Transcripts For SFGTV2 20121120

That goes to show precision being used to address these issues being brought up by the neighborhoods affected by the project. And thats incredibly important. And, so, while speed can be sometimes a bad thing, that a slow process in and of itself is not necessarily a good thing either. That just because something has slowed down doesnt mean that that project is then deliberated appropriately. As long as the appropriate deliberations is happening, that is more than enough. And thats whats happening right now. So, again, wed like to continue the momentum behind the Warriors Arena project and hopefully continue to see this project move forward and addressing these issues as well. Thank you. Thank you, mr. Ryan. If there is no other Public Comment, and through the chair, we can close Public Comment. Close the Public Comment. Thank you. If i could just make some concluding comments and then turn to my colleagues. I have another meeting. I want to thank all the city departments and the warriors and also many of our community for being here today. I just wanted to state one of the Public Commenters had talked about the pace of the project, and i agree. I actually do think that this project is moving very quickly through the process more than other ones and for a project this size. But i do also want to understand there are some clear delineations in terms of timelines the warriors are working with as well. So, i think there is a balance that we need to strike. I think a Better Process and more meaningful process will come out with a better project which will still create jobs. I dont think anyone is in conflict. I really appreciate hearing from members of labor also supporting a meaningful process because i think that means a better project in the end. I think thats a good thing. I did want to address the point about the holidays. We heard that comment and, so, because of that we did move the scoping meeting to mid january so we will not be holding a scoping meeting in december as had been previously planned, understanding that people are during the holidays are distracted, i think that is a very valid concern. We dont expect people to come out in december from holiday parties and a family gathertionses for this. It was pushed to january at a Committee Meeting last week. We will ensure there are going to be required discussions at the cac around the eir scoping and also the term sheet which will come to us in the spring. I think one of the other valid feedback that we got was how meaningful the discussion is happening at the Citizens Advisory Committee and were going to try to ensure in the agenda there will be time with the cac to discuss it with the board to give us guidelines and prudhoe bayvs theyd like principles theyd like to see in the project as well. We do have the model process that happened before. Ive heard over and over again the giants did a great job. We have a lot to learn from them. We have lessons to learn from the giants project as well which i think the warriors have listened to and are trying to incorporate in that design project. And i do want to congratulate the warriors for being the first private develop erred to agree to the local hire legislation. I think that is a great step in working with labor from the get go is certainly a big step up for this project. Of course, i just want to ensure that were having meaningful participation from the residents in the neighborhood. I think it is just going to make a better project overall because this could be a fantastic project for both the city and the neighborhood. But it could also be a disaster as well. I think we all acknowledge there is a balance that has to be struck within the process to ensure that it turns out to be the former. So, with that i dont know if there are any comments from committee members. I do want to thank the Land Use Committee for hearing this. This is only the first of many hearings. There is going to be a process, our office will work hard to ensure that. Thank you. I just wanted to add to supervisor kims comments that let me do my best to make sure my staff is working with neighborhood residents and others as we move other hearings and item forward through the Land Use Committee or to ensure that that happens. I also wanted to say, too, im really appreciative of the thoroughness of the presentations by Different Department staff and thanks to rick wells for being here as well as others from the community, too. Thank you so much, supervisor kim. Can we continue this to the call of the chair without objection . Thank you. Thank you. Now, mr. Evans, can we call item number 1 since supervisor chiu is here, item number 1. Item number 1 is ordinance 1, commemorating the stockton street sidewalk adjacent to Washington Square park under public works code sections 789 et seq. , the commemorative street plaque ordinance; 2, accepting a plaque in honor of jack early as a gift to the city; 3, waiving permit and inspection fees for plaque installation; and 4, directing official acts in furtherance of this ordinance. As a gift to the city and county of San Francisco. Thank you. And the sponsor is president david chiu. Thank you, mr. Chair. And thank you for delaying consideration of these items. Our Jail Committee went on for a lot longer than we expected. But, colleagues, the legislation we have in front of us would allow the city to accept a gift of a commemorative plaque to be installed in the stockton street sidewalk adjacent to Washington Square park in honor of jack early who was not only a beloved Telegraph Hill Community Member who passed away in 1998, not only the president of his own San Franciscobased company, but an urban conservationist who made his mark on a ridge route on a rocky ridge in Telegraph Hill that the city had once considered unusable. Mr. Early single handedly created a spot of greenery that is now named for him the jack e. Early park and for his efforts he won an award from San Francisco beautiful and was nominated for environmental prize by friends of the urban forest. When mr. Early passed in 1998 he bequested five large evergreen trees to the city and those trees were planted at Washington Square park in may of last year. This legislation again would allow us to accept a gift of