for fisherman's wharf to succeed, to go from north beach to fisherman's wharf, we had an area that was dicey to say it mildly the the people who took on an amazing transformation is one of a kind and i think it's pride of that success, including giving large numbers of people the ability to be live in decent housing and par take in how good housing lifts you up from nowhere to somewhere. that makes me want to stand with the remaining side, literally the pivotal side of the project to be a housing site. i have walked the site four times since we left, had our meeting and i have gone around it. i have observed it in the morning, in the afternoon, in the middle of the day at lunch. i walk down to the wharf and each time i go by, you can only be proud of this particular part of town. it's amazing. it's a lovely neighborhood and everything about it works. and it's for that very reason that i have to stand by not supporting the hotel but looking for a housing development on this portion. >> commissioner johnson. >> thank you. i would just make a quick note. i feel like i have to say it. just because of whatever we vote on with this project, it doesn't mean it will be housing. this is still a site where we would need a sponsor to come forward with a different project. i feel i have heard that a number of times in public comment. it doesn't mean this project will just be housing. somebody else has to propose something. >> commissioner moore. >> i have a procedure motion are we making. we don't have anything to deny -- >> there is a draft motion for disapproval as there was the previous week. >> it was deadlocked the last time. we have a full compliment of commissioners, we won't deadlock today. both motions are in front of you. >> there are others who want to weigh in. >> i have not changed my mind much. so i don't know -- we're waiting for commissioner melgar, i make a motion to disapprove. >> second. >> okay. great. i stick with my opposition to that. i think this is a perfect site for a hotel. i think when -- i don't know how we got here, i think the first part of the hotel didn't work and there was a lot of legitimate concern about the type of hotel, the roof deck, how it would impact the neighbors and i think a lot of that has been corrected, for complete cities and neighborhoods we need hotels and schools. this is currently a tourist oriented bike rental which is not a great use for the site, a key site. i don't think the wall greens is a greatest use of site. i would like to see them all developed into housing and hotels, preferably affordable housing. but we don't get to pick and choose. i think a hotel is appropriate on this site, especially evolved into the newer iteration of the hotel, i think works. there are hotels in residential and neighborhood, i don't think we should ban hotels in the neighborhood or housing in the city. we don't get a lot of hotels in front of us. i'm against the motion. commissioner fong. >> i thought more about this, in bed. i'm sympathetic and understand the neighbor's concerns but from a pure land use issue. we had this imaginary line of bay street being residence, tourist hotels and tourist activities and that's been a plus and minus for fisherman's wharf, that been the line, you are deemed in tourist land which is sort of taboo. and that's a dark spot for fisherman's wharf, the wharf has wanted to cross over and get more locals. the idea of a hotel on the south side of bay street is equally as good as putting residents on the north side to make fisherman's wharf fuse as a neighborhood rather than a dividing line for lanes of the road. i am in support, and in the future if there's a residential project on the other side of the street, i'll be in support as well. >> commissioner johnson. >> i would say -- i completely agree with commissioner fong. it is about land use and the design of the project presented for that lot. but i agree i'm not sure i agree with that imaginary dividing line. a great example of north of bay street residences/hotel is the fairmont residences, fancy people land but it's a hotel and residences and north of bay street, north of fisherman's wharf. and i think that works. i just throw that out there to say there's not a black and white dividing line. i just agree the project is not quite right and we worked with it and i still don't see it. >> okay. >> we have a motion and a second. >> indeed you do. the motion to disapprove the project on the motion commissioner fong. >> no. >> commissioner johnson. >> aye. >> commissioner melgar. >> aye. >> the motion passes 4-3 with fong, kroppel and hillis voting no. that puts us at the next issue. this is a downtown property authorization. >> good afternoon commissioners. the item before you is a downtown project authorization -- and conditional use authorization for a mixed use development on market street. it's located on the south side of market between 6th and 7th in the downtown commercial zoning district and the market street theater and loft historic district. the lots are currently developed with a two story vacant building. the project would demolish the existing building and construct a tourist hotel with retail on the bottom. the project requests an exception foreground level wind currents and conditional use for establishing the 160 room hotel. the department believes that the arrangement of the ground floor does not comply with section 138. the current proposal places the publicly open space behind the reception area that doesn't easily convey the nature of the space. alternatives such as removing or relocating the rooms were rejected by the sponsor. the ground floor should be redesigned so it's more acceptable and closer to available market and stevenson street. the project sponsor prepared alternatives for the commission's consideration. should they choose one of the alternatives, to date the department has not received correspondence in support or opposition of the project. subsequent to the redesign of the ground floor, department staff proposing a hotel use within a district that supports larger hotel and tourist uses and support the tourism sector, terminate revenue through the occupancy tax. provide publicly accessible space and ground floor uses to help market and stevenson street at this location. it would create new jobs and incorporate site design existing with the surrounding context. it is compatible with the surrounding neighborhood. there's a presentation prepared and the sponsor is available for questions. >> thank you. project sponsor. welcome. >> good morning. i'm michael stanton, the architect for 1055 market street. as claudene said this is a mid level market site -- could you give me the second image please? it's a -- we're dealing with a broken tooth on market street. we have a 1981 non descriptive building between two attractive buildings. the building has no historic value. the proposal you have in front of you, for 160 rooms only hotel. no meeting facilities on the hotel, no food or beverage prepared on the facility, but there is a large retail space available. it's going to be developed, built and operated by jay singh, the successful developer of the mission street hotel that is now the hampton inn, this is a developer who is invested in the san francisco community and proven success in terms of getting hotels built in the 21st century. it's intended the hotel would be branded. we have not selected a chain yet. we'll be aiming for a business traveller type hotel. currently in loft is the suggested brand but we have made no commitment to a brand r.as mentioned, the first floor, we have made an effort to try to energize stevenson and market street. market street will have a retail space and pedestrian entrance to the hotel. stevenson is where the lob why is located with guests coming from cab, uber, lyft through stevenson street. the second level shows the retail space and lobby will be two storeys in height. this is the typical level of the plan. and finally the final plan is the the roof level, about 20% of the roof with mechanical penthouse. the most is seen as passive landscape space about 450 square feet. our initial proposal was for a bay on market street oriented the access of mcallister reflecting the city grids. this is the exact copy of what we're presenting here. the planning staff and i have been working on many things, including the treatment of the building, the recessing of the windows and the materials to come up with what we think is a good proposal. market street will be stone on the first two levels, brick above that with metal and cement sp spindles. we will be finishing stevenson on concealed fasteners. here's a view of the market street facade proposed with the stone, brick plate and multi level connection out of the guest room levels. this is intended elevation for the stevenson street facade. a view of the market street portion. a blow up of market street at night showing the retail space. a view of the stevenson facade. here's the stevenson street entrance. this is the roof deck as currently proposed. there's a good deal of discussion about the popus. we started out with the proposal to put it on the roof. that was rejected by staff and nopdr number two, the tier. and instead they suggested street level. street level makes a lot of sense. more people can see it and get to it and use it. in this particular site however, we have very severe constraints for street level. 60 feet wide and it loses elevation to stevenson. when we think of popus, we can put it on market, stevenson, through block or behind the lobby. it breaks the continuity of the market street store front and alike. likewise, the long narrow alley doesn't offer anything but a dark passage way. initially we didn't like stevenson street, therefore we proposed to put it where you have in your package but staff is right, the way it is in your package is less than ideal. we propose to the commission that you improve this conditional use with a provision that the popus be returned to the roof, the 2400 square feet on the roof is sunny, it has nice views, nice amenities. it's very much the neighborhood pattern. if that's not the preference, we believe we can work out popus on stevenson as a forecourt to the lobby. with that, we would like to hear the thoughts the commission may have on the popus location and other thoughts on the hotel design and we hope for your approval. we think it's a fine infill project to fix a broken tooth on market street. >> opening up to public comment. cynthia gomez. >> good afternoon commissioners, you have heard me speak before. this project sponsor came to us very early on in the process and signing an agreement that guarantees the workers will be able to join a union and we want you to think about the amount of hotel proposals coming to mid market and what it means to have a project sponsor who has taken the care to come to us and sign this sort of agreement. so for that reason, we support this project. thank you. >> thank you. >> any additional