need knowledgeable, professional leadership in the department, and i don't see a commitment to making that happen. thank you. >> thank you. is there another caller? >> no, no more callers. i will do a roll call vote of the commissioners. commissioner mccarthy? >> yes. >> vice president mar? >> yes. >> commissioner alexander tuk? >> this is the city attorney. are my options yes or no, or can i abstain? >> yes, no, or abstain are fine options. >> okay. i am abstaining. i am unhappy with the process.

>> okay. commissioner beto? >> um, yes. >> commissioner clinch? >> yes. >> commissioner jacobo? >> i'm going to have to abstain only because of the process. >> commissioner tam? >> can i make a comment before i make my vote? >> sure. >> so i definitely understand, you know -- i definitely think that president mccarthy has served the commission and has the experience and kind of guided it thus far. and i also see that the process here is, in a way,

kind of false and not what it should be. and i think, you know, elizabeth, commissioner tuk, pointed that out and kind of make that very clear. with that said, i would like to continue and put my vote in with a yes. >> okay. >> thank you. so this motion carries 5-2. so thank you. >> okay. so next item on the agenda, please? >> so we would need to do the motion for vice president. >> please call the question. >> is there a motion to nominate a vice president? >> i would like to nominate commissioner

jason tam for the vice vice presidency seat, please. >> is there a second? >> i'll second. >> so kevin seconds. so there is a motion and a second for commissioner tam for vice president. is there any public comment on this item? >> no one is on the line. >> okay. seeing none, do a -- >> sorry. henry just raised his hand. >> okay. >> henry, you have been unmuted. >> okay, great. i just want to say congratulations to commissioner mccarthy and commissioner tam. i know commissioner mccarthy has been at this a long time and is trying to do the best he can. congratulations. and to all of the commissioners on this

commission, thank you for all of your hard work. thank you. >> okay. great. thank you. so there is a motion on the table to nominate commissioner tam for vice president. and i'll do a roll call vote on this motion. president mccarthy? >> yes. >> commissioner bock? >> yes. >> commissioner alexander tuk? >> yes. >> commissioner beto? >> yes. >> commissioner clinch? >> yes. >> commissioner jacobo? >> yes. >> and commissioner tam? you have to unmute yourself. >> yes. >> okay. thank you. congratulations. this motion carries unanimously. commissioner tam is vice

president. >> and thank you, commissioners, for your comments. and i look forward to, as i said in my comments, to getting through this next year and getting some really important work done, and also congratulations to vice chair tam. >> thank you. >> next item, madam secretary. >> our next item is item 5, discussion and possible access to appoint commissioners to serve on a litigation subcommittee, and currently the members are angus mccarthy, elizabeth alexandra tuk, and john jacobo. >> if i may, madam secretary, i was really happy with the litigation committee last year. i'm throwing it out there if the same people would like to sit on it, and that was with commissioner alexander tuk and commissioner jacobo. >> are you both still willing to serve on that?

>> yes, thank you. >> okay. >> commissioner jacobo? >> oh, i think he had to step away momentarily. >> he did, but -- >> is he present? >> if you step away, you have to volunteer -- [laughter] >> i'm sure he would probably still like to serve. >> so let's just be careful on this. is it okay to vote him in if he is not there? let's check with the city attorney. >> city attorney rob capla. this is the situations of online meetings. i think commissioner

jacobo said he was still present and able to hear, but may not be able to interact. i'm not sure. but if he is truly the not in the room or unable to confirm his involvement, do we have another commissioner who can confirm as a proxy that he intends to stay on the committee? if not, i don't think we can nominate him. >> i can confirm that he is interested. >> okay. is that sufficient then, rob, because she confirmed it? >> i think it has to be the commissioner -- there are a lot of rules in this. but if it ends up that commissioner jacobo is not interested, we would have to entertain nominations at the next meeting. but i think we can take that representation.

