orthodox school in the bay area against a fellow jewish education institute. thank you for your time. vice president miguel: thank you. >> i put 42 years into this community fighting for survival against tremendous odds. mr. sugaya, maybe you heard this name. the leaders and students from lithuania, the germans were murdering everybody and he was handing out these 6,000 visas to survive. he is my rabbi and he performed at my wedding. all i can tell you is you vote, you give them antennas, you must shut the school, you will do exactly the opposite of what's his name, sugaya did. he saved jewish lives even in

san francisco. i'm here because of mr. sugihara. my rabbi was saved by him and half of israel are being taught by jew in japan and the shanghai community. you give the antennas, you must shut us down. if you vote against it, you might go down in history as this giant, check him out on wikileaks and see what the japanese people did for us and the chinese in shanghai. we are fighting for jewish survival against tremendous odds. the jewish community does not support our tradition or education. i'm begging you do not give us antennas to shut us down. we are the only orthodox school for 400,000 jews. you heard these kids. i raised them. i put 42 years into this

community. vice president miguel: thank you, rabbi. are there any other speakers? >> i'm david, the c.e.o. of the bureau of jewish education. with your permission, since i'm the sole speaker on behalf of b.j. -- vice president miguel: i cannot. >> ok. just a few points. we have great respect and esteem for the rabbi and everything he has done to create that school. we certainly support the school. we have no intention of harming the school. we have worked with the school over the last month with the request of the commission to see if we could come to an agreement. we have with at&t's support significantly changed our proposal in a way that we

believe is not going to harm anyone at the school and is supportive of the view that there is really no radiation going to be beamed toward the school, so the earlier testimony i think was based on the previous configuration. we have removed the antennas closest to the school. the remaining antennas are going to be pointed away from the school. as far as we can tell, there is no substantial change from the status quo. thank you. vice president miguel: thank you. are there any additional speakers on this matter? if not, public comment is closed. i'm going to start this one off. first of all, thank you to everyone for heeding my consternation a month ago and actually talking to each other. that was pleasing.

i will compliment the rabbi and the school on raising students, teaching students who are excellent in expressing themselves. that doesn't always happen with high schoolers having had many in my family and having taught high school debate. i understand that. that being said, i totally disliked the comments that likened this action, possible action to a pogrom because that's not what it is. and i think those comments to me as a jew were totally out of line. they really rangel. -- wrankle. i appreciate that our director is working with the other

departments involved to try to find a new protocol. we -- the entire city or certainly the official city bodies have been pushing for this for some time. maybe it takes a while, but maybe that will happen. the only specific comment i want to mention was someone said that there was no public process for the original installation of the antennas in 1997. i have personally spoken to someone who was on the board of the jewish education at that time and there was a great deal of interaction between the two institutions and the board before that was allowed. so there was a lot of public reaction at that time.

i think that katherine who basically is head of school put it very succinctly and many of the other speakers said the same thing. what we're talking to here is not a planning issue that is what should be before this board, but a revenue issue and that is not within our -- that is not what we are part here today and i'm not going to make any comment on it as i have no idea where that is going to go and i don't think anyone else does either. i greatly appreciate at&t's involvement in the discussions in this one. i think it was proven that given a month, changes could be made and things amealated as

far as possible. i know it's going to be more work, cost more money, involve more city time for that matter in order to procedure with the full program. but that being said, i would move to proceed with the new configuration. oh, i can't do that. you're right, i'm the chair now. >> it was interesting because this week on the news, they were talking about arsenic in apple juice and that the expos you're of and it will be dr. oz was the first person to bring this to light that is arsenic in apple juice and other scientists said that's not true. it was found to be true. there are no levels of arsenic in apple juice, there is not much to be done about that. the sad thing is that everything in our food system,

our ecosystem we find out daily with new studies and new information that things aren't maybe as healthy or as helpful as we like. the problem is what do you do? do you stop? do you say i won't ever drink apple juice, i won't drink the water. it just becomes one of those endless battles. the sinse in all of these areas is unclear. the only way we can operate under is the science that we have available to us today. the truth is we all are being exposed to antennas, there are obviously none in city hall, but there are other sorts of wireless -- there are in city hall there are all kinds of wireless antennas about us all the time and it's just reality because we're in a city with complicated topography and when we have had these multiple hearings around cell phone antenna sightings, we found that because of our topography, these cell phone antennas are

needed every few blocks which is really startling, but then i look at the ipad, the iphone, all other kind of tablet devices, droids, computers, wireless network systems and so on and so on, you know, a lot of small businesses anymore, they don't even have to have a cash register. they use a wireless, the new squared system or other sort of products that are wireless to allow them to take credit cards. we're moving in an age and we're living in an age where we probably, i imagine everyone in this room probably partakes in these sort of devices and so we all say we want this and we grab for it and we go for it, but the consequences of that lifestyle that we have all chosen to be part of is that it requires infrastructure and infrastructure is antennas. nobody likes antennas and everybody time we have an antenna hearing, everyone talks about the health risks and we only have the same data that we have had for a while on it and,

you know, we hear that wireless antennas in your house may be more detrimental, who knows? but the point is we can only operate on the science that exists today, the f.c.c. regulations, and our own preference for locations which this happens to be. the other thing becomes a fairness issue. every time we have had one of these cases, people have come before us and said the health issue is the same. and so how do we say, oh, you people who we approved the antenna last week, we have determined that your health, this next group's health issue, their health is better than your health? you couldn't even get into that game of deciding that this health issue, this group of individuals' health issue is better than this one's. i don't want to be in our business. that's not our business luckily and i think that's a dangerous position to be in and for us us, it puts news a fairness factor. we have always looked at the

planning issues of our guidelines which says this is a local preference, one site. what we asked for in the last hearing was to go back and look. and i think with the removal of two of the four antennas, the two antennas that face the school and the only ones left are the ones facing away from the school seems like a really good outcome for what was -- what has been needed in this situation. the truth is, i can't say that there won't be a proposal for antennas around the corner, across the block, because it might be just and maybe you wouldn't notice because it's not on your building, but the point is that this is a constant issue that is evolving as a problem within the city, but i think we all have to look into ourselves and decide if we don't want these antennas, then how do we live our lives in a way that don't require them. i just think that that's something we all have to ask ourselves in that sort of place. we all say we want -- we call

complain about oil companies, but then we drive cars that require oil and take flights all over the world all the time. i'm not saying that makes people bad. i'm just saying that the reality is that our decision-making doesn't always support what we say our priorities are and i think that, you know, really to affect change, we have to make those sort of decisions. i know that we had, as we said before with these antennas, at&t will make sure and i want to make sure we request this in this case that they go to the school after the antennas are installed, it's exactly to the first speakers comments and take readings and maybe there is some sort of -- i know the bureau had some conversation if they thought it was detrimental or the levels are too high, maybe you can work that out here. there is a way to take readings in the building after the antennas are installed. i don't know if they would also look at this independent consultant idea thing that came

up earlier to talk about it. that's for you all to decide. in an earlier case there was something an independent consultant comes in to look at the data about coverage maps. i don't know if you want to engage in that. from the standpoint of what we asked to be done a month ago and what has been accomplished today, i can say that it's been done. i think that, it's very hard from the land use standpoint is this the land use, is this the site for this? it says it's a local preference one in our sighting guidelines and the health issue is not one for this commission. i have long advocated for the health department to have hearings on cell phone antennas so the public can understand how they find the public exposure limit to be what it is and make that determination, but that is something that i can't, i don't have privy to make a decision based upon. so i understand that people don't like it. they're not happy about this.

again, the real choice rests with the bureau of jewish education that can always make a different decision because, just because we pass this conditional use doesn't require them to do it, but i think from our standpoint, we have kind of exhausted the issues that we can on this point. i just, i just would say that -- it does concern me. i work in technology and it does concern me that the kind of hysteria a little bit about this issue because i think while there might be some legitimate concerns, i think that to ratchet the conversation up to the level that it's been is really, it is scary, i can understand why people are scared and i understand that people have different cultural lives and places and things that have happened to them that might influence how they feel about this, but i would just say that, i mean, as a school and really studying the science and having the kids look at the