this plaque to really commemorate his efforts and what he was able to do to create some greenery in one of the densest and least green spaces in San Francisco. Thank you. So, if there are no questions, lets open it for Public Comment. Is there anyone from the public that would like to speak . Seeing none, Public Comment is closed. So, colleagues, can we move this forward without objection . Thank you. And, mr. Evans, can you please call item number 2 . Item number 2 is an ordinance amending the San Francisco environmental code to suspend the yellow pages distribution Pilot Program. Thank you. And the sponsor is president david choo. Thank you, colleagues. As i mentioned at roll call a couple weeks ago, a year and a half ago, we voted 10 to 1 to approve a threeyear Pilot Program to reduce environmental waste and blight from the over distribution of yellow page phone book. I want to thank the members of the Land Use Committee for your support of that legislation. At the time we passed that bill there was only one federal case on the issue which had decided that the city of seattle with the comparable ordinance was allowed to regulate yellow page distribution under the First Amendment. Unfortunately a few weeks ago the threejudge circle panel reverse that had case found that yellow pages are subject to full First Amendment protections. As i have stated before, i strongly disagree with the 9th circuits ruling which is a misreading of the First Amendment to protect polluters with 1. 6 million unwanted yellow page books every year. Based on the same logic as the Citizens United ruling that treats the free speech rights of corporate super pacs to be the same as real people. But in light of that decision and in consultation with our City Attorney, this legislation would be recommended to suspend implementation of our Pilot Program at least until future appellate proceedings determines that the seattle law is consistent with the First Amendment. And, colleagues, i also want to mention that im still committed to finding policies that reduce yellow page blight and im working with the City Attorney to hopefully draft new legislation to find alternate approaches to achieving the same goal. At this time, colleague, i hope you will be able to support this legislation in light of the 9th circuit. Thank you. Thank you, president chiu. Supervisor wiener. I thank you and i want to thank president chiu for having pursued this legislation which i was happy to support and i was really saddened by the ninth slur circuit ruling. It seems that our federal courts more and more are fetishizing commercial and corporate speech. I fundamentally disagree with that. With that said, the current law is what it is and i will be reluctantly supporting this suspension and hope to revive legislation in the not too distant future. Thank you. Lets open this up for Public Comment. Is there anyone from the public that would like to speak . Seeing none, Public Comment is closed. So, r colleagues, theres a motion to refer this item to the full Board Committee report for the consideration on november 20, 2012. Can we adopt that without objection . Thank you. Thank you, president chiu. Mr. Evans, please call item number 5. Item number 5 is a resolution to remove certain proposals and activities from the Environmental Impact report for the recreation and Park Department significant Natural Resource area of Management Plan and to consider proposals and alternatives for the future of the Sharp Park Golf Course for the separate and complete ceqa process. Thank you. The sponsor is supervisor kristina olague and i dont see her here or her staff. She has asked me to continue this item to the call of the chair and well do that after hearing Public Comment. So, if there are no questions, lets open this up for Public Comment. But i should alert people that this is going to be continued to the call of the chair likely after the end of Public Comment. So, im going to call a number of people that have filled out cards and ill just urge people to keep in mind that were not acting on this today. Brent plater from wild equity. Neil [speaker not understood], arthur finestein [speaker not understood], [speaker not understood], Virginia Marshall Sequoia Audubon Society. Brittany [speaker not understood] from wild equity [inaudible]. [inaudible] edth ultimate design or layout of Sharp Park Golf Course. Instead of doing as it promised, the rec and Park Department at the last moment combined a new redevelopment project for the golf course into this preexisting ceqa process for the significant Natural Resource areas Management Plan. All this resolution would do is require the recreation and Parks Department to make good on its word and consider these two different projects through two different ceqa proceedings and nothing more. It will not constrain the citys ultimate decision about what to do, what sharp park, they will not alter or change the kind of alternative the city will consider as it goes through this processes. All it will do is apply the two separate proceedings as [speaker not understood]. The reason this is important is items of that golf course plan are exceptionally controversial and have skipped specific ceqa proceedings required under law. It could not go through scoping. It did not go through the notification of other Public Partners that must comment on the plan. And the city is at great risk of unneeded ceqa litigation if this resolution does not pass. I dont believe it is necessary to extend this another time period. Its been sitting on the docket since june and weve been awaiting comments from rec and park and planning and the City Attorney ever since and havent heard a word. So, we find it kind of surprising all of a sudden they are objecting to this resolution. So, we would request that you not continue this motion and pass it on to the board today. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Drasani . Good afternoon, supervisors. This is neil dasai with National Parks conservation association. Id like to talk on two things right now. One is substance and one is process. We support the resolution as written. It segregates out the controversial elements of this plan that are actually not even relevant or germane to the natural area. Thats a key thing here. Since 2006 when the planning started on this eir, the golf course elements were not a part of this. Only natural areas. 