Publication Date: Wednesday Jan 12, 2000

Under the watchdog's gaze

Palo Alto's Human Relations Commission targets issues that others would rather keep buried

The six members of Palo Alto's Human Relations Commission sit around an oval table in the cramped, florescent-lit conference room on the ground floor of City Hall.

They face a handful of audience members and a row of police officers, shifting awkwardly on folding chairs. The HRC speeds through the usual business before it gets to the main show--a heartfelt conversation with Police Chief Pat Dwyer about race, and whether it determines which drivers are stopped, ticketed, or arrested on Palo Alto's streets.

The topic is graphically laid out by six audience members, each of whom relates personal experiences of being stopped by police for "offenses" that appeared to be nothing more than the color of their skin.

Before hearing the stories, the HRC urges the Police Department to examine "racial profiling"--the alleged targeting of minority drivers. Police departments in San Jose, Oakland, and San Francisco have agreed to compile statistics on the race of every driver stopped by their officers. The HRC asks the Palo Alto Police Department to consider doing the same.

Dwyer is frank with the commissioners about the training his officers receive before they hit the streets, but he's obviously a bit uncomfortable with the request.

The solution to confronting prejudice, he explains, is not keeping statistics but changing "what's in the hearts and minds of individual police officers."

The meeting breaks up with the assurance that the subject will be discussed further--an outcome the commissioners consider a success.

If nothing else, they say, a touchy subject has been brought out into the open, and members of the public have had a chance to be heard. Providing such a forum is a role the HRC has perfected over the past few decades as it wades into unpopular political territory, shaking up the status quo and raising issues that Palo Alto's power structure would sometimes rather bury.

Often called "the conscience of Palo Alto," the HRC has found its niche tackling the social issues that never seem to go away, ones that often get downplayed in a community sometimes more concerned with managing its wealth and popularity. Championing such causes as affordable housing, discrimination and homelessness, members view themselves as defenders of Palo Alto's disadvantaged, neglected and ignored.

The HRC has taken an increasingly aggressive stance in recent years, locking horns repeatedly with the City Council. Though the commission is strictly an advisory group, with no power to enact laws, its high profile and activist attitude has prompted some council members to suggest the HRC's influence should be checked.

HRC members, however, said they are forging a closer and less complicated relationship with the council. Playing nice seems to be working; the HRC's pet project, a broad anti-discrimination ordinance for the city, is traveling quickly through City Hall. City staff have started to pay more attention to the HRC, and to solicit its input on thorny issues, such as a proposal to build an Orthodox Jewish eruv in Palo Alto.

But some HRC members wonder whether their recommendations are being heard by the elected leaders who appointed them in the first place. They worry that most Palo Altans don't even know the HRC exists.

"We're one of the best-kept secrets in the city," says HRC Chair Wynn Hausser.

If members of the HRC sometimes feel like their voice is a lonely cry in the woods, they have succeeded at drawing attention to a wide range of local and international issues.

One of the HRC's more far-reaching projects was its 1997 push for the city to impose sanctions on Burma's oppressive military government. But the HRC routinely works on smaller projects as well, such as creating a pocket-sized guide on tenant's rights for local renters. The HRC has also founded task forces to issue recommendations on homelessness and disability issues, and holds regular town hall meetings to take the community's pulse.

Hausser said he views the HRC as the sounding board for local concerns, particularly those that might otherwise never be raised within City Hall.

"We are a place where anybody can come and have their concerns met, or at least listened to," Hausser said. "I also think we have a strong role to play in terms of raising awareness and advocacy."

That philosophy has given the HRC a knack for stirring up controversy. It enraged some local parents this fall, for example, with a proposed anti-discrimination ordinance that--as originally worded--may have the unintended consequence of kicking local Boy Scout troops out of the city's Lucie Stern Community Center. The proposal bans organizations that discriminate against 13 specified groups of people from using city facilities.

The Boy Scouts of America prohibit homosexuals and atheists from joining, and local chapters are required to follow these national rules. This may put local troops in violation of the proposed ordinance and prevent them from renting meeting rooms at the city-owned Lucie Stern facility.

Met with strong opposition to its proposal from some Palo Altans, who felt it was unfair to punish local chapters for policies enacted by national organizations, the HRC appears to be easing its stance. HRC Vice-Chair Andrew Pierce, a attorney who wrote the proposed ordinance, said the Boy Scouts may not be affected after all.

"We may have some proposals that would make (the ordinance) a little less controversial," Pierce said.

"We're primarily concerned about the provision of services and programs in Palo Alto, not so much with organizations' policies or leadership outside of Palo Alto."

But the HRC's determination in pushing the ordinance, despite the possible conflict with the Boy Scouts and other organizations, has alienated some members of the public and the City Council.

"Those who are championing the proposed anti-discrimination ordinance for Palo Alto do not seem to understand its impact on local scouting troops" said Kathy Durham, the mother of two Boy Scouts.

"I think we should be focusing our energies on dealing with documented local cases of discrimination, and strengthening federal and state statutes," rather than going after local Boy Scout troops, she added.

