Transcripts For SFGTV Ethics Commission 82415 20240622

[gavel] welcome to the regularly scheduled dawg 24 meeting of the San Francisco Ethics Commission. First calling the roll commissioner andrews. Here. Commissioner hayon. [inaudible] commission hur. Here. Commissioner keane. Here. And all present and accounted for. Moving the secretary item on the agenda Public Comment on matters appearing or not appearing on the agenda. Do we have any members of the public who want to speak . Please come forward. Good afternoon chair hur and members of the commission. My name is Kathleen Courtney and reside on green street in San Francisco and owned and reseated at that location for the last 35 years. I have been out of the country for the last month, and therefore i was not returned home on thursday and therefore was not able to give my comments to Eileen Hansen who submitted a complaint about the alliance in connection with jobs with the work theyre doing against darren peskin. I am calling something that occurred to me on june 28 that i think reflects the egregious nature of what is going on. I am a professional marketer and as such i listen to surveys. Anybody that surveys me i listen because i want to know what is going on and how they do it, and if you look at the declaration i prepared for you june 28 after returning from the pride march and i took a sawr have a call and lasted 15 to 20 minutes. The questionnaire suggested and the way they asked the questions suggested they were fully informed about who they were calling. They asked fiwas on a land line or cell phone. I said land and asked for my address and i declined to give to them but nay knew the number and i was in district 3 and i listened to a series of questions and you try to determine who was calling you and the questions were what i do think uber . Mayor lee and supervisors that have been out of office for years and Public Safety and rents and Bicycle Safety were for and next asked to give my opinion of aaron peskin, Julie Christensen and wilma tang and i was familiar with wilma tang but i gave a response to that and using a rating for the names of the candidates i was read a brief description of Julie Christensen and i was taking notes from different surveys and a supervisor in the neighborhood for 20 years advocate who fought for libraries and International Library and jody park and they asked me this is what supporters say about her and everything was generally fine. Next the interviewer described aaron peiveg kin of a president of a nonprofit who halted development on the waterfront, worked against prop posals and elected supervisor of the board and this is what they say about them and the positive comments. I need two minutes. Maam, i think your time is up. Okay. I call to your attention points 10 where they stated that aaron peiveg kin was known for threatening phone calls and fowllanguage your time is up maam you. Need to act on this complaints. Thank you. Good afternoon. Good evening, good afternoon mr. Chairman and members. I am reminded that the last time you had a mayor of any kind here in this room it triggered a boom threat. I am hoping that my comments are not as explosive, but they are important, and i am appearing here to respectfully urge this commission to direct staff as you heard with the previous testimony and the ones that you will hear that you act with all deliberate speed on the complaint by Eileen Hansen who are the way here and the Third Party Spending on behalf of incumbent Julie Christensen and aaron peskin in the campaign has not been reported by law. The complaint states up to that 150,000 has been spent on behalf of supervisor christensen and filed on august 13 and the failure of staff to act on this in a timely manner has the effect of denying mr. Pefngin an opportunity to raise funds that will allow him to compete fairly with his opponent. It shouldnt take that long to determine the facts. In addition the complaint states that the San Francisco alliance for jobs, the third party involved in this independent expenditure and this election has failed to file or disclose their spending. A newspaper article in the San Francisco kron krel last month reported a poll last month by the alliance for jobs that outlined the strategy of defeating him and electing supervisor christensen. Best estimates by that poll done by a National Polling firm would have cost at least 25,000 and yet it fails to appear in any of the filings as an independent expenditure. Two other issues that are worthy of your attention. A reliable report indicates as citizen hansen indicated the complaint was brought to the immediate attention of the former executive director that dismissed it out of hand and there is no disclosure required. I am informed that this is contrary to the last as it existed at the time the complaint was filed. Always the potential conflict of interest mr. Chairman of the current executive director, no personal affront attended, but this includes lawyer james sutton. Mr. Miin regardy was a member of that firm before he took this job as your acting executive director. He should be recused as he was in the mark farrell case because of the involvement with his prior firm. I asked for your immediate attention to this complaint. Mr. Chair. Yes. I know its unusual but we have something being brought to us by a former mayor. There is only one aspect of it, if i could, i would like to inquiry about, and that has to do where it is now . Was the complaint dismissed out of hand by mr. St. Croix . We had problems in the past in regard to the matter of mr. St. Croix overstepping his authorities so this is what has been alleged now publicly by a former mayor of the city and if the case we should have Immediate Response to that one allegation. Commissioner, as youre familiar all investigations conducted by the Ethics Commission are confidential. Were not talking about an investigation. Were talking about just something dismissed out of hand. We as a commission over the course of the last few months had discussions relating to matters not getting to us because of former director st. Croixs deciding he was going to make arbitrary decisions relating to it. I think its important relating to this allegation for us to know was a complaint just dismissed out of hand . And that has nothing to do with the confidentiality of an investigation or anything like that. Was it just tossed out . Again commissioner we treat complaints by the Ethics Commission by the laws and Campaign Laws as confidential. In addition to that may i remind you were currently in Public Comment. If you want to have discussion about matters under the jurisdiction should be noted and agendized as such. Commissioners, my name is larry bush. Commissioner chair i just want to say first of all that none of the commissions rules anyone that files a complaint is to get ac j want its received and its my understanding ms. Hansen has gotten no acknowledgment of the complaint that she filed and its a simple matter to say whether its received. It doesnt get into anything more complicate than that. Secondly, i am reliably informed by reporters that talked about this issue and talked to mr. St. Croix there is no violation here and just send it on its way. As you know when you recreate the campaign recreate the law this year you dropped the provision of those that spend 5,000 or more on a Third Party Disclosure no longer have to file with the Ethics Commission. Ind instead the commission was to under take a review of the record and see if that money was spent. But in the event there is no report filed you have nothing to review and you have a catch 22. There is no report so we didnt review a report. I think