2014. with structural claims and numerous name changes, many have passed through and will remember candlestick park as home to the legendary athletes and entertainment. these memorable moments will live on in a place called the stick. (♪♪♪) february 12, 2021, regular meeting of the san francisco ethics commission. commissioner chiu said, happy new year to everyone. commissioner lee will be joining us today.

but she is delayed. so we expect her to join us shortly. this meeting is being held by teleconference pursuant to the governor's executive order n-2920 and the 12th supplement to the mayoral declaration dated february 25th, 2020. before we proceed, i'd like to ask commission staff member acting as a moderator to explain procedures for the meeting. >> thank you, madam chair. the meeting reflects the covid-19 health emergency and protect commission members, city employees and public, the meeting rooms of city hall are closed. however, commission members and staff will be participated in a meeting remotely. this precaution is pursuant to the various local, state and federal orders, declarations and directives. commission members will attend the meeting through video conference and participate in the meeting in the same extent as in they were physically

present. please note today's meeting is live cable cast on www.sfgovtv/ethicslive. each member of the public will be allowed 3 minutes to speak. it's available via phone call by calling 1-415-655-0001. again, the phone number is 1-415-655-0001. access code is (187) 462-0879. again, 1874620879 followed by

the pound sign. you will hear a beep when you're connected. you will are muted in listen mode only. when your item of interest comes up, dial star 3 to raise your hand to be added to the public comment line. you'll then hear you have raised your hand to ask a question. wait until the host calls on you. the line will be silent as you wait your turn to speak. make sure you're in a quiet location. before you speak, mute the sound of equipment around you, including television, radio, or computer. it's especially important that you mute your computer if you are watching via the web link to prevent feedback and echo when you speak. when the system message says "your line has been unmuted," this is your turn to speak. you'll hear staff say welcome, caller. we encourage you to state your name clearly. as soon as you begin speaking, you will have three minutes to provide public comment. six minutes if online with an interpreter.

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 3 again. you will hear the system say you have lowered your hand. once your three minutes expired, staff will thank you and mute you. you will hear your line has been muted. again, those who wish to speak during other public comment periods may stay on the line and listen for the next public comment opportunity. raise your hand to enter their public line by pressing star 3 when their next item of interest comes up. public comment may be submitted in writing and will be shared with the commission after this meeting concluded and will be included as part of the file. written comments sent to ethics.commission@sfgov.org. thank you. >> chair ambrose: with that, i

call the meeting to order. mr. moderator, can you proceed with item one, commission roll-call. check >> clerk: commissioners please unmute your microphone. [roll-call] >> clerk: madam chair, with four members present and accounted for, you have a quorum. >> chair ambrose: thank you very much. as i said, commissioner lee will be joining us shortly. i'll make an announcement when she joins us. but i would like to go ahead and proceed with the agenda item number 2, public comment on matters appearing or not appearing on the agenda. members of the public who are on the line and wish to speak, dial star 3, if you have not done so, to be added to the public

comment line. moderator can you proceed. >> now it's public comment on agenda item number 2. as a reminder to participants in today's meeting, if you are shuffling paper, if you are -- all background noise can be heard. please mute, thank you. the ethics commission is receiving comment on item 2 remotely in this meeting. each member of the public has up to three minutes to provide comment. if you joined earlier to listen, now is the time to get on-line to speak. if you have not already, press star 3. it's important you press star 3 only once to enter the queue. as it will move you out of the public comment. once you are up in line, the system will prompt you when it's your time to speak. address your comment as a commission to the whole and not individual members. madam chair, we're checking to

see if there's callers in the queue. [silence] >> clerk: madam chair, there are no callers in the queue. >> chair ambrose: thank you very much for that. i'm going to call agenda item number 3, the consent calendar. we have the draft minutes for

the january 8th, 2021 as the commission's regular meeting. and we have a request for an amendment from one of the public participants, who communicated those edits in advance to the director. director, do you want to read the amendment that -- or describe the amendment that was requested. and i'd like to ask for a motion to move the minutes, as amended. >> yes, good morning to commissioners. we did receive the email and the reviewed the audio from that meeting. it makes sense to us to adjust the minutes accordingly. so the paragraph under public

comment under item number 3, january 21st, minutes would read at follows: ester marks identified investigations as priorities. she stated -- considering the sum of those implicated in the corrections standard filed electronically and -- enable detection of their correct practices. the minutes would strike the next sentence as shown. and insert instead she stated: the commission is not known as being effective carrying out its mandate. she closed the board of supervisors and analyst's, to communicate goals that do not demonstrate effectiveness of core functions. >> chair ambrose: all right. i'm going to ask for a motion and second. and then, i would like to ask for public comment. so do i have a motion and second

to accept esther marks' edits to her comments? >> so moved. >> chair ambrose: commissioner bush, do i have a second? >> commissioner bush: yes. >> chair ambrose: ron, can you request public comment before we vote on the consent -- i mean, on the minutes? >> clerk: thank you, madam chair. the ethics commission is receiving public comment on consent calendar number 3 remotely in this meeting. each member of the public will have up to three minutes to provide public comment. you'll hear a bell when you have 30 seconds remaining. if you joined the meeting early to listen to the proceedings, now is the time to get in line to speak. if you have not already press star 3. it's important you press star 3 once to enter the queue as pressing it again will move you out of the public comment line and back into listening mode. once you are in the queue and standing by, the system will prompt when it's your turn to speak. it's important you call for a quiet location. please address your comments to the commission as a whole and

not an individual member. madam chair, we're checking to see if there's callers in the queue. >> chair ambrose: thank you. [silence] >> clerk: madam chair, we have no callers in the queue. >> chair ambrose: all right. thank you. i'm noting we have draft minutes from january 8th meeting that

amendment is actually to the draft minutes for the january 21st, 2021 special meeting. commissioner bush, i just want to finish one thing. we also have the proposed stipulation decision, which is action item on consent that you received in your packets. we also have received comments from esther marks about that fine in that matter. so i'm wondering if commissioners have any comments on that matter as well? so now, commissioner bush, please. you're muted, commissioner bush. >> commissioner bush: thank you. on the january 21st, minutes it says that i identified esther marks as a task member of the

department of building inspection commission. as my understanding, she was on the board of permit appeals, not building inspection. so i would recommend that be changed. >> chair ambrose: okay. >> commissioner bush: are we ready to talk about the stipulation at the same time now? or do you want to do the minutes first? >> chair ambrose: it's all -- well, actually, no. we can go ahead. we have a motion and a second to adopt, i will say, the minutes for january 8th, 2021 without amendment. and to adopt the draft minutes for the january 21st, 2021 special meeting with the amendment described by the director and amendment described by commissioner bush. so why don't we go ahead and vote on those two consent items 3 and 4. and then, we'll take a separate

motion on the dante king stipulation. so ronald, can you call the roll on both items 3 and 4, the draft minutes for the january 8th and the january 21st meeting, as amended. >> clerk: a motion has been made and seconded. i will call the roll. [roll-call vote] >> clerk: with three votes in the affirmative. i'm sorry. this is new to me, commissioner bell. >> commissioner bell: i was not a commissioner.

i read the minutes, but i'll abstain at this point. >> if you don't mind me interjecting? >> chair ambrose: you can go ahead. i was going to let it go. but go ahead. >> i understand. as you are aware, commissioners are not allowed to -- and commissioner bell, welcome. and my apologies, but unfortunately that applies to meeting minutes such as this. even if you didn't attend the meeting in question. >> commissioner bell: aye. >> clerk: thank you. >> chair ambrose: all right. >> clerk: four votes in the affirmative, the motion is approved unanimously. >> chair ambrose: and all right. i see that we have commissioner lee. welcome. happy new year! >> happy new year. >> vice chair lee: happy new

year, everybody. [simultaneous speaking.] >> chair ambrose: can you hear us? >> we can hear you, commissioner. >> vice chair lee: okay. [laughter] >> vice chair lee: was i cussing? >> no, you weren't. i just want today make sure you were aware. >> vice chair lee: well, happy new year, everybody. my apologies for being late. and i want to add my welcome to my fellow commissioner bell. >> commissioner bell: thank you so much. i appreciate it. i've already screwed up on my first vote so... [laughter] >> commissioner bell: i hope to get better from here on out. thank you. >> welcome. >> chair ambrose: it is an odd thing. i've had that question come up when i was advising commissions. it does seem odd to vote on

minutes you weren't present for. there's a charter issue about not abstaining. moving along, we are -- commissioner lee, we are just about to take up item 5 on the consent calendar, which is the stipulation for dante king. and i had mentioned -- and it may -- although, there wasn't anybody present for public comment on the consent items, esther marks had written an email, advising the mistake commenting that she did not support the reduction of the penalty from $5,000 to $2,500. and i -- when i read the stipulation, i didn't understand her point that there was an

abuse of the public employment in pursuit of personal gain, which is what she referenced. so can we hear from mr. pierce or the director about what are the mitigating circumstances that encouraged them to negotiate a stipulation with the lower penalty? >> sure. good morning, chair ambrose and commissioners. you know, the stipulation is a negotiated document, so this was a process that both parties engaged in to arise at. you know, realistically, settlement negotiations are confidential proceedings. and so in general, the document has to speak for itself. but i would refer commissioners

to finding in the document indicating that we did not find -- the evidence did not reveal that mr. king had behaved intentionally or willfully. and we found as well that mr. king cooperated with the investigation. he was forthcoming when we spoke with him, he expressed a willingness and desire to remedy any potentially unlawful conduct at the time that this was brought to his attention. and for those reasons, we arrived at the penalty that we reached. >> if i might add. one additional factors in the stipulation, we recommended and came to an agreement about, we looked to prior cases to try to peg them in the same ball part and that's what we did here as well. >> chair ambrose: okay. thank you for that. i'm going to make a motion to

adopt the stipulation as recommended by staff. i like to support staff. you're the ones on the frontline of the investigation, so i would make that motion to -- and commissioner bush, please. you're muted still, commissioner bush. >> commissioner bush: thank you. i have some questions about the stipulation that i hope could be answered. it mentions that he was in violation of the s-i-a

statement. there's no requirement that i could see that people who are employees of the city and covered by is that correct? >> i can tell you in this i think instance mr. king acknowledged the time he began employment he read and understood the statement of incompatible activities. you're right city law requires departments no later than april 1st of each year to distribute their statements. i can tell you the department in doing so notified employees that they had an obligation to read and understand the contents of those statements. but there's not -- i don't believe there's a requirement in city law that officers and

employees annually acknowledge their understanding of the contents of those statements. >> commissioner bush: generally speaking, when we require people to read something that affects their employment, we require that they also sign that they have read it, not simply that it went to their inbox. so i'm concerned that what this indicates is a broader issue that this was this employee. so i'm raising this issue here. secondly, it appears mr. king's violation of this persisted for three years; is that correct? he started his employment in 2016. and then, continued it until 2017. and 2018. and then, finally in 2019. >> to clarify, the stipulation does not describe liability in relationship to his outside

employment. the liability arises only in relation to materials that he posted to a website that he created in relation to that employment. and the stipulation indicates that he created the website in june or july of 2018. and that as far as we could tell, the material producing liability here were uploaded around march of 2019. so the span of his noncompliant behavior was a period of months rather than a period of years. [please stand by]

-- considering that he disclosed the names of employees who had taken the training or had signed up for the training. so i'd be happier with a higher royalty than 2,500. that's my feeling. and what happens when i expressed that feeling? anything? >> i already made a motion that i would support the staff's recommendation. i mean, i see the description of the -- that he included, um, a website, the d.h.r. sign-in sheets that employees when had participated in his d.h.r. trainings had added their

signatures to confirm their attendance, and i'm not clear why he wanted to show that people were taking the training that he was doing at d.h.r., i guess. but the amount of the penalty, given that he made no income from the -- from showing that he had done d.h.r. trainings and his employee capacity. i mean, that to me is the question about penalty is in relation to how egregious the violation is and whether or not it was, you know, a money-makiny material and this just doesn't -- you know, in my view, $2,500 seems fairly effective in demonstrating one's -- the

seriousness of the violation. but it's up to you, commissioners. and to decide what you all want to do. if we want to amend -- i mean, this is a stipulation on consent and we can amend it. we'll send the staff back to renegotiate with this individual, which is underlying my concern, because it means then spending a lot of time in that capacity and maybe not working on the other backlog of the investigations that we have in our queue in order to try to attain an agreement to impose a higher penalty when to me i'm willing to support the staff recommendation that this is a fair stipulation. but it's up to the other three commissioners to decide which motion you want to second and then we need to vote.