>> okay. we have a motion to continue with the same members. and is there a second? >> second. >> okay. i'll do a roll call vote on this item. president mccarthy? >> yes. >> commissioner mar? >> yes. >> commissioner alexander tuk? >> yes. >> commissioner beto? >> yes. >> commissioner clinch? >> yes. >> commissioner jacobo with a yes. and vice president tam? >> yes. >> thank you. the motion carries unanimously. graduations. so our next item is item 6, discussion and possible election to appoint commissioners to serve on the nomination subcommittee. currently are members or sam moss and jason tam.

and there is one vacancy. so if someone would like to maybe try for that position? >> i'd like to nominate commissioner beto for this. i think it would be a good commission to sit on if she is up to it. subcommittee, excuse me. >> commissioner beto, are you interested in that? >> i'm interested. could i understand the role and responsibility of the nomination committee please? >> in general, this committee basically meets periodically. there are a lot of meetings. usually maybe twice a year to discuss appointments to the sub-committees, which the b.i.c. oversees. they oversee the board of examiners, code advisory

committee, and appeals commission. and the sub-committee didn't meet last year, but i believe we may this year if members' terms or about to expire, or if new members need to be appointed due to the current vacancies. >> okay. >> and commissioners moss or tam, do you have anything to add about that? >> nothing. >> that sounds good. >> so if we could have the same, so commissioner moss, you're good, and commissioner tam, you're good? >> yes. >> okay. >> and so we will need to do a vote on that. so we have a motion to elect commissioners tam and moss and beto. and is there a second? >> second. >> okay. thank you.

i'll do roll call, but on this motion as well. >> deputy city attorney rob capla, we should check to see if there is public comment. >> public comment -- is there public comment? >> there is no one on the line. >> okay. thank you. president mccarthy? >> yes. >> vice president moss -- i mean commissioner moss? >> yes. >> commissioner alexander tuk? >> yes. >> commissioner beto? >> we're voting on the whole three of us? >> yes. >> yes. >> you can vote for yourself. >> commissioner clinch? >> yes. >> commissioner jacobo? >> yes. >> and commissioner tam? >> yes. >> the motion carries unanimously. and commissioner jacobo, we just do the election for the litigation

sub-committee, and by proxy, commissioner alexander tuk submitted that you were still interested. is that correct? >> yes. i'm sorry i had to step away for five minutes. >> thank you very much. we're on to item number 6, discussion and possible action to appoint commissioners to serve on the nominations -- i'm sorry, that's wrong. our next item is -- where are we? i'm confused now. >> you're on "b". >> 7a, increase the staff. at this time the commissioners may increase the staff provided by this document and procedures which are ventures of the commission. >> commissioner alexander tuk, please? >> i missed it during your opening comments, but did we have an update on the vaccination question? >> we did not in my

opening comments, no. on whether our frontline workers would be considered vaccinated. >> yes. >> i will say this, madam secretary, you sent me an e-mail yesterday regarding getting tested, right? that you could -- >> yes. i've been sending out the e-mails that the department has been receiving from the department of human resources and any e-mails that we get regarding the vaccinations, all of the staff receives, and i try to forward that to all of the commissioners. >> could you get me a number, so if i wanted to get tested, i could get immediately tested. is that correct? >> yes, i did e-mail you. >> this is not answering your question, commissioner tuk, but it is leading towards it. right now you can get

immediately testing with that number. did everybody get that? and i'm sure all of the staff have that as well. that is kind of new, right? that is something that wasn't there, for sure, before. in answer to your second part of the question, in regarding to christine -- i don't know if she is on the line -- but i know we talked about it, and you were looking at some possibilities and how to frame it. sorry to put you on the spot. >> no problem. thank you, president mccarthy. i was looking at that -- [audio breaking up] >> i know there was a request made to move our inspectors up in the vaccination schedule. tarus, do you want to jump in on that? >> hello, everybody,

tarus, deputy director for the department of building inspection. we have been talking to the department of human resources. however, as everyone is aware there is actually a shortage in vaccines. and at this time, we haven't gotten any additional information. the focus is still on those who are elderly, and those in congregate settings. so at this point in time we haven't been given additional information. also, the mayor even did a citywide online presentation to all city employees, that really the tier structure is actually not determined locally. it is determined at the state level. but we will continue to follow up if more information is available. >> commissioner alexander tuk, does that answer your

question? i basically wanted to close it out. >> yes. thank you. so, um...maybe i do -- maybe this is more of a question to mr. capla. we had talked about perhaps writing a letter as a commission, to whoever the decision-making authority is at the state level, etc., and is that something we can do just under this agenda item? or is this something we did do off-line? it is definitely the will of the commission. my hope is we can do this as decision-makers on the tier level. to have our essential workers have faster access

to the vaccine, the covid-19 vaccine. is that something -- what are my options? >> deputy city attorney rob capla. the -- any commissioner can speak as an individual, but not on behalf of the entire commission. to speak on behalf of the entire commission, we would need to -- i think the best practice would be to draft that letter or to have a commissioner draft the letter, and then bring it to the commission for approval on behalf of the commission. >> i can do that for marge. thank you. >> okay. thank you commissioner tuk. so we look forward to seeing that letter from you in march then. okay. next item, madam secretary. unless there are anymore inquiries to staff. >> i do. >> yes. please go ahead, commissioner jacobo?

