Controller assumes de facto control of Human Rights Commission

In a Friday afternoon letter to San Francisco officials, city controller Greg Wagner announced his office would essentially assume control of the scandal-plagued Human Rights Commission, with his “accounting staff immediately to oversee accounting operations at HRC, including approvals of payments and other financial transactions.”

The Human Rights Commission’s director, Sheryl Davis, resigned at Mayor London Breed’s behest yesterday and hired a defense attorney after a slew of news articles alleging cavalier or even potentially illegal spending.

The San Francisco Chronicle on Thursday revealed that Davis spent some $10,000 renting a home for city interns on Martha’s Vineyard, allegedly splitting the invoice to evade city reporting requirements for purchases of $10,000 or more. On the same day, the San Francisco Standard noted that Davis had directed some $1.5 million in funding to the nonprofit Collective Impact, which is overseen by James Spignola. Spignola lives at the same address as Davis and they co-own a car. 

Trouble had long been brewing around the Dreamkeeper Initiative, which directs funds toward nonprofits serving San Francisco’s African American community. Davis oversaw the monetary allocations and distributions of Dreamkeeper, too, and the propriety with which the funds were being dispersed was a growing concern.

In his letter yesterday, Wagner noted that his office and the city attorney are currently investigating both the Human Rights Commission and the Dreamkeeper Initiative. He also shared a series of steps the controller will immediately take. They include: 

• Accelerating and expanding an audit of the Human Rights Commission’s purchases under $20,000, which were less scrutinized; 
• Suspension of the Human Rights Commission’s ability to make such purchases until the completion of the audit; 
• An assessment of the Human Rights Commission’s “procurement processes, policies and procedures and segregation of duties,” with “necessary controls” being implemented; 
• A team of analysts will work with interim Human Rights Commmission director Mawuli Tugbenyoh to “assess current contract and invoice approval process, staffing and administrative procedures, and develop a plan for long-term organizational changes to improve program and performance monitoring”; 
• Audits will be performed on grant agreements with Collective Impact, the nonprofit run by Davis’ housemate Spignola.