excellent okay so we're going to start this meeting over um apologies to the public and uh the rest of the commission
for those technical difficulties um we are ready to begin welcome to the
January 17th 2024 regular meeting of the San Francisco elections commission I'm
the president Robin Stone The Time Is Now 6:12 p.m. 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 can you hear me yes the meetings uh the minutes of this
meeting will reflect that the meeting is being held in person at City Hall Room 408 one Dr Carlton B goodlet place in
San Francisco 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 of 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 once your three minutes
have expired the staff will thank you and you will be muted please address your comments to the entire commission
and not to a specific individual while providing public comment remotely please
ensure that you are in a quiet location when joining by phone you will hear a beep when you are connected to the
meeting you will be automatic ly 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 the public comment line press star three again and you will hear the system
say you have lowered your hand when joining by WebEx or web browser make
sure the participant side panel is showing by clicking on the participants icon 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 your time to comment when you are
done with your comment click the hand icon 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: 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 Will you
pre please proceed with item one commission roll call yes president pres Stone present vice president
jeronic here commissioner bernh holes here commissioner Dy here commissioner
Hayden Crowley here commissioner loli here commissioner Parker here president
stone with seven members present and accounted for you have a quorum excellent and commissioner D will you
recite the land acknowledgement for today's meeting yes yes the San Francisco
elections commission acknowledges that we are on the unseated ancestral homeland of the ramitos alone who are
the original inhabitants of the San Francisco Peninsula as the indigenous stewards of this land and in accordance
with their Traditions the ramitos alone 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 respect by acknowledging the ancestors
and relatives of the ritos community and affir affirming their Sovereign rights as First
Peoples thank you commissioner D that closes out agenda item number one um
agenda item before we move actually to agenda item number two I just wanted to announce a quick agenda just or change
in order so uh agenda item number four is the director's report and then agenda
item number five is commissioner's report and then agenda item number six is policies and priorities review and um
we're actually going to move agenda item number six between 4 and five um so that
the director can stay for that discussion and then um we will pick back
up with agenda item number five so just to rephrase that the item will go the
order of items will go agenda item number four agenda item number six then agenda item number five let's move to
agenda item number two 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 there are no hands
raised okay there are no hands raised great thank you um we will close
out agenda item number two and move to agenda item number three approval of previous meeting minutes discussion and
possible action on previous elections commission meeting minutes um so uh just
to kick this off quickly uh the we had had these items for the most part
agendized in December they were postponed due to the amount of material that we had to
get through last meeting um and then additionally I was asked to put together
just a little memo on uh our how on our meeting minutes in general um and those
just to quickly run through what is on that document it just explain pulls the
specific section of the sunshine ordinance um uh walking through what is
required for meeting minutes and then also pulls a highlevel explanation of
the Roberts rules uh the Roberts rules pertaining to meeting minutes there are
way more Roberts rules than what is included in here uh if folks recall from
a a year ago it's crazy that was already a year ago um we the I put together a
very abbreviated I think two sheeter on Robert's rules that the commission could
follow to uh manage and run operate our meetings and uh included in that
document was ALS Al a explanation of what is required um in meeting minutes
based on Robert rules Robert's Rules and our bylaws specifically state that we follow Robert's rules for our meeting
minutes um and then of course we are all obligated to comply with the San Francisco Sunshine ordinance so um that
is what you will find in the memo document and then uh the other items are
the September October November meeting minutes with commissioner D's revision
which we did not have the opportunity to get through um in the last meeting so I don't know if commissioner D you had
something specific you wanted to share to intro those edits um otherwise we can open it up to to
comment yeah just briefly I um uh my um edits
were often to fix typos uh and to improve
readability uh in some cases I try to make them more succinct um and also try to balance out
like in some cases I think particularly in the September meeting minutes there seem to be a lot of detail in some
things and no detail in others so so with my notes I try to balance that out
a little so that is um all I have to
say thank
you and if folks have forgotten since the new year you can just feel free to
raise your hand using the uh blue button on your on your
screen I can make a couple comments um if folks don't have any so I think where
I had concern because I had raised I had raised this um is that there isn't
really that much that we need to include in our meeting minutes and um I am I
have concerns with big substantive additions and
changes um that were that are more material or added specific context but
perhaps um added very specific context uh that I
felt perhaps were not necessary but maybe what one commissioner wanted
mentioned and so I had asked that the full commission review these to make sure they agreed with the changes um
before we approve and going forward part of the reason why I hoped that folks can
review the um the me Memo I put together
we can all just agree that we don't need to have these very lengthy edits I agree
that um you know if there are typos and things of that nature fine I also don't
think we need to over overload the commission secretary
with word changes that are just personal preference um and so that's my feeling
about it uh really we just need to make sure we comply with the sunshine ordinance and the specific asks of the
uh uh by of the um of Robert rules and I
don't think we need to make it more intense than that the other piece that I wanted to give feedback on is that I
think it's inappropriate for the commission to insert names of public commenters who did not provide their
names especially if a if they did not provide their last names um we're not
required to do that unless they offer it um we can it it specifically says um the
names and titles were appable um for close session but then the members of the public who spoke on each matter if
the speakers identified themselves um whether they supported or opposed and a
brief brief summary um of that agenda item but I don't think it's appropriate for us to add in our names just in case
we know them that is my personal preference um again open to hear other
people's feedback uh but I don't think that should be a practice of ours unless people offer their names those are my my
pieces yes commissioner Hayden
Crowley thank you president Stone uh I would agree with you and I also just
would add as just as a guideline um when I think when when I as I
understand how minutes should be prepared with Robert's Rule of orders according to Robert's Rule of Order and
also to just as a reminder we have a recording of every meeting so this is
just a sum the minutes are supposed to be a summary of our actions and and then also I believe that the bylaws or maybe
it's the sunshine ordinance that says that we have to identify the speakers and if and in in consistent with what
president Stone has said uh if they don't identify themselves I don't think that we should include their names we
should just share the information that they share but I would say as a rule
because they will typically give an opinion or whatever that um one good thing to do is to take any adjectives or
adverbs out of every um uh description
because I think that's a way that people then um can introduce bias and our goal
is to just present the facts straight up and it's up to any to if people want
more information they can simply refer to the recording and interpret it the way that they choose to because
everybody has a different perception of how things are uh presented and received so that
would be my recommendation but I also think that as the items come up if there
is no action taken so for example director ARS presents his report so director ARS
presents his report we have the document that shows what his report is if there's
no action taken then nothing more needs to be said because anybody can refer to
the recording if they want more information thank
you thank you commissioner Hayden Crowley
um uh secretary Davis would you mind actually closing the attendee box so I can see commissioner bernh hols thank
you so much just in case the commissioner raises their hand want to make sure I can
see commissioner commissioner
D yeah so um I don't have any problem with instituting that that um policy
moving forward um if someone doesn't introduce themselves that we don't identify them however in many cases they
did introduce themselves and it sometimes it's hard for um to catch the
name so uh or the correct spelling and if we happen to to have that information
I don't see why we shouldn't provide it I know that's something that uh that this commission has done in the past to
to try to get people's names correct um and then again I don't I don't have a
problem with moving forward I I think part of the challenge is that there's been a great
inconsistency uh in the minutes and what we capture and some minutes are very detailed and some you know are fairly
sparse and if we want to go with sparse moving forward I think that's fine uh although
as someone who has had to consult a lot of minutes lately um I think very few members of the public have the stamina
to to go through you know three-hour plus meetings uh recordings and so um
capturing a little bit of color is is not a terrible
idea thank you commissioner
d okay I will also respond this is President Stone there are multiple
instances commissioner D where you added people's names when it previously said Community member so I just want to be
very explicit like I think we all agree then I mean not we all agree the three
of us seem to be on the same page but if there's an area where a we couldn't
catch the name and they gave it that's one thing but if they didn't give their name I don't I personally would Advocate
against including it I think it's inappropriate um and I think members of
the public are entitled to that level of anonimity if they want it um and I hear
you about the inconsistency I think that's why I put together the memo is to give direction
um but I also think it's okay it doesn't need to be perfect uh and I you know I
think I I don't think we need to overdo it um I understand that you've had in
your experience recently in your review have needed to consult the minutes more
but um we do have you know we know what agenda items there were the secretary
does put up the recording there are many ways to access it without us having to
drag on link the minutes discussions which has happened ever since I've been on this commission so I think going
forward let's keep it brief Let's uh let's uh really stick to what we are
required to do and hopefully if we can have some general consensus that the
names of folks are only included if they've explicitly provided it provided
their names and of course edits to spelling are welcomed um are welcomed as
well uh would folks I been interested to hear other members of the commission
this is more just a general topic than it is specifically around the September
October November
minutes commissioner Parker um thank you I appreciate the
memo um and would agree with um generally
this discussion think you know I agree with the the comment about the members of the public um and only including
their names if they provide it and if there is some knowledge to get a correct spelling or um or you know the name and
it was UND misunderstood in the you know the instance itself that it's fine to correct so I agree with all of that um
and I appreciate with the memo kind of key words that I would say I took away is that what was done versus said is
just kind of reiterating what has um already been said and and would encourage us yeah moving forward to do
these things um I um I appreciate the last thing that
you just said president Stone I uh of us not trying to be too focused on perfect
um because I don't know that that's the best use of our time um accurate is um
probably the most important you know um and you know and when we're when
we're capturing what was done the topics um the the very high level you know if
there is a document that definitely covers um what was uh shared in that item great but very highlevel topics and
um and focusing on accuracy as opposed to perfect is um is where we should put our energy because we have a lot more
things to spend our time on in our meetings um so that's all I have thank
you commissioner Parker
okay um I otherwise think I my feedback
specifically is about going forward so otherwise if Commissioners don't have
concerns with the with what uh commissioner D has provided in feedback
previously My Hope Is that we can have General consensus about the process
going forward um but if anyone has concerns or um feedback about
commissioner D's feedback on those minutes from the last year or from last year's
minutes please raise those now otherwise I'm just going to ask for General consensus that we move to adopt the
drafted changes from commissioner D okay let's not drag it on much longer
okay so we are going to accept commissioner D minutes changes
uh for the September October November meetings um and going forward with our
uh minutes we will try and keep them brief and fairly consistent where
possible uh using folks's name if provided and spell check and you know
edits accuracy changes word uh grammar it spelling Etc are welcomed in feedback
changes yes vice president jonic yeah thank you president Stone I think also like another thing we
could do is um you know during public comment we could remind members of the public that if they would like their
name reflected in the minutes they could just identify themselves because some people might
forget that's all thank you thank you vice president jonic anyone have
any I think that personally I think that's a good idea happy to happy to to
ask uh secretary Davis to include that in the um in the
script okay so we don't need to vote on it but I just would love just a general nod everyone is agreement of the go
forward okay wonderful I'm glad we're getting these three off the plate and thank you commissioner D for your
extensive work on those appreciate it um let's move to public comment on agenda
item number three approval of previous meeting minutes
there are no hands
raised okay thank you secretary Davis that will close out agenda item
number three let's move to agenda item number four the January 2024 director's
report discussion and possible action regarding the month director's report and the many other items on his agenda
item oh yes commissioner Parker just just a quick um point of order and I may
have missed this because I knew you talked about the order of things were we supposed to do general public comment before the minutes we did and I just
wasn't paying it was brief no one was no one raised their hand thank you for keeping us
honest um yes director ARS thank you president
Stone so a couple of update well one update on my direct from my director's letter on item 1B we indicated that the
