Meeting Information

Southeast Community Facility Commission

M I N U T E S
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 28, 2002
6:00 P.M.
1800 Oakdale Avenue
San Francisco, CA 94124


I.          Call to Order
Commission President Millard Larkin called the Wednesday, August 28, 2002 meeting to order at 6:19 p.m. in the Alex L. Pitcher Community Room at 1800 Oakdale Avenue.

II.          Announcement
Commissioner Larkin read the Sunshine Ordinance aloud and welcomed everyone to the meeting.

III.          Roll Call
Present:          Commissioner Bobbrie Brown
                    Commissioner Millard Larkin, II
                    Commissioner Enola Maxwell
                    Commissioner Atiliai Tofaeono

Not Present:          Commissioner Heidi Hardin (excused)
                              Commissioner Kim Nguyen (excused)

Staff Present:          Robert Bryan, Deputy City Attorney; Toye Moses, Executive Director;
          Joseph K. Tham, PUC Real Property Officer, Annette Price and Liz Palega, SECF                     Commission Secretaries

I.          Approval of Minutes
Commissioner Maxwell moved and Commissioner Looper seconded to accept the minutes of Thursday, August 8, 2002. Motion passed to accept minutes as presented.

V.          Public Comment
Commissioner Larkin opened the floor for public comment and noted that requests may also be heard after Commission discussion of an agenda item by completing an information card and submitting it to the Commission Secretary. Requests will be given on a first-come-first-serve priority and speakers may be limited to three (3) minutes. (Speaker cards were made available).

VI.          Communications
Dr. Moses reminded that at the previous meeting, staff was directed to send invitational letters to the following to meet with the Commission: a) Chief of Police, Earl Saunders; b) Reverend Calvin Jones, Charter School at Providence Baptist Church; c) Mr. Charles Flowkes, Transitional Housing for the Homeless at Providence Baptist Church; and d) Acting Director of Elections, Mr. John Arntz.

Other communications for the perusal of the Commission included: a) Decorative Plant Services Facility Quarterly New Hire Report; b) Request from City College to sublease space to SFUSD; and c) Appreciation letter from Commissioner Brown for support during her loss.

VII.          Presentation
Commissioner Larkin introduced Michelle Meeker who spoke about "Hypothermia as a Treatment for Severe Traumatic Brain Injury".

Ms. Meeker announced that Dr. Manley and Dr. Holland were unable to attend the meeting because there were two head trauma incidents that evening which required their surgical expertise. Ms. Meeker is a nurse at S.F. General Hospital (SFGH) in the Department of Neurosurgery. She showed a slide presentation and explained the following in detail:

The National Acute Brain Injury Study: Hypothermia II (NABIS:H II) is taking place at SFGH under the auspices of University of California of San Francisco (UCSF). Severe traumatic brain injury occurs as a result of an accident, e.g. a fall, car accident, or assault—resulting in patients becoming comatose, unresponsive or minimally responsive. Nationwide statistics on traumatic brain injury indicate that every 15 seconds a person sustains one (1,200,000 new cases each year), 50,000 persons die annually and 80,000 are permanently disabled. The risk of brain injury is highest among adolescent young adults and those over 75 years of age. The risk for males is twice that of females because generally, males engage in more risk-taking behavior than females. The community that this program serves is the Northern San Mateo County and San Francisco. NABIS:H II is a study that has been designed to determine if hypothermia helps certain brain injured patients. This multi-center study consists of nine centers and is funded by a large national research program called National Institute of Health. The study is expected to enroll 200 patients nationwide over a period of three years--about 10 patients annually at SFGH.

The use of hypothermia treatment with brain injury patients has been in effect for quite some time. It is very useful in certain patients, but has never actually been studied prospectively. There is not a good understanding of why it works—only theories. The previous NABIS:H I study was also a multi-center study conducted at ten centers nationally. There was a significant treatment effect but only in patients between the ages of 18 and 45 years who reached cool temperature. However, those who did not come in cool, could not be cooled quickly enough. Patients who were over the age of 45 did suffer complications, e.g. infection at a slightly higher rate than the controlled group of those who were not cooled. As a result, patients over the age of 45 will not be included in this study. The theory is that hypothermia helps the injured brain because it slows down secondary injury to the brain. The primary injury to the brain is the actual impact on it and secondary injury is what happens after the impact. Generally, swelling and micro bleeding that occurs are mainly a result of higher cellular metabolism. It is suspected that cooling slows down the injury consumption of the brain and helps control the swelling and stabilize blood vessel walls.

The inclusion criteria of participates in this study are patients with severe brain injury due to trauma with no penetrating injury confirmed by head CAT scan. For example, a person who was in a car or motorcycle accident, hit on the head with an object such as a baseball bat, fallen down a flight of stairs or out of a window. Patients who have penetrating injury such as a knife or gunshot wound to the head cannot participate because those are different injuries to the brain and there is not evidence that this helps those kinds of patients. As mentioned, the injury must be confirmed by CAT scan with no evidence of trauma bleeding to the chest, abdomen or pelvis areas. Patients must be between the ages of 16 and 45 years of age.

There is a parallel pediatric study occurring in institutions nationwide, which include patients under the age of 16. Ms. Meeker does not anticipate seeing very many patients here because they have to be 94 degrees Fahrenheit or about 35 degrees Celsius upon arrival. Patients must be cool on arrival to the emergency unit. There are quite a few patients seen who are cool on arrival but they have to meet all the criteria as required. The reason patients must be cool on arrival is because otherwise they cannot be cooled down quickly enough for this treatment to be effective. In addition, patients who have other significant bodily trauma, e.g. significant chest or abdominal injury, broken pelvis or liver laceration are disqualified—excluded from this study. All female patients of childbearing years who arrive at the emergency unit must have a negative pregnancy test to be eligible.

Patients who cannot participate in the study are: a) Comatose or semi-comatose patients with a normal head CAT scan. They are inebriated or under the influence of drugs which causes them to be non-responsive—not because they actually have the significant brain injury; b) Brain-dead patients. In most parts of the country, they are considered dead; c) Patients who have evidence or are suspected of internal bleeding; and d) Patients who have suffered a penetrating injury, such as gunshot or knife wound.

In the consent process, persons participating in the study must give informed consent or permission before any research procedures can be performed. Consent must be given in person and cannot be given over the phone. Patients who are comatose cannot give consent, so normally the next of kin would be asked for permission. If a patient's immediate family is unavailable to give consent, then those persons actually cannot participate in the emergency research study. The solution on a national level has been to devise some guidelines of how to conduct emergency medicine study without consent use, "Waiver of Consent".

Ms. Meeker emphasized that the main reason for the presentation was to request support from the Commission in advocating consent from the community for this kind of research study. There are very specific circumstances for which the "Waiver of Consent" can be used—must be a life-threatening situation and available treatments are unproven or unsatisfactory. Statistics indicate that medical techniques have not been very successful in saving many of these patients or returning them to a normal functioning life. The patients are supported in many different ways, but unfortunately many do not do very well in the long-term. The research must be necessary to prove safety and effective intervention, and show that cooling is an effective treatment. It has been found that obtaining informed consent is not too feasible and the study cannot practically be carried out without the waiver of informed consent. Participation in the research must hold the prospect of direct benefit to the patient, and there is already evidence that this treatment will provide this.

Some private studies were done at other hospitals to observe the timeframe it would take to locate next of kin. Sometimes they came in with the patient or they were easily contacted; but a great majority of the time they were not found until sometimes up to 6 or 7 hours. The study must define the length of time of the therapeutic window and a little diligent search must be undertaken for the next of kin. These regulations require that coordinators confer with the communities. They have visited different neighborhood and advocacy groups because they are all at-risk populations for head injury. Ms. Meeker also does community notification through the media/press release in different forums, e.g. newspapers, television, radio, public service announcements, etc. This also needs to be done in a multilingual approach, but they have not started the community identification yet.