that is something that obviously needs to be addressed. Thank you. Good evening commissioners. Im the founder and director of neighbors visiting a viz dareo and i think bringing the biggest ethics concern in the city and we want you to address violations mayor lee of the Campaign Violations and in debt after the 2011 mayors race. Since he is seeking reelection we want this addressed to the public before voters receive the ballots. The public learned in recorded conversations from a human rights commissioner and staff member told an under cover fbi businessman and to use this by using straw donors. Ed knows you gave 10,000 and you will give another 10,000 and we had to break it up said in a 2012 recording. Lee met with the same under cover agent at a human rights commissioners nasally ho hodgers office and raised 10,000 to assist in retiring campaign debt. He met with the agent and discussed breaking up an additional 10,000 contribution. When the agent asked about going into smaller increments and he said we have no problem with this but you cant talk to this about anyone. He was brought up with Campaign Issues violations with the commis hosting a matter and we see that ed lee basically out spent john avalos who the closest contender four to one and still went over the budget by nearly 300,000 and one of the Main Responsibilities of a mayor of the city and county of San Francisco is to stay within the budget, and so its alarming to me that he didnt stay within his means because i was raised to stay and live within my means so since he was out spending four to one why go over budget an extra 300,000 and that makes sense why he is scrambling about his underlings afterwards how were going to pay off the debt in increments . 300,000 to retire after he had already won the election. People contributed millions of dollars in 500 increments and had to figure out a way to retire it so what are you going to do before the election to put our minds at ease about this matter . Please let us know. Thank you. Good evening commissioners. Im here to speak about the district 3 Third Party Spending complaint that is before this commission. My name is ms. Berry and i have lived in the district for 15 years and the election this november is by far one of the most heated in a rather dull Campaign Year at least thats what the newspapers tell us. This campaign is of utmost importance and follow up and investigate the complaint before you and knowing what Third Party Spending is are canning its critical to us and we have a savvy city. We Pay Attention and read and investigate so were here before you to ask you in your wisdom to investigate the issue of the San Francisco alliance for jobs and Sustainable Growth pack because the complaint alleges there is Third Party Spending to influence the race with one supervisor and not the other and that is supervisor christensen there is a statement filed by the alliance that they paid 13,500 to advisers for Campaign Consulting service. However according to the Ethics Commission website its not registered to provide Consulting Services to San Francisco alliance its not a registered Campaign Consultant at all. The advisers are providing field organizers and knocks on behalf of one supervisor in the race, supervisor christensen and not the other. This is very troubling. Were asking you to act on this complaint. None of this information has been disclosed as part of the race. Thats the issue municiple transportation agency, disclosure and make sure that the. Transparency and disclosure and please take action on the complaint before you. Thank you. Good evening. My name is shannon bolt and Owner Operator of a dog walking business in the city i am 30 and a long time San Francisco resident and i wanted to echo amys concerns about mayor lees Campaign Finance allegations against him and the potential ethics breaches in that case especially with the upcoming Mayoral Election its important that theyre investigated so theyre lead to fall on deaf ears. Thank you very much for your consideration. I am Oliver Chalker and lived in San Francisco the last couple of years. This is the first time i am voting in a local election and i want to copy amys statements on the allegations regarding ed lee as someone who is just stepping into San Francisco politics i feel like this has in a lot of ways taintdd and i have a lot of questions and i would like very much for you to respond to all of this. Thank you very much. David pilpel speak as a individual and i wanted to respond to the comments in the chronicle a few weeks ago with the allegations about ed lee from the matter. I was concerned that those remarks appeared to confirm the receipt of a complaint and or investigation on that matter and also suggested to me possible that commissioner keane had already come to a conclusion that there was probable cause finding. Thats how i read it. I am sure others could read it differently. I wanted to express that concern they think as deputy City Attorney shin advised you earlier that complaints are confidential under the charter and although commissioners can speak to reporters and get quoted in the paper and talk about the general practice of how complaints are received and reviewed that one probably shouldnt comment on a specific complaint or specific facts so im not filing a complaint or concern beyond this but i wanted to state that so i had those concerns. Thank you very much. Any other may i respond mr. Chair . In a minute. If you look at the commissions bylaws there is a paragraph that reads as follows. The Commission Shall urge the public in the strongest possible terms not to make complaints at Public Meetings since the Public Disclosure of such complaints undermine any subsequent investigation under taken by the commission. Now, as i think all of you know if you have a complaint it is to be filed with the staff, and dealt with in a confidential manner, and i dont know there have been some references to complaints that have been filed and have been dismissed. I dont know anything about it, but the proper procedure is not in an open forum to discuss it because of the fact that if in fookt there is an Ongoing Investigation you could well prejudice by the remarks that are made when the time comes when Enforcement Actions are taken, but i appreciate the comments and we will certainly follow up on some of the issues you raised, but i dont think at the moment they were not on the agenda and were arent in a position to deal with them as agenda items. All right. Commissioner keane. Thank you mr. Chair. In regard to the statement by mr. Pilpel relating to the my comment to moe green of the San Francisco chronicle and her having put it in the story. Who i said was a little what i said was a little regurgitation of what executive director john st. Croix said in a letter he wrote to the member of the public and the member of the public disseminated widely to other members of the public in an email. One of the people who it was disseminated to was mr. Larry bush, and i then got that email along with other members of the public of what mr. St. Croix had said about that particular complaint. Mr. St. Croix had spoken on behalf of the commission, made a comment relating to it, and i simply regurgitated what those comments were literally. I sent an email to you mr. Chair referencing mr. St. Croixs letter and also mr. Bushs email where he had set out what mr. St. Croix has said, so it wasnt a personal comment of mine in any way relating to the complaint. It was simply a statement of what had been said by our executive director, presumably on behalf of the commission and everyone else, to the public; therefore revealing what was said in