Mayor Gary Fazzino has also been critical of the HRC's treatment of the subject.

"The HRC needs to find a way to help us solve this issue," Fazzino said. "They are making a big mistake if they try and throw the Boy Scouts out of the Lucie Stern center."

Though he says the relationship between the HRC and the City Council is better than it was two years ago, when both groups clashed over the city's treatment of homeless people, Fazzino would prefer the HRC stay more tightly under the City Council's control and defer to its judgment.

"They shouldn't go out of their way to put (the council) in a difficult place politically. It shouldn't happen. They need us and we need them," Fazzino said.

This perspective doesn't entirely mesh with that of HRC members, who see their role in part as being a thorn in the side of the City Council.

"Anyone who speaks his or her mind is likely to get into trouble," said Commissioner Litsie Indergand. "We should be as vocal and forceful an advocacy body as possible."

Pierce agreed.

"There is a tendency to become complacent," in Palo Alto, Pierce said, due to "both the wealth of our community and the assumption everyone has that because this is a university town in Silicon Valley that we're very liberal and progressive. That's not always the case."

"One thing the HRC can do is make sure ... that we don't become too complacent," Pierce added.

Few issues have illustrated the chasm between the HRC and the City Council more clearly than the treatment of Palo Alto's small but visible homeless population. Rather than working together, the HRC and City Council in the past four years have often found themselves in high-profile confrontations over the issue.

The HRC is unanimously opposed to many recent city ordinances that attempt to regulate certain behaviors, including the "sit-lie" ban on sitting or lying down on downtown sidewalks and a proposed ordinance to ban panhandling from street medians.

Commissioners say such ordinances are thinly-veiled attempts to harass the homeless and drive them out of sight.

"One issue that concerns me have been the rules devised to regulate behavior that I didn't think needed regulating," said Commissioner Eve Agiewich.

The HRC's opposition to the City Council's tactics flared publicly in 1997, when the HRC staged a protest on University Avenue against the sit-lie law. The demonstration attracted 200 people and several television news stations, giving the city a dose of negative publicity that council members didn't appreciate.

"We had to pound on the door to get ourselves involved on that one," said Hausser, who said the HRC was eventually included in the debate over the sit-lie ban.

But Hausser said the council has kept the HRC in the dark about a controversial ordinance to ban panhandling from medians, currently scheduled to hit the council on Jan. 24.

"There are times when we get blindsided," Hausser said. "What the council members feel is that 'We already know what the HRC is going to say about that, so why ask them.' But we're pretty good about saying ... 'If you are going to go ahead, here's how to make it less onerous.' That's where we can really be constructive."

Hausser said the commission got off to a bad start with the council on the homelessness issue. It happened, he said, after the city founded a task force to address "aggressive panhandling." The task force returned with recommendations for increased social services for homeless people as well as more punitive measures for those who bothered passers-by.

When that task force's recommendations stalled before the City Council, the HRC formed its own task force on homelessness in 1996.

The HRC's group came back with a lengthy report that recommended the city create more shelter beds, transitional housing, a multi-service center and public restrooms downtown.

When the council failed to act on the HRC's recommendations, which were unsolicited, they appeared callous to many Palo Altans. This, Hausser said, created bad blood between the council and the HRC.

Since that time, some of the Task Force's ideas have become reality. Two public restrooms were installed in downtown Palo Alto last month. The nonprofit Community Working Group, which includes both Indergand and Hausser as members, adopted the idea for a homeless indoor day services center. The group expects to close escrow on a property off of El Camino Real this month.

The HRC has taken pride in being the city's watchdog since the mid-1960s.

Though the group's early history is difficult to piece together, Jay Thorwaldson, a reporter for the now-defunct Palo Alto Times, remembers the HRC's members resigning en masse in 1966 after a conflict with the City Council. The Council was bitterly divided in those days, Thorwaldson said, but he didn't remember the nature of their fight with the HRC.

The HRC was reformed in 1969 by Councilman John Berwald to address discrimination in housing and employment, as well as larger issues of justice and fairness.

"I think they've done very well since then ... to help victims of injustice in a way that does not develop hatred and animosity ... and stick to the requirements of the job," Berwald said.

According to Thorwaldson, the HRC took many public stands in the late '60s but was less controversial than its predecessors.

"The new membership was more cautious," Thorwaldson said.

Minutes from the HRC's early days show a letter sent to the Palo Alto Times asking for the removal of race from the paper's employment advertisements, as well as correspondence with the civil rights group Congress of Racial Equality (CORE).

"Our area of leadership is in human problems. ... This is an area where the (HRC) can do what the City Council cannot," said then-Councilman William H. Clark.

Early HRC discussions showed a combination of lofty goals and broad-based concerns, much like those of HRC members today. A December 1969 HRC meeting listed "lack of consensus," "citizen apathy," "community polarity," as well as "prejudice in housing and jobs," as top priorities for the group to address.

