as well. just keeping it open to many possibilities within the rfp process. and i would like to encourage this process with the rfp move forward as quickly as able, while including as much public participation and sufficient, if not broad as possible out reach across san francisco, not only in the bayview area but to other neighborhoods as well. in general, i would like to put in a support from the sfuaa with the school district and the collaboration they're on joint use to not only have the site open for kind of glorified classroom use but also available to the public and community during school off hours. thank you. president moran: thank you. our next speaker.

>> i am with s.p.u.r. thank you for letting me comment. certainly excited about these projects and do not have to much to add except for it is good to hear about the time line. i have put in applaud if it is possible to move that faster, i know staff has a lot on their plate but to have an open house will sooner than late summer might give people more time so that when it gets closer to starting a project in the fall that people have time to think about it and echo what dennis said -- dana said. staff has done an amazing job of outrage. some do not know the best way to plug in. -- staff has done a great job of outreach. if there is an announcement on a

website that would give people an outline, it could help encourage ideas we do not know of yet. it is moving ahead in a great way. i look forward to seeing this happen as soon as possible. thank you. president moran: any additional public comment? seeing none, we should return to item nine. >> i have identified in the master license agreement attached to this agenda item where the prudent utility practice clause that commissioner courtney during our section 2, section k is applied. on page five, section 10.

under the section entitled "operation of solar power projects." >> it shows up on the bottom of the page. >> i will give you a moment to read that. the last sentence there. the puc shall undertake that permitted activities in accordance with the terms of the license and prudent utility practice and in compliance with all permits and applicable laws and regulations. president moran: is that the only -- >> the only use of the defined term. commissioner courtney: i

appreciate the opportunity. this is changing jurisdictional discussion that has been taking place for the better part of a couple of years, right? if you are deciding we're talking about the unified school district, it is exciting we're talking about the rooftops. given some of the feedback i got from the city attorney, i feel comfortable at this point moving the item forward with one last question. in the event that we enter into an agreement to shift the responsibility back to the unified school district, will there be a process or an undertaking that we engage in or is that outside of our dominion and control? >> i would be a process that is a written agreement. we're looking at the section, you can follow.

on page 12 foch page 12. section 36. >> your question is back on page 5. >> i am sorry. section 10, same section. where it indicates it is made the responsibility of the unified school district pursuant to an executed written agreement between the parties, the school district and the puc. any agreement as is this one would come back to the commission, any written agreement would come back to the commission for consideration and approval. president moran: thank you. we do have a motion by

commissioner vietor, i do not believe we have a second. >> second. president moran: seconded. any further discussion on this item? any public comment? ok, all those in favor of tax opposed? the motion carries. -- all those in favor? opposed? we do not have any items for closed session. remind me to continue that or -- do i have to dispose of that in some way? >> i think if you do not move to go into closed session that takes care of it. >president moran: that will take care of that. >> we should remind you and the public that the next meeting on

march 27 will be at 4:00 p.m. as opposed to the 130 pm regular meeting. it will be at the southeast community center -- facility as opposed to city hall and that will go into a joint meeting at 5 or thereabouts. president moran: thank you for that reminder. on to the next item. is there any other new business? for the commission. sing and -- seeing none, that concludes our calendar. this meeting is adjourned. thank you.

>> the only item on the agenda is consideration of amendments to legislation. >> hopefully, this is a great simplification over what we expected to do today. i will ask you to more or less ignored them, what we had earlier this week, and look at what is in front of you. although the board of supervisors passed out a version of the public finance proposal that the ethics commission adopted, there were a number of amendments included. even though it passed the board, since then, there has been some dissension among board members on that language. so in some fairly frantic

negotiation going on this week and into last night, members of the board have come to an agreement on this, the ones that are actively involved. what that means is, the proposal that ethics has adopted with the two changes in front of you, reducing the overall cap of the amount in the election campaign fund, from $13.5 million to $7 million. the purpose of this is to escalate concerns and there has always been a surplus and that money is idle when the city could be using that money in other places. this is certainly acceptable to the staff. the second change is the ethics commission adopted an increase in the cap for the mayoral race , and the board had decided to leave that where it is.