logic and accuracy would begin on January 17th however the the translator
that the Secretary of State's office uses was late in getting the final translations to the Secretary of State
who was then late getting the translations to the county so our testing will actually begin next Monday
on the 22nd we ised a press release today indicating uh that change
um then also just so the commission realizes ballots will be going out Friday and Saturday to overseas voters so we've we've already we already deep
into the election uh even though you haven't received your B Vo information pamphlet yet um and
then what so also at the end of the director's letter there's a list of items that we're providing the
Commissioners in relation to doing uh conducting Outreach for for the election so there's a list of items and I'll
leave this here you guys can can can grab it uh after the meeting I guess uh I don't know if you want to talk about
this now or how you want to go about the commission supporting the Outreach efforts for the Department uh but
president Stone had put forward previously uh how the Commissioners can support the department in conducting
Outreach for the March election and as far as Staffing any sort of events or
tabling or or things like that uh we we have sufficient Personnel for those activities but we think where the
Commissioners could be supportive of Outreach for the election is to actually
to use the materials which are also on our website there's links all these materials the digital copies on our
website too if you want to uh share those links with your friends but the idea is that the the Commissioners can
leverage their networks their friends and any events that they attend and and bring these Outreach materials or even
uh place them in your you know your your work areas or that you attend and that
would be probably a way to help us expand our reach more than you coming to something that we're already Staffing uh
so we have the materials here and they're also on our website and I'm glad to take any questions on that then also
attached to the director report is the election plan which uh the commission uh
would need to review and approve uh prior to the election and also there's a waiver that's attached to my director's
report and that waiver is is a is a is a release of the
prohibition of city employees assisting the department in conducting the election and that's part of the charter
amendment that created the elections commission uh there was there was language that prohibited city employees
from assisting the department in the past we've we've had Personnel from other departments help us with the
uploading of the results from the memory cartridges from memory device or memory cards from each polling place this
election we're going to do that work ourselves so we don't have a need for the extra Personnel from other
departments uh but so this is more of a general waiver of the prohibition and primarily we would appreciate any city
employees who uh are bilingual in Chinese Spanish and Filipino especially
uh to to volunteer as poll workers for election day uh so that's the purpose of this waiver then hopefully the
commission will approve the waiver and then it would be forwarded to the Board of Supervisors for for their final approval and then we could could
actually enlist city employees to to work as to volunteer as as pole workers
then also attached to it's in Incorporated in my director report and attached to the director report is
information on the uh Chinese character-based names uh that which was
a topic recently as we went with the nomination period and might be just in a
way better take questions on that but uh primarily I want to say that the department didn't change any any
requirements around the documentation or substantiation that uh potential candidates could submit to verify their
use of a character-based name uh but the board of the Board of Supervisors did pass a resolution unanimously requesting
that the department adopt a state law that incorporates two-year time frame
for candidates to be using a character based Chinese character based name uh
but the board can't change local law through through a res resolution they can only do through do so through
ordinance I don't know the board's approach I wasn't a part of any conversations on on the board uh
introducing And discussing and passing the the resolution but uh the department
considered the requests and although the local uh law the Mec section 401 does
not have a time frame attached to it the the state law has a time frame of two years we determin we could we could pass
a a a standard or we could Implement a standard of two years to to mirror the
state time frame which we implemented for this past election for this past
nomination period so the the document the the types of documents themselves
never changed there was no we're it's a very very liberal low threshold for
people to submit documentation in regards to their use of a character-based name uh so the only
thing that was different was the time frame where there's no time frame stated in local law there's now a two-year
standard a standard of of two years that we implemented then going forward uh I
will go to the board and have them formally uh adopt a two-year time frame in the local code as well um
so I think I'll just take questions from there so um uh director ER just in order
of operations I actually had one uh clarifying question the election plan we
need to approve prior to the March election correct so
recognizing I don't know if all the other Commissioners were able to get through the 70 pages of the election
plan yet um but would it be possible for us to
agendize that again at our next commission meeting as well or are you hoping to have the review and approval
today procedurally February is fine I mean the
election's continuing right so uh this is
basically a statement an overview of what we're doing to implement the election to conduct the election so
election will continue uh even if you wait until February to approve the plan thank you so what I was what I had in
mind was if folks were able to get through it um at length
um we I think let's try to get through it today if folks have continued
questions we can roll it into February but for the purposes of this
conversation let's start with the director's report questions pertaining to the director's report uh and and and
uh the specific items that he mentioned around Outreach and the wave and well
I'll come back to labor and the Chinese character um names and whatnot and then
let's move into the election review and if we need to we can always extend um
but we do need to take action on the waiver so I think let's start with our thoughts questions for the director
about the report then move to the waiver then move to the election plan if that
sounds good to everyone because I think it's a lot to tackle all at once is that does that work for you okay
um anything else director ARS before I hand it over to the thank you
okay yes vice president jonic uh thank you president Stone yeah thank you for
your report director um I uh just had one one question about
the Chinese character-based name I think we're on the waiver right now are we on the waiver we'll do the depart the
report questions first then we'll do the we'll take action on the waiver yeah
yeah but I I first wanted to mention that I I did see one of the the um
Department um advertisements on one of the bus the bus stops which was very
cool I saw it on 24th Street and it was very prominent you know was biking by so
it's um good work on that is that the first year you've done that design or the design yeah yeah changes every
election yeah and um so on the character base name I just wanted to get clarity on one um part of it because I know you
weren't here last month but so just to um just to kind of
summarize and then maybe you can tell me if I'm correct so the current ordinance it gives you a little bit of discretion
in what standards you want to apply for you know whether to adopt the names like
in which includes the time frame is that correct so the Mec has no time
frame yeah so it gives you discre on what time frame to adopt and then
um and then also related to that you're not required to have the board if you
decide on a certain time frame you're not required to have the board incorporate that into the law but it's
your preference right so that you don't yeah it's better to formalize the time frame in ordinance rather than have it
be a policy yeah okay yeah so I guess my one my one point of confusion was um the
last meeting the materials that were part of the packet said that you um it
said that you could change the time frame and then um but there was an
article in the San Francisco standard from like the week before saying that
you had already changed it and it was from December 4th and do
you know the article I'm talking about I don't yeah so there was an article on December 4th saying that some of the
candidates were complaining that you know that the 2-year requirement had been um implemented but then in the
materials to the commission it said that you were it didn't mention that you had already changed it
so were you um did you change it like in early December or in November or
no mid late December M okay after the fourth for sure so how did the
candidates know that it was two years or you hadn't told them at that point or it was it was more based on the information
that provided to us so if candidates didn't provide information to us that had that would reach back two years and
we contacted them okay so then it was later in the month that you decided to go forward with the two-year time frame
correct okay I got you that that clears up for me
thanks commissioner Hayden Crowley thank you president on
mute thank you president Stone um thank you director ARS for your comprehensive
report and your um awesome uh election plan um question you indicated in here
3A that you are continuing to hire an onboard about 200 temporary employees
and so is you indicated that I think that 70% of those are
returning of the 200 I think I I don't know if I read that in this report or the other one or the election plan I
don't think it's 70% I read it I read it in here I somewhere can not not in all instances
maybe in some areas but not in all instances like the ballot the people that will be doing the ballot distrib
the work with the ballots uh they're moving up the cards from the envelopes and that work they're
mostly they're going as we go as we move through the election cycle they're going to be mostly new Personnel oh okay yeah
so you're still hiring because I the I I just I am telling people that you're
hiring oh yeah and they they've applied and they've gotten the they've gotten an acknowledgement from DHR but they've
heard nothing after that it's been over a month that's why I asked yeah that's
yeah and that's I can't remember I think it was the election plan where we indicated that uh we're hiring in phases
so it's not just all at once so that we can actually accommodate the the the
workload better but also just the nature of the city's processes yes I understand
that we it's just and that's there's like the advertisement period you know
and then there's the all then even if we bring someone in for interview there's the the the onboarding pro so if someone
has applied and they've been and they've been acknowledged by DHR uh does it mean that we're not interested or may not
contact them it just a matter just depending where things are in the city's process processes and also where we are
with in our hiring cycle for specific positions depending on what they applied for okay okay I will let them know that
because I I am actually I told I told another person the other day to to apply
so I mean anybody that I know that's kind of you know I I because I figure you need good people we do yeah yeah and
if if if there's a job announcement still on DHR site then that position those positions are still EV still open
great okay thank you and thank you again for your uh comprehensive reporting well
thank you commissioner
Parker um thank you um as always um I have perhaps all of us kind of nerd out
on this stuff because that's why we're on this commission but reading reading your report I just was getting so
excited because it's I don't know elections are I like I like them a lot
um so I hope so I know I'm like I probably say that in this room everybody feels the same way um but you know
election day putting on the sticker after I vote and I just I just love it um so anyway um thank you so was fun to
read it um I let's see one thing um I had a question which I answered myself
and I'm going to just share for the Public's benefit um I had a question when I was reading is is where the
public could find the list of the 30 seven ballot drop boxes that would be open starting in a couple of weeks um
but again I answered my own question and so I just want to share with the public I actually did find it fairly easy to find um if you go to the Department's
website on the return your ballot page there's a map of dropboxes where you can find those if you want to drop your
ballot off before election day um and appreciate also the packets that you put
together and related to that um you know in your absence um last month when we had uh you know I appreciated the
suggestions of of how we could be involved which I realize this is part of that and then there was a one other item
in that short list and so I just want to um make sure that this is what you were speaking to earlier that said um that
Commissioners could help Place election door hangers on local residencies with no currently registered voters or election posters or utility on utility
infrastructure neighborhoods with below average historical turnout and so when you said we're pretty staffed and events
and things like that were you referring to that also or is this still an area you would appreciate commissioner help
on we would appreciate help that actually yeah so you want to show them your goodie the goodies you brought us I
don't think that's the same thing isn't no it need to be similar but yeah so if you could just provide more information
on like how we might be helpful on that particular item I would be interested in
hearing that um and then I think that's the only question I had the rest was
just enthusiasm and thanks I mean essentially we would those areas the map that that it's also these
these bags but uh that was in the the election plan indicates like the the
greenish yellowish areas of the of the city those are the areas that we want to be placing the hangers and then uh and
we're still organizing our Personnel ourselves to to do that work so if there's an area that you'd be interested
in you know you let me know so great and how much you can car
uh that's that's great I mean I like walking areas and doing that so happy to reach out all right that's great thank
you commissioner d uh director ARS um thank you we're
always in an awkward line of sight here um I wanted to thank you for coming up
with um a creative solution to the challenges that Chinese candidates were
having with their own names um as um we didn't have the chance to discuss it with you at the last meeting
but um uh I'm glad that you came up with a solution that was acceptable that that
the the policy that was trying to guard against cultural appropriation was actually causing a problem with people
who had the culture and so coming up with a solution that you know dealt with
the intent of the legislation um I think shows good judgment and I appreciate that uh
and also um as a fellow elections nerd I always appreciate your very detailed
elections plan um I as usual enjoyed the taglines
that your staff came up with um I also like the clever you know reuse of
Graphics of the Iota sticker that it's being used for you know other parts of
the campaign um and um I really like um the kind of evidence
based um tactics that you're working on to try to increase voter registration
which of course is the one of the elections commission's high priority so appreciated seeing that you know I vote
for my family I vote for my community I vote for the future I think that's fabulous and you know hits a lot of the
key demographics that are underrepresented so I just wanted to thank you for your work