science about this thing would be an important thing to remember in this because we can't lose sight of that. i think we all know that there is a lot to be learned in that space and maybe one of the kids will come up with the ground-breaking research in this area. i just think that that's, i would like to really encourage us to kind of bring it back to that. vice president miguel: commissioner antonini. commissioner antonini: thank you. could i talk to the representative from at&t? why don't we start with you, ma'am, i might talk to you mr. hammond. i guess there was a presentation made at the beginning of the -- our discussion from the gentleman who was talking about the radio frequency levels and i just was wondering what the distance is that we feel is a safe distance

for radio frequency and it seems as though we're dealing with, i think it was a 57-foot space between the school aped denied also i understand there has been a moving from the antennas to a different location and the distances are greater. if you could elaborate on that and mr. hammond, or the fellow from hammond edison wants to add some comments. >> sure, i'm with at&t. the 57 feet was actually the old configuration, so the antennas are on the north eastern side of the bureau of jewish education, which is one building. then there is a building in the center and then there is the academy. so it's quite a distance, but i'm going to turn the mic over to mr. erickson with hammond edison to answer any questions that you have around that. commissioner antonini: sure. that's great. so now what is the distance

from the antenna to the location where most of the children would be? >> let me clarify that 57-foot distance is unchanged. that's how close you could get to these antennas if you were up in the air and then the main beam. commissioner antonini: ok. >> but normally, that would require somebody in a cherrypicker or on a ladder or something like that. commissioner antonini: right. not to interrupt, but i think the gentleman said that the beam is sometimes directed at a downward angle. >> you have to understand these are four different free consequences si bands involved here, so there are four sets of elevation patterns and four sets of azimoth patterns. it's a complex set of three-dimensional calculations. i agree that it's more than just what the predicted maximum is at ground level. that certainly has to comply with the federal standard.

but also any nearby buildings have to be taken into account and the height of the building and our studies do take that into account. the northwest face of the school, previously at the face of the building, that's the second story, the calculated maximum was 3.2% of the public exposure limit. it's now .04%, that's 80 times lower. and further, you could expect about another 10-fold reduction inside the building. and by all means, once the cell site is built, there are calibrated meters which we maintain and you can go in and do actual measurements. commissioner antonini: ok. so you did say at one time, your safe distance if you're hovering in space is 57 feet and what is our distance now

from the antennas to the school ? >> i don't have that exact distance, but they calculated at 3.2% previously and now -- commissioner antonini: presumably and also the fact is that the school is not at a direct angle at the level that is in space of the antenna? >> correct, from the two remaining antennas, they no longer have line of sight. however, we assumed what's called free space path loss which could be conservative calculations. commissioner antonini: ok, following that up, there were two existing or are two existing antennas from singular from 1997 and those are no longer operational, i would assume? >> that's my understanding. >> do you have any idea how much radio frequency these two antennas were putting out over the years? >> well, they would have been

required to meet the f.c.c. public limit, even back then. >> i guess what i'm getting at is the fact that you have to, even the low level that you're having now, you have to also factor in and subtract whatever that level was because you're taking away what was there before. >> yes, i understand your question. the calculations have to take into account any other existing two-way antenna, cellular, whatever, it's the aggregate of the exposure. however, since it follows a square law, typically once you get more than a few hundred feet, you're down to thousands or tens of thousands of time below the public limit. commissioner antonini: so what we did also in addition to moving the antennas, there is a decrease in the number of

antennas, is that what you're saying at this site? are there still six proposed or fewer now, down to four? >> yeah. commissioner antonini: down to four. you're netting a net increase of two antennas in a location that's quite a ways further from the school. ok, i just wanted to establish that because i think there have been significant changes on that and i don't know that it wasn't a problem before, but it's even more remote now with the changes you made. >> that's correct. commissioner antonini: thank you. and the other thing, sir, while you're here and it may be a question for at&t, but would you be receptive with at&t be receptive to checking the levels inside the school afterward to assure that it is, in fact, what has been projected? >> we're certainly available to do those measurements if requested by at&t. commissioner antonini: i think it would be a good thing to do if you do that.

