Transcripts For SFGTV Government Access Programming 20180128

We are concerned however that we havent received documents in response to our public records act and sunshine ordinance request and without those documents we will not be prepared for the hearing, and that is true to the master lease between the Port Authority and the park service which should have been released with the mitigated declaration to allow parties to analyze the significant effects of the project. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good afternoon, im with holy trinity cathedral. Im here about 1555 young street, we support the continuance to get more neighbors involved. Thank you. Jason mack, a neighbor, regarding 1555 union street, and just procedural point, attempted have made a number of attempts to file a letter of objection emailed on november 29, filed it in person at the november 30, when there was a continuance i again attempted by email january 24th, id like to attempt to file this again today. Its a letter of objection. I notice that in the documentation that was on the agenda regarding this project for today, the developers appeared to be disregarding the letter of objection and i understand that im not the only neighbor whose attempts to file letters of objection have not been successful. I apologize for the interruption, but were only accepting public testimony on the matter of the continuance. I will accept it and add it to the administrative record. Next speaker, please. Good afternoon, commissioners, speaking on the matter of the continuance for 1555 union, we want to urge you to support the continuance for two reasons, one, the neighbors have expressed concerns about the project in terms of parking appropriateness and Environmental Review et cetera and believe their concerns would be alleviated by a continuance to see if there can be workup of issues and is there may be time to agree to build with union labor and fair process to join the union and continuance allows for more of an opportunity to accomplish this. We hope you will grant continuance for the 1555 union project. Any additional comment on the items proposed for a continuance . Seeing none, we close Public Comment. Commissioner koppel . Commissioner koppel before i make the motion, did anyone want to mention about a timeline for number one . Im comfortable keeping it at that timeline if obviously sunshine requests are on a different calendar, but there are set days when they have to be responded to, but i think when we hear the item, if there is issues, we can continue it again. Ok, motion to continue items number 1, 2, 3, 12 a and 16 to the dates specified. Second. President hillis 4 also withdrawn, do we have to approve that . Also including item number 4. There is a motion seconded to continue matters as proposed. Commissioner koppel . Aye hillis, aye. Motion passes unanimously, 50. On the variance side, 12b continuing indefinitely for 1555 union street. Thank you, Zoning Administrator. Commissioners place this under matter for item 5, draft minutes for december 14, 2017. Any Public Comment on the draft minutes . Hello, i want to comment on the draft minutes for the 21s of december general Public Comment, when i made those comments i didnt know that mr. Sanchez, the Zoning Administrator had raised the number from 1. 63 to 1. 9. I dont know if you want to correct that in the minutes, but the singlefamily home value has been raised to 1. 9. Thank you for doing that. And then here i corrected the minutes myself, so those are the minutes that reflected your comments. I know, i apologize there is no correction. That needs to be made. The correction will come in the reflection of your comments here today. I made copies of that today, i didnt know it was raised because i made those comments on the 21st. Thank you very much. Thank you. Well close Public Comments. Commissioners . Commissioner koppel motion to accept draft minutes from december 14 and 21 . Second. Thank you, commissioners, on that motion then to adopt minutes for december 14 and 21, commissioner koppel . Commissioner koppel aye. So moved. The motion passes, 50. In places of item 6, commission comments and questions. Commissioner richards. Commissioner richards a couple of things, in this weeks Business Times on page 4, there was an article about 1601 16th street which we approved probably a couple of years ago. What was interesting, the developer, they cut a floor off the development not because neighbors had blocked views or whatever, they cut the floor off because of Construction Costs. So for anybody thinking that Construction Costs arent inhibiting maybe some projects getting under way, here we have one that is entitled, but is cutting units because of Construction Cost. The other thing i wanted to mention, i read this past sundays chronicle in the insight section and the chronicle came out with sb 827, which if you take a look at some of the articles on the web, really affects pretty much every parcel in San Francisco. It upzones every parcel to have no density even in rh 1, r h2 and 3 zones. Doesnt have parking minimums and there are other things that go along with the sba 27. I would like to understand what the impact would be here in San Francisco. The reason is, i think an informed public needs to understand exactly what this is. There is a lot of words being used but people arent internalizing what is going to happen and i really want people to understand it. Maybe staff could do a quick memo on what it does and doesnt do and what it covers, that would be great, thank you. Secretary commissioner moore . Commissioner moore we approved Meeting Minutes of december 21st where commissioner johnson resigned, and since that time, we are understanding there are reasons she needs to be here, but i think the public is asking i dont have an answer i asked the