than I'll jump in I guess we're going to just do it all the election plan and the
director's report um I had a couple of things so I just
wanted to Second commissioner D's comment about the solution for Chinese
names I know the department goes above and beyond to try
and make the process itself easier to not not be a roadblock um for candidates
uh trying to get on the ballot um and I know I I just wanted to give kudos to
the department for that um and if you know there are other issues that come up
with concerns I think it's shows that um there is obviously the commission if
folks have real you know if there's big issue um but I think it shows that the department resolved this in a way that
is actually Fair um and um also keeping the lens on how to support
how to keep how to support folks um so I just wanted to add some kudos to that um
and I actually wanted a point of clarification about commissioner perker your question you said it was separate
from the things that director Arns brought so I think I misunderstood what was your original question to
him um so in the his director's report for December right there were three ways
Commissioners could help and the the one it was number two of the three ways and
it was putting election door hangers on residences and when I looked at his list of what was included in this packet in
his report it didn't look like that's exactly oh what this it looked like a
different thing because the other cuz the number one thing in last month's report said to distribute election
packets containing registration forms br assures pole worker applications Etc so I took that as mostly meeting that need
and right did I read it correctly yeah that that first item is mostly that these packets are mostly the first item
in that list of three and the second item is a little distinct which we just discussed okay got it that was a very
detailed like you were much more detailed about that I just said oh great here are all the things um thank you for
clarifying um the uh I had a couple of questions
pertaining to specific areas of the director's report so what and you may
not know this off the top of your head director Arn what is the participation rate of overseas voters um because I
actually was surprised to see that the number of overseas like eligible is so high and I know that participation rate
of overseas voters at a national level is like tiny um for a variety of reasons
um so I'm curious what the participation of those folks is um in terms of
registration and also returning their their ballots even though they vote I
know electronically yes yeah most most of the time they still facts uh facts
wow yeah so imagine that there well the the the the potential registered uh
overseas voters I don't know that number I don't think anyone does uh as far as particip participation rates it depends
on the election some elections like the special elections we had in 2022 we had pretty much a low turnout
with the overseas military overseas voters but then when you get into the presidential cycle the the number gets
higher and I think for the November 2020 election for instance I think the overseas voter turnout was very similar
to what we had here in San Francisco like in 80 some percentiles really yeah
yeah yeah we're getting flooded with with faxes from overseas yeah I read
some report recently I would have to go back and look that the national the national level is like under 10% no no
no okay I must have had a different for a special election maybe but even that sounds low for San Francisco but for the
presidential cycle the primary will be well I don't know it's hard to say but the primary turnout likely will be lower
than the general election The General election will have a very very solid turnout I the number I had is in the
2022 so um take that it's different from a presidential cycle but the voting
rates for overseas citizens and domestic voters 3.4% of overseas voters return to
ballot in 2022 3.4 which is crazy um so anyways interesting um and good to hear
good to hear we have so much participation that's definitely rate
um one other call out I wanted to mention especially pertaining to pole
workers uh and now understanding a different perspective around kind of
where the numbers are at because it said a thousand has recruited over a thousand poll workers obviously needs to get to
2,000 but wanted to just put a plug into the commission as well that January 30th is National pole worker recruitment day
and so I think if there are things that you can PLL from the website around how
to apply to be a poll worker and share it in your own communities and social
channels networks just a little plug uh they're all available on on the website uh the P
worker application is on the website so just a little a little fact uh I also
think it's great to see the registration numbers in the director's report again really excited uh that that's being
included I'll talk a little bit more about that as it pertains to the election plan and then uh one question I had
about the grantees in the monthly reports are they also providing the
department feedback are they giving you are you I mean you have so much work on
the Department's level so you know there's so many things that you are managing I'm just curious if in the
monthly reports from the grantees they're going to be giving the department some data that can help you
do things going forward with those communities let's say we don't have the budget to do grantee funding and the
department has to do that are there things that we will be getting from those reports that perhaps could inform
the department in future Outreach well they have to quantify their work okay
so uh if that's what you mean but if you mean more like process or procedures or
or practices we do have a an after Grant meeting with the grantees so we we do
get their feedback uh from them and they you know whatever input they want to provide to us we certainly take it seriously awesome yeah I was more just
wondering learning about because they are specifically working in their own respective communities of there are
community-based insights that the department can use when engaging in those in work with th or Outreach with
those specific communities so I think you answered that that's great um and
then moving along we talked about all of those things I as it pertains to the
director's work I just wanted to say what an incredible election plan you put
together and on a very selfish note I was very happy to see some of these
things around voter the UN the eligible unregistered voters and the map and all
of the prioritization around that I just wanted to say a huge thank you to these
effort for these efforts I know it's a commission priority it's obviously been something I've been pushing on you for a
while that I I think you already are so committed to but seeing this renewed
push ahead of March is really amazing so thank you so much for that I also agree
want to Second uh commissioner D's comment about the messaging and the uh
and I think vice president Jordan made a comment about it as well around uh the
the messages about why people should vote I think those are awesome and agreed also very meaningful in a for
diverse communities which is great um I did have a couple of points I was able
to get through uh the full uh the full report I also wanted to say a couple
other pieces around efforts with specific communities that are vulnerable
so obviously we've talked about on this um on this commission folks who are
system impacted I also just talked about unregistered but uh eligible voters we
talked about but also the direct Outreach that is being done in single
room occupancy hotels shelters navigation centers community centers um
I and working specifically with food pantries and folks on the snap side of
things I think all of that is really really great and it shows a commitment
to really being in community and making people aware of their power to
participate in our election so I just really wanted to give a huge um a huge
shout out to you and the department for this um I also wanted to add a shout out
again more praise of the data fit and the dashboard that you are working on I
think giving members of the public access to these data sets and the data
set the data over time as well the historical trend is awesome it's
something I think we talked about a few months ago that I I believe IID mentioned I reached out to someone from
Mission local asking if they could include some of these um some of these
numbers in uh maps that they already use to talk about other issues in this the
city so that you know if folks aren't automatically thinking oh let me go check out what the Department of
Elections is are doing they're more likely to be checking out what their local newspaper is has available so um I
think that's that is something that as a commission can also um continue to
support now that I'm seeing all this amazing work to that end I did have one
question about the ad campaign in local U media and I was curious I know it says
print media but I'm curious if about some of the uh local newspapers and if
and how those were chosen um I saw the marina times the SF Weekly SF examiner
SF bayew Sunset Beacon I did not see Mission local um obviously I didn't see
the C SF Chronicle um but I was just curious I know some of these are more
neighborhood specific curious if you could talk a little bit about Mission local or other um news outlets that you
had engaged but otherwise I just wanted to say as a final just great work thank
you so much and um I think I'm excited to see the results of all of your hard
work on these efforts so on the on the ads so the newspapers are actual papers so the
neighbor their neighborhood hard copy paper but you're aing off yeah yeah so that's that's the reason you part of the
reason you see that list plus they reach certain populations uh we we don't advertise on
on every uh online newspaper uh certainly we can reach out
to Min local and see if what we also have to consider what they you know who they reach sure uh and maybe the who the
mission local uh any Outreach on a mission local if if it would meet an audience that is we were getting another
another Avenue we're not going to pay double for that potentially so yeah we we try to balance the the cash that we
have with who we can reach and then the methods and we do put more effort into uh non-traditional media because there's
a bit more cost there than we do the traditional media like even KS on that list if if you noticed so yeah I did
thank you I think just that being a a question answered for public knowledge
is just helpful okay uh there was one other comment that I did want to make Which is less a concern about March than
it is about November that I wanted to just kind of flag is around the timing of results reporting and I know we've
talked about this on the commission a it being a priority this year but B also just in years past
concerns around uh understanding in the public and in the media about results
reporting and uh making sure that folks actually
understand the the process of what gets counted when so for example the
department is going to report on you know and I'm looking at page 63 of 69
you know the the vote by mail ballots received before election day is on
Election night and then we move to the polling places but if more than 80% of
folks in San Francisco are voting by mail and let's say they all drop them off um drop them off
at not within the time frame to be included in that 8:45 p.m. cut off then
they won't be counted those won't be included in the results for another day or two days rather um and so making sure
the public is aware of that and doesn't get ahead of themselves not the public
the media maybe in calling results uh before the actual votes have been
counted so just more of a flag that we've seen we saw this happen in previous elections over the last couple
of years and something I think we should talk about as a body leading up to November less concerned about it
although may still be of concern in March I think definitely something in November we should pay attention
to and that that's all from me on the director's report and the election plan
plan um anyone else want to make comment about either of those items before we
move to the yes vice president jonic yeah I just wanted to mention one more thing about
the Chinese character-based name policy um we've been talking about
nerding out a lot but if if people want to nerd out more on the the the new
policy if you go to the um page for the the board resolution that was from
October and the memo that director ARS provided on the pack it's a three-page
memo but if you go to the resolution page for the board there's a a longer eight-page memo that the director um
sent to supervisor Chan that has a little bit more background it has a copy
of the forms that the Secretary of State recommends for state-based Statewide
candidates as well as the form that um local candidates fill out so it's a
little bit more um background is that correct direct okay okay so that's all
thanks thank
you there comments from
Commissioners okay unless folks have questions about
the waiver I move that we approve the directors waiver um
immediately does anyone have comments or or were you gonna say I was going to
Second it thank you commissioner
D okay let's move to public comment before we
take a vote on approving the director's waiver and just to clarify for the public we are voting to approve the
waiver that allows city employees to assist the Department of Elections with the March 20124 presidential primary
election there are no public
commenters I also want to make sure I didn't mislead the public that this is
not just on the waiver this is public comment on the director's report the uh
March 2024 election plan and the
waiver
okay so secretary Davis will you please call the roll call for vote on the
waiver president Stone yes vice president jonic yes commissioner burnol
yes commissioner dy I commissioner Hayden Crowley yes commissioner loli yes
commissioner Parker yes um president stone with all seven voting yes you have
your form excellent well thank you Commissioners thank you
director Arts the waiver has been approved and we will now move to as I
mentioned earlier agenda item number six 2023 2024 elections commission policies
and priorities review discussion and possible action on the election commission's current policies and priorities for the commission and
Department of Elections per the charter SE point of order did we want to approve
the elections plan um that's a good idea sure if you'd
like to so we did already close out agenda item number five but we excuse me
S four but um sure we can go back let's reopen agenda item number four
um would you like to make a motion I would like to move that we approve the
uh the uh director's plan for
2024 since we did not uh since we already took public comment I don't
think we need to take public comment again uh secretary Davis will you call
the roll call vote for the March 2024 election and thank you commissioner D I
appreciate that
president Stone yes vice president jonic yes commissioner burn
holes commissioner burol yes the we're taking a vote on the the
director's plan for March yes I vote yeah I didn't hear the first part the audio is going in and out but yes I vot
yes thank you commissioner dy I commissioner Hayden Crowley yes
commissioner loli yes commissioner Parker yes that's all seven uh yes for
that excellent so thank you commissioner D again and thank you director Arns uh
and for for putting that together very robust elections plan and also congrats
on not having to agendize that again next month um okay now we actually are closing agenda item number four and
moving to agenda item number six 2023 2024 elections commission policies and
priorities review I'm not going to restate the piece I already stated so
let's go straight into uh let's go straight into this topic uh I will I
believe first hand it over to um to vice president Jordon if you want to start on
since you have you've you authored two of the priorities okay sure um I guess I put
you on the spot there hope you don't mind yeah well I thought for this item
um it would make sense unless you had a different idea maybe you could just ask director
Arn um what if he's had a chance to think about the different policies and what his plans are for them and then