these comments, and i simply regurgitated that to ms. Green when she asked the question about the particular issue involved. I did not reveal any confidential information. It was not confidential. Mr. St. Croix had already widely disseminated it to the public and by his doing that in terms of the remarks that were talking about it was not confidential, and therefore there was no improprietiy on my behalf. Very many. We will turn to very well. We will turn to item 3 on the jernldz and position action on Commission Activities regarding the expenditure lobbyist ballot measure. I dont think there is action we will talk about but i wanted to bring my fellow commissioners uptodate on what has occurred in connection with the expenditure lobbyist ballot measure since the last meeting and i think distributed to the public was the ballot statement which was prepared on behalf of the commission, the opposition that was prepared by a single individual who took issue with what he deemed to be exemptions, but not really the substance of the ballot measure, our response to the argument agency and there have been since that time there was also a ballot simplification meeting with the ballot simplification commission which committee which did a great job of doing some i think clear laying out what the ballot measure seeks to accomplish. Mr. Manardy and i have attended a fairly large number of various club meetings, and for those of you who have not been in the political process, San Francisco has numerous political clubs that meet and they hold what are called endorsement sessions and we received invitations to those sessions, and we appear, and our role is very constrained because of the advice from the City Attorneys office that we cannot advocate. We can talk only objectively, and talk about the facts, and therefore and the invitation always say we want a speaker on behalf of the in favor of the proposal and any speakers against it , and i always have to tell them when i stand up were here in a totally different role. Were not here as advocating to vote for or against, but heres what its all about. Generally theyre quite accepting of that limited role, and ive got to say that friends of ethics, particularly mr. Bush who has been attending many of the meetings, and i think playing the role of an advocate for the ordinance, and explaining some of the questions and answering some of the questions that they may have about some of the misstatements that are out there in the public. But one of the problems is many of the clubs limit it to one speaker so that if mr. Mar nardy agreed to go mr. Bush or anybody who is an advocate for it isnt allowed to speak, and i will tell you that we have generally been fairly successful. The great overwhelming majority of the organizations have voted in favor of supporting what is proposition c, and i believe that one that i appeared at last saturday voted no, and i will i dont know what the reasons were. I was the only one that appeared on behalf of it but there was hostility in the club to the Ethics Commission and questions why should we trust you . Because you dont do anything so it was a little hard to stay factually objective in response to some of the questions, but in any case we expect the invitations will continue through the month of september, and we will try to appear at as many as we can, and urge those who are in favor of proposition c or who are opposed to it to appear and express the views as advocates for whatever the point maybe. Anybody have any questions or comments that you want to i wanted to mr. Chair, i wanted to get some clarity on the back page because i have a feeling that there will be over the coming months a growing amounts of advocacy on both sides and i am looking on this back page and says can the prop posal be amended or changed at a later date and does that mean a later date after the ordinance is passed . It has to pass. From this point it moves forward and has to pass and all of the bullet points are in play . Okay. Thank you. I will say chair thank you for your efforts and attending the meetings. I think its good for the public to Seat Commission participating. Yeah, i would like to second that. Well, its typical this saturday theres three of them. Two between 1130 and 12 something and another one that has been the time but somewhere around 130 or so. We did turn down a one for sunday because neither of us were available but im happy to say that club endorsed proposition c without our appearance, but i think maybe mr. Bush may have been there and been helpful. All right. Public comment. Just a few points mr. Chair. I know the club that voted no on saturday and jesus couldnt have delivered that club. It was opposed deeply by some members of the committee who had been given i think misleading information. I wonder at this point whether or not you might want to do an update on the frequently asked questions page because a number of issues have been coming up repeated atly at the endorsement meetings. For example the question what constitutes a member of an organization . Because there is an exemption for contacting members when youre doing things. The response on that is a little unclear in the law, and it would be good to have view of that. Also its helpful when i talk to clubs to point out that the groups that have been most concerned about this, the nonprofit organizations and the unions, already register, lobby as direct lobbyists and i have been handing out a list of those that do that and point out those exist in other cities. I want to bring to your attention a part of the lobby law that has been overlooked by many people but is relevant to this case and prop e which is the measure about Public Notices and that say requirement that says when you testify before a body on behalf of a client youre to identify who the client is when testifying. Here is a copy of the law and reference to the prop e thing. I think its good if you commission sends to the boards and commissions and the board of supervisors a reminder that people speaking as Public Advocates need to identify who theyre speaking for. Under prop e it would eliminate this part of the lobby law because it says all of the testimony should be confidential in which no record is kept of the points of view or the people who speak, so theres perhaps an unintended consequence of invalidating some of the important Public Disclosures that we have in the lobby law. Thank you. Good afternoon. Im robert james [inaudible] swai. I think you need to update the faqs a bit. What is handed out has two pages. There is a three page document that ties off your agenda. I think the second page is missing from the handout. And there was a section in there that asked did the city previously regulate expenditure lobbying . With bullets under that. I think that should be expanded a little bit to make it clear that nonprofits and unions were subject to the prior law up until 2009, and i think where you talk about the process under which it was adopted you should mention it was brought up at more than one meeting. You did discuss it in a couple of meetings. You had an interested persons meeting as well, and just kind of put that in the faq because some people are making allegations about late night secret meeting where this was adopted which doesnt fit with any reality im aware of so thank you. Any further comments . Turning to agenda item number 4. Discussion and possible action regarding staffs proposal to issue warning letter instead of pursuing fines for violations of disclaimer requirements for campaignrelated communications. Mr. Manardy do you want to expand on that . Sure director, commission. This is a very simple request