That is in a binder, but we have had some, its difficult to, you are getting something for free, which we are, getting for free, the publication, subject to delays. A little frustrating but we are getting it done pro bono, so you will have, in a book form, a bound copy that we intend to distribute to every unit or company within a station. We have 300 copies coming, that will be in book format. Some will be just sort of a simple binding and some a coil binding. And as soon as we get those, we are supposed to get the shipment today, but i want to let you know this is available, and to answer your question, we will also distribute it in a p. D. F. Format, so it can be copied. Its meant to be shared. Wonderful, thank you. Thank you, commissioner hardeman. Madam secretary, would you call the next item. Item ten, closed session, Public Employee performance evaluation of Fire Commission secretary. Item a, Public Comment on all matters pertaining to potential closed session. President cleaveland is there any Public Comment . Seeing none, Public Comment is closed. Commissioners. What is our decision on whether to go into closed session . So moved, mr. President. Commissioner covington second. President cleaveland all in favor . Thank you, madam secretary. Back in open session, any Public Comments on whether we need to disclose the discussions held in closed session pursuant to administrative code 67. 12 [a], employee evaluations. Seeing no Public Comment, Public Comment is closed. Commissioners. Whats your pleasure . A second . All in favor . Its unanimous, thank you. Item 11, adjournment. Commissioner covington so moved. President cleaveland the Commission Meeting is adjourned. Thank you. Welcome to the november 15th, regular meeting. Did i go too soon . Im supervisor safai, and to me is supervisor fewer and joining me is supervisor yee who is not here and my clerk is lisa wang and i thank charles kriminac from sfgovtv for staffing this meeting. Clerk please silence all cellphones and complete speaker cards and documents to be part of the files to be submitted to the court and items will appear on a november 28th board of supervisors agenda unless otherwise stated. Super safai i think that supervisor safai i think that item number one is going to be continued. So actually why dont we take item number two, please. Clerk yp two, ordinance of money to require parties to pay a refundable deposit when requesting written findings when the assessment appeals board has established procedures concerning the waiver and renewal of requests for written findings. Unless theres any comments from my colleague here why dont we hear from supervisor peskins and aide lee hel heppner. The proposed legislation before you today is an amendment to chapter 2b of the administrative code with policies and procedures for requesting findings of the assessment appeals board prior to an assessment hearing. As i understand it and this was sort of urged to our office at the request of the assessment appeals board, these amendments codify the policies and the procedures that have been developed by the assessment appeals board with the cooperation of the assessor recorders office. Relative to requests that the board prepare findings pursuant to california revenue and taxation code 1611. 5 and the property tax rules 308 and 325. And im happy to go into details and either the applicant or the assessor may make a written request for findings before commencement of an assessment hearing and theres a 215 ddeposit to cover the first hour of those finds and to the requesting party is billed for the preparation of those findings up to 30 hours. Theres also a procedure established for the abandonment of a request for findings and if the deposit is not paid before the conclusion of the hearing itself, if the requesting party fails to pay the total assessed amount or if the requesting party either explicitly or through neglect abandons their request for findings. If the request is abandoned, the requesting party is entitled to a full refund of deposit or fees paid unless the city has already spent more than an hour preparing those findings and for the appeals board to notify all parties that the request for findings has been abandoned. Again, this is to codify the existing procedures that the assessment appeals board already uses and in doing so to fill a gap in state law that was left there for us to be able to develop these procedures. One nonsubsanative declaration, on page 2, line 4, i believe that it should read, finding fees shall be waived instead of just findings shall be waived, and so it should be waived if any of the following occur. So i request that slight modification be made and don duran from the appeals board is here to address any details that i left out. I have a quick question. So this is designed and so this is prior to having a hearing that youd get essentially a written response. Is this prior to having the hear something. I think that is the case. Okay, great. Please come forward, mr. Duran. Good afternoon, supervisors. In answer to your question, the request for findings of fact must be made prior to the commencement of the hearing and the deposit is due either before or at the conclusion of the hearing. Once the hearing is held, when the board has the hearings, both parties are present, and the board can choose to render its decision prior to issuing those findings, or they can choose to issue its decision in conjunction with the findings. If the board releases their decision, if they choose to release their decision prior to issuing the findings or writing up the findings of fact, the parties both parties will be notified of the boards decision. The requesting party is then given the original requesting party is then given 10 Business Days to confirm whether they still want those findings to be issued by the board. please stand by please stand by today is wednesday november 15, 2017. This is the regular meeting of the building inspection commission. I would like to remind everyone to turnoff electronic devices. The first item on the agenda, roll call. Commissioner clinch is excused. We have a coquorum. President announcements. Welcome to the big meeting of november 15, 2017. Madam secretary, i have a few announcements. Congratulations to building inspection donald duffy, praised for his response of Helpful Customer Service in early november. They failed to obtain a permit for a retaining wall issue and inspector duffy issued one. And Housing Inspector yee, inspector yee provided the proper permit and inspected the proper setting for the timer. Nice job there. Finally, nominate qualified staff for our employee of the quarter appreciation program. We are accepting nominations for quarter three, july, august and september and ask you again to send them to Caroline Jane and William Strong to continue to recognize the work done each quarter. B. I. C. To take comments not part of the agenda. I have some material. Thank you. You can begin. Good morning. My name is jerry dratler. A construction project across my house is root cause of unpermitted construction work. I handed out a detailed explanation. Ill highlight six of the more important root causes. Number one unpermitted demolition work carriers low financial penalties because of the value of the work. The work is labor only and no materials and it is very inexpensive. Number two, unpermitted construction carriers a penalty of two or nine times the permit fee. A smart contractor will pull an inexpensive Building Permit at the start of the construction project which will limit all future violations to a penalty of two times the permit fee because theres an existing permit. Unpermitted construction penalties as they exist are not a deterrent. Number three, the Code Enforcement process does not assess penalties or fines. An absence of reporting building law penalties, there is no effective process for identifying serial violators who should be subject to escalating penalties. Number six, there are no penalties for sequel violations. Actually the current Historical Review process encourages unpermitted demolition and construction. If you apply for a permit and the building is over 45 yearsold, you are required to get a Historical Review evaluation that delays the project six to nine months and you have the cost of the hre. From a risk reward perspective, you save time, you save money and theres no penalty. Why would you do why would you pull a permit if you have a building over 45 years . It is my hope the b. I. C. Will schedule a formal presentation at a future meeting to discuss the root causes of unpermitted work. Thank you. Thank you. Any additional Public Comment . Seeing none, item four commissioner questions and matters. Inquiries to staff. May make inquiries to staff for policies, practices and procedures that are of interest to the commission. Commissioner walker. Following up on the Public Comment just issued, i think its a good assessment of issues we could discuss and maybe we could either schedule it here or at a future joint building and planning Commission Meeting that we threaten to have and maybe this is something we should follow up. This is one of the things we talk about, the squaring up between planning and building and really looking at the penalties and how were using them to discourage this kind of demolition that we dont want. So to encourage a process we do. So, i would like to put it on one of our future agendas or to figure out a schedule for the joint meeting. And add it. Okay. So theres two asks there. The joint meeting one, which we need to revisit again, which we did i want to say two months ago, i can do that. I didnt get feedback. The second part, sonya, we could see if they would like to discuss this and we could figure out how to articulate it more and theres a lot of information here and a lot of suggestions. But i think i do get the spirit of whats being asked here. If we dont get a kind of resolution, maybe we would calendar it for a hearing for ourselves. Im more inclined to have it ourselves and then go the other option. Yeah, i think we have had conversations internally about demolition. Maybe we can get an update about that considering these issues and how to make the system more effective. Lets have this sooner than later, possibly next month if we can get organized with staff. Any other inquiries from commissioners . If you have any items at a later date, you can contact me to let me know. Item 4 b future meetings of agendas. The commission can discuss and take actions to set up a special meeting or determine the items placed on the agenda of the next meeting and future meetings of the building commission. The next scheduled meeting is december 20th. Are all commissioners expected to be here for december 20th. Two weeks before christmas. Yeah. Any Public Comment . Seeing none, moving to item five. Item five, were going to i believe vote to continue one of the seats the general contractor seats but for now addressing the other parts of this item, discussion and possible action to approve and swear in members of Property Owner, licensed architect, Civil Engineer street and registered mechanical engineer street. Appointments recommended by the nominations are Michael Robbins and menghsiu chen. Terms to expire september 15, 2019. The Nominations Committee met and feel very strongly that we have two very strong candidates, mr. Robins and mr. Chen to recommend for the two seats at this point in time. Once again we would like to thank the talented people who offer their services to serve on the board of examiners and were he here to address questions colleagues may have about these two nominations. If the commissioners dont have questions, we can ask the two candidates to come up. Thank you commissioner. Im sorry. Is there Public Comment on this item . Okay. Do we need to approve it . Okay. Sorry commissioner warshell, just a moment. I apologize for the delays. Were going to vote to accept the candidates. Are all in favor of accepting the candidates. Aye. Any opposed . Okay. Go ahead. Repeat after me. Im michael robins, do somely swear and confirm that i will support the constitution of the United States and the state of california. Against all enemies, foreign and domestic. That i will bare true faith and allegiance to the constitution to the United States