City of San Jose, CA Smart Cities and Service Improvements Committee, 7 Oct 2021

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From YouTube: OCT 7, 2021 | Smart Cities & Service Improvements Committee

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City of San José, California
Smart Cities & Service Improvements Committee of October 7, 2021

Pre-meeting citizen input on Agenda via eComment at https://sanjose.granicusideas.com/meetings.

This public meeting will be conducted via Zoom Webinar. For information on public participation via Zoom, please refer to the linked meeting agenda below.

Agenda https://sanjose.legistar.com/View.ashx?M=A&ID=894235&GUID=BC409122-4BDF-4D5C-BBDF-C7EFD462F386

A

A

B

B

Everyone and welcome to the october meeting of the smart cities and service improvements committee. I believe we have a quorum, so why don't we start with a roll call.

A

Foley jones, president ricardo president.

C

A

C

Okay! Sorry about that.

A

A

B

Here and I see councilmember cohen- he might have stepped away for a moment. um We're able to proceed, though, with three correct.

A

Yes, you have a quorum with three.

B

Thank you so much hello again, everyone, I hope your fall is off to a good start excited to get into our very substantive agenda today. um Rob do you want to give us a an overview and I don't believe we have anything on consent, but I don't um just orders of the day here. I don't think we're changing. Have any changes to the agenda is that correct.

D

Correct sure person, so yes, good afternoon, chairperson mayhem, mayor lucardo, vice mayor jones committee, members and members of the public rob lloyd chief information officer for the city of san jose. Today, city staffs will present on four topics and initiatives. First, under agenda item one we have a requested status report on procurement improvement, uh julia cooper, director of finance, lewis, caprese howe assistant, director of finance and jennifer chang, deputy director for finance, purchasing and risk will share progress, priorities and plans.

D

On this important item, I will follow with d2, which is a bi-monthly status report on the city's innovation and technology projects. This month, michael foster, division manager for the city's portfolio products projects office will describe the independent verification and validation function. The division is implementing building on a 2019 technology deployments audit and for number three we have d3. We will do a deep dive into the city roadmap item: digital equity status report with jill bourne, a city librarian ann grabowski, digital inclusion, division manager leading a session with other staff.

D

This is the final presentation plan for the smart cities and services improvements committee on this item. Future updates will go through the neighborhood services and education committee and then last we will have a very quick uh audit report- notification from city auditor, joe royce, on an audit item that they are performing with that. I turn it over to, I think, to julia.

E

Yes, correct. Thank you rob um good afternoon, chair mayor vice mayor and other members of the committee, so, as rob mentioned, I'm here today, along with luiz cafresi, howe and jennifer chang in the finance department, so we're here today, based on a continuing interest from the mayor and members of the city council on the city's procurement efforts and the finance department is here to provide an update. Just as a reminder. Under the muni code, the finance department is responsible.

E

Is the responsible procurement authority for the purchase of equipment, goods and related professional services, including I.t procurements, and that is an overall important component of our portfolio.

E

Jennifer and her team do an amazing job ensuring that the city spends public funds in an open, transparent and accountable manner. We view ourselves as stewards of the expenditure of public funds and what she and her team does is rooted in the municipal code and is based on the best procurement public procurement practices.

E

The finance is always supported. Continual improvement and change in our organization, and especially in the area of procurement and her staff, has worked hard to identify and streamline and make improvements over the last few years.

E

So for today's agenda, jennifer will illustrate that our team has completed an enormous body of work which is back office, strategic support, which is not always visible to you or the community that we ultimately serve. The finance department is here to provide an update and dispel some of the myths and shed some light on our work and challenges and talk about our work plan for continued procurement improvement, which is on the city road app. So with that I'll turn it over to jennifer.

D

Jennifer, I think, you're on mute.

F

So sorry about that good afternoon, honorable chair mayor committee, members, I'm jennifer chang, I'm the city's chief procurement officer, so public procurement. What is it? How do people feel about it? Well, we know that some people think that the city's procurement process is this, but some people actually feel like the process feels more like this, but in summary, most folks probably feel this about public procurement.

F

So, let's talk about it. What do we sometimes hear procurements? Take too long? We need to procure with speed. I want to directly contract. This is the only vendor that can do this. How do we make this happen? It doesn't cost that much the risk is really low. So why couldn't I get it?

F

Procurement seems to be in the way of everything that we're trying to accomplish whether it's equity or efficiency, improvements, whatever it is, procurement is always what is holding us back. So, let's change some perceptions about public procurement.

F

Procurement is often falsely viewed as a stand-alone bureaucratic process solely managed by finance, but really procurement is a team effort. It requires multiple stakeholder engagement and cooperation for success. Yes, finance facilitates procurements, but it takes the team to make that effort be successful.

F

It's really easy to attribute a whole host of issues and delays to the blanket term procurement problems. The reality is more complicated and involved. Sometimes a procurement has to do with the fact that the requester is new to the city and is unfamiliar with the city's procurement requirements.

F

They initiate a purchase without understanding the rules or they enlist the assistance of someone to make that purchase. Who provides poor or inaccurate advice.

F

When that issue reaches finance, we educate customers that purchases are bound by municipal code purchase requirements which were established by city council, and we explain what we're able to do that's within media code and why- and we try our best to get ahead of this. So in the last several years we have made a concerted effort to regularly update our purchasing website the tools, resources checklist. Anything folks might need to initiate a procurement other times.

F

Procurement problems are challenges with scope and specification development, which the department owner of the procurement is responsible for finance, can't start a procurement until the department owner defined what they want.

F

In an ideal world when finance receives procurement requests accompanying specifications are clear and complete and listing expected requirements, deliverables outcomes without redundancies without overly restrictive specifications or contradictions.

F

But in reality sometimes we receive requests with no scopes at all or more frequently draft scopes that need work, purchasing works extensively with departments to transform drafts into procurement ready documents, but how quickly that process goes really is incumbent on working with the right department. Subject matter expert who is responsible and available to push their end of the project along delays, contribute to the perception that procurements take too long, but when, in fact, the procurement clock shouldn't start until the department subject matter expert is procurement ready with their request.

F

Purchasing staff works hard with responsible departments to establish city standards through procurements and to provide established vendor pools for routine purchases, sometimes requesters desire to purchase something outside of these parameters and department, standard owners and the spirit of being helpful grant that exception and finance is put into a difficult position of dealing with the procurement or contracting issue for a non-standard product.

F

In fact, we need to work collaboratively together to stand firm on standards, make sure that exceptions are truly exceptions and ensure that the responsible lead department plan their procurements with their core customers and their requirements in mind, contract negotiation challenges. Vendors are also sometimes attributed to the city's procurement process, but in reality these aren't procurement problems, rather their legal and business issues.

F

Finance is the city representative for contract drafting and negotiations, but the city attorney's office has the final say on material changes to our standard terms and conditions, and we have a collective responsibility to protect the city's interests so to help get in front of this. Several years ago, finance started having bidders to rfps complete an exemplar and insurance acknowledgement form and to require them to provide upfront any third party agreements that might require cd's signature.

F

The idea is to identify any significant red flags in the procurement process, so they can be resolved and considered through the procurement, if contractors certify in the procurement that they don't have any exceptions or there's no other third party agreement for us to look at then contracting theory should be really straightforward, but issues do come up after procurement has concluded an award has been made and at the end of the day, the goal of contracting is to get the best possible solution for department customers, while protecting the city's business and legal interests, and it's really important that city stakeholders align on that point and we not end up in a position where we are negotiating against ourselves.

F

Other procurement problems are actually due to poor planning on the department's part or finance. Purchasing is not engaged early or timely enough in their project planning, so to ensure customers are on the right track from the outset. We encourage early engagement with purchasing beforehand and over the last several years staff, and I have also established standing meetings with key departments, including airport itd, public works and the police department to review their current and upcoming procurement and contract priorities and to improve planning. Overall.

F

As a core strategic support function, finance purchasing team makes a significant contribution to city operations that are invisible. We do our best to deliver creative solutions that meet our department, customers, requirements and timelines, even if we ourselves are not given much time at all all the while staying within unicode guidelines.

F

For example, we work with public works to set up two pilot projects with aval project docs and teleme to meet immediate high priority city needs for small sales deployment and housing redevelopment displacement projects. This allowed public works and their customers to still test the technology before initiating a competitive procurement.

F

In our line of work, we also go often beyond our standard procurement and contracting responsibilities, and we end up providing significant business and strategic advice to departments managing contracts and dealing with underperforming vendors, which are the department's responsibility.

F

In fact, we were receiving so many requests from departments that in 2019 we developed and issued a vendor management guidelines document and published them to our intranet as a resource to all departments.

F

Since we are the central procurement authority for most city purchases, we're in a unique position to identify cross-departmental needs, and we invest time and effort to work with departments to break down, purchase silos, consolidate procurements and to establish city-wide standards, so, for instance, for the city-wide janitorial services rfp and the city-wide concrete removal bid, both of which council approved in the past year, finance was the one to take the project management lead to initiate, coordinate and facilitate a procurement with four to five departments.

F

Each separately after receiving numerous separate security, camera requests from departments finance, initiated efforts to spearhead a citywide approach for enterprise, video solution by reaching out to it and public works, and that procurement is now in development.

F

We also make for the game strategic city contributions.

F

For instance, it was finance's it strategic procurement manager who identified the joint agency regional strategy approach for housing, affordable, affordable housing, housing portal with dalia she successfully pitched to housing and the city attorney's office. To make that happen, the same individual was also the one to come up with the idea to add the web content site accessibility guidelines to it, security exhibits for ada compliance.

F

The idea was pitched to I.t and cmo communications and is now being used an exhibit that we use in it. Procurements finance also brings a number of purchasing items to council for approval and in those recommendations we anticipate and plan for contingencies, options change, orders, amendments that our departmental customers will likely need in the future.

F

Council doesn't necessarily see these items again, but lots of ongoing work is performed in the subsequent years to maintain and manage these contracts as our contract activity. Work increases as the city spends more money and enters into more agreements. So what else have we been doing?

F

Well, we've been doing this. So in the past fiscal year, finance purchasing, completed 83, competitive procurements, plus six requests for information on contract activities. We completed 139, separate actions plus 18 brand name and pilot project determinations.

F

We brought forward 52 council memos for consideration and approval. We issued over 2 000 purchase orders and purchase order. Adjustments on behalf of all city departments and a not to exceed amount for all this work was close to half a billion dollars.

F

I like to note that these statistics are merely counts. They don't necessarily reflect the complexity of the work that we do so, for instance, one of these rfps here represents the seven package cyber cyber security rfp, where each package is like its own procurement. It's like seven rfps in one that rfp resulted into 20 agreements with an estimated not to exceed of seven million dollars an initial term.

F

Another one of these rfps was the four package. Janitorial services rfp same concept that rfp resulted into four agreements with a not to exceed amount of 13 million dollars in the initial term.

F

In addition, we also supported eoc procurement requests. So from march 17 2020 through september 17 2021, we issued 153, coveted 19 related pos and adjustments. We supported a drafting and execution of about 14 food distribution contracts. We issued about 31 million dollars in purchase orders and conducted 12 procurements to support covet 19 efforts and programs.

F

We made sure those procurements were conducted in accordance to federal procurement regulations and included the required federal contract provisions to help cities withstand future clawbacks and audit findings.

F

And we did this with a very small and mighty team of 15 authorized purchasing positions. This is my team. They work really hard and collectively provide a very high level of service to the city.

F

I'm happy to report that we were recognized by the national procurement institute for the eighth year in a row 13 in all with the achievement and excellence and procurement award for 2021 and in spite of their heavy workloads and busy schedules, we have key folks who carved out time to earn or recertify in technology, project management and procurement certifications as presented here.

F

Procurement improvements, we support procurement improvements and in recent years we have invested time to further this goal and the following ways.

F

So in 2019, with the support from the office of civic innovation, we introduced the procurement prioritization board for the pdb.

F

The pvb is made up of the assistant city manager, the budget director and the director of finance, and it governs how new large-scale and complex procurements specifically rfps are prioritized to ensure that the purchasing division is working on the right projects at any given time so to be considered by the pbb. A department must demonstrate it's ready for the procurement by completing the items on a pre-rp checklist.

F

The board considers each department's procurement submission and prioritizes them in accordance to the rfp's readiness complexity, departmental priorities, city roadmap priorities amongst other criteria. Finance then assigns out projects to our team based on that prioritization list.

F

This program sets expectations of departments that procurements and contracting is a team effort, and the departments must be ready with an appropriate subject matter expert assigned- and this also helps take finance at a picture of making organizational procurement prioritization decisions based on who's streaming. The loudest we also completed efforts to increase our responsiveness to our organizational demand for services for complex procurements and contracting by reorganizing the work group, that's responsible for it and adding more staff.

F

So in 2019 we deleted a manager position and replaced it with two analysts so that each of our contract managers can have a direct report, create work teams and increase efficiency in 2020 we added one permanent senior analyst to our work group and in 2021 we added one over strength. Analyst.

F

Finally, in the recognition of our need to review and reimagine our procurement and contracting processes comprehensively, we engaged with the procurement consultant in february of 2020 as a result of an rfp.

F

We conducted an initial kickoff in february 2020, but then could have been 19 shelter in place happened and due to the wide uncertainty at the time, the project was put on hold finance, purchasing staff, transitioned operations to 100 remote and concentrated our efforts and eoc procurement requests and sustaining ongoing operations.

F

We reviewed and discussed possible re-engagement with the consultant in march 2021 and decided to defer to september due to ongoing code with 19 restrictions, and we held re-engagement discussions with the consultant in september and a contract amendment is now in the signature process to restart that work.

F

So the consultant we've engaged with is guide house and the next steps include bringing guide house up to date on purchasing activities and challenges, so they can solidify their work plan.

F

Their key deliverables include the project plan, providing weekly status reports and developing a stakeholder engagement plan, so they can start organizational stakeholder interviews and their engagement guide house will be shadowing procurement processes to see firsthand how things are currently done and based on these activities guide house will build recommendations based on leading practices, develop a detailed implementation plan and bring them forward to the city project leaders for consideration, finance plans to report back to council and 2022 with these recommendations.

F

And that concludes our presentation. We are happy to take questions.

B

Thank you jennifer and appreciate the heavy workload you and your your team taking on there. um Why don't we go to public comment, welcome to all the members of the public who are here with us today. If we're ready with our timer, we will start with the the number ending in five one: four, zero.

B

I think you're still muted you're able to unmute yourself hi. Can you hear me yes right? Yes, we have you.

G

Yes, now the procurement process, I want to know who's buying the police dogs, that cost 20 or 30 thousand dollars the brand new motorcycles for the police department to give out traffic tickets who's, brother-in-law, god, child and who's in charge. Who who gets these deals is what I want to know who's behind all these real estate negotiations for these dumpy hotels or who's, paying 600 000 for a unit for a homeless person.

G

I mean procurement, I'd love to be in that department and see what goes on and how people spend money and who gets what and how the deal goes down. What relatives, friends, family who's involved in all this stuff, I like to see the transparency for that. I bet that's something you would never want to show the public of who gets what bid and who's connected to who I and I could just imagine the p.o boxes, the uh the p.o box of the delaware somewhat. Who knows where?

G

How you guys do it to try to cover up who's getting the deal, because.

H

G

Know it's not the taxpayer and by the way, every time you guys procure something think about the taxpayer. Okay, think about the taxpayer. When you go to buy something I mean hey, this procurement happened a lot. A lot of shenanigans happened when the uh the red light cameras. All of a sudden we found out whose dorky brother-in-law had the company who manned those those cameras and all of a sudden.

G

These cameras started disappearing because they were, it was in relation to people getting these uh contracts to give out uh tickets, except around city hall and uh the police department. You guys finally got rid of it. Thank god you saw the light because you listened to people like me, so I want to know where's the transparency in these kimmy deals.

B

Thank you, blair.

I

Hi uh blair beekman, here uh to note uh you know there is new the new uh red light cameras. uh I you know. I think that that deal has come through uh that that you've been haggling with the state for a number of years now it sounds like, with the new monterey uh plan, the monterey uh curtiner uh issue in the new pilot program there, that new red light cameras are working now in san jose. uh Thank you for this item. um I do not know how to better talk about the depth of procurement issues.

I

I you know for for a few years, past few years I've been able to offer the the wonders of how to include you know the the open democratic process and and good.

I

uh You know civil rights and civil protection ideas that can be a part of explaining the procurement process and what you want to expect from that and what you ask for when you're talking with with with people what they can expect in working with san jose, I mean, if we talk about you, know our good practices and our sustainable future ideas and have that philosophy present in your decision making uh for new procurement projects.

I

I it just develops a really interesting form of dialogue between each other, between ourselves and and that just builds our better future, a more peaceful future, a more sustainable future where we don't have to harm each other. um I don't know how much you guys uh yeah I've been doing that for a few years now, and I don't know if that, how you know if you need a refresher of that of those words, and I don't know what next steps.

I

I can better talk about these issues with what you're talking about here, but I hope this can be of help in how to always be talking about procurement issues with others in the future we can be building. Thank you.

B

Thank you and now we'll go to molly.

J

Good afternoon this is molly. Macleod procurement is a topic that is near and dear to my heart and that I have been speaking about for quite a number of months, um most recently at the vision, zero meeting where, um despite the fact that uh one person with a wheelchair and one person using a walker, had been killed as pedestrians, the outreach for the community meetings had no outreach whatsoever to people with disabilities, and this is an issue that I'm finding very common in a number of different departments from emergency uh affairs.

J

Cultural affairs department of transportation. Public works many many, and it's because there's a need in um procurement to follow. What's, uh for example, in the disability inn, it has questions like of the procurement officers. Do you have an uh inclusive accessibility process who's? Your officer have you implemented a reporting decision and it goes on with a number of different things. So, for example, the current um contract that I'm very interested in um application software technology corporation to be used to improve san jose 311 um it is it doesn't it.

J

It says that the testing is going to be done by the city of san jose and in my conversation this morning I was asked so do you know disabled people who could do that? That's a problem um city of san jose should be paying for the expertise. Another example guide house that was referenced when you look at their own website. Webaim shows empty buttons, so screen readers can't use it missing structural elements.

J

It's really easy for somebody who isn't doesn't know much about tech to simply go online and say what did the accessibility conformis report say? Why aren't? Why isn't that part of the practice um routinely at san jose and also please describe what's on the slides? The first slide, simple procurement reality complex. Thank you.

B

Thank you molly, and I appreciate you always bringing accessibility to the floor in these conversations. We're going to come back to the panel and we'll start with mayor licardo.

C

uh Thank you sure, sir, really appreciate the presentation. Appreciate all the work. That's being done, could you help explain what performance metrics there are that are guiding procurement and helping you as you manage the team.

E

Jennifer, do you want to take that question sure.

F

Hi mayor um we reportedly and prefer our performance, friendships and um and the budget document I believe- and so there's kpis on mostly focus on the po to purchase order cycles on when departments put in their initial requisition and when we're able to take those requisitions and turn them into purchase orders. So there are kpis and cycle times for that, and we also track, I believe, spend as well as cost savings achieved on on the purchase orders.

F

um Often we will ask vendors whether or not we will be willing to hold pricing for that year before we execute, you know an option, and so we do track um what the potential cost savings are for that year over year. Having said that, those metrics- um probably I would suggest, probably needs to be revisited. What we've been finding is that departments are submitting purchase requisitions into our fms system without the required information for us to actually do the procurement, and so what had been happening was in the spirit of being helpful.

F

We would reach out ask for the additional information- and we might not hear back for days weeks months, but the clock is ticking on procurement.

F

So it's an issue where um we've recently released a memo where we're asking departments to not submit anything until they have everything ready and that will be kicking back requests that don't have everything fully attached to it.

E

And I- and I would like to add mayors- part of the work that we want guide house to do for us- is to help look at some of those metrics and provide more visibility into where we are in the timeline, especially related to some of those more complex rfps.

E

I can say that the implementation of the pdb, which you know, creates a checklist and a way to have departments ready to end up into the queue, has been very helpful and also helpful in prioritizing the work. So we have the most urgent items near the top of the list, especially if there's dollars that are constrained with grant money and stuff like that. But we definitely as we reach out to departments as we do the improvement project wanting to know what are the appropriate metrics.

E

So people can kind of see into the system and also you know. Where do we know that? Maybe there are certain times of the year. We maybe need to have some temporary staffing help to help us as well. So we're hoping that the report that comes out from guide house will help enhance the metrics in terms of the performance of the program.

K

C

So, does that mean that you want to revise the metrics themselves or that you'd like to revise the processes that are resulting in uh perhaps you're, not getting reliable data for those metrics.

E

I think it's a combination of both, so I I know where most of the frustration probably comes up from the department and the council is probably around some of those larger rfp procurements, in which we do require a lot of a subject matter: expert identified in assisting the procurement office in getting the work accomplished.

E

um I'm sure jennifer, if you want to add anything else or lose to to those comments, but you know we definitely. We definitely know there's ways for to improve the process and provide better reporting out on what we're doing.

C

And can you give me a sketch I'll go ahead? I'm sorry.

A

I think one of the things we also need to add is is when we're spending other people's money grants many times, certainly when the federal grants or when the state is passing through federal dollars, we are required to adhere to their restrictions and their guidelines, and so sometimes we don't have a choice if we want to take other people's money and right now, in this past couple of years, we we're looking at over 800 million dollars of other people's money. That's been given to us for spending uh to address the covet-19 pandemic.

A

A lot of that is procuring services and goods and all of it pretty much has to be procured under federal and or state pass-through guidelines. So that's.

C

A

Our challenges as well.

C

Understood so could could we just look at what metrics you might have for cycle times? Is that something you'd be prepared to discuss today or at the end for another day.

A

F

We I felt prepared to discuss that today, but we can certainly talk about that in the future. If you'd like.

C

I think it would be helpful just to understand how we are measuring performance and how we're doing against those measurements to appreciate a lot of works being done. I certainly saw that there's a lot of output, um but I think it's the outcomes that we're really focused on um here. Recognizing there's just a lot of challenges.

C

Could we go back to that slide where I think it lists sort of this source for this about a half dozen sort of explanations, that of the source of the problems that have been come up here? We go, that's it!

C

So, as I read down this list, lack of awareness, that's really the lack of awareness of other departments right.

A

C

And the incorrect information is incorrect information, other departments might have of purchasing processes.

F

C

And and challenges the specification involving you say explicitly, is at the develop department level. That's in the department.

C

And poor planning uh and not engaging financial purchasing, that's with the other departments.

E

Right, yes, and.

C

I guess as we're having this conversation, I don't know if anybody from the city manager's office is on. I I'm looking at the gallery to try to see. Is there anyone here from the city manager's office who oversees this.

D

Mr mayor rob lloyd chief information officer, I'm representing a cmo for the committee.

C

You are okay, well unlucky! You rob.

C

Tonight you say rob what the hell is wrong with you.

C

No, um so I guess you know something a former mayor used to say to me every once in a while is just to remember we're all on our team and um kind of an odd way of saying that we're all supposed to be on the same team here um and- and I guess the point of the memo is for the city manager's office- to digest this and try to understand how it is as a team, we're not working together very well to get to desired outcomes.

C

And so I'm, just as you can imagine, we're a lot less interested in sort of the bureaucratic ping-pong between one department, another we're much more interested in getting the solutions, and so is there a perspective from the city manager's office. Here.

E

But you know what I I I can give a perspective, just the fact that the assistant city manager and the budget director sit on the pbb, and so as part of that process. You know. Jennifer and her team have worked really hard. There's a lot of tools that she's put together to help departments understand their role in the process, create more organization and when they come forward with a with a a complicated rfp. That needs to be prioritized.

E

There's a lot of information that is included in that and and as part of our regular monthly meetings with the pbb jennifer chang does provide an opportunity to give an update with respect to the challenges that we're facing overall, in purchasing and um and in the past, when jennifer mcguire was sitting in that spot, she would make recommendations for some over strength positions to help move things along understand where there was difficulty we were having with departments.

E

So there was a regular interaction on a monthly basis between finance purchasing staff and the city manager's office through the assistant city manager and, to some extent, the budget director on issues that we were having.

E

So so I think that some of these barriers that have happened are starting to break down as we use that pbb and use that regular interaction with the city manager's office, on where we may be having challenges so, and we hope, with the with the guide house report and bringing that back to the senior staff team and then ultimately to the city council, we can see how we can continue to work together in a collaborative way to ultimately provide the goods and services that we need to to the organization.

E

So so we are breaking down those barriers and trying to have more education with our partners in the various departments. As jennifer said, she has regular meetings with big users. You know with the airport public works so again we can know what's in their pipeline and help plan appropriately.

E

So while some of these things are have happened in the past, we really think we're working towards a more collaborative effort across the organization and are seeing some of that come to fruition.

C

Okay thanks, I appreciate we may be breaking down those barriers. I hope that's true. I guess we'll know if we're able to look at indicators like performance metrics that can tell us. So that's why. I really think these conversations need to be really had with folks bringing those tools into the conversation, um because that's how we're able to assess whether we're making progress or not or if we're going the right direction or not. So just I can't emphasize enough.

C

You know I appreciate everyone's doing a lot of work throughout the organization, but outputs are much less interesting to me than outcomes and the outcomes are causing frustration. So we really want to look at those outcome: measurements, um the you know, there's a few references to challenges with awareness of city, municipal code, procurement requirements and things being outside city established standards, and I think the intent here is at least in reform. Is that you know rather than asking people to think outside the box.

C

It gets a recognition that we created the box and it probably probably needed to rethink the box itself and the muni code. Requirements may not be the right requirements and the standards may not be appropriate standards if they're slowing us down and comparing our ability to get things done.

C

So I guess my question is: are there opportunities here to be changing the shape of the box.

E

Yes and that's part of the guide house work as well is to look at the muni code and benchmark about what other cities are doing and what we may be able to do as well um in our organization.

E

So so you expect to see changes to the muting code come forward as part of staff's recommendation, because we know it does kind of inhibit some of our ability to be nimble as well and so and provide those services um to the organization. So we fully expect to see some changes to the moonee code as part of the recommendation coming out of the guide house work.

C

Okay, that's great, and then I I know, there's a million and one anecdotes which I know collectively don't prove anything, but I'm more interested in just trying to understand perspective here uh one one and ago who shared with me was uh trying to procure a website. It would require us four to six months. It was a fairly simple um for is very fairly simple um website development effort uh that I think would require. uh You know: payment of 50 bucks a month or whatever for maintenance and- and so the question was posed to me.

C

Why is that- and I I said I don't know just- does anybody either an it or procurement want to offer why we think it takes that long.

F

um If it's the example that I think you're thinking of mayor, that one was the expected, when we got down into the quote, to look at what was actually being asked, um the website developer wasn't able to commit to deliver delivering the entire product under the competitive threshold of ten thousand dollars. It was very open-ended as to whether or not the website development could fulfill all the cyber security requirements that had to be met, and so that was the major cause of concern.

F

Is the ability for them to meet the cyber security requirements that the city has. There are other secondary issues such as inability to meet insurance requirements and they simply weren't registered on a secretary of state website. So there are occasionally just issues that we have to look at and do our due diligence on and those, unfortunately, can often be a little more frustrating when they seem like they should be simple because you know they're low dollar, it should be low risk.

F

But, as we've seen, it's really easy right for the city to be vulnerable to some kind of cyber issue. um Based on what we've seen in the news. These days, so we're we're simply doing our due diligence and making sure that all of our t's and c's are are are examined before we record in a new procurement.

C

Just to go a little deeper in that rabbit hole. I promise I'll I'll stop here, but wouldn't we have fairly objective standards for cyber security? You have to meet these certifications and either you do you. Don't I'm just trying to understand why it would take four to six months.

D

Oh, I think I might be able to help with that jennifer's is. We actually do have a very clear list of things that we would check that it's um compliant and safe um the the back and forth. In some of those cases it can go a bit longer and then just the accumulation of other checks, like the insurance business license and other things for the cyber security one. We actually have a fairly clean list of things that they have to hit. um It's just the debate that can ensue.

C

Yeah, okay! Well, thanks for all the information, I appreciate it. Thank you very much.

D

And mayor just to reinforce uh for julia is the coordination between the departments. um The guide house work from the cmo's perspective is where we're going to encapsulate the work uh and the proposals that will come forth to make any fundamental changes that are appropriate through finance and their work.

C

Okay, great thank you appreciate. Thank you. Jennifer thanks julian and rob.

B

Mayor would you like to say another word just about your memo, which I'm hoping we'll move here.

C

Oh uh yeah, I guess I since I'm not the chair. I guess I could make a motion huh uh yeah. If, if there is a second I'm happy to move the motor, I'm happy to wait till folks have a chance to comment.

C

uh The the urge the the the desire here is to try to accelerate the process is because uh our procurement challenges have been holding up an awful lot of the things that we're all trying to accomplish collectively in different parts of the organization. The hope is that we can move this up the priority list so that perhaps that may help us accelerate a lot of other uh work as well. So that's that's the whole yep. I assume I assume that was a motion. So, okay, that's a motion. I'll shut up now, okay,.

B

All right, we have a motion and uh in a second well.

A

Well, a kind of emotion in.

B

A second yeah we'll count it yes julia. I.

E

I we will, we will do our ultimate best, recognizing that it's october and if it's coming back to this committee, you meet the first thursday in april, and that means all of that staff work with all the work with guide house would literally need to be done in the latter part of february early part of march in order to kind of move through the organization before it becomes a recommendation to the committee and ultimately, the council and and recognizing today is october 7th.

E

So that's a lot of work, so just I mean we'll do our best, but it may be very challenging. Just given the number of of weeks we have between now and the early part of march.

D

And the holiday break as well.

A

C

Yeah thanks julia. I I assume, if it becomes uh apparent in in january, that you can't meet the deadline, then someone will uh yell uncle and we'll figure out a way to either segment the work or extend it. I assume that something come back to us either through rules or through this committee is right: yeah yeah.

E

We can do that.

C

Okay, great thanks.

B

Thanks julia, do any of my other colleagues want to comment, I'm not seeing any other hands. um Okay, I'll just add I mean I appreciate, I think um I think the mayor kind of laid out many of the questions that I that I had, I will say I think, in the future, when we- and I I should have as the chair probably caught this earlier in the week, but when we have an improvement status report, I would really like to encourage us to have outcomes based metrics uh performance measures that we can look at.

B

How are we actually performing what? How is the kind of what is the core metric by which we measure success, which should always ideally be outcome focused? So I really appreciate that as well in the future. um I I think you know to this point about other departments. I guess my my question is, I don't know if anyone wants to add on anything that's been said, but what can we do to go upstream of these challenges and whether it's it's improving or simplifying, really streamlining, simplifying the requirements?

B

We're standardizing? Certainly training is good, but training is also very labor. Intensive, so what can we do to make it simpler for our partners in departments across the city.

E

I mean I can start off. I mean jennifer's developed a fair number of checklists, so they so departments know what information they need to put together to get into the procurement queue um you know. Additionally, as jennifer mentioned in her presentation, we now include um in the rfp documents the exemplar contract, so that so that vendors have to state right out in the rfp response where they have issues with our agreements. So we can evaluate that so as not to slow down the contract negotiation process.

E

So jennifer did you want to add anything else that that we've done or we think might happen in the future- to help streamline the process.

F

I think the the work of the pbb and just having that out there and putting out the memo that we recently uh issued about a couple months ago about having every having having a department put together all of their procurement documents together before they kick it over to us. That would be the biggest thing, is getting them to recognize that they should need to assign the project to the right people and have those people be available and ready to work on the procurement collaboratively with us.

F

It's not just kicking the can over and say where where's my procurement. How come it's not done? It's a sort of behavioral change,.

B

Yeah that makes sense to me if I might just suggest one of one of the things I learned: um building software and using metrics to figure out what was and wasn't working is that we used a lot of health metrics to understand our failure modes and if, um if a large number of initial applications are not up to snuff, if they're not what they need to be for you to be able to move forward, it would be if you're not already.

B

It would be great to know what that rate is, and then, if actions you're taking to partner with or better train departments or simplify, the process is actually bringing down that failure rate, and I don't know, is that something you're currently doing or is that something that could be incorporated in the future?.

F

um It's something that we can certainly explore with guide house and how we might do that.

B

Great yeah I'd encourage that to be maybe part of that conversation, because if you, if you find that half of those applications are coming in complete you're, certainly right, that makes it impossible for you to do your job well, but I think, collectively, being part of one team, as the mayor said, it'd be great to figure out how we go upstream and bring that bring that failure rate down to five percent right. um Okay, I saw jordan had his hand up earlier. Did you want to chime in before? We take a vote.

