field and flipping it on its side. thank you. >> thank you. >> jonathan. then we have claw dean and richard anderson. >> >> i am jonathