agree that we -- that this is part of the policy agenda that we wish to pursue as a body. >> commissioner kopp: the legislative history will be a part of the staff's report and the staff's analysis together with a proposed amendment to the charter. there's no magic to it. it's a common practice. >> commissioner lee: madam chair. yes. >> commissioner lee: i think this commission is given the task to propose charter amendments. and this is a very, very sacred responsibility. i feel right now i am not objecting to commissioner copp's

idea of eventually the ethics commission moving forward on this, however i feel as a representative of the -- of this commission, every decision that we make -- especially when it comes to opposing charter amendments for the san francisco public to take action on, i would not want to jump in without having full information on the background percent background percent perspective and everything else. i would ask if we can wait a month we can move forward. because right now i feel i

cannot support my colleague's proposal. not because i don't agree with him. it's because i don't have enough information in the background to understand whether we can have the jurisdiction, number one, and number two, taking on this charter amendment which is such an important duty this commission has given. i just do not want us to jump into any action without full information. yes, i would agree. >> i might redirect a moment the commission to the question that is in front. you with this memo. and that is if there is any additional policy with regard to the whistle blower elements that is constituted that we research

it at the commission's request. it may be worth turning to some public comment. certainly if the commission is interested at some point as exploring related issues to have the program currently work, we would certainly be happy to extend an invitation to the controllers office to programs come and do a briefing for the commission. but it may be -- for this particular meeting it may be helpful to focus on the request that is actually before you, with respect to the language for the whistle blower. so we can get some policy to move it forward again in conversation with the president of the board's office or other approach you may want to take. thank you. so we will move to public comment. >> it's regrettable that you have not taken the time to research the issue before you today. if you had, you would have found this issue was discussed with a report at the civil hearing with a full board. with the recommendations that went two years ago to the board

of supervisors for action. it had a full explanation of thousand came to be. i was asked by then chair, ben hehr, to assist in drafting the version -- similar to what you have now. though it was more robust because thing have been trimmed back as often happens is the case. it was moved to the controller because theetics commission was doing nothing. so the controller he' ed hearinharring ton. now are you resisting how to do nothing. it's disheartening. you should have done your homework. you should have read the last minutes of when the commission voted to put this on the ballot. you should have read the minutes that showed how it was created. you should have read the civil grand jury report. you haven't appeared to do any of that.

if you had, would you have also discovered that the civil grand jury report pointed out that the current version of the whistle blower act does not comply with what the charter directs. the charter directs the whistle blower reports of all kinds come to ethics and the civil grand jury said that's not what is being done. the city's response to the civil grant jury report was that, welsch that's alright. it's a matter of process through legislation. what they said was that after all, people have the right to sue. so they can get justice by going to the courts. that means out-of-pocket. it also goes through an incredible turmoil for the individual employee to have to go through filing a whistle blower complaint. it does not tell you that the majority of whistle blower complaints don't come to either ethics or the controller. do you even know that? do you know they go to dhr? i know the staff knows that. but i'm not sure the commissioners know that. do you know dhr puts out a

report, that lists what all the complaints are that its received and the jurisdictions and that it shows over $20 million have been paid out by city budget and you think you have time to wait with $20 million out of the budget already? i don't think. so you need have -- at a minimum an explanation made public of where people can go to get satisfaction when there is wrongdoing, and that it's come to their attention as an employee or as a contractor. whether it's to the dhr, to the controller, to ethics, to a federal inspector general, to the up ins, you need a complete scheme attic that let's people know what is available. you are asking people to become familiar with your bureaucratic in-fighting. this is ridiculous. than thank you. >> i'm bob planthold.