maybe we can respond with questions or do you sure I mean I as it pertains to
the go to registration policy priority I was going to give kind of my sense my uh
perception of where that stands uh less so than having the director do so but uh
if folks have different if folks have different um I also didn't ask the director to prepare
certain responses so if you would like to ask certain questions I think we can
do that I I don't have a specific Vision I just
had prepared my specific priority okay sure um should should I just do maybe
I'll just do want to alternate maybe I can do the rank Choice voting then okay yeah so
um yeah so the first policy listed in the agenda is the rank Trace voting results reporting
priority and um I know director erns we've talked about this in the past at
previous meetings and you had said that you weren't really going to work on it until after the March ction so I assume
I assume there's probably nothing more for you to say on this or or have you done any research or anything
or we well we indicated that we would use the program that you developed oh
you are going to okay great correct okay great so then
um yeah I think there isn't a whole lot more to add I mean I I guess I could mention two small things one one thing
is um I was doing some random um I was looking around at
other jurisdictions that use rank Choice voting and I saw that Salt Lake City who uses rank Choice voting um they also use
dominion and they they do something similar where they um they're able to
display the rank Trace voting results in their own custom way so they
were able to take the Dominion results and then reformat those so that's another example
and um and then I I could also just mention to the commission that I um I
was planning on adding the um the tool tips to the results page where if you
hover over certain terms like um you know exhausted ballots
or what's another one continuing ballots it would show the definition so that's
something that um you know the the department could benefit from too and um
but I think there's not much else to say on this unless other people have comments or
questions I yes commissioner Hayden
Crowley just a point of clarification are you are you mentioned the hovering over for the terms you're actually going
to implement that yes okay because that is great I'm always trying to think
remember what they mean and and I understand rank Choice voting so yeah imagine for the people who don't
yeah so I'll I'll I'll somehow communicate that to this body once I'm off the commission you know when when I
get around to it and I'll let the director know as well I had one point of clarification so
the D director AR you said that you are going to adopt it is that for March or for November no for November okay thank
you for clar verifying did any other Commissioners
have feedback on that item and director ER we can be in touch
if um once you get around to it if you have questions or if there's anything missing or anything so thank
you great thank you um I guess we can move to voter
registration so yeah as I said I didn't ask director ARS to put anything
together on this one mostly because I think the election plan and the director's report speaks for themselves
uh they if you look back on the commission's priorities uh and you look
at the second no the last page the it talks about potential tactics and I my
when in preparing for today's meeting I just did a a brief and review of what was in there
and refreshed my memory on what really we had talked about and where we stand
currently and I think that the department is actually
achieving is achieving all of these items uh not only um assessing the data
but also working to get the data in the first place um but I think the map and the targeted
Outreach and the community grants all speak to uh speak to this effort I also
think the multi the multi method approach multi- Channel and multi-method approach to getting folks to think about
registering to vote is speaks to all these other tactics that we had talked
about uh under as a as sub bullets to agenda to the tact first tactic of
assessing data and then the second piece the director immediately implemented which is incorporating data and
registration rates in the director's report and not only is it have those items been included in the director's
report they've also been uh updated on the um uh
the uh dashboard that the department has been updating and so we do have total
registrations on the director's report but then also had the drill Downs of the
uh uh districts on that dashboard what is the dashboard called I'm not the what
is it called eata sorry eata
edena sorry dat dat dat dat okay thank you um apparently I'm heart of hearing
today well most days actually um but I appreciate everyone saying it in unison
for me uh so we you can do that drill down and the director is including the
tactics some of the tactics employed as well in the director report so I feel we're really marching to toward that I
also think that the director has helped the Commission in thinking about how we can uh make progress on this policy
priority by bringing the materials today and then also answering commissioner Parker's specific question with
resources um as the Director already said that um you know well let me take a
step back it had been talked about in previous commission meetings that uh we
could join some of the voter registration drives or attend some of the events that the Department's already
doing but actually um as the Director said today and I just wanted to El re-elevated it that we don't actually
need to duplicate their efforts but rather expand to our own networks and our own communities and so uh I think we
should as a commission continue to talk about how we can do that whether it's through what commissioner Parker was saying of getting those door hangers and
using the map that the director provided to Target the specific communities that have low registration rates um and
eligible I think uh that's that's a good Next Step there are two other pieces of
that actually three other pieces of that I think I believe we've talked about before that I think we can uh continue
to talk about as a body and would like to continue talk about as a body is engaging our appointing authorities and
uh their communities and their departments about folks that they're working with to um help expand our
efforts there are other intergo like intergovernmental departments so the
I've engaged myself with members of the office of Civic engagement and immigrant Affairs who already do really amazing
work in communities um to engage them on all sorts of issues and support
resources that are from the city and so um I think that's another department or
other types of departments where we can just proactively make sure the folks who are out there in the communities have
these resources so I think knowing that we've already hit some of our our goals
that were in that uh in the priority document I'd like to see in future
conversations us talking about ways in which we as a body are individually uh
supporting these Outreach efforts around March but then again leading up to November and the last item of that which
is separate is I'd love to add a button on our website uh
to register to vote um you know just a link that says here's where to register
to vote and it can connect to uh the Department's uh page uh I also think we
could be providing a link to the uh dashboard on our website as well so
website updates on RN can be a little bit slower but these are all things that the commission I believe can continue to
to do and support I welcome folks comments feedback
concerns about all of these items quick comment so we can Pro
provide a route of where to go for the hangers
so commissioner Hayden Crowley thank you been doing the mic on and off all
evening just learning how to do it thank you president stone for your hard work on this initiative um I just wanted to
share some information that I got yesterday I'm part of a a sort of a mastermind group in public relations and
there was some information that was presented about the decline of trai traditional media and this individual who has been
studying it for years said I'm not even going to talk about about this as something that's happening it's happened
and they're they're really the and of course this is upsetting to me because I'm a big media person and I really love
traditional media but anyway I just accepting it and he then brought up these different studies that have been
done about where people are getting their news and according to the age group and I can't tell you off the top
of my head everything but one thing that struck that's uh jumped out at me is that first of a lot of people don't pay
attention to the news which is really concerning so we're trying to get information out about issues or or or or
just just letting people know that it's you know to vote and to care about candidates and they're not even paying
attention to the news we have a problem but here's the second thing is that most
38% and it's a growing number and this is going to be a controversial thing that I'm going to bring up get their
news from Tik Tock which of course it's controversial and we don't even know if Tik Tok will be in existence after the
next election uh the fellow that was giving the webinar indicated he thinks it might get sold but just something to
think about if 38% of the kids that are under the age of 25 are getting their
news from Tik Tock we may want to think about a way to talk about registering to
vote on Tik Tok there are departments in the city that put videos on Tik Tok
there are short videos they're fun and it's just it I mean social is one of the
one of the vehicles that you're looking at and I just you know you don't want to throw good money you know Away by
putting it into something that people aren't paying attention to and I think we have to whether we like it or not we
have to look at where what water cooler people are hanging out at and meet them there so that may be an opportunity in
the coming year um they even even the over 65s 1 to 3% of that group those are
the numbers that I that I remember are get their news from Tik Tock and then the another growing demographic is those
from 25 to 34 more of them are as far as the other social media platforms threads
and Facebook are responsible for a lot of this decline in interest in news
because they have intentionally uh adopted a new policy where they're not referring people to new organizations so
there's less of an emphasis on news Gathering and news information and of course if people are hanging out on
social media they're not going to be clicking on headlines on those platforms because they're no longer making them
available um amazingly X had only declined Five Points in terms of uh
people getting their news from there which I thought was interesting because it's I I'm not on there but I was on
Twitter so and and I do and I will say I miss it because for breaking news I think it's really valuable um and then I
I they did talk about some other platforms but I do want to share that information because it is something that
we have to pay attention to because if that's where people are getting their information then the elections
department needs to be there promoting voter registration and this group needs to think about that
too you do look disappointed I'm sorry no no I I was just the Boomer telling
telling the millennial no I I was just going to say thank you for keeping us all awake through the rest of the night
with our fears about the future of my world you and my kids been upset when I tell them this they no that can't be
true no you said nothing I don't already know I just try to suppress those fears
of our existential crises um commissioner D yeah I was just gonna add
on um to the comment it's it's actually a really frightening number it's much higher than that uh if you take it a
cross-section of how many people get their news from social media I was just thinking um you know the uh campaign you
did for going green uh which had that nice you know short video and then
you've got these you know this catchy messaging and this cute rhyming it it's
actually the stuff you have is I think with a little bit of work you could do a very quick tick Talk video and get that
out quickly get some of the creative folks to to work on that because like I said you've already got rhyming stuff
right just add a little dance and you're
there I'm not suggesting you do the dance but maybe some of maybe some of the
department prman Stone I think no I no no one wants to see
that I'm just commenting the Department already does a lot of great you know
kind of catchy you know short um messaging so it's actually a good medium
for you thank you commissioner D vice
president jonic yeah or if the department doesn't want to do it you could always host a contest other people
could you know do it so lots of
people
anyone else okay are folks open to us
continuing the oh yes commissioner Parker just gonna undo it I I was trying
to decide if I should um ask anything I was just thinking about um you know some of the ways that
some of the things you were suggesting president Stone about you know engaging our appointing authorities expanding our
efforts and things like that and um so it just made me think I know director
arst you've talked a lot about how you've worked with high schoolers and and things engaging them around um voter
registration um poll workking things like that and I'm realizing I'm not sure
have you also had any conversation with the school district in the past about um voter registration of families and
caregivers in the school district um has there has the Department ever asked them
to put out anything in like their their Wednesday packets and things like that we have in the past I don't we haven't
for this election and then more recently he's been around non-citizen voting yeah
yeah okay um that might be I mean that's such a such a large number of people in
one spot so it just made me think because my appointing authorities the school board is this something that I could help with you know is reaching and
having them put something in their um in their Wednesday envelope um kind of
packet that goes out to all the schools if you hadn't already done something that's something I could help with um so
it's a big group so anyway thank you for the
thinking thank you commissioner
Parker great um so if folks are open to it I think we'll just continue the I
might plan to just agendize this again uh not or whomever will agendize this
again so that we can keep talking about ways in which the commission can continue to support uh whether it's
through our appointing authorities or our networks taking materials from the Department to keep ourselves
accountable I think that would be good that is it on
my priority vice president jonic do you want to finish us out sure so move to
the third priority which is the open source voting priority and for this one I just thought
I would preface it with something that else that's relevant which is um you know from the director's report we see
that the budget is is going to be become a big issue this year and then in future
years and we've heard from Advocates that open- Source system could be as as
um save the department as much as 50% on its voting system contract each year and
if the department has a an annual budget of around $20 million and our current voting system
contract is um $2 million a year like a 50% savings would be 1 million which
which would be 5% of the Department's budget so if the mayor's asking departments
to um reduce their budget by you know 5% to 8% per year this could be a potential
way for the Department to meet that goal without affecting um voter services or
um Department staff so I think it's a really good thing to work towards
because it could be a huge um savings to the department which is um just going to
become more much harder to meet you know with each year that passes so um I there were a couple
things I wanted to mention about this topic in addition to that but um I
thought I would just give director Arns a chance to um share I know director RS did send me
an email uh towards the end of last month but I can let him mention that but
um in November I had asked if you had had a chance to think about this priority and um I thought I would just
