help to ensure safety and accessibility for everyone so we can all enjoy these public spaces. more information is available at sf dot gov slash shared good morning. this meeting will now come to order. welcome to the june 5th 2025

regular meeting of the government audit and oversight committee of the san francisco board of supervisors. i am supervisor jack fielder, chair of the committee joined by vice chair danny sauder and supervisor cheryl we also have supervisor mahmood joining us today on separate items and i want to thank our clerk monique creighton as well as cleanup susan enos of as of today for staffing this meeting. >> madam clerk, do you have any announcements? yes. public comment will be taken on each item on this agenda. one item of interest comes up in public comment is called please line up to speak on your right. alternatively you may submit public comment in writing in either of the following ways email them to the government audit oversight committee clerk at imo in iq e dot c.r.a. whiteman at s.f. gov.org if you submit public comment via email it will be forwarded to the supervisors and also included as part of the official file you may also send your written

comments via u.s. postal service to our office in city hall number one dr. carlton be good place room 244 san francisco, california 94102 if you have documents you would like to be included as part of the file please submit them to me before the end of the meeting. please make sure to silence all cell phones and electronic devices to prevent any interrupt interruptions to today's proceedings. finally, items acted upon today are expected to appear on the board of supervisors agenda agenda june 17th, 2025 unless otherwise stated. >> thank you so much madam clerk. please call item number one. yes. item number one is a resolution authorizing the mayor members of the mayor's office and the director of the office of economic and workforce development to solicit donations from nonprofits, private organizations, grant makers, foundations and other persons and entities for the purpose of supporting the continued economic revitalize revitalization of san francisco for six months from the effective date of this resolution.

>> notwithstanding the behest payment ordinance, this item will be referred to the full board as a committee report for consideration on june 10th, 2025. >> thank you. and today we're joined by executive director of office of economic and workforce development sarah dennis philip. the sponsor of this item who will be presenting today is dennis phillips. >> please go ahead. thank you so much. chair fielder good afternoon, supervisor cheryl supervisor sartor and supervisor ambode pleased to be before you today . so i'm representing the office of economic and workforce development. this ordinance as you probably know authorizes not only myself as head of ewg but the mayor, members of the mayor's office and others to select donations from nonprofits, private organization loans, grant makers, foundations and other entities for the purpose of supporting the continued economic revitalization of downtown san francisco for six months. >> there's a pretty long tradition of city's working

with private philanthropy to revitalize their downtown areas . the ones that are probably most well known is detroit who work closely with the kresge foundation with jpmorgan chase and other philanthropic efforts to invest heavily in an arts district in small business incubators and in affordable housing in cleveland. downtown philanthropy helped fund the transformation of their public square and support their cultural area like the cleveland orchestra in new york. >> a really great example which hopefully many of us have been to is the high line which happened solely through private philanthropy right? a nonprofit supported by the geraldine r dodge foundation and the rockefeller brothers fund among others. and then chicago another great and very highly visible example is millennium park which was funded by the macarthur foundation. >> so i just lay that foundation to say this is not a new idea although it is a new idea for san francisco. >> downtown has been an ongoing focus since this board first

understood the impacts of covid on our office based downtown environment since then and that was about 2022 when i think really an understanding of the transition that we were going through was felt. we've been working through a transition to change both downtown's activity and perception. we have been able in past years to fund some of that work through public funding last years based budget for example just within a way for downtown was larger and it was augmented by a minimal by a one time $15 million mayoral enhancement that allowed us to do some significant work like the family based activation that you're seeing in union square today almost every day. >> and we are not going to when i presented my budget to our budget committee on friday, you'll see that those funds don't exist. given the challenges that we have, it's simply not an option to continue that work through public funding.

we have other priorities. and so what we're really looking for is can we work with partners to step in and continue the work that we've started and hopefully expand and try new ways of doing it. >> the ordinance itself specifically mentions the san francisco downtown development corporation which is a5a1c3 set up outside the city. but to be clear we are not intending on going to them to ask for money to come to the city. it is more likely that we'd be going to various corporate philanthropic and other partners to ask for dollars that would go into the downtown development corporation as a place and a home for dollars that could support efforts like public safety, street cleaning, small business support and activations like night markets and festivals among other things because we also want to continue to be innovative. we have some idea of what works but we certainly don't that's not the scope of where we want to stop. >> so the downtown development corp. would be more a repository that we'd be

soliciting funds to go to where the money could sit and then be expended from. >> there also might be cases where we would ask for dollars to go directly to the project source whether that is an existing nonprofit that we're working with or someone with a new idea. >> so the what and i think you know, this is a new idea. it's a pilot. we definitely are focused on clean and safe efforts like our ambassador programs, some of the ambassador programs that we're running will run out of money public money by the end of the year by december 2025 installation of new trash cans and other methods of public safety, small business support and grants that helps us fill vacancies and continue the success of new small businesses that have started downtown events cultural activations like those run by some filipinos in the in our yerba buena area. >> looking at finding sponsorship and stewardship of key public spaces like is happening in union square plaza right now and in the crossing but there may be other public

areas. >> and long term i think we'd also be interested in placemaking and capital improvements although the scope of this is about six months. so i think those are probably much longer term efforts. >> why are we doing this? >> really the biggest benefit here is to try it as a pilot. i think while other city agencies have used philanthropy to fund civic minded efforts through the city this is new on the economic development side for san francisco again not across the country but for san francisco. i know our office looks forward to learning from the mayor's office who has piloted this already in the last five months and other agencies on how best to execute and treating it as a learning process. >> the other thing i want to highlight is while it's like clear that most of the entities we would fundraise from are not interested parties under the behest id payments law we think this behest id waiver is an important way to go simply because it provides the mayor's office and my office the

ability to fundraise in full visibility of the board. >> so you know what we're doing? we're coming back to you in six months even if it's not technically someone that would have to be reported under the requested waiver i'm under the ordinance. >> we will be reporting to you under this ordinance. so i think that provides more visibility to the board on what is happening and what's possible. >> so with that i'm open professions oh i also have to mention i'm joined here by ben white from the mayors office too as this is a mayor's office ordinance. >> thank you so much colleagues . do you have any comments or questions? vice chair sauder thank you chair fielder i just want to voice my support for this waiver. you know director the the work that you spoke to i know will be challenged and perhaps limited by this budget and i do see this as a as a way to correct that. i think we're all here on the board working on some of the more structural pieces to fix

downtown and reimagine downtown but also recognize that there's got to be this continuation of the short term work and activation in union square for example. >> i mean i've just personally seen night and day since those activations have started and we've got to keep that up every day with more activations. i've seen incredible work from the downtown partnership in the open space and plazas that they maintain mechanics plaza letters store if if this can be an avenue to scale that work and to go from you know three spaces to five spaces databases and do all that other work on on public spaces, on on trashcans, on clean streets, on safety then i certainly would support it and i will thank you. >> thank you. thank you director so much for presenting answered a lot of my questions already. i guess this question is for either yourself or the mayor's office how will we assess whether these funds are effectively supporting revitalization efforts

downtown? >> so i think it's a good point that you raised supervisor fielder in that when a ewg or other agencies issue a grant with public funds we include very specific metrics and so we get reporting on the expenditure of those funds and the impacts i do believe and our partnership with the downtown development corp is evolving that particularly with that entity will be able to request and build in similar metrics because it isn't public funds we obviously won't have the ability to require them but i imagine they and other entities are even more or just as eager to prove the benefit and the impact of their work that we'll be able to get similar metrics. >> thank you. i definitely look forward to those. and then if this program is successful all in downtown will all we need and the mayor's office consider seeking the same waiver to support economic

revitalization of their neighborhoods. >> i this is a pilot. i think everything's on the table so i think we can all assess that when we see how this goes. >> great. thank you so much. all right. seeing no other questions or comments, madam clerk, let's take public comment. >> yes. members of the public who wish to speak on this item shall line up now along the side by the windows. >> all speakers will have two minutes. >> it appears we have no public comment saying no commenters public comment is now closed. >> i now move to send this item to the full board of supervisors as a committee report with positive recommendation. >> yes and on the motion to forward this item to the full board with a positive recommendation as a committee report vice chair slaughter fischer slaughter i remember cheryl remember cheryl i try filter i chair filter i have three eyes. thank you. the motion passes and will now be sent to the full board with positive recommendation. madam clerk please call item

number two. >> yes. item number two is a resolution approving and authorizing a permit between the recreation and park department and phil partners llc for the golden city football club to use kezar stadium for their home games plus use of the of of other field for practices for an initial term of 15 years three five year extension options for a permit fee equal to $1,500 per game plus $750 per hour reimbursement of rpd expenses a share of revenues and a specified number of tickets and the completion of certain stadium improvements effective upon approval of this resolution determining that permit fee is appropriate and that the permit will serve a public purpose in accordance with administrative code section 23 dot 30 and 23 dot 33 affirming the planning department's determination under the california environmental quality act and authorizing the rpd general manager to enter into any amendments or modifications to

the permit that do not materially increase the obligations or liabilities to the city and are necessary access necessary scuse me to effectuate the purposes of the permit or this resolution. >> thank you so much. and today we're joined by supervisor mahmud who is one of the sponsors for this item. please go ahead and make your remarks. >> good morning, chair fielder supervisor sauder and cheryl, i'm here today to speak in support of item two a permit issuance between the recreation and parks department and for all partners to bring gordon city football club to san francisco's iconic kezar stadium this is an exciting item because gordon city football club would be the city's first pro soccer team in years as part of this deal, golden city fc will invest $10 million in stadium upgrades such as new turf seats and a state of the art scoreboard. for those who may not know he's our stadium was built as the home of our beloved san francisco 40 niners 55 years

ago in the 1970s so the investment will bring much needed improvements to enjoy keyser's facilities for decades ahead. importantly community access is retained under this agreement meaning these improvements will benefit all users and enhance the stadium's ability to host not only soccer but a range of events including recreational sports and school athletics. >> these aren't investments in just the afc. they're investments in uplifting our communities. these improvements will benefit local schools, youth leagues and neighboring small businesses with over 30,000 kids playing soccer in san francisco. >> so this partnership is a welcome addition to our city. >> the stadium improvements will also create well-paid local union jobs right here in san francisco a critical opportunity to support our working class families and stimulate economic growth. >> as we prepare to host the

world cup in the bay, i'm thrilled haight-ashbury will become the new home for u.s. afc and district five and look forward to the energy, joy and community this will foster in our neighborhood and the city at large. i ask for your support on this item. >> thank you colleagues for hearing it. thank you so much. and now i will pass it over to the presenter for this item miss beverly and with depart. deputy director of policy and public affairs of rec and park. >> please go ahead. oh, sorry. good morning. i'm actually hank hackel. i'm a property manager with the recreation and parks department . good morning. chair fielder supervisor cheryl supervisor souder, thank you for joining us, supervisor mahmood. i have a short presentation regarding the resolution before you today to authorize our department to enter into a permit agreement with golden city football club soccer team to play at kezar stadium kezar is an iconic venue owned by the city and county that recently celebrated its hundredth

anniversary. supervisor mahmood noted it was the original home of the 40 niners and hosted many other athletic events and concerts in its initial decades. it fell into disrepair in the 80s and following a ballot measure it was completely rebuilt in 1991 and the capacity was reduced from 60,000 spectators to the current 15,000. >> since that time it has primarily been used for school and college sports as well as some semi-pro and amateur teams . >> today the city has an opportunity for a commitment from a new professional soccer team to play their home games at kezar and make a significant investment to improve the stadium. the resolution is for a 15 year permit agreement with three five year extension options. golden city will invest $10 million in upgrades to the venue as well as pay fees for gaming per game and per hour which are subject to a credit against those capital investments. >> they will also have to reimburse the department and pay other expenses to other