The procedure for the use of "Waiver of Consent" is that when the patient enters the emergency unit, staff has to try to identify the patient. They will establish eligibility for the participation by going through the aforementioned criteria, locating the family and trying to get the consent. For the purposes of this study, a one-hour diligent search for family is done using directory assistance and/or police assistance, e.g. sometimes an address is found without phone numbers so the police is needed to visit the patient's home. Old medical records are reviewed in case the patient has been there before. If family is contacted, permission will be requested of them. If not, staff will proceed with the use of "Waiver of Consent".

Once the patient is enrolled, the coordinator will call a randomization center in which the patient will be randomly assigned to a treatment group. Patients will be cooling within 4 hours of their injury using a cooling suit that wraps around their chest and legs to provide surface cooling (it may also require other treatment). The cooling phase will last 48 hours and then the patient will slowly be re-warmed to a normal temperature on the third day. All patients, regardless of what group they are in, will receive standard care for severe brain injury. Once the patient has undergone therapy in the ICU, if they continue to improve and eventually are discharged from the hospital they will be seen 3, 6, and 12 months after their injury to determine how well they are recovering. There is no cost to the patients for any of this follow-up involved in this study.

Ms. Meeker gave a list of her contact information in case questions arise that required a physician. She asked that the checklist questionnaire that was distributed among the Commission be completed and returned before her departure that evening. This questionnaire has to be forwarded to the Institutional Review Board who reviews all of their research studies. It is a way for the board to determine whether or not there is community support for this study. Once the community outreach notification is completed, Ms. Meeker will meet with the board and request permission to proceed with enrolling patients. If everything goes well, it is hoped that this will occur sometime in mid October.

Commissioner Larkin thanked Ms. Meeker for her outstanding presentation. He noted that it is prohibited for a full body Commission during a meeting, to complete such forms. However, this can be done individually, as a resident after the meeting.

Commissioner Brown wanted to know, "How many patients have enrolled or has the study already accepted patients?" Ms. Meeker replied they are not allowed to enroll patients into the program until they have accomplished all of their community outreach and have determined that there is support for the study. In addition, after the community notification is done, they have to wait to see if people attempt to contact them due to those notification efforts. Commissioner Brown asked "Approximately how many cases would be handled by SFGH?" Ms. Meeker estimated that about 8 to12 patients per year would fit the criteria. It is not a lot of patients because they have to have primarily isolated head injury and be cooled upon arrival at the emergency unit.

Ms. Meeker also noted that there are some methods being worked on at other institutions for cooling patients more quickly. When that has been successfully achieved, then at some point in the future, they might be able to expand it to patients who come in with a normal body temperature. Then they would actually be able to cool those patients for this treatment and make a difference. Everything happens very quickly with head injuries, e.g. the swelling starts immediately as soon as the brain hits the cranial vault, skull hits the car, or the windshield, or the ground, etc. Swelling is what causes much of the damage with severe brain injury and it is important that all is done to decrease that swelling as soon as possible. If it does not occur within 4 hours, it won’t have an effect.

Commissioner Looper thanked Ms. Meeker for her presentation and acknowledged that he is
familiar with her work because he went through her program about 10 years ago. Ms. Meeker asked Commissioner Looper to share his firsthand experience. Commissioner Looper stated that he was a recipient of blows to the head from a baseball bat. He was comatose and went through physical and occupational therapy. Commissioner Looper was curious that with the great reputation of the program, why would Ms. Meeker have to go through this exercise--is there something controversial about this cooling method?

Ms. Meeker replied that the reason they have to speak to all the community groups is because this is a "Waiver of Consent" study. It is impossible to get consent on every patient involved in the study. Federal regulations indicate that "informed consent" is required on every patient who participates in the research study. If "informed consent" from the patient is unobtainable, then "immediate consent" from the family is requested. Because treatment needs to be implemented quickly and if a family member cannot be located immediately, that patient would not be able to participate in the research. Therefore, the only way to pragmatically carry this out is to use the "Waiver of Consent". In order for this to be done, the federal regulation requires that consent is obtained immediately—this is the reason for this exercise.

Commissioner Looper encouraged Ms. Meeker to use the resource directory that was provided by staff and informed her that there are organizations in this community that might be able to assist. He suggested an Afro-American health improvement organization that could be approached as a resource for reaching the community. Ms. Meeker thanked Commissioner Looper for the information and informed the Commission that she had similar groups to visit. She is going to submit this to her board for consent to proceed and then she will enroll patients. The coordinators will continue to see groups throughout the study and they are obliged to return to every group with their results and findings.

Dr. Moses thanked Ms. Meeker for her presentation and expressed concern from the community residents that wanted to know:
a)          How will the community be convinced that this study is not a guinea pig study, an experiment?
Ms. Meeker responded that the participants are whoever goes through the emergency unit and meets the criteria. A person's background, ethnicity, etc. does not make a difference in the study. Previous studies have shown that this is safe and effective in the age group of 16 to 45 years. The study needs to be repeated because the previous study accepted patients from 18 to 60 years of age. As a result, the subgroup of patients up to age 45 benefited and patients over 45 did not respond to treatment well. There has been sufficient evidence to show that this is a safe treatment and will not cause damage in this group of patients. If this becomes an effective treatment, then it will become standard of care for all trauma centers in the country because the providers will be obligated to perform this treatment. At the halfway point, an internal analysis is done to see if the treatment has been effective with all the patients being studied. If the treatment is effective, the coordinators are obliged to take the treatment out of "research mode" and place it in the standards of "care mode". If this is not done, they would be withholding effective treatments from patients just to finish the study and this is unethical. Hopefully if this is effective, it could be combined with other treatments and maybe it will even be more effective. Lots of drugs have been studied over the last ten years for head injury patients and none of them have been effective. Ms. Meeker believed that it is because they were not administered quickly enough. The reason they were not given treatment quickly is because it was part of a research study—they had to get the consent, they could not get consent fast enough, and they did not go through this process of trying to pursue it using "Waiver of Consent".

b)          What is the success rate of those who participated and how can it be measured?
Ms. Meeker replied that this would be measured with an "outcome tool" that is standard use in the neurosurgical setting. It is a questionnaire that allows providers to record whether a patient is or is not disabled, and if they are, how disabled. Patients would have to rate above a certain number on that scale or on that test for them to be considered successful participants. In other words patients who are vegetated or who are severely or moderately disabled would indicate the treatment was "unsuccessful". Whereas, patients who are mildly disabled or who are not disabled at all would indicate the treatment was "successful". This is how the outcome is measured and it would be done at those three different intervals of 3, 6, and 12 months. Past studies have shown that the one-year time point is sufficient. Usually people who are not responding to treatment within one year—do not recover. There is not a statistically significant difference.

c)          How is it that a 16 year old is eligible for the study when it requires consent from the parents/guardian—why 16 as opposed to 21 minimum?
Ms. Meeker stated that "In terms of research, surgical or medical procedure, it generally starts at 18 years of age or older. The reason 16 and 17 year olds are being included in this is study is because their body habit is that of an adult. Also, 16 and 17 year olds and even at times 15 and 14 year olds, are able to give their consent to other types of medical care procedures with the parents cosigning. This study would be the same, in that, if a 16 or 17 year old patient was admitted to the hospital and met the criteria for this study, permission from the patient and the parent or legal guardian will have to be acquired.

Commissioner Larkin remarked that "Anytime research is performed by using animal or human subjects in exploring the unknown and trying to reach an outcome, even though it might be beneficial, they are to a certain extent guinea pigs". Overall, these participants/human subjects would be reviewed for the procedure, its outcome and if successful, this could derive to work in a larger society.

Ms. Meeker agreed that the patients are considered human subjects and a tremendous amount of data will be collected from them. She acknowledged that there is definitely risk involved in any treatment—even those that have been approved. When patients are waived into the study without consent from the individual or their family, then those issues cannot be addressed, which is part of the reason why permission is being requested from the community in support of this study.

Ms. Meeker mentioned that she would refer the Commission's concerns to Dr. Holland and Dr. Manley because they probably could have a better response. She apologized for their absence and assured the Commission that they are anxious to answer any questions. Commissioner Larkin wanted Dr. Manley and Dr. Holland to be invited back at a later date. He expressed his appreciation to Ms. Meeker for her detailed informative presentation and asked "What did she want of the Commission?"

