are for people between 50 and 654 transgendered people and i suspect they're pretty high. there is also the unique needs around health care. obviously there is a very high rate of not being insured in the transgendered community for health care. most people now many are living in sro's. the challenges they face in those environments. i'm not saying anything that anyone here does not already know. there are some particular days around the transgendered community. it deserves further exploration in terms of on needs. in terms of cultural sensitivity training, that might be something the city should be exploring more. thank you. >> we have exhausted the yellow

cards. is there anyone who has not filled one out who would like to speak? please come forward. in order. -- any order. >> good afternoon, supervisors. it is a great pleasure to speak here and to have you conduct this hearing. i am going to tell you a tale of two of my queer friends. les gilbert at age 92. she was under the care of onlock. every new year's eve we would go to jon's grille and drink ourselves silly. the conductor on the cable car would get her back home. she was an artist and lively and vital and she was still looking for the love of her life.

howard grayson was a valued activist and friend and a beloved care giver of harold wallace. it took the community six days to locate his body. at kaiser. kaiser would not tell us he was dead. that could have been avoided if there were other kinds of contacts in place to let his friends or his family know his condition in hospital. every organization here today wants to be an extended research to lgbt elders in san francisco. the milk club will hold an annual elder life conference on my couch -- on march 24.

to learn how we can act politically and foreman elder caucus. we all want to stay in san francisco. that is what they wanted and we want to work with you on this issue. thank you. >> good afternoon, supervisors. thank you for putting this form together. i am the executive director of stepping stone and a member of the mayor's long-term care coordinating council. so much has been said, but i would like to underscore one important fact. housing is home. it is health. we cannot deliver services to people without stable housing. when people have it, their

health improves. safe, welcoming housing. with this population, we have also heard that many are without care givers and people watching over them. so our support systems are critical to be that caregiver, to know when things are going bad. and to step in. we have heard a fact today that i urge you to pay attention to. that is about the suicide rate in the senior community and especially for lgbt seniors. i heard yesterday from san francisco suicide prevention that they believed not only is it the highest in san francisco, senior suicide, they believe it is double in the lgbt community. there are no statistics. it is double in used and they believe it is double in the lgbt senior community as well.

-- double in youth and they belief is double in the lgbt senior community as well. >> good afternoon. i am on the lgbt advisory committee to the human rights commission and a longtime volunteer for open house. i want to say that as a gay baby boomer, i feel it is our duty, we created that castro and -- the castro. we must acknowledge and care for our aging population. it must be part of the political agenda. i am speaking for many of my neighbors. we have a grass-roots organization called friends of 55 and we have been advocating for this site to be billed for a

long time. i am putting that forward. this really needs to be the legacy of my generation to san francisco. thank you for having us today. and moving the dialogue forward. thank you. >> hello, supervisors. several organizations submitted things for me to read on their behalf. i was going to read those now if that is okay. supervisor wiener: if you could submit them in writing also. >> great, i will do that. the alleys and are -- the alexander hamilton post, which represents the lgbt-focused veterans agency. "on behalf of the 200 lgbt war veterans, alexander hamilton post in san francisco would like me to speak a few words on behalf of our lgbt elders.

our country would not be strong or successful if it were not for them. sexual orientation does not diminish the sacrifices that made for our nation. these citizens carry the burden to ensure that our society, with all its complexities, could succeed courage to those in the 1970's and 1980's, i cannot imagine what you winter in the early years. we owe you a great deal of gratitude. thank you again and got less all of you today." -- god bleesss all of you today" "discrimination can take many forms, including discrimination of omission, refusal of rice to receive visitors, denial of access to hormone therapy, being

threatened for expressing gender identity, being segregated, being harassed on the basis of hiv status, refused the right to visit a partner, and refusal of life-planning documents the dead -- of life-planning documents. we have worked to share with our consumers. i will submit the rest of these. supervisor elsbernd: any of the -- any other members of the public who would like to speak who has not? if anybody else would like to speak, please line up. otherwise, this will be our last public, enter. -- commenter. >> i am a citizen of the lgbt

community and i feel is mandated to have proper facilities to reside in as we get into our golden years. i do not feel comfortable having to leave the city because i cannot afford to reside in this community. i have been here for -- since the 1970's. i feel there is a lot of discrimination even though san francisco is considered to be the liberal cities. -- city. i have been involved in a lot of hate-bashing and name-calling when i'm with other people of the lgbt community. i feel that safety is a big issue. i would feel uncomfortable having to leave the city because of financial situations. i really feel that we need a senior housing for the lgbt community. it is very vital to our survival. if you can do something to make

it happen, i would really appreciate it. i do know a lot people who are older than me who do have a lot of situations that -- they have to move out of the city because they cannot stay here anymore. i came here to represent that situation. i think you for your time. thank you. supervisor farrell: seeing no other members of the public, public comment is closed the. supervisor wiener? supervisor wiener: i want to thank everyone who has come out today. this has been an amazing hearing. i want to thank my colleagues for listening current i noticed a lot of people who -- i have been in the city for almost 15 years and a lot of the people who came to this hearing were not seniors when i first met them or knew they were back in 1997 and.

