is accurate and more than adequate as it clearly shows that the plan to build a new north beach library on the triangle parking lot and expand the joe dimaggio playground is the correct course of action. please join your fellow commissioners and approve the north beach e.i.r. so we can use this ground wisely for our children for the future. thank you. president miguel: thank you. >> do you want to have that? >> commissioners, my name is dawn and i'm the planning and capital manager for the recreation and park department. thank you for taking time tonight to hear about this important project. the draft e.i.r., the recreation and park department feels provides an excellent analysis of the proposed master plan for the joe dimaggio playground and its various alternatives.

the e.i.r. carefully evaluates the various impacts including potential historic resources, open space and recreational resources, traffic impact as well as views and esthetics. it's a thorough and complete document. the plan reviews and presents the advantages of the preferred plan which replaces a parking lot with a new library branch, plaza and unified park adding an additional 12,000 square feet of open space in a highly dense, high open space neighborhood. north beach chinatown residents only have about half an acre pr thousand residents as compared to the rest of the city, which has about nine acres of open space per thousand residents, a significant gap. when you add that to the fact there are no other backyards in north beach and chinatown, you can understand why this neighborhood has been clearly designated in the recreation and open element of the plan as a high-needs area for acquisition of new open space and the addition of open space. i'm really here tonight i think to make that particular point around the policy context for

environmental review as we think about its consistency with ourover all general plan and the roads process that i've been very personally involved with working city planning staff over the past year. if there's one clear -- one of the main clear messages that emerged through the updating of the roads has been this focus on adding open space in highly dense neighborhoods and that we need to think about that criteria and that impact as we evaluate the e.i.r. and the preferred alternative. so with that, i thank you very much. president miguel: thank you. >> good evening, commissioners. my name is alan martinez and i am speaking for the historic presidentration commission. as you may or may not know, we reviewed this yesterday so i don't have comments that i can give to you that are written out but i will be commenting from my notes of what the different

commissioners had in mind yesterday. there was a general consensus on all of these points. i think the main one is that people felt that although the preservation alternative that was picked as superior was a good preservation alternative but that actually -- the superior preservation alternative is the addition to the north because as commissioner hoss pointed out, functionally shaped buildings can difficult to work with and a straight addition to the north is going to be a much more easier building to run. additionally, the two main reasons for not choosing that as the preservation alternative seems to be very -- shall we say flimsy reasons. one of them being that it was aligned with the other building. and that, that would impact an historic resource but the park side additions lined with the older building and that doesn't

impact the older resource. the marine branches have the addition in front of the building and they claim that doesn't impact the historic resource and resource delivery maintained integrity. so to have the building aligned with an existing building, that's the state of the art these days. to me that disappears as an objection. and the only other objection is it cuts off the playground from the triangle park. well, it seems to me that, you know, it's debatable about how thrand is used but the triangle park in and of itself is about the rise size of public square. so you would want to cut it off from the playground. so gets into land use issue outside of our curfew but i don't think that's a reason to not do -- do the addition. don't think it's a reason to drop that particular -- to now look at that particular position alternative seriously. the other issue -- the other base issue is that we felt that the e.i.r. doesn't really

analyze the esthetics of what is being done to the playground itself and what is being done to the playground itself and the -- wherever the park is on the surrounding context. on the historic resources around it. the analysis of the new estheftics of the new library on the historic resources around it. there's absolutely nothing about that. i mean we're talking about an existing older neighborhood and we're putting in this huge project has landscaping and a new building and extent of the historic resource analysis is just the -- about the building they want to tear down. there's nothing about the buildings around it and how this -- this new landscaping and building is going to affect the resources around it. there's detailed stuff about the measures need to be reviewed by commission and planning before

the issuance of the permit. files the new library will be certified, the most sustainable is always use existing structure than build new ones. so that wasn't really brought out that the greenest thing to do is reuse and retrofit our existing building. and the draft e.i.r. also states that the merced branch has a high degree of integrity. my commission disagrees with that. that's the one with the addition of the front. while the building they last state of a high degree of integrity we really feel sort of compromises that, which increases the cumulative impact of demolishing this library because it's a tool of libraries with integrity we feel is smaller than what was stated in the draft e.i.r. the final point was anougesed that the tort legislative branch is treated as its an extent ineligible when in fact it's

