Overview
San Francisco Elections Commission regular May meeting.
The meeting video and transcript are posted below.
Agenda
- May 15, 2024 Agenda
Call to Order & Roll Call
A member of the Commission will state the following (from the adopted 10/19/22 Elections Commission Land Acknowledgment Resolution):
The San Francisco Elections Commission acknowledges that we are on the unceded ancestral homeland of the Ramaytush Ohlone, who are the original inhabitants of the San Francisco Peninsula. As the indigenous stewards of this land and in accordance with their traditions, the Ramaytush Ohlone have never ceded, lost, nor forgotten their responsibilities as caretakers of this place, as well as for all peoples who reside in their traditional territory. As guests, we recognize that we benefit from living and working on their traditional homeland. We wish to pay our respects by acknowledging the ancestors and relatives of the Ramaytush Community and affirming their sovereign rights as First Peoples.
- General Public Comment
Public comment on any issue within the Elections Commission’s general jurisdiction that is not covered by another item on this agenda.
- Approval of Previous Meeting Minutes
Discussion and possible action on previous Elections Commission meeting minutes.
- Director's Report
Discussion and possible action regarding the May 2024 Director’s Report.
- Commissioners’ Reports
Discussion and possible action on Commissioners’ reports for topics not covered by another item on this agenda: Meetings with public officials; oversight and observation activities; long-range planning for Commission activities and areas of study; proposed legislation which affects elections; others.
- Discussion and Possible Action Concerning Commission’s Process for Performance Review of the Director of Elections and Commission Secretary
- Agenda Items for Future Meetings
Discussion and possible action regarding items for future agendas.
- Adjournment
There will be an opportunity for public comment on each agenda item.
Date & Time
6:00 pm to 9:00 pm
Online
Webinar password: MayMeeting15! (62963384 from video systems)
Phone
SFEC Regular May 2024 Meeting
In this video
San Francisco Elections Commission regular May 2024 meeting.
1. Call to Order & Roll Call 0:04 /3:15
2. General Public Comment 4:16
3. Approval of Previous Meeting Minutes 7:22
4. Director’s Report 17:05
5. Commissioners’ Reports 46:50
6. Discussion and Possible Action Concerning Commission’s Process for Performance Review of the Director of Elections and Commission Secretary 49:30
7. Agenda Items for Future Meetings 1:23:20
8. Adjournment 1:24:16
Transcript:
Perfect welcome everyone to the May 15 2024 regular meeting of the
San Francisco elections commission I'm the president Robin Stone The Time Is Now 6:02 pm and I call the meeting to
order before we proceed further I would like to ask commission secretary Marissa Davis to briefly explain some procedures
for participating in today's
meeting oh thank you president
Stone the minutes of this meeting will reflect that this meeting is being held in person at City Hall Room 408 one doct
Carlton B goodlet Place San Francisco California 94102 and remotely via WebEx
as authorized by the elections commission's February 15 2023 vote
members of the public May attend the meeting to observe and provide public comment either at the physical meeting
location or remotely details and instructions for participating remotely
are listed on the commission's website and on today's meeting agenda public
comment will be available on each item on this agenda each member of the public will be allowed three minutes to speak
six minutes if you are on the line with an interpreter when providing public comment you are encouraged to state your
name clearly and once your three minutes have expired staff will thank you and you will be
muted please direct your comments to the entire commission and not to a specific
commissioner when joining by phone you will hear a beep when you are connected to the meeting you will be automatically
muted and in listening mode only to make a public comment dial Star
three to raise your hand when your item of Interest comes up you will be added to the public comment line you will hear
you have raised your hand to ask a question please wait until the host calls on you the line will be silent as
you wait your turn to speak if at any time you change your mind and wish to withdraw yourself from public comment
line press star three again you will hear the system say you have lowered your hand when joining by WebEx or a web
browser make sure participant side panel is showing at the bottom of the list of
attendees is a small button or icon that looks like a hand press the hand icon to raise your hand
you will be unmuted when it is time for you to comment when you are done with your comment click the hand icon again
to lower your hand in addition to participating in real time interested
persons are encouraged to participate in this meeting by submitting public comment in writing by 12: p.m noon on
the day of the meeting to elections. commmission sfgov.org it will be shared with the
commission after this meeting has concluded and will be included as part of the official meeting file thank you
president Stone thank you secretary Davis uh will you please proceed with
item one commission roll call President Stone presid vice president Parker she
has an excused absence commissioner bernh holes here commissioner D here commissioner
loli here Commission Wong here president stone with the members president
accounted for you have a quorum great thank you the San Francisco elections
commission acknowledges that we are on the unseated ancestral homeland of the rayu shalone who are the original
inhabitants of the San Francisco Peninsula as the indigenous stewards of this land and in accordance with their
Traditions the remit to shalone have never seeded lost nor forgotten their responsibilities as caretakers of this
place as well as for All Peoples who reside in their traditional territory as guests we recognize that we benefit from
living and working on their traditional Homeland we wish to pay our respects by acknowledging the ancestors and relatives of the rsh community and
affirming their Sovereign rights as First Peoples closes agenda item number one we'll move to agenda item number two
general public comment public comment on any issue within the election commission's General jurisdiction that
is not covered by another item on this agenda welcome
pH one second let me get your time going here
nobody it's too
loud okay you're good to go yes so tifi is my name artist name I
wasn't aware of this commission actually I just found out tonight which is surprisingly empty nobody cares it seems
never mind let's go straight to the point I wrot it down generally I don't write anything it comes from
automatically the words come out of my mouth okay but let's do it so basically
because of the expensive consequences of the pandemic of an
intelligence one of these consequence is to have exacerbated the trust in government
officials and the system by which they are supposed to be soundly elected so
the future of San Francisco SF which is not science fiction s Francisco
incidence is a totally new system that's going to be by drawing basically you select randomly a
certain number of locals who are going to decide who can
run or not for a position after any candidate has demonstrated enough
responsibility and critical thinking to be part of the draw this
limit enormously the possibility of Corruptions because in that case the
first mandate initial mandate the length is reduced okay
now we need to pay attention meanwhile how basically unintelligence here is
going to self- destroy it's automatic so the system
today but with More Than Just a Little Help From My
Friend the SKU of San
Francisco from me to you all
have a good night thank
Youk you anyone
online thank you secretary Davis that closes agenda item number two we'll now move to agenda item number three
approval of previous meeting minutes discussion and possible action and previous elections commission meeting minutes I'll open
the conversation for
Commissioners commissioner d uh yes I um had a couple of um minor
typo Corrections which I uh sent over to uh secretary Davis and and to president
Stone um I also feel like we've kind of gone from kind of gross detail to almost
no detail and I think it's uh useful to um provide um some detail when the
discussion uh especially when it um includes suggestions or proposal that
kind of show what the Commissioners are engaging in so for example for the uh
April minutes um you know commissioner Wong had made a
comment about adding Chinese and Filipino media for the Outreach for
non-citizen voting I thought that was kind of important to note um you know I had suggested targeting schools with um
underrepresented populations for the high school ambassador program um so anyway I uh made a couple
of suggestions like that uh and then for item number
six um I just thought it would be good to show that we took public comment before
we actually voted so just flipping the order a little
bit and then for item number seven we had a fairly extensive conversation on
the issue of um trans transliteration of candidates names into Chinese characters
and it just wasn't clear where we came out on it so just adding a sentence indicating that we basically concurred
with the Department's recommendations to modify the current policy just so it's clear kind of what the conclusion of our
discussion was and
for for the March
one uh go for my Note since seems to have signed me out
um uh same couple of typos um for item number
four uh commissioner Wong had mentioned the importance of collaborating with cbos to
ensure uh that great content and the mythbuster Mondays was also available to
uh people who don't speak English um in item number five um uh
again uh there was a pretty extensive discussion about how we could um take
advantage uh and communicate that it's not just about election night in fact president Stone had mentioned that it's
really like election week and then I had suggested it's actually election month and maybe to kick it off with the start
of early voting um and then commissioner Wong had again made a comment about the
importance of targeting ethnic media and uh making sure that the
FAQs that are so have a lot of information are also available in multiple languages and then finally for item
number six we had also agendized we had talked about agendize the racial Equity progress report so just a few additional
details that I have provided in uh with track changes to commission secretary
Davis thank you commissioner d I'll I'll touch on the one comment you
made just about uh going from too much to too little um since we've talked
about this multiple times and for our new commissioner just to share a little bit
about the previous discussion the minutes are not supposed to be a transcription of the
conversation uh we offer multiple ways for folks to review what the commission
discussed it is really just a formal record of what was
agendized very Loosely uh like a loose like a general statement about
that and then any action that was taken the more detail that is required is around public
comment um and so I have been in the operation of what
we had discussed at the beginning of the year um sorry I'm like leaning heavily
forward um at the beginning of the year and last year we've had multiple
conversations I don't believe that it's necessary to include all of what you just shared that's my perspective um
because we do have we follow the rules of what we have to include and then we also have the video recording and the
video recording also is available in multiple locations and in the uh
description of the video recording we also put timestamps so folks can watch
and find the individual discussions so they could see that
um that said you know I don't want to get in the way of what
you want to include um and so if you want to include those things I'm not I
I'm not going to say no but I I'm not I don't personally think it's necessary um
the only one part that I I don't feel that I want to or that I would like
uh uh oppose is a very charged word I just would not agree about is the part
about the consensus of the Department's policy I don't think that we had a
general like we didn't have that takeaway of like we all agree it's this
I think we one thing that maybe is an alternative to that is like we agreed not to continue the discussion or that
no I think the fact that no action was taken kind of speaks for itself um but I wouldn't feel
comfortable suggesting that we had some sort of like consensus that's the only
part of the contents of what you said that I personally don't agree
with just want to give yes commissioner
D yeah I I I um appreciate the efforts to kind of you know slim down the
minutes and I I and I think it's great that we're starting to put time stamps in and bookmarks I think that's all
really helpful for the public um I do think that you know kind of providing a
gist of the discussion which in most cases I think was done there were some good summaries of kind of what was
discussed um and uh that I could called out a few things because you know uh I
think it's help ful for someone who doesn't want to go back and and pour through two hours of video to you know
just see kind of what the commissioner engaged on especially if there are kind of policy issues that are consistent
with um what you know the commission is been advocating in terms of greater
access Etc so I I think that's helpful and I think it adds one or two sentences
so that's why I call those out in particular um and I'm totally fine with switching it to you know no further
action was taken it's just felt like it just felt like it wasn't clear what happened at the end so adding something
like that would be fine cool so just to um recap I want to make sure we're on
the same page so your suggestions we can accept those um with the exception of
the one agreed upon tweak and then going forward if there's content that you want
to add unless there's a disagreement about the actual like content of it I think
it's you should definitely feel that you can is that a fair is that
fair completely I just think in the interest of transparency just to make it easy on the public fair
enough anyone
else thank you commissioner D for your efforts um and
always watchful ey over the minutes I appreciate it um let's move to and I mean that
genuinely um let's move to public
comment oh sorry before we move to public comment do we have General consensus of everyone else to do what we
just discussed just a general head nod would be great okay cool just want to make sure it's not just commissioner die
in myself making the decision for everyone okay let's move to public comment
okay let's move to agenda item number four director's report discussion and possible action regarding the May 2024
director's report I will hand it over to director erns thank you president Stone so uh as you can see from the report
there's start things are starting to kick uh kick into action in the department for the November election I
think the one of the main points to reiterate from the report is that Friday is the beginning of the nomination
period for candidates to file for mayor and board supervisor contests um and I think really from
there I can take any questions and and clarify anything that's in the report but so want to make sure that people realize that Friday is the the beginning
of the following uh period for mayor and voter supervisors thank you director ARS open
it up for
yes commissioner Wong thank you pres president Stone um
yeah so I just I want to highlight two parts one on the non-citizen voting web
page as well as um the Monday's hearing on AI in elections so I'm going to start
with the easier one the non-citizen voting reformatted web page and I had a
chance to take a look of the web page it looks fantastic and I really appreciate director ARS of incorporating the
feedback that we discussed from our last meeting ESP especially useful to inform non-citizen folder that they might
answer no to the question related to um registrating for and participating in
elections on their naturalization application I think that would really reassure noncitizen voters um to proceed
with their right to register and vote in Schoolboard election so that I really appreciate and I also notice that you
provide information related to requesting for vacation letter after
each election that's something that you know we talked about last time and then I really appreciate director AR's um you
know effort in incorporating those um discussion um and I'm really excited to