and state of california. I take this obligation freely without any mental evaluation. I will well and faithfully discharge the duties im about to enter. I will vow and faithfully during such time as i hold the office as a member of board of examiners, Property Owner licensed architect, civil or Structural Engineering seat of the city of San Francisco. Great. Yes. You are now sworn in. Great. Thank you. Congratulations. Thank you very much. If you want to say a few words youre more than welcome. Sure. Im a licensed architect, i have worked in the city about 15 years, mostly for large firms. Specialize in healthcare, resort hotels, i now have my own practice and its more focused on residential, small commercial projects. Im also a member of the aia, im on the board of directors this year and involved with a committee on Public Policy through the aia. Thank you. Thank you for serving. applause mr. Chen. I menghsiu chen do solemnly swear too support the constitution of the United States and state of california against all enemies foreign and domestic. Can you repeat that . Yeah. That i will bare true faith and allegiance to the constitution of the United States and the constitution of the state of california. That i take this obligation freely without any mental reservation or purpose of evaluation. That i will well and faithfully discharge the duties that im about to enter and during such time that i hold the office for member of the board of examiners, registered mechanical engineer seat in the city and county of San Francisco. Congratulations. I am honored to be with all you people. I have a master degree from u. C. Berkeley in mechanical engineering. I have been working in the city of San Francisco since 1977. So im a little experienced at least in my field. Ill be honored to serve for the board. Thank you. Were honored to have you. applause commissioner walker has a comment. Yes, i want to formally move to continue the general contractor seat to the next meeting. Thank you for that. Okay. Theres a motion. Can we have a second for the motion . Second. Okay. All in favor . Aye. Thank you the item is continued to the next meeting. Congratulations again to both of you. We are on to item six discussion of possible action regarding best practices approach for Tall Building review. Good morning commissioners. R robb kapla. The d. B. I. Was one of the first building departments in the nation to use the adoption of administrative bulletins in march 2008. Requirements and guidelines for the seismic design of new Tall Buildings using non predescriptive seismic design procedures. These guidelines mandated third Party Reviews for all new Tall Buildings. Develop with the Structural Engineers association of northern california. Since may of 2017 at director hueys request, building safety reviews for Tall Building. Still in draft form and expected to be submitted to director hui by 2018, improvements include. Broadening the scope of the regulations beyond the current Structural Design with more comprehensive Structural EngineeringDesign Review with geotechnical and seismic hazard mitigations. Tightening technical qualifications that the expert involve in the Tall Building review must be a licensed california geotechnical engineer or licensed civil california engineer with expertise. Beginning another effort to work separately to improve or work on ab083. We expect that to be coming next year. In june 2017, d. B. I. Distributed a request for qualification, rfq to create a pool of academic seismic experts to draw upon as needed for future Tall Building projects. While a number of submissions didnt make the july deadline, our Senior Engineer recommended the reposts of the rfq to retain a deeper pool of experts. It was posted october 30th and are expected by january 5th, 2018, as a deadline to have submissions. Once all submissions are reviewed, including those from last july, we will issue a requalified list of experts after february the 9th 2019. Sorry, is it okay if i interrupt. I have a question. So this the rsq, you had a date there of the first original i dont know, can you bring it back on the screen there . June, i believe of 2019, right . 17. Excuse me. Just so i understand, you had to repost this. Can you explain what happened there . We received a good number of engineer civil and Structural Engineer response. We didnt receive as many from the technical field and also from the academic field. So our Senior Engineer in concert with our director determined that we needed a deeper pool, so thats why we went out again with the rfq. And the rfq is pretty much to the geotechnical and there was more outreach this time to associations for especially for the geotechnical side. We did have a deep pool for the structural review. So we have a highly returned rate on is there a certain quantity you need that youre satisfied . I dont believe so. It was just a matter of making sure that we had opportunity to draw from a pool that was more representative of the disciplines. Its not a quantifiable i dont know how many we have for each, i think there were four. Director hui, do we remember . I would like to know how many geotechnical and mechanical applied and you made the decision based on needing more. The bidding section, i discuss with my Senior Engineer and look at the group because outreach more to capture all the expertise. Its not only number, its expertise to come in and look at different stuff. Its not only now the Tall Building, also for other peer review. Okay. Still have a number. 