the number of departments that have been forced, because there is insufficient money to take a look at their existing practices, existing operations within the i.t. area, and make trade-offs, we know a number of departments have fresh projects where all of their computers and software must begin to be replaced. there are a number of infrastructure requirements. i can tell you that what a number of departments have done, particularly large departments, they have found existing savings within their own organization and applied those savings to meet new needs rather than request general fund money. whether or not there is a cost savings that can be used towards the deficit is another question. i do know that there is a tremendous effort to reallocate

in every appropriate resources and to prioritize those resources. with respect to a partial reserve, certainly, this board has the authority and capability to do it. i also think that with all of the hearings taking place in all of the departments, there will be ample opportunity to question the department and for the department to provide information on what their i.t. budget is and how it is changing from year to year. by that time, the board of supervisors will have access to the five-year i.t. plan and you will have the entire picture. what the financial strategies might be to meet those needs and what sacrifices the department and city needs to taken on in order to accomplish many of these. supervisor chiu: i hear that. i appreciate the information that has been done.

it does make me think that what the supervisor has proposed in terms of withholding some of the i.t. reserves in this area would be a good thing. we are asking departments right now to come up with 10% cuts, plus 10% contingency cuts. even if we get caught in the general fund in department, we are still $100 million away from where we need to be. what are different groups within these departments doing and are the things that we can do throughout the apartment of technology that will result in greater efficiencies? supervisor mirkarimi: something

that has been festering for almost three to four years now, related to the west of consolidating services, and i appreciate the sidebar conversation we just, it is that 3.5 years ago we passed legislation for all the city commissions. we want streaming audio. people that can get off their computers. the ongoing proceedings and deliberations of the number of commission task force that the general public should have complete access for, it has not happened. the budget item that was for that particular endeavor that we passed was literally under

$60,000. at most, to date, from what i understand is the progress report has seen only five departments out of the huge network of departments and agencies represented by advisory group interests have been able to get signed on. the reason for bringing this uppe, the fact that if we are nt having the hearing today about the realizing of financial savings or efficiencies have been enhanced internally, i would like to think that the outgoing benefits would be something that benefits the public directly. i am not feeling that yet, although i hear that that is happening, that it is in the making, and when we see the gift presented and unwrapped it will be in standing. but as it is now, this is

problematic for me that this legislation 3.5 years later has not been realized, something that was so simple and, surely, affordable, wiring in everyone through streaming audio. access to deliberations that are not covered by sunshine in an ongoing proceedings disclosure and sf tv. that is not happening. so, i will make an alternative motion. i would suggest pepper, and it is ok if we have friendly disagreement here, i suggest that my motion that we release half of the reserves today and we ask for a condition of report to come back within six weeks, by six weeks, to hear what the progress is. of course, i think we would be poised to release the remainder amount. supervisor chu: thank you.

i am hearing a motion to release half of the reserve and to bring the item back in six weeks? correct? supervisor mirkarimi: yes. whenever the period of time, but i am trying to give you, instead of two months, three months. supervisor chu: call of the chair, you are saying. i do not support releasing only half of it. i truly think that this budget committee needs to focus on savings and other ideas from the department. it is time to ask the part of technology to come to us and say, where else are we going to get the savings from? i do not see how i am going to squeeze this or more from i.t. consolidation. i would hate for us to spend all of this time on an issue that we are making good progress on.

i think that it would be more worth our time to get cost saving alternatives in the near term, that would be a better use of our time. the other thing that i want you to understand before we take this vote, if we say that we will take a 50% released in reserves, what we are saying is that we will only release $750,000. meaning that you have a cap or a shortfall in your budget, roughly. if we come back in one month, the department but have no ability to deal with it. let of noticing provisions would kick in and he would not be able to realize a savings. we're with the department code to figure out how to realize the shortfall? they would go directly to contracts. they are not going to reduce the rent. they will not have savings in the other categories. i want to impress upon all of us here, the reason i will not be

supporting partial release, frankly, we have exhausted this item. we need to come back and monitor it, focusing on the future and other opportunities. second of all, i think apple you will be leading the department in a bad situation. contracts and other things to close the gap. making a decision later on in the process. that is just my thought on it. i will not be supporting that motion. ok, so there is a motion to release 50% income -- continue the item to a call of the chair. could we do a role called? supervisor chiu: the supervisors have just articulated my own ambivalence. it is my hope that if he were to come back in six weeks and

provide a report, that it would give us a road map of the savings that we could expect to see in the next year. i would be worried that if we simply released to the reserve, there will be no incentive for departments to work together to compose the solutions that help us to deal with our budget situation and make us stronger as a city. i think that what the supervisor is proposing makes some sense. i understand that the departments are assuming this money is coming in, but in my mind that is part of the problem. we should have been assuming all along that we had to find cost savings and it has not happened. people have assumed that they will be able to live within the budget they have set. framing everyone's priorities and how they will find cost savings as opposed to assuming that this committee is going to

not press forward with the need for overall i.t. consolidation. i think that what the supervisor has proposed makes sense and i look forward, i hope, too good answers and solutions in the coming weeks. supervisor chu: i know that supervisor mirkarimi is looking to make a point, but one thing that i would ask to be specific, given that all of us do not intend to force the departments to cut contracts, a month other things -- the ph, where will they go with contract cuts? think about who they contract with. can we be specific about what it is we want the department to deliver so that we can be more specific? supervisor mirkarimi: i gave you

the soft pitch. i have done this every year. representatives, my concern is that what i thought was an easy to do item that has become so convoluted, it is creating doubt in liability towards consolidation altogether. within six weeks i want to hear, specifically, not only about this work order process back to department, but if there is commissioned interested business or advisory task force business that realizes the legislation passed so that you can do streaming audio to the general public of these departments. the fact that there has been no leadership on this and the bill of originally brought back to us was for $58,000, yet we are talking about tens of millions of dollars in savings that cannot begin to be realized is beginning to fester out in a way

that makes me wonder in which direction you guys are going. i believe that there are efficiencies and greater efforts to seize that are being achieved on this process on the inside. i do not know what the public is feeling on the outside. to me, this is a soft, soft pitch. try to accomplish this in six weeks. do not talk about which departments wish to that -- wish to participate. they are legislated to participate. dp is now facilitated over the administration of this. your savings, now and in the future, for $58,000, could have been realized to pick up the slack, and it never did. meanwhile, the general public is

divorced from getting the streaming audio the legislated would happen. that is one example. on the bigger ticket items, the question relates to what the supervisor was talking about. how are you going to achieve these consolidations and savings in a way where we will be able to conceive -- perceive the tangibles. whether they in kind or direct dollars savings. that is the way i would answer it. supervisor chu: supervisor chiu? supervisor chiu: i will articulate quickly. the mayor has asked for top -- 20% cut proposals from every department. i would like to know what the 20% cost savings we are expecting to see from a $200 million i.t. budget for 2012.

supervisor chu: in actually, if, being on the committee, i am confused as to what it is we are asking. let's be very clear. the reserve was originally placed on a pending update. now we want to see something else. now we want to see how the savings will be realized from the budget submission? supervisor chiu: the whole point of i.t. reserve was to figure out if there would be savings in the city. from my perspective, we have not done a good job in that. we have figured out a plan over the course of the year to figure out data consolidation, but we are not seeing savings. where are we going to find savings? we have been talking about this for years. we are still looking grantors. the problem is that if we do not

come up with answers, here on the board we are forced to make budget cuts. hundreds of us will be making cuts to the parks department. if we could find consolidation in the budget, i would prefer to spend that money providing services back-to-back and park. for several years we have been asking for this work to be -- services- two -- services back to rec and park. for several years we have been asking for this work to be done. supervisor chu: we are looking for information from the apartments, probably bardee i.t. departments. we want them to share with us as a part of their budget commission de i.t. reductions? supervisor chiu: i want to know the specific cost savings, within departments, but did i.t. budgets.

but certainly i am open to understanding alternative ways to do this -- >> certainly i am open to understand and alternative ways to do this. within the department and myself , ofdt and president chui, as you know the budget is still in development. we could take a look at the ideas on the table. it would be worthwhile to have a discussion on this so that we could get into some concrete proposals. i think that that is going to be the trick, understanding in a much more substantial level what types of savings initiatives we are talking about. supervisor chu: we are in agreement about what is required

for the release of reserves? information pending from coyt and a list of where departments had issued cuts? is that clear? we have that motion. can we take will call on that item? supervisor mirkarimi: aye. supervisor kim: aye. supervisor chu: no. >> the motion passes. supervisor chu: that item is dispensed with. do we have many other items before us? >> there are no other items on the subcommittee agenda. supervisor chu: thank you very much. we are adjourned. we will be reconvening as a full budget and finance committee at 1:00. we will be back in chambers at 1:00. thank you.

