failure of an elected official, department head, or city employee perspective violations of the sunshine ordinance. we will also handle referrals from the task force of any violation of the ordinance, a willful violation of non department heads for the employees and elected officials, and non local violations as well. for non local -- for non will full violations, we will have a hearing that will have to work at the details of, which will entail the responded to showing cause why the sunshine ordinance order should not be enforced. in addition, we will have to discuss with the city's

attorney's office and the commissioners specifically what sort of enforcement, penalties come up for outcomes that we will have to -- that we can and should put in place. obviously, if we enforce something, we would like to be actually able to do something and make sure that the enforcement is carried through. that is something that we will have to address. is anything that i missed? >> in june of 2010, the commission voted on three procedures. when you do the regulations and recommendations -- my question is, how are you going to deal with the decisions that were

already made? will you go back and revisit them and revise them based on what we do here and vote on them again as the commission? >> what i thought was that the staff would go back and put together revised regulations, or maybe it is more efficient to do a memo outlining what the policy points would be and instituting the policies that we talked about here. i guess i am unclear as to what you mean by -- >> well, what we discussed today is pretty similar to what you discussed back in june and actually voted on. so, when the new recommendations came out, it is very much

departed from that discussion. now, we're back on the other side. the commission did take a vote. there has been a couple of times where new information came over the years and we had to unto our vote before we could hear something that we voted on. i just wanted to make sure that these discussions would not get lost and your vote as a body would not be lost as the new commissioners come in. you have voted on three procedures which are similar to what you have now than it was revisited by staff and changed after the jeweled gomez case because it removed some of your jurisdictions.

so, now, you will go back and revisit and i'm curious. i want to make sure that members of the public would be able to hear your vote again and make a comment again. >> i think the short answer is that we change is something that we had done at that point, we would do this in the usual way it. i don't mean this flippantly, but did you like what we did in june? do you think that we did the right thing? >> this is in your packet. in your minutes are in the packets. some of it, i was there. and there are a number of people there at that commented on it. like as said, are concerned about it is that we did agree with the findings at the time in

japan banned the november jurisdiction which was much more limited. >> this was to do those things that look like we were all moving in the same direction. we were beside the one that we have not achieved resolution. >> my recollection is that the sunshine or dance task force's memo came out with this and i hear your concern. do we need to do any vote on this? >> you cannot. this is just a public discussion. >> >> the agenda is the discussion. there is no action plan. >> thank you. >> could you hear that, sir? >> i could. >> when the new regulations are

drafted, at that point we would carry out the usual, we would have another discussion and vote at that point and public notice and everything would be usual. >> mr. chairman, when public comment begins, i will have a statement to read. i can do that from here or from the public podium.

>> sometime during public comment, i would like to read this statement. >> ok. >> did you get an answer to your question about whether you had covered all of the points? >> ok, public comment. >> ok. i am here are my own time as a private citizen. >> like to read a memo. "the primary concern had been that the staff draft, this is so drastically restricted to the commission's enforcement jurisdiction as to render it

nonexistent. another part of the memo is that the staff draft would be the jurisdiction. we should completely rewrite the guidelines for enforcement. those guidelines must be written. finally, i would like to remained both the ethics commission and the sunshine task force members, that the task force found mr. st. croix in willful violation on my sunshine complaint and the city

comptroller was also an willful violation on 113 and 11. i have begged to over and over to schedule a public hearing on both of these complaints. obviously, mr. st. croix will have a refusal problem. -- recusal problem. unlike get some justice on these? there may are may not been some about them.