we need to move along, because we're still on consent. so any comments from commissioner chiu or lee or bell? >> thank you, chair ambrose. on the one hand, the posting of these to the website, you know, would be -- of employees who attended the training and their capacity as employees and the training conducted by mr. king, as a city is in violation of this, and they had put their names down on the sign-up sheet though they wouldn't expect it to appear on a website. but balanced against that is in my mind a determinant factor is that, you know, according to mrt

we received, you know, mr. king, immediately took it down. he said that i want to be in compliance with other areas of my website or my work outside of my role for the city. you know, it's not in compliance. i think that, you know, what is the purpose of the sign? is it to be -- you know, punishment? retribution? or is it a deterrent and to send a message to others who may be engaging in outside activity to make sure that they are in compliance with their statement of compatible activities and they observe all of the rules and the procedures and, you know, seek guidance from the city attorney or the ethics commission as appropriate. and i think that like you we are not close -- as you noted, chair

ambrose, we are not close to the facts and we're not on the frontlines conducting this. and as executive director pelham has said that they looked at past practice and other similarly situated cases, the signs that were levied in those cases and that would be commensurate and consistent with that practice. and, you know, i would support as let recommendation of staff on this. and the main factor in my mind are, one, that they're closest to those facts and that the expression of a willingness to correct the mistakes and the, you know, the commitment and the undertaking towards future compliance, which is what -- which is what i think that is the ultimate goal of our efforts here is to ensure that people --

people, you know, will comply. >> chair ambrose: okay. so we have a motion and a second on my motion. we might have to get a parliamentary assistant here. but do we have -- from commissioner lee or commissioner bell, if there isn't a second for commissioner bush's amendment, i'd like to call the roll on my motion to approve this stipulation and consent on number 5. so, commissioners, your hands are not up, and so on that basis i would ask ronald to please call the roll on agenda item number -- sorry, my screen just went dark -- agenda number 5. thank you. >> clerk: a motion has been made and seconded and i will now call the roll. [roll call vote]

with four votes in the affirmative and one vote in the negative, the motion is approved. >> chair ambrose: all right. thank you for that. and i'll call agenda item number 6. which is the election of commission officers for 2021 per ethics commission bylaws, art iv, section 1. there's a cover memo attached. and i should have read that before, because am pretty sure

what i'm supposed to do is to ask for a motion. let's see... all right, i'm going to open up the floor for nominations for chair. commissioner lee or commissioner bush. commissioner lee. >> vice-chair lee: thank you, chair ambrose. i think that the year has been a very challenging one for both our country and the city. we were hit by a couple of viruses, covid pandemic, and also in the city the outbreak of

the corruption virus. the commission has gone through a very challenging year in various ways. and i really appreciate chair ambrose's leadership in guiding us through some really unusual times. and i would nominate her to a second term, because we need steady leadership and continuity to bring us to a new chapter. to really rebuild the public's trust. and also to enforce the ethic commission's relevance in our work and tackling the -- the challenges that we're facing as a commission and in the city. so it is with honor for me to

nominate chair ambrose to be our next chair for the commission. >> chair ambrose: thank you. commissioner bush. you are muted, unfortunately. >> commissioner bush: i second the nomination of chair ambrose. >> chair ambrose: thank you very much. are there any other nominations? seeing none, i think what i'm supposed to do is to go ahead and call for a vote. and i would have happily stepped aside for any one of you, because i so admire and honor the work that you do. but i will try and to keep up with this work for the remainder of this year and will hopefully

we'll be able to count on all of your support in doing so. so, ronald, if could you call the chair. >> i'm sorry to interrupt. andrew chen. we should take public comment before we do the vote? >> chair ambrose: see, i first blew it. [laughter]. >> sorry for the interruption. >> chair ambrose: no, no, please, yeah, so that's -- boy, that's a lot of public comment. let's go through that really fast, ronald, if you could. >> madam chair, we're checking to see if there are callers in the queue. for those on hold, wait until the system indicates that you have been unmuted. if you have just joined this meeting we're on the public discussion on the motion of agenda item number 6, the election of commission officers for 2021 per ethics commission bylaws article 5, section 1. if you have not already done so, please press star 3, to be added to the public comment queue. you have three minutes to

provide public comment and six minutes online with with an interpreter. you will hear a bell go off when you have 30 seconds remaining. please stand by. madam chair, there are no callers in the queue. >> chair ambrose: all right, thank you for that.

can you please proceed with the roll call on the motion for the chair. >> clerk: motion has been made and seconded. i will now call the roll. [roll call vote] with five votes in the affirmative and zero opposed the motion is approved unanimously. >> chair ambrose: all right. well, thank you very much for that. and now i would like to ask for nominations for vice-chair, and i'm going to take the privilege of the floor and go first and nominate commissioner lee to

serve again as vice-chair of the san francisco ethics commission. and now i'll open up the floor to anyone else in the commission to second or to provide a nomination. all right, commissioner chiu. >> commissioner chiu: i would like to second that for commissioner lee to serve as vice-chair for a second term. >> chair ambrose: all right. and do i hear any other nominations? nope? so, can we please have public comment on -- oh, commissioner bush. >> commissioner bush: i have questions to ask of commissioner lee. >> chair ambrose: okay. >> commissioner bush: commissioner lee, i respect your work and i think your participation has been an asset,

particularly what you have done beyond the confines of the commission. but one of the things that took place about two years ago was a vote on behest of contributions, in which a motion by the commission failed on a 3-2 vote. and you were one of the two votes who opposed a reform of the behested contributions law. and since that time, it has emerged that behested contributions, as was suggested at the time, was a route for corruption and it is at the heart of much of the public integrity findings by the controller's office. and the proposal that had been made before the commission and supported by three commissioners, those three commissioners were the chair of the commission, the past chair of the commission and the

vice-chair of the commission. and it had been the result of two years of hearings at the commission. and at that time you said that you didn't support it because you felt that it was a step too far for the commission to put something on the ballot. and that you were not concerned -- not committed to its impact on non-profits. in retrospect, as now as we have seen with the public integrity reports, do you have any second thoughts about that vote? >> vice-chair lee: thank you, commissioner bush. i stand by my vote at that time. and i remember i stressed very strongly the need to really make a differentiation between what we mean by "non-profit." i came from non-profit,

community-serving organizations. and the way that i understood at that time, the proposed language did not make a differentiation between, say, a non-profit, friends of the opera, than a community non-profit that provides food and other assistance to immigrant families, to childcare centers. so i remember that we went through that a lot. and, again, my understanding at the time and with my experience working with the true non-profits that i had been familiar with for the past 40 years. i know the importance of non-profits. what i would call

community-serving, direct service non-profit organizations in this city. their contributions, their struggles with financial support, both from the private and the public sectors, and the need for them to continue to really raise the voice for their community members, which in this city to this day -- while a majority of our residents are newcomers or persons who do not have the access to city services or city's attention, i felt that these non-profits provide a much-needed voice and presence to make sure that they're not forgotten. so was that a perfect proposal?

no. and, again, i am open to holding groups who are using -- as i said, using the tax exemption status to promote whatever they have at that time. but i felt that combining the true community service, vital service organizations and to the other folks who are basically skirting the system, i felt that i had no choice but to really stand by the community that i'm very familiar with. so to answer you, i do not regret my vote. however, i am open to continue to work to make sure what we have experienced and i had said

at that time people that organize under the guise of non-profit that are not truly non-profit. but as i said, we need to really make a clear distinction and i really do not feel that we should diminish the folks who truly need to have a voice in this city and i'm open to working with you and other commissioners to really push forward to realize the controller's recommendations. because i agree with you, you know, there are corruptions. but corruptions are not in all non-profits and we need to really make a clear distinction. >> chair ambrose: thank you for your comments, commissioner lee.

and i see that your hand is up, commissioner bush. >> commissioner bush: i just wanted to state that my recollection of that is a little bit different. i think the chair had put an amendment in to adopt the san francisco -- the los angeles law on behested contributions, which exempted those which served low-income residents with human services, including housing and health and so forth. but it continued to cover things like the national rifle association and entities which are non-profits under the law. and which continued to enjoin a dissension in san francisco, so they don't necessarily adopt a federal standards and apply it

to our local situation. so my recollection is that the final vote that was before the commission at that time did include an exemption for the kind of non-profits that you're discussing. and i competely agree with you that non-profits that provide those services do not get the support that they need from the public or the private sources. and they need to be supported. that they should not be made as a vehicle for a work around so that dark money can influence our elections and our officials. and as it stands now, dark money can do exactly that. >> chair ambrose: i'm going to interject here because i don't want -- from an agenda point of view, this is not the time to talk too much substantively about behested payments,

vis-a-vis the non-profits and how we might better fix that. the item on the floor is a motion to elect commissioner lee as vice-chair of the commission for a second year. and we have a motion and a second and i haven't heard any other nominations and so i'd like to call for a public comment. ronald, if you could please ask for public comment here and then we will move to a vote. and get on on to our very full agenda. >> clerk: madam chair, we're checking to see if there are callers in the queue. for those already on hold, wait until the system indicates that you have been unmuted if you have just joined the meeting we're on the motion of agenda item number 6, the election of excision officers for 2021 for ethics commission, with section 1 -- so sorry -- excuse me -- >> chair ambrose: i lost my place too.

[laughter]. >> clerk: if you have not done so, please press star, 3, to be added to the queue. you have three minutes to provide public comment and the six minutes if you're on the line with an interpreter. you will hear a bell go off when you have 30 minutes remaining. please, stand by. madam chair, we have no callers in the queue. >> chair ambrose: all right, with that can you please call the roll on the motion to elect

commissioner lee as vice-chair of the san francisco ethics commission. >> clerk: a motion is made and seconded. i will now call the roll. [roll call vote] with five votes in the affirmative and zero votes opposed the motion is approved unanimously. >> chair ambrose: all right, thank you very much. and i will call agenda item number 7, presentation by the controller's office on the january 11, 2021 report, request the preliminary assessment: ethical standards for contract award processes of the airport commission and other commissioners and boards," and

discussion and possible action related to report finds and recommendations. and before i turn it over to director pelham, i want to say to mr. delosriosa, thank you for coming back and making your presentation. i'm going to ask you -- i did see your presentation at the board of supervisors. i know that we have assistant controller todd -- hi, todd, how are you? i'm going to ask that you move relatively quickly through your presentation so that we can get to the substantive discussion, because i think that there are questions about what we as the ethics commission might do going forward in response to these recommendations. and maybe some others that you make. and i want to make sure that we have time for that deliberation. so with that, director pelham, did you want to make some remarks?

>> thank you, chair ambrose. just very, very briefly for context for the public who are viewing and for the benefit of our new commissioner bell, welcome. this is a fourth in a series of reports that the controller's office has issued as indicated in the cover memo. and as a process note, a couple items. one, this is based on the agenda and does not require action by the commission, but we realize that the commission is interested and engaged in these issues and so it's in place if the commission takes action for the findings and the recommendations, you will have the matter to do that as the matter is agendized. these are items that we'll often talk about in a subject matter area and so all of these items will be as relevant and we will bring them into our policy -- ongoing policy discussions as well. so just with those brief comments i'm happy to turn over to mark and i appreciate the participation of the controller's office once again. thank you.

>> good morning, commissioners. definitely noted we will go through our presentation as quickly by not going through a lot of background. but hopefully we'll provide enough so that there is context for some of you and provide some discussion later. good morning again, commissioners. chair ambrose, vice-chair lee and commissioners chiu and bush and bell. as director pelhammentioned, thn our series of presentations. to provide briefly, we started these reports a little over a year ago when the mohammed nouri investigations became public and really the key goal is to provide recommendations on the internal control weaknesses and

to improve transparency for the city. in conjunction with our efforts in the controller's office is the city attorney's focus on the investigations related to the misconduct of the current and former city employees. one thing that we're going to highlight as well on the next slide is just to provide context on some of the key aspects of the federal complaint and the affidavit just so that there's context on how we were able to scope our report for this deliverable. as some of you may know, the f.b.i. affidavit has alleged that in 2018, mr. nuru and they tried to bribe the airport commissioner linda crayton to get a city lease at s.f.o. for a company owned by mr. bovis. and miss cra yton had indicated

a willingness to do favors given the relationship and checking to make sure that the subject of the note was not promised to others, and that she would find out who would be on the selection committee and she'd do everything that she can to provide assistance to mr. bovis. and the role of mr. nuro areu in the tjpa. and his willingness to assist mr. bovis in trying to get a lease with tjpa. but mr. bovis on this particular example was not successful. briefly as well, you may know... (please stand by)

>>mark de la rosa: any contracts must be approved before the board of supervisors this is just to run through the board process which is a robust process but mostly driven by the revenue management division within the airport. there are three key points in which the rdn division within

the airport goes beforethe commission for approval . again, as contexts , these are the contracts that we reviewed as part of our assessment from 2020, there were 99 units covered in our report with a minimum guaranteed revenue of $123 million. the first set of recommendations were findings actually rather that we have really is more of a positive finding in that we found based on our assessments and procedures that the airport appropriately awarded concession releases based on solicitation results and really despite mister creighton's alleged assurances ibelieve that was , that the subject was ultimately not given to mister bovis and the lease number five was awarded to the winning bid

based on theairports competitive solicitationprocess . one thing to also note is in 2019 , our city services auditor also conducted on it separately of the airport commission and concluded based on that audit that the airport administers the solicitation process though the findings based on that on as well as the current assessment are corroborated based on the results of our review. the second set of findings and recommendations that we have really commissioner creighton having had an improper communication with a potential bidder who in this case is mister bovis. miss craven allegedly agreed to meet with and help they

potential bidder and she did not report the improper reques for preferential assistance . miss craven did meet with a proposer during the required training which violated the rfp as to the proposals inception preventing any attempt by the proposer to communicate with or solicit any market officials with theintent to influence the outcome of the selection process .we also wanted to highlight as part of our fieldwork we did a limited scope survey of various commissions and boards in the city . in particularly we look at the court commission, sf mta board of directors as well as the sfp public utilities commission and the dtpa and what we want to highlight some of the findings based on that comparison, it's that we found none of the commissions reported having

their commissioners being involved in the solicitation process with theevaluation process . we also found in terms of the approval authority that all commissions to have responsibility to contract and in terms of writtenpolicy , we found that the airport does have written policy in this prohibition. in terms of the statement of incompatible activity or sia prohibition we all found that all of the surveyed entities had this except for the key jpa which was technically not of city affiliatedentity . and that in terms of rfp instructions to potential bidders that all actually did have instructions intheir rfp regarding their communication . one thing to note is that none of the departmental sia's that we reviewed included any prohibition related to communication with potential

bidders .it mostly focused on actual bidders but not potential bidders and i will talk more about that in the set of recommendations that we have. that really drives to our recommendations related to the communication prohibition . the first is for the city commissions and board to revise their policy procedures to include requirements to address involvement in contract board process. we also have a second recommendation on sia training in conjunction with the commission and board, it should annually train its members on the departments sia and the training should state that if requesters do request inappropriate assistance that petitioners have a responsibility to report them and to have certain next steps with the cityattorney and ethics commission as well .

