between the union and the school board and the school district, it feels like from those -- those other entities, and i want to say that the purpose of this meeting was to figure out how the city can best support families and the school district and educators. because i agree with the comments of susan sullivan that the caste that the educators have in front of them is so monumental. and it is difficult to roll out

distance teaching and learning, which is what you are doing, and also at the same time to simultaneously provide for the needs of families to do what needs to be done in households to make that education work and meaningful. so what i see the role of the city is and i want to take my at off to maria sue and her staff and the mayor who stepped up and are trying to play a useful role in -- in the -- in one area of where families need help. and it is the area that is most complicated because how to provide safe child care so that there's an adult, you know, helping the teachers to teach the children during the day is incredibly complicated to set up and i'm just really appreciative

that this is underway and that, you know, it's hopefully going to start in about -- in exactly a month today. and so i want to appreciate that. i also think that we're setting our sights too low and that we're not helping enough families. and i want to take this model, if there is a need for it, and even expand it further. because my guess is that more than 6,000 children and their families need this resource in order to make distance learning successful. i know that pre-k through second grade cannot do distance learning successfully unless there's an adult by their side almost the entire day. and then if there's an adult translating what their teacher is teaching them, that could be very successful. most families in san francisco have parents that work

full-time. both parents, if there are two parents in a household they're working full-time. if there's only one parent in the household, they're definitely working full time. so they need that assistance especially with the young ones to make the distance learning that the district is planning successful. and i believe that we can do this. we are -- we are smart, we are resourced and if there is a will, there is a way to make this happen. and to not just let families fend for themselves and to deal with this on their own. and so i believe that if we continue to talk and to partner together that we can solve these problems and my daughter's school as well, the families are getting together to help each other and that is fantastic. but this is a role that the city can fill in and make the distance learning of the

educators that much more successful. this hearing could last to tomorrow morning. i have a thousand questions for every single entity. and we were just able to scratch the surface today. but i did take away three things that i'm going to follow-up on between now and this year and in two weeks from now. well, let me -- let me revise that -- four things. the first thing is that i want to delve into the pot. i think that allison hit the nail on the head. there is contradictory advice coming from d.p.h. on this issue. and i completely trust that the wisdom and the experience of susan sullivan who was a teacher of young kids for so many years who is saying 20 kids, this is

impossible. i completely agree being a parent of a young child, i don't see that being safe. so i want to probe that and at least get consistent information coming from d.p.h. where there isn't different health standards for different groups of children. that doesn't make any sense to me. so that's number one. number two, i believe that we need to survey the parents now that we have a model that is concrete and that we can share with people, ask them if they would participate if given the opportunity. once we know how many families need it, and then we know what we're fighting for. number three, we have got to get testing on a regular basis in those community learning hubs. that has to be provided by the city, and that is an essential way that we're going to keep everyone safe in those pods. so we'll be working on getting that promise met in this design.

and then fourth is how much money do we need from the city and perhaps from philanthropy. perhaps we have to go out -- although i do not love philanthropy. this is the whole point of government is that we're able to come in and to solve these problems. but how much money do we need during the budget process in order to accomplish a range of goals here? so those are the four things that i'm going to work together with all of you and help to facilitate those conversations over the next two weeks. and i want to thank you for letting me be here today, chair haney, thank you for letting me come into your hearing and i'm sorry that you won't be rid of me for a while. i'm going to become an ad hoc member of this committee until we figure some of this stuff out. and that i really just want to appreciate everyone here,

everyone is working so hard and has that exact same goal and interest in making sure that our kids are successful. so thank you. >> well, this has been a very long hearing so i won't add very much. but i want to make sure that we have this in two weeks and, again, we'll be back and we'll be able to get follow-up for all of those and we're going to try to not have a hearing this long each time because i know that everyone's time is very valuable and we have taken the senior staff in particular and from dcyif for the entire day. and one thing that i want to make sure that we cover in next week's hearing, which will require us to -- sorry, two weeks' hearing, which will require us to also have rec and

park with us is more information about the child care and how that fits into all of this. i know that the focus was on the health care workers and we really need to i think as you said, supervisor ronen, we're thinking about the capacity and where the needs are. if we cannot, you know, guarantee a spot for our educators and our health care workers who require some sort of care, whether that's a learning hub or a -- a more child care-based environment, i don't see how our city functions. not just our schools but our hospitals and everything else that is essential right now. so i've expressed this and director sue and i have spoken about it and i understand that there's some competing facilities in some cases, but i was approached by some of our health care workers at s.f. general who are incredibly concerned about how they'll be able to show up to work without child care. and i'm sure that our educators and the school employees more

broadly are asking the same questions depending on their ability to be working full time. so that's one thing to flag that i'll ask to come forward in the next two weeks. i'm sure that we'll have a lot of updates on the rollouts around outreach and who we're working with and how, you know, for the learning hubs, how we're engaging with parents and educators and their role in it. i think that it will be really be important as well as some of the safety measures and, you know, and, frankly, as you said supervisor ronen, the capacity. i mean, i'm really concerned if we have a situation where folks felt like it's down the street from them and they absolutely need it and it's required for them to be able to be at work and they weren't on the list of outreach and they are told that they can't get in, we're setting them up for a bit of a disaster there.

so whatever we can do to get ahead of that. i mean, whenever i hear that the -- that for something this essential that the limitation is space, i really think that it's a question of our creativity and our outreach and our collaboration because (indiscernible) limitation and we have to make sure that we have adequate staffing and safety and with all of these things working with our educators and making sure that they're at the center of the conversation. and i want to just appreciate just everybody, but director sue and a lot of folks -- and the superintendent -- all of the superintendents that are here, but i want to just also appreciate you commissioner collins as well and how relentless you have been around getting these answers. and just that we work with families and that we work with educators and just standing up for their health and well-being. thank you for your leadership and staying here to the end.

you know, and just being so vocal and a champion for our families during this time. thank you supervisor ronen and i are here for you to support you. and to support the district. and thank you, everyone. thank you to our deputy superintendent, and director sue and everything. and your staff. charise as well. we're all in this together. we have to work together. and we're here to support you. and thank you to susan solomon as well, for your leadership. supervisor ronen, do you have one more thing? >> supervisor ronen: i wanted to say one more thing that i am adding to my list for two weeks from now. the public commenter that talked about children with disabilities. it is unclear to me how we're serving those children in these community hubs and we need to get very -- a lot of clarity and communicate that clearly to families.

-- >> and i want to piggyback and say i want you, director sue, to reach out to the special education community advisory society, and they are parents of children with disabilities and they have been working on the working groups with the district. so they are the ones that can really help you and connecting with families that are dealing with those challenges. >> great. thank you all. have a good weekend. >> mr. chair, a motion on items one and two? >> you can't just end the meeting -- >> so moved. >> all right. sorry. >> clerk: is there a motion to file items one or two or continue to the call of the chair? >> a motion to continue to the call of the chair. >> clerk: on the motion to continue to the call of the chair [roll call]

you have three ayes. >> is there anything more, madam clerk. >> clerk: no, just for the record, it's kind of -- we had -- we should have said earlier that we had supervisor ronen in place of supervisor fewer as an action. but it's okay. >> all right, anything more? >> clerk: that completes the business for today. >> okay, all right, this meeting is adjourned. thank you. i appreciate it.

>> this ethic commission of august 14, 2020 has started. miss ambrose, we are ready to begin. >> thank you, i want to welcome everybody to the august 14, 2020 meet of the san francisco ethic's commission. this is pursuant to the governor's order and the 12t

12th supplement to the proclamation declaring the existence of a local emergency dated february 25, 2020. before we proceed further, i would like to ask commission staff member ronald conraras who is acting as the moderator to explain procedures of today's remote meeting. >> thank you, madam chair. the minutes of this meeting reflect due to the covid-19 health emergency and to protect commissioner members, city employee expose ths and the pub, committee meeting rooms are closed. commission and staff will be participating in today's meeting remotely. this is taken pursuant to the local, state and federal directives. commission members will attend the member through video conference and participate in the meeting to the same extent as if they were physically present. please note that today's meeting will not be live cast until the

adjournment of one of the two board of supervisor's meetings. however, today's meeting will be shown live in the we webe competiton application, that's sfgovt v.org/dozethic'slive. member of the public will be allowed three minutes to speak. comments to speak during public comment period are available via phone call by calling (415)655-0001 and/or (408)418-9388. again, the phone number is (415)655-0001 and/or

(448)418-9388. the access code is (146)056-8750. press pound to join as an attendee. we apologize that previously webex only offered a 408 number. you will hear it beep when you're connected to the meeting and you will be muted and in listening mode only. when your item of interest comes up, dial star three to be added to the public comment line and you will then here, you have raised your hand to ask a question and please wait until the host calls on you. the line will be silenced as you wait your turn to speak. ensure that you are in a quiet

location. before you speak, mute the sound of any equipment around you including television, radio or computer. and it is especially important that you mute your computer if you are watching throug watchinb link. when the system message says your line has been un-muted, this is your turn to speak and you'll hear staff say, welcome, caller. you are encouraged to state your name clearly. as soon as you begin speaking, you will have three minutes to provide your public comment, six minutes if you are online with an interpreter and you will hear a bell go off when you have 30 seconds remaining. if you change your mind and wish to withdraw yourself from the public comment line, press star three again and you'll hear the system say, you have lowered your hand. once your three minutes have expired, staff will mute you. you will hear your line has been muted.

aattendees who wish to speak during other public comment may stay on the line and listen for the next public comment opportunity and raise their hands to enter the public comment line by pressing star three. when their next item of interest comes up. public comment may be submitted in writing and will be shared after the meeting is concluded and be included as a part of the meeting file. written comments should be sent to ethics.commission@sfgov.org. thank you, madam chair. >> chair: thank you. and with that, i'll call the meeting to order. the gavel down and moderator, if you want to call the role, please. >> commissioners, please un-mute your microphone is that you can verbally state your presence at today's meeting after your name is called. chair ambrose.

(role call) >> madam chair with all five members present and accounted for, you have a quorum. >> chair: thank you very much. welcome, everyone. i want to express my appreciation to the staff for bringing us all together remotely. i know it's a challenge not just for us. i worry, too, that it's a challenge for our viewing public. one of the things that i was discussing with another commissioner is just the concern that the only access that people have is over the internet, really, and with the public libraries closed, i'm just wondering if staff could look

into whether or not the city has any, i don't know, viewing centers or loan or laptops for those people, because it seems like we'll be in this world for awhile and the idea that the only way that you can participate in government is through a computer with, as we all have seen here, with really good enderne ethernet or wi-fi d something to be conscious of and see what we can could to help. i want to make a friendly reminder to commissioners and participants today to mute your microphone when you're not speaking so we don't get a lot of audio feedback and with that, i'll call item number two is public comment on matters appearing or not appearing on the agenda. members of the public who are already online and wish to speak

should now dial star three if you've not already done so to be added to the public comment line. moderator, can you please proceed with public comment. >> thank you, madam chair. the ethic's commission is receiving public comment on agenda item number two remotely in this meeting. each member will have up to three minutes to provide public comment. if you join the meeting earlier to listen to the proceedings, now is the time to get into line to speak. if you have not already, please press star three. it's important that you press star three only once to enter the queue. after pressing it again, we'll move you out of the public comment line and back into listening mode. once you are in the queue and standing by, they will property you and when it's your turn to speak -- excuse me. [ laughter ] >> the system will prompt you

when it's your turn to speak so it's important you call from a quiet location. please address your comments to the commission as a whole and not to individual members. madam chair, we are checking to see if there are any callers in the queue. if you have just joined the meeting, we are on agenda number two, public comment on matters appearing or not appearing on the agenda. if you have not done so, press star three to be added and for those on hold, wait until the system indicates you have been muted. >> chair: we'll wait for a few seconds to see if there are any speakers. >> that's correct.

for all those patiently waiting, we are waiting 90 seconds and we're halfway there. madam chair, there are no callers in the queue. >> chair: thank you. item number two is closed and i'll call items from the cob sent calendar. this is items three and four on

your agenda notice and item three is draft minutes so the ethic's commission july 10, 2020 regular meeting and item four is a proposed stipulation decision and order in the matter of hilary ronen, supervisor 2016, hilary ronen and stacie owens, fsc client number 161086 and moderator, if you can explain the call for public comment, please. >> if any members of the public intend to offer public comment for any of the consent items, dial in now and enter star three to be added to the public comment queue. items three and four are on consent and they're considered routine. if a commissioner objects, an item can be removed and considered separately. >> chair: so does any commission member wish to sever

any of the items for content and call for a separate discussion? seeing no such requests, i am going to -- >> i was making a request. >> chair: oh, you were? >> i was trying to raise my hand. >> chair: ok, i'm sorry. maybe i have you all grouped in a row and i need a tutorial again on how to spread you out so i can see your hands. it just says participants. >> i wanted to make a comment on the minutes and i don't know if that's an objection to sever it, but i do want to make a comment about the minutes. >> it's up to you. i mean, we can call them separately and call role separately on each item if you just want to make -- if you just

want to make a comment about it, then we can just hear it under the consent calendar. >> then i'll just make a comment. but in view of the fact that we're concerned about a disproportionate impact, people without access to the internet to operate in ou participate in, it becomes more important so i'm urging that our minutes provide more detail rather than just sort of an outline so that people get a better sense of not only th of what different people spoke but what they said and anything related to that and so that's my comment. >> ok. >> chair: any other comments from commissioners before we ask

for public comment? moderator, i'll ask for you to provide the instructions for public comment on the consent items. >> thank you, madam chair. the ethic's commission is receiving public comment on consent calendar items three through four and each member will have up to three minutes to provide public comment. you'll hear a bell go off when you have 30 seconds remaining. if you join early to listen, now is the time to get in line to speak and if you have not done so, please press star three. it's important you press star three once to enter the queue and after pressing again, we'll move you out and back into listening mode. once you're standing by, the system will prompt you when it's your turn to speak.

so it's important that you call from a quiet location. please address your comment to the commission as a whole and not to individual members. madam chair, we're checking to see if there are any callers in the queue. >> thank you, so, again, we'll have a slight delay here while you check for speakers.

madam chair, there are no callers. >> hopefully our phone lines are working. and then, i would like to ask for a role call on the consent agenda, if i can get a motion, please. commissioner lee, thank you, and a second. >> second. >> commissioner smith seconds the motion. >> chair: and now the role call, please. (role call).

>> with five votes in the affirmative and zero opposed, the motion is approved unanimously. >> chair: now i would like to call agenda item five, discussion of possible action on the ethic's commission draft annual report for 2019-'20 and before you ask for public comment, i just wanted to say a few words and ask director pellham to say a few words. i'm sure all of you have had the opportunity to both look at this draft annual report and also to

read the budget and legislative analyst's recommendations about what we might achieve in the future with an annual report that reflects -- well, actually not reflects, but is more reflective about what we might have accomplished over the course of the year. but in the interest of satisfying the charter requirements that the chair and executive director produce an annual report, i wanted to get my homework done and so i pressed on executive director pellham that notwithstanding the budget and performance audit from the budget and legislative analyst and everything remote that we try to pull together as best we could an overview of what the commission and, frankly, the city accomplished

on the ethic's issues in the past year and while it's certainly looking for comments and recommendations to improve it over the course of the next year, i would ask for your support in approving the draft with, again, with any correction's revisions and i would especially look to commissioner chu, since this work was accomplished on your work for the remainder of the last fiscal year. during my tenure, we were in absentia. director pellham, any thoughts corners. >> no, good morning, chair ambrose and commission members, i don't have anything to add. i want to acknowledge and thank both the chair for getting this

important and overdue ball rolling and i think it was a good effort for all of us on staff to take some time to dig in and reflect and collect information about what the commission has been working to accomplish in this past year. we look forward to continuing to evolve this report that we'll talk about in the future agenda items in this meeting. but just wanted to provide it for your review today and as the cover home notes, the bylaws do state that the commission approve an annual report and so we have it here as a draft and i'll turn it back to you and the chair for comments or feedback you wish to provide at this time. >> if it's ok with everywhere, i was going to elicit commission feedback or comments, corrects, recommendations for future

improvement before we go to public comment. so i will ask that if any of you want to speak, i have now figured out how to get my panel on the side where i can see whether your hand is raised. and so, feel free to raise your hand. commissioner bush, i recognise you. commissioner chu, you'll be next. commissioner bush, you are on mute. >> one thing that helps quantify the work of the commission is a statistical systemmery of how many calls were fielded and how many opinions were issued and

how many enforcement actions took place. the other part of the annual report is not so much about the ethic's commission annual report but our partnership in the city. so, for example, the number of referrals that we send on to the city attorney or the district attorney, the number of referrals that go to various departments so that people have a better sense of what's going on. some reference to the controller's work on whistleblower. i think that what we saw this past year were questions being raised about the thoroughness of the city's approach to public

integrity and that's why you saw issues such as creating a public advocate for a whistleblower program. so if you can acknowledge that we are a partner, that would give a better perspective of how we fit in. thank you. >> thank you. i appreciate those comments and i did want to say that i had heard your recommendation, which i think is a good one, and i still thunderbay we can pull together this sort of fact sheet of having a highlights by the numbers. i know personally i like looking at just, you know, numbers of cases, time to completion, as you point out, the number of opinions. because you can look quickly and

see the body of work that's going on and i also really like your idea that we bring in our shared responsibility with other departments and the elected officials in the city for maintaining, you know, ethical standards in san francisco. so that's something that i will keep note of this year so we can make sure and incorporate it in the annual report for the coming year that we're enjoying right now. and with that, i'm going to recognise commissioner chu and then commissioner lee. >> thank you, chair ambrose. i wanted to echo commissioner bush's comments and this is actually my feedback, as well. so i think the metrics would be helpful for the public as has already been commented on by the

commissioner. and one would be the 4700 filing anas one of the primary tools fr disclosure for elected and appointed city employees. and i don't have a recommendation here but i have a question for the commission, how much or should we and if so, how much should we reference in terms of the recommendations from the bla report? because i think it's important to note that while we have a body of accomplishments and work that has been done and we need to communicate about, i also think that it's an opportunity in the annual report to identify areas of improvement. i don't want to get into the bla audit results because that's for the upcoming agenda item, but i think there might be an opportunity here, you know, to say that one of the reasons why

we will be given more, hopefully, is we can be fully staffed, for example, that we have experienced a high rate of vacancy, which is one of the second highest in the city as noted in the bla report. in order to paint not just a picture of what we have accomplished but also some of the ongoing challenges. >> chair: there is a reference at the end of the annual report. the annual report or draft annual report was put forward to the commission and we were just getting in hand the bla report and just from a timing point of view, there's simile just a cross-reference to it and maybe in the final version of the annual report, we could

certainly include online a linker to the bla report and, you know, specific reference to the date that it was issued now that the bla report is final. going forward, and this is going to be an agenda item, if not in september than i then in octobee specific recommendation in the bla report is that we have adopted metrics for ourselves in terms of what we want to strive to achieve on our numeric performance standards, really, including that would be the budget and staffing issues because, obviously, any performance metrics that doesn't take into consideration resources doesn't reflect reality. the timing didn't allow for us

to embed discussion about the recommendations in the consideration of what's happened in the past year and with that, i want to recognise -- i'm sorry, if you have a follow-up, go ahead. >> i do, so yeah, i did see the reference and i understand there's a timing issue of when this was prepared. are we to take action to approve this in the current slide or as mr. bush has raised to include metrics to give a proceeder picture of the work the commission has done and we could take this up at next month's meeting and approve it for publication at that time?

mary if these are the improvements the commission wants to see in the report, then, yeah, that should be the motion. we obviously can't draft it by committee or commission, so if there is a motion to make improvements, i would ask that they be as specific as possible so that th i and the executive director have a really clear path forward about what you're looking for, you know, to bring back in september. but i'm happy to take notes and try and make those improvements. >> thank you.

>> chair: with that, i need to go back to my panel here. commissioner lee. >> thank you, madam chair. and i want to echo what my colleagues have said. i also want to thank the director and her staff for putting this document together in these challenging times. specifically, i do want to suggest that in addition to the summary of the key highlights in the front, that it starts with what the previous speakers have said, a simple chart, so that this is easily. i think there's so much attention, especially to the

auditing part of the commission's mandate and again, this year being a really unique year, i would recommend that the report includes why given the staff reassignment and everything else that some of the metrics were slow. and so i think that would be really important because this is a document for future reference. so i think it's really important to reference that. it doesn't make this an excuse, but at least to put it in context. and i also would like to recommend that even though this is the annual report of what we've done, but maybe in the last section to have the unfinished business moving forward, what is the commission going to do? what are our plans to really

move forward only things that have been identified and things that have been addressed and that these are the plans that we have to continue to efforts for the next fiscal year. so those are my three recommendations. >> i think i'm going to raise my hand. >> chair: commissioner lee, i agree with the first two parts of the last one. if we're going to have in september agenda items to revisit the policy priority plan in light of whatever we are able to obtain from the mayor and the board and the way of budget resources, so just, you know, for myself, i don't know about director pom, but i would be

hard-pressed to write in the next 30 days what the commissioner's agenda is for the unfinished business for this coming physical year without having the commission actually having resolved the competing priorities and adopted that, which i'm hoping we're going to do at least in part in september. so i hear you that it would be nice if we already knew what we would do going forward. but with the way this year is unfolding with so uncertainty, whether we can keep the positions we have, i would be afraid to take something from our last priority policy or to-do list and, in my words, say what we were going to do and so i would ask that we set our

agenda in september once we know what our resources are. although, i certainly agree that we can -- now that we have more information about what metrics are and staffing problem have been in the past and have confirmation of the bla report that that is, indeed, been a constraint on the commission's performance that we can incorporate that in the report. and i'm looking -- i'll let you respond. go ahead. >> i don't mean this as setting the agenda for the next year. a i meant by unfinished business, there are a lot of areas that we've started and i think it would be a good document to show the intent to

continue this pass and right now there's uncertainty regarding the budget but at least on record, we recognize that these are some of the areas we need to continue to move forward. and i don't mean to set a new agenda for the year, but on the current areas that we're working on, such as the audit and everything else. these are the things that commission intends to continue and then if for whatever reason, budgetary constraints or what have you, next year, we can revisit that and say we intended all of these things and, unfortunately, budget constraints prevented under the circumstances from doing that. is that a record that we did not

drop it and that we have every intention of carrying out these activities. that's an important point for the public to know that we're just not doing things because of that. >> chair: i hear you. again, though, because you did

name one example of the audit, i guess my thought and maybe you've been on the commission a lot longer and you might have internalized what our overarching continuing missions are. i'm just really leery to say that i would know what to put in that paragraph without more specific direction from the commission and i guess i had envisioned a more -- and i think, you know, the executive director also had a lot of ideas along these lines, in terms of that part of what we would do in the fall is set the specific metrics for where can we go with auditing once we know, for example, whether or not we're going to get our auditor back from the disaster service working assignment. you know, where can we go on

form 700, depending on our financial resources, et cetera. and so, to put in the annual report for last year what we think we'll do next year, to my mind, again, as described, i'm not prepared to take a shot at what that might be. but what i do want to do is put it on the agenda so that we can have an actual discussion item by item, what do we think we can get accomplished in the coming year and have the commission and the staff come together with a clear understanding. so we're not just setting metrics that other people think would be nice that we would accomplish, but we don't think realistically we're going to be able to get there, et cetera. and so, i'm still -- and if you all want to give more bullets for things you want to put in the report for what we intend to

continue working on, then, i guess -- and my thought, too, i think between now and november, given where we're at with the staff that's been directed to disaster service work, given the fact that everyone is remote and given the fact that the assistant director is happily out on maternity leave for the next six months, so what i would want the staff to do is to really focus on the november election on getting the disclosures and continuing with our enforcement efforts and really just doing the basic hard day-to-day work of the commission and then continuing to fight through the budget process to get as many resources as we possibly can. but anyway, that's what i would say if i was going to say what i want us to do for at least the

next quarter. and again, if folks can articulate what you think and agree on lists of what we will continue to do, i'll write it down and we'll put it in the report. because i don't want to guess. >> i can't find my raised hand thing. but when you have a moment, i would like to say something. >> chair: ok, and then i'm going to let commissioner lee respond and go back to commissioner chu. so if you want to go ahead, commissioner bush. >> just one way forward, because we all seem to be headed in the same direction, is to appended to the annual report a copy of the bla audit so it's all in one place. and secondly, to ask each of our partner's agencies, like the controller or the city attorney

or the district attorney or dhs, if they have something to add, that they provide us a paragraph and we put that into the report, as well as a separate section, which would be related commissions from partner agencies. and finally, on the point that commissioner lee was just making, i think you have a final paragraph that says, to be completed or work underway without enumerating them, but just acknowledging that there are still things that are priorities and we'll be working on those in the next few months and you pretty well covered a suite of issues with all of those steps and done so in a way that informs the public that we are not asleep at the wheel.

>> chair: i wrote that down and now i want to recognise commissioner chu. >> i would offer up a motion that would open for feedback for myself. , commissioners adding some metrics for the report which would be the number of audits conducted, the investigations, open asked opend closed investigations, the form 700 filing and the amount of public funds dispersed and then, as commissioner bush enumerated, appending the bla report as well as any paragraphs or written statements from partner agencies

to incorporate into that report, as well as commissioner bush has just noted a very high level paragraph about the continuing work, that we're not resting on our laurels, but we've accomplished to date, but that, you know, a lot of these work streams will continue into the future. and it's something that gets to that point without granular and specific and holding us to initiatives that we have not yet prioritized but will in the upcoming months. >> chair: is that a motion? >> yes. >> chair: and is there a second for that motion? ok, commissioner smith. and if we can have discussion on that motion, if anyone wants to confirm or revise and if not, then i'm going to go to the moderator and ask for public comment. commissioner -- nobody has their hand up.

is anybody trying to put their hand up? no, ok. thank you for that. and then, moderator, could you please call for public comment. >> thank you, chair. madam chair, we are checking to see if there are callers in the queue and we do have one right now. for those already on hold, please continue to wait until the system indicates you have bun muted un-muted. we are on agenda item number five and possible action on the annual report for 2019-2020. if you have not already done so, please press star three to be added to the public queue. you will have three minutes to provide your public comment, six minutes if you're online with an interpreter. you'll hear a bell go off when you have 30 seconds remaining. we do have callers in the queue. give me just a moment here.

welcome, caller, you have three minutes and your three minutes begins now. >> speaker: good morning, commissioners. my name is dr. derick kerr, a whistleblower. whore. whistleblower. a key recommendation of the ethic's commission is that the

outcomes of investigations should be disclosed, particularly whistleblower retaliation claims. now, in your draft annual report, there's a table on page 13 which shows some outcomes of the investigations of whistleblower retaliation claims. however, there's something missing. it doesn't state how many cases were sustained. and i think that the reason that we don't have that information is because the ethic's commission has never sustained a whistleblower retaliation claim since its founding. that's zero in 27 years. if you would disclose how many cases were sustained or not sustained, it would draw more

attention to the fact that these claims are never sustained. and maybe that would give somebody on the commission the impetus to explain why whistleblower retaliation claims are always dismissed by the ethic's commission. thank you very much.

>> madam chair, there are no more callers. >> chair: thank you for your comment and public comment is closed and a motion on the floor with a second. so moderator, can you please call the vote on the annual report, revisions and approval of the annual report? so i just want to be clear, we will make those revisions, we'll bring it back in september for final adoption, correct? that's the understanding? ok, if you can call the role, please. foul a motion has been made and seconded. you can chime in and just give me the synopsis again. i'm sorry. >> chair: i'll ask you to restate the motion. i think it's on the tape that commissioner chu did a good job of combining commissioner lee and commissioner bush and her

own specific recommendations for edits to the annual report but i won't ask her to try and read that because we will be working it back for approval and then we'll find out whether or not director pellham and i got the correct message. and so, anyway, if you can -- >> i'll call the role. (role call). >> the motion approved unanimously. >> chair: thank you very much for that and with that, i need to find my place in the script. and so, we're on to agenda item six and agenda item six is the discussion of the budget and

legislative analyst, performance report of the ethic's commission conducted at the request of the board of supervisors and i'm going to ask executive director pellham to lead our discussion here with her staff. thank you very much. >> thank you, chair, and good morning again. this item that we have on the agenda for you, it is the budget and legislative analyst performance audit of the ethic's commission that was issued publically on monday, the tenth. and so we wanted to make sure to have the opportunity to have it before you to be able to begin to digest it. it's an 82-page report and also the public to start engaging as we did in the prior agenda, as we can continue to improve the operations and the impact of the mission and the mandate of the ethic's commission. so we have -- i will, in a

moment, ask our acting deputy director and enforcement director, jeff pearce, to refresh what is in report, which there are 16. to provide brief background, you'll recall that in november of last year, the president board yee introduced a motion to ask for the budget and legislative analyst to, as a priority, in fiscal year '20, to product a performance for the year. and that was approved by the full board at the end of january. in early february, the bla auditors met with commission staff, the management, to review the scope and the time frames expected. the work proceeded immediately.

we began to prioritize our responses for data collection, document production interviews so that we could help the bla auditors dig into whatever areas they needed to to access areas that would help to understand where we can continue to improve and to help them stay on time for releasing what would be an audit to the board in late june. at that point, we anticipated that would be during the budget season. and fast-forward for the past several months, the covid pandemic and public health emergency and the need for offices to operate remotely changed the time frame a bit. non-theless, to the credit of the bla auditors and my thanks to our staff, we were able to move that audit to completion.

the report is attached in full and there is the opportunity for the department to have provided a response. as your executive director, as we looked at this operationally, i provided a response to the report on behalf of our office and that reflects on what we believe to be our full agreement with the recommendations that the bla auditors have provided in this report. they did an extensive amount of work analyzing data and providing feedback and insight that will be very helpful for us to continue the kind of work we have laid the foundation for. my response to the audit reminds all of us that the commission started on a new journey back in 2016, when it embraced vision and blueprint for the accountable and part of that is not just holding others accountable, but holding ourselves accountable, as well. we know that we need to have

goals. we need to have indicators that we can hold ourselves to account to and that we can have a way to gauge whether or not we're making progress. that's not an easy task, particularly when you all know that we do not staff ourselves in a way that has any administrative performance, financial budget unit that would normally do this for a department and so, for us, it's been a struggle over the years to do that and i think that is not a headline. i think what we have tried to do over the years is to address it as much as we can and this report gives us real insights and i think some helpful ideas about the way that we can and need to start implementing that. your discussion about the annual report is a perfect example of that and i just wanted to convey on behalf of the staff having looked at the report and worked with the auditors, we appreciate the time they invested in doing this work and we very much appreciate and agree with the recommendations that they've provided to us and we do look forward to implementing those as

we identified in my response. i thought i would share two slides and walk through at a high level the recommendations and i'll ask jeff pearce to join me and if we can answer my questions you have about the report, address any further questions about what building blocks we have in place already that are standards to address some of those issues, that's how i will proceed to get the item back in your hands for discussion. if you'll bear with us on these two slides for a moment. let me call those up and share my screen. one moment.

