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City administrator and tech chief outline budget priorities: census outreach, justice data hub and capital moves
Summary
City Administrator Naomi Kelly and Department of Technology Director Linda Jarrell briefed the Budget and Finance Committee on staffing changes, transfers (DataSF), census outreach grants and a multi-year Justice data hub funded by COIT; supervisors pressed for more language-access staff and clearer budget allocations.
San Francisco's city administrator and the director of the Department of Technology used the June 13 budget hearing to preview the administration's priorities for the FY20'FY21 budget, highlighting transfers, program changes and investments in data systems.
City Administrator Naomi Kelly described an organizational transfer of DataSF into Admin Services, the creation or transfer of several positions tied to capital moves (49 South Van Ness permit center, Treasure Island) and a roughly $50 million year-over-year net increase driven primarily by one-time capital costs and reallocated positions. Kelly and deputy administrators also described requests for specialized staff — including positions to assist equity applicants in the Office of Cannabis and new teams to support language access and immigrant engagement.
Adrienne Pahn of the Office of Civic Engagement and Immigrant Affairs told the committee the city expects to use $2 million in multi-year grants and an approximately $5.5 million state grant to support Complete Count Committee activities for the 2020 Census, relying on community-based organizations to reach limited-English and hard-to-count populations.
Department of Technology Director Linda Jarrell outlined DT's five strategic priorities and discussed COIT-funded projects: the next-generation network, cybersecurity and the multi-year justice hub program intended to replace legacy mainframe systems and provide a shared data platform across justice agencies. Jarrell said the justice hub work is funded, in part, with COIT and will require further investments to migrate mainframe data to the new system.
Supervisors pressed for more details about language access staffing and census outreach capacity; Kelly and Pahn described field staffing plans and grants to community organizations but said additional support would help reach the hardest-to-count populations. Jarrell acknowledged vacancies and the challenges of hiring in the Bay Area tech market; she reported performance measures (real-time dashboards and a 79% net promoter score for DT services) and said DT was supporting the 49 South Van Ness permit center with technical systems.
Next steps: Supervisors requested further detailed level-by-level budgets for department phases and committed to follow-up hearings to reconcile staffing requests with mayoral budget instructions.
