work around the persecution of lgbt people in russia. first i want to invite up amy wheelan, senior staff attorney at the national center for lesbian rights, followed by julie [speaker not understood], council for global [speaker not understood]. gary virginia who is the president of san francisco pride board of directors. so, am i wheelan. good morning. my name is amy wheelan. i just want to thank the board of supervisors for inviting us here today. i m a senior staff attorney at the national center for lesbian rights and these issues are really, really important to us and we have been working on them recently. i want to keep my comments very brief, but i do want to address two issues today. first, just to paint a brief picture of what it s like for lgbt people living in russia today. and second, i ll just add to what has already been said about the efforts that we know that already exist to do this elsewhere at the state level. there s no question that life for lgbt peopl
board of supervisors agenda unless otherwise stated. okay, are there any changes to the agenda? no. okay. so, can you please call the first item? item number 1 is a hearing on the san francisco employee s retirement system (sfers) investments in russian securities; the feasibility, consistent with sfers s fiduciary obligations to retirees, of sfers divesting from russian securities, given russia s continuing persecution of members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community; and sfers s policy regarding responses to inquiries from members of the board of supervisors about policy matters of interest to residents of san francisco. okay, thank you. and i would like to turn this over to my colleague, supervisor scott wiener. thank you, madam chair, and thank you for accommodating this hearing in terms of timing. we very much appreciate it. so, colleagues, today before us we are holding a hearing relating to the extreme persecution of the lgbt community in
entire career on defending the rights of lgbt people globally. to add to that background to what you obviously all are knowledgeable this particular anti-gay crack down in russia right now, i think it s important to under a teeny bit the context for that, which is that president putin, after his second reelection, experienced for the first time opposition, and this has been part of an overall crack down to keep opposition at bay. and in particular, to take all the freedoms away from civil society actors. the most important law that has impacted lgbt people in russia is actually the foreign agents law which is in the process of taking down any civil any no. nongovernmental organization that receives funding from outside of russia. just yesterday in st. peter sberg, the longest standing human rights mainstream organization, the moriales was to shut its doors. every lgbt organization in russia with a few exceptions are in the process of having to account for their funding that
retirement system did hear the message from the board of supervisors and did respond according to the policy. thank you. and i know this is a different topic, but i just wanted to we re moving down a road of discussing this particular issue and i want to make sure that the communication is open and clear and provided to us in a timely manner. i ll make sure that that happens. thank you. thank you. supervisor wiener? i want to thank you, madam chair and also supervisor chiu, for supportive words. just to be clear, it s not, it s not 1%. i did the calculation at $19 billion fund, $26 million invested in russian securities, that is point 137%. it s even smaller, it s a really small percent, but thank you for acknowledging that it is it should be zero. yes, i agree. thank you. okay, thank you, mr. hewitt. i appreciate it. colleagues, just a few speakers from organizations in the lgbt community who have been doing work around the persecution of lgbt people in r
and jennifer low from sfgov-tv. and, madam clerk, do we have any announcements? yes, please make sure to silence all cell phones and electronic devices. completed speaker cards and copies of any documents to be included as part of the file should be submitted to the clerk. items acted upon today will appear on the april 22nd board of supervisors agenda unless otherwise stated. okay, are there any changes to the agenda? no. okay. so, can you please call the first item? item number 1 is a hearing on the san francisco employee s retirement system (sfers) investments in russian securities; the feasibility, consistent with sfers s fiduciary obligations to retirees, of sfers divesting from russian securities, given russia s continuing persecution of members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community; and sfers s policy regarding responses to inquiries from members of the board of supervisors about policy matters of interest to residents of san francisco. o