having to do with two sort of areas of rule thats commission is dealing with that are certainly currently under a bit of a transition. The first has to do with the first sort of set of rules has to do with the disclaimer of laws which just changed. The Commission Approved it back in january and effective at the end of july, and the disclaimer laws are i believe improved. They have for Additional Information like somebody has to refer people to the website, the Ethics Commission website on the paid for by line so paid for by committee x. Go to the Ethics Commission website for more information. So that has just changed and based on a lot of the calls coming in people are trying their best it appears to comply. Theyre a little confused. I have been pretty happy with how were advising them, but what we anticipate we anticipate that there will likely be a few mistakes and disclaimers that are not complete based on this transition period, so what the commission has is the Commission Adopted back two years ago another set of rules which are policies which provide for fixed fines for certain violations of our Campaign Laws, and you all may remember this, but like i would say six to nine months ago we had this rash of disclaimer violation cases where there were disclaimers in 13 point font instead of 14 point font but by virtue of the policies we had to go go ahead and impose the fines so those policies have to be updated because the disclaimer rules and other things changed some of the applicable code sections but pending that update we think its reasonable for staff in certain instances to sort of exercise discretion to present the commission with where there is a violation with a proposed warning letter as opposed to necessarily a fine, be given the transition and what we understand are a lot of questions on these matters. Now, again all it would be is a prop posal so the commission would of course retain the authority to say no we think that a fine should be imposed, that sort of thing, but were thinking of instances where for example its a new campaign. There is no history of any sort of violations. There is no intent and they say forgot to include the reference to the website, but all of the paid for by information was included. The address was included and it was an oversight given that were sort of having these new rules so in an instance like that we say it might be reasonable to say look no history, no intent. Most of the information is there, the Important Information is there. Were going to suggest that the commission close this with a warning letter. Dont do it again. If you do it again we will issue a fine as opposed to going to this automatic procedure where you automatically have to pay. I mean the past fines are minimum 500 and the policy calls for a thousand dollars for those fines. You know there would be cases where we would say we should still impose those fines automatically and i think staff would propose that. For instance if there is a mass mailer and subject to disclaimer laws forever and there is no disclaimer on it that is not a warning letter because its a very common thing in the law for a long time, but things like the font size is off. Maybe the reference to the website is not there, no history. We think allowing us to propose a warning letter settlement we think is a wise thing, and again this would be subject ultimately to your approval to the extent you thought the facts didnt merit it you could reject it and we could go back and seek a fine. [inaudible] you say that you have to update the policies. The policies are not on the website or on other material . They are on the website. Updates policies . Not the updated policies but theres a couple of notes there are a couple of things that need to be updated too. And our regulations and policies and there is a note on it that says there have been changes to the campaign law. That these policies and regs have to be updated. With any questions please contact staff immediately if you have any questions how these apply. And how long do you think its going to take to update the policies on materials and the website . It would take Commission Action so the staff couldnt do that so we have to prepare the new policies and regulations. The policies couldnt be a huge overhaul but it would certainly be some work. The regulations will take a bit longer so we certainly need a few months to do that. Well, given that i really support what youre saying because from what ive seen often it is newcomers to the electoral process and the political process that make the mistakes, dont know what theyre doing, and suffer these fines which often i think we have seen dont really have the money to pay for it so i think a warning letter is appropriate in those cases. Obviously with the people that you know are fully conversant with all of the regs and all of the policies thats a different situation, but i support your prop posal. And by way of clarification one thing although the regulations havent been up dated staff prepared this and i will mention it as part of the ed report a lot of guidance through the interested persons list including charts that layout exactly where the disclaimers should be. Hopefully we hope in an easy to use fashion but again theyre confusing rules so certainly people make mistakes. That seems perfectly reasonable to me. Yeah, i would agree also. Its good guided discretion because some of the fines, 500 for these rather diminutive font violations and i am comforted by the fact that the last line of the staff recommendations, which of course would follow through that, the commission would retain the authority to reject the proposal warning letter in any matter and direct staff to pursue the appropriate fines so were not giving up anything here. Were just widening the area of discretion and seems very reasonable. So as you contemplated if we approve this that in a case where youre going to send a warning letter rather than imposing a fine that you will advise the commission thats how you intend to dispose of it before you send out the warning letter . Thats correct. Yeah, definitely. Commissioner andrews. How many warning letters do we send out in a year . What other violations do we allow this kind of warning letter enforcement . You know i couldnt comment on the numbers but it can be i mean warning letters whether from our organization or others are generally sent out where there is a violation usually a technical violation and the estimation by the staff and if a approved by the commission and the commission as well that the public harm was limited and that there was limited amount culpablity and taking those factors into consideration the idea is people make mistakes. If its not a big mistake, theres not a lot of public harm were telling you dont do it again, so it could be on any of the matters within the jurisdiction, so i cant think of one right off hand. Thats fine. There is another approach obviously. We could comtemplate the reduction of the fine and say for that classification of violation its 50 and not 500. Thats true. That is you know put someone on notice that theyre culpable and responsible and to right the wrong they have to put some skin in the game and complicit with a warning letter. I think thats right. I think i wasnt here but my understanding is that these policies were designed to sort of speed things along a little bit. Im not sure they ultimately im not sure that was necessarily the outcome, but certainly sort of a traffic ticket approach is something that the fbc does and i think would be in this commissions interest to look into, certainly something i was thinking about, but that is another issue, but do i hear a motion . I will move to approve the proposal relating to the warning letters. Second. I call for Public Comment. Good afternoon. Robert james [inaudible] sway again but attached to the staff memo rts policies you adopted before and when i read this section dealing with the written disclaimers and i think this is a good idea, i cant really map it into what is in the policy right now. Theres sort of a sequence of events where there is initial preliminary review. There is a 14 day deadline where things might come to a commission after that. Would they come to the commission with a recommendation for a warning letter . You know i think you need some clarity about how it maps on to the policy, and then its probably good to go. Thank you. Certainly. Well, i think most of the timelines have to do with notifying the committee as to we think you had a violation of your disclaimer rule, and have 14 days to get back all during the preliminary review phase of it complaint. The thing is that with the disclaimer theres you know, its sort of there so its very unlikely theyre unless they show that the disclaimer somehow the copy you have doesnt have the right font size which is unusual. Usually it is what it is but even under this that says if you dont respond in 14 days we will open a formal complaint process and then it goes through the same process that we would have with our normal complaints so what we would do again we would to the extent we thought there were mitigating circumstances. It wasnt that big of a deal, whatever it is, that is smen subject to folks to a move at a regularly scheduled meeting. David pilpel again speaking as an individual. I support the proposal and i wanted to clarify two points. When a proposed warning letter is brought to the commission i just wanted to be sure one way or the of the is it for a vote to approve the warning letter or would it go absent a vote to disapprove so i am trying to figure out where the three votes would be . Maybe staff can clarify and my other concern is just to make sure this gets in the project calendar or work plan so that at some point along with the long list of other things thats going to happen its cataloged as a thing to update. Thank you. Any other comments . All right. I will call the question. All in favor say aye . Aye. Opposed . Motion is carried unanimously and the staff recommendation adopted. Turning to item five discussion and possible action regarding the commissions efforts to hire a new executive director. Again i dont think wer asking for any action here but again i wanted to bring the commissioners uptodate on the recruiting process to date. The recruiting firm has advised us and sent us resumes for nine applications applicants. They tell us there have been 14 as of yesterday. Theyre sending further letters out to some of their contacts to see whether it engenders additional applicants, but our intention is that will continue through september 11 at which time the application process will be completed, and commissioner andrews and i will be meeting to review and discuss the applications that have come in, and to see whether or not we think that there are candidates who are appropriate for the position, and present them whether its two, three, four to the commission for its consideration and decision as to the hire. If we are not satisfied with the quality of the responses we may ask the recruiting firm to open the recruiting for a longer period of time to see whether we can engender stronger candidates. I would say overall looking at the nine that i have looked at im not overwhelmed, and maybe a little disappointed at this stage, but the recruiting firm says its very common for the major amount of the applicants coming in towards the end of the period so we will see. Chair hur. Yes. Just. Chair rene. Yes. Just a couple of questions and you commissioner andrews will look at it and whittle it down. There is no magic number and there is a clear delineation after three or seven thats what you will present and any discussion to reopen or continue the application process will be made by the commission. Is that right . I think to continue it i think unless you tell me otherwise i think that commissioner andrews and i as the committee assigned for the recruiting process would have the authority to tell the recruiter to send out notices that the recruiting deadline has been extended to another time period. And that would be because you didnt think there was even one candidate that would qualify . Right. I dont know if i would say one but there were not i would hope that two or three we feel would at least qualify. Now, i have to tell you that the were in the process of preparing what i will call core questions which will be the questions that will be asked of every candidate when we have personal interviews with them, whether those interviews are facetoface or whether we do them by skype or some other teleconferencing, but i think in fairness to the candidates were going to have a group of core questions that every candidate will get asked that we can sort of test them all against a standard, but then well question beyond those that might be subjects that open up because of the resnses to the core questions. When will the questioning of potential candidates occur . Assuming that we close it on september 11 commissioner andrews and i will have to agree on some time when we can conduct these interviews. I would hope it would be some time in the month of september. So the idea being that you would conduct the interviews and eventually whether thats september or october the commission would have candidates. Do we have a chance to meet the candidates in open session . Not in open session. In any session, closed session, im sorry. Closed session but its only the ones that we whittled down to that we would recommend be considered. In other words, we will go through the nine or 14 or 20 as it maybe. I think some will whittle out without facetoface meetings, but and i think hoping to have it done by the end of september is probably overly optimistic so the target date should be our meeting in october. That would be when the commission has an opportunity to meet the candidates . Right. Or we might schedule a special meeting for that purpose but i would like to get a final decision made by the end of october. Okay. I have i think we do need a little clarity though on what the basis is going to be for continuing the process . In other words, you know i you know, i think as you guys know i have some concern. I do think we want to be efficient and try to get a person in place as soon as reasonable and if there are no good candidates i can understand the need to keep the process open but i would like more clarity as to what that threshold is . In other words, if you look at all the candidates and dont think there is one that would merit being the executive director then i can understand that but which is the number that all right we need to keep the process open because there arent enough good candidates . Well, i dont think there is a magic number as i of through this process quite often on both sides there is no magic number but generally speaking the minimum would be two. The max would be the max. Three is always great. But i would say to just bring one candidate forward is not worth it, and that for me be the automatic trigger to extending the process and then looking at the strategies of outreach that we would be doing to be more targeted in our strategies of out reach and even looking at some of the what were offering in terms of salary and benefits and i know theres not a lot of wiggle room with that but how much of it is a consideration or not in people that riewld