please, commissioners, this is for my knowledge and thank you for your valuable time. president miguel: additional speakers in favor of the project sponsor? >> there is an argument that they are a chain store, but there are already chain stores in japan town mall, the japanese bookstore is an international chain. kabuki hotel is owned by a

corporation that owns a chain of hotels. there is the emerson bakery. where is the problem in having a store open when they are loosely affiliated. thank you. president miguel: are there additional speakers in favor of the project sponsor? >> i am here to support the applicant for his project. japan has many different restaurants but does not have any place i deal for this uncertainty.

i have friends the and on businesses in japan town, and it would only be beneficial. i support this asian business opening in japan town. thank you. president miguel: are there additional speakers in support of the project sponsor? >> my name is crystal, i am coming here to support the project sponsor. many of my friends enjoy japanese culture a lot. we also visit places ichiban and others. we go to the other side of gary

boulevard to purchase chinese desert and have a cup of my favorite chinese tea. it would be cool -- since it is a little dangerous. president miguel: are there additional speakers? >> my name is mary, and i am here to support the project sponsor. personally, i love to go to japan town with my friends and we love to go there. we love puddings and smoothies. the other dessert place are mainly selling crepes and yogurt. it doesn't offer crepes or yogurt.

it does not create any direct competition to the shopping center. thank you for your time. president miguel: are there additional speakers in favor of the project sponsor? if not, d.r. requester has a two-minute rebuttal. >> i will be brief. i have heard nothing really that this use the information we provided to this commission that mr. liu is in direct ownership base k is aobe the bent -- of the kobe bento chains. the excerpts from the website were intended to show the permeable relationship with which he is associated.

he says he is independent, but we have seen nothing to anything else that indicates he is nothing but trading on the relationship with the chain. that is precisely what the formula retail restrictions are designed to limit, and that should be done here. the signal to the public is that this is through the trademark service images that he claims are totally different. the public will be quite clear as to who this entity is associated with. that is the critical link in establishing the elements of a formula retail. how does the public perceive this?

that image is how it is marketed to the public. it is not something that is supposed to be part -- we asked the commission to deny a permit. president miguel: project sponsor, you have two minutes. >> first of all, i need to clarify, kobe bento is owned by me. we have no franchise whatsoever. we have support from the community. the nature of my application,

please give me this an opportunity to serve the community. the cafe is a different concept it is owned by me. i don't have any franchise. thank you, commissioners. president miguel: i just heard it again. kobe bento is owned by me. commissioner borden? commissioner borden: i tried to give the project sponsor the benefit of the doubt, but everything has been unclear from the start.

we ask you this serving, the menu, it changed, and it seems like there is an attempt to start what they'd be a conditional use process. i am frustrated by the fact that in the time that you had, you did not reach out to the community and try to work with them. we said we wanted you to work with the community at talk about your concept and figure out a way that there can be some sort of common ground, but you did not do that. the evidence shows that there may be evidence that what you want to do is open a kobe bento. you kept referring to kobe bento. the issue that i have is dishonesty. pick a side whether or not there should be formula retail, but there isn't an honest answer. it has been changing back and forth, and even one of the

speakers mentioned that there is -- even if there is a loose relationship, that is not the point. if you are circumventing the process, that is the issue. it doesn't give us faith that you will be a good business operator if you do legal work on the space, if you don't reach out and have a community outreach meetings like all businesses are asked to do when they go to a space. they're going to be formally retail but not apply in the process to do that. i don't know what the truth is and i should not have to figure it out. commissioner moore: when this commission continued the item, that was a real gesture of supporting the applicant to do what we mostly need to have done, that is clarity and what

you are applying for, i will not go as far as speaking about lives, it is something i do not feel comfortable doing. i will say there is something seriously lost in translation. to the extent that the applicant does not understand the process, he doesn't seem to have anybody that helps them, he is unclear what the rules are and i can interpret any rule on my own and say that i am right. it is for that very reason that i don't have any feeling that i

can approve this project. [unintelligible] it was leaving it open and giving room for dialogue. i don't feel that their response today was anything that has moved by an inch. it is for that reason that i would like to take the d.r. and deny the project. >> second. commissioner sugaya: i would like to agree with both of the other commissioners, part of the issue that have been the last time, this was before us, and i noticed there was no representative of the landlord. they purchased and the japan center a number of years ago. it prompted concerns on part of

the japan town community. supervise mirkarimi authored a special use district that is in effect there now. the the new owners decided to participate in the japan town better neighborhoods plan. after that process, but after a number of years and when the draft came to the commission had and was sent back for additional work, 3-d dropped out of the picture weather for economic reasons or anything else. the unfortunate thing is that their property is crucial to the future of japan town and to not

have landlord participation is extremely disturbing to me. and to have that the landlord fully knowledgeable about the city's process and what it takes and to not have worked a little bit more closely with the community and with this particular gentleman who proposed his business there seems to me to be an little bit on a businesslike. that is directed towards a landlord. in any case, i think that this complicates matters immensely that we have this kind of situation existing. >> i am in agreement with the other commissioners. the whole thing is process. had this been brought forward as

