supervisor avalos: good morning. welcome to the city operations and neighborhood services committee. i am the chair of the committee. i am joined to my left by supervisor elsbernd, and we will be joined shortly by supervisor mar. madam clerk, do we have any announcements? >> yes, all persons attending this meeting are requested to turn off cell phones and pagers. if you wish to submit copies of materials to members of the committee, please submit an extra copy for the file. if you wish to submit a speaker card, please put it by the container in front of you at the real to your left. items recommended today will go

before the full board of supervisors tuesday of next week, july 19, unless another date is indicated. supervisor avalos: thank you. please call item 1. >> item 1, hearing to consider the transfer of a tight 21 off- sale general license from 511 crescent street to 2801 jones street for walgreen company doing business as well greenes, will serve the convenience of the people of the city and county of san francisco -- doing business as walgreen's. supervisor avalos: thank you. this item has somewhat of an interesting history to it. please. >> good morning. inspector falzon, san francisco police department. what is before us is an application. there is a typo in my report. though the description is correct. my report inadvertently said a

tight -- type 42, but they are applying for type 21. there is a little bit of it back story to this application. early on, when walgreen's started looking at getting liberalizes is again, they early on met with the police department and started meeting with community groups and the mayor's office. one of the strategies they agreed to deploy was to try to purchase when available and when attainable liquor licenses that were either problematic for the community or in police problem areas. this application is one of those such places. the license being transferred -- the operator of the premises actually would be exploited by her own employees, who have basically taken the store away from her. it received a fair amount of media play at the time.

subsequently through a police and abc investigation, we were able to determine if it was the employees at fault and not the owner. we eventually arrested the employees, and she subsequently sold the licensed to walgreen's, which is now being transferred to the address in question today. that was really what the community wanted because they no longer wanted a liquor store in this residential neighborhood. in brief, that is the story there. specifically to where the license is now going to, it is pretty much the fisherman's wharf area. it is an area of high crime with a undue concentration. we have worked with walgreen's to define a lot of conditions that will lock in how beer and wine will be sold at this premises, and i would like to go to those conditions now. i would point out i will be striking three conditions i will explain as i go because they are covered by statute, and this is just another attempt on our part

to bring efficiency to licensing with state beverage control. what we're trying to get away from is being redundant, which was a practice that was often done in the past. condition one -- sales of alcoholic beverage shall be permitted only between the hours of 10:00 a.m. and 10:00 p.m. daily. in short, they will only have a relatively small window. the sale of distilled spirits is prohibited. there will be no sales of distilled spirits. we'll have a license to transfer again because of the special circumstances and the fact that we got it out of 511 crescent, and it could not be downgraded to a tight 20 license. our next condition -- no more than 5% of the square footage will be used for the display of alcoholic beverages. again, walgreen's will stay in their primary business segment, which is general food and convenience and so on, a very small portion of their premises will be beer and wine. next condition -- the noise

shall be allowed beyond l.l. area of the control of the licensee. -- beyond the allowable area of the control of the licensee. we can step in. we have laws in place to address them. our next condition that would remain -- lawyering is to find a standing idly about, and is prohibited on premises under the control of the licensee. no person under the age of 21 will sell or deliver alcoholic beverages. no ball beverage shall be solved -- no more beverage shall be sold in concentration above 5.7. condition 11, the sale of beer and malt beverage implies a 16223240 and similar size containers prohibited. we're trying to it but -- discourage the single sale. next condition, no beer or malt beverage shall be sold in

quantities of less the manufacture prepackage six-pack for so with the exception of wine coolers and beer coolers, again, discouraging single can sales appeared next condition, no wide -- no one shall be sold in greater concentration 15% by volume except for tender ones -- dinner winds. next, why shall not be sold in bottles or containers smaller than 750 ml. copy of the abc license and operating conditions shall be available during operating hours for viewing by the general public and law enforcement. the last condition -- electronic surveillance shall be maintained in the area where alcoholic beverages are on display. with these conditions, i think that they should be an asset to -- or a balance, i should say, to the community. we do not really see it

generating a police problem. we are recommending approval. supervisor avalos: great. thank you. i appreciate your work on this, especially the work of your office with the previous licensee at the crescent street site. it is a big consideration i have, that the history of this one license and how it is being transferred across the city to a better location, that you probably want to send this out of committee. probably without recommendation, but i will be sending it forward with the committee. we actually met with folks from walgreen's as well about this. i wanted to thank them specifically dave, who i believe is here, for his patience on this item as well, and we can go ahead and open up for public comment. we will do three minutes per

person. i have a couple of cards. [reading names] use the one to your right. >> good morning, supervisors. good morning, san francisco. i bring you greetings from the united food and commercial workers union local 648. michael sharp is our president. we support walgreen's in their endeavor. they are an outstanding employer. they brought nothing but honor to our city. we support them. thank you very much. >> good morning, supervisor avalos, supervisor elsbernd.

i am the district manager for walgreen's. this store is under my supervision. i also wanted to add that i am a native san franciscan. i want to make sure that we all understand that throughout the process with walgreen's trying to get back into the beer and wine business of san francisco that we have worked very closely with inspector falzon from day one of this process. it was never our intention to add an extra burden to any of the communities we have served. we take a great deal of pride in being a very strong community partner in all of our neighborhoods we serve throughout the city. we currently have about 68 stores in san francisco, and our process, as we have discussed in the past, is trying to put liquor in a very small percentage of those stores. we very much share the committee's concern about public safety.