been demolished, which makes it ineligible but the reason that it's no longer there, not that it might not have been eligible. also, unless and addition found ineligible in the draft e.i.r., where as our commission found them eligible. so those were discrepancies. but i think the biggest point was that we were very dissatisfied with the preservation alternative and how it was handled and that we felt that it was a real lack of -- of analysis of how the landscaping in the new building affected the historic resources around the site of the hole. thank you for your time. president miguel: thank you, commissioner. i have a stack of cards here, however, rather than call them directly in order, i would first like anyone who has small children due to the lateness of the hour, if you can come up first and we will hear you and

then we will get to the rest of the cards. well, some of them may be. i'm not sure all of them are. >> hi, my name is lisa bellman. i'm a mother of three. i have already written you a letter so i'm not going to take any more time. the planning code has been disruptive thufment for letting me get them out of here. i to say on my way over here my 9-year-old said to me, mom, are we going to get the library in the park built before i'm in college, and i said i hope so. then i started thinking, it's been seven years since this project got started. and i don't know. but i just want to say i've looked at the e.i.r. i actually have all 386 pages or whatever it is. i'm not an expert in that area but to me it seems to i guess

address a lot of the issues and i think any benefits of getting a new library and park would far outweigh any -- the destruction of the current building. thank you. president miguel: thank you. >> hi, my name is sage o'malley and these are my two sons and we use the northeast library a lot. we think that the e.i.r. is accurate and complete. i actually read it. i'm actually -- i actually have a masters in city planning so i actually understood it. but we want to move ahead with the new library. thank you. president miguel: thank you. >> hello, my name is teresa dell santo and i'm taking younger kids home with me and i have two

at home waiting for me. i am a 23-year resident of the neighborhood who lives one block from the library and playground in a typical small apartment with no yard with my husband and two children. i'm also actively involved in five community-based neighborhood associations, the two -- the elementary school, the middle school, the community -- north beach telegraph hill neighborhood association and an aging in place group. so i'm actively involved with my neighbors, see them often and speak with them often. i'm here and am speaking in support of your approval of the north beach library draft e.i.r. . i believe the e.i.r. is complete and accurate. it shows that by building a new library on a parking lot and tearing down an old library and closing a small portion of mason street, we gain over 12,000 square feet of open space. we need more open space in north beach. because it is a dense neighborhood in the city with

the least amount of open space per capitalia. in addition the draft e.i.r., one of my concerns was about traffic and there were no significant impacts on traffic when they close the street. i was there. i saw it didn't change anything. and it didn't impact public transportation or emergency vehicles. my neighbors and i were actively engaged in the community input process leading to the plan to build a new library on the parking lot and we gathered as a community, provided our input, voiced our support of the new design when it was unveiled and we thought we would soon have a new library and more park space. we had been shocked by the amount of time that this process has entertain to make this community vision of a reality. we are busy parents on the frontier of urban living, trying to make some community space for our children and speaking up actively and vocally at every opportunity afforded us. the draft e.i.r. is complete and accurate as presented. let's finalize the draft e.i.r.

as presented so with you can move forward with a bigger library and more space for all of the neighborhood residents thank you. president miguel: thank you. >> hi, my name is lisa garvis. i'm a resident of north beach, a teacher. i speak on behalf of the elementary school parent/teacher organization. i'm a library patron and park pray pay tron and i urge you to approve the e.i.r. and allow the project to begin. the e.i.r. is complete, adequate and accurate. it took two years to prepare many, many preservation alternatives were considered and studied extensively and they didn't work. they took up too much of our precious open space. they were not functional, the preservation alternatives. they were frankly disrespectful to people in our community who have disabilities, who are elderly. those alternatives did not work. the e.i.r. shows clear,

complete, accurate information that the best alternative is a new library on the triangle. it showed accurate complete information that an expanded park is good for our community. we in the community want a new library because we love the library and we want to be able to use it. we in the community want a new, bigger safer park because as everybody has said, open space in our neighborhood is rare. live in a small apartment with my family with no backyard. we in our community use our open space. we in the community participated in the public process to get this plan going. it was a respectful process. it took into account everybody in the community. we have been waiting and waiting and waiting and we are ready. thank you. president miguel: thank you. >> hello, commissioners. i am a 26-year resident of north