16 Structural Engineers, we have seven or eight geotechnical and four from academic field. Four from the academic field. And i know were kind of reading the tea leaves, when you say seven or eight technical, how many are you expecting on the next outreach . I think if we have a dozen well feel comfortable, just as director hui advised, in the design professions, over the course of time you develop a level of expertise youre known for because clientele maybe hear about your work, so you start focusing on certain areas, Structural Engineering orgio technical and certainly in the academic field, various professors from surrounding universities especially, stanford or berkley, develop the reputation because they focus on certain aspects and theories that they work in the labs and write papers and such. So we get an idea of what their area of expertise and background are. I get it. Its a good answer, thank you. More to the director, kind of lets say we dont get a huge pool again, i think at that stage, what decision will you make . First of all, we already have that number there. And then we outreach to other organization. I believe we would be more and then at that time well i guess im just you know playing devils advocate, i think its something that needs to be decided on in the next round. You might get to 12 or 15, i think the pool we have is what we should go with. This is something we need to get in place as soon as possible. Thats important. We want to get it out and later on theres a presentation regarding the cause. Is it okay if i pop in any other commissioners have questions . Just to reinforce what director hui just stated, this time around we were able to reach out to other professional organizations. Some members work with us pretty regularly. We asked them if they had heard news through the professional organizations and they did not. We feel this time were reaching out to professional organizations who will in turn canvas their membership and we believe well have an improvement from the last pool. Lets see where i am. Okay. So on november 9th, 2017, d. B. I. Issued information sheet s18. These are interim guideline and procedures for seismic and Structural Design engineering for new Tall Buildings and one of the special features, it will require settlement monitoring data, submissions to d. B. I. Annually for 10 years after a tco is issued. And by qualified organizations that have the proper instrumentation i want to add. On that, i think its a great going forward, particularly for the city is a necessary next step and particularly because of where we live. Its a really, really i want to recommend to staff and director hui on that. The one question i would have, enforcement of that measurement, how do you feel in regard to how the process will go in regard to the communicating the data we need. The Department Building inspection, yeah, this is i did talk to the developer and then outreach more. Most of the developer willing to do it because its for their protection for the property and then 10 years also is good idea. I talked to them, for that time period, any residential building, they have problem, thats why right now the people i talk to are willing to do it. I will do extensive outreach to the public or any other organization or to inform them. And i wanted to address the matters in there will be put in, recorded in the office to make sure its continued. So the mechanism to monitor that it triggers it at the time frame theyre supposed to send it in will be done by the which office . Something through our office for the inspection. But want to make sure they know new owner that theyre aware of that. And if they dont comply, of course well give them a correction notice and then start the coenforcement. Why you dont comply. And then of course you know, thats the process were going to do. Commissioner walker. So it would be like a notice of special restriction on the successor office . Yeah. Thats what we recommend. Most of it will be put in later how to put the specific instruction, especially instruction in the title. And so, essentially when these things are billed and approved and we issue the permit, it will include a projection of what the settlement is expected to be, there will be a Monitoring System and if it is different, then theres some i think its what he was talking about, theres some enforcement of it. What we do is, settlement, we see settlement and ask them to satisfy and then well thats all we can do. I think commissioner walkers point, we think its a great policy but we want to make sure its a very clear director and its every six months or whatever one year. What happens if its not. What happens if its not. But more to the point is were not silent on this. We have a mechanism in place, if somebody doesnt give it to us, we can say within two months of the day theyre supposed to have it in, something triggers in our department this should have been in and reviewed and i think it should be matched to their geo tech approval, we have learned quite a lot lately on this process, if a building traditionally settles and usually theres an estimate on how much settlement will happen in the building and it falls within the guideline, the time period, if it was supposed to be four inches over 20 years, its on track for the four inches. So can we talk on that mechanism. Will you have that type of thing, assistant director in place . Maybe director, can you answer that question . First of all, we put that information sheet lots of detail we need to iron out. But they submit annually, each building you have a file in a Computer System to make sure and then well ask the developer to have their own review. We can ask them what happened and put correction maybe an nov on it, you need to satisfy it. We see how to thats perfect. When its agreed on and clear on the mechanism, maybe you can put that in writing to us, this is the mechanism in place to the commission. So we are clear on the policy and procedure. Let me add to that. Director hui just explained to you the process we think will be in place and the intent of how we will enforce it, but the key for something to last 10 years, some of us wont be around and wont remember. You dont want to depend on the system, depending on a human factor of oversight, overseeing the process. 