we must expedite me with a public hearing on my two complaints. >> members of the commission, members of the task force, the director of san francisco open government. i want to take a moment to go back to what i believe is the core of everything you are discussing here and that is the oath that each and every one of you took to support and defend the constitution, the state of california, and subsequently all of the laws that flow therefrom. the first amendment guarantees the right of freedom of speech and i think the sunshine ordinance and the brown act both go to support and ensure that members of the public that wish to participate in public meetings are able to do so and to make comments including those meeting predicted the protection

which are descending comments. the right to petition government for redress of grievances in most cases is going to demand that unless you are making wild accusations, you have the public records so that you can proof and show that what you are saying has a basis in fact but the california public records act and the sunshine ordinance are there to establish the right of a citizens access to the necessary public records so that they can put forward a cogent case to support what they are presenting. one question that the task force members can say, yes, something that is one of his bugaboos, i asked him to consider their performance in the light of what have you done to support the right of a citizen to speak freely at public meetings and what have you done to support

the right of public citizens to access public records in their efforts to petition government for redress of grievances. that is the very basic core of what they are there to do. i believe that the discussions go to that same thing for the ethics commission. what have you done to support the rights of citizens to ensure that they have the ability to participate in government and make public comment and what have you done to ensure that members of the public sunni public records are given the proper access to support that effort? if you can look back and say, well, the record is not that good, that is one of the main underpinnings for everything you were doing right now. if a citizen cannot come and speak openly and speak honestly and get the records they need to do so, then basically anybody

who denies them that right is violating their oath of office and i think that that is something that unfortunately many city bodies do not take seriously. >> let me begin by saying that i came to the meetings in june of 2010 where these were last discussed. the fact that you are complementing yourself for almost 82 full years of spinning your wheels does not impress me that much. i i am a little shocked.

there is this mass of garbage that ended up at the bottom of the mountain at 17 years later. let me begin by talking about official misconduct. if you look at the willful failure, the restriction there -- will fulfill your to discharge any duty is a sin of omission. they did not do what they were supposed to do. with respect to official misconduct itself, you might look at your own ethics

commission regulations, which defined official misconduct in section 15 poin5.105. in the wrongful behavior by a public officer in relation to the duties of his or her office. presumably, people can do all kinds of things without making an omission of the sunshine duty and be guilty of that section and that section would trigger your enforcement. i want to take a few moments to talk about the burden that you placed on the complacent. -- complaintant. it is the duty of every private citizen to defend his duties and rights from scratch, all over again, as if every other citizen has not come forward already and

should have established the president's. we have a situation where he has wrongfully made a police complaint for purposes of political retaliation. are we going to just go from scratch and make her guilty of official misconduct a second time so she can ignore it again? i hope that will not be the result. thank you. >> i realize that three of the commissioners are new and not around in june of 2010. i also realize, it may be correct to say that none of you have ever attended a sunshine enforcement task force meeting.

complaints on public matters -- public records matters and the follow-up meetings to make sure they had it right. my question is, have you ever wondered how it is bad in this seven-year period, somehow, through sheer coincidence or some other and know and intangible, every records case was dismissed. none of them had merits? how was that possible? i will give you an example of one of the reasons why i case was dismissed. november 5, 2008 -- when there is a conflict of opinion between

the task force and the city attorney's office, the ethics commission, that is you, recognizes the city attorney as the lead attorney for the city and county of san francisco. having been elected by the people of san francisco to that position, the city attorney is a higher authority than the task force. you are just appointed. that was the basis on which the case was dismissed. when i asked for copies of that legal opinion from the city attorney, and it did not exist. when i filed my lawsuit and asked for the file to see what was in it, there was nothing. 0. there is a reason why all of these cases were dismissed. i know what it is. and if you thought about it, at

you would eventually come to the same conclusion. thank you. >> good afternoon, commissioners, and members of the task force. i was a candidate for mayor in the november 2011 ballot. it is nice to see you guys trying to work together. it would be nice if the city family could get along and do their job. my concern is that to on november 11, essential tabulation units of the department of elections that was run by dominion systems completely through the vote. we know that in march of this year, 2012, dominion got busted in palm beach, florida.

their citizens assigned votes to the wrong candidates. when you have a right choice of voting system with 16 candidates on the ballot, if this system is citing the wrong votes to the right -- wrong candidates, we have a bad election. 460,000 registered voters, six out of 10 do not vote t. that is six out of 10 voting against the official family. that is only 18% of the voters in san francisco that voted for mayor that authorized an election system where the central tabulation is fraudulent. where did you go to make complaints for this type of thing? as a candidate, i was not allowed into the locked door to see the process.