agencies for the costs associated with hosting the games. so why are we proposing this agreement? this is a major investment of $10 million to bring sorely needed capital improvements to the stadium. these improvements will enhance the experience for all users and spectators at kezar for decades to come. the city will own these improvements and critically the terms of the agreement preserve the existing uses of schools such as for football games and track meets and for the community at large such as the folks that enjoy running on the track. golden city's use will consist of 15 to 20 regular season games per year. any additional games would need to be approved approved by the department manager. this will provide san francisco with a pro soccer team to experience locally so people don't have to drive to san jose to see that level of soccer. and importantly this is not a new concept. the san francisco deltas

another pro soccer team played at keyser in 2017 under a five year deal and they were in the process of building up a fan base. but unfortunately their their league folded. >> but since that time the department has been looking to partner with a new new pro team. >> golden city is founded and led by jeff altman, mark rau and paco cicero all of whom are in the chamber today. they are longtime s.f. residents with a deep passion for the city and the game and are committed to building a club that reflects and serves the community. they are part of the mls next pro league which is the second tier of major league soccer. that's the premier soccer league in the u.s.. there are currently 29 next pro teams around the country most of which are affiliated with the primary mls team. golden city would be just one of the few that's that's independent. >> the next pro league serves as a pipeline to major league soccer. more than 160 mls next pro players have gone on to play

in mls and the hope would be that local players or players that come to san francisco to hone their game could move on to the major league. here's a brief overview of the specific specific improvements that golden city will be making completely new turf field a new state of the art electronic scoreboard, an improved sound system, improved seating and improved press box, a new concession area and all of the americans with disabilities act upgrades that would be necessitated by those other improvements. now just to get into the weeds a little bit on the field. no pun intended. sorry about that. the keys our turf has not been updated since 1991 and there are major problems caused by what's called thatch thatch as organic material that creates a layer between the grass and the soil underneath which doesn't drain. so as a result we frequently have wet unplayable conditions

at the stadium and this is a big reason why the schools that that play at the stadium support these improvements. they they they recognize the value of fixing the field. >> another key factor here is that we've ensured continued continued access for those existing users the high school and middle middle school track meets high school football games. >> our rec park summer camp uses of the stadium and of course the the regular runners of the track. the department retains control of the stadium for all of these uses outside of golden city games and there are specific provisions in the agreement that explicitly protect those uses and and with respect to high school football, there's a requirement that the team meets with the department in the high schools to work out a schedule around the golden city games. so that would guarantee a minimum number of three games each per year for mission high school and sacred heart as well as preserving the bruce mahoney

rivalry game between sacred heart and saint ignatius and the thanksgiving turkey bowl. >> just briefly the key key elements of the agreement. the initial term is for 15 years. there are two five year options to extend that at golden city's discretion but with the important caveat that to exercise each of those options they would need to invest $1 million in a capital maintenance fund for life cycle maintenance of the stadium. that's above and beyond the initial $10 million investment . >> the $10 million investment must be made in the initial years of the term or the department retains the right to terminate the agreement. specifically they would need to play their first game by september 30th 2027 and make 50% of the improvements and then the other 50% would have to be done within the later of two years after the first game or september 1st 2029.

the term sheet also provides that golden city may use some of our other facilities for their practices. they msehe sdium itself for their practices. other than light walkthroughs the day before a game, the permit also requires them to prepare an annual operating plan which would include transportation and safety plans to manage the impacts on the local community in consultation with our department and mta police and other agencies. and of course they do need to reimburse the agencies for the costs, the staff costs and putting on the games our staff costs. >> so if we go back to the other slide because of so it's really because of the combination of the improvements that benefit everyone and the preservation of the existing uses that this proposal has gained support across the community both by the schools that use the that use the stadium as well as other local soccer teams like l'affaire

alito and the s.f. glens and the nighthawks two soccer organizations that promote promote the sport among our youth like the sfa elite academy. the stadium will activate will be activated for pro sports and which will bring business to the local community. >> in fact our citizens advisory committee the our committee which advises the department on the relationship between the stadium and the neighboring community voted to support the proposal. and for all those reasons we asked the committee to recommend approval of the proposal. >> thank you. thank you. mr. heckle and colleagues, do you have any questions or remarks? survivors rights for sutter. thank you chair fielder. just a few questions. i think there's a lot of excitement about this and rightfully so. i have some questions around the impact on current usage and users of the stadium. first, you know i think you

mentioned some of the recreation. i know this is a popular spot for neighbors to come in and particularly running clubs meet there often and you know, people love to use the track. what is the impact of this particular agreement on access to the public in that sort of way? >> thank you for the questions . supervisor souder so again, we're very focused on protecting those uses. the use of the track would mostly be impacted just on game days. of course there has to be the initial improvements and renovations in the first few years of the deal, but that would be done in stages and so there's likely only going to be periods where access to the track would be limited just to make those improvements but not not for the entire period of the renovations by any stretch . and so once that once we're through that it's it's really those game days game nights particularly that that access would be limited. yes. and then you know i know

there's an existing football club that uses the facility san francisco city fc. what impact does this have on their usage of the stadium? >> so the agreement provides that for adult soccer teams there their use would be restricted to one game per year . the that the s.f. city team i believe played four games last year. we have other facilities that we would make available to those teams as have city uses boxer stadium currently as well and so the department would of course make make those other facilities available >> thank you vice chair. i have a a set of questions so thank you in advance for bearing with me. i want to thank golden city fc for meeting with my office early on as well as it took it upon our office to meet with as of city and the nighthawks as well as el for a little

football club who have been using keys are and very glad to hear about the one game and that does mean as you alluded to just now that it seems like boxers stadium is going to be seeing some increased use from all of these teams. >> but in my discussions with them, you know there's some things that were brought to light around boxer stadium and so i just want to kind of ask what the department's plans are for making some improvements to boxer stadium. one thing i heard consistently was about the poor drainage of boxer's fields and you know, something as simple as a need for a better mowing schedule. so if the lawn is mowed, if the field is mowed on a monday, it grows pretty fast. >> and so by weekend time it's it's a different game to play. >> is there any way to, you know, accommodate the teams

in in just the fields and mowing part. >> yeah. thank you chair fielder for the question. so i think absolutely for fixes like adjusting the mowing schedule all the department is is open to recommendations from from the from the teams that use the field and we would want to improve those conditions on the field. the asf delta is under their agreement actually did make some some improvements to boxer but you know additional improvements of course whatever the department can make work you know with its budget would be certainly something that that we would like to do and we would welcome feedback from from the other teams and users of that facility. >> great. thank you. i would definitely want to follow up on that. i think that's pretty doable and we'd love to hear more about the the deltas improvement and then i've also heard about the you know, the need for lights.

some teams play games at night due to their their league requirements. >> is there any plan in the future to uh to upgrade to have lights at boxer i'm not aware of of current plans but there may be plans around temporary lighting and we would we would of course be open to looking at a permanent solution. >> right. i would love to follow up on that. >> and then another thing is a scoreboard. so it seems like the the the the teams have had to invest in scoreboards and it's it's a really gigantic logistical responsibility for them where they get fined if they don't bring out a scoreboard that measures up to the specs of their leagues. is there any way that we can get a scoreboard compliant with those leagues? >> a boxer again yes. the department would be would

be happy to to help the teams accomplish that through through our own you know, our own efforts or fundraising. but definitely something that the department would want to pursue. >> thank you so much. and then there i think this is just limited to a few circumstance a few instances but i have heard from some of the teams about um at least one instance of a double booking you know when a team pays so much to rent boxer obviously the expectation is is to be able to use a locker room and um and just wondering what the department is doing to potentially avoid the double bookings. >> yeah, absolutely. i mean we want to avoid that that sort of you know we we do air traffic control with the property management and the permits and so that's we always want to avoid that. i mean we'd be happy to talk to your office and get in touch with the teams about specific instances where that happened and we we definitely want would

correct that going forward and thank you. >> and then um also have heard about the locker rooms i know it's come up for um and this discussion and um just wondering if there's any upgrades to the locker rooms being contemplated. >> i'm not not currently aware of any plans but certainly happy to follow up with the team. >> yeah. excuse me. supervisor sara, madeline's director of policy and public affairs for the parks department. >> we actually have a modular locker room left over from our work with the deltas that we are currently looking at being able to provide in these situations at boxer i mean i think it's a late breaking update that hank didn't have. thank you for letting me. thank you. appreciate it. >> that's really exciting. thank you. um, and then how regarding keys are thank you so much for answering my questions about boxer around keys are have there been discussions about how to handle the increased traffic to the area and kind of transportation? >> yes there have i mean that's

that's a key element of that will be a key element of the operating plan that they would be required to do annually. in our discussions with the keys, our committee they resolved and we agreed to to work with the keys our committee on the operating plan and the transit plan. golden city actually has hired a transit consultant already to to work with the mta. we've had some initial discussions with the mta 100% public transit would be promoted by the team as the best way for folks to access the games. we've talked about bike valets and of course the team is required to reimburse mta for whatever parking control officers or other staff are needed for the games. >> thank you so much. those are all my questions for the department. very much appreciate it. thank you. i didn't want to call up golden city fc who i know is here march specifically um mark rau is here again want to thank golden city for meeting with my office very early on to iron out a lot of my questions so

just want to invite mr. are please come forward and i would love if you can share you know some remarks and in general what what your vision for san francisco soccer is and how how you think this this partnership can support that. >> chair thank you chair filner for having us today. supervisors it is an honor to stand here before you and speak of two things that i care so deeply about san francisco and soccer again my name is mark rau. i'm a 25 year resident of san francisco. i have played at the youth high school collegiate and professional levels of soccer in the mid-nineties i had to move to germany to pursue my professional soccer career as there weren't enough opportunities here in the united states to be along with my co-founder jeff altman's after our families san francisco and soccer are the

most important things to us and we believe that that through this investment in the city i'm golden golden city football club that we will fill and much needed gap for players in their pathway from amateur to professional. so presently we don't have that opportunity to go from amateur professional we will fill that gap. we have not had a player on our men's national team for a long time out of this area and it's not because we don't have the talent, it's because we don't have the pathway. so we will we will make that happen. over the last year and a half we've developed a strong working relationship with the team at rec and park and feel that this deal is an appropriate opportunity, a fair and balanced opportunity, an appropriate opportunity for a professional club and a great investment into the city as you go around the world soccer is everywhere. it is the world's game you can

see it played in the streets when you step into a stadium the goal is always the same size. the penalty box is always the same size and with that everybody who comes in to a soccer stadium feels at home. san francisco is such an international city. we we are just so pleased to be able to grow the sport in san francisco. add to the vibrant soccer community that is already here and we believe that if we do this right in a sustainable fashion that all all members of the soccer community, all teams will be uplifted in this process. >> thank you for your time. thank you. >> one one question for you before you jump off. just you know, we're really proud to have our multiple football clubs in san francisco . >> you know, we honored over a little football club with the board of supervisors just recently we have the women's team, the nighthawks and of course san francisco city

football club. you know, can you share more about what you have done to you know, make inroads with these teams and and plan to support them other than, you know, the one game i keep i'm sure. >> sure. well, we are very pleased to be growing relationships with all of these all of these clubs and it would not be unique to san francisco for multiple clubs to find success in the world of soccer. there are lots of ways to partner obviously players develop at different times and we're counting on these teams to continue to do what they do in developing players that can move on to the next level which is which is our goal as well. we want to develop players and staff that can move on represent san francisco at their next destination and and build community at the same time. it's just so important. so we think there are many ways that that we can help the whole commuting including the clubs

that you mentioned. >> thank you. >> all right. so i wanted to talk about a specific clause in the agreement. there's i know in the legislation there's an agreement from both parties around the tickets and i wanted to i wanted to propose that we change the amend this item on page four lines six through seven um, changing underserved communities to read underserved youth and striking the line and for department specific uses and striking the next line at least 30 tickets will be distributed to the city's underserved community. so that the clause now reads 38 tickets to our pd for each home game for our pd to distribute to the city's underserved youth

. >> does the department want to to share any comments on that? okay. good to go. all right. so i now move to amend this item as read into the record. we need to think public comment. sorry. >> yes. members of the public who wish to speak on this item shall line up now now along the side by the windows all speakers will have two minutes morning supervisors vince courtney with the laborer's international union of north america specifically local 261 it's appropriate i hope to thank each and every one of you for all the hours that you're putting in on our city budget at a during a contracting economy trying to look out for ,you know, the workers. i want to start by saying thank you in advance for the hours that you're going to continue to put in. we're grateful to be here.

>> we're grateful to have, you know, good city jobs in the field that's gardeners and laborers. we've done fantastic work in the past for professional sports teams whether that's the san francisco giants, san francisco 49 ers when our when our men and women are given an opportunity to to work to a professional standard that everybody can take civic pride in they always answer the bell and they did so for years and years and years just like they're doing out at the golf courses right now which are which is another conversation i was impressed and excited when i was approached by team leadership about this endeavor coming directly to the union, coming directly to the workers is not something that we oftentimes see. we know that we can get this field up to the professional standard that i think the team needs but also that the community wants and the youth wants to. we know that this is a better model than some of the models that we're looking at for some of our other precious public assets, other sports fields

and we want to have a conversation with you about those things. we we have a history of working with management joint labor management committee is something that we're excited about participating in with the team so that we can resolve any issues that come up but also protect the integrity of the work that the men and women are going to do at keyser stadium moving forward under this plan make sure that there's no complaints because there never has been before. >> thank you very much. thank you for your comments. >> next speaker please. good afternoon supervisors griffin lee here speaking as a resident and also on behalf of the connected staff staff we are in full support of this this agenda item we believe firmly that this is the type of public private partnership we want to continue to see mark and jeff's investment upfront investment i think will only lead to positive outcomes for the rest of the community and i look forward to seeing you guys approve this here today.

>> thank you so much. thank you. next speaker please. >> hi, my name is aaron. my name is sammy. my name is mitchell. my name is bodie. my name is jack. my name is james. >> my name is ryker. my name is william. my name is charlie. >> me and all my friends are really excited to have a professional soccer team in san francisco because i think it just it's an opportunity for more people to have well, fun. >> it's a good job. i've played and watched soccer my entire life and we all think it just be super important and amazing to have a pro soccer team right here in san francisco close to home. >> so thank you all for your

comments. next speaker good morning board of supervisors. >> my name is sarah kabala and i've lived in san francisco for over 15 years. i grew up in oakland and today i'm in the room today and the mom of two boys who attend george peabody elementary and roosevelt middle school, both of whom are here with me today sports have always been a central part of my life. i was lucky to grow up in a family and a community that deeply valued athletics. i spent my childhood at oakland a's and warriors games, played soccer through high school and even joined the golden gate women's soccer league after college. >> the only professional soccer match i ever attended was during the 1994 world cup game at stanford. that experience showed me the magic and global power of the

game. today my sons play for the san francisco glens club and soccer continues to be a big part of our family. but san francisco has no local professional team to anchor inspire all this passion. >> that is why i'm here in support of golden city football club and the proposal to bring the professional soccer to keyser stadium. keyser already holds so much meaning my dad always reminds me that is the original home of the 40 niners and every time i run there i'm reminded how beautiful, historic and full of energy that space is. i remember taking my grandmother to her first giants game at at&t park and ah and that and all of the connection that we both felt at that moment. i know keyser can offer future soccer fans for many of us traveling to san jose two earthquakes matches is it realistic? the distance makes it hard to attend regularly and there is nothing like rooting for a team that belongs to your city to build pride, identity and connection. soccer is growing in the u.s.

and san francisco with its diversity and love of the game is more than ready. we already have countless youth clubs now we need professional teams to match and this the outcome of our families life, sports inspire and teach. thank you for your time. >> thank you for your comments. next speaker please. >> good morning supervisors. my name is joe dugan. i'm the executive director of the san francisco elite academy and we believe our mission is that we want to impact children's lives positively through the game of soccer. >> we believe in inspiring kids and allowing them to dream. >> and we're very proud to be part of over 100 kids development and they've reached that next level which is college soccer. and we think that golden city will be that next step in the pathway. >> one day we and other clubs will have a player playing in san francisco professionally for golden city and i think

that's a pretty special thing for the city. >> there are over 10,000 kids playing soccer in san francisco. this is going to inspire them. it's going to give them hope. it's going to give them aspirations to reach a higher level whether they reach that higher level or not. >> letting kids dream is very, very good. >> a lot of positive things come from that. >> i encourage you to support this measure and we're looking forward to seeing them on the pitch. thank you. >> thank you. next speaker please. >> hello, supervisors. my name is michael mcgurk. and i was just thinking everything the city has gone through really on the comeback trail. what could be better than having keyser's stadium refurbished and up to world class standards? i've got an 11 year old son who loves to play soccer and he gets so many lessons from the game of teamwork and you know, working with his friends and as other people have said, san jose is just too far. and really as a soccer fan it's

really unbelievable that a city like san francisco does not have our own team. so we're just really excited to have the team and can't wait to be able to go to games with my son and all of his friends on a regular basis. >> so thanks a lot. >> thank you. next speaker please. >> yeah. good morning. my name is phil freedom and the athletic director at sacred heart cathedral. and we are one of the longtime users of kezar stadium for whom football games we run track and field out there. we've played soccer. we've played lacrosse. it's a beautiful venue and golden gate park. all of the teams that we play always look forward to coming out there because of the iconic history of the stadium i played out there. i went to 49 games as a native tim siskin and i've been out there as athletic director football coach for the last 35 years at sacred heart cathedral. and i can tell you that kaiser is tired. >> and what the golden city football club is going to do to invigorate that space and make

it a more inviting space not only for soccer but for other sports and other uses out there is going to be awesome. and so we're here in full support of this proposal to the city and hope that you agree as well with us because it's going to be great for everyone once it's all said and done. so thank you very much. >> thank you for your comments. next speaker please. >> little floppy. my name is markus zimmer. i'm the men's soccer coach at some state university. i was born in san francisco, moved to sonoma county when i was four. i have a little bit of history with kezar stadium. my wife's grandfather was bob st clair who played his high school, college and professional career there. and i've grown up driving past san francisco to go to san jose earthquake games a city this size as many have mentioned

should have several professional teams. if you look at london and you look at some of the top cities in europe, they'll have 8 or 10 professional teams. and the fact that we don't have one men's professional team, it's sorely lacking. past speakers have mentioned the dreams of kids for the four young kids to grow up going to professional games, watching, watching train being around. it provides them with hope and a lot of them will end up maybe stopping playing at a high level after high school but some play in college and a few will retain their dream. and then also to have a professional team for the community to rally around would be amazing. the upgrades as we all know the current situation in a lot of cities the public private partnership would be fantastic. i personally know mark roy and friends for over 30 years. in spite of the fact that i recruited him back in the 90s to come to sonoma state and play and he decided to stay in fresno and play at fresno state. >> so he's a first class guy and i know he's put a great

great community together. he has a lot of experience both on the financial side and also on the soccer side. i helped and helped arrange for my son to train in europe over many years. one of my daughters currently plays professional soccer in germany. fc cologne. and when a professional team does a city as amazing as we can tell from from the you know obviously the niners and the warriors we have san jose earthquakes for oakland roots we have sacramento republic why not golden city fc? thank you. thank you. next speaker please. >> good morning, supervisors. i do not have the soccer pedigree that a lot of the other people have had coming up here. marie harvill executive director of connected s.f. what i bring is the perspective of the community and a perspective of caring about the vitality and vibrancy of our city and i think this plan is an excellent

one. it really encourages dynamic awesome. it encourages people to come together. sports obviously are such an amazing part of any community and to add this team would be a huge benefit for san francisco and for san franciscans and for children who are looking to get into soccer and play more. but also just for regular community members who can come out and be part of cheering for their team. and we also hope that this would bring a lot more economic vitality to the area. so i am personally and connected s.f. is supportive. we also really appreciate the work that golden city has done to connect with community members and connect with impacted organizations fans. and i think what i've seen so far the people coming up here this morning to talk about this is an incredibly diverse and lovely just collection of

people who want to support from all different venues and angles this project. so i just want to voice my support and say thank you very much and thank you to golden city for wanting to invest in san francisco. thank you. >> thank you for your comments. next speaker please. >> my name is jackie bos. i am a mother of three teenagers in the city who were born and bred in the city. i am a community volunteer. i volunteer with the friends of joe dimaggio playground north beach and the san francisco bay keepers and the gardens of golden gate park. >> i am my family is very excited about professional sports in the city we love the warriors. we love the giants and those teams motivated my kids to elevate their basketball and their baseball to a higher level. we are very excited about

having a professional soccer team in the city again and i've spoken to a lot of other mothers and teenagers in the city and you know the general feeling amongst all the mothers and teenagers that i've informally polled around the city is that everyone is excited to support this and have an improved kezar stadium and a professional soccer team here. thank you for your comments. next speaker please. >> thank you. good morning to the supervisors . my name is bonner sides. i'm here on behalf of soccer. i just learned about soccer maybe six years ago. drew my ten year old son. he was up here with the rest of the children. soccer is what we believe in now. that's the only thing that we believe in is soccer. he gets up every morning and he put on his soccer outfit and he says dad. let's go to the soccer field. his last book report at school that live oaks he said in his book report he wished there

were more soccer fields. i was born and raised in san francisco in 1965. i was born. we'd never had soccer fields in our district district ten we have one soccer field in district ten. me and my son we have to travel go other places to the sunset to the richmond. i have met some very very good friends. do my son and his classmates do soccer? i really appreciate you all for hearing us today and i thank you. thank you. next speaker please. >> good morning. my name is cyril hackett. i am a business person, a business man and they hit us pretty neighborhood specifically i own the keyser pub right across the street. i am very much involved in the neighborhood and i really encourage you. >> thank you for hearing this and i really encourage you to pass pass this motion. i just sat here earlier this morning the first the first

motion the first time item was about the city looking to get money from private organizations and looking for donations for the downtown downtown union square area. >> we have people here offering $10 million to the city. >> $10 million is not to be snuffed that to put into a facility that really, really needs it. all the speakers who use the facility have already said how much the facility needs it. i can attest to what this brings to the neighborhood by all of the events. sacred heart ci the soccer teams all of the smaller groups as well that come to the neighborhood. i just don't benefit myself across the street even though i do benefit all of the businesses in the neighborhood benefit greatly. people come to three hours before a game to hang out to go to the restaurants to go down here street to go out in the cold alley over to the inner sunset. every neighborhood in the city will benefit from this and it's a no brainer. i mean it's something that the

