Reviewing the model of a seismic upgrade, existing units, and remodel of the units. And i was discussing with a very experienced planner, max poutra, on what we were going to do with this basement, and how we could best incorporate this basement into the unit above. It was never intended to do this unit as an a. D. U. Un asn addition. It was staffs recommendation to be a dwelling unit. Im going to go to the computer now and run through a few slides and show you a little bit about this. This is what the basement looked like. It was storage in the back and a row of storage throughout. When the seismic upgrade was done, ceiling heights were increased, and the spaces were improved with windows as you see here. This is what the remodel looks like. This is the angle in the other direction. You can see the staircase that takes up most of this back yard patio. A new steel staircase was put in with grating such that the entire staircase that was there is no longer there. Here is a entry declaring it as a very clear entry to housing, and this is what one sees when one comes in that entry. So this is not a dark basement by any means. This is quality housing. We can turnoff the overhead, please. Id like to run through our findings a little bit. Because there is actually a flaw in the way the Zoning Administrator reviewed this and the findings that the Zoning Administrator made in disapproval. In the disapproval findings, the sewning administrator referred to substandard exposure to the Zoning Administrator referred to substandard exposure to light and area in finding three and finding four, stating the proposed a. D. U. Would create a dwelling unit with significant substandard to light and air. Light and air is a Building Code issue. Light and air in this unit is met light and air of 10 of the floor area, five for ventilation, and five for light, and we exceed that. The outdoor space, it is true that this looks an exposure to the outdoor space. You have an aerial photo of what the exposure to outdoor space is like. There is an exit that provides considerable access to sky, light, and air, but we do not meet the minimum standard set by the planning code, and i would argue that the planning code cant always capture all the needs for what defines quality housing. So id like to quickly run through the findings that i believe we have sufficiently made in favor of allowing this housing. That there are exceptional extraordinary circumstances is the first one. While the proposed unit would lack sufficient exposure to meet the Zoning Administrators limit, the lot faces a large protected midblock open space. Number two, that theres an exceptional or extraordinary circumstance that would result in practical difficulty or unnecessary hardship, and that is always the most difficult finding to make. In this particular situation, the unnecessary hardship is not on the developer, its not on mr. Mallia, who has renovate this particular apartment building. Hes not a speculator, hes not flipping this for condominiums, this is for tenants. The unnecessary hardship is upon the community atlarge, its upon the Housing Stock of the city. That here is a quality space that could be inhabited by a tenant in this very dense neighborhood where basement units are far darker and far left exposed by this. I would suggest that in this case, the Zoning Administrator has erred in his discretion to not approve a housing unit that would add to the qualitying Housing Stock quality Housing Stock of this city. I have a tenant who wishes to move in who will make statements, and i will answer any questions about the project. Excuse me, sir. How come you didnt put all those lovely pictures in your presentation . I hadnt taken them yet. Commissioner honda and what would be the purpose of this . Can you give me a moment to speak with my commissioner honda what would be the rent of this . It would be 1750 a month. Commissioner honda and could you refresh my memory what the Square Footage is. Im sorry. You can come to the podium, sir. Actually, its a pretty spacious studio. I did some checking in the neighborhood. Its about 500 square feet. Commissioner honda and according to the pictures, nice job. Thank you. Believe me, i put an extraordinary effort into this building. I plan to keep it in the familitor generations. Sir, just for the record, youre ronald mallia. Yes maam. Thank you. Thank you. Excuse me. Can you explain how you had had the building approved but did not have the variance yet . Why go through the expense without a variance in hand . Can you for the question, commissioner. The order that things took place is that we had a permit for the remodels of the rest of the building, and we had to resolve the use of the basement and the connection of the basement to the lower unit. Planning proceeded to approve the permit for the remodel of the rest of the building for the seismic upgrade without including a dwelling unit down there, allowing us to file a variance application. Mr. Mallia was the general contractor getting the work done, doing it on his own. He purchased cabinetry and materials for each of the units in the building. So he had those setup in the unit as he finished the space out. He got the permit finaled without installation of the kitchen. These materials are just placed against the wall, and its not currently inhabitable form. All right. Thank you. Commissioner honda you say that with a straight face . Im sorry. There are a few connections to be made, commissioner honda. Im sure those can be done fairly quickly or undone fairly quickly. Commissioner honda thank you. Thank you. We will now hear from the Planning Department. Good morning, planning commission. Scott sanchez, Planning Department. Double surprise because i had no idea that the sunt wunit wa until the photos were put up. Thats not whats been represented to the Planning