Its an honor to have you in the chamber, congratulations again and thank you for making San Francisco a beautiful place for everyone to enjoy. Thank you. Well, colleagues, that concludes our commendations for the day. Thank you to all the honorees and the people who join them in recognizing some amazing folks who not only take care of San Francisco, but make San Francisco a more beautiful place. Looking forward to next week commendations where we will im sure have some more amazing people. Thank you all so much for being here today. All right. With that, madam clerk, well go to our first 3 00 p. M. Special order. Please read the item. Items 2427, comprise the public hearing of persons interested in the determination of exemption from Environmental Review, under the California Environmental quality act or approved on november 30th, proposed project at 1526 wallace avenue to process and sell small lifestock in a pdrtwo processing distribution and zoning repair district. Item 25 is the motion to affirm that it is exempt. Item 26 is the motion to conditionally reverse the departments determination, and item 27 is the motion to direct the preparation of findings. President breed ok, colleagues. We have an appeal of the Planning Departments determination of exemption from Environmental Review for the project at 1526 wallace avenue in district 10. For this hearing, we already considering the Planning Department determination the proposed project at 1526 wallace avenue is exempt from environment review. Without objection, we will proceed as follows. Up to ten minutes for a presentation by the appellant or representative, up to two minutes for speaker in support of the appeal, ten minutes for the Planning Department, up to ten minutes for the project sponsor, or their represent, up to two minutes per speaker in opposition to the appeal, and finally, up to three minutes for rebuttal by the appellant or the appellant representative. Colleagues, if there are no objections to proceeding in this way, we will move forward and open up this hearing. And supervisor cohen. Supervisor cohen thank you ladies and gentlemen, president breed. Colleagues, today we will hear from the appellant, along with the Planning Department and members of the public about a halal poultry butcher. Brought forward by the animal Legal Defense fund, alds, expressed concerns with the Planning Commission concern to exempt in the approval of the conditional use application submitted last november. My office has spent the better part of the last month working to understand how this particular facility would impact the proposed area and city at large. And with that, madam president , i turn back the rest of the hearing over to you. Thank you. President breed thanks, supervisor cohen. And before we proceed, im going to ask members of the public, if you could please keep it down, we need to move forward with our agenda. Thank you very much. And with that, we will start with the presentation for the appellant, or appellant representative. Please come forward. You have up to ten minutes. Good afternoon, christina stella, here on behalf of the animal Legal Defense fund and the 2,000 individual members who reside in San Francisco. Aldf urges the board to remand it back to the Planning Commission to be adequately considered before it is granted a conditional use permit. Highlight three points from our alds written materials today. First, reiterate at the outset that the concerns raised in the comments are squarely in those addressed by seqa, and appeal based on the misuse or lack of process that took place here. Alds supports fostering stronger connections between consumers and their food. With respect to this project, the position is that a facility that seeks to transport, confine to indoor cages and slaughter more than 100,000 animals annually has environmental effects that must be considered under seqa, and particularly because slaughterhouses have contributed to the frustrating legacy of pollution that lingers in the bayview today. Inviting that industry into San Francisco anew, over the opposition of San Francisco residents, and without any meaningful consideration of its Environmental Impacts before permitting it. Continues the injustice of residents for decades. Second, the project sponsor has tried to distinguish itself with larger operations with more of an Environmental Impact, it has not introduced to directly address the contention. For example, aldf presented evidence that live transport can travel from animals to humans and increases salmonella. The response from the project sponsor, the amount of overall truck traffic will not increase. So nothing about the nature of live animal transport in the project sponsors response. Aldf presented evidence that confinement facilities are recognized as sources of air pollutants, such as ammonia, bacteria, yeast, mold, airborne dust and patrols from grains mice and fungus. Can cause problems. And severe irritation to the track. And cardiac arrest. Longterm exposure to decreased lung function. Poultry manure, collecting in the cages of the facilities before transported off site and contaminating the air pumped out of the building, contains nitrogen, phosphorus and heavy metals. 2 to 4 times more nutrients than the manure of other livestock. Also parasites, bacteria and pathogens that are with humans, and nothing with regard to filtration system or evidence the ventilation system will address these problems. Aldf presented evidence that cages prevented chickens in cages from being mentally or physically healthy. Physical stress, more susceptible to infectious dies, and bacteria colonization. Overcrowding, overheating, withholding of food and water, excessive lighting, incorrect flock sizes, different ages and colors and abrupt changes in management environment, all of which are concerns that relate specifically to the type of operation proposed here. Can all precipitate feather pecking and can ballism. Caged birds cannot escape this behavior. These impacts on animals are directly related to food safety and Public Health. And the response from the project sponsor, that seqa does not apply to livestock. So the factual matter, the sponsor has not contradicted the evidence submitted or addressed the concerns raised by aldf, denying any harm will take place, not supported by the evidence. Finally, in regard to the legal standards that apply here, the class one exemption does not apply. The California Court of appeal has made clear a class one exemption for existing facilities does not apply where there is a major change in focus, its a quote, of the facilities operations. Change from an auto towing shop or vacant space to a slaughterhouse is a change making the exemption inappropriate. The board should reject this attempt to shoe horn this into an exemption that is meant to and does only apply to minor physical alterations to a building. Even if class one or class three were to seem applicable, 146,000 animal slaughterhouse is unusual for San Francisco. Whether unusual circumstances make an otherwise appropriate exemption, depends whether the circumstances of a particular project differ from the general circumstances of the projects covered by a particular exemption. The sponsor makes much of the fact the facility will be the first and only life slaughterhouse of its kind in San Francisco, that there are no projects of comparable size and location in the city means that the project itself presents an unusual circumstance that makes the categorical exclusion inappropriate. The air quality of the proposed site is also an unusual circumstance. Case law in california shows that environmental sensitivity can constitute unusual circumstances that make an seqa exemption inappropriate. Aldf has shown the bayview is an environmental sensitive neighborhood. Makes the exclusion all more appropriate here. Lastly, that it does not apply to animals and agriculture is not correct. Seqa does contemplate livestock, and that the mitigation measures can have impacts on livestock. To the extent the project sponsor claims the Animal Welfare commission is charged with making recommendations to the board to protect Animal Welfare in San Francisco. On january 26th, the commission did in fact advise the board to support aldf appeal by letter. So, aldf agrees with the sponsor statements, that the recommendations of the Animal Welfare commission should be followed here. In sum, aldf is glad to see the environmental effects are seeing action now, but prior to granting the conditional use permit so adequate conditions can be put in place to mitigate any potential environmental effects. It is not enough under seqa for this conversation to take place, only as a post hoc or ad hoc afterthought that cannot bind the business to mitigation measures. To the degree the board still has questions about or uncertain about the effects of the facility at this stage, aldf submits this is exactly what seqa is designed to address. The proper course to remand to the Planning Commission for a study to evaluate environmental effects and mitigation measures. Thank you for your time. President breed thank you. All right. Now, we will open it up to Public Comments for those who are here to speak in support of the appeal. For those of you who would like to speak in support of the appeal, you will have up to two minutes per person, so please line up to your right. If you are opposed to the appeal, there will be a time to speak at a later time in the agenda. First speaker, please. Good afternoon, brian butler, Community Organizer and policy advocate for green action for health and environmental justice. Im here not to clarify some of the recent comments i read in an article about this appeal being based on vegetarians, just not wanting a slaughterhouse, this this appeal, frankly, is based on decades and decades of systemic neglect for the community of bayview Hunters Point. Bayview Hunters Point shoulders the majority of the commercial industry in the city of San Francisco. That in and of itself i think warrants additional safeguards to the community. You may have heard it, i know supervisor cohen is familiar with this, but a child born in bayview today is expected to live 14 years less than a child born in russian hill. When you think about the sewer plant, the radioactive super fund site, all the concrete batch plants, the two freeways, the maritime traffic in the bay. And railroad traffic. Youve got air pollution, soil pollution and Water Pollution. [bell rings] we have to do everything we possibly can, im on overtime, do everything we possibly can to ensure we are protecting the health of this vulnerable community. One last thing, we have to consider the cumulative impacts