city doesn't even have to go out and look for. these people are coming. >> offering $10 million to improve a facility that badly needs it. and of course the city needs soccer. it needs these community organizations. i think it's a perfect opportunity to to take this grab it before it's gone before it goes to oakland or millbrae or somewhere else. >> thank you very much for your time. thank you for your comments. >> next speaker please. thank you. dave mcmonagle. richmond district resident graduate of s.i. wanted to comment in support of the of the proposal and permit. >> i think a lot of people have spoken about how this will revitalize keyser and that's hugely important here. but i think one thing that that should be commented on is the people that are back in this who and you know mark and jeff are longtime residents with deep roots and you know i know

mark raised in a family with him and they the way he speaks about the city in a positive and focus on you know the civic benefits and what we can do as citizens to improve this city is always kind of chief you know focus for him in front of mind and here i think this proposal is that mindset being put into action and you know the where kids are is iconic but it's underutilized and in need of repair and they're stepping up with a thoughtful and inclusive proposal in that regard. so as somebody who's been going to games there for 30 years and who runs their weekly i would just say that the opportunity is not for kids are and look forward to its use. >> thank you. thank you for your comments. >> next speaker please. good morning supervisors. thank you for having us here. my name is d.j. johnson and i

am a long time resident of san francisco. i also coached soccer at university high school. we have a long experience with kaiser having played with the san francisco seals back in the 90s and coached many games with the university high school. unfortunately we haven't been able to play there in a number of years because the field is doesn't really allow for usage in the winter times. oftentimes we'll schedule games and they will be in other fields be unavailable. so i love the idea of the field being reconstructed as a big soccer fan. i have been to a lot of the recent events with the deltas as a city. i'm a season ticket holder at the oakland roots. having a team here in my neighborhood i live in on the panhandle i think is amazing. >> i think that the clause might be, you know, maybe

undervalued. i'd love to see you know, maybe thought to be maybe a little bit bigger but loving the fact that being able to walk to a game, being able to support a san francisco based soccer club and seeing the community build around that. so i do want to thank mark and his partners for bringing this to the table so i hope it passes. >> thank you. thank you for your comments. >> next speaker please. >> good morning supervisors. i'm scott jackson, 15 year resident of san francisco, 33 year soccer player. also soccer coach coached my kids here in san francisco. >> how else are we going to revitalize keyser? i mean it sits there we all see it. it needs to be revitalized. this is something that was not put together overnight. it's very deliberate.

i know it's from some of the supervisors that mark has met with you mark and his team. so i know that any impact that it makes to the community is going to be overall a positive impact. and i just rise in support of this. so thank you for your time and hope you pass it. >> thank you for your comments . >> do we have any additional public comment that includes public comment saying no their public commenters public comment is now closed and i'm going to hand it off to supervisor cheryl. thank you chair fielder and everyone who spoke. thank you. editors quick question the amendment that a. highlights underserved youth. yes. excellent. excellent. i just want to make sure that we're not accidentally not allowing chaperons to come with them. i'm not sure the best way to do that may be a moot point but i just want to make sure we that

that's okay with the tickets? >> no, i think i think that would i don't know. >> city attorney good morning supervisors deputy city attorney brad razzi it's really up to the committee whether you would like to clarify that the three tickets are available to youth and their families in. to address this issue that supervisor cheryl has raised that sounds fine to me. >> can we update the motion to reflect youth and their families? all right. >> thank you very. >> all right. thank you. thank you. supervisor cheryl. >> all right. seeing that i read the motion into the record, can we please call the roll, madam clerk? >> yes. and on the motion to accept the amendments as presented. vice chair salter vice chair sartor i never cheryl member cheryl i chair filter chair fielder i have three eyes to accept the amendments as presented.

>> thank you. the motion passes and i now move to send this item to the full board as a committee report with positive recommendation. >> madam clerk please call the roll. yes and on the motion i don't believe this item is a committee report so i will forward to the item to the full board as amended with the positive recommendation. >> vice chair slaughter fischer slaughter i am member cheryl river cheryl i chair filter. i'm chair filter i have three eyes thank you and the motion passes madam clerk please call item number six. >> item number six item number six. yes sorry. item number six is a resolution authorizing the mayor or his designee to cast. assessment ballots in the

affirmative for the proposals were new and expansion of a property and business improvement district known as dogpatch and northwest patrol hill green benefit district with respect to certain parcels of real property owned by the city that will be subject to assessment in set district. this item will be referred to the board as a committee report for consideration on june 10th 2025. thank you so much. and today we're joined by mr. donovan lacy, acting executive director of the dogpatch and northwest potrero hill green benefit district who will be presenting this item on behalf of supervisor walton to sponsor this item. >> please go ahead. morning. yes, i'll also be presenting good morning. >> my name's esther lee, government affairs liaison with the san francisco public works . >> donovan and i are here join you this morning to present on the resolution authorizing the mayor or his designee to cast ballots. assessment ballots on the

in the affirmative on behalf of the city and county of san francisco as the owner of nine parcels of real property for which the board of supervisors has jurisdiction and that would be subject to the assessment in the proposed dogpatch and northwest petro hill green benefit district we know an expansion. >> earlier earlier this month on may 20th the board of supervisors passed a resolution declaring the intention to renew and expand the dogpatch and northwest petro hill green benefit district and initiating the balloting process to do so on june 3rd the mta board of directors also approved a resolution supporting the renewal and authorizing the mta board. excuse me the mta director to cast ballots in favor of the renewal on 12 parcels on 4% of the weighted vote. the department of elections is on track to mail assessment ballots on june 6th to all property owners in the proposed district. with nine ballots ready to be mailed to the city and county of san francisco.

>> i just want to be clear that the city ultimately may or may not cast a vote. however, if passed by the board of supervisors, this resolution grants the mayor or his designee the authorization to cast those ballots on behalf of the city. >> a list of the nine properties is included in the resolution and also can be found in the file for this item. >> these parcels have a total annual assessment of $5,983.66 which represents. points zero 7% of the weighted vote and.07 percent of the gbd annual budget. >> so supervisor i want apologize to you on the way in this morning i noticed a clerical error on our resolution on page four under the items that indicate the 12 parcels that are under the mta board jurisdiction the total. >> of the assessment is not 0.04% it's 4% on tuesday, june

30th the mta board of directors approved the resolution supporting the renewal and authorizing the mta director to cast ballots in favor of the 12 parcels which totals 4% of the weighted vote. apologies that we didn't catch that earlier so i'm here to answer any questions you may have and also donovan lacy, acting executive director of the dogpatch and patrol northwest patrol green benefit district is here as well as percy birch, legislative aide with supervisor sherman walton, the sponsor of this legislation . >> thank you so much, colleagues. you have any questions or remarks? all right. i neither do i. so do we need to amend the legislation to reflect the clerical error? deputy city attorney brad

russell yes. after you take public comment i think you should make the amendment as proposed by the department. it's just. i think the addition in the chart was not correct but it reflected if you add it up correctly it's 4%. so it's just a clerical error and that's fine for you to do today and move the item forward. >> okay. thank you. >> all right, madam clerk, let's take public comment. yes. members of the public who wish to speak on this item should line up now along the side by the windows. >> all speakers will have two minutes. >> it appears we have no public comment saying no one make public comment. public comment is now closed. >> i move to amend the legislation to correct the clerical error as read into the record by the department. >> yes and on the motion to accept the amendments as presented. fischer sartor. fischer. sartor i member cheryl member cheryl i chair filter i'm sure filter i have three eyes to

accept the amendment as presented. >> thank you. the motion passes. i now moved to send this item as amended to the full board of supervisors as a committee report with positive recommendation. >> yes and on the motion to. for this item as amended to the board with a positive recommendation as a committee report vice chair slaughter vice chair slaughter i member cheryl moore cheryl i chair filter i'm sure filter i have three eyes. >> thank you. the motion passes. thank you so much. all right, madam clerk, please call item number seven. yes. item number seven is a resolution authorizing the mayor or his designee to cast an assessment ballot in the affirmative for the proposed renewal and expansion of a property and business improvement district to be named the ocean avenue community benefit district with respect to certain parcels or real property owned by the city that would be subject to assessment and said district. this item will be referred to the full board as a committee report for consideration on june 10th 2025.

>> thank you and miss jackie hazelwood community benefit district program director for d will be presenting this item on behalf of supervisor melgar and the sponsor for this item. >> miss hazelwood, please go ahead. thank you chair fielder and good morning treasurer souder and cheryl. so i'm jackie hazelwood, community benefit district program director with the office of economic and workforce development. i'm also joined here by my colleague casey holic also from our team awb. >> so. similar item as the one before i will keep it brief i'm here today to present on a resolution authorizing the mayor or his designee to cast an assessment ballot in the affirmative on behalf of the city and county of san francisco as the owner of seven parcels of real property over which the board of supervisors has jurisdiction that would be subject to assessment and the renewal and expansion of the property and business improvement district. named the ocean avenue community benefit district on may 6th, 2025 the board of supervisors passed a resolution declaring the intention to

renew and expand the ocean avenue community benefit district and thereby initiating the balloting process on may 22nd, 2025 the department of elections mailed ballots to all property owners in the proposed district with seven ballots being sent to the city and county san francisco. >> the city could vote on the parcel if the board of supervisors were to approve this resolution a list of the parcels is a part of this resolution. as you can see the seven parcels have a total assessment of $19,512.20 annually and represent approximately 4% of the total weighted vote. i'm here to answer any questions that you may have and i also just want to note that we have here in the chambers i'm christian martin, the executive director of the ocean avenue association and also i just want to acknowledge that we have jen lowe to chief of staff of. >> to supervisor melgar who is one of the co-sponsors of this legislation. thank you so much ms. hazlewood colleagues, you have any questions, comments all right. neither do i. so let's go on to public

comment. >> madam clerk. yes, members of the public who wish to speak on this item should line up now along the side by the windows. all speakers will have two minutes. >> it appears we have no public comment. >> thank using no public commenters public comment is now closed. i now move to send this item to the full board as a committee report with positive recommendation. >> yes and on that motion to forward this item to the full board as a committee report with a positive recommendation . >> >> vice chair slaughter vice chair slaughter i am member. cheryl member cheryl i chair filter chair filter i have three eyes. >> thank you. the motion passes and madam clerk please call item number three. >> yes item number three is an ordinance fixing compensation for persons employed by the

city and county of san francisco whose compensation is subject to the provisions of section 8.409 of the charter of the charter and job codes. >> not represented by an employee organization in establishing working schedules and other terms and conditions of employment and methods of payment effective july 1st 2025 this item will be referred to the full board as a committee report for consideration on june 10th, 2025. >> thank you. and just really quickly one of the things supervisor walton for joining the chambers for future items and now we will hear from mr. artist gram employee relations director for the department of human resources who will be presenting on this item. mr. graham, please go ahead. >> good morning supervisors. thank you so much for having us this morning. this is a relatively routine item that we do annually which is codifying the unwrap ordinance or a kind of hiding the wages through the. for the unrepresented employees there are about 88 of us that work for the city out of the

city's 35,000 employees. >> the compensation here simply mirrors the compensation that all other city employees get in terms of annual increases in. and wage adjustments. >> if there's any questions i'm available to take your questions. >> thank you, colleagues. any questions? seeing none, madam clerk, let's take public comment. yes. members of the public who wish to speak on this item should line up now along the side by the windows. >> all speakers will have two minutes. >> artist did you have i did. the city attorney city attorney rusty rusty reminded me that we needed to make the point that we we do need to amend the amendment, amend the ordinance as it was originally presented. it's a small clerical change

