 My name is Luis Herrera and it's my pleasure as City Librarian to welcome you to the wonderful inauguration of the mix at SFPL. Yeah, absolutely. Let's hear it. Let's hear it. We're right on schedule, but I literally had to drag Mayor Lee from inside because he was hip-hopping it in the production studio and I suggested that he keep his day job. So anyway, we are absolutely thrilled that all of you are here on this fabulous morning. We're ushering a new generation of how we serve teams and you'll hear about these amazing young people that have led the effort for the last four years. But without further ado, it's my sincere pleasure to welcome Mayor Adley. Mayor, thank you for joining us. Thank you Luis, to you and to the library commission, to your friends of the library, to the youth that are advising us congratulations on this wonderful accomplishment. I want to say thank you to those who have blessed me and blessed the city because we don't know ever what progress means unless we know where we're coming from. And so I don't want to acknowledge that as we open this wonderful facility, we also honor many of the people who have been with us for years, part of our city's history. And then as Michael Jackson says, we have a great history, but I'm interested in the modern stuff. And I want to say thank you to so many of the people who have come together to make this happen. There's a couple things Luis and I have talked about this concept for some years now, and we had challenged ourselves and our mothers and fathers libraries to become the libraries of the future. And this is a glimpse, a very strong glimpse of what we will predict to be the libraries of the future, if not the present. And it took a village of people who are committed to this vision to make it happen. Not only the library commission, but there are partners now with our public works, our public education, our United, our census school unified school district as a great partnership here because they need to look to the future as well and they need to have examples. This enthusiasm I have for this center is marked by our commitment as a city to have the best education for our youth and for their families and for the entire community, if you will. We started out by making a commitment years ago that will have every branch library rebuilt in the city so that the neighborhoods can feel comfortable it's their library. Now today at our main library with all of the collaboration that we have with the partnerships that we formed with the private sector, with the community sector, in just a minute I'll name the invaluable partnerships that we've had to do this. But I want to give you an understanding that as we approach what is in our future we have to have partners because if it was just ourselves, it was just a library, we'd have great books, we'd have great access to those books, but these days it's all about making sure those books become part of digital learning that we fulfill a commitment and a promise that we made that we won't have that digital gap that exists today, it exists in many pockets of our communities. This is one of the great answers to that digital divide and you'll see why when you come through here. You'll see the commitment that was reflected in the contractor CM construction when they built this in the funding that was had in the high level of enthusiasm that our youth said and they gave our architects and designers the direct input about what they thought would really work for them because we need their involvement, we need their buy-in to make this a teen digital and learning center that it is. So I want to say thank you to everybody for accomplishing this because this glimpse, more than the glimpse, I think this is going to become a model. Something that I'll be proud of tomorrow to announce at our US Conference of Mayors. We have another solution to the great challenge of digital divide that I want them to come here and see. And this will be open I believe all weekend for this to happen, it will be engaging. I'm sure there will be little lines out the door of youth that want to experiment with it. The other part that I want to say is in addition to that partnership, I've been committed to making sure education is at the forefront of everything that we do because people will take over this library, government facilities, elected offices, all over we're preparing our youth in the future to do what they need to do to become successful in the 21st century. And if they don't have the basis of science and technology blended with their organic talent of art and culture, then we won't be the San Francisco that we want to be. And so I wanted to say this that it also is a part of the story of our investment in our middle grades with Mr. Benihoff and the Salesforce Foundation, but also the education fund and all of the wonderful grants and foundations that have been working with us from the SF Foundation to Hope SF to all these programs that suggest that we want everybody included in the future of the city. And we use the platform of education and modern education to get there. And I want to say, again, thank you to the Unified School District. Thank you to my advisor, Hydra Mendoza, and the school board, the entire school board. Thank you to Superintendent Carranza for working so closely with Luis Herrera and his commission for making this happen, because it's a continuum of the future of education in this city. And I want to make sure that the structures, when you look at this, you might imagine in the future branch libraries have an extension of this whenever we make the next improvement in every branch library to have something like this going on. But civic centers should be the place where that vision is accomplished so that we can spread it out. And I know Supervisor Kim wants to be here, but I know every supervisor will visit this because I'm sure they're going to ask me in next year's budget, how can I get a digital learning lab here. I also want to say, again, thank you to the incredible number of agencies that worked closely together here. You'll find here, reflected here, on time on budget with public works leadership and also with their own architects working with the library's vision to accomplish this as well with the input, the incredible input. And they treated this no different than their private enterprises have treated. You know, whenever we have great sites that are designed in the city, those architects go out and they seek input from the very constituents that are going to use their structures. And when we said this is for teens, then the architects in their very great inclusionary minds said, well, let's go out to the teens and say, what do they want? And how can we make sure that our design is reflective of not only their input of their incredible day-to-day use that they will have? Because ultimately, this is going to be a place for them. It's going to be their living room where they don't have a living room. Their tech rooms where they don't have a tech room in their house. Their engagement room. You know, there's one room here, an area that's dedicated to Skype, where they can talk to kids in Ireland or in China or in the Philippines or in South America in any place of the world and interact with them through music, through art, through digital learning. So that's why I say it's no longer your grandfather and grandmother or your mother and father's books anymore. They're there. The books are here. But there's also digital learning. You'll see here the checkout counter for iPads, for modern iPads. It's a checkout counter. You can literally check it out. You don't have to go through a Dewey system of cards to find out if they're available. You're going to see this. See, I grew up on Dewey systems. I knew that. You don't even know what the Dewey system is about. Yes, I am dating myself. I've thanked the libraries. I've obviously thanked the school district for their work here. I want to thank our Department of the Environment because part of the learning is also about understanding new things in our lives. And of course, we want not only creativeness, the interactive workshops and the programs about literacy are all going to be here and technology. But we also want creativity to help us solve the world's problems. I mean, we all live in a world where we want it to be better. We want it to be fun. But like I say, we also want the kids to know that they're living in the city that solves problems. So while you're having fun, you can have fun solving the world's problems. And this is where the introduction of climate change and the interactiveness with our climate is going to be here. And whether you're part of making a competitive video, as I know some of the youth are going to be engaged here, or whether you're taking on an imaginary trip to find out what it is with our environmental theme of zero waste, of making 50% of your personal trips out of your personal vehicles, or having a city that represents 100% renewable energy. The 050-100 theme is going to be embedded here because having fun using your artistic art, using technology, can also be fun in solving the world's problems like climate change. Yes. Yes. It's incredibly engaging. I wanted to put it into context as I also thank Public Works. I want to thank our incredible California Academy of Sciences. They have got a great overlay here. You already know. Innovation that's going on, well, they've lent their innovation to here as well. I want to give a big, big shout out to an agency that has been at the forefront of technology change and inviting our low income minority communities to have a voice in this, our Bay Area Video Coalition. Give it up for them. Yeah. And when I said education, and when I said video and digital learning, KQEDs at the forefront of exposing this to the larger community because as we embrace change, we want to make sure that change carries with it the responsibility of including everybody else. This is what our city is about. It's about making sure prosperity is shared by everyone. And when we breach the digital divide, it's because we want everybody to be part of the new economy. And that's why I want to be very thankful that the biggest contributor to accomplishing this thing today, the financial contributions, as well as the technology and the equipment is Microsoft. I just want to make sure I acknowledge Microsoft for their wonderful contributions here. And then as importantly, I will continue saying this, our youth is our future. I put my future of our city in your hands at this bridge, if you will, because when we are making the changes, we want to make sure you carry forth that change with the values that the city has, the values of inclusion, the values that when you open this door, you help us keep it open