>> welcome to "culture wire." i'm here with james lee, and exhibiting artist, and we will have a chat today about the body of work you are presenting. after you left the military, what prompted you to go back to a place where the u.s. is engaged in military action? >> it is interesting. the population of afghanistan is around 29 million, and

there's probably no more than 80,000 u.s. soldiers serving in afghanistan right now, but if you look at the stories that come out, you think the numbers are completely reversed. all the stories are about americans, and you see almost no images of stories about the afghan people themselves, so if you look at the dominant representational paradigm uc today, it is all about foreign soldiers. my idea was to try incurred counted to that a popularized narrative and focus on images and stories that really reflect that lived experience of conflict through the eyes of the afghan people. >> you are exhibiting with three other photographers. it is true all three of them have really focused in the areas where a lot of u.s. and allied forces are seeing action, are actually involved in combat, so your story is different than theirs.

what does it mean to show your body of work along side of the stories that probably are more familiar? what kind of juxtaposition does that create for you as an artist? >> i think the strength of bringing the two different stories together is i think there is a real danger in focusing only on surface similarities between conflicts. when people look at a body of work and say that they see in this conflict photography, and it reminds them of somalia or iraq, i think that is dangerous because i think there are very unique elements to each conflict, and if you do not focus on the distinctions, you start to create a broader, watered-down topic, which is armed conflict, so i think it is important that when we focus on conflict, we make sure we do not just generalize, but we allow specific places and voices and people to be heard and we do not make these generalized assumptions about what conflict is like. >> the other photographers in the show, what is local, and the others are from new york and new

delhi. what do you like about some of their work? >> in a big fan of the fact that he approaches photography from a non-traditional point of view. he also cunner has a mixed view of cameras themselves. he calls them toys. >> he uses these cameras that one might assume our toys, but he also says all the toy cameras are cameras, so it does not really matter to him what he is using to take the images as long as he is getting the images he wants. and because they are taken with these film cameras, they have a very different feel than the other pictures in the show. one of the things i want to talk about is that lindsey's body of work is running down one side of the hall, and it is all about women in afghanistan and how they serve and their special

interactions with civilian women and communities, which is the special role that women soldiers play in afghanistan. across from eric copeland's work, which is extremely masculine and black and white and very aggressive -- what do you think about that juxtaposition between their two bodies of work? >> i like lindsey's contribution to the exhibit. she shoots in color, like i do, so it is great to see more color. she has a gift for capturing distinct moments that balance the conflict that these women are facing did today, but also very intimate, very feminine moments. she has one where a female soldier is shaving her legs at the beginning of her day, and it is kind of an odd thing to consider, but, obviously, it happens every day, but most people do not think about the challenges that face women in these types of environments where they continue to be feminine, continue to be women, but they also serve a vital role

in afghanistan. she allows viewers to come in and see those kinds of intimate moments you might not normally think about. >> to our viewers, and actually the curator of the show. one of the things i was interested in with your work and with the other bodies of work i selected was that you are presenting a real human perspective. each of you zeroes in on individuals, and the kind of sensitive, intimate, or private moments. >> if you look at most people's lives today and the way they spend their lives, it is probably not that different from what goes on on some of these larger for an operating basis. they have cafeterias. they have internet cafes. they have laundromats. they have their own spaces where they read, play video games. it is really like a small, microcosm of what they might find back in the united states. >> what do you hope that viewers take away from seeing your body of work or the exhibition as a whole?

>> i think it is important for people to question how much we do or do not know about afghanistan, but conflict in general. too often today, i think we see one or two images and we think we understand what is going on in a part of the world, and we should try to get away from that. we should question what we know about a conflict, where we got the information, and always look for new perspectives and new focus is on topics that we think we already understand. >> james, thank you for spending time with us, and congratulations on the exhibition and letting san francisco see this big body of work of yours. >> thanks.

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