Transcripts For SFGTV 20130819

The short answer is, commissioner wynns, yes. In our application, the criteria that we asked for, and we asked folks to present themselves was to say, are you a parent . Because were looking for individuals who had taken some kind of leadership role within their schools community. We wanted individuals who were really stakeholders from the community, but also from the community, but stakeholders in our sites where this is having where this proposition was having such a huge impact. And because the Oversight Committee is primarily about the fiscal solvency and the audit that we do each year for qtea, we wanted individual members who understood who had a background in that, in that context. That was the primary focus for this [speaker not understood]. Im requesting that in the future we have some discussion, maybe at the rules committee, about how we constituted this committee. I dont remember somebody tell me if im wrong, that we at the board actually discussed what criteria we would want because it seems to me that in all of these kinds of advisory groups, one of the most important things is to have various experiences. I mean, i might say for each one of these people, i might individually read this description and say, oh, yeah, that would be a valuable, you know, set of experiences to be on this committee, but i dont really know if i want them with all the same experiences or if we ever really consider that or thought about what kind of a balance wed like to have. I think we should probably my own opinion, we should go ahead, but we should talk about this and think about what wed like to have in the future. Commissioner fewer and [speaker not understood]. Mr. Ar men trout, [speaker not understood] this all basically reads about the same. Everyone says also has extensive Financial Experience and is currently a parent so, i would also like to know the diversity of the schools. Which schools are they at . Do they represent . Sort of through their perspective . I think thats a really important thing because of this qtea is sort of directed at that. Its sort of an equity issue. [speaker not understood]. So, actually, this is so brief about people on this committee and i think i know jenny lam personally very well and also Michelle Parker so i dont have an issue at all with those two women. But they also bring a different perspective to this committee, you know, one is a nonprofit both of them with nonprofit, stems. Parent engagement also, but i so, i think that i dont have enough information on these individuals to actually approve this tonight. I feel like i would like to know what grades the children are in, but particularly what schools are their children from. And i think its really important to have a diverse sort of gathering of people who have Different School experiences and represent a Diverse School environment. And, so, were looking at this and it doesnt give me enough information. And i dont think that is i am in no way blaming you. I think that what commissioner wynns brings up is about the description and being more descriptive of what were trying to achieve with this committee and a more well rounded perspective of our district, too. So, i am a little dismayed that none of them have a very strong education background and i think also that because i dont know what schools they represent or where theyre from, i think i dont have enough information to approve this today personally. Im just speaking for myself, but thank you, mr. Ar men trout. Commissioner mendoza. Thank you. When do we have to have this approved by . Commissioner mendoza, theres no deadline. The committee has an active body that has the minimum number to operate. So, the numbers could be approved at any point. This brings it up to full capacity. So, we would like to have this approved. The Oversight Committee and we would like to get going with the school year and to have the members participate. One example is that the Oversight Committee will be participating in the qtea impacting innovation awards which is happening that process is really starting in september. So, if we wanted to include these new members, give these members a chance to vote on who would be the chairs for the committee, we need to move forward. That would be the incentive to do so. But in terms of operating, we have the minimum number to continue to move forward. Okay. So, i actually feel with the commissioner fewer, i dont think im ready to vote on this only because i dont know what the current makeup is and how these particular candidates fall into where the missing links are. And what actually the whole body would look like. I would be interested in who else applied and why we selected these particular candidates over others. And i really think its important to have someone who has who is a current or former teacher, retired teacher, even a current teacher. I think its a lot for current teacher and perhaps a conflict. But a conflict, but we have lots of retired teachers and we have folks that have some kind of background in some of the pieces. Id like to see something more than what we currently have and just see what the makeup could be on this. It just doesnt feel like i dont feel like i have a good perspective on who is currently on and how these other folks would be adding to the mix. Commissioner maufas. Im going to chime in with what my colleagues have let you know, mr. Ar men trout. Are you the person im sorry. ~ im having a important conversation outside of the room, but i missed, are you the person that we would normally see [speaker not understood] for this body or are you suck for somebody . People may still be on vacation. Im not dinging anybody. I just want to