2011 this last year, this nongermane item was put in. This is a procedural way to separate these two and allow supervisors to look at both projects for what they are and what they should be, all right. I wont repeat much of what mr. Plater said, but i do want to say that from a procedural standpoint, this has been notified to you folks, to the city, to the public for more than five months and we would like to see it move forward for your consideration next week. Thank you. Supervisors, arthur feinstein, chair of the sierra bay club. Second what has been said previously. I am very much in support of this. Its poor process. In fact, its probably not a Legal Process that the department has taken in combining these two very disparate elements into one eir. Its unclear to me when, if you have this hearing again we will have the opportunity to testify again i hope so and we would urge you at the very least if you cant just move it on to the full board which we think you should, it has been hanging here for a long time. That you schedule it for this committee next week, then, so that it can move forward this year. Again, its been with you for around five months now. Rec and park has had ample time to comment on it. If it hasnt, its sort of bad showing and bad faith to say at the last moment, wait, dont do this. And, again, this does not affect sharp park. This is in terms of the current management. Does not affect outcomes. It simply asks for an appropriate process. So, thank you very much. Appreciate it. Good afternoon, supervisors. Im maryian [speaker not understood] with golden gate audubon. Golden gate audubon [speaker not understood] sharp park plan from the natural Area Management plan Environmental Impact report. The future of the Sharp Park Golf Course should be considered through a separate and complete California Environmental quality act review process as previously recommended in the natural areas Management Plan scoping report. We suggest to support this resolution and to hear this agenda item next week. Thank you. Thank you. Im going to call a few more flames. Tom brookshire. Eric mixon. Roxanne ramirez. Johnny baldini and [speaker not understood] margaret good dale. Lazar kettle man. Rose [speaker not understood], and rachel tom. The next speaker . Hello, my name is [speaker not understood]. We have to leave so i wonder if im going to be able to read her comment in addition to my own. Youll have to squeeze it into your own time. Ill read mine first. I think it might be short. My name is [speaker not understood]. Im a San Francisco state environmental studies major and i also live in district 1. San franciscos precautionary principle resolution states that the city has an obligation to consider a full range of alternatives. The recreation and Parks Departments failure to consider [speaker not understood] all alternatives to the Sharp Park Golf Course reenvironment plan violation of San Franciscos precautionary principle resolution. Buried on page 527 of the last page of the draft eir, it is stated that the registration alternatives were rejected because they were not compatible with the existing and planned 18hole layout of the historic golf course. The recommended management actions for the sharp park in the draft eir do not refer to a planned 18hole layout. How can a restoration alternative be rejected and play 18 holes of golf when the holes are not assessed in the draft eir . The assessment of the current 18 holes of golf is that one of the main reasons why the Sharp Park Golf Course redevelopment plan was to be separated and [speaker not understood] independently of the significant Natural Resource Area Management plan. I urge you to vote yes on the resolution. Now for brittanys. She is also an environmental studies student at San Francisco state university. This issue is important to her not only as a student of the environment and currently environmental law, but also as a resident of the city. The attempt with the new draft eir Impact Report characterizes the golf course as unacceptable and has been refuted that San Francisco Historic Advisory Commission when there is a clear disagreement such as this, it is a clear indicator that a separate evaluation for the alternative plan is necessary to maintain [speaker not understood], almost done, and the endangered species within it. [speaker not understood] procedural resolution to ensure that the department up holds [speaker not understood] the golf course project from the natural area plan and allows for the Environmental Review. A yes vote will pave the way for the protection of humans and wildlife [speaker not understood] areas to rely thank you very much. Thank you so much. Thanks a lot. Good job squeezing it all into. Good afternoon, supervisors. My name is johnny baldini and my comment is in regards to the recreation and Parks Department, significant Natural Resource Area Management plan for which a final draft plan was approved for Environmental Review in 2006 and has completed several steps in the Environmental Review process since. Including the publication of a notice of preparation in april 2009, the completion distribution of an initial study to responsible agencies. Conclusion of public scoping Public Comment periods in summer of 2009. Around that year november, alternative [speaker not understood] was [speaker not understood] to significant natural Area Resource Management Plan. After the aforementioned steps in the review process had been completed, a member of the citizenry, [speaker not understood] and the Environmental Review process that bothered me most was the public scoping comment period. As a san franciscan being born in district 1, the natural areas mean everything to me. Growing up Golden Gate Park [speaker not understood] neighborhood kid. [speaker not understood]. Myself and the other hundreds of thousands of other san franciscans who cherish the natural areas deserve the chance for comment. Please separate 18 from the significant Natural Resource Area Management plan for separate review under the California Environmental quality act. Thank you, supervisors. Thank you. Next speaker. Good afternoon, supervisors. My