go over again how the process works the initial request must be made in writing the employer may defining deny the request for a good reason. if the request is denied the employer must explain the basis in writing and the employee who's request is denied can have that reconsidered and if reiterated that has to be explained. the city's office of labors enforcement establishes rules and composed penalties and the o

e.c. may not find the business only if the employer failed to apply or violates the employees rights. the economic impact unfortunately, the last survey happened about 10 years ago but it showed about thirty percent of the employees across the country i would agree it's probably a higher number in san francisco. the reason those volunteer arrangements have been worked out the reason because the benefits to the employee anti weigh the employer. and that includes a higher work production and people not he

leaving because they have something that better meets their schedule and the recruiting costs >> can you explain brown were there data comes from. >> the data around the productivity. >> just what this actually doesn't where is the data come from. >> some are alluded to in the supervision presentation that have looked at the letters and employees highway after the arrangement have effected them. >> legislation that is similar to this has been adopted in other countries and in the u.s. vermont in the united kitchen was the first country to adopt this. and the coalition has suggested

to have this in effect next year. the faculties a right to request s rather than a right if the employee were able to set the scheduled with a cost to the employer with an economic impact but because this gives the employer the right to deny it it would filter out the impact. what you're left with is a systematic and universal right to make a request and have that request serial considered. without the cost to the employer will go through and that will have the economic benefits we can expect to see the benefits from the volunteer program.

it's likely this unnecessarily effective will increase the number of work arrangements flexible work arrangements in san francisco without increasing the costs to businesses and that is highly likely to have an impact citywide >> and on that i will take any questions that you have. >> i want to thank the jae gentleman and colleagues if we have no questions i'd like to invite up the director of the staffing. >> good afternoon supervisors i'm the executive director on the status of women i want to thank itself supervisors and my staff who's been working hard. i'm here to stress my support

this will have a wonderful impact. we've lead a partnership with cal net and human rights montd nonprofit on the gender principles to advance gender quality in the workforce and i went to work in the italian work - we have mckins that document that document work life business is good for the bottom line. you might see the gold ribbon. this proposed ordinance is a

21st century that reflects the needs of our community. this ordinance is a win for our employees and win for our families and our city. our households and workforce has changed as was illustrated in the power point. according to a recent report 40 percent of our households at the age of 18 are the sole breadwinners for the families and they're mostly single mothers. additional low wage and hourly women in the minority are victims of inbe flexibility. they have fire financial resources and are less likely to share family work and having

flexibility on the job it is absolutely necessarily. and flexibility is important for single moms it's about families and parents and communities everyone he benefits. and it's smart business employers leave money on the table and miss out open profit and growth in good times and bad. and many of our businesses already know this small biz businesses have been that credible innovativeors. gift more smaller needs and flexibility is good for them and us. i urge you to support this

measure and make sure that san francisco continues to be healthy and a flexible place to work and it will keep families in our communities. together let's help san francisco become the gold standard. and on 0 final notes the committees agenda change and be flexible so i don't have to run out and pick up my kids at the same time (laughter) >> that's part of being flexible. i'd like to invite of its director of small businesses. that's fair to say there's concerns raised as we discussed and i tried to work diligently to address them but on behalf of the commission is regina and a

thank you supervisors you should have received a copy of the commissions response if not, i have copies hero. so the commission did hair the legislation the ordinance on monday july 8th and it's official responses not to approve as presently drafted amendments are required and between that the evening of monday july 1st and today supervisors chu has been working on the amendments outlined anonymous outlined in the commissions response but also with some additional responses and requests from the community that is important for the small business commission their recommendation to the supervisor was to work go with the business community to address the concerns that were currently in the ordinance.

