And we never had the deputy City Attorney there. So, we often dont have the benefit of that person. One problem weve had for the past two years is we have not had our own seat number 1 has not been filled so we have not had the benefit of our own member attorney. His opinions would also be important for us nonlawyers to hear. Although we did have former member [speaker not understood] was an attorney, too, and it was often he wasnt in seat 1. He was in another seat, but he was very important as well. I guess one of the questions i have is a simple one. What keeps you motivated for this . Well, first of all, this is somebody mentioned, i think former chair grant, there is a very steep learning curve here. So, for the first year or so, i really was constantly just having to do my homework, to listen to members who had vastly more experience than i did, and it took me a good couple of years to really feel that i knew what i was doing in most respects. So, then, after investing two years,
Reversed the rules for these [speaker not understood], the 6vote rule. You know [speaker not understood]. It sounds good on paper. In the back of my mind, thats pretty good. But at the end bottom line it was a violation of city charter. To me it seemed sort of ironic that here we have the sunshine ordinance. In charge of all of these rules and yet you were violating a rule. Whether i agreed with it or not, [speaker not understood], i absolutely would not violate that charter [speaker not understood]. So, lets see. All of these thing you heard from kit. We missed several meetings, thats problems we had. We only had 9 out of 11 members. Im not going to go through our statistics again. But i want to mention the good news that many of our complaints [speaker not understood] many of the complaints are solved by the administrator and dont even come to us in front of the task force. And if i can anticipate your next question, though are some of the things that i would like to focus on if i we
Attorney. Im a Community Organizer with the harvey milk democratic club. As an attorney much of my practice focuses on freedom of expression and in many instances my clients have benefited from use of the California Public records act, use of the brown act as well. Which mandates open public hearings. In my experience on the harvey milk club, i participated in Public Comments before the board of supervisors and various committees. Ive also provided forums for public comment. I have myself admittedly grappled with occasional member complaints about incidental failure to post agenda in advance of a meeting and im very familiar with dealing with and addressing complaints. To put on my advocacy hat just a second, i think the importance of open government is twofold. On the one hand citizens have more trust in the government when they know what that government is doing. It is as simple as knowing how many potholes local government fill in a year. I believe truly showing in the past Harvard
City attorneys interpretation of the ordinance, visavis the city charter is a red herring. First, interpretations of roberts rules of order is hard to get [speaker not understood]. Second, the city has settled over 21 million in payments paid out over the last six years to settle various lawsuits involving discrimination and wrongful termination that involved a quoteunquote advice from the City Attorney [speaker not understood] proved to be mistaken. Even though the City Attorney [speaker not understood] makes mistakes in interpretation of the law. Third, consider doing contract talks that just concluded, local 21 ha reported to our member that they defeated the proposal that was requested to prohibit City Employees from filing discrimination complaints under local, state, and federal law. The [inaudible]. Thank you. [inaudible]. Thank you very much. Hell do fine make it real fine hes on the hunt hes work for task force you and josh wolf will do shine the Sunshine Task force fine hes o
Run our meetings, to mediate matters before they come to the full task force. We do have a backlog still. I think its incumbent on us to be as efficient as possible because if were not, that just delays fairness and justice for those who come before us. So, im happy to entertain any questions you might have for me. Supervisor tang. Thank you, ms. Washburn, for your service. And as you indicated, your good attendance on the task force. Something that i will be asking all the applicants here for reappointment is one of the issues that has come about is that, as you know, the task force is assigned a staff attorney who works with the task force. And there have been instances where members of the task force may not have agreed with some of the recommendations or advice of the City Attorney and i wanted to get a better understanding of, you know, the importance that you feel of the role the City Attorney that is staffed at the Sunshine Task force and guiding the rules set forth in the city.