Ms. Meeker expressed concern that when she was invited to meet with the Commission, she was unaware that the questionnaire could not be completed as a group—which presented a little problem. The Commission represents the community and it is important that the Commission is aware of the study. Ms. Meeker asked that after the meeting, if the residents could complete the questionnaire individually, she would appreciate it. Also, she would appreciate any suggestions of other groups that she could speak with. Commissioner Larkin suggested that she contact Dr. Moses and staff for assistance with some referral information.

Commissioner Larkin opened the floor for public comments and questions. He reminded speakers to limit their remarks to three (3) minutes. (Speaker cards were available)

Ÿ          Dr. Veronica Hunnicutt, Dean of City College of San Francisco (CCSF), Southeast Campus announced that she serves on one of those review boards for UCSF which meets regularly (at least once a month) at SFGH to review many of these procedures. She commended the Commission for the excellent questions that were asked, and assured them that as long as she is a member of that community board no one will perform any type of guinea pig study. The Commission's Community Board members on these review boards are very scrupulous and they do not want people to be used as guinea pigs. They want to make sure that the methodologies that they are using are very sound. Dean Hunnicutt concluded that she might not be totally aware of all the medical aspects, but there are also medical doctors who serve on the board and they are watching very closely too.

Commissioner Larkin was relieved to know that there was a board reviewing the study. He recommended that a representative from that particular board be invited intermittently to give updates.

VIII.           Director's Report
Dr. Moses reported that:
a)          The Commission website is still in progress. Commissioner Hardin has been requested to submit a hard copy photograph.
b)          The Budget Request for FY ‘02-03 has been approved and is ready for implementation.
c)          Dr. Moses had requested the assistance of Commissioner Sulu Palega, President of the Housing Authority to locate housing for Commissioner Tofaeono whose home caught afire last week. Dr. Moses asked that Commissioner Tofaeono and his family be remembered in everyone's prayers.
d)          The Acting Director of Department of Elections, John Arntz was invited to speak on preparing the community for the November election. He was hesitant about that particular topic and will report back in the near future on which topic is feasible.

Commissioner Brown moved and Commissioner Maxwell seconded to accept the Executive Director's report. Motion passed unanimously to accept report as presented.

IX.                    PUC Bureau of Land Management Report (Discussion and action)

-          Decorative Plant Services Quarterly New Hire Report 1st Quarter, 2002.
Dr. Moses reported that this item was submitted at previous Commission meetings, but had to be calendared for discussion. Commissioner Brown observed that the report showed an increase of employees from this area--4 of the 7 new hires are from the 94124 area.

Dr. Moses noted "for the record" that Decorative Plant Services should forward the initial reports to the Real Estate Office and copies to staff. Mr. Joseph Tham and his staff will more or less digest it and incorporate what conditions the lease call for.

Commissioner Looper moved and Commissioner Brown seconded to accept the Decorative Plant's New Hire Report. Motion passed unanimously to accept report as presented.

Commissioner Larkin thanked Decorative Plant Services for the fine job that they are doing regarding the new hires and attending the meetings.

-          Request from CCSF to sublease property to S.F. Unified School District (SFUSD).
Mr. Joseph K. Tham, PUC Real Property Officer, informed the CCSF has submitted a request to sublease 4 classrooms to the SFUSD to hold their various programs.

A letter was sent to Dean Hunnicutt on August 1, 2002, listing concerns of security, general cleanliness and upkeep of areas being subleased to entities other than CCSF. Dr. Moses felt that this item should be calendared for discussion by the Commission to perhaps collaborate with CCSF in reaching some type of resolution regarding these issues. Commissioner Larkin asked that Dean Hunnicutt respond to the question that is mentioned in the letter.

Dean Hunnicutt thanked the Commission for the opportunity to give clarification of the high school program. She understood that there are concerns and last semester/last year were horrendous. A collaborate effort was made between CCSF and SFUSD to make needed changes for the betterment of the program. It was evident that the school program as is, would not allow the students to matriculate well. In joining forces, between CCSF and SFUSD, they were able to fashion a new program.