we also have a recommendation in codifying prohibition, city law should be amended tocodify that city officials and employees who knowingly provide selectiveassistance , to further strengthen the requirements that we have and solicit on the potential proposer for a city contract . fourth is on the inclusion of the communication restriction. really just for departments to include in their competitive documentation, solicitation documentation the restriction on communication with potential bidders and the fifth on codifying prohibition of the sia. we recommend this commission to work with the city attorney to consider codifying prohibition of the statement of incompatible activities to ensure consistency in their enforcement as well as increasing the visibility of the requirement.

and next set of findings and recommendations really how the city may benefit from codifying limitations when the commissioner and board directs their involvement in the contract board process. currently the charter inception 4.102 outlines the powers and duties of boards and commissions but it doesn't say much substantively, the board should not do. one example we found was the qualifications of such a requirement in la county in which they codified thedirector and commissioner involvement as such . though their recommendation that follows really is for the city to consider whether it would be warranted to codify the rules commissioning boards limitations and the contracting board process. the fourth set of findings really is more on the measures that the airport has taken since the fbi report and

strengthening their contracting policies and procedures. one thing we did note was that they did implement a number of new seizures including adding restrictions in the communications by bitter and proposer during thequiet period . that's our rfp request for bid and they also in december implemented their competitive selection processcommunications policy . a prohibited communication with potential proposers during the restricted communications period. our recommendation specifically follows for the airport to continue with their efforts in improving the various aspects of their competitive solicitation process including regularly issuing reports to the commission that they have

waste awareness in terms of the various proposers. the last and final set of findings and recommendations that we have really the increase or enhance data-driven decisions. as some of you may know one overarching requirements the city has related to transparency is the san francisco campaign and government conduct approach section 11.26 which prohibits city contractors or affiliates from contributing to city elected officers where a contract must be improved approved by the city elected officer or a candidate for an office or a committee . since january 2019 departments and city elected officers have been bound by this requirement. for example, report departments

are required to comply with section 1.12622 file their form 126f to within 30 days of receipt of any proposal. these are for contract evaluations for $100,000 or more per fiscalyear. and then for city elected officers , they are now required to comply with section 1.126f4 to file within four days of the contract and really currently the forms 1.126f2 are tracked by the commission but they are not available or tracked such as not trapped in the financial or procurement system.basically while filing in centrallytracked information is important is before a contract is awarded , the department department and commission contract approvers may not know if contract information that could help

them avoid conflicts of interest . one key feature of the form 126f2 is it contains the nameof the subcontractor owners and officers . informationcollected earlier on , would certainly benefit the city as a whole and in particularthose that are proving . another key aspect of this is we also noted that revenue contracts which are those that generate revenue for the city are not yet configured to the duty stored in the city several financial and procurement system information collected through such essential repository can facilitate awareness of entities or individuals subject to the city competitive selection policy so what follows are recommendations related to the city directing departments to require to submit the information about their

thoughts affiliates. basically the earlier date will collect such information the better information, the better site line we will have to avoi potential conflict of interest . and then also to promote data-driven decisions to develop and implement the departments to work with the city controller to develop any new refinements in the evidentialsystem that could benefit the departments . thatconcludes our presentation . we have as mentioned, this is fourth in a series. we have three currently in the pipeline thatwe will be issuing the next few months . the next one being on the citywide ethics reporting requirements and next one on the department of building inspection and another one on the sf utilities commission in response to the november 30

complaint. that concludes ourpresentation and we would be happy to answer any questions you have , commissioners. >>chair ambrose:thank you very much, i appreciate it , all the work you've been doing and effort as well.i'm going to go to commissioner busch, you have your handup . i don't know if that was from you. if i can get everybody back on the screen. commissioner busch, yes, you had a comment. >>larry bush: i have a question about conferencefor commissioners , i notice on membership at least two of the commissioners are executives in nonprofits who solicit contribution. and those contributions are not disclosed because they are

nonprofits. how would you know if someone is bidding on a city contract was a contributor to a nonprofit that the airport commissioner headed ? was i muted? >>chair ambrose: know, we heard you.i think people are trying to process the question. you're saying there are airport commissioners who are employed by nonprofit organizations and your question is how would we know if they solicited contributions to their own organizations, is that the question? >>larry bush: they are not just employed by, they are directors of nonprofits and i'm wondering about whether a better make the

contributions to their nonprofits at the same time they're making a big at the airport and would that be consent or not? >> one of the things the city currently has in place already is that there is a payment reporting scheme for commissioners so that's been in place for a couple of years now. there are some exceptions admittedly in the ordinance but commissioners do have to report payments or contributions solicited that they solicit, those need to be disclosed and those contributions are $1000 or more or more those are on file with the commission. >>larry bush: they didn't solicited it and it came across the transom, would you know? >>andrew shen: not necessarily.

>>chair ambrose: okay. i'm not going to ... >>larry bush: ifit's commissioners is a serious issue . >>chair ambrose:did i hear somewhere out there the point that , i'm not sure delarosa's informationprovoked some of the commissioners who'd been on the commission for 24 years or more , did i hear board members suggest that their return limits for commissioners or did i just dream that anyone here that ? go ahead, commissioner busch if you have another question or comment. >>larry bush:that was where i was going at the moment . i think the controller's office has done again another excellent job of getting this

information and showing us our roadmap of where to go . >>chair ambrose: i had a few questions if i can interject. first, the recommendation that all departments have written policies precluding what i would call ex parte communications from proposed bettors or proposers on contract or opportunities or leases before the commission, when you presented this matter to the board of supervisors hearing, did any ofthe supervisors say they were going to introduce legislation along those lines ? because i do think that having consistent written policy applies to all commission decision-makers on these major contracts and development opportunities would be a good

policy so is that pending anywhere? do you know? >> chair ambrose, remembering what was the gao, i don't think there was a specific motion to introduce at the time. we are aware that a supervisor may be putting forth a possible set of legislation that relates to this particular deliverable but i don't have the specifics on that and what exactly is covered under that. >> what we're doing as part of our recommendation and now there are approximately 29 recommendations in the core report, we are tracking where there have been legislative

items introduced either by board members or in the case of city attorneys departments for suspensions update to the degree thatthose or mayoral directors, we are tracking that . supervisors as you know at the chance to reach out to do drafting and review. i believe a number of them are still considering whatpotential implications may be especially given that we have three more reports coming out . so what we know and has been introduced, you can see on the registration system specifics, we don't have sightlines so that the proposal. >>chair ambrose: my second question specifically, you referenced form 126 f2 and 4 but that only applies if the underlying contracts are going to be subject to an

>>daina chiu: have you thought about a mechanism or process by which it could force the officials to either certify at the end of the year, if you have any recommendations other than that would be beneficial to say if you are an elected or appointed when you file your forms you also certify.

>> is buried within the first set of recommendations i mentioned. this is in relation to a competitive solicitation document and a new restriction from communication and there's a second part to one of the recommendations that basically requires commissions and board members to certify annually. >>daina chiu: with respect to contracting ... [inaudible] that's helpful because it could be a great reminder what am i missing and course in place of record-keeping and compliance filing along the way for

instance search for march 31. and drive more disclosure hopefully. >>mark de la rosa: the next deliverable assessments willthe concern you just mentioned . it will highlight any improvements that we need to make in order for such ethical reporting and data to be more centrally tracked and located so that there's a public facing mechanism by which either elected commissioners and department heads can track on regular basis . also for the public to have visibility to compliance on an ongoing basis . we will cover that in our next deliverable.

>>daina chiu: just a follow-up question given your work in investigation of these agencies, what level would you put in awareness or understanding to elected officials have their obligations amid these allegations and the various scenarios that are pretty outrageous and egregious and were they knowingly flaunting the law or were peoplearound them just not there ? how much awareness was there would you say if you can do obligations that come with the responsibility of the office and how much of that was just simple and blatant disregard. i know it's not something we are going to do anyway but how much of it was actual ignorance and thinking it would be all right and how much training is there within city departments?

>>mark de la rosa: that's certainly something that we tried to scope these assessments based on the limited at least scope that we were able to create based on the federal complaint. so we didn't really extrapolate beyond the departments that have beeneither implicated or that we survey .again, it's a great foreshadowing to for the final report, so all of the assessments we've completed so far are preliminary and at the end of the series of the preliminary assessment tool then have a final report. i think last time we boarded we discussed how that final report will be basically cover some of the underlying or overarching themes and issues including

tone at the top and the ethical environments in the city. so hopefully we will shed more light on that citywide kind of lens and pulls for the ethical and the values citywide. >>daina chiu: thank you for that, i know this is coming from the corporate world and the strategies get brought before us all the time and the principle of leadership and holding people accountable for ethical behavior and its not just words on paper and having breach of recommendations including actual facts, leadership and requirements for people to be ethical and be held to account and divide by legal standards. it will be a long time coming to thank you for your work and i look forward to your report

and we will read it back here in the meantime. >> you are muted, chair. >>chair ambrose: that is the phrase of 20/20, that youare muted commissioner lee, go ahead . you are muted now. >>yvonne lee: thank you madam chair, i cannotfind my button . >>chair ambrose: its way down in the far right corner. >>yvonne lee: thank you so muc . it's then another informative presentation. thank you for all your work and leadership.

i have one question . when the proposal appeared before the airport commission, they may be legally required to recuse themselves from voting as a requirement but is there any other requirements for the commissioners to disclose their friendships or facilitation with the applicants? out of a total abundance of transparency, they may not meet the legal requirement but there should be anethical consideration . >>mark de la rosa: i was going to defer to andrew shen. >>andrew shen: i don't mean to interrupt you but vice chair

lee, we have a provision in the governmental code actually 3.14 which requires officers leading commissioners to disclose thei personal , professional or business relationships with people that come before them where the commission is making a final decision about the matter at hand so in addition to therecusal requirement you mentioned , vice chair lee there are otherrequirements that does fairly often .thank you. >>chair ambrose: commissioner bush go ahead. >>larry bush: if you can explain where is that disclose because it's not part of the hundred. i don't know if it's just disclose in the minutes of the commission meeting and not the ethics commission . where is the disclosure taking place? >>andrew shen: commissioners are required to and it's a matter of public meeting they

are required to take the disclosure at the meeting itself and that disclosure to be incorporated to reflect the meeting minutes or city employees those disclosures obviously can't be a public meeting if there are committees outside of that context and they're supposed to put a memo to the file and in my experience itusually sent to a department in charge . so it depends on the official involved. >>larry bush: thatsounds fairly inaccessible to the public . >>chair ambrose: just to be clear about this is an instance where a person is disclosing that they have a personal or professional relationship with someone who as as a matter pending but where they are stating for the record that that relationship is such that there is no financial interest involved. that's if somebody that they know from their church or their

in the school committee from their kids high school or something, if someone asked the conflict of interest and they recuse themselves, my understanding is that now we do have a centralized database where we show that somebody recuse themselves because they have an actual conflict of interest that precludes them from voting on a particular matter or being involved in preparation of the contract. is that correct, city attorney? isn't there arequirement now that that , that refusals be disclosed? >>andrew shen: that's correct, the commissioner needs to recuse due to a financial conflict so they have a financial interest in the matter at hand they are

required to file a notification which are submitted and posted with the ethics extension. >>chair ambrose: okay. go ahead commissioner bush. >>larry bush: i like to put on the record that we have groups like the third, a good public civic minded group whose board of directors is made up of city officials and developers . and some of the people on the board of directors are developers who have matters before the city department head. the department heads are not in a public meeting where theyare making a recusal . so i don't know where that shows up except that theywrite a memo to themselves . so i think that there is an issue to be explored here.

>>chair ambrose:just to be clear even if you are a department head , if you can separate what's legal versus maybe something gets disclosed that we can examine as mister delarosa pointed out in the next comptrollers report which i hope you will work very closely with commission staff, we're going to focus specifically on what do you know and how can we find out when you know. the whole disclosure regimen for ethics wise so we can come back to that there. but if you are a department head and you have, you're not paid but if you're a department head and you have a financial interest in a matter before your department and you are going to recuse yourself from being involved in, minimum assuming that department head

notifies their pointing officer should either be a commission or it would be the mayor or the board of supervisors, depending upon who it was that they were explaining why they couldn't perform their expected duties, but with that i want back to ronald because we need to make an announcement and solicit public comment so just so we all know when this itemis included , i'm going to take a maximum 10 minute break so that everybody can eat a granola bar or something and then we will come back and do the budget item so ron, if you could please offer public comment. >>ronald contreraz: we are checking to see if there are colors on the queue. if you have joined thismeeting we are currently on public

commission on item number six , on january 11 day preliminary assessment for contract processing of the airport commission and board. actionsrelated to report findings . if you have not already done so please press á3 to beadded to the public comment queue. you will have three minutes to provide public comments, six minutes with an interpreter . you have 50 seconds remaining. ... madam chair, 4 colors in

the queue. >>. >>chairambrose: public comment is closed. i'm going to do 1209 on my computer. would everybody be okay if we came back like in seven minutes ? i just want to keep moving. it's 12:10 now,we're going to be back here at 12:17 . so i'll see you all then and at that time, i didn't give director chance to say anything in his final remarks or to thank mister delarosa and mister right so thank you very much for your work and we will the working with you intensively during the preparation of your next presentation because it involves us so closely.

