>> thank you very much. >> any questions for the staff? >> okay. seeing none, we will go ahead and break, shortly, for a ten-minutes and, we will be back here for the presentations thank you, again for all of those who attended. [break] >>6. information item: a review of civil service rule 115 and its' implementation for hiring people with disabilities. presentation by donna kotake, department of human resources, workforce development director, city and county of san francisc >>student: >> human resources advices us that she is running a few minutes late and so if you have flexibility you might want to go to the next item if that is possible. >> thank you.

>> moving on for to item number 7, information item,san francisco public library and its' successful implementation of civil service rule 115. presentation by marti goddard, access services manager, san francisco public library. >> the staff hired the rule, reflect the local communities of the users who are deaf and blind and those who have learning disabilities and the works are one or two part time positions for people with the developmental disability and presentation by marti, goddard, access services manager, san francisco public library. >> that i think this meeting is a celebration and i am so happy to be able to be a part of it, thank you very much. >> being a lie braeer an, as i

was thinking of what to say today, i spent the time looking at and thinking about definitions of diversity and inclusion and mostly i found when related to humans something like the state of having people who are different races, or who have different culture and a group or an organization, and or references to people of all backgrounds, and experiences. and we are lucky in san francisco because we don't have to work really hard at recruiting a diverse workforce and when the job openings are posted and a number of talented people who represent, many racial groups are always in the applicant pools and however my experience, we don't often find the great numbers of applicants of disabilities with *f in those pools but i am really proud to be here representing the san francisco public library, because this is the city, department, that has made a commitment to building a staff that represents all kinds

of human diversety, and including people with disabilities. and i want to identify individuals among our staff who have been hired through a 115 process, but i will tell you in general terms about my own experience with hiring colleagues with disabilities and support of rule 115. and i have four examples of positions where we have benefited by being able to deliberately hire people who share the disability experience with the consumers of our services. one program of service, that always has included at least one staff member who has a disability is the fspl deaf services center and so someone that i am happy to name today, roberto esteves was responsible for establishing the library and print in 1972, and our deaf services center in 1977. and he really set the precedent of having a library assistant

job always filled by a deaf employee, that is a step above that entry level position. and but the very talented deaf woman who was in that position when i started working at the library 25 years ago. made meeting people in the deaf community, really easy for me and through the years having someone who represents the community served by the deaf services center has helped to make it a place, where other people in the community feel valued and so they value and support the service. at this time, the only two full time staff members in our deaf services center is the library and the assistant and both of them happen to be deaf. rule 115 made it possible to hire one of those folks without having to wait for the new eligible list, and you will hear about that soon and did not have to wait for that new eligible list to be developed and the other was hired through the standard hr process. and so the people with

disabilities come to us in more ways. and in the library of the adult literacy program, many of the consumers of the service are with us because learning disabilities really affected their success in school, during the conventional k-12 years. and they entered adult hood and they need to improve, and the reading and writing and path skills so that they can succeed or advance in work or help their children with homework or many other things, that they come to project read. and when we were ready to hire someone who to be a full time community out reach worker, the very talented individual, who had been doing that work on a contract basis, happened to be a person who has learning disabilities. the shared experience and empathy that he has for learners made him a natural for the job, however the exams and the typical hr process was more than he could deal with. through real 115, we were able

to bring that person on board and he is a successful member of the team who is beloved by learners who know that he shares their experience in our library for the blind and print disabled a braillist is the essential member of the team, the fact that there are only two positions within the entire city and county of san francisco makes the labor of establishing and maintaining eligible lists not a priority at all. and so when the long time braillist retired there was no list of potential people to replace her. the braillist that we hired last year is halfway through

the extended period, that is through the rule of 115 but she is a great member of the team but i have very little doubt that she is going to be with us for a long time or as long as she wants to be. finally, the committee and so with the partner with the arc of san francisco, the committee members have been looking for opportunities to bring the people with developmental or intellectual disabilities for the library of volunteers and so as we were working on that, identifying the potential jobs, the wonderful man who was our current chief of branches, edward milton decided that volunteer positions were not enough and that he set aside one and we are hoping two