see that there's an upcoming language accessibility advisory committee meeting coming up um to discuss um non-citizen
voting Outreach at foot with grassroot organization and do you have any idea when the next
advisory committee meeting will be held so we haven't set the date yet it'll be in June prob in June okay good to know
um and I am interested in attending um the meeting to listen and without making
any comments um and I just want to check with DC Russell um from my understanding
um Commissioners can attend the meeting to listen and without making any comments eson as it doesn't exceed the
Quorum is that a correct understanding yeah there's no problem there's no issue with you attending the meeting and
listening as long as there's not a quorum of members there gotcha should gotcha um since I think we need to co
coordinate among ourselves so we don't exceed the Quorum I think I would suggest adding this item for the future
agenda for the next meeting um yeah because I'm I'm still pretty new I just
don't know if is something that we can discuss right now I think it should be discussed after is it is agenda next
meeting kind of clarification what are you asking to have agenda um to talk
about my my potential attendance to the language accessibility I don't know if I
need permission or okay I don't uh so I think we can talk about it
right now okay okay I don't think okay I mean I think folks can weigh in I I
happy to add thoughts but I don't think we need a formal agenda item okay gotcha
um yeah I would love to attend um the language accessibility advisory
committee meeting and then just would love to hear all your feedback and if anyone else also is interested in
attending thank you uh commissioner I point of clarification as well for the director is that meeting in a public
forum yes yeah be people attend the meeting remotely so it's not a it's not
an inperson meeting so anyone could anyone can watch it
right um and is it recorded it is okay I I don't see any reason why not I
think personally um I'll speak for myself uh I'm always wary of when and
I've not always but I've learned to try and I be cautious of for my own self
this isn't me telling you what to do but with the departments committees um knowing that my presence can be
potentially intimidating um as you know the commission um for example when I go
to the department I almost 100% of the time tell the director that I'm I'm
coming so that I'm not a surprise hey you know um so that's that's more advice
of just um something to think about but knowing that it is a public
forum uh that anyone can listen to I don't see I I don't I personally don't have any
concerns I think yeah that's just
advice you you can continue with your yeah yeah if if other folks have want to
weigh in on that or immediately they can or we can just wait but you can continue your comments commissioner D do you have
a feedback on this particular issue no I'm delighted that you're planning to attend thank
you any other comments on this topic just I want to make sure go you can
finish your okay yeah perfect um all righty so I am going to attend um so you
know please keep me posted once the meeting date um is available and I do
have a second comment on the AI um in election special hearing at ruse
committee on Monday um I just want to check with DCA again if I can make
comments and ask questions related to the special hearing it is noted on the director's
report because it's part of the director's report that was included with the packet of materials on the agenda
you can you can ask him about that yes perfect just want to be very careful um
so I had a chance to actually reveal the hearing recording I find it really
educational informational it really high to recommend the public um and my fellow Commissioners to review the recording if
you haven't done it already it is really really helpful to hear from uh director Arns the ethics commission and also um
expert in this field and just to have like a quick Rec recap and also verifying if I understand the issue
correctly the dep department does not monitor or regulate uh campaign speech
though the department jurisdiction covers misinformation related to the operational side of the election such as
for registration V process for example I think one example is say someone you
know um maliciously talked about um misguiding people on the voting date um
or how they should register that's something that direct um the department can um cure and you know alert the
public about is this my is this um correct understanding of what the
department can do in relation to this information conceptually yes the the
specifics would matter but yeah I mean the department would monitors and potentially would respond to any speech
related to the operations of the election like you like you like you mentioned but every statement doesn't
necessarily mean that we're going to respond to it just it depends on the situation and the and the um and the
facts involved but yes we don't we don't monitor we have no authority to monitor or to regulate and we have no resources
to enforce any sort of political speech gotcha yeah that's I think is my
understanding from the hearing as well so I'm happy to and want to highlight that for the commission and also the public I think that's really important
to know what the jur jurisdiction is um and on the hearing you mentioned about
the department has develop protocols for identifying and reporting to sorry responding to false and and misleading
elections information um and you know subsequently activate a evaluation and
response plan um and you you know basically Give an example that um once
the department at identifying problems they can alert the public about that by releasing press conferences updating the
web page and also spreading the information to um nonprofits Partners um
and I do have a questions about just just wondering not that I'm imp that you you should do that uh I question that um
for the reporting and evaluation response could the public for example
report misleading information related to for the registration the operational side of things to the Department of
Elections according to this protocol yes okay and then so the public
can report to you correct and then you will you might I might not follow up with that depending on the content
correct okay that's good to know um and so on the hearing the ethics commission
also testified on their own protocol right um to Monitor and regulate some
aspect of this information and I think Lamy the disclaimer um and I was just
wondering if there's any ongoing conversation or collaboration with the ethics commissions on this particular
issue so we have uh exchanged uh we had
a conversation since the hearing yes gotcha because I remember the executive director was talking about um she want
to learn more about the department response plan and I think that would be really great to um perhaps you know when
things are more materialized you can share more with the commission or the public um you know the collaboration or
more detailed plan for dismantling AI related disinformation related to the
oper operational side of V voting I think the public will be benefited to learn more about what the department is
doing and then the coll collaboration with ethics commission if possible yeah I think it depends on what we there's so
many variables there's no there's no one set approach to this and also AI doesn't really create new concerns around the
election it creates perhaps new methods or it it amplifies the the ability
ability to generate yeah information that would be adverse to the Integrity of the election so AI itself has not
created new scenarios that we haven't dealt with before right so I don't know what You' want me to report to be honest
with you um so if you could clarify please um I guess so going into more
details on the hearing I heard from the ethics commission that they want to
educate the candidates and committee on AB 730 um and not
necessarily investigate anything related to that law it's more about educating the public on on this and potentially
also collaborating with um the department on you know perfect Tain the existing system so I'm just
wondering if there's more information on the existing system and you know if there's any plans or updates from the
ethics commission would be great too because you you you mentioned that you started conversation with ethics
commission just wondering if there's anything come out of it it would be great to share certainly yeah if that
makes sense certainly yeah I think that's more about following up with what the hearing was about and and just happy
to see more Co coordination among government agencies and commissions in this important issues and I I totally
agree with director ARS that AI generated issue is not new in terms of this information but because of AI the
ability to generate this information has increase substantially and that make um
you know elections officials like yourselves and the commission hard to you know dismantle those information and
make sure the public have correct information um prior to the election so I I think that's something that I I'm
just really interested in learning more about certainly I think that's it from my side thank
you commissioner D thank you president Stone um I was going to ask director ARS
about what you said about AI at your session so thank you commissioner Wong for that executive summary um so a
couple other um comments um thank you for the update and all the work you're doing with young
people in the city I I think it's fabulous and really interested in the student mock election um and
uh uh I'm wondering we'll we'll get an update on that or is that uh you know
you're providing the information to them to sign up for it will we have a chance to hear um about the results of this
student mock election well the secretary state's office conducts the mock election so we are providing information
to the schools to to join the Secretary of State effort in organizing and
conducting the election as far as results the the results of the election are posted and
so you can even go on sos' website now and see past election results uh from
the mock elections and the mock elections consist of State contests and
state measures uh certainly we can provide the information to the commission yeah uh so
since it's at state level I suspect there won't be any rank Choice voting then right correct okay um also I'm glad
to see uh making progress on the Go Green campaign that was good to see uh
and then I of course am extremely delighted that uh uh you're going to be
working on improving the elections results reporting so I'm very happy to
to see that uh and um I would be happy
to uh make myself available if there are any questions on some of the suggestions
that I put forth in the memo before and then I also wanted to offer
myself as a resource if there's anything on the education and rank Choice voting
um that I can you know help the department on I just happen to have a lot of experience with rank Choice
voting and and how to message it properly I've worked with Fair vote before so if I can be of service please
do not not hesitate to call surely okay thank you thank you thanks commissioner
D anyone
else okay I had a couple of um comments uh I was looking for
something just bear with me something that came up
requests find it um oh okay I remember what it is now
okay um thank you director Arns for a thorough report and all the great work
um especially being responsive to commission input as always it's really
awesome and also just seeing continued great registration numbers in alignment
with the commissions priorities thanks um can you speak a little bit about why
you were asked to present about AI at at
this special meeting to the extent that you're
aware of I mean I don't know the Genesis for me I
was contacted by supervisor Preston's office uh asking what the Department's
role would be in relation to deep fakes and and that was in I think December and
then from there there was that was told that a hearing was was imminent on AI
and that elections would be asked to report on it and then uh later and then
also ethics would be included ethics commission would be included and it wasn't until uh on Monday when the
hearing took place and that's that's my knowledge of our role or reason we were brought
into that hearing so perhaps it doesn't sound like you're saying this but one might wonder if it has to do with a
candidates like someone who's running for office might be concerned about deep thinks about his own
campaign um I and you don't have to answer that but I'm just curious if perhaps that had to do with it because
as it pertains to elections you know we shouldn't it really would be the ethics
commission that would deal with concerns about campaigns um as it pertains to
responding to operations of the department and actually administering the election
would you say you have a pretty robust process for responding to any kind of threat whether you know through the
city's mechanisms of the like through law enforcement FBI
um and the mayor so whether it's AI or someone physically intimidating someone
would you say it's similar a similar type of protocol that you would follow for something you saw with a deep fake
that you would with a physical threat as well would you say it's the same yes
and like we could we can't stop anything I mean this we can but we can certainly
put information out that that contradicts or uh refocuses people on
you know the actual uh process and
the but if if if the Department of Elections wanted to put out information and message to the public and to voters
that there is disinformation Mal information or or misinformation Mis dis
and Mal uh we would have a very solid response and support from a lot of
different agencies and we would draw in a tremendous amount of media attention
quickly uh ethnic media wouldn't be an issue uh we would be in multiple languages uh and it would happen nearly
instantaneously and that's been my experience if something doesn't go right in elections uh the people show up and
if we were putting something out there that there's something needs to be fixed people would show up so
I so and it to me it's it's not the concern isn't the action It's the
reaction to the issue and I I think and then it's then in relation to the reactions how much time has passed from
the action to the Rea because you don't because I don't want to have my my concern is that there's um too much time
where people reacting to bad information without the department being able to respond to it and put out good
information and that's to me where the damage would would because maybe someone would would vote and they and we've
counted that ballot and they voted on on bad information we we can't we can't fix that you know uh so we want to be able
to have a a response to the so the reactions are are are minimal to any bad bad information but we have the means
and we have the support in the city and also outside the city and also the community organizations would would be a
part of this as well um yeah I think we San Francisco especially could be would
be very responsive and I think it'd be a very thorough response to any sort of bad information that was circulating
about an election or elections process thank you for sharing that um I
appreciate that Insight I think it's important also just to not
over overemphasize fears ahead of November um
as well I think there are a lot of a lot of different Industries and
areas of concern and around you know the election in a national lens around the
role of AI and I think not just the election but lots of other um sectors
and industries and policy implications that go that I think there are a lot of
folks who don't work necessarily in AI who might be saying what are we doing about this what are we doing about this
right um and I don't think necessarily that's the purview of director like the
director of elections of San Francisco but I do think what's important is that we have a strong response protocol if
something if there is something that occurs whether it is from um uh AI or
physical intimidation or anything like that and I know to be sure um that that
is something we've continued to talk about and that the department is working on so the only other thing I would add about that is I think it just continues
the conversation about how important it is that relationships with the media and
the department remain strong um and what I mean by that is around
results reporting and um making sure that the media knows how to look for the correct
information on the website uh and understands the length of time it takes
to count ballots which is stuff we've really already been talking about so I
think it just kind of further amplifies that need um but it's great to know that
there is a response plan I think people way above all of our pay grades need to
be um approaching this issue uh congressionally in other ways um so I
think for the short term important that we just have a plan to respond to immediate threats one question unrelated to AI uh
that I wanted to ask was actually I had two questions one was just about the budget process uh and
the elections commission's desire to include a line item for digitization of
our records uh do you know if that will remain intact or get approved slash has
it been approved will it be approved can you share a little bit has it been cut good glad to hear that mayor's office is
listening um please keep it in um okay cool I had one question about the
training uh moving from uh in-person interviews sorry not
training the in-person interviews to and I want to just find where it where it is
I think it was on yes the department would continue to integrate equital practices hiring temp election workers
allow applicants to complete a short interview questionnaire in Li of traditional face tof face
um and we'll work with HR to vet the content of the questionnaire does that
also cut down like create more efficiencies for your team additionally so will require fewer hours and you know
do you feel that you'll still be able to uh like it can achieve the same goal
or outcome of having uh like a robust process that you
need if you even need a robust process like will it still serve the goal that you're trying
to get by going that path we're hopeful we actually did this partially for
people who for for folks who assisted with the um processing of the ballots
last election so now we're going to expand it out to other areas of our operations so we had we did test yeah so
so so yes it worked it worked fairly well uh for for the ballot processors
and we're hoping that we can expand that out and it'll continue to to work well so so I don't mean to be funny here but
um you might also consider how AI would impact that because uh folks may also be
using chat GPT so uh it might be worth
putting in the questionnaire into chat GPT to see what answers would come out so if folks
are putting in an answer that just was spewed out of chat gbt you can compare
against what answers you got full full circle there with AI um that was it
otherwise thanks thanks again for this report and I appreciate all the hard work excellent thank you commissioner
loli there we go that's better um thank you for the report and I just have a
question about the section um congratulations on submitting your racial Equity progress report I had a
question on the first part um about the outreach program to those um individuals
who are involved with the criminal justice system do you have a way of tracking the number of people that are
being impacted by this or
measuring we can we can measure the like one measurement is the number of people that we engage with uh during our
sessions and I think we do that uh but once once we're no longer on
site it'd be hard for us to really track we don't potentially we we could track
registration if they use the hard copy registration form um because when we go when we have
Outreach we we generally categorize a certain uh number of registration cards
for an event or to to a group so potentially we could be tracking that as well um but as far as we don't we don't
track them as if we have not tracked them if they're voting or uh beyond the registration status really
or just just are engaging and that would that would be anonymous but so so the the engagement the point of Engagement
then potentially at registration in the past we we have we have measured those sorts of instances
is is there a way to give us a sense of how many people as a result of this
program and Outreach have registered who were previously not registered and potentially be in a future report for
the the for the jails yes uh I think pre-registration for those in the in
juvenile probably I'm sure um but in the jails yeah and that's probably one of my
previous director's reports too I don't remember okay if we put the number in there but I can we can I can provide
that the next next month okay so yeah thank you I think also point of uh
clarification I think you also include it you include it not from a registration perspective but in terms of
participation in the election um in your postelection report uh of the um folks
who participated in jail voting but not registration so that is a data point that we get okay through that um but I
imagine prisoner Legal Services probably has like a very well I know you guys work together on that anyways oh yeah
commissioner see um just just clarification I'm more interested in
registration um as a result of the Outreach as opposed to
participation yeah okay thank you I was responding to the director saying he
thought he included it in a previous report and I was saying I think that it's actually the number that he's singing about is the one of the post
election review yeah but could be wrong always anyone
else okay let's move to public comment
no hands are raised thank you thank you secretary Davis and um thank you
director ARS uh let's move to that closes agenda item four let's move to agenda item
number five Commissioners reports discussion and possible action on commissioner reports for topics not covered by another item on this agenda
meetings with public officials oversight and observation activities longrange planning for commission activities in areas of study proposed legislation
which affects elections and
others all right well I'll just share one quick um item in the vein of digitization of Records uh secretary and
Davis and I have been talking over the last couple weeks about digitization of
Records pending that uh the budget approval um and so I've asked that we
start kind of throwing things away in the file cabinet that are not necessary
and starting to catalog and organize those records um and then should we get the funds to do it we'll be able to good
to go um we'll be able to scan and upload onto onto the website and get
that organized so I have a feeling that once we do get the budget this will be a
probably at least a year process um not just because of the organization of
Records or even the actual like the digitization of them but also more over
getting them on the website and organizing them on the website is a task uh and so I just want to set everyone's
expectations that that not only will take a long time but it also will likely
not be under me as president or I I would assume that folks wouldn't ask me
to do a third year as president so someone else will um have to oversee
that that project um in once that comes around so uh just wanted to get everyone
heads up hopefully we get that um that funding and I think it'll be really important for continuity that we get it
digitized yeah um anyone
else okay let's move to public
comment No Hands raised thank you secretary Davis that
closes agenda item number five uh now we'll move to agenda item number six discussion and possible action
concerning commission's process for performance review of the director of Elections and commission secretary so
I'll just set the table a little bit um as the ever astute commissioner D
pointed out there are no attachments for the secretary's evaluation that's a there's a specific rationale for that
because I was going back and forth about how to approach this um so a little bit of background um
uh former commissioner jonic had in his very lengthy um proposals for the
evaluation process um which I actually I used the bones of in in other ways um
for the director's process I just simplified it a lot um I took a lot of those recommendations and I one of the
things that I thought was really good for the secretary was that we should
align it we should actually detach it from the review of the director um reason being we should align
it with the year the term of the president so he proposed in his
documents that we conduct the evaluation for the secretary in December based on the president's term I agree with this
approach um last year we didn't conduct a review of the secretary and there was
a specific reason for that which is that secretary Davis joined in April um and
uh and um took you know I think the onboarding process she's also a
part-time employee I don't think it would have been Fair uh to conduct an annual performance review uh but so my
proposal of how I want to approach this is actually just to for me and secretary
Davis to uh have a midyear General conversation um and then
of just hey how's it going let's like look back and how digs going moving forward and then conduct a more formal
process at the end of the year um to align with the end of my term as
president and um we would probably kick that off around October November so what
it's not ultimately that far away uh if you do want to provide some thoughts uh
ahead of that I will take those into consideration in my conversation with secretary Davis but um this is the way I
think it it makes best sense um moving on to the director's uh the
director's evaluation so couple things about this so uh
commissioner jonic put together a very
uh strong process um but like I said I wanted to simplify it streamline it a
bit but I used kind of the bones of that and actually condensed it a little bit
um and one of the challenges in addition to that um it was
also an extremely long process for us last time we had I don't even know how
many meetings I don't even want to think about how many hours and so basically
what I did was I took the S the I took commissioner jonic and I think uh BC's
conversation about this streamlined it and then I actually condensed a very specific part about this before I get to
that um one of the biggest challenges we have that you may be wondering how it
fits into some of this is that we changed the June 5th the June meeting to June 5th which means we actually have a
much shorter Runway between this meeting and our next meeting and so that is the
reason why we're not having the full evaluation in June we would do it in July but the process is kind of extended
to provide enough time for everyone to weigh in the biggest difference of
commissioner jonic and my proposal which I actually hope will you all will find
agreeable mostly because I think it will shorten the length of the conversation
is that you all will provide me with your reviews of the director I will do I
will combine everyone's comments into what I believe to be a full recap of
everyone's um and try to take the main points and then share all of that back
with everyone so I will put together like a summary document it won't be everyone's comments every single comment
for every single section it'll be okay I think you know commissioner Loli and commissioner burnol had a similar
comment or you know I think this was addressed in a different part of the review or whatever I'll try and do my
best to honor people's input um and put together a summary document of what I
propos to be the final version I will also share everyone's individual reviews so you'll be able to see okay see how
she may be connected those dots Etc and that way we can review the final the summary document in
our discussion um and that way people can bring specific points that they want
to make sure maybe I I didn't capture in the summary document I just think it'll be a much more efficient process that
way this is like I said not included in commissioner jonic a original proposal
so this is a new uh step in the process that I I'm hopeful you all will agree
with um and then to that vein I I included additional time in my review of
everyone's evaluation um then perhaps everyone else gets I think I gave
everyone two weeks I think I get a little bit more than two weeks if I remember correctly um and the reason for
that is also that it's over the 4th of July I don't plan to work on the 4th of July uh so um those are the those are
the the kind of three considerations I wanted to raise
with that I will hand it over for you all to uh weigh
in yes commissioner D yes thanks for that and for
considering the timing of major holidays and our meetings um
I think one thing that um is missing that was in the proposed um process that
vek discussed last December was the
um um opportunity to request additional
information uh we had talked in the past about how um the commission doesn't have
a lot of visibility into uh um you know
staff interactions with director and yet we're you know expected to evaluate him
obviously that's an important part of his job um and so there were a list of
suggestions that that um uh was discussed by
boek uh we had talked last year about you know 360 reviews employee surveys
eeo complaints um um just objective information that we could consider U as
part of our evaluation rather than you know not having a whole lot to
say just because we don't have visibility over that so where would where would you think that would
fit um would you like me to respond to that yes if there is a
specific uh piece of information that you wanted
that you specifically would like to have us consider feel free to okay raise that
I I never felt fully comfortable in some of that um I think the eeo complaints I
think I was more open to I think our relationship with the
Department is really supposed to be through the director so that is why I didn't I I wasn't trying to
uh opine on those specific items I just didn't I wasn't or rather I wasn't
trying to prevent us from talking about these specific documents I just didn't
think that they were as yeah it wasn't a priority in putting
together the process yeah I mean so I I think I mean you're right that is the commission's uh interface with with the
Department is through the director yet we are the only you know
evaluation point for the director there's no separate DHR process um and he is a senior manager
that you know manages a you know a lot of employees a lot of of temporary employees and so it it would be hard to
provide a a comprehensive evaluation without you know considering that and
providing feedback and it was pointed out that you know in the past uh there
were guidelines that were adopted in 2016 which predates all of us um But it
includes it previously apparently uh the commission used to
invite um you know one or more employees to to to interview uh in closed session
so um that I'm sure is in you of a Anonymous employee survey or some
Anonymous you know kind of 360 process but what I would hate to do is um not
take advantage of the expertise that DHR does provide to you know provide
comprehensive employee reviews and including for managers um and if there are you know
tools or employee surveys that have been done you know I would I would be interested in seeing that because I feel
like you know that's that's where we kind of Punt because again we don't have a lot of visibility over that and yet it
is an important part of his job um just to respond to
that uh so a couple of questions and comments um so you said take advantage
of what DHR does provide are you aware of what DHR provides or you're just making a guess that that's what they
provid I'm guessing their professional HR organization that you know that manages a huge number of employees and
and managers and probably had standard processes and because of the unique
composition of the elections commission and our oversight responsibility for the director they basically are hands off
and you know that's fine um but it doesn't mean we shouldn't leverage their
expertise and whatever tools they use for other managers I see that tools they use for other because I don't know that
they do do 360 reviews like I can't confirm do but I have I have met with
DHR um and the extent to what they offer
is being able to tell us the number of like eeo complaints um for the department and I
will just speak person I I would be very surpris I'm very curious of
where of having a member of the department come and speak I know John
has been invited to come and speak I would not I'll just speak to everyone I would absolutely not be comfortable
with someone working for John coming and presenting to us I think that's
personally I find that inappropriate um and I also don't think we'd be able
to really get the answer like I don't know how objective that would really be actually um but I do think uh when I've
spoken with DHR in the past the because I've gone through this now multi times
of the evaluation and also when we talked about opening competitive selection process I also engaged with
DHR quite a bit and eeo complaints seem to be where at least commissioner jonic and
I landed and I think we talked about it as well uh the trouble is those things
are we can't really get much further than that because they're actually like
confidential um but we could I could if folks wanted to I could uh ask them if
there have been eeo complaints um I could I could reach out and ask well and
and you know I don't know if they do employee surveys that are you know
Broken Out by Department I mean you know I will just say that you
know we've kind of faced the same issue at the state level at the uh California citizens ring commission where there
were 14 of us who were supervising the executive director and this question came about how to do evaluations and you
know they sent their head of HR who gave a very professional presentation on our
responsibilities of managers and and a framework on how to evaluate and you
know they had processes and standard practices in place um and so I'm
assuming DHR you know at at at the city you know probably has equal level of
sophistication so I don't know I don't know if they do an annual employee survey um Citywide and maybe break it
down by Department to provide feedback for managers if nothing else but if that data exists I would want to see it and
leverage it um you know we did have that unique opportunity when we were looking
at uh you know opening up a a competitive search that a number of employees came and spoke to us in public
session and wrote us a letter and so we we had some you know feedback from
employees the last time around even if it was um kind of under under um you
know perhaps with inaccurate information that prompted that kind of response uh
but but yeah we had discussed that it's like how can we get some feedback from
employees I mean I tend to agree I mean I'm not sure how this was done in the past it apparently was a practice of the
commission uh to invite you know a couple employees just to provide feedback just you know in close session
I have no idea how they were selected I have no idea what the process was but um
that seems to me in lie of something that you know might be more objective
and standardized like an employee survey satisfaction survey I mean it's pretty normal in the private sector so I don't
know I can't claim to know what what the what the city does over here but I've got to imagine there's some kind of tool
for employee feedback I would be happy to go back and ask DHR
if they can send us data and that if that's you know in I I can incorporate
that into the uh you know the next two weeks just reaching out to them and saying hey do you have anything that's
readily available because I also would hate to have it slowed down the process as well um so I'll just reach out and
yeah ask them if they have anything and if they do I'll include it right in in
yeah I mean standard statistic too like retention I mean so there's eeo complaints there's retention turnover
you know there any any other kind of of information that we can use would be
helpful I mean I'm sure they do they must do some kind of survey for all the temporary pole workers that interact
with the Department as well I mean I got to imagine there's some some kind of feedback
mechanism so if if it if that's available you know it would be helpful to have that because otherwise we're
literally only reviewing him based on our interactions with the director at at
meetings you know any one-on-one meetings that we have and his own self-evaluation and that's not a lot of
data points it's all so I wouldn't agree with that I mean we also he provides
monthly reports sure he provides report he provides election very robust election plans and postelection
reviews um I just would you know I agree that there are maybe you don't have all
the data you want but I wouldn't say all that we get is I mean the director provides a lot of transparency into what
he does I don't disagree with that but I'm saying we don't get any information from other sources other than the
director that's all I'm saying well I I would also add the incident reports for
the election plans is data I mean I think there are many I just don't yeah I don't
necessarily agree that that's it's only through the director we get full incident reports John isn't the excuse
me director ARS isn't the one who's like providing data on how people
vote I I get what you're saying that you want a different audience of like you
want a different stakeholder to provide other like angles of data but I don't
think yeah I just I just don't fully agree with that assessment um but I I am
happy to happy to reach out uh to DHR and ask
what they have that's no
problem and perhaps I mean just going in response to that commissioner D I mean we could also I think totally fair we
could also provide especially for new Commissioners a list of what data we do
have access to um is so that folks know you know they can consider the types of
things when doing their uh doing their evaluation um because I don't think that
is included at this point in the process so I'm happy to also add that here different uh data points that you could
use to evaluate on these criteria commissioner
Wong thank you for the robust discussion I think I learned a lot from your discussion about past practice and um
Suggestions by uh president Stone and also commissioner D um I have a clarifying questions uh president Stone
when you say EO complain do you mean equal employment opportunity that's correct okay and just to clarify because
I'm I'm super new to this commission so you mentioned that DHR can provide
information related to eeo complaint oh um yeah I just want to have
like more clarification on that totally no problem um they can provide the number of eeo complaints but they can't
provide the content because that's uh privileged gotcha that's useful to know
okay yeah sorry I should have clarified that no worries so only the number but not the contents due to confin um you
know privacy issue okay um and in relation to employee survey I do agree
that it would be great to have different source of information when we conduct evaluation so if if DHR has an existing
survey already conducted on a regular basis it would be useful for us to
consider those when we conduct evaluation and I think what commissioner D was talking about like retention data
or any sort of HR data that they already collected would be extremely useful so it's it doesn't harm to ask digr for
more information but that said I do agree with president ston to not um
summon or ask employees to um testify in close section just because
of just existing power dynamics it is could be scary um even though it's a
close section who knows people can find out and I don't want employees to feel
uncomfortable while doing that so Anonymous survey would actually help if
such thing exists um to prevents power dynamics or things that we don't want to see like retaliation at work so I think
that's kind of kind of just my feedback based on the discussion and I do have two questions um one is just a really
simple question so each commissioner will need to sub submit their individual evaluation form I was wondering will the
public be able to reveal our individual okay what about the final recap
evaluation no yeah that's a sorry continue off I'll respond yeah yes okay
just to confirm that the public would not be able to reveal the individual
evaluation form what about the final recap evaluation thank you for that question I
I uh should have said that from the beginning especially since you haven't gone through this process before um the
commission will hold because I only wrote the commission holds close session to review and agree on a f final
evaluation um none of that will be an open session
none of that will be publicly available all of that is done privately and in fact what will also likely
occur I I mean I don't want to speak for the full commission but I think this is how it worked last year if
I had to guess this is how we will want it to be that this year the director also won't see our
individual uh evaluations either we will agree to one evaluation that I propose I
deliver to him um and last year just to also speak to this since I I should have
clarified this so I I um appreciate the question last year I also um I gave him
a a written copy but then I also met with him in person privately and shared
the feedback and allowed him to ask any questions if he had any um but all of that is confidential so after we've
talked about the process everything is uh not in the open
so including the um director self evaluation would be confidential as
well yes okay thank you so much president Stone
I'm just wondering about the yeah like if it is subject to public information no I'm glad you asked I I should have
said that from the beo no worries I appreciate the clarification and also like coming up with a robust system to
evaluate um the directors in a way that is respectful but also you know make
sure that we're also functioning and then actually providing constructive feedback to the director um and I do
have a second question that I think you might already have addressed but I do want to talk about this so since since I've been on board for only three months
I'm not sure if I have enough information for um I reviewed the form already for example like effectively
uses and manages the Department's budgets and resources I'm sure you know director ARS did a wonderful job it's
just I do not have information um um to do and I can revie past meeting
recordings and minutes but it would be really hard I think for me to do a thow
Assessments in some aspect so yeah it would be great if there's any guidance
or additional information or data to look into and I would feel more comfortable commenting or else I might
just kind of just say I don't have enough information yeah yeah I think that's totally fair um
my my response to that and I think other folks should weigh in as well um is that
you don't have to do anything there this isn't like you know when you show up to the first meeting and we're voting on
something and you're like I don't know anything about this and you still have to vote um it's not actually that
scenario this time um you know if you want to write one sentence of from my
short time I observed X um I also I'll speak for myself in this I I don't think
you should have to go back and look through every single thing if you know that's a lot of a lot of work um and so
you know I think if there's an area that's of particular importance to you you know I I'm supportive but um I don't
overburden yourself would be my personal suggestion but that's that's just me yeah thank you for your thoughtful you
know comments and and feedback um I would take you up on it I think I will um write you a few feedback that from my
you know really brief observations and interaction um at one-on-one with director ARs and
provide constructive feedback but then might not be able to you know provide you know feedback on other as yeah thank
you commissioner thank you commissioner Wong commissioner
laosi yes I have a question about the timeline for the review I am going to be
traveling internationally and so just wanted to make sure that I'm clear that
you need our comments by the 28th or by
July 12th the 28th the 28th
okay should I would it be helpful if we go step by step
um no I'll just have to get them in early because I won't be here I won't be yeah I'm going to have to do it
immediately since I won't be here either okay I just want to make sure that I understand at that so you need them no
later than 28th what I would suggest is if you can get get the self- evaluation
earlier I mean if he finishes assignment early then distribute it early so that
those of us who are leaving town can work on it yeah sure I mean I also I
think we gave I gave him the same amount of time I believe that I gave I would
give us I think I gave two or three but if you recall from last year and commissioner Wong I
know you weren't here the director puts a tremendous amount of work into this um like he writes a very thorough report
self- evaluation I think last year was more than 10 pages um and so I want to
be fair to him also and I don't think any of us write 10 pages um so I just
wanted that's also I wanted to be fair to knowing that he cares deeply about doing that um but if you need a if you
need to Edge into my review you like let's let's talk about that I'm happy
to um but basically the the process is you know giving everyone you know he
gives it on the 13th yeah and then I would just immediately send it to all of
you on the 13th that's fine and then on the 28th you send to me and then between
the 28th and the 12th I am evaluating everyone's and putting together that
recap which will take me a lot of honestly a long time I'm sure it will
so I wanted to leave myself well you're going to get our feedback early because we're going to be gone okay great
looking forward to that um okay and and like don't overburden I mean I think I
think yeah we can hopefully yeah uh so if you need a couple extra
day just let me know ahead of time so that I don't am not bothered I don't want to like have to message anyone
saying where's your thing um right no I'll get in early I am going to to be
out of the country from June 22nd through July um 9th so I am not going to
be available yeah I'm leaving even earlier so I'll be doing it that weekend get I'll get it in early but thank you I
just want to clarify that because it wasn't clear and then I had another question um and DCA this might be
something in your purview I'm not sure um the 360 evaluation if that were to be done
are there any legal implications for doing
a 360 review which is essentially um a review how many people and nonprofits
I'm reviewed in my position in that manner and look at Anonymous feedback and talk to my head
of school about it so it is a common way to get information um and feedback from people
you supervise or just the community at large that you function in is that
something that is not common in the city and county or are there any legal implications because often people are
with bargaining bargaining units what what is that well I'm not a labor lawyer let me
just say that from the outset I don't um I'm not aware my office is not do 360
reviews but it is something that's under consideration so I'm not I don't think there's a legal issue with doing I am
not aware of um I've never received an anonymous survey for my department the
only surveys that I've seen that are similar ilar to that are related to the racial Equity implementation that we've
done in the past couple years across the city so it's possible the department has done that kind of survey and he may have
even reported on that here I'm not sure but I'm not aware of other departments doing sort of like a general employee
satisfaction survey or review the department head survey so I'm just it
may exist but I'm not aware of it okay thank you that's probably why when I
when commissioner jonic and spoke with DHR basically the best they could offer
was eeo complaint numbers um but I will ask I'll ask what they have access to
right essentially it's not a common practice of the city and county I can't speak to that but I will I
you so um okay but no I'm just kidding yeah it's it's just really common it's
very common it's very common in the private sector it's pretty normal I mean I've never had that in any organization
I've ever worked in and worked in have you been a director yes okay that's
interesting yeah it's it's very common in the private sector I also worked in the private sector I'm just saying it's
not just because it happens doesn't mean that it happens here so I think it's fine if they have it they have it if
they don't they don't I'll do what I can as I said um and I will ask and if we
just get EO numbers or no numbers from them that's what we get but I'll ask
yeah and then they should have like turnover and retention numbers that that should be basic stuff they
capture anyone
else okay so just to quickly make sure everyone's on the same page after this
meeting I'll share the form and the process with director Ernst immediately
the next day um ask him to complete the self- evaluation form give him the June 13th deadline as
a reminder that is after our June meeting our June 5th meeting we will not
be agendize this so just a quick reminder of that um when I get it from
the director I will immediately share it with all of you you will have until June 28th to review submit submit as Hefty or
as not Hefty as appropriate um and then
I will put together a recap evaluation that I will share to the full
commission which is basically a proposal of combined comments and include share
that plus all of the uh individual commissioner evaluations so that in the
packet so that folks have that for ahead of the July 17th regular
meeting once we've had the conversation and agreed in hopefully in that one meeting I will then share it with the
director thereafter do I have General consensus
that with that approach okay I'm really really hopeful
the goal in my mind is one closed session meeting okay that is the goal if we can
achieve that then I feel like we're rocking and rolling um
great oh and in the interum I will also reach out to DHR
great let's move to public
comment there are no
great let's that closes agenda item number six let's move to agenda item number seven agenda items for future
meetings discussion and possible action regarding items for future agendas so
just a reminder our next meeting is June 5th in room
416 I think um I think we sometimes like that
room better yeah um any asks I think it will be probably
a pretty light agenda given that we'll have just met uh pretty much just
meeting minutes the director's report but anything
else nothing need agend let's move to public
comment no hands are raised thank you secretary Davis okay
the time is now 7:26 p.m. and the me meeting is
adjourned told you be a quick one thank you commissioner bernh house
by are you considering you said
that Ric
English (auto-generated)
AllFor youRecently uploaded
erfect welcome everyone to the May 15 2024 regular meeting of the
San Francisco elections commission I'm the president Robin Stone The Time Is Now 6:02 pm and I call the meeting to
order before we proceed further I would like to ask commission secretary Marissa Davis to briefly explain some procedures
for participating in today's
meeting oh thank you president
Stone the minutes of this meeting will reflect that this meeting is being held in person at City Hall Room 408 one doct
Carlton B goodlet Place San Francisco California 94102 and remotely via WebEx
as authorized by the elections commission's February 15 2023 vote
members of the public May attend the meeting to observe and provide public comment either at the physical meeting
location or remotely details and instructions for participating remotely
are listed on the commission's website and on today's meeting agenda public
comment will be available on each item on this agenda each member of the public will be allowed three minutes to speak
six minutes if you are on the line with an interpreter when providing public comment you are encouraged to state your
name clearly and once your three minutes have expired staff will thank you and you will be
muted please direct your comments to the entire commission and not to a specific
commissioner when joining by phone you will hear a beep when you are connected to the meeting you will be automatically
muted and in listening mode only to make a public comment dial Star
three to raise your hand when your item of Interest comes up you will be added to the public comment line you will hear
you have raised your hand to ask a question please wait until the host calls on you the line will be silent as
you wait your turn to speak if at any time you change your mind and wish to withdraw yourself from public comment
line press star three again you will hear the system say you have lowered your hand when joining by WebEx or a web
browser make sure participant side panel is showing at the bottom of the list of
attendees is a small button or icon that looks like a hand press the hand icon to raise your hand
you will be unmuted when it is time for you to comment when you are done with your comment click the hand icon again
to lower your hand in addition to participating in real time interested
persons are encouraged to participate in this meeting by submitting public comment in writing by 12: p.m noon on
the day of the meeting to elections. commmission sfgov.org it will be shared with the
commission after this meeting has concluded and will be included as part of the official meeting file thank you
president Stone thank you secretary Davis uh will you please proceed with
item one commission roll call President Stone presid vice president Parker she
has an excused absence commissioner bernh holes here commissioner D here commissioner
loli here Commission Wong here president stone with the members president
accounted for you have a quorum great thank you the San Francisco elections
commission acknowledges that we are on the unseated ancestral homeland of the rayu shalone who are the original
inhabitants of the San Francisco Peninsula as the indigenous stewards of this land and in accordance with their
Traditions the remit to shalone have never seeded lost nor forgotten their responsibilities as caretakers of this
place as well as for All Peoples who reside in their traditional territory as guests we recognize that we benefit from
living and working on their traditional Homeland we wish to pay our respects by acknowledging the ancestors and relatives of the rsh community and
affirming their Sovereign rights as First Peoples closes agenda item number one we'll move to agenda item number two
general public comment public comment on any issue within the election commission's General jurisdiction that
is not covered by another item on this agenda welcome
pH one second let me get your time going here
nobody it's too
loud okay you're good to go yes so tifi is my name artist name I
wasn't aware of this commission actually I just found out tonight which is surprisingly empty nobody cares it seems
never mind let's go straight to the point I wrot it down generally I don't write anything it comes from
automatically the words come out of my mouth okay but let's do it so basically
because of the expensive consequences of the pandemic of an
intelligence one of these consequence is to have exacerbated the trust in government
officials and the system by which they are supposed to be soundly elected so
the future of San Francisco SF which is not science fiction s Francisco
incidence is a totally new system that's going to be by drawing basically you select randomly a
certain number of locals who are going to decide who can
run or not for a position after any candidate has demonstrated enough
responsibility and critical thinking to be part of the draw this
limit enormously the possibility of Corruptions because in that case the
first mandate initial mandate the length is reduced okay
now we need to pay attention meanwhile how basically unintelligence here is
going to self- destroy it's automatic so the system
today but with More Than Just a Little Help From My
Friend the SKU of San
Francisco from me to you all
have a good night thank
Youk you anyone
online thank you secretary Davis that closes agenda item number two we'll now move to agenda item number three
approval of previous meeting minutes discussion and possible action and previous elections commission meeting minutes I'll open
the conversation for
Commissioners commissioner d uh yes I um had a couple of um minor
typo Corrections which I uh sent over to uh secretary Davis and and to president
Stone um I also feel like we've kind of gone from kind of gross detail to almost
no detail and I think it's uh useful to um provide um some detail when the
discussion uh especially when it um includes suggestions or proposal that
kind of show what the Commissioners are engaging in so for example for the uh
April minutes um you know commissioner Wong had made a
comment about adding Chinese and Filipino media for the Outreach for
non-citizen voting I thought that was kind of important to note um you know I had suggested targeting schools with um
underrepresented populations for the high school ambassador program um so anyway I uh made a couple
of suggestions like that uh and then for item number
six um I just thought it would be good to show that we took public comment before
we actually voted so just flipping the order a little
bit and then for item number seven we had a fairly extensive conversation on
the issue of um trans transliteration of candidates names into Chinese characters
and it just wasn't clear where we came out on it so just adding a sentence indicating that we basically concurred
with the Department's recommendations to modify the current policy just so it's clear kind of what the conclusion of our
discussion was and
for for the March
one uh go for my Note since seems to have signed me out
um uh same couple of typos um for item number
four uh commissioner Wong had mentioned the importance of collaborating with cbos to
ensure uh that great content and the mythbuster Mondays was also available to
uh people who don't speak English um in item number five um uh
again uh there was a pretty extensive discussion about how we could um take
advantage uh and communicate that it's not just about election night in fact president Stone had mentioned that it's
really like election week and then I had suggested it's actually election month and maybe to kick it off with the start
of early voting um and then commissioner Wong had again made a comment about the
importance of targeting ethnic media and uh making sure that the
FAQs that are so have a lot of information are also available in multiple languages and then finally for item
number six we had also agendized we had talked about agendize the racial Equity progress report so just a few additional
details that I have provided in uh with track changes to commission secretary
Davis thank you commissioner d I'll I'll touch on the one comment you
made just about uh going from too much to too little um since we've talked
about this multiple times and for our new commissioner just to share a little bit
about the previous discussion the minutes are not supposed to be a transcription of the
conversation uh we offer multiple ways for folks to review what the commission
discussed it is really just a formal record of what was
agendized very Loosely uh like a loose like a general statement about
that and then any action that was taken the more detail that is required is around public
comment um and so I have been in the operation of what
we had discussed at the beginning of the year um sorry I'm like leaning heavily
forward um at the beginning of the year and last year we've had multiple
conversations I don't believe that it's necessary to include all of what you just shared that's my perspective um
because we do have we follow the rules of what we have to include and then we also have the video recording and the
video recording also is available in multiple locations and in the uh
description of the video recording we also put timestamps so folks can watch
and find the individual discussions so they could see that
um that said you know I don't want to get in the way of what
you want to include um and so if you want to include those things I'm not I
I'm not going to say no but I I'm not I don't personally think it's necessary um
the only one part that I I don't feel that I want to or that I would like
uh uh oppose is a very charged word I just would not agree about is the part
about the consensus of the Department's policy I don't think that we had a
general like we didn't have that takeaway of like we all agree it's this
I think we one thing that maybe is an alternative to that is like we agreed not to continue the discussion or that
no I think the fact that no action was taken kind of speaks for itself um but I wouldn't feel
comfortable suggesting that we had some sort of like consensus that's the only
part of the contents of what you said that I personally don't agree
with just want to give yes commissioner
D yeah I I I um appreciate the efforts to kind of you know slim down the
minutes and I I and I think it's great that we're starting to put time stamps in and bookmarks I think that's all
really helpful for the public um I do think that you know kind of providing a
gist of the discussion which in most cases I think was done there were some good summaries of kind of what was
discussed um and uh that I could called out a few things because you know uh I
think it's help ful for someone who doesn't want to go back and and pour through two hours of video to you know
just see kind of what the commissioner engaged on especially if there are kind of policy issues that are consistent
with um what you know the commission is been advocating in terms of greater
access Etc so I I think that's helpful and I think it adds one or two sentences
so that's why I call those out in particular um and I'm totally fine with switching it to you know no further
action was taken it's just felt like it just felt like it wasn't clear what happened at the end so adding something
like that would be fine cool so just to um recap I want to make sure we're on
the same page so your suggestions we can accept those um with the exception of
the one agreed upon tweak and then going forward if there's content that you want
to add unless there's a disagreement about the actual like content of it I think
it's you should definitely feel that you can is that a fair is that
fair completely I just think in the interest of transparency just to make it easy on the public fair
enough anyone
else thank you commissioner D for your efforts um and
always watchful ey over the minutes I appreciate it um let's move to and I mean that
genuinely um let's move to public
comment oh sorry before we move to public comment do we have General consensus of everyone else to do what we
just discussed just a general head nod would be great okay cool just want to make sure it's not just commissioner die
in myself making the decision for everyone okay let's move to public comment
okay let's move to agenda item number four director's report discussion and possible action regarding the May 2024
director's report I will hand it over to director erns thank you president Stone so uh as you can see from the report
there's start things are starting to kick uh kick into action in the department for the November election I
think the one of the main points to reiterate from the report is that Friday is the beginning of the nomination
period for candidates to file for mayor and board supervisor contests um and I think really from
there I can take any questions and and clarify anything that's in the report but so want to make sure that people realize that Friday is the the beginning
of the following uh period for mayor and voter supervisors thank you director ARS open
it up for
yes commissioner Wong thank you pres president Stone um
yeah so I just I want to highlight two parts one on the non-citizen voting web
page as well as um the Monday's hearing on AI in elections so I'm going to start
with the easier one the non-citizen voting reformatted web page and I had a
chance to take a look of the web page it looks fantastic and I really appreciate director ARS of incorporating the
feedback that we discussed from our last meeting ESP especially useful to inform non-citizen folder that they might
answer no to the question related to um registrating for and participating in
elections on their naturalization application I think that would really reassure noncitizen voters um to proceed
with their right to register and vote in Schoolboard election so that I really appreciate and I also notice that you
provide information related to requesting for vacation letter after
each election that's something that you know we talked about last time and then I really appreciate director AR's um you
know effort in incorporating those um discussion um and I'm really excited to
see that there's an upcoming language accessibility advisory committee meeting coming up um to discuss um non-citizen
voting Outreach at foot with grassroot organization and do you have any idea when the next
advisory committee meeting will be held so we haven't set the date yet it'll be in June prob in June okay good to know
um and I am interested in attending um the meeting to listen and without making
any comments um and I just want to check with DC Russell um from my understanding
um Commissioners can attend the meeting to listen and without making any comments eson as it doesn't exceed the
Quorum is that a correct understanding yeah there's no problem there's no issue with you attending the meeting and
listening as long as there's not a quorum of members there gotcha should gotcha um since I think we need to co
coordinate among ourselves so we don't exceed the Quorum I think I would suggest adding this item for the future
agenda for the next meeting um yeah because I'm I'm still pretty new I just
don't know if is something that we can discuss right now I think it should be discussed after is it is agenda next
meeting kind of clarification what are you asking to have agenda um to talk
about my my potential attendance to the language accessibility I don't know if I
need permission or okay I don't uh so I think we can talk about it
right now okay okay I don't think okay I mean I think folks can weigh in I I
happy to add thoughts but I don't think we need a formal agenda item okay gotcha
um yeah I would love to attend um the language accessibility advisory
committee meeting and then just would love to hear all your feedback and if anyone else also is interested in
attending thank you uh commissioner I point of clarification as well for the director is that meeting in a public
forum yes yeah be people attend the meeting remotely so it's not a it's not
an inperson meeting so anyone could anyone can watch it
right um and is it recorded it is okay I I don't see any reason why not I
think personally um I'll speak for myself uh I'm always wary of when and
I've not always but I've learned to try and I be cautious of for my own self
this isn't me telling you what to do but with the departments committees um knowing that my presence can be
potentially intimidating um as you know the commission um for example when I go
to the department I almost 100% of the time tell the director that I'm I'm
coming so that I'm not a surprise hey you know um so that's that's more advice
of just um something to think about but knowing that it is a public
forum uh that anyone can listen to I don't see I I don't I personally don't have any
concerns I think yeah that's just
advice you you can continue with your yeah yeah if if other folks have want to
weigh in on that or immediately they can or we can just wait but you can continue your comments commissioner D do you have
a feedback on this particular issue no I'm delighted that you're planning to attend thank
you any other comments on this topic just I want to make sure go you can
finish your okay yeah perfect um all righty so I am going to attend um so you
know please keep me posted once the meeting date um is available and I do
have a second comment on the AI um in election special hearing at ruse
committee on Monday um I just want to check with DCA again if I can make
comments and ask questions related to the special hearing it is noted on the director's
report because it's part of the director's report that was included with the packet of materials on the agenda
you can you can ask him about that yes perfect just want to be very careful um
so I had a chance to actually reveal the hearing recording I find it really
educational informational it really high to recommend the public um and my fellow Commissioners to review the recording if
you haven't done it already it is really really helpful to hear from uh director Arns the ethics commission and also um
expert in this field and just to have like a quick Rec recap and also verifying if I understand the issue
correctly the dep department does not monitor or regulate uh campaign speech
though the department jurisdiction covers misinformation related to the operational side of the election such as
for registration V process for example I think one example is say someone you
know um maliciously talked about um misguiding people on the voting date um
or how they should register that's something that direct um the department can um cure and you know alert the
public about is this my is this um correct understanding of what the
department can do in relation to this information conceptually yes the the
specifics would matter but yeah I mean the department would monitors and potentially would respond to any speech
related to the operations of the election like you like you like you mentioned but every statement doesn't
necessarily mean that we're going to respond to it just it depends on the situation and the and the um and the
facts involved but yes we don't we don't monitor we have no authority to monitor or to regulate and we have no resources
to enforce any sort of political speech gotcha yeah that's I think is my
understanding from the hearing as well so I'm happy to and want to highlight that for the commission and also the public I think that's really important
to know what the jur jurisdiction is um and on the hearing you mentioned about
the department has develop protocols for identifying and reporting to sorry responding to false and and misleading
elections information um and you know subsequently activate a evaluation and
response plan um and you you know basically Give an example that um once
the department at identifying problems they can alert the public about that by releasing press conferences updating the
web page and also spreading the information to um nonprofits Partners um
and I do have a questions about just just wondering not that I'm imp that you you should do that uh I question that um
for the reporting and evaluation response could the public for example
report misleading information related to for the registration the operational side of things to the Department of
Elections according to this protocol yes okay and then so the public
can report to you correct and then you will you might I might not follow up with that depending on the content
correct okay that's good to know um and so on the hearing the ethics commission
also testified on their own protocol right um to Monitor and regulate some
aspect of this information and I think Lamy the disclaimer um and I was just
wondering if there's any ongoing conversation or collaboration with the ethics commissions on this particular
issue so we have uh exchanged uh we had
a conversation since the hearing yes gotcha because I remember the executive director was talking about um she want
to learn more about the department response plan and I think that would be really great to um perhaps you know when
things are more materialized you can share more with the commission or the public um you know the collaboration or
more detailed plan for dismantling AI related disinformation related to the
oper operational side of V voting I think the public will be benefited to learn more about what the department is
doing and then the coll collaboration with ethics commission if possible yeah I think it depends on what we there's so
many variables there's no there's no one set approach to this and also AI doesn't really create new concerns around the
election it creates perhaps new methods or it it amplifies the the ability
ability to generate yeah information that would be adverse to the Integrity of the election so AI itself has not
created new scenarios that we haven't dealt with before right so I don't know what You' want me to report to be honest
with you um so if you could clarify please um I guess so going into more
details on the hearing I heard from the ethics commission that they want to
educate the candidates and committee on AB 730 um and not
necessarily investigate anything related to that law it's more about educating the public on on this and potentially
also collaborating with um the department on you know perfect Tain the existing system so I'm just
wondering if there's more information on the existing system and you know if there's any plans or updates from the
ethics commission would be great too because you you you mentioned that you started conversation with ethics
commission just wondering if there's anything come out of it it would be great to share certainly yeah if that
makes sense certainly yeah I think that's more about following up with what the hearing was about and and just happy
to see more Co coordination among government agencies and commissions in this important issues and I I totally
agree with director ARS that AI generated issue is not new in terms of this information but because of AI the
ability to generate this information has increase substantially and that make um
you know elections officials like yourselves and the commission hard to you know dismantle those information and
make sure the public have correct information um prior to the election so I I think that's something that I I'm
just really interested in learning more about certainly I think that's it from my side thank
you commissioner D thank you president Stone um I was going to ask director ARS
about what you said about AI at your session so thank you commissioner Wong for that executive summary um so a
couple other um comments um thank you for the update and all the work you're doing with young
people in the city I I think it's fabulous and really interested in the student mock election um and
uh uh I'm wondering we'll we'll get an update on that or is that uh you know
you're providing the information to them to sign up for it will we have a chance to hear um about the results of this
student mock election well the secretary state's office conducts the mock election so we are providing information
to the schools to to join the Secretary of State effort in organizing and
conducting the election as far as results the the results of the election are posted and
so you can even go on sos' website now and see past election results uh from
the mock elections and the mock elections consist of State contests and
state measures uh certainly we can provide the information to the commission yeah uh so
since it's at state level I suspect there won't be any rank Choice voting then right correct okay um also I'm glad
to see uh making progress on the Go Green campaign that was good to see uh
and then I of course am extremely delighted that uh uh you're going to be
working on improving the elections results reporting so I'm very happy to
to see that uh and um I would be happy
to uh make myself available if there are any questions on some of the suggestions
that I put forth in the memo before and then I also wanted to offer
myself as a resource if there's anything on the education and rank Choice voting
um that I can you know help the department on I just happen to have a lot of experience with rank Choice
voting and and how to message it properly I've worked with Fair vote before so if I can be of service please
do not not hesitate to call surely okay thank you thank you thanks commissioner
D anyone
else okay I had a couple of um comments uh I was looking for
something just bear with me something that came up
requests find it um oh okay I remember what it is now
okay um thank you director Arns for a thorough report and all the great work
um especially being responsive to commission input as always it's really
awesome and also just seeing continued great registration numbers in alignment
with the commissions priorities thanks um can you speak a little bit about why
you were asked to present about AI at at
this special meeting to the extent that you're
aware of I mean I don't know the Genesis for me I
was contacted by supervisor Preston's office uh asking what the Department's
role would be in relation to deep fakes and and that was in I think December and
then from there there was that was told that a hearing was was imminent on AI
and that elections would be asked to report on it and then uh later and then
also ethics would be included ethics commission would be included and it wasn't until uh on Monday when the
hearing took place and that's that's my knowledge of our role or reason we were brought
into that hearing so perhaps it doesn't sound like you're saying this but one might wonder if it has to do with a
candidates like someone who's running for office might be concerned about deep thinks about his own
campaign um I and you don't have to answer that but I'm just curious if perhaps that had to do with it because
as it pertains to elections you know we shouldn't it really would be the ethics
commission that would deal with concerns about campaigns um as it pertains to
responding to operations of the department and actually administering the election
would you say you have a pretty robust process for responding to any kind of threat whether you know through the
city's mechanisms of the like through law enforcement FBI
um and the mayor so whether it's AI or someone physically intimidating someone
would you say it's similar a similar type of protocol that you would follow for something you saw with a deep fake
that you would with a physical threat as well would you say it's the same yes
and like we could we can't stop anything I mean this we can but we can certainly
put information out that that contradicts or uh refocuses people on
you know the actual uh process and
the but if if if the Department of Elections wanted to put out information and message to the public and to voters
that there is disinformation Mal information or or misinformation Mis dis
and Mal uh we would have a very solid response and support from a lot of
different agencies and we would draw in a tremendous amount of media attention
quickly uh ethnic media wouldn't be an issue uh we would be in multiple languages uh and it would happen nearly
instantaneously and that's been my experience if something doesn't go right in elections uh the people show up and
if we were putting something out there that there's something needs to be fixed people would show up so
I so and it to me it's it's not the concern isn't the action It's the
reaction to the issue and I I think and then it's then in relation to the reactions how much time has passed from
the action to the Rea because you don't because I don't want to have my my concern is that there's um too much time
where people reacting to bad information without the department being able to respond to it and put out good
information and that's to me where the damage would would because maybe someone would would vote and they and we've
counted that ballot and they voted on on bad information we we can't we can't fix that you know uh so we want to be able
to have a a response to the so the reactions are are are minimal to any bad bad information but we have the means
and we have the support in the city and also outside the city and also the community organizations would would be a
part of this as well um yeah I think we San Francisco especially could be would
be very responsive and I think it'd be a very thorough response to any sort of bad information that was circulating
about an election or elections process thank you for sharing that um I
appreciate that Insight I think it's important also just to not
over overemphasize fears ahead of November um
as well I think there are a lot of a lot of different Industries and
areas of concern and around you know the election in a national lens around the
role of AI and I think not just the election but lots of other um sectors
and industries and policy implications that go that I think there are a lot of
folks who don't work necessarily in AI who might be saying what are we doing about this what are we doing about this
right um and I don't think necessarily that's the purview of director like the
director of elections of San Francisco but I do think what's important is that we have a strong response protocol if
something if there is something that occurs whether it is from um uh AI or
physical intimidation or anything like that and I know to be sure um that that
is something we've continued to talk about and that the department is working on so the only other thing I would add about that is I think it just continues
the conversation about how important it is that relationships with the media and
the department remain strong um and what I mean by that is around
results reporting and um making sure that the media knows how to look for the correct
information on the website uh and understands the length of time it takes
to count ballots which is stuff we've really already been talking about so I
think it just kind of further amplifies that need um but it's great to know that
there is a response plan I think people way above all of our pay grades need to
be um approaching this issue uh congressionally in other ways um so I
think for the short term important that we just have a plan to respond to immediate threats one question unrelated to AI uh
that I wanted to ask was actually I had two questions one was just about the budget process uh and
the elections commission's desire to include a line item for digitization of
our records uh do you know if that will remain intact or get approved slash has
it been approved will it be approved can you share a little bit has it been cut good glad to hear that mayor's office is
listening um please keep it in um okay cool I had one question about the
training uh moving from uh in-person interviews sorry not
training the in-person interviews to and I want to just find where it where it is
I think it was on yes the department would continue to integrate equital practices hiring temp election workers
allow applicants to complete a short interview questionnaire in Li of traditional face tof face
um and we'll work with HR to vet the content of the questionnaire does that
also cut down like create more efficiencies for your team additionally so will require fewer hours and you know
do you feel that you'll still be able to uh like it can achieve the same goal
or outcome of having uh like a robust process that you
need if you even need a robust process like will it still serve the goal that you're trying
to get by going that path we're hopeful we actually did this partially for
people who for for folks who assisted with the um processing of the ballots
last election so now we're going to expand it out to other areas of our operations so we had we did test yeah so
so so yes it worked it worked fairly well uh for for the ballot processors
and we're hoping that we can expand that out and it'll continue to to work well so so I don't mean to be funny here but
um you might also consider how AI would impact that because uh folks may also be
using chat GPT so uh it might be worth
putting in the questionnaire into chat GPT to see what answers would come out so if folks
are putting in an answer that just was spewed out of chat gbt you can compare
against what answers you got full full circle there with AI um that was it
otherwise thanks thanks again for this report and I appreciate all the hard work excellent thank you commissioner
loli there we go that's better um thank you for the report and I just have a
question about the section um congratulations on submitting your racial Equity progress report I had a
question on the first part um about the outreach program to those um individuals
who are involved with the criminal justice system do you have a way of tracking the number of people that are
being impacted by this or
measuring we can we can measure the like one measurement is the number of people that we engage with uh during our
sessions and I think we do that uh but once once we're no longer on
site it'd be hard for us to really track we don't potentially we we could track
registration if they use the hard copy registration form um because when we go when we have
Outreach we we generally categorize a certain uh number of registration cards
for an event or to to a group so potentially we could be tracking that as well um but as far as we don't we don't
track them as if we have not tracked them if they're voting or uh beyond the registration status really
or just just are engaging and that would that would be anonymous but so so the the engagement the point of Engagement
then potentially at registration in the past we we have we have measured those sorts of instances
is is there a way to give us a sense of how many people as a result of this
program and Outreach have registered who were previously not registered and potentially be in a future report for
the the for the jails yes uh I think pre-registration for those in the in
juvenile probably I'm sure um but in the jails yeah and that's probably one of my
previous director's reports too I don't remember okay if we put the number in there but I can we can I can provide
that the next next month okay so yeah thank you I think also point of uh
clarification I think you also include it you include it not from a registration perspective but in terms of
participation in the election um in your postelection report uh of the um folks
who participated in jail voting but not registration so that is a data point that we get okay through that um but I
imagine prisoner Legal Services probably has like a very well I know you guys work together on that anyways oh yeah
commissioner see um just just clarification I'm more interested in
registration um as a result of the Outreach as opposed to
participation yeah okay thank you I was responding to the director saying he
thought he included it in a previous report and I was saying I think that it's actually the number that he's singing about is the one of the post
election review yeah but could be wrong always anyone
else okay let's move to public comment
no hands are raised thank you thank you secretary Davis and um thank you
director ARS uh let's move to that closes agenda item four let's move to agenda item
number five Commissioners reports discussion and possible action on commissioner reports for topics not covered by another item on this agenda
meetings with public officials oversight and observation activities longrange planning for commission activities in areas of study proposed legislation
which affects elections and
others all right well I'll just share one quick um item in the vein of digitization of Records uh secretary and
Davis and I have been talking over the last couple weeks about digitization of
Records pending that uh the budget approval um and so I've asked that we
start kind of throwing things away in the file cabinet that are not necessary
and starting to catalog and organize those records um and then should we get the funds to do it we'll be able to good
to go um we'll be able to scan and upload onto onto the website and get
that organized so I have a feeling that once we do get the budget this will be a
probably at least a year process um not just because of the organization of
Records or even the actual like the digitization of them but also more over
getting them on the website and organizing them on the website is a task uh and so I just want to set everyone's
expectations that that not only will take a long time but it also will likely
not be under me as president or I I would assume that folks wouldn't ask me
to do a third year as president so someone else will um have to oversee
that that project um in once that comes around so uh just wanted to get everyone
heads up hopefully we get that um that funding and I think it'll be really important for continuity that we get it
digitized yeah um anyone
else okay let's move to public
comment No Hands raised thank you secretary Davis that
closes agenda item number five uh now we'll move to agenda item number six discussion and possible action
concerning commission's process for performance review of the director of Elections and commission secretary so
I'll just set the table a little bit um as the ever astute commissioner D
pointed out there are no attachments for the secretary's evaluation that's a there's a specific rationale for that
because I was going back and forth about how to approach this um so a little bit of background um
uh former commissioner jonic had in his very lengthy um proposals for the
evaluation process um which I actually I used the bones of in in other ways um
for the director's process I just simplified it a lot um I took a lot of those recommendations and I one of the
things that I thought was really good for the secretary was that we should
align it we should actually detach it from the review of the director um reason being we should align
it with the year the term of the president so he proposed in his
documents that we conduct the evaluation for the secretary in December based on the president's term I agree with this
approach um last year we didn't conduct a review of the secretary and there was
a specific reason for that which is that secretary Davis joined in April um and
uh and um took you know I think the onboarding process she's also a
part-time employee I don't think it would have been Fair uh to conduct an annual performance review uh but so my
proposal of how I want to approach this is actually just to for me and secretary
Davis to uh have a midyear General conversation um and then
of just hey how's it going let's like look back and how digs going moving forward and then conduct a more formal
process at the end of the year um to align with the end of my term as
president and um we would probably kick that off around October November so what
it's not ultimately that far away uh if you do want to provide some thoughts uh
ahead of that I will take those into consideration in my conversation with secretary Davis but um this is the way I
think it it makes best sense um moving on to the director's uh the
director's evaluation so couple things about this so uh
commissioner jonic put together a very
uh strong process um but like I said I wanted to simplify it streamline it a
bit but I used kind of the bones of that and actually condensed it a little bit
um and one of the challenges in addition to that um it was
also an extremely long process for us last time we had I don't even know how
many meetings I don't even want to think about how many hours and so basically
what I did was I took the S the I took commissioner jonic and I think uh BC's
conversation about this streamlined it and then I actually condensed a very specific part about this before I get to
that um one of the biggest challenges we have that you may be wondering how it
fits into some of this is that we changed the June 5th the June meeting to June 5th which means we actually have a
much shorter Runway between this meeting and our next meeting and so that is the
reason why we're not having the full evaluation in June we would do it in July but the process is kind of extended
to provide enough time for everyone to weigh in the biggest difference of
commissioner jonic and my proposal which I actually hope will you all will find
agreeable mostly because I think it will shorten the length of the conversation
is that you all will provide me with your reviews of the director I will do I
will combine everyone's comments into what I believe to be a full recap of
everyone's um and try to take the main points and then share all of that back
with everyone so I will put together like a summary document it won't be everyone's comments every single comment
for every single section it'll be okay I think you know commissioner Loli and commissioner burnol had a similar
comment or you know I think this was addressed in a different part of the review or whatever I'll try and do my
best to honor people's input um and put together a summary document of what I
propos to be the final version I will also share everyone's individual reviews so you'll be able to see okay see how
she may be connected those dots Etc and that way we can review the final the summary document in
our discussion um and that way people can bring specific points that they want
to make sure maybe I I didn't capture in the summary document I just think it'll be a much more efficient process that
way this is like I said not included in commissioner jonic a original proposal
so this is a new uh step in the process that I I'm hopeful you all will agree
with um and then to that vein I I included additional time in my review of
everyone's evaluation um then perhaps everyone else gets I think I gave
everyone two weeks I think I get a little bit more than two weeks if I remember correctly um and the reason for
that is also that it's over the 4th of July I don't plan to work on the 4th of July uh so um those are the those are
the the kind of three considerations I wanted to raise
with that I will hand it over for you all to uh weigh
in yes commissioner D yes thanks for that and for
considering the timing of major holidays and our meetings um
I think one thing that um is missing that was in the proposed um process that
vek discussed last December was the
um um opportunity to request additional
information uh we had talked in the past about how um the commission doesn't have
a lot of visibility into uh um you know
staff interactions with director and yet we're you know expected to evaluate him
obviously that's an important part of his job um and so there were a list of
suggestions that that um uh was discussed by
boek uh we had talked last year about you know 360 reviews employee surveys
eeo complaints um um just objective information that we could consider U as
part of our evaluation rather than you know not having a whole lot to
say just because we don't have visibility over that so where would where would you think that would
fit um would you like me to respond to that yes if there is a
specific uh piece of information that you wanted
that you specifically would like to have us consider feel free to okay raise that
I I never felt fully comfortable in some of that um I think the eeo complaints I
think I was more open to I think our relationship with the
Department is really supposed to be through the director so that is why I didn't I I wasn't trying to
uh opine on those specific items I just didn't I wasn't or rather I wasn't
trying to prevent us from talking about these specific documents I just didn't
think that they were as yeah it wasn't a priority in putting
together the process yeah I mean so I I think I mean you're right that is the commission's uh interface with with the
Department is through the director yet we are the only you know
evaluation point for the director there's no separate DHR process um and he is a senior manager
that you know manages a you know a lot of employees a lot of of temporary employees and so it it would be hard to
provide a a comprehensive evaluation without you know considering that and
providing feedback and it was pointed out that you know in the past uh there
were guidelines that were adopted in 2016 which predates all of us um But it
includes it previously apparently uh the commission used to
invite um you know one or more employees to to to interview uh in closed session
so um that I'm sure is in you of a Anonymous employee survey or some
Anonymous you know kind of 360 process but what I would hate to do is um not
take advantage of the expertise that DHR does provide to you know provide
comprehensive employee reviews and including for managers um and if there are you know
tools or employee surveys that have been done you know I would I would be interested in seeing that because I feel
like you know that's that's where we kind of Punt because again we don't have a lot of visibility over that and yet it
is an important part of his job um just to respond to
that uh so a couple of questions and comments um so you said take advantage
of what DHR does provide are you aware of what DHR provides or you're just making a guess that that's what they
provid I'm guessing their professional HR organization that you know that manages a huge number of employees and
and managers and probably had standard processes and because of the unique
composition of the elections commission and our oversight responsibility for the director they basically are hands off
and you know that's fine um but it doesn't mean we shouldn't leverage their
expertise and whatever tools they use for other managers I see that tools they use for other because I don't know that
they do do 360 reviews like I can't confirm do but I have I have met with
DHR um and the extent to what they offer
is being able to tell us the number of like eeo complaints um for the department and I
will just speak person I I would be very surpris I'm very curious of
where of having a member of the department come and speak I know John
has been invited to come and speak I would not I'll just speak to everyone I would absolutely not be comfortable
with someone working for John coming and presenting to us I think that's
personally I find that inappropriate um and I also don't think we'd be able
to really get the answer like I don't know how objective that would really be actually um but I do think uh when I've
spoken with DHR in the past the because I've gone through this now multi times
of the evaluation and also when we talked about opening competitive selection process I also engaged with
DHR quite a bit and eeo complaints seem to be where at least commissioner jonic and
I landed and I think we talked about it as well uh the trouble is those things
are we can't really get much further than that because they're actually like
confidential um but we could I could if folks wanted to I could uh ask them if
there have been eeo complaints um I could I could reach out and ask well and
and you know I don't know if they do employee surveys that are you know
Broken Out by Department I mean you know I will just say that you
know we've kind of faced the same issue at the state level at the uh California citizens ring commission where there
were 14 of us who were supervising the executive director and this question came about how to do evaluations and you
know they sent their head of HR who gave a very professional presentation on our
responsibilities of managers and and a framework on how to evaluate and you
know they had processes and standard practices in place um and so I'm
assuming DHR you know at at at the city you know probably has equal level of
sophistication so I don't know I don't know if they do an annual employee survey um Citywide and maybe break it
down by Department to provide feedback for managers if nothing else but if that data exists I would want to see it and
