By Sullivan : westsideobserver – excerpt
Need Help Getting a Record from City Hall?
After Sergei Severinov and his immigrant family were harassed, intimidated, insulted with racial slurs, abused and racially profiled by San Francisco Police Department (SFPD), he filed multiple complaints with the Office of Citizens Complaints and the Department of Police Accountability over several years. Finally, fed-up with the victimization of SFPD, he decided to find out what records SFPD keeps on him and his family. He sought help from the Sunshine Ordinance Task Force (SOTF) and in particular, all records of interaction with SFPD. He believes he has the right to do so under the California Public Records Act and the San Francisco Sunshine Ordinance…
Sunshine
“Elected officials, commissions, boards, councils and other agencies of the City and County exist to conduct the people’s business. The people do not cede to these entities the right to decide what the people should know about the operations of local government. The right of the people to know what their government and those acting on behalf of their government are doing is fundamental to democracy, and with very few exceptions, that right supersedes any other policy interest government officials may use to prevent public access to information. The people of San Francisco enact these amendments to assure that the people of the City remain in control of the government they have created.” San Francisco Sunshine Ordinance of 1999, Findings and Purpose, Administrative Code §67…(more)