MINUTES
of the
POWER PLANT TASK FORCE
SPECIAL MEETING
September 8, 2004 at 4:00 p.m.
City Hall
1 Dr. Carlton B. Goodlett Place, Room 408
1. CALL TO ORDER AND ROLL CALL
The meeting was called to order by Chair Philip DeAndrade at 4:15 p.m.
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Present:
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Joe Boss
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Toby Levy
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Philip DeAndrade
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Steven Moss
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John Kosinsky
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Absent:
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John Borg
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Richard Millet
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Dana Lanza
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Karen Pierce
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2. APPROVAL OF THE MINUTES
The minutes of the meetings of June 24, 2004, July 14, 2004 (Special Meeting) and August 5, 2004 (Special Meeting) were approved as written.
3. REPORT FROM DEPUTY CITY ATTORNEY THERESA MUELLER REGARDING CONFLICT OF INTEREST LAWS
Deputy City Attorney Chad Jacobs of the Ethics Team of the City Attorney's Office appeared on behalf of Deputy City Attorney Theresa Mueller to comment on conflict of interest laws.
This Task force is an advisory body. As a rule an advisory body is generally not subject to most of the City and state conflict of interest laws. There are two important exceptions to this general rule: 1) if, over a period of time, the recommendations that this body makes are accepted and not changed by the actual decision-makers, then under state and local law, members of this body are deemed to be decision-makers and, at that point, are subject to conflict of interest laws.
At this time, the Task Force members have not established that track record. City Attorney's Office will work with Task Force to ensure that once body reaches that point, it (City Attorney's Office) will work with group and members will be notified and be made aware of the conflict of interest laws that would be applicable to members of the Task Force.
Other important exception is a conflict of interest law that does apply to members of Task Force is Govt. Code Section 1090, and local counterpart SF Campaign and Governmental Conduct Code Section 3.206 (b). These laws say that it is improper for a public official or employee to participate in making a contract in which he or she has a financial interest.
If, in the discussions re community benefits, offsets and mitigations, votes may be scheduled whereby grants or other types of funding are made available to organizations of which members may be board members or possible recipients of funds, Mr. Jacobs suggested that members consult the City Attorney's office for legal advice regarding the necessity to abstain from a vote or to step down from the Task Force. If there is a conflict, the contract cannot go forward unless the member takes either of the above two steps. The issuance of a contract is the event that would trigger the conflict of interest possibility. City Attorney's Office will speak with members as individuals with particular circumstances.
4. RETROFIT OF POTRERO UNIT 3
Greg Karras, Communities for a Better Environment (CBE): Air Quality Board met today. Re shutdown of Hunters Point Plant, as soon as ISO releases that unit from Condition 1, RMR contract, that unit, or if still a plant, the entire plant will not have an air permit
Mr. Karras appeared to let Task Force know that there are three or four issues that should be considered in an environmental review should there be one of the Potrero retrofit:
1) Retrofitting the plant is not consistent with the City Electricity Plan and could prolong the life of the plant as opposed to not retrofitting it; 2) Proposal includes the largest ammonia storage tank in the City, and there is potential for spills at the site and in transport; 3) Relates to air pollution; retrofit would reduce smog, but does not reduce direct emissions of particulate matter, which does violate air quality standards in southeast San Francisco; timing of retrofit before other resources are put in place, would mean that other dirty distillate oil-fired existing CTs and HP would run about ten to twenty times more per month during the winter; 4) Demolition of historic resource, Station A would be part of the project.
Mr. Karras asked the Task Force to take a position stating that the plant is not reliable and communicating it to ISO at its meeting on Sept. 15.
a. Joshua Abraham from Literacy for Environmental Justice: was at press conference today that Air Quality Management District put on; discussed ammonia issue; City has to open up issue to the public.
5. ADJOURNMENT
Mr. Kosinsky left the meeting and the quorum was lost. Remaining members remained for discussion but no business was conducted.