>>chair ambrose: agenda item number eight although i'll actually go ahead, ronald if you wanted to advise folks about the change in sfgov tv >>ronald contreraz: to any members listening and watching , our ethics commission meeting is on live channel 26, and the first channel rather than channel the once again we are broadcasting live. >>chair ambrose: thank you. agenda item number eight, public comment and possible action regarding ethics commission object proposal for fiscal year 2022 that begins july 1,2021. director , if you'd like to make your presentation speak

and thank you chair, item 4 for the benefit of the public and additional background for some of you commissioner bell, we have a slide presentation that i'll walk through briefly but i wanted to update you with where we are with our planned budget proposal at this stage. this commission meeting constitutes the second of 2 public hearings required under city law to help mold public participation and understanding of the budget process so this hearing is obviously public comment as with any agenda item called for it alsoprovides an opportunity for the commission to take , to hear an update and take any action you might choose to in regards to the proposed budget for fiscal year 22 so we can submit it as required by the february 22 deadline to the mayor's budget office so if i could jump over to slide 2 for a moment for context about how we are developing our budget , through

this budget process obviously it's a way to express the organization's priorities and deeds and we are every year making an effort to try to achieve the resources necessary for the purposes we established to accomplish. over the past years as we discussed in meetings a number of times, the revelations of high-level corruption allegations have underscored a variety of operations where certainly the work of the ethics commission is needed and the improvements we started putting in place need to take hold and come to fruition and that requires sufficient operating funds in order to do that as you know from our perspective , our commission has too long suffered from a lack of core funding that's not enabled us to do the work that we need to do so for us to work that in corruption, preventing corruption from taking root in the city means more than investing in the status quo.

i continue to slide 3 as a snapshot of our current funding and full-time equivalencies, this slide is familiar to you, will go through in detail and it includes information of our existing funding by program areas and distribution of staffing by the types of functions that we have. in slide 4, this is where we talk about what our budget proposal is that we are envisioning. and as recommended, in our budget request that we plan to submit, we would be requesting a total fiscal year 22 operating budget of $6.5 million for the commission. at 6.5 million would be 26 percent increase over the commission's current operating budget of 4.7 million and it includes a 33 percent increase in that division by eight new divisions over our current

level. there are three key areas where this will enable us to pursue our essential reason to address the essential need and it will allow us toattain our capacity . you heard from the controller's office we have several reports from the office that we had the dla performance and the existing organizational capacity is critical to make sure we'recontinuing to work through those recommendations and address the findingthose reports contain. from policy and enforcement across our operations, that's essential . so we are continuing to propose that we have full funding for all existing authorities. secondly , on the following slide this goes back to our training andoutreach that we believe are necessary to

develop , deliverand support city employees and leaders at all levels of city government and practical ways of understanding and applying , navigating efforts through difficult decision-making . clearly we are in difficult stressful times and it is often the case at the time when people feel the pressure to cut corners the most. is this it specifically atthis time we need to address that and begin to try to support the city's workforce in a much more exhausted and comprehensive way .this matters and we're going to fund in it so we can create a stronger city government together for all san franciscans. our view is that requires training specialists to hit the ground running with techniques and training that would build content and needs around ethics at work. moving on to the next slide, the proposal that we also plan to submit is investigative resources that would enable us to reduce our existing

resolution 10 times by 40 percent so it would be no more than 18 months on average on the time the enforcement division identifies allegations either receiving complaints or initiates and matter. the date of final action for the commission to resolve the matter.this would have the same time enable us to increase the number, the proportion, the severity of cases that our staff examines and investigates so that capacity to a initiate proactive investigations would be wanting to make sure we're focusing our resources as we can to address areas where there's a threat to the most public harm if they are in accountable government. this we've identified three new investigative physicians to enable us to do that. lastly, one area we did not talk about last month but in continuing to reply and reflect on our budget proposal and to accomplish it, we've identified one additional position we

believe is essential to be able to not just track and develop the performance work that we are initiating but need to expand office slide but we also need a position that's going to help us communicate that to the public, somebody that will be the set of hands that will drive theprocess of establishing and inventing , reporting on the performance of programmatic measures that we are putting in place because this is essential to make sure that we can both our own accountability and impact and progress but that we also have to do a better job of engaging the public as you know what the commission is doing and how we're going about doing our work so we can engage in contributions on aregular basis to shape network that continues to be effective over time . one program is physicians identified for this purpose. the assets that we believe are essential to the budget that we plan to submit on february 22

is not shy about identifying the needs that we see, that we believe are essential and we also know at the same time we have address the mayors instruction to all departments to prepare them should they be deposed given the ongoing challenge, we know that. we have identified, we would respond to the proposed 10 percent customer impact. i won't go into detail on this slide number eight but it shows the level of funding that would be required to show these numbers. the mayor's budget instructions you will recall ask for a 7 and a half percent or 2 and a half percent contingency so this is what that would translate to for our operations in the next 2 fiscal years. as to how we would absorb those impacts or those cuts to be

faced with and in fact, there are three significant areas of impact in these three slides so i will turn it backover to you , chair for any discussion. there are three areas of, significant areas of impact and the first is we would be faced with elevating three staff positions primarily on departmental administrative support. these are positions when we look to the future when we are faced with operating with drastically reduced staffing resources, we would need to be to have resources on board that can be asked to do a broad range of duties as not all our positions are applications where we can ask that of them so we would be forced with having to make choices about where we would retain positions and ones we would not be to retain, we would not be able to retain the positions that would be a departmental support primarily.

this consequence is identified in the slide, the high level obviously would delay issues related to response times and public guidance, payment to vendors and also the impacts of some of theservices that are currently being handed by the staff . obviously that work would have to continue to be done at the department and be explored by other staff impacting back hours that we would have available to do the other work and we would also have to completely cut our seasonal hiring temporary staff to handle as needed work during the election season as we've done in years past. turning to the next area of impact on the following slide, this is an area when we looked at the options for the alternative approaches discussed in the first meeting january 21 about the budget priorities. here we have looked and as all those options, we think that we would not be able to further make progress on the citywide filing form.

electronic filing projects and this would be the project as you know would allow for the line of sight as the controller might describe it to the financial interest in over 3500 city employees are every day divided on departments to file as they make or participate in governmental decisions. they would not be able to continue with electronic filing if they would have to buy on paper within their department decreasing the public's line of sight into potential financial interests. be impacted by those officials decision-making capacity. this project would have to stop . until we have reason to think the project is not going to be able to part of next year we continue to make progress and we will continue to move forward but if we did this it we would have to absorb this and the program would have to come to an end until more persons are available so the final area that would be impactedhis staff training.

we've made some strides in the last couple of years , increased funding and our staff levels having increased to the levels that they currently are. this would basically pull that ability back. we would have to cut $20,000 down to the budget for training. this comes at a time where training opportunities that would enable the staff to acquire and refine and strengthen skills that are necessary working in a fully digital environment to, it would impact our ability to keep our skills sharp and on the leading edge where we believe they can be and should be with the training. so that's the sum and substance of the areas we would have to have absorbed these cuts. one other document that is attached to the report that i provided is the attachment that

i received from chair ambrose the last meeting on the budget authority as you recall the commission discussed might express the views that you have about the impact of the budget cuts really imposed and your interest of the value that you would like to see expressed in the budget. there's a draft statement that chair ambrose has provided for your discussion at this meeting so with that i'll pause and be happy to answer any questions and i want to acknowledge that we have our deputy director and chief operating officer back with us after a leave of absence and we are delighted she's here. it's perfect timing and stephen matthews is acting as chief operating officer on all things budget has returned to technology services both are here toanswer any questions with that i will pause and be happy to answer any questions . be one commissioners, i'm going to take questions and then we

will go to public comment and then come back for action. i guess actually before we take public comment we should hear those first. so starting at the top , commissioner bush, you have your hand but you are goingout from my screen, are you there ? >>larry bush: i amhere and i am seeking . >>chair ambrose: we hearyou . >>larry bush: i had a number of questions. i should put them all out at one time? >>chair ambrose: that would be for the best in theinterest of time . >>larry bush: you see anything in this proposal that includes revenue enhancements? that's number one. secondly are you contemplating work orders on any of the form 700s, especially to those departments that have

independent general funds ? third, are you willing to look at having the april form 700 forms submitted as pdfs at each department so they can post them in ethics list of which positions arenow posted, at least as pdfs . they are not searchable, they don't do what you want us to do but at least takes us to some level of transparency beyond what we have. i'm asking about equity steps that are in the budget, especially with 3 seats will be upfor election next fall . not in this budget cycle but we have to get readyfor it since this budget goes until july 1 . and i know that those three seats which are for districts

, 6 and 10 i think it is. they areall majority minority districts . and i have only two more left. when you do the investigations and you have a give us an update every six months on where the progress is on that so we have some sense of him and him and the public has some sense of it all. and finally, i'm delighted to see your public proposal at the last part of theethics budget that you just gave , in what way is that different from the commissioners's secretary. >>. >>larry bush: as far as i know ethics is the only department that doesn't have a commission secretary and i think what

you're proposing goes a long way towards those same issues that are the crux of a commission secretary so that i take it your division includes press releases about enforcement actions, press releases summarizing what's happening with public financing for compliance with disclosure laws whether it's for city commissioners complying with the filing of form 700 or whether it's city political committees and its route for the public to go directly to the commission. those are my questions. i'll shut up now. >>leeann pelham:did you want me to take those now or wait until

all commissioners have closed their questions ? >>chair ambrose: i'm going to go at least for questions, not comments but if we can get all the questions for the executive directoror i don't know, actually i was going to defer to you director if you'd rather takethese one at a time and go ahead and propose an answer . and can i stop for a second ? for some reason on my commander computer, it's easy to see but you are flashing on top of another commissioners grid panel. is that just my screenor is that everybody ? not everybody, just mine. it's you are like a disco. i'm just going to get out of the grid and then i won't bother you anymore. go ahead director pelham. >>leeann pelham: i'll try to be brief and if i can handle them

going that's mosthelpful and other directors if they have anything to clarify but the first question about revenues , are the revenue enhancements reflected in the budget, not as we're showing them here. we've not been able toconnect with the controller's office but in a weeks time by the time the proposal has to be submitted it is not going to be possible to come up with solutions thatwould address the revenue side so that's why we're seeing that not here . i don't think it's doable this year but it's a conversation we need to initiate because we trip clearly have to try to get a handle on it . for the work order 700, our focus has been on trying to make sure we get form 700 file for this april 1 filing and we continue to work on building the program for the full disclosure next year. you have not been able to reach out to and apartments to

suggest paying for this process at this point. the question about willing to look at pdfs april 1. in my view that also is something we have not been able to focus on because i think we can ask people to do that but unless there is a requirement for them to do that i think perhaps it rings hollow and it would be confusing given we are in the midst of working them with them to set up an automatic filing system nowto take effect next year we have not at this point proceeded with that . in terms of equity steps as you mentioned in terms of the election, i think our focus is on trying to make sure we can reach out as possible with resources that we have in new ways and that's going to depend on us being able to use marks technology and staff whose focus is on helping us do that so in some ways it speaks to we should be taking new approaches regardless of the staff levels that we have what we have to do more with the staff levels we

are hoping to receive in the coming budget year. you also mentioned the three-year timeline that updates every six months, we be happy to update youevery six months and that progress would continue if we are to get in any event try to keep you posted about progress on all of our friends , certainly if we had three additional investigators who were able to make toward this goal and producing disclosure time by 40 percentcertainly we want to be reporting back to you and the public to get your sense of progress and what the issues are if any that are continuing to be in front of us . and then lastly very briefly you asked if the program performance analyst working with the performance tracking information helps us to annual reports and in my mind it is not. the commission secretary is something in my time here i have not been proposing in budget because i think provides a limited way in which we would be able to maximizeresources that we could otherwise use or a variety of projects .

it is akin to the commission secretary in that will free up your director, your deputy director be able to do that type of work which is part of our portfolio but i think it completely supports the goals that the commission secretary has but is not limited to providing services that only a commission secretary could provide. >>chair ambrose: with that , i'm going to try to bring up my screenbut commissioner chiu my recollection is you had your hand up . >>daina chiu: this is questions only as opposed to comments? >>chair ambrose: if you can get your questions in and then i'll come back for general comments. >>daina chiu: i had one question director pelham and that was in regards to budget. i wanted to clarify for commissioner bell who is new to the commission today what we will be submitting, there are

directions from the mayor to submit a budget with the decreases as directed and i believe we have done that but we've also had the opportunity to propose our ideal budget if you will with the additional resources that we are requesting. could you just do a brief recap for my education and also clarification. >>leeann pelham: the position of the department on february 2 it's all essentially apartments entering into the city's financial system a series of figures that reflect what our operations would look like where we faced with a 10percent cut. so the only , if you are a budget person in the city the only budget submission you see is a department entry of information into that system

that reflects a budget that is 10 percent less than it is at present that's the way the system is fixed so and there are opportunities within that system to annotate what the impact would be but as has been our practice in my tenure for the last five years it's been important to have a much more visible conversation about what that is and what the impact of that submission would be because our request our proposal that we would describe merit narratively and in attached documents we sent to the mayor for the mayor's budget team is much broader. it will go through the acts that we have for the essential functions that are not yet being met. so the package is what we're proposing. we believe we need to do our essential services and we will also have in that narrative attachments how we have to enter the numbers into the system to reflect the budget cuts when we are faced with having those. does that answer your question?