when we look at things so narrowly we miss the bigger picture. Thank you. President breed thank you. Next speaker, please. Hello, hi, everyone. I lived in bayview, Hunters Point all my years. I have watched company after company move into the community and add more pollution into the already heavily polluted community. For years i have called on my elected officials to reduce my exposure to harmful pollution, not increase it. Today i ask the board of supervisors take every step possible to protect hunters view, Hunters Point residents from any potential harm caused by yet another facility, claiming to only have a small impact on our community air, water and soil. Would you please make sure this project is thoroughly checked for another, for any possible negativity, Environmental Impact on us and the community. Thank you. I appreciate it. President breed thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. Hello, my name is deandra, a resident of bayview over 40 years, Business Owner with el over ten years. Submitting comments this afternoon, the same i submitted when i was at the meeting earlier late last year. My commitment as a Business Owner and long time resident of the bayview Hunters Point has made it possible to raise my children and now grandchild in the family home, three blocks away from 1526 wallace. Say again, three blocks from 1526 wallace. I can actually see it from my living room. Ill be able to smell 1526 wallace from my living room. Which is a proposed site of the slaughtering and livestock facility. Disappointing once again my community, folks like myself that live blocks away from an intrusive and hazardous establishment, we were not notified in a clear and concise way, nor was the testing the aldf has been asking for has been done, has it been analyzed and shared with the community. Again, i live three blocks away. I know there are rules in place and establishments in which at the last meeting we were told that we were reached out to the community was told about this. Im going to say again, i live three blocks away, i got nothing in my mailbox, i got no one knocking on my door. [bell rings] so again, im going to say, time is up, i am opposed to 1526 wallace business going into place. Adamantly. I am asking that the clear and True Research review that aldf is asking for is done and shared with the residents of the bayview Hunters Point community. Thank you. President breed thank for your comments. Next speaker, please. Good afternoon, mary beth, resident of the engelside district. I strongly oppose a slaughterhouse in San Francisco. Requiring Environmental Review to understand how the bayview would be impacted is a modest request. Allowing a slaughterhouse without so much as a consideration of the environmental effects on the bayview flies in the face of San Franciscos progressive nature. Opposed to a slaughterhouse anywhere, but i would like the city to acknowledge a slaughterhouse does in fact affect the environment, our residents, and the animals. Thank you. President breed next speaker, please. Good afternoon, ina, and my wife and i live in the bayview with our four children and also run a doggy daycare, im a native San Francisco resident. We look small here, those of us in line, i want you to know the bayview is full of working class citizens and many people wanted to be here but could not afford to take a day off from work. I understand the reasons why the Planning Commission okayed the permits. Also believe it was based on a false narrative that has been created. Repeatedly stated that it was important for San Francisco to be culturally inclusive. They would feel this way after hearing system that people had to travel to oakland to put protein on the table. They say its opposed by fascist vegetarians opposed to eating meat. Im not, i like eating chicken. My grandfather was a butcher in hawaii. Im not antibutcher. There is a difference between butcher and slaughterhouse. More than 75 excellent restaurants serving halal food in San Francisco and 35 groceries to buy fresh meat. Only 7 of the customers are actually muslim. According to the law of halal, no requirement that the chickens must be freshly slaughtered in full view. This is a business choice. [bell rings] i am here because i care about the bayview and the 37,000 residents of the bayview. Give us a running starts to move away from the environmental racism and classism that continue under the guise that there its zoned that way or diesel and emitting businesses in the neighborhood. Not allow a dairy farm based on an old legacy or walk along heron point youll know the legacy of toxicity in the bayview is one we need to [bell rings] president breed thank for your comments. Next speaker, please. Hi, i was born and raised in San Francisco, and i am a resident of the bayview. I have chronic asthma myself. I was also an after School Teacher at one Purpose School in the bayview. I know firsthand the children of bayview suffer from health issues, and even at the young age of five they are impacted by the iniquity of society. Please choose them over the money. Choose the children and families over the money and make sure the business does not add to the pollution in the bayview. Thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. Jane tobin. Im hear in support of adlf and a letter we sent to you earlier. We want to stress that