speakers on the item? seeing none, that portion is closed. commissioner johnson. >> so generally supportive of this project. this is a rooms-only hotel plus i would say as a contrasting to the project we just heard, there is public space and retail and other things that sort of integrated into the highly commercial district located in. i would say, i do think i agree, popus has been challenging for us. we have had comment from the public in the past that verifies something that anybody who has been to some of the larger hotels can see that they can be hard to find, hard to access. i think a group of youth tried to go to all and some they didn't have access to, some they couldn't find. there are renderings of roof top space in the package regardless. is that just for hotel guests? >> speaking through the chair, commissioner johnson, we'll build the roof top whether it's the popus or not. if the direction is to put it on stevenson, which is where we would prefer rather than the staff recommendation, we'll still have the same roof deck that you see in the renderings. >> thank you. so it sounds like then if we put it on the roof we would just have less open space. i think i'm supportive of the ground floor. i don't see the issue with the reception area and popus, i don't understand why you need three hotel rooms on the ground floor between publicly accessible open space and retail. i would just say i think the staff recommendation was to do what? >> to relocate or remove them so the popus could be integrated more with the retail and accessed through both streets. >> okay. so i make that motion we approve the project with the condition that the three hotel rooms on the ground floor be removed and the popus between reception and retail. >> second. commissioner moore. >> i want to ask if it was on the roof, wouldn't it have to be a designated order to protect access to hotel rooms. question two, the protected area of the hotel is mostly between the reception area and the elevator, if the popus is right across from the elevator, i'm concerned there's not enough protection that unauthorized people do not go up in the hotel elevators to rooms they haven't rented. .3, the rest rooms you're proposing at this moment from three hotel rooms don't have the typical privacy pockets you see in commercial establishments by which you step into an anti room before turning into the washroom itself. this particular case, the door to the toilet is center line with the access to hotel room. i think that's an unfortunate solution and i don't think it's appropriate for a public facility like a hotel or lobby which has potential to be open users using the hotel rest room as well. there are a number of questions. i also observe that the hotel room dimension and i think we're speaking here to the same architect of mr. stanton as the columbus street hotel, they were 11 foot 3 in cross dimension. the hotel rooms here in this particular project are proposed at 10 foot 9, 10 foot 10. it is smaller than what we see on columbus. i question that those are properly dimensioned tourist rooms and potentially concerned they could be hotel rooms for longer stay tech workers. i'm concerned they're like a surrogate residential type facility. i don't have any problems with the hotel in the location. i have some problems with the design and layout including the absolutely minimally sized seven or eight story light well that brings hardly any light to the bottom floors on floor one when you look at sheet a102 at room number 12. looking against the wall is about three feet and that seems to be not enough for having well enough appointed hotel room. i have some issues with the design, not with the location. >> would you like to comment mr. stanton? >> speaking through the chair, that was a bit of a compound statement, i'm going to divide it a bit. commissioner moore, what's normally done when the popus is located on a roof, is that the user of the popus is directed at the front desk and he or she gets the key to access the elevator to go up. the control point when it's on the roof like at 942 mission street, the 17 story hampton inn mr. singh has is at the elevator. you commented on the bedroom sizes -- >> can you talk a little louder? >> sorry. you asked about guest room sizes, the general trend is more toward smaller guest rooms. people spend less time in their rooms. this is not a full service hotel. it's one of the few types of hotels we haven't built many of in san francisco opposed to the w which is full service hotel. with the advent of the flat screen television, guest rooms have shrunk a foot in width. they have gone off like the elephant graveyard, somewhere to die. this is very normal and meets most operator's standards, particularly in a city like san francisco where they recognize the high cost of land and high rates you can get will have the brands accept a smaller guest room. these will be fine for a number of chains just as of the slightly undersized ones worked out for hilton and hampton in. the bathrooms across from the guest rooms on the first floor. point well taken, these are schematic plans and we'll work it out so one is not exposed to the traffic there. the light well comment, the rooms at the end where the light is narrowest, it's what they call in the hotel business as last rent, they'll be rented last. the sponsor has said we'll go however you want to handle the popus. i would like to make the observation though, simply enlarging this in the middle of the building, which