********Disclaimer!********. This text is being provided in a rough draft format. Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) is provided in order to facilitate Communication accessibility and may not be a totally verbatim record of the Proceedings. ********Disclaimer!******** NYC Civic Engagement 12/18/2019 SAYEED: The meeting will please come to order. I would like to welcome everyone here today, welcoming members of the administration, organizational partners, members of the public who are here today. Thank you so much for taking the time to be with us, and also thank you. Welcome to those who are watching the live stream. For people in the audience, we do have a sign-in sheet that we would love to get your name on, if you... Hopefully someone is passing that around. If you haven't already signed it, please do. And I also want to check if there are members of the press here today. As is usual, I want to remind everyone that we're being live streamed as part of open meeting guidelines, and we have live captioning today and Spanish language interpreters. So if you would like a Spanish language interpreter, please let us know. Someone will help you with that. The last half hour of today's meeting is dedicated to open public excellent, and Brooklyn Voters Alliance is our presenter today. Is someone here from Brooklyn Voters Alliance? Amazing. Okay. Thank you. So we're gonna turn to the internal business of the Commission. First there should be a sign-in sheet for everyone to put down that they're here today. So please make sure you sign that. Holly, you are on the phone. I want to make sure you can hear me. HOLLY: I can hear you. SAYEED: You can or can't? Can? Amazing! Technology is working today. So the first thing we should do is review and approve the minutes from the last meeting. Which are in your packet. >> Approved. >> Second. SAYEED: Thank you. Okay. All those in favor approving the minutes from November? Aye. Anyone opposed say nay. Okay. Minutes stand approved. Thank you. So as I indicated in my email, we have some really important mission critical matters to talk about today. Before we go on, I wanted to actually... Anyone else need to sign? Okay. I'll pass it around. So I wanted to actually make a slight change in the order of items on the agenda. So today we're going to be talking about the Commission's draft proposed poll site language assistance methodology. And we have colleagues here who have helped us work on this document from the Mayor's Office of Electorate Affairs. Sabrina Fong, director of research, and Anne Montesano, Executive Director of initiatives and language access, and has presented to this group before. She talked about the poll site interpretation program, and is very well versed in the operation of the program. As it has existed to date. And Asher Ross, a data director from the Mayor's Community Affairs Unit. Both Asher and Sabrina -- there have been so many good people who have been very helpful with preparing a document that you have today. Asher and Sabrina have been very helpful in the data analysis. So in order to accommodate their schedule, because Anne might need to leave a little bit earlier, I wanted to make a motion to reorder items B and A on our agenda, under amendment 1 and 2 discussion. So I would like to first discuss the poll site methodology draft before we discuss the advisory membership. So I would like to make a motion to make that swap. Could I have a second on the motion? To take up discussion first? The proposed methodology. Thank you. All in favor? >> Aye. SAYEED: So the agenda is now updated to discuss the poll site methodology first. The other thing I wanted to mention, in the interest of, again, respecting our colleagues' time, we put on the agenda the vote on the amendments towards the end, so we'll have discussion and voting on the amendments after we present the actual documents to you. I'm not sure... I'm hoping everyone had a chance to read the email that I sent. That we sent to you on Monday. And just in case people hadn't seen it, I'm gonna go over what I said in there. So we're all starting from the same page. So given the timeline and the crunch that we've been under to sort of make things happen with the CEC, we've been really working hard to stay on track with the Commission mandates. And there are some deadlines. And so today I'm really -- we're asking for your help to continue to stay on track with the schedule and the mandates. The Law Department reminded us, as a Commission, that we have some time-bound responsibilities that are defined in the resolution that we voted on in May. That is included in your folder. So if you could turn to that document now, the initial resolution that we passed... Under section 1d, you will note that the responsibilities for the Chair and Executive Director are -- include -- several things. But under D, it talks about development of a poll site language assistance program, which we're required to present to you. And the Commission must approve the proposed final and updated methodologies to determine the covered poll site and languages and related policies. Okay? Under number 3, if you turn it over, it talks about recruiting candidates for membership of the participatory budgeting and language assistance advisory committees to be established pursuant to section 32 of the charter and selecting proposed candidates for the Commission. That's also the Chair and Executive Director's responsibility. Today's amendment. The first amendment that we're looking at... I want to remind people that the advisory list was given out in the last meeting, along with the language assistance advisory. So our main deadline is that by January 1, we need to post the proposed poll site language assistance methodology. We don't have time or opportunity to meet again this year, between now and January 1. So we are looking to attend to this legal requirement that you all have approved the proposed methodology in advance of posting. So the amendment that the Law Department has drafted, the first one, is to delegate responsibility and authority to the chair, to publish the proposed methodology on January 1, and to ratify the past recruitment and appointment to the advisory board. Amendment 2 will permanently delegate responsibility and authority to the Chair and Executive Director to recruit and appoint members to the advisory board. In these amendments, you will see what is being changed, what's being overridden. As I mentioned in the email, approval of the first amendment is critical in order for us to meet the January 1 deadline for publishing a poll site proposed methodology. And to tidily convene the advisory board. Amendment 2 is not critical for meeting the deadlines and the law, but would enable the Chair and Executive Director going forward, if there were vacancies in the advisory groups, for example, to quickly move to recruit and appoint them. The second amendment is dependent on the passage of amendment 1. So we've been working around-the-clock, literally, to prepare the draft document that we have given you today on the proposed methodology, and as I mentioned, a lot of people have been involved in that. The Mayor's Office of Immigrant Affairs, department of City Planning, law department, and others. And this has been going on over several weeks, to get this document going through several drafts as well. So once we go through this document, you will have this meeting, and until Monday, December 23rd, to send us the edits. We'll incorporate the relevant edits and email you in advance the version that will be posted online, Jan 1. You'll also have a second opportunity to review and propose and make substantive edits between Jan 1 and the next time we vote on the final. And the final, as I mentioned, needs to be posted by April 1. So I'm gonna start by reviewing the language in amendment 1 first. It says on the top the new material is underlined. Deleted material is in brackets. The first addition is under number 1. It's a new number 1. So it allows us to present... (phone chime) SAYEED: Oh, yes, there's a severe warning alert. >> It went to my phone too. SAYEED: I don't see any snow yet. >> We're quite specific as to our... That's right, yeah. SAYEED: Okay. So what this allows us to do... The language allows us to present the document to you as a draft. Okay? And it allows us as a commission to make non-substantial edits to the document before we post it on January 1. So this means, again, we can take it home, we can look at it, you can send me things. So it says: By Jan 1, 2020, make available on the Commission's website a proposed methodology to determine poll sites and languages covered by the Commission's poll site language assistance program. Pursuant to section 3202 of the New York City Charter, the proposed methodology shall be the draft proposed methodology presented at the meeting of the Commission held December 18, 2019. That's today. With such further appropriate amendments as the Chair may make, provided that such amendments shall be provided to Commissioners in advance of the proposed methodology being made available on the website and the proposed methodology as amended shall be substantially similar to the draft proposed methodology today. So is that making sense so far? APELIAN: I'm having a problem. I thought we were voting today. And now you're saying that after we approve it, we're still leaving time to