am i correct there's no audit report recommendation? >> no. >> well, if i could ask you then, in that case -- or if i draw your attention, it's on page 69 of the report, if you have it nearby and if not, we'll just walk through them very briefly for you. the slide that i would present and we will send to you and post online is a list of the report items that the bla has recommended. there is specific language and their ordering as well as the prioritization that they applied to it and some they have asked to be completed by the end of this calendar year, in december, by december 30th. and others note, their recommendation, some of them and

the bulk of them be completed by the end of june, the end of this fiscal year. and i think there is one that they recommend be completed by december of 2021. so just, briefly, i'll start with the recommendation four. we spoke this and you'll hear about this in the next issue on the agenda but the first was to ensure adequate staffing of the commission and they spent a lot of time looking at the history of the commission's vacancies and recommendations to the board of supervisors and the mayor's budget office to expedite approval of request to fill vacant positions at the commission and allocate the commission salary savings and funding to the work of the commission, to the department of human resources, to help the commission with the recruitment and hiring in an expedited manner. i pointed out in my response man

tore the bla, we strongly support this recollection and that is something that we'll touch on in the budget item on the agenda today. and that really is one of the great dependencies with the recommendations made, to help us complete the recommendations on the time frame envisioned by the bla report and it will depend on our ability to have those seats filled. there are two other items. the first and second recommendations of the report speak to -- number one, to the item we were discussing, producing an annual report and that is something where they are specifically focusing on, again, outcomes, what are the outcomes, what are the specific performance measures we want to identify for each functional area, not just one or two? and to have them consistent from year to year. and so the report identifies some o of the efforts we've made over time to capture in our budget requests and at that time of year what we have been attempting to do and how far

we've come. their (pleas.(please stand by).

this month. so we're going to provide that to the engagement compliance team to support that continuous information and to make an impact. secondly then recommendation five speaks to establishing overall goals were completing audits and then reporting on

those results. also recommendation seven speaks to developing an updated audit manual that auditors have, again, a consistent step-by-step guide as a way to go about their work. we have achieved significant improvements, in my view, in increasing the consistency of our audits against audits in audit cycles, but this is something we don't have extensive documentation for, and we know that in a period where there is any kind of staff turnover, which we hope we do not see, there is a need to have that knowledge sharing from person to person so that there is a consistent basis as to on-board and to help sustain the work that is reflected of the collective knowledge that we have. that is another recommendation. and then finally as to the campaign or the audit program specifically their tools is establishing a formal training program for the audit division. something, again, that includes what are those needs that the audit division has to conduct its work, what are the training goals for each employee, and

just the process for tracking of revising and monitoring and ensuring that's been impactful in monitoring our audits. the last area addresses recommendation six, and i'll backtrack on that. the office recommends that we approve procedures for a lobbying audit program and conduct an initial lobbying audit by the end of fy21. the audit staff has provided to me a template, an initial draft this spring to enable us to do that as we had it on track for our staff to do an initial audit by the end of this year. given the demands operationally with the need to change to remote work and other covid-19-related operational demands, that unfortunately has sat with me, and so this is something that i have to dust off and make sure that we are able to put into operation and complete this, and i'm very hopeful and expect that we will do that, and i myself am committed to do that as well.

i'm going to pause there, and the number of other recommendations that i've asked pearce to join in, this is recommendations 9 to 16 speak to our investigative work. if i could ask jeff to walk through briefly those items and then turn it back to any questions that you might have for us, commissioners, that we can try and answer. >> sure, thank you, director, and good morning, commissioners. so as the director noted, fully half of the recommendations from the d.l.a. audit regard the processes and outcomes of the enforcement division. five of those eight recommendations concern investigations generally and then three of those regard the whistle-blower protection programs specifically. just a further note that as the director stated that auditors

certainly spent a lot of time with our staff, our staff spent a lot of time with auditors. we provided a lot of documentation for those auditors and engaged in a lot of back and forth to clarify the nature of our work and the mandates that affect us. i would add that the auditors also consult [indiscernible] jurisdiction, so that they would develop an understanding of how this division performing in implementing its mandate as compared to enforcement divisions similar to ours, including at the fdvc, the los angeles city ethics commission, in san diego, and also at the local public ethics commission. so you will have seen in the report some remarks about processes or outcomes from those peer jurisdictions. and then finally auditors also consulted internally within the city for similar purposes.

they talked, for example, with the deputy city attorney in consulting the enforcement division and they spoke as well with the department of human resources equal employment opportunity division for an analysis about how that division handled the particular retaliation jurisdictions that they oversee. so with that background, i would just add that you could interrupt at any point if any of you has a question about these particular recommendations or about how staff has reflected on them. so the first recommendation affecting the enforcement division recommendation nine, you know, auditors were expressing precaution here that the division not open in a given time period more cases than it can resolve within that same time period to avoid a piling up

of matters that can grow [indiscernible] they've asked that we develop a plan to ensure that that happens and also to develop a method for reporting in that area. i would note that the plans could include either, that the division open fewer matters or that the division develop processes that would accelerate the resolution of existing matters, and i would say i think that the division has endeavoured to do both of those things already. i would remind the commission about the discretionary factors that we adopted in the fall and that we began to implement at that time, and of course the ambition of the division to expand the fixed penalty policy and adopt a broader program to accomplish the acceleration of certain kinds of matters before the commission. it's also true that as we reported in the july enforcement report, in the last fiscal year

we have gained 20 new investigations that resolved, 48 investigations that -- the division is moving in the direction that the auditor has identified, and we fully agree that it is not in the interest of the city, not in the interest of the public for matters to age unhelpfully. and so we look forward to developing that plan and to finding the most fruitful way of reporting on it too. the tenth recommendation regards additional tracking that we might undertake. so what -- i think what the auditors are concerned about here is if you look at exhibits 18 and 19, the auditor's endeavoured to describe as fully as they could the enforcement process, which is rather complex. you will see there that there are many decision points, there are many opportunities for

review, some opportunities for ratification or for approval, and so here's what the auditors hope, is that by developing these new metrics, executive director and i can identify any inefficiencies in that process, and in particular that we might take better track of any points where it is the management's review that is imposing any inefficiencies on this process. so we have developed a kind of draft approach to tracking those new metrics and at this point we have to figure out technologically what's the best way to implement that. the 11th recommendation really is that we bring to you our goal with respect to the penalty policy that we have been talking about for quite some time. beyond that, when we do, the auditors have recommended that we present specifically an analysis about what the

projected impact of that extended program might be, and i think what they are identifying there is a concern that the commissioner raised at the july meeting, namely, how streamlined is streamlined? what can we really anticipate the program of this program might be? so we will look forward to doing that. the executive director and i in the coming weeks and months should have renewed opportunities to view these recommendations and bring them in a format that we will be ready for public review and commissioners. let's see, the 12th recommendation regards the discretionary factors that we adopted in the fall. here i think the auditors are looking for assurances both as to process and as to outcomes. as to process, the auditors note not that there is evidence that the commission has applied these

factors improperly and not that there have been complaints that the commission has applied these factors improperly, but only that there is a risk given the degree of discretion provided in these factors that i heard that staff for the commission as a whole will apply their discretion in uneven ways or that the public will worry that the staff or the commission have applied their discretion in uneven ways, and so we will be happy to evaluate the risk that we face there and to identify ways of mitigating that risk. as to outcomes, what the auditors had recommended is that we produce for the commission, and i suppose for the public, more data about how we have distinguished between which cases to pursue and which cases

to put aside so that there is a public accounting of -- in a comprehensive way, of how we have actually applied these factors, both individually and as a whole. the next recommendation 13 regards training, and i would note that it over-laps some with training, which is certainly within the whistle-blower context. it's true that in the last few years investigators on the whole have -- they have in one sense learned on the job more than they have been provided, say, a structured process of on-boarding or maybe an ongoing system of mentoring. i recently had a conversation with the head of the hr's equal

employment opportunity division, and certainly that division has a larger staff, but they have also a very robust training program that includes a long period of on-boarding and conscientious mentoring of new hires. our investigators had already identified a desire of that internally before the auditor engaged with us in this process. so if we had been successful in hiring between 18 to 22 investigators, we had envisioned a more systematic process of on-boarding, but it goes to ongoing professional development. i would note one dependency there would be reduced training budget that steven matthew will discuss with you in the subsequent agenda item, but we acknowledge that we certainly want to develop the skills and expertise of our team over time. we have got ways to do that, and

we will continue to do so. in the last couple of weeks we've had already conversations with the fppc, the los angeles city ethics commission, with eeo, as i mentioned, and also with the national association of attorneys general, and the training arm of the federal department of justice to identify training opportunities. unless there are questions on those five, i'll turn to the whistle-blower protection context. the 14th recommendation regards reporting, and this is what derek curb mentioned in his public comment not so many minutes ago, so we will be glad to include more detailed information about that in a public and annual way. i think the public may not know that commissioners receive already ongoing reports about the individual case outcomes

under the commission's enforcement regulations [indiscernible] are required to provide at the very least some reports to commissioners about any matters that staff have elected to dismiss or to close. and so commissioners have had some information available to them already about the specific nature of all of the matters that we have not pursued, including the whistle-blower matters, but we will look for ways of making some of that information more publicly available within the confines of the confidential requirements. the 15th recommendation regards timelines, and the auditor's concern here is that long time frames for resolving whistle-blower protection investigations don't exactly indicate the city's policy commitment to protecting whistle-blowers, and we are certainly sympathetic to that with the caveat that as was described in the fall or the

winter whistle-blower protection investigations are enormously fact intensive and require many more witness interviews than most of our other investigations do, but as a matter of policy, we certainly agree that shorter time frames [indiscernible] commitment to protecting whistle-blowers here. we will look forward to evaluating how we might prioritize whistle-blower matters vis-à-vis the other areas of jurisdiction that we retain, and we will gladly report back to you findings on that. and again, the last recommendation i mentioned in relation to recommendation 13 that regard specialized training for the whistle-blower context. the auditors note that whistle-blower protection law is much more akin to labor law than it is to government ethics. we did a couple of years ago invite counterparts from the commissioner's office to join us

at san francisco. we had a training in the substantive law and in method of investigations. at that time we invited members from other city departments to join us there, and we had an audience, a group of participants, 50 or 75 strong. we have not since refreshed trainings in that area, but we agree that this is a specialty area of law. when we attend the annual council on government laws conference, we have no jurisdiction either in california or across the country who obtains the same jurisdiction that we do, so it is generally outside the scope of those conversations, and so we have to look elsewhere for substantive training and procedural training.

there is a background in labor law. we will be working more closely with her to improve our capacity in the whistle-blower protection area. as i mentioned, i've spoken also with the head of the city's eeo division, and linda simon has pledged her support in helping develop the capacity of our investigators, both to broaden our view of the substantive law and to improve the methods of investigation that we undertake in that aspect of our jurisdiction. >> commissioners, i'm going to give you all the first opportunity to raise your hand if you want to make comments or ask questions and then i'll go last. so commissioner chu, your hand has been up for a while. i don't know if you're raising it again. >> no, i -- i can't tell whether it's been up, but yes, my hand

was up. i would like to start with just a process question. first off, i want to thank director pelan and staff for doing all the underlying additional work in order to be able to provide the information and data and reporting needed for the bla to be able to complete its audit. i think this is a very comprehensive and detailed report and recommendations and would like to start broadly, you know, by understanding that, you know, what is the process and the timing, and what is the impact that this report will have on our budget going forward, because i know that there are 16 very detailed recommendations. you know, 31% of have are level one, which they recommend should be completed by the end of the calendar year, and an additional 56%, nine out of the 16, that should be completed by june of next year. and then two more, so 13%, that

need to be completed by december 31 of 2021. so there's a lot of work to be done, and it is significant work and really important work, but i think as we have discussed over time and, you know, we'll certainly get into in the budget presentation, and is identified in and of itself in this audit report and recommendations is that there is chronic under-staffing in the ethics commission, as well as ongoing challenges to be able to fill those positions. if we just take the very first number one priority, formalizing document procedures, and that was the ethics at work initiative that we had identified, but in the absence of funding from the -- through the budget process and the ability to be able to fill these positions on a faster than 160-day timeline, i'm at a loss as to how we can move on them.

my long lead up to this is how will this report and budget recommendations help us, if at all, to be able to retain the budget and the resourcing that we need to be able to take action on these recommendations? >> if i might respond to commissioner chu, i think those are all very fair points. i think our ability to accomplish what we envision will absolutely be impacted by the availability of resources to do that work, and when those resources become available to us. we know expedited hiring means we could have authority to fill positions, you know, sooner than we're actually able to have seats in the jobs, and we have on-boarding and training when people are in those roles to give them the knowledge and the skills and the tools to accomplish that work.

that takes time. i think it's fair to say at the same time that the d.l.a. audit report gives us a further path on the kind of work that we need to do when we are able to get those resources. so yes on the one hand i think the sequencing and the timetables that are provided as recommendations in the report may not be achievable depending on the budget resources that we have and when we're able to actually have bodies in seats. with that said, the work that we need to do i think will be very helpfully shaped by the insights and the recommendations that this report contain so that we do do that type of work as we can move forward. >> and maybe just as a more practical question, and perhaps the commissioner, given his experience, has a little more insight into this, but how impactful will this audit and report and recommendations be on the board of supervisors in terms of their consideration of

our budget? if there is the request from the commission saying we want to do an ethics-at-work program in order to address the significant training needs given the significant allegations against multiple members of city departments, and now the dla itself has conducted a thorough review and is making recommendations that training needs to be done. will this have an impact? i mean, will that help us get the funds? i know that some -- i don't mean to put you on the spot, commissioner bush, in terms of, you know, committing in any way, but i'm just trying to understand, you know, can this materially and in a very real sense help us get the budget dollars that we're going to need to be able to make significant headway against the work? and i appreciate the comment that of course we are going to continue to do this work, but

being understaffed and under-resourced necessarily curtails the impact and progress that we can make. >> you were lucky for a minute there. so let me say that i think that the impact of the report to seize issues on the agenda but not to solve the question of how to fund them. i think that there are some things that were not included in either the report or the response that point us in a direction to better handle some of the issues that were raised. for example, the backlog in complaints and how fast they are resolved. there's really not a good guide with people filing complaints to let them know that there are other places where complaints are referred.

so for example, in past elections we have seen people put up political posts in buses and on public transportation, but those don't get really -- as i understand it, mr. pierce will know the answer to that. those don't get handled by ethics. they get referred over to m.t.a. because there's a specific provision in the m.t.a. thing about political postings on public transportation. same thing about advertisements include a uniformed officer, either police or fire, in an ad. they get referred to those departments and not to ethics. so to the extent that you can let people who are filing complaints know that we will be referring this on to other departments, you can reduce some of the incoming level of complaints, and that could be particularly important going into november, because there are going to be so many campaigns and so many questions raised.

so that's one thing. the second thing that i didn't see addressed is what other training resources funds are available, and i mentioned to the director pellam that i had come across at d.h.r. the information on implicit bias training, and it turns out that there is a requirement for many city employees to take that training and that there was an mou with the m.e.a. that provides for funding to reimburse the fees for that training, and in the same way there's training by them on sex harassment. and it raised the question in my mind as to whether or not there shouldn't be similar training on form 700. why wouldn't that be similar to any of the other kinds of training that employees have to undergo? and if so, is there a sufficient

funding in those departments to provide that training? or at least to provide some funding to ethics so that we provide it under a contract to them? i think that's something worth exploring. and the third thing is on form 700, which is a big ticket item in terms of renewing this. i believe that there's a basis for cost sharing from the department that are transferring paper filings to electronic filings with oversight by ethics. i think that director pellam identified something like 3600 single filings that have to go into electronic filings. i did a quick back of the envelope check with city departments, and three departments alone account for a thousand of those. and they are departments that

have their own revenue. they are not coming from the general fund, but the airport, for example, or c.u.c., and where they have other funding that's not going to come out of the general fund. had a talk with a prior head, and he said it's not unusual at all for there to be a cost-sharing arrangement between departments and those agencies. he mentioned the airport, public health and p.u.c. i hope i haven't just put him straight on to the curb by telling a story about that, but it seems to me that those are three levels to go back to the commissioner's question about ways to do it and this is -- this provides guidance on that, it does not, but it does provide

an agenda and a priority and it gives the door opening for us to explore some of these other options, whether the funding that's already allocated for d.h.r. for their training purposes, whether it's funding from departments that have now paying for the paper filings but no longer will have to pay for a staffer to do that, will no longer have to pay for a file setup, that will transfer all of that to our costs, i don't see why the cost with the transfer of the duties, and then thirdly slimming down the kind of complaints that get filed with ethics. like if it's going to go on to m.t.a. or if it's going to go on to the police or somewhere else, where we have enough experience with those complaints coming in, we know this is going to be the pattern. you can certainly put up a guide

to the people wanting to hold government accountable for its actions about where to take those questions. so it's not a complete answer, but it moves us forward, and what it does if we do that is tell the board of supervisors, yes, we will be part of the solution. we're not just throwing up our hands and saying we can't be done. we can be part of the solution, and here are some of the ways we can go about it. thank you. >> thank you. i would just interrupt for a second because i see that commissioner smith has dropped off my screen. i'm just wondering if maybe she is in the panellist queue waiting for the monitor to invite her back in. can you just check there? >> yes, chair ambrose. i did check. i have been checking periodically. jared is behind the scenes and trying to -- i think he got a message saying they are attempting to re-start. >> okay, all right. i just want to make sure that we

aren't just leaving her standing by. thank you very much. and so i'm going to go -- i can go back to commissioner chu if you had -- no, you're good? okay. then i'm going to invite commissioner lee to please provide comments and questions. >> thank you, madam chair. going back to the whistle-blower recommendation, i'm glad to hear staff is reaching out to other -- to the agencies for -- and other colleagues around the state for training because it is true that labor and employment law is a very unique field, but i would recommend that the staff

in addition to working with the city families to reach out to the private sector, because those as well programs whistle-blower investigation, protection, it's so complex and unique that it would be a good way for the staff to get a perspective from both sides so that when you work with potential complainants that you will be well versed in both sides of the law. so i don't know if the budget would allow you to do that, but i think a lot of the programs put up by a.b.a. and other folk, but i would certainly recommend that you seek out the private

sector training as well. >> okay. if it's okay, then, i just had a quick couple of comments. one, commissioner chu, you had asked about the process. i just wanted to be -- have the director explain the d.l.a. report was issued, but typically my understanding is there will be a government hearing, a government audit once the board has an opportunity to calendar that, and that will be then a chance for the department to both answer questions from the board and also speak to what we're going to do in light of the recommendations. i don't know if you have any information about when that might be clealendarecalendared,

assuming it will be in the next few weeks or so. >> that is a process described, to expect that the committee would have a hearing on it, and it would be an opportunity to go provide any further comment on it. i don't know when that will be scheduled for. i do know that the board is deep in the midst of some of the budget hearings right now, so as soon as we know something more about the time frame, we will certainly let you know. >> mm-hm, okay. and then my comment i can follow up with staff direct ly, i do think that in the face of the city's budget crunch, the fact that it seems that some of the represented groups in the city are conceding that they have to forego salary, negotiated salary increases in light of the $1.7

billion budget shortfall, that we shouldn't hold out a lot of hope that we're going to get an increase in our budget this year. i think that the staff has been working really hard to hold on to what we have already, but i also think that what staff has been explaining about working with other departments in the city and reaching out to people taking advantage of whatever existing resources there are with respect to training while the commissioner was talking about in terms of trying to seek funding from departments that are not as vulnerable to general fund revenue losses is also important. one of the things that i noted when i was waiting for the budget hearing to start at the board on wednesday for the

ethics commission, i listen to the comptroller's budget presentation, and he was very clear about how successful their office had been in moving their budget needs from the general fund to other departments, through work orders. the controllers may be a resource for us. they can help us explain or understand how he managed to get the departments to fund functions of the controller, because that's exactly what i think commissioners are saying we need to look at. we're a wholly funded general fund department, and if there were functions that we're performing that are to the advantage of departments that have other sources of funds, we need to try and see if they will share some of that with us.

and lastly on the whistle-blower issue, i am really concerned about the fact that we have seen from the controllers report on the public works department that both the controller and the city's attorney office has something like a fivefold increase in whistle-blower calls in the face of the investigation and corruption investigations, and that means that there's a lot of people out there in this city workforce who are putting themselves forward and potentially at risk for retaliation, and i want to make sure that when you're looking at how you are allocating your stack resources going forward and you're reaching out to the other departments, i realize they are all very preliminary, they haven't come to the department yet, there haven't

been times, presumably, even for people to be retaliated against yet, but with that kind of groundswell of engagement with the whistle-blower program, we need to be prepared for that. so i just want to put that bug in your ear. at some point later i'll ask you how that's showing up in the inbox, okay? and then lastly one of the things they did say is they should we should have that public, the six penalty policy back in january of 2021. but just from a pure procedural point of view, i want to try and keep -- start putting together sort of a forward agenda so that we can have meaningful and measured commission meetings on a monthly basis. as you go through the report and

make conscious decisions about after you know how much staff you're going to have about what deadlines you can meet and which ones you can't for commissioner chu's note that there's a good number of them that they want to see done by december and so forth. if you can bring that back to us as part of your executive director's report, like where do you think you are relative to their recommended deadlines, i think that would be helpful for ourselves to keep in our mind what everybody else thinks we should be doing. so thank you for that. >> can i make, chair, a couple of brief responses to some of the comments of commissioners and the questions. in our next item on the agenda, in the budget, we will walk through in a detailed way what information we did use from the report in our budget presentation on wednesday. so the analysis of the report was made public on monday, but we did want to highlight that

information in our budget presentation on wednesday to the appropriations committee, so we'll talk about that. it's in agenda seven, a bit more, as to how we might look to new funding models and give us a better chance at having sustained funding that can accomplish this work, one of the things that has also been a challenge historically is not having had a finance admin budget person to help create sales opportunities and sustain those opportunities because it won't happen in isolation. we need to work it, right? one of the things that operationally we did, just as a point of information, is with our structure this year as i reported last month, we have -- our deputy director is back from leave. she's assumed the role of chief operating officer because we know we need to designate some capacity internally, even with funding levels and staffing levels to focus on enabling

those conversations and ideas and to be pursued in real time. i just wanted to point that out as a reminder that we know that's going to take some resources and we have shifted things around internally to make that conversation and that issue much more at the top of our agenda so that we can really pursue some innovative funding models that other departments seem to do quite well. >> mm-hm. >> thank you. >> excuse me, chair. i do want to inform you all that unfortunately commissioner smith has experienced a power outage in her area, but she is on the phone line and she will be remained unmuted throughout the process on the phone line. >> all right. thank you for that. appreciate her efforts to stay online. i see your hand coming, commissioner lee, and then commissioner chu. so commissioner lee, did you want to -- >> yes. i just wanted to make one

comment as you mentioned the whistle-blower program, just one more comment. i think that san francisco is really unique compared to other bay area counties and state commission offices, because our workforce is more diverse because of people of communities from color and other first-generation san franciscans. so the traditional knowledge of what the whistle-blower program is, it's relatively new, it represents certain certainty, so i would really encourage the staff to keep that in mind when you're going through the training, the education and the outreach when you design -- not design but when you conduct investigations because those are the key areas that we have seen

that might have impeded workers from stepping forward. >> thank you for that comment. commissioner chu, you have a comment? >> i just wanted to make one final comment. i do appreciate that there is a significant budget shortfall of $1.7 billion for the city budget due to the ongoing global pandemic. but i also want to point out that we are continuing to learn about the unprecedented corruption not just the actions that have been alleged to have been taken by city officials, but also the culture that enabled it and that in this time of crisis, this is the opportunity for the board of supervisors and the city, as well as the mayor, to show the

residents and the citizens of san francisco what is important because when things are going great and we have a lot of resources, lots of things can be done, but it's when resources are constrained and the times are tough that it becomes a true measure oaf what a city and the people think are important, and i think that's residents and the citizens of san francisco deserve better than what they've been getting in terms of the public contracting and the significant allegations against city officials and the violation of that public trust and that the bla report plays out a very clear road map and priorities for what the ethics commission can do to address those shortcomings. and i think it would be a big

missed opportunity and really unforgiveable if the city does not do more to address and fund the solutions that are not just being recommended by the ethics commission but have been -- are being recommended by the bla audit and report, and that this is an opportunity for the board of supervisors, you know, and the mayor to say corruption will not stand in san francisco. like, the allegations that have come to light are not acceptable and that we are going to create a different kind of culture. we are going to create programs and training so that people know what to do and know that this kind of behavior is wrong, and if we don't do that, i think that we all lose, and i think it sends a message that it's okay, and because we have this other -- you know, not insignificant global pandemic that's going on, but we do have money. it's not that we don't have money. we do have money in the budget.

we just have less of it, and so what are those priorities that are really important and that you have to invest in in order to build public trust that what this city takes government and accountable government and transparent government seriously, and the way that you do that is by putting resources into it. it's not enough to have the service and to say this is not okay, this is not okay, but we're not going to fund training. so i feel pretty strongly about this and just wanted to note that for the record. thank you. >> thank you. i do think that executive director pellam did a good job at -- i don't know who else had a chance to watch that, but we can talk about that a little bit more on the next agenda item. we're waiting for -- oh, i'm sorry. i was going to call for public comment, but first i'll call for

commissioner bush to have his hand recognized. >> am i unmuted now? >> yes. >> i want to associate myself with commissioner chu's remarks. i can't help but think of the image of being unable to take the burglar alarm while the burglar is down there rifling through the family silver and taking it out of your drawers. that's what's going on. we are making a choice, and the choice is we are okay at being open to being robbed constantly, and the people who are being robbed are the taxpayers of the city because we're overpaying on rigged contracts, and we have policies that have chosen to ignore that. this is one anecdote. we had a fellow who was a city contractor for a number of contracts who was indicted by the federal government for bid rigging. and while he was under indictment he was awarded a new

contract by a city agency. and when i called to say why are you giving this guy a contract when he's just been given a criminal indictment, they said, well, he hasn't been convicted. he's only been indicted. well, i think that the new policy closes that door a little bit, but it's after the facts. if you take a look at something like mohammed naru and his form 700 filings, [indiscernible] on his form 700 filing that he was chair of the transportation agency that oversees that new facility, and that's where he was wheeling and dealing and getting payoffs to give contracts. wasn't even on his form 700. why wasn't it on his form 700? who knows, but why wasn't it checked? because we don't have the money to do audits of the form 700s. so you have to -- you know, you pace your money and you take your choice, and in our case,

we're not paying the money, and the choice is to let them get away with it. i'm finished my little rant. >> no, i think we all share your fervour on these issues. i also think we need to reach out wherever we can to get the resources because of exactly what you're saying, what we need to do is important, and one way or the other we need to see what we can do to get it done. i am going to -- unless -- i don't know, can i ask if commissioner smith has any comment by phone? >> thank you, madam chair. no, i don't have -- i've been listening intently, but i don't have any comments. i certainly agree with the concerns expressed by both commissioner bush and commissioner chu. thank you. >> thank you. and then now moderator can we

see if we have public comment on this item. >> thank you. madam chair, we are checking to see if there are callers in the queue. for those already on hold, please continue to wait until the system indicates you have been unmuted. we are currently on agenda no. 6. if you have not already done so, please press star 3 to the added to the public comment queue. you will have three minutes to provide your public comment, six minutes if you are online with an interpreter. you will hear a bell go off when you have 30 seconds remaining.

we are continuing to see if there are any calls. madam chair, there are no callers in the queue. >> oh, okay. i'm actually -- if everyone is okay with it, i'd like to just take a five-minute break before we pick up with agenda item 7, the budget. if that is suitable, we'll be back online in five minutes. is that okay? all right. thank you. number seven. discussion of ethics commission annual budget as proposed by the mayor's office for fiscal year

2021-22. [indiscernible] themselves. is that commissioner -- i'm sorry, executive director pellam, are you ready to present along with mr. massey? >> yes. >> thank you. >> thank you, chair. i'm going to just do a quick recap of where we are procedurally for the commission and those listening to the meeting. steven massey, who is our acting chief operating officer, and also serves regularly as our director of technology services, has been stepping in in a major way to assist us with this budget process. so as a recap, you know that the board of supervisors this week began their departmental hearings on the proposed budget for fy21 and fy22. it presents a $3.7 billion budget for the coming fy21, and

for our office there are some changes from what we had anticipated from the 10% cut exercise that everybody was required to do in june. i'll leave those details to steven to cover with you. but we presented our information to the committee, the board committee on wednesday morning. you may recall that the city right now is operating on essentially an interim budget. prior to the actual end of the fiscal year 20, the city adopted an interim measure that would provide funding between now and october 1 when the new budget will be in place for fy21. so oddly, even though we are now in fy21 which starts july 31 and goes to june 30, the budget that was under discussion is what the budget from october 1 through june 30 will look like, and also in the city's normal course, presents the budget for fy22, a year from now as well. you will also recall that even

though we talk about an fy22 budget in this context, because that's the way the mayor's office and the city -- the board adopts a budget, we still need to go as departments, most of us, back through the budget process that starts typically in february. so when we start -- essentially we're in a year-round budgeting process. in october the budget is put to rest and know for certain what our resources are, early in the year, in february, we will come to you with a proposed budget for 22. this is the same for most departments. with that, i think i will pause here and ask steven massey to join us and share information about what the mayor's proposed budget for the commission looks like with her issuance of the proposed city budget on july 31, and then also with the feedback

and information that we've provided of the budget and appropriations committee on wednesday morning. >> good morning, commissioners. i'm going to start the slide presentation. give me one moment. are you all able to see the slides? yes, i can. >> okay, thank you. >> so i want to take about 10 to 15 minutes to review the slides that are presented to the board. to get you up to speed with where we stand at this point and then to open it up for questions. let's start with the second slide here. so as you know, in february

prior to the shelter in place, the commission submitted a budget that requested an additional $1.8 million in annual and continuing spending. as the economic situation changed over the past few years, the city's fiscal outlook has changed considerably. the commission was asked to submit a revised budget request with 10% cuts to the base budget in fiscal year 21 with a 5% contingency cut and a 15% cut to the base budget in fiscal year 22. after the commission complied with that request, the mayor's office revised the cuts down from the initial 10% starting point and the table on the slide here shows the final mayor's proposed budget that was sent to the board of supervisors budget and appropriations committee for consideration. so in fiscal year 21, the commission loses one-time funding in salaries and materials and supplies, which results in roughly a 3% cut from the operating budget that was available in fiscal year 20. but it's also roughly no change from the commission's base

budget. this also adjusts the commission's attrition target, which requires a certain amount of salary taperings each year. this target was increased in fiscal year 21 to salaries that are equivalent to 2.41 positions. i'll talk about how we plan to achieve that in a minute. in fiscal year 22, the mayor is proposing to restore the 3% cut and increase funding roughly over 6%. however, the fiscal year 22 budget remains a target in the subject to the normal budget negotiations that happen each year starting in february. sorry? >> may i ask a question about the salary savings? i'm sorry, you're on mute. >> there we go. yes, please. i actually think given the amount of material, clarifying questions or comments, let's all

plan on asking them as the material is presented. please go ahead. >> steven, thank you. my question was on salary savings. are those salary savings in addition to what the commission is already saving in terms of salaries because we don't hire on -- you know, we have to a protected hiring process and we have the salaries and is the amount that's identified here going to be in addition to those current amounts? >> so if positions are left vacant due to delays in hiring, that would satisfy the salary savings requirement. the problem comes in to planning long term as the fiscal year goes along you don't want to be caught in a situation where you don't have the funds to pay filled positions. so that becomes the difficult thing to manage throughout the year. >> right, and then because positions are budgeted at 0.75 salary for the first year but