10 years is a long time. Most of the time its from a Planning Department but its a mechanism in place you record a special restriction. When you have the title of search, they show up. Having said that, im going to put on my other hat as a project sponsor for accela, not to steal thunder from the speakers coming up, but well have the ability to relay the records and be able to put in programming, im confident we can, were looking at how to do it for automatically expiring permits. We can have similar methodology apply so that when the one year timeline for this specific address or permit application number is coming about, say 60 days prior, then well have automatically notification built in to the new ppts for any permits coming up so that everybody becomes aware of it within our department. Im confident it can be done. Very good. I mean, its thats what computers are good for. You can plug in just like our phones, you can put the alarm in and it will go off at a certain date and repeat itself. Im confident this will be more practicalble to enforce. Okay. Perfect. Thank you director. Let me try to wrap up, a couple last items about the current actions. Last week we asked supervisor peskin to schedule a hearing at the land use hearing before the end of 2017. And allow Cost Recovery for third party peer review and other permitted related expenses. Currently those are paid by the developer. And this would be a mechanism for us to recover it up front. Since september im sorry, on the supervisor peskin hearing, this is our first time asking for this this is the first time asking . I think formally, yes. But its been referenced and discussed in previous public hearings. Supervisor peskin found it inconsistent that the developer would pay for peer review directly. This is a response in order to address that concern but also to look at more holistically how to manage the peer review process so were the sole parties that designate the peer reviewers and cover the cost of the peer reviews. Right. My point is, could we have had this meeting sooner than now . Im a little baffled about that. Bill strong, the ordinance has been on the land use 30day calendar for about the past 45 days or so. It could have been called any time after the fifth of october. It has not yet been called so we took the Initiative Last week to ask the supervisor if there was a possibility to schedule it before the end of the year, meaning november or december, but it is subject to the committees agenda and various items they have. I dont know if theres a reason as to why it hasnt happened yet. We took the additional action step last week in order to say were trying to move ahead with the rfq. We would like in parallel to have the mechanism for the payment Cost Recovery at about the same time. Thank you for that clarification. I want every angle we need to push, we need to push here. Thank you. Were a team, we try to do our best. I think were an effective organization. Let me wrap up quickly. Just a reminder of what we have done in the past. One more item, current efforts, since september 2017 d. B. I. Is working closely with the City Administrators Office for new comprehensive tall safety study building. The study is expected to be completed next year, november. Actions we have taken, october 2016 all peer review panelists are appointed without input from the developer and since november 2016, one or more licensed geotechnical engineers are required to review new Tall Buildings in the citys class f soils and most at risk seismic safety zone. And last but not least, since december 2016, we took steps to improve d. B. I. Tall building retention and require all peer review documents and design letters to be scanned, indexed and made readily available. If i may, assistant director, go back to the im working hard trying to get educated myself. No, can we the last two paragraphs on the geo tech and so on. Since november so im a little bit confused about these definitions that keep appearing on some of these new policies and procedures. With regard to the type of class of seismic and how we get to the definition of whats really bad and whats buildable. Im saying it as a point of view, i think we need to be kind of more simpler in our approach to like for example i hear class f is the worst and then i hear c is not great but okay. Its usually all in the seismic safety zone areas. As a matter of procedure and policy, i dont know, you might be doing this, is there a map we could put together where we go to the map and say if a building or design would say this is where were building a 240 foot Tall Building in this area, these are so were not kind of mixed up with all the different soils. I think the most important thing to consider, the history of San Francisco, you have your outcroppings, quarries. As you get toward the water, the history of San Francisco has been to fill in the bay so to speak. To create a very rather uniformed shore line whereas it was never that way to begin with. And the fact that you would like to map out specific sites will be somewhat difficult but not impossible. But whats more important, as you focus on each site itself, the lot or parcels, they themselves can have a profile very different from the general map you might want to assemble. You may not know theres a dropoff right within the same parcel that has a different has rock very close to the grade line. It could drop if that was the bay so to speak. Its difficult to know that, even on a regional basis, downtown shore line. You could craft a map but you would never know the specificity of the lot until you do the borings. In the borings, depending on how large it is, you may find very different soil classifications. Thats why it would be very difficult to create that kind of a map and say youre on this site, therefore you shall do this or that for the foundation. Director hui may want to add because of his experience as Structural Engineer and having soil reports and looking at sites with different profiles. I do understand the dilemma. Director, did you wants to Say Something . I understand what youre saying about the soil conditions can vary. But couldnt we possibly just say any Tall Building in the zone regardless of the soil has to be reviewed this way . Would that be more practical so people can understand that any Tall Building in this area they are going to be reviewed. The thing here i think pointed out, we want to have a peer review thats more than just a Single Person reviewing the work effort of the technical engineer worker. When we get into higher risk and its a Tall Building, those require us to have a better view of this from not just one person but at least two. So op