know. [laughter] [speaker not understood]. Commissioner maufas, on this i am your man. All right. As my man, be prepared. [laughter] here it comes. So, you heard and i think you get it. Just because of i think the timing and with monies coming in from the state because of bad selection cycles, its important to see who is on this body. And i think just a refresher, as commissioner mendoza has said, who exists now and then the makeup of these new people, as commissioner fewer said, and some comments were from commissioner wynns, i didnt hear them. But how this all comes together because i think its really important not that it wasnt important before, but maybe now im paying attention. But the point is i care and i think, to their points, its something i need to see before i approve as well. And i did hear you say we did some approval as quickly as possible [speaker not understood] that process. I dont know if theyre so new, maybe they need to sit with this body awhile before voting on an award of what i think is pretty important. Thats just my opinion. And, again, not to ding who they are, but i dont really know who they are. [speaker not understood] some of these names, i would certainly like to know a lot more about these individuals and again, the makeup of the whole body of the commissioners have said. Thank you. Thank you. Dr. Murase. Yes, i had one question and then i did get a response from Michelle Parker on the gender balance issues. My one question is are any of these five renewals, are they people who have been seated in this position before . Dr. Murase, no, none of these individuals have served on this committee before. Okay. And then for the benefit of my colleagues, i want to list jenny [speaker not understood], cochairs, [speaker not understood], and [speaker not understood] walton. So, that would leave the gender balance, if they were adopted, of three women to eight men. And if there is a compelling reason why a particular man should be appointed, i would really like to know that. But three women to eight men to me is not a 3satisfactory gende balance on this kind of body. [laughter] yes, ours is appropriate. [laughter] yeah, right. I want to thank Board Members for their input. [speaker not understood]. All right, enough mumbling. So, what i count is i count a majority of Board Members that are either prepared to vote no on all of these nominees or are prepared to vote no or not to vote at all on this. So, we can either withdraw this or we can vote no on all the candidates. But i think in any event, i did express some frustration to mr. Ar men trout and ms. Richards about this early on there is very little direction in the legislation about who should be on this committee. And we like to rely on staff to vet but theres no guidance for them to rely on. So, i do think that the board has to give more guidance through the rules committee for what the makeup of this committee should be. So, unless there are strong feelings to the contrary, my suggestion would be we withdraw this item, that we send the question of the qtea makeup to the rules committee, we develop some guidance that allows staff to actually put forward a stronger roster of candidates but that has the makeup that we think reflects the School District most accurately. Yes, maam. Commissioner maufas. Thank you, president norton. I appreciate that clarification. And i want to in my own reflection, apologize about my flippancy around not caring about this. Thats not the case. Its just when we put it on the shelf because of our economic times, it definitely dropped off my radar, so, im glad its back on my radar. I think commissioner haney, if you can put down on a future rules committee, we can develop some guidance and then staff can go out and recruit more candidates or send us a roster that is more balanced, whatever balance we want. Thank you, president norton. And, mr. Ar men trout, would you mind compiling that list of requests about more information, the gender bias, blah, blah, blah, to commissioner haney so those questions can be addressed and those issues can be addressed and added to the discussion at the rules committee . Absolutely, commissioner. Thank you, mr. Ar men trout. May i ask one more wi sf are we in time to get this on the next rules Committee Agenda . Yes, it will be on the 21st, wednesday, august 21st. ~ we have two weeks before that agenda. Thanks, everybody. So, this is now withdrawn. There is no action item. Were not voting on the action item. All right, we are now going to move on. Item m, discussion of other educational issues. There are none tonight. Item n, consent calendar resolutions removed at a previous meeting for second action. There are none tonight. Item o, vote on the consent calendar. Yes, roll call, please. Thank you. Mr. Logan . Here. Aye. Were voting on the consent calendar. Yes . Yes. Thank you so much. Thank you. Ms. Fewer . Yes. Mr. Haney . Yes. Ms. Maufas . Yes. Ms. Mendosa . Yes. [speaker not understood]. Item k4, 6, 7 and 35 because theyre retroactive. Thank you. Those are all in the items. Director murase . Aye. Ms. Wynns . Aye. And ms. Norton . Yes. Thank you. All right, thank you. We are now going to move on to item p, consent calendar resolution severed for board discussion and immediate action. Commissioner maufas severed item 2q, and i see mr. Golden here to address that. Commissioner maufas. Thank you, mr. Golden. You talk, it was mentioned in this letter we received from some of the Public Comment on this the issues that we had last round. Can you speak to that a little bit to give us some of your perspective and how we got to the selection of those same folks this cycle . Thank you. Good evening, commissioners. Im david golden, the