Mayor’s Task Force on Anti-Human Trafficking

Youth Trafficking Committee Meeting Minutes

Wednesday, September 13, 2017, 1:30 pm – 3:00 pm

25 Van Ness Avenue, Room 330 A, San Francisco

 

Attendees:

Saerom Choi, Asian Pacific Islander Legal Outreach; Ifasina Clear, Young Women’s Freedom Center; Melinda Clemmons, Chronicle of Social Change; Neda Dai, UNICEF USA; Jen Daly, Legal Services for Children; Carly Devlin, Huckleberry Youth Services; Darian Eastman, Not for Sale; Sabrina Forte, Bay Area Legal Aid; Tony Flores, SFPD; Lili Gamero, Mayor’s Office on Violence Prevention; Emily Hinsey, Love Never Fails; Minouche Kandel, Department on the Status of Women; Antonia Lavine, San Francisco Collaborative Against Human Trafficking; Rebecca Marcus, SF Public Defender’s Office; Olivia McCarrick, SF Public Defender’s Office; Elisabet Medina, Safe and Sound; JaMel Perkins, Freedom FWD; Sarah Purnell, San Francisco District Attorney’s Office; Mirelle Raza, San Francisco District Attorney’s Office; Angelina Romano, SFUSD; Paul Wesson, SFUSD; Alia Whitney-Johnson, Freedom FWD; Katherine Yoo, Asian Pacific Islander Legal Outreach; Karina Zhang, Family and Children Services

 

Minutes:

 

I. July 12, 2017 minutes were approved. [Rebecca Marcus]

 

II. Announcements

• Matrix of current legislation related to trafficking was distributed to committee members – thank you to Susan Abrams and John Skoglund from Children’s Law Center of California for assembling

• HA&RT is expanding and is going to be hiring another intervention specialist focused on family work. They will be focused on younger youth (ages 11-13), living with caregivers. Ideally would have experience working with families and on issue of human trafficking. Job link:
  https://www.huckleberryyouth.org/2017/08/07/intervention-specialist/

• Sept 28^th – 6:00 - 9:00pm - West Coast Children’s Center Event on CSE-IT Tool findings, including which youth have the highest rates of trafficking indicators
• Oct 10^th – 5:30pm – Trafficking event at Grace Cathedral by Stop the Traffik
• Free DACA renewal workshops by SFILEN – Look on the “events” tab

 

III. Updates from Housing and Placement Work Group

Link to distributed document

 

Elisabet Medina presented an update on current housing and placement activities going on in San Francisco, as well as a draft set of recommendations, compiled through the Youth Trafficking Committee’s Housing and Placement Work Group and informed by discussions from MOVE, the city’s MDT meetings for trafficking cases. She highlighted the need for a continuum of housing options for youth who have been trafficked or are at risk of trafficking. She also emphasized the need to strengthen existing placements, and to minimize factors that are pushing or pulling youth out of placements.

 

Next steps will include identifying groups who could be in charge of implementing recommendations and circulating to the committee for feedback. We will vote on the recommendations as a committee at a future date.

 

The Committee also discussed whether the school district could do anything to support placement efforts. The Committee suggested we should have a future meeting where presentations are focused on school programs, including trafficking prevention through School Wellness and the work that the school district does for foster youth.

 

 

IV. Updates from Prevention Work Group

Link to distributed document

 

Emily Hinsey presented on the progress of the Prevention Work Group, which includes mapping existing efforts to prevent trafficking in San Francisco, as well as gaps it recommends be prioritized.  The work group has also been documenting who has been trained on screening and the city’s CSEC protocol. The work group has developed a logic model for where the task force can play the biggest role in prevention. The work group proposed developing a first version of website with list of resources, training opportunities, and recommendations to prevent trafficking.

 

Minouche highlighted that the work group needs to align on city standards to make the website accessible. Others suggested that we consider digitized versions of training resources and also be thoughtful about training capacity.

 

 

V. Youth Advisory Board

Ifasina Clear presented on the work Young Women’s Freedom Center and Freedom FWD are doing to support youth in forming the Youth Advisory Board. Six youth are meeting twice a month for training and will be participating in future task force meetings.

 

Asks of the Task Force:

• Build, learn, and grow with the Fellows
• Don’t assume direct experience with trafficking or sex work
• Recognize power and privilege within the Task Force
• Appreciate that knowledge and data does not trump experience
• Share preferred pronouns at the beginning of meetings
• Be humble to ask open questions
• Admit confusion – it’s on us to meet them
• Reach out to Ifasina (ifasina@youngwomenfree.org)  or Alia (alia@freedomfwd.org) to get involved

 

Committee members asked if the scheduling and timing of meetings worked for Fellows. The timing works for this batch. They also asked how we could hold ourselves accountable to the young people and suggested that it would be helpful to do work as a group as a Committee to prepare the Committee to integrate young leaders in an authentic and meaningful way. They also recommended we consider integrating a process check at the end of meetings to continue to refine our meeting format and interactions over time.

 

VI. State of SF Youth Trafficking Committee:

Link to distributed document: Summary of Task Force Strategic Goals and Committee Work Groups

 

Alia Whitney-Johnson led the Committee through an exercise to reflect on its progress throughout the year. As a follow-up to this exercise, she will invite additional groups to join the Committee and begin to draft a dashboard for the Committee to track its progress over time.

 

A. What are we doing well?

 

• Commitment:
  • Committed group of people
  • Have had more action!
  • People are on time to meetings
  • Consistent participation

 

• Engagement:
  • Meeting engagement and participation

 

• Action:
  • Have had more action!
  • CSEC protocol
  • Collaboration
  • It is working well to bring community partners together to collaborate
  • Work groups and shared leadership
  • Sub committees generating realistic goals and timelines
  • Prevention work group
  • Prevention efforts

 

• Youth Voice:
  • Incorporating and prioritizing youth perspectives
  • Youth Advisory Board!
  • Youth Advisory board and engaging people who have been impacted
  • Future Youth involvement
  • It is working well to now have a youth voice
  • Engaging survivors

 

• Improved data collection and analysis
• The Committee’s membership is multi-disciplinary which fosters information sharing and collaboration
• Good awareness of what other agencies are doing in regard to human trafficking

 

 

B. What could be better?

 

• Outcomes:
  • Create a set of metrics we check in on regularly
  • Less conceptual conversations and more specific directions around decision making
  • Work on prevention in our schools
  • More tangible outcomes
  • Increasing actual placements and housing options
  • Improved coordination of information sharing regionally (with other bay area counties – Goal #4)

 

• Shifts in government:
  • Need to work on accountability of government agencies on providing services to CESC youth
  • Accountability of government agencies
  • FCS – follow-up with high risk, run away and missing children
  • Work on improving the foster care system

 

• Collaboration

 

• Stronger integration between sex and labor trafficking efforts:
  • More focus, attention, and understanding of labor exploitation
  • Integration of sex and labor trafficking efforts

 

• Mandatory reporting – understanding what info can be exchanged

 

 

C. What information do you want reported at each meeting?

 

• Quantitative Data:
  • # clients served (case management, etc) since last meeting*
  • # placed in stable housing
  • # cases reported, investigated, prosecuted
  • # of missing children
  • # and types of trainings conducted* / agencies receiving trainings
  • # of job placements
  • # of classrooms reached through SFUSD prevention curriculum
  • # of kids who have been screened + percentage at risk or confirmed CSEC – through FCS, Juvenile Hall, and HA&RT
  • Back wage amounts recovered
  • Data from each agency on outcomes of youth (more transparency around work)

 

• Qualitative Data:
  • Case studies on what has worked
  • Success stories
  • Survivor successes
  • Actual client successes and failures

 

• Trainings:
  • Trainings that are needed
  • Trainings that are conducted
  • Short trainings on topics like labor trafficking

 

• Work Group Progress:
  • Progress towards work group goals
  • Work group updates

 

• Available funding for activities within the committee goals

 

• Agency information
  • Information on different services provided*
  • Actual clients served and successes and failures

 

• Legislative Updates* - State and local

 

 

 

D. What indicators would suggest we are doing a good job as a committee?

• Youth Trafficking Committee attendance over time
• Retention rate of participants
• Number of Youth Trafficking Committee members actively engaged in a work group
• Surveys
• Process check-ins
• Improved systems measured by youth’s outcomes
• Actual accomplishments
• Data
• Including service gaps in HT annual report
• Increase the number of available beds in shelters
• Increase of service options
• Increase of survivors accommodated by existing services

 

 

E. What other organizations should we consider inviting to the committee, particularly to ensure we are incorporating labor trafficking?

• Youth engaged in survival sex
• Office of Labor Standards Enforcement
• Transgender Intersex Justice Project
• Young Workers United (May have been contacted previously)
• Groups that do presentations on labor rights / employment rights for the community (especially given current risks for undocumented individuals)
• Home School Advisors
• Folks working with underground economies
  • Gangs
  • Drugs

• Kids in Need of Defense
• Agencies dealing with unaccompanied youth – both legal and social
• California Youth Connection
• Office of Civic Engagement & Immigrant Affairs
• Chinese Progressive Association
• Instituto Familiar de la Raza
• Instituto Laboral de la Raza
• Independent Living Skills Program (First Place for Youth)

 

VII. Next Steps

• Next Meeting: Nov. 8^th 1:30-3pm

 

• Action Items:
  • Alia Whitney-Johnson to begin to assemble ideas generated into a dashboard or tracker for the Committee to measure its progress over time – to be presented at a future meeting
  • Alia Whitney-Johnson to reach out to groups identified for potential task force engagement

 

• Future meeting topics:

• Getting the Committee reading to meaningfully engage young leaders
• Approving housing and placement work group recommendations
• SFUSD’s approach to supporting youth through prevention curriculum and foster care support

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