ignoring the seqa requirements would continue this trend of environmental injustice for the residents. And also an area of public concern, or Public Safety for the commissioners, too. So we ask for the process to be followed as required by seqa and also in support of the animal Legal Defense fund. Thank you. President breed thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. My name is paul denning, here on behalf of lori green who lives at 1500 revere avenue in the bayview. She was not able to be here today, because she cannot afford to take off work, and she just had one short comment for you which is that people need in the neighborhood need more Fresh Produce options, not more options that destroy their health and this is also an environmental issue on a global scale and i totally agree with her. Thank you. President breed thank for your comments. Next speaker, please. Hi, my name is donna turner, lived in the San Francisco area my entire life and my daughter is a fifth generation in San Francisco. Current address for nearly 37 years. Strongly opposed to allowing a slaughterhouse in San Francisco. Much easier to keep slaughter out of the city than stop the negative effects once the door is open. Slaughterhouses do not belong in San Francisco. Many problems associated with slaughterhouses. Please take these issues into consideration as you decide whether to allow the facility to move forward. San francisco seems to either be experiencing a drought or massive 100 year storms happening with greater frequency, every ten years, if not more. Either way, the slaughterhouse in the city will have grave negative effect. Its extremely water intensive, and where will the polluted water end up, in the bay . Its not acceptable. The wastewater is not able to handle a normal winter and with climate change, it could more flooding in the neighborhoods. Nobody wants the slaughterhouse waste in the homes as the system backs up as it has in the last decade. And toxic pollution in waterways, nitrate pollution, Drinking Water contamination and agricultural communities nationwide. We have some of the best water in the nation. Why would you want to allow this unnecessary pollution here. Violent crime, university of windsor, michigan, 1994 to 2002 f. B. I. Data on 581 counties to analyze slaughterhouses. Increases arrest rates for Violent Crime and sex offenses and other industries. Enough of a crime problem in San Francisco. We should not at to it into a neighborhood already plagued with crime. Trucks filled with life animals bringing them to the death. Killing is messy, violent, killing is president breed thank you for your comments. [please stand by] for those reasons, as well as the aldf, we urge you not to allow the project to move forward. Thank you for your comment. Before the next speaker speaks, ill ask if there are any other members of the public who want to support the appeal of the categorical exemption. Please step behind where that gentleman is. Next speaker, please. Hi, good afternoon, everyone. Im jason oliver, resident of the bay area. Many friends in San Francisco, im speaking on behalf of compassion bay, direct action everywhere and i volunteer with food Justice Groups and environmental organizations. I think that what everybody else has said has spoken quite eloquently, this is a terrible idea for San Francisco. A step in the wrong direction. Animal agriculture is extremely devastating and destructive to the environment. Its the number one cause of climate change, water loss. Its very damaging to the workers who work in the facility. I personal have been into many farms, many facilities and the air quality is extremely toxic. It burns because of the amount of ammonia. And ive been in the live poultry facility in oakland and it was extremely disgusting to see the animals. There is no consideration of their wellbeing. These animals are considered to be products under the law. So this facility was incredibly dirty. And there were many animals suffering and so i just really encourage folks to consider what everybody else has said. Thank you for your comments. President breed thank you. Are there any other members of the public who would like to speak in support of the appeal . Seeing none. Public comment is now closed. Now well have a presentation by the Planning Department. You will have up to ten minutes. Good afternoon. Joining me today are tanya schoenherr, lisa gibson, Environmental Review officer, Matthew Chandler and bridge. Additionally im joined by staff from Public Utilities commission, the San Francisco department of Public Health. The item before you is for the proposed change of use of 2100 square foot industrial building which is currently vacant and was previously used as a towing facility. The proposed use would be operated by saaba live poultry, a slaughtering facility. The space would include a retail component. Which applies to minor alterations. On november 30, 2017, the project received conditional use authorization from the San Francisco Planning Commission, which unanimously approved the project. Please note that the conditional use authorization decision was not appealed to the board, this means that the merits of the project are not relevant at todays proceedings. The decision before the board today is whether to uphold the departments decision to issue a cal gore cal exemption and deny