come back with amendments? And how would you ratify? SAYEED: So the document -- what this amendment is doing is calling the document that we're giving you today a draft of the proposed methodology. APELIAN: Understood. SAYEED: And then between now and Jan 1, we can tweak it. And then we would post the version that I sent you in advance of Jan 1, taking in your input, I would send you that, and then we would post that version online. APELIAN: I'm just asking about procedure. How you would have that approved. If it's after we all disperse. SAYEED: So if you look at the -- if you look at d -- what it does is remove the word "proposed" from there. And instead, it's letting us have this draft for your approval. And making the changes. That you might suggest. Under d. So the word "proposed" is in brackets. So we'll delete that. And there's a bit of renumbering also here. Right? You can see that. APELIAN: I'm still missing... Whether it's draft, proposed, whatever -- how are we gonna vote on it again? SAYEED: Today's vote on the draft, according to this amendment, will constitute the vote on the methodology posted on Jan 1. APELIAN: Agreed. But now you're doing more work. Potentially more might happen between now and the end of the year. SAYEED: It's if you want to make... What this is saying is, if you see something that you think, like, there's... I don't know. GILL: A comma, a period. SAYEED: Something non-substantive. That's the issue here. It's supposed to be substantially similar to the draft proposal. APELIAN: So we would allow you as Chair to make the decision and give you the authority to make those changes? SAYEED: I will let you know the comments I've gotten from all of you and tell you what I've incorporated and what I would flag as a substantial edit that would need -- the issue here is that any changes would need to go through internal review again. What this would allow is for us to tweak it slightly, as long as it's not substantially different, and add the substantial changes to the second round. We then have to approve the one that is posted before April 1 as well. Does that make sense? DILLER: So if I'm understanding you correctly, the proposed amendment is an interim measure to meet the January 1st deadline, and that the document in substantially the form that it is in now will be the document that is posted on January 1st, but we'll still have an opportunity to comment in a plenary way on the final version that will be the document that is adopted in time for the April 1st deadline. Is that a fair summary? SAYEED: Exactly. Thank you very much. APELIAN: That part I'm clear on. It's just the window where... I don't know what's gonna be happening. I think it just leaves it open for... Criticism versus... We take a vote today and that's it. FIORITO: It's just us that are reviewing it. It's not anyone else. SAYEED: This is just more because we're giving you the draft today. And we don't know that we're going to be able to read a 10-page draft during the time we have together. It's out of respect for your time, really. That's all it is. If you would like to propose a change to the amendment... APELIAN: No, I was just saying I thought we would be voting on it today and if any other change took place, it would be between January 1 and April. SAYEED: I see what you're saying. GILL: We're voting on it today, but we're getting an opportunity, because it is something that -- we didn't have enough input on -- so we have time to have our input and then have our input respected, added to the document, and then... But in essence, we're voting on what we have right now. SAYEED: Yeah. It will change dramatically. DILLER: So adopting this resolution would effectively adopt the draft as an interim document, but it would not -- and this is the question, I guess -- am I correct that it would not prejudice us from offering substantive comments after January 1st, so that if we found an issue, and I've already found one, that I might want to have a discussion about, before it becomes final, that there would be a subsequent opportunity to debate that, and -- SAYEED: Yes. And we can actually -- if you like, we can dedicate the next meeting to doing that. And that might also be helpful, because we do need to hold a public hearing. So... DILLER: Okay. GILL: All right. SAYEED: All right. So I'm gonna move to the next part that is the change in here, in the first amendment. The last section of it that was added. BREEDLOVE: Section 5? SAYEED: Yeah, changes in the last... Yes. It's now 6. And it states: Be it further resolved that the Civic Engagement Commission ratifies and approves actions taken by the Chair prior to the date of adoption of this resolution to recruit and appoint members to the participatory budgeting and language assistance advisory committees, established pursuant to section 3202 of the charter. The language... Yes. The language in number 4 now hasn't changed. It's still the same. It still says recruit candidates for membership. So what this allows us to do is for us to present to you the list of people that were selected, and for you to approve that group. Are there any questions? DILLER: So by this amendment, we're essentially approving this? SAYEED: Yes. And we're gonna go through the documents. DILLER: And this? SAYEED: Yes. GILL: Okay. (inaudible) SAYEED: No, I want to go through the documents first. I mean, next I'm gonna go through the second amendment, so you all understand, and then we'll move into the methodology and the draft methodology advisory. So in the second amendment, it's the same language as the first amendment. Okay? It's assuming that we have passed that. And what it does is, under 4, it allows the Chair and Executive Director to recruit and appoint members of the advisory committees. And it deletes the word "candidates for membership" and deletes "present proposed candidates for acceptance to the commission". So it's allowing us to consider a different way of appointing advisory group members. Right? Instead of recruiting members and presenting proposed candidates to the commission, you can decide whether you'd like to give the Chair and Executive Director the responsibility and authority to recruit and appoint them, going forward. Or if you prefer to have a process that considers the merits of new candidates, or replacements for candidates that leave for some reason. So the main challenge is just that it takes time. People would need to be presented to the Commission, and then also something tricky about this is that it might mean having to go into some kind of executive session. Because we want to protect the confidentiality of the applicants. If you wanted to discuss their individual merits. As I mentioned in the email, the approval of the second amendment is not critical for us to meet deadlines and the law. Right? So we can continue to talk about it, if you would like to, after today. But if we did pass it, it would allow us to keep moving with the advisories. And as I already mentioned, it's the same language. So it is dependent on the passage of amendment 1. Are there any questions on amendment 2? Comments? APELIAN: Both advisory committees -- are they paid or volunteer? And if they're paid, are they within our budget? SAYEED: Volunteer. APELIAN: All volunteer? Okay. Thank you. DILLER: Is there a current unacceptable lag in the process between when you identify a candidate and when we're able to appoint them, if we didn't adopt amendment number 2? SAYEED: Um... It depends, I think. I think part of our challenge is that we have deadlines to meet as far as coming up with the participatory budgeting plan. And also, going through this review for the language... The poll site language assistance plan. So posing a hypothetical scenario, if someone from the committee is unable to come to meetings, and they're not meeting that often either -- they're meeting about once a month -- we'd have a situation in which we'd need to wait several weeks to get them on the committee. And I think it's up to us to figure out if that is unacceptable. I mean, it's... APELIAN: So the real change in amendment 2 is to allow you as the Executive Director or Chair to make these decisions, making appointments, versus making recommendations and having the Commission then hear it and make a vote. SAYEED: Exactly. APELIAN: I support that, just to let everybody know. I think it's a good idea. DILLER: Yeah, I like the idea of streamlining the process, so that you can folks that you need quickly. SAYEED: It's folks that WE need. Just to clarify. DILLER: Don't go too far down that road, though. Because if it's folks that we need, then we ought to be -- SAYEED: That's another good point. I tend to try to use language that's inclusive. I've got to learn where to draw the line, I guess, on that. DILLER: Because the effect of amendment number 2 is to remove a power of this Commission. SAYEED: Very true. DILLER: It's not a huge power. But it does limit our authority. And it does so not in an interim way, which amendment 1 does. Which I support as well, so I should put that on whatever record we're keeping. But number two gives me just a little bit of pause, in terms of... If there's a compelling need to do so, that's one reason to think about doing... Supporting it, as Charles said. But if it is simply administrative convenience, I might think differently about it. And I wonder if there's an interim or middle ground of granting