Candidate Name: Jeanette Quick
Phone Number: 510-326-1090
Web site: votejeanette.com
E-mail: votejeanette@gmail.com
Name of Campaign Manager: Jeanette Quick
How much do you expect to spend in this contest: $5K
Major Endorsements: As I just entered the race late in July, I am only now in the process of seeking endorsements. I would be honored to receive the endorsement of the Green Party. Protecting the rights of historically marginalized communities is fundamental to my core beliefs and my platform, and the work of the Green Party has been essential to creating a safe and inclusive San Francisco. This endorsement would be very meaningful to me.

Incumbent Board Member whose votes most reflect your values: Alex Randolph

Incumbent whose votes least reflect your values:

1. What is your stance on resuming in-person classes in the time of
COVID? What would be the main basis on which you make this
decision? (e.g., would it be based on your gut feelings, or whose
advice would you listen to?)

City College should focus its resources and energy on ensuring that it can create fully online courses for as long as there is no vaccine for COVID-19. We cannot be risking the lives of students, faculty, and staff and we also cannot risk them getting off track on education and ensuring that those that are on a transfer track are able to continue their journey. I have been taking classes at City College for 3 1/2 years, and I know that the online course offerings are very low-tech and are not consistent with a quality education. The online system is basically a discussion board and does not include a lecture component. It does not include many of the tools that are used by other online resources like Coursera and EdX. We need to improve the technology at City College and ensure that both students and teachers have the resources to teach and learn effectively online.
I will make this decision based on the advice of the medical experts, who continue to recommend caution in reopening schools and on in-person gatherings. Until the medical experts say that it is safe for individuals to congregate, I will focus on keeping City College's campuses closed and ramping up its online offerings and quality of that online experience.

2. Why are you running for College Board?

I have been taking classes at City College for the past three years and it has been a critical part of my life here. When CCSF cut 350 of its classes this past semester -- and eliminated the program for 2,000+ Older Adults completely -- as well as let go many teachers overnight, I was shocked. I started looking closer at why CCSF had slashed its budget. I was astounded at the years of financial mismanagement and unstable accreditation. I want to help get CCSF back on the right track. I have a degree in economics and have been working in financial policy for the past 15 years. I am also an attorney. I will work to restore financial stability to the college and to improve the collaboration with the City to understand the parameters of the Free City program. I have a real stake in the program and will advocate to expand its application to classes and tools that will be particularly useful during the pandemic, including expanded online and vocational courses, and laptop lending. I have worked for two United State Senators and I know how to build coalitions to get things done.
CCSF is a critical pipeline for over 60,000 people in our community, many of them from marginalized communities or people that have daytime jobs and rely on CCSF as their sole opportunity to get an education. We have to ensure that CCSF stays accessible to all, is low cost, and provides well-rounded education to our community. In my experience, the computer labs have barely working computers, classes are difficult to schedule with the clunky website and scheduling system, and the financial aid process is challenging to navigate. I was shocked that the technology that is used at CCSF during classes seems more outdated than what was used when I first went to college in 1999. This is not acceptable in 2020.I want to fight for CCSF to improve its services to students -- and I will do this by cleaning up its processes internally, seeking more funding from the City, and developing new streams of stability by soliciting corporate donations from the tech companies in our backyard that should be paying their fair share towards local education.

3. How are you currently involved in the Community College -- or how
were you involved in the past?

I am a CCSF student. I have taken classes every semester for the past three years. Last semester, I was the Fiction Editor for Forum, the magazine, and completed my Creative Writing Certificate. I relished hearing stories from my classmates about being the first in their families to go to college or how much they value classes in retirement. But I also saw 350 classes cut without warning, hard-working teachers laid off without notice, 2000+ Older Adults left without any programming, and CCSF in another financial crisis -- before COVID-19. This is what inspired me to run for office.

The computer labs have barely working computers, classes are difficult to schedule with a clunky website and scheduling system, and the financial aid process is challenging to navigate. I was shocked that the technology used at CCSF is more outdated than what when I first went to college in 1999. I will fight for CCSF to improve its services to students -- and I will do this by cleaning up its processes internally, seeking more funding from the City, and developing new streams of stability by pressuring the companies in our backyard to pay their fair share towards local education.

4. What is your stance on public and private partnerships within the
college?

City College can do more to ensure that the companies in San Francisco donate services and money to help fund City College. This will help expand its revenue, stabilize its budget, and get City College back on track to keeping its accreditation. However, I do not think that private fundraising should come at the expense of City College autonomy. For this reason, I think that any and all private partnerships that City College has -- both current and future -- need to be examined very closely to ensure that City College is not favoring particular contractors, outsourcing work that should be kept in-house with City College staff and faculty, or spending beyond its budget. As Trustee, I will also fight to ensure that any City College land is used effectively and that any private partnerships that are struck to develop its land include affordable housing and are negotiated at rates that make sense for City College.

5. What is your position on Free City College? How should it
be changed, if at all?

Free City College has been critical in expanding access to college for many San Franciscans. Many people that would have been unable to afford college have been able to start their journeys and have benefited from Free City. However, historically marginalized communities, such as Black, Latinx, housing insecure, LGBTQ+, and API communities continue to struggle to graduate from City College. As Trustee, I will fight to expand Free City to include additional services, such as books, housing, and transit services, as well as increased funding for free laptop borrowing.

6. If elected to the Board, how would you ensure that you and the
public would receive the college's draft budget with sufficient
time to review it thoroughly before adopting it?

One of the major reasons that City College is again in a financial crisis and at risk of losing its accreditation is a lack of strategic planning and a lack of transparency to the public. I will ensure that the public and the Board are given the Budget with enough time to review, and that timelines and benchmarks for progress are established at the outset of a new Chancellor's tenure. I will also increase public accountability -- and holding the college accountable for deadlines that are missed by requiring budget updates every Board meeting and reporting out to the public the results of those budget discussions. Too often, the Board minutes are not accessible to the public, which means there is very little public oversight of the administrators of the college and little accountability when failures happen. In the Senate, I personally reviewed the budgets for 7 federal financial agencies on a quarterly budget and regularly questioned them when something did not add up or did not look like it was on track. As Trustee, I will do the same with City College in holding it accountable and transparent to both the Board and the public.

7. What is your position on selling campus properties?

I believe that City College should examine all of its budget to determine how it is spending its money and how it can continue to be a going concern for decades to come. That being said, I generally believe that City College should not sell its properties, and should instead focus on how to best use them for its students and faculty, whether that is through additional classrooms or affordable housing. I also believe that City College should explore renting out its space for events and thinking about innovative ways to use its valuable property to raise revenue.

8. Do you feel there is enough transparency or public disclosure of
the Board and the college? How would you change things?

There is too little transparency or public disclosure at the Board and the college. The only reporting available about the fact that the college experienced a $14 million shortfall this past year is in a newspaper, not on the college's website. The College publishes very little information about its progress on accreditation. CCSF's public website on accreditation FAQs has not been updated since 2015, and the Accreditation Steering Committee, which comprises students and faculty, publishes little information. The Board publishes very little information. This is not acceptable for a public college, and to measure progress and accountability against a strategic plan. The Board's minutes on the website are challenging to navigate, and many of the key topics -- like budget and accreditation -- are shielded from public view completely.

The City College Campus Police appears to not be complying with federal requirements related to transparency around crime statistics. The Jeanne Clery Disclosure of Campus Security Policy and Campus Crime Statistics Act of 1998 requires all colleges and universities to disclose information about crimes reported on campus to be readily available to the community and the public. However, the City College website makes reference to an Annual Security Report, but there is no link or way for a member of the public or student body to access this report. This does not serve the public purpose of understanding the crimes that have occurred on campus and how the security force is being deployed at City College. Thus, my first recommendation is to increase transparency and accountability of the Campus Police, likely by first publishing the ASRs for the last several years and surveying the opinions of students and faculty about the effectiveness and appropriateness of Campus Police services and behavior. I will then develop recommendations for further reforms that may be needed to the Campus Police.

I will change things by publishing the college's progress against accreditation standards and its budget, including where it has fallen short, and require the future Chancellor to publish reports to the public on City College's strategic planning.

9. Have you attended the Community College Board meeting? Would you
change public comment policy at the meetings? If so, how?

I have attended Community College Board meetings. The public comment policy needs to be overhauled. When I worked in the federal government, I worked on several regulatory rule makings that included a public notice and comment period. We received thousands of comments on rules that I worked on, and I read and summarized every single one of those comments. Those comments did not have word limits or time limits -- because it is important for the public to weigh in on important issues. City College's current policy of limiting comments to two minutes and allowing no more than 10 minutes on one topic is not sufficient time to hear from the community. Limiting public comment to 30 minutes, and requiring the pubic to file a Notice Card is also unnecessarily procedural. I would lift these limits and encourage both oral and written comments.

10. How will you increase quality child care at ALL campuses?

I will increase quality child care at all campuses for both students and faculty. I will evaluate where the College has an unmet need for quality child care -- beyond the Mission and Ocean campuses - and determine how we can best allocate resources to those campuses that are currently underserved. Ensuring that students with children can stay on track -- and that we encourage faculty with children to stay engaged with City College - is critical to ensuring the success of the college.

11. How will you work to counter and prevent profiling and police harassment on campus? What is your position on police firearms on
campus?

Multiple CCSF students have been killed by San Francisco police officers in the past few years. This is not acceptable. I support citywide police reform, including reallocating funds from the police department, publishing public complaints about individual police officers, mandatory bias training, and a public oversight board. I also support specific racial justice policies within CCSF, including ensuring the Campus Police are accountable and transparent in their treatment of Black and Latinx students; reversing the cuts to African-American History classes; prioritizing guaranteed university admissions and guaranteed jobs for minority students; expanding Free City to include books, housing, and computers; hiring of more diverse faculty; and developing curriculum related to racial justice and advocacy, including a new degree program. This is a start. I am certain that I will develop additional policies and ideas when I hear from students and faculty about their experiences and where there are areas for improvement.

In addition to what I noted above about requiring Campus Police to publish their annual crime statistics, I will also require Campus Police to be transparent about bullying and unfair treatment of marginalized communities and implement accountability training and standards for police, faculty and other students. I do not believe that Campus police should be armed. When I was a student at Cal in the late 90s, I briefly had a stint as a Campus student police officer. We were not armed; we had only walkie talkies and this was sufficient to deal with every issue that came up on campus. I think the same should be true for City College, especially with targeted de-escalation training for Campus Police.

12. What is your position on allowing noncitizens the right to vote for College Board and other local elections? Did you take a public
position on previous ballot initiatives on the subject?

Noncitizens should vote for College Board and other local elections.

13. What are your views of transportation and pedestrian safety to, from and around City College campuses? What, if anything, would
you change, and how would you go about making those changes?

Transportation and pedestrian safety needs to be improved to, from and around City College. City College is generally underserved by public transit, as bus lines come infrequently to many of the campuses and do not always run late enough at night to be able to serve working students. As Trustee, I will also work closely with MUNI and MTA to ensure that bus lines that serve City College are not cut.

14. What is your position of military recruiting on campus?

I believe that the military should be presented alongside other recruiting options for students, and should not be given special treatment in terms of long-term career. I do, however, believe that some people have been able to benefit greatly from ROTC and from serving in the military. My sister, for example, is an Army JAG and has been proud to help service members with their legal issues, from estate planning to family issues. I do believe that people should make the decision that best makes sense for their lives, and I think the best way to ensure that students do that is to make sure they are informed of all of their options.

15. What criteria will you use in deciding whether new cell phone antennas will be installed on top of City College buildings?

I will evaluate the environmental impact of such actions, and what the tradeoffs are for installing such cell phone antennas. I will also want to ensure that the health impact of antennas on faculty and students has been evaluated by an independent body and that we do not jeopardize the health of our people for a few extra dollars. Weighing the costs and benefits and listening to the feedback of the public, students, and faculty, will be critical in this decision.