need to have aren't their home. >> it is important to have extra every day items buy a couple extra cans of can food that you can eat without any preparation. >> here is a giant can of green giant canned corn. and this, a manual can opener, your electric can opener will not be working not only to have one but to know where to find it in your kitchen. >> yes. >> so in addition to canned goods, we are going to have fresh food and you have to preserve that and i know that we have an ice chest. >> having an ice chest on hand is really important because your refrigerator will not be working right away. it is important to have somebody else that can store cold foods so something that you might be able to take with you if you have to leave your home. >> and here, this is my very own personal emergency supply box for my house. >> i hope that you have an alternative one at home. >> oh, i forgot. >> and in this is really important, you should have

flashlights that have batteries, fresh batteries or hand crank flashlight. >> i have them right here. >> good. excellent. that is great. additionally, you are going to want to have candles a whistle, possibly a compass as well. markers if you want to label things if you need to, to people that you are safe in your home or that you have left your home. >> i am okay and i will meet you at... >> exactly. exactly. water proof matches are a great thing to have as well. >> we have matches here. and my spare glasses. >> and your spare glasses. >> if you have medication, you should keep it with you or have access to it. if it needs to be refrigerated make sure that it is in your ice box. >> inside, just to point out for you, we have spare batteries. >> very important. >> we have a little first aid kit. >> and lots of different kinds of batteries. and another spare flashlight.

>> so, alicia what else can we do to prepare our homes for an earthquake so we don't have damage? >> one of the most important things that you can do is to secure your valuable and breakable items. make sure that your tv is strapped down to your entertainment cabinet or wall so it does not move. also important is to make sure that your book case is secure to the wall so that it does not fall over and your valuable and breakables do not break on the ground. becoming prepared is not that difficult. taking care of your home, making sure that you have a few extra every-day items on hand helps to make the difference. >> that contributes dramatically to the way that the city as a whole can recover. >> absolutely. >> if you are able to control your own environment and house and recovery and your neighbors are doing the same the city as a whole will be a more resilient city. >> we are all proud of living in san francisco and being prepared helps us stay here. >> so, thank you so much for joining us today, alicia, i

appreciate it. >> absolutely, it is my pleasure. >> and thank you for joining us on another edition of building

>> good morning. today is wednesday, march 20th, 2013. this is the regular meeting of the building inspection commission. i would like to remind everyone to turn off all electronic devices. the first item on the agenda is

roll call. vice president mar? >> here. >> commissioner lee? >> here. >> commissioner walker? >> here. >> commissioner mccray? >> present. >> commissioner clinch, president mccarthy, and president melgar are all excused. we have a quorum. and the next item on the agenda is president's announcements. >> okay. president mccarthy is with his family in ireland for st. patrick's day and we hope he has a speedy and safe return. the first item in regards to the announcements is that acting director tom hui participated recently in a field inspection with the mayor and members of the sfp.u.c. and other city agencies at the 15th avenue where the water main leak occurred and caused major damage to some homes. dbi had to red tag three homes

there and place yellow tags and restricted access on others. acting director hui also joined the mayor and other city officials in a meeting with the community and explained how dbi would help expedite the permits required to make the repairs. i think a lot of us read about that. soil problem there with the sink hole in the papers, and that's where that took place. sfpuc is planning to lease a store front on west portal avenue. dbi will have information and staff to respond to the neighbors, questions, as well as to provide updates as we get them. building inspector mark walls will be the dbi's designated representative once the store front is operational. the other thing i wanted to announce was that there was a

special thanks to building inspector tom kessler who represented dbi at a special town hall hosted by supervisor mar on accessibility compliance for small businesses. that was held on saturday, march 2nd, at the richmond branch library. town hall was part of an effort to educate the small businesses on steps they can take to minimize or prevent drive by lawsuits on accessibility issues. another of our staff, vivian fong and evelyn of planning review also received letters of appreciation from customers that they helped who they felt went above and beyond the call of duty. so, we want to thank them for their work. the dbi also -- i guess i'll hold this because we're going to talk about it on the agenda. briefly, the dbi distributed abbreviation forms for new employee recognition programs that we wanted to start for the

quarter, but we'll discuss that more because it's agendized. and finally, the dbi has been working with the san francisco carnival business reporters carolyn said on an upcoming article about recovering local economy from dbi permit issuance. since the uptick in the amount of permits we've been issuing on buildings is probably a good sign in terms of how the economy is going, so, that's going to be an article that's going to be coming out soon. i guess that's it for the report today. >> is there any public comment on the president's announcements? okay. seeing none, item 3, general public comment. the bic will take public comment on matters within the jurisdiction that are not part of this agenda. ~ is there any public available?

seeing none, we will move on to item number 4. discussion and possible action to elect bic officers. 4a, waiver of bic rules to hold bic offer certificate election on a different date, 4b, election of president, 4c, election of vice president. >> so, we wanted to get some action on waiving the rules of the commission because we wanted to postpone the election of the board president and vice president till the next meeting when more commissioners could be present. >> i move to waive the rules and hold our officer elections at the next meeting to accommodate a full commission. >> i second that. >> we have a motion and a second to waive the rules. is there any public comment on this item?