is what removing the three guests room does, puts additional space where there's eight floors of hotel above it, no visual access to it from the street, so it's not necessarily more attractive. my preference personally would be to keep the guest rooms, valuable to the developer and to the city and put the popus off stevenson as an entree point. that said, we'll be happy to proceed in the direction the commission wants and commissioner moore i hope that helped. >> i still have a question. i would like to not see this be ground floor rooms but rather reconfigure the retail and give the hotel a more gracious entrance for market street. that particular block and since it has the market street address, it needs strong support of a positive architectural. we have a well designed shopping center that is basically empty a block away. i would rather see the retail at that portion reconfigured and like to see the popus in a more gracious way, see the entrance from market street be a more convincing noticeable presence on market street. >> if that's the direction the commission decides, we'll move it in the direction you recommend. >> commissioner johnson. >> i was just going to say, sir -- you can sit but you made my point when you answered commissioner moore's question about how do you access it if it's on the roof. going to the elevator where there's not a lot of access is not that public. i think i stand with the motion we have and i would second that if the three hotel rooms are eliminated, take any and all means to reconfigure the space. you could make the retail more through so there's more sight line to the popus, you could expand the bathroom facilities since it's not just shared with the hotel staff and popus and also the people in the retail. it's not the best use of space. >> there's a motion seconded to approve this matter with conditions as amended to include staff's recommended amendments, removal of the three hotel rooms -- >> expansion of the popus. >> get a more positive address for the hotel on market street as commissioner johnson just said, find a way there is potentially a visual connection between retail and popus and work on the rest rooms to be basically more public facility feature with pockets at which you don't look straight into the rest rooms. >> commissioner fong. >> is that accepted by the maker and seconder? >> i wasn't that specific. i just wanted to remove the three hotel rooms. >> so -- so remove the ground floor hotel rooms and reconfigure -- >> reconfigure the popus. >> i was okay with her renditions. i think they would add to the project if you would reconsider. >> i don't understand all of the changes. >> i think the motion, the condition that staff added to the motion covers sufficiently and we'll work with the project sponsor to make sure the direction that commissioner moore provided is followed. >> okay. >> great. so then the motion is to approve the matter with conditions with the recommended amendment, removal of the ground floor hotel rooms and reconfiguring the popus. is that correct? >> aye. >> aye. >> aye. >> commissioner moore. >> aye. >> commissioner chair richards. >> aye. >> it passes anonymously 6-0. that puts us on item 21a. this is conditional use authorization. >> good afternoon commissioners. >> i need to ask to recuse myself as i live too close to the building in question. motion to recuse commissioner moore. >> second. >> thank you commissioners on that motion. commissioner fong. >> a. >> melgar. >> aye. >> chair richards. >> aye. >> so moved. >> the item before you is the conditional use authorization in the 19 unit residential building at 1750 taylor street between green. it would merge a two bedroom two bath unit with a two and a half bath unit. the stairway between the units to create one four bedroom that occupies the ninth, half of the tenth and the penthouse. a point of clarification, the staff report states the rental unit is vacant but it is occupied by the owner. in addition to the conditional use, the commission has to consider other criteria. it would not eliminate housing considered affordable, it would remove a unit subject to the residential rent stablezation and go against the mayor's executive directive that all housing, especially rental housing should be preserved. the merging of the two units, considered separately would not be in the best interest of the community. the department has received one correspondence in support and two in opposition. after analyzing all aspects, the department recommends disapproval, it will result in a net loss of rental housing stock and merge two units that are affordable and result in one merged unit that is not affordable to a large part of the population. it's not needed for housing for families, they are sized for families already. the residential merger removes a residential housing from the stock. the sponsor has a presentation and i'm available for questions after that. >> thank you. project sponsor. >> conditional use permit as of 10 minutes, i would appreciate it, if no one else it will be a short hearing. thank you. good. i want to introduce brandy from my office, thank you for being here. first i'm rick gladstone representing the bently's, hope lives with them in the top two floors, chris has owned this high end building for about 12 years. chris married camille his current wife in 2014 and at that time, camille's daughter hope became part of the family and at that point, the two bedroom top floor unit became too small for the