15, 2019 meeting of the ethics commission. [roll call] agenda item number two is public comment on matters appearing or not appearing on the agenda. >> good afternoon. i'm not sure if this two minutes or three minutes. in front of me, two minutes. >> chair chiu: it should be three minutes. we'll change that now. >> good afternoon. my name is ellen lee zhou, e-l-l-e-n l-e-e z-h-o-u. i am an seiu 1021 union member. i am also the director of public relations for california civic grand jury association, the san francisco chapter. i am here today as a former nonpartisan candidate running for mayor for the june 2018 election. i was discriminated because i was not a democrat. i was not white, i was not black. i was not allowed to go into the many of the debates and forums, and those took place in public places, such as the city hall right here with televised programs, public parks, and many other occasions like 401 vanness -- south vanness. i have been coming here and asking you, ethics commission to start investigation to stop possi

under the ethics commission's bylaws, either a member of the public or commission can separate an item. >> chair chiu: thank you. we'll call for public comment on agenda item number three. we still have a pending motion for approval of the minutes. we can do that at the end. was there a second? i didn't hear a second on the motion to approve the minutes, but we can -- we went to the procedural and didn't have time for a second. so is there a second on the approval of the minutes? >> commissioner smith: second. >> chair chiu: there is a second, thank you, from commissioner smith. public comment. mr. marstellar? >> regarding the idea of writing miss pelosi about the -- essentially or problems with the bankrupt ski -- our problems with the bankruptcy law and regarding public financing, the thought is that with ab -- i'm sorry, hr-1 before the congress in such a robust and visible way, which is the major reform for essentially campaign finance and all other related ethics matters, it's a very large bill put forth. in any event, that -- that was my thinking, that ms. pelosi would be probabl

ethics commission doesn't sustain any of them. it's whistleblower retaliation complaints are dead only rival at the ethics commission. please look into it, thank you. >> item 8 for communities to comment. [please stand by] >> just one more bit of background, i guess. so the city has a lot of different types of public satisfaction surveys, including a broad citywide one that my office conducts, but they're usually not at the level of detail that would give you public feedback about something as specific as a bond projector knowledge of a bond program. so these are being done through intercept surveys at two sites, and they're very specific to voters, to visitors, understanding the linkage to the city bond program. the underized templates. so this is the subject that we've been talking about with goboc sometime. there's a standard spreadsheet that you will always see in the back of your packet, giving status of the macrofinancials of the bond, how much has been appropriated, how much has been expended. again, the macrofinancials, wi

number four, the proposed stipulation, decision, and order in the matter of john avalos, ethics commission complaint 13-150618. are there any members of the commission -- >> i'm sorry, correction. since you put my name in the front about a draft minutes in last week, you put it down in here that i said i was not allowed to participate in all debates. that was not true. i said any debates. >> chair chiu: excuse me. i have not yet called for public comment. i'll invite you up in a moment. thank you. >> vice chair kopp: i just have one suggestion, and that is on page four, under public comment by mr. marstellar, i think the word "acted" should be inserted after "department." so it reads, "he was pleased to see the planning department acted on the issue." >> chair chiu: okay. >> vice chair kopp: i'll move approval as amended. >> commissioner renne: i'll second. >> chair chiu: there's a second. all in favor? [voting] >> chair chiu: i'm sorry. public comment. miss zhou, did you have public comment on the minutes? >> i apologize that i came in here, that i didn't hear it well. i want to correct t

confusion on the part of the public or on the part of city employees about what precisely the ethics commission does. other times, staff can dispose of a complaint within an hour, for example, although the allegations might be within our jurisdiction, it's clear that they express opinions, and that there's nothing that would make those allegations plausible or colorable. there's nothing -- no additional indicia to substantiate them. when staff might spend an entire week on preliminary review, it's because there are additional indicia, but staff has to do additional work to ensure that the complaint is colorable. but beyond that, as i mentioned, when investigators write a preliminary review report, it's going to go eventually through me. i'm going to have to review it, and if they've proposed to dismiss a matter, in addition, the executive director will also have to vote to review it. >> thank you. >> turning back to the first page, we do have this month more matters open than we had previously and substantially more than we had at this time a year ago, but once again, the average amount of time