are all commissioners in favor? >> aye. >> any opposed? the motion carries. item number 5, discussion of mou between dbi and the san francisco housing authority and the housing tenant complaint report process. >> thank you. i guess i was the one that asked that this be put on the agenda because, as we've all read about, there's been a lot of reports of problems at some of the housing projects in san francisco and there is an m-o-u between the hud and the dbi in term of the inspections that we're supposed to do if there's any violations and stuff or repairs or any tenant complaints. so, i wanted to get an update on how we've been dealing with

novs, how many novs we've gotten and whether some of those problems have been abated. >> thank you, members of the commission. good morning, rosemary boss key, chief housing expecter. you have before you the ongoing tracking table that we created upon the execution and adoption of the m-o-u between the housing authority, the san francisco housing authority and the department of building inspection. it deals exclusively with complaints that are received by the department of building inspection. this m-o-u does not address complaints that go through a 311 directly through to the housing authority or complaints that the residents of housing authority buildings make directly to the housing authority. so, as you can see from 2007 on to date, we have received approximately 195 complaints. and we have in a detailed

fashion documented the time we have spent on these cases, by inspector, by clerical. we have also cat groined some of the complaints for you so you can see whether they involved heat, hot water, mold, plumbing, electrical, leaks, painting, roaches, bed bugs, rodents and other so that you could get a sense of the percentage in when we received the case and when we sent it on to the housing authority. ~ the m-o-u pretty much essentially assigns the protocol as to when we receive it. we communicate that to them by e-mail. and that they have so much time to respond or give us an action plan. and, so, you have the entire program before you within the spreadsheet. a lot of times, sometimes things take longer to do because the housing authority, if it's a public housing building, may be doing a complete redesign of the building and they may have relocated an individual. so, in those situations we try and [inaudible] that for you to

give you a sense of if something took longer why it might have been the situation. or say it was a heat complaint why we didn't write a notice or do an inspection. it may have been that the individual was relocated soon after the complaint was made. or maybe because it was an anonymous complaint, something like that. so, we weren't quite able to get access. so, if there are any questions, this is where we are right now. and as you can see, we have in this program so far about 153 inspector hours and about 50 hours of clerical time in implementing the m-o-u at least on the dbi end of things. >> commissioner walker. >> thank you for this. i think that this partnership is one that's really important for us and the people living in these buildings. has the housing authority provided a list of their violations to you? i mean, do you guys work in a

partnership two ways, or is this just stuff that comes to us? >> the m-o-u only deals with complaints that individuals within housing authority buildingses have made directly to dbi. anything with respect to -- one of their constituents making a complaint directly to them or through 311, that has been sent to them. we don't have knowledge of. we would not be -- this would be just like any other constituent. they could get complaint to dbi. >> and, so, we don't -- our m-o-u does not include doing like routine visits? >> not at this time. >> not at this time. >> and that is [speaker not understood] policy from the previous directors. >> when the tenant is relocated, so, somebody complains, the response is let's move this person out, do we follow-up to see if somebody else has moved in? >> yes. >> [speaker not understood]. >> generally we'll follow-up with that. and if the unit is left vacant

or a series of units are left vaedthctiontion because there is something going on with that particular development ~ vacant ~ then we will not abate the case until we have a site inspection or action plan or whatever. from the housing authority, pursuant to the m-o-u that the work has been abated and therefore then we can close the case. and it also depends upon what the matter is. if it's a life safety matter, then as you can see, the m-o-u from previous presentations ask for more documentation. so, if it's just a general maintenance item, it's a little different. >> the commissioners, any questions? i have one. it seems like from the date the complaints are sent and the date where they were abated and closed, just looking at the dates they seem pretty reasonable considering how these things go. but ways wondering if we do follow-up inspections. do we actually -- how do we

abate it? do we actually send an inspector out and do they inspect the work? so, some of it is pretty complicated also. some of it is electrical, some of it was plumbing jobs. do we actually send building site inspectors out and they say yes, this plumbing job was done right? >> in some cases the criteria set forth in the m-o-u. if it's a life safety case, then generally we would send an inspector out unless there are other circumstances where they vacated the whole property. but yeah, we have to go out and do an inspection to see if that work is done if it is a life safety hazard. if not they can give us an action plan to see if the work is done. we also follow-up with the tenants. if it's a minor item, leaking fawcett or whatever, and the housing authority is telling us it's done and the tenant is tell us it's done, then we may not go out there on that because that was part of the criteria set forth in the m-o-u which makes these complaints a little different than others. ~

but beyond that, then we definitely will follow-up and go out and do an inspection. >> i just wanted to also say thank you for the report. it's very useful. and especially one of the questions i had before was the staff hours that we put in. and, so, i think there is quite a few staff hours. i don't know what the m-o-u says exactly because i haven't combed through it again. it would be nice to get a copy. but the other thing is i think with some of the changes that the mayor is proposing -- i'm told, i don't know what those changes are. they might be very positive. but i could foresee the possibility that we might need more staff hours. so, i just think that, you know, if there is a change with the sf housing authority, especially with some of the problems, you know, recently publicized, we might just have