leverage it um you know we did have that unique opportunity when we were looking
at uh you know opening up a a competitive search that a number of employees came and spoke to us in public
session and wrote us a letter and so we we had some you know feedback from
employees the last time around even if it was um kind of under under um you
know perhaps with inaccurate information that prompted that kind of response uh
but but yeah we had discussed that it's like how can we get some feedback from
employees I mean I tend to agree I mean I'm not sure how this was done in the past it apparently was a practice of the
commission uh to invite you know a couple employees just to provide feedback just you know in close session
I have no idea how they were selected I have no idea what the process was but um
that seems to me in lie of something that you know might be more objective
and standardized like an employee survey satisfaction survey I mean it's pretty normal in the private sector so I don't
know I can't claim to know what what the what the city does over here but I've got to imagine there's some kind of tool
for employee feedback I would be happy to go back and ask DHR
if they can send us data and that if that's you know in I I can incorporate
that into the uh you know the next two weeks just reaching out to them and saying hey do you have anything that's
readily available because I also would hate to have it slowed down the process as well um so I'll just reach out and
yeah ask them if they have anything and if they do I'll include it right in in
yeah I mean standard statistic too like retention I mean so there's eeo complaints there's retention turnover
you know there any any other kind of of information that we can use would be
helpful I mean I'm sure they do they must do some kind of survey for all the temporary pole workers that interact
with the Department as well I mean I got to imagine there's some some kind of feedback
mechanism so if if it if that's available you know it would be helpful to have that because otherwise we're
literally only reviewing him based on our interactions with the director at at
meetings you know any one-on-one meetings that we have and his own self-evaluation and that's not a lot of
data points it's all so I wouldn't agree with that I mean we also he provides
monthly reports sure he provides report he provides election very robust election plans and postelection
reviews um I just would you know I agree that there are maybe you don't have all
the data you want but I wouldn't say all that we get is I mean the director provides a lot of transparency into what
he does I don't disagree with that but I'm saying we don't get any information from other sources other than the
director that's all I'm saying well I I would also add the incident reports for
the election plans is data I mean I think there are many I just don't yeah I don't
necessarily agree that that's it's only through the director we get full incident reports John isn't the excuse
me director ARS isn't the one who's like providing data on how people
vote I I get what you're saying that you want a different audience of like you
want a different stakeholder to provide other like angles of data but I don't
think yeah I just I just don't fully agree with that assessment um but I I am
happy to happy to reach out uh to DHR and ask
what they have that's no
problem and perhaps I mean just going in response to that commissioner D I mean we could also I think totally fair we
could also provide especially for new Commissioners a list of what data we do
have access to um is so that folks know you know they can consider the types of
things when doing their uh doing their evaluation um because I don't think that
is included at this point in the process so I'm happy to also add that here different uh data points that you could
use to evaluate on these criteria commissioner
Wong thank you for the robust discussion I think I learned a lot from your discussion about past practice and um
Suggestions by uh president Stone and also commissioner D um I have a clarifying questions uh president Stone
when you say EO complain do you mean equal employment opportunity that's correct okay and just to clarify because
I'm I'm super new to this commission so you mentioned that DHR can provide
information related to eeo complaint oh um yeah I just want to have
like more clarification on that totally no problem um they can provide the number of eeo complaints but they can't
provide the content because that's uh privileged gotcha that's useful to know
okay yeah sorry I should have clarified that no worries so only the number but not the contents due to confin um you
know privacy issue okay um and in relation to employee survey I do agree
that it would be great to have different source of information when we conduct evaluation so if if DHR has an existing
survey already conducted on a regular basis it would be useful for us to
consider those when we conduct evaluation and I think what commissioner D was talking about like retention data
or any sort of HR data that they already collected would be extremely useful so it's it doesn't harm to ask digr for
more information but that said I do agree with president ston to not um
summon or ask employees to um testify in close section just because
of just existing power dynamics it is could be scary um even though it's a
close section who knows people can find out and I don't want employees to feel
uncomfortable while doing that so Anonymous survey would actually help if
such thing exists um to prevents power dynamics or things that we don't want to see like retaliation at work so I think
that's kind of kind of just my feedback based on the discussion and I do have two questions um one is just a really
simple question so each commissioner will need to sub submit their individual evaluation form I was wondering will the
public be able to reveal our individual okay what about the final recap
evaluation no yeah that's a sorry continue off I'll respond yeah yes okay
just to confirm that the public would not be able to reveal the individual
evaluation form what about the final recap evaluation thank you for that question I
I uh should have said that from the beginning especially since you haven't gone through this process before um the
commission will hold because I only wrote the commission holds close session to review and agree on a f final
evaluation um none of that will be an open session
none of that will be publicly available all of that is done privately and in fact what will also likely
occur I I mean I don't want to speak for the full commission but I think this is how it worked last year if
I had to guess this is how we will want it to be that this year the director also won't see our
individual uh evaluations either we will agree to one evaluation that I propose I
deliver to him um and last year just to also speak to this since I I should have
clarified this so I I um appreciate the question last year I also um I gave him
a a written copy but then I also met with him in person privately and shared
the feedback and allowed him to ask any questions if he had any um but all of that is confidential so after we've
talked about the process everything is uh not in the open
so including the um director self evaluation would be confidential as
well yes okay thank you so much president Stone
I'm just wondering about the yeah like if it is subject to public information no I'm glad you asked I I should have
said that from the beo no worries I appreciate the clarification and also like coming up with a robust system to
evaluate um the directors in a way that is respectful but also you know make
sure that we're also functioning and then actually providing constructive feedback to the director um and I do
have a second question that I think you might already have addressed but I do want to talk about this so since since I've been on board for only three months
I'm not sure if I have enough information for um I reviewed the form already for example like effectively
uses and manages the Department's budgets and resources I'm sure you know director ARS did a wonderful job it's
just I do not have information um um to do and I can revie past meeting
recordings and minutes but it would be really hard I think for me to do a thow
Assessments in some aspect so yeah it would be great if there's any guidance
or additional information or data to look into and I would feel more comfortable commenting or else I might
just kind of just say I don't have enough information yeah yeah I think that's totally fair um
my my response to that and I think other folks should weigh in as well um is that
you don't have to do anything there this isn't like you know when you show up to the first meeting and we're voting on
something and you're like I don't know anything about this and you still have to vote um it's not actually that
scenario this time um you know if you want to write one sentence of from my
short time I observed X um I also I'll speak for myself in this I I don't think
you should have to go back and look through every single thing if you know that's a lot of a lot of work um and so
you know I think if there's an area that's of particular importance to you you know I I'm supportive but um I don't
overburden yourself would be my personal suggestion but that's that's just me yeah thank you for your thoughtful you
know comments and and feedback um I would take you up on it I think I will um write you a few feedback that from my
you know really brief observations and interaction um at one-on-one with director ARs and
provide constructive feedback but then might not be able to you know provide you know feedback on other as yeah thank
you commissioner thank you commissioner Wong commissioner
laosi yes I have a question about the timeline for the review I am going to be
traveling internationally and so just wanted to make sure that I'm clear that
you need our comments by the 28th or by
July 12th the 28th the 28th
okay should I would it be helpful if we go step by step
um no I'll just have to get them in early because I won't be here I won't be yeah I'm going to have to do it
immediately since I won't be here either okay I just want to make sure that I understand at that so you need them no
later than 28th what I would suggest is if you can get get the self- evaluation
earlier I mean if he finishes assignment early then distribute it early so that
those of us who are leaving town can work on it yeah sure I mean I also I
think we gave I gave him the same amount of time I believe that I gave I would
give us I think I gave two or three but if you recall from last year and commissioner Wong I
know you weren't here the director puts a tremendous amount of work into this um like he writes a very thorough report
self- evaluation I think last year was more than 10 pages um and so I want to
be fair to him also and I don't think any of us write 10 pages um so I just
wanted that's also I wanted to be fair to knowing that he cares deeply about doing that um but if you need a if you
need to Edge into my review you like let's let's talk about that I'm happy
to um but basically the the process is you know giving everyone you know he
gives it on the 13th yeah and then I would just immediately send it to all of
you on the 13th that's fine and then on the 28th you send to me and then between
the 28th and the 12th I am evaluating everyone's and putting together that
recap which will take me a lot of honestly a long time I'm sure it will
so I wanted to leave myself well you're going to get our feedback early because we're going to be gone okay great
looking forward to that um okay and and like don't overburden I mean I think I
think yeah we can hopefully yeah uh so if you need a couple extra
day just let me know ahead of time so that I don't am not bothered I don't want to like have to message anyone
saying where's your thing um right no I'll get in early I am going to to be
out of the country from June 22nd through July um 9th so I am not going to
be available yeah I'm leaving even earlier so I'll be doing it that weekend get I'll get it in early but thank you I
just want to clarify that because it wasn't clear and then I had another question um and DCA this might be
something in your purview I'm not sure um the 360 evaluation if that were to be done
are there any legal implications for doing
a 360 review which is essentially um a review how many people and nonprofits
I'm reviewed in my position in that manner and look at Anonymous feedback and talk to my head
of school about it so it is a common way to get information um and feedback from people
you supervise or just the community at large that you function in is that
something that is not common in the city and county or are there any legal implications because often people are
with bargaining bargaining units what what is that well I'm not a labor lawyer let me
just say that from the outset I don't um I'm not aware my office is not do 360
reviews but it is something that's under consideration so I'm not I don't think there's a legal issue with doing I am
not aware of um I've never received an anonymous survey for my department the
only surveys that I've seen that are similar ilar to that are related to the racial Equity implementation that we've
done in the past couple years across the city so it's possible the department has done that kind of survey and he may have
even reported on that here I'm not sure but I'm not aware of other departments doing sort of like a general employee
satisfaction survey or review the department head survey so I'm just it
may exist but I'm not aware of it okay thank you that's probably why when I
when commissioner jonic and spoke with DHR basically the best they could offer
was eeo complaint numbers um but I will ask I'll ask what they have access to
right essentially it's not a common practice of the city and county I can't speak to that but I will I
you so um okay but no I'm just kidding yeah it's it's just really common it's
very common it's very common in the private sector it's pretty normal I mean I've never had that in any organization
I've ever worked in and worked in have you been a director yes okay that's
interesting yeah it's it's very common in the private sector I also worked in the private sector I'm just saying it's
not just because it happens doesn't mean that it happens here so I think it's fine if they have it they have it if
they don't they don't I'll do what I can as I said um and I will ask and if we
just get EO numbers or no numbers from them that's what we get but I'll ask
yeah and then they should have like turnover and retention numbers that that should be basic stuff they
capture anyone
else okay so just to quickly make sure everyone's on the same page after this
meeting I'll share the form and the process with director Ernst immediately
the next day um ask him to complete the self- evaluation form give him the June 13th deadline as
a reminder that is after our June meeting our June 5th meeting we will not
be agendize this so just a quick reminder of that um when I get it from
the director I will immediately share it with all of you you will have until June 28th to review submit submit as Hefty or
as not Hefty as appropriate um and then
I will put together a recap evaluation that I will share to the full
commission which is basically a proposal of combined comments and include share
that plus all of the uh individual commissioner evaluations so that in the
packet so that folks have that for ahead of the July 17th regular
meeting once we've had the conversation and agreed in hopefully in that one meeting I will then share it with the
director thereafter do I have General consensus
that with that approach okay I'm really really hopeful
the goal in my mind is one closed session meeting okay that is the goal if we can
achieve that then I feel like we're rocking and rolling um
great oh and in the interum I will also reach out to DHR
great let's move to public
comment there are no
great let's that closes agenda item number six let's move to agenda item number seven agenda items for future
meetings discussion and possible action regarding items for future agendas so
just a reminder our next meeting is June 5th in room
416 I think um I think we sometimes like that
room better yeah um any asks I think it will be probably
a pretty light agenda given that we'll have just met uh pretty much just
meeting minutes the director's report but anything
else nothing need agend let's move to public
comment no hands are raised thank you secretary Davis okay
the time is now 7:26 p.m. and the me meeting is
adjourned
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