. >> discussion and possible action regarding complaints received by the ethics commission. possible closed session. is there a motion foreclosed session? >> no. >> any public comment on agenda item 12? >> 13. discussion and possible action on items for future meetings? anyone have anything? >> we did want to announce that the april 19th meeting because of the path of -- passover holiday and other conflicting schedules have moved the commission meeting to the week prior. april 12, friday at 1:30 p.m. we will put the notice on the website so people can plan accordingly. thank you for your flexibility. >> could you send us an e-mail to update our calendars. it is the good friday and start of passover. >> did you say 130 time tim? thank you. >> any public comment? no. 14 additional opportunity for public comment on matters appears or not appears on the agenda pursuant to ethics commission by laws article 7 section 2. >> i did have a comment. when you promulgate legislation to amend a voter passed initiative, would it be a matter of law to attest that the proposal in your view b

policy and government affairs, and i've been with sfpuc for 2.5 years. 15, 2019 meeting of the ethics commission. [roll call] agenda item number two is public comment on matters appearing or not appearing on the agenda. >> good afternoon. i'm not sure if this two minutes or three minutes. in front of me, two minutes. >> chair chiu: it should be three minutes. we'll change that now. >> good afternoon. my name is ellen lee zhou, e-l-l-e-n l-e-e z-h-o-u. i am an

i'd like to thank the former ethics commission chair the sponsor and former assemblyman amiano and johnollinger who will be managing the campaign. while i'm the lead proponent my colleagues signed to put it on the ballot. thank you to supervisor ronin, peskin, mandelman, yee, brown and walton for your partnership. and finally today i'm also announcing that along side our ballot initiative, my office will be soon introducing an ordinance to reform a public financing program. speaker pelosi has made it clear embracing and expanding public financing is at the core of how we must protect our democracy and the congress made this their first priority by introducing hr1 the for the people act of 2019. while leader pelosi worked on this on the federal level, the board can enact the reforms at the local level here and now. i look forward to working with my colleagues on the crucial issue in the weeks to come. the rest i submit. >> clerk: thank you, supervisor mar. now to supervisor ronin. >> thank you. >> i'm introducing amnesty. do dozens of businesses are facing displacement due to violation o

what i hope the ethics commission can do is to agree to send to the board of supervisors. one is leaving the incremental increase. 50 versus 100,000. we don't know where the board will be. i prefer 50. you could do 100 thousands it would be okay. send it to the board of supervisors so we can move it forward. also changing the deadline for the statement of participation we agree. i don't think you should track contributions to expenditures. this is bad policy. it will lead to candidates holding back money because as a result the i ec of the opponent will go up more slowly. they can hold that money back and throw it all in the race. then will if iec of the opponent go up in the response of the ex tendy tur. then it is too late to raise the money. tracking by contributions is the way we have always done it here. i am conservative about this. you change only what you need to change to make it better. don't go fishing for things that aren't broken. the part of changing contributions to expenditures was part of the package of getting rid of the iec entirely. if we don't do that

more information and the whistle blower protections please seek www. 15, 2019 meeting of the ethics commissionublic comment on matters appearing or not appearing on the agenda. >> good afternoon. i'm not sure if this two minutes or three minutes. in front of me, two

as a result of this, we saw the ethics commission come out and say the ethics watchdog in canada sayingmes the probe and of course this all comes in an election year, he fights for reelection later this year, so a few months from now and in the last three hours we have heard that the former attorney general of the centre of all of this down from her position as veteran affairs. this ethics investigation, doesn't have sufficient teeth in the view of commentators? —— doesn't have. there will be questions in the records of the pressure but the problem is so far, justin trudeau has said there is a limit to how much he will reveal in terms of conversations he had it with the attorney general siding privacy legal protection and i think his opponents are pushing for that to come out. whether or not the ethics investigator can force them to biltmore, that could be helpful to his political opponents. —— reveal more. all of this coming month before he is due to face reelection. thank you. see you in a few minutes. hello there. a historic a winter storm is currently leaving the shores of hawaii bu

