i have been out spoken about the celebrations here and new york city sense the late 1990s. at the members meeting the members passed a set of resolution asking for the board to comply with procedures. i took extensive notes at that meeting and since the board has not provided any minutes up to date i posted my own notes. based on these notes, on the several resolutions were ignored. the members were to post the updated procedures within a week of that meeting. they have still not been posted. they were set to set out candidate statements. these were not sent out according to the timeline and the format

indicated in pride zone. third, the members that the board should comply with statutory authorization according to code section 6632. as of july 16, two members had made such request and 5 days have passed without response. after 7/16 several other members have made request and i'm not aware of one that was honored in 5 days. it took more than a month 1/2. at that meeting, the members repeated hee asked the board why the online form you heard about had been removed from the website. knob offered that information except for an item cal error watt data base. as a professional in the field i'm curious what that technical might have been. the downloadable pdf amounted to an

online form. contrary to generally accepted language in forms. since the pdf must be staged and filled out, it's not really possible for members to fill that out and the current board has drastically reduced the number of membership. in closing i would like to honor the contractors and staff and many of the volunteers who put so much work in the organization. i hope that we can turn around the -- the organization.

>> thank you very much. please turn off your cell phones. >> hello, i'm a pride member and gay man. it's been difficult to find a good c exterior -- ceo and what the criteria maybe. traditionally it's been lgbt person. i think we should open ourselves to the straight community, at least let them know that we would consider them. we might get a rather motivated and interested person who wants a challenge. the two lawyers who won the victory in the supreme court over the lead lawyers over scene ame sex were heterosexuals. the broke back

mountain the movie about gay relationships were heterosexuality. why limit ourselves. we might have someone that has something special to offer. i'm not saying it has to be but something to consider in our search. >> thank you very much, next speaker please. >> good afternoon, supervisors, i can't tell you how relieved i am to be here and that you are conducting this hearing. it's something that we wanted in the community for a really long time. i appreciate this opportunity and i also want to express my gratitude to the pride board for this past service that you have carried out and the transition from a fragile economic situation to the current day. to be able to provide balance in this hearing i think is very important and to make sure that we all know

that it's not a one-sided issue that we are confronting here. i'm sue an landers and a top manager at a major non-profit at stanford universe and the associate director of the matter lutdz king project and research institute. the two issues i want to raise with you to me are very bottom line issues. it's sort of reminds me of the fact that when i started graduate school in 1992, i had to remind my male colleagues in the graduate division why woman's history was a legitimate form of study when it had been in the field for 20 years. i said you are not an

ungrad. that is not an under graduate question. that's one of the reasons why we are still here. we are grappling with very bottom line-up issues with pride. when steps are taken, what are the outcomes. and again it's very basic management driven principles. so first of all, stability. i'm not kind of person and property bho goes with phraseers form of communication which is basically i'm length. i really, my expectations are higher than that. what i want to hear is i'm responding. i'm engaging. i'm reciprocallying. those of us who are members, we wanted

to know more, joey cane has been instrumental at moving behind-the-scenes to try to work with the board that he thought that was going to be friendly and responsive as well as reviewed bylaws and procedures and practices with very little return. >> if i may ask you to finish your statement. >> i'm on the runway to wrap up here. basically to a lot of steps have been taken but to what end, all the meetings, trainings, retreats and consultants and the huddles that the board has gone to and what is has come in all of this . where is the involvement of the community, transparency,

democracy and accountability. it takes a heart, soul and conscious. this is what i present you with. >> thank you very much. next speaker please. >> hello board members. thanks for your time. i'm going to troo i and be brief and try to say things people haven't said with regard from a rather unique perspective from having been a labor union activist for years. i also work with bradley manning support network as well as the pride accountability

coalition that came together around this past year fiasco. it was a from esh entrance to an event that i had long insist to the corporate drunk and street party and hadn't been around it for a dozen years. i'm not opposed from it happening. but i just basically stayed away. coming and witnessing this years behave of the board was a real eye opener. i can say that even in some of the knockdown drag out balance -- battles that i participated in i never witnessed such arrogance and disrespect from a wall of resistance towards community input. it really makes me sad, all cynicism aside that mr.

