>> go ahead.

>> thank you for your patience. good morning. i'm cynthia i'm the san francisco director of the state of board of appeals. i'll walk you throw our budget proposal. as you likely already know we're to provide the last stop in the

cities process from disputes from a wide range of determinations. i wanted to give you a picture of our appeal volume just before the economic downturn we are receive 2 hundred and 8 appeals year-old. we've been down over the last had years. we're seeing the trend upward largely due to increase in construction activities throughout the year >> i wanted to give you a picture of where our appeals originate. we have complete data. you can see that 61 percent of

the determinations were land use related. we find that most are from the planning and zoning administrator. they change from year to year. we had quite a bit of spike when i contribute to the local field legislation and the new permit

context the board might allow the trees to be removed. and you might see the type of food and hours of operation to mitigate competing restaurants in the neighborhood. we have filing fees for people to come to the boards office. the bulk of our budget comes from surcharges. and the rate of those surcharges

is to be proposeal to the cases from each department. the controller has the authority to increase those surcharges and may do so without coming to you. now we're not coming to you this year for an increase in the surcharges but we may come to you later this year to request a change in the surcharges. we may not have enough money to cover extra costs. this also notes that there are some new surcharges that need to be at. some changes in the dealings

with restaurants that have in surcharge on them at all. so looking at our two year budget proposal we have a minor change and we do have mandatory changes that are being offset by other line items. some of those adjustments are to help services cost and some specific to our budget. for example, the tv order we've had we're not using their services so that line item would come down. the 9 hundred and 64 thousand dollars is the smallest amount of money you're going to be asked for today.

for fiscal year 15 we have no increases. i wanted to give you a picture of the budget which is at a high-level the expenditure budget is at the top. the salary represents 58 percent of our budget. we also have services of other departments our work orders this represents the 58 percent of our budget. finally i wanted to address some of the questions you proposed regarding our f e count. we made reductions in our account we laid off 5 position. and i've had exceeded staff leave or i have positions i held

open. we're fully staffed now and i think with the increase in the appeal volume we're staffed appropriately. we've asked about overtime. currently we're at the 38 percent and it's he spent exclusively on the non exempt employees. i do expect in the next couple of years our board meetings will be longer so that appropriation is appropriate >> you've asked about our accessibility of our services. i'm fortunate to have bilingual staff. and that's in cantonese and spanish.

we have other trrpts we higher as we need. i also wanted to focus on what our board does. our board recognize there can be great sdarlt or disparity. this might be because of language limitations. fortunately we're set up to provide additional assistance to folks. so somebody can come into the office and learn about the appeal process. and what to expect at a hearing. our board members can help the folks talk about their cases.

our board members can ask a lot of questions so everyone can have their cases decided that's fair. i have two additional slides. one shows you the current filing fees and the sir, charge rates. i'm happy to answer any questions you have >> thank you. thanks. colleagues any questions at this point in time? >> much appreciated and we're saving public comment for friday so we'll - we do not have a budget report inform this department and so at this point in time i see our city attorney if you would like to go right

now. why don't we move forward with you >> i anticipate i'm going to be very brief to allow you to get to what are other matters that are important. supervisors i know of your warns with the work done by the city attorney's office over 3 hundred dedicated professionals that are in the practice of municipal law handling a variety of things like marriage quality we're hoping to get a favorable decision on and to the nuts and bolts of city government. and we have a lot of claims advising commissions and every elected official with respect to the law how we should handle the

negotiations. you name it the city attorney's office off the is involved in the inner workings. whether it is legislative branch or executive branch. we try to provide the highest representation to all our clients. i've had the opportunity to review the analysts report. you'll note that our proposed budget increase for 2013 and fourteen is a little bit over $14.04 percent of our 2013 and 2014 budget. in our fiscal year 2014, 2015 there's an increase of

approximately 3 percent more than the 2013 and 2014. most of that increase is in both years is due to mandated salaries and friendly benefits. we are a department that does not have physical assets separate from the personnel costs we have for our attorneys and support staff which is negotiated and collectively bargained as to what their rate of pay and fringe benefits. we've had the opportunity to look at the analysts reports and i note that the budget analysts recommended a cut of about $108,000. and then in the 2014 and 2015 an

additional recommendation of $50,000 recommended rescues. i have no problem with the budget analyst recommendations for either of those years. and i'll be happy to take imply questions from the committee >> colleagues any questions right now? >> thank you, mr. herrera. i have a question. last year when you came before us we had a discussion about the city attorney's protection which is an important aspect of the city attorney's work. we've seen over and over again the city attorney filing a lawsuit for the benefit of the public. that's a protection lay i

believe you and your predecessor have used ton the city's on behalf of. can you update us on where we are with the issues? >> yes supervisors. over 2011 with a variety of cases in the press our checking for arbitration forum we've had the opportunity to recover $20 million. under prop 64 that money is mandated to continue to go to the protection efforts. since that time the included in our budget over last year and

