San Fran's System

Back in April of this year I mailed a request to obtain a death certificate for the Mike Fragassi who was born in Bari, Italy. I had called a few times to the number at the Vital Records office leaving a voicemail message, asking about the status of the request. No luck.

Finally on the 14th of August, I got a different message from the same number. There is a new service in San Francisco! They call it 311, it's a Civic Center Customer Service "to create an atmosphere where people can talk to a live person and get information on all affairs of City Hall, the Muni, etc." So I called that number, which is 311 in the city, but outside SF it's 415-701-2311. I was told that according to their system, my request was being processed at that very moment. I thought this to be an awfully interesting coincidence, so I patiently waited a few more days.

On the 21st I called again. This time I got a woman who told me that the envelope was opened on May 10th, they began to process it around the time of my first call (the 14th) and on the 17th they sent a letter saying something to the tune of "we can't find a record" (haven't recieved this yet) which would mean they would keep the $12 search fee and I would have to ask the State vital records office next and pay their fee. This was her interpretation of the code that was entered in the system. I thought it super-ridiculous that I would find a clear and conscise record from the state's system that this person died in this county on this date and here is the file number, and yet the county would not have that record... Something very strange...

August 22, I'm still steaming, ready to make formal complaints, and my husband calls saying "some broad just called me on my cell phone regarding a death certificate I know nothing about. She said they didn't have a record of it there but the state does and they're sending it out to us..." So can it be that because I put on my request form to the county of San Francisco the state file number for the document I found in their indices, they know it must exist and called the state office up themselves to verify? Could it be?

Well, I'll believe it and exhale when the document is in my hands...