Best Bureaucrat

If you live in San Francisco and are interested in animal welfare issues, you have the ear of Carl Friedman. "You pay my salary, so the least I can do is be accessible," says the affable Friedman. The head of a city department who personally returns calls almost immediately? Who answers e-mails himself? Who makes himself readily available to Joe Citizen and reporters alike? "It takes a toll," Friedman says of being so in touch with the public. Well, we want to say thanks, and let Friedman know we appreciate his work at ACC, and his sense of humor.