for the generations of kids that our school district is preparing for, that our San Francisco state, that our city college are prepared for, keep the door open for them. Because I know you're going to be successful. I know you're going to have a great arts come out here. I'm going to commit to doing a video with the kids here, just so that we have fun doing this. I got some ideas, but it may be really old-fashioned. But I want you to know that you have a mayor and the board of supervisors. You have elected officials all over the city that want your success, and that it is reflected in the way that we committed, not just the funding, but all of the talent of the city was put together to make sure this happened. So I want to say, again, thank you to everyone for producing this. I know I'm skipping a few things that I have wanted to say, but even events, great events like the ones that I announced already, the U.S. Conference of Mayors, the 100-year Centennial is yet again another example of how we're breaching the past with the future. 100 years ago, people like yourselves were thinking after the aftermath of an incredibly damaging earthquake and fire in the city. How could they invent themselves going forward? And they did some fantastic stuff. It's in some great engineering feats, which now allows us to even, I think, think of surviving through this drought because we have an incredibly built Hechechi. We have an auxiliary water system that we rely on. These were great engineering feats that were thought of over 100 years ago. Fast forward tonight, today, and you've got the 100 years next. What are you going to invent? What are you going to say to people 100 years from now that you were responsible in doing to make the city continue to be the great city of innovation, the innovation capital of the world? And on the eve of us hosting the Super Bowl, 50, not just any Super Bowl, the Super Bowl 50, and again, a reflection of how we blend sports. By the way, go, warriors. Go, giants. Now, our Niners are still there because of the Super Bowl. We've got a connection. And within that Super Bowl, 50, even the people who have been helping raise that money for philanthropy, they've created a read zone right here as well. We usually reflect it as a red zone, but this is a read zone, digital reading. I want to say thank you because the Ed Fund and our school districts have come together to make sure that our low-income youth have that opportunity to conquer literacy and make sure that they're able to read in every way possible, again, to breach that digital divide. With all of that, and this investment along with the huge investment our city is making to support our families and kids, I want to say congratulations to everybody that's here. It really took a village to make sure we listened to each other, we collaborated. And I'll tell you, the best ideas are born out of collaboration. Remember that. It isn't just your individual effort. Individual efforts are incredible help, and it's just like the warriors. You got Curry, they had their nights and their moments, but when they celebrate, they know it was the entire team, the coaches, the trainers, front office, back office, as well as every single team member had a part to play, and they recognized that. That's why they're a great team. That's why they will continue being a great team, just like our Giants, and our 49ers again will be there, they'll be there. But I want to say thank you to the incredible team that we formed here for this wonderful team learning and laboratory center. It is the library of our future, and I want to congratulate everybody for opening this up. Let's get on to experimenting. Wow. Mr. Mayor, you articulate the vision of our city so amazingly beautifully. And also the vision of the library. So I feel compelled to confer an honorary degree in library science to you, because you are so good about talking about the future of library. How about that? All right. So, I mentioned that this is really about celebrating our youth, and they've been so amazingly persistent, our board of advising youth, and so we're going to hear from them. So without further ado, our first speaker is someone that's been with it through the entire four-year planning phase. Her name's Carmen Sosa. And to demonstrate her success, she's a graduate of the Flex Academy and now is on her way this fall to attend City College of San Francisco. So Carmen, welcome. Thank you, City Librarian. And thank you all for coming today. My name is Carmen Sosa, like you mentioned before. I've been a member of Board of Advising Youth for over three years now. And just being able to stand here and be in this space has been really amazing and been really great for me. It's meant a lot. From the very beginning of this process, teens have been involved 100 percent. From deciding what we want in the space to meeting the architects and deciding what we want, the colors of the furniture and the wall, just being able to see the transformation from the old teen center to the new teen center has just been really amazing. I used to hang out in the old teen center upstairs on the third floor. I always had suggestions and I never knew what to do about him. I never, yeah. And just once I was introduced to the Board of Advising Youth, I was finally able to see my ideas and my visions come to life as well as my other peers. Thank you. Wonderful job of articulating the vision, Carmen. Thank you so much. So we talk about the Library of the Future. So when you walk in there, that's what you'll see. We're going to be really pushing the envelope on that. And you need to experience that. So I'm not going to go into a lot of details about it. But it really is a place where young people will be able to experience learning for them to be creative, to be producers of content, not just consumers of content, to push the envelope on the future of what it means to work in the tech sector and to be engaged in, as Mayor of Soil Equitley put, solving problems of the world. That's what it's going to be all about. When you walk in there, and I don't want to steer your thunder when you see it for yourselves, but it'll be an amazing place where you can see a makerspace that has fabrication equipment, including a 3D printer. I want to get my hands on that one, but I'm not sure they're going to let me. There's also going to be a video editing room for our budding filmmakers and our future artists in video. There's going to be a sound editing room. That's where we spend a little bit of time with the mayor for folks that are really interested in music and artistry. It has books. We won't forget that. It also has a carpet garden and a performing space. All of that to say that this is really pushing the envelope to what we call the Library of the Future. So that's happening now. Mayor already mentioned some of the amazing partners, but I'm going to take a moment to just again re-acknowledge the fact that in the four years of planning, one of the things that made this project unique in the nation was the fact that we had the most amazing partners that are going to help us bring the talent to train our young people to collaborate with them. So beginning with the Academy of Science, Elizabeth Babcock, back there, thank you so much. Carol Varney from the Bay Area Video Coalition, back there. I can see you waving at us. Matt Williams from KQED. I think it bears mentioning over and over again. Thea Nielsen, I don't know if she's here, but I know that there she is, absolutely. And Mayor Lee mentioned their support. Let me just reiterate that they're setting the bar for the support from the tech community because not only did they open their checkbook financially, but they also provided hardware, Surface Pros, Xboxes. They're all out there. It's going to just wow us. And from the very beginning, they say we're in it for the long haul, including training our staff in some of this equipment that's new to us in their training center. So let's hear it again for Microsoft for the great work on that. I can go on and on and on on the various partners, but I do want to just mention to you how diverse this group of talent is going to be. The Blue Bear School of Music, they're going to introduce world-class music here. Girls Who Code, Girls Who Code are going to teach technology skills to young people. Rider Score, what can I say about them? They do wonderful work. The Arts Commission, Tom DeCaney, I think right now is defending his budget so he couldn't be here with us, but I know some of his staff is. SEO scholars, they help us with at-risk youth in terms of academic skill building. How important is that? You speaks. Fantastic collaborator. There's going to be here. The 9th Street Independent Film Center, they have a program called Tilt, Teaching Intermediary Literacy Skills. I see Melissa Hung there from Rider Score. Thank you, Melissa, for all the great work you've done. And the mayor mentioned the amazing working relationship with Superintendent Richard Caronza and the school district. Hyde, I can't thank you enough for all the support you've given us as the education advisor. Appreciate it. Emily Murase, a school board president. I know that she could be here, but I want to channel her support for all of us. We've got some colleagues from other city departments that have been wonderfully supportive. Department of the Environment, Deborah Raphael is here. So is Carla Johnson from the Department Mayor's Office of Disability. Thank you, Carla, for your support. And then I want to also just reiterate, because you'll hear from them individually. But I just want to take a moment, because it's important, our collective team, beginning with DPW, Julia, I can't thank you enough for the wonderful leadership that you provided. The other Julia, Julia Shue, Laoi, Mohammed, what a great partner you are. And I know we'll hear from you later. There's always there for us. Dennis Oates, our resident engineer. I know he's in the audience. Fantastic. Dennis, yes, our contractors. Boy, I feel like I'm family with them. Robert Chang and Stanford Chang, my god. They do fantastic work. And I know that they'll be acknowledged later. My library team, too many to call out. And I hope you don't not remiss in forgetting names, but the library team, beginning with Megan Anderson, Jennifer, I know I've got Michelle, Karen Strauss, who's a wonderful chief of branches. Jennifer, I've mentioned that already. Richard, Kathy Cormier, all of them. Listen for them. Let's really hear from them. Yeah, absolutely. And last but not least, the entire library team from Facilities, I see Roberto out there, from IT, Michael Lange's team, Media Services, a new team web. Joan, thank you for your help on that. I can go on and on and on. So I'll stop there. And now it's just my