bishop and a recognized. i really appreciated that. commissioner antonini for bringing up the subject has been something that is unworkable and a project like this. when i went into the meeting for the public, as i arrived, there were talking about how many shifts of doormen. you have to have three or four between the weekend and what not. what does this cost b the hoa? on the eir, there are two ways

to look at it. maybe we still have to pursue that. we do not know the state of this building. we really need to know. they were saying, keeps the eir open. have the historic preservation commission look at it. we need to analyze that. a decision was made that makes sense. we have identified that there would be an impact that would be significant. there is an alternative, which is partial preservation and a housing project. it could be the one that this developer is proposing. or it could be a different kind altogether. i want to read a little communication that came in from one of the active methodist serious to be in that congregation.

i am glad things went so well thursday evening. i hope it goes well for the church, too. we tried for more than three years to help them with building plans. they were told that landmarking was not legal for a church. the whole umc should not be blamed, though. our conference has been more careful about how things are done because they did not want to end up in a similar situation. >> any further public comment on items not on this agenda? public comment is closed. >> we can move forward to your regular calendar. item #6 is public outreach and engagement.

>> good afternoon, commissioners. thank you for your time today. we are here to talk about the department public outreach and the engagement program. i and the communications manager for the planning department. i have six months under my belt and we are seeing progress already on the communications front. establishing an employee

newsletter. one of my functions is not to manage the implementation of this public outreach and engage the program. claudia joins me today and she is the one who spearheaded this initiative. as a planner, she saw the importance of improving communications within this department. this is one example of one of the many things she has done to spearhead this effort. she has done a phenomenal job. she has shown great leadership by getting this program off the ground, doing their research, and maintaining momentum. as an overview, and i will give you a quick refresher on what we have done in the past year. some highlights on our performance. we will talk about the program that we created based on the feedback. and what we intend to do in the following years. in order for us to move

forward, we are asking the commission to endorse our principles. this will serve as a foundation for this program and really help guide what it is that we're trying to do. i will pass it off to claudia right now. >> thank you. good afternoon, commissioners. we have the software here, so we will try to play with that. we are -- we were here in october and we are excited to come back to give you -- whoa, it skipped. by a lot. ok.

we are excited to give you an update. we were here in october to tell you what we have been doing in the area of public outreach engagement. for the benefit of the public and for the new commissioners, we wanted to remind you the background of this project. it is provided a push to get off the ground. this -- three things came together. we really want you to look at how you reach out and engage low-income communities, immigrant communities we like to see better represented and more engagement of those communities. there was also staff initiative. we had been wanting to improve our process for a long time because we had several challenging community meetings. we went to get more tools in our belts and do an assessment of what is working and what is not

working. our action plan was a series of operational recommendations to improve the process is and the department. one was them to how -- to look at how we communicate with the public. that provided momentum and we started to look at this more systematically. if i could have those slides, we got a grant from the davenport institute for public engagement. they provided us with financial and technical assistance to do the following. i am not sure why the projector is not working. what this grant is covering, and before we started -- let's improved how we reach out to communities. let's improve our communications. let's start with a baseline. what is our baseline?

let's get an assessment. we surveyed the community as well as staff. last october, we came to give you an update. now we have a report. we provided you with an executive summary and we also have copies for the public. the second component, we talked about getting more tools under our belt. we are creating some more guidelines. how to plan, implement, and evaluate public outreach and engagement. davenport is assisting us with that. we're providing extensive training. we have one that is going to come from davenport. they're holding it for staff. we're trained as planners, but we want to have the skills to be able to do this more effectively. on a point of why public outreach is important, one of

the components -- the functions of the department is to provide information about our services. we also engaged with achaemenids seat in an ongoing dialogue about the future development of the city -- we also engaged with the community in an ongoing dialogue about the future development of the city. decisions that are reached through a public process are more supportable, more informed, and more legitimate. there were four goals in your memo. they rarely guided the assessment and have been supported -- they really guided the assessment and have been supported by a senior management. this goal rally came from former commissioner olague and