we worked very hard to ensure that our employees do the best -- do their best for the community. as the inspector said, we definitely agree to a downgrade of this license to beer and wine only. we also agreed to all of the stipulations in the agreement. it can be said that -- the amount of space we devote to beer and wine in our stores is very small. we are a drug store, but we are also a convenience store to the neighborhoods which we serve. this store especially -- our customers for many years have come in asking us if we sell beer and wine. all these years, we have always had to turn them away. but our customers have asked us over the years for convenience to be able to sell beer and

wine. beer and wine in our stores is a very small linear footage. some of our stores, 3 feet. some of it goes up to maybe 12 feet or so. a couple of doors of cold beer. maybe one in some stores. the selection can best be described as if you are going to somebody's house for dinner and want to buy a bottle of wine, you can come to walgreen's and get a bottle of wine. the inspectors had described the types of beer and wine that we are not selling, and that certainly attracts the kind of customer that we do not want to have. with that, i thank you very much for your time, and thank you. have a good day. supervisor avalos: thank you for your comments. if there are no other members of the public to comment on this item, we will close public comment, and we will move this forward with the conditions without recommendation of the committee. we will take that without objection.

so done. thank you for your work on this item. we can move on to this item. madam clerk, if we could please call item two. >> item two, a hearing on the report entitled "recommendations on voting systems for the city and county of san francisco" issued by the san francisco voting systems task force in june 2011. supervisor avalos: thank you. are you here for the presentation for the task force? >> i am, thank you. i am chair of the san francisco voting systems task force.

thank you for the opportunity to be here today, and i would like to spend a few minutes interesting our final report. i am going to go through a power point presentation. ok, so a bit of background. in march 2005, the san francisco department of elections began an rfp process. in the same years, of course, following the 2000 presidential election and subsequent years when we were requesting across the country, deborah brown requested her top to bottom review. and the security concerns with all systems then in use in california. at the same time in san francisco, citizens here were also wanting input into the city selection process.

a variety of questions were raised about how the city could acquire the best possible systems that have the highest level of integrity, transparency, and independence. in december 2007, the city did make a decision, selecting sequoya voting systems. sequoia was subsequently purchased by dominion. it is the voting system that has been in use since the february 2008 election. even though the city made the decision, the board of supervisors did want additional strategic guidance about how the next generation voting system could better take into account the variety of issues we're servicing across the whole spectrum of issues. it moved to create the city task force that i and my colleagues today are part of, and that was the voting system task force. the establishment occurred in february 2008. we began work in mid-2009. our mission is to advise the

city and county of san francisco on a development or the acquisition of a voting system. to ensure a system that is fair and accurate, that achieves voter intent and that provides for transparency and public our ability -- public auditability. several members of our volunteer team are here today sitting in the front row, all available for q&a, should you have specific questions for us. just to step back and talk a little bit about the challenges of the voting system environment, and this is not necessarily specific to the city and county of san francisco, but these are issues being looked at across the nation. we want to say that the san francisco doe does an excellent job. the director provides high- quality leadership, and this process of ours was not a criticism of the doe but rather

intended to be supportive and forward thinking for the city, to set us on the best bat weight for the future. we need new voting systems and procedures in the election process. what are the challenges? we have a cumbersome regulatory process at the state and federal level. this makes innovation difficult. it makes it difficult for new players and thought processes to enter. it takes a very long time to get a system certified, and the voting systems marketplace is fragmented. jurisdictions like ours across the country typically independently pursue their own process to acquire a system. there are not consistent standards or needs that are easy to package for vendors or for other people looking into this. also, funding is going to be an issue going forward because of the economy in general and lack of funding coming from other levels of government. it will be a challenge with our

future voting systems. but the goals are definitely worth pursuing. we want to achieve a greater intent of the voter -- to know the intent of the voter, make the system as accessible as possible. we also took a look at new models of acquisitions. it is very much the norm today for a jurisdiction to purchase a system from a private vendor. typically of a proprietary system. are there new ways of approaching this? shattering the model and coming up with a completely different approach? and could that be done in san francisco or through partnerships? we are not alone in this topic. another very interesting process is going on in the county of los angeles. that county is actually one of the largest voting jurisdictions in the entire nation. larger than most states. they are engaged in a robust process -- of course, the outcome of the process is a

noble, but the city, our department of elections -- we should monitor to them and cooperate with them to the extent possible -- the outcome of the process is unknowable. travis county, texas, also recently completed its own two- year process, looking at issues similar to what we did. our intent was to provide strategic guidance to the board of supervisors and other interested parties. we want to provide short-term actions that can be looked at and taken immediately as well as longer term recommendations really geared toward the next step, the next move for the city. this is a very complicated topic. we do not want to make it seem like it is an easy decision for an easy turn key thing we're looking at. throughout the process, we have tried to balance privatism with innovation, thinking about the next big idea in voting systems,

and also want to keep incremental progress in front of us. we can always be looking for ways to improve our system. we studied by topic areas. i should mention i have some hard copies here if you do not have one in front of you or anyone else who is interested here today. the election records and post- election audit procedures. auditing. balloting systems and services. security, right choice voting, and acquisition strategies. basically the models for acquiring. our report contains about 50 individual recommendations. i do not think today's meeting is the place to go through all of them individually, but i want you to be aware that they span across those five topic areas. some of them are granular. some of them are pretty major. but we kept in mind we wanted to put in front of you things that you could do right now. in many of these sections, you will see broken