chief facilities officer. Most of you may remember, about three years ago we put the security contract out to bid because it was up for its cyclical renewal. We received almost no bidders. And eventually the low bidder dropped out. There were concerns by the board about whether the bidder was union or nonunion and it was not a qualification in the bid language that the bidder be union or nonunion, but that was a very large concern of the board. Particularly in terms of the labor practices, salaries, and wages. At that particular point in time and i forget the details we determined to renew the contract for securitas for another period of time. In november of this year and the contract was based im slightly wrong. We accepted their bid and awarded them the contract. In november of this year, securitas informed us that they would like to raise their rates. We met with our legal counterpart in mr. Davis offices and under consultation the conclusion was you cant raise your rate when its a bid. And the rates are fixed by the bid and by the terms of the bid. Securitas canceled, sent us a letter, essentially canceling their contract with us. So, if they couldnt raise their rates, they chose they literally chose not to continue. We then sent them a letter saying, thank you, we are putting the contract out to bid and we will continue with you at your higher rate until such time as the bid is awarded on a monthbymonth basis because we have to have security. And thats the current arrangement with securitas. We then embarked on a new process with purchasing and ms. Cassi coleman in the legal office to rewrite, represent the bid package for a new bid for the security contract. That took several months. That went out to bid. We received five bids. The lowest actual bidder was found to be nonresponsive. The lowest bidder was abc security. The most expensive or the highest bidder was the current bidder securitas by almost half a million dollars. We have done our Due Diligence and vetted the current low bidder to be responsible. Their paperwork is in order. Their bond is in order. Their bid is in order. Their references check. They all of their documents say they are a Union Contractor. We fully expect them to abide by the terms and conditions of their contracts with their Union Partners just as they will abide by their contracts with us. And to this date we have absolutely no reason to find this bidder nonresponsive. Should the board choose to not award the contract to abc and not award to the next responsible bidder, which would be d2 securitasllc, the only other option would be to cancel the bid ~ and rebid the entire contract. Those are the options are slim and few. Its either award to the most responsible bidder, or its reject all bidders and rebid. But at this point staff has no reason to find the current low bidder nonresponsive and our Due Diligence deems that they can do the job. Theyre a minority hispanic woman owned company. Weve had securitas [speaker not understood]. So, yes, we are changing systems. Change is a little bit difficult for all, but we respect the words that we heard from the people that talked tonight, and abc will have to honor and respect the contract they sign with us or its not going to be a very happy relationship. So far i have no reason to think otherwise. And in your discussion with our counsel, ms. Coleman, have you all sort of reasoned out what would happen in the event that during sometime during the contract thing didnt work out for the workers, as you said, you have no reason based on all the processes that have happened thus far to think anything would go wrong. But if something did go wrong, have you vetted with Legal Counsel what steps we would take, if any, at sfusd . I dont have the agreement in front of me, which was part of the bid proposal. And i do not know if there is language to that effect. I know that this vendor has stated that they are a Union Contractor. There were several that bid that were i think this one is obviously we know securitas is. One or more of the other ones is and one or more is not. It is their obligation to fulfill their Union Agreements. Im not sure whether our contract says what happens if they are in bargaining dispute with their Union Partners. I think our general counsel wants to weigh in. Commissioners, i dont have the contract in front of me either, but i can give you some basic guidance here. If we award a contract to the lowest bidder, they begin to perform on the contract and then they incur some sort of labor strife in the course of performance on the contract which affects their ability to perform the contract by having workers show up on time for the designated shifts and performing the duties as required, that goes into the noncompliance breach of contract arena and the district has all of the contractual legal contractual rights to deal with that, you know, if and when Something Like that occurs. So, there would be a process where we would engage with a contractor saying a, b, c and d, this isnt happening, why isnt it happening, when are you going to make it happen . If the answers to those were not satisfactory, then the district would begin a relatively speedy process to terminate the contract. All of our contracts, all the district contracts have a 30day termination provision in them. We dont even have to have a reason. Thats just in the public contracts code. So, there is ample ammunition should it be necessary for the district to take appropriate action if the contractor is not performing. Commissioner fewer, and then commissioner wynns. So, mr. Goldman, i think that the gentlemen tonight, their question to us was are we going to monitor prevailing wage and benefits. And as you know, if