community groups. can you look at how we are engaging in low-income communities? staffs desire, how do we reach out -- the day today folks who are harder to reach and have a ton of meetings to go to. to develop more collaborative and positive working relationships with the public. how we make everybody had a better experience? how do you work together? insure the department is an adaptive organization that uses the latest -- there are all kinds of creative ways to do good process. the picture that you see in the back of this slide, an initiative launched by the

mayor. it is called improve sf. anyone can provide ideas about how to improve san francisco. we are excited to partner with them. the fourth goal is to increase public knowledge of the department's mission. when the public really understands what we do and why we do it, they have a better experience. the international association for public participation spectrum. you see increasing levels of public impact. the different roles are to conform -- in form, consult, involve, collaborate, and power

the public. we looked at what are the different departments activities under each of the rolls. will notify residents, and put things on our website, send e- mails and have informational meetings, when we consult as well me -- is when we seek input from the public. in our assessment, we collaborate together because they're very similar. this is when we work with the public together and plan for policies the workshops as well as advisory committees. we had some expenses -- this is when task forces are used. we have some key highlights of the assessments.

we passed but staff at the public, what is the current role of the public? there are a lot of points that can be gathered from this. the main point is that one of the key point is we see a fairly consistent agreement between about staffing and the public. there is a smaller role for in power, but there are community and staff to fill that may be inappropriate -- that may be appropriate. as another key point, we cannot do everything and not every single role is appropriate all the time. we have to do what makes sense and what is valued for the projects, so we make the best use of people's time. so that we are very clear on

what we are asking the public to do. kind of having clarity. this is what the framework was useful. another highlight, we asked the public and staff to rate the effectiveness of the outreach activities. we saw the majority of staff and community art in be somewhat effective or effective range. there is some room for improvement, but we're not doing too bad. this is a quick snapshot of where the survey respondents came from. it was a fairly good spread throughout the city. we also complemented the on-line survey with focus groups and interviews and organizations and individuals so we could reach people who do not have access to on-line surveys.

another assortment of highlights, people told us to reach us where we are ads already. we want to see more web 2.0. we want to see more culturally relevant outreach. if we speak other languages, we also heard they want more small group dialogue. they think it is more creative and accessible. we heard broadening participation beyond the vocal few. making the role of the public clear, improving accountability and transparency. building strong relationships, making language and the process more accessible, enhancing staff capacity.

education, education, education. monitoring and evaluating our efforts. we are moving forward with the program and training and different things, but we wanted to have frameworks to guide that. she is going to what he threw what we came up with. >> -- she is going to walk you through what became up with. >> before moving on with implementation of the program, we wanted to make sure everyone was on the same page on what this program was set up to do. how we ever going to go about doing that. we have created a set of principles to set the direction and godard program. this is a process that involves staff and senior management. after a lot of debate and rewriting, we were able to boil it down to six key principles.

the first one is being inclusive. identified and involve all of the community members. especially in a city like ours, we know it is important to reach out to businesses and neighborhoods. community groups, seniors, students, families. been thoughtful, -- been thoughtful, figuring out to in our community would be impacted by this project, who would be interested. the translation required, at best methods. our second principle is transparency. we conduct a clear and honest and open public process. members of the public are aware of their levels of involvement and decisions that affect them. insuring that the public is informed. they are made aware of the process and how their impact will be used.

keeping in touch, checking into what the length of the project. that also speaks to the public participation. depending on any type of project, the roles of the public can change. to give them a heads up for letting them know that a project is being proposed in their neighborhood. organizing the citizens advisory committee, getting folks involved from the get go. similar to shaping the addition -- division. -- the vision. we communicate clearly and concisely to the general public. we use plain language of balancing the need to be precise with technical and complex information. when i first started, i was bombarded with akron mississippi.