my time has run down and need to be reset. i wanted to approach this from a different process. it seemed like you were debating among the commissioners whether to go along with a request from commissioner kopp to draft some legislation. which is almost like an agenda item where you are going to be voting, and this hasn't been agendaized. but beyond that, what is the practice when a commissioner asks for a report to be made or for some other information to be brought forward that i know commissioner kopp among others has made previous requests that have been honored without question, without delay. so you may come up with prudent idea for what you consider debate, but that's not the same as honoring the practice and precedent of letting a commissioner get the information he seeks. if you want to do that, you may have to formally change some

rules about how commissioners requests get addressed. but right now i think he made a simple request. i haven't seen you rebut that with precedent that says he doesn't have the right to get that as he previously did. than thank you. any other public comment? so we have before us the whistle blower protection orde ordinates, and the request from staff is to discuss and to

provide any further policy direction on how to proceed. so miss pellum, do we have a proposal, would you layout the options with regards to what the next steps would be in regards to the ordinates themselves. >> sure. this item today was to bring forth additional information in case the commissioner wanted to consider changes to the language to the whistle blower orde ordinates as adopted if there was no additional comments to the research that was presented i think absent further direction our staff plan would be to simply refer this item meet with the president for reintro

introduction. so we would move forward to bring that back into the board's agenda as the commission indicated at the last meeting or two they wanted to. >> it was january. >> so it would proceed legislatively. so it would require an act. >> no, there's no action required to do. that. so commissioner kopp you had a question about that language. >> commissioner kopp: no, all i ask is that the minutes of this meeting reflect my request for preparation of legislation, that was in effect previously, that transfers authority and responsibility, on the whistle blower complaints from the controllers office to the ethics commission of the city and county of san francisco, that it

be placed on the agenda of the next meeting together with such report as the staff believes is advisable. and my request for preparation of legislation was denied. by the chairwoman. i would like to propose this, commissioner kopp with regard to the legislation itself. i think that we are -- i think in disagreement with respect to the process as opposed to the substance. in my mind, i have legislation, which is a separate issue from the policy decision. although the two are related. so i would like to ask the city

attorney and director pellum, about the comments earlier about the past custom and practice with regard to commissioner request, if you could give a brief overview on what is ordinary and customary for these types of issues here at the commission. >> is that something are you looking for now? yes, just a briefing. >> mainly provide my comment first and mr. chen can add a comment. but i think since, over the past -- certainly year or two, but certainly over the last year, the introduction of the annual policy plan was a document, and a process intended to help the commission on a regular basis sort through these kind of questions. so as the various issues would come up the commission would have a chance to publicly discuss and consider each in

that context, whether there should be something shifted on the policy horizon that they've already identified. so that tool was something that we've created as an agency to help the commission sort through and prioritize policy issues and also to help the public have some predictability about when they might engage on various issues. so i think the development of the annual policy plan -- which is what i'm trying to do a monthly policy plan, has been designed to give some framework to these kind of discussions so the commission can know and the public can know what are the standards that are guiding the commissions prioritization of its policy issues. we know that there are a number of policy issues that are vital to this commission and vital to the public. the annual policy plan was a process developed to make sure that there was some way of doing that in a logical manner, because we want to make sure that the commission is getting the best use of its staff time but also the best use of the

public's limited bandwidth for dealing with issues. so that's on about the tool that we have intended to use. we can certainly bring more information to the commission between now and the next meeting to refresh what the guiding principals were that we envision when this process was created, that might be worth having a conversation about again to determine how commission wants to proceed. my understanding has been that our policy direction was always taken by the voice of the commission as a whole. and that is something that we've been trying to work with the annual policy plan to accomplish, because we think that's the most effective way of using staff time and helping the public to know what to expect at meetings coming up. >> i don't really have too much to add. i would just echo that historically, my office has worked with the staff and the ethics commission jointly together on a lot of these

policy issues and that is done historically at the request of the commission as a whole. chair on the request of the commissio on the request of the commission as a whole. thank you. agenda item 7. discussion obtain separate legal counsel for ethics commission. >> thank you, chair. this memorandum is just a simple memorandum that we put together with some language at the request of judge kopp for transferring the general counsel duties and the ethics commission to the commission and away from the attorney office. which would require a charter amendment but that would be within this jurisdiction. we didn't provide any analysis, we just provided a straightforward, this is how would you effect the charter amendment and this is the