the appeal or return it to the department for additional Environmental Review. If their appeal, the appellant state thad the project is not qualified for exemption under ceqa. The project did in fact qualify for a class one exemption which applies to existing facilities. Subsequent to issuing the exemption, the Planning Department determined that the project qualifies for a class 3 exemption, which applies to new construction and conversion of small structures. Determine federal government its exempt under determining if its exempt under ceqa, first the department determines if it fits within a class. The threshold that qualifies it under class 3. The second step is for the department to determine if there are any exceptions that would disallow the use of an exemption. This includes review for any unusual circumstances, associated with the project or the location that could result in significant impath on the environment. Impact on the environment. The analysis completed by Planning Department shows the project does not have any unusual circumstances that could result in significant Environmental Impacts. Thus it qualifies for categorical exemption. As discussed in detail in our response letter, the department maintains that the size and scale of the project do not rise to a level where Significant Impact on the environment could occur. The project proposes a use within a 2100square foot building. Operation would require three to five trips a week. It would not require a backup generator or other equipment that result in air quality emissions and the only machine on site would be a defeathering machine which is powered by electricity. For informational purposes, the Planning Department conducted air quality review of the property. As discussed in the letter, the project regardless of location would not rise to a significant of air impact. Thus the project was exempt from ceqa. They expressed a concern on waste water. The project would be required to obtain necessary permits from various regulatory agencies, including dph and pac. Additionally the project would require state and federal regulation for solid Waste Disposal and food handling. If the department could not rely on existing regulations, no project could be exempt from Environmental Review, requiring the creation of individual are regulations for each new project. Further, assuming that the project would not comply with necessary regulations is speculative and speculation is not considered substantial evidence under ceqa. Today, im joined by staff who can answer further questions regarding the permitting and inspections required by the city. In conclusion, fort reasons stated in the appeal response and statements made at the hearing, the department continues to find that the ceqa determination complies with the requirement of ceqa, and the categorical exemption. The appellant has not provided any evidence that there is a reasonable possibility of significant Environmental Impact due to unusual circumstances. Therefore, i urge you to uphold the departments exemption and deny the appeal. This concludes my presentation. Planning staff is a available for any questions that you may have. Thank you. President breed thank you, supervisor cohen. Supervisor cohen i have eight questions i want to present to the Planning Department. The first has do with the ceqa determination, the determination does no discuss waste collection. I understand from the presentation that waste from the slaughtered animals will be collected and stored in refrigerators before transport to a processing facility. How about animal waste while in cages . Could you describe how the solid waste will be collected . So, just a little background knowledge. The Planning Department did visit the oakland facility to get a better understanding of how the facility would function in San Francisco. And currently the way they have it set up, the cages have individual trays that line the bottom and they are removed daily and a couple of times a day is what i heard and theyre also stored in the sealed containers that are picked up. And what about what about the amount of treated water . Should saba be using daily. What is the amount of treated water that saba will be using daily . And my followup question is how do you know this . I think for this question were going to ask the pc to come and speak if thats ok with the board. Sure. Im the manager of the pretreatment program. As far as water consumption is concerned, i spoke with my counterpart and they indicated that the oakland saba poultry on kennedy avenue uses approximately 2000 gallons per day. That has not been verified with the San Francisco office yet. We will conduct a full inspection, full permitting and waste Water Monitoring once they establish themselves. Supervisor cohen by comparison, what or how would we determine if this is a significant amount . Well, we have water meter readings. We have that information. And we know how many employees there are, so we could factor in the amount that is going toward sanitary. Supervisor cohen let me see if i can clarify question. I want to know what amount of treated water is considered significant. For our program, a significant industrial user, is 25,000 gallons per day of processed waste water. I see and you said that when you did the research with the saba facility in oakland, they had 2000. Per