Basically the high school program has improved 100% and there have been considerable changes made. CCSF and SFUSD administrators went into negotiations and reached new procedures of operation and new staff was hired or given additional work hours: a) A new Principal, Elaine Whitley was assigned to the school program. This is a major step because Ms. Whitley is very familiar with the community and the needs of the young people being served. b) SFUSD has committed to a full-time security person. This makes a big difference because their security, in conjunction with the college's two public safety officers, really monitors the situation. c) SFUSD agreed to have the young people enroll in college courses. Since they will be concurrently enrolled, they can matriculate through the school district and have a head-start with the community college system. d) A full-time counselor instead of the past part-time counselor was assigned to the program.

During this semester, after observing the dynamics between the college students and the community scholars of success students, Dean Hunnicutt was pleased to report that the flow was better in terms of the young people attending classes and taking care of business. The Principal has been notified to deter students from clustering in front of the building (area where SECF Director's office is located).

Dean Hunnicutt wanted clarification about the "uncleanness". There was some graffiti on the walls last semester. She felt that those persons writing that graffiti should be in some type of graphic artist program and using those skills in some productive way. Ways should be sought to work with these young people. As mentioned previously, there were issues last year, but major improvement has been done, e.g. the security issues no longer exist and there is not the same kind of clustering in front of the building.

Dean Hunnicutt stated that she has been trying to address the various issues. She has been working with Ms. Whitley and two community-based organizations to develop a proposal for submission on September 23rd to "Revamp the high school program". They want to legally have a quality model county community school program for these young people. She knows change is already taking place, but more change is forthcoming. Ms. Whitley and the security person are circulating the hallways during class hours. She is acquainted with all the students and is making sure that she communicates to them and staff. Currently, one of their concessions is to lower the enrollment to 50, as oppose to the nearly 100 students previously. They hope to be able to define/fine-tune this program so that the young people will have a good program.

Commissioner Larkin asked whether there were less than 100 students in the program? Dean Hunnicutt stated that there are 71 enrollees, but not all of the students show. This effort is being done with the various groups: Omega Boys Club, Office of Samoan Affairs, SFUSD and CCSF.

Commissioner Larkin asked Dean Hunnicutt how long the school has been in session? Dean Hunnicutt responded that the CCSF has been in session since August 19 and the school since August 26. Commissioner Larkin asked Dr. Moses if there were any problems since the school session began? Dr. Moses explained that his office has been cooperating with Dean Hunnicutt. Dr. Moses had to call the S.F. Police Department and campus police to mediate and take some of the students away. Dean Hunnicutt was aware of the incident and she had a solution. Dr. Moses commended Dean Hunnicutt for bringing these young people to college for a higher education, but the problem is SECF has a very small budget. Anytime something breaks, SECF has to pay for the repairs--which has caused concern. PUC said that if this is approved, they are somehow going to place some conditions on it. Dr. Moses feels there has to be a way that he can work with SFUSD to be responsible for some of these payments. They will be happy to work closely with PUC and SFUSD upon the conditions that must be met once it is approved.

Commissioner Larkin remarked that he knows firsthand how hard Dean Hunnicutt has worked. He has been to a couple of meetings/discussions with the students and security. He was glad to see a high school program here because it will allow young people the opportunity of transition from high school into junior college. However, he was in total agreement with Dr. Moses, in that, there needs to be some conditions if something is broken because last semester they did experience some break-ins and other incidents that occurred. Those are normal things that happen with young students, but there needs to be some conditions so that the facility does not suffer and everyone can have a chance to take advantage of these opportunities.

Commissioner Brown thanked Dean Hunnicutt for being at the meeting. She wanted to know why the high school students at CCSF were not in a traditional high school? Dean Hunnicutt replied that they are not successful in traditional schools, due to poor class attendance or suspension. They did not attend high school for one reason or another and they found some horrible situations where it was not necessarily the young person’s fault. She had worked with
Commissioner Tofaeono trying to figure out why one particular student was not attending
school. As it turned out, the parents were keeping this young person home to baby-sit.
Commissioner Tofaeono had to do a reeducation of the parents that this was illegal—the young
person needs to be in school. The high school program graduates one of the largest groups of
young people—similar to the program at 1950 Mission Street. There are about 19 or 20
community schools and one of those programs is housed at this facility.

