>> for more information, visit sfartscommis

>> you will need to either take a seat or leave the room because we need to have the whole is clear. the m4 hundred 21.

-- room 421. thank you. good evening and welcome to the march 16, 2011 meeting of the san francisco board of appeals. the presiding officer is board vice president michael garcia. joining him on the dais is commissioner chris hwang, tanya peterson, and commissioner fung. president goh is absent because of a family emergency. to my right is the board clerk. i am the board's executive

director. we have representatives from some city departments who will be speaking this evening. laurence kornfield is here. joseph duffy will be representing the department of building inspector. scott sanchez is here, representing the planning department and planning commission. he is joined by planner dan sider. carla short is here representing the bureau of urban forestry. john hwang is representing street use and mapping. i will go over the meeting guidelines. the board requests you turn off all cellular phones so they will not disturb the proceedings. please carry on conversations in the hallway. appellants, permit holders, and department respondents each have seven minutes to present their

cases and three minutes for a bottle. people affiliated with these parties must include the comments within this. members of the public who are not affiliated with the parties have up to three minutes each to address the board, and no rebuttal. please speak into the end of the microphone. you're asked but not required to submit a speaker card or business card to stop when you come up to speak. speaker cards are available on the podium. the board welcomes your comments and suggestions. there are forms on the podium for your convenience. if you have a question about requesting a rehearing or a hearing scheduled, please speak to step during a break or call or visit the office. we're located at 16 is the mission street room 304 -- 1650 mission street room 304. this is rebroadcast fridays at 4:00 on channel 26. the beebes are available for

purchase. -- dvds are available for purchase. if you intend to testify, please stand, raise your right hand, and say "i do." do you solemnly swear the testimony you are about to give will be the whole truth? thank you. vice-president garcia, members of the board, we have one housekeeping item this evening, in regard to item 4f, a jurisdiction request. this matter has been withdrawn and will not be heard this evening. we can move into item one, public comment. is there any member of the public wishes to speak on an item that is not on tonight's agenda. i believe mr. kornfield will speak under that item. >> members of the board, staff,

and the "the deputy director of the department of building inspection. the department will be sending other representatives to the board. it has been my great pleasure to come here. it has been 22 years representing the department of building inspection as chief building inspector and deputy director. it has been the most fun of my job at the department of building inspection. it is an interesting, intellectually challenging job you do. i want to thank you for that opportunity and the great pleasure of being here. i am sure you will be well served by staff who will continue to come. i should mention i will be working with a city administrator under the mayor's office on the earthquakes of the implementation program starting in may, to see if we can move

the city forward in earthquake safety projects. thank you very much. vice president garcia: thank you, mr. kornfield. commissioner fung: since i third met mr. kornfield in 1986, he and i both had darker hair, and i would like to thank him for his service not only to the city, but also in terms of what he added in the discussions and decision making of this board. thank you, mr. kornfield. vice president garcia: i feel sometimes i have been here a long time, and i have been here only a fourth of the time of mr. kornfield. i always felt we were in capable hands when you stood before us. there were plenty of times when you help us work out solutions to problems we were having as to where we needed to go.

i am very crippled for the service in the past. i will -- i am very grateful for the service in the past. good luck. commissioner peterson: i want to congratulate you on the new position. you have been a gentleman. it was a pleasure to work with you. thank you for all your service to our city. commissioner hwang: i have had the least experience with you, but when cynthia sent us the e- mail saying you are no longer with us, i said this is such a bummer. in my short time working on this board, i have appreciated your input and the education. thank you. vice president garcia: thank you. >> is there any other comment under this item? seeing none, will move on to item two, commissioner comments and questions. commissioners? seeing none, item three, the

adoption of minutes. but for you for consideration are the minutes of march 9, 2011. vice president garcia: seeing no comments, i move we adopt the findings. >> the minutes? vice president garcia: thank you. >> seen no public comment, i will call the roll. commissioner fung: aye. commissioner peterson: aye. commissioner hwang: aye. >> president goh is absent. the motion carries 4-0. moving to item 4a, adoption of findings for the property at grant avenue, also known as 460 greene street. crown importune properties -- fortune properties.

the board voted to grant an appeal and overrule the zoning administrator with the adoption of findings at a later time. notice of violation and penalty dated august 17, 2010, addressed to pgb regarding the business professional service use in violation of the planning code. the indication i have received from the zoning administrator and the appellant is that they are in agreement with the language of the findings as written. at this time, you can ask to hear from them if you wish. otherwise, if you have any revisions to suggest, you can bring them forward in the can be entertained. public comment on the adoption of findings? seeing none, we need emotion. commissioner fung: move their adoption. >> motion by commissioner fung

to adopt the findings as written. vice president garcia: aye. commissioner peterson: aye. commissioner hwang: aye. >> thank you. findings are adopted. we'll move on to item 4b, which i will like -- will now call. jurisdiction request. the subject property is on filbert street. we received a letter asking the board allowed the filing of appeals against the building permit applications, which for all issued on january 31, 2011. all were issued pursuant to a conditional use authorization

and thus unappealable under the city charter. the permit holders are dominique lahaussios and david low. the project it is renovation and remodeling of existing landmark cottages and an artist's studio , and addition of a garage. the matter was continued to allow for the sub middle -- submittal of additional evidence. that was provided to you in your packets and by e-mail. you should have hard copies on the dais. we will not take additional comment from the parties unless there are questions from commissioners. vice president garcia: this any commissioner of the question of either one of the parties? commissioner fung: i have a question for the jurisdiction

requestor. >> ms. brandt-hawley? >> good evening. commissioner fung: i saw your submission, but i was not quite sure what you were trying to say with it. if you could be sent and explain why you provided this particular -- if you could be succinct and explain why you provided these particular materials. >> the plans were revised. the of original plans show a retaining wall being totally replaced. the plans were revised. he was given a copy by the planning department in october. the revised plans show going

around his retaining wall. he was told the project would not touch the retaining wall without his permission. we were showing you that this is what we have been concerned about. the plans were changed and there has been no oversight. the materials given to us by mr. junius have given a lot of new information we did not have before. the approved plans, unknown to us, have gone back to completely replacing the retaining wall. there is an easement agreement we did not realize was an issue. they do not have a right to take away his retaining wall. they also submitted a report by mr. lewis, which in essence agrees with dr. parks' report. it has limited discussion of groundwater and did not do it well. that underscores the problem we have here. i do not know if you will permit

me to talk about the building commission appeal. i did check with them, because there are questions from the board about that. normally, they did not accept appeals of building permits. normally, it must be a decision regarding an application. in this case, we have the permits already issued and it would be too late. i would certainly ask that you leave the question of jurisdiction open to see if we are allowed to go before them or not. we believe the proper jurisdiction is here. commissioner fung: thank you. commissioner peterson: do you want to give the permit holder a moment to respond? commissioner fung: that is only fair. commissioner hwang: would you talk about the change to the retaining wall drawings you just described?

you said it very quickly. we also did not request any written comments and i am hearing it for the first time. >> we just understood in the last couple of days, through the sieve middle of mr. -- through mr. junius, that there is a change to the retaining wall. we thought the plants were what was handwritten, revised. we have just learned is that the plans that were now approved show the wall like the original, is my understanding. somehow, it that changed back from the revised plans, which were never approved. that was actually approved, something else that requires the will to be taken down. this is news to us. that is why i have a copy of the easement agreement i would be happy to submit to you. the cannot legally take down that wall. that is what the current plans,

i believe, show. commissioner hwang: on that issue, mr. sanchez, would you be able to speak to that? no. who here from which department could talk about those plans? were they taken in reverse, such that the retaining wall is going to be removed? >> removed and replaced. commissioner hwang: that is what was originally proposed? i am confused. >> it was originally proposed. they do not have permission to do that. somehow, they are back to the original. it is so confusing. we do not know why or how that happened. in october, we were given the plans we marked as revised. commissioner hwang: if you have an easement issue, you would have a different avenue of recourse. >> i do not even know what that

is. it just seems if they are going to replace the wall -- there are a couple of different issues. one is the permission to replace the ball. the bottom-line issue is that no one has looked at the ground water issues that i guess to keep the underwater -- to keep the underground garage dry, we now have the applicant's report that concurs that the groundwater study had one line about ground water, that is in the letter from mr. junius. no one has analyzed it in any independent forum like this. commissioner hwang: thank you. >> we will hear from mr. junius now. >> i am here on behalf of the permit holders and project sponsors. let me start with just the basic

premise that what we provided in our pocket where the approved conditional use plans and the approved building plans, and the fragments of plans that were produced by susan were in between those. there were clearly, from the time that we got approval at the planning commission to the time the building permit was issued -- a lot of things happened. a lot of permits had to get prepared. the foundation permits, the architectural permits, a lot more drawings in process right now and being planned checked. the sequence of events was essentially as follows. we worked for almost three years with mr. dimartini to get an agreement we thought we could get. we got that arm for other properties. we are working fine with them.

we are going to do a different foundation system with respect to the retaining wall. it did not happen here. after the planning commission approved the project, we had to shift gears on the foundation issue for that corner of the property. we thought about encasing it and doing an little bit of a different approach. we thought more about it as the process went forward and we were getting ready to have the building permits issued and the structural done. we finally decided that since the retaining wall is at least 2 feet on our property, it is our retaining wall and parts of it can be removed and improved. we have a structural engineer who is happy to talk more about the details with respect to the foundation issue. i think back to the primary issue of jurisdiction. the permits that are before you are connected to the site permit set. these are the drawings that need to be consistent with the cu.

the technical issues that come after this are not appealable. susan is trying to appeal those aspects of the project when the basic issue is that the site permits that must be consistent with and issued pursuant to the cu set. happy to answer more questions. vice president garcia: mr. duffy, if you would sir. one issue that has been raised by the request for jurisdiction has to do with seeping of water from one property to another property. that is against code, correct? or that the case, that would have to be corrected. >> that is correct. i would imagine that going through the review at dbi by structural engineers down there