Department or Planning Department staff that there was an existing illegal unit ready for occupancy and theyve got somebody wanting to rent it. The photos looked like it was all finished and ready for occupancy, but that is not represented anywhere that i saw in the appellants brief nor the plans nor any of the materials that were presented to the Zoning Administrator. Its my understanding that the variance for this was filed in january 2018. There was a hearing on the case earlier this year. The Zoning Administrator denied the application. Its an rm2 dwelling unit. Theyre already over density by one, and they we wanted to add an a. D. U. The generally and historically, the compliant of the code require that each dwelling unit have one room that meets standards of a certain size that have windows of a certain size that face into an area of a certain size. And thats a street at least 20 feet in width, a rear yard that meets the requirements of the planning code or an open space thats 25 by 25 and goes up the larger the unit. The board of supervisors didnt want to remove the requirement entirely because exposure is an important factor for dwelling units, so they allowed variances, and allowed a space that was 15 by 15. At the time of Zoning Administrator, and some of at the time i was Zoning Administrator, and some we would approve, some we would disapprove, and some would go to you. But last year, they reduced it even further to 225 square feet or at least nine neat by 9 feet. So this doesnt meet the original coat requirement, the second code requirement, or the newly reduced. It could have just said that its a waiver and the Zoning Administrator would have great flexibility. I dont think the appellant has provided any information to demonstrate what the hardship here is other than they have a unit thats already constructed that they would like to occupy. And we very much encourage new dwelling units, but we do have to have minimum standards. In this case, you know, it is at the bottom at least its not north facing, but it is at the bottom level of a very tall building. Its four stories over the basement, at least buildings that are taller. And i could put more work on the overhead commissioner honda are your pictures as good as his . Not at all. But could i have the overhead, please . Commissioner honda thank you oh, that was in the package. No, thats a bad one. You can see in there, you cant even see the floor level that the building is going to be located at. Its four stories over basement. Its four, three, two, one, and at that level there. So and i have concerns with seeing the work that was done here without permit. I mean, the stairs look at if we were replaced, and i dont know that that was on any of the plans. Thats not showing as part of the scope of this project. It may have been other previous permits, and we can review that. But, again, none of that, to my knowledge, was made available none of that information was made available to the Zoning Administrator at the time of the variance hearing earlier this year. And i think the Zoning Administrator very clearly outlined the reasons i know this is not acceptable or appropriate exposure that has been justified by the board of supervisors. The new information that the unit is already constructed, its not anywhere in the appellants brief, and i can understand even more now why they want to have the variance overturned, but the fact that theyve illegally constructed the unit does not justify the approval of this variance. Im available for questions. Commissioner honda ive got a question, scott. So considering the lovely board of supervisors institutes all the laws that we have to file, doesnt he have to legalize it after . Yes, he has to legalize it after commissioner honda and we have lots of illegal units, that have wiring through the wall, and bare piping and substandard egress. And now, the citys goal is to legalize all those units. What happens if this case comes back to us seven months from now and its been rented out and he has to legalize it . So the code says you must legalize it, but if you cant legalize it and in this case, theyve gone through the even though they didnt ask for legalization, they tried to get the a. D. U. , they would be required to remove it. The code requires that you seek legalization, but if the legalization is denied, then, the unit is to be removed. Commissioner honda okay. Im not an architect or a planner, but looking at the pictures, and a picture is worth a thousand words. I lived at 101 suramonte, and that is way nicer. I would ask the appellant why they didnt present this to the Zoning Administrator . Why they didnt present this at the time of the hearing . Maybe it was still under construction. I dont know if these photos were available at the time. I spoke with the Zoning Administrator today, and i didnt ask him if the unit was there commissioner honda i talked to him today, too, but he didnt make any mention of that. I dont think any information was made available to the Zoning Administrator about those qualities of the unit. Commissioner honda so looking at the unit, i see lots of light and air in my thoughts. So why would it and im not trying to be argumentative. Why would it not qualify at that point . We are looking at the dimensional requirement. That photo is probably taken at the best time of the day and best time of the year to get that. Commissioner honda no one knows how to photoshop in this modern technology. But weve been very strict on applying the standards and again, this may be new information that was not available to the Zoning Administrator commissioner honda would you be interested in taking a look at it and us potentially continuing it . I could take this new information. We could certainly review the history as well and review it with the Zoning Administrator and get his