mickey callahan, the director -- the initiatives are what we need. specifically we need to generate and create less waste. indeed, this was one of our goals. to reduce waste by 15%. it's only been a year since the summit, city agencies like the human resources department are already stepping up. here's a list of what they are doing. $35 million in employee benefit payments, 80% will be converted from paper checks to electronic fund transfers resulting in the elimination of 26,000 paper checks to employees. an estimated 4400 checks will be eliminated. the final phase, of this project, will be in 2021 creating a system interface tempe medical providers electronically which will replace approximately 33388 checks annually. that is less waste generation, reducing consumption also reducing carbon emissions. this particular instance we are saving trees. many around the country, the world, san francisco city departments are the cities best environmental ambassadors. we hear, at commission on the environment, are proud cooperating with sustainability into as

if mickey callahan, and/or the department head gave a thumbs down, is there any step beyond that? >> every decision, almost every decision of the human resource director can be appealed to the civil service commission. there is a provision in the rules that says any decision of the human resource director can be appealed to the commission. we have not seen that. i haven't actually experienced an appeal in this process. in most instances when there are questions or concerns that we are able to work backwards through the department and adequately provide the employee would notice and reason for why we cannot support this. we have not seen circumstances for a decision of either the department, or the director has been appealed. >> when you give someone notice they have been denied, what form of notice is it? is it an e-mail or letter? >> we go back through the appointing officer, at the department, usually through their human resources team. most departments will have their own h.r. team and we will advise them. maybe this is something you did not consider, maybe you can remedy that.