this year which is $1.8 million which have been allocated for that we've got 15 unlawful million dollars that could be used to funded consumer protection and other efforts that can benefit the folks in san francisco. i've had discussion with the mayor's office and whether additional fund or resources are made available that we could pay for and continue to continue that work. we have about 15 unlawful million dollars available. the mayor's office is support i have in terms of supporting our effort and i welcome to continue that discussion with either the administration or the board of supervisors to see how we can enhance the situation >> that money has not been

budgeted. there's $15 million in fund that have been recovered by the city attorney's office under the state laws for only further consumer efforts and a that's correct. 15 and a half million remain from the 20 million >> so we could use it for other things. >> we can't. >> they have additional money available and a okay. and i'll be honest this has been an ongoing question last year and this year. you're in the position you have this money that is recovered due to our good work and others that could be used to do further

consumer protection. we've had beneficial results for the city. it's unclear why we wouldn't be used for another purpose. >> it could benefit taxpayers additional money being allocated for example, code enforcement throughout the city. and many code enforcement cases has a 2 hundred and 17 component. it's not just national arbitration it's about neighborhood b for nuisance abatement. i anticipate that we'll continue those discussions with the

mayor's office or with this board in the future to how we can allocate more resources that we have to be of greater benefit to the state of citizens >> you know i think the last point you made is important fitsz it's not just the major lawsuits. we deal with the code issues all the time. sometimes, the departments are not as active as they need to be in the code violations and the city attorney's office plays an important role >> the funds are made available we can make good use of it. >> thank you. thank you, mr. herrera. colleagues any further comment

>> mr. herrera thank you for the presentation. i know there's a lot of work that's been done for disadvantaged communities to work with other but we're going to talk about equity and culture appropriate community can you talk about your work to make sure that your assessable to all of san francisco >> yeah. supervisor oar you're correct in terms of the work we have done substancely whether it's he wage theft or sensitive issues around elections to be sure everyone was accounted for. it's about process and procedure and we make sure we have language accessibility in our

office to make sure we can make public increase. in terms of reaching out you may have seen we've announced a new app. it's trying to assess with the code enforcement that provides a direct link between our offices and both in city offices. many times some of our most disadvantaged and we've seen tremendous in just a short term a tremendous ability to collaborate to make sure that the folks see the results in their government. it instills confidence or in san

francisco >> thank you. colleagues any fester questions or comment? >> we'll go to our budget report from mr. rose. >> mr. chairman on page 52 of our report we report that our reductions total $58,050 and 50 thousand of one time savings is rescues that allow $3.1 million or 4 percent in the budget. and then i recommend reductions of 50 thousand are all knowing serving. we allow the 3 percent in the departments budget as i understand the city attorney concurs with our recommendations >> thank you, mr. rose.

any questions from mr. rose? >> and you're in agreement with the recommendations yes. >> colleagues with have recommendation on the table we have a motion to accept those recommendations providing that we're going to be he hearing public comment but we, have a motion to accept those rementsdz. any opposition? and so approved. next up the rent board. mr. collins.

>> good morning commission chair and a supervisors. i'm robert collins. my colleague was not able to attend the meeting she is out of the country. i will be presenting a high-level overview of the rent boards budget and an overview of the mission which is workload changed and other thanks.

to begin with the mission of the san francisco rent board as enacted in 1979 it is to assure landlords rent xhfbt with the guidelines. it protects the tenants from evictions. speaking from a high-level prospective the rent board areas can be grouptd into two it's public information and counseling unit provides information to the public regarding the rights and responsibility of landlords and

tenant. and it's administrative hearings and appeals unit provides landlord and taint arbitration and mediation to hearing with the administrative law judges. the board is dedicated to the enforcement of cities ordinances and to the fairy treatment of landlords and tenants. the agencies workload has increased during the last fiscal year. the total number of petitions filed increased by about 27 percent from one through 78 fiscal year 2010 and 2011 to

fewer petitions. the total petitions increased in fiscal year 2010 and fiscal year 2011 by 33 percent from same fiscal periods >> the budget changes that we are proposing for the necklaces two years are as follows the proposed budget represents an increase of 39 percent of $322,000. half of that increase is for salaries and mandatory friendly benefit increases. the proposed budget for fiscal year 2014 and 15 is about a 3

percent increase is >> i pledge allegiance to the flag and $89,000. three-quarters of that is for friendly benefits and a quarter of it is an increase in cola and salary adjustments. from is another prospective we have two positions an administrative law judge. the addition is in the process of filling the vacant council position with a spanish special condition person who will have the skills to communicate with an english and spanish to assess more of the community. the law judge is to be filled in

the fall. the two years doesn't request any new positions. the budget is for more ftes. i didn't make a slide but we have noo. and haven't paid overtime and don't have