family. why do they want to vertically merge the 9th floor unit they occupy into the larger two story that lies above, why can't they leave in all three floors like they currently do. each of the two units being bedrooms. they want extra bedrooms for visitor family and or a home office. living in two units happens to be awkward. they go out to a common area hall to take common stairs or elevator leaving the ninth floor unit to get to the tenth floor unit and that is a privacy issue they would like to eliminate and they're dropping down a circular stair from the bottom level of the upper unit to the level of the lower unit, half a story now. why not move to a building somewhere elsewhere there is a four bedroom unit, common question. first of all, there's a lot of sentimental value in the building. chris bently has lived there 12 years. it's very historic, he has upgraded to former historic features and put in a lot of system renovations. he wants to continue to oversee the maintenance. they spent a good deal on restoration and improving it environmentally. they do the same by the way with all their buildings. you may see the bently reserve, they brought it up to standards as do all their buildings and put a lot of care into them. the other reason they want to stay and not move, they have a 10 minute walk down the hill, they're in knob hill. and we've been asked why don't they take the upper level of the upper two level unit and simply renovate it to create two new bedrooms there instead of moving into the ninth floor unit they occupy right below. we have to look at the drawing. would you bring the drawing? thank you. here in the drawing you see the upper level and by the way, this outline is the nine floors below, this is the top floor and the top of the two level unit. this is an elevator room with gears and pulleys for the entire building. this is common area stairs for everyone in the building and it's a fire exit to the roof, can't be messed with. this is the only space on the upper level and there's already a circular staircase. these two small areas are not big enough for a bedroom and they have no windows currently. all of this was mechanical space and putting windows in this facade is not appropriate for the historic building. it would be hard to create windows for the first time there in the structural walls. so just to move on, i understand you commissioners and you're rightly concerned if clients like mine will continue to occupy this or just flip it as others have. i know a family did that many months ago and it was sort of embarrassing to all of us. after the media reported that they sold the unit after representing they were going to live there. this is a little different than that situation. this unit cannot be sold separately from the building after a merger. the building is not a stock co-op. it's not a tenancy in common and they don't wish to create that, meaning they would share control with a lot of other people and they put too much time and effort and care into this building to want to give up control and not see it continue as a legacy for their family. he specializes in historic buildings and renovations as you can see. this is just one of his gems, one of his gems. now, the bently's have set up a $40 million charitable foundation and have been lead donors to many nonprofits, including environmental and arts foundation groups and this is just being fed to make clear they're long-term players in the city, i hope you don't get the impression because of the foundation and money that you treat well off people better than others, i just mention it to avoid the impression that this family will be like others who just do it to make a buck and flip a unit after a merger. to make even clearer their sincerity, we have proposed three conditions of approval and will appear in a recorded notice of special restriction, any future owner will see it before they buy. one, the restoration of the two units must occur if the bently's no longer occupy the units. two, that will be reported. there will be a yearly affidavit given to the code enforcement people at planning department i will personally prepare. and that will state they continue to reside in the building. third, they will only open the ceiling and only put in a circular stair and the only thing they're going to change in the kitchen area is remove an oven and cabinet, they can be easily restored. so the affidavit will come yearly. this is not the first time, i know staff is not wild about the idea of yearly affidavits, they have to log them in and enforce them, but as zoning administrator and mr. ram knows, i file yearly for other clients that your commission has approved. one is a famous landmark building where the client resided and opened a gallery and only allowed four showings a year and has to make affidavits as to the showings every year. and finally a conditional of approval states there will be no more merged units in the building. the city gains something there. future owners won't be able to do it. it will be recorded and thus this decision for this building won't be a precedent for this building and i think that's very beneficial. i don't think it will open a flood gate of requests for wealthy people to want to merge their units. i doubt many people can live with the kind of restrictions we're recording here. if they can, why not, they are simply not if they're living with that, property flippers. those would be difficult to meet. by the way, the unit being rented -- the unit that used to be rented and they lived in was rented at 65 years ago, now at 7500. i don't know why the planning says it would be unaffordable to the larger part of the population than the two individual units considered separately. this would not be in the best interest of the community. with all due respect to staff, they go on to say that the merger of the units would be -- would not be beneficial to economic diversification. at this level of affordability, i don't know if we're talking about economics at 7500 for a rental. we're not here to protect a community of wealthy people and i don't understand the staff basis for denial being there's a community here that will be affected that is people who rent for more than 7500. please consider -- few people want to rent 7500 a two bedroom with no parking and no common area and with all due respect, we shouldn't be so concerned about the people who may not be able to rent a 7500 or more unit because it's been merged and your housing inventory report says only 6.6% of the city's units are four bedroom. we don't have that many. that means this couple won't go out and buy an existing family size one, which means a four bedroom somewhere will continue to be for someone else. i really appreciate your consideration and happy to answer any questions. >> thank you. we may have some. let's open up for public comment first. any public comment? seeing none, closing public comment. commissioners. >> thank you mr. gladstone, you win the award for the most time a person said wealthy in a single presentation. we have seen these before, generally speaking, i try not to look at the personal stories of the people unless maybe there's something supextraordinary, onct goes through, they own the units, they can sell them, they can do whatever they want. i try hard not to pay attention to that. in terms of land use issue, they're two units being brought together. we talk all the time about how there's multi bedroom two and above properties in the city. i don't see we should be spending our time on building buildings with lots of units and not necessarily spending a ton of time on things like this, if we had enough supply, things like this wouldn't be an issue for us. i don't see any particular issue with it and i move to approve. >> second. >> you recognizing the conditions mr. gladstone has put forward? >> yes. >> okay. i generally don't like to merge units, the staff does conditions, we did something similar a couple weeks back with two condos, we added a door in front. >> i think the best thing to do would be to stop intent to disapprove and then -- >> it was approved with the conditions that it would be reversed upon the bently's not occupying the site. and mr. gladstone sent those, that would be the only way i would vote for it. if the conditions are there and basically it's the same issue, they're occupying it now without the staircase but when they no longer occupied the unit or presumably sold the building, it gets converted back to what it is today, which is -- >> i think because we didn't include a motion to approve, we did the motion to disapprove, it needs to come back to you. it has to be intent to approve and then we'll fold the conditions into the motion. >> got it. >> that's something we can put on the consent calendar. >> okay. i would only approve it with those conditions being included that it would be reversed back to what it is today. in this building, it's -- the remainder of the units are rented mr. gladstone? >> that is correct. i don't know if one is vacant from time to time, one may be vacant as people move out but they're all rental units, correct and tend to be long-term. they have been rental since the time it was built in 1928. >> presumably they have to be. you couldn't condo it. >> no, you can't condo a building that big or do a stock co-op. you could tic the building but that's not -- bently's don't share ownership and they don't want to lose control of the great grand asset they have. >> commissioner richards. >> yes, so the enforceability of the conditions proposed, how do you feel about those? the one we did before was upon sale of one or both of the units which was easy, pull a title report, being sold, i would say you have to combine the units back. now we have something a couple steps down the ladder. >> i would defer to the city attorney on this. >> through the chair -- i need to see the conditions of approval. i would caution the commission that -- we have to be careful about the wording of conditions of approval. i think it might be easier if they were phrased in the way that the property was converted to two units at the sale period -- then you're not specifically regulating users, but i think maybe the easiest thing to do at this point would be to continue the matter and give the city attorney's office and staff an opportunity to look at the proposed nsr i think is what mr. gladstone is proposing to work language enforceable. entitlement runs with the land, with the unit, that's my big fear here. nothing personal to the bentlies, once it's done, i'm not sure it can be undone. they're not going to sell the building. i don't think i can be supportive. >> i'm happy to allow the city attorney to look at the motion and see what will work legally. i agree that we do need to be really careful about making sure that this is about the land use and not the users. and i don't think that it's problematic to look at something happening on the sale because that's a land use