that we need to make to ensure that it actually does align with the existing wage pattern for all other city employees. we are adding the words. >> on page two line 17 if i remember correctly the words at the end of the business day what's the exact words close of business. close of business. thank you. thank you, madam clerk. >> do we need to reopen public comment? yes. members of the public who wish to speak on this item shall line up now along the side by the windows. >> all speakers will have two minutes. it appears we have no public comment seeing no commentaries public comment is now closed and i would like to move to amend the item to read on behalf of h r d by adding. close of business to page two line 17 of the legislation and again as noted these

amendments are non substantive and requested by d h r yes and on that motion to accept the amendment as president fischer sartor. fischer. sartor i. member cheryl member cheryl i chair filter i'm sure fielder i have three eyes thank you and the motion passes i now move to send this item to the full board as a committee report with positive recommendation. yes and on the motion to forward this amended items to the board with the positive recommendation as a committee report vice chair slaughter. vice chair sort of sartor i. member cheryl member cheryl i chair filter i'm chair filter i have three eyes. thank you. the motion passes madam clerk please call item for item number four is an ordinance adopting an implementing of the second amendment to the 2024 2027 memorandum of understanding between the city and county of san francisco in service employees international union local 1021

staff and. per diem nurses to address order of selection for filling vacant nursing positions. this item will be for it will be referred to the full board as a committee report for consideration on june 10th 2025. >> thank you madam clerk. >> welcome back mr. graham. please go ahead on this item. great. thank you so much, madam supervisor. the purpose of this amendment is to make it easier for what we call per diem nurses or p 103 nurses to become permanent nurses with the city and county of san francisco. so currently we have per diem nurses who work shifts on an as needed basis and we have made some changes to the civil service rules and accordingly are making changes to the mou to make it easier for them once they. if they choose to become permanent nurses with the city they would maintain their seniority rights and their seniority position. so things like being able to keep the shifts and schedules that they already have.

>> thank you colleagues. >> any questions or remarks so no one on the roster. madam clerk, let's take public comment. >> yes. members of the public who wish to speak on this item shall line up now along the side by the windows. >> all speakers will have two minutes. it appears we have no public comment saying no commenters public comment is now closed. >> i now move to send this item to the full board as a committee report with positive recommendation. >> yes and on the motion to forward this item to the board with a positive recommendation as a committee report vice chair slaughter vice chair slaughter i. member cheryl member cheryl i chair filter i chair filter i have three eyes. >> thank you. the motion passes madam clerk please call item five yes item five is a resolution in retroactively authorizing the san francisco police department to enter into a memorandum of understanding agreement with the united states capitol police.

to provide supplemental law enforcement services for the period beginning on january 1st, 2025 and ending on december 31st 2025. >> thank you. and today for this item we have commander derek jackson field operations bureau, the metro division to present on this item commander jackson and as well dr. diana roger. >> commander jackson, please go ahead. thank you. good morning, chief fielder vice chair sorter supervisor cheryl and supervisor walton. my name is commander derek jackson from the san francisco police department with me presenting today is our chief financial officer. kim, you were with me in attendance from the department is dr. diana rotary . director of policy and public affairs and as well as principal legislative liaison stephen lopez. >> today director wu and i will be presenting s.f. pd's

memorandum of understanding with united states capitol police what the nature of the services rendered are and what the fiscal implications are. >> so for context for the request for approval for the new. memorandum of understanding, i'll provide the following on october 28th 2020 to paul pelosi the husband of speaker emerita nancy pelosi was brutally attacked at the speaker emeritus residence following this assault there was a clear need to ensure the protection of speaker emerita pelosi and her husband paul from future violence to advance this goal in 2024 s.f. pd entered into a memorandum of understanding with united states capitol police to provide 24 seven protection at the residence of the speaker emerita. approval for this mou was secured by the board of supervisors and signed by

mayor london breed from january 1st 2024 to december 31st 2024 s.f. pd continue to provide this vital service to the speaker emerita and her husband and as the year came to an end there remained a need for these services to continue taking place. s.f. pd to this day still provides protection services for the speaker emerita as there is currently still. incidents and threats made against her on a regular basis . s.f. pd respectfully request that this retroactive resolution be approved while approval is being sought. s.f. pd has utilized funds from our general fund with the expectation that we would be reimbursed when this mou was agreed upon, signed and approved. the department respectfully request that this resolution be approved so that we can continue providing a key service to speaker meredith

pelosi. and so we may be properly reimbursed for our work with the united states capitol police. >> thank you for your time. thank you take public comment. yes. members ofhe public who wish to speak on this item shall line up now along the side by the windows. >> all speakers will have two minutes. >> it appears we have no public comment seeing no one making public comment public comment is now closed. thank you so much commander and doctor for being here and presenting today. i now moved to send this item to the full board as a committee report with positive recommendation. >> yes and on the motion to forward this item to the board with the positive recommendation by chair slaughter vice-chair sartor i. member cheryl member cheryl i chair chair filter i'm sure fielder i have three eyes. >> thank you.

the motion passes madam clerk let's go on to item eight. yes. item number eight is a hearing to investigate the allegations of fiscal mismanagement by the san francisco parks alliance and to examine the impacts on city agencies and local organizations. thank you and thank you so much for supervisor walton for joining us today. supervisor walton is a sponsor of this item and will be leading this. >> i also stand understand that supervisor walton is requesting that this item be continued to the call the chair but has some remarks that he would like to make so supervisor please go ahead. >> thank you so much chair fielder and colleagues today we are here to address the serious and disturbing allegations about the san francisco parks alliance and its reported misuse of millions in restricted funds. >> these funds were held on

behalf of community based parks and open space groups across our city, according to investigative reports and by the parks alliance own admission at least 3.8 million intended for community use were misappropriated to cover the organization's operating costs. that appears to be a direct violation of judiciary duty and contractual agreements. these are not just numbers on paper these are funds raised and entrusted by community members volunteer years and nonprofit staff who are now scrambling to recover from this betrayal. this is not the first time this organization has come under scrutiny. five years ago this board raised concerns when it was revealed that the parks alliance took nearly $1 million from recology allegedly to help secure favorable garbage rates. that scandal led to oversight hearings and greater scrutiny.

but the problems clearly continue. >> despite those red flags, the parks alliance remained a major player in our city's public space system. it served as fiscal sponsor for more than 80 friends of parks groups including many in my district. in 2022 this board approved a $3.25 million grant between the port of san francisco and the parks alliance for crane cove park continue it on specific safeguards. only $975,000 of those funds have been received by the port and we recently learned the port never finalized the mou that this board approved. last year we approved another $2 million for india basin shoreline park in district ten. we're now learning that those benefits were never delivered and these are just two examples. there are many other agreements

particularly with the recreation and parks department that we must now closely examine. to make matters worse, the parks alliance has issued conflicting public statements from board members. one claim restricted funds were not spent but another publicly admitted they were in a leaked board member email. a board member called the organization's financial condition a dumpster fire and confirmed that the board had hired a nonprofit liquidation form. the group has already laid off staff sent out vague and confusing notices to partners and appears to have shut down entirely on tuesday. our office received an email from former ceo robert ogilvy stating that he is no longer the ceo and that the organization is now under jigsaw advisors for wind down. the harm to neighborhood groups across san francisco cannot be

overstated. these are the groups that clean our parks maintain public stairways, restore habitats and steward community greenspace. and many of these groups are volunteer run. they did nothing wrong. they're funds were held in a trust. and now those funds may be gone. >> i want this body and the public to know that none of the requested documentation from the parks alliance was ever submitted to my office and none of the staff or leadership of the parks alliance is here today. again, the parks alliance has not been forthcoming or transparent not only with this body but also with the public. we know that the city attorney's office and the district attorney's office are leading investigations into this organization. the parks alliance has now hired jigsaw advisors specifically to take control of its assets which primarily

consists of cash and office equipment manager formal claims process to allow creditors of the parks alliance to assert their claims and then would distribute cash to creditors per california law and strict priority. we do not know the parks alliance for assets at this time but we do know they owe the city and many nonprofits a lot of money. we are here to demand answers and this is about public trust, accountability and the real consequences of failed oversight. but seeing that the parks alliance is absent, we have no other choice than to call for the full use of this board's power of inquiry. so i would like for this committee to motion to direct the clerk to prepare and issue subpoenas to the last two parks alliance alliance ceo's, its board president and its former treasurer to appear for

testimony at a future board of supervisors hearing and to produce the documents identified in my may 13th, 2025 letter sent to the parks alliance. >> i would also ask this committee to move to delegate to the chair the authority to set the date for their testimony and document productions. thank you. >> thank you supervisor. um i concur. you know this is not the first instance where a city supported nonprofit has mismanaged public funds entrusted to them and we're seeing the full extent of that coming to light now with reports of alleged misappropriation of funds by the heirs of parks alliance. unfortunately, this is also not the first time in which advocates and city leaders have sounded the alarm on the parks alliance and its potential mismanagement. >> there are community groups and san francisco residents that make our neighborhoods

beautiful often completely on their own without financial help of the city who have relied on the parks alliance as fiscal sponsors and are now being left high and dry with so many reports of people's hard earned funds raised for development of public and green spaces and people's entire jobs and livelihoods now lost. these actions erode public trust and undermine the neighborhoods these resources are meant to support. >> there are amazing nonprofits that do incredible work in our communities and to do so it is truly tragic that a few bad apples are able to scour public opinion for all nonprofits that are contracted with the city to serve their communities. unfortunately the parks alliance, as everyone knows, has shut down its operations this week ahead of this hearing and as they're unable to be here to report on the

mismanagement of their funds, potential mismanagement of the funds and their outstanding debts to the city and community groups seeing so many community members here today who have unanswered questions about the management and how they can recoup their funds. >> as chair of this committee i will do everything in my power to make sure that the leaders of the parks lands are held responsible and are able to speak on the charges levied against them for the public record. >> that is why i will be introducing a motion together with supervisor walton to subpoena members of the parks alliance. >> robert ogilvie current s.f. pay ceo as of three months ago drew bettcher former ceo of as of pay from 2017 from 2015 to 2017 and rick hutchinson as board treasurer and to have them produce relevant documents identify fired in sorry.

