Brown out
Task force to discuss securing departing mayor's records

By Matthew Hirsch

The Sunshine Ordinance Task Force will take up a resolution Dec. 16 asking City Attorney Dennis Herrera to inventory Mayor Willie Brown's records before Brown vacates his office. It's the last opportunity for the task force to issue the request because Brown leaves City Hall Jan. 7, two weeks before the first task force meeting of 2004.

The task force was supposed to hear the resolution on Brown's records at its meeting last month, but members adjourned before it came up for discussion because the meeting had already run longer than scheduled.

The Sunshine Ordinance provides that all original documents in the Mayor's Office belong to the city, not the mayor, and must be kept on file for the next administration. The provision was added to the ordinance four years ago when voters approved Proposition G, making Brown the first San Francisco mayor affected by the law.

Brown told his audience at the State of the City address Oct. 28 that he had already begun clearing out his office to make way for his successor. In response, Bay Guardian attorney Thomas R. Burke asked Brown for written confirmation that he would uphold the city's records retention policy in compliance with the Sunshine Ordinance. Shalonda Baldwin, director of operations for the Mayor's Office, told Burke in a Nov. 4 e-mail that Brown's office would adhere to the policy (see "Mayoral Sunshine," 11/19/03).

On Nov. 13, Herrera also wrote to Brown advising him of new laws arising from Proposition E, the ethics reform measure approved last month, that may affect his transition from office. Task force member Richard Knee told the Bay Guardian that independent of action by the City Attorney's Office, it will be difficult for the task force to prevent Brown from taking public records from his office because its enforcement powers are limited.

One possibility for the task force, referring the case to the Ethics Commission for investigation, would be unlikely to yield timely results because the Ethics Department is understaffed and underfunded. That's a result of Brown's 2003 city budget, which cut funding to the department – cuts that were approved by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors.

Nevertheless, Knee told us he thinks the Sunshine Ordinance will be effective in keeping Brown from carting off boxes of files as so many outgoing mayors have done before him. "If that happens," Knee said, "Willie Brown can expect some sort of legal action either from a private citizen or from the city itself."

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