language you wish to use. so with that i will answer any questions. >> commissioner kopp: madam chairwoman. commissioner kopp. >> commissioner kopp: i know what the charter conveys. i have read the charter i know what the ordinates for this commission provides. i thought i would be getting the information about the practice from other cities such as san diego, los angeles, oakland, san jose, with respect to the independent council. we've had this san diego provision before us about 1, 1

month ago. i now request on the april agenda there be an item from the board of commission to convey not board of supervisor a chartedder of amendment taking the san diego language verbatim. again there's no language about it. and i will pursue it with the

board of supervisors. there isn't a meeting which occurs and which there is one or more than one entries on the status of pending complaints, some going back to 2015, in which the city attorney is representing the respondent to a complaint. it's the simplest provision in the law that i can remember from first year of law school. a lawyer can't serve two masters. and that's what the city attorney is doing, trying to serve two masters, and i know all the theories and the case law. which includes a holding that a client can wave the conflict if the client wants to. and i infer and believe that applies to an ethics commission with its own attorney.

i suppose if there was some unusual circumstance, under such a circumstance, the commission could wave. it but that's my request for the next agenda. [ please stand by ]

>> -- unless you're suggesting that it be continued to april. but you have before you -- >> commissioner kopp: no. i was this on the agenda for action. >> clerk: the thing is it's on the agenda for action today. >> commissioner kopp: no. the action request is the request -- >> clerk: there's language in here. >> commissioner kopp: says evaluate -- oh, you did say possible action. all right. then just put it over the same

place. >> commissioner kopp: this is the san diego language. this is all those things, so you could do that today or you could continue it to april. >> so commissioner kopp, are you asking us to act on it today or put it over to april? >> commissioner kopp: i want it put over to april, because i want additional information on additional city departments, and i want to refresh our memory about practices in other cities across the nation, if you will, not just california. >> okay. public comments? >> i'm bob plannedhothold.

though the item that you post says agenda and possible action, then someone who reads the agenda, agenda item seven, and possible action, period. in other words there's nothing that says in the memo "action ". further, action requested, the commission identify the options identified and provide further policy direction. it doesn't necessarily say adopt or direct that a matter be put on -- developed for consideration by the supervisors. and this is important in more than just the ethics commission. i happened to be once at a meeting of the board of appeals where one party was the

planning commission, and the other was zoning. there was one attorney representing all three parties, and i asked, what the -- and i was told, well, that person was the only one who had the knowledge. and i'm sorry, but that came out in similar things when i was on the board, and that was causing us problems as commissioner commissioners. we didn't feel we had full, independent, i will say loyalty and attention and duty from the council who were split. and it seems to have happened other times, so the idea of pursuing this is worthwhile, but at the same time, i'm suggesting in the future, you also need to consider the wording on a memo because that may mislead people or allow somebody start to file other questions and so forth. i support the idea of

independent legal counsel. believe me, it would have helped us years ago. thank you. >> thank you. >> larry bush for friends of ethics. this was a recommendation that came from the civil grand jury originally in a 2013-14 jury report on ethics. it was also endorsed strong lie by friends of ethics. you have only to look at the most recent example of christine johnson on the planning commission where the ethics commission raised the point about whether she faced a conflict of interest, and your attorney here, your dca here went and represented here if a rebuttal of the complaint. so there you have the same person representing the ethics commission complaint or issue and then representing the city commissioner. and as you looked at the case, you could see that the dca was

unfamiliar with these conflict of interest laws and failed to notice, for example, that that particular person was not only an employee of a competing agency but also was a member of their board of directors, so all of that has now gone forward to the stpc for a deeper investigation into how it is that the dca gave incorrect advice. but you should never have to go through all of that. that's become a big conflict. and you see that repeatedly in enforcement cases. but in addition to enforcement cases, you see it in questions of policy. you'll be taking up under polishes the form 700 filing that are coming up. one of the issues in the form 700 filings is you have to list any business positions that you have, including business positions that you are not paid for. there is no advice coming from the city attorney in the guide to good government that says this means if you are a member of a board of directors of a