transaction. i think it's easily recorded. i do think, though, that you're drilling a hole in the ceiling and putting a staircase through it. that doesn't seem like something that's going to be reversed easily. i think it's a nonproblematic project and we should be focusing our energies on creating lots more housing stocks across the city. >> commissioner melgar. >> commissioner melger: i disagree and i support the staff recommendations. >> upon sale of the building, it may be held forever, the children and the children's children and they move on and move to palm springs and the weather's too cold, and then they don't sell the building, but the units are vacant and can't tie it to the people that are living there, i get where we're creating an irreversible situation long term. the building probably won't be sold. so i couldn't support this. >> i do support a continuance. i only would if the city attorney would have that condition allowable, enforceable, and their vacation of the unit that it would revert back. i don't think it's an enormous issue to put that floor and ceiling back, so that would be the only -- i recommend we continue it for a couple of weeks or months and see what guidance we get back. >> sounds good. so would that be a continuance? >> yes. and advice from the city attorney. >> move to continue -- >> to december 14. >> sounds good. >> second. >> commissioner johnson? >> aye. >> commissioner koppel? >> aye. >> commissioner melgar? >> no. >> commissioner hillis? >> aye. >> that places us to item 23, 2017-003058cua, 2323 mission street. this is a conditional use application. >> he's been here for 3 1/2 years, but haven't had a presentation from matt. he started as planner 1 and code enforcement and graduated to a planner 2 in june of this year to be a planner 2 on the northwest team. the projects that you -- the project later that matt will be working on is the result of all of his work on the code enforcement team. as i said, matt has been with the departments for 3 1/2 years and is a graduate of cal poly. we welcome him to the commission. >> welcome, matt. >> hopefully i'm allowed back after today. [laughter] good afternoon. the item before you is request for conditional use to legalize and establish outdoor activity area for existing restaurant use. the subject property has been in use for 23 years and current ownership for the last six. the outdoor activity area has been in use for the last 23 years. application for conditional use is enforcement case 1244-enf. a complaint was received about an unauthorized activity. it dated to 1994, but no evidence was found to demonstrate that the outdoor activity area preceded the first zoning controls in 1987, which were the first to require conditional use authorization for outdoor activity areas, as no evidence existed. the proposed patio will have a maximum cap'stive 49 and measure 750 square feet. it has a patio proposed for the first 25 feet. the remainder is a safe disperse all area in the event of an emergency. the project proposes to demolish 300 feet at the rear of the building. to date, the department has received letters of support for two members of the public, one from the middle polk neighborhood association, one mission merchants and one from state assembly member chu. it's identified as a driver of community engagement through weekly fundraisers held at the restaurant. the department has received one letter in opposition with noise from the existing patio cited as the main issue. the project sponsors will share that information with you during their presentation. the approval has the following conditions. the project promotes the continued operation of an established locally owned business and contributes to the viability of the neighborhood. the sponsor will limit the hours of operation to 10:00 p.m. daily to mitigate noise. it's located 70 feet away from the residential buildings adjacent at the rear. the project meets all planning code requirements and surrounding uses. that concludes my presentation and i'm available for any questions you may have. >> thank you. project sponsor, it's opened up to you for 5 minutes. >> good afternoon. i'm serena calhoun, project architect for the project at 2323 mission. i'm here with the business owner. the patio has been in use for 23 years. one of the neighbors complained. that's why we're here today. i will give you an orientation and then ben will speak more specifically about the use. the two-story awning that you see is the project. this is a floorplan and you can see that i've illustrated there's a red line. that's the existing plan. structure in the rear extends out far to the rear yard. in our meetings with building and fire department staff, to provide a second exit from this space, need to make a larger rear yard so there is space at the back of the property for people to escape to. there is only one way out to the street in the front and unfortunately no way it put a second corridor. so the fire department staff agreed it's an appropriate and safe solution to the problem. by limiting the outdoor space to a maximum of 49 people it's complaint with the building code. it is the area that we need to demolish and will create a larger rear yard than currently exists. it's difficult to see, but the site is very dramatically sloped. and so when you come out the back of the restaurant, you are on a grade level and there's a step up, another tier, and then a step up, another tier. the property is to the rear of our property and up about al