to kind of foresee that. commissioner walker. >> yeah, i also know that our partners -- our community organizer partners are involved in this. i see ms. short from housing rights committee. maybe you could talk about your experience. just so the public knows, we contract with several community organizations who do outreach to all of these different tenant communities. and you probably hear firsthand more than we do

and what we heard recently, i think everyone is familiar with the general problems, both aging building structures and deferred maintenance and, you know, et cetera, the housing authority and the fact that that's led to a lot of repair needs for tenants. i think in the buildings, you know, city-wide, again. and one of the things, though, that we hear along with the complaints themselves is concerns from residents about response and getting the complaints fixed. i'm hoping that we could sort of maybe reevaluate the m-o-u a bit. i think it's time to sort of look closer at it and see what kind of, you know, tweaks we might be able to make, ways we might be able to strengthen it, and particularly at a time, you know, that the mayor is working hard to sort of bring the housing authority into the city family a little more and trying to, you know, open up better channels of communication that

we may have had in the past with the agency, that it makes sense to see how, you know, maybe we could incorporate, you know, some more -- as commissioner walker, for instance, mentioned, some more communication about ongoing repair needs that may not have come to the agency directly through tenants, but sort of have a better sense from the department of, you know, generally what the common issues are, what maybe the patterns are, the response time, you know, issues such as that. and then also kind of separate, being able to separate out a little what is related to major capital improvement needs. we know there are issues with that particularly related to funding. and other things are maybe really an issue of someone's not going out in a timely manner to go fix the issue at hand. and, so, it might be good to just be able to sort of track

these things better, to have more of a conversation ongoing about these needs. one of the things that i think of when i hear, you know, rosemary's report on the number of complaints received, et cetera, is that i really think that they are under reported. i don't think that that's an accurate picture of the number of complaints that tenants actually have. nor are we necessarily capturing the fact -- i guess the time frame for getting the repairs responded to. so, we may know when people initially call, you know. we're doing that within the department in term of the calls that you get. but what i'm saying is outside of those calls, we also don't have a sense of, you know, are these being taken care of in a way that maybe dbi would have a role in jumping in and trying to, you know, speed up the repair abatement, et cetera.

and, so, i think there is a lot of confusion at the housing authority properties right now about how to report repairs. some people are still trying to go through 311 because that's what they were instructed to do awhile back. others are reporting directly to management. some people tell the repair guy. well, heout in the unit, try and get things fixed that way. others might call dbi. but there isn't necessarily a good sort of streamline process that tenants are aware of, anyway, of how to -- not just make your initial report, but then do the follow-up you may need to get the issue addressed. and then how to get dbi involved when the need arises. and i've heard at least a few concerns from residents lately that they have called 311 and we're told to go back to the property manager, which just seems to be happening lately. but explain that while we have done that, we kind of done everything we feel like we we can and we want to report this to dbi. ~

and 311, you know, not necessarily channeling the calls to dbi into the proper inspectors there. so, just getting that whole systemic structure kind of a little more i think sured up. and then, you know, second part of it is really making sure that the residents also understand how to use all the systems that are in place to help them get their repair needs met. the truth is that the m-o-u is, you know, purposely sort of a softer agreement in terms of enforcement than what dbi generally does for private property owners. like i said, that was purposeful because the understanding was, you know, this is a public agency that's trying to do its best to meet affordable housing needs in the community and, you know, we're all working together and we have joint goals and, you know, so, let's try and just resolve these issues together. and i feel like it's time to revisit that and think about, you know, honestly how dbi

might be able to put a little more punch into it on cases where they really need to. or, again, maybe it's just a matter of having much more ongoing communication and, you know, a two way street on what the issues are around repairs. the last time we had this on the agenda it was pretty evident that there were folks at the housing authority who actually weren't all too aware of the nature of this m-o-u and weren't also necessarily aware of how it was supposed to work and then how it was working. and, so, just, you know, again, revisiting this all together, i think it's time. i can it's been at least five years ~ i think. even for that very reason, the fact that it's been some time. and it was experimental. i don't think anything like this had been done before this. and, so, -- and so much has changed not only at the housing authority in general, but also in terms of the procedures internally for getting repairs met. when this was, i believe when

this was created or at least shortly before that, there was still a repair crew where people called directly to report repairs. that's, for instance, no longer at the housing authority. so, a lot has changed and i think it just makes sense to, you know, look at this again. >> thank you for [speaker not understood]. i appreciate that. >> sure. >> have you expressed your views and your statement to us today with the new housing authority commission? >> no, not yet. they've been in a pretty short while. so, yes, i definitely would like to do that. >> i would like to hear what they have to say first, of course. >> absolutely. >> commissioner walker? >> yeah, i would like to, from our perspective, maybe begin the conversation with the housing authority