positions that are really entry level page positions and so they will be begin in the streets of employment through the rule 115, and then it will just be part of our staff and so, i will finish this by saying, it only makes sense to have people working in city government who represent all of the communities of people we serve. >> thank you. >> question, and comments from the council members? >> co-chair supanich. >> thank you for coming today. and it sounds like you have an ininclusive atmosphere at the public library for many years. is all of this at the main branch that we are talking about? and what about a branch libraries around the city? is there equal efforts being made to incorporate the people with disabilities in their hiring? >> actually, the last physicians that i talked about is kind of makes me really

smile, and our chief of branches is who said, we should not be just hiring, or bringing people in as volunteers, we really want to make some opportunities that are really entry level, and although, the first one and we are hoping two positions that will be in branch libraries but it was kind of funny to me and i was talking to my boss who is the chief of the main library and said guess what edwards is doing and, she said that we can do that at the main too. and so that makes me happy. >> thank you. >> any other council members? >> council members senhaux? >> there you go. i can hear in your voice because of my visual impairment your dedication and how you

talk about your employees and how incredible they are, and what it is like to work with them. and their contribution, you know, as individuals, and not just from their disability, you know, perspective, and that is to be, you know, commended and we don't hear too many success stories and so i compliment you and commend you for what you are doing. and for how you feel about, you know, the people with disabilities and looking past that and seeing that they can contribute and they can work. and so, i really appreciate that. and i can see the joined commitment that you have from your end and your boss. so i thank you for sharing very heartfelt stories like that with us. >> thanks. >> all right. and i have got a comment from then followed by a couple of questions. >> my comment is thank you very much for coming here today. and i think that we can all say that we really appreciate all of the work that is being done

and not just the main, but through the branch as well and try to create an ininclusive atmosphere for everyone, i will speak to the learning disability portion and that is such a huge commitment to see at the library system to hire somebody who has a learning disability. where i come from in the midwest and i am not going to stay which state, because currently also in the world series. okay, thank you. i am not wearing a hat today for a reason. so, but out there, it was really tough to have a conversation honestly, about a person with a learning disability or adhd like myself and often times, issues like one of those hidden disabilities that too often the people who are seen as being dumb or stup pid or slow and really are kind of embarrassed to talk about it or reluctant to speak to someone about it,

and the wealth of resources and the person with the learning disability who is working very well with the community, that is just speaks really widely to just the efforts that are done, and not just through rule 115 and also the opening hiring process. my questions are, first off, after the actual process of identifying a job as a rule 115, job, you yourself, were going through this, or do you have a personal experience in doing this and can you kind of speak to, is it a labor intentive process or is that not as hard as it may seem. can you give acronym. >> for me as a supervisor vicing manager the only labor was saying, that this is important and we need to fill this job and it will best be filled by somebody who brings that experience with them. our hr staff has been really supportive. and i know we have had to do a

little bit of extra paperwork, but not much. and through the probationary period, we have had, it is a longer and there are more reports, so i think that is harder on the new employees than on us, frankly. because you know, it is more of the waiting but, it really, i don't know if my colleague and in hr would say it defendantly, but it doesn't seem to be a very big deal, you just say that we want to do this, and fill out the forms and then have you to fill out a lot of forms any way. and then it goes forward. and thank you. questions from the staff? >> and thank you, and my question is a little bit off topic for a moment and i know that you had a library commission meeting last night and i think that you had something that you wanted to announce? that was announced at the commission meeting, about some of the different new features available in the branch

libraries? >> we just call it disability awareness month and in october we offer a number of programs and so i was invited to talk about that and as well as the other feature and since you digressed i want to digress a tiny bit. and i really want to invite you all to come to the main library and go into the growth street entrance because we have a new exhibition, hoping today, by arists by the fox explored and it will be there until the middle of january but come to the library and see that wonderful exhibition, so sorry about that we are installing

something that is available in the microsoft operating system and we are using the ease of access condition ter and putting the magnifier and by the end of this fiscal year and probably by the end of january. and to choose the three different kinds of lens so they can view the different parts in different ways. and coloring version. and on the fourth floor of the library and in many of the libraries. thank you carla for letting me do that. >> and any more comments from the staff?