that power to the Chair, subject to a ratification after the fact. So that you can have your team fully formed and ready to rock and roll, and if there is some concern later on, that we've appointed Charles Manson to something important... That's why I picked him. That then we still have something of a chimera of a -- SAYEED: It's sort of what we're doing today. You would amend to change this language to reflect the ratification? Do you want to propose... DILLER: So if I understand you correctly, the current practice is that these folks are not officially appointed to these bodies until this Commission votes them in. Even though you've identified them and interviewed them and vetted them and are happy with them, and they are otherwise ready to get going three weeks ago, but this meeting was on the 18th, and that's when you're gonna see us all. SAYEED: Yeah. DILLER: So I would not be in favor of a process that unnecessarily keeps them on the sidelines for some number of weeks until they could be profitably contributing to your work. The flip side is that I am... And there's a reality of how often this body can meet in some form. But the flip side is also that we're voting to remove permanently a power from us, not just on an interim basis. And so a compromise would seem to be to facilitate the appointment in as smooth and streamlined a fashion as we can come up with, without surrendering complete authority over that appointment process. Because that's... APELIAN: I supported it because you picked your staff that are paid employees without our approval. Correct? And there's at least 50 names over here on a voluntary basis that I don't know any of them, and... I trust that you and the staff will vet them and see resumes and discuss it. And to have 50 names, 10 more names next year, whatever it might be, come and go... I understand Mark's issue of control, and it's not that we're giving up anything, but if you have the power to appoint or hire, I should say, your staff, that's paid employees, of the City of New York, I don't see a problem with you having that same obligation and right to hire volunteers. SAYEED: Okay. What I'm gonna do now... If there are no questions on this, let's come back to the discussion about it. Right? So... What I'm gonna do next is to look at the draft of the proposed methodology. So you have a little bit of an overview of what's in this document. Since it's the first time you're seeing it, I'm just gonna read through the summary, the executive summary. We tried to make this summary very concise. And then as I'm reading, I'd like to just ask that you make a note, if you have some kind of question on the margin, because then when we're finished reading it, I will ask our colleagues to come up and take questions from you. If there are things that are not clear. So... To begin: The New York City Civic Engagement Commission, NYC-CEC, is charged under chapter 76 of the New York City charter with creating a poll site language assistance program known as Program that will provide interpreters at New York City poll sites to assist limited English proficient (LEP) voters with casting a ballot. The NYC-CEC must develop a methodology to determine which languages are eligible for services and the poll sites where such services would be provided. The timeline for establishing the methodology is as follows: January 1st, 2020, the proposed methodology is publicly available. There's a 30-day public comment period, and a public hearing. April 1st, 2020, the methodology is publicly available. This document is the proposed methodology that NYC-CEC is required to publish pursuant to chapter 76 of the Charter. The NYC-CEC will accept public comment on this proposed methodology and schedule a public hearing. Such public comment period and public hearing date will be published on January 1, 2020. Below is a summary of what the NYC-CEC is proposing hearing. Determining the total number of poll sites served. The total number of poll sites eligible for the program will be resource-driven and based on the amount of money allocated for this program. Languages served. The program will provide services in the following languages: Arabic, Bengali, Chinese (Cantonese, Mandarin) French, Haitian Kreyol. Korean, Polish, Russian, Urdu, and Yiddish. They will provide services only in counties where the New York City Board of Elections is not mandated to provide services in such languages, under the federal Voting Rights Act. Determining the level of services for each language. The number of poll sites that will receive services in the languages served will depend on that language's share of the citizen voting age population among the languages to be served in the program. By the program. For example, according to US Census data and among languages in the program, Russian limited English proficient speakers of citizen voting age are 42% of the citizens of voting age with limited English proficiency, CVA-LEP population. Therefore, if NYC-CEC is allocated resources to serve 100 poll sites total, interpretation would be provided in Russian, in up to 42% of the total number of poll sites, or 42 poll sites out of 100 poll sites. Targeting poll sites for services in a particular language. The program will provide interpreters in a particular language at a particular poll site if the US Census data indicates that there is a significant concentration of citizen voting age limited English proficient individuals residing around that particular poll site. Over time, the number of targeted poll sites will be adjusted based on administrative data, such as surnames of registered voters within each poll site, and interpreter journals on service utilization rates to ensure that the program is effectively serving registered voters. So now I'm gonna invite Sabrina, Asher, Anne, and also Duggan, if you would please come up for this part of the conversation. It may be helpful to go up here, since there's a mic. So the rest of the document describes this methodology in greater detail. Obviously we're not gonna read that now. But it has a section in it that's the history of the pilot program that's been operating. It has a timeline for what we need to do. And then it goes through the methodology step by step. It talks about how we chose the eligible languages, it talks about how we determined the total citizen voting age population, it talks about the total poll sites that will be served for each program-eligible language. The percent, proportion formula that I mentioned to you. It breaks it out for each language. And then it talks about the site selection for targeting of poll sites. The final three sections are about using administrative data such as interpreter journals or surnames. It talks about what we would do for early voting. And the kinds of things that we would take responsibility for, in terms of operations. In terms of training the interpreters. For how to do this work on election day. Talks about the role that they have in setting up their site for the day of. And it talks a little bit about the language assistance advisory meeting. So do people have questions or comments on what we've read? Mark? I'm sorry. I forgot to mention... We should make sure we turn the mic on when we speak. DILLER: (inaudible) two points. And perhaps... So the first is on page 1, under determining the total number of sites served. As I understand the document, the total number of sites will be determined by budget, not by need. That strikes me as... Right? Because if there's... There's a finite number of sites that can be served per budget. Rather than allocating resources in order to meet the needs that are otherwise defined. If that's our budgetary reality, I guess I just lament it. But the purpose of it is to ensure that every voter has an equal access to the ballot. And that we identified language proficiency or the lack of language proficiency as an impediment to voting. Then we are... Then this program would not guarantee that everybody who needs it will get it, but rather, we'll do the best we can with whatever many dollars we've got. SAYEED: Yes. Well... I do have a comment on that. That I'm gonna ask colleagues to say something... One, I think, in this document, we have taken it into account. So part of my response to you is that the way this sentence is written should include... Resource-driven should be based on... It should mention the word "needed" then. Because we do take that into account. And need is defined in terms of the number of people who speak a language and are citizen voting age, limited English proficient. So that's one part of the answer. And then I think the other part of my answer is... Or response... Is that I think that it would take an enormous amount of resources to serve every single person in New York City who has this need. And I think... I'm not sure what the dollar amount for that could be. I mean, I guess we could calculate it somehow. My thinking here is that it's important for us to also educate people about the right to bring an interpreter with them. And that that needs to be part of what we're doing. On an ongoing basis. But I will turn it over to you all, if you want to add anything. ANNE: Hi, everyone. I'm Anne Montesano with the Mayor's Office of Immigrant Affairs. If it's helpful to you, MOIA was allocated -- and I should double check this. I don't have this in front of me -- but I believe it was close to a million