give you a chance to um let the commission know you know what what you're thinking for this next
year in terms of the two bullet points that we had uh put in the document
and so I did email you asking for a list of contacts of Open Source vendors and
then uh I have to go through the information you gave me because there weren't a lot of vendors on that list
that I that I noticed but then I actually have questions for the commission on this priority nor that I
have thought about it so the the commission wants the department to forward the commission's priority to the
vendors and ask the vendors how much they need from the city financially and
then also what the department can do to help the vendors get certified is that
correct um so let me pull up the document here so
basically the city has had a long a longstanding policy for the the city to
work with organizations to to develop an open source voting
system that the city can use so this this commission policy and Department
policy was an attempt to [Music] um to like meet that City policy so the
idea was that there are potentially you know many
organizations out in the country that would be willing to partner with the city to help develop or to develop an
open source voting system that the city can use but um but we don't the city doesn't know
what what these organizations need until we ask them so the idea was that if you
send an email out to um not just vendors but organizations because some of these
um individuals might not be associated with like a necessarily someone that's
labeled a vendor but if we hear back from them and say like hey you know we we would be
willing to partner with you for um you know for free if you we need you
to answer these questions and then we could develop this system for you and and if you can try it out you know we
will do this for you or maybe they would say you know we can do this for you for $50,000 or
$100,000 or maybe it's Z like in the past voting Works offered to do something for 0 so the idea was that if
you send out an Outreach email just saying like you know hey the city has
had this policy to work with an organization and um is this something
you can help us with and what would you need from us so it's kind of an open-ended
um query and then based on what you get back it can help you decide you know
whether any of these seem promising then how much of this Department's resources would you think
we would need to commit to this well that's that's what's the beauty of it you don't need to commit to anything
just to send the email out I mean it's you you would get the information back back and maybe you'll get you know a few
responses and you can share those with the commission and then using that information you can kind of work from
there like maybe maybe some of the responses require very little from the Department
or maybe some require more but it would at least give you and the commission the
information about what the options are to to kind of work towards the city
policy of partnering with the an organization I know I know just
historically one of the examples that I know you've mentioned is uh the department uses a an envelope sorder
from um a vendor is that correct yes and there was a time where you did a pilot
with them right where they they made some changes to their sorder to um so
the department could use it is that correct right but we didn't help them develop their
sorder well but I mean it's it was a pilot though that they but they brought the
product that we use for the election yeah so so the idea is
that until you until you ask the organizations we don't know what the
possibilities are so you know based on this information you could learn um you know what are the
options you know may maybe some of the options would require very little from the
department but again how much resources of the department do we commit to the I
mean it's sort of so open-ended and there's nothing and there's and how do we do we have to get a contract with
these vendors well this this initial step here is it's just to to ask you're
not committing to anything you're just you receive the information and based on the
responses then you can decide like is there anything here that makes sense for the department so that the department
can move forward on this policy so you're not you don't need to commit to anything to to just to ask well if we're
helping a vendor develop a voting system are we committing that to that voting system
well you don't I'm saying you're you're just asking the
question but like after you get the responses then you could decide whether or not you want to
partner with any of these any of these organizations so
it I'm saying that until you have that information it's it's hard to kind of discuss this in the abstract you know
that's does that make
sense sorry I was just rereading the sentences commissioner Hayden
Crowley you're on mute um I I I'm just
point a clarification I think what vice president jonic is asking director ARS
is for you to create maybe a a brief scope of work almost like an RFP but not
because because that would require a lot more but a scope of work that you would
put out to the vendors Andor the organizations describing what your needs
are and can they potentially fulfill them and what kind of resources are
needed for on their end to do that because I think without any kind of
initial query we are just fumbling in the dark we have no idea like we're what
what I heard vice president jonic say is that experts out there say that we could
save a million dollars uh or 50% of the budget if we went to open- Source voting
well how do we really know that these are just people that are out there without some sort of a um a scope of
work and and people bidding on it there you know that there's no way to go from
you know to move off where we are right now so but that's a much bigger thing I
think vice president jonic than the resources I'm just going to put words into what I'm hearing um uh director AR
say is that he may not have the resources certainly not right now and maybe not in this election season to
create a scope of work no matter how modest just because all of the resources are dedicated to getting putting on free
fair and functional elections perhaps you can work together to create this scope of work that would be a way
forward but it can't consume a lot of the Department's time because they have
a several priorities but that's where I would think you would want to go with this because you can't move forward
without a scope of work and that's what people need to provide a bid
on but there's nothing to bid on because there there's no funding for it and there's I mean that's the thing it's the
chicken and egg and what the department needs and what a vendor needs to do is to have their system approve a Secretary of State's office so that we can use it
okay I mean that's that's that's what has to happen Okay and then what what I understand commissioner jonic asking is
that we're supposed to ask these vendors and organizations what they need as far as funding and whatever resources the
department has to get them to be certified that's the big ask I think and I so that's why I'm trying to clarify
what you have in mind just asking for information I mean that's that's that's the first step to committing resources
I'm that's I'm kind of get a sense of what you have in mind as far as the resources to commit to this I I think
the um the scope of work that you know to use commissioner Hayden Crowley's terminology I think the scope of work
could be just what you said I think the the city what it needs is a a system
that's certified and has certain you know capabilities like you know rank Choice voting you know the the certain
multi- language ability you need it could you know could be described in a couple senses and just say you know
since 2007 or 2014 the city has wanted a system that we can use that has these
capabilities and we we're hoping that an organization can develop it and certify it you know what what would you need
from the city for you to be able to do that and maybe they'll say maybe it would require very little on the
Department's part maybe they just need we need someone that we could you know maybe just try it out one
day you know after every couple months you know try it out for a couple hours
or I don't I don't know what they're going to say but it could be something very easy that doesn't even
require much money or or any money you know it's but until you put
that out there no one's ever going to um people aren't going to know to
like to tell you what what they could do for you do for the
city but we need a voting system yeah you know I mean we don't just need like some software we need a voting system
and so if someone came forward and and and and replied to the Department's
request for information we don't know what they would actually make and if it would be a good system I mean we're kind
of committing the the city to A system that we have no idea if it' be any good or not and so that's so it's not as
simple as it sounds at least in my mind and I'm not trying to overstate this but it's not a matter of just getting some
information and we're going to use you know provide a few bucks and then give some information and off we go has to be
a good system so well then what what is so like I know
like New Hampshire did something similar they they worked with um voting Works in Dominion they and
maybe a third vendor but they they um worked with them you know
they had certain like interactions where they the the vendors would um update their system to
like meet certain New Hampshire's requirements and then they had a a day where the vendors came and they showed
the systems and now um a New Hampshire now has an open- Source system that
they're able to use and um like they were able to to do that
process so that's just an example of one jurisdiction doing it but
um I guess until until you just let people know let these
organizations know that this is what the department is interested in
it's you don't really I mean you don't know the possibilities that that's kind of kind of to you want to learn to make
the next decision you need to know what the possibilities are it's not it's not an RFP it's just a
simple email that could be you know a few paragraphs long I
think commissioner Hayden Crowley make sure you're unmuted um
yeah I'm hearing a couple different things I'm just trying to help mediate this here um
when you're talking about New Hampshire it sounds like the state was very much involved it wasn't handled at a local
level or even if it was implemented at the local level it was handled though at the state level and then implemented at
the local level but it does sound what I'm hearing from um uh director Arn is
that you have to have an approved system by the state and that's where we get the chicken before the egg the egg before
the chicken I I I I think one of and You'
you've been down this road it's hard to move forward without the state's participation in it because the for the
city to commit money Andor resources um you you don't want to um
invest in something that wouldn't have um you know the state's blessing so to
speak um and I I I I I'm jumping in on this with really very little knowledge
but I'm just trying to move this forward to the you know to try and understand it um but I do think it sounds like I I
can't wrap my head around why all these politicians go out there and say this is something that they're for and then they
do very little to push it forward but that's kind of typical um so that doesn't surprise me
completely so so I think I think that the state you
know obviously needs to approve the system but that's something that the vendor would take care of and I'm
not it's it's not something that would be on the Department's shoulders but no the your the priority for the from the
commission is that the department would help the vendor ask the vendors what they need from the Department to get
certified that would be the initial step so and then you'd have an array of
replies and then at that point you could just look at the replies and then
but that's the commitment that we're putting forward by with that policy that the commission's passed so the
department sends an email to the vendor saying what can the department do based on this policy prior from the elections
commission to get your system
certified well let's say that let's just say hypothetically you get six replies
from different organizations and then it would be up to the and then the
commission would have this information you would have this information the Board of Supervisors would have this
information the mayor would have this information and maybe all these different groups they could say well
like two of these six look like they have you know really seem realistic you know maybe
maybe one of them is asking for $20,000 or maybe one of them is not asking for
any money maybe they just need a point of contact and then among all these
different stakeholders in the city that the supervisors and the mayor or or the department could um maybe one of the
members of the board says you know this is great this this one response was was good let's let's
put um some weight behind it but but without having that initial query no one
really there's nothing to concrete to pursue you know that's it's just really
all all you're doing would be doing would just be getting the information
and it could be an input into the city on how how it could move forward you know um no but the policy
priority from the from the commission is what resources of the department do the do the vendors need and so it's sort of
a commitment from the Department's side that we're going to commit resources that's why I'm asking originally like what resources and how how much
resources are you envisioning the department provide I I think that minute can I make
a point of clarification so I I think some of this is actually just language in the
priority that might be causing some uh like I can actually understand
where your perception is and also understand like I think I'm I'm getting
I'm understanding a little bit differently now and you'll have to reconcile if I've I've gotten it but my
I think perhaps the language that is most challenging on the side of the director
is that there is a kind of subcon a
subliminal message that implies that the department would allocate
resources whereas the intention of the priority is simply just
to say if I'm understanding correctly that we
would want the uh we would want to be able to
ask the uh the voting system the open the vendors excuse me what they would
need from us in theory but not actually have there be any sort of
commitment that the department would be would do any of that it is a in
theory what would you need to accomplish this goal and I think how it reads might
not make that clear it might imply that it's that the there is an ask
for there to be a more a more uh realistic commitment from the
Department when it's just an Outreach message of what do you need what would you need to be able to do this in theory
um I think you've also raised that your concern is and again correct me if I'm
wrong that not withstanding that fact you believe that asking about it in
theory is still one step closer to reality and
practical resources being allocated is that your concern it is okay and so so
is your feedback then that even
asking putting out there in theory this is what we would need is is still too
close to actually committing resources themselves totally it's a slippery slope
okay I just want to make sure we're all talking in the same
way uh yes Vice President John it quickly and then we have actually lots of hand
okay so I'll I'll just pose this question to the commission like if if the commission were to ask the board for
funding for an initiative like until we ask we would
never know how much money to request you know that's it's it's it is a chicken and
egg but so um but I I just want to say I do
agree with your your summary it's this is an in theory like if if you get six replies back maybe none of them makes
sense maybe they're all asking for too much or maybe some of them aren't realistic so I would say
that it's not you're not committing to anything by just asking is my reply to