>> helpful point about the reductions and the different scenarios that you outlined, i think we discussed this very briefly towards the end of our last meeting but i just wanted to circle back to it and that is believe there are three open positions we are currently filling right now and are in the process of, have yet to be filled. have you considered and haven't ruled out simply freezingthose positions and not hiring ? [audio loss]

>>leeann pelham: we're looking at what we are required to do under the laws that have been established for us, we have a broad range of mandates that require the five positions we are continuing to hire right now, positions that we had that are essential so is not the new positions were asked for, these are positions we had him so in my view this is the time, if we were faced with six or seven less positions than we currently have we have to have all those positions able to be deployed in every range of work that we need done so that in my judgment we keep on a hiring plan as we are now until we are told otherwise but we have

every reason to believe we should be able to hire these physicians recognizing they are essential network has beenfar overdue to be done. so this isnot , if this is what we landed on , we would have to make the best of an awful situation but we need the maximum resources and ranges to be necessary to get that program implemented. >>daina chiu: i just one last observation about equity these days, and i know that the mayor's instructions are the mayor's instructions but you have a disproportionate impact on our ability to perform a mandate that the city has entrusted us with. it's a department with tens of millions of dollars and i don't

know if this will come up in future conversations or if you want to get to attachment three with the statement on budget funding but it feels to me a 10 percent cut is not equitable for a commission with a tiny budget of 4 million and change to keep up with a budget of 1.3 billion. >> 1.3, 13 million. and a modest increase to support these programs, not decrease, a modest increase. we doubled our budget and we can barely scratch the surface of the work we need to do and when there is a crisis , in

chinese the phrase is danger and opportunity,and the moment of crisis , the choices we make indicate what's important to us. and so i'll stop editorializing now and let others ask their questions but i fully support the proposal that director pelham put forward and that you and resources to the commission staff in order to be able to do the work and we just ask the question is that enough given theever widening corruption scandal . there are threemore comptroller reports coming in is that sufficient ? it's monumental to create culture change and create policies and procedures and

programs to really turn the titanic away from theiceberg . >>chair ambrose:i'm going to assume commissioner lee as a comment . i just want to make sure i understand okay, we have to budget. the one we want and the one the mayor requires you to submit with 7 and a half percent and an added 2 and a half percent contingency. iwasn't sure from your presentation how many positions , whether or not you would have to eliminate all of the administrative support which i'm going to come back to in the form 700. if you are underthe 7 and a half percent or is that, you're just assuming 10 percent ?

>>leeann pelham: the short answer is the impact one through three would be the 10 percent but i'm going to defer to the deputy director. she can walk you through how that operationally works. >>chair ambrose: out go there and just one second but to get to myother question , in your statement about the impacts of, about eliminating three administrative support positionsyou only talked really about the administrative support function . but those functions as we all know, they are not discretionary functions in any department. somebody has to answer the phone

somebody has to respond to public records requests . somebody has to paythe bill . somebody has to keep the material going on so that's 120 hours of work a week that somebody has to do if you eliminate the three positions who are doing that work right now and that means that ofthe 20 people that are left in the apartment , that much, what is that?not all of those people can do that work so somebody's going to have a third of their time or corner of their time doing those other functions and so when you're writing a statement aboutwhat are the impacts of eliminating your entire administrative support staff , i think you need to explain that it's going to have an impact on policy and enforcement andcompliance and legislation because that's the real impact of taking that approach. otherwise , if i was sitting in

the mayor's budget office and i thought somebody was willing to give up their entire administrative support staff and that all meant is some vendor wasgoing to have to wait another 30 days to get paid , i wouldn't be renting my hands trying to figure out how to get your money. that's one comment and the other one is with respect to the revenueenhancement and work orders , we missed our chance i realize when we had the deputy controller on the line. i wanted to buttonhole him about getting access to the bond money for oversight. i wouldn't assume that we don't have the chance to do that in this fiscal year. when the budget preparation ordinance goes to the board, as a legislative action they have every ability in whatever it is, 150 page piece of legislation that is a budget

appropriation ordinance to write in there that some percentage of the controllers bond oversight review can be used by the ethics commission for an investigator position or something like that though it's not that to one side. while you're in there, we all know this is just date 1. you submit your budget to the mayor and then the wrangling begin. the board doesn't adopt it until may or june, the actual budget isn't adopted until july so let's keep our you know, our foot forward on getting other sources other than the general fund for that. now i'd say if you wanted to sort of remember whatever it was i was asking about. oh yeah, the positions in how the seven and half percent gets broken out.

>>leeann pelham: so seven and half percent target in addition to attrition savings target which we are expected to meet each year we will need to consider the five positions that we have mentioned in the presentation. the reason being ... >>chair ambrose: all four or three in the presentation you see there's administrative staff and mentioned and two positions that divide from700 . so in order to meet the 7.5 percent project and the attrition savings targets each year, we would need to rule on our costs, the reason being we have a very thin budget it comes to non-family expenses. the majority of the expenses in that category are for our filing systems.

and in telecommunications, we don't really have a lot of room in that category to spend to be able to meet the level of production that the mayor's office is asking for. so that's the answer to your question. >>chair ambrose: so i'm clear, the other 2.5 percentwould , you need all the form 700 positions which are new positions and the three existing positions to meet the mayor's unacceptable 7.5 percent and for the 2+ attrition and then to get the 2.5, that would also into the what, theinvestigator positions that were trying to hire for ?

>>gayathri thaikkendiyil: to clarify one of the points you mentioned earlier, we're not talking about affecting all related program support, we're specifically talking about the citywide e-filing effort which is expanding employees. specific positions to cancel that project so that is where they in fact will be. coming 2.5 percent contingency. the way we are able to meet that target is by offsetting some costs systems and related costs that are allocated for the lobby system so we've been in discussion with themayor's budget team . and currently there's a maintenance cost that gets charged to our annual operating budget. the mayor's team was okay with usmoving back over .

recently they're coming in their careers to a project on pipeline funding so specifically the instructions that the mayor's office has provided two departments for the budgeting cycle, the 10 percent, the entire 10 percent is required to be identified within the annual recurring costs butthe mayor's office in our case were okay with that . making this adjustment, meaning not taking greater reductions on the recurring expenses. instead, making some adjustments within the appropriate category meaning we are again offsetting the lobby system maintenance onto a lobby related project funding that's available so we were able to make that type of adjustment and also as director pelham mentioned cutting out a few

other areas on staffing and job training and we also have 10 million funds for seasonal type staffing recruitment, specifically closer to an election cycle , we hired staff to assist with increased customer support so we will now be able to do those types of additional changes to our staffing levels but we have to cutdown our temporary funds as well so to answer your question we were able to find 2.5 percent in those areas . doing acombination of different attempts . >>chair ambrose: and make sure i don't have any more questions and then i don't see any other hands with questions.

we have based on what we've seen our last special meeting about the budget, we had talked about our collective discomfort with having to suggest a budget that reflected a 7.5 or 10 percent cut and was asked to draft a statement that would allow us to meet our charter obligation which is to approve a budget submittal, presumably the one to the mayor's office since it doesn't necessarily come back to us and at the same time to object to the budget that we submitted that meets the requirements that were required to approve and so that's the action item before i want you to consider what we want to do with that. i have drafted something and

had asked along with commissioner busch and i've asked commissioner chiu to look at it and add her comments so that's the piece that we need to work on. i also wanted to say because we've had written comments from esther marx. she wasn't going to be able to stay at the meeting after noon today and she had expressed a strong support for an operating budget of 2.5 million which is our ideal budget. and communicated that these are for essential department needs. and that filling the five vacant positions and authorizations to receive vacant positions is important as we all know that we fought really hard last year and we

supported them, fought really hard to get the mayor's office to include those positions so that's understood. she also said that she thinks that investigative and enforcement division needs to be strengthened in order to reach public comfort in government and the department could move ahead in addressing culture city leadership. she suggested that staff increase to a budget of640,004 2022 . she also adopted a timeline of investigative matters within nine months within 18 months. as commissioner busch had stated at an earlier meeting would be ideal if those investigative matters could be resolved within six months. the essence of work is useless if people think they can get away with noncompliance abuse

and she said that as agenda item number five. she also said on commission support in mobilizing public opinion i hope that 6.5 million budget would be approved but in the event there are reductions she objects to eliminating the three administrative staff positions focusing on administrative support. her assistance with me it would be limited in participating in at x programs and it would negatively affect the department's budget and delay the ability for payment for goods and services means no one will want to do business with the ethics commission if the departments nonresponse as an attitude of what are they good for ?i wanted to get back on the record because i think that they are important contributions from the public and i can go back to the talk for whatit's worth .

i have concerns about eliminating administrative support and about a of the budget cuts that i am concerned with eliminating all the administrative support in the department. i understand from director pelham's perspective to freeze person positions that we have advertised and that are essential to our core function, i think what you're going to find is that the mayor take you up on that and you have to eliminate all your support , you're going to have a really hard time getting to your core function because your staff is going to be spending a lot of time doing administrative work but anyway, that's my comment and i'm going to start with whoever as their hand up and that would be commissioner chi . if you have a comment or recommendation on how to

proceed? >>daina chiu: to proceed with the budget overall. >>chair ambrose: this is up for possible action. we need to have a motion to presumably since the deadline for the director to submit this budget to the mayor is on 22 february ibelieve , so this is the meeting we need to authorize the director to submit some budget that complies with the mayor's directives.and we presumably need to make a statement about how we hate having to do that. >>daina chiu: is the statement to be submitted along with the budget or would it run along

some other approach ? >>chair ambrose: the idea we talked about was to try and publish it as an op-ed. and as you know, i didn't put in the statement what the commission did today because i didn't want to presume what it wasthat we were doing today . once we do something we could amend the statement to say that the commission's position so i sort of left that in the draft since it was drafted ahead of time. but we can't be sure that any newspaper is going to want to express our opinion for us so we called it a statement so that yes, though the director could reference it when she sent it over to the mayor's office and the controller's office or whatever. though that we are on record as not supporting the absolute gutting of the ethics commission's resources but anyway. >>daina chiu: i think if we

can't run this final version of an op-ed i would also support releasing it so that is out there in the public in the absence of us putting forth our own narrative of what's happening from a budget standpoint, then other people can make up their own stories about what is happening, like what the ethics commission thinks about cuts to the budget. but i think that's really important for us to seek kind of our own position publicly. and then second i think as an overall observation i would jump straight in to making the point that i think yourwords are very apt . there gutting our budget. there gutting the budget. we are going to be crippled and unable to fulfill our charter mandate and mandate that the

people of san francisco have entrusted us with .we won't be able to answer the phones, we won't be able to help people comply and we certainly won't be able to change the culture of corruption in parts of the city's family. if we don't have any of the resources and we won't be able to investigate due to enforcement.everything is going to be limited so i understand that this is a belt tightening exercise because there is significant shortfall in revenue but we have and i think commissioner lee said it very well read the virus of corruption is here in san francisco and we can collectively adopt that it's just going to go away, but it's not going away. it's only increasing first it

was in the building inspection and then it led to the puc on airport commission and more and more. we have three more comptroller reportscoming out . and i think the federal investigation is ongoing and the other shoe is going to drop or acouple other shoes are going to drop .we need to exclusively say that i think that the wires of corruption have affected san francisco and if left unchecked it's going to spread and intensify like a cancer . on city government and that by refusing or requiring the ethics commission to cut staffing and be gutted i think that what the city is saying is that's okay. because when thechips are down , that's when and everything is

online, you have to make the hard choices. what are the choices you're going to make and if the choices are the one organization in the entire city department, the entire city family is tasked with ensuring high standards andethical practices,ethical conduct , transparency and accountability , it's in a time when all that is under fire and multiple instances that has been uncovered byfederal government for which people have pled guilty and are facing criminal indictments , and for the city to say yes, you know , we're going to make the ethics commission cut 10 percent just like everybody else. i mean, the message that i got from that is it doesn't matter. and that everything that's happening, it's okay.