updated view on the commissioner honda i trust you as a junior Zoning Administrator and joe duffy as a senior building inspector, i look at the pictures, wow, that looks like a really nice unit. If you do a site inspect, you can say hey, they probably brought in flood lights to bring that light . I can review it with the Zoning Administrator, and get his review on this, and report back to you. I have a question for you. In regards to a. D. U. S that the Zoning Administrator has granted or not granted since the more relaxed 225 square foot regulation came into being, does he tend to allow variances, in terms of this is half the required size or is it pretty strict, you dont meet the 225, youre not getting the variance fore exposure . Its my understanding that theres only one two units approved under the negate reduced standards. One, it has a street that didnt meet the minimum street requirements and set back. Independently, they didnt meet the requirements, but separately, they did, so that satisfied the intent of the code requirement. And then, the other one was had situated in a way that there were two very large light wells, and basically every room in the a. D. U. Had exposure on to one of those two very large light wells, that, you know, were each very close to meeting the minimum dimensions, so it was substantially different from what we have here, where theres just one area and its very clearly not meeting the code requirements. Okay. Thank you. Does the 110 measurement include or exclude the measurement of the staircase . It excludes it. Does anybody know what it would be including the staircase . I believe it would be a larger area. And before making these findings, did planning visit the unit at all . In this case, i dont know. Probably staff did not do a site visit and relied on the materials submitted by the applicant to demonstrate their case. I had another question. For finding number five, it says a requirement i was confused. It says a requirement for finding number five was not met, but then, the discussion seems to say that actually it is met. So i it looked like a mistake to me on that finding. Well, actually under finding two or a2 of finding five, it does say that the project will not be in keeping with the existing housing and neighborhood quality that the a. D. U. Is of substandard quality, falling below the requirements of such unit. So with that okay. So thats in keeping. Essentially, i read this as for all five findings, since its below the statutory number of 225, we shouldnt do it, which sort of seems like weird logic since the purpose of a variance is to go below the code. But its also based on the materials that are presented by the appellant, and they werent able to show that there are exceptional or extraordinary conditions. We cant make findings that dont exist. I see. Vice president swig can i grill you for a second . Or two or three. Vice president swig im like commissioner honda. We see these circumstances where people have been living in socalled your motherinlaw units or grandmother units where wives or mothers are picked on, and the intent of the legislation was to try to limit illegal rental of really bad units, and hoping that people would come out of the closet and say okay, weve been renting this unit illegally. Now, we can make it legal again. And with and this kind of flies in the face of that. I think commissioner hondas exactly right. If i was the Building Owner now, it wouldnt be me, but it wouldnt be unheard of that a Building Owner would say okay, fine, i lose. Im going to rent illegally, and we have another illegal unit on the streets of San Francisco. Here, we have a unit that may be out of compliance but it gives somebody who might otherwise be homeless an opportunity to live under a roof instead of under the stars. So im really trying to work hard to in the spirit of creating housing right now, its clear that the project sponsor blew it, you know commissioner honda jumped ahead as we say. Vice president swig jumped ahead and done a few things, and now hes being justifiably punished for that because youre not going to do that youre not supposed to do the act and then pray for forgiveness, but it is more Housing Stock in a city thats plagued with no Housing Stock. So what id like to know here and help me with this. Under finding one that there are exceptional or extraordinary circumstances applying to the property, etc. , etc. If if this unit were permanently designated as an affordable unit, and this unit could not be rented as a market rate but add restrictions on its rental to a person that met the affordable status, would that create a a an exceptional or an extraordinary circumstance . The planning code does not require an affordable unit for this proposal and one has not been proposed. Vice president swig i understand. But if this were conditioned, and the Property Owner were to mandate that i would discuss that with the city attorney, but that would be an ad hoc condition of approval usually, there needs to be a voluntary concession here on the part of the Property Owner. If they want to designate a unit as affordable thats not required under law, there would be certain other requirements to make that happen. But this unit has not been proposed by the applicant as affordable. Its not required under the code. Vice president swig for example if we were to continue this and as far as your oversight, you looked at it further, and during the hiatus, the project sponsor would voluntarily designate this as an affordable unit, would that create an exceptional extraordinary situation . I would id be careful in how i i want to be careful in how i respond to thatthat. I would want to discuss that with the Zoning Administrator before i get an out on that. Commissioner honda calling corey now. Vice president swig im not trying to pardon a misdeed on th