mr. st. croix was quoted in the "san francisco chronicle" at saying, "the ethics commission's biggest critics are believers in gotcha government. this is the criminal's mantra. do you have any idea of the social damage that is caused when police are followed with the abuse and corruption that are faced in our society and they say they're against accountability. the effect is devastating. mr. st. kroy's ethics apparently is just another opportunity to network with the criminals. well, the reason why we have an ethics commission is because the supervisors and other public officials just treated, a chance to network with the criminals and we needed an outside independent group. in fact, why should they fire ms. gomez if you can't fire mr. st. croix. >> members of the ethics commission, ray hart, director of san francisco open government. know your rights under sunshine ordinance as printed on every agenda for city board meetings and commissions. you can submit a 150-word summary which is supposed to b

mr. st. croix? >> when we have is to clarify some issues that have been raised dealing with the extent of the campaign finance reform and ornaments, and basically, many of the changes are technical in nature or are linguistic in nature. the one thing we wanted to do is to clarify when we are talking about the applicability is that it applies to an individual who holds city elective office in any committee controlled by the elected officer. and i am happy to -- not want chair hur: -- chair hur: any questions or comments from commissioners? this strikes me, again, as helpful amendments to clarify the purpose of 1.126, and to clarify it in terms of how it is applied. i think it is consistent with the goals and the intention of the voters. i welcome public comment on this. matter. >> commissioners, way, director of san francisco open government. is there ever a meeting where you are not revising cfro? is this not like rearranging chairs on the titanic? relieving city government and it doing this, and yo

mr. st. croix said you only handled those cases. the whole purpose of that april meeting was to straighten out what had been originally decided in june 2010 which was you did have jurisdiction over the task force referrals under 6730 c. so now we're back to where we were, except that there are six cases that were dismissed improperly and should be reviewed on the basis that you did have jurisdiction to hear them, whether the respondent was an elected official or a department head. i think it's only fair to the complainants and i think it's in keeping with your responsibilities to make sure that everything is done according to the book. thank you. >> hello, commissioners. my name is larry bush. i was at the rule committee hearing in june where there was discussion about proposals from the ethics commission put forward by superviser weiner. before that meeting took place. supervisors campos had asked harvey rose to do an analysis on how san francisco compared on policies dealing with ethics and transparency and how they did on enforce

mr. st. croix. i do not think we should complicate it further. i think we should make a simple recommendation. from what you have said, the charter, if they find -- if they all vote in agreement with their recommendation that the person is guilty, automatically, that person is removed from office, correct? >> if after reviewing the charter, the charges are sustained by not less than 3-4 of the board of supervisors, the officer shall be removed from duty. commissioner hayon: that seems pretty straightforward, unlike some other parts of the charter. chairperson hur: when commissioner renne raised this two-step inquiry idea, i like it in part because one of the difficulties here is that in some ways the sheriff was a guinea pig. if the charter provision was so difficult for us to parse, in some ways, it does seem -- it gives me some pause for him to be removed, based on a provision that we took quite a while and had a hard time deciding exactly what it meant. but i kind of think you are right. i am not sure we have any leeway to do anything other th

mr. st. croix? or do we want to read it and see what would be useful? >> it is a good idea. this budget analyst is here in san francisco. >> he is a private contractor contract by the board. >> ok. i would be happy to invite him. i am not sure what half the budget to pay for his time is what would be -- we have the budget to pay for his time is what would be required. >> who signed this? ok, that is his signature? ok. it is not likely have to pay him to come and talk about the analysis. i would reconsider. if it is possible, i certainly would like to hear from him directly. >> i like that idea. any other agenda items for future meetings? >> i meant to say this earlier. in the various draft minutes related to the special meetings we have been having, there is a systematic misspelling of sheriff. somebody needs to go through and correct. left out that we knew how to do it. there is a certain list in which is appears that way. i am sorry but better to [inaudible] >> ok. public comment. >> i would think both the commissioners for -- thank both the commissioners for making the mo

mr. st. croix -- i would argue that you have missed it completely the spirit of the law. the police commission, they give us the tate -- the type of case, the case number. they give us some idea of what they are going in the back to discuss, and what you have here, there is no way anybody would have the faintest idea, and i have a hard time believing there is not a single thing you can tell the public about what you're going back there to discuss that would allow them to make meaningful comment on whether or not a closed session is appropriate. i do believe closed sessions are used in an inappropriate way very often for things that you just do not want to deal with in front of the public, and i am not just talking about the ethics commission. i am talking about all city commissions. just slap litigation or a lawsuit where some name on it, and we can go in the back and discuss anything we want, and commissioner studley can shake her head, but as one member who almost never ever sees any discussion afterwards to disclose anything that is held in closed session, it is hard t