Thank you very much. Wonderful, what a great award that is. Id like to take a moment and acknowledge Supervisor Scott Wiener has joined us here this evening. Someone who we all know. applause has done an amazing job in district 8 and making that a wonderful place to live for thousands of residents there, including my father. So, thank you very much. He thanks you. Fourth generation, you know . Without further ado id like to invite someone who was standing on the stage just last year wearing a different uniform, stunning us all with her well deserved award as a most empowering city employee, that is lucinda from the Fire Department to do the next award for nerc. applause thank you, i want to say on behalf of chief hayes white who could not be here tonight nert is a [speaker not understood] with the community of San Francisco. The marina navy demanded training. 23 plus years later the Fire Department is still working with the community on this great program. We have great training and support for what you do in your neighborhood. The neighborhood that you live in, the earthquake knows no boundaries, the earthquake does not Pay Attention to that. Were all going to be in this together so getting to know who you are in the portola, getting to know who you know is critical. applause the critical piece to the nert program. And that happens through neighbors building their teams and building what is going to be the network that we have together. So, thank you to the battalion 2 chief. Hilbtion hickey is here on the chiefs behalf. Nora is here today and donna is going to tell you why. applause good evening. My name is dianne rivera, and i have a cold. So, i hope youll bear with me. Im a member of the neighborhood Emergency Response team, and i am so pleased, as we all are, that nora has been chosen as the exemplary leader for receiving the exemplary Leadership Award for 2012. Nora is a leader in her neighborhood and we all recognize her as a leader throughout the city. As a past coordinator nora has led her team in all aspects of nert training. Nora does many other things for the nert program. She has organized youth groups, namely the red cross youth group, so they can act as victims during our triage drills. Nora also participates in mini drills, outreach tabling programs, and she does continuing training. When nora is not doing this, shes working in the nert office organizing volunteers. Nora is our resident ar extraordinaer. And what do i mean by that . Nora has the ability through use of makeup to create lifethreatening wounds on the limbs of victims. [laughter] so that our graduating nert class 6 triage people can see what it might really look like during a real event. Noras goals are pretty selfevident. She would like everyone to take the nert program. We are so happy, nora, for you where are you . You are very deserving of this award. Congratulations. applause thank you so much. I really consider myself a student, and i have so many people that are part of the nert family that have taught me so much. And i invite all of you to become member of the nert family. And thank you again. applause to introduce our next award i would like to invite someone to the stage i have a cold, too, i apologize. [laughter] sneeze with my mouth moving. I want to invite someone who i think many people in this room know who works behind the scenes here at city hall to actually create what i think are some of the most significant physical examples of neighborhood empowerment in the city. And that, of course, is lenny denriquez. I want to invite her up here. If you walk around and see an amazing mural or amazing garden, its a good chance shes the one that said yes to that application. So, here we go, lenny. applause good evening. Im up here because i nominated the Progress Park for the best ccg nen award. Im proud to present this award on behalf of nen to bruce and bill for their hard work and dedication for turning this vacant lot, this eyesore in their community to a beautiful green park for everyone to enjoy. Through their hard work and dedication and the support of their neighbors, they just created something tremendously beautiful. Its just amazing. And i would like im honored and i would like to invite them up to receive their award. applause thank you. [laughter] i want to mention that we live in one of the newest neighborhoods in San Francisco, brandnew well, tenyearold buildings, condos, apartments, a bunch of people who dont have a history, dont have a neighborhood. Just a bunch of strangers living in proximity. And we got this idea to convert this derelict property, this derelict piece of weed infested lot under the caltrans on ramp. And all of a sudden weve got people showing up writing checks, digging weeds, breaking rocks. So, i got a real we got a real experience of what it means to be in a neighborhood because we took this we turned into a neighborhood. Thats the power of that project. So, i never anticipated it would do that. applause thank you very much. I just wanted to make sure everyone understood where its located. Its located in dogpatch, small neighborhood on the bay in San Francisco. applause part of district 10, supervisor cohens district. applause certainly im weeding in front of my house, wait for people to show up with check. [laughter] get ready for that, deposit with my phone there. Next is an award that i think, you know, ironically its become