L

Thank you, councilmember, um and just to add on to that, you know in terms of educating our our our fellow departments and and our team members. You know one thing that would be helpful, maybe is, I know my team back in the day did a map of the procurement process and who is in dark of which part of each phase or step of the process, but it would be helpful to to revisit that map but, more importantly, take a look at you know what are the timelines involved right?

L

So when you think about this and jennifer, I know you come from a supply chain background of having been in industry.

L

You know you look at where is your throughput and where's your bottleneck in this entire system, and then you target those bottlenecks to fix and alleviate those issues, and the bottleneck shifts right, but it'd be really important for us to understand, and I think that better helps educate others too in terms of getting the message across, but I think that'll be helpful for us uh in terms of what happens, and I think the other part is you know having been in the in the dear in the federal government space and seeing procurement uh evolutions there.

L

uh You know you know a lot of it is segmenting the check size and segmenting what you're procuring, and so maybe we can have a segmented approach that is unique for smart cities unique to software. uh That is, you know that could allow for a little bit more agile procurement.

L

You know, and I'm happy to share a little bit where, on you know the air force side, the greater department of defense side that have really procured software more agilely to build delivery innovations for mission impact, so just something to consider there.

F

Thank you and absolutely, I think. One of the things I lose julie- and I have been discussing is one of the outputs that we'd, like guide house to provide is definitely an updated process map so that we could make it pretty clear to everybody what to do when they want to picture something. That's definitely number one or less but happy to continue that conversation and how we could possibly look at um doing uh improvements to it. Procurement side.

L

Yeah and segment what you procure.

F

B

Great thanks for that comment. Thank you, jennifer and julia. I think we're ready to vote.

A

Holy hi jones, hi, ricardo, hi, cohen mayhem,.

B

A

B

Thank you, great motion carries, and we are on to our second item.

D

Thank you chair. The next item will be michael foster on the information technology, innovation technology projects, update michael.

M

Thanks rob, uh hopefully everybody can see my screen. Somebody say yes, okay, good all right.

M

Let me line up everything here uh good afternoon, chairperson mayor vice mayor members of the committee and members of the public, I am michael foster, division manager of the city portfolio products, project office, shortened to c-3po here to present the innovation and technology projects status report.

M

So um we'll start off with the now familiar city, road map, and we will fade into um a version of this map focusing on the squares that are related to this committee, specifically digital equity, san jose 311 and service delivery, and the power by people initiative uh called drive to digital on the following three slides I'll zoom in and update you again on our technical project, work tied to these citywide priorities.

M

The first zoom in is into digital equity, expressed here as digital inclusion and digital access projects.

M

I probably don't want to go into too much detail on this one, because literally the very next report will give you a lot more detail on this. So I am going to uh not steal their thunder and let the folks uh in the next presentation give you a lot more detail on this one, but again for uh for your information. uh There is an update slide here on the next one, uh we'll zoom in on the san jose 311 and service delivery, supporting projects.

M

So some good news here on the residential garbage and recycling service, we won a national project, experience award from the govex summit and obviously we're continuing to improve that process over time for sj 311, accessibility assessment.

M

We've done that assessment and we've already completed 40 of the critical accessibility recommendations and our next steps are, of course, to complete the remaining recommendations on the virtual agent um street lights and water inquiries have been identified as new services to be added to the virtual agent and we'll be working with vendors to implement these selected services and then, finally, on sj311 on the spanish and vietnamese translations over the last three months.

M

Spanish and vietnamese usage grew by 14 and 9 respectively, and our goal is to continue to engage community members to increase adoption on those, and one more slide here is the drive to digital zoom. In so, uh first is the omni channel strategy and process and service.

K

M

So previously reported that we had 37 paper forms automated, but since uh that last report we have published eight more workflows and our plan is to publish seven more um by the end of the year and our goal is a 50 total workflows planned for this fiscal year, um the one city workplace.

M

We do have some gaps in funding and timeline on that. But, as you heard actually in the previous presentation, it's getting ready for rfp submit submission and contract execution there hybrid work.

M

So this is the assessments for both city, employee work and public meeting participation, and there will be an update on the public meeting participation segment of it in the december smart cities meeting so, um but we are making great progress on both of these in terms of assessing the needs for a new hybrid work environment here at the city, as well as hybrid public meeting participation, then. Finally, the learning labs and innovation academies, so the learning labs continue. The next lab is 18.

M

People are going to take on three new human-centered design challenges, and this is a continuation of the innovation academies with the powered by people focus so um getting into the meat of things here. uh You you may recall that there's the bigger than a bread box it projects that we per the audit will be reporting on. So again, here's this familiar slide and there are projects that meet the following criteria.

M

So, once again, linking this to the city of overall road map, we fade into where we last left our heroes, so this is from august 5th and that fades into the latest version of the roadmap. As usual, I've got follow-on, slides here for what's change status. What's new and our project velocity.

M

So, um what's changed in new? um The first two here are a couple of policies that were not approved previously and languished for a while, but they are now approved and published. Those are the technology, management and deployments policy and the mobile communication and devices policy.

M

These are a pretty big deal that we've got these through and uh we could probably talk about that a little later. Next one is the copier printer replacement. Some of you who have started returning to city offices may have noticed that the copy or change color we have replaced white rico's with black toshiba's.

M

We have full replacement of the originally assessed devices that was done by august 31st and subsequent equipment orders are taking longer as supply chain issues continue to drag on inventory, and this is a you know. This is like complaining about the weather, there's sort of global supply chain issues that are interfering with uh getting some of the replacement parts and other devices, and things like that and we're obviously affected by them for the copier printer printer replacement.

M

uh Next, the building energy usage monitoring. So this one got a bit stalled during the pandemic, but it is planned for completion of all meter installations by uh this month, so hopefully that one next time we meet will be dropping off uh the eoc next generation technology, so that project um wasn't started earlier. But now the charter has been accepted and the project has started and they're seeking funding um and then finally, one city workplace, which is a next generation intranet.

M

um It does have some gaps in funding and timeline, but our next course of action is, of course, to secure funding and I believe, there's good news coming on that really soon uh net new projects. So we do have some new things appearing on the map here. uh The first one is the sj311 equity project.

M

So this is the sj311 service owners agreeing on equity objectives uh and to measure and monitor the ability to meet those objectives. This is in conjunction with uh the mayor's office of technology and innovation or moti, um and our next steps there are to create some dashboards and agree on the equity targets.

M

um Next is city building security cameras, so this was also mentioned in the previous presentation that we're doing a refresh and modernization of security, camera technology at city facilities, and this is going city-wide and uh I believe the rfp will be publishing soon on that.

M

um The next one is the environmental enforcement data management system and I'll lump in the laboratory information management system. These are two needs of the esd group environmental services department.

M

These are they're looking for basically next gen management software for their needs, as well as the next-gen laboratory management software and those are in the planning and analysis phase right now.

M

Finally, the hybrid work environment for uh conference room tech- this is preparing for the public and employee meeting spaces for a future where hybrid mode is normalized and common. So this is an assessment of conference room hardware and software to support that hybrid model of work. So we do need to address some budget gaps there, but that is underway. That assessment is underway.

M

Next, um on velocity, you can see that we've increased our velocity lately, you'll notice, there's a capacity line now as well. We like to consider that, given the folks we currently have that about 30 to 35 projects underway at any time is roughly our capacity limit, as you can see we're a bit over capacity right now.

M

The good news is that four to five of the projects you've seen today should be closed very soon and off the next smart cities report.

M

Of course, more projects are always rolling in and that never stops so rob had alluded to earlier this next section, which is I'm going to talk a bit about independent verification and validation, review process, which is in the new technology deployments and management policy that was noted before as having been approved.

M

So we can start with the definition here. Verification and validation are independent procedures that are used together for checking that a product service or system meets requirements and specifications and that it fulfills its intended purpose.

M

So the goal here is to have three projects per month, evaluated by ivnv. There's three different ways to do this: we can do option one which is just the c3po division manager. Does a review option. Two is an internal independent panel of three subject matter: experts to do the review and, of course, option three is going externally and and paying consultants to do that uh iv and view review.

M

um So a grading system for the projects is to know what to review. um We need to stack rank these by the following criteria. So um we look at the c-3po project qualifications as you've seen before greater than half a million involves, more than one department greater than one year in execution or high profile or sensitive to the city.

M

um Each one of these um would you know, kind of bounce it up a bit uh the status on the dashboard we mentioned the dashboard last time we met and there's those four cup force, colored squares there. So um you know if something is in yellow or in red condition. That would be uh extra points as well and then, of course, extra points for if it's high profile or sensitive to the city and extra points.

M

If that value column, that fourth column, there is not green, that's very important, and then the goal is to report this to this committee on six projects every other month uh with the current status and how the evaluation went via ibmg.

M

So just to give you an idea of sort of what we ask in ivnb, you know what is it? Here's some example questions that look under the hood of a project to get to the meat of the subject. Another another way of saying this is we're trying to prevent watermelon reporting here where it looks green on the outside, but it's really red on the inside.

M

So I don't need to read these, but you guys can take a look at them but they're. You know very basic things like how is the project tracking to scope, how's it tracking the budget, how's it tracking to completion date and milestones uh things like? Is there a charter?

M

You know we have a charter required in that new policy that I just talked about. If there isn't a charter, you've got a serious problem and and there's other questions, there's many more of these questions. But this is sort of how we start peering under the hood.

M

As I said um so, the next the six projects um will be reported for iv v every other month and they'll be summarized with a relatively simple, stop light orientation, which is you know, red, yellow, green on these three main categories, which is governance and funding, schedule and resource and delivery of value.

M

So the independent review of these three factors will help prevent watermelon reporting, as I talked about where the project appears green on the outside, but is really red underneath and appearing on this list with yellow or red, isn't necessarily a punishment.

M

It's an opportunity to get help and move projects forward or an opportunity to reassess priorities and focus our limited resources on the projects that are delivering the most value and I believe that's all I have and we can open it up for questions.

B

Thank you michael appreciate the overview. Do you have a few questions? Why don't we head over to public comment first and we will start with molly.

J

Thank you. This is molly macleod, um appreciated the presentation a whole lot. um I love the independent verification of validation and the importance of uh finding if there's any watermelons.

J

um With regards to mayor ricardo's, licardo's comments, which I wholeheartedly agree with the outcomes being more important and also how do we collectively city of san jose community change, the box, I'm going to go back to the guide house example of the contract, 665709.

J

Where you know, one thing that could change is looking at accessibility, conformance reports. That's the actual provider, saying we've done our checks to to set to national standards for accessibility.

J

Instead, you've got city of san jose, saying well, we'll check out with how three out of four users experience it, which users, elderly users, users that have lots of tech, savvy users that speak spanish or vietnamese or another language. Besides english, what about disabled users, who use a screen reader and to put that work on the backs of people with disabilities is um problematic, shall we say um from a moral perspective, so key takeaways.