>> correction former ceo as a pa from 2017 to 2025 and rich hutchinson as board treasurer and to have them produce relevant documents identified in supervisor walton's letter to the parks alliance dated may 13th. >> colleagues any questions or marks i see supervisors cheryl . chair fielder first of all thank you. i more or less would echo almost exactly your remarks and supervisor walton, thank you for calling this important hearing today despite the fact of what has transpired. but thank you for going even farther with subpoenas. what has recently transpired with the parks alliance is nothing short of outrageous. so many of the art advocate groups who rely on their services have lost all their fundraising options. this just makes me frankly incredibly, incredibly angry. i know of my colleagues here many of your many members of your districts are here as of mine and we all stand here

committed to supporting you in any way that we can. and to the other park advocate groups here, thank you for your commitment to our neighborhoods and to our parks. this city would not be the same without you. and this this is just so damaging by the parks alliance and again, i can't understate my anger here because especially today when one of the first items that we voted on that we heard was about asking philanthropic dollars to trust the city to make the city better and if outside donors can't trust that their money is going to be used, well we're going to be in in even more of a problem than we are. so i think it is absolutely critical that we follow through on your leadership. supervisor walton thank you. and we hold the people, the bad actors accountable and we follow through on this. so thank you for for your work here and chair fielder thank you for supporting supervisor walton as well. >> thank you. director cheryl vice chair

sartor i want to echo that and thank you chair fielder supervisor walton for your leadership on this and as we go forward i just hope that we do keep in mind and centered in this conversation all of the volunteer groups, all the friends of groups, many who i see here today and i know many came here today expecting a longer, more thorough hearing and you deserve that and you will have that. you know these these groups are volunteers. these groups do incredible work and you know, i've seen firsthand for for many, many years their dedication to our parks and to our open spaces in the city. we need to get answers for that. we also i think collectively as a city with all of our other departments need to come up with a plan on how we support these nearly 100 different friends of groups because their needs continue the spaces that they're stewards of, the spaces that they maintain that need continue. so i hope that collectively as a city, as a board we work to

support them in the interim until we get more answers. >> thank you. >> thank you. vice chair supervisor walton thank you. chair fielder i wanted to mention for the record that we have representation from the port as well as rec and park and i feel that to have a thorough hearing we need of course to have the parks alliance here and so i want to thank the port and our pd for being here to report. we will make sure that the community hears from rec and park that the community hears from the port and make sure that we do everything we can to get the parks alliance in front of the public as well. >> thank you. thank you. i echo those things. thank you to the port and our pd for being here seeing no one else on the roster. >> madam clerk, let's take public comment. yes. members of the public who wish to speak on this item shall line up now along the side by the windows. >> all speakers will have two minutes.

>> good morning, supervisors. i'm bob fiedler, the executive director of stern growth festival. and i'd just like didn't offer a public comment related to all of this in support of phil ginsburg and the recreation and parks department. >> i've been working with phil and our pd for nine stern grow festival seasons and during that time i found phil and his team to be nothing except professional and rigorous in its relationship with us as a nonprofit organization. in my experience, phil in particular while being a fair and professional person to work with is always trying to do what he feels is best for the people in san francisco in an ethical, transparent way. he's held my feet to the fire on a number of occasions advocating for what he believes is right for all of us as public entities. >> i'm constantly impressed by

what phil has accomplished during his time as general manager and what has unfolded at the parks alliance is a tragedy. however, in my experience as someone who has run multiple nonprofit organizations in my career, i don't see how there would be any way that phil would have access to see inside the parks alliance overall or specific finances as as far as i know they're an independent and private nonprofit organization. >> especially with someone as big a response ability as phil with all of the parks and all of the employees he manages. i just don't think there's any way that he could have known anything different than as it unfolded. >> thank you. >> thank you for your comments . next speaker, please. hello. i'd like to thank chair fielder for holding this item.

thank you. sharon walton, supervisor walton for bringing this to the fore. my name is elda capellini. i'm the executive director of citrus stewards and i'm a co-chair of the community partner network advisory committee that has banded together as soon as we heard of the financial mismanagement of the parks alliance. so if you could raise your hand if you're here representing the park partner network, please do . >> just to give a sense of of the breadth of our work and how deeply this impacts us. i really appreciate all supervisors comments prior to this. you are really understanding the depth of the problem. >> i think i speak for all of us in saying that we really do need those responsible to be held accountable. i have ideas of others that could be subpoenaed and i also would like to say to highlight the importance of the function that sfp has provided for us. so what sfp has allowed is for community partners for neighbors to get together

in their neighborhood to make change that they want to see happen in their neighborhood. >> there is something there's little that is as empowering to a community than being able to come together and envision together what you want to see happen in your community and then work to make that happen. so the fiscal sponsorship program that sfp provided that function needs to continue. right now we are all out to dry hung out to dry. i run an organization that had ten staff. i got a layoff notice on tuesday monday i don't even remember. >> things are happening so quickly. and so now i'm in a position of scrambling trying to find what to do. trying to figure out what to do . not only have we had to cease our operations and everybody here had to cease our their operations but if a vehicle to continue that function that sfp provided does not get reinstated. then that critical beautiful community empowerment of coming

together to enhance our public space will also be lost. >> so i'm you know envisioning five years down the line in san francisco. we have a a degraded public space. thank you for your comments. >> next speaker please. thank you chair fielder. and thank you supervisor walmart for taking this very seriously. >> my name is sarah varley and i'm here on behalf of the detroit steps project in district seven sunnyside. >> there are a lot of community projects in every single district of the city. and each of the supervisor here knows well how important this community projects are not only to the fabric of the neighborhood but also because let's be honest community projects are made by volunteers who commit their own personal time skills and passion to projects that benefit the community and the city at no cost to the city.

>> and now we're stripped of our assets and in some cases big donors are involved. >> we understand that. >> but in so many more cases the funds and trust the two parts alliance where donation from local residents is at the rate of $25 for a trivia night ticket fundraising at least that was the case for the detroit steps project. >> so we are disheartened that. so we asked the board to please ensure that we recover our funds as soon as possible and not in an indefinite and uncertain bankruptcy case. >> and that the city works with us to ensure that any permitting process that is pending i was here a month and a half ago for the arts commission that those permit continue so we are not disrupted. more so by this unfortunate event. thank you.

>> thank you for your comments. next speaker please. >> good morning. my name is steve ward. i'm here from the la playa park village coalition and i'm also on the board for the coalition of san francisco neighborhood. and i suppose i just wanted to give you some sort of sense of how it has worked in the past. we've completely transformed our neighborhood with building la playa park which includes bocce ball courts, edible landscaping, community areas that are at the end of the end of the end due to turn around prior to us starting on this project. those areas that we transformed were where dumping ground for old bottles and people to hang out and drink and just cause trouble. so the whole thing has been transformative for the whole neighborhood. now we hope to extend this

complete idea to to the whole neighborhood being la playa village, a beach village in san francisco. >> and so to give you some idea about how it worked, we would do volunteering for example, we just recently did volunteering for the bay to breakers. and now they're going to be forthcoming with more money to put into our fund that then we would be able to use to do repairs like we have to fix faucets and different other things that we have at the park. >> oh well in any case it's really important that we would come up with some idea about where we're going to be able to put that money and what is going to happen to the money that we already have in in in deposited with the san francisco parks alliance. thank you for your time. >> thank you. next speaker please. >> hi. good morning. supervisor summers.

i'm lisa napoli and this is cathy phillips. we're with friends of lakeside village. >> we co-founded the group more than five years ago and with the intent of revitalizing the neighborhood corridor. but i think speaking to the larger issue which is the 80 projects that are affected by the parks alliance, i think it's really important that we figure out, you know, a pathway out here and that it's quick and that we hold these people accountable. but while we're doing that we have to figure out how to fund the operations to reclaim the money that is due to these affected organizations. and like you heard from the other speaker to also have a mechanism where we can once again have a fiscal sponsor. we've already started interviewing others but it's an onerous for volunteers like us to have to take our time to yet find another fiscal sponsor

and do all that legwork so i'm grateful to the imaginative creative people that are represented here today. >> i know there are other people that are unable to come . >> i think the work they're doing is invaluable. you get more out of volunteers like us than any city agency could ever do. so i just want to applaud all of the others who are here. >> thank you. thank you for your comments. >> next speaker, please. good morning. thank you. chair fielder and supervisor walton for calling this hearing and thank you to supervisor cheryl of my district two and supervisor sadr for hearing our comments about what the demise of the san francisco parks alliance has done to groups such as mine which is the friends of alta plaza park. we are located in district two.

i am prejudiced but i considered it a jewel in the crown of the park system. it's it's a lovely, lovely facility and it draws people from all over the city for our recreational facilities and children's playground tennis courts pickleball and. and it's a haven for dog walkers. i've been involved with the friends of all types of parks since 2007 and saw it through many interation iterations including a major water conservation and irrigation project and from that we called six community meetings which involved finally into a master plan that was approved by the parks commission in 2016 and formed a board that we were hoping to implement many of the enhancements that are in in the plan. fast forward our current new

board has just learned that a $50,000 bequest from the estate of a former deceased resident of park heights was is is now known longer available to us because of the failure of the parks alliance. this is a tragedy and a disgrace to her legacy and her gift to us which we no longer have access to. >> thank you for listening. thank you so much. >> next speaker, please. good afternoon. i'm jeffrey miller. i'm a landscape architect live in bernal heights. over the last 50 years i've been working all over san francisco in parks, community gardens, things like that including alta pleasant park where we did the master plan hilltop park in the bayview lafayette park.

and currently we're involved with a playground project at stern grove. we are in a situation now where parks alliance i would say we're a kind of small business even though we've had a lot of impact on the city. currently we're in the arrears of about $35,000 from parks alliance for the work that we've done on stern grove and another $20,000 that's in the in the contract for this potentially like a $55,000 hit on our company. who knows if we'll ever see it. it's rather rather disturbing. we have worked with community groups all over the city through parks alliance, through the through the department. and i would say every time we've worked with the department they've been fantastic, especially under the leadership of phil ginsburg

over the 50 year period i've worked with several managers of the parks and none of them match up to what phil has done for the parks. but i'm just here to say, you know, there's a real problem here problem financially for us and clearly financially for a lot of these organizations all over the city. so thank you for having me. >> thank you. next speaker please. >> good afternoon. my name is and simon and i manage the communal community garden in visitation validates the egg lot of the of the this valley greenway. our group is veg visitation valley engage green and thank you supervisor walton your supervisor for district ten and i really appreciate you calling this hearing i co-founded the greenway almost 30 years ago to fill a need that our neighborhood had which was we wanted to create a

beautiful space to bring our neighbors together. our community was known for crime and i personally noticed how people were fearful of just being outside and didn't really have a way to get to know each other. >> then also one of the means to do this was to create to restore some of our community's agricultural history because every culture has agriculture and we were then in a food desert. so we're part of the innovation and imagination that our city is known for and have a track record of following through with our plans. >> that includes the political advocacy to secure the land an immense amount of volunteer hours and passion and now i have to say we have the next generation of leaders ready to continue our work here we are in a bind now with our pool of private donations gone which wasn't much compared to many other groups here but nonetheless it was hard won.