that but I'll I'll let others speak commissioner D yeah I was going to say
actually a a strong City tradition to ask with with zero commitment I mean the
city puts out out rfis all the time just to create vendor lists with no
commitment to hire so they they put out these requests all the time and say we
want to know who's qualified here's what we're looking for and you know if you
meet our qualifications we'll put you on a list for the next two years with no
it's true no commitment at all that we're going to hire you we're just trying to see who's out there so I think
this is essentially the same thing it's like city's been trying to look at open source systems and we've hit this
roadblock right because they can't do rank Choice voting for one there and there probably some other issues as well
uh and we need a complete voting system so we would like to hear from anyone who
is seeking Dev V to develop a state California State Certified you know open
source system that would meet our requirements um and you know we'd like to know who
you are and what we would minimally need to do to to help get you across the Finish
Line with no commitment that we're actually going to do it but you know because you know the city's not going to
pay for your development but what are the things we could do it could be as simple as we need a technical point of
contact you know as we're developing this to give us feedback it could be I'm have no idea
but I'm making stuff off right it could be as simple as that um it could be um you know we we would like the city
to you know to to be an alpha tester right when we when we have
finished developing a rank Choice voting module right doesn't have to be in a
real election we would like you to test it and go through your procedures and give us feedback that that could be the
you know the ass so it may may not result in a money ask it could be
there's no question it probably be some kind of resource asked but it may not be that hard for the Department to meet and
that's I think what vice president Jon is asking for is let's find out you know who who might be options right and are
there any that are worth throwing some resources at whether it be people resources or time resources
or maybe some money even to help them get across the finish line so we have options because it's in our interest to
develop these options uh at a very in a cost-effective way right so let's find
out who's a candidate thanks commissioner d h
commissioner oh were you gonna say something no okay commissioner Hayden Crowley um I can't add much to
commissioner dy I think she was articulate in what she had to say I did go through this uh very issue with the
city on a Drupal platform for website and they had screened a number of
different vendors to qualify them for um working on Drupal based new websites for
the city and I when I did this uh for my previous employer with the city I had to
uh interview from a pre-qualified list of say 20 vendors who had met certain
qualifications and then were approved but it was interesting because at the end of that I think for there's a
committee now I think the thing that's missing from this entire conversation is the level of bureaucracy that's involved
in all of this it's not as simple thing as director Arn sending a a query out
and I think when he talks about resources we need to be mindful that it
involves multiple departments Department of Contracting I mean lots of different departments so what we think is a simple
letter is is never ever simple ever trust me but it does happen all the time
so um I just think that um I I think
it's definitely worth this uh commission um moving forward because that seems
like a good first step um it's more not in theory I'd say it's more of an
exploratory um exercise to see what may be available out there but again um I
think you have to be mindful of the levels of bureaucracy and it would probably involve um working with the DCA
first or or or whatever to to figure out what departments need to check boxes on
just even asking for information thank you commissioner
Hayden crley commissioner ly thank you director Arts given you've
said multiple times that resources and allocating resources for the Department
to do something like a request for information for a um open- Source
system and given that we have an election coming up in March and we have
the presidential election um in November is it possible after the presidential
election in November 2024 is that we don't have an election for a little while is that a Time time where
potentially resources could be allocated to have this inquiry to kind of look
at how we could do this and how the department could do it and what
resources um would be needed um so is an off election time when there's there
isn't election going on there's a little bit of time between because I appreciate what you're saying especially given the
budget cuts that have been requested for each department in the city but is there a possibility of bringing a report to
the elections commission um saying the president's
election is over we've looked at what it would take to do this and here's what it would take so we could have a sense of
what resources would be needed is that something that could be
possible off Fe is always better certainly than the presidential cycle and this this is kind of growing from my
perspective from a two sentence ass to an RFI which is even bigger um
so yeah I I mean really off year is always better to start investigating and
and thinking about this uh and you know I'm not against open source I just uh I
know that's the perception uh from certain people but it's I I from my
perspective I know once whatever we issue there's going to be a expectation that something is going to happen next there's something and that's I get that
that's that's how it goes uh but not having to go through that during the presidential cycle definitely would be
better than it would be better to for more advantageous I think for everyone considerer not to have the presidential
Cycles facing us going through all this um and also from my understanding voting Works was planning getting certified in
California they said originally 2022 I believe and then I don't know where they stand now so potentially within a year's
time you're going have a a voting system in California that's open sourced and that's that's approved by Secretary of
State's office so I don't it might kind of solve a problem for everybody I right but but if that isn't the case just just
for clarification I'm not saying you create the the request for information
just let us know what would it what are the resources what would it take for your department to be able to do that R
I'm saying yeah I have to write it I me I mean the RFI would just take time writing to to do that
that's why I kind of like the two sentence policy foror better uh that
makes sense yeah yeah okay and then I mean then we right just coate it and
send to the commission you guys could have the information that way um I'm I'm
sorry maybe I'm I'm tired I I guess what I'm saying is I'm not saying that you
should do an RFI I'm saying you let us know because you've said multiple times
there's a lot of resources you you don't want to or I had the indication you don't want to put too
much of the city's resources into doing an RFI and so what I'm saying is letting
us know what it what would it take for you to be able to do what Chris is
saying which is essentially an RFI so I'm not saying do it but to say after
the election the presidential election here's what it would take for us to put this to to make this happen here are the
steps here's the pathway I would need X number of employees X number of things
is that something you would be amable to after the presidential election I want to be clear about that it'd be
better okay yeah and when I mentioned resources not so much about the
whatever's issued it's more if what the ask would be uh from the department and
my concern just from past experience I this can't be the issue for the Department especially now and that's
sort of How It's been in the past no matter where we are in the this has been the issue uh so if it's going to be
potentially be the issue for the Department it's better to have this happen in off cycle than during the presidential Cycles okay thank
you and where is actually I don't know do you know where voting works is on their system because they're certified
in California I'm talking to commissioner
jonic can I ask my question oh yeah you can just go ahead vice president jonic I just assume I didn't I assumed that you
would answer that yeah yeah so I do want to reply to um commissioner L's comment
but yeah director my understanding from voting works right now they are not
have not prioritized California they're they're prioritizing jurisdictions where
there is um active interest and willingness to work with them and collaborate with them
so I think I I don't think they're going to partner with they're not planning on
partnering with us unless they see some interest from San Francisco so
um I would say that right now they're not they're not doing anything in California unless we would take some
kind of a step to show them that we want to partner with them so
um which I think sending out some doing some kind of Outreach like would would
provide them an opening to partner again but um I think my understanding is that
you know San Francisco would need to kind of take the first step on that um just on commissioner LOL on on
your comment um yeah I think an RFI is much more work
and I think um I think I think we wanted to avoid asking
the department to do n RFI because it was more work and um I think
legally um the the DCA um when I was working on
this document the dca's had said that you know we can't ask the department to do NY so I I would my preference and I
think in our document our preference was to do something that was not did not
involve the work of an RFI to allow you to do it um you know easily and
quickly so and I I think even the the email could just say explicitly you know
this is not a commitment that we will we are not committing to acting on this
information you know act on this information if if that would make you feel more comfortable you know one of your
concerns was that it might be viewed as a commitment but I would I mean if if the
department was going to wait until till next year to um do this it
would I think it would really um we would lose a lot of time to
um you know we we would lose a full year on on um preparing for what we could do
with that
information but I I do I do think that an email could be it could just be a few
paragraphs and not a couple sentences I think it could be a few paragraphs but um until the department
signals to organizations that it it is interested in doing something I don't
think I don't think anything's going to
happen commissioner loli I have a question for the ca is an
email that um vice president jonik is
suggesting if that were to be sent to um open source organizations does that
legally bind the department by inquiring and
saying we we would like more information about your system what you need for
certification um vice president janic help me with the language like basically what you're asking to go into this
email that could theoretically be sent does that bind the department by
doing that good evening Commissioners Deputy City attorney Brad russie that what I understand of what's been
discussed about that request for information it wouldn't find the department to make any kind of purchase
um we would probably want to review how this is set up to make sure there aren't any violations of competitive bidding
requirements in the future for example giving certain vendors a preference or
not equal access it has to be open to everyone like so to the extent the
department started working with one vendor and not others there could be issues with competitive bidding I know that's come up in other context so we
just have to make sure we follow the proper process and we're happy to work with the Department on that if this moves forward thank you
so so I'm not I'm not sure um really how to proceed like I mean director based on
this conversation are you you going to think about it more or
um um or do you have more to say based on
what what has been said today or um I I I mean I think part of this policy part is the
commission does want this you know issue to move forward and this has been this
has been going back 16 years now so um you know we're trying our best to
find ways that it to move it forward and if you have um
you know maybe variations on what we're suggesting I think we would be we would
love to hear that too you know I think we're we're doing our best um but if you
have other ideas you know I think um I think we're open to you know
collaborating together on this issue but we we we don't want this to be
any kind of a commitment we just wanted to get information so to inform you
know the next steps
basically yeah so um I mean would it help if if
um you know I or the the commission were to draft an email that would um you know
be the few paragraphs and then you could look at it if you didn't have time to draft the email would that help you
or I'll draft the email I can share with the deputy attorney's or state attorney's office um and then kind of go
from there okay that would be great I think that would be very appreciated
um okay
so um
I there was one there was one related issue that I wanted to um mention during this item because it's related and that
was um during the retreat the commission had a discussion
about the um the city's current voting system contract with
dominion and because um originally your plan was to issue an RFP for a voting
system in the spring and um one of the commission concerns was
that um well informally during our discussions was that the um signing a new voting system
contract could delay the um you know that could kind of lock the city into a
a voting system at the exclusion of an open source voting system so we had a
discussion about the possibility of the department extending that the city's current voting system contract with
Dominion instead of issuing a new RFP and um during that Retreat I had shared
with the commission that um in the past the department had signed a a voting
system contract back in 2007 that was similar to the one that the department
signed in 2018 or 19 and with that
contract it was similar in that it was a four-year contract with two one-ear options to extend I'm I'm saying this
for other people's benefit because you know it but after that the department went to the Board of Supervisors and had
the board extend it twice beyond that original um you know was originally stated in the
contract and is there anything that prevents would prevent the department from doing something similar to that
with our current voting system contract asking the board to extend it
beyond the original six years well I think one is does do we
want the same same contract and for the same terms I mean if you extend the current contract you're you're extending
the current terms in in the current costs so I I think we have to consider
what that means I don't have an answer right now for that okay but but legally
it's a possibility though is that I'll leave it to to Deputy sign uh
okay proceed to discuss that um but it's fine I'm not going to I didn't come here
today to talk about contracts and I wouldn't do that in a public session so
uh certainly we can think about is that is that the the commission's formal uh
recommendation then no this is a discussion that we had and I think this is a it's a question
um that we had discussed during the retreat so
um and it's related to the open source policy priority which is why I'm asking it today but um I mean I'll I'll just
ask today just to kind of move the
discussion forward from the commission's perspective but DC RI um like legally is it an option for
the Department to I I understand there's choices about whether it makes the most sense but like legally can would it
would one option be for the Department to extend the the city's current contract with Dominion if it went to the
Board of Supervisors commissioner I haven't examine that contract with respect to
this question I mean generally the board has the authority to pass an ordinance and wave different things and sorry