>>chair ambrose: one of the things i want to make sure we're clear on, while the mayor asks everyone to show cuts across the board, as has happened last year, the end result that the mayor's office submits to the board of supervisors is not always reflecting an across-the-board cut. i mean, that's just the beginning of the process but just to be clear that the reason for the tone and the statement we are clear that we cannot withstand a 10 percent cut but that we don't want to presume that it's already been called out to us and that therefore the message is that corruption is in vogue in the city so there's a balance there.

what we want to say is i'll be honest with you. i would hate to be either the board finance committee or the upper rewrite now because it's going to be ugly. there's no question about it. it's like, revenue is down. it's goingto be down even more over the course of the fiscal year, whatever their projections are one assessments start changing . and there are a lot of problems in the city. you just have to open the newspaper every day. it's going to be ugly and we may not get what our ideal is and i guess the question is how in my mind is how can we get as much of our budget off of the general fund as possible and into the sources of revenue in the city that are not affected by taxes and i think that's where commissioner bush has

been going with the work orders and bond oversight because there are capitalfunds, capital funds are based on issues that you pay off over 20 or 30 years . and our budget is so smallwe would be like a minuscule little piece of . but anyway, all i want to say is we need to be clear that they haven't done it yet and when we first come out with, we will say this is how ugly it would be if we had to meet across-the-board but of course, nobody would do that to the ethics commission at this critical time. as the gentleman wanted to set i think that's fair because they haven't taken action. i think that we can be preemptive in an agreement that if they take that action this is the message that would be sent. and i think it would be also helpful to propose that are there alternative sources and

that should the departments that have been publicly identified by the office as having these problems, should they not do a work order to support training? i was impressed with what the airport commission had done in terms of the drafting the procedural and programmatic rules or deficiencies that the comptrollers had identified. what has the department of building inspection done and how they decided to commit to putting their house in order and can they partner with the ethics commission by creating a work order to conduct training for all employees above a certain level to be able to do that so it's not so much ethics going hand in hand with the board asking for funds but asking those who have the most need of change to be part of

that change and to invest the resources to affect change within their organization. >>chair ambrose: i'm sorry, go ahead commissioner bush. >>larry bush: two points, when you faced significant budget cuts wasn't an across-the-board budget cut so for example the budget that's at the department of social services did not cut the positions of staff working to get people qualified for social security. because that resulted in an increase in funds for the city . san francisco's ethics commissioners in a similar situation where better investigation and more timely investigation on whistleblowers might reduce the amount of money that we are paying out in

court costs because a significant amount of money goes out from san francisco city budgets due to court decisions on san francisco whistleblower cases. that same thing is true about how much we might be able to save small businesses which is one of the priority areas for the mayor . by addressing rigged contracts and fraudulent contracts because that really is not just a question of losing taxpayer money. it's also taking money away from all businesses who don't have a chance to compete fairly. so i think that those are areas that we need to surface more clearly in our discussions. finally, we see that the federal government is looking at adding more resources to

local governments to compensate for the amount of loss that's taken place.and as that moves forward and i expect that it willsucceed , i would like to suggest that we get ourselves put first in line for reimbursement of expenses that we paid because we are as commissioner chiu points out a small commission with a small staff which is asked to do a great deal so it's appropriate that we would be first in line to have what we have lost made up. thank you. >>chair ambrose: thank you. commissioner lee, is your hand up? you. >>yvonne lee: thank you madam chair. i asked my fellow commissioners comments, i want to suggest

that every time there's a budget discussion support staff is always in the front line of the cut. what is ultimately going to happen is an acceptable proposal that puts staff out and at the same time people find it easier to say we could do without the staff but other staff can do the work and i wonder if the director can answer this question. in lieu of the three support staff recommended cutsthat you made , what about a particular program? let's say several hundred

outreach program. something people can direct their attention to that this is what it means by requiring the 10 percent cut, we will not be able to do a, b, c and d at the commission because it's a very easy excuse to say you're just losing the three support staff, all of us deal with it but if we come in and say this is what it means, we're not going to be able to do 10 percent of what we are required to do. this particular program. it makes it harder for folks to visit andsay here's your 10 percent . and i agree with the chair. this is just the beginningof the fight and it's going to be a tough fight . but we are facing a huge epic

challenge for the next year or beyond so we just have to find ways to fight it and i don't want to put ourselves against other departments and community groups that need money quest somebody isnot muted . >>daina chiu: chair, i would like to echo vice chair of these!. to the extent we can make impacts more real, what would that look like for questions about i'm a candidate and i have questions about what

forms i need to file areayou're not going to get the answer to the question or a real person . public financing is if you want to apply for public finance funds, you need to take next time, is probably going totake three times as long so to the extent we can qualify on to tell the story about what we won't be able to do and what that means , for the public and for no, officials i think it's all the more tangible and real powerful in what of the cuts would be and that'san point that commissioner lee made . >>chair ambrose: director pelham do you have to identify specific positions when you show your cuts? are you going through and building your budget and this system and all of a sudden somebody that was in your

budget last year , number 13 something isn't in there or is it bigger blocks? you just say this is how we are going to get there? i don't understand when you have to submit it and maybe i should stop before i ask a question like that because i thought if i ever really understood the cities finance system, i've been around too long but going back to the other point that folks are making, i agree. i think if we don't communicate and in fact it occurred to me we should just say we won't be able to do public financing of campaigns and then all of a sudden the board of supervisors would be very interested in making sure that we had enough funding to make sure they can get the funding that they needed for their next election cycle so are we being on strategic in identifying

positions that arenot clearly articulated as being essential to our being able to perform all the substantive things that we do ? i hope that that message is getting across. i also would want to because i am concerned about moving forward, i want to make sure that we if there is somebody out therein the public that wants to testify that we hear them .go actually want i'm going to ask you to go ahead and mute a notice for public comment and see if anyone'sbeen able to hang in there long enough to comment .>>ronald contreraz: where checking to see if there arcolors in the queue. wait to indicate you have been on muted . to join the meeting we are currently on discussion on agenda item number eight . keep your comments to fiscal

year 2022 that begins july 1, 2021. please press á3 to enter the public comment you.you will have three minutes tsubmit their comments . you will hear a belt go off when you have 30 seconds remaining . madam chair, wehave a color in the queue . thank you caller. your three minutes begins now. >>caller: commissioners, myname is francisco the cost . the last time i participated in your deliberations i described the state of affairs of the sometime task force, theethics commission , the city attorney and the controller.nothing has changed. now, our mayor in the middle of

this pandemic has taken a rais . she makes $400,000. as far as i know,i've been following this commission from day one , we need to put a business plan and submit to the mayor directly, not to the controller, not tothe city attorney, to the mayor directly . the federal bureau of investigation if you know something and know the ethics commission , they lean on the mayor. the federal, the fbi is still monitoring her . so if harlan goes down and naomi goes down or juliet jumps the ship, there are about 30 or

40 in the pipeline that the federal bureau of investigation was forced to come and clean up because the sometime task force at thiscommission, the controller's office and city attorney did not do their job . nobody's going to tell it to you as strongly as i am and i do send you all some emails which i think all the commissionersshould read . we have corruption in our city that has reached saturation point. why do you think we created the ethicscommission ? what has our ethics commission done in the last 15 years when it comes to a blow that's brought to your attention the millions of dollars that are

being wasted, what have they done denmark nothing. what has the controller's office done, nothing really so we have a budget of $30 billio . and it shouldn't be a problem to give the ethics commission the full amount that they are asking to have resources to serve their constituents and taxpayers of san francisco. but you need to write a letter to the mayor and have that letter published in the newspapers. you know that some of the local newspapers are doing a beautiful job on the controller, on the city attorney and ethics commission really you should read those articles by doctor kerr and the others. thank you very much. >>chair ambrose: thank you

mister dacosta and do we have any other people in the queue? >>ronald contreraz: we are checking. once again if youhave just joined this meeting we are currently on public discussion of agenda item number eight . public comment and discussion of ethics mission for disclosure, 2022 which begins july 21st. if you've not done so rest á3 to be addedto the public comment queue. you will have three minutes to provide public comment. you will hear a bell go off when you have 30 seconds remaining . ... madam chair, we have a

caller in the queue. thank you caller, your three minutesbegins now . >>caller: iq. i agree the ethics commission does a lot of important work and there's a lot of things that need to be changed in the city and not only is the ethics commission important because of current problems in thecity , i think the ethics commission is relevant because a number of the important political figures have mattered in the san

francisco and the commission as a bunch of documents related to those individuals. form 700s and so on. that are just of interest to people of san francisco, there of interest to people internationally even. and so yes, i think the questions of the ethics commission are critical and they are important to people around the world to be quite frank. and i would like to see the ability to research documents and stuff expanded and maybe made it easier to be made

public and certainly having staff would make that more helpful, especially now that we are in service for the virtual world of zoom and all that . and not all of the electronic tools are necessarily the most user-friendly. it's easier to search for c words and all that. i don't know if those two are the ones that were chosen by the ethics commission specifically or ones that are usedby all city departments . the ethics commission got stuck with but yes, just being able to expand the tools of the ethics commission, notjust for the ethics commission itself but for the generalpublic so that they can use them . it would be of great benefit to pretty much everyone . and so yes, it's important that the ethics commission does have

an added budget and the ethics commission use it judiciously. thank you. >>chair ambrose: dowe have any other callers in the queue . >>ronald contreraz: we are checking. there are no more colors in the queue. >>chair ambrose: so public comment is closed on agenda item 8. but we need a motion. we may need me 2 motions, one related to the proposed op-ed and one related to what the director needs from us which is

authorization to submit a budget into the system in compliance with the mayor's across-the-boarddirective . so do i have a motion from the commissioner on either of those two topics and i know commissioner chiu, you might have had specific edits to the statement or the letter to the editor, i don't know if there are any specific language. if you folks want to give me general directions i'm happy to go back and try and a in a way that reflects that really what i would plan to do is the way it ends in the draft form is to say that we recommend that folks look at what they did today but instead of that i would say what position we took at something more definitive about because you have all

expressed about how we don't want to see the ethics commission hampered a lack of resources because our mission is so critical. particularly at this time and that we don't support a reduced budget. in fact we need to use additional resources,something along those lines but omission or chiu , i will hand it to you next and in the interest of at least moving that along and then we are going to need a motion onthe budget . >>daina chiu: i'm going to send you specific edits but i think that revising in the direction you just mentioned i think would be helpful and then i think maybe making the distinction back reducing our budget, gutting our budget would be sending the message

that the status quo of corruption and our troubling culture is okay. that's the main message that i would want. if the board and mayor and act these reductions, that in effect that's what they would be saying. >>chair ambrose: i just wrote down what you said and i'd be happy to include a finishing statement and commissioner lee the last time she had said we need a signing statement in the way i guess executive orders are the president will try and control the legislative history on the action by writing a

signing statement. the other motion which i envisioned as being something to the effect of the authorized the director to submit a budget in compliance and the reason i say a budget is while we understand what you said about accommodation of physicians you heard what were saying about how administrative staff are important and that needs to be reflected inyour communication to the mayor about the impacts would be an how we frame that . anyways, commissioner lee, did you have any comments or edits okay . and commissioner bush.

>>larry bush: on terms of the science paper i think we need to underscore the extent to which effective ethics will save taxpayer money and save businesses in the city. so it's basically saying that on the other side of this. >>daina chiu: i would agree with commissioner busch and the way we can harken back to the priorities of themayor about supporting small businesses and making it explicit , making public contracting clear and fair andtransparent and accountable in our small businesses . there will be a clear playing field and not have something be rigged in the favor of those who can influence. >>chair ambrose: i had started toinclude the list of the

mayor's priorities which extend to homelessness and equity . which are important and how corruption undermines those. i am a little concerned if we want to get this published that it ended up being in another 2 paragraphs but then we can count on whatever editorto edit our letter to the editor in any case so we should include that . i will circulate, if we can designate a committee, i'm going to have commissioner chiu, i'm only allowed to work with on the one other person i've already understood what commissioner bush has submitted about the financial and business impacts and the other mayors ideas so i'm going to take those and then i'm going to work with you commissioner chiu if we have the support of the commission to getout the final version of the letters

statement , because i think we all know where we want to go with that but i still need 2 motions along those lines to authorize the director to move forward with an authorization to submit the budget as required. absence commission support for their reduction reflected their ability by motion on the budget so that we have a six sink resolution so when the director sends it over in addition to this long statement that they may or may not read it will be clear that the commissions resolution was to authorize executive director to submit the budget as required provided that the commission does not support a 7.5 percent or 10 percent reduction in its budget.

is that a second for that motion? >>daina chiu: a clarifying question if i may, with that submission incorporate the suggested changes that vice chair lee has proposed which providing a bit more detailed information around what the impact , what the administrativestaff reduction would mean ? >>chair ambrose: absolutely, i'm assuming all of our directions to the executive director as to how better to present the alternatives is something that she's going to incorporate in her submittal. i guess with respect to the other thing i was going to say, we're going to bring this back at least by april four consideration by the commission

as we understand better what the members actually are going to submit our weather we got money from any of our sources but yes, i'm assuming that going back to the motion that the executive director has heard that we are not fans of just drawing theadministrative support staff on this . >>james bell: i'm confused about where we landed with respect to the option we were going to use so there's options one, two and three.one is without the administrative, one is with the administrative staff for we are not trying to do that so i'm just a little confused on where we are with what we are proposing >>chair ambrose: i think maybe i should let somebody else

enter that . i think in terms of the option at the last meeting, there were more options about how to move forward and they included cutting for example the investigated staff and our direction back to the executive director was not to do that and so left with that direction, my understanding is that our recommendation is that the only way forward is to eliminate the administrative support positions and possibly the form 700 electronics filing positions. i, i think it's going to be important that we get regular reports on how things are going with the mayor's budget office

back in april as well because it comes down to a four percent cut, i think we might have further discussion on whether or not involves having any positions versus eliminating a new filing program. and i don't know, go ahead director, maybe you have a better more clear answer. >>leeann pelham:i think just to be clear , we're out of options and the proposals in the slide today each of those impacts go into what we would have to report to the mayor would be impact and those are one two and three combined together as the impact that would have on us under this proposal.

thedifficulty and i to your comment earlier , it is clear to all of us and recognize our staff are important to all operations as well. none of these options are a good one or tenable one all in my mind but we have to make a choice to what we are able to do the mass with because that's essentially what the mayor's budget system requires is to do the math in this first year, assuming that is what might be imposed on the department. so in short, i think there is a process.this is the start of the process and i think what is really clear which we also share his notion that what we submit absolutelyis clear and strong as possible on what the impact would be in real terms as commissioner lee mentioned earlier .we want what would be the impact if these were imposed and we will do that

over the next 10 days. that's not the end of the conversation as commissioner busch said, there will be ongoing negotiations with the mayor's office and staff as we move forward to the proposal that she ends up proposing to the board later this spring and then there will of course be further conversations like we had last year which enabled us to get funds back it is a months long process that we want to be reporting back on what we know at every stage that we can area the other thing i've heard clearly was yes, we will continue to try to reach out to the controller's office and others to explore where we might have a revenue side impact sooner rather than later. your hearing frustration in my response earlier because that alone takes time and effort to get those conversations going and we've not been successful in doing that and it doesn't mean i agree we should stop doing that we will not stop making the effort .