day. So by your professional opinion, this would not be considered that is not considered significant . Yes, this would be a class 2 permit versus a class one which is for the larger operations. Supervisor cohen thank you. One more question for you. Are there any other interceptor requirements for collecting fats and solids that might otherwise go into the sewer . The california plumbing code will probably require interceptor, i spoke with the chief plumbing inspector and he said there would be inspection on their part as well. So interceptor would be probably the best pretreatment equipment to take care of their waste water situation. Supervisor cohen all right, i think thats it for my questions. Please, dont believe just yet. We might need you. I want to go back to the Planning Department. One trigger of environmental evaluation would be a facility that is at least 10,000 feet, is that correct . 10,000 square feet. So how big is the proposed location in the bay view . 2100 square feet. Supervisor cohen thank you. How much noise do you anticipate coming from the facility . Based on our site visit again of the oakland facility, we did not notice any audible noise outside of the property. Additionally the property would be required to follow the San Francisco noise ordinance, which would be enforced by the department of Public Health. Supervisor cohen i understand that it must meet and hopefully exceed our local noise requirements. Maybe you could explain to us, the members of the public, those levels of noises . Im going to defer to the department of Public Health so they can speak more on this matter. Supervisor cohen thank you. Dph . So just to repeat the question, im just looking to get a better understanding as to noise level. How do we determine what is abnormally high versus what is an acceptable rate of noise for doing business . Sure. Im patrick, im assistant director at the Environmental Health branch. The standard is 45 decibels from a fixed mechanical noise source. As measured in any nearby residence. And thats the evening standard, so the nighttime standard of 10, thats the most restrictive standard that we have as far as noise is concerned. Other than that, its measured at 8 decibels over whatever the ambient is for the neighborhood at the property line. That is usually what we apply during the day time standard. Supervisor cohen thank you. Back to the planning. There were complaints by some neighbors at the Planning Commission meeting that was held in november of 2017 when this item was first heard. That they were not properly noticed. Could you go through what are the noticing requirements, answer the question as to whether timely notice was given to the residents, and what type of notice was given to the neighbors . Were there flyers on homes, cars, on poles . Did you call people . Good day. Matthew chandler of the Planning Department staff. For all conditional use authorizations that go before public the Planning Commission at the public hearing, theyre required to have a 20 day notice, both within the newspaper, 20day notice posted on the site, which is a pretty large poster posted on site and there is 20 days mailed to all Property Owners. This was notice that is mailed to all Property Owners within 300 feet of the site. Supervisor cohen thank you very much. So to me, it sounds like its a Standard City notification process. Correct. Supervisor cohen is there any resident residual waste Water Pollution from the previous tenant . Thats an important question. If youre not able to answer, i dont know if there is anyone within the Planning Department that can speak to that. I want to know if there is waste water resume sid wall residual. And i need to know if that needs to be cleaned up before the future business occupying the location. I want to know if the future business, be it saba or any other business. Lisa gibson, Environmental Review officer. If you could hold, were consulting with the city colleagues about the matter. My understanding is that, if there were a notable violation of any sort, that would have to be addressed, but were not aware of any, so were not prepared for the question. And the project wouldnt result in soil disturbance, so we wouldnt anticipate if there was any soil ground water contamination that it would be disturbed by the project. Supervisor cohen i guess the final question has to do with odors. You heard comments in the planning hearing. And you heard Public Comment here this afternoon. How will odors be mitigated . So as part of the condition use authorization, we do have a kind of standard conditional approval for installation of odor control unit to make sure that any odors are prevented from escaping the premises. Supervisor cohen thank you. I have no other questions, madame president , happy to turn it over to you. President breed seeing no other names on the roster, we will allow up to 10 minutes for the project sponsor, or the project sponsor representative to present. Good afternoon. President and members of the board, im dan frattin, the project sponsor. Were here today asking that you reject the appeal and clear the way for San Franciscos only butcher shop. This is the only place in the city selling freshly slaughtered chicken prepared accord to islamic tradition. Its important to the community who value to see the condition of the animal theyre going