themselves out or insofar but at minimum two and three i personally would feel great if there were three or more, but certainly i dont know how the commission feels about it but not one. Would there be a down side . If there are two and i agree with you it sounds like the minimum should be two but if there are two is there a down side to bringing two to the commission and if neither is deemed satisfy to reopen rather than deciding i want you two deciding i want four. I dont think there is a down side because of the process. We have structure in place; right . We have an interim executive director. Different situations call for different strategies. In this one we designed it that time is on our side. It may not be optimal for staff and such as we move forward but the fact is we have built this temporary strategy and structure to be in place so that it can support us so that we have the time, so if it came that two candidates came forward and through the interviewing process we recognizing these arent the right candidates we would have the opportunity to do that, and the commission as the staff would continue to move forward, so i think the staffing and the structure is all in place for us to have any of those options in front of us, and we could exercise them at any time. Thank you. Any Public Comment . off mic . Thank you. Larry bush commissioners. Just a few quick comments. At what point if at all are you going to be disclosing the names of the candidates or is it all going to be confidential . I believe that all of them will be confidential because all of them are holding their jobs other jobs thats what i would expect but i didnt want to put that on the record. Fact they applied for another job and run successful so i think the only Public Information will be the successful candidate. Secondly, the core questions that youre talking about will you circulate those among the other commissioners or is it just going to be you and commissioner andrews . I would i would anticipate they would be circulated to the other commissioners, and although i hadnt i had given some thought to it. They maybe circulated for Public Comment. I dont know. I always appreciate transparency but i was thinking we might just solicit from the public the questions they think should be asked and whether or not you decide to release the questions being asked is a personnel decision for the commission. I know in terms of the number of people that go forward when i worked at in the federal government you always had three candidates who went forward, and i sat in and i was involved in hiring the heads of the offices throughout four states in different cities, and its important to have a robust group of candidates to look at because they bring different skills and at different times. Its not a cookie cutter thing. At different times there is a different agenda and commissioners have another so its good to have some variation. The only other point i wanted to make is to bring to your attention a factor in the new executive director that hasnt been true in the recent, and that is that under the city charter the Ethics Commission is required to have an executive secretary and thats found in section 4102, section number nine says shall appoint an executive secretary to manage the affairs and operations of the boards and commissions and that is true for every commission. There is no exception for the Ethics Commission. I know you have resisted having an executive secretary for the commission, but i think as you look forward to a new position you need to keep in mind thats a factor. Thank you. Thank you. Good evening commissioners. I want to thank you for the hard work you have been doing on the campaign trail. I know its exhaustive and exhausting. I do want to also i know this process that the appointment of the executive director is not something where we really have to reinvent the wheel. There is plenty of Technical Assistance available to you and i assume your staff i think for the public thats watching this broadcast they would be interested in knowing how your subcommittee works a little bit, whether you have a staff or assistance, or perhaps interface with the Civil Service commission i would assume or some of the technical people there, so that you can get all the help that you need, and this is not coming off of the brow [inaudible] [inaudible] Human Resources provides whatever support we need whenever we asked for it and they have been very cooperative. Great. And the recruiting firm is the firm itself. Right. So you have both the city and outside consultant helping . Right. Very good. David pilpel again speaking as an individual. Just two comments here. I wanted to appreciate the continued discussion in public and transparency about the hiring process. In particular chair your admission there are nine candidates so far if i understood that correctly. I think to the extend you can extent you can provide information as the process goes on so the total number of candidates you received, how many were screened by the subcommittee . How many were presented to the commission . And ultimately who was selected . I think that is helpful so we get a sense of what happened. I am not interested in knowing the names until you actually select director so that all works and just to comment on mr. Bushs comment i believe the charter provision about a charter secretary is subject to the other parts of the charter and the budget for the commission doesnt have a position allocated for secretary. In the event you had one then the commission would oversee and hire that person as well but its my understanding that you dont currently. Thank you. All right. Unless any of the commissioners have a question we will turn to item number 6 discussion and possible action regarding complaints and a list of complaints are contained in that agenda item, and we will first i guess i will does anybody have a motion as to whether or not we should go into closed session to discuss those items in the agenda, item 6 . Do i hear a motion to have us consider those in closed session . Can someone remind me of the legal basis for going into closed session for Something Like this . Sure commission hur. Its spelled out on the second page of the agenda itself under subb. Very top of the page. So this is an action where we are determining whether regarding possible actions regarding complaints received or initiated by the Ethics Commission and the basis is the attorneyclient privilege . Is that right . Yes. That is correct. As youre familiar this is the citation we use for all closed session discussions Enforcement Matters and during this time members of my office are present. I am not present since i advise the staff. We maintain due process and the City Attorney josh wrightwood would advise the commission but tonight john gibner is here advising the staff. All right. Do i hear a motion . [inaudible] maybe i can ask a clarifying question, so the City Attorney is the attorney obviously. Who is the client . Im sorry . Who is the client . Our client is the city and county of San Francisco including one of its agencies, the Ethics Commission. So the commission in this instance, the commission is the client. The City Attorney is the attorney . Correct. And to the extent we are seeking legal advice in connection with pending Enforcement Matters. In connection with pending Enforcement Matters. Okay and isnt there a local regulation that we rely upon for keeping these Enforcement Matters in closed session . Yeah, the charter section as well is one thing that we do rely on. The charter section c. 369 9 13. Right. Thats what is cited here, and remind me again that charter section requires yeah, i