>> okay my time's almost up. but anyway we we really can't write grants now to to make the programing that we want happen such as our peace and unity celebrations which cost in the around $6,000 and i just also want to say that groups like ours foster community engagement and neighborly interaction and are really important in these times to counter the current attempts to divide us and demonize diversity. >> thank you. thank you. next speaker please. >> how you guys doing? i'm jordan henderson. i'm actually with and as well with the visually greenway lot and it's been very amazing in my time here in san francisco. i'm actually from new orleans. my wife is from bayview so i actually ended up volunteering at the first valley greenway like three years ago and i've seen this valley change over

the last three years. much more families is much more community oriented and you know this time around i'm visiting and it's more families passing up the garden but then me and then have to talk about the funds disappearing and so you know there's opportunity definitely brings about different things because san francisco is very much moving at a rapid pace. california as well and it's just that is pretty atrocious that everything has to be revolving around other things before things like the gardens and the parks alliance which you know gardeners are actually artists to the community and it's very atrocious that we can be fourth largest gdp in the world is very outstanding. you know that we can reach all of these levels but the people that actually matter and then just to know about the history of certain things on how you know these people are the ones that actually have faith in the public there are some gardens

that don't want to deal with their lines and they have all the right to because they are sticking to the eternal, you know, historical facts of people from california to wanting the best skilled growers and from mexico and now all of that is pretty much but to where we are now. but i appreciate it and thank you guys for your time. >> thank you for your comments. next speaker please. >> good morning supervisors and thank you for bringing this to public attention and to scrutiny. my name's debbie joseph. i am the founder of a small friends of group at cabrillo playground in the outer richmond. we formed friends of cabrillo playground in 2007 to address our little playground which was being badly vandalized. we put our money that we raised very in under very difficult circumstances with trust in the

san francisco parks alliance and we're wondering where that trust has gone and what can be done about it. the whole neighborhood worked on the project, brought us all together as friends and we feel very disappointed right now and we wonder what can be done . >> thank you. thank you. next speaker and good morning members of the committee and supervisor walton my name is janet crane. i'm a member of the fay park citizens advisory committee looking after a very small park exactly on the border of districts two and three. we have $22,000 probably lost on this which represents 20 years russian hill neighbors contributing to the maintenance of this park. i wanted to talk about reviews . i am also a co-founder of another nonprofit under the department of disability and aging and they review us every year.

one could not put a postage stamp in the wrong column without finding out. so how can a group of this size and get away with this with no one bringing it to anyone's attention? >> earlier i spoke to the woman at parks and rec who is the partner coordinator and she knew nothing about this when i called her. when i read about it in the paper, it's just astonishing. so along with trying to make good to all these wonderful groups, i would ask the supervisors to make sure that the oversight of anything like this is handled rigorously. this is just really a disaster. >> thank you very much. thank you for your comments. >> next speaker please. good morning. thank you very much for holding this hearing. >> my name is leslie couch and i've been the treasurer of our neighborhood organization corbett heights neighbors for a number of years. we're a neighborhood organization of long standing with an annual membership

and substantial funds which obviously slowly accrued through a great effort over the last 50 or so years. and i've been an active member and officer on and off for over 40 years as a volunteer citizen has developed and maintained leftover fragments of otherwise undeveloped lands consisting of our regular topography and street pattern. >> these lands are not maintained by the city but see agendas turn these lands into landscape areas from neglected eyesores or major improvements include merritt danvers park or corbett park alleys part clurman stairs and the community park. >> san francisco parks alliance predecessor hill summer river funds beginning in 2014 and all our friends beginning in 2019. >> up until april of 2020 for the payment request we submitted were routinely paid every two weeks. >> that stopped when we inquired why we were told it were changing their financial system and they needed to verify existing funds.

>> it was a lie. all our funds approximately $25,000 have been misappropriated by the former administration of parks alliance with apparently no oversight whatsoever or from the trustees. >> our gardener has suspended service and we currently owe $3,250 to vendors but have no funds to pay them. >> thank you. >> thank you for your comments. next speaker please. >> >> good morning supervisors . tom reed elovitch with livable city. first thank you supervisor walton for calling this hearing and for your comments. i appreciate that enormously. as i mentioned, i'm with level city where a nonprofit here in san francisco i'm also a volunteer. i volunteer with friends of oak woodlands. for 30 years we have contributed thousands of volunteer hours to stewarding one of san francisco's last remaining old growth forests.

>> and we are an sfp fiscally sponsored project. obviously this is a huge breach of trust what's happening here with all of these different community groups and there have been many. i i'm thinking about the community challenge grant program which is kind of malfeasance from within the city the dream keeper initiative, what's happening the human rights committee. so you know we and i think a lot of the communities we work with we're reeling. right? it's a scandal after scandal. we're kind of trying to go out and work in that community and do things and stuff keeps happening. so i guess three things that i'd ask you to think about as this moves forward. one, of course that city governments seek not only to make itself whole but to try and make whole the community initiatives that steward that that trusted their funds to us have reassured by your comments here today that that's certainly one of your goals. second that the city requires this bible 1c3 fiscal sponsorship to get any public funds and things like liability insurance so that fiscal sponsorship function is

essential. >> we're doing what we can as a nonprofit helping some of these fiscally sponsored projects to get back on their feet. but we can't do it all so we need the city as a partner in recreating that function because it's essential or at least the city has made it essential. secondly, just reaffirming that the city exists as a partner to community to support community initiatives now the culture in different departments varies a lot like rec and park has been a great partner to us at friends of oak woodlands other departments are not so cooperative but just to kind of reaffirm that the city is here to support community taking care of the commons would be important as we move forward. >> thank you. thank you. next speaker please. hi, i'm janet. you. i'm in barnard heights so thank you. supervisor jackie for leading this hearing. i just want to say that i know you will represent not just my voice in the district but all

the voices that you're hearing. and in that spirit, you know, we called a meeting and we met with the partners and it was heartbreaking to hear all the stories like anita a story about loss, legacy or you know, about staff being laid off. and i just wanted to bring to your attention that this is not just about, you know, losing the money but is about moving forward. for instance, now i'm executive director of bernard beautiful and we're doing a lot of like fun events and fundraising for arts and for the neighborhood and bringing community together and we're leading workshops and doing regional gardening and bring climate to the community to bring that awareness to them. >> so now we've had a really fun event taste of bernal and we don't know where to park that $17,000. so we have these real financial implications. and community work is never easy and we're often asked to do like now forensic you know, accounting or we do plumbing

sometimes because our parks need irrigation or whatever it is our volunteers bring everything to the projects. and so what i want to say is this is not just about park alliance is about a broken system because park alliance lost a lot of funding when the ccg went away a couple of years ago and it went away because we have a grant director arrested and we had corruptions highlighted and park alliance was already on the radar for you know, the scandal with dpw. >> so it's not just like one layer it's you know, we need accountability, understand? but it's like on all facet and we're just volunteers and we're just asking to bear the brunt of a lot of that. >> thank you. thank you for your thank you for your comments. next speaker please. my name is bob siegel and i've been working with trade trails in san francisco for four decades. maybe i did a lot of building trails on mount sutro and i'm

now on the board of mount sutro. i'm also responsible for the creation of the crosstown trail as i saw the number of people in line come into trails connect people. and as a trail one across from candlestick park through visitation valley and onto to land's end i found out there are a lot of people doing amazing things in the city. and you met some of them. remember today you only saw a fraction of them. there were 80 of our organizations doing great things for san francisco and we need help. >> thank you. thank you for your comments. next speaker please. >> good afternoon, donovan lacey i'mring a different hat now in addition to being the acting executive director of the green benefit district, i'm also on community friendship garden which is fiscal sponsored through s.f. parks land. so i want to thank chair fielder vice chair souder, committee member cheryl and of course our supervisor sherman

walton for calling this hearing . >> you've heard art already heard from everyone else in this room. it is truly heartbreaking to hear what is going on and it makes me angry first of all because there should have been more oversight here. but i'm not going to spend a lot of time on this. you guys you're going to you're going to go find where the money went and what happened there. >> i think what's really important about what we're talking about today is these folks are literally the lifeblood of our community. all of our communities they put in their time, their energy all of this energy is placed in with this understanding that they have support not just from the parks alliance but also from you know, from our city government i think is extraordinarily important. tom said it ildiko said it these folks need money. they need something to backstop them now sooner rather than later because they can't afford to have that money out of pocket. they can't afford to fund even more money of their own. so again, i thank you for everything that you're doing here and i thank everyone in this room for what they've done to make our community such

a great place to be. so thank you and i and i hope we can get to the bottom of this. >> thank you. thank you. next speaker, please. supervisors. i'm julie christensen. i represent 3 or 4 different park groups a couple of things one i'm disappointed the parks alliance isn't here today but i'm glad for the emphasis on the 80 groups that have been harmed by this implosion. >> the city and its department suffered a setback. all these organizations suffered devastation and annihilation and it's not only the money, it's the fiscal administrative and capital guidance that the parks alliance was also supposed to deliver that's been in short supply over the past few years. secondly, a shout out to my colleagues at rec park. they have partnered with me on all of the city projects that i've been involved in. these were not simple projects. they involved street closures and eminent domain and moving libraries and all the solemn and like decisions that were required to get a spree park finished. >> they have been diligent

and professional and tireless. they've put up with the often overly tolerant public process that's involved in so many of our park projects and they are just as devastated and saddened as angry as most of us in the civilian corps but mostly i want to ask what can this committee actually do to make things better? what can your colleagues at the board do? what can our mayor do and our city departments do? i'm i'm all for retribution and supervisor walton chair fielder bravo for you go get them but the way things are now that is not going to restore the leadership and the guidance and the finances that these organizations need. san francisco has long punched above its weight in governmental and philanthropic leadership. >> we have we have former supervisors and neighborhood activists who are national names. >> but what we have here is not an isolated incident.

this is an epidemic in our city and the need for training for commissioners and board members so they understand their duties, the need for physical guidelines that really matter and the city may be able to aggregate and and underwrites some of this so that all of our organizations and commissions operate as they should because something systemic needs to change and you guys may have the power to make that happen. >> thank you so much. >> next speaker please. good morning. my name is paul allen. i'm a member of the corbett heights neighbors association that submitted this document to you last week actually a couple of days ago. we're in the upper castro lower market corona heights area. i want to make a handful of points that have not already been made. number one, thank you very much for your leadership on this a because it's important and b because it stands in stark contrast to other instrumentalities in city government and i think

in particular of the city attorney's office, the city the city of san francisco according to the published reports today we know is out somewhere around $1 million and yet we don't hear anything from the city attorney. i personally i'm going to call the city attorney's office today to find out what, if anything they're doing to pursue this. and i hope they take my telephone call. number two is if the folks who are complicit in this did not know this already the action of your committee today puts them on notice that any spoliation of documents, emails, text messages will carry serious adverse legal consequences and they should be on notice of that. >> number three there's been a lot of hand-wringing in this city about making a restitution about making our organizations whole. but we all know that the reality of that is there's only two sources for that restitution.

>> either we have one or more generous benefactors who come forth or we extract those funds from the dissolute organization and or the officers and directors who were who were complicit in this. >> finally, one point that hasn't been made is that all of these organizations employ a lot of people who live in san francisco. so it's not just the folks in this room. it's the gardeners. it's the other folks the painters, the construction people who get paid to do the work and contribute to the local economy. thank you. thank you for your comments. next speaker, please. all right. good. good day. thank you. supervisor walton fielder and the other supervisors for calling this hearing. i'm matthew blaine. i'm chair of s.f. urban writers for the local mountain bike advocacy group and we're best known for maintaining the trails at laguna honda hospital. so one of the points i want to make is that parks alliance isn't just about reckon park right? >> you've heard from a lot of

people all day of dpw. i think we're the only entity in the city which volunteers with the department of public health. so i just want to talk about the short term future. >> you've heard a lot sort of long term questions but i don't know if i called my volunteer day this month because the organization is i'm not quite sure the status organization i know it's been dissolved and taken over by some sort of organization managing the wind down. so my ask to the city and supervisor to support is the same as that also part of the the recently formed advisory committee is just to ensure that this function exists and that include me may include some short term stopgaps to make sure that includes as someone else mentioned earlier that the agreements that have been hard fought for by these local partner groups either exist or are maintained in some new organization and it's easy to transfer to the city doesn't put up obstacles if we need to transfer them and so that the city funds which have an already raised and some are not spent are easily dispersed to small businesses and the volunteers and just that our trusted money is returned. so thank you again and you've heard all these stories and looking forward to hear from from future hearings here

and all the other things which are going on the city to help all of us community partners. >> thank you. thank you for your comments. next speaker please. >> good afternoon supervisors thank you. supervisor walton for calling this matter and for the opportunity to meet you all. i haven't met many of you and to speak today but my name is jackie bryant. i am the executive director of the philip randolph institute san francisco and i want to just say that it is actually really difficult to hear how deeply hurt a lot of organizations were and community groups feel today because we share that pain. we offer community service and the baby hunters point in our mission has been historically rooted in civic participation. we're one of the many organizations that have been working on the india basin park project with rec and park department. our work has been to keep residents involved to keep the vision of the park one that