name is david wilk. I studied Environmental Science and conservation biology at ucla so hopefully there is some input i can put in the subject. What i want to focus on is the aspect of stewardship in this issue. Ecosystems are a very fragile organism. Ze you can say, and there are organisms involved in it. Tampering with even the smallest piece of that could have dire consequences. And as we can see with the gulf folks they have tampered with the ecosystem. The frog eggs as they have moved from the original location. Something as simple as that could cause awful things to happen to the ecosystem. And if these gulf folks are so free to even tamper with that, then who knows what could come next. Its not out of their character to try to evade the process of ceqa. That is what they are trying to do right now. What we can hope to do is stop them from getting away with this so that hopefully other institutions similar to them will not be able to do this very same thing in the future. Thank you. Next speaker. Hi, im Virginia Marshall from the Sequoia Audubon Society and we do also support this resolution for reasons that have been adequately presented by plater and [speaker not understood]. Sharp park is unique and we want it to be considered as a unique ecosystem. Thank you. Next speaker. Hi, good afternoon, supervisors. I want to thank you for taking the time to review this resolution that has been six months in the making. We ask that you vote yes in the resolution that separates the sharp golf course from the natural areas plan which was precisely promised and that you have natural Area Management plan scoping. The department stated because redesigning or eliminating the Sharp Park Golf Course is a separate proposal being studied by the San Francisco rec and Park Department. It will not be included or reevaluated as part of the proposed project and the analyzed eir. We need to make good on this commitment. This resolution does not change the status quo at Sharp Park Golf Course or control its future. Therefore, shareholdersv, your support does not mean you are taking a position on the future of sharp park. It only ensures keeping the commitment to the public and policy makers. You have unanimous support of the environmental shout and need your support as well. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker. Good afternoon, supervisors. My name is eric mix. Im here to tell you about my support of the resolution to segregate out the Sharp Park Golf Course redevelopment plan from the natural areas Management Plan, Environmental Impact report. Sharp park is a unique ecosystem as you heard from speakers before me. In which case they have unique circumstances that exist in sharp park. Before we can decide the sites future we must fully understand the function of the site. The function not only to surrounding communities and to the environment, but also as a function as a service to the community and its residents. So, to fully understand this, we must analyze and estimate what the real costs are going to be regarding the future of this site. Id just like to invoke a quote by Albert Einstein that given about the importance of defining the problem. So, with given if his life depended on a single decision, he only had one hour, he would devote 55 minutes defining that problem. I think thats just a commitment that we must commit to perform and exercise Due Diligence to this site. Again, the resolution does not change the status quo at Sharp Park Golf Course nor does it plan for or modify any land activity on sharp park. This is a procedural resolution to make sure the department makes good on its promise to the public and policy makers. Thank you very much. Thank you. Next speaker. Good afternoon, supervisors. My name is stan [speaker not understood]. Im a longtime resident of pacifica. Id like to urge you to bring the Comment Section to a close preferably by next week so we can get along with finishing with the plan. I ask you to please vote to the resolution to remove Sharp Park Golf Course from the plan. It is a Sticking Point to the approval of a natural areas plan. It will allow these two separate projects to be considered on their own merits and by both the public and the policy makers. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker. Good afternoon, supervisors. Im margaret godell. A longtime resident of pacifica. [speaker not understood]. I wonder when the citizens of San Francisco voted to institute the National Areas significant resources if they actually considered that a golf course would be considered one of those natural areas. It seems to me that a golf course, certainly this one, is no longer a natural area. [speaker not understood] has been drained, its been turned into a ditch in order to avoid winter flooding on the greens. The golf course is an unnatural area. The golf range is an unnatural area. The natural area staff are talented and dedicated, they have their hands full with lands in San Francisco, not even outside the city of San Francisco. I ask you to approve separating the golf course from the natural areas and separate the areas because they are very separate lands and deserve separate consideration. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker. Good afternoon, supervisors. My name is la zar [speaker not understood]. Im speaking on behalf of the natural areas program. In light of the mayor of pacifica park and rec director ginsburg wrote to say any divination of Sharp Park Golf Course as a historic landmark frankly is not helpful in furthering a legitimate policy debate in San Francisco. But against his judgment, both the city of pacifica both fail to recognize it as a Historical Resource [speaker not understood]. Changes basically in the configuration of the golf course would likely violate state prc 58 28 a and place a burden on the city of San Francisco. Further, the state of california with the support of the individual and organizations that have an interest in historical and landscape preservation may be legally bound to defend the Historical Preservation to the detriment of San Franciscos plans. The eir makes mention of this and clearly states that there are significant impacts that would alter the historical nature of sharp park. The current designation of sharp