All right, good morning, everybody, and welcome to our April 14th, 2025 rules committee meeting.

I'm your chair, Supervisor Shimon Walton, joined by Vice Chair Steven Sherrow and of course our President Mandelman, and we have Supervisor Mark Mood here as our guest this morning.

Our clerk is Victor Young, and I would also like to thank Eugene Lubadia from SFGov TV for making sure that this meeting is broadcast for the public.

Mr.

Clerk, do you have any announcements?

Uh yes, public comment will be taken on each item on this agenda.

When your item of interest comes up and public comment is called, please line up to speak on your right.

Alternatively, you may submit public comment in writing either the following ways.

Email them to myself, the rules committee clerk at VICTOR.yo UNG at sfgov.org.

If you submit public comment by email, it would be included as part of the file.

May also send rent comment via US mail to our office in City Hall.

One Dr.

Carlton be good at the place, room 244.

San Francisco, California 94102.

Please make sure the silence all cell phones and electronic devices.

Documents to be included as part of the file should be submitted to the clerk.

Items acted upon today are expected to appear on the Board of Supervisors' agenda on April 22nd, 2025, unless otherwise stated.

That completes my initial announcements.

Thank you, Mr.

Clerk.

Please call item number one.

Item number one is ordinance mending the administrative code to allow city departments to purchase content and data subscriptions without compliant with solicitation requirements that would otherwise apply and without adhering to provisions in the municipal code that impose obligations on contracting parties as a condition to agreements with the city and to list conditions required for amendments or modifications of such agreements.

Thank you.

And I believe we have a team from the city administrators' office here to present this item.

Good morning, committee members.

And good morning, Vice Chair Sherrill, President Mandelman, and Supervisor Mahmood.

My name is Molly Peterson, and I'm pleased to be here today on behalf of the Office of the City Administrator to speak with you about this proposed legislation related to data and content subscriptions.

I have a very short presentation to share with some background and context.

So I wanted to start uh my presentation by talking a little bit about the city's procurement landscape.

Real quick, sorry.

Sorry to interrupt you.

Um we do uh have some comments from Supervisor Mahmood.

My apologies.

Um thank you, uh uh Chair Chair Walton.

Um sorry to cut you off, Molly, but uh just uh thank you again for bringing this resolution this uh ordinance to our our office and uh I just wanted to speak briefly about um why we we carried it forward and I think the impact it can have for our city.

Um I know when we took office, a lot of what we wanted to focus on was how can we help city departments uh get do their service and on behalf of the people.

And I believe that this legislation will provide departments with an important pathway to purchase a very specific, just very focused type of information, which is data and content subscriptions that you need to do the work you do.

Um I know I was surprised when I then talked to Michael at the city librarian and then Carmen Chu or City Administrator on the types of data services that you were not able to access.

Um the city librarian couldn't access basic business data and provide it for free to the public.

Um instead, they're handing out paper manuals.

Uh and the city administrator's office.

I know that back in college we would use Lexus Nexus.

Uh I hated that term, but um as uh so old, but it was like a software tool that we used to find uh kind of I think legal uh data and stuff that we need to access uh for free.

But it seems it's difficult to provide Lexus Nexus internally in San Fran in the city of San Francisco.

Um and so I firmly believe that as elected officials we have to do what we can to make government work smarter, work more efficiently, and provide the data and the software that we are used to providing in the private sector.

Um but right now, I think as I understand it, the city's contracting process is making it difficult for the departments to operate in this way.

And this is because the current code that the legis that this legislation is amending was written in the 1990s when physical books were the only mechanism to get data.

And as a result, departments from the treasurer to the assessor recorder have been delayed for months every year in purchasing the data that they need, while others like the city librarian, like I mentioned, are providing outdated paper manuals to the public instead of the digital content subscriptions to residents who rely on public resources that as private residents we have access to in our everyday lives.

And so I think how we how we approach reforming and modernizing government, we have to be nimble and effective.

And this is just one important roadblock that we can remove to make things easier and more efficient.

And I do believe that this legislation is table stakes to bring our city government into the 21st century.

And this is a very focused legislation, is focused on a very one specific type of data conduct, which I'm looking forward to Molly.

You kind of share more context on the type of services this will help our community and our public with.

Thank you, Supervisor McMood.

And now we will hear back from city administrators' office.

Thank you so much, uh Chair Walton, and thank you, Supervisor Mahmoud for those opening remarks.

I think that's exactly right.

Um so I'm excited to share more context and background today and talk specifically, as you say, about the sort of tailored narrow use case that we're that we're moving forward with this legislation.

So I'll start uh, and this is slide two in your packet, um, talking about the city's overall procurement landscape and challenges that this landscape can cause for city departments who need to make purchases, such as data and content subscriptions to support their operations.

So I lead the government operations team in the city administrator's office, and for the last several years, we've been working to identify and to address challenges in procurement here in San Francisco, because we see that their city's procurement framework can be quite difficult to navigate.