one of those buzz awards for nen awards. Ill be walking down the street and have someone come up and get in my face, were going to come back neighborhood of the year, you watch. Come back neighbor of the year, its that bcs of the nen awards. And its my honor to introduce someone who to drone deuce this award, many of you much in the southern part of the city especially have worked side by side with and do Amazing Things in your neighborhood, especially along merchant corridors. Thats chrisy atano of the economic work force development. applause were at the homestretch for awards. So, ive had the distinct pleasure of being able to work with many of the residents of the portola and got corrected many times how to pronounce that name. So, i am also a resident of silver terrace. Its been such a pleasure to work with everyone in the committee including both of the supervisors that have been part of the district. applause supervisor campos and supervisor malia cohen. Im not going to speak too much because i know the nominater took not only is she a part of this community, but she has taken the time to really outline all the achievements of the community. But i will say on behalf of my boss, amy cohen, the portola never had a drop down on the yelp. It never had a drop down on the cdbg Grant Application process. And they used to have tshirts that said best little neighborhood you never knew. So, im going to bring up lindy lynetsky from dpw. applause we stole all her lines already. Yeah, stole all my lines. You just stole another. All right. Tonight is called the portola sweep, right . [cheering and applauding] i know there are several people here tonight who nominated the portola as the come back neighborhood of the award of the year. Neighborhood of the year award. Im sure there were several nominaters. So, im very humble to be able to present my nomination and the reasons why i think we deserve tonights award. Im a relative newcomer to the neighborhood, only 13 years, and there are many more folks who have been there for their whole lifetime. Several years ago as even chrisy talked about, i first saw the portola, because portola family connections who this year is celebrating their 20th anniversary serving the community. applause had applied for a grant and as chrisy mentioned, there was nowhere to check. You couldnt get a grant if your neighborhood didnt include it. Think of it still very similar. If you look at a aaa map today or a city neighborhood map, you aint gonna see the portola on it despite all of our victories tonight and all of our victories over the past years. This particular year has been very important to the portola. I think our biggest accomplishment was staying together. It was district redistricting and the government wanted to put some of us in one district and some of us in another district. And folks came out and they went to all those meetings and said, i dont care which district you put us in, but we want to stay together. The portola needs to be one. Similarly, there was a road between two reservoirs in our neighborhood that was supposed to have been we opened after construction and we were told no, were going to keep it closed. And that would effectively have blocked one side of the neighborhood from the other and hundreds of people attended a Community Meeting and said, no, you keep that open because we cant to stay together. applause in addition this is definitely our year. Weve won two Community Challenge grants. One of them was doing a beautiful mural of a stake on a caltrans its the year of the snake, isnt it . Of course were going to win. applause the second is for a pocket park on boers at san bruno. It will be the first to be a pilot pocket park could say that several time, a pilot pocket park. [laughter] one of at least five improving every Little Corner of all the dead end streets on san bruno avenue. Boce. We could go on and on, everything from the garden tour to the brandnew library to the new trees that get planted to the folks in mclaren park getting fixed up. We have the most amazing people, volunteers and neighbors. I am so incredibly proud to live in the portola and watch and be part of all the wonderful things we do. So, everybody here, give yourself a big hand. applause so, in addition to what mindy said, we should start getting a fourbarrel that should get construction in february. applause without further ado, we would love to have everyone come he up here because i think half the people are from the portola. But we are going to have barbara, lets see, Barbara Senich and jackie moray to come up on stage and accept the award on behalf of the portola. applause nice tshirt. Thank you very much. Here is a model of the tshirt. [laughter] applause it is the best neighborhood you never heard of. Both barbara and i are lifelong members of the neighborhood. Im still in the same house that i grew up in. And come and see the new fourbarrel when we timely get it. Were the only neighborhood that doesnt have a coffee shop. What can i tell you . [laughter] applause as jackie said, youll have to come out to the portola to see whats going on. And dont forget to notice our painted pillar there as you drive along 01 experiencing technical difficulty; please stand by here is the other linda to accept the award on behalf of the group. applause thank you. My name is linda light haiser and i work with help mclaren park. Aliotopier