>> okay. >> we have not had negativity and we simply made the decision and went for it. >> could i interrupt, and we

lost our captioning, it is back on, thank you. >> >> and no negative experiences with this at all. >> and let's that is amazing, do you think that is unique to the library? or was it something that you guys did differently that can help to inform the other departments? that might be hesitant in applying that rule? >> the thing that i think to say is that we are working hard at making our programs of service inclusive and our public programs inclusive and it is something through the staff training and stuff that we send out to people regularly, and it is just something that is grown to be part of our culture, so, >> thank you. >> i don't know what else to say about that. >> thank you.

>> thank you. >> moving back to agenda item 6, information item and a review of the civil service rule, 115 and, its implementation for hiring people with disabilities. >> the presentation by donna. >> let me apologize for being late, i looked at it twice and it said 2:30 and so i am here at 2:30, thank you for accommodating me. >> i am the director at the department of workforce services and with me is ed who is the newly acquired recruiter and i will talk about him later.

i thought that i would do a quick recap, in 1985, prop a was passed to amend the city charter so that qualified individuals with disabilities could be hired into the city's workforce, without going through the city's merit system process. and you know the goals, need to increase in the employment opportunities, and to increase the diversity of the city's workforce, and to really allow, a city department to hire qualified individuals. it brought about the rule, and the rule 115, if i am not mistaken, rule 115 allows them to be appointed to permanent exempt positions for entry level, classification and without going through the civil service, exam process, and as you all know, civil service, exams are very, time intensive

and we want to be fair employees but sometimes the process over comes everything else. and so, the requirements that are the positions must be designated and i think that you heard earlier and it applies to the entry level classifications and this means the entry level classifications the applicant must meet the qualification so that they can perform the essential positions of the job and serve a one-year probation period and after one year, they will be transitioned into a permanent civil service position, and through that period, the, and the candidate, now employee would be to have an assessment done at 3 months,

and 6 months and 11 months to insure that they are moving ahead in their position that i think some of the challenges have been, one thing, and that, i think that at this point, a lot of the departments don't really know about rule 115 i think that education and getting the word out is one of the big challenges and i think that the other challenge has been our lack of resources, and to be able to put more emphasis on that. and i am, and it is really, and i would have to say that we are making some of those changes now, and it is one of those very positive changes. and but, i think that the other thing that has happened is that as the economy has improved, and more and more people are applying for positions the time to hire for the city departments is really there is a lot of out cry that is taking

too long to hire people and so i think that taking advantage of those two things, we can really, looking forward on promoting rule 115 hires. and again, i think that the main two things that i will like to focus on, is one is getting the information, out and secondly it is great if we could highlight that there are all of these qualified people out there that can do these jobs those are some of the things that i think that we need to focus on. and so, one thing that we are doing, around the educational out reach we just begun, both carla and johana thank you for coming to the city wide, hr professional meeting on a monthly basis and this past wednesday, carla and johanna came and we talked about rule 115 and talked about their percent and things like and so i think that is just a start. and also, what we are going to do is we are going to start reaching out and individually to the departments. and then, we also, want to

start developing more marketing materials, and i think that both, print materials would be great, and maybe, we will put a little video on the website at something like that. and so, i definitely think that market and getting the word out is really important. and the other thing that i want to also, continue or partnership and expand our partnership with the community based organizations that have the clients look at the website and with the job post and if there is something that they feel the clients qualify for and they will contact me and i will reach out to the department and that is very limiting in some ways and what i would like to really look more into is finding a way that we can partner with organizations to maybe, if you, if you can develop a job bank or a skills bank or something that we can really match up people who are can qualify for these positions.