Commission Secretary and perhaps there could be clarification of what is going on so that we know ourselves of what to expect. Indeed, we can formulate something. Commissioner moore thank you. But its my understanding at least at this point, shes a member of the commission, has no pulled back that resignation commissioner moore issuing meeting memos that say she has resigned and she said there could be intent to resign but not say she resigned, its a typo, so we need to be clear. Well get clarification on that. Commissioner moore definitely would like her to be here, but it needs to be clear to the public. Commissioners, if there is nothing further item matters, director announcements. Just two items i wanted to report today, one is the status of the permitting project tracking system, this has come up several times in light of the work with the department of building inspection. Im pleased to tell you that the dbi is on schedule to go live this fall, september. Just to get into the weeds a little bit, the initiation started about a year ago and the consultants have completed the analysis of dbi system requirements and the configuration. Theyre in stages 3 and 4 out of 5. Which is actually building the system and then they go into testing and training. The build is projected to be completed by april. And then after that, the conversion will happen in testing and training and preparation for the golive date which is in september as i said. When they go live, this will also allow the Public Access portal to go live as well, so there will be broader access. And hopefully, have better communication between the two departments which is one of the many goals of this system. So as you know, we went live in october 2014, and we are working with dbi and their consultants to make sure when they go live and join with the system, thats seamless as well. So were happy to report that were moving ahead on schedule for september launch. The second thing i wanted to report to you on, is really news from kevin guy the office of shortterm rental director. There has been part of the Settlement Agreement with airbnb on the litigation, we have been in phases implementing the agreement that came about as a result of the litigation. The last phase was implemented last week at which point the agreement of course calls for anyone who is not registered to not have a posting on any of the websites. As of last week, 6,000 postings had been removed. Not just from airbnb, but all the listing agencies. The really interesting news that kevin is working on, and his team, looking at units where they had had enforcement cases and some of those are appearing on the rental market. So he believes there has been an effect on making more Units Available in the market which is very good news. Hes getting the data, but i wanted to let you know that information and publicly thank him and his team for the extraordinary work theyve done to make this happen. Thank you, that concludes my report. Secretary that is good news, thank you. Commissioners item 8, review of past events. This week Land Use Committee hearing was cancelled. The general plan amendment for the area plan passed the second read. The definition for gross florida area sponsored by this commission passed first read. And article 8 passed first read. The mission neighbor commercial district amendments passed its first read. And the supervisor safai interim control for personal uses, Institutional Uses and conversion to residential uses, those were adopted. That concludes my report. Thank you, mr. Star. The board of appeals did not meet last night. Ok. If there are no questions, commissioners, we can move on to general Public Comment, members of the public may address the commission, on items that are within the subject matter jurisdiction, except agenda items. With respect to agenda items, that will be addressed during the meeting. I did have one speaker. President hillis ok. I gave the amended minutes because i wanted to make a appointment. I think its good that you did residential flat policy. I dont know if you saw in the paper, that fancy glossy section, three units, it was three, now its one big 11 million unit. Too bad. I know its pacific heights, but you know, you could have three units in pacific height. Ok. I think i mentioned the one on shotwell and one on duncan. There is one on duncan that is actually for sale and has nov on it. I mean, where do these people get this idea they can get away with this stuff . They say its going be one unit, and its two units now. It drives me crazy. When you get to your samples from mr. Sanchez and star, 40 should have been demolition. Thats a lot over the last few years. You could use your tools that you have to make the adjustments now, you could raise the number or the criteria that is on the Zoning Administration bulletin. And get rid of ands and make them ors. The first one doesnt require legislation. Its simple fixes. In the meantime we have stuff like this. 20th street. Thats not a demolition. Two units. Look at that. That was the original house. You can see two entrances. Look at that pretty little window. Beautiful stained glass gone. Why is this not a demolition . I dont understand. And then theyre getting entitlements, there it is 4 million. Here it is under construction. Here it is before what it was. Its not a demolition. And then youre selling them, 55 homestead. Thats being sold. Its the highest price per square foot in the valley. In the meantime, they get their entitlements and rev up the number. This went from below a million to 4. 