i was 27 and i am entering my middle years carry -- my middle years. this is so important, as our current generation of seniors, but also preparing for the future. i think every lgbt person i know who lives here really wants to stay here. it is an amazing city to live in. to age in. we all want to do this in a dignified way. this is just the beginning of the conversation. we will continue to work on these issues together. supervisor olague, do you have any concluding comments? supervisor olague: i am not sure where that conversation would take place. i am not familiar all the rules of the government body, the brown act and sunshine ordinance, but i think we do need to have a conversation

about the next step. there was some talk of having a conversation at some point where we could work with the department of asian -- of aging and adult services and find out how they are engaged on this issue. the senior network, clay for elders, have been involved in the ihss. there are so many groups talking about senior issues in general about which the lgbt community is excited -- is affected by. we heard the particular situation around the transgendered community, which are truly unique. issues that affect transgendered situation -- seniors, we do not know what we do not know. planning for elders to have that training, that center provided to us, we are grateful for that.

there is still more conversation and needs to happen, more planning on our part, and more collaboration from the different offices to figure out where to go. as mentioned earlier, so that we do not keep talking but actually come up with some kind of plan and schedule where we start bringing these things to fruition. i am anxious to be part of that conversation. it is just a question of when and where. president chiu: i appreciate everyone's patience as we have been dealing with all the foreign issues and all the conflicting meetings that were scheduled. i am really glad. we started a really robust and substantive conversation about the challenges that we have. i think we all know that, in general, in san francisco, we are going to be experiencing the fact that our senior population,

the numbers are rapidly expanding. as supervisor campos said at the beginning of the hearing, i was watching on television, when you are talking about 25,000 seniors to come out of the lgbt community with all of the challenges that are, that we have for about today, it really helps to elucidate and clarify and inform a lot of us. my staff provided new is a number of records that have been put out on the needs of individuals with hiv and aids who are over 50 and 60. seniors within the lgbt community in. i want to thank those of you share your personal stories. it really helped the policy- making come to life. it impressed upon me and everyone else how important it is that we focus on this. i want to thank my colleagues for bringing this year and working with your leadership. a lot of this is going to take

money, but it is also going to take a lot of tough and good thinking in complicated policy areas. i look forward to working with all of you in doing that. supervisor wiener: i would request that the committee -- supervisor elsbernd: absolutely. can we say that without objection? are there any other items before the committee? seeing none, this committee is adjourned.

commissioner: i would like to call the meeting to order. welcome to the meeting of the san francisco ethics commission, january 3, 2012. i will take role. commissioner studley, commissioner liu, commissioner hanyon. item number two, public comment on matters appearing or not appearing on the agenda. >> once again, i do not see my agenda item on the agenda. the sunshine task force were for

all on case number 11-013 and 11-014, which i sent you months ago. you have not yet scheduled a public hearing on my item, and it should not take you five months to either recused him from this case, since the task force had a finding of willful failure and official misconduct bore him on both cases, so for him to recuse himself and this body to schedule a hearing on my case, i wonder when you are going to tell me, commissioner hyr, -- hur, when you are going to schedule my hearing on the agenda? commissioner hyr: -- hur: thank

you for bringing it to my attention. we will look into it. >> excuse me. i have had a hearing loss since i was a child. commissioner hur: i said thank you for bringing it to our attention. we will look into it. >> that will be the third time you have said you will look into it. >> we have been here six or eight times before this body. the ethics committee is the only city body empowered to enforce violations of the city -- laws. i -- from 2004 to 2011 without having a single hearing or taking a single vote, the ethics commission rejected every one of 26 public record enforcement cases sent in by the sunshine ordinance task force. during that eight-year period,

the commission membership has turned over almost three times, and the commission has held over 100, over 100, meetings. the only constant player in all of these 26 rejections over the entire eight-year period has been john, your executive director. wrongfully using the ethics regulations and its default, and he handled the entire process from start to finish without the participation or involvement of even one commissioner. managing any staff investigations, determining whether there was probable cause for a commission year and, selecting the facts for his report and recommendation to the commission, and is sending a it,

no hearing, no vote, case closed. his views of the task force are no secret. in the new york times, he said that the work of the task force often lacked due process and that his department had an obligation to review the cases. that statement was blatantly false. he knew that. the task force has an exhaustive procedure, including at least three hearings. the ethics commission, on the other hand, has none. that statement and others in the article are gratuitous comments intended to discredit the task force work and discourage members. prop 59 adopted in 2004 by an 83% majority created the public constitutional right of access to public records.