In the early 1970s the HRC gave special attention to youth issues, and to mediating disputes between young demonstrators and Palo Alto police.

Mary Cottrell, an HRC commissioner from 1970 to 1978, remembers the HRC had a cordial relationship with both the council and Palo Alto Police Chief Jim Zurcher.

Zurcher attended most HRC meetings himself or sent one of his officers. The chief even allowed the HRC to mediate between police and citizens making formal complaints against the department.

"We had the enthusiastic cooperation of the police chief, but we made it very clear to the police we were not investigating or sitting in judgment," Cottrell said.

"We were not doing anything to tread on anyone else," Cottrell added. "If we had stepped over the line ... we would have been stopped in our tracks immediately."

The HRC did sometimes appear to flounder without a clear direction in its early years, given the numerous social programs and agencies already operating in the city.

"The HRC is plagued with what direction to go," said one HRC member in the minutes of a 1971 meeting.

Decades later, the HRC's role is often equally uncertain. This frustrates both council members, who feel the HRC oversteps its bounds, and HRC members, who feel their work is often dismissed by City Hall.

"There is sometimes a perception that no matter what we do, we're told that procedurally we've done it the wrong way," said Pierce.

Former Councilman Joe Huber, who served as a liaison to the HRC, believes the council should give the HRC clearer marching orders.

"There isn't a heck of a lot of direction from council to HRC on what they should be doing, so they sort of do their own thing," Huber said.

The proposed sanctions against Burma, which passed a council vote in a more watered-down version, is one example of an issue that Huber thinks is far outside the HRC's bounds.

"Sometimes I think they may be in search of a problem that may not exist, but on the balance I think they do a pretty good job," Huber said. "It's a very hard role to define."

For some commissioners, it has been difficult to see issues they've worked on end up in radically different form. "We have no decision-making power at all ... We are recommenders, people who have no authority to do anything," said Commissioner Roy Blitzer.

The HRC does have some concrete responsibilities, however. It sets Palo Alto's "priorities of need," deciding how the city should divide up $1.2 million from its general fund among 20 different local and regional nonprofits.

With 25 agencies this year requesting an excess of $3 million, agencies will receive funding depending on how well they can meet the priorities laid out by the HRC. After holding a series of forums and workshops with the community, the HRC's priorities include: new shelter beds, a homeless services day center, employment opportunities, affordable housing for special populations, outreach to seniors, crisis counseling for youth, rental deposit funding, and shared housing services.

The HRC also runs the Palo Alto Mediation Program, a free service in which trained mediators help solve disputes between neighbors or landlords and tenants.

Kathy Espinosa-Howard, who as the city's human services director serves as the staff liaison to the HRC, said the group works best when it focuses on advocacy, rather than policing other city departments. But she doesn't think the HRC should avoid taking controversial stands.

"Every organization worth its salt must have creative tension. ... The HRC is an important element in the community because it raises issues that many in the community may be reticent to address," Espinosa-Howard said.

"They have been very strong in the past few years, and very focused. That's where their strength lies," she added.

It's now been more than a month since the HRC held its meeting on possible racial profiling by the Police Department.

HRC commissioners haven't heard anything else on the issue from Dwyer. All they know is that he is scheduled to give his report on the subject to the City Council this month.

The HRC has no say in whether the city decides to confront racial profiling or not. But HRC members say they feel they made a difference anyway.

At least the six people who spoke got to deliver their message to the man who can change things. And their message was clear: racial discrimination exists in Palo Alto, among members of the police force and in the community at large.

"It's not made up, it's real," said Yvette Lafleur, an African-American women who has lived in south Palo Alto for 30 years.

Kim Singh, a Palo Altan of Indian decent, echoed Lafleur.

"This city is very highly respected, but just because you live in Palo Alto doesn't mean everything goes right. ... People of color keep getting rapped on their knuckles," Singh said.

Pierce said such face-to-face discussion of sensitive issues serves an important purpose.

"I thought it got a lot of issues out on the table," said Pierce. "It didn't solve everything, but I think it's helpful for us to be a go-between. A lot of these people would never go down and talk to Chief Dwyer, and (he) wouldn't necessarily go into the community and find these people either."

For other HRC members, the meeting served as an example of what the group can do.

"Often we lack exposure, but I think we're making headway in letting people know they do have a voice," Blitzer said.

Commissioner Adele Khabbaz said hearing the community's concerns should be the HRC's number-one priority.

"The best-run HRC we could have would be one that had a total relationship with the community. I feel really strongly about the community connection," Khabbaz said.

Agiewich agreed, "It is very powerful to have people come and tell us what they need, and to make that leap to think that we can help them."

The HRC will meet tomorrow at 7 p.m. to discuss how a gap in services for the homeless will be met if the church-based nonprofit Urban Ministry does not get city funding this year. Urban Ministry supplies hot meals and other basic services to the area's homeless population, and missed the December deadline to apply for the city's federal block-grant funding. The meeting is in the City Council conference room on the ground floor of City Hall, 250 Hamilton Ave.



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