-- with acronyms. for the average citizen, they may all main -- they may only apply for a permit once in their lives. the only time they will get any information is through a mailed letter. we want to make that interaction worthwhile. the information we provide the to be easy, simple, easy to understand. at the same time, we need to maintain that balance of providing complete and accurate information. that is the challenge with planning. a lot of what we do is so technical, and so complex. how can we communicate effectively, simplify our language while still being accurate. there are tools out there. the rule of thumb for that is if

you can say jam, do not say marmalade. we foster authentic dialogue and appreciate diversity of views. this is what we heard from the feedback. it is a two-way street. our goal is to ensure an atmosphere where people will feel like they can give their input and know that they will be heard. projects will get heated, and we know that. our job is to ensure that we create an atmosphere of trust. the next item is meaningful. we engage the public in a way that is genuine, appropriate, and well planned to achieve the goal. at times, we do get in touch with the public a little late in the game. we intend to make a deliberate effort at the beginning of the

plan to ensure that public consultation is considered and included in the time line during appropriate periods of the project. we will reach out so that the public will know that their input will help shape the decision. the last principle is accountable. we communicate the results of the process to those involved. keeping in touch with folks. letting them know that we have listened, we have heard them. here is the outcome. circling back, they attended the open house, and they gave their input, and that means they are invested in the project. at the very least, we need to close the loop and let them know about the conclusion. for the planning department, our commitment, management is behind this initiative 100%. they have put in time, money,

and resources towards the effort. we have the public outreach and engagement team. we effectively colall it "the poet." we have folks from environmental planning, legislative affairs, city-wide planning. i will be managing the team and a program in itself. for the budget, the team's budget is covered from the department's annual budget. in addition to that, for the friends of city planning, we have a grant from them for this program. the davenport institute, we have a grant as well. we will be pursuing other grants.

program priorities, the program says it all in the name. it focuses on improving our engagement with the general public on the many different projects at any given time. from an eir to a 20-year neighborhood plan, i will provide you with a list of key priorities. the first one being the departments function. the key function is making sure it is being recognized by the department and by staff. it is a key function for planners and the rest of our team. this is being noted and performance appraisals -- and performance appraisals. staff training. we need to set these folks up for success. we need to give them the confidence to execute effective communication. some topics they were thinking about or mediation, cultural

awareness, customer service, and also public speaking. resources. giving them tools to put on their tool belt. the guidelines claudia was talking about, we will have >>, online resources, and meeting materials. -- we will have books, online resources. access to information. strategy to make the information distributed accessible and understandable. when you look at the material on the website, it is clear, it easy to understand, easy to navigate. do we understand what it says? our newspaper notices as well, did they make sense? educational programs. planning 101.

this speaks to our goal about informing the general public as to what we do. this could come in the form of it saturday workshops or video tutorials. alternatives. this is also noted in the goals as well. looking at other ways to share information, it does not have to be a brochure. we can look at really different ways. we could have a conversation on line or we could physically go there. in my last position i was involved in a project to develop a 25 year transit plan for a number of cities. we took our old bus and took it out of service. we put in posters, maps, ipad

and interactive survey, and we went out to the community. we parked back bus in front of the mall, at the farmer's market, the arena. we meant thousands of people and they got on the bus. they gave us their input. they became invested in their local transit system by helping to shape the future. communication. that is my job. a highlight in the feedback or other methods of communication. it is outside of the program's scope, but it falls under my purview as communications manager. that really draws on to broader communication, media relations, social networking. we can draw on does to help the public outreach engagement

program. for monitoring progress, we will monitor progress throughout. planning has done a fantastic job in setting a baseline. we know what people think about and how we are doing. now we can check in to find out how we are doing. we also do interviews as well with stakeholders. that concludes our presentation. thank you for your continued support. we're asking for your endorsement of these program principles so we can move forward. thank you. commissioner wu: thank you. any public comment on the public outreach? >> linda chapman.

personally, i feel there is a lot that is best practices. the director has had meetings where people who were interested could comment on possible legislation, student housing, other subjects. i would just say that the best thing i ever saw in the city was when harry became head of the house in committee at the board of supervisors. i got a call saying, -- he got in touch with all of the people who were doing activist things. we sat there and we