and the fight in congress about sexual harassment in the military. yes. i agree there are businesses that do handle their business in an honor and integral way don't use fear and intimation on their workers we have businesses in this country that doughnut carry themselves in this high responsibility. we have a responsibility to push people out of their comfort zone. why the ballot and not the democratic process they've both democratic either way they're

still public comment and a an up to the present time to take anna piece of legislation that is put forth and make amendments to it. this is the process. this is how we begin to resolve some of the issues and i want to call your attention supervisor breed in the presentation that president chiu present there's 3 steps; right? an employee makes a request the employer can grant or deny it and if the employer finds for whatever reason they're not able to grant or honor the employees request it's spelled out heeler on a bone fide reason if you're not able to meet argue change

okay. we're in business we're not trying to hinder no one from making a profit. those are all ligament things. but the reality is there are people working in the city fearful of being fired of being let go do we just ignore them not extend any kind of a shield. i'm a little bit uncomfortable. we need to address those. we've got an unbelievable department this is who we are

and we have the ability to shape the policy decisions on how women are treated in the workplace and how elders are treated in the workplace and we can continue that decisions. to the members that are in the business community that is the venue that we continue. i understand with the set of amendments that sorry president chiu has proposed we've been able to relax some of the oppositions of the legislation it it correct >> we'll certainly hear that. >> sorry. >> i hope that's the case but we'll hear from the public soon. i'm sure >> constituents gosh.

it's the same one we've heard about women in the military lnlt community and i'm not looking to see any further undo costs on small businesses but this is a legislation that will be focused on employers who have 20 or more employees is that the definition of a small business >> pits medium to small. >> we're at the table it's 5 o'clock i've got all night. we're not he leaving until we have something that's a good

piece of legislation that we can all stand behind and be proud of like the previous pieces we have as a city. trust me i was at the mayors door when the idea come forward about letting same sex couples marriages happen. i think we're in good company you explained a little bit but with president obama and hillary clinton and, you know, 7 out of 10 policies i pretty much agree with that's pretty good. i feel like i'm being rushed it's good to see all you good people out here

>> i'd like to respond to supervisors breeds comment. first of all, i mentioned our expense and i'm very appreciable. i've heard from every non-profit you sector by and large they engage in flexible work arrangement because they don't have the monetary - every - they believe this is something that works for the workforce. the second issue is under the first amendment every pleasing employee has the right to ask but many employees don't ask for about as the flexibility signal. our workplace despite the fact

of the demographic changes treat the employees like they don't have family issues they're to be there from 9 to 5 or 7:00 p.m. hours but and required to be at their work when we have significant caregiver responsibilities. about three years ago thirty million workers had caregiver responsibilities and when smoking gun someone is going to ask their boss can i go part time they're often intimated or don't feel like people will think highly of them in the workplace. part of what we're trying to do st. is change the workforce

culture. you're absolutely right people have the right to ask but month employees don't ask. now you mentioned do we want to layer on different bureaucracies. we're talking about a minimal challenge at some levels that's something you've denouncing adopting done when you ran your center in your district pardon as an employer if someone want a flexible working arrangement i would provided them an answer and asked to meet with you, you would do that. sort of the sense there's a huge amount of bureaucracy attached to this i think of this as a modest minimal thing

>> i want to know what we as a city i mean this is a rules committee and privately we deal with lawsuits will matters as well. that are maybe similar in nature to things of this nature. i don't understand how this is going to change a personality which someone asks for something and t is told yes or no. it's going to be what the employer k is going to be. i'd prefer we do something that's tangible in making a significant differences. i'm not clear on how this really does that and again, you know, many of the folks you've been working with have been involved

in putting together this legislation and making changes and arrangements and this is new legislation to me. i haven't had a chance to digest the legislation and understand the impacts and understand it's relevance or non-relevance and understand the non profits to have a h.r. director. i went the tedious process through my employees. i'm looking at this through a prospective p of someone who have employees. the city made it more challenging for me to do the job as the h.r. director and everything that took to raise money and have a program that