J

Let's start looking at the accessibility conformance reports, and that would also include when we're looking at the guide house, which is going to be. You know, we're we're paying three hundred thousand dollars to have them redesign, and yet their website doesn't have content related to accessibility. What are their standards? Do? They have a charter on accessibility because most products most uh businesses will have. This is our accessibility journey and here's how we can check it. Instead, what I check is their website and it's got all these um errors and omissions.

J

We don't want to buy the same boxes over and over that are not serving people with disabilities. Thank you for your consideration.

B

Thank you. Let's go to blair.

I

Hi, thank you uh blair beekman here you know, I guess this being. uh You know the fall. uh It's just an important time to be reminding of what I can do best and just remind yourselves with these digital inclusion ideas.

I

uh You know to be thinking of open, good practices, open good public policy ideas um can really I mean I can say the words but to really practice the words it's important and, and it develops relationships between uh you know each city government department better and then that feeling then transfers to community who understands that you're trying to be more open and accessible about your practices that develops you know. Community trust community then starts to consider.

I

Well, maybe I can ask more what are open public policy ideas and and and and good uh civil rights practices and civil protection practices that that we can talk about together? um That's the process of innovation that I just continuously talk about here, we're talking about a bunch of new ai issues that are going to be happening. This fall. You know the the practices I'm mentioning can help immensely with that and just with our good selves, what we can do for ourselves. This fall is as a community um to speak of other digital inclusion issues.

I

I hope we'll we can learn to talk about the vaccine process even better than we have uh this this past summer and we've developed new ways to describe to ourselves. You know what what is the science of the vaccine process.

B

You're getting pretty off.

I

Track there? Okay, what? What can we expect from the science of the vaccine process and, I think, that's important, subject matter how we're going to develop this fall. Ai practices, our community data collection practices, how we talk about the future of digital inclusion and community trust?

I

It's not off track thanks a lot.

B

Thank you, okay, we'll come back to the committee and michael thanks again for the overview. I want to congratulate you for the uh the gov x you and the whole team for the gov x award. I was uh certainly very excited to see trash and recycling in 3-1-1. I haven't used it yet to do my free junk pickup, but anticipate doing that soon. So congratulations on that. um Unless anyone else has questions, I'm going to just offer up a couple to get us going here um on the dashboard. I appreciate the update.

B

I wasn't clear: when will we be at the point where we can actually just pull up the dashboard live and review projects stack ranked from the dashboard in this meeting rather than slides? Is that something we can do in the coming months?.

B

Well, I think we've lost michael see.

A

Michael's on the phone, I can answer that um jerry. Actually, it's an audit um requirement that we produce that dashboard publicly and we have responded in the audit.

A

The the audit updates that uh we put the target goal for publicly making that available um uh december and the reason why is we just want to make sure we run the water through the pipes to make sure we don't put stuff in the dashboard that um publicly we we would regret like any uh detailed information related to cyber security or privacy right sure should get too detailed.

B

Got it okay, great, but by by the new year by january, in theory, we could um actually, rather than just slides, we can actually pull up the dashboard and pull down different drop-downs and understand the stat dig into the status of different projects live.

A

Mr chair, we have made that commitment to the audit uh to the right. Yes, great, just.

B

Want to confirm excellent, that's exciting, well, good, that's very exciting, and then I wanted to on the um the the independent um verification validation. I um I just wanted to draw attention to. I know you had the example questions and one that actually didn't get called out explicitly, but I think is maybe at the end of the day, the most important one is how we're tracking the business value- and I know we talk a lot about outcomes, but I I just I want to emphasize that because certainly being on budget is important, very important.

B

Being on time is, is something we all should strive for understanding if there are changes or we have sufficient resourcing or what the dependencies are are all important, but at the end of the day, particularly, I think and I'll just speak for myself. You know representing district 10. um You know, I think, in this position. What we most care about is what's the actual impact to the day-to-day lives of residents and so being able to you've heard me say this many times before, but being able to define upfront before the project even kicks off.

B

How are our residents lives?

B

Going to be better when the project's completed or we get to our first public milestone with the project and then when we sort of pre-plan, for that we ought to be able to then gather data once it is live to the public and understand well did we did we have the positive impact for residents that we were expecting and I think one challenge I have with these status updates is that the projects all sound good and I think I understand what they all are, but we're not spending as much time talking about the tangible value to the resident, and so it's not always clear.

B

How important is this project how's it going to change life for our residents and then once we ship it, you know. Did that actually happen, or did we just have good intentions, but it didn't really hit the mark and that's all important for us to achieve our our mission. So I know it's, I know it's in there. It was one of the questions, but I just wanted to really double down on, emphasizing that to me being in the long run. The the the greatest value of this kind of tracking and performance system is really understanding.

B

To what extent did you improve people's lives through these through these projects? um Okay, I'll get off my soapbox? um Why don't I see if my colleagues- oh rob you want to chime in please.

D

Yes, uh just on that note, uh so we do have three things that we're improving practice on. uh One is that we identify that, and business value is one of the four things uh core questions um as you've heard before it's our iron pyramid, instead of the traditional iron triangle that that that fourth data point about business value is very essential to our model.

D

Number two is improving when we start not tracking towards those that we actually get better about canceling, calling out and canceling or fixing the project, so don't throw good money after bad if a project indeed might be finishable, but it doesn't produce the benefit and then the the, where were the weakest, that we're gonna still have a lot more work to do is the retrospective of checking in on that project, if it can, if it delivers the value and continues to deliver the value over the time.

D

The honest truth is we're not a strong bear, and so, as we get the ibm b program set up as we get um the reporting setup. um Our road map is to get better at that in 2022 um and into 2023. Just just to be honest with you about where we're tracking specific items in time.

B

Great and I really appreciate that you called out the willingness to also fail fast if we find something isn't delivering the value or it's much harder more expensive than we thought. There's there's no shame in that. That means we learned right. We should we should be willing to cut our losses and redeploy resources where they can have a bigger impact. So I appreciate that. Let me see if any of my colleagues have questions or want to offer a motion.

N

Move to accept the report.

A

B

Great excellent: okay: let's vote.

A

Foley I jones hi ricardo, hi, cohen and mayhem hi. Thank you.

B

Great okay- and we are so I'm just pulling my agenda back up we're on to our third item, which is the digital equity status report, and is this uh mrs zulma who's taking us off.

D

Jill and soma and others, and I think, jill's kicking us off, though correct hi jill.

O

Correct hi good afternoon, chair mahan and members of the committee, and thank you for having us here today to present an update on the city, priority roadmap item of digital equity.

O

I am jill bourne, a city librarian- and I am here today with a super stellar team of colleagues and partners who are engaged with us in this important work, the priority of ensuring that all residents are connected and have the tools and skills to participate in an increasingly digital society has been a city, council and city priority for some time and during the pandemic, this need became truly critical and our city leadership took a series of actions to advance digital access, connectivity, engagement and ultimately equity, especially for our most impacted and vulnerable residents.

O

Today, you're going to hear about the progress of each of the planks of these efforts, and I want to note that this is the first of two comprehensive updates being provided to council committees this month, the other being to the neighborhood services and education committee on october 14th.

O

So to get us started, I'm going to pass the mic to somo maciel, the director of the office of racial equity.

P

Great thank you joe good afternoon, chair mahan and members of the committee. I am pleased to be kicking off this presentation by recognizing the city-wide digital equity team and their accomplishments.

P

As the director of the office of racial equity, I to see the application of equity principles into the design and implementation of programs and you've heard me say it before the principles are desired and impact. What is the desired impact you want. What does the data say?

P

What about community engagement, what happens there and accountability and as you as you've, probably read in the memorandum and we'll see in today's presentation, it's clear that the team was intentional about approaching the work to achieve the greatest impact to ensure access to all things: digital for underserved communities, most in danger of being pushed further from socioeconomic prosperity due to a lack of digital access and infrastructure.

P

The team built the region's very first equity priority index. They involved and leveraged the expertise of staff and community partners to inform decisions and tracked and continued to report out on outputs generated by the project.

P

The role of the office of racial equity is to enable the city organization to embed this racial equity practice that will examine and improve policies and programs, so that, ultimately, we improve outcomes for communities of color and the digital equity project is one of several examples across the city that demonstrates what advancing racial equity looks like and specifically, how it's operationalized by my colleagues.

P

So this is progress and we're moving in the right direction and I'm very encouraged by the presentation you're about to see. Thank you for your time.

H

Mayor chair council committee, my name is ann krabowski, I'm the division manager for digital equity at the san jose public library, and I will be providing the bulk of the presentation today.

H

As, as you all know, the memo was extensive because I think we clocked in at 12 pages and um the the powerpoint is fairly expensive as well. We're going to move through it fairly quickly to preserve as much time as possible for questions and discussions.

H

um So please know that we won't go over everything on every slide, but we'll get started as wilma mentioned. The digital equity priority index is the center of our work. The council has seen this map before, but in front of you today is a map of the equity index and the methodology is along the side.

H

We won't spend too much time on it, but I just want to center us today in the acknowledgement that data is imperfect, especially census data, which biases us towards those who have participated in the reporting. But it's an important and, as we saw through the pandemic, um absolutely a critical feedback tool for us as we understand how and where we should deploy resources.

H

This slide you've also seen before this is a recap slide of the accomplishments of the team. Over the last in the last fiscal year, we had significant lifts in many of these areas and significant outputs that we've already shared with the council, but I just want to center us in how far we've already come and and to use this as kind of our guidepost for where we're going in the future, but into the really fun stuff.

H

So here's our status, update. Here's where we are, um I'm I'm pretty proud that, as you heard in the last presentation, lots of people are starting to use my my um traffic light um here on the in our dashboard, we're going to start with access eastside, which is broken up into three different project areas. So customer experience and outreach is one that is top of mind for us this year.

H

Customer experience and outreach is really focused on the areas of the network that have already been built and are fully operational for public benefit, so the james blick overfelt in yerba buena areas and in those areas we were working on a litany of items, one of them being an awareness and outreach campaign, so communications campaign which we'll deploy in quarter four of this year, as well as a website redesign to help ensure that there is a streamlined method for people to find information about digital equity programming and resources through the city and the library's website.

H

We are also onboarding into sj311 for a customer service survey tool which um is only yellow in nature right now, because we're going through the startup of it and but we're excited to be part of that project, and also the last piece of this puzzle, which is uh is a fairly large flip, is the data aggregation between the data that will be produced by the customer service survey and the data that is coming out of our network equipment on how the network is functioning versus how the public is engaging with the network.

H

um All of those are mostly on track or are will be back on track very shortly, as we work through some small, some small items that we need to clear up: network design and construction of the areas that are underway right now, but are not fully operational for public benefit. We have three attendance areas that are operational as I mentioned three attendance areas that are in final design and moving into the construction phases.

H

Two attendance areas that are in preliminary design and the downtown cambium network is live, which is exciting sustainability and management, which has been a focus of this committee, you'll, see both of the items here. The update for the digital equity study and the sustainability and management consulting review or community wi-fi are both yellow.

