Solar Program Lights Up Lives - 1994
Timecode 00:00:00
[VIDEO: Headshot of Anchorman, Pete Wilson with name graphic and side graphic box with abc7 logo and title ‘Focus On Solutions’]
ABC 7 News Anchor, Pete Wilson: You've heard a lot recently about the the wave of violence hitting San Francisco's troubled Bayview Hunters Point neighborhood. There is crime there, but there are also very good people doing some very good things. ABC 7's Carolyn Tyler has tonight's focus on solutions: An innovative program that uses a solar program to light up lives.
Timecode 00:00:20
[Video: Man climbing up ladder to the roof]
ABC 7 News Reporter, Carolyn Tyler (Voiceover): It's a bit of a climb to the top of this San Francisco House, but for Joe Snell, the steps he took to get here were much harder.
Timecode 00:00:27
Solar Installer Trainee, Joe Snell: All my friends are dead or in jail so I had, you know, to decide, don’t follow, don’t go that route, don’t go that way.
Timecode 00:00:35
[Video: Joe Snell holding up a solar panel on roof and carrying it to coworker at the solar panel frame]
ABC 7 News Reporter, Carolyn Tyler (Voiceover): Instead, Joe's path has landed him here on the roof, installing solar panels. He and Gerald MacDonald are trainees in a program funded by San Francisco's Department of the Environment.
Timecode 00:00:47
Solar Installer Trainee, Gerard McDonald: The opportunity has been great to get some of our young men in the neighborhood off of the streets and working.
Timecode 00:00:52
[Video: Snell and McDonald assist solar installer cut to images of neighborhood, PG&E powerplant sign, gated sewage treatment building, wide shot of old shipyard and closer view of run down portion of shipyard]
Reporter, Tyler (Voiceover): The $1.3 million for the program comes from what's called an environmental justice grant. That means the city recognizes some communities like Bayview Hunters Point suffer more pollution than other neighborhoods. They have a power plant, a sewage treatment facility and a former naval shipyard, which is listed as a Toxic Superfund site.
Reporter, Tyler: So, residents who've had to put up with this environment for decades are the ones now being rewarded with solar panels.
Timecode 00:01:24
Solar Panel Recipient, Dorothy Witherspoon: I’ve been in the community since 1945 and that's a long time. I've been through all the pollutions and everything else, and I feel that I deserve it.
Timecode 00:01:34
[Video: Snell giving a panel to McDonald who lays the panel onto the solar panel frame and cut to Tyler interviewing director of Bayview Hunters Point Advocates]
Reporter, Tyler (Voiceover): Introducing Greg Kennedy. He started almost four decades ago. One of California's first firms to supply solar [panel installations] to large and small customers. His story begins with this.
Timecode 00:01:47
Director, Bay View Hunters Point Community Advocates: And then we told them what it would do, and how it would benefit them, and how it would take them off the system. and generate more power so we can get rid of the PG&E plant. Then their eyes open up.
Timecode 00:01:57
[VIDEO: Close up of solar panel]
Solar Panel Recipient, Alex Garner: You know, they're actually free. And I didn't expect anything to be for free.
Timecode 00:02:03
Reporter, Tyler (Voiceover): The seniors benefit and so do the Bayview’s young people like Joe and Gerald, who are paid to install the panels.
San Francisco Dept of the Environment, Jared Blumenfeld: Well, the thing that I find so exciting about this program is that it transforms people's lives and transforms San Francisco at the same time.
Timecode 00:02:16
[Video: View from the back of a man in a conference room. Instructor at the white board teaching class, cut to man looking engaged, cut to closer view of instructor at white board to a woman watching him to her hand writing notes, cut to wide shot instructor at the white board and class]
Reporter, Tyler (Voiceover): It hasn't been easy. Every day for more than a year, the trainees are taught electrical, plumbing, carpentry. Other skills by a company called Next Energy. Most of the students drop out along the way.
Timecode 00:02:28
[Video: Carolyn Tyler speaking to Snell]
Reporter, Tyler (Voiceover): Joe says he had to cross gang territory to get there.
Trainee, Snell : It's all about commitment. Commitment, sacrifice had to do all of these things to be here, even to this day.
Timecode 00:02:39
[Video: Solar installer picks up ladder and places on top of truck with Occidental Power logo on driver’s side door.]
Reporter, Tyler (Voiceover): The payoff has been working with Occidental Power Solar and Cogeneration, a firm the Bayview community chose to partner with.
Occidental Power Owner and General Manager, Greg Kennedy: We're really happy with them. Both the guys that we have, have been performing really well.
Timecode 00:02:52
[Video: Snell conversing with McDonald while he rolls up an electric cord. Dissolve to Snell and McDonald working with Occidental Power installer on solar panel and to close up of part of solar panel with smoke stack from power plant in the distance]
Reporter, Tyler (Voiceover): The guys are now looking to the future.
Solar Installer Trainee, McDonald: We really wanted to start our own business, our own solar business here. We learned how to do mostly everything.
Solar Installer Trainee, Snell: I Just feel good, all new to me. Hopefully I can go on and keep doing what I'm doing.
Reporter, Tyler: The program wraps up in about six months after fulfilling its commitment to the community, but the hope is the city or a private foundation can find money to keep it going. In San Francisco, Caroline Tyler, Assignment 7.
Timecode 00:03:21
[Video: Computer monitor showing ABC 7 News website and cut to graphic ‘abc7news.com, ABC 7 logo Focus on Solutions’]
News Anchor, Pete Wilson (Voiceover): If you would like to find out more information about that program, just go to our website at abc7news.com, click on: Focus on Solutions.
[VIDEO: Fade to black.]