really be the sphere head, the czar for getting support for people with disabilities. a lot has been touched on already and i won't rehash them because i don't have the time. two of the biggest issues is we need to hire this position immediately. not to take anything away from the work of the department of human resources. but this issue is big enough to warrant a full time position to really sphere head this issue. 8 out of 10 people with disabilities remain outside of the workforce and that warrants at least a full time position for a 30,000 workforce. we need data. the first day of public policy school they taught me, you cannot craft good public policy in the ab sence

of data. i would encourage the city to step forward and find a way to compromise to get data to help us drive this process. in closing, i want to thank the board, i want to thank you in particular supervisor march as our members uniformly said you are the loudest and steady person we have in elected office. i want to thank you for all the work you have done and your colleagues and done an ed wong and special thanks to carla johnson for her leadership on this and i want to thank all of my colleagues on the advisory committee. too many to mention today because i will inevitably forget one. i want to thank all of them for their tireless work. many of them live day in and day out. i will go back to my job and that will have nothing to do with

this. but these people have dedicated their lives to empowering people with disabilities. that's really what our members believe. we believe in empowerment through employment and that's what we believe the city and board of supervisors will continue with moving forward. thank you very much. >>supervisor eric mar: thank you and thank you to the fdr club as well iechl want to say for public comment we are going to limit speakers to 2 minutes, there is a softer buzzer that goes off. some people need more than 2 minutes and committee members can ask that question at that time. i have already called a few names. ann steiner, stephanie nichols, colleen stall eo, kerry goodwin. there is a number of speaker cards. people don't have to come up in that order. i have

cards from ron from the department of public health and from the department alliance and denise from the mayor's disability council. anybody wishing to speak can come forward. people can just come forward when you can to speed up the testimony process. >> thank you. >> hi. good afternoon. my name is ann steiner with the department for people with disabilities. i have been working in disability and employment almost all of my adult life. i have been a service provider and i have worked in human resources. i have been a trainer and consultant and working with specialized organizations. in 1981 and 82 i

was working on a grant for the county of san mateo. thanks to everybody. we are a great team, i will tell you. the grant was to start an optional alternative program for people with disabilities. in the after math of section 504 of the rehab act. local government and state government were required to have local committees of advocates that we have now that looked at the entity that we did for people with disabilities. for employment one of the things that san francisco wanted to do. the advocates in san francisco was they wanted to start their own version of a hiring program. since i was coordinating that at the time i was asked in fact to come up and explain why the program was not special

treatment. i see i'm already starting to see i'm running out of time. >> can i ask you a question. the federal rehabilitation act section 504 required local committees to set up these programs. when did that mandate go away? >> they weren't required to set up special programs. what they were required to do was within the input of the community evaluate everything that the entity did and come up with a self evaluation plan. part of what came out of as a result of these committees was transition plan laying out architectural barriers needed to be removed. various measures such as providing on-site sign language interpreters and we worked on a

lot of those committees. for san francisco, what was then rule 34 until the charter amendment that was one of the recommendations the community wanted at that point. during the 80s the san francisco from my perspective was fairly active. you actually had a person in your human resources department, anita skondar who chaired a lot of projects and had a fairly good reputation for hiring people with disabilities. unfortunately after the earthquake she didn't want to cross the bridge anymore and went to immediate alameda county and sphere headed those programs. in my job placement i couldn't give anyone to give anyone of my tech students an internship. i would talk to people in hr here and

it seemed like 115 was dead. it seemed like the competitive hiring process went no where. i had tons of candidates on your list who never got anywhere. for me to hear that you guys and you in particular supervisor mar was sphere heading this at some point again, i thought thank god we are not going to have to recreate 1982 and 2008 and to me the two most important things are the hiring of a point person and there is a lot of things i can talk about if you are interested. the ingredients that i would see and some of this is already mentioned but you want the point person who is a coordinator an have the responsibility to other non-disability related efforts and you want them to have the responsibility and you also want them to have the authority. that is my last point that i think is extremely important. >> you've noticed, supervisor mar how

things in local government tend to happen in a flurry and then kind of die off. who knows exactly what is implemented or how successful those efforts were. >> thank you, ms. steiner. next speaker, fiona. >> fiona, community organizer at the independent resources center, san francisco. again, we wanted to echo the sentiments of my colleagues from the panel and human resources. to thank supervisor mar and the board of supervisors and the hr. we at

independent living resource center are in the business of getting people back to work. so we feel that one of the key aspects would be education to community based organizations so that we can that our consumers know about what job opportunities are available. again like everyone else has said like jonathan and carla has echoed the importance of getting data so we have a good baseline for what we are measuring in terms of people who have disabilities. again we also want to echo the sentiments of everybody that wants to continue the

great work that our colleagues are doing on the panel. and we would like to thank the board of supervisors for their continued support on this very important issue. >> thank you for organizing the september 25th and 26 disability unity festival and parade. we'll get the information out. thank you for being such a great organizer. >> thank you. >> thank you, next speaker? >> thank you, supervisor mar. my name is kate williams and i'm with the center for the blind in san francisco. i have been here 20 years of my life and i have always known that the city of san francisco is the one innovator, the city that puts things on the map first and we follow through with them. look at what we started here ten or 15 years ago that last month we were able to celebrate with. i think that's where