beach and i'm a prop 8 school librarian with sfusd. i'm an avid user of north beach library for work and pleasure. i have a 10-year-old son using our branch library his entire life. i'm here to support the approval of the environmental impact support for the north beach library. this is accurate and complete. it shows that many preservation plans for a new library were considered but that each one of them kept the library at current four levels, which would force an inefficient use of space in the library and a loss of open space outside of the library due to ramps and an elevator. also, there are six other appleton libraries in san francisco which are more historical and architectural value. the e.i.r. shows that over 12,000 square feet of additional open space added by building the new library on the triangle and closing one block of mason street is sorely needed in our very densely populated neighborhood. through an extensive

transportation study and the closure of mason street, the e.i.r. shows there are no adverse effects on the flow of traffic in the neighborhood. i live two blocks away and my husband worked at home full time and we're on busy powell street and we noticed no differences. the e.i.r. also found that the new library would not obstruct any views or create negative shadows. north beach needs a new and bigger library that supports the needs of our community. it needs dedicated spaces for adults, toddlers, elementary school children and teens. there are five schools in walking distance from the north beach library. there also needs to be enough space to meet the computer needs of these patrons. the new lie library on the triangle would be almost 60% larger than the old one. along with my neighbors, many of my neighbors who couldn't be here tonight, my family and i have attended hours of community meetings regarding the library and expansion of joe dimaggio playground. the master plan includes not only a larger space for the library that meets the needs of

the community but it creates more open space and it reconfigures the park. it moves the toddler area way from the cars on busy columbus avenue and near the blacktop where care givers and families can supervise children of different ages. north beach residents need and deserve a new and bigger library. we need and deserve more open space. please approve the e.i.r. and allow construction of the library to begin. thank you. president miguel: thank you. >> hello, i'm a north beach resident, i'm a mom, i'm a student. i'm also in the representative on the council of neighborhood libraries. i wanted say that the e.i.r. is adequate and complete and we would like to get on with this process and get a new library. thanks. president miguel: thank you. ok, i will now start calling the names in the order i have them here.

jack stewart, jerry crowley, howard shavner. >> i'm a landscape architect, private practice and lived near the library for 50 years. the e.i.r. confused me a bit so i asked some of the experts i have worked with over the years to help me understand it and see if anything is missing in it. they volunteered their time to do that although they normally work for developers and get paid for doing this kind of thing. the harborist said there's no harborist report on the trees that will be demolished as in the e.i.r. petition.

the acusting said 100-foot long, two-story high sound wall on columbus avenue will alter the acoustics of columbus avenue. the building maintenance expert says that the appleton has been very badly maintained and can't be judged by its present looks. the value engineer says there's a zero sum gain involved in destroying three tennis courts and then rebuilding them new. there's no net gain there. and destroying a playground and then building it new. there's no net gain there. and destroying a building and building it new, there's no net gain there. she also points out that north beach has a lot of buildings and it doesn't need another new one. she also points out that the whole second floor of the

proposed new library is there to support one meeting room. and there are three meeting rooms within about 200 yards of the building. in terms of the seismic and handicap, there are awash for either building. both buildings require seismic and handicap. and structural and architectural i found an architect who worked -- who did a brand new building under the palace of legion of honor. actually one of my yale classmates. thank you. ok. >> good evening, president miguel:, commissioners, my name is jerry crowley. the draft e.i.r. is inadequate and incomplete because it fails

objectively to explore an analyze feasible alternatives to expand and upgrade the existing library do -- to meet the goals of the library improvement program. more significantly, the e.i.r. rejects out of hand all potential preservation northerly expansion alternatives that could clearly meet all of the goals for a new, expanded library. yet the e.i.r. fails to look at these in enough detail to justify their rejection. another significant inadequacy of the e.i.r.'s failure to look at the alternative masterplan scheme for the park. instead of taking a look at an alternative park plan configuration that would meet rec parks goals, it uses only one of those master plans as the basis to reject all of the preservational alternatives. this is supposed to be an e.i.r. master plan as well as the

library, but why will alternative park plans not analyzed? the e.i.r. makes it clear that the library staff committed long ago to demolishing the existing library and then developed a master plan for the park to fit the predetermined outcome. in conclusion we believe there are feasible alternatives to the demolition of the historic north beach library that will meet and exceed the goals of the library program in rec park. we urge you to ask the department to revise the e.i.r. to more fully consider these alternatives. thank you. president miguel: thank you. robert chamber, howard idish, janet decario. >> good evening president and commissioners, my name is howard