i am living in the housing authority. we have a problem at the housing authority where 30 or $40 million contracts are being awarded routinely. no 72-hour notice is being given to anybody about what constitutes those contracts and to the bidders are and it is incomplete violation of the sunshine ordinance. amos brown and housing commission, complete violation of federal law, state law, and local law. where do go to make these complaints? i looked at some of these issues today, jurisdiction enforcement. as you go forward, the solution i would like to propose is, and give staff to the sunshine commission and said that a two- tiered process where they can handle some enforcement with

some financial sanctions. if things require greater review, that could go to the ethics commission. thank you. >> good afternoon. let me say -- i want to thank you for getting together, finally. and attempting to work out your differences. you need to focus again on what the goal you are seeking to date is and that is getting citizens the right to public records. citizens having the ability to participate in open meetings. i was not here for the entire discussion. there were a couple of points that were mentioned. first of all, i do not think anyone from the task force has ever suggested that you would not have the ability to hear

issues. the problem has been, you have never had -- i am sure you have read your grand jury report. i am sure that was one of the primary motivations of you having this joint meeting. no one is suggesting that you do not hear all the issues. what the public is asking the ethics commission to do is review the findings, the letters of determination by the task force, and determine if there is any merit. secondly, i heard a comment about the volume of cases. volume -- which should never be a criteria of whether or not you accept orders of determination for your trial. if you would began to hear some of the cases, i can assure you

there would be less volume of cases and orders of determination by the task force. thank you very much. >> good afternoon. this meeting was a reassuring and a big relief. i do not know why it had to happen. because of that document. that deviated from where everyone was going. i recall the civil grand jury report, pointed out the executive director had too much influence on the commissioners. i recall that 96% of the sunshine complaints gets dismissed. they probably never get to the commissioners.

similarly, whistle-blower retaliation complaints. not one has been sustained since this commission was founded. all of the investigations, the preparatory work is done by the staff. looking at the staff's proposal, you can see it the legal technicalities, the restrictions, the narrowing down of the intent. i think that is where the problem is. >> good afternoon, commissioners and staff and members of the public. my name -- i am a candidate for supervisor in district 7.

2012. this is all new to me. i have a case that was referred before you. i do not know if you will. . i did not know it would be referred, but i am glad that it was a -- that it was. the case took a lot of time and the sunshine taskforce worked hard on that. one of the things i am concerned about is a lack of open government. i want to commend all of you for all the hard work that you do. some of the stories i have heard, i do not know, but one of the things i will say is that i am very appreciative of the numerous hours the sunshine taskforce has spent. we are beginning to work with other people to invite them to participate in open government.

as a person of color, i am very concerned about the lack of diversity at some of these meetings because i am not the only one who has a grievance. i am sure that our residents who are in hunters point or bayview or the mission district, they have reasons -- grievances as well. as the sunshine task force and the ethics commission, you have a lot of work to do. i'd to comprehend that everything political, even though we like to say it is not, it really is. some of these decisions to arrive that may not be something that you want to do because friends are involved, may be distant relatives, but you are here for the people. you are here for me. it is very difficult -- i hope that is not lost. you are here for all of san

francisco. it is truly a very diverse city. until my case, people thought they were disenfranchised, they were in despair. i had to do something to help my community. you are here on behalf of all san franciscans, nearly a million of us. i hope you keep that in mind. and not this side of that. thank you. -- and not lose sight of that. thank you. >> executive director of library users association. i am somewhat encouraged by today's meeting and there certainly appreciate the time and effort that all of you love put into this. i certainly hope this will result in some type of action

fairly soon. that will be a positive. mr. grossman referred to a 2004 case. that was my case against the library. even though the library did not even bother to show up for what they called an enforcement hearing, which the sunshine or dance task force held, even though they specifically said -- sunshine or dance task force held, even though they specifically said they would not show up at that hearing because they were unavailable, that kind of flouting of the law, including the finding of a violation, when this reached the ethics commission.