Commissioner Looper stated that he was unaware of the program and it sounded interesting. He wanted to learn more about the program and get any written material about it. He remarked that he really wasn’t aware of the program and said it sounds interesting. He offered to work with staff to get some of that information. He further asked, "How many classrooms does this school occupy?" Dean Hunnicutt replied the high school occupies 4 rooms (1 teacher prep and 3 classrooms). Commissioner Looper asked if it was an expansion of classrooms. Dean Hunnicutt replied it is the same amount as previously—they wanted to formalize the situation. They do not want to have people utilizing their space without paying for the right to do so. This program was in effect before she came on board. At that time it was called Renaissance Parents for Success, then the name changed to Community Scholar System, and then it was changed to reflect the direction they would like to go. Commissioner Looper thanked Dean Hunnicutt for clarifying.

Commissioner Maxwell wanted to know if the SFUSD leases the building? Dean Hunnicutt replied "No". Commissioner Maxwell suggested that the Commission see if it can get SFUSD to lease the rooms. If SFUSD was leasing property, perhaps the Commission could get some funding to repair damages to the facility. Commissioner Maxwell emphasized that not too much should be expected from these young people at this school. The students are here because they are not conducting themselves properly elsewhere. Some responsibility needs to be taken to guide these young people by involving the community and helping the teachers with them. SFUSD should pay for those rooms. Commissioner Maxwell wanted to know: What was the student to teacher ratio? How many assistants and teachers were at the school? How many children are enrolled at the school? What is the curriculum? What are the students learning? Do they have mental health? Do they have anger management classes? All of these should be in place before blaming the children.

Commissioner Maxwell expressed concern about the police being called upon to handle the young students. She suggested instead of calling the police, to call her or her staff and they would be happy to assist the instructors. She wanted people to stop being afraid of them, stop expecting too much of them, stop misusing/mistreating them and treat them honestly. Commissioner Larkin stated that the approach to solving some of the problems would certainly be taken into consideration. He felt that since this is a public building, there are certain regulations that the Commission is bound to. He suggested that those fantastic ideas be shared with staff, as well as, CCSF. CCSF has entertained the idea of working with the high school as they are under lease to PUC--a situation that should be handled by CCSF. CCSF should contact the SFUSD and request rent, as they did with requesting additional security. He recommended that CCSF meet with SECF staff and a PUC representative to iron-out what CCSF wants to do and bring it back to the Commission with those concerns being addressed. At that point, the Commission can make an informed vote and either support this or not. The Deputy City Attorney, Robert Bryan was asked if this was acceptable, was proper? Mr. Robert Bryan responded that this could be done. Commissioner Larkin suggested that this matter be calendared for the next meeting.

X.          Introduction of New Business
          Commissioner Larkin asked Commissioner Maxwell to work with staff regarding some
of her ideas. Commissioner Maxwell said she would be glad to. Dr. Moses suggested that Commissioner Maxwell's project be referred to the facility committee meeting scheduled for September 10th. There are some other issues that need to be discussed and then get back to Commission at the next Commission meeting. Commissioner Larkin responded that will be fine, as long as Commissioner Maxwell is involved.

XI.                    Announcements
Commissioner Larkin acknowledged Commissioner Maxwell for making the front page of the newspaper again. He told Commissioner Tofaeono that he would certainly be in his prayers and the prayers of all the Commissioners. He personally would like to meet with Commissioner Tofaeono to see if he can assist him in any way.
          
Commission Brown asked that the Commission express their gratitude to Liz for working with them. Commissioner Larkin, on behalf of the Commission, thanked Liz and told her that the Commission certainly appreciates her help.

XII.                    Adjournment
          Commissioner Brown moved and Commissioner Looper seconded to adjourn the SECF           Commission meeting. Meeting adjourned at 7:45 p.m.




                                                                       Respectfully submitted,





                                                                      _____________________________
                                                             Commission Secretary