the key things have been change that the small business identified was to remove the impede workable refresh my memory making it consistent in terms of when the board of supervisors wants to make any changes to the ordinance. in addition the commission recommended changing the employer - the employer from 10 employees to 20 employees to make that consistent with the health care sxurt ordinance. we hear over and over again that businesses want to have our policies be consistent and one of the means is making those

thresholds consistent. i wanted to extend our appreciation and katherine for taking the recommendations into account in the final draft minutes. the one other component that the commission was very firm and had a strong opinion on is that this ordinance really should be taken through the legislature process and not the ballot process. when an ordinance such as this, the voters think this is something that couldn't be resolved at the board of supervisors level 80 so as you heard from many presentations the supervisors many businesses are already providing flexible

work arrangements. they know this is good for business and that's happening and we've heard heard from many small businesses owners they're doing that. so putting this on the ballot makes a statement because businesses are not doing this so the commission was very firm on it and it made a strong regulation that this ordinance should work its way through the legislature process. those are the key comments and i'm happy to answer any questions >> so i want to make a couple comments i want to thank the small business commission. before the monday meeting i had propriety a number of amendments and i understand i'll ask the

committee to adopt today their acceptable but colleagues there were a number of other amendments that were placed on the version. i want to address the ballot measures. the suggestion that i think voters will think because something comes on the ballots is there because we couldn't take care of it. but that's not true. and i also want to say that assuming if this were to go to the ballot i think there's an opportunity here in san francisco for us to say that in san francisco we do business you differently and many employers already provided the opportunity for employees to request a flexible working arrangement and that's something we should talk about harassing as part of the

education effort but this reflects our values and a particularly the challenges fatiguing parents and caregivers >> i look forward to take up to work on this measure but i wanted to make those points. i have a question for president chiu. why i don't understand why this has to go to the ballot and why it can't work itself out through the legislature process >> as i mentioned before this will not only have the flexible working arrangements been around but this idea has been around for 10 years and adopts in other countries very consecutively. and president obama and

secretary clinton wanted to move forward international but we could be another jurisdiction in our country to step up and say this makes sense. we were asked by state and local advocates to move it to the ballot and have a conversations to educate the public about the possibilities and educate employers and employees and have to a discussion. it's about something that colleagues feel differently about i'm open to that but i thought it should move to the november ballot >> thank you. i think because i haven't had a chance to digest this. and i was a former employer even if people.

mostly some parents who when summer came around we worked around parents schedule and technically we could allow for flexible time mostly we the but a big part of the job is the fact that we had a non-profit we had a need for both sides and presents which is not something that i believe based on this legislation is something you could somehow if on employee asked for a flexible work schedule and they were told no and could file a complaint and our response would have been we need the presence of individuals here i don't see that as a reasonable argument so i'm finding it really challenging to understand the impacts on a lot

of the groups that i've worked with in the past the non profit community and just how you define those kinds of things from a legal prospective. the other concern i have here is i mean everyone has the right to ask and this, of course, adds a layer of bureaucracy that is a little bit unclear obtain terms of how you clear those issues. i know the office of standards helps facilitate that. i found as someone who had employees that this added layer could be frustrating. there are a state department where a number of regulations

exist that provided from a state prospective certainty regulations we're required to follow. i've been through issues with employees. and i've been through situations where an employee had to take 6 months off to take care of her mom and we did everything she could she got paid and a worked from home. i know there's a lot of people sensitive to that in san francisco but to add another layer in some ways i feel forced employers to have to deal with an additional requirement and there's the challenge of we can't forcing enforce it with state employees or federal employees we're not trying to

look at doing it with our city employees first. there's a lot of questions i have and a lot of concerns and a lot of uncertainties about moving on legislation like this of having personal experience of having employees and dealing with the challenges of trying to implement policy after policy after policy to the point where your disencouraged from trying to hire people. correct me if i am wrong but you have the right to ask that's yo your first amendment right.

villaraigosa the ability to work things out with an employer. so i'm trying to figure out how this make sense to push on the ballot i mean in this kind of really fast pace manner and a president chiu so there's no confusion since this is your item i will facilitate this discussions >> oh, certainly. >> till we get to the point of no amendments. >> supervisor cowen. >> this is an interesting conversation here. from envy prospective we have an opportunity to continue moving the conversation forward and continuing to test the limits. i remember a time when gay men and women couldn't get married

and you heard some of the similar things at any time chambering how much is it going to cost as a business and will they kiss in front of me. we tried to get women in the military it's too costly too sweeping of a change. we here civil rights we can't let woman and colors vote it's too much and too foos. we've got local laws on the books that says it's okay for african-americans to own property but we know from jim crow it was hard to own property. we know that the legal courts are set up to handle any kinds of a change.

and the turning the prop 8 as well as don't ask don't tell. 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