3. I have another one here, but im too emotional and still too sick to talk. But 276 duncan. I dont know what is going to happen there, but theyre selling for over 2 million. Please do something. Please. You can do it. Maybe just adjust the numbers so its harder to do demolition, but get rid of the ands. That would be so simple. I dont understand. But thank you for doing the flat policy. That was really great. And i could tell you about the one for the entitlements, but the one of on casher. This one on state street ms. I know, im done, ill stop, im ranting and raving. President hillis thank you. Mr. David . Good afternoon. Im here to talk about, im pretty sure i brought up a handful of times in the past, its starting to have effect in our mayors race. So this is the inconsistent reporting of the rina numbers by the Planning Department as to the state of california. So as you can clearly see on this sheet that is provided the Planning Department, it shows that our above moderate rina number, were at 217 , that means that were planning to build a. The other thing is rhna numbers are supposed to be the minimums not maximums. Were just reaching the minimum. I want to point that out. The San Francisco Planning Department says that were at 217 . I want to remind you the numbers are done by the state of california, theyre not done by the Planning Department. Heres the state of california rhna number. Above moderate number is 109 . Not 217. 109 . Not 217. Im sorry . That was the wrong page. Here we go. Everyone see that . That is 109 , not 217. That was for the years between 20072014. Now the other rhna number that i have here is for the current stage between 2015 and 2023, the market rate number is 20 . Not 217 . So, what is happening is there are mayoral questionnaires going out saying given that were building 217 of our market rate units, dont you think we shouldnt be building anymore . That is misinformation. London breed the other day was in front of the Community Alliance and said were building 200 of our market rate units and people said, no, were not, said, the Planning Department said we are. This is a problem. These numbers are incorrect. The other thing im sorry can i a have a couple more seconds . No. President hillis but thank you for the information and you can submit emails to us. Good afternoon, im catherine pet, i supported the appeal for the chestnut lombard in december. You will recall that project resulted in the intentional illegal demolition by a speculative developer of a significant willis polk designed building. It was an example of the first bay tradition and one of only two examples of the city designs in San Francisco. The project under construction near completion highlights the errors in the city permitting process, oversight and policies, flawed remedies addressing the demolition after the fact. It illustrates the practice of unlawful demolition by serial permitting, submittal of plans, et cetera, et cetera, as we just saw from many examples. 841 chestnut is one of the most egregious in terms of the importance of the loss of the building, the level of intervention and audacity of the demolition, this development illustrates incentives for developers to do illegal work for great financial gain at little risk of penalty. You may recall that the property was purchased in 2012 for 4. 5 million and was appraised at a value of 30. 2 million in 2016. Finally, ill mention that we believe there is a historic cottage on this site, but in what condition we dont know. I believe that and supporters are trying to have an inspection organized we ask that the commission take action to better protect its citys Historic Buildings and welcome your comments on how the department intends to do that, thank you. President hillis thank you, next speaker, please. Good afternoon president hillis, members of the commission, im an architect here in the city. I would like to further address our concerns regarding 841 chestnut. How to end this loss of housing and how to prevent the land. As this project began, the neighbors made two complaints. They questioned the extent of the demolition and lack of shoring of the front walls at 841 chestnut. The two complaints were turned into one. The two issues in the complaint interpreted by dbi became only about shoring. The other half of the complaint left uninvestigated. The house had been gutted and the front wall was unsupported so neighbors were alerting the city to extent of the demolition on the site at that time. A request that fell on deaf ears at dbi when the complaint was responded to, planning review to see the extent of the demo proposed at that time was lost. Subsequent permit applications should have planning review, but dbi didnt route it. Dbi kept planning from doing their portion of the review on the permit, intentionally in my opinion. Why didnt that complaint result in the review . Well, the chief building inspector said we dont send shoring permits to planning. So if they dont send shoring permits to planning and planning has interest in historic build how can planning know when serial permits are changing the original scope of work . The one certified local Government Department is the Planning Department, only they can make alterations to category a Historic Buildings. An experienced team of architects and engineers could have removed rotted members and treated the house for mold. Dbi has shown itself over decades not to be reliable when it comes to citizens complaints. We would like to make requests. We would like planning to build into the budget for the coming year an fte Structural Engineer on staff trained in Historic Preservation as well and stop passing on checking structural drawings for historical buildings that come through the department. All category a and b buildings should have planning review. And finally, all Building Department complaints should be shared with the Planning Department. Thank you very much. At the bic we brought up the issues, they were looking forward to a meeting with you in june. We think thats too far out and would appreciate you expediting that. President hillis than