Fire Commission - March 14, 2018

 

 

The Video can be viewed by clicking this link:  http://sanfrancisco.granicus.com/MediaPlayer.php?view_id=180&clip_id=30…

 

President Cleaveland called the meeting to order at 9:01 a.m.

 

1. ROLL CALL

 

Commission President Ken Cleaveland Present 

Commission Vice President Stephen Nakajo Present

Commissioner Michael Hardeman Present

Commissioner Francee Covington Present

Commissioner Joe Alioto Veronese Present

 

Chief of Department Joanne Hayes-White Present

 

Mark Gonzales Deputy Chief – Operations

Jeanine Nicholson Deputy Chief --Administration

 

Dan De Cossio Bureau of Fire Prevention

Andy Zanoff EMS

Mike Cochrane Homeland Security

Joel Sato Division of Training

 

Assistant Chiefs

Peter Fay Division 2

Tom Siragusa Division 3

 

Staff

Mark Corso Deputy Director of Finance

Olivia Scanlon Communications and Outreach

 

2. PUBLIC COMMENT

 

Jimmy Lee spoke in regards to the condition and location of the preservation of the city-owned antique fire apparatus.  He gave a brief background on the Guardian of the City's involvement with the apparatus and his disappointment that there is no long-term solution to house them.

 

Jacquie Martin also spoke in regards to the antique apparatus and corrected a statement made by Chief Nicholson wherein she mentioned the SFFD has been working closely with the GOTC and that that statement is not entirely the case.  She feels there has been little collaboration other than a request to pay for the shrink-wrapping that the GOTC oppose.  She commented that she hopes there can be a mutually agreeable solution for this issue because the antique fire apparatus is rusting away at the moment.

 

Paul Barry spoke in terms of how low-density polyethylene foam has been around for decades and concluded that he does not recommend the use of shrink wrap as a substitute for inside storage of vintage and one-of-a-kind fire apparatus.

 

3. APPROVAL OF THE MINUTES [Discussion and possible action]

Discussion and possible action to approve meeting minutes.

 

• Minutes from Regular Meeting on January 24, 2018.

 

Commissioner Hardeman Moved to approve the above meeting Minutes.  Vice President Nakajo Seconded.  Motion to approve above Minutes was unanimous.

 

There was no public comment.

 

4. PRESENTATION FROM THE SAN FRANCISCO PUBLIC UTILITIES COMMISSION ON THE AUXILIARY WATER SUPPLY SYSTEM [Discussion]

John Scarpulla, SFPUC, Policy & Government Affairs and Katie L. Miller, P.E., Manager, City Distribution Division, SFPUC Water to present overview of the AWSS.

 

Chief Hayes-White introduced Ms. Scarpulla and Ms. Miller from PUC and thanked the Public Utilities Commissions for their hard work on getting additional water resources into the Sunset and Richmond Districts of San Francisco.  Mr. Scarpulla presented the attached PowerPoint slide show and explained in detail how the PUC is currently working on the AWSS and the history behind it.  He added that when the AWSS was transferred to the PUC, it was the beginning of a fantastic partnership that has been getting stronger since 2010.

 

Commissioner Covington thanked Mr. Scarpulla for his comprehensive report.  She confirmed that potentially the ESER bond for 2020 is going to play a major role in getting where they need to be unless they are able to identify funding sources prior to that.  She asked how much money they would be requiring from the 2020 ESER bond and Mr. Scarpulla answered that it’s hard for them to provide numbers right now and that Directory Kelly would clearly work with Chief Hayes-White to figure out what the right numbers of that particular bond would be.  Chief Hayes-White added that it is currently part of the ongoing discussions they are having. Commissioner Covington also asked if they have a way to have something so that the water is travelling downhill, a la Hetch Hetchy can reach the higher elevations such as the Glen Park and Twin Peaks areas and Mr. Scarpulla stated they are looking into that issue, including increasing the pressure of the water to get it up with new pipelines and building new connections from Summit Reservoirs and Stanford Heights Reservoir and have that flow by gravity rather than relying on pumps.  Ms. Miller added that for a short-term solution, they have installed two cisterns in those areas.  Commissioner Covington also stressed the point of how important the potable water challenge is and reminded the public that they may be on their own for 72 hours or more after a major disaster and to have extra water handy.  She also confirmed that with the redundancy that is needed, Director Kelly has already put 40 million dollars in the budget towards it so they can start right now and they expect to begin to put pipe in the ground as early as 2019.  There were questions and answers pertaining to negotiating with developers for projects outside of the development boundaries and recouping the costs for the AWSS in the development agreement.