chapman. i urge you to approve the draft e.i.r. it is accurate, adequate and complete. i urge you to approve it so the inadequate existing library can be torn down, a state of the art, larger, warmer lighter and fully disability accessible library can be built and playground can be expanded and integrated with the new library. the draft e.i.r. is complete because the city spent over two years analyzing every impact of this project. it's accurate because it shows none of the renovation alternatives provide more space or for efficient library services, better or more integrated park or better disability access. the guidelines of historic properties defines rehabilitation as the process of returning a property to state of utility and repair or alteration which makes possible and efficient contemporary use by

preserving those portions and features of a property that is significant to its historic and architectural values. it is simply not possible to renovate the existing library to provide an efficient contemporary use. for one thing, inserting a 9 by 12 elevator shaft on each of the floors, which was being necessary for disability access would seriously compromise the openness that supposedly an important character defining feature plus that doesn't even address what would be done to make the -- the patio level accessible. you'd end up having to alter significantly a lot of the window and doors and so forth. the e.i.r. states that tearing down the building would be a significant impact but that's only if the building were deserving of land mark status, which with all due respect to the historic preservation commission, it simply is not.

absent the landmark issue, the environmental impact of the new project would not be significant. so i urge you to approve the e.i.r. thank you. president miguel: thank you. >> good evening, president miguel, commissioners. i would like to speak to the relocation of the tennis courts on the playground itself. >> state your name for the record. >> robert henish. i live across the street from the playground. i lived there 25 years. my daughter grew up on that playground. those tennis courts are located in the center of the playground for a very good reason. there's walls, high walls on three sides. they keep the noise from traveling. the voiciest aspect of that playground is the tennis courts. if you relocate those tennis courts to any other streets where there are residents, those residents are going to be impacted severely by per cussive noise starting at 7:00 in the

morning. it's not going to be easy to study, work or sleep with that tennis court along greenwich, along stockton, along lombard. it's also going to intrude into the hardscape there and i can tell you by looking at that playground, nothing is used more than that large rec tangal out there of open space. anything that intrudes on that is going to impact the kids that play on that. the majority of kids playing there are 5 and up. so if you cut into that with the tennis court, not only do you get noise, you get less use of that space for the age demographic that has most need of this. thank you for your time. i hope you'll consider i didn't read the environmental impact report. i don't know whether it addresses this issue. but i don't see how -- i just don't see how it could not be noisy with people pounding tennis balls, running and grunting at 7:00 in the morning all day long for everybody on greenwich. and then there's the kids come and run around the playground

all day. thank you. good evening. president miguel: thank you. >> good evening, commissioners. my name is karen tateson and i have either lived or owned a business, architectural practice in north beach for 20 years. the e.i.r. i did read most of it, i understood it, it is complete, accurate and adequate in evaluating the impact of the proposed project. the e.i.r. demonstrates that the community will be much better served by a new library than by renovation of the existing building. it shows that a renovated building will not achieve full parity for the disabled, that space for books and programs would be compromised and that it would result in a smaller children's playground and lezz useable open space. i think it's time to bring that building into the 21st century. i used to live a block away and use it.

the e.i.r. is complete because it evaluates multiple options for preservation of the existing building and it still demonstrates that a new building will better serve the community with universal access, improve library services and program spaces and as an architect who's worked on the park side branch, which is about to open, i can also say that i am familiar with appleton and walford and that's a really lovely building. i don't know that the north beach branch really rises to the level of land mark status. the e.i.r. is adequate because it shows that the new plan for the site will result in 12,000 square feet of new, open space. the e.i.r. is accurate because it shows that there are no significant impacts to transportation or traffic with the closing of that section of mason street and a similar diversion at 17th and castro, which was completed i think last year, has had absolutely no impact, no adverse impact on local traffic patterns. so i ask you to please accept

the e.i.r. as it's written in the draft. thank you very much. president miguel: thank you. janet decarl, lisa grivas, allison weatherall. if i called your name, come up. excuse me. angie, pat tora, mabel santiago. >> good evening, commissioners. my name is pat tora and i'm here to speak on behalf of supporting the e.i.r. as i believe it is accurate and complete. it does address the issues of the multiple preservation alternatives which were studied

thoroughly. there is an exhaustive transportation study. there's included accurate information that there is no significant impact to aesthetic character of the area scenic vistas, shadows, land use or recreation. the city conducted a comprehensive public process that was used to come up with a plan for the new library in the park. that process included hundreds of neighbors and city government stakeholders. at this time i think because the e.i.r. was -- there was so much work that went in to get to the e.i.r., that it is time to move on and to grant this community what the majority of the community has wanted for the last seven years. thank you.