this is something that's that is fine with working with. there is a third technical change that recreates the formula at which the commission staff wants to notify the board and the mayor there will be a shortage in the fund. because of the way it is written, there will not be a shortage when the trigger hits, we are changing the trigger so that it matches the mathematical intent. that is really it in a nutshell. you have before you what you already adopted with those two changes, which are simple to understand, and those are the technical changes. >> could you describe, procedurally, what happens if we adopt this, these changes in the legislation? >> the rules committee, likely will hear this on april 5 -- >> possibly late march.

>> at that point, it goes back to the full board come first and second full of reading. our understanding is there is sufficient support that this would be adopted with the changes. >> we have sufficient confidence -- if we do not vote on the version that was sent to us by the board originally, but instead, vote on this version that was negotiated over the course of the last week, we are not running into any procedural problems? >> no, if the commission were to adopt these last set of changes the director just presented -- and these were last minute changes -- there should not be any holdup in terms of how quickly it could be enacted at the board and how quickly the ethics commission could

implement. >> procedurally, we are also ok with this regarding the version that had originally reidy that had originally come down from the board. >> certainly within the ethics commission purvey to make any changes that you see fit, frankly. even if it is something that several members of the board at least initially expressed support for. although, that seems to have changed a little bit. >> so your review is that this was satisfactorily noticed that we reluctant changes to what was done, that there were visions to that and the public was on notice that we were addressing this topic in this level of detail today?

that is another procedural issue. >> yes, in terms of noticing this item on the agenda for the special meeting, the notice is sufficient. the ethics committee can also make changes and still pass it out the same day, or evening, as it usually is. >> thank you. commissioners, comments regarding the proposal? >> briefly, on the $7 million, can you tell us more about what the staff thinking was when you came to the conclusion that that was adequate? >> the most we have ever spent in a single race is the past mayoral race, $4.8 million.

that is too close to $5 million for what we are thinking about next. in projecting forward the anticipated inflationary costs and everything, we wanted to make sure there was enough money looking for to at least the next mayor's race. we costed it out and just under $7 million. we started at $5 million, but there was concern that that would not be enough, so we recalculated and moved up in that way. >> a question about the conforming changes in the last paragraph. previously, the trigger was much further away from the cap, giving more time to find money in the budget, if necessary, make other changes that would allow that to work. i am just wondering what the

thinking is about having the cap at $6.9 million, which seems pretty close and not allowing as much policy room. i know this does not speak to timing. what is the background on that one? >> i was not in the room when this figure was arrived at, actually. the fact is, even though this stipulates a time when we are to go in the case of a supplemental, there is nothing constraining us -- >> from doing it early. so it is required at this point, but could be done at any time when we believe it is proven in the cycle. >> yes. -- prudent in the cycle of. >> commissioners, any other questions or comments? >> if i could just add a lot

more on the question presented by commissioner studley. the ethics committee needs a signal prior to the election. the possibility that a commission may request a supplemental appropriation is permissive. if that extension was close, $6.7 million, for example, we would still be required to notify the board of that, but it is not clear that the ethics commission needs to go through all the groups to ask for that money -- hoops to ask for that money. >> in the words, it is possible there may not be $7 million in the fund, but at the extent not have the obligation necessarily to ensure that there is $7 million. >> the ethics commission would be required to notify the relevant authorities but is not

required to actually go through the steps of requesting that money. it is not practically required. >> is there any mechanism for the board or mayor to put money in the fun without a request from ethics? >> yes. >> it is in their budgetary authority. >> further questions or comments from the commissioners? public comment? >> good morning. i have not seen this before. i walked in the room and you were talking about it. mr. hill said he was vaguely aware. would have been helpful if this was available yesterday, to let the public know. i am not sure i can digest the changes right now. i think that is a problem in terms of public notice and consideration of further changes