we are now with our work with our disability communities. i think it's one of the cities that leads the nation in how we work with our people in our workforce that are disabled. it's a real opportunity. serving on this panel has been such a pleasure. i thank every single representative from your service supervisors from that committee came to that meeting and where we would talk about concepts and ideas and nothing would happen. i can tell under your leadership under your hr department with donna, ed, linda and with the mayor's office on disability with carla and joanna, this has been different. we were able to look at issues and talk about concepts and then we came up with objectives and what i think is most important is we came up with actual action items. whenever there are action items, there are going to be

results. and i think those results are that in a few years from now we are going to look back at this time when we started our movement not to just create opportunities but for people with disabilities that we are able to appreciate their abilities and how they are going to be enriching the landscape of the work force in san francisco. just one more thing, please. i have to thank the generosity of jonathan lions for actually taking his personal time and getting out there and getting himself and sometimes others in front of your board of supervisors who are kind enough to listen to us and to pass the budget to have someone on your committee in the hr department. we are so very grateful for that. thank you. >> thank you, ms. williams. next speaker. >> public speaker: good

afternoon supervisors, my name is marty goddard from the san francisco public library. for rule 115 recruiting a diverse group in san francisco is easy. for jobs that represent many racial and cultural groups are applicable. however we don't find many mriblts -- applicants with disabilities and i'm glad that san francisco represents all kinds of diversity. i will say that san francisco benefits where people are hired to share their experience. the sf service center always has one staff member with a disability. having an employee who represents the community service has helped it to make it a place community members value and support. right now a librarian and technical assistant who are

deaf hired someone without finding a way and others through the hr process and many have k-12 education and others have temperature ability for reading and math in their work and children come to project read. when we decided to hire a community outreach worker the man hired to do the work on a contract, he made it natural to have the job and the typical hr process was very difficult for him. through rule 115 we brought a board a successful team member who really knows he understands him. finally the library for the disabled our braillist who is an employee. there are a couple positions in the

city. when our long time braillist retired there was no list of potential employees to survey for the vacant position. through the rule 115 process we found a large pool of qualified applicants and the braillist we hired through this process is the valued member of the lgbt team. to conclude we have individuals that represent all the communities served by the library. >> thank you very much for being here. next speaker? >> my name is jose santa maria. i'm actively looking for a job and i learned about the 115. one of the things i have experienced it seems there is a lack of knowledge

about this rule within the city departments. i have not seen a job that has been designated as 115 on the hr department. the other thing is i don't know if there is any work that's been done in mainstreaming for instance of applying for the one rule 115. i had to go to hr to find out about it and then i was sent to the department of rehab and come back and give that certificate to hr. i don't see why hr couldn't do that themselves. the other thing if you could possibly not only make entry level positions as a rule 115. i think ms. johnson touched about the average person with disabilities earns

20,000 or $26,000. we have added expenses as persons with disabilities and we need to have the at some point to work at a decent wages our able bodies. thank you. >> thank you, i know the task force is looking at the definition of severely disabled, but also the entry level versus expanding the different opportunities to those are some key issues that they are recommending to make hopefully changes and expand our policy. >> that's one other thing about the certificate. it's certifies that i was severely disabled. >> thank you for testifying. next speaker? >> public speaker: hi. my name is stephanie. i'm with the lighthouse for the blind. we are very lucky in

san francisco. we have a great city. our employees should reflect that diversity. rule 115 will enable the city to fillmore jobs quicker. employees with disabilities tend to be extremely loyal to their employees. they tend to stay longer at a job. city jobs are career jobs. they offer competitive salaries. people with disabilities need to continue to advance entry level jobs are not appropriate for all of us. some of us have skills that would but put this in -- us in management positions. this rule just looking at if you just, if this rule just applies to entry level jobs, it's leaving out a huge part of

the disabled workforce. all levels of government should be included. i would also like to thank the committee and also supervisor mar for continuing to look at all of this, but the employment of people with disabilities. i also am really glad that there is going to be someone in the hr department who will be watching out for our interest. i hope to see in the next year a lot more people with disabilities on this city payroll. thank you. >> thank you, next speaker. ms. goodwin? >> public speaker: hi, i'm terry goodwin with deaf buddies job program. i would like to say thank you, donna and ed for all of your work in facilitating the committee and supervisor mar for continuing to advocate for this key effort to

increase jobs for people with disabilities in the city. i only have a few comments. i think the one thing that is really clear is that we need clear timelines for all the recommendations. we have a lot of recommendations. we need to get specific and move forward specifically related to the education piece. educating the hiring managers about rule 115. i think we really need to make that connection. also, i'm very excited that the position has been allocated. that's terrific. i hope to have feedback related to that position particularly in light of the information we've gotten through best practices and what has worked for instance the seattle program has been very successful particularly with getting people with developmental disabilities hired with the office services position. hopefully we