H

The focus right now for our team is really on ensuring that there's no slippage with our construction projects and really wanting to have a robust effort on the customer experience side of the work, and so we're delaying both of these items to start in the in the new calendar year, so that we can ensure full build out of the networks.

H

For the student hotspot program, we have funding for hot spots for 32 local education agencies. Carrying on from last year, we have 25 local education agencies that are that are managing devices on our behalf and distributing them to students right now, we're continuing to support those leas as they navigate the world of covid. We learned today that there's one of our partners had to shut down an entire grade level for quarantine recently and so being very flexible there with them, but currently we have 25 that are distributing devices on our behalf.

H

We have a brand new order of 1200 hotspots that was received into the library last friday and will be distributed out to branches later this week and early next week and we're awaiting emergency connectivity fund awards for new devices that we'll talk about more in a minute and then on our affordability and adoption programming. As you all know, the round one grant was extended to september 30th as the deadline and so grantees are, are completing their final reporting now and then we'll have round.

H

Two grants awarded in november are not awarded in november, but managed through by november. We'll know who's moving on um and who's, not we'll have a report to council in november and then our grant our round three grant processes are, are being shored up right now, so diving, even further in um on community wi-fi.

H

I just shared the current service plan for the existing areas um and what you'll see on the graph and what you saw in the memo is some of some of the high level data for how people are using the existing network, so we're seeing moderate and sustained use of all of the areas we're continuing to try and understand further and better what um what indicators really are meaningful as we track performance and find ways to ensure that when we do outreach on our customer service survey that it's a meaningful outreach that we're collecting data that is important to us.

H

The drops in june that you see kind of universally I would just want to acknowledge- were a failure of reporting from the equipment not from any. There was no outage um that we are aware of. This is a failure of reporting, but at this time I think more meaningful than any graph that I could put on.

H

The screen is to hear from our partner at eastside union high school district, and so I want to introduce randy phelps, who many of you know as the information and technology director for the district and he'll, tell us a little bit about how his students are being impacted and how the networks are functioning for for our important partners.

Q

Hi everyone um lots of friendly faces, who I know well uh nice to see you councilmember mayhem. I think you're, the new person on the block here so welcome. um Thank you. I at first I just want to thank everyone with the city, everyone from ed, kim and and rob and amanda and ann and jill. It's just been a great great project to work on um we've been together for so long.

Q

I feel like we're family at this stage, um the progress is really good and I can say for um the district and our our users we're extremely happy with the project. We think it makes sense on a whole bunch of fronts that I'm always happy to uh speak in long-winded paragraphs about what I won't do today, but I can assure you that the the benefit to our kids and our families and um our community is significant and it's been well worth doing.

Q

um I just signed off on some checks to the city, so um the pa, the payments are all happening in the proper time and and we have every um expectation that will continue. We were also lucky enough in our district to win the sprint. A sprint grant of 3 000 access points along with the ones that we got from the city so for the kids in neighborhoods that aren't hot, yet we're able to take care of those children and that's really awesome, and we just really appreciate the opportunity to to do this project.

Q

I think it's a shining light for other cities across the country. I get lots of phone calls about feasibility and how to do it, and all I can tell you- is I tell every single one of them that if they're lucky enough to have a mayor and a city council and staff to work with that or have been as helpful as san jose, they can pull it off. It's not it's not that difficult technically and it has a huge benefit for our students.

H

Thanks randy we'll move on um quickly. This is a slide that many of you have seen before. This is our our timeline by project area. We have, of course, the three that are active, we'll be bringing three projects uh or attendance areas online in the first half of 2022 and then in the later part of of the 22-23 fiscal year, we will have the last two areas.

H

The council also approved funding for a brand new fiber pull into the mount pleasant area that that is the barrier we needed to overcome to be able to build networks in mount pleasant and silver creek, and that should be happening um this winter, and so we're we're pretty excited for that too, and it's coming in well under budget, which is also exciting.

H

um Let's see, where are my notes? Lastly, as part of the broader city effort to enhance community wi-fi staff from the information technology department has led the effort to refresh the downtown wi-fi network working in partnership with facebook to decommission the paragraph equipment that was previously mounted in downtown and with the guidance and direction from the office of economic development, on which corridors should be included in the service area. We are happy to report that the brand new downtown wi-fi network is live.

H

You see here, you see a map here on the screen of the corridors that have the highest and most effective wi-fi service and coverage areas. I do want to just note quickly that portions of arena, green, um the plaza district of chavez and says chavez park and portions of st james park all have wi-fi connectivity which to me, is more exciting than having it on the sidewalk. So congratulations to our partners at it.

H

Whoa all right hot spots, um so I think pictures are- are worth a thousand words and I'll. Just let you be happy with these these thrilled faces on the screen. You know these numbers better than just about anybody in the city of san jose, so I won't read them.

H

I think the new data point that's important for you to see and was included in the memo is that, based on reporting from our local education agency partners, students that received a hot spot from sj access last in the last school year had an attendance rate of 93 percent, which is pretty stellar and, I think, exceeded all of our expectations, although, admittedly we didn't know quite what to expect, and so without saying any any more about our school hotspot program, I want to introduce superintendent elita macarthur, who is the superintendent leading the mount pleasant school district and she's, going to speak about the impact students.

R

Good afternoon, everyone thank you for the opportunity. I just want to share that your support significantly impacted our community.

R

I came in as a new superintendent during the pandemic and as we began to assess the need for connectivity internet connectivity, our survey was very simple. Just asking do you have access to internet and we were pleasantly surprised at the beginning that over 60 percent of our family said yes, and uh so we planned for 40 of our families needing to have access to internet.

R

As we got going with virtual learning, we began to find out that when we said connectivity or internet access for a lot of our families was a phone, um and so that was not enough for adequate connectivity to connect with distance learning. So I cannot say enough how having 700 hot spots from the city provided access to virtual learning tool for our families and our students. But beyond that, what we learn and what we will continue to implement this year, that increased parent engagement.

R

We saw increased parent participation on our parent trainings on our committee advisories, our board meetings, you name it so the parent engagement really increased when we surveyed our parents about access to um to distance learning.

R

We had positive ratings from our families and when we asked what they wanted us to continue, it was exactly that a village literacy, um tech literacy classes for them for parents, they wanted to know if they was, if we were ever again in the same situation that they were going to be able to be ready to help their students without going through three struggling months at the beginning of the year, trying us to get the devices out, providing the training you name it.

R

Another thing that we learned from them is that they wanna, because we all experienced this. They wanted to know how to better function in a society where a lot of things are done. Online banking uh accessing health services, community services- you name it so that is our goal. This year is to continue our parent training and workshops to build family parent literacy with technology.

R

We want to have a device to families that is for them to use. We have a device for our students that they're using, and I am proud to say that we are one to one and ready to go if we need to go on a virtual learning, um but our families having their own device to be able to do family business, so we're looking not continuing to work with the city as our partner to provide to continue to provide internet access to our families as well as a device.

R

Another positive connection um with having internet access. We were able to do vaccine clinics, a vaccination clinics at our site and by working and networking with local health providers and answering questions to our families directly about concerns questions that they have uh that our last clinic we there were 103 people that were vaccinated. 49 of them were first time they receive a vaccine other square second, so just making those family those community connections to resources connecting our families to what's already there in the city and our community is a huge help.

R

So again, I just want to say thank you so much. Thank you for the equity inclusion with technology. We, our families, benefit. We learn a lot and I just hope that we continue to work together and with this equity purpose and focus for our community. Thank you. So much.

H

Thank you so much superintendent. We really appreciate your partnership so this year, as the council has already reviewed, we are fully funded for 3 200 hot spots to be distributed to our school partners and are seeking additional funding through the emergency connectivity fund for the remaining allocation that will take us up to about 6 200 lines available for for students that are distributed through schools.

H

We are creating a youth hotspot program available through the library of 4 500 devices and also adding 1500 connected chromebooks to our collection that will be available and prioritized for use. All of these are contingent on the award of emergency connectivity funds. Those awards have started to be made by the um by the fcc and we're just awaiting our award, which we're told we should come forward within the next month.

H

um Then we'll move on. Like I mentioned earlier, we have 1200 devices that were received into the library. We are allocating those two branches based on where those branches are serving our community and where the neighboring community to that branch falls within the digital equity priority index.

H

So your residents should see those devices hitting the streets relatively soon, we're also reopening the cbo referral process so that residents throughout san jose, who are working with a cbo partner on digital literacy, equity or any other self-sustaining service area, can get access to a hot spot through that through that partner, we couldn't do it alone. These are the partners that we work with every day. The slide makes me very happy to remember that we're not alone and that the lift is being carried by all of us together collectively.

H

Lastly, we are going to talk just briefly about our affordability and adoption programming. The the notes on the slide are the systemic work that the city continues to do. The city and departments continue to do to uplift and improve in these areas, but without further ado, I'd like to turn it over to sunny mcpeak, who is our fearless leader of the california emergency technology, emerging technology fund, who's going to talk to us about our work with the digital inclusion grant.

H

S

You ann and what a pleasure it is to join you and jill and zuma in making this presentation so council, member chair, mahan and committee, the california emerging technology fund, was engaged by the council to assist with your digital inclusion fund community grants, and I must say it's always a pleasure to sit through a san jose city, council, meeting or committee meeting, because I love the way you drill down on on outcomes as opposed to just outputs mayor and uh for the benefit of the committee.

S

uh Just we want to review your digital inclusion grants our performance based on the outcome of adoption, which means essentially, three conditions, have to be met for unconnected households, which is they need to get connected to the internet. They must have a device that is appropriate for that household.

S

As you heard, superintendent macarthur talk about the need for the proper device, especially for students who are doing their work remotely, and there must be digital literacy that also you just heard superintendent macarthur talk about those three things have to be completed by the grantees.

S

There are 21 grantees in round one several have completed their grants. Others are going to be completing through the end of september and did and then also december, the quarter ending in september.

S

Those grantees are reporting their results of adoptions of next week on october 15th, so we'll have more specific quantified information for you. I want to say overall that the grantees have risen to the occasion.

S

It takes a lot for community-based organizations that are often held accountable to outputs to understand what it means to change the culture to outcomes and incorporate or integrate this work of digital inclusion to their usual service delivery.

S

We manage grants, statewide have for almost 15 years, and the san jose cohort is on track actually performing very well, and so I just want to close by thanking uh you and our colleagues in the city team, uh the city manager's office. Abbey shull is on point these days, the library jill and ann and the mayor's office, jordan's son for working as truly a team with the etf and managing two outcomes on your behalf.

H

Thank you, sonny um joe, unless there's anything else, you'd like to add we're ready to conclude the presentation and move to questions.

O

Yeah, I think we have one more slide. No, um oh, we do you're right. Thank you yeah this. uh So this last slide details just some of the resources that are available to our residents.