plant chooses to codify his arrogance. he was a terrific fundraiser. i had just about come to a grudging respect for him before his resignation for that set of skills which is something that many of us could never have done. he was a great fundraiser. that said, his total arrogance and the lack of ability to deal with people, to have him codify that into racism in a city that still suffers egregious daily examples of the most vial racism and segregation is beyond the pale to me. it's really sad to me. this was not about anything other than that earl's terrible behavior during these last 3 months. thanks again for this meeting.

hopefully we can continue to work this out. >> thank you, sir. next speaker, please. >> good afternoon supervisors. thank you very much for hosting this meetings. every time since the voters commission has met i have been at that meeting. i share no not in pride but our commitment to our veterans community. i'm equally committed to the lgbt community in san francisco. i have lived in san francisco for 26 years. this is my home. i have lived in no other place sense san francisco. in 1986 i attended the first san francisco pride organization. i'm a past board member of the organization and

in the past 6 years coordinated with our veterans and the american allegiancelegions. we are the ambassadors for our disabled as well as our viep vooips. i'm deeply upset about this organization. this management has led our pride organization to a disaster. we've seen night violence and shootings and this needs to be addressed. it's totally appropriate for the city of san francisco to hold the host body in any event fully responsible for those that attend the event. there are many ways to do this in the future. i suggest get the cameras. as we

all know the heinous violence before the pride, the only reason that person was apprehended was because of the cameras provided. for the pats -- past 3 years it's been more violent. earl plant nominated one of the candidates up for board election and that should not be appropriate in any non-profit organization. i'm glad lisa was here. she's a very beautiful woman. if you put one hat on top of her head it would be magnificent. she has decided to take a leave of absence when board of pride while she accepts the interim director ship of pride.

congratulations to lisa. she has not given herself a rise. i would like to throw the issue of raise, since early plant and his quote to the racial politics of personal destruction. i would like to share as one latino there is not a single latino on this board of directors, i can't remember the last time there was a latino in this board of directors'. you can ask this through your current president and the in interim lawyer, when was the last time there was a latino on this board. hello, my name is jaime cater. i'm a political activist. i live in the east bay. i see on page 3 of your

agenda it says the government's duties to serve the public reaching a decision and full view of the public. commissions, boards and council to conduct the people's business. this organizationen insures that this business is conducted boo before the people and city operation is open to the people's review. i know the sf pride board and everything associated is not a city agencies but surely they can get an example of this what i just read on page 3 of your agenda. i'm concerned that this position in the pride board is

called ceo. my this is considered in a private association. my mother lost her house to a private bank as a person called ceo. >> hello. i have spent the last 20 years and also directed hiv programs using chinese medicine. i'm here because what brought me to the meetings to again with was the whole thing

that happened around bradley manning now known as chelsey manning. i felt what i was reading was so wrong to me that i decided to speak up. people weren't interested who were running the show. that is what is most important is that this is a member driven organization. theoretically that's how it started. the whole thing began because of people's oppression. people don't join to get this because they are oppressed. what came was contentious out in the street saying we need to be acknowledged. what happened? we started to get a little bit of acknowledgment and stop --

acknowledging everybody else and we come to chelsey manning and this whole process and we decide this isn't good enough we are going to throw the rules out. they throw out a lot of rules, they throw out the bylaws. they just keep throwing out what doesn't work for them. i want to say one thing before i go on in the negative. i have had extremely positive experience with lucky gutierrez. extremely. he's been professional. every time i have e-mailed, called, he's answered. there are real problems in the board, the board is trying to maintain itself and they forget that there are members, that there are rules and there is reasons for rules and that's so we can all be actually involved but

what's starting to happen is manipulation. there was a discussion and we were told there were 12 board members, now there was 10. that was heartbreaking. i was hoping there were 15. the secretary cannot get the meetings out because she's too busy. they need more help. to turn this around again the manipulation. one last thing. i know people bring up this whole idea about contentious. continue getting contentious until you get it right. doesn't mean you have to be disrespect, but it doesn't mean we haven't to prevent

ourselves from speaking up until they hear us. >> thank you very much. is there anymore people from the public who would like to come and speak? seeing none, public comment is closed. >> i want to ask a couple follow up questions to the president of the board. >> yes, supervisor. >> thank you. it really does concern me some of the things that have been said in public comment. let me begin with some of the vendors and contractors, the fact that people have been involved in these events are saying some of the things irrespective of the individuals comments. that is a concern that so many people that have been involved that are saying

things. i'm wondering if you have any thoughts or response to that? >> you asked me earlier. the overall production is created by many different people. our contractors have a great role in the production and as well as our cochairs. i being one of them. one thing i will do, i took a lot of notes this afternoon and i will definitely share this among my current board as well as the board elect once i'm there and it's being determined on sunday. i think i definitely there have will have to take this back and share with my fellow members of the board. the concerns and comments made this afternoon. unfortunately i don't have.