can give some feedback towards the role of that position. also as what's already been mentioned is making sure we establish placement goals so it's really clear and that we can measure our success and last but not least one of the key things as i think we still need the mayor to do it's challenge to the department head to keep the momentum going. and i also agree with all of the recommendations that have been made with carla and donna and jonathan as well. thank you. >> thank you. scene next speaker. >> public speaker: gabriel with the department of disability. i want to applaud the steps that san francisco is taking. as others have alluded to san francisco is the leader in this effort and i know others will try to

replicate what you do. just a couple of other key success. clear measurable high level goes that are trackable so everyone in the city and county can rally around them. 1 person designated to lead this effort and i would echo the point that making sure that person has the authority to get what needs to be >> don orsillo: and finally making sure the person who is designated within hr to sphere head this has competencies to do job development. in my experience, it's a fairly rare skill set and not everyone can do it well. there are some members in your advisory committee who knows that very well and hopefully they are focused on the what competencity is for that purpose. part of our role is to gather best practices from

around the state and the country. if anything we can do to support your effort, let us know. >> mr. rog an, is the state council representative different people from all regions in the state or how is? >> yes, i'm the manager of our bay area office and we have 5 counties but we are throughout the state. >> is there an oversight body and the staff department? >> it is a staff department and there is a council that sits in sacramento and oversees our work. >> and that effort is appointed by a council? >> yes. >> thank you. next speaker. >> public speaker: good afternoon thank you for the opportunity to come before you today. my name is

denise senhaux. i want to thank you for being with us to celebrate the 25th anniversary of ada history and thank you for your resolution in going forward and making july ada month. thank you very much for that support. i pretty much wanted to talk to you about something that is close to my heart in the mayor's disability council heart is around employment opportunities and i want to speak to you not only as a council member but an individual with a disability and a non-apparent one which is ian invisible one. i'm fortunate to be engaged in the private sector for 5 years and my employer is accommodating in place in the hiring practices in the interview and i have been able to compete and bid for jobs, not based on my disability, but based on my skill set, my knowledge and my education. i appreciate what the ada has done in giving me an even playing field

in doing so. so i'm very proud that i'm able to not only work for a fortune 500 company and not be given a job in just an entry level position. i have been able to move through that process and as i have mentioned i'm extremely fortunate. i appreciate you looking at this and myself working for the council and the advisory committee. thank you for your time. >> thank you, next speaker. >> public speaker: hi, i'm stephanie. i will be very short. i just wanted to echo how important i think that we have one point person who deals with getting people with disabilities into employment. i think what we should really not underestimate is that that needs to be a person who really

has a depth of understanding on all kind of disabilities. that is a group of people who are so easily left behind. so i would like the idea of concrete goals and concrete timelines. i think we can't be too ambitious with that. the last point i want to make is i hope we will have a stability with rule 115 that allows us to not exclude best practices that we have seen in other models. thank you. >> thank you very much. next speaker? >> public speaker: >> hi. i'm collin from arc san francisco at the employment department. at arc we support over 700 clients with disabilities. the rule 115 task force along with the mayor's office

on disability, hr and numerous community based organizations and founded said rule 115 continues to be misunderstood and under utilized and we do feel that funding a specific recruiter or lease -- liaison to support and educate the department and be able to help bring candidates from under a talent pool would be very very important. one major thing is utilizing these community based organizations as that knowledge base. for instance in the past year, the arc has we helped 161 clients obtain employment. we have 92% retention rate. so the private sector has really caught on to this and we want to see the success in the city and county level as well. we are on the right steps like we said that specific point person will help

collecting data, will help as well. we need to have some sort of a baseline so we can set those goals. otherwise we don't really, it's hard to look forward when we don't have those baseline parts of information. but lastly, we are heading in the right direction. i want to thank the airport commission for taking the first step in partnering with the arc to continue to work with people with disabilities and head their internship program and this is going to create a great pipeline for civil service employment. something like this needs to happen a lot more. thank you very much for your time. >> actually, mr. sell io are there other departments. i know the california science center was mentioned but are there other departments? >> there is is public library and cal academy and there is another one and that is it for right now. >> thank you very much. next

speaker. >> good afternoon supervisors. ron for the department of public health. i'm the human resources director there. i learned about 115. i met an employee hired through 115 and that employee works directly for me and taking on more challenging assignments and the more challenging assignments i give the more they step up to do it. so i'm an advocate of rule 115. also on behalf of our department director, robert garcia and donna and ed wong and jonathan lions who i have done some work with, carla johnson and the others, the members of this group, i think you have a great initiative going here and we are more than happy to support it. we have done a lot of rework in our hiring program and there is a lot of opportunities to forward that work. so i look forward to

doing that. >> thank you very much. are there any other speakers on this item? >> public speaker: my name is wendy and i'm a member of the public. i just wanted to say that i came up with some suggestions that if you could possibly implement quickly. for example, the sf mpa has a muni accessibility advisory committee. meets monthly. it would be nice if this was a stipend position. d also like the city to consider that any commission that is held should have