the commission complete lack of involvement in these cases and the executive director misuse of this position has denied those 26 complainants that right. i think the time has come to recognize that that right exists. thank you. >> good evening, commissioners. my name is dr. washburn. i am a member of the sunshine ordinance task force. i occupied seat number five and was appointed by or recommended by -- of san francisco. i also share the compliance and amendments committee of the sunshine ordinance task force. i appeared before you in november at your regular meeting to urge you to meet with us jointly about your proposed regulations for handling

sunshine enforcement cases, and i think that the consensus seemed to be that that would be a good idea. i then sent a letter. it was dated january 6. 2012. asking again for a joint meeting, suggesting the week of february 6. it is probably too late for that to happen, but i am here today to again requesting a joint meeting. i think that the matters before us are complicated. the history between our two bodies is strained. we look to the sunshine ordinance task force, and citizens look to you to help enforce the city's public records laws, and this has not been happening, so i hope to hear a response to my letter in

a few days' time so that we can schedule a joint meeting. thank you so much for your consideration. commissioner hur: thank you. >> thank you very much for the time clock. it is in the morning that even though this meeting is relatively sparsely populated but the handouts are already exhausted. i begin by saying with the public library do not accept things from the public library and the friends of the public library. you will remember that the president of the library commission was found to have created a willful violation and that her conduct was below the standard for a public official. later that month, the library commission, during a discussion of a service for the public, one of the commissioner said, and i quote him verbatim, "you know last monday when we had met,"

the commission meets on thursday, "last monday, the commissioners had met, and we talked about how the changes to the printing system would potentially impact staff, as well. i was just wondering if it would be worth it to speak to the public about how it impacts them, as well." you do not have to be a genius to figure out that this is a blatant omission of a non announced meeting of the commissioners. it goes without saying that there was no announcement of a meeting on the previous monday and no explanation offered about why this was a blatantly illegal meeting. i have mentioned this several times. of course, my mentions of it were never documented in the library commission minutes. finally, at a meeting on december 15, that same commissioner said, again, into the microphone, and i transcribed him directly, "there is just a thing in reference to

the illegal meeting, which was simply a briefing. i just wanted to be clear. there is no such thing as an illegal meeting. it was purely a briefing." well, this is an example of them simply flaunting their power, . they have a commission president to has been found in willful violation. you have no concept of how corrupt these people are. i certainly found nothing comparable in society. they are ripping off a public institution of millions of dollars, and a finding of being unethical or violating sunshine ordinances and laws is just an opportunity to show how impervious they are and how we any sort of democracy is compared to the influence of money and corporate power that they possess. the fact of the matter is if you

come to this ethics commission meeting and just shuffle paper, you need to be aware of how much damage you are doing because you are demonstrating how powerless democracy is, and of course, the laws cost more than the money. thank you. >> good evening, commissioners. my name is dr. -- after 20 years at laguna honda hospital, i became a whistle-blower, and then i was laid off. in the past six years, you have dismissed 29 consecutive sunshine complaints. even though you substantiated 20% of them, none resulted in any enforcement action, and only one was granted a public hearing. all of them were dismissed. this wrongly implies that the complaints were not valid, and

it also allows city officials who violate the sunshine ordinance to claim that they were exonerating by the ethics commission. your handling of a whistle blower retaliation complaints is similarly one-sided. every single retaliation complaint has been dismissed since the commission was founded. meanwhile, the government accountability project has provided a legal aid to some 5000 whistle-blowers over the past 30 years. here is what they advise in the whistle-blowers' survival guide. it says, "you will surely suffer retribution for blowing the whistle, because bureaucracies instinctively eliminate anything perceived as a threat. academic studies confirm that more than 90% of whistle- blowers report subsequent

retaliation, and they give references." now, if experts say that retaliation occurs in 90% of the cases, why do you report in retaliation rate of zero? please consider two possibilities. number one, your investigations are biased against complainants. and number two, your decisions are based on opinions from the city attorney, who has a duty to defend the very same city officials that we report for wrongdoing. thank you very much. >> good evening, commissioners. maria. i was pushed out and forced out

of the kahane after over 20 years of service to the city. two years ago, we made three whistle-blower complaints to the ethics commission. the first one regarded health director michel --mitchell katz, with a group that had an affiliation. this complaint was dismissed by ethics. our second complete recorded davis john s. sicilians, who was awarded a $2 million department of public health contract. the white, a high level dph executive, played a major role in awarding the contract. after two years, the comptroller revoke the contract siding, quote, irregularities. this complaint was also dismissed by the ethics commission. the laguna honda gift fund was r