to eat and the conditions theyre processed in. I understand this is not the kind of business that people are familiar with and perhaps misunderstanding underlying some of the testimony youve heard today. However, when you consider the scale of the facility, the specifics of the operation, and the extensive, it clearly qualifies for exemption. To start, id like to give you an overview of saba live. It operates nine facilities. As you can see, many of sabas locations are directly next door to or below homes. About 40 of the customers at saba location in fruitvale, come from San Francisco. This is the location where the wallace street facility will go in the bayview. As you can see, its in a pdr two district, fairly industrial and one of few areas where San Francisco allows intensive industrial uses. You can see here that the adjacent uses include several auto repair and painting businesses, metal working and storage yard. Lets take a look at what saba proposes. Physically, the project is simple. Its an Improvement Project fitting out the windowless structure for the operations. The chickens are stored in the back of the shop and small rooms will be built for slaughtering and processing the chickens. Customer waiting areas are in a separate room in the front of the building with internal window allowing customers to look into the processing area, and there is also a small chiller room where waste is stored and byproducts are stored and sealed in containers. Saba will have about 500 chickens on site, just to give you a sense of what that looks like. This is the oakland facility, they have slightly more than 500, but its six crates in a relatively small room. This change of use fits within class 1 and 3 exemption, which includes leasing and minor alterations as well as changes of use up to 10,000 square feet. Here were talking about 2100 square feet, so about one fifth of the maximum allowed. When a project fits within an exemption category, Environmental Review is not needed unless there are unusual circumstances. Neither of those conditions are present here. There is nothing unusual about a small scale industrial use on a site occupied by an industrial user prior. And surrounded by other industrial uses in a district where that is what the city encourages as a matter of policy. Second, a light volume of trucks making pickoffs and deliveries are also not unusual. Chickens will be bought in on boxed trucks, 24 a week with 35 trucks coming in per week to remove waste. Even at the busiest times of year, were look at two trucks a day, which is typical or less than most other commercial uses in the city and it will be a net reduction compared to the five tow trucks that previously operated at the site. So were not looking at increase in truck traffic or associated emissions. Third, businesses that handle live animals and animal waste are not unusual. Neither are businesses that process meat and seafood. Animal shelters, doggy day cares are a dime a dozen. Live seafood is processed and sold in storage throughout the city, along with one of the biggest tourist attractions. Though night is has international, there are a couple of live poultry. Process meat and dispose of byproduct. Each controls odor and properly disposes of waste and byproducts without causing Environmental Impact. In no small part it is because there are regulations they must follow. Once you account for the regulations and understand that the data cited by the appellants ignores them, as well as the small scale of saba operation, youll see there is not a fair argument of Significant Impact. Now the appellants urge the board to accept the position that other regulatory actions have no bearing on whether the project requires ceqa analysis. Basically ignore all of the other laws and regulations that protect health and safety and the environment when doing ceqa review and deciding whether impacts will occur. Its hard to see how anything would be exempt under this, which is not reasonable and its not the law. The city litigated that very issue in the San Francisco beautiful case in the court there, it ruled in its favor saying agency may rely on regulations to include Environmental Impact will not be significant. Put another way, the city doesnt need to recreate food handling laws every time a restaurant opens. It can assume a baseline of hygienic operation based on all of the laws in place. It does that routinely. So who regulates saba . The same principle applies to saba as it does a restaurant. Lets talk about the specific regulations. As you heard under the waste Water Treatment program, solids cant be discharged into the sewage system, they need to be contained and recycled. Saba workers do a lot of the separation by hand with built in grease traps doing the remainder of the work before waste water enters the sewage system before its process add and discharged. Solid Waste Disposal is regulated by state and local law. Together dph and the state regulate the handling and disposal of animal tissue. Saba will comply with these regulations by storing waste and byproducts in sealed containers a cooler room before theyre picked up by a certified waste hauler. No animal products are disposed of in the regular garbage and you can see here were talking about a small volume of waste. A container for feathers, a contain foremeat, a container for animal