we will do what we can to enhance the revenue side so the revenue side of the strongest impacts we can make and recognition that there is no good solution but we do need to have a proposal in 10 days submitted to the mayor's office and this is what it reflects the least of all bad options. the trade-off would be what policy positions and audits work that we would have to cut. what enforcement work we could cut in providing information to people through training and education so there is no good option and i desperately regret we're having this kind of a conversation about any of our staffhaving to be let go and that is where we are so i wanted to share that we've heard that , my hope would be we are getting approval to submit proposal proposal as we have with your staff that we are trying to avoid any cuts at all costs by making the strongest case possible i'm looking for revenue enhancements and by making the case as strongly aspossible

that we have much work to be done and we are doing it well and continuing to hold ourselves accountable for it and if the city is serious about ethics it is time to put . >>ronald contreraz: you are muted, chair ambrose. >>chair ambrose: i was trying to recognize commissioner busch and before i do give that answer, this question that you put out about the budget presentation. >>james bell:basically it's going to be the one with the three administrative positions will be the ones that are most in jeopardy . those are the choices that were made in terms of all the bad choices. i just want to make sure that's where welanded is when i saw your powerpoint , that was the

one.see one that is the proposal. i just want to go over the rest of this discussion about how we're going to fight like hell. >>james bell: i wanted to he sure where we landed in terms of what we were going to be submitting in 10 days. >>chair ambrose: thank you for bringing that up and commissioner bush. >>larry bush: i want to underscore in specific terms that we will continue to add additional resources for our budget and that extends from director pelham one of the obstacles is the lack of staff time and the ability to reach out in new ways to obtain

either resources from existing departments both from outside the city. i know for example the district attorney has reported that payments for his office of hundred thousand dollars. from a university program. and i also see that the district attorney has put out a letter asking people to make contributions to pay for the district attorney's work and so there are a variety of options, but all those options that director pelham has said require staff time and resources and what we have in favor of that is these are not for ongoing programsbut they are one-time expenses .a

one-time expense to clear up the investigations backlog. a one-time expense to take a deeper look at the kind of policy changes that the controller has recommended . so there's a greater chance of finding a foundation for outside funding that will look sympathetically at us because it's a one-time cost with an endpoint and secondly, because san francisco is a city that people look to for policy innovations and people look to us because our ethics commission has the unusual ability to put a reform on the ballot itself so i am recommending that any budget submission make it abundantly clear that we are going to endeavor to our own resources

or other resources that we are able to assess to increase the capacity of the ethics commission in this budget year to get its movement forward. so i'm making that as a motion for our amendment. >>chair ambrose: i'm going to ask you the motion is that we will continue to add, to seek additional resources to support our budget. in short, i just want to make sure we can state this clearly the minutes reflect what we did . >>james bell: >>larry bush: yes, vigorously. >>chair ambrose: so yes, the motion then would be that we will authorize the executive

director to submit the budget in compliance with the mayor's office request for 7.5 percent across-the-board. provided however that the commission strongly objects to a reduction in the ethics commission's resources and further provided that we will work to seek additional outside resources to supplement our funding. but communicate what everybody has been talking about in terms of the resolution. and if so, can i have a second to that motion and then can you call the role, mister moderator?is that a second,

commissioner lee? thank you and can you call the roll please. >>ronaldcontreraz: a motion has been made and seconded, i will now call the role .[roll call vote] quick's. >>ronald contreraz: that's five votes in the affirmative and zero votes of those, the motion is approved . >>chair ambrose: i'm going to ask for another motion to delegate to the chair and to commissioner chiu to finalize a

letter to the editor statement reflecting the discussion that thecommission has had in regards to its action on the budget . before distribution in the case that's a second from commissioner lee . and commissioner bush, did you have a question. >>larry bush: you've expressed concern about the length of the ethics but under covid and everything else little is being said on paper, it's mostly coming out in a digital format. even our daily papers. so i would not let that constrain me other than tight enough so that people will read it so you don't have to worry aboutcutting it down in the past . it was 500 words or 850 on the

sunday paper. i don'tthink those rules apply today . >>chair ambrose: thank you, i knowyou are from the publishing world . we have a motion and a second. mister moderator, can youplease call the role on that function . >>ronald contreraz:rule has been made and seconded, i will now call the role . [roll call vote] with five votes in the affirmative and zero, the motion isapproved . >>chair ambrose: thank youfor that. i'm going to just make a suggestion . we have an agenda item nine which is the streamlining. i want to move forward on that because we've already had the interested person meeting and i

think we're ready to go. i am going to suggest though that agenda item 10, the discussion of the staff policy report that we put that over to the next meeting if that will be too inconvenient for staff. i think there's a lot of important work that's going on in that world and that we're going to want to be sharp and creative in engaging with you both on that as well as when we meet in march we're going to want to talk about what the controllers next report is going to be because that is totally 100 percent in our wheelhouse so i went to take this staff policy report and make that a priority item or meeting in march blended with our response on the controllers agenda and where we are on all the ethics disclosures in the city so we only have been this agenda item 9 as the next item so that everyone can get on

with their holiday today. so with that i'm going to use my executive authority as chair to declare if that's the case if i don't hear anybody shaking their head about it and i'm going to call agenda item 1 which is discussion of possible action on revised penalty policy and streamlined administrative resolution program and turn it over to eric willett. mister willett, when you make your presentation if you don't, then i will make the comment that we received electronically both esther williams and i don't have it in front of me yet.

i want to makesure if they can participate if they taken the time to commit written comments i want to make sure they are shared with everyone . so anyway, if you want to proceed then with your presentation, please do eric willett and i will deliver a brief presentation that summarizes the revision process and shows the new proposed streamlined resolution program. beginning in august 2019, staff proposed revisions and expansion of the commissions penalty policy as part of process improvements to increase the efficiency and effectiveness ofthe enforcement program. after the commissioner expressed its approval that staff do so , staff develop a revised policy for the commissions consideration that would result in expansion of the current policy to be implemented as a new streamlined administrative legislation program. this proposal is built on commissions policy which was

approved by the commission in july 2013 and qualified for provisions incentivized accelerated settlement. subsequently staff advised the penalty policy in both substantive and procedural aspects with the goal to provide accountability for violations of city laws while reducing the amount of time and resources required for a more formal solution. this revision process was undertaken in seven parts. firstly investigators sought feedbackinternally from staff in each division and from colleagues in other jurisdictions . attention was paid to the efforts and processes that the fair political practices commission used to amend its streamlined settlement program which precededsomewhat in the process and proved helpful to review their process working on

efforts . secondly staff then solicited and received focused input at two interested persons meetings regarding what members of the regulated community nonprofit groups thought of the review process might entail. drafted the streamlined administrative resolution program and hosted a further two interested persons meetings and received feedback in response to the draft provisions. staff revised the draft as appropriate. that brings us to staff presentations today and discussionshere with iterations as necessary . on final approval staff will implement the new program. if we turn to death proposed revisedpolicy and streamlined administrative resolution program documents located in agenda item 9 , let me go through that. on pages, pages one and two, staff identified general eligibility guidelines and

considerations that provide staff with the flexibility to issue warning letters in lieu of administrative penalties or to exclude respondents from participating in the program. onindex one on pages three and four,staff proposes to expand from four provisions of law 241 provisions of law across article 123 , articles 12 and three in the campaign in governmental conduct code . from start to the one on page 5 through 25, staff tailor the program to the nuances of the different provisions of law and where applicable identified civic eligibility guidelines and discretionary considerations or warning letters or for exclusion from the program. additionally after the threshold that are informed by those included within the states streamlined settlement

program and with that data gap gathered on activity level found in san francisco. table 2 on pages 26 through 36, staff reassess the penalty schedule and developed penalty amounts and discretionary modifiers are informed by those included with the state streamlinedsettlement program are scaled to reflect data gathered on the activity levels found within san francisco . overall matters resolved in this program will generally result in of the penalty that is less severe and a description of the violation in surrounding eventsthat is less detailed . in comparison to matters resolved through the regular administrative enforcement process . not withstanding processes require action by the commission in a publicly noticed meeting. it's ongoing efforts to reduce the effectiveness of the commissions enforcement program that proposes that option of the new line administrative resolution program implementation as an expansion of theexisting penalty policy .

staff welcomes any question about further input from this commission on the program as proposed and look forward to implementing the program as adopted.chair ambrose, i will defer to you with regard to public comments received by the commission. >>chair ambrose: the public comments from esther marx was in support of the streamlined program. i think fortunately because you didn't do interested persons stakeholders meetings, we had a chance to hear her sort of questions and comments at greater length. the comments from the other individuals is i'm afraid i'm having trouble bringing it immediately to mind so if someone.

>>eric willett: it's just in minardi. >>chair ambrose: 'scomment, i remember he works in the field and i think he said something about reducing low-level fines lower. and i'm not sure, i'm definitely not willing to take that at this time but it did occur to me when i saw that when i thought about what ms. marx said about the penalty on the stipulations, that a future agenda item maybe we should review what our fine level is. i don't know how often they are used for limiting or where we are seeing people behavior not being modified accordingly so if we can do that in the futur , are there any questions for commissioners?

i know we all had achance to hear this presentation and the interested persons meetings with the exception of commissionerbell . i see 2 hands up . commissioner chiu. >>daina chiu: thank you chair ambrose. my questions derive from justin minardi's comments and i'm curious mister willett with regard to the fcp funding level that are lower than what the ethics commission haschosen for this new program , can you respond or share what the thinking was in terms of what factors you concerns in terms of starting the lineover there, i'm curious to how you would respond to that and if you can

answer whether you think it should be higher . i just wanted to ask the question . >>eric willett: commissioner chiu, we established a penalty amount that were informed by the states program but then that was scaled up for consideration within san francisco's data , for instance thestate , the entire state not necessarily a major metropolitan areas discovering jurisdictions in all levels of government whereas ours is specifically san francisco so we used these state programs as a base and scaled it upwards based upon our own internal data that we have within the commission databases. and we feel that our program here has employed a generous warning system that would capture a vast number of respondentsenvisioned by just comments . furthermore the staff does not make a distinction between a warning letter and a $100 or

$200 financial penalty whereas a $500 penalty is a turning point reflects the inference between the conduct of the respondents received a warning letter and one received a $500 penalty . and the financial penalty reflects both the different factors within the city and the amount of resources employed by the enforcement programto bring a matter of resolution before the commission . >>daina chiu: 'sother comments asked that the commission revisit the fine structure on down the road in the future and that it doesn't remain in place for decades. about that, that something you would want to about just as a practice going forward or something that you considered including in the overall program structure?

>>eric willett: staff will be addressing the efficacy of the program before long so throughout the program life as a policy, we can assess the efficacy and make changes tothe process . as staff is recommending, this would be an amendment to the existing fixed penalty policies that wereadopted in 2013 . it would be a similar process in the future if they were extending the amendment to the policy. >>chair ambrose: if adopted whenwith the program go into effect ? >>eric willett: almost immediately. i'll be the administrator of the program and we've already done a walk-through of how many of our existing caseloads would be eligible for the program

that would entail around 53 percent of our open investigation dockets would be directly eligible for the program. >>daina chiu: this is tremendous work, i have the opportunity to participate in the meeting and appreciated all the feedback from esther marx andfrom this thoughtful input . it was the product in the proposal are the better for it. and thank you to you and the team for the tremendous work. i think it will make a big difference in people who are doing the work load and is 50 percent be able to takethat off the table . it's taking everyone's time to pursue the digger features here, that's a greatoutcome .

>>eric willett: thank you commissioner. >>chair ambrose: i want to thank jeff and eric and your team, i know commissioner chiu in your tenure that you urged this effort and analysis and i think we are better for it. i'm going to make a motion to adopt shall we call it the sars program or that streamlined? public comment, yes. >>ronald contreraz: commissioner bush had his hand. >>chair ambrose:commissioner bush before we make the motion, we will have a motion and asked for public comment . i guess i'm a little tired after sitting here. commissioner bush. >>larry bush: we are all tired. i had questions about whether

or not this program encompasses two kinds of violations which i think are significant that i don't know if they're under a fixed staff, one is independent expenditurecommittees except prohibited contributions . that's an issue that comes up where people are not allowed to give contributions but they get money to an independent expenditure committee that is dedicated to a candidate. is that contemplated in the fixed penalty or without the outside that? >>chair ambrose:make it more clear what illegal activity you are referring to so i understand . >>james bell: they give money to an independent committee

stating its purpose is to elect that candidate. but unless someone is going through the records, and determining that some of the donors are prohibited from making contributions, it escapes attention. and there have been no enforcement actions on that basis since this law into effect so i'm thinking that it may be that if you have a fixed penalty thing we will begin to track that betterthan we have so far . >>eric willett: if i may, unless i misunderstood the question i don't believe you conduct your describing commissioner bush is prohibited in law. the contribution to an independent expenditure committee is not a contribution to the candidate even if the committee is designed to support that candidate and under existing law and controlling judicial president

that conduct is still out. >>larry bush: couldyou take a closer look at that because i believe it is illegal in existing law . >>eric willett: is it the case that contractor contributions areprohibited in the list ? >>eric willett: it's number three. >>larry bush: that's one to a candidate notlonger through a ie . >>chair ambrose: i think the legal question you're asking we will have to come back to that because i did tell the deputy city attorney shen he could leave early so we will have to clarify that we will come back

to commissioner pierce and eric, your answer is that a violation of the contributions to an independent expenditure committee is or isn't something that could radically be eligible for streamlining if it made it through all the different conditions that are embedded in the program? >>eric willett: i would have to takea closer reading of the code section1.126 . 1.126 is included within the start program . and that is contributions from the contractors. we will bring up the applicable code60 revisions . the scenario that commissioner bush has put to us. one moment.