would you mind talking into the sure generally the board would have authority to by ordinance wave competitive bidding
if that's an issue or um other legal requirements that are not um
imposed by the charter but with respect to this particular contract I I don't know the answer without looking at it
more closely okay thank you yeah and the commission did not take any kind of a formal action on this we were just
discussing it and with the idea that we wanted to keep this the city's options
open for open source um well can I ask so if the if there is
a opportunity to extend the contract is the Comm with the commission then formally recommend that be the case that
that be the course of action well I mean I I would say informally the sense was that and I mean
I can let other Commissioners speak for themselves but it seemed like commission were Commissioners were supportive of
the idea of extending the existing contract and um I mean personally I
would I would support that um because you know for the reasons I mentioned
but I I would I would hope so and I would I would expect it personally
but I go ahead commissioner D you look like you were going to say something yeah I I mean I think you know
theoretically without looking at the details of the contract it was more about you know mitigating the city's
risk while leaving the options open so you pointed out there are lots of reasons to engage in a new contract um
but the concern was if a new contract locks Us in for another five years or whatever the you know multi- years that
obviously limits the options for open source and so that was just a
consideration we were thinking about is if there is an opportunity to you know
work with an open- Source uh vendor who's close you know to getting certified we don't want to then sign a
five-year contract and and lock ourselves in and not be able to Avail ourselves of that opportunity so of
course it depends right so again we didn't we weren't looking specifically at the Contra we were just talking about
how can we leave our options open so that we can move toward an open source system um without shooting ourselves in
the foot because as you said we need a voting system right so we want to accommodate both and obviously you know
what your thoughts are on on the specific contract and and you know maybe
our opportunity to get concessions from the vendor um that matters
too so this is um commissioner Stone I'm just going to jump in uh first vice
president jonic if that's okay um I think there are two things I just want to say one in response to the director's
question and two just a point of clarification
also uh related to what commissioner D had said because there's some context
that I also want to add for the public in this conversation which is that the director was is slated to issue an RFP
in this spring for a new voting system I think that's something we just need to level set on to make sure the public is
aware of what we're talking about um and these contracts are much longer than 5
years um and I think the concern was that if let's say an open source
system were to be able to be certified in the next 2 years 3 years four years
that if we were to commit to a new a fresh contract that then we would be
locked in for upwards of 10 years potentially or nine years you know depending on how we work through that
process um knowing the city's requirements around 10year contracts so
but these contracts with voting systems like Dominion are very are long and I
think that was the expressed concern um and then the second piece of that is to
answer is related but also to answer to the the director's question about if
this is the commission's policy we had talked about it for that exact for what
I just described we knew that you were going to issue an RFP in the spring that
meaning in the next you know few months in the midst of already a crazy election
year knowing that you were already going to do that and that perhaps there might
be movement toward an open source system in California that could get certified
wanting to see if there was an option to extend and that with a little asterisk
our existing contract so that we wouldn't have to go out to bid and could keep marching on with uh throughout this
election cycle and you know revisit this again in a year or two uh the reason I
say asterisk is that the extens the length of extension has also not been
discussed in this moment I think that needs to be made clear if we're going to answer the director's question about if
that's our policy uh you know what would that mean would is it our stance that we
would want the extension to be two years
with option and then revisit in two years you know what does that look like because ultimately the director will
have if this is the route he goes he will also have to go to the Board of Supervisors to do this and so I think
it's important for us to be very clear on what we mean when we say extension and
why um yes vice president Jon yeah and I just wanted to link this back to
something earlier in the conversation which is you know talking about how much work in RFI is like an RFP is even even
more work and so I think you know this could potentially save you some time if
you're able to avoid the whole rigal of writing an RFP and then doing that whole bidding bidding
process so um it could it could potentially be um you know a timesaver
as well for you and I I think that yeah if you had the you know with if the
commission was supporting this approach and um you went to the board I'm confident that
it would it would sail through you know this isn't something that you'd be doing on your own um you know assuming the
commission were to adopt a policy supporting that so um yeah I mean it
could it could save you some time to go that
approach is that of interest to you like would you want the commission to take a
position on that
yeah I think it'd be good I mean because in the past yeah things can turn pretty
quickly on these contracts with with voting system vendors at the commission by the commission so I think it makes
sense it would be good policy good approach by the commission to actually put forward they would support uh and
they can even of course uh clarify that the support of a contract potential contract extension is really also in
support of the policy to uh bring an open source system eventually into San Franco Isco that way it's not just you
know John AR against open source hang out to Dominion you know so I I think
that I think it would be a good idea and a good approach I so thank you if if that's what you're offering I I accept
yeah well and also if and I know you don't want to get into the contract in full public and so if you can't answer
this at this time totally understood but would you want to extend the contract as
existing or would you rather move forward with your plans and again again if that's not something you want to
answer in Open Session I completely respect that and understand why yeah I don't think I'm at this point ready to
comment on contract yeah because I just don't think the commission should make a policy until you until we know where you
stand like I don't think that we should I think we should support you in what you want to do and
not you know adopt a policy that is in conflict with that I think that would be a problem so I appreciate happy to talk
about it offline if that's better and I don't know if it has to be a policy if it even was just you know a resol I
don't whatever you know so ceremonial
yeah commissioner D yeah so you know I I think it would be good to agendize this
next for the next month and um and maybe U have a you know a more in-depth
conversation about it like what can we do uh consistent with the open source
voting systems priority in step with this because you know to me this is it
goes hand inand like I said we're trying to mitigate risk for the Department make sure the city has a solid voting system
at the same time we don't want to cut off our notes to spite our face here we want to want to make sure we're developing these other options because
otherwise you know we don't want to be stuck in an old contract for other either right so I think um we would love
your thoughts on that you know sending out an email what just our idea if you have other ideas on how can we move
things forward to continue developing viable options on the open source side
you know and then the commission can support you know passing a resolution or whatever we need to do to make sure you
have the support you need when you go before the board so that there's an understanding of why we're doing
this I think you know have a few weeks to think about it and prepare something for next meeting for a discussion and we
could probably have it in closed session if necessary
right um I'm just looking at the time uh Vice President jonic are there
other items thank you commissioner are there other items vice president jonic on your on this policy priority that you
wanted to raise today okay any other commissioner have
comments they'd like to make concerns observations before we move to public
comment okay let's thank you for that thank you for the discussion um let's
move to public
comment there are no hands raised okay so that will close out
agenda item number six thank you to the director you're good to go um we will
now move to agenda item number five 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 but long range planning for the commission activities in areas of proposed study legislation ex elections
others sorry I just got distracted because I realized there was one thing I wanted to mention before the end of that
agenda item um hold on one second if I can find My
Notes apologies it'll be very quick so uh just to Circle back on something
about the voter registration policy priority we'll plan to agendize these as commissioner D had suggested I did want
to mention uh commissioner Parker brought up the questions for the director which I had shared with him um
and one of the things that you talked about I think one and two but number three was also adding links to our
signature um I talked about the website and so uh also we will we should all
plan to uh accommodate that and put items these links uh and happy to send
an email reminder to folks to add them to your email signature as well um so I just wanted to elevate that very very
small thing apologies let's go back to agenda item number five Commissioners reports um and I am actually going to
first hand it over to commissioner Hayden Crowley thank you president Stone um I
need to let everybody know that I just uh recently accepted a new position with the San Francisco Public Utilities
Commission which requires my full-time commitment and as you all know the city
Charter mandates that no member of the San Francisco elections commission may hold any employment with the city and
county so in accordance with the requirement I am resigning from my position as an elections commissioner
effective this Saturday January 20th when I begin my new position with the Public Utilities Commission so I just
want to thank everybody here um I've gained incredible valuable insights
working with all of you and collaborating with you I have tremendous respect for each and every one of you I
have learned so much I I really have um I've been humbled and I've been equally
excited and thrilled by all of the progress that has been made um my first Commission meeting was
mindblowing but we got over that and I really feel that I've uh
developed wonderful relationships with my colleagues I only have great things to say about all of you so thank you so
much and I wish director ARS had stayed to though I'm very I've just always held
him in high regard for operating free fair and functional elections and I think that we've seen evidence of that
once again again in his director's report um and that is the mission of the elections commission and I also want to
call out our uh commission secretary who we fought so hard to get on board here
Marissa Davis and Marissa am I pronouncing that correctly yes uh
president Stone worked so hard to bring you on board it was her mandate along
with all of the different processes that she's brought to this commission which have made these meetings run so
incredibly smoothly and I just we just owe an incredible debt of thanks to her
and thank you for the wonderful time that I've had on this commission to you and to vice president jeronic and I
really do want to call you all out commissioner Parker commissioner loli commissioner D and commissioner bernholz
as well thank you so much for being wonderful wonderful colleagues and I
will treasure my time with you and my memories thank you commissioner Hayden
Crowley I think I I won't try and speak for everyone I'll speak for myself but I think the it is a huge loss it has been
a complete privilege to work with you and I think you've brought great perspective I think we've all grown so
much as a body in the last year I feel really proud of that and I also think um
I I've seen each of us grow and learn in many ways and I certainly feel that you
have contributed tremendously to that so thank you so much thank you um even when you were very tired
sometimes we all we all got through it so um it's a huge huge loss and uh we
will do our best to try and carry on your uh perspective and hopefully uh
someone who fills your shoes has your knowledge and uh particularly your
understanding of this city and the things that are important to this city how the city operates the bureaucracy
that is involved um I think you have brought so much important perspective as well so thank you commissioner Hayden
Crowley commissioner Lei well
congratulations um and I just want to say that what I appreciate the most
about you commissioner Hayden Crowley is keeping
us with our feet on the ground and remembering that there are processes procedures and
that money is what's often needed for things we want to do so I really appreciate
that practical um knowledge that you brought to many of our discussions and you will
be missed and I hope um this is means an opportunity for coffee or lunch um at
some point but thank you very much for your service thank
you okay thank you I will share just a
couple of quick other things bit or sweet um but uh I wanted to talk a
little bit about the the um meeting schedule over the coming weeks so as the
commission is aware we have to do two budget reviews the uh prior to the department
submitting its final budget for to them to the mayor's office for their review
and consideration and those meetings need to be no less than 15 days apart the tricky
piece of that is that the director we will not be able to begin reviewing that budget from the director until January
29th he is going to submit it the Friday before which means unless someone is wanting to work on a weekend we will not
be able to review it until uh January 29th and then we must submit it by
and I actually I wanted to ask TCA russie one point of clarification I know we already talked about this previously
but I just wanted to confirm that we needed to submit it by the for by the
15th because I believe I had the 14th written down and then then I also had
the 15th can you confirm it's the 15th and not the 14th the code provides that the last day for the commission to
approve it or yeah prove it would be the 15th of February 15th thank you okay so
we need to our first review January 29th 30th 31st and then the second review is
basically the the February 14th or February 15th now the important piece of
this is that the commission's regular meeting does not fall within either of
those dates so my proposal is that we hold a boek special boek meeting on
January 29th 30th or 31st and then now this is we can discuss this um but
move our regular February meeting which is currently slated for February 21st to
the 14th or the 15th secretary Davis has already done the work to uh ensure that
we can have a room available for these two different slots uh vice president
jonic has agreed to support the special boek meeting I also had support um from uh
commissioner Parker who said that she could support the boek um if other folks have uh conflicts on the other dates and
would prefer to take BC we can also swap around as well um the idea is to do this
in the most painless way possible um so I guess let's start by saying are folks