waste. Lastly, health and hygiene, saba is regulated by the usda, department of agriculture and dph which enforce standards and conduct regular inspections and testing for hygiene. There is also a state certified inspector on site at all times to monitor both the conditions of the birds and facility. Finally, i like to close on a practical note. Were talking about a small shop with 500 chickens on site. This is not at massive agri business operation, this is not a 10,000 hog farm in North Carolina with open air at thes wools of data pools of data waste. There is not a Single Source that addresses small scale operations like sabas. They rely on studies of huge operations, many of them in the open air, and none of them located in a well regulated setting like San Francisco. Those kind of exaggerated evidence may show that there are Environmental Impacts if you have 182,000 chickens in one place at one time, thats not what were doing. There are 500. More to the point, we dont need to speculate about impacts here. We can look across to the bay to sabas slightly larger facility in fruitvale, where we have a letter from a neighbor of the facility on the overhead which reads saba live poultry is one of the best businesses this the area, the place is well maintained and they keep it super clean and sanitized. They operate responsibly and dont negatively effect us or any of the surroundings neighbors with noise and smell. The same will be true of the bayview location. We have about 52 speaker cards and 100 people outside which would like to in deference to the boards time, not have everybody speak, a small selection of them will, but if everybody here who is in support of saba could please stand, with that i thank the board and im available for questions. Thank you. Thank you. President breed thank you. Ok, as this time, we will open it up to Public Comment. If there are any members of the public who would like to speak in opposition to the appeal, please line up to your right and the first speaker, youll have up to two minutes each. Im a member of the organization of the peninsula and a board member of the north california Islamic Council and board member of the Community Development grant in oakland and creator of the oakland Business Improvement districts and specifically in the fruitvale district. Community activist. Work for the rights of the poor and defending them in the city of oakland and specifically in the district of fruitvale. As much as i was thrilled being a muslim that a muslim establishment would open, i was a skeptic. As many of my clients passed by the doorway of this establishment, i had the same concerns adds that of the person who stood before us here and said she was three blocks away from the location in San Francisco. I had a concern about the odor. I had concerns about the feel of the whole community which is where we spend the last 24 years developing and making it attractive for business. I had concerns for the hygiene and the pollution. I must say to some extent i almost work against the project myself. I have to tell you, i have to testify to you, as a Community Activist in oakland that none of these concerns materialized. On the contrary as you pass by, surprisingly there is no odor whatsoever. The place does not omit a lot of noise at all. Actually pass by there probably nine times a day. So i hope that will calm the concerns as myself was a concerned citizen myself. Thank you for the time. Thank you for the comments, next speaker, please. My name is salam. I came from india in 1953, im a property taxpayer for over 50 years. And i would hike to say you should go to the halal meat shops here, there is one on gary and jones near the civic center. You compare the prices and the prices at saba, its a big if you have a big family, a lot of family and friends have to suffer through the hassle of the bridge traffic, so why not have it here . And if it been approved by the Planning Commission and this small scale operation, why . It provides jobs and i think the city will get more revenue than from the uhaul or the tow trucks. And it will provide more jobs. And if you if you are so strict against any future ones and even the present ones, you should be as strict to them, dont single us out, please. Thank you for your comment. Next speaker, please. Hello. I am a member of the american muslim community. Im also an activist in the Mma Community as well. Im here to support the opening of the saba life poultry. Having a place like saba in our city is very important for the residents and will be great addition to the city. The city is a special place that tolerates everyone. And many muslims who live in the city, eat only halal meat. Its important for us to eat halal and fresh meat that has frozen food that has been in the freezer for months. The city should be proud and support a small business. Abiding by all the rules and regulations should be a priority for our city leaders. The track record of the oakland location is great. They have fulltime Health Inspector and the place is very clean and well maint maintained. Im one of their biggest customers. Supporting organic stores, this type of business should be supported as well. With regards to the Environmental Impact, i am a licensed chemical engineer in the state of california and its commonsense to me there is no such Environmental Impact. Its a very smallus