Mayor’s Task Force on Anti-Human Trafficking Meeting

June 27, 2018                     1:30-3:15pm

1 Carlton B Goodlett Pl, City Hall, Room 305, San Francisco CA 94102

 

Attendees:

Najwa Ahmed, SFUSD; Lauren Bretzing, FBI Intern; Frances Byrne, Freedom House; Gena Castro-Rodriguez, SFDA; Rachael Chambers, Department on the Status of Women; Victoria Chan, Asian Law Caucus; Saerom Choi, APILO; Ifasina Clear, Young Women’s Freedom Center; Jen Daly, Legal Services for Children; Carly Devlin, Huckleberry Youth Programs/HART; Cristy Dieterich, DPH Newcomers Health Program; Abby Ellis, US Senator Feinstein’s Office; Antoinette Flores, Department of Public Health; Marie Gaillac, NCCAHT; Fred Gales Jr, Hospitality House; Emily Gollub, FBI Intern; Carletta Jackson-Lane, Sojourner Truth FFSA; Megan Kalsman, SF Environment; alix lutnick, RTI; Paola Martin del Campo, Safe and Sound; Erik Martinez, SFUSD; Alyssa Miller, Love Never Fails; Kristen Moore, SF Safehouse; Emily Murase, Department on the Status of Women; Armando Ortiz, Safe and Sound; Sheela Ramesh, Freedom Fwd; Ali Schlageter, Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing; Mary Steiner, United Nationals Association-USA, SF; Dongmei Tan, Department of Public Health; Tavi Taos, Youth Advisory Board; Emie Tonooka, Asian Women’s Shelter; Rochelle Veloso, Department of Public Health; Jennifer Wang, FBI; Alia Whitney-Johnson, Freedom Fwd; Karina Zhang, Family and Children’s Services; Iris Zhu, Department of Public Health.

 

1. Welcome, Introductions/Check-In

 

2. Agenda/Minutes from April 25 were approved [Carly Devlin/Gena Castro-Rodriguez]
   1. Change to the April 25 minutes: ask was to send a letter clarifying that there wasn’t consensus in the Task Force over the creation of a Human Trafficking Unit at the District Attorney’s Office.

 

3. Review Process of Task Force Membership:
   1. Minouche reviewed the criteria for membership within the task force and provided attendees with a list of member organizations that have been invited to participate and have returned forms. Since receiving feedback that some feel uncomfortable sharing all of their concerns while at meetings, she reassured the task force that working relationships or funding will not be impacted by disagreements about policy and decision-making within the task force. It was suggested that to provide more anonymity for members to get a sense of whether consensus exists, using a sticker/dot approach may provide an approach that allows for input from persons who might not feel comfortable giving it in other ways.  However, given that the meetings are public, votes cannot be secret.

 

4. Updates on Committees
   1. Youth Committee: (Ifasina Clear):

Ifasina talked about the Housing and Placement recommendations, which were created with youth voices to ensure that they were at the center of the policy and work. Laws and social norms have changed over the past 10 years, and the recommendations make distinctions about what services are needed for minor dependent, non-minor dependent, and non-system involved youth looking for housing and placement today. The recommendations give a framework for addressing concerns of each of these groups, and advocate for expanded resources to meet the needs of youth and service providers accordingly.

• Human Services Agency is going to issue an RFP that has 2 parts for emergency placement, including foster homes and residential treatment programs à goal to get some of the recommendations into that draft document
•  For the housing and placement group, the next step is to get the document into the hands of the appropriate stakeholders and changemakers, with reference to past projects and other models with a distinct understanding of why this will be different

The Task Force approved the recommendations by consensus. [Alia Whitney-Johnson/Mary Steiner]

2. Sex Work and Trafficking Policy Impact Committee: Implementation of Prioritizing Safety for Sex Worker Policies (Saerom Choi):
   • The Prioritizing Safety for Sex Worker Policies were passed in December and went into effect as of January 2018. They ensure that sex workers will not be arrested or prosecuted for prostitution or minor drug offenses when they report witnessing or experiencing violence to the police or district attorney’s offices. The policy inspired state-level legislation, AB 2243, which amends the Evidence Code to ensure sex workers will not be prosecuted for prostitution when they report violence throughout California.
     • On June 13, the Department on the Status of Women, with speakers from the Human Rights Commission, US PROStitutes Collective, St. James Infirmary, and attorney Nedra Ruiz, held a community outreach event at the San Francisco Main Public Library to educate service providers and community members about the policy and related resources.  There was strong attendance and positive feedback.
     • The Committee is working on a video to train the police department on the policies.
3. Adult Trafficking Committee (Megan/Minouche)
   • Healthy Nail Salon program with SF Environment has been working on expanding curriculum to ensure that a greater number of salon workers and owners understand labor rights, including human trafficking.  The first session with the new content was rolled out this Spring. The data set detailing where certified healthy nail salons are located is now on Open Data SF, in the hopes that this will make it easy for Yelp to scrape and match with their listings.   
   • Stop the Traffick, a London-based group, is creating an outreach campaign on labor trafficking and may collaborate to educate consumers about the Healthy Nail Salon program.
   • The Good Food Purchasing Program, with support from Supervisor Sandra Fewer, has gained traction and the Board of Supervisors passed a resolution to implement it at Sheriff Department (in the jails) and Dept of Public Health (major hospitals) in San Francisco to ensure that food is being sourced with traffick-free supply chains.
   • The committee is also hoping to expand survivor voices within the Adult Committee, using the Youth Advisory Board within the Youth Trafficking Committee as an example.

 

5. Survivor Leadership Engagement/Empowerment (Sarai Smith-Mazariegos)

Sarai gave a presentation on engaging survivor-leaders in human trafficking work.Her presentation was cut short due to a room scheduling error, and she will continue the presentation at the August meeting.

 

6. Adjournment

Next General Meeting will be August 22, 2018.