able to accommodate moving the February regular meeting from the 21st to the 14th or the 15th um
and I think just a head nod would be great um really we need a quorum okay I
see commissioner bolz has a thumbs up our folks and I also want to add I know
that scheduling is very frustrating because we do these you know we
anticipate that our meetings will be the third Wednesday of every month so but this the budget process does happen you
know once a year so um hopefully this will be the only time yes commissioner
laosi your your question is about the 15th or the 14th and not the 29th 30th
or 31st yeah let's start with the febru the February meeting
yep commissioner Parker um I let president Stone know
this already um I will be out of town on the 14th 15th and not available those days which is fine if everybody if
there's a quorum that's fine um which so I just won't be here those days thank
you commissioner Parker yes that's that was one consideration knowing that commissioner Hayden Crowley will uh not
be on the commission and the potential for a vacancy uh at least one vacancy at
that time that the priority is really ensuring that we have Quorum so um we
will be at that point we with commission Parker's absence it would
be there would be five of us so yes go ahead oh yes I just wanted to correct
myself I'm glad you asked that question because I looked back at the code it's actually February 14th I'm sorry no no
I'm so glad between 15 days that have to be between the two meetings and the
thank you thank you for double checking no problem um I so glad to know um
because we can decide it here and now so okay scratch that and who can do
February 14th um commissioner bernh hols can accommodate commissioner
D okay vice president jonic um no problem okay and really we need a quorum
um otherwise I think we would probably have to delegate to a special Committee of some kind wonderful we'll all spend
val day together um make sure you bring your Valentine's for the director I ask
yes vice president introd so DC Russi can can the meetings be reversed can it
be the commission meeting first and then the committee meeting
or the the the purpose of the first meeting is for um the public to provide
input on the budget priorities and then the second meeting is when the commission actually proves the budget
and the commit the whole commission needs to consider the budget okay so okay so so we will move
forward with moving the February 21st meeting we are going to cancel that
meeting or rather push it up a week to Wednesday
February 14th um that will be our new February
meeting we will still move forward as if it's a regular meeting but the budget will be the primary agenda item for that
meeting and then do does anyone have a
burning passion to participate in the BC meeting as an alternate for commissioner Parker well
commissioner Parker perhaps you want to join that BC one since you can't make the I mean I won't speak for you but you
might want to have be able to review the budget um but uh perhaps in lie of
myself or vice president jonic does anyone you're not all dying to me meet
again February um okay um yes commissioner L
see I'm sorry I just got a little confused there um the BC meeting is
sorry the BC meeting is going to be before the meeting on the 14th correct it would be January 29th 31st yeah 29th
or 31st okay I absolutely cannot meet on the 31st I
have five 100 people coming to my school for an event and I have to be there
okay well I think let's keep it so it
will be a special boek meeting of commissioner Parker vice president jonic and myself on either the 29th or the 30
31st we will oh yes DCA
Rie it needs to be 15 days so the 29th yep okay so it will be January Monday
January 29th I'm glad you're keeping us honest um it will be Monday January 29th
um it also helps you have your answer immediately secretary Davis so the BC meeting to review the budget the first
review will be Monday January 29th and the second will be at the full
commission meeting that will be moved from the 21st to the 14th of February is
that clear thank you everyone for accommodating that um I really
appreciate it um I did have one other or I had two
other items um which I actually one of them I meant to
mention after commissioner Hayden Crow's announcement uh which was just that um
uh uh DCA huling Delan how do I say her last name that she's no longer Staffing
the commission um it will be just DCA russie and DCA Flores uh going forward
and then uh the last piece is we had talked about on the I don't remember
when we talked about this but doing a uh after we had done the warehouse tour
during the retreat in December we will be doing a or we had talked about doing
the same thing for the vote Center in City Hall and I spoke with the director about this and he proposed
uh and he said we could do it in March I thought it would be more fun for us to do it ahead of November and so uh just
everyone kind of this is a ways away but keep in the back of your head we're one of the dates we would do would be
November 1st 2nd or 4th and we would get to do you know the full it would be in the afternoon probably and the director
would show us the whole kind of um process I think there were a lot of
questions when we did the warehouse tour around uh around vote by mail ballots
and and uh the process of those and so now we'll get the the ability to see
that um at the vote Center in City Hall so just keep that on your radar November
1st 2 or 4th yes commissioner ly oh
okay correct yes um and I'll bring that up again in the
future um yes good that is it are there other
commissioner reports yes vice president J thank you
president Stone just one thing to mention um one of my action items from
the last meeting was to just incorporate the revisions from the annual report that we discussed and I was I was
intending to do that today um because I wanted to finish it before the meeting
but I wasn't able to get to it but um I should be able to do it in the next few
days and um commissioner Hayden cley I did receive your email you had suggested some wording to incorporate like we
discussed at the meeting so I have that so um I just wanted to give people an
update on that so thank you thank
you okay let's move to public comment on
agenda item number five commissioner reports oh were you GNA say something commissioner do you want me
to do you want me to give an update on it um yeah uh vice president J just
asked about the registration report uh so uh Michelle and I spent uh most of
the early holidays uh incorporating all of your comments and
revisions um and then flipped it over to uh president Stone who had a couple of
uh last suggestions which we're in the process of reviewing and it is also
simultaneously under review or will be shortly under review by the
dcas so uh and president Stone's already drafted a letter to go to the board so
we just need to cross our eyes and Dot our teas and triple shoot some formatting issues um and and will be
done um I don't know if anyone has a strong opinion uh commissioner Parker
I've been debating whether we should have the appendices as a separate document or whether we should try to put
it all in a single document assuming it's not too big if anyone has a strong opinion on
that I I mean the commission voted to move forward as drafted with the
specific yellow changes so I personally would propose that we not reopen the feedback on the report that's my
personal feeling that's fine we'll go with single document then awesome thank you commissioner
D let's move to public
comment there are no public commenters quite a bunch
today um okay thank you secretary Davis so we will now move to election of
Commission Executive officers discussion and possible action to elect a new commission President and Vice President
per commission bylaws Article 5 Section 1B the procedure will be as follows and I'm just going to read the full
procedure the chair of the meeting will open nominations for president any commissioner who wishes to nominate a
candidate will state the name of that person if that person agrees to run then that person is nominated when there are
no further nominations the chair will close the nominations and call a roll call vote in which each commissioner
shall State the name of the nominee for whom she or he is voting if a nominee
receives four or more votes that person is elected president if no nominee receives four votes the commission may
have further discussion and proceed to another vote this process shall repeat until one nominee has received four or
more votes the same process will then be used to elect a vice president per the
bylaws the term shall begin immediately at the conclusion of the meeting so with that we will open nomination for
president commissioner Hayden Crowley I nominate
president stone for another term to be president thank you commissioner aen
growley oh I
accept seconds and you don't have to second you can just nominate are there
any other nominations
well thanks um let's move to I appreciate that let's move to a roll call vote
then before we go to vice president because we were going to do president
then vice president Public public comment oh before we take any action
okay so let's hold on public comment let's because we also do the need to do the nomination period for um the vice
president I I think you could take public comment on the entire item once just before you take a vote on anything
it should be before that okay um would folks like me to take public comment now or move to the
nomination of the vice president now the lad yeah just do the next nomination oh
okay you'd like to move to public comment now well the the agenda says
to I'm Vice President should happen after the vote but
okay okay I hear half and half public comment um let's just move to public
comment there are no public commenters and we can always take public comment again after after vice president that's
totally fine um okay let's secretary Davis will you call
roll call vote for the um election of the president the executive officer of
president president stone
stone president Stone president
Stone president's St president
Stone president Stone president
Stone wow thank you everyone certainly one of the less painful ones
I've done since being on this body so I really appreciate that um uh let's move to nomination for vice
president any nominations yes I'd like to nominate commissioner Parker okay
thank you commissioner loli I'd like to nominate commissioner
D
okay thank you commissioner Parker do you accept as
well um yeah yeah thank you
any
other we can move to public
comment there are no public commenters
okay um secretary Davis would you mind moving
to the roll call vote for vice
president president Stone
Parker vice president jonic commissioner Parker commissioner burn holes
commissioner Dy commissioner Dy
I guess I vote for myself commissioner Hayden Crowley
Parker commissioner Luli commissioner D commissioner
Parker Parker okay
one four for Parker and three for Dy okay thank you secretary Davis thank
you secretary Dy thank you secretary or not secretary D and secretary Parker
commissioner Parker thank you secretary Davis thank you commissioner D and thank
you commissioner Parker I appreciate that um and I also would ask secretary D
if you're open to also being the boek chair for the year as
well we can discuss it offline if you would like I am not going to escape this am I
I'm so sorry I'm off we can discuss it offline we discuss it offline okay well thank you I
appreciate it everyone um and I know these are never easy um are there any
other comments before we move to agenda item number
eight okay agenda item that closes out agenda item
number seven let's move to agenda item number eight agenda items for future meetings discussion and possible action
regarding items for future
agendas sorry vice president jonic yeah I know um one item that we had
discussed maybe five or six months ago was the um the ballot label state law
that you know Sisco could choose whether to opt in or out and especially since
this um this election was just a two-card ballot like it seems like there would have been room to have it for this
election so maybe it's something the commission could discuss a policy around the ballot
labels and then um there was something else oh
and I don't know president Stone if you think this is necessary but um perhaps
an agenda item around formalizing the um the policy for sending letters to the appointing authorities ah for um around
vacancies yes so I'd like to respond to both of those I that was actually a
complete oversight I had meant to bring that up after um you can tell I'm a
little all over the place here um but I mentor to bring that up after commissioner Hayden Crowley's
announcement that uh I wanted to unfortunately that would mean us
going back um but the commission had discussed the letter for that I believe
we took action correct on that letter we did yeah I thought or was that just in
vek no okay we'll have to go back but
I okay Listen to I I couldn't recall if we had approved that as a commission or
just in boek um but I wanted to get the commission's blessing to send that to uh
the seats that will be vacant so I believe we already sent one to the board
although I don't recall I don't remember if we did or did not um but then also to
the mayor's office as well so uh what we given that we have our meeting sooner
rather than later in February um I can add that to the agenda um and then I
also wanted to and so thank you for bringing that up I I had that on my list and I just it was an oversight and then
the ballot label I'm glad you brought that up um I have been in conversation with the director about this offline and
actually if you look at his uh March report you'll see that there's already
movement uh toward that so so the uh uh
vice president jonic is speaking directly about uh ab14 16 which was
including proponents and opponents on the ballots themselves names of
proponents and opponents of ballot measures on the ballot themselves and there is concern about the number of
ballot cards um there are many concerns about including this and this had been
discussed at the commission back in
October something like that yeah in the fall um and uh I had spoken with the
director about it offline he is kind of working on a we've been working on a
many different components of this that we plan to share with the commission uh it's just there have been too many other
priorities uh that have kind of deprioritized this but yes I can speak I
don't know if that can necessarily be as soon as February 14th um but yes in
either February or March that needs to be something that is brought back up um
and so oh what I was going to point to is in the March election plan on page um
hold on a second just because I I did see someone from the League of Women Voters on as well who I think had asked
about this um ah on page 17 of the March
election plan it says ballots for all voters will include information on where voters can obtain information about
proponents and opponents so that will be that is new um that is something in the
March election plan even though there isn't going to necessarily be full transition to AB
1416 um there is going to now be something on the ballot themselves that says the directs people to the voter
information pamphlet where they can see uh who the proponents and oppon are so I
just wanted to give everyone a little kind of preview of that but yes I will also um make sure that's included on the
agenda as well commissioner Hayden Crowley thank
you thank you president Stone um I don't know that this would be an agenda item
but it is pertains to your processes my understanding is that when people leave
the commission I've been advised that I have to file a form 700 for leaving the Vaca the commission and so I'm just
reminding you uh commissioner vice president jonic um but then also to all the Commissioners I think that this we
all uh we all have to do our form 700 just a reminder thanks yes I'm sure secretary
Davis will be bothering all about all of us very soon about that um and then of
course policy priorities will be agendized as well um per I think commissioner loli I think you are the
one who mentioned that anyways it will be aend IED again anything
else okay let's move to public
comment no public commenters okay the time is now 9:02
p.m. and the meeting is adjourned