August 26, 2024
At its regular meeting on Friday, September 13, 2024, the San Francisco Ethics Commission will consider and possibly act on proposed amendments to the Ethics Commission’s regulations regarding incompatible activities for City officers and employees.
Section 3.218 of the Campaign & Governmental Conduct Code (C&GCC), as recently amended by voters through the passage of Proposition D, contains rules for City officers and employees regarding activities that are incompatible with their City service. These rules had previously been located in departmental Statements of Incompatible Activities (SIAs), but through Proposition D, the rules will be standardized and moved into Section 3.218 of the C&GCC. The changes brought by Proposition D will become operative on October 12, 2024.
The proposed regulations seek to clarify terms and create exceptions to help ensure these rules are both strong and practicable. The proposed regulations would make the following changes:
- Clarify that a City official can appear before their own department on behalf of themselves, entities they own, or their immediate family members, but that they must abstain from any involvement in any such matters as part of their City duties.
- Clarify that merely being employed by an entity that engages in activities subject to their department’s jurisdiction is not prohibited, if the City official avoids engaging in certain specified activities.
- Specify the situations in which a City official may be an officer or exercise management or control over an entity that engages in activities subject to their department’s jurisdiction.
- Specify when the exception for volunteer activity with a nonprofit organization includes serving on the board of directors of the nonprofit organization.
- Define when a City official is contracting with their own department.
- Clarify how serving on the board of directors of an entity is not prohibited for a City official, when the service is part of their City duties.
- Define ‘department’ for the purposes of Section 3.218.
- Remove outdated regulations focused on departmental Statements of Incompatible Activities (SIAs), which will be discontinued on October 12.
The Commission would like to consider and possibly act on the proposed amendments at its meeting on September 13, so that City officials can have the clarity provided by the regulations prior to the rule changes coming with Proposition D in October. However, the City is currently engaged in a meet and confer process with the Municipal Executives Association (MEA) regarding the proposed regulation changes. If this meet and confer process is ongoing on September 13, the Commission may be prevented from voting on the regulations at that time.
This 10-day notice is provided under Charter Sec. 4.104 to encourage public comment on the proposals in advance of the Commission’s next meeting.
The Commission invites all input on the proposed regulations. Written comments can be sent via email to ethics.commission@sfgov.org. Written public comment received by 4:30 p.m. on Thursday, September 12, 2024, will be shared with the commissioners prior to the September 13, 2024 meeting. Opportunity for public comment will also be provided during the Commission’s meeting.