RULES AGENDA:
ITEM:
Memorandum
TO: City Council FROM: Councilmember Bien Doan
SUBJECT: SEE BELOW DATE: 09/21/23
APPROVED:
SUBJECT: CREATION OF A CITY COUNCIL POLICY FOR UNIFORM
TRANSITIONS DURING CHANGES IN ELECTED OFFICIALS.
RECOMMENDATION
Direct the City Manager and City Attorney to study and evaluate the feasibility of a City Council policy for Council consideration which addresses the need for a uniform transition during changes in elected officials. We ask that this work will be completed in 90 days and will include, but not be limited to the following:
1. Mayor and City Council Offices to use City-based accounts for ownership and access credentials for social media, website domain registrations, constituent databases, and software subscriptions, as well as require administrative accounts for the Information Technology Department and/or the City Clerk to administer costs, contracts, and transitions when there is a change in elected officials. Data is not to be shared with any other department or office and must be safeguarded.
2. Consistent with Assembly Bill 1637, provide a general plan for the City to adopt “.gov”, coordinate City ownership of registrations by the City’s Information Technology Department and/or the City Clerk and applying security and privacy standards set per City Council policy.
a. Any non-.gov may only continue operation as a pointer to a .gov resource. b. All domains are to be City property and not registered as individual property. c. Administrative privileges and credentials must be administered by the City’s Information Technology Department and/or the City Clerk.
3. City-based social media accounts are to be set as business accounts for the use of the office and should be used as the primary account for constituent communications.
4. Optimize a smooth transition experience for outgoing and incoming elected officials to ensure the residents of San José are always served.
5. Ensure the Clerk’s Office maintains a checklist of all City owned and purchased assets, both digital and physical.
6. Anything else related to the transition of elected officials that staff identifies as applicable.
7. Address and evaluate any potential legal issues.
9/27/2023
C.1
HONORABLE MAYOR AND CITY COUNCIL
Subject: CREATION OF A CITY POLICY FOR UNIFORM TRANSITIONS DURING CHANGES IN ELECTED OFFICIALS.
2 8. Exemptions should apply for the continued use of previously created and in-use social media accounts, as well as for domains/websites of the current Mayor and Councilmembers until a change in elected official occurs, however login credentials and account ownership should be provided to the appropriate city department.
BACKGROUND
A peaceful transition of power is the expected outcome of all elections in our Democratic Republic. When this does not take place, the newly elected office is setup to fail, and ultimately the residents of that District are disserved and harmed as a result.
Since the City of San José does not have a robust policy addressing the transfer of power and property during changes in elected officials, issues have arisen with social media, digital properties (domains), purchased items, newsletter services, and other office resources.
Since January of 2023, the District 7 Office has dealt with several of the issues which have made constituent communications impossible at times and very difficult at others. An example would be the continued shutdown of the official D7 Facebook page due to these issues. The City Attorney sent a letter to Facebook demanding access to the account; however, Facebook has not issued a response as of the date of this memo.
D7 had no way to communicate with its residents swiftly and directly during the flooding in January 2023. This is not an issue isolated to the District 7 office. In 2013 the District 10 office also did not receive a transition meeting and encountered similar issues as outlined above.
The City Attorney, ITD, the City Clerk and District 7 have worked tirelessly to remedy these issues for months now and are still working towards a resolution, despite the minimal hope on the horizon. The signers of this memorandum want to prevent this from happening to any future San José City Council Office.
The creation of a uniform transition council policy in San José would address many of these concerns and ensure that the residents of San José always have a representative who can communicate efficiently with them and spend their resources representing the people.