section 1.126 is contribution prohibition without contractors doing business with the city. and. >>larry bush: if the prohibition exists in 1.26, isn't that provision applied only to the contributions to the candidate committee? i'm not familiar with your use of the law so we will have to get back to you. >>eric willett: it's hard to open up copies of the code at the same time i'm doing this on my screen. somebody must be able to teach mehow to do both one time but i don't know it right now .i will get back to you but that's just from eyes that this is a loophole. in which case as you've gone through this i hope you will identify loopholes and present them to the commission for action so that they are no longer loopholes becauseclearly , if pg and eve or ecology

cannot give money to a candidate but can give money to the independentexpenditure committee for larry bush , then that would be a loophole that you would want to close. >>jeff pierce: you may have to take that up with the supreme court. >>eric willett: i can tell you what my opinion is. >>chair ambrose: timeout because we are getting into a substantive area that's actually not on the agenda and that's where we would benefit from some background analysis and presentations so we will take that as i do take into support that we know the answer to that question and if we don't precluded and why we are not precluding going back to the streamlined. >>larry bush: i have one other

issue with streamlines which is the streamlined thing contemplates enforcement of lobbyists who failed to disclose fully what they are lobbying. >>jeff pierce: it does, commissioner bush. under the lobbyists provision and on page 4, it's under ... and multiple scenarios like non-failing or a failure to update registration records or i think what you're speaking towards is lobbyist monthly report omissions or a failure to update on that monthly report of lobbyist contacts and what the item favorite contact being city officials pertain t . and those specific revisions on number 26 of our lobbyist traditions. >>chair ambrose: however, a

violation to one of those rules would still have to go through the various buckets before it could be dealt with essentially in the streamlined fashion as opposed to requiring a much narrower, in essence they would have to confess and pay off pretty much or prove to you that they didn't make the violation in the source pledge. all right, thank you commissioner bush. any other questions for staff before we go to public comment? actually i'm going to have you go ahead mister moderator and read the instructions for public comment and then i'm going to ask someone tomake a motion . >>ronald contreraz: we are checking tosee if there are colors in the queue .

wait to see if you have been muted. we are currently on the public discussion of agenda items on revised fixed penalty policy and streamlined administrative resolutions programs. if you have not already done so these press á3 to be added to the public comment you. you will have three minutes, six minutes if you are online with an interpreter. you will have bill go off when you have 30 seconds. please stand by. madam chair, we have a color in the queue.welcome, caller. your three minutes begins now. welcome, caller. are you there?

you might be experiencing if you have muted yourself okay, caller, weare going to come back to you . and then as we have a couple of other callers in the queue. i see yourname and it says you're speaking but i cannot hear you .we cannot hear you. okay. i'm going to put that calleron hold, please and by . okay, the next caller looks like it's actually the same

caller that commented on the last public comment, she just never undid her raised hand so we'll see . welcome, caller. your three minutesbegins now . >>caller: i'm sorry, i didn't mean to raise my hand. >>ronald contreraz: i wanted to make sure because it remained raised up so inorder to lower you just hit áthree again . thank you.okay. let's set the timer your real quick. you have another caller in the queue. welcome, caller. your three minutes begins now.

>>caller: can you hear me. >>ronald contreraz: yes. >>caller: this is alisa pittman and i believe the proposed dream line administrative resolution program is an improvement over the current program. it is morestraightforward , the fines are transparent and more importantly, it covers many more substantive areas than the currentprogram. i do have a few comments regarding specificitems . the first is item number 18 . the contractor contribution. the provision which is on page 13 of 36 and this item applies to a committee which is lawfully received a contribution for city contractor and one of the stated exclusions from the programs is evidence that the contributionthat a contributor tried to conceal unlawful contributions . hence the penalty is against the recipient committee, it

seems unfair to block committee from participating in the start program due to the badbehavior of the contributor . it would be more appropriate that the exclusionary language provided, that the committee tried to conceal the unlawful contributions. the second item is item, sorry cable to item 3, the major donor of campaign statement nonfiling that is on page 26 of 36 and i have a technical comment related to column three, four and five. based onstaffs revisions to this section , the language quote, whichever is greater " no longer applies and should be deleted in all three columns. andfinally, item number nine , record-keeping on page 28 of 3 , if a respondent takes action

in 30 days of contact being by the enforcement division to correct the campaign record than i think a fine of $1000 plus five percent of either undocumented contributions or expenditures, whichever is greater is an excessive fine. a simple fine of $500 would be more appropriate and is significant incentive to quickly resolve the matter to avoid a $1500 + at the next level. those are all of my comments. thank you. thank you caller. all right, that's actually thank you i need a. i appreciate you because it look like you're on here twice . that was the previous caller that we had we could not hear

so please and by tosee if we have any more callers into . again, if youjoined this meeting we are currently on public discussion of item 9 . discussion of possible acts to revise penalty policy and streamline administrative resolutions . madam chair, we have a number of callers in the queue. >>chair ambrose: public comment on agenda item 9 is closed. i want to ask staff regarding the notes that our last caller had and assuming that i think it was item22 , what sounded like technical corrections are things that staffcan make on their own initiative . regarding the other two items, i'm prepared to go with staff

recommendations but is there any comments by staff or any questions from commissioners about those two suggestions that the caller had. i will entertain them. >>jeff pierce: i'm happy to provide acouple of responses if that would be helpful . first of her concerns, and the conversations we had at that timewas the provision of law issue was there . it provides liabilityboth for the contributor and for the committee . mrs. mayo asked for clarification in the document about whether the contributors bad conduct would be held also against the committee. he didn't include clarifying language in the document itself but we would intend in implementation not to hold against the committee bad conduct on the part of the

contributor so we hope by implementation we will be able to address those concerns. the other, the beginning penalty levels for record-keeping violations, i would note for the commission in the instance of a record-keeping violation are typically talking about a single count against the committee over the entire lifetime of that committee if it can committee or maybe an election cycle or calendar year as to the general-purpose committee, record-keeping violations are typically identified by on it and so in contrast to other provisions of law where the committee could be on the hook for multiple violations, multiple counts of the same conduct there is really only ever going to be one count of a record-keeping violation and for that reason we started at $1000instead of $500,000 .

>>chair ambrose: okay. any other questions or comments from commissioners before i ask for a motion to adopt the motion, commissioner chiu. >>daina chiu: i would like to request that mister pierce come back to report on the implementation and how the resolution of the 52 percent of the current pending cases and application of the new framework worked out. >>chair ambrose: with that understanding, is that a motion to approve subject tothem giving us a report >>daina chiu:yes. >>chair ambrose: thank you, do i have a second ? my screen is not open so if you could verbalize if you are providing a second to this motion. >>james bell: i will second.

>>chair ambrose:with that mister moderator could you

-- and just general public comment. for matters not on the agenda. >> agenda 11, the executive director's report. >> chair ambrose: i'm sorry. i guess that i looked and when i looked i didn't see that there was an executive director's report on my agenda. >> item number 10 was a discussion of policy (indiscernible). >> chair ambrose: i see. hmm. i'm going to ask the executive director -- i really was going to try hard to get us all out of here in four hours. i don't know how everyone is doing, but i'm going to ask the executive director if you're going to proceed if that item, if you can do the fast talking version of that. that would be much appreciated. because then that would -- that

would leave us with just essentially the final public comment and adjournment. >> thank you, chair. and fast talking can be my specialty but there's only three items here. and acknowledging and welcoming the commission or his appointment. and i was able to reach out and to provide background information and the staff and i are looking forward to setting up informational questions to enable the commissioner and the staff (indiscernible) in the coming days. so i want to formally welcome you to the staff. and we do have all five positions that we talked about earlier, in recruitment and/or about to be in the interview phase across the board so we have made very good progress on that. and we look forward to having reports for you next month. lastly, with mixed emotion i'm reporting that thomas mclean, one of our senior investigators for the last three years who had been on the disaster service work assignment over the --

nearly a year -- has been -- offered a position full time with the human services agency for the city. continuing on doing his d.s.w. work. the first day with them was this past monday, so we very much wish him the best but we're sad to see him go but his skills will be well used by the city going forward. that's all i wanted to report. >> clerk: (indiscernible) i wish -- >> i wish tommy all the best and i know that he'll make a huge impact but, yeah, i'm sad that he's not going to stay. but pass along my thanks for his stellar work. >> thank you. >> chair ambrose: thank you. and also i think we all extend our welcome to commissioner bell. thank you very much for joining us. okay, we need to ask for public

comment on this item because that's what we do. so, moderator, if you could please ask for public comment. >> you're muted. >> chair ambrose: you're muted. >> clerk: chatting away like a champion here. excuse me, folks. [laughter] 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 that you have been unmuted if you have just joined this meeting we're on the motion of agenda item number 11. discussion of the executive director's report. and updated operational highlights much the staff activities since the commission's previous meeting. if you have not already done so press star, 3, to be added to the public comment queue. you have three minutes to provide public comments, six minutes if you are on the line

with an interpreter. please stand by. madam chair, there are no callers in the queue. you are muted, chair ambrose.

you are muted, chair ambrose. >> chair ambrose: oh, sorry. there we go. i'm sorry. trying to say is that if -- unless the commissioner actually has an item that they want to propose for a future meeting, we could just take this item off the calendar and then we'll not have to wait for public comment when there won't be any. so unless i see somebody's hand go up and they want to put something on the calendar, i'm going to just take this off the calendar. i see two hands up because -- commissioner bush, your hand is up. please, go ahead. >> commissioner bush: thank you. i'd like to put on the calendar measures to implement the recommendations from the controller's report that we specifically take up each of the recommendations and vote on whether or not to implement them. thank you. >> chair ambrose: okay. thanks. any other recommendations for

future calendar items on agenda item number 12? >> vice-chair lee: i would expect to explore a year-end annual certification from an elected official to affirmatively say under, you know, whatever penalty of perjury or whatever the right measure is, that they have complied with all of their obligations, whether it's form 700 or inappropriate conversations, something along those lines. >> chair ambrose: okay. and the idea -- i think that's the kind of thing that we could talk about when we meet in march and work on all of the ethics-related disclosures that the controller's office is taking up and that we're going to take up with them. so i think that both of those things in that context we can do

what commissioner bush suggested which is to give it all to the controller's recommendations and decide which ones we're onboard with. any other items for future agenda? okay. moderator, if you could please see if we have any public comment on either -- either of those comments. thank you. you're muted. >> clerk: okay. here we go. 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 that you have been unmuted. if you are just joining this meeting we're on the agenda item number 12, the discussion and possible action on items for future meetings. if you have not already done so, please press star, 3, to be

added to the public comment queue. you have three minutes to provide public comment, six minutes on the line with an interpreter. you will hear a bell go off when you have 30 seconds remaining. please stand by. madam chair, we have a caller in the queue. please stand by. >> caller: commissioners, what i wanted to say is that the ethics commission plays an important role to see that this city has some standards. right now the situation is very

dangerous. it's affecting the contracts, and it's affecting essential workers. it's affecting all of the city departments. more so because of the pandemic. the city is always closed. and the city departments have been creating their own way of operating whatever they operate. and what the ethics commission must realize is that the most vulnerable are our elders. the most vulnerable are our children, our students. and our most vulnerable are small businesses that you all alluded to in a general way. and the ethics commission has a

role to play. so don't be bullied by the mayor. and don't be bullied by some programs such as racial equity. i would say racial equity can be challenged by title 6. what about native americans? what about latinx? what about the pacific islanders? what about the asians? and i can go on. so this city is getting into areas in a pandemic where they're taking money from the sheriff's department, from the san francisco police department, and that's wrong. so the ethics commission, you commissioners must stand up and be the guiding light.

the mayor's office is corrupt. thank you very much. >> thank you, caller. >> clerk: we are checking to see if there are any more callers on the line. please stand by. madam chair, there are no more callers in the queue. let me unmute you. you are unmuted now. >> chair ambrose: okay. closing public comment on agenda item number 12. and i'm required to call agenda item number 13, which is our

standard additional opportunity for public comment on matters appearing or not appearing on the agenda pursuant to the by-laws, article 7, section 2. if any member of the public intend to offer public comment for this item they should dial in now and dial star, 3, to be added to the public comment queue. i don't know -- mr. moderator, if you could see if there's any commenters in the queue. >> clerk: madam chair, we are checking to see if there are callers in the queue. for those already on hold, please wait until the system indicates that you have been unmuted if you have just joined this meeting we're on the motion of agenda item number 13. additional opportunities for public comment on matters appearing or not appearing on the agenda pursuant to the ethics commission bylaws article 7, section 2. if you have not already done so, please press star, 3, to be added to the queue. you have three minutes to provide public comment and six

minutes if online with an interpreter. you will hear bells go off when you have 30 seconds remaining. please stand by. madam chair, we have no callers in the queue. >> chair ambrose: all right. thank you, public comment on item 13 is closed. and now agenda item number 14, which is adjournment. commissioners, do we have a motion to adjourn the moving. >> vice-chair lee: i think that everyone's hands would go up. >> chair ambrose: and could you please call the roll and thank you all for your participation today. >> clerk: a motion has been made and seconded to adjourn the meeting. i will now call the roll. [roll call vote]

and the vote is affirmative and zero votes opposed to the vote. the motion is approved. >> chair ambrose: the meeting ended at 2:45 p.m. thank you very much. and we'll see you back here on march 12th. bye. >> goodbye, everyone.