here to accept the award on behalf of the founders of the organization, the real movers and shakers who couldnt be here tonight, chuck and [speaker not understood]. [cheering and applauding] their family is in peru, which is where [speaker not understood] hailses from. Theyre so disappointed they couldnt be here tonight. But the back story on this is chuck grew up in the portola. And next to mclaren park and he spent his whole childhood there. And when he and she married, they wanted the same childhood experiences chuck had had, and even better ones. So, they have spent their time working on the play grounds and all the other aspects of the park. And they worked so well and collaboratively with all the other park groups that represent mclaren park. Parks alliance and rec and park department. I know they want me to thank everybody who has been such an integral part of giving them this award and all the work we still have to do on mclaren park. So, thank you for chuck and trilsy. applause fantastic. Easily one of the best views in San Francisco, so, if youve never had the opportunity to visit mclaren park, i highly recommend it. Its like finding a whole new part of San Francisco. And now its time for our last award, which is an award that we felt was an important element of our vision for the neighborhood empower. Ment network and that was to takethe opportunity to acknowledge the contributions of folks while theyre still with us. So, the Lifetime Achievement award is for someone we feel we should take this moment in time and thank in person for their contributions to the city. And i think we have this years winner epitomizes the kind of person that we should take the time to acknowledge and to go further into that id like to actually take a moment and invite now our supervisor district 8 malia cohen who would like to share her opening thoughts on this award. applause can i just tell you how good it feels to be up here, to look out to see all the people that make everything possible, that really makes San Francisco wonderful . And i just have got to give a special shout out. You knew i grew up in the portola for those that dont know. [cheering and applauding] right there at the intersection of silly man and colby, my parents still live there. Thats where it started for me. But tonight is a night that we have abopportunity to up lift and support and say thank you to all the people that certainly provide me support and provide me the motivation to get up and come to work every single day. This is an opportunity to thank and praise the people that call me stop, that email me, find me on facebook, send me a twitter and pick, found me on next door. I tell you, this is your day. Put your hands together. Hang in there, were almost done. But this is the day that we get to celebrate applause im calling it the neners. You know whats interesting . Ive been around city hall long enough to watch the nen awards grow and mature into what it is today. So, i also want to give a special shout out to daniel homesy who is the originator of this. Thank you, daniel. applause also i want to acknowledge his right hand christina palone, the new director, mon, Mayors OfficeNeighborhood Services over there in that corner. applause and for those of you that dont know, i represent district 10, thats the southeast neighborhoods. Thats bayview, thats potrero hill, visitacion valley, its a little hollywood, its dogpatch. It used to be the portola, half of it. My heart is still with you, but im glad like the speaker said, it is whole. And that is whats important, is that that neighborhood remains whole so that our city will be whole. You agree . [cheering and applauding] cheers so, a few years back there was this little idea to take back the bayview and really began to rewrite the history and the narrative that we often hear about in bayview. And it actually started, ironically, with a small little abandoned swath of land that has grown up to become the cuseda garden. And its the thought child and the physical manifestation of hard work, of a few Community Leaders that got together and rolled up their sleeves and got to work. And tonight i have the honor to introduce one of the cofounders, his name is jeffery betcher. Where are you . Get up here. And jeff is going to introduce to you as he escorts ms. Annette young smith to the stage. This lady, ladies and gentlemen, is a Lifetime Achievement award winner. Please, please welcome her to the stage. applause i cant think of a more deserving woman. Thank you. Come on in. Jeffery, i love you. I love you, too. Hello, neighbors. Good evening. You know, first i have to say that i heart the portola, i really do. [laughter] this is an amazing win frankly for the whole southeast sector, from Progress Park down, and its a wonderful night. Great to be here with all of you. My name is jeffery betcher. I am the executive director of the organization that emerged 10 years ago from Annette Young smith and carl pages work on the block where i live. Annette lived across the street from me and started planting flowers here or there around the block. And that changed everything mysteriously. And we figured out over time what it was that really created the change, and it wasnt the garden. It wasnt the plants. It was that annette was unafraid to cross the street and give a hug to someone she didnt know, who was radically different from her, and she started to