>> did somebody else jump in? >> i did. but you can go first. >> okay. great. this is just -- i think this is even on the thread of public comment. so, of course, there was a couple of articles that came out this week shedding light into some of the searches for the deputy director role. i just will point out that i know there is a lot of focus on g.e.d., or not a master's. for me, personally having a lot of family that are blue-collar and are incredibly brilliant, and able to do the work and some, i don't think that a master's degree denotes anymore worth than an incredible amount of experience does. i just want to put that there because i think it is important to highlight. i do not want to disparage folks who may not have gotten the formal education but have an

abundance of knowledge through their lived experience. it calls the question, at least for me, what was the role, and why was the time of it being open kind of cut short, or looked like it appeared to be short. i wanted to learn more about the hiring process. the intention behind it. was it an oversight? what was the issues that led to what appears to be a very short time, or window, if you will, for searching for a particular position. again, just to piggyback off of the diversity issue, i think we're grappling with race within our country and realizing that all of these issues of inequity are popping up in every single level. i think our numbers mirror with a lot of other departments may mirror with a lot of black and brown folks that are able to be hired and promoted into roles that carry leadership and have the ability to get the economic mobility to

folks. just, again, to reiterate, ,inquiring what the hiring process is and what public comments are made. and the second piece, which is escaping me, but i kind of remember it, was on this kind of online system, going from paper to online. i know that estelle probably gives us headaches, trying to get people to come around, or not, and the pitfalls with all of that, really trying to think through what the next steps are with that and discussing it, about what can be done with the potential online process. i'd like an update on that at some point. >> i want to circle back to you commissioner jacobo on a couple of your

comments. commissioner beto, please? if you could unmute, please. >> can you hear me now? i just wanted to tell my fellow commissioners and d.b.i., i had my tour and introduction to d.b.i. last friday. i spent about three hours with them, doing a full tour, and so i wanted to thank them for your hospitality. and also a tour of their new building, which was quite impressive. i think coming out of the pandemic will be great for the public to see that as well. i did want to make a request, though, if i could come back a again and dive a little bit deeper into -- or just talk to some -- are we allowed to talk to the deputy again and get some firsthand and talk to some -- tn particular, to the permitting department, and also to the technology. because some of the points that were raised by you,

president mccarthy, and other people -- >> yeah. the answer is yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. you can reach out and set up anything you need from the staff that you feel you wanted to get the background on. which i really recommend because it is a real problem for new commissioners, when they come in, trying to catch up and get current with what happened in the past to why some of the situations that are going on right now are. for example, commissioner jacobo's point on the estellla system. i really recommend that the commissioners go back to that meeting, agenda item 14, and the staff gave a full report on the estellla, and how it was going. and it has kind of closed the circle as to the issues that was created by it, and how the staff had to react over the years on it.

and it is called the gartna report, which is this big report, about 170 pages. if you really are wanting to understand the failures of the system, i think i would start there. and i think it would be really helpful for you. and we are also probably going to have, if needed -- i don't want to keep playing history here and rewriting the same script that has been written many times and given to us by the staff because it takes a lot of time and hours. but if they wanted a hearing on the estellla, for a streamlined outlook, just -- all you have to do is reach out to me and let me know if that is something you would like to do. with regard to commissioner's comments on the director and the qualifications, that is very close to my heart because as an immigrant to this country and didn't have higher education as all, you know, jobs like

working in the department of d.b.i. are great jobs. and, fortunately, you know, because you didn't get higher education, i do not think you should be excluded from these jobs. and they're particularly immigrant jobs. it gives a good opportunity to people who have years working in the trade, an opportunity to come in and work within the d.b.i. department and progress and climb the ranks. so i really feel strongly if you overqualify these jobs, you eliminate a lot of hard-working people who wouldn't get an opportunity to go to these jobs. and i really feel strongly about that.

>> we share those numbers. we'll share those numbers with you during the upcoming update on permits. of course, we're also processing many permits on paper. the majority of the permits we're issuing right now are in fact