pleasure to introduce another one of our amazing folks from the advisory team, Emily Robert Wong. Emily, you're up. I am a member of the Mix's Board of Advising Youth. I was asked to talk about how the library and being a board member influenced me. So I thought I would share some insights that I've learned throughout this experience. To me, the library has always been a place to grow, to explore, and to learn. And my favorite part in creating the Mix is just how innovative it is. More than just a depository for books, the Mix has a video booth, a recording studio, and a makerspace. And we are really reimagining what a library should be and what a library could be. One of my favorite memories is when we were brainstorming. And another board member said, he mentioned an idea, but then he followed it up with, I don't think that would ever happen. And Eric, one of the librarians who worked with our team, said, why not? Being a board member has taught me not only to think innovatively, but also to think of myself as a valuable, powerful voice to bring to the Mix. And now it is my pleasure to introduce supervisor Jane Kim. Thank you. It's really a pleasure to be here today with everyone on summer break. It's really appropriate to have the opening. You know, when I served on the school board with Hydra Mendoza, for the first time, taxpayers had decided that we were gonna finally reinvest in our school libraries. In fact, of all of our 70 elementary schools when I had joined the school board, there was only one school librarian. It was pretty extraordinary. I visited school libraries where books were organized by color because parent volunteers didn't know how to systemize book borrowing in the schools. Proposition H, which is a public enrichment fund that passed overwhelmingly by voters in 2004, said, we wanna reinvest in libraries. We wanna reinvest in schools in ways that the state funding has cut since the passage of Prop 13 over the last 30 years. And when libraries came back into our schools, it was actually one of the most exciting rooms in our schools. We had librarians that were coming in with different ideas. And it wasn't your standard library anymore. It wasn't just a place where you came in to find books and check them out. It was actually the place where the most dynamic and exciting learning was happening on computers with sound and video and many others. This project, I remember when Luis approached the board about this four years ago and started talking about, well, how can we re-envision the main library as well to serve the many young people that live in the city, but in particular the district that I represent, the Tenderloin and the South of Market. And what I really appreciate about our city librarian and the library team is that they are really moving our library into the 21st century. And whether it is partnering with many of our services organization on the fourth floor with a bridge, which is gonna serve many of our homeless residents that come to the public library for resources with employment training and computer skills training or whether it means being an additional resource for young people throughout the city with 3D printing, sound and video engineering, and computers, this is really gonna be the hub for San Francisco. And so I just wanna appreciate the vision of moving the library into the next century, but also making sure that our youth are armed with the skills that they need to actually enter into the marketplace that we are building here in the Bay Area. This is a creative marketplace now. And whether it is the technical skills and the access to learn how to program and engineer I'm here at the library so you can work at Yammer and Microsoft across the street or you can work at Twitter and Zendesk that's come in right across the street or whether you're gonna be the individuals behind the next album that comes out or the next movie that comes out. We often look at the actors and the singers but there is a whole team of individuals that produces these artworks. It's a lot of folks that are on sound and video and these young people are gonna be the individuals behind that. And so I just wanna thank our youth for making sure that we were listening to you and building what you wanna see. I'm just a little older but I know that once I start using an app it's not cool anymore. So it's really important to have your input and feedback over the last four years. And I just wanna thank the whole city and library team and all the private partners and the Board of Education for making this possible today. Thank you. Thank you, Supervisor Kim. My name is Dawson. I'm a member of the Board of Advising Youth. The mix at SFPO was a project several years in the making. The Board of Advising Youth enabled youth around the city to come together and collectively provide input into what we wanted in the Teen Center and Digital Learning Lab. From location and spaces to technology and book stacks to even whether or not we wanted a bathroom. The mix is truly a Teen Center and Digital Learning Lab designed by youth for youth. Now it is my pleasure to introduce to you City of San Francisco Public Works Director, Mohamed Nuru. Okay, I think we've heard a lot today. What really made the mix happen is the partnership of so many people. And I am proud of the partnership that we have with the library. A few years ago we finished 24 libraries. We