dollars, last fiscal year, and with that allocation, we were able to provide interpretation services at one general election, the November 2018 general election, at 101 polling sites across six languages. The primary in June, at 48 sites, another election at 48 sites, and a special election at 3 sites. Now, the cost per election... Or the changes based on sort of the vendors that the CEC would be using, and that could vary from year to year, potentially... But just to kind of give you a sense of the scale that we have been at, and the amount allocated for that scale. DILLER: If I may. So the million dollars is still a big pile of money. But I still have no idea how many people are underserved or are well served by it, without a reference point to know... Of the number of sites where the need existed, how many did we get to? Yeah. We live in a world of budget reality. So I'm not minimizing the import of that. I have a second comment that builds on the first. But to the point of what you just offered, and thank you for that... Is there some sense of how well covered we were, or how well covered the total population of folks who might need these services were, based on the spending of the million dollars? A, spending of a million dollars, and B, the way we spent it? FIORITO: And was it used? ANNE: Yes. Yes. Let me just consult. Yeah, yeah. We would have to consult to figure out... To let you know what the turnout data was. And, you know, what we did, what MOIA did in its pilot project, is determine the six languages that had the greatest concentrations of LEP eligible voters, and we went to the poll sites with the highest concentrations of those individuals, and we provided interpreters in those relevant languages at the 101 highest poll sites. So we could get back to you, with some of the data you're requesting. DILLER: Thanks. And if I could build on that, because you've just anticipated my next question... Which is that if I understand that determining the level of services for each language provisions on page 2... As amplified somewhere else in the document, as I was perusing it... SAYEED: Page 9 and page 10. DILLER: Thank you. Am I correct or incorrect in interpreting the explanatory note to assume that the... However one pronounces that... Does it assume an even distribution of folks with language needs? As I understand the calculation, 42% of citizens with limited English proficiency have Russian limited English proficiency. Therefore 42% of the poll sites would have that resource available to them. But doesn't that assume that all 100 poll sites -- 42 of all the poll sites -- there's an even distribution of limited... Right? I'm saying it badly. But the idea is that all those folks may be at three poll sites. SAYEED: Yes. So... Here's the clarification on that. DILLER: I'm thinking Brighton Beach. SAYEED: So on page 10, it breaks out the total number of citizen voting age LEP that are eligible, under each language. Right? And column three is a calculation of the percent that that population represents in the whole, of all the languages being served. DILLER: All the languages being served, or all the voters? SAYEED: No, all the languages that we have in the program. GILL: Grant total. SAYEED: So this doesn't include somebody who speaks Punjabi, for instance. DILLER: 211,000 is the number of voters to be served, right? SAYEED: Who are citizen voting age. DILLER: So this is the identification of the need. It doesn't say where they are. SAYEED: Yes, it doesn't say where they are. So what we're proposing to do is that... On page 11, it talks about how we would take the number of poll sites, the poll sites that serve each language, we would order them in order of concentration. So we would start with the poll site that has the greatest number of people who speak Russian. The list would go all the way down to the lowest number of people who speak Russian. And assuming that it's 100 poll sites, we would take the top 42 of those. No, so just to clarify, we would do that for each language. And part of why it's done this way, the proportionality, is because the charter has asked us to serve people in the City -- in the ten designated Citywide languages. So that's part of the issue. That's why there are so many languages on here. And Yiddish is included in here. There's another provision in the charter that says you may serve a language if the population is greater than the lowest amount of people in the lowest designated Citywide language. PEREZ: If the concentration of those people is higher than the... That makes sense. SAYEED: Yes. So does everyone know about the designated Citywide languages? Right? That is talked about on page 7. Okay? So in the charter, we're tasked with identifying concentrations in these languages. That's listed in paragraph 1. The 10 languages. And the second paragraph talks about how we can add additional languages, provided that the number of people with limited English proficiency that speak that language is greater than the number of people with limited English proficiency that speak the lowest ranked designated Citywide language. So although, actually... We don't have the data here that tells you the breakout of these. The lowest ranked language is Urdu. And Yiddish is greater than that. So that's why Yiddish is in here. BREEDLOVE: May I just ask... Was there a model run? Did you run these? Because I understand what you're saying, Mark, and I think the concern is that we go very deep into the list of 42 Russian polling sites, and maybe on the last 20, we're only affecting, let's say, 60 voters. And we haven't gotten to the Haitian Kreyol, and going deeper into their list, so I think the concern is that we might be limiting our impact based on this. But if you had a model that could show us how that would work, then we would, I think, have a greater understanding of the impact. ANNE: So maybe I can just provide one point of clarification, which might help and may address the concern that you raised. The way that this is laid out, it actually says up to 42 sites. So there's a proportion that each language would get, but it's up to that number. So that if, as you pointed out, there are high concentrations at fewer poll sites, you don't have to meet that cap. DILLER: That's not what it says. SAYEED: Page 2. DILLER: Page 2 says it will be 42 sites. ANNE: It says Russian up to 42%. It should be up to 42 sites. Also, Russian... This could definitely be the case for other languages. Russian actually has, like, way more than 42 sites. In our, you know, in planning this out. But it's a really good point that you raise. DILLER: But if I may, the point isn't whether Russian is 42 or more than 42. Part of the point is that when you get down to the 30th Russian site, is that 30th Russian site concentration of voters with limited English proficiency... Does the percentage of Russian limited LEPs... Is that different... Is it possible that at the 40th site, French overtakes Russian, or Cantonese overtakes Russian? Again, I think there's an assumption in here that there's an even distribution throughout every single place where we're gonna put resources, and I... Intuitively, I question that. But I don't have data. You do. So yeah. >> What I'm hearing so far is that we don't have confidence. Maybe there's some more explanation that needs to be given. And some examples of how this is done. And I have to say, my colleagues have echoed some of my initial thoughts about this as well. So I think perhaps... There's a sort of deeper explanation that's required of why this methodology makes sense. Or there needs to be some modeling done. Or there needs to be some... I mean, perhaps we can look at other cities to see how they've done this. But it's clear that folks around the table are not confident in this method being the most effective and efficient way of spreading the resources to get to the goal of ensuring that the maximum number of people have access to interpretation if needed. PEREZ: I have a question. Are we determining these needs by ED? Or by community? Or poll site? I'm confused there. Because, for example, I'm a bilingual person that is in a bilingual neighborhood, but that doesn't necessarily mean that I do not speak English. So are we over or underproviding resources based on assumption of surnames? How do we determine whether we need X amount of poll sites to have translators? >> I think for our purposes today, we're defining need as the total number of citizen voting age people with limited English proficiency at a poll site. So it's kind of done at the election district level and rolled up to the poll site that the person would be voting at. So that's the geography we're talking about. And we've done some internal modeling, just using some past poll site lists, and I can just say that the need is so great in Russian that the last site in Russian, number 42, still very much outnumbers the number one site for some of these other smaller languages. As required by law through local operating. To >> But to me, that last point also suggests that this is not the right method. PEREZ: Because we cannot concentrate on one language either. How do we know... SAYEED: I think that's the challenge. We are required to try to serve all the languages that are designated. So how do we do that? >> I feel like there has to be a better -- APELIAN: But your starting pool is based on Census data, not registered