with the vacant position and we can work with the departments to designate them ahead of time but we really need to figure out a way that we can match those, and the people and the positions up. thirdly, the great news is that we now have a recruiter, ed is, city wide recruiter but there are two areas that he is focusing on, and you one is public safety recruitment but also recruiting the people with disabilities and increasing the 115 hires is another area, and so we are beginning our out reach, and campaign around that. and then, we are also revitalizing and i think that earlier they had an advisory panel to actually advise us more on what some of the challenges have been and give us more advice and things like that and how we can increase some of the rule 115 hiring and so we are going to reinstitute that, and hopefully starting next month. and then, just a couple of other items that we are looking

into that we would like to have some more discussion on. is the possibility of a civil service rule change around rule 115, and i know that there has been a lot of discussion about the terms severely disable and so we want to have some discussion about that. and dhr can put forward that, and for the commission, and recently, many of us attended a national conference, for resource and professionals in the public sector and there were a lot of jurisdictions that talked about the different kinds of programs that they have and so we are reaching out to them, and trying to learn more lessons and hopefully get some new ideas from them as well. and so that is kind of where we are going, at this point. again, ed is here and i am happy to answer any questions >> thank you for coming here today. and i think that first we will start off with co-chair supanich. >> thank you. >> thank you so much for coming

today. and we really appreciate the efforts that you are making to implement rule 115, and more broad fashion. and i actually agree with you that public education community education, is very important. i think that our goal as a council will be to see and normalization of the workforce where the people with disabilities are not the exception but they are part of. and that come component of marketing is vital. >> and you mention td the 3, and 6 and 11 months. i would like to know do non-disabled new hires get

evaluated at the same rate? if not, why are the people with disabilities evaluated more often and what is the purpose and goal of that? >> and great, i don't know if i can answer that, i can answer part of it. i do know that all, employees, probationary employees have been assessment and an assessment, and we do encourage them to you know the managers and the supervisors to assess them at mid point. and at least, at the 6 month period and then do it, and then do annually evaluation. and as far as why that was, and that assessment was put into the rule, and so i am not exactly sure, as to why, it was inserted in the rule, but i can look into that and get back to you on that. >> that will be great, and i would like to think that it is because they are focusing on the specific needs and making sure that the disabled employee has all of the rules, he or she

needs, to perform their jobs. >> i would hope so. >> i would hope so too. >> but i just wanted to ask the question. >> okay. >> and to the chair, i might be able to share a little bit of light on that because i actually was a rule 115 placement for the building inspector after suffering a disables injury as a carpenter and i believe that it was part of the negotiations actually with the different bargaining units and the unions who had expressed the concerns that they wanted to be sure that the candidates that were coming in outside of the civil service process that they truly did have, as you said the tools to be able to perform that job. and it was not an onerous process, it was routine and it was actually always good to have a dialogue with your supervisor about expectation and goals for performance. but that was my understanding of the background of it.

>> and now, we have questions or comments from council member wong. >> hi and, thank you for coming today. and i just guess that my question was, why is the probationary period so long? it is one year? >> and that is pretty standard for the city employees, and all of the city employees have one year probation. >> okay. >> mine is only three months. >> oh, you are lucky. actually it is a short period if you are move froming one department to the other but the new employees have a one year probationary period. >> questions and comments from commissioner? >> thank you for come ining and speak on behalf of the rule 115. are there, and the place that

we and the people can see in the website. >> yes, it is on the dhr website. >> and can you, give us the contact information, and i mean, like a telephone number and the website? >> okay. yeah. >> and maybe they will do it slowly. >> okay. >> the website is sfgov.org back slash, dhr. like donna. h, like harry and r like roland. >> okay. >> got it. >> the department of human resources. >> correct. >> and then you are going to have to go to up in the right-hand corner, there is something that says highlights and you can see new job postings for the week but also on that page you will be able to scroll down to see all of the job postings. >> okay, great.