supports the arts in my community. i know there are other companies that have other issues but i feel like i want time to understand this. i want time to have the diagonal and if this is the venue to have it here today to get the clarity this can be the venue i'm not bothered by that but i'm just trying to, you know, understand more about this and what the impacts b will be and from a legitimate standpoint when the legislation is, you know, implemented when there's the back and forth between the dnld and letters what are some of the claims that are denied and the

support we talk about in theory a lot of legislation and we don't think the the impacts on the people who are required to implement this stuff first year i'm from a prospective of you know the end of the road when it gets to me i know it's a challenge and frustrating and i'm tired of the city imposing a lot of regulations that is redundant to policies that exist. when theirs conflicts between employees and employers which something happens or doesn't happen it's where people have the ability to report claims to deal with an employer. how this changes someone's mind or not i don't understand. my point is, you know, this is

and are bureaucracy so i'm entitled to my opinion. i want to make sure i'm being fair and open minded but i want to see families in the situation we're talking about. i want to hear from people that are actually who are directly in these kinds of situations and not the same advocates or the same people on the community or this and that side. i want to know what the businesses are the ones that are creating the problems in our city and why is this being proposed not because this is a policy matter from the feds or this and that and how and what we can do as a city to make a difference to impact their lives in a positive way

>> let me suggest colleagues i know there are a lot of folks in the audience and we have a couple the additional presentations. and i hope you'll hear that and i hope first of all, colleagues because we're making those we're not going to vote today but as i said before in britain in the first year a million of the folks asked for this and if you're wondering why hillary clinton and president obama thought this measure was important this is a policy that's worked effectively in a lot of situations.

and about the lawsuits there's no private right of action in this legislation. an employee can't bring a lawsuit based on those laws. the office of labors enforcement can enforce those laws but no employee or employer can bring a lawsuit. regarding h.r. and any burden this is a minimal set of requirements but part of the reason i'd be able to talk about this size of employer with larger organizations with 20 or more there's a little bit of structure about h.r. you have a folder relied to each of your employees and we want to be cognizant and respectful of that. one of the important things

about this legislation if there turned out we haven't covered all the issues this allows the board of supervisors next year if you have an issue with this you can introduce an ordinance to amen that. all that said i'd like to continue the conversations with the public >> supervisor yee. >> first of all, i appreciate you're bringing this to our body. for discussion. there's some similar discussions i've been involved with in the past. i was involved with once again with the family act when this was discussed around that there was a lot of resistance and it

took many years and decades to get that passes and it changed forms many times and some of the discussion was about is this going to be an undue burden to the businesses and i would say that i don't think this piece of legislation has the same magnitude as the family act to be truthful but it's very important. i've as you know i ran an organization close to 1 hundred employees ran it for over a decade and i was always able to sit down with my employees who had some personal issues they needed to change their schedule and was bill u willing to do that and others are.

however, i'm also be sure that from duces with families there's many places they don't grant that type of flexibility and sometimes their reasons for that. and this is not always grantable. so one of the things i like about this is nobody's going to feel if this passes in santa fe san francisco nobody should have any anxiety about asking. and another issue i think this will help prevent the consistency or in between that consistency in the business i've heard other complaints people say that one of my colleagues at the business was able to get some flexible hours, you know, and i didn't. and so where's the consistency

driver's license. they would give me some reasons that sometimes, i don't want to mention it here but the reasons are not valid and there's more personal relationships with our bossy maybe granted or not granted. this refers to everybody but i'm willing to listen to the amendments and i'm anxious to hear the public on this so i'll and - >> thank you mr. chairman. >> we have a few brief presentations from the city staff. >> thank you supervisors and thank you so much for bringing this important proposal to the publics attention and working

with the business community and asking great questions as supervisor breed is asking it's context implementations those are great questions we need to work out. i'm going to provide a public health prospective. we have 9 thousand birthdays a year close in san francisco. and it's true many of the mothers do receive excellent parental leave policies and excellent workplace environments but some of them don't. and this is the basis for us from the health department and height disparities. it's a critical time of how do we need to have an equal playing