voters? SAYEED: Yes, it starts with Census data. APELIAN: That in itself is a gunshot against the wall. SAYEED: Would any of you like to comment? >> I'll start. But Census data is our starting point, and I think the goal is to refine it with the incorporation of administrative data. And I think Census is because it actually asks explicit questions about limited English proficiency. That's important. That's not available -- APELIAN: Why would you start with such a large spectrum where if they're not gonna vote, they've never voted, the job is to get them to register. And if they're not registered, why are you trying to find people that don't exist, other than they live in the city? >> Not that it perfectly justifies it, but it's also the starting place for the New York City (inaudible) in terms of how they target poll sites. I think the goal is to refine it with administrative data around voter surnames, who are actually registered voters in these communities. I'm not sure if there's anything to add. SAYEED: The registered voter data that we could find wouldn't tell us if the voter is limited English proficiency. APELIAN: But you would... I've done plenty of campaigns, and some people around the table have done that too. That's where you cross your lists. ASHER: The challenge is exactly what you said. The voter registration list doesn't include any information on languages. And the Census data doesn't include information on who is registered to vote. So the idea is to take the Census data and estimate of all of the limited English proficient citizen voting age population what is the fraction of that that's likely to be registered to vote. APELIAN: Estimate is likely to be a mistake. Why don't you just cross the two datas? You've got to be able to do that. And not only that, there's a step further that's been evolved. We have what we call a prime voter. That's a person that's registered, but you go for the people that vote. As we know in this town, 14% of the people vote. But the fact of the matter is, you're taking such a big set and then you're guessing what will be of that set, and then you're trying to guess what neighborhoods they live in and what the concentration is. We're not gonna... We're gonna lose. Right off the bat. DILLER: If I may, the one thing... I was with you until you got to the point of prime voter. I think the whole point of this exercise is to identify those who are not prime voters. We're targeting people who are for one reason or another -- and in this case, language -- PEREZ: Disenfranchised. DILLER: Proficiency. APELIAN: You miss my point. I'm not saying you go for prime voters. But you need the immediacy of who's out there to serve. And until you get to that subset, then you're just identifying ghosts. You don't know who they are. And whether they're gonna come. So what I'm just saying is that there are all these different levels of crossing to get the best efficiency. Other than that, we're just throwing money against the wall and we're not gonna get efficiency. PEREZ: I think that one of the best things we can do -- and it looks like we do not have the data, and it will be a challenge no matter what -- I think it might be a good project for the City of New York to begin capturing those that are coming through the door on election day, the same way they're asking for their address, and their name, there could be a question there: Do you need assistance? Do you need language assistance? Or the person, the translator, the interpreter that is giving the service, immediately captures -- it doesn't have to capture the name of the person. It can capture just the number of those folks that came to the door, to get the service. Because I'm telling you, the assumption is huge. I watch it. I've worked the polls. Where I can see a translator or interpreter literally sitting there, for 12 hours. Or I've gone to polls where there's a huge line waiting for translators. Or the translator won't show up and still get paid. So we have a problem that we need to solve, that I don't think it's easy to solve just by assuming Census information. Let me tell you, we have a huge problem in the communities we're talking about. The Census is not true. To those communities. Because of many different other challenges. So even trying to solve the real community issues based on Census data? I'm from the Bronx. We have a terrible problem with Census data. Undercounting like you wouldn't even imagine. Others somehow are overcounted. And I don't even know how. But I'm telling you, I don't feel comfortable with a fix that is making so many assumptions. BREEDLOVE: I just want to piggyback on that. I know that MOIA does the NYC ID card. PEREZ: Yeah. BREEDLOVE: And on that, you ask if you are English language proficient, or you need a translator. I forget exactly how the question is worded. I don't know what the constraints are around that card. But I know you're making a push for people to get the card. It's a way to sign people up for voter registration. And also quickly -- you're already capturing the data. What language they speak, and if they need interpretation. So I know I'm going outside of the box here. But I just wanted to put that out there, that you have some data already within your office. PEREZ: I must say, usually that card is being pushed more to the undocumented community. There's not a huge need for -- I mean, I do it because I want to make sure that they're not targeted. But not because they need it. So even that data is also not real. In terms of for this purpose. For the use of this data. We have a challenge in our hands. And I think it's because we've failed to survey the need of the community. We need to do it on election day. That's the most real we're gonna get. SAYEED: So Anne, do you still need to... ANNE: I think Asher wanted to explain the UCS data versus the registered data/surname... ASHER: I just wanted to clarify one thing. This is an effort to improve the way we estimate these populations, since we don't have that survey, which would be really the best thing. And it's going to involve estimates. And assumptions. No matter what method you use. If you cross the lists, as you mentioned, there are all sorts of causes of error in that. Like, there are false negatives and false positives for the surnames that get matched. You're missing a bunch of names and you have a bunch of names that are false positive. Also you have no idea who speaks what language within those ethnic surname groups. So that helps, and we want to integrate that within the methodology. We didn't have access to that data at this point, but we're expecting to get it in 2020 and to improve this further. But right now, this is an attempt to use these various datasets to zero in on these populations. ANNE: I would just add one other thing, which is: The draft, this draft also lays out the use of administrative data. So we do -- we have in the past, and BOE does it too -- track the utilization of these services at the sites where interpreters are provided. And so that data could be our interpreters indicate how many people they've served. At the poll sites that they've been at. And so that could be considered. You know, I think this lays out using that data over a period of a few general elections. PEREZ: That's interesting, because just to test -- I've never seen anyone do anything. When they're... I don't know. You see somebody taking your information down, or doing a clicker or something, and I've never seen an interpreter capturing -- ANNE: So I don't know how the BOE does it, but I know that the interpreters that the City contracts with has tracking sheets, and we collect that information throughout the day from each site. But that would be potentially considered in determining which poll sites to go to as well. DILLER: If I may, I think you hit on something there that... That may explain a different aspect than what you're offering. And may be quite helpful. Is the use of ACS or Census data an attempt to capture the population that never even enters the poll site in the first place? PEREZ: That's right. FIORITO: That's what I was thinking. APELIAN: That's what I was getting at. PEREZ: The undocumented population. Once you're a teen and you have gone through the -- look, I wasn't even born in this country. I can tell you my experience. Once you've gone through the school system and you take the citizenship exam, you can vote without any help. So there's a population that is very sort of new, or very older, that needs assistance. It's not... So are we capturing everybody? Are we capturing 80%, when we have only 10% need? I don't know. SAYEED: It's the citizen voting age population. I don't know if that makes sense. It's people who are eligible to vote. But we don't know whether they're actually registered to vote. FIORITO: Correct me if I'm wrong. One of our first meetings, we discussed about how to really focus on the individuals that are not voting and getting them to polls. SAYEED: Yeah. FIORITO: And how to get them to polls. I feel like now what we're discussing is we're preaching to the choir. These people are already coming there and they're voting. I think we need to get... APELIAN: That's not what -- ANNE: The Census data is those who are potentially eligible to vote. So they're not... The ACS data doesn't tell us that they're registered. But they tell us that they're citizens. They tell us the language. And that they're 18 or