can pull up the language pretty quickly. So yeah sub a of that section it provides for the investigation shall be conducted in a confidential manner. Records of any investigation shall be confidential information as to permitted by state law. The unauthorized release of confidential information is subject to termination of any employee or commissioner responses for any such release and this is from our charter. I will move that we meet in closed session. Could i just ask a question before we take up the motion . Im not going to oppose. In regard to the charter section that you just talked about relating to the need to keep confidential the investigation of any kind of complaints. As i understand it and looking at the materials themselves are to trigger tonight a probable cause hearing. Is that fair . I mean if we go forward we would be Going Forward with what would be in effect a probable cause hearing, like a preliminary hearing in a criminal case before a case is held to trial. Isnt that right. I dont want to go into too much detail im not going into detail. I am talking about procedure. Youre always telling me i am saying too much. Im talking about procedure but not investigation but the procedure you layout in agenda item 6, and im not opposing the closed session. I want to ask a question of you as our attorney as to whether or not first of all do you agree that if we go forward on agenda item 6 we would be Going Forward with what would be some form of probable cause hearing . As the agenda describes if there are three Enforcement Matters that the commission is considering for the night some of them involve probable cause and some do not. Okay. So in regard to im trying to analogize this probable cause hearings in other situations like in the criminal system. You had the investigation. The investigation is being done here by the staff and the criminal system is done by the police or whoever and the material is assembled and all of it maybe confidential whether its a grand jury or here in terms of a investigation its all confidential. Thousand then you get to a point we will have a hearing to determine probable cause, and if we again analogize that to probable cause hearings in the criminal system at that point its an open hearing; right . If we have a preliminary i will defer to you on that. You have more experience that i. If you do that its an open hearing and whatever that maybe confidential up to then, grand jury matters and everything they start coming out. Why would a probable cause hearing im not arguing that it isnt, but why is a probable cause hearing in our proceedings something that must be confidential . I think that was a policy decision made by the voters and whoever drafted the Charter Amendment establishing the processes. Even though the language talks about an investigation, an investigation. It doesnt talk about any hearings that we conduct. The language you gave us talked about confidential investigations. Now, were in regard to a hearing. Why would a hearing have to be confidential . Right. Do you. Me to jump in . [inaudible] jessie manarde executive director. The direct answer is that the relations provide it to are confidential. Tell me the language. The hearing shall be closed to public by state law unless the respondent request that. Thats all i am looking for. Thank you very much. Simply a policy decision made long ago. Could have taken that with the one sentence language that was just given to us. Do we have a second. I second. Public comment . Larry bush. Without disclosing any of the specifics is it in the commissions view possible to disclose whether any of these cases involve candidates or committees involved in the november 2015 election or is this going to be one of the thing where we look back they acted today but its on things that happened in 2011 or 2012 . Its good to disclose now whether what youre taking up is on committees or candidates on the ballot in november. Is there any reason thats not included . I would advise that the commission not disclose that information of. As the Council Aware there are limited offices and up for competitive election. Its not a limited number. Your boss is up for election in november as is the sheriff as is the District Attorney as is the mayor as is one supervisor as a number of people on school board and Community College board. Theyre probably 15 people on the ballot so i dont think you can make that statement and be accurate. Any other comments . Yes. Taking mr. Shins opinion about what constitutes a disclosure i would like to know why the City Attorney and the commission didnt sanction mr. St. Croix for sending out a letter in april describing the status of an investigation . That letter went out and the case was referred to the City Attorney and the District Attorney and sent out publicly. Under your advise just now mr. Shin that should be a violation of the city law. I heard no action by you or by this commission taking mr. St. Croix to account for that. The City Attorney can correct me. My understanding is that we are that the staff is obligated to advise complainant what action if any is taken in connection with a complaint filed. That is correct. You understand that the letter being referred to is a letter in which mr. St. Croix told the complainant what had been done with his complaint. I understand, but in that case why didnt Eileen Hansen get a letter when she filed a complaint and its been two weeks and no notification that the commission accepted it. I cant respond to it because i dont know. Im not putting you in the witness box. There is a question here and pending at staff for two weeks. It doesnt take two weeks to send a letter saying we accepted the complaint or rejected it. Nothing. Not even an acknowledgment about it. Is it lost in the mail . Thank you. Good evening commissioners. I am charlie mars stellar for the record. I thank you for all being here tonight and this is an excellent opportunity and discussion to raise a little bit of prehistoric history. I have been attending meetings of the commission very robustly early on starting in about 97. That would include probably many hundreds of meetings of all types but i do want to say that in the early days when this commission was born you had hardly any staff, and you were just feeling your way scprkts City Attorney was taking conservative views and was understanding given resourcing and things because you were just babes in arms, and they ruled very conservatively on your processes and procedures, particularly the ones pertaining to enforcement and adjudication of enforcementses or complaints to the commission, so there maybe now an excellent opportunity with three attorneys on the panel and perhaps more, and then some excellent staff who are also attorneys to look at some of these issues you have seen come up, particularly mr. Hearsest since he been here long and has gray hair now maybe not, maybe a few, but there is a lot of expertise in the room so you might want to revisit some of your processes as you have really interpreted them the most conservative ways, and in some ways throughout your history this is come into conflict with the publics needs and right to know and i think at some point some of your processes on adjudication need to be loosened up a little bit, but you started off very conservatively. That was back when i think deputy City Attorney julie ma was here and that was youre just feeling your way. Thank you. David pilpel again speaking as an individual. At first i thought this discussion was sort of superfluous and not at all and its enlightening about the basis for the closed session. I am remembering that the regulations provide for part of the process to be in closed session and once theres a finding of probable cause for the hearing on the merits to be public, and i think those regulations were drafted by deputy City Attorney ma or previous deputy City Attorneys and there were policy considerations about that and maybe its time to revisit that but on balance i am satisfied both under the brown act and sunshine ordinance youre in a good place and how the charter section affects these and i support the motion. Thank you. Thank you. All right. I will call the question. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed . We will go into closed session. Mr. Chair if i could say one thing for the first matter i have been fire falled off so im going to leave for the first matter and i will come back for all right. Were back in open session and i will turn to section e of item number 6 for discussion and vote pursuant to the brown act and the sunshine ordinance whether to disclose any action taken or discussion taken in closed session regarding the pending litigation. Move that we dont disclose. Second. Any discussion . Any Public Comment . David pilpel. Its not Public Comment but i am wondering if there is announcement of action taken in closed session . Im not asking about action and discussion. Im not sure i understood what you said. I support the motion not to disclose but i am wonding if there is any action that you need to report out . Okay. Thats all. Call the question. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed . It carries unanimously. We will turn to item number 7, discussion and possible action on the junes29 and 27 draft minutes. Any corrections or additions by the commission . Any corrections or additions by the public . David pilpel speaking as an individual. Since we had a lot of time and while you were in closed session there were a number of typos and things that would read better. I wont go through them and i will give them to staff and give them discretion to improve them. Thank you very much. Thank you. Motion to approve the minutes as possibly revised with minor corrections . I move that we approve the minutes subject to typographical and other drafting errors by staff. Second . [inaudible] all right. Call the question. All in favor say aye . Aye. Opposed . Minutes will be approved as amended. Item number 8 is a discussion of the acting executive directors report. Yes commissioners i would just call your attention to two items. One is on page two which talks about under Campaign Finance disclosure programmure our new rules went into effect as i mentioned before so we have been doing a lot of outreach. We issued two new forms, two fact sheets summarizing the changes and five charts based on the f dc charts about the Disclosure Requirements and help people comply with the new rules and the final thing i point out is on the second to last page about the statement outreach and education. We just met the other day with Union Members in connection with the Electronic Filing of form 700 issue, so there continue to be concerns that the unions have regarding both the people who are required to file in the first place, and then folks who are and then just getting it up posted electronically, so we did meet and discuss per the advice of the city and dhr. Were now at the point right now it is not possible to implement this by the april 1 deadline given a number of things that have to happen, so we are going to have to shoot for the following year, and we have a couple weve had discussions with the unions in terms of them culling through the list to make them more appropriate so that for instance receptionists dont have to file form 700 and in one case they did, but also talking to them during that process about the actual electronic posting itself, and they have some suggestions. Im not sure how possible they are but we will maintain that avenue open as well. Otherwise its as submitted. Any questions or discussions . Mr. Chair. Yes. I just wanted to talk about the budget. Sure. Since we just approved the the city approved a two year budget, and in relation to they wanted to talk about this Commission Secretary that came up earlier in the meeting which is mandatory but only in relation to budget considerations of the city, so under budget and staffing we were talking about the reduction of some reductions we had. There was a three reduction in fringe benefit costs and services from other departments. I just wanted to hear more about how and why those reductions happened. The honest truth with respect to those smaller percentage reductions i dont know the specifics. I can certainly get back to you. The big reduction, the 22 reduction is really a reflection of the fact we got this one time funding last year thats not there. My understanding is that the staff funding increase is a cola increase for ongoing staff but they anticipate next year basically adding another position. That would be an enforcement position, so its like anything else. I mean obviously it would be great to have a Commission Secretary who could prepare all these wonderful materials for you. Certainly its like anything else in terms of priorities and that sort of thing to make that determination. What kind of i guess for sake of a better word politicking is done over the years to try to get the mayor to be more sympathetic to our needs . I mean do you know . Was jack meeting with the mayor and his staff over time and trying to convince them that we do have needs if were going to be an effective body . Or is it just something that we hand in what we want, and the mayor does what he wants . So my experience is that most of the communications are done through our budget analyst with the mayor, right, in the year that i have been here, a year and a half and the extra asks are generally in the position for the Mayors Office has been well, i think to answer your question i dont think jack was going to the mayor directly. There was some back and forth with the Mayors Office and the budget in terms of pushing theres a lot of push back and ultimately there were some appeals made to particular members of the board of supervisors in the year and a half i have been here thats what i have seen, so i would just have to say they would look for the new executive director to be more of an advocate around some of these open positions for just that reason. Were going to this is a very administratively heavy commission, lots of just looking at that timeline and projects that we have on board, and if someones time is being taken up with pulling reports and minutes together that a secretary in which we would just be more in line with almost every other commission i cant imagine i wouldnt put that as part of my recommendation for 1617. I would somehow find a way to get that in there. Enforcement is obviously important and investigators and auditors are important, but in the last two up to two years that i played in this particular arena i see the benefit of having a secretary. I agree totally with what at this time commissioner said and in terms of lobbying for the budget of the commission and mr. St. Croix and my grilling of him several times he did little if anything, and i speak as someone who for 20 years was chief assistant of a city department, and was the person who was in charge of getting the budget and dealing with the Mayors Office and dealing with the board of supervisors, and for any agency you have to its the squeaky wheel that gets the grease. You need to go constantly knock on them, and i think the new executive director has to make that a priority, and enlist this commission in helping them. I would be perfectly happy in regard to the budgetary processes as a commissioner if