nonprofit, have you to show that that's on your form 700, of who are you a member of a nonprofit board of directors especially if it's a board that's going to receive money from your vote. that's not showing up. that's a conflict of interest, but the city attorney has sent a letter to the stpc saying the people who are members of boards of nonprofits who are also commissioners, they vote to give a contract to the donor to the nonprofit and done it in writing officially. that is that's why you need to have your own attorney. thank you. >> thank you. no other public comment? we'll move onto agenda item eight, discussion and possible action on staff monthly policy report, including possible updates -- i'm sorry? -- on -- >> i believe it was continued, correct? >> yes, it was continued. we need to -- sorry?

[ inaudible ] >> it didn't require a vote. >> didn't require a vote. >> item eight, discussion and possible action on staff monthly policy report including possible updates to the annual policy plan. >> thank you. so i'm going to keep it fairly brief 'cause i think a number of these items are -- are pending future updates and upcoming meetings will have more informative memorandums and whatnot, but i do want to point you to a couple of items on page two, agenda number eight, the form 700 nonvoting ordinance. at its march 6 meeting, the board did vote unanimously to pass that legislation on, so that is currently under the mayor's purview for his approval, denial, etcetera. i believe the ten days actually lapses today before we came into this meeting, i had not

yet heard whether he had signed or taken any other action on that. but i -- if he does not take action today, it becomes effective, is that correct? [ inaudible ] >> so i just wanted to inform you that that -- yeah, correct. if there's no action taken today, that will become operative or effective after 30 days from today, so i just wanted to make that note. >> a question on that in terms of notification. so how -- what communication plan do we have to alert form 700 filers that if they have failed -- if they fail to file their form 700 timely, that they will not be able to vote? >> i'll -- go ahead. >> we've -- as you may recall, we've been doing some initial information sessions on -- with our engagement and compliance team for filing officers within departments as we ramp up to this april 1st or this year april 2nd filing deadline, so

we've been highlighting that for them, but we also plan to do a communication directly to department heads and others who might be affected for that, so we are preparing a communication plan. we haven't rolled out in great detail yet, but we we need to do that. we need to reach out to people directly affected by the most direct way possible. we'll reach out through the website. >> i'd like to ask for an update on the communication efforts in the april meeting 'cause this will be in if effect by then, and if not, it'll be shortly thereafter. >> we can do that. thank you. >> thank you. >> a question. >> commissioner kopp? >> commissioner kopp: on page -- what was it, five, on the request for legislation to stop this practice of using a campaign for a party-county

central committee which ends the campaign with money in it and then using that money for a campaign for supervisor, assessor, district attorney, who knows what, the initial question is jurisdiction. have you ascertained that yet? >> so we sought advice from the ftpc from that question, since they are the agency that administers the law that would be preemptive in this case. they provided us informal advice just at the end of this last week that was inconclusive. >> commissioner kopp: that was what? >> that was inconclusive. they were unable to determine whether or not the rule that we have been discussing here, that you have been discussing, would be preempted by state law. so at this point, we're trying to figure out what the city attorney's office --

>> commissioner kopp: all right. what's your recommendation next? >> at this point is to probably seek formal advice where we require the ftpc to provide us with an answer from an attorney in their office. >> commissioner kopp: all right. can you do that on your own? you want me to make a motion? >> we can do that on our un. >> commissioner kopp: well i'd ask that you do it as quickly as possible because time is going by, and these accounts still exist, and apparently, some of them are substantial. 50,000, plus or minus. so they're getting around the law which limits donations. >> and just a couple other items just quickly. taking you back to page four on the city's review of public finances system, i just want to provide you a couple of updates on that. we have begun the sort of scoping stage of that project,

and if you swing over to your attachment three of this item, you will see the proposed action plan, and i'm not sure what page that is on, but it is attachment -- item eight, page 11, and on the backside of that is sort of a closer snapshot of the next three to four months as we do that outreach. so we've met with oakland who's had an ongoing review of their public financing system. we've met with their executive director, so we're continuing to do sort of initial outreach, but a lot of it right now is sort of staff level review pages, and we will continue to do that as we move along in that process. >> supervisor kim had also incorporated some public finance reform in her ordinance. have you -- has she responded to our request for an update on where that stands? >> they've had some -- given