field for works but for babies. and this unequal playing field contributes to some of the reasons we have 20 to thirty percent of separation anxieties amongst babies asia other issues for mothers and babies. what we found from our research and research that exists is that workplace policies do matter and do change outcomes. so i want to address some of the issues you related to feasibility. so from one public health prospective this exact policy of workplace flexibility is one of the recommendations from the surgeon general in 2011 in terms of promoting breast-feeding so

this definitely confirms that important point. and from my own prospective of practicing medicine in san francisco i'm a pediatrician and i see many patients. i see this actual disparity happen. at 1:00 p.m. i can be seeing a 12 week old baby and she could be an attorney and her corporation could imperative her a lot of time off but the very next patient could be a mom on

medi-cal she may not qualify for family issues and the baby could be 12 months and it's one of the most incredible health disparities in terms of life course i could ever imagine. the mother needs to give up her baby from 7:30 in the morning actually 6:00 p.m. and that's beyond the statistics i can have a whole protocol to share with you all. that's why i appreciate our leadership. i can illness that any implementation is really tiff in terms of how it effects nonprofit. i serve on the board of a large

non-profit of boys and imperials clubs. and for the last 8 years i served on a board of 0 smaller non-profit and i can imagine it being difficult with less than 20 employees. i can understand the significant from a publicity health prospective. this a one an important issue how it's relevant to city functions. i appreciate the leadership of the small business coalition and with the health department has established the healthy mothers award program that recognize accommodations and parental leaf and family balance. that's a good voluntarily work

program but it does but i do need to ask myself that question is it going to reach that mother who's on medi-cal is that woman that's 25 percent of the population st. is that woman going to be impacted by the volunteer policy we're proposing. so i appreciate this by our elected officials so think about what's feasible to our community. >> it's been interesting i've heard from many that think this may be go too far. i think we can assess assuming

this is going through. i want to h.r. for their review of our legislation and as one of the largest employers in san francisco >> good afternoon supervisors arrest linda i'm the deputy director for the department of human resources i stand before you. i'd like to thank first of all, the president of the board of supervisors chu who really gifts an opportunity to review this ordinance and his aid and also other staff. because they really involved us to commit on this and i really appreciate the department appreciates the fact you

listened to our feedback and incorporated some of our feedback and made some amendments to the ordinance >> you said at the beginning when was that the beginning when you were brought so what providing feedback. >> i would say it's been a couple of months. >> a months ago. >> i do not have the exact day. i think it's this kind of collaboration that leads to policymaking decisions. we want to state we requested t the "x" conclusion of classes i know you've heard you today talk about adequate staffing in the department particularly when your referring to the police departments earlier that's one

why we asked for a - due to emergency situation such as a tragic situation as the airplane crash we couldn't provided two weeks notice to those folks and president chiu has loud an "x" conclusion of our public safety and health department as well regard this ordinance. i'd like to say as the city human resources department equal opportunity director we're pleased to see there are protections cabins retaliation. our city employees and our manages abide by federal state and local allowing law from retaliation and harassment that

we support of prohibiting the retaliation by any employee who requests a flexible work schedule. and finally i'd like to say that while it provides a benefit for the city employees we'll be looking at this with our labor partners so this would be the appropriate time to meet and confer on this issue. we'll have an impact on our professionals because we'll have to come up with policies and procedures and as president chiu said we're the largest employee in san francisco with thirty thousand employees and we predict our employees will be asking for permission for

schedule flexibility. we'll be coming before the board requesting additional resources in our department to be able to fully effect this ordinance if that's passed by the voters of san francisco. and 15 i'd like to say to we're going to be implementing this ordinance within our lead department. i'd like to thank you for approving that and we believe that's the appropriated venue for implementation of this ordinance. we look forward to work with president chiu and to continue to provide feedback on it >> thank you very much. i want to make the observation and the private sector if a request is made it