O

If you want to find free, wi-fi borrow a hotspot, borrow a computing device or take a class and using those devices all can be found at the san jose public library's webpages, starting with sjpl.org, and then, as we conclude our presentation, I just wanted to acknowledge and thank our staff and and the entire cross-departmental digital equity team, as well as our school district partners and cetf for their shared commitment and efforts to move the needle on this important work, despite many many challenges and obstacles of working across departments and across organizations and all the processes that this work entails.

O

So, despite all those challenges, this team always tries to get to yes, and I think that shows so with that. I want to thank you again for your time and welcome any questions you may have.

B

Thank you. What an inspiring presentation thank you jill and zoma and special thank you to our partners and guests who are here today to sonny and um and randall good to meet you for the first time and uh superintendent macarthur, just it's great to hear from you directly and to see the the fruits of this incredible partnership that um that we've all forged. So thank you. I'm looking forward to the discussion. Why don't we jump over to public comment and we will start with molly.

J

Good afternoon molly macleod, um I love the library and um the digital equity um part is just so very important. It's been a privilege to be one of the folks on an equity task force right now with the library and to be able to identify gaps and ways to go better. It nothing says um outcomes better than all the the students and families that have wi-fi hot spots and on the literacy classes too, want to put in a plug for accessibility.

J

There are wonderful, free um accessibility, trainings, um and I think that that's where it would be wonderful to have the mayor's office on technology and innovation to match up all of that innovative fabulous spirit of collaborations that gets these types of partnerships going with a broader view that has, for example, cities for all talks about smart cities and um making them more accessible for people with disabilities, and there is an opportunity to collaborate with uh dr victor pineda, who headed the uc berkeley, um focus and now has a world enabled he was involved in the language being developed that was developed for the united nations um standards for accessibility and is currently working with long beach.

J

That's uh the california city that had joined the government alliance on race and equity before san jose and had some examples there, the netherlands, abu dhabi, I sure, would like to have city of san jose join because the practical examples of access and equity that come here could be enhanced even further. If we are um able to to join in these types of um efforts. uh I've, let uh jordan and clay, know about that and and hope that it will be considered seriously thanks.

B

Thank you and we're on to blair.

I

Hi blair here sorry for my weird energy, but uh you know the last item was a public item about public issues and I was trying to develop ways to talk about. You know the public relationship with with government and the whole community process we're going through. I think I'm talking about relevant issues, and you know I'd like to further talk about those issues on this item and I hope I think I need to to preface my words and to begin by uh operating and considering the idea that you know not.

I

Everybody can have the proper ways to speak within city government practices, but people try to offer their honest ideas and input to the city government process, and I- and I hope you know you- can hear these ideas and you and you won't deny them or dismiss them simply because they come across as uncouth and not the the formal norms of accepted ways of talking about issues at this time.

I

To really talk about digital equity issues, I mean: how can digital equity issues address the future of our ai concerns? I think that's a major factor here that it's not exactly what this item is talking about, but I think we have to consider equity issues. You know in terms of how we practice the future of our ai things.

I

How can local communities learn to walk hand in hand with all the good digital inclusion ideas that can take place, but also ask the questions of the open public policies of new technology being placed in their neighborhoods?

I

That you know is questionable. Sometimes how can people ask about those things? How can this be a shared process of working together with different ideas and concepts and bringing them all into a whole?

I

That's what I'm trying to work on here people, so I'm a bit upset that you dismiss my words and you know we have to learn how to talk in cooperative terms. Thank you.

B

Thank you blair, and we do also need to stay on the topic of the item. Why don't we come back to the panel? Thank you to those who commented great, and I know unfortunately, we we lost the mayor to a cnn interview, obviously very important, but he wanted me to just stress his uh deep gratitude to all of our partners, and especially um our guests, who showed up today to share a little bit of their perspective on the work that we're doing together.

B

So I know he and his team have been just instrumental in bringing this to fruition and care deeply about the work of digital inclusion, and he just wanted me to to make sure I expressed that on his behalf. So with that, um thank you all again great presentation, great progress and we're gonna go to council member fully.

N

Great thank you, wonderful presentation and wonderful topic. I remember when we activated digital inclusion in such an aggressive way when we realized how quickly schools were getting shut down and they didn't and and students did not have the technology they needed and how quickly everybody responded to that east side. High school district, our partnerships and the funding that was received jill and your team sonny everyone and the work that you've done is truly incredible and helped our students through and families, through a really really difficult time and now they're back in person, which is great.

N

That's wonderful! It's not without its complications. I understand that, but it also doesn't mean that the technology, both the access and the devices, are not important, they're, equally important. In fact, what what we learned is how important it was, and while school districts were trying to trans uh transfer to technology.

N

Pre-Covered covet forced the issue, and now there are devices in many student every student's hands. I know san jose, unified has been really good at getting a device in everybody's hands and, of course, the federal funds and the state funds have helped with that as well, but our hot spots have has helped tremendously, and the devices has helped tremendously and keep those devices in the hands of our kids, because and not not just that, but as we heard from the principal principal and foreign superintendent, sorry sorry, I gave you a demotion.

N

I didn't mean to that how important it is to have access not just for education purposes but for job searching and edd and applications, and many other things that need to be done so real kudos to your team for filling a need that was so critical that we knew we had. We just didn't know how much we needed it across the city and all this all of our kids benefited. All of our schools did benefited. There are weak uh internet accesses all over the city.

N

Some have weaker accesses than others, but with what you've done is really been oppressive to to help our kids, it doesn't mean that their education didn't slip during the during the virtual teaching, because that was tough, but uh at least uh we were able to help them with the technology they need. So I don't really have any questions other than are you seeing any devices and major just major kudos to all of you, because we we would.

N

Our kids are so much better off now, because of all of your efforts, are we seeing devices come back that the are no longer needed, because the school districts have the funds available same thing with the hot spots and and to what level.

H

Thank you for the question council member. uh We are seeing devices come back to the library um actually school districts who are who have either transitioned to their technology source for hot spots or who, for whatever reason, have chosen to terminate their their connectivity. Services um are returning their devices to the library and we we will be repurposing those so that we're not purchasing net new devices we'll be uh refreshing, those and turning them into use hotspots so that our our cost is lower.

H

um We're seeing I couldn't give you a number right now for what is is returned and functional. um Certainly, second graders had a hard time, not misplacing the power cords, and some of those hot spots are rather sticky, so our teams are going through right now and understanding on an inventory basis what's functional, but I believe that we've received about a thousand devices back into the library 500 of those have already been repurposed and sent back out as youth hotspots available immediately through the branches we're continuing to to refresh and redistribute those.

H

But I don't have exact numbers right now for what the rate is.

N

Yeah that that's helpful and really the crux of my question was about repurposing. So thank you for for mentioning that. I wondered what we did with them when they came back and and how we uh made them available in the future. What we did uh to be the have them be available, and I understand that little ones might be tough on computers, but or laptops, but or devices, but so can teenagers. I imagine be uh just just as difficult on them.

N

Are we uh if, through the library system, we're still checking the hotspots and and devices out, do we have an idea uh or how are we reaching out to our senior population or are those who have accessibility, issues, uh possib population, not accessibility issues? I shouldn't say it that way: accessibility needs.

H

Sure sure um and and jill actually I'll, let you start you've overseen a lot of the work on accessibility for us.

O

Yeah, so, during the original outreach um last year we uh created a special challenge of the work with a community community-based organizations that work directly with seniors and um and had a real focus on trying to reach out to them to get devices and hot spots into the hands of folks who needed them, and that did include taking out the maker spaceship to check out devices in in neighborhoods, at special locations at senior centers um and and also launching some other programs which are not sort of digitally related.

O

But we were launching our first ever library by mail program, which was also part of this effort to get out, especially to homebound seniors. So so that work will continue. And, as anne said in the presentation, we are relaunching our cbo referral program for this purpose. As we get more devices, we had it a little bit on hold because our checkout rate of our hotspots got to 100.

O

So we didn't want to be going out there telling people to come, get their hot spots at the library or to place. Someone hold to have them delivered and not have any available. But now that we're going to be increasing that collection significantly we'll be able to to reinitiate that outreach effort.

H

And I'll just add to mayor's comments earlier that we're all on our team. We've worked really closely with the parks, recreation and neighborhood services department who has their they have the in with the senior population. They've got a special pilot going with source wise and so um there's been direct referrals for those participants um and source wises. um The source-wise senior population that they're connected to into our hot spots right.

N

That's great, thank you so much for all of your work. I look forward to the next report and uh kudos to all that you've done that. That's it for me, chair. Thank you.

B

Thanks, council member all right, councilman cohen,.

B

Yeah sorry, council councilmember, if you're able to.

T

Is it better? Now? Yes, oh okay, I I I hadn't had a chance to test it. That's why I wasn't available able to stay here during roll call before anyway, um we're good now, anyway, good.

T

um I know it seems, like we've, seen a lot of of each other with these reports recently, so I'm glad to get another update and that we're probably going to see your report what again at nsc next week, the same so so I'll only ask a couple questions this week, so I can save some for next week, but actually can you go to slide 12 while I, I think you already kind of answered the beginning of my second question, which was about um when, when devices come back how usable they are for future, you know for uh to be checked out, and I assume with devices like this, you have damage and, and things happening to them, you talked about sticky uh hot spots, I'm I'm envisioning hot spots, being good coasters, but um anyway I I guess we can talk about that a little bit, but um is that 12, maybe 11?

T

That is what I meant.

T

um So I I see most of these most of these uh targeted allocation of devices are kind of overlapping, with the east side, partnership right in terms of where you're building out community, wi-fi and, and also that sort of that heat map. Of uh of that you should have on the left or is that? That's is that true.

H

They are, they are roughly aligned, I think the other. um The other piece of the map that you see here is covered transmission rates and that's that's the other kind of compounding variable that we're looking at and considering.

T

I was only going to briefly ask about alviso branch and whether I mean I know it's a small area with smaller circulation. I assume, even though a library may not appear on this list, that all libraries have some hot spots and some devices available, even if they're, not one of these most targeted ones,.

H

Yes, absolutely um so all branches are getting at least a baseline of 20 devices, and then it escalates and ratchets up higher and higher from there, based on based on the digital equity, score, cova transmission rates and then also what we know about what the school districts are doing in the area, whether they have like eastside union high school district has an onslaught of hotspot devices, but alum rock doesn't and san jose unified is not issuing devices this year so work work.

H

We don't have a concrete data source for that last variable, but we've been adjusting the allocations per library branch based on what we know is happening in the area.

T

So if people are starting to show up asking for them, you can move them from branch to branch as needed.

H

We can do that, but yes, everyone at all all branches are getting devices and we'll continue to adjust and reallocate as needed.

T

Okay, yeah this morning I was actually spent an hour with the superintendent in orchard school district. It was great to hear from the educators on on the call today to get some first-hand experience as to why this is important when I was at orchard this morning. I wish I had been thinking of some of these questions about their students. Their high needs school district with very few students, but I was you know I should have been asking some questions about how their students are covered with technology and I apologize chair.

