and one that had far more mandated reporting from the Companies Back to the regular agencies. That the sharing of information would not have been vol tailor a manualed tory reporting process. It is eye opening that the reason or one of the reasons besides the fact that my chief is very well spoken and passionate about Public Safety in San Francisco, another reason we near this position the San FranciscoFire Department is the few places that aggregating and collecting information about inneraction with avs. The av incident report that was instituted by the chief because we were seeing so many of the incidents is one of the few places where they are capturing time, date, Incident Data that is associated with the vehicles otherwise everything is social media, anecdotal reports. So the 87 events we recordsed now, put us front and center in this conversation. Its. Eye opening and may i ask if you know. How is the woman that was double hit in this incident looks like th