you have a full one rate the following year, is that also reflected in these numbers? >> that is normally how it works, and this year it's slightly different due to the interim budget. so many new positions will start as a 0.5, and they can't start until january. >> i see. okay, thank you. >> so as at the board of supervisors meeting on wednesday, the warning was the current year budget will need to be actively managed in assumptions in the budget don't pan out. so this could result in cuts mid ye year. so one of the issues that director pellam highlighted for the board is that even though the budget authorizes up to 24 employees, after attrition and ongoing difficulties with getting hiring assistance from the department of human resources, and ongoing disaster service work being conducted by

commission employees, [indiscernible] is considerably constrained. so in the audit division here, the audit supervisor position is currently vacant and has been vacant for about a year. the mayor has implemented a hiring freeze, and in addition one auditor is on extended disaster service work through december. so this leaves two of the four audit positions available. those resources have been completely reallocated to implementing the public financing program and requires that further audits and program improvements, in addition to any kinds of new -- be on hold to 2021. we have essentially funding for 0.5 fte, and that leaves a position vacant for the first half of the fiscal year. and then over in the policy division, one of the two positions remains vacant. this will constrain our capacity to do effective policy analysis

and legislative development, which is especially difficult during a time when the controller's office is issuing findings based on their investigation of the corruption scandal at the public works department. the proposed budget will also green light hiring the 1822 policy analysts but also not until january 2021. so that leaves the position vacant for the first half of the fiscal year, and we only have funding for a 0.5 fte. >> steven, i have another clarifying question. so if hiring is authorized as of january 2021, does that mean that the commission cannot start the hiring process until january 2021 or that we could begin the hiring process because it does take 160 days, we could begin it in the fall but it can only make -- we can only make an offer or have an effective start date in january of 2021? >> correct. so we can only make an offer for a start date effective january 1. we can probably start the process shortly after october 1

when the budget is approved, but the hiring process in the city, as has been discussed in the audit report from the budget and legislative analysts, it takes quite a long time to go through the hiring process in the city. >> right. >> and a lot of this will also depend on whether the position is filled as a sort of temporary hire or civil service hire. >> i see. okay, thank you. >> so let's move on to the enforcement division. so in the enforcement division, one 1822 investigator position remains vacant, and another 1823 trainer is on extended disaster work through 2020. we foresee this impacting the timeliness of investigations and case resolutions. it also delays progress on updating and further strengthening enforcement

policies and practices. if we -- sorry? >> i'm sorry. i'm backtracking because i didn't get myself recognized. >> i'm sorry. i can't see your hand in my -- i moved you all out of the way so i could read this chart. please, go ahead. >> do you want me to go back, commissioner bush? >> no, i want to ask a question about what you just said, about if the hiring process is extended so it takes a long time to get somebody on board. what would happen if you, instead of hiring people, did a contract to the fttc for august? because they do have legal authority, which they didn't used to have, to undertake that for local governments using the local government's law about what's required. so if you instead had money for a one-time contract, could we

get the audit thing going faster? >> i have not looked into that, so i can't really answer that question now. >> commissioner busch, if i might just jump in briefly, i would suspect that the city's contracting processes that are quite complex as well, that would probably not take a less amount of time, but we could certainly look into that to see what the time frames have been when other jurisdictions have done that. >> if you could look into it, it would be -- give us more information to make a decision about how to move this forward. thank you. >> okay, so coming back to the enforcement division, if we fill the audit and policy positions that i discussed, then we will have a salary shortfall, and so for the investigator position, so it will need to remain vacant through june of 2022 to meet the

attrition savings target. and then in the electronic disclosure and data analysis division, the division has three permanent positions and one limited project position. the 1042 information systems engineer, and that was funded by a project that was sponsored by the committee on information technology in fiscal year 20. the position was eliminated on july 1, and at that time the commission's budget office did not authorize continuing the position. in the most recent proposal, the mayor's budget office proposes reinstating the position but not until january 2021. the impact of this is that there will be a six-month gap without the information systems engineer position on staff. and while i'm discussing -- oh, is there a question? >> i'm not sure. i'm not muted. i just want to make sure i understand this because this really ties into the whole form

700. so you have four ftes. you have funding for those ftes going forward or you're losing one going forward if the board doesn't re-authorize? >> so we had four in last fiscal year, and one of those positions was limited to a one-year term, and in the original february budget submission we had proposed continuing that one project-based position. >> okay. >> when the hiring freeze went in place, the mayor's office no longer authorized any position -- they considered it to be a new position, so they would not authorize it to continue, and the position was eliminated on -- after june 30, at the end of the fiscal year.

in this coming budget, right now we have three ftes, and the mayor's office is proposing to bring that position back but only at a 0.5fte so we could hire it effective january 1, 2021. >> and so was there somebody in that job? so it was just a position but you didn't have somebody in that job on a temporary basis? we had -- >> i can get into a lot more detail about this. we had a 1053 i.s. business analyst position that was recently vacated before the shelter in place, and we had an employee in the i.s. engineer position that was eliminated, but he was able to apply for the i.s. business analyst position, so we were able to retain him, but now we're down one position.

>> okay. all right. >> i have a question, steven. >> sure. >> with the position 1042 being filled in january 2021, does this mean that the planned launch of the e-filing of the form 700s to go on track or would that also be delayed because the person cannot start until january? >> it would be delayed. maybe it would help if i gave just sort of the background of the form 700 and where we stand with that. that might help give some context. it's been impacted throughout this budget process. so just remind everyone, the commission currently provides an online system via net file for elected officials, board and commission members and department heads that file form 700 with the ethics commission to file electronically. and the recent regulation that the commission approved would

expand use of the system to roughly 35, 3600 designated city employee filers that currently file on paper with their department filing officers. so prior to the shelter in place, that project was under way. so in addition to approving the regulation, staff had recently completelied a lengthy feet and confer process with their collective bargaining units, and they are now on board with the electronic filing of the form 700, and we are also doing extensive outreach to departments. the engagement compliance staff were also beginning the process to develop the training and the outreach material. staff had and still have sufficient non-personnel funds from the committee on information technology to purchase all the necessary licenses and materials and supplies for the project. the project dependency problem that needs to be discussed is almost entirely on the staff

resources side. so one of the outcomes of the meet and confer process and meetings for the departments was the feedback that the ethics commission needed a dedicated support for filers and the filing officers that will be administering the system for their department. the customer service role will be the commission's front-line telephone and online support for the system, and in february staff requested an 1840 e-filing customer service position for the project as a three-year limited term position from the committee on information technology through their budget process, and that request was denied. in addition, the project is going to require a technology lead to migrate the data from the city's h.r. system to the net file system to get employees set up with their filing account. >> why isn't this being paid for by the departments? >> it's not -- >> they are the ones who are supposed to be filing it. they have been filing it for

years in paper. they have been paying a staffer to handle that. they have been paying for filings and storage. now it's going to come to us but none of the dollars that they have been spending are going to come to us? that's not right. >> right. i agree. >> i agree. >> so to give a little background on this, the committee on information technology originally was funding both the position side of this and the non-personnel side of bringing up this project, and really the question of the ongoing way that we were going to fund this project, whether this was going to be funded through the ethics commission's budget or funded by other departments really was something that could be put off for about two years. now we have a problem due to this budget season on the staffing side, and yes, that's not to say that's not a possible solution, but that's -- at least not where we stand at the moment with the budget negotiations.

>> even in this document that we're looking at now of the budget impacts, you're saying that we're not going to have form 700s filed until january of 2022. >> correct. >> that's really too long. i don't think that's at all acceptable. and i don't think that it's because of us. i think it's because the resources are not traveling with the job. >> i don't disagree with you, commissioner. >> let me just jump in here. i want to make sure we're really clear about this. if you even assuming that you could get more money from the other department, what i thought i just heard you say is we don't

have a body in a chair to create the net file accounts for the 3500 people putting aside the customer service e-filing contact person, which is one position that we don't have, you're also saying just logistically you don't have somebody who can take all of the contacts for all the 3500 plus people who are paper filing to create net file accounts for them so that they are ready to file april. if you had the money tomorrow, would you be able to move somebody into the position to do that preliminary work? >> at this point, it would be very tight to pull off the project because we're already in august. ideally we would have had all of these accounts set up in the

september to october time frame, and we're fast approaching that. and it -- i don't see a path where we can bring on a person in that kind of time frame. >> because i think what all the commissioners are saying and what we're certainly hearing from the controller is a recommendation as well is that there's urgency around bringing all of that data to light, and i -- so let me ask you on that front, is it possible to do a -- i'm just going to call it a pilot program. can we take public works and department of building inspections staff and move them

online as a first initiative so that we can start to bring that information in to the, you know, public domain? >> that's -- i mean, it's something i can discuss with the staff. i mean, it will require a little bit of planning outside of this meeting. >> right, i'm not asking you -- i think what we're all struggling with is -- wasn't clear from our discussion in july, at least it wasn't clear to me, that the time that we've lost was going to specifically put us back a whole year. i mean, you know, it's like the idea that we're going to bring somebody on in january and -- but the deadline is a year and three months later. we're really losing the benefit of that position. i guess just to get my other comments in, you know, one of

the things i'm looking at is not only the resources that we need anew in this budget allocation, but there is a point where i think we really need to look hard at this disaster service work, you know, assignment issue as it impacts the ethics commission going back for commissioner chu's comments about the difficult situation that we find ourselves in with these corruption revelations, notwithstanding that we're also dealing with a once in a hundred years pandemic, and i really do honor and appreciate the responsibility that our staff have taken on with service workers, but if you're looking at our audit division where we have these budget and legislative analysts and our own

internal conclusion that we are unable to do even what the charter requires us to do, and now we're down two staff people, and as you pointed out, because they share responsibility for the public financing program along with the other program, whatever time we have available for existing staff is going to be focused on getting through the november election. so we literally are going to lose six whole months of our entire staff on audits, and that -- you know, from a compliance and enforcement point of view, that's just -- you know, that's the message, that it's more important to have these folks because they are very capable doing, yes, very important work, but maybe it's time to have that conversation with the mayor's office and with the h.r. about, you know, seeking resources from departments that are much, much

larger and better able to handle the last half of an entire division. but anyway, those are my thoughts at the moment. i do want to allow mr. massey to get back to putting the facts in front of us. if there's something immediate, i'll take comment. otherwise, i'm going to give the floor back to either commissioner -- i mean either director pellam or mr. massey. >> i'd like to make one comment, if i can. >> okay. >> i'm going directly from executive director pellam's report under impacts of items not of [indiscernible], and the very last column says without taking steps now to provide team lead supervisors and managers in the city's workforce with the tools to support the practical applications of ethics [indiscernible] in their day-to-day work, corrupt practices will continue to go

unchecked and the city will miss a vital opportunity to create and sustain the right tone at the top. now if we're an ethics putting out a statement that says corrupt practices will continue to go unchecked, that ought to set off alarms across all of city departments. >> certainly [indiscernible]. >> i think that's a headline. >> well, and certainly not funding the efforts that are needed to check those corrupt practices also sends a message. we don't -- we don't have resources now, and the resources that we're asking for are unavailable to us or are not being allocated in a crisis. >> exactly. >> and this is clearly with the -- with the board of supervisors, and that to the commissioner's point earlier, what they're saying is that it's okay. it's okay that we don't fund the ethics commission.

and the work that's needed to check corruption. [please stand by] (indiscernible).

>> somebody -- [distorted audio] >> i'm sorry. i thought that i was getting reconnected but apparently i'm causing a problem. so i'll back out. >> okay, so we'd like to at this point [distorted audio] >> somebody is really bad. [distorted audio]

>> let's see if we can improve this problem. everyone mute themselves. >> i don't think that it is my audio. can you hear me? >> yes, i can hear you. >> it's my cellphone again. can you all hear me and am i no longer creating a problem? >> yes, commission, that is much better. >> sorry for that problem. >> if we can go back to mr. massey. >> sure. let me give you more context to this engineer position. so that position was actually being tied to this project, and

it was responsible for all of the commission's data systems, and the contractor band disclosure forms that are filed with the board and the mayor's office, the website. and most importantly developing and updating the commission's finance dashboards and data. so with this continuation of that position and the election coming up, we felt that it was critical to maintain those core finance resources, the website and other data systems as opposed to bringing in new systems online. so we actually because we had a vacancy in the 1053 information business analyst position, and the 1042 position was being eliminated, we actually would have only been down to two f.t.e.s in the technology division. and so we were going to have some systems that would be unsupported by any staff. so the reason that we were able to fill that 1053 position is

that we did communicate this to the mayor's budget office and the h.r. and they allowed us to expeditiously fill that 1053 position so we would have three on staff. it still doesn't satisfy the need for the form 700 project. so if we look at these four divisions that i have been talking about and we come back to the attrition savings issue in some -- so if we have the six-month hiring delays for the policy position and audit supervisor. so we keep those as .5 f.t.e. and don't hire them until january 2021, and we keep the investigator positions vacant, and we freeze hiring of any temp staff for two years, we'll be able to meet the attrition savings target for 2021, and

2022. now if i could take a moment and discuss how this budget is -- whether this budget is in alignment with the various reports that have been coming out. so because the controller's june 29th report, recommendations, were available for review by the mayor's budget office before the mayor's proposal was finalized, the mayor's office was able to restore positions required to deliver on three other recommendations in the report. but the work cannot commence until january 2021 at the earliest under their proposal. so, one, this includes the project which we talked about. so they are providing a new position, the 1840 customer support specialist, but not until january 2021. and they're bringing back the i.s. engineer, but not until 2021. and they also recommended that we conduct annual compliance reviews. this is related to reviewing 4700s. it also authorizes hiring the

