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Meeting Information



Full Commission

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Immigrant Rights Commission
Minutes of Meeting on February 13, 2006 at City Hall – Room 416

The meeting was called to order by Commissioner Diana Lau at 5:00 p.m.

I. Roll Call:

Members Present: Commissioners Lau, Escobedo, Alexander, Dajani, Haile, Jones, Levy, McCoy, Melara, Spektor, Ng, and Nguyen were present.

Members Absent: Commissioners Kaff, Lee, Enssani.

Staff Present: Dang Pham, Executive Director, Vanessa Soriano, Intern.

Guest Present: Dr. Sally Al-Daher, Executive Director of Arab Cultural & Community Center

 

II. Approval of Minutes:  The Commission will consider the minutes of January 9, 2006 meeting at March meeting.

 

III. Public Comment:

 

None

 

IV. Presentation:

 

Dr Sally Al-Daher, Executive Director of the Arab Cultural & Community Center in San Francisco informed the Commission about her organization. The Arab Cultural & Community Center has been involved with many aspects in empowering the Arab community.  The Center offers the extensive human services network and established liaisons with public agencies, which in turn have resulted in meeting the specific cultural needs of our community.  The Center also receives grant from MOCD for outreach and cultural service. As part of the commitment to better serve the community and respond to its needs, the Center offering the Arabic language program for adults.  The most prideful accomplishment is the cultural competency program which was initiated after September 11 and which collaborates with many agencies and organizations that serve the Arab community in the Bay Area in order to ensure that their services are culturally and linguistically competent.

 

V. Equal Access to Services (EAS)

 

The Commission reviewed the final draft of the EAS Report.

 

Commissioner Escobedo went over the changes in the final draft version compares to the previous versions in the areas of translation of written materials, language assessment, and the qualified bilingual staff to check the translation.

 

Based on the argument made by Commissioner Levy, Commissioner Escobedo urges the Commission to remove the partial compliance category out of the report.

 

The Commission determined that the EAS Report should be delivered to the Mayor, the Board of Supervisors, City Administrator Edwin Lee, all City departments not just the Tier 1 departments, and the public.

 

Commissioner Haile made the motion to approve the EAS Report and Commissioner Melara seconded the motion.  The Commissioners approved the motion to release the Report.

 

Commissioner Jones suggests that the Report should be posted on the Commission’s website for public.  Commissioner Melara requested that staff should have a final ready to go version for final review by the members of the Program Access Committee at their regular meeting on February 22, 2006.  After that the EAS Report should be ready to release to everyone.

 

VI. Committee Assignment:

 

The Commission reviewed the Committee membership list:

 

  • PROGRAM & ACCESS AND POLICY & LEGISLATION COMMITTEE:

      Members:

  • Deborah Escobedo
  • ·        Gilberto Alexander
  • ·        Samira Causevic McCoy
  • ·        Vera Haile
  • ·        Sonia Melara (Chair)
  • ·        Diana Lau
  • ·        Jamal Dajani

 

            Meeting Time:

            Jointly meets every 4th Wednesday of the month in City Hall at 5:30 pm

           

  • FINANCE & OPERATIONS COMMITTEE:

            Members:

  • Sam Ng
  • ·        Zina Spektor
  • ·        Svetlana Kaff (Chair)
  • ·        Solomon Jones
  • ·        Phu Nguyen

 

            Meeting Time:

            Meets every 3rd Tuesday of the month in City Hall at 11:30AM

 

 

 

VII. Director’s Report:

 

            1.   2006 Compliance Plan:

 

To this date, the Commission received five (5) 2006 compliance plans from the following departments:

  • Controller’s Office
  • ·        District Attorney’s Office
  • ·        Fire department
  • ·        Juvenile Probation Department
  • ·        Rent Board

 

2.   Rally for Immigrant Rights in Oakland:

 

On Saturday, February 25, 2006, the Immigrant Workers Freedom Ride will organize a rally in Fruitvale District of Oakland to call on the US Senate to reject the HR 4437 – the Border Protection, Anti-terrorism and Illegal Immigration Control Act.  The Immigrant Workers Freedom Ride also invites the Commission to attend this rally.

 

  •    Language Access & Cultural Competency Working Committee – Juvenile   Probation Department:

 

The Committee invites the Commission to join it in its continuing effort to improve services to the city youth, especially, the immigrant youths and their families.  This Committee includes representatives of local service providers, Juvenile Probation Department, and the school district.  It meets monthly at the main office of the Juvenile Probation Department.

 

            4. Cultural & Competency Task Force:

 

The Task Force will meet on February 23, 2006 in City Hall.  At this meeting, Randy Dongug of Xtech Company, a contractor, will make a presentation about the 3-1-1 citywide informational line, a new customer call service center.  At this meeting, Chris Vein, Director of DTIS also talk about the schematic of the current city website’s and the proposed framework for the translation.

The Cultural & Competency Task Force has met with numerous experts from the private and public sectors to explore ways to better serve our immigrant residents.

 

5.   REAL ID Report:

 

Enclosed please find a copy of the latest version of the draft of the Report on REAL ID Act.

 

VIII. Next Meeting Agenda:

 

On the next meeting’s agenda, the Commission would like to discuss about the neighborhood meeting.

 

IX. Adjournment:

 

Commissioner Haile moved, seconded by Commissioner Jones to adjourn the meeting at 6:55 p.m.