T

I have to leave in two minutes because I'm heading up to north san jose to visit the santa clara, unified school district's new school up there so for four o'clock engagement at a school today, today's my education day, I guess, but um um they actually have plenty of devices for their students in that district, but um I will I will ask. Maybe this will be a question for next week's meeting.

T

um We've talked about building out the independence high school area coming next, but independence has a very complicated attendance boundary. The students coming from all kinds of places, the orchard area in oakland, road and all the way north into north san, jose and- and you know not as compact and as easily defined area, so I'd be curious, just to see sort of a map of where the actual service will be versus where the attendance area is just to see.

T

So I have an understanding um if people ask me about it- or just so, I know what's getting covered with the installation, that's coming this fall and into the spring.

H

Yes, absolutely we'll actually set that up as an individual meeting, so that you have more time for questions, and yours has more time for questions, but we'll be able to review the construction map of what is um planned for construction.

T

Yeah great well, thank you so much for the update.

B

Rating council members since you're leaving us- maybe you can do me, the favor of offering a motion. I.

T

Will move? We accept the report? uh Second, I'm sorry, I'm dude.

B

Thank you before we vote. I I just want to thank you all again: city staff. We've done tremendous work here, our partners, california, emergency technology fund, all of our district partners, non-profit partners. I know it's an incredible team effort, but it's clearly having a really significant impact in the community. So just thank you all again appreciate the very substantive and inspiring update. So with that, why don't we vote.

A

Fully hi jones, aye cohen and mayhem hi. Thank you.

B

Okay, thank you great. We are on to our fourth and final item, which is the I.t audit report.

K

Good afternoon uh otter, it's a very short update. So this is an update on our information technology audit report. uh The work is underway currently and will be presented in closed session when it's complete as it relates to it infrastructure security and that's my update.

B

Great joe, you surprised me that was an awful quick update. Let's go to. Thank you. um That's great love, having efficient meetings. Why don't we go over to public comment and we'll start with uh caller ending in 5140.

G

Yeah with your it infrastructure, I mean the three one: one app is terrible: the telephone system calling city hall or the police department.

G

uh The library is good. I can give you a thumbs up on that, except for the librarians, but with the it the 311 app is terrible. This whole zoom system is awful. uh You guys need to spruce things up. We want to call yourself the capital of silicon valley.

G

I could tell you it's not good uh if you guys can't even get the phone system right at the police department, your I mean, and the police department's website is complete garbage, oh my god, what a joke of a website that is, so you guys need to clean up your websites. You need to get. You need to get the 311 app to work properly, uh calling get better than that stupid app.

G

I took it off my phone, it's so bad and I mean really do I need to carry around a phone to take a picture or something for you guys to repair you got. I should be able to call you guys should be able to repair it. I mean you're, making the citizens use their own devices, so they can help you do your job. What does that tell you?

G

Let's just be able to call you, or I should be able to tell my city council person what the problem is and where it is, and they can go, look at it and use their phone and take a picture of it. I always love the oh yeah just use the app it works so well, and we know right where no, it doesn't work. Well, anytime. Somebody says: go on the app of almost anything, whether it's this city or even a private company.

G

It doesn't work very well, the technology's not there yet, and I got a brand new phone, but I can't imagine the amount of money you're spending for for this high-tech stuff. That's complete garbage. I just I can't imagine I mean I know what works well. Is the high-tech parking meters.

B

Thank you we're on to we're on tamale.

B

Molly, I still see you as muted. There we go.

J

This is molly macleod. Thank you. So much for letting me know I was muted um chair. um I would like to know who is the outside consultant um I'd like to be able to look up on guiles and see the consultant scope of work and um for the audit on it?

J

That would be really helpful. um So if you could share that information either now for everybody or I can follow up with you on an email. The other question I have on technology. I've given feedback on the real estate services access report, 21-03 having to do with recommendations about getting a it for tracking all the real estate. Since the city doesn't have a complete listing, and my recommendation was to ensure that there was space in the.

J

Database that would include um accessibility. Information, for example. Are there stairs uh how many are um accessible bathrooms? What other barriers are there? There really aren't descriptions that are available to the public, for example, um for finding out basic access information, and it would be helpful for both city staff and could be used um outs for the members of the public to have that available in a database. So I'm wondering how that procurement is going and um didn't hear back from real estate, so I I really have no idea on that one.

J

So those are my two questions: who's the outside consultant. If you can give the um the guile's reference number the scope of the audit and the real estate update. Thank you so much, and I do hope that um that accessibility will be a focus of future audits. Thanks, citywide.

B

Thank you and we are on to blair.

I

Hi really nice words from molly macleod today, she's done a really uh good work and uh thanks for her words today, um my words are in a mess today.

I

I hope that uh council person mahan you can review my public comments today uh in the future and just really consider that I did practice the ideas of what could be relevant to the subject matter and agenda items. My words are a bit abstract, but gosh darn it. I try to make a really important point that comes into the the.

B

Do you have a comment on the audit.

I

And public comment.

I

Agenda items are about, and that needs to be respected by you, guys more you're, not doing that enough um for this item. I just would like to thank the work of city daughter uh at this time, who, I think, uh he's doing some interesting work uh around issues of equity that I'm interested. uh You know uh as a part of a whole community process that we really need to talk about this fall. How can we talk about our better practices of democracy, equity and just develop good concepts together, heartfelt concepts as a community?

I

It's vitally important, and the city auditor is doing a really good job at this right now and how can we add our part to it? I feel I should be allowed the words that I'm trying to offer on subject matter at this time and uh to to to further those sort of good questions that people like the auditor are working on at this time about reimagine about equity and uh thanks for your time.

B

Thank you. Okay, back to the committee and joe, do you um have an answer on the consultant question.

K

Yeah, so the consultant that uh unless rob, wants to take this on sure.

D

I can do it as well joe's, uh so we did uh do a multi-award. um The consultant in this case is sp uh spire inspirant. uh I forget how to say it correctly, um there's also a city audit component of this, and because it falls under um security of the city and our systems.

D

um If it's not the the details of the report are not releasable, uh there will be a summary information that will be provided later in tandem with joe, so we're working very closely together. So anything you would add. No, I think that's it. I just.

K

Didn't know if you want to say anything about the the procurement piece of it but yeah so they're. We initially put this on the agenda because we didn't know what the content of the report was going to be and we're scheduling further out. But now, as I said, because of the nature of we'll be under closed session.

B

Yep got it thanks, joe rob and council member fully.

N

I just wanted to move to accept the report. Thank.

B

You exactly great okay, let's vote.

A

Foley hi jones, hi mayhem.

Q

A

B

Great thank you, motion carries and we're on to open forum, which is an opportunity for members of the public to speak on any items that did not appear on today's agenda but is still within the jurisdiction of this uh committee. So let's go over to public comment and we'll start with blair.

I

Hi blair here um sorry for a tough meeting. I just I have feelings that I I my voice is not being respected enough. My ideas are not being respected enough. If you review each item today, I specifically talk about agenda items and then connect them to my ideas of thinking of how I'm working on these issues on the very issues you're talking about the connections between community, you know digital inclusion and equity.

I

It has to be talked about in terms of open public policies and I'm sorry. I didn't make that more friendly and clear to the community process we're all trying to build. This fall. It's incredibly important to talk about. You, know our heartfelt connections and not just to build things in terms of technology.

I

That's an important concept. I don't say enough here this month that I'll need to learn how to do and and and to respect. You know all the people from the last month who came in about the vaccine issue.

I

They may not be the voices we want to hear the most or all the time, but they have a very important point and and their their voice needs to be included in the future of our discussions. You cannot just shift that sort of thing away, which is what you're doing to myself. Today we have to talk about the science of the vaccine process better. This fall simple as that and and that's how you're going to be able to build the ideas of trust, how we're going to talk about all the future of technology.

I

That's going to be developing out of these new vaccine things. You have to learn to start talking about these things openly and make it a trusting process. You're shushing me away again as usual, and I don't like you guys doing this to me- I'm trying to be respectful and do this in decent terms. Man, you guys got to respect my voice when I speak at public comment time when I'm trying to deliver and offer is an incredible form of good practices and for you to say otherwise. It's incredibly insulting.

I

Is that clear? I hope I'm clear and we'll work on this together and talk about good practices. uh This fall thank.

B

You thank you. We're on to 5140.

G

And where do I start? You know, I mean this city, I mean the.

K

G

Road diet: this is something that everybody listening should look forward to two lanes now, instead of three on each side, you could thank pam foley for that. uh As for blair, I feel bad for you dude, they don't care, I mean they have to do this by law. You think, if it wasn't, this thing would be. If this wasn't the law, this thing would be so secret. I mean I can remember when they did secret things like uh on a saturday morning.

G

They wanted to get rid of the manger at christmas in the park and the mayor and city council met illegally. They got caught for it, but you know their debt. They definitely have to do these things because it it's the legalities there. If it wasn't, it would all be in secret. They just get to show you what's there, they get to do it in front of your face, but the only thing is we get to complain about it and tell and tell the politicians publicly how we feel and you guys don't get enough of it.

G

There should be a thousand callers calling into you people with the amount, the 10th largest city in the nation. You would think more people would call in and tell you what a lousy job they're you're doing, but they don't have time they've got you guys, hold these meetings at odd hours. They go till midnight. This whole city, council mayor you guys, should be ashamed of yourself. I can't say it enough. I mean look at that downtown.

G

Look at it. I want everyone to look at that downtown and say wow. That's a city council that really knows how to how to do a good job running a city. Look at the potholes! Look at the burned out buildings.

G

Look at what the city looks like the trash everywhere. You would think we'd be the greenest city in the world with all the recycling that we have here and everything else you don't have it. This city is run horribly. This place is going by the way of venezuela every single day. Just take a look around it's pretty clear. They can't even keep the fountain running.

B

Thank you. We are on to molly.

J

This is molly. um Thank you very much. um I would like to say that this is making a difference. um Yes being heard, doesn't always get the changes you want. um When I was participating in the office of cultural affairs. You know my hope for a work plan was was not voted up, but during this meeting, jordan has sent me an email reply, saying that he's already reached out to victor pineda with world enabled um the one who's doing the part of the cities for all and has um capacity for another city.

J

Is there working with long beach and um abu dhabi and the um in amsterdam? So I take encouragement from that. I'm also encouraged, because um you know it was my public comments on san jose 311 and the americans with disabilities act that led to the accessibility work.

J

That's been done and 40 percent of the way there that's progress and then, um when I had questions about it, um german uh introduced me to namrata batra agrawal who's, the new um staff person, who's working on the accessibility of san jose 311, and we had a good conversation found out that we're both fans of one accessibility person's um work and uh what we have in common. So I am um in this with you and that's. What it takes is to identify okay, here's this box. um Is this really the box?

J

Is this how we want to box ourselves in or open things up, and I am so incredibly thankful for um the the work particularly being done on the hot spot, so have a great rest of your day. All thanks.

B

Thank you, molly and uh great rest of the day to everyone appreciate your time. We are now adjourned. Thank you.

B