built eight new ones and renovated 16 of them. But this project, this project is very special and it's special as you've heard today. It's really because of the interaction that we had with the teenagers. Just giving us their ideas. Just thinking out through everything. And when the door's open, you experience from space to space, the different rooms. I think your dreams can come true. And I just want to thank my staff, Julia, both Julia's, Julia Lowey and Julia Shuck for their leadership. We have a lot of engineers who really worked on it to make sure that when we built things that they stand right and that they'll last long. I want to thank the whole engineering team from Public Works. And I also want to thank our contractors, CM Construction, Robert and Stanford. Stanford is actually a younger guy and so he gets it when we're building stuff. And we just continue to looking forward to being the best provider of service to all the city departments, but especially the library. This has been a great partnership and I just thank everyone for being here today and looking forward to celebrating and making music behind the mayor. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Nuru. Hi, I'm Samantha Chang and I'm a member of the Board of Advising Youth and I'd just like to share a little bit about what our involvement with the design process was. So the beginning of the project was very conceptual and we surveyed our peers and visited sites to pull inspiration from the resources that we saw. And then after months of gathering ideas, we were invited to share our ideas with the architects and project designers and then the resulting floor plans and renderings reflected everything that we suggested. Later we got to provide input on things like which carpet for the carpet garden and the color scheme and that was really cool. And then, yeah, now the mix is really real and I'm walking through, I see everything we suggested reflected in the center and I'm really excited for San Francisco's youth to have access to the mix. Thank you. And now I'd like to introduce Library of Commission President Teresa Ono. Good morning, everyone. It's so great to see so many of you here, especially all the youth. Being a commissioner for the last six years has been an honor and a privilege for me. I am also here today with two other commissioners, Zoe Dunning and Mary Wardell. Thank you for attending. One of the main roles of the commission is to make youth a priority for us. We do this by ensuring that funds and support were in place for this truly important youth design space for various youth. We truly appreciate our special role as library commissioners to get to see a project that we support and take shape in such an exciting way. We understand in value in investing the resources like the mix to ensure our community's youth have the skills and hands-on experience to succeed in college and beyond. The best part of being a commissioner was listening to the youth when they came to the commission meetings to ask for our support. They had heartfelt and very meaningful speeches and it was your speeches weighed a lot on us to approve this project. So I wanna thank all those who attended. The involvement of the youth throughout the project is one of the most special that we as a commission has worked on. We wanna congratulate all who were involved but especially the youth who provided advice and counsel not only through the planning process but also to the commission. Thank you and enjoy the mix. It's my pleasure to introduce the Friends of the Library Executive Director Deborah Doyle. The Friends of the Library, thank you. I wanna talk about the Friends of the Library for over 50 years. We have fought to make this library the best library in the country. We have helped build this library. We has also helped create a separate source of funding for the library and we have helped renovate all of the branches and this is so exciting for us to be helping to build the mix. Luisa and the good mayor have already mentioned many of the donors and many of the supporters but we could not end without thanking the Lewis Lurie Foundation who gave a tremendous gift. Forrester Foundation who gave a tremendous, let me say that again, the Morrison and Forrester Foundation who gave a tremendous gift and so many of our individual donors. We couldn't do all of this without your support. Many of you belong to the Friends or should. We have some of our board members out here, Mikiko Huang who is our president, our chairman of the board and a number, let's see, Marsha Schneider is also a member of our board and we have our staff as well. This is so exciting and we look forward with your help to fund even more things for the library that are innovative and have new technology in mind. So thank you very much. There is a big sign in there that also lists the donors who have made a gift to the mix and so as you will go by, please note them and thank them in your end, have fun and I think Louise is gonna say the final words. Yes. All right, one more shout out Naomi Kelly. Thank you so much for your support. Our city administrator, I know she's in the audience. Thank you so much and with that, we are Mr. Mayor, you've got the scissors. We're gonna have a countdown and I want a loud countdown for the ribbon cutting. So we need the ribbon. All right, here we go. 10, nine, I can't hear you. Eight, seven, six.