to what was already a complicated proposal. i was prepared to talk about what was made available in earlier this week. i am sorry. i am a little bit unhappy right now. >> at the beginning of the meeting, we addressed these changes and the procedural mechanism for how they came about. perhaps you can provide another recap -- >> perhaps staff could have let the public know that this document was available yesterday? >> the document was written last night after 6:00 p.m. >> and we are considering in this morning? >> this proposal was with the ethics commission adopted before with two changes that are simple to understand and one technical correction. >> the negotiations continued into evening last night, and this was prepared immediately

after those. >> we sought for the first time this morning as well. >> i will try to restrain my unhappiness, but i expressed it. the technical changes that i had here on what is now paid 18 subsection b, with respect to insufficient funds, in addition to notify the commission and the board of supervisors, i would suggest adding the mayor on line six, line 16, 17. to the extent this suggests a supplemental appropriation that could originate from the border or the mayor, or as suggested by this commission. i think notify the commission, board, and mayor would be useful. i have no policy objection to the changes in the program

structure. as i have testified before, i would use different figures, but i think these figures work as well. this is an evolving program. it is possible there could be a future court decision that says a non-incumbent candidate cannot be treated differently. we may have to go back and revise the formula to that end. to my knowledge, there is no such decision in that regard right now. i think it is fine to handle incumbent, non-incumbent candidates in the manner proposed. whether or not my concern about the single subject rule is still pertinent, i still think, on a policy basis, moving back the filing deadline 58 days has the effect of extending the campaign season for two months, which i actually think works against one

of the goals of the commission with respect to financing of campaigns, which is to limit the expenses. by extending the campaign season, that will increase expenses of running for office, not keep them level, which i think is not a good idea. why candidates should have to file in june 4 in november election rather than august seems to me there are other approaches to deal with the zombie candidate issue, or reducing the number of candidates -- limiting the number of candidates that may seek public financing under a reasonably separate -- structured program. i will leave my comments there for the moment. >> thank you. >> good morning, commissioners. steven hill. it has been a long road.

yesterday was a pretty furious day. lots of people were involved trying to tweak anything at the last second. it was not an attempt to hide anything from the public. there were just a lot of concern from members of the board that we are doing the right thing here. as someone who has come here before, an advocate for public financing, i am not 100% happy with everything in this, but, on balance, it is a good effort. the standard that you are charged, to look at changes like this, does this further the goals of the campaign finance reform ordinance? that is what any changes meant to do. looking at it that way, this document does that. it does a number of good things, including dealing with the zombie candidate issue, and will make the program itself more stable because it is making us more conscious of the use of public dollars.

it is going to make sure there is enough money in the fund, we hope, to finance all the candidates based on past elections, but it is also going to make it a love it harder to get the public financing, as we know. on balance, we have struck a good package here. i would urge you to support it. we know we need a boat from the board of supervisors. that is a high threshold. when you need at high of the threshold, sometimes everybody can get what they want. the major substantive change that was made yesterday is a very good one, after all the back-and-forth. the amendment that came to you was going to put money into the fund in june, in the middle of

campaign season. that would have allowed the program to become a political football. that would have used up a big lump sum, instead of doing it year after year. those of us that have been around this issue for a long time remember in the past mayoral administration where they raided the fund and turned it into a political football. this was alarming to thing that money would be injected into the fund in the middle of a campaign, in june. i am pleased we were able to get agreement to go back to the year to year allocation, and to keep it that way, where it has already been. and it is also true the ethics commission itself is overseeing this program, which is funded by that. the lower that amount gets, the less funding the ethics commission has. if you are getting in a lump sum, i imagine it allows more

difficulty in planning for staffing and all the other needs of the commission. doing it year by year seems to be a better way to do the sorts of things, to allow the commission and staff to plan, knowing that the money is coming each year and plan accordingly. not everything i wanted, but on balance, it furthers the goal of the cfro, and i would urge your support. >> commissioners, any further comments, questions? is there a motion? --is there a motion to pass the provisions to the cfro? is there a second? >> second. >> all those in favor? opposed? the motion passes.