>> i appreciate that. the one thing i would say in respect to the specifics, the fact that he is the coming out in this form is good and bad, it's good because we want people to come out and speak up. but as an organization, you don't necessarily want involvement by the board of supervisors to know what your vendors and contractors think. if there are concerns that they have, whether they are right, legitimate or not, you want them to come to you. so that is a real concern for me. supervisor wiener? do you have something. >> not a question. >> okay, then the last question that i have is with respect to the election and the number of boards members that are being elected, number of seats, how

does that happen from going from 12 to 10. that is a ledge concern. i'm wondering if you can talk about that because if elections are coming up shortly i know i would be worried about that. >> the election coming up with the board as well as our legal council as to how we came up with the no. 10 directors. we wanted to be able to have 10 individuals and also appoint more later and identify individuals who had the skills to be able to fill. but in

terms of how it went from 12-10 , >> i don't know if your legal council can talk about those things. i don't think he can because it might be attorney-client. let me make this point here and i will turn it over to supervisor wiener. this is just me, i have a simple mind just making this point. i would think that if you have the ability to have 15 board members, as an organization i want to have as many board members as i could because you are volunteers, and the more people you have, the more work that you can do. in my experience with every single non-profit that i have worked with is that the issue for many of them is that they can't get enough people who want to be on

the board and they are dying to have people on the board. if you have the ability to have 15, i personally would have 15. it's your choice but i don't know why you would limit yourself to 10. if you have more people that want to be involved. the more people that are involved, the better it is for the organization. that's just simple me thinking. i just want to put that out there because i don't understand how that happens. >> i understand. >> supervisor wiener? >> thank you. i'm not going to express a view on the side of the board. i think there are boards of 10 or 12 or 14 that just function 15. but i do want to say that some of the issues that we heard today and this is general comment, you don't need to -- thank you. in terms of

that there are outdated bylaws and procedures that should have apparently been updated a long time ago, haven't been. we have the situation which has been resolved thanks to a lot of hard work but probably shouldn't have happened in the first place to have significant turnovers of executive directors which is not just recent thing but happened in the past as well. we see problems and apparent low moral among contractors who make the actual parade and festival work every year. and to me whether the comments whether the

structure, it's a challenging organization. whether you talk about an organization that is responsible for really this public trust, ensuring the pride parade and festival happen every year. i respectfully disagree with miss oliver in terms of anyone's role in commenting on it and having a strong view on the governance structure. this isn't just a private thing. it's not about a private entity and how dare you suggest that they should merge or a different group should be responsible for the parade. this is a concern and should be a concern of the elected representative of the community as well as the community itself. i think it is an open question in terms of the governance structure because we want to make sure that this

parade and this festival continue to get strong and are not jeopardized or weaken the structure that are some of the problems that i have outlined and outlined during the hearing. i will say, i know there is an election coming up and that will be conducted pursuant to the organization's rules. i have no idea what the result will be. that is what it is. i actual low don't know that even if there is some sort of change of leadership in the board, m in my mind i'm not convinced that it will address any of the governmental situations that exist. for me whether i or anyone else favors the incumbent director, this

is about structure of this organization which i think a reasonable argument can be made does not necessarily serve the critical need of -- insuring the parade. we need to continue to have this amazing iconic and unique institution in our city. >> thank you. supervisor wiener and again i want to thank all the members of the public who have come out to speak about this item. i also want to thank the members of the pride board, president of the board, the general council and their acting executive director for being here today and i want to thank the members of the

public, of our community who are involved in doing this and i also appreciate from the vendors who shared their experiences. what i want to say to be completely fair what we heard here was in many respects was a mixed bag in the sense that there was the positive development on the issue of the finances of the organization and i think we need to give credit where credit is due and we are grateful to the board and the staff that worked so hard to make that happen. i think it's something we should be very proud of and lisa williams who made that happen. but there are comments that i heard that there are issues that remain around governance, around transparency and around accountability and when you hear fromse