the supervisor's candidacy for mayor, she's had some moving staff pieces along, so we just had discussions of a new member of their staff that has taken up her campaign finance, ethics and legislation, and they were still working through our proposed changes which suggested that they withhold or postpone their pieces of the public financing piece until we had a chance to review. so they're still in the sort of -- they haven't gone through completely those proposed changes, so i don't have much else to update on on on that piece. >> okay. thank you, but we're still keeping in touch with her. >> that's correct. >> thank you. >> and just the last item, i thought this was sort of a positive movement, still on the bottom of page four regarding the on-line communications database and the social media and election integrity item that we've been working on, we have continued to reach out to subject matter experts someone

like to have as a participant ideally in both our initial expert meeting that we'd like to have and in the subsequent stakeholder forum, so we're planning to reach out to that person shortly, and hopefully, he'll be available to participate. >> so that's great.

i'd like to ask in our next policy updates on this topic that if there is a draft plan, that -- and next step pros in h -- proceedings in how you would like to proceed for the next step of the year, that would be very helpful. any other comments or questions from commissioners? i had two things that i'd like to add, and that one is that we have -- we touched on it briefly, or maybe you didn't. we have the april 3rd joint meeting of the board of supervisors and the ethics commission coming up, and that following that meeting and the outcomes, i would like to ask staff to prepare us an after action report because in my tenure on the commission, we've gone to ballot directly. we've also pursued the legislative route. i'd like to get what are some

of the pros and cons from staff. under what circumstances should we go to the voters, under what circumstances should we work with the board of supervisors, and i think that would help inform our thinking and also qualificati decision making and provide a little more clarity. and then second, on the related topic, as we think about the annual policy plan and there are a lot just in this, you know, few-page memo, many very important initiatives that we have here. and i think that it would be helpful for us, for me, personally, and i think generally for the commission itself if we had -- took the opportunity to come up with, very corporate term, a matrix or some criteria by which to think about or assess the different policy initiatives, whether it's from an effectiveness or efficiency, an

enforcement standpoint in order for us to help us better consider the impact of the -- of the -- of the work that we are doing and to help us prioritize our finite resources that we have because there's a lot of great work that we can do, but what are we going to do first, and when. so if it -- that way, we can -- to director pelham's point earlier, have a little more predictability and transparency for staff so everyone knows what we're working on and when, but also for the public to know when something is going to be coming up. and i think there are times when there are -- the things will come up and we want to have flexibility for that, and to be able to incorporate that into our ongoing plans and reassess whether we want to prioritize something, but to be able to do that in a manner that is clear and consistent.

and so i would like to incorporate here that the -- the -- as a policy matter, the proposed charter amendment that we had discussed in agenda item -- what was it? -- six regarding the whistle blower protection so as a body, we can consider the totality of the policy initiatives together and then determine, and based on staff input, as well as public input, what is the best direction to proceed. >> thank you. i believe, chair, you had requested a chief recess at 4:00. i believe we're approaching that. i don't know if you'd like to wait till 4:00. >> i'd like to take public comment, and then if we could take a brief break after public comment. >> i'm bob planthold.

i wanted to call attention to two topics on page three under your(a) legislation. first, number one, supervisor cohen's legislation. this introduces that legislation was introduced nine months ago and a hearing was heard any objection months ago and you haven't heard back. i'm suggesting maybe a letter to the sponsor and/or to the chair of the board and/or chair rules, asking essentially what's up, what's going on; that you're interested and you haven't heard. just something like that. >> i'm sorry. could i just -- to that point, mr. planthold, when you say staff is monitoring, would that include that require inquiry that mr. planthold is referencing. >> yeah, and perhaps not sufficiently reflected here, but we've had continuous back and forth with the city attorney's office and the supervisor's office still rolling around ideas and considering amendments and etcetera. >> okay. >> you've taken up my time with

some of your answer somewhat. and then, number three, it mentions state legislation. i'm not concerned with that bill. i'm not sure if you're ware that the state has a formal legislation committee that authorizes position on state bills. the city attorney has a slot, as does the controller, and i don't know whether you have ever monitored their agenda or suggested any legislation because that may have some influence that the city formally gets behind some legislation or opposes it, controller being partially responsible for whistle blower, they may see some legislation coming up about whistle blower coming up that they want to comment on. you need to be aware of that, and city attorney folks, just suggesting, i have never been comments by staff to monitoring the state legislative committee, develop some sort of

outline. maybe it's being done, but the silence makes me and others say. >> what's up. >> what are you doing? and this is just trying to be helpful because you have as much right to weigh in as does controller as does city attorney and treasurer, as does some of the other bodies, okay? thank you. >> thank you. >> larry bush for friends of ethics. i'd like to suggest again that the members of the commission review your own record as a commission in order to understand what it is that you have done and where you think you're going before you start deciding priorities for the future. for example, this commission has long been involved in the state legislative committee. you have passed legislative suggestions that have gone from ethics to the state legislative committee and been endorsed by the city as a result of your input. so that's not a new issue, but apparently, the members of this commission have not kept up the pace with what it is that's

happened in the past. among the issues that you did not include on your policy thing is a transfer of slate bailers from the elections department to the ethics commission. that certainly should happen before the june election. otherwise, there's really nothing that's going to be done until november . when you take a look at what your priorities are, please take a look at the calendar of when things have to be submitted to the ballot, when you have to have a hearing at the ethics commission, how much time you need for an interested persons meeting because if you start counting backwards from that requirement, you'll find that you're already behind the eight ball. that's why you're messing around now with the whistle blower thing because you haven't been paying attention to what it is that you need today ed to be doing. you have not put a timetable on your statement on social media. it's on your timetable.

san francisco is about to be left behind, because as i've been sending to the ethics commission staff and to some of the commissioners, there's a lot going on now in drafting social media campaign materials. in fact there was just a major awards ceremonies for all kinds of social media campaign documents. did any of you even look at at that to see what's going onto see what's going on and happening, what it means in campaigns? i don't think so. for your april 3rd meeting, i had said at the last commission meeting that i supported postponing a vote, and putting it on the ballot despite my strong support for where we started off with because my hope was that the board of supervisors would strengthen what this commission weakens. now, i find that you are continuing in the venue of trying to weaken stuff before it even leaves your desk. so i'm concerned that you have not made any outreach to people before the april 3rd joint

meeting with the board of supervisors of what it is you're willing to strengthen and what you need to accept. will you change the implementation date of january 2019? will you deal with the contributions that are being raised by commissioners for people who don't appoint them but are favored by the person who does appoint them? all of these were originally in the measure, were taken out at the insistence of one or two commissioners. it was a bad mistake. hopefully some of it will get corrected, but if it doesn't, it will have to go to the ballot and you will have failed the commission's responsibility. thank you. >> thank you. >> commissioner kopp: madam chair woman through the chair, has anybody here read ab-664? okay. you recommend it? >> it's effectively already the law. >> commissioner kopp: do you recommend it? >> i would yes, personally.

>> commissioner kopp: all right. what do we have to do? put it on the agenda for the next meeting to vote? all right. i ask that it be on the agenda for the next meeting. and get -- get me a copy of it. >> i'm sorry. commission commissioner kopp, you want it to be on the next agenda -- i'm sorry. could you clarify it. >> commissioner kopp: i want it on the agenda next meeting motion to support or act otherwise with respect to assembly bill number 664. >> okay. thank you. >> okay? >> okay. thank you. all right. without further public comment, we'll take a break until 4:10. >> commissioner chiu: we

. >> we go onto item number nine. >> thank you, chair. this month was a busy and exciting month for us because we were preparing for the implementation of our new enforcement regulations which go into effect on monday, so it will be a new date in the enforcement department or division. we're very excited about that. >> commissioner chiu: it will be an achievement on your last day. >> we also started training that was purchased or procured by the department of human resources on personnel investigations, and all three investigators attended that training, and i also attended it, and we met a lot of our colleagues across the city who works in investigations across the city, just more of a general misconduct or employee misconduct nature, but it had a lot of overlap, and it was very

interesting. i think the highlights on the statistics this month are that we're under five months on the age of matters in preliminary review, and when we started this process, and we had no investigators, there were -- i think at one point, 180 or so complaints that hadn't been reviewed by our staff, and we were up to 13 to 14 months old, and now the average number is 4.5 months. i anticipate in april we will have reviewed all complaints older than january 1, 2018 by your april commission meeting. >> commissioner chiu: that's wonderful progress. >> thank you. >> commissioner chiu: congratulations. >> right now there's only 45 matters in preliminary review. that translates into a very large caseload, open communications caseload. 73 matters in active investigation right now. but we did hire our fourth investigator who is in the room. tomi mclean is here doing his

due diligence and learning all he can about the commission. he is a former district attorney from san diego county, and we're thrilled to have him on staff, and we're thrilled to have him off with the ball, hit the ground running, what are the metaphor is, and with that, i'll take any questions. >> commissioner chiu: questions? i have a question. on page four, i was just looking at the random age of the types of complaints of and i noticed that lobbyist was the longest. do you have any insight into that because it's so much longer than the others. >> yeah. it's good pick up on that. oh, these are matters in preliminary review, so i don't know what those two lobbyist complaints are about. we haven't looked at them yet. >> commissioner chiu: okay. and then my second question is on page two, isabel urbano, she

has been nonresponsive to making payment arrangements and has ceased communications. she lives in approximate new york. do we have any recourse there, any remedies that we can pursue? >> so this -- isabel urbano's matter has been turned into a small claims judgment, so there is a uniform recognition of judgment act or uniform -- some process by which a state can file their judgment and obtain recognition in a district court, which would be in another jurisdiction, so the bureau of delinquent revenues has the option to pursue her in new york if they would put the time and resources into trying to get that sister judgment recognized in that court and then executing in that court in new york, but that would be their only option. >> commissioner chiu: okay. thank you. any public comment? seeing no public comment, item ten, discussion of executive

director's report, an update of various program attic and optional highlights of commission staff activity since the commission's last month meeting. >> thank you, chair chiu. this is -- a brief report is attached to my overview on item number ten. first, we did submit our budget as required on february 21, and the overview of that -- the goals that we had from this year's budget process and an information about where our program left turn atic work stands along with a memo that sent to mayor farrell on the 21st. we are having conversations with the mayor's budget team in the next week or two, so we should learn more if there are questions or issues that we may have, but those are going to be started toward the budget issue in earnest. but that detail is also in this

report and posted on-line. there has been a tremendous amount of activity for the election season to the june election and also to the november election. we continue to have our staff focus on very priority urgent matters related to public financing program. there are two candidates so far who have been certified eligible as of today. that may change next week, but we are continuing to update that information as it happens on our website, that those links also appear in this report, and today, we also just yesterday posted for this election season our campaign finance dashboards, and those are new interactive pages that the public can link to to identify how much money is raised and spent by which candidates and which ballot measure committees. there are ways to sort that by top contributors, ballot measure, by type of race, whether it's ballot measure, mayoral, and supervisorial, and

we also have a geographic depiction of that, so the public can look to see by toggling on the website. that's very interesting information so, i would urge you all to take a look at that. we will continue to be posting the information to that live as it comes in. it'll be updated regularly, so we hope that people use that, and if there's any feedback about something that's not workable or if there's some other information about how that information can work, we would love to hear it. we're also in the process of our statement of interest filing economic season. as i mentioned we have had four information presentations, we've appreciated the assistance of the city attorney and other staff who have been there to provide guidance to those who have requirements this year. we've also been starting a lot of outreach with departments to let them know how we've s

synchronized the certification deadlines to be the same as the form 700's so we have a clean process and an easy way for the public to track who's completed that training and who hasn't, so those deadlines with noted and information is out in circumstance is lation about that, as well. i would also make a note that on our webpage for our 2016 campaign audits, we have made progress getting the publicly financed candidate audits posted on-line so now, we have 16 audits completed and posted of the 27 that were identified a year ago. those are the -- the audit process continues. because of the time sensitivity of public finances, we've had to devote our resources to do the public financing claims, but we know we can't stop work completely on our audits, so we're going to be reassessing and rebalancing that work so we have a continual focus on

compain audits from 2016 so that we don't unnecessarily delay those for the remaining campaigns. >> commissioner chiu: do you have a at the same frame for when the remaining audits will be completed? >> i don't. i hope to have an anticipated timetable for that. i think it's likely to take another 12 months to finish those, but at the same time i say that, that's given the perspective this week of very big public financing push, that that is going to be dissipating a bit as we get closer to the election, so i'm hoping that we'll have it sooner than that, but i don't want to make a promise of that until i have a chance to take a look at it with the time. we do need to keep up that work would. and of course, i'm procrastinating. i'm trying to think another things i can share with you so i don't have to make a public announcement here that today is the last day of the commission with our esteemed deputy director of enforcement and

lela fares, jessica blum. she has had an opportunity to take that is too good to pass up, and we are delighted that she's decided to take it. it's great for her and her family, but we're sad for us. as my report notes, jessica has done an amazing amount of very creative and foundational work for this organization in the last 19 months that she's been here. i have to say since i've been here, i've not seen that kind of energy and effectiveness in that short time period, so i just want to convey in the few words that we can today our deepest gratitude for jessica for the work that she's done for the legacy that she's built and for the work that she's leaving behind and that we have ahead of us. i want to thank you for her work and her friendship, and the graciousness that she's leaving behind with us. i think with anyone else, i'm happy to answer your questions. >> commissioner chiu: i would like to echo director pelham's

comments. jessica, it's been a pleasure and privilege to work with you these past 19 months. your contributions to the commission have been profound. i think that the work you've done on the enforcement regs and the -- the -- getting the backlog of all of those complaints down and hiring a team and leading that team have been tremendous and will have -- been able to position us for success going forward. and i echo leigh ann and say i'm very very sad for the commission, but happy for you and only want to wish you the best with your new endeavors and your family. >> commissioner kopp: i want to thank you for your time and attention to all of our requests and assignments and to wish you further professional achievement in a new responsibility and personal

satisfaction in that new responsibility. >> i also wanted to extend my deep appreciation to you, and san francisco's loss is berkeley's gain, so best of luck to you. stay in touch. >> commissioner chiu: any comments or questions from the commissioners on the executive director's report? so my only comment would be, director pelham is that as you have the discussions with the director's office on the budget, that it's critical that we receive the funding and not have to suffer the requested cuts because that would go directly to staffing because we don't have the budget for -- you know, beyond the programming, and that is really

mission critical for us to be able to do the work that we need to do. so if i can be a help in any way of lending my voice to that effort, please don't hesitate to reach out. keep fingers crossed for some good news on that front. public comment? >> good afternoon, commissioners. i'm charlie marstellar for the record with friends of ethics. i've been down filing ballot arguments today. the deadline is monday, so the public can know they still have time to file. i wanted to also extend my really sincere thanks for all the work that has been done by our deputy, jessica. i think she's done some amazing work to the order of a legacy. she's left us a legacy, and i'm

astounded that somebody could have covered so much territory and -- in such a profound way in just those 19 months. i have no doubt you'll be a super success in court litigating. i think you would be formidable and scary, but in a certainly good way because it's for the greater public benefit and good and apparently for animal welfare, as well. so i'm very sorry to see you leave but i'm very happy for your new assignment. i'm sure you wouldn't have accepted it unless it was pretty spectacular, but i knec know you've enjoyed the work you've done here. i also wanted to ask, mr. pierce has been on the staff for a period of time. i'm not as familiar with him, but i'm sure we'll be sin