i think you are asked sometimes to do those after installation. >> it's actually a regulation. we have 10 days from the day that we turn on the site to go out and test and to turn those measurements into the department of public health. and then subsequent, every two years, we have a requirement to do testing and turn those results into the department of public health and anytime we go out and/or make a change to the antenna, we also have to test and submit results. commissioner antonini: ok. i know we have already done this and we found out that we have done a lot of other sites were surveyed in the area, of course, and found to not be as successful as other sites as the case with this site? >> you mean alternative sites? commissioner antonini: yes, very good. vice president miguel: i'm sorry, public comment is closed. >> can i ask a question first? vice president miguel: no. i will allow you to come -- >> unless you are directly

requested to speak, you can't speak. >> i don't know what the question is. >> the question is whether or not i can make a rebuttal? >> no, i already heard your comments the first time and i know what you said, so thank you, thank you. vice president miguel: i'm sorry. public comment is closed. >> was there a motion? she agreed to make the motion. >> i made the motion. >> can i say something to your comments about -- >> he is seconded it. [[inaudible] >> aye. >> aye. >> aye. >> aye. >> aye.

>> this motion passes. >> [inaudible] >> your mic. commissioners, your now on item number 11. 1737 post street, suite 300 also known as 11 peace plaza. >> good evening, members of the planning commission. sharon young planning department staff. the item before you is a request for discretionary review involves the change of use of a vacant space previously occupied by a retrail store into a small self-service restaurant located within the interior of

japantown center kitt mall in the n.c. 3 neighborhood district and the 50-x height and bulk district. the restaurant was approximately 490 square feet in floor area which consists of a sales and service area, kitchen and storage area. restaurant seating will be provided within the interior courtyard of the mall. the applicant has also filed a separate permit to legalize improvements that have already been created in the commercial space. the request for review was filed by the japanese cultural and community center, a neighborhood organization located at 1840 souther street, two blocks north of the subject property. the d.r. requesters are primarily concerned that the small self-service restaurant appears to qualify with the use requiring conditional use authorization. the proposed self-service restaurant are in the controls of the special use district and

the proposed small self-service restaurant, speciallizing in selling stharks and desserts, within the commercial establishments of the japantown center and would not contribute to an overconcentration of small quick food outlets which currently exist in the mall. the requesters that have indicated that without changing what the caffey is, changes could be implemented. the project sponsors will provide a response to the d.r. requesters concern in their presentation. the restaurant is the personalitied use on the first ground story under planning code section 712.44. section 703.3 of the planning code defines a retail use as a type of retail sales activity, retail sales establishment which has 11 or more retail establishments located in the united states and contains two

or more of the following centers. a centerized array of merchandise, color scheme, uniform apparel, standard diced signage and a trademark or service mark. the planning departments has identified the corporation as qualified as a retail use under the planning code. it also appears to quality as a retail use under the planning code since it appears to be a trademark of the corporation. the project sponsor had modified his original plan indicating that the small self-service restaurant will be under the name k.b. cafe and complete a formal retail affidavit and provided information that is won't be a former retail use. because the proposed 490 square foot small self-service restaurant will update the space at the mall, it will not

significantly affect the existing cultural and historic integrity neighborhood character, the patent and design aesthetic of the japantown special use district and will support one of the purposes for establishing the japantown special use district by revitalizing the economic diversity of the neighborhood by occupying a vacant commercial tenant space with a new business. in addition, under the current draft japantown plan, the proposed project would be consistent with the development framework vision for space with high traffic shops and restaurants and consistent with maintaining a significant number of small spaces with its small retail use size of 490 square feet and currently under the draft neighborhood plan and japantown special use district controls do not include development objectives or requirements regarding the concentration and mix of commercial establishments listed in the japantown special

use district and japantown center malls. the planning department and the planning commission take discretionary review and approve the project with conditions. this concludes my presentation. vice president miguel: thank you. d.r. requester. >> good evening, commissioners. my name is robert, i'm speaking on behalf of the petitioner for discretionary review. paul is the center's executive director is recovering from surgery and is unable to attend. i have a letter with the text of my presentation to give to you as well. this is a leading commune-based organization dedicated to the preservation, conservation and vitalization of japantown. it's been active member of the japantown planning process and