 

Commissioner Veronese asked if there is some sort of recoup from the developers on the impact to the Department outside of the water supply.  Chief Hayes-White responded that they anticipate call volume going up as the new developments are built and she envisions a well-built fire protection system, but when it comes to the budget in terms of staffing, those situations are contemplated and she would like to continue to have robust discussions related to the impacts to the Department.  Commissioner Veronese confirmed that the City of San Francisco gets 85 percent of their water supply from Hetch Hetchy and that they have enough water to sustain a 7 year drought and that is calculated from previous supply side modeling based off of droughts in the late 70’s, early 80’s but as weather patterns shift, the models will get updated.

 

Commissioner Hardeman thanked Mr. Scarpulla, Ms. Miller and Mr. Birmingham for their presentation.  He confirmed that San Francisco supplies the water for Treasure Island and eventually will have a sea water pumping station on it.

 

Vice President Nakajo thanked Mr. Scarpulla, Ms. Miller and Mr. Birmingham for all their hard work and dedication as well as the partnership that they have with the SFFD.  He thanked them for paying attention to detail and concepts of the urgent need to get AWSS to the west side of the city.  He confirmed that Olivia Scanlon, Chief Rivera, and Chief Hayes-White have done a fantastic job bringing in the concerned residents and providing this information to them.  Mr. Scarpulla added that they have also stepped up their outreach to residents.

 

President Cleaveland thanked them for their comprehensive report and asked if the $70,000,000 shortfall can be wrapped into rates as opposed to waiting for the ESER Bond.  Mr. Scarpulla answered that there are certain components that they cannot put rates towards including high-pressure pumps needed to fight fires. 

 

There was no public comment.

 

5. CHIEF OF DEPARTMENT’S REQUEST FOR LEAVE TO ATTEND CITY OF LOVELAND, COLORADO’S PROFESSIONAL FEMALE FORUM

Chief Hayes-White respectfully requests a Leave of Absence with pay for two (2) days, Thursday, March 29 and Friday, March 30, 2018, to attend the City of Loveland, Colorado’s Professional Female Forum event, to serve on a panel with four other members.   Deputy Chief Gonzales will serve as Acting Chief of Department.  There will be no cost to the Department for this trip.

 

Commissioner Hardeman Moved to approve the above Leave Request.  Commissioner Veronese Seconded.  Motion was unanimously approved.

 

There was no public comment.

 

6. CHIEF OF DEPARTMENT’S REPORT [Discussion]

REPORT FROM CHIEF OF DEPARTMENT, JOANNE HAYES-WHITE

Report on current issues, activities and events within the Department since the Fire Commission meeting on February 28, 2018, including budget, academies, special events, communications and outreach to other government agencies and the public.

 

Chief Hayes-White reported on events since the last meeting on February 28, 2018.  She introduced Battalion Chief Pete Fay who was filling in as AC for Division 2.  She also introduced newly selected Assistant Deputy Chief and Director of Training, Captain Joel Sato who gave a brief overview of his time in the Department.

 

Chief Hayes-White talked about the budget stating that they had the opportunity to meet with the mayor’s budget director who will be taking leave soon and will be reposed and that it was a productive discussion.  She thanked President Cleaveland and Commissioner Veronese for attending the meeting as well.  She mentioned that in regards to the Division of Training, they graduated 36 members from the H-3 Level 1 EMT class on Friday and that the 124th academy class will start on March 26, 2018, with 42 members off the H-2 NTN list to be followed by 12 members of Station 49.

 

Chief Hayes-White accounted for the activities she attended over the reporting period, including participating in the California Metro Chiefs phone call, the Sunset Elementary read-aloud event, and the service for retired Chief of Department Robert Demmons’ son, who passed away at 50 years old.  She attended the policy meeting for Healthy Streets Initiative, the Kiel German Sister City event, interviews for the Division of Training deputy chief, a Department Head Capital Projects meeting, the Delancy Street Life Learning Academy groundbreaking event at Treasure Island, and the Irish Flag raising event.  She also touched on upcoming events, including the St. Patrick’s Day parade and the tsunami walk.  She asked that the meeting be adjourned in the memory of Acting Lieutenant Michal Rice who passed away recently.

 

Commissioner Veronese asked how many antique apparatus are being shrink wrapped.  Chief Rivera responded that the Department has a lot of experience in storing equipment and the wrap that they have selected for the 15 apparatus has a mildew resistant treatment that is designed to not allow the greenhouse effect.

 

Vice President Nakajo stated he was a little disappointed in the Guardians of the City in the sense of the comments that were made during public comment and he’s troubled by the lack of communication between the Department and the GOTC and not working together to solve this issue.  His preference would be to meet with the administration or the officers of the Guardians of the City and establish a sense of communication so that they can establish goals, even if they are temporary goals and be able to try to resolve the issues short term and long term.

 

There was no public comment.

 

REPORT FROM DEPUTY CHIEF OF OPERATIONS, MARK GONZALES

Report on overall field operations, including greater alarm fires, Emergency Medical Services, including update on EKG monitor/defibrillator; Bureau of Fire Prevention & Investigation, and Airport Division.

 

Chief Gonzales reported on activities for the month of February.  He mentioned there were three greater alarms during this reporting period, which were all second alarms.  The first one was at 1216 Fulton and Assistant Chief Burk was the incident commander and the cause is undetermined.  The second occurred at 250 Hyde Street with no injuries and Assistant Chief Postel was the incident commander.  The third was at 519 Sanchez Street and the incident commander was AC Juratovac.  The cause of this fire is still under investigation.  He touched on other notable incidents during the reporting period including a water rescue near Station 35, a cliff rescue of two dogs at Fort Funston and three adults rescued from the cliffs at Baker Beach.  He touched on outreach efforts, recruiting efforts and fire prevention educational material available to the public and public safety announcements that were made during the month of February.  He touched on response times, the activation of the QRV’s, and the upcoming bike med class.

 

Commissioner Hardeman welcomed Captain Sato aboard to his new position.

 

Commissioner Covington asked what can be done to reduce the number of cliff rescues.  Chief Gonzales answered that people need to leash their dogs and also more signage from the National Park Service would be helpful.  They touched briefly on the incident at James Lick Middle School where several children injected edible marijuana and had to be treated.

 

Commissioner Veronese congratulated Chief Sato for his new role.  He mentioned that after the death of Tori La Rocca at Land’s End last year, and because so many jurisdictions respond to those incidents, he drafted a measure that requested the mayor’s office put together a multijurisdictional task force to identify the gaps in services, technology and what more can be done about identifying dangerous places for the public.  Unfortunately, the Mayor has since died and he stated he will follow-up on that measure.

 

Vice President Nakajo welcomed Captain Sato to his new position.  He discussed the new Sprinter ambulances, which have a smaller profile and are currently being run as a pilot program.  Chief Gonzales gave an explanation on how the QRV’s will be used and will allow the ambulances to get back into service quicker.

 

At the request of Commissioner Covington and in response to an email received from a concerned citizen, Chief Zanoff gave a brief update on the EKG monitors that the department uses.  He stated that the Department’s monitor defibrillators are basically oscilloscopes that are designed to detect and display the electrical activity that goes through the patient’s heart.  They can do that on the largest patient to the smallest patient, the youngest to the oldest and they use them multiple times a day on every patient that they pick up.  The EKG tracings that come across the screen are accurate, and they display what the patient’s heart is doing from the electrical standpoint and there is a difference between the electrical component and the mechanical component of the heart.  He concluded that they can treat all of their patients equally and accurately with the equipment that they have.

 

There was no public comment.

 

7. PRESENTATION ON EXPOSURE STUDY OF FIREFIGHTERS WHO RESPONDED TO THE NORTHERN CALIFORNIA WILDFIRES

Firefighter Adam Wood to present on current status of the study being conducted on members who were responded to the North Bay wildfires.

 

Firefighter Adam Wood stated that in the midst of the Northern California wildfires last October, Tony Stefanie, who is the president of the San Francisco Firefighters Cancer Prevention Foundation, conceived of this study and it was generated by the concerns that he had about this fire.  He stated that on the one hand, you had firefighters who, for the most part, were equipped with wildland level personal protective equipment which does not provide a high level of dermal or respiratory protection and on the other hand, they're operating in a fire ground that ended up consuming almost 8,000 structures from top to the foundation and almost 700 cars.  The firefighters were potentially exposed to the contaminants that they typically associate with urban structural firefighting, but without the protections they generally provide to those firefighters.  He stated that they wanted to find out if those firefighters got exposed to toxins, and if the data could inform the way going forward on how to protect these firefighters in the future with similar fires.  He went on to describe in detail how the research was conducted, the techniques used and who was involved.  He stated that they expect the result sometime in May and he would report back with those results.  He mentioned some of the items that they can improve on as well as finding more funding.

 

Commissioner Covington was glad to see they took immediate action to conduct the study and looks forward to seeing the results.

 

Commissioner Veronese thanked Firefighter Wood and stated he appreciated the report.  He was glad that they have learned a lot from the drill and he hopes the Department can also learn from the experiences and result from the study and if needed put a policy together to address the findings for fighting future wildland/urban fires.  He talked about the foundation and how he is willing to help find more funds for these types of studies.

 

Commissioner Hardeman thanked Firefighter Wood and 798 for having the capacity to take this task on and stated they need a pat on the back for doing the job they do.

 

President Cleaveland thanked Firefighter Wood for the very excellent report and the very important study and he looks forward to having him come back to give an update on the study.

 

8. COMMISSION REPORT [Discussion]

Report on Commission activities since last meeting on January 24, 2018.

 

Commissioner Nakajo described in detail his ride-a-long with the EMS 6.  He stated it was an all-day excursion and he was able to experience firsthand how the EMS-6 personnel works with clients that frequently use the ambulance service.  He presented detailed experiences he witnesses throughout the shift and stated how professional and amazing the members of the team conduct themselves and he walked away with a sense of high esteem and respect for the staff and stated the Commission is very fortunate to have that kind of dedicated personnel out at Station 49.  He thanked Chief Zanoff, Dr. Yeh and Chief Molly for the opportunity to observe the team. 

 

President Cleaveland tabled this item as we were short on time.

 

9. AGENDA FOR NEXT AND FUTURE FIRE COMMISSION MEETINGS [Discussion]

Discussion regarding agenda for next and future Fire Commission meetings.

 

10. DISCUSSION AND POSSIBLE ACTION TO APPROVE FORM AND CRITERIA FOR COMPLETING PERFORMANCE EVALUATION OF DEPARTMENT PHYSICIAN DR. RAMON TERRAZAS [Discussion and possible action]

Commissioners to discuss and vote on appropriate form and criteria to use to complete the performance evaluation of Department Physician, Dr. Ramon Terrazas.

 

President Cleaveland explained the process and how DHR provides a form for evaluating employees but the Commission is not required to use that form.  He explained that after the initial evaluation of the Department Physician, the Commission created a summary of that evaluation which is in memo form and he was hoping that this is the form they will agree on.  Commissioner Veronese brought up the process that the commissioners' themselves don't really know or don't have the day to day experience with the Department Physician, which is typically a person who manages the person being evaluated and he feels that it is insufficient going forward to conduct this type of evaluation.

 

Commissioner Hardeman moved to approve the form.  Commissioner Veronese seconded.  The motion was unanimous.

 

11. PUBLIC COMMENT ON ITEM 12

Public comment on all matters pertaining to Item 12 (b) below, including public comment on whether to hold Items 12 (b) in closed session. 

 

President Cleaveland called for public comment.  There was no public comment.

 

12. POSSIBLE CLOSED SESSION REGARDING PERSONNEL MATTERS

 

a. VOTE ON WHETHER TO CONDUCT ITEMS 12(b) IN CLOSED SESSION [Action]

The Commission may hear Item 913(b) in closed session pursuant to Government Code Section 54957(b) and Administrative Code Section 67.10(b).

 

Commissioner Veronese made a motion to conduct items 12(b) in Closed Session.  Commissioner Covington seconded, and the motion was unanimously approved.  (5-0; Cleaveland, Nakajo, Hardeman, Covington, Veronese)

 

The Commission went into closed session at 11:45 a.m.

 

b. DEPARTMENT PHYSICIAN PERFORMANCE EVALUATION (Con’t) [Discussion and possible action]

Pursuant to Admin. Code section 67.10(b); Govt. Code section 54957(b), Govt. Code section 54957.1(a)(5), the Commission may hold a closed session to discuss and vote to approve the performance evaluation of Department Physician, Ramon Terrazas

 

13. REPORT ON ANY ACTION TAKEN IN CLOSED SESSION [Discussion and possible action] as specified in California Government Code Section 54957.1(a) and San Francisco Administrative Code section 67.12(b).

 

The Commission reconvened in Open Session at 12:15 p.m.   There was nothing to report.  The Physician’s performance evaluation was concluded and will be submitted to the Department’s Human Resources Unit.

 

13. VOTE TO ELECT WHETHER TO DISCLOSE ANY OR ALL DISCUSSIONS HELD IN CLOSED SESSION, as specified in San Francisco Administrative Code Section 67.12(a).   [Action]

 

Vice President Nakajo Moved to not disclose discussions held in closed session.  Commissioner Covington Seconded.  The motion was unanimously approved.  (5-0; Cleaveland, Nakajo, Hardeman, Covington, Veronese)

 

14. ADJOURNMENT 

 

President Cleaveland adjourned the meeting at 12:17 p.m. in honor of Acting Lieutenant Michael Rice.