we have a long history of working with the Union Contractor and we are committed the district pays prevailing wage, so, i think what we would like to know as a board before we vote on this is that will this be monitored and it would be monitored regularly . And is there some way for you to report back to the board on whether or not they are abiding by their Union Contract . And what is your process to monitor . Commissioner commissioner wynns just said prevailing wage doesnt apply. It does apply, thank you. It does . What i was going to say, commissioner, is i dont i mean, i know in many construction trades where prevailing wage laws apply, i dont know in this particular case if prevailing wage law applies or not. Im not privy to the Union Agreement that was signed by abc and the security workers, whatever it seemed like it was seiu. Whatever union it was, im not privy to that agreement. Right now, unless its a prevailing wage job and we are obligated by the dir to monitor them, we wouldnt normally do that. Excuse me, mr. Goldman. I dont mean to interrupt, but [speaker not understood]. So, we wouldnt monitor it with their contractor . So, we wouldnt do any monitoring, i think this is what the gentlemen are asking. Do we do monitoring . And are you are we keeping track of it . And, so, i guess im just asking for the process. If we do monitor it, how do we monitor it . And are we making a commitment to monitor it . If it is not our practice to monitor it, then i think we need to state so, that is not our practice. What i would say under the current security contract with securitas, we are not monitoring their, their wage payment to their employees. If there was a grievance, we would investigate it. So, youre telling me that in order to monitor this or for it to be it needs to be red flagged first by a complaint from maybe an employee correct. That says, i am not being paid. So, gentlemen, i think this assertive for your information also. That in order for us to monitor it, then there needs to be a red flag that is its an allegation that they are paying the wage they said they were going to pay or pay the benefits they said they were going to pay then we would investigate. So, i think our response is that we dont usually monitor this, but if it is brought to our attention, then we take it very seriously. And if that is different, mr. Gold nan, feel free to correct me. ~ goldman no, i would agree with you, commissioner. Superintendent . Thank you, president norton. I just want to assure the commissioners that it is our absolute intent that any contract that we enter into as a district with any organization, we expect up front and will have that conversation that they will abide by the contractual agreement they have entered into with us. And that we will exercise our 30day clause if we are aware that they are not living up to the agreements that they have made with their partners as well. We are a School District. We are in the people business. So, while we are not going to set up a separate process for monitoring every single contract, we are going to be hyper vigilant and we commit that we will have this conversation as we enter into this agreement so that the expectation is very clearly stated right up front. Commissioner wynns, then commissioner [speaker not understood]. Commissioner fewer, i was going to ask that question although i would have asked it like this. I presume our prevailing wage infrastructure or the law doesnt apply to this because i think it only applies to constructionrelated unions. Thats what i had presumed. So, i need to know if thats not true. What i really wanted to ask is do we know how much this company pays to security guards in the bay area or San Francisco and how that what the comparison is to what securitas is paying them. Do we have any way of knowing that or do we know it . We know ha theyre i dont have it in front of me. We know what their hourly i believe what their hourly rates were because thats what the bid was based on to get to a certain total. We gave them a formula of how much we sort of anticipate using them and said, we want you to give us a baseline bid and one was 900,000 or a million and one was a million4 or 5. So, we have their rates and we know what they would charge us. I would have to get back with you information of how that compares with securitas is paying. When they wrote in their bid that they are signatory to the union and maybe this is a false assumption on our part. We assumed it was the same union that securitas is signatory to, just like if youre a contractor and your signatory to the carpenters union, it doesnt matter what company you are. The union signatory is the union signatory. And once you are signatory, you agree to abide by certain rules and regulations or there is a serious breach of that Union Agreement and there is a procedure to adjudicate thats what i presume. Now, there are a couple questions. We do have contracts with private contractors where we require them to be we put in the bid specifications that they have to be union, that they actually have the one im thinking of is the transportation contract and it says right in there they have to contract with United Transportation workers and honor their contract, right. Which is, you know, we discussed that over the years a few times and its quite an interesting discussion. Ive had it with Board Members and other School Districts, too, because School Bus Drivers tend to be extremely well paid in other parts of the country and also extremely unstable work force. They turn over all the time because they dont get paid anything. ~ so, its in the School Districts best interest, so, we put that in there [speaker not understood]. We shouldat