speaks to the voices of community and the equitable development plan that was drafted with community gave us hope that our city can actually listen to community and respond to the needs and respond to the ones the future park should look like what the community wants it to look like and i'm here to remind you all that it's important to keep a commitment to this community. >> we have lived through decades of broken promises and despite the inexcusable actions of the san francisco parks alliance, i believe we still have an opportunity to continue to deliver a world class park for bayview. >> we're a resilient and strong community. we've suffered through decades of racism, trauma and disenfranchisement. our organization has already hired some of the staff that was fired by the san francisco parks alliance because the work that needs to be done needs to reflect our community. and so i'm just confident that we are resilient. we will be able to get through

this. our project was small in comparison not everything that's going on but our commitment is to build a project, hold it to high standards and deliver community led programs. >> so thank you. thank you for the time. thank you for your comments. >> next speaker please. >> good afternoon. my name is miriam dresner and i am the president of the board of directors of corbett heights. >> neighbors thank you for the supervisors for calling this meeting and bringing this urgent matter to the attention of our community. >> all of the partner groups require reimbursement of the amount of money that they had thought was in trust with san francisco parks alliance also all of these community groups

which were called partners of the san francisco parks alliance now require an alternative fiscal agent to process their funds. i am suggesting testing that any alternative fiscal agent that gets authorized by the city be required to segregate the funds that it receives from each of these partner agencies from its operating funds. >> the partner agencies each paid a 9% fee of all their funds to the san francisco parks alliance with the assumption that that 9% fee was going to be used for the parks alliance operating expenses. >> thank you. >> thank you for your comments . >> do we have any additional

public speakers? >> that concludes public comment. thank you madam clerk. seeing no one else making public comment public comment is now closed and i want to recognize supervisor walton. >> thank you, chair fielder and i just want to say to everyone who came in and spoke today definitely understand how you feel and are going to be working to do everything we can to track the resources and of course do every thing we can as a city to try to figure out a way to make organizations whole. obviously we don't know exactly what that looks like at this time but most certainly will be working to do everything in our power to support our organizations. if we look at the loss of jobs, the loss of community projects and more importantly the loss of trust we understand that we have a role of course to try to do what we can. and this is really devastating.

it's very consequential to all of our neighborhoods across the city. and so we get it and we'll be working together to do what we can. and so i just want you to know that obviously we have to track where the resources have gone, where they are, what's available was there, whose or what. but most certainly we'll be working to to do all of that. so i just want to thank you all for taking time out of your day for coming in. i know many of you are volunteers and just want to do what you can to make your neighborhoods and your communities better. and we appreciate all of that work. thank you, chair fielder. >> thank you and well said. want to echo those sentiments and thank everyone for coming out to make public comment and thank you for for working to beautify this city. >> and with that i am going to move to direct the clerk to prepare and issue subpoenas to robert ogilvy current as of the

most recent as a ceo drew bettcher former ceo of as of p.a. and rick hutchinson as a pay board treasurer to appear for testimony at a future meeting of this committee and for the production of the sfp is current bylaws and documents identified and supervisor walton's letter to the parks alliance dated may 13th, 2025 and to delegate to the chairs authority to select a date for the witnesses testimony and production of documents. >> madam clerk, please call the roll. yes and on the motion to direct the clerk to prepare and issue a subpoena. >> vice chair order fischer sartor i member cheryl member cheryl i try of cheer fielder i'm sure fielder i have three eyes thank you. >> the motion passes i now move that this item be continued to the call of the chair. yes and on the motion to continue this item to the call of the chair fischer slaughter vice chair slaughter i member cheryl member cheryl i chair

fielder i'm sure fielder i have three eyes. >> thank you. the motion passes madam clerk thank you so much are supervisor walton madam clerk please call item nine. >> yes, item number nine is a motion directing the budget and legislative analyst to initiate a performance audit in fiscal year 2526 of the recreation and parks department. this item will be referred to the full board as a committee report for consideration on june 10th 2025. thank you. colleagues today i am introducing a performance audit of the recreation and parks department by the budget and legislative analyst. the function of regular performance audits is to ensure that city departments and agencies make prudent and efficient use of city resources and also effectively perform the functions assigned to them by the charter and applicable laws. given that recreation and parks department has not undergone a department wide performance audit in over ten years this

audit is particularly timely as we've heard from so many committee members today about the parks alliance and organization that conducts direct business with the recreation and parks department . it is my hope that greater transparency will result in better outcomes for our residents. >> my commitment is to ensure that san franciscans have a government that they can trust to provide equitable access to basic services, green spaces and to ensure that our city's public resources are allocated to san franciscans across our city. >> i would like to thank supervisor walton for co-sponsoring this audit. >> colleagues, do you have any questions or remarks? >> seeing no one on the roster. >> madam clerk let's take public comment. yes. members of the public who wish to speak on this item shall line up now along the side by the windows. >> all speakers will have two minutes to speak.

>> hi, my name is hazel kellogg. i came in i'm a resident of the richmond district. i came in with the volunteer group and i just wanted to express my support for the audit that you're suggesting because as you alluded to it seems very much connected with the issues ongoing with the parks alliance and i want to encourage you to do everything that you can, as you said, to make sure that the agency is indeed trustworthy. >> thank you. thank you for your comments. >> do you have any additional public comment for this item that concludes public comment. >> thank you. as you know now's making public comment. public comment is now closed. >> i now move to send this item

to the full board as a committee report with positive recommendation. >> yes. and on that the motion to forward this item to the board with the positive recommendation as a committee report. vice chair sartor i'm vice chair slaughter are i member cheryl member cheryl i chair filter chair filter i have three eyes. >> thank you. the motion passes. >> yes madam clerk please call items ten through 16 yes items ten through 16 are. is five ordinances and excuse me ten ten 1230 is five ordinances in one resolution authorizing an improvement and improving and approving scuse me settlement of lawsuits in a litigated claims against the city. >> thank you. >> i want to move to sever item six teen. madam clerk, please call the roll. >> yes and on the motion to sever item 16 fischer slaughter

fischer slaughter i am member cheryl member cheryl i chair filter. >> i'm chair filled out i have three eyes thank you. the motion passes madam clerk please call items ten through 15 items ten through 15 are its five resolutions authorizing and approving approving settlement of lawsuit and litigated claims against the city. >> thank you colleagues. any questions or comments seeing no one on the roster? madam clerk, let's open up for public comment for these items. >> yes, members of the public who wish to speak on on these items items ten through 15. she line up now along the side by the windows all speakers will have two minutes to speak . it appears we have no public comment for items number ten through 15 thank you.

seeing no one making public comment public comment is now closed. i now move to send items 11 through 15 to the full board of supervisors with positive recommendations. >> so do we want to separate item 16? yes. yes. >> deputy city attorney brad rusty, just to clarify your motion, i think you said 11 through 15 and i'm sorry i want to move forward 10 or 15, right? >> correct. 10 to 15 items ten through 50. >> and just to clarify, i believe 16 is going to be continued to the call the chair which you can call separately next and that motion will be made after these five urgent are addressed. so on the motion to continue item 16 to the call of the chair vice chair slaughter

fischer slaughter i member cheryl member cheryl i chair filter i cheer phil do i have three eyes hold on i'm sorry you had called ten through 15 the motion was to forward those five to the board with recommendation. then 16 should be called take public comment and then the motion to forward that item continue that item to the call the chair should be taken so you may want to rescind the vote on 16 and move forward with the motion to continue to forward the five items ten through 15 to the board with positive recommendation. >> all right. so i'll move to rescind the vote on item 16. >> yes. and on the motion to rescind the vote on item 16 vice chair slaughter fischer slaughter i. member cheryl member cheryl i chair filter i'm chair filter i have three eyes motion passes and i now move to send items ten through 15 to the full

board of supervisors with positive recommendation. yes and on the motion to forward items ten through 15 to the full board with the positive recommendation vice chair slaughter vice chair slaughter i. member cheryl member cheryl i share filter i'm sure filter i have three eyes thank you. the motion passes and now madam clerk please call item 16. >> yes item 16. >> item 16 is a resolution authorizing the port of san francisco to execute the settlement agreement between the port commission and the cast nola agency. >> thank you colleagues. any questions or remarks? >> seeing none we can go to public comment madam clerk yes? >> members of the public who wish to speak on item 16 ship item now along the side by the windows all speakers will have two minutes it appears we have

no public comment for item 16. >> thank you. public comment is now closed. >> i now move to continue this item to the call of the chair. >> yes and on the motion to continue item 16 to the call of the chair vice chair slaughter vice chair slaughter i. member cheryl member cheryl i chair filter i'm chair fielder i have three eyes. thank you. >> the motion passes now i'm clerk any other business before us today? >> no that completes our meeting agenda. thank you. seeing no other business we are adjourned

. >> looking for something fun and totally free in the heart of san francisco. union square just leveled up. every day brings something new for the kids and adults like music spoken animals, foosball battles to board games and even a little arcade style basketball and juggling to keep things moving. need a break? step into the cozy activity center for coloring and crafts or treat yourself at the participating pastry shop serving up mouthwatering dessert. whether you're bringing the kids catching a vibe or just passing through you, union square is buzzing with free fun every single day. and of course you're steps away from some of the best shopping in the city. whether you're bringing the kids, catching a vibe or just passing through union square is

buzzing with free fun every single day. don't miss out. come see what's happening this summer we have the great pleasure of welcoming you to the poll guest walter temple. we're joined here today by the american waterworks association and our peninsula partners to honor the tremendous legacy and history of one of the most unexpected parts of the hetch hetchy regional water system. a drop of water in hetch hetchy reservoir crosses nearly the width of the state of california to get here using only the power of gravity it was at that time and continues to be an engineering marvel.

in october 1934 a crowd of 20,000 people waited here to witness the first water from the hetch hetchy reservoir arrive on the peninsula. journalists broadcast the moment live on national radio. if you look closely you might notice that temple doesn't look like the one behind me nor is it in the same place. that temple in 1934 was a fake. it was constructed of wood and plaster just for the occasion. the temple you see behind me was constructed in 1938. it has a really strong sense of place. it sits in a very special location. we have 23,000 acres of watershed lands that have been protected since the mid 1800s. that means we have high quality clean water as well as protection of this beautiful area. the sfp u.s. also manages a trail for hikers, bikers and equestrians right through the center of the watershed on the fifield cahill ridge trail . >> in existence for over 20

years. and we are now in the middle of constructing a six mile extension of that trail to the south. we expect the construction to be completed early next year. it's also a place for people and it takes a village and then some to care for this area. a staff of biologists and hydrologists carefully monitor the plants animals and water flow within the watershed. what we celebrate here today is the dignity and higher purpose of providing quality drinking water to our regional communities. when we think about it that way, what better way to honor this legacy than with a water temple? as we continue to maintain and improve this amazing water temple and the water system that it honors, my hope is that both will be enjoyed by many generations to come. this breathtaking temple not only celebrates water, it also has become a part of the daily

lives of the community that it serves as an organization whose purpose it is to promote and facilitate the higher purpose of delivering drinking water. it's only fitting that we honor a monument to the same. on behalf of the american waterworks association, it is a deep pleasure for me to acknowledge the work and recognize the progress. water tower as an american water landmark.

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