1824 audit supervisor which would be needed to do that kind of a review. but, again, it's not effective until january 2021. and the report also recommends an examination of gift loopholes. this work on top of the commission's existing priorities is going to require more than one person at the helm. and the budget proposal does include authorizing filling that position even during this hiring freeze, but, again, not until january 2021. and they also have provided an increase to the commission's d.h.r. work order budget. and that will effectively allow us to have the support of a .5 f. t.e. analyst with h.r. to help with hiring and in the subsequent year to have a full-time analyst to be in h.r. now on the b.l.a. audit, it's not completely in alignment, it's something that we're still reviewing, but two things to note here. one of the recommendations about

expediting the approval or the request to fill vacant positions, again, we have to keep that 1822 investigator position vacant. and, in addition, there was the recommendation to establish and to formalize sufficient training for the audit enforcement staff for the same time that the budget is cutting over half of our training budget in both fiscal years. so the committee director pellam asked the board to reduce the commission's attrition target so we could hire the vacant 1822 investigator position. this requires the attrition targets to be reduced by 75,000 in fiscal year 2021, and 150,000 in fiscal year 2022. staff has reached out to the mayor's office after the committee's meeting and we plan to meet in the coming days to reach an agreement on the attrition savings target. in addition, director pellam

addressed the commission's proposal to establish a ethical training program for city employees. this proposal was originally made in the commission's february budget but it is not included in the commission's revised budget proposal because the proposal requires a mandatory 10% cut to the base operating budget when it's made. so director pellam raised this issue for the committee. and i think that at this point maybe it would be a good idea to stop there and see if there are further questions or other areas that the commissioners would like to look into as far as this budget. >> i'm going to ask a quick procedural question. so from a timing point of view, you have the initial committee hearing with the board on the 12th. and just to be clear, unlike the scripted protocol where the department is expected to smile,

you know, willingly when the mayor makes a recommendation, i think that the director and the department made the case that this commission has been insisting on that more was required. and so now you're having a follow-up meeting i gather with the mayor and the budget staff, that's what you're referring to here? >> correct. >> and will you go back to committee at the board, or does this all roll over to meeting of the whole of the board of supervisors for disposition of the entire city budget? >> at this time we're not scheduled for follow-up with the budget and appropriations committee. it would go to the full board. >> because, you know, the budget hearing -- as i was listening, i did hear particularly supervisor ronen expressing her view that the positions needed to be funded at the ethics commission. but i also heard chair fewer say we're not really in the mode of

asking the departments what they need. we're asking departments what they can give up. and it left me with the impression that they were going to have another meeting to find out what departments really want of it. i gather though that's not the case. that what the board -- the chair of the budget committee, anyway be, was saying. in any event, they did seem to say that there would be an opportunity for the board to take up ad backs. so you're having a meeting with the mayor's office. is there any outreach to the members of the board to see if they support you with ad backs to the mayor's budget? i'll let pellam respond. >> at this point i think that is a very good suggestion, chair ambrose. the original scheduling of the board's budget and the

appropriations committee made very clear that there were certain departments that had one hearing and will not have a second hearing before the committee. there's no reason that we cannot ask to reach out individually, but also just to ask for a second hearing. we'll know more hopefully after our conversation with the mayor's budget office on tuesday of next week when we have a chance to meet with them. i think that one of the things that was notable on wednesday's discussion before the committee is that there was very little, if any, questioning about the need for an ethics at work program. it seemed that supervisor ronen mentioned the need to have an investigator on staff with the commission, particularly at this time, but we have not really seen a lot of questions or -- and i don't know that i can read that as interest -- but we haven't had questions about the need for supporting city officials and workers with stronger ethics training by establishing an ethics training team in our office. so we certainly could reach out

and ask for additional consideration by the board. >> chair ambrose: and i don't presume to do your job, i mean, in terms of your -- how you connect with and inform, you know, if not the supervisors themselves, but their legislative aides. and it's been a while since i've been in the budget process mix. i'm just -- i want to make sure that everybody understands that we are in the middle of the process. we haven't been turned down and we are very much at the point where applying pressure is whatever everybody else is doing right now, trying to keep their needs at the top of everyone's recollection. you know, at least up to the point where they don't stop listening to us. so i just wanted to know how -- how much opportunity you thought that you had for that. and i guess that my sense is

that we don't need another public hearing at the board. my sense is that we need to pick a couple of the supervisors who are on the budget committee or otherwise previously expressed some sympathy, whether it was in saying that we don't need a public advocate because the ethics commission just needs to be fixed or so on. i mean, hopefully those are people that in the overall scheme of things as the commissioner was pointing out, we're a drop in the bucket. i mean, the money is there, not -- not aplenty, but it is conceivable that these things could be supported, whether it's by work order from another revenue stream or directly, and whether it's short term or with promises to look at it again after we see how things go next year. so, anyway, that's my two cents and i'll let the commissioner

bush speak because he's waving his hand at me and then commissioner chiu. >> commissioner bush: i want to say that i concur with chair ambrose's view of what chair fewer was saying, which is that there should be another chance to revisit these issues. rather than to just accept that they were. i would also say that my experience is that if you can show officials that you are not presenting something new but, rather, implementing something that was always part of our mission, that you will be more successful. people are cautious about adopting something new like ethics at work looks like it's new. in fact, it's not new. if you go back and look at the 1993 charter that was passed by the voters, it required that the ethics commission establish a manual, that it establish annual training for all top city officials on ethics.

all of the things that are in ethics at work are spelled out specifically, not in general terms, but specifically in the 1993 charter. so i would suggest that you revisit that and that you also share that with the people who will be making decisions, including the mayor's office. there was a revision of the charter later on. but that revision did not repeal these provisions. those provisions still are part of the law. >> chair ambrose: okay, commissioner chiu? >> commissioner chiu: i would like to emphasize that not only -- not only is it required by law, but it hasn't been done. but here's the opportunity to meet that need and to demonstrate to the people of san francisco that they take compliance and corruption very seriously. and i would also suggest that we

rely on the findings of the b.l.a. audit. so it's not just what the ethics commission wants, it's also contained in the numerous recommendations, you know, identified in the highest priority coming out of the controller's department that these resources be deployed in that manner. so i would be very much in support of going back and communicating with, you know, the committee or whoever the executive director and others would deem the appropriate audience to make our case. >> chair ambrose: okay. and if there aren't any further comments from the commissioners, i'm going to go back to mr. massey. did you have further slide presentations? >> no, that completes the update that i planned to give the

commission. >> chair ambrose: all right. so then i'm going to go back to director pellam for any remarks and comments. and then one more walk through and we'll go to public comment and we'll wrap up with commissioner comments. >> i have no -- nothing of substance to add. i think that the feed back that you all provided about next steps and the reminder to reach out to the board is something that we will definitely pursue and follow-up with you as needed, chair ambrose. but we will keep you in the loop and make every effort to make our case as much as we can. >> chair ambrose: great. so our meeting in september -- if you can get back to us on the dates, i just -- so we meet in september on -- >> i believe that it's the 11th. >> chair ambrose: on the 11th. and i don't know what the schedule is for the board but i would like to know that when it will be on the budget if they have forecast those days so we

know that we can talk more about how we might continue to weigh in. with that, moderator, if all could please see if we have any public commenters in the queue. >> clerk: madam chair, we are checking to see if there are callers on the queue. for those already on hold, wait until the system indicates that you have been unmuted. if you have joined this meeting we are taking public comment on agenda item 7 as proposed by the mayor's office for the school year 2020-2021, and 2021-2022. if you have not already done so, press star 3 to be added to the public comment queue. you will have three minutes to provide your public comment, six minutes if you are online with an interpreter. you will hear a bell go off when you have 30 seconds remaining. madam chair, we have one caller so far on the queue.

>> chair ambrose: thank you. >> clerk: give me one second. i do apologize. hello, caller. your three minutes begins now. >> caller: yes, good morning again. this is dr. garrett curr. your funding mechanism means that you're not independent. because you're beholden to the people who approve your budget. year after year you have to bow and scrape before the very same people that you are monitoring for misconduct. it's hard to bite the hand that feeds you. so this system inhibits your ability to investigate high

level officials at city hall. one solution is to get an automatic portion of the budget, much like the controller's city services auditor. they get i think 0.2% of the budget every year and they don't have to seek approval from anybody. ethics could get 0.1% of the budget every year. i realize this would require a change in the charter, but it would make you independent and would restore public confidence in your ability to reduce corruption in the city. thank you very much. >> chair ambrose: thank you very much for your comment. any other commenters in the queue? >> clerk: i am checking, chai chair.

chair, there are no more callers. >> chair ambrose: okay. i first of all want to say please anticipate that the budget will be back on the calendar in september depending on the dates when the board is going to act. hopefully -- well, i don't know -- hopefully we'll get what we asked for and we'll be celebrating. in any event, we will have an opportunity to discuss where we're at the that time and how we're going to go forward. i also would like to in that context because i believe that

we're going to also have our policy prioritization plan on for discussion. i want to talk in the context of both of those things about performance metrics and how, you know, we'll set goals for ourselves as part of that. this is my personal pitch. i really do want to look at the least pulling some sub-set of form 700 filers online, if we can't get the whole 3,500 up and running as a test pilot. i just think that waiting an entire another year before we bring that information forward, and also just that level of attention to the seriousness with which the city takes the responsibility of these

high-level decisionmakers in city government to be thoughtful and thorough in their disclosure of their relationships and financial interests. and i think that there's going to be considerable attention paid once they realize that that information is not sitting locked away in some secretary's filing cabinet. so if we can't do all of them because we don't have the positions, i want you to at least look at your allocations. and then the other thing is that i do want to come back on the d.s.w., i don't know who we talk to in city government. and i totally understand why they love the staff because they've got the kind of, you know, computer writing, you

know, spreadsheet capabilities that are probably really useful at the emergency operation center. but i do want them to recognize, you know, how much, you know, taking the number of staff people that you provided affects a department as small as, you know, the ethics commission department. so, anyway, those are my two themes. and now i'm going to ask if other commissioners have comments and suggestions before we close out this item. everyone said their piece? commissioner smith, is there anything that you wanted to say on the phone? >> commissioner smith: well, i will only say that this experience of being connected by phone only proves the adage, one picture is worth a thousand words. because i did feel handicapped

by not being able to see mr. massey's power presentation, but that wasn't anybody's fault, other than the power failure in my building. so i am -- i did find that my colleague, co-commissioners' analyses and comments very helpful, but i don't feel equipped, frankly, to say anything in addition to that other than that i'm sorry this happened. >> chair ambrose: well, i'm sorry for you too, on the hottest day of the year so far in san francisco and not having your power is not a good thing. so hopefully they get you back online soon. and then i am then going to i guess -- i didn't actually now -- i will close public comment. and i will move on and call agenda number 8 which would be two pages on. agenda item 8, discussion of the monthly staff policy report.

and if any members of the public are up for public comment for this item they should dial in now and enter star 3, to be added to the public comment queue. before we hear public comment though i'm going to ask pat ford for his presentation. commissioners, if you can hold your questions and comments until we hear from mr. ford and the public just to move through this item in light of my overall deadline. thank you. >> thank you, chair ambrose. this is pat ford, the legislative affairs counsel. i will be quick and i know that we're in a bit of a time crunch. i think that you can see from this month's policy report and also you have heard from director pellam that there are a number of overarching issues and projects that have really consumed a lot of us in the office over the last couple of

months between the ongoing budget discussions, the b.l.a. audit, and also we've been working with the controller's office to help to give them feedback on the reports that office is doing. that's really occupied a lot of my time and a lot of the time of others in the office, as i'm sure that you have heard and will continue to hear. so that's really what this report is about, is focusing on those. and really just making myself available for comment and i'll just end it there. >> chair ambrose: commissioner chiu. >> commissioner chiu: thank you, chair ambrose. mr. ford, i just have a quick question about the public ballot measure. do you have any more context around why the board of supervisors decided to not place that measure on the november 2020 ballot?

>> yes, i do, from watching the meeting where that vote took place. it was a close vote, it was 6 opposed and 5 for placing the measure on the ballot. so it failed by one vote. and i heard a few things from those who voted against placing the measure on the ballot, but i think that the two most common themes were, one, that it was not an appropriate time to create a new office in the department, considering the financial situation of the city. and, two, that there are already mechanisms and entities in the city that are responsible for doing what the public advocate was envisioned to do and the ethics commission was one of those entities that was discussed. and they also talked about controller's office and the city's attorney office but they did mention us and they said we have an ethics commission and they're supposed to already be

be looking for corruption and enforcing against corruption and so let's stick with what we have. so hopefully that means that there's also some energy like we've bettewewe've been talkingh the budget to power to us do that work. >> commissioner chiu: i would hope that the funds that would have otherwise gone to support and resource this new public advocacy position will be theoretically directed into the ethics commission. but thank you for that update. that is helpful. >> chair ambrose: commissioner bush. >> commissioner bush: i also listened to that and the ballot measure would not have come into effect for two years. it will take quite a while to get going. secondly, it did include whistleblower provisions. but those provisions were a10uateed by a variety of restrictions as to how they got

handled. and i went on to the controller's web page to read their whistleblower report.

>> people ask for this to be funded and that's what george did when he was district attorney.

>> i think at the latest meeting

of the policy subcommittee which is where this project is taking place and they just now generalized their calendar of how they'll be undertaking the project and so they're still at an earlier stage and honestly, i don't know how broad the project will be. but i will gladly keep you up to date on what i'm learning and i definitely will be sharing what our experience has been and i think one interesting vignette is that the commission had with the acao and the payment revisions that law and what we were doing with that provision and why it was ultimately not a pardon of the ordinancpart of t. some of the things you've spoken to, hopefully, we'll be talking about that next month, as well, when thele policy prioritization plan is on the agenda and i will

be recommending that we do a conflict of interest project. mostly in response to the correction investigations that are ongoing and i think it could definitely incorporate some of the things you're highlighting right now, commissioner bush. >> i would underscore looking at incompatible activities as they're listed by each department. the planning department, for example, allows commissioners to raise money for nonprofits that have business before the planning commission. >> i realize that you have been on the frontlines, as it were

with the work, remote as it was, it was hands-on and answering questions for the budget and legislative analyst and i want to make a point to commend the staff in that. i have seen a lot of harry rose's reports over the years and in many respects, it was a very helpful report, but it also reflected that they respected the cooperation of the staff and providing information and engaging with them in a positive way as opposed to what can sometimes happen where departments become defensive and try and hide the ball. and i just want to thank you all for the efforts that all put into inform and educate and just answer all of the many questions that i'm sure you all have had to deal with. so thank you for that.

we do have the discussion and the public advocate and we do have allies in the city attorney's office and the controller's office and the district attorney's office, especially with the new district attorney's office. and, frankly, probably, in dhr and in some of the personnel who were lucky to have their own staff and from that kind of liaisonning where you're probably the one in the department that's most connected

to other departments, maybe also the enforcement division. i just want to encourage as much as possible, given how difficult it is with everybody not being at city hall, you know, to reach out and see what other departments are doing in response to the corruption investigation and the revelations that are coming out and what their experience is and their budget review and whether or not we're going to have the kind of support that we might be able to look to from the controller's office or city attorney or d.a.

>> it's very helpful in past policy projects. >> ok, and maybe, then, at that time, we'll talk about what other -- because i know commissioner bush you've been bringing this to my attention. if we can in september plan to talk about what we might do to engage in outreach for funding

to not just to brennan but to other organizations. i asked for the city attorney e prepared to explain to us what it means to solicit, receive, process through the city budget our finances, but in light of the time that we have for remaining items, i was actually, think, it might be better to put that on for september. so andrew, if you can be prepared to educate us all about what it means to solicit, seek and obtain funding from outside sources and by september, too, we'll know how we did with the city and what our missing pieces are. >> yes, good afternoon, everyone. and i'm happy to address that in september, yes. >> thank you so much. i just realized notwithstanding

we would take public comment before the commissioners jumped in, i'm sure we jumped in before we asked for public comment and so, mr. moderator, can you please let us know if there are any public commenters on item number eight? >> madam chair, we will check to see if there are callers in the queue. for those. on hold, please continue to wait until the system indicates you have bun muted un-muted. we are on agenda item eight.

>> madam chair, there are no callers. >> chair: then i'll close public comment on agenda item eight and call number nine and that would be the discussion of the monthly staff enforcement report. if there are any members of the public that intend to offer public comment for this item, they can dial in now and enter star three to be added to the public comment queue. but first, we're going to hear from mr. pearce and commissioners, i'll ask that we hold our questions and comments until we hear from the public sl stop for a second since, obviously, that's not the way we proceeded before.

if you would prefer, we can do questions to mr. pearce as his presentation unfolds and then after discussion, then we can ask for public comment if that's the way you would report proceed. so anyone who wants public comment first, raise their hand.

>> we had a conversation about how our respective offices might collaborate on ethic's related matters and within the other constitutional protections and you will remember, mr. gollinger, as a highly motivated advocate before the ethic's commission. and my report also notes that like our engagement with mr. nollinger, we meet in the controller's office and district attorney's office and to commissioner bush's point about what the overall role of the commission is, vis-a-vis these other accountability departments, i believe those

relationships are strong and healthy and that we have developed useful ways of sharing information triaging. apart from that, i guess i would note only a couple of things from the bla or sorry the bureau of delinquent revenue. there was a call with several staff members from the bureau earlier this month regarding the bureau row's approach to collections at this time and the bureau has effectively paused their collection efforts in light of the economic downturn that has resulted from the pandemic. the during, i think, more recently is going to resume some of those collection efforts, but adopting a somewhat softer

approach. they will not be filing small claims actions in superior court. so in the report where you see the status listed as tend to mail small claims final demand, what that means is that the bureau will not be sending those letters until the bureau can effectively file a small claim's matter.