an application as part of a formula retail, there are times when the form of a retail establishment can bring people to an area that would normally be there but this is coming in kind of back door and i don't think that is proper. >> i am also and support of the other commissioners and particularly the remarks of commissioner sugaya. we have in front of us from time to time all types of building landlords from what can be turned slum landlords to landlords who care nothing about their property and in this case we have a landlord that cares nothing about the city as far as i can see as well as who they have as their property

manager who allowed construction to go on on their property without proper permits and to go through that process and never come before us in order to explain any circumstances whatsoever. that would at least give us some indication that they care. to me, that is terrible. they are still not here. i must presume that they have no consideration of their current or anticipated tenants whatsoever. again, as i said at the very beginning of our remarks, the last words that i heard out of the project sponsor's mouth and

i wrote them down at the weigh exactly the quote last time he was here. -- i wrote them down echoing exactly the "last time he was here. >> we suggest that should you exercise your powers, one of the primary findings that the proposal is extraordinary and unusual particularly in that this is not consistent with the purposes and intent of japan town. "no one can say it better than you did. -- a >> no one can say it better than you did.

>> commissioners, the motion on the floor is to take discretionary review in light of this proposal with the finding that has been articulated by the acting zoning administrator. >> aye. >> aye. >> aye. >> aye. >> aye. >> aye. >> that passes unanimously. you are now on item number 17 has. >> i have to ask for board recusal. a company that i work for provided some design assistants

to the assistance of the client therefore there is a conflict of interest. i did not work on it or anything. >> move to recuse commissioner sugaya. >> aye. >> aye. >> aye. >> aye. >> aye. >> aye. >> to discretionary review has been filed in an alteration permit application. alterations along the rear facade are proposed. a discretionary review was filed by the owner west of the project. his concerns are primarily that this is out of scale and would

adversely affect neighborhood character and he also has some light and shadow concerns. to this date, the department has received 8 letters of support hong then all of those are from other side of rico way. the department head is not fine need to be exceptional or extraordinary. they are not averse and we recommend that the commission approved the project as proposed. >> thank you. dr requester. >> good evening.

i represent the requester. we have the proposal of a third story addition to this building. and this would add an additional floor of occupancy. the project has significant impact on the streetscape of ri co way. this is only 26 feet wide of pavement. there are nine houses on this side of the street.

this is the side of the street we are talking about. there are nine buildings. they are all two story. there are a number of buildings including our building that has a penthouse. this is set so far back that you cannot see it from the street. this building is interested in the right in the middle of this line of nine buildings. this is very low scale, lots of light and so on and so forth on this side of the street. what this project will do is that it will be easily very readily available and observable from the street of a large

addition on the roof and it will change the character of that side of the streets significantly. what we are fearing is that we will set a precedent. this is the building of the project. as you can see, these are architectural details on the roof that were put there when the buildings were originally built to have a low skill residential feeling. according to our calculations indicates what we will see from the street once this project is put in. it will be out of character with everything else on the block.

in addition, we have a beautiful deck and this is what is seen today. this has a wonderful view and so on and so forth. this is what we project. the wall will take a significant portion away of the airiness of the deck and that would be the consequence. here is an isometric indicating the scale of this development in relationship to our property that we are on. what we are requesting today and is that a portion of this front be pulled back no more than five or 6 feet. we feel that it would be less observable from the street and will have less impact on our deck and it will also protect

the resources, which is the streetscape. we don't have too many of these in san francisco anymore. this is one area in a small street and this is very very handsome. this fits in very nicely with the streetscape. that is what our concern is today. >> thank you. >> speakers in support of the dr requester. >> you have had a very long day. i owned the building. i bought it in early 2003. when we understood that troy and

mary wished to improve their building, we were delighted, they are the third young couple to live there since we have been there and we're hoping that they will live next to us for a long time, however, we're asking for only two changes to their project. this is the view of my building on the left and they're building on the right as it exists now. that picture was taken this week. this was drawn from the documents that were distributed by your department in october

showing how we believe the third floor will look. this is the view that we expect if they build out the project as it is currently drawn. my question to you is why should i have to look at this wall and why should this third floor loom over the street? why should improve in their building, which i am in turley in favor of, why should that impinge on my enjoyment? we are asking for those two changes to be brought back and for that wall to be brought back in for the wall to be reduced. >> thank you. >> additional speakers in favor

of the dr. >> good evening, commissioners. every week, i hear stories about a neighborhood keep a special and hearing special treatment -- and requiring special treatment. the subdivision are not on the san francisco grid. all of these were stucco, tiled roof, flat trams. many have been changed by misguided improvement, the northeast side reflects the original concept. the houses still appear small in size because the upper floors

are set back and are low enough in height. you just don't see them from the street or you minimally see them. i have been walking towards san francisco for more than 20 years with city guides and visitors and residents often comment that it is the distinctions that make the city special and we don't treat our city like so many others. i am not against change. i am excited that they want to improve their place but it should be wise change. there is no reason to break the current streetscape. this is the same picture that you saw before.

we can expand at a lower height but with more of a setback. besides changing the streetscape, this proposal will drastically change our upper deck. since our rear yard as to the north, it does not get much sun. the upper deck is our major up your space -- outdoor space. this is spoken of as a small addition but as you can see here, this is number 66, our house. this is their addition. please help retain an area and makes san francisco special and require that this conform to the neighborhoods housing and height and setback.