and independent ethics commission in new mexico and anti-corruption package in missouri. i should note, also, these kinds of reforms and many embodied in h.r. 1, campaign finance disclosure, ethics reforms and others, also passed with bipartisan support in state legislatures. the reforms embodied in h.r. 1 are not lofty and tested ideas. most are pragmatic solutions that are already working in a city or state somewhere in this country. these solutions are proven to work and in many cases save taxpayers money. the timing of this legislation has never been more important as americans grow more frustrated and cynical about our state of politics. while every presidential administration has in our nation's history has had various ethical challenges we have never seen so many corruption scandals and appall lack of concern for the ethic rules that should govern our executive branch than with this administration. we have a series of reports that detail dozens and dozens of ethical challenges and conflicts of interest that have plagued this administration in the last two years. th

don't know how you can say that, mr deputy president, how can you say that when your ethics and anti—corruption commissionch found, and i quote, the figure for those who pay bribes for receipt of government services has risen to 62. 62%! let me tell you, sackur, if there is an administration has taken the fight up against corruption to a level that has been unimaginable, it is this administration. that's just words. look at action. even the most signature infrastructure project like, for example, the china —funded railway between nairobi and mombasa, it's being undermined by senior government officials who are on the take, who have been convicted in the last year of taking systematic bribes. for your information, in fact, you have given an example of how successful our anticorruption mechanisms are bearing fruit. any person involved in corruption knows today in kenya that they will not escape our net. on the 22nd of august, the ipsos polling organisation asked kenyans which politicians in your country they believe to be corrupt. people were asked, and this is the question, of all the current and past but

s ethics and religious liberty commission, they have been generallyve respon they definitely see thisort as opening a lot of eyes and really laying on the table the extent of the s.p.c.'s sexual abuse problem. thus far, almost all the reactions are people who are shocked orateful that this was finally coming to light in a edy that can't be ign anymore. >> reporter: there are two more installments of your reporting to come out in the coming days. robert downen of the "houston chronicle," thank you very much. >> thank you for having me. >> woodruff: stay with us, coming up on the newshour: denver public school teachers go on strike over compensation. amy walter and tamara keith join us to discuss the growg field of 2020 presidential candidates. a conversation with amy adams and adam mckay about their film "vice."et and rica dawson shares her take on individuality. but first, it has been almost a year since kremlin intelligence rs tried to kill a russi defector in the british city of salisbury by poisoning him with nerve agent. that attack, and subsequent death of a british woman last su

ethical and moral issue. no, it doesn't have legal teeth. no, you have to care. do you know that the commission has for 13 years and four votes blocked tasers? do you know that tasers were originally introduced as a nonlethal weapon and now there's been over 1,000 people since 2015 killed by them? do you know that sonoma county lost a $2.5 million lawsuit because someone was tased for half an hour? do you know that taser international cannot be sued by anyone except the city? you are going to have a lawsuit on your shoulders unless you rescind this vote. i respected turman. we communicated with each other. in fact, he was vehemently opposed to tasers and was shocked, president hirsch at the way you talked that night and showed you that. if we want to do something for his memory, you did rescind this vote. i thank you, petra dejesus, i suggest that you rescind that vote. we don't need to take another vote on tasers until the other 271 recommendations by the department of the d.o.j. are evaluated and taken care of. and then, we'll talk about tasers later, so i really suggest that you don't vote o

one is i'm someone who uses the ethics commission website in the disclosure literally every day during the campaign cycle, and sadly almost every day outside of the campaign cycle. i will say in part because i have not found that the dashboard is updated in a timely fashion -- at least to me a timely fashion is effectively immediately. because certainly during campaigns, every day, hour by hour during the heat of the election really does matter. so i'm not sure that i have found that the dashboard is the most current information. so personally, i go to the most current filings on the website and pull them down. benioff, when i was telling campaign reporters about the money that was being spent on that campaign, i looked them up and pulled them myself. i'm sure that staff is working hard, but i would encourage priority to upload those when they come in. related -- this is related to what commissioner lee asked, the individual donor -- i think the dashboard emphasizes the aggregate and the big picture, which is valuable for policy heads and those of us who care, but for voters and i thin