>> i understand there will be greater collaboration but does this mean from a practical standpoint, you'll have more visibility and insight into investigation holds that the ethic's commission places on matters that are being referred in order for the district attorney in order to pursue its own investigation? >> i don't 100% understand the structure and i could be wrong but i don't believe mr. gollinger is in the white collar division where our counterparts have generally been or these collaborative efforts on overlapping jurisdiction. i think he's in the special investigation's team. that having been said, he certainly has access to them and speaks with his counterparts in

the white collar division routinely and has offered increased communication between our office and that division wherever he can be helpful and so, i can't predict in the long-run what it means practically and i'll have to legislator a little biexplore wr understand what role they envision mr. gollinger might play. >> you're muted, chair. >> chair: commissioner bush. >> thank you. when you've done this grade of the various complaints, can you add to that i think it would be

i think at one point, the commission, the ethic's commission adopted a policy that after a certain period of time, they could be undertaken by the commission itself that the attorney or district attorney didn't take action and i don't know if it was 30 days or 60 days or however long that was. with that, in sending that to some departments, like to mta or the police department, they're sending it to a department that is overseen by political appointees and that might make someone who has filed a complaint concerned that it's being swept aside for political purposes. and so it would seem prudent to have anything that was referred to by political appointees referred back to ethics with a

conclusion about what they did rather than simply have it disappear. for example, the complaint that was originally against mohamed gahru for sex harassments and failing to act was sent to his supervisor, which was at that time the way the. cpolicy workedand the supervisog with it. >> we could look to data pending and explore ways of reporting that. to your question about referrals to about the departments headed

about appointees and i believe article four, the protection ordinance empowers the commission to require from those departments a response about what steps they may have taken with respect to any referral. what i'm less certain of is that the reason that we make those referrals is that we lack jurisdiction to pursue them ourselves. and although we could, in theory, we could receive reports, we wouldn't have wherewithall to require them to do anything. so if no report comes back or if the report comes back, and we disagree with the outcome because we lack jurisdiction, i'm not sure that it's a different outcome but i'm happy to consult with the city attorney. >> if we don't have the authority and we should and the conclusion by the commission we

should have authority, let's say a president, any president that just bears the name, re-elect the posters in all of the post offices and don't count on vote by mail. >> commissioner lee or commissioner smith, any comments? no.

>> then i'll ask the moderator to see if there are callers. >> for those on hold, please kate until the system indicates you have been un-muted. if you are just joining this meeting we are on item number nine, discussion of monthly staff enforcement reports. if you have not already done so, please press star three to be added to the queue. you will have three minutes to provide public comments and six minutes if you are online with an interpreter. bylaw.

madam chair, we have no callers in the queue. madam chair, can you hear me? >> chair: i un-muted. with that, public comment is closed and thank you very much, mr. pearce, and we will proceed with agenda item number ten, discussion of director's report and update of various operational highlights about the ethic's commission staff committees since the previous meeting. director palin. >> a brief report this month

since most of the items have been addressed in the earlier agenda items, bla, audit, reference of the public committee, as was the budget report that steven matthew presented to you. the only highlight i would add from this report at this time is the public financing program. since the commission last met in july, we had, i think, at that time, candidates running for the supervisor rates on the november 2022020 ballot had received $200 in public financing at that point in time and since the last meeting, we have had six more candidates qualify to receive public financing in connection with their campaigns in november and that brings us now to 59% of the candidates who stated their interest in participanting and 59% have been called to receive public funds and as of

august 7th, our staff had candidated received $1.66 million, over a million and a half dollars in qualified in distributions to candidates who agreed to participate and certified to be eligible for november. and i would also add just one last note about our audit that we now have all but one of the publically financed candidates from 2018. their audit work has been completed and their audits will be posted in the coming days on our website and we have one audit remaining outstanding and as soon as that is finalized, we will make sure to get that out to the committees and to the public. lastly, we do list in this report from the form 700 annual filing deadline extended this year to june 1st because of the covid emergency. there were 18 filings to file

electronically either their form 700 statements -- they were required to file their form 700 statements or a certificate of having completed ethic's and sunshine training as required, 18 individuals who have that requirement this year have not filed one or the other and they is been receiving non-filing notices from our office as a reminder they do have the filing obligation. we also have notified them if they are a board and commission member currently of the no-file, no-vote that prevents them from taking action on items on their meeting agendas and we've sent this informa, attorne attorney'o the board can be advised and keep people from acting when they are not eligible to act. and we are also communicating with them.

we have another 90-day notice -- 30, 60 and 90-day notice and we'll be asking them to file and after 90 days, that's a standard practise to refer those on as needed. and so i just wanted to provide that highlight for you as that is undoubtedly a question of how we're handling late filers. and we had 96% filing for the 700's this year which is notable, i think, by all filers, given that we were in a pandemic environment and i'm sure a lot of the officials had their focus elsewhere. we wanted to provide this list of those who had not at this point.

>> just briefly, i have contacted colleagues who advised about the commissions and alerted them to this non-filer issue and they are working with the commission secretaries to get people's filings on with the

ethic's commission. and i would have to be honest, at this point i'm not sure to what extent the commissions did participate, despite the non-filing status and i suspect many of the people have left city service or have not been to city meetings. and i'm not sure to what extent they have been participating. >> if they had not filed, what would the legal consequences be of the decisions? >> so the legal consequence of it would be any potential, would notify their appointing authority of that issue, as well. the appointing authority could choose to address that with their appointee or commissioner and likewise, there's potential commissioner from office. >> even if they attempted to

vote, the vote wouldn't count and i would be curious if they could count towards a quorum and no reason to speculate, i guess, if that specific issue hasn't arisen. but clearly, their vote wouldn't count if they were prohibited from voting. some i'm not sure if that's entirely clear. >> it's not clear to me that they've not been participating despite any status. >> well, keep us apprized if they continue to not file and otherwise -- >> i have a question about the form 700 we're talking about here. my understanding that the penalty, financial penalty, non-filing is ten dollars a day.

>> let's say once we get to a point of compliance, somebody misfiled or didn't fully disclose, you're saying they're subject to an enforcement action by both the fppc and san francisco or one or the other has jurisdiction over san francisco filers? if you could clarify that for me. >> what i meant, it was the process that the fppc implements

of late fee oppose the one hand and pu.as a practical matter, be they know we might assert that jurisdiction, the fppc would check with us before they did. >> thank you. i was just curious whether or not they fully de delegated stae low to local jurisdiction or shared jurisdiction. >> it's not a matter of the delegation but of what local law provides for it. >> ok.

>> madam chair, there are no callers in the queue. >> chair: thank you, mr. moderator. public comment is closed on agent item ten and i'll call item 11 and discussion. i'm sorry, i didn't ask commissioner smith, i'm assuming you didn't have any comments because you didn't jump in. >> you're correct. >> madam chair, i would have spoken up. >> chair: thank you very much. eleven is the discussion and possible action on items for future meetings and, again, if any member of the publicken teno offer comment, dial in now to be added to the public comment queue.

can any of my commissioners, if you want to raise your hand if you have -- if you want to identify matters for future meetings and i see two hands from commission chu and commissioner bush. you're going to take your hand down and commissioner bush, then, please. >> what about working groups because we have so much that we're handling. and we only meet once a month. and so would it be possible for a commissioner or two commissioners that have not reached a three-commissioner threshold to confer with each other.

i hear nothing and that must be ok, right? >> i would actually ask -- and i talked to you about this. i like the idea of having substantive matters, you know, being informed b by looking into things. but there are complications about officially establishing committees or specifically delegating as opposed to informally accepting, you know, recommendations from commissioners. of course, two commissioner can talk without representing a quorum and triggering various

notice requirements. i'll ask deputy city attorney shen to explain the rules from the sunshine ordinance about officially delegated committees so that we all understand what would be involved and how we might best approach this. >> just very briefly, this is not a prohibition, if the commission wants to take this route. if there are any committees or subcommittees, any such constituted committees would be subject to brown act notice in public meeting requirements. it would have to post agendas, provide 72 hours in advanc advaf the meeting. so just something for everyone to keep in mind. >> and that's if -- when you say committee or subcommittee, it doesn't matter db -- obviouslyf

there's a quorum, it would be for a regular meeting but if we were to say two people get together and work on acts, that would also make that committee almost like a board committee, also subject to notice agenda and internet meeting, protocol. >> and that's a good comparison chair. similar to the board's rule's committee. when they get together and let's than a quorum, they're separated to meet the requirement. >> uh-huh. but if on the other hand, if commissioner lee and i have a conversation about what we want on the agenda for september, that's not a quorum or a meeting. and we could come back and say

we talked and we both think that we should keep meetings to four hours, right, commissioner lee? [ laughter ] >> yoonce we have our work

sources, we know what we'll need to fill in for any missing link and that might be a good time to decide what that was and whether or not there are the resources to support another agenda notice and public hearing process. and i hear you. there is a lot of work to do and if we needed to do it that way, we have that option as andrew said. they're just protocols, not a question of not being allowed to meet that way. >> as i understand it, if we were to formally create a working group -- >> if i say it as the chair or

executive director pellham asks people to meet in that fashion, i'm pretty sure that is what triggers a. cy body formation under the sunshine ordinance. and i think maybe we lost -- no, andrew is still there. and andrew, is that correct? it's the manner in which the group is created? >> that's correct. it's really if the commission is taking some kind of action to create the committee. >> i'm not even sure it's the commission. i'm pretty sure that if the chair does it, but i can't remember. i used to have it memorized. >> in any event, we will bring that back on september when we're doing all of the forward-looking work and that's one of the things that we'll look at. well, i just wanted to put that

parameters around what that would entail so that we understand what that means to do that as opposed to maybe having volunteers or something. >> and i'm thinking in terms of a specific picture of it, like if we were to discuss commissioners doing fundraising outside of the commission process. >> they would have provided

enough information together to be a resource library of where you could go to obtain additional funding. >> i asked the executive director in september to speak to what is involved in soliciting outside funds? in my mine mind, because i've processed a lot of grant funding applications for departments over the years, there is something specific, a deliverable that's associated with eliciting support to from outside agencies and there's usually a contract and usually an indemnity clause to say you won't sue the san francisco association while in a car accident working on the project. there are protocols around that and i wanted as a part of that,

i know you're just using it by a way of example, it's something that we've discussed and enticing certainly in the circumstances we find ourselves. and in september, and i will work with you, director pelham, to try to structure the agenda so that these things all come together in some manner in which we have the knowledge for purposes of the discussion, we'll talk about what's involved in terms the city process for getting outside funding support.

we need look at whether in today's worlds those groups should be viewed, unless they're providing services to those communities but not simply acting on behalf of an issue. like the national rifle association is a nonprofit.

should they be a lobby to make sure that we have stores that can still sell the guns? we can certainly argue that could be listed that way. >> chair: to make sure i understand, as a you substantive matter, this would be something we're looking at legislatively -- >> so we're supposed to do at least one lobby audit a year. >> chair: maybe director pelhao presume what you're going to bring forward to staff in september under the policy prioritization plan. but if you heard the issue that commissioner bush raised and you are able to get feedback or comment or some discussion about topic, i think is appropriate

and we're not going to substantively know because it's not on the agenda, accept for to raise it for future discussions. if you are concluding your remarks and i don't see any hands about new business, i'll ask themonitor to see if we have any public comment on this agenda item. >> madamadam chair, we're checkg to see.

madam chair, no comments in the queue. >> chair: then public comment is closed on item number 11 and item 12, additional opportunities for public comment on matters appearing or not appearing on the agenda pursuant to ethic's commission bylaws article seven, section two, members of the public who are already on the line and wish to speak should now dial star

three. if you've not done so to be added to the public comment line. mr. moderator, would you please proceed with public comment, if there are any public speakers on the line. >> we're now checking to see if we have callers in the queue.

please stand by. >> chair: , there are no callers in the queue. madam chair, there are no callers in the queue. >> chair: public comment is closed on agenda item 12 and we're on agenda 13 which is adjournment. commissioners, can i have a motion to ajourn the meeting. >> so moved. >> seconded from commissioner bush and on the motion moved and seconded to ajourn the meeting,

moderator, will you please call the role. (role call). >> chair: thank you all for meeting my time. and i look forward to our very busy meeting in september and i wish you, staff, all the best and we're available and on standby to support you as we get through the budget process and then certainly let us know when you see something scheduled for government audit on the bla report. know myself and maybe some of the other commissioners may want

to observe and call in. thank you again. you all have a nice weekend. >> e leadership of the department of public health flattened the curve in san francisco. the steps we have taken together

have saved lives. one of the reasons the city acted so quickly so early was to not overburden our health care systems. as the state of california and bay area counties have begun to gradually reopen, we are seeing some troubling signs. we have a seven day average of ninety eight new cases per day. our demand for acute care for covid positive patients has goan

each week. today dr. and i are announcing the establishment of our first low acuity medical site. located a 163. it will open with twenty patients. it's not expected to treat covid positive patients. when i starred this i facility i was truly impressed at the first rate medical facility.

the city's ability to confront covid 19 depends on our ability to care for those with all manner of conditions. sprained angels to heart attacks. other ailments are not stopping just because of the pandemic. opening this facility will shore up our ability for the hospitals to treat covid 19. it is not a drop in acute care site testing location or shelter. please do not visit this

location if you are seeking any of those services sm as the district two supervisor i would be remiss to not note the response to local emergencies. we're an incredible resource and i'm grateful for the partnership with press i hapartnershipwith.a

>> good mark morning. i'm director of health. thank you for your support during this unprecedented time. today like if everyday, i check the number of patient patients h covid 19. unfortunately that number is higher than ever before and continues to climb. that number dropped to just 26 patients six weeks ago. today, it's one hundred and seven. of those one quarter are very sick and in intensive care. across the city we have more

than six thousand cases of covid 19. and look, it took us thirty eight days to go from two thousand to three thousand cases. of half as long to go from three thousand to four thousand. in just ten days we went from five thousand to six thousand cases of covid 19. let me be clear, we are in a major surge of covid 19. the virus is moving fast and more people are getting seriously ill. if things continue, we estimate we'll have more than 750 san franciscans in the hospital by

october. plausible worst case scenarios put us at twenty four hundred hospitalizations and eighteen hundred deaths. these scenarios unfortunately become more likely as each day goes by with the current trend. today, fortunately all patients are getting world class treatment from the most caring professionals sm we wisals. we still have capacity to care for patients. it is good news that our health care system has not yet been overwhelmed as we saw in new

york. many are contributing to that by staying home, avoiding gathering, covering your faces when go ting out, washing your hands sm you are preventing more illness and spread and keep our health care system functioning. our city must prepare for this surge. how many people-that puts us in the red zone of one of our key health indicators. we've been there for over a month. it's extremely sobering that we

reached this point. it's extremely concerning. our reopening remains on pause. the main reason we joined the watch list was because of our rapidly growing rates. our goal is to keep the increase to less than 10%. since january the health department has been planning and preparing for covid 19. we built up the capacity of our health care system. we added testing sites a sites.

today supervisor stephanie announced, we're creating a care site that we hope we will not need. it's located in the presidio but will serve all san franciscans. it will serve patients who no longer need acute care but are not ready to go home. they would have medical medical supervision and care from staff.

i hope this day won't come. we hope our hospitals will never need to open the relief that this site represents. that depends on you. all of us. please. please wear a mask. it's really not that hard. i want to see san francisco open schools instead of medical sites. we want to see houses of worship open their doors. sit in their favorite barbers chair. hug our grand children again. we can make that happen. we still have time to turn this around. if we want those things we can't take chances and hope this virus

is not as infectious as the data and facts tell us it is. everyone needs to behave as though each of us has covid 19. think about that. we know half as many doap don'te symptoms at some period. be careful. every time you wear a mask, socially distance. wash your hands. avoid gatherings. you're moving closer to the day we can live more like we did

before march. everyday you take a risk you move us farther away from that day. we can prove testimon works aga. covering our faces may be the most important. on friday san francisco updated the orders. everyone over the age of ten should wear a face covering. if you're alone in a space that people might use later, cover your face. if you're handling food for other face, cover your face.

basically, cover your face. if you're passing someone on the sidewalk, your face must be covered. other things we must do. washing our hand hands, stayingx feet apart. if you are meeting. meet out side if you can. of course, please you must stay home if you can. short of the vaccine or cure of covid 19 these are the most effective interventions that we have available to us. they work if we take them up and practice these behaviors everyday. you can do this. it's up to us to flatten the curve again. thank you.

>> thank you doctor and thank you supervisor stephanie for your time. we'll begin the q and a portion of this meeting. we have a variety of questions for dr. co lfax. the first question is from the associated press. we haven't seen the devastation in the homeless communities. why do you think that is? >> i think it's a number of factors that so far have helped us avoid worse case scenarios with people experiencing homelessness, we took action

early on with our partners and support of housing and with our community seven is agency part mere ins. ensuring that best practices were rapidly a applied. people had the materials necessary to reduce the spread. other key interventions that we did is make available hundreds of hotel rooms so people experiencing c homelessness were able to shelter in place. over thirty five hundred people have been placed in those hotel rooms. we've done a lot of out reach work on the street. providing hygiene. we had an intense clinical team

that provided health care for people before the pandemic. this team has been working around the clocke clock to ensue people get the best care. it's a variety of actions that we've taken to avoid some of the outcomes we've seen in other jurisdictions. >> thank you, doctor. the next set of questions are from ab c seven. face shields should be worn in addition to face masks. do you for se for see this beina

requirement. >> the most important thing is that we ensure in public that everyone is wearing a face covering if they are over ten years of age. we've been very clear that protecting our health care workers is key. >> how close is san francisco to getting off the watch list? >> we continue to see increases above the 50% hospitalization rates. i can't speculate on how soon. we are in a major surge here and anticipating on average seven hundred fifty in the hospital by

october. if we're on and off the watch list what is key is we work to flatten the curve and recommit ourselves. we did it before and we can do it again. it's going to take the whole community to make this work. >> are social gatherings the major reason for the surge. >> it's a major ko contributor. people should not be using testing to determine whether they should gather. if someone is infected, the

virus is extremely contagious. they are contributing to this increase. if you go to a gathering and somebody has the virus and is going to transmit it. we have to understand that with more virus in the community you saw how quickly we went from four thousand to five thousand tcases. please, please don't gather. >> we have a handful of questions about san francisco issuing fines on people who

don't wear masks in public. >> we've been emphasizing the needs of these masks and the social distancing as we continue to emif i if emphasize. we're schorrin exploring how wey increase enforcement particularly in situations where requirements that are very clear are not being followed. this would be enforced following

up with businesses an other situations where people gather. we're working with communities for voluntary compliance. we're looking at increasing enforcement. in regards to the press ci the . who is paying for it and who will staff it? >> the city is funding the site. it will be staff by health departments and u c sf

providers. we'll take care of 93 patients. m>> what has it historically ben used for and is it prepared to accept patients. >> it will depend on the capacity of our hospitalization across the city. if there's a need to move people out of the hospital quickly and make room for covid 19 patients. i can't speculate on the past use of the site. >> thank you for your time today

that conclawed concludes the prs conference. for additional questions please e-mail.

my name is doctor ellen moffett, i am an assistant medical examiner for the city and county of san francisco. i perform autopsy, review medical records and write reports. also integrate other sorts of testing data to determine cause and manner of death. i have been here at this facility since i moved here in november, and previous to that at the old facility. i was worried when we moved here that because this building is so much larger that i wouldn't see people every day. i would miss my personal interactions with the other employees, but that hasn't been the case.

this building is very nice. we have lovely autopsy tables and i do get to go upstairs and down stairs several times a day to see everyone else i work with. we have a bond like any other group of employees that work for a specific agency in san francisco. we work closely on each case to determine the best cause of death, and we also interact with family members of the diseased. that brings us closer together also. >> i am an investigator two at the office of the chief until examiner in san francisco. as an investigator here i investigate all manners of death that come through our jurisdiction. i go to the field interview police officers, detectives, family members, physicians, anyone who might be involved with the death. additionally i take any property with the deceased individual and take care and custody of that. i maintain the chain and custody

for court purposes if that becomes an issue later and notify next of kin and make any additional follow up phone callsness with that particular death. i am dealing with people at the worst possible time in their lives delivering the worst news they could get. i work with the family to help them through the grieving process. >> i am ricky moore, a clerk at the san francisco medical examiner's office. i assist the pathology and toxicology and investigative team around work close with the families, loved ones and funeral establishment. >> i started at the old facility. the building was old, vintage. we had issues with plumbing and things like that. i had a tiny desk. i feet very happy to be here in

the new digs where i actually have room to do my work. >> i am sue pairing, the toxicologist supervisor. we test for alcohol, drugs and poisons and biological substances. i oversee all of the lab operations. the forensic operation here we perform the toxicology testing for the human performance and the case in the city of san francisco. we collect evidence at the scene. a woman was killed after a robbery homicide, and the dna collected from the zip ties she was bound with ended up being a cold hit to the suspect. that was the only investigative link collecting the scene to the suspect. it is nice to get the feedback. we do a lot of work and you don't hear the result. once in a while you heard it had

an impact on somebody. you can bring justice to what happened. we are able to take what we due to the next level. many of our counterparts in other states, cities or countries don't have the resources and don't have the beautiful building and the equipmentness to really advance what we are doing. >> sometimes we go to court. whoever is on call may be called out of the office to go to various portions of the city to investigate suspicious deaths. we do whatever we can to get our job done. >> when we think that a case has a natural cause of death and it turns out to be another natural cause of death. unexpected findings are fun. >> i have a prior background in law enforcement. i was a police officer for 8

years. i handled homicides and suicides. i had been around death investigation type scenes. as a police officer we only handled minimal components then it was turned over to the coroner or the detective division. i am intrigued with those types of calls. i wondered why someone died. i have an extremely supportive family. older children say, mom, how was your day. i can give minor details and i have an amazing spouse always willing to listen to any and all details of my day. without that it would be really hard to deal with the negative components of this job. >> being i am a native of san francisco and grew up in the community. i come across that a lot where i may know a loved one coming from the back way or a loved one

seeking answers for their deceased. there are a lot of cases where i may feel affected by it. if from is a child involved or things like that. i try to not bring it home and not let it affect me. when i tell people i work at the medical examiners office. whawhat do you do? the autopsy? i deal with the a with the enou- with the administrative and the families. >> most of the time work here is very enjoyable. >> after i started working with dead people, i had just gotten married and one night i woke up in a cold sweat. i thought there was somebody dead? my bed. i rolled over and poked the body. sure enough, it was my husband

who grumbled and went back to sleep. this job does have lingering effects. in terms of why did you want to go into this? i loved science growing up but i didn't want to be a doctor and didn't want to be a pharmacist. the more i learned about forensics how interested i was of the perfect combination between applied science and criminal justice. if you are interested in finding out the facts and truth seeking to find out what happened, anybody interested in that has a place in this field. >> being a woman we just need to go for it and don't let anyone fail you, you can't be. >> with regard to this position in comparison to crime dramas out there, i would say there might be some minor correlations. let's face it, we aren't hollywood, we are real world.

yes we collect evidence. we want to preserve that. we are not scanning fingerprints in the field like a hollywood television show. >> families say thank you for what you do, for me that is extremely fulfilling. somebody has to do my job. if i can make a situation that is really negative for someone more positive, then i feel like i am doing the right thing for the city of san francisco. >> coping with covid-19 with chris manning. >> hi. i'm chris manners, and you're watching coping with covid-19. my guest today is tanya peterson. she's the director of the san francisco zoo on sloat boulevard, and she's here today

to talk about how the zoo's managing during the pandemic and how they're reopening. tanya, thank you for being here. >> thank you for having me. >> i'm really pleased to hear that the zoo has reopened again. that's great news. can you tell us what changes you've made to make visitors to the zoo feel comfortable and safe when they're there. i understand now you have to make reservations, and there's only a limited number available each day. >> we were making changes before shelter in place. fortunately, because we work with animals, and we have a vet hospital on-site, we have the safe coverings before the shelter in place. while we were closed, we made some internal and external changes. the first one, i guess, would

be on-line reservations. you now need to make reservations to visit the zoo, just like your favorite dinner restaurant. that is an effort to slow down congestion. try to keep everything smooth, and we can control the number of families coming in over the course of time. >> that's great. what about the indoor exhibits and the playground. are those off limits now? >> well, they're not off limits, but the playground, we had -- we had started child care program for essential workers even when we were closed, and the playground is used exclusively by our child care programs. so if you can think of the zoo, 100 acres, about a good third of it right now is reserved for child care, so what we do is we have the -- we've got the children in their safe pods. they're with each other for three weeks. they're in a controlled environment, and in the morning, one pod has the

playground, we disinfect, and in the afternoon, another pod comes. all indoor spaces were closed before the shelter in place. the one thing i'm asked most frequently about is the train. we have a 100-year-old train, and as soon as we can disinfect that, we'll get that open, because that's the number one question i guess, when is the train reopening. >> is there a map how you're supposed to walk around the zoo? >> yes. in certain areas, we created a one-way path. we try to make it fun. they're generally in the shape of bear paws and colored -- you know, follow the blue bear paws, follow the red bear

paws -- but we've tried to make it fun. when children have not been out for three months, they were climbing anything and everything. we didn't anticipate that, so we put coverings open water fountains, statue signs. kids had been cooped up, so they went crazy the first few days. more control in place. >> that sounds great. how did the zoo's residents respond to a lack of visitors. did you observe any behavioral differences? >> absolutely. we have some shy residents, gorillas and orangs. we have a male orangutan, he

would blow me kisses. the rhinos, they would come out when i would feed them. >> how does it feel to have the zoo open again to the general public, even if it's a limited fashion? >> it feels fantastic. i'm a mother, and i know it's been hard on kids. to be able to open safely outdoors -- we're one of the few zoos on an ocean, so you've got the coastal air coming through. we see families or self-ascribed pods coming through. it's been great for our staff and for our visitors. it's been heart warming, all the true experiences the first few days. >> clearly. you have a lot of mouths to feed. how did you cope with the pandemic so far? were you able to get some

financial assistance, and how can viewers contribute if they'd like to? >> well, thank you. we received some help, but we burned through that quickly, and we received some financial donations. we burned through a lot of our funding, and we were really feeling it. all of the people who supported us and hung in there, i thank you. you can join as a member. it's a tax deduction.

david attenborough said it best. if the zoo becomes extinction, we all do. in the wild, poachers are getting the best of the wild anima animals, but i think with the help of the zoo and the community, we can save the animals. >> where can i go if i want to donate? >> you can go to sfzoo.org. you can join, become a member or make a donation. it takes about $30,000 a day to feed all of our 2,000 animals, so you can pick how you want to help. >> well, i appreciate you

coming onto the show today, miss peterson. >> thank you. the animals and i thank you from the bottom of our hearts. >> you've been watching coping with covid-19. for sfgovtv, i'm chris manners. thanks for watching. [♪]

>> i am the supervisor of district one. i am sandra lee fewer. [♪] >> i moved to the richmond district in 1950 mine. i was two years old. i moved from chinatown and we were one of the first asian families to move out here. [♪] >> when my mother decided to buy that house, nobody knew where it was. it seems so far away. for a long time, we were the only chinese family there but we started to see the areas of growth to serve a larger chinese population. the stress was storage of the

birthplace of that. my father would have to go to chinatown for dim sum and i remember one day he came home and said, there is one here now. it just started to grow very organically. it is the same thing with the russian population, which is another very large ethnic group in the richmond district. as russia started to move in, we saw more russian stores. so parts of the richmond is very concentrated with the russian community and immigrant russian community, and also a chinese immigrant community. [♪] >> i think as living here in the richmond, we really appreciate the fact that we are surrounded three natural barriers. they are beautiful barriers. the presidio which gives us so many trails to walk through, ocean beach, for families to just go to the beach and be in the pacific ocean.

we also also have a national park service. we boarded the golden gate national recreation area so there is a lot of activity to do in the summer time you see people with bonfires. but really families enjoying the beach and the pacific ocean during the rest of the time of year. [♪] >> and golden gate park where we have so many of our treasures here. we have the tea garden, the museum and the academy of sciences. not to mention the wonderful playgrounds that we have here in richmond. this is why i say the richmond is a great place for families. the theatre is a treasure in our neighborhood. it has been around for a very long time. is one of our two neighborhood theatres that we have here. i moved here when i was 1959 when i was two years old. we would always go here.

i love these neighborhood theatres. it is one of the places that has not only a landmark in the richmond district, but also in san francisco. small theatres showing one or two films. a unique -- they are unique also to the neighborhood and san francisco. >> where we are today is the heart of the richmond district. with what is unique is that it is also small businesses. there is a different retail here it is mom and pop opening up businesses. and providing for the neighborhood. this is what we love about the streets. the cora door starts on clement street and goes all the way down to the end of clement where you will see small businesses even towards 32nd. at the core of it is right here between here and 20 -- tenth avenue. when we see this variety of

stores offered here, it is very unique then of the -- any other part of san francisco. there is traditional irish music which you don't get hardly anywhere in san francisco. some places have this long legacy of serving ice cream and being a hangout for families to have a sunday afternoon ice cream. and then also, we see grocery stores. and also these restaurants that are just new here, but also thriving. [♪] >> we are seeing restaurants being switched over by hand, new owners, but what we are seeing is a vibrancy of clement street still being recaptured within new businesses that are coming in. that is a really great thing to see. i don't know when i started to shop here, but it was probably a very, very long time ago. i like to cook a lot but i like to cook chinese food. the market is the place i like to come to once a year.

once i like about the market as it is very affordable. it has fresh produce and fresh meat. also, seafood. but they also offer a large selection of condiments and sauces and noodles. a variety of rice that they have is tremendous. i don't thank you can find a variety like that anywhere else. >> hi. i am kevin wong. i am the manager. in 1989 we move from chinatown to richmond district. we have opened for a bit, over 29 years. we carry products from thailand, japan, indonesia, vietnam, singapore and india. we try to keep everything fresh daily. so a customer can get the best out a bit. >> normally during crab season in november, this is the first place i hit. because they have really just

really fresh crab. this is something my family really likes for me to make. also, from my traditional chinese food, i love to make a kale soup. they cut it to the size they really want. i am probably here once a week. i'm very familiar with the aisles and they know everyone who is a cashier -- cashier here i know when people come into a market such as this, it looks like an asian supermarkets, which it is and sometimes it can be intimidating. we don't speak the language and many of the labels are in chinese, you may not know what to buy or if it is the proper ingredients for the recipe are trying to make. i do see a lot of people here with a recipe card or sometimes with a magazine and they are looking for specific items. the staff here is very helpful. i speak very little chinese here myself. thinks that i'm not sure about, i asked the clerk his and i say is this what i need? is this what i should be making?

and they actually really helped me. they will bring me to the aisle and say this is battery. they are very knowledgeable. very friendly. i think they are here to serve not only the asian community but to serve all communities in the richmond district and in san francisco. [♪] >> what is wonderful about living here is that even though our july is a very foggy and overcast, best neighborhood, the sleepy part outside on the west side is so rich with history, but also with all the amenities that are offered. [♪]