older. APELIAN: Right, and that's not getting people to go to vote, because there are also English speaking people that aren't registered. So voter registration is a separate issue from what this is. SAYEED: You're absolutely right. That's a separate program. We can have a conversation about how we work with other offices in the city who are registering people to vote. If you recall, Democracy NYC is one of those entities that is registering people to vote. And that's a vigorous effort that's happening. And we can work with those folks. And support their efforts. This is for people who are registered. And who have language needs. BARON: I was wondering if this was ever incorporated into models. Using probability, so that we can maintain the spirit of that sentiment about encouraging people to get registered and become engaged. But with a little bit... You know, just with a little bit of math to understand what the likelihood of someone who was eligible to vote, but hasn't yet registered to vote. Like, what would be the profile of that person? And could that be built into your model for probability, which would allow us to target some of those populations a little more carefully? PEREZ: Can the question be added to the application? Because that way, once you're registered to vote, and you can check off that you may need assistance with a language, can we just have New York City add a question? That way you will get the service that you need. SAYEED: Okay. So it is now 5:10. We have promised the public we would open the last 30 minutes for their comment. So the kinds of questions that you are raising are incredibly -- very meaningful. Very important. And I would categorize them as substantive questions. That we can consider as we are working with this draft. I mean, after Jan 1. We can have a more in-depth conversation. Bring these folks back. If you have ideas for, like, data you'd like to see in that presentation, you can send those to us. Maybe we can, you know, present some graphical displays to show you, so you understand a little bit better. You will also have time to sit with this document and think about it some more. So I'm gonna propose that we actually continue the conversation and move into the second part, because between now and 5:30, we need to review the advisories and vote on the amendments. Okay? So thank you so much to all of you for being here. Thank you so much. DILLER: So where are we going now? Amendment 2? SAYEED: Now we're going to the advisories. Just so I can show you and we can talk about what these papers say. One of the documents is the participatory budgeting advisory committee. And the other one is the language assistance advisory committee. Just so you're aware, what we did was that we had certain metrics, or categories, that we were looking at, in each application, and every person was -- every application was reviewed by at least two people, and they were given ratings. So for the participatory budgeting advisory committee, as I mentioned, we told you in the last meeting we were looking at categories such as Borough, age, language, diversity. We took into account whether they were coming from sort of the veteran's community, people with disabilities, seniors, other groups that have been marginalized from participation in the past. And we looked at their Civic Engagement experience, their public service experience, we also asked about their availability to perform these responsibilities. For example, if they were -- what times they would attend meetings, if they had prior experience on advisory committees, and whether they had participatory budgeting experience. So some of this criteria is captured in these categories that we have listed here. So it tells you their work affiliation, their job title, their relevant experience, and some of the things they represent in terms of the diversity of the group. We may have shared last time that we had a gap in terms of Staten Island being represented, and now we've added people from Staten Island. So... And then similarly for the language assistance advisory, we had left the application online, and we are charter mandated to try to find people who are fluent in all of the designated Citywide languages. And as we mentioned last time, we were missing Arabic, Haitian Kreyol, Korean, Polish, and Russian. And since then, we have filled those languages, and some people on the Commission have been helpful with that. So thank you so much to those who have helped us with that. So I just want to give you a minute or two, just to look over these lists, to see if you have any questions on any -- either one. Before we turn to the amendments. GILL: Italian? I don't see anyone with Italian. SAYEED: Italian? Yeah. Italian is not actually a designated language. SEECHARRAN: I noticed that Brooklyn is really well represented in both lists. And I notice that I think on the participatory budget advisory committee, we only have one individual from the Bronx. And two from Queens. I think. Is that correct? I'm just wondering -- is that reflective of the candidate pool? So I guess my... I'm sorry if I missed something, because I wasn't here last time. Or something in the emails. I think in a situation like this, one, I think that the unevenness of the representation is of concern. SAYEED: By Borough? SEECHARRAN: It is of concern to me. Particularly when you think of, like, the Bronx. That is where there is, I believe, a greater need for this. As well as Queens. I do wonder... Sorry. I didn't pay too much attention to Staten Island. But I do wonder in a situation like this if we would consider doing more intentional outreach to make sure that we have more representation, because I think if we fall into this trap of going for the low hanging fruit, what comes to us then... We actually are not achieving the big goal of this Commission. And the purpose of this. SAYEED: Yeah. So one way we can address that is to keep these applications ongoing. Right? And rolling. So we would start -- and again, this is the challenge here. Trying to keep this moving, as we are trying to assemble a better grouping that we think is inclusive. So we can do that. Right? We can identify the gaps, and specifically go out and try to fill people -- fill those gaps, as we did with the languages. Right? We saw in the applicant pool, there was nobody who had applied with those languages. So we went after people. We got recommendations. So we can do that for any gap that we think is important. PEREZ: There's no one here North of 96th street, Manhattan, and that's a huge concern also. No one from El Barrio, no one from northern Manhattan. Maybe we can use the community boards to get individuals who are active in those communities too. Those are the ones that I want to show -- SAYEED: And that was also the purpose in really trying to include you all in this process of getting more people to apply. If you recall, we had sent out the applications to you, and encouraged you to really promote it and continue to do that. So I would like to be able to lean on you. Because you're coming from all around the City. Right? And you're connected to so many communities. And this is one way that you can really help us. APELIAN: But the size of these committees are arbitrary. So we can continue to add, correct? SAYEED: Yes. I mean, they can continue to grow. SEECHARRAN: Is there a timeline for the next tranche of candidates? Or is it just rolling? SAYEED: I think we can leave it rolling. If we think we want to fill certain gaps, we should leave it open, I think. Right now, as of today, the participatory budgeting advisory application has been closed. As of today. But if we think we want to add more people, we can reopen that. The language access advisory... I think it's still open. But I'll double check. HERNANDEZ: I think I saw one person representing disability? In this group of 25? SAYEED: For which committee? HERNANDEZ: Participatory? SAYEED: Participatory budgeting. Yeah. There's definitely gaps. This is not a perfect list, at all. By far. Not even close. BREEDLOVE: I mean, just to say... It is hard to start up. Right? So this is part of the startup process. And I think once we start to get rolling, and there's clarity, I think we'll have more applicants, and we can help out more as well. I think that we all have -- in fairness to you, and the hard work that you and your team have been doing, I think this is great. And we all recognize that we need to go deeper and heavier. But we can do that, I think, as everything is fleshed out. DILLER: I agree. PEREZ: So can we agree that we will continue this process? Not close it today? SAYEED: Yes. PEREZ: Great. SAYEED: Yes, you're welcome to send us -- we will make sure that the application is -- team note -- we will make sure that the application is open online for both of the advisories. And we can re-send you the information. So you can -- PEREZ: Great. SAYEED: Okay. Awesome. All right. So let's go to the amendments. So amendment 1... Are there any edits to this amendment? GILL: Mark? SAYEED: Did you say Mark? (laughter) GILL: He's gonna have one, right? BREEDLOVE: Mr. Amendment. DILLER: Yeah. SAYEED: If I recall, your concern was more the second amendment. Right? BREEDLOVE: Yeah. DILLER: Yes. No, as long as... I'm actually okay with amendment 1, as long as -- based on the representation that we won't be locked into this methodology as a final come April. And that there be an opportunity to implement whatever it is that is the right answer to the discussion we just had. I'm not certain what that is right now. So I'm glad we have the opportunity. But I would support amendment number 1 in its current form without amendment. BREEDLOVE: Moved. GILL: Shall we move to make a vote? BREEDLOVE: I'd like to make a motion to approve amendment 1. GILL: Second. SAYEED: All in favor? All opposed? Okay. So this amendment is hereby approved. Thank you. That was really critical for us to be able to get this posted on January 1. I'm gonna encourage you again to please try to read it between now and Monday, because some of us will be in the office, and I'm gonna be out for a few days in the coming week. But we'll be checking emails and making sure that we are revising it accordingly and getting it up by January 1. DILLER: Just to follow up on that, though, the amendments or edits that you're looking to next week are not the substantive issues that we were discussing about -- I think the supplemental -- more across these kinds of -- SAYEED: Yeah, I think the things that you brought up already are -- you know, in the executive summary. For instance, mentioning the word "need". I think that's important. And that wasn't captured here. It is included in the methodology. Also, when you're talking about "up to" the number of poll sites. If you see things like that, that -- and I think you'll get a better flavor of what this document is, once you read it from A to Z. From the beginning to end. And then you can -- and then we can discuss: What is it -- if you're suggesting something that is really changing the methodology, that's gonna be part of Jan 1 to April. DILLER: Understood. I'm not certain whether the need discussion fits into the before or after next Monday category. I guess I'll read the document to find out. SAYEED: Yeah, yeah. DILLER: Okay. SAYEED: Okay. And then amendment number 2. Are there comments? Questions? Edits? APELIAN: I'll make a motion to approve. GILL: Not yet! DILLER: You can put it on the table. APELIAN: You need a motion to discuss. BARON: Does this preclude our ability to recruit in the future? SAYEED: I think both on the initial resolution and here, this is tasking the Chair and Executive Director with the responsibility of recruiting. It's silent on the Commission's role. I mean, the Commissioners, as a body. But we did ask you to help. It's just not required that you do it. PEREZ: And do we have to have identified and approved the methodology by January 1st? That's number 1. GILL: We passed that. We're on number 2. SAYEED: Just to clarify, Lilliam, on the methodology, what we're posting up by January 1 is a proposed methodology. Okay? That has to have public comment. For at least 30 days. It also needs to have a public hearing. So we'll need to hold that public hearing probably sometime in February. We'll do that. And we will take all these comments from the public, rework the document, post it again, April 1st. Whatever goes up on April 1st is the methodology that we will use to provide interpretation in the general election in November. PEREZ: That's fine. As long as we have a little bit more time. SAYEED: Yeah. And what's also, I think, helpful, and the people who put this -- you know, our mandates together -- we do have the opportunity to review and revise again, after November. Right? Because according to the mandates, we have to review and update the methodology on or before September 1, 2022. And every five years after that. So it's a good way to assess how we've been doing, and then continue to change. GILL: All right. So on amendment number 2, Mark had an issue with number 4. And I in some ways agree with him. I don't have an issue with recruit and appoint, which is what you're doing anyway. What you're taking out is taking out the Commission's approval, more or less, because it says present the candidates for such committees to the Commission. So I feel that language shouldn't be taken out. Because you can recruit and appoint. We don't have an issue with that. But presenting for us to know who they are and get a look at them -- I think that would be, if that's taken away, that takes away some of our responsibility and takes us out of the picture, which we totally need to be in the picture at all times. APELIAN: Then she can't have the power to appoint if she has to listen to us first. GILL: No, I'm not saying listen to us first. APELIAN: That's what it says if you leave in the second part for candidates. GILL: But you can take out proposed and you can leave present candidates. APELIAN: Still takes away her right to appointment. DILLER: Yeah, the difference is the word "candidates". Because if you follow... If I hear you correctly, you still want to have a look at the folks. GILL: Absolutely. DILLER: That goes back to... So basically the choices are before or after. Right? You can appoint them, which is the status quo, or after, which is that hybrid ratification thought I had. Which is the chair can go ahead and appoint these folks, but at some point, they need to be presented to the Commission, on a post hoc basis, recognizing -- so it would not be something that I personally would do lightly, but there is still the opportunity to say: Goodness. Where did you get this person? GILL: Yeah. What is going on? Who is this person? So you're appointing one and then we all find out that this is an egregious person who has done this horrible thing. You know, and we can say: We don't really... We respect your authority and we appreciate all of the work, but no, we can't live with this person. SAYEED: So do you want us to... Do you want to change the... To make an edit to this amendment? BREEDLOVE: I just want to bring up, though, the Charles Manson and the egregious infractions... I would think that the Chair, if we brought that to the attention of the Chair, the Chair would then take care of that. GILL: Right, okay. BREEDLOVE: So the two examples that have been given thus far... I don't see as a reason to amend what is currently written. SEECHARRAN: Can I ask about the process of removal? So say that you've appointed... Recruited and appointed whoever. And then one or all of us have an issue. What's the process of removing? SAYEED: That's a good question. Since these are advisory committees, I would have to look into that. I don't know the answer. But they're all volunteers. They're also not appointed by, like, an official... Like you are. So I think that it's relatively probably easier to just say to somebody... Thank you for your services. You know. We'd like to ask you to step down. GILL: Depends on the person. PEREZ: I'm wondering -- can we say -- can you appoint and we confirm? In other words... APELIAN: We're back to square one. Look, if you really want to be involved in the process, set up a subcommittee and let the people volunteer to come in here six days a week and listen to all the applications, like you do, and I guarantee you'll have nobody on the committee. (laughter) That'll solve the problem. We'll just let you appoint. Because that's what it boils down to. It's not like we're taking away authority from ourselves. It's a voluntary position. It's an appointment. As I said before, if you have the power to recruit your own staff that we're paying hard dollars to, I don't see a problem why the next step couldn't be done on your own, and we can always as a Commission say... Hey, just like you said. We need more representation from the Bronx. There's nobody from Staten Island. We need some disabilities. We need this. We need that. It's taken. It's an open committee. We say... That's great. Any suggestions? We'll follow up with that and come back to you next month. And let it be rolling from that standpoint. But I'll make a codicil to my motion. If you want, make a committee. I will not be on that committee. (laughter) SAYEED: Okay. We're at 5:30. SEECHARRAN: Sorry. I have a question about the affiliation. To what extent that's weighed in the other... You know, the other areas. Like diversity and experience. Because I know... I can't remember... I think... Maybe the participatory budgeting one? The Immigration Coalition has a number of folks. SAYEED: Probably for language access. Yeah. SEECHARRAN: So I'm just wondering... SAYEED: I think there are two people from the Immigration Coalition. Yeah, two. And we didn't only... For those two individuals, I mean, we also tried to factor in their experience and expertise, like, technical expertise, that they were bringing. And sometimes, like, for instance, someone might speak a language that we wanted represented, and then they also worked for an organization, so it was really trying to... I think the most important thing we've looked at for language assistance is what language they're fluent in. APELIAN: You know what might help? They're not creating policy. They're an advisory. Right? They're gonna advise to us and the policy is still gonna come to us. SAYEED: And you all need to vote on it. APELIAN: You had six people from Staten Island only and you didn't like what they said, we'll have that opportunity to talk about it around the table anyhow. I don't see it being that detrimental. DILLER: Yeah, I've given that some thought, thanks to your suggestions about that. I was just trying to draft something, and I've got it drafted, but I am not convinced that we need it. If at the end of the day with some future Chair we end up being boxed out of the situation, we can revisit this issue at that time. And if this streamlines the process, and, as you say, we have final approval of the substantive work product of the group, then why not? I think I'm inclined... GILL: Yeah, it's 5:30. BREEDLOVE: I'd like to second the motion on the floor as it stands. SAYEED: All in favor. >> Aye. SAYEED: All opposed? Okay. Great. So hearing none opposed, the amendment is hereby approved. Thank you so much to all of you. So now we are gonna turn to the public comment period. Jan Combopiano... Did I say that correctly? From the Brooklyn Voters Alliance. We're happy to have you here, and please... Yes, go ahead. COMBOPIANO: Yeah, hi. I'm Jan, the senior policy director at Brooklyn Voters Alliance. I want to talk about two things. One is about the language access. This was a very robust discussion about how you would do it. I want to mention two things that I did not hear anyone talk about. One is: Three of those languages are covered under the federal VRA. Chinese, Korean, and Bengali. So they are part of the Board of Elections interpreter program. And so I'm just mentioning that as something, when you're talking about prioritization. Maybe the BOA can handle the bulk of those languages, and you guys can concentrate on the others. And the other is about accessibility. There's a lot of discussion about whether people were registered to vote, and interpreters sometimes just sit around, and are not responding to people who come in. I would say a good sort of analogy for this is: We have accessible poll sites. They have to have ramps. They have to be big enough for somebody who uses a wheelchair to come in. There might be no one who has a wheelchair who comes in to use that. But it has to be accessible. The same way for languages. You might not have somebody on that day for early voting. Yay! We have early voting. Or an election day. But if you think about it, and they come in, and there is not an interpreter there, they cannot understand that ballot, because it's just... Like, they're in Brooklyn. It's just in English and Spanish, and they speak Russian, they did not bring someone with them. I love the idea of educating the public that they can bring anybody they want with them to the polls. That means they are turned away. We have a lot of voter suppression in this country. And unfortunately, we have some voter suppression by process in this state. And I certainly hope the Civic Engagement Commission will help alleviate that by providing this as a service and making sure to work with community groups to make sure it is as robust as it can be. And not try to limit it -- as much as you can, about money -- I realize money is not an infinite resource. But we need to get as many people voting as possible. 2020 is going to have a high participation rate across this country. And in this state. And if we don't provide adequate translation services at the poll sites, people are not gonna vote. And every time someone is discouraged from voting, it doesn't just mean they themselves are discouraged. That means their families are gonna be discouraged. That means other people in the community are gonna be discouraged. This is going to have a ripple effect. So I'm just putting this out here. For all of you to think about. When you're thinking about this methodology a little further, and love the idea of the public hearing. And I appreciate it. Thanks. SAYEED: Thank you so much for that. Just to clarify, on the VRA languages, I wanted to note that you're absolutely right that the BOE does provide translation or interpretation in the VRA languages, Spanish, Chinese, Korean, Bengali, and also... So what we did in the methodology is that we are not going to the counties where they're mandated to provide it. We are only providing interpretation in counties where the New York City Board of Elections is not mandated to provide it. So, for example, Spanish is mandated to be provided Citywide by the New York City Board of Elections. We will not be providing Spanish interpretation. However, the Bronx... BOE only provides Spanish in the Bronx. Right? We might find that there is a large Korean-speaking community in the Bronx. That is not being served. So that is just a hypothetical example. We would only go to places where... We're not replacing anything the New York Board of Elections is doing. We're trying to work alongside them. Just to clarify that. COMBOPIANO: I totally agree with that. And the other language is Hindi. Just to be clear. SAYEED: Yeah. COMBOPIANO: That's covered. I just wanted to make sure... Because I know this as a poll worker myself, that working in poll sites where there is not language interpretation -- Russian is a great example. There's a lot of Russian speakers in Brooklyn. There's a lot of Haitian Kreyol speakers -- it becomes really frustrating for people, and the more that they feel like they don't count, it just really is something that I would love for us as a city to figure out how to do that more effectively and really engage people in this basic tenet of democracy, and that is casting a ballot. SAYEED: Thank you so much. Yes. COMBOPIANO: Thank you. SAYEED: Sorry. Did anyone have any other questions or comments? On what she said? No? Okay. So... One thing we have left off of today's conversation is our bylaws. GILL: Oh yeah. BREEDLOVE: Wow. APELIAN: That's a good five to six minute conversation. SAYEED: Yeah. So we're not gonna do that. We will... We can put it back on the agenda for the next meeting. I think from what I'm hearing, you'd like to spend a little bit more time talking about the poll site methodology at the next meeting. Okay. I had invited the Department of City Planning to come and present today. But because we had to discuss this draft and deal with this -- the amendments and stuff, I asked if they would be willing to come in January. So they said yes, they can do that. That will help us with the Community Board mandate. Is there anything else we should add to the agenda for next meeting? PEREZ: I wanted to ask if there's any other way we can get more information about all the models that are being -- methodologies that are being utilized in other cities for language access. I feel like I want to see others. I don't know how you feel about what we received today, the presentation. But I don't know. SAYEED: You're talking specifically about language assistance at poll sites? PEREZ: Assistance at poll sites specifically. SAYEED: We can look into that and see what's out there and send you information. I'm pretty sure that they have considered that in developing this program. Yeah. And a lot of the way that this methodology is working is actually similar to what the New York City Board of Elections does. BREEDLOVE: I just want to ask a process question. So we voted to approve 30 minutes at the end of every meeting for the public? SAYEED: We never voted on it. BREEDLOVE: Oh, okay. We just said that we were doing that? I mean, we've left 30 minutes at the end of our meeting, and we had one speaker from the public. So I feel that we often have so much to discuss, and we have very robust conversations with our Commissioners that maybe knowing in advance that there's one person from the public or two... Which you are timing in their comments... That we might adjust accordingly, in the meeting, to accommodate the time. DILLER: If I can follow on that, what I've seen in some committees that I've served on is to actually have the public comment first. SAYEED: We could do that as well. DILLER: And then they're not hanging around. I understand today you also had a reverse time pressure of staff who had other things to do. So some balance of that. But maybe from time to time they could be first. If there isn't a countervailing need. It makes it more welcoming to our public too. SAYEED: I think that's really thoughtful and a good idea. My only thing is -- I'm trying to remember that in the public notice, I think we specified that it's the last half hour, because it allows people to walk in without signing up. I mean, we ask people to sign up. But maybe someone will just show up. PEREZ: They also hear our discussion. GILL: I was saying -- I know we want to say let it happen first, and then we deal with the business at hand, but for Jan, the conversation helped her with her presentation. Because if she didn't hear this conversation, and she spoke, it would not have tailored it -- you know, because then she realized what we were thinking. Because I'm sure when she walked in here, she didn't realize we were gonna have this discussion about poll sites and voting and languages and things like that. Which -- it helped, because then we were able to listen to her, but still also inform her, and she could shape our conversation going forward, with this methodology. SAYEED: I mean, we can continue the conversation on the poll site methodology, if you'd like, for the next 15 minutes. PEREZ: (inaudible) It took me almost two hours to get here from the Bronx. There was like a blizzard downtown when I arrived. (people speaking over each other) SAYEED: You'd like to end the meeting a little bit early today? PEREZ: Sure. I vote for that. DILLER: No objection. SAYEED: Would someone like to make a motion to adjourn the meeting? DILLER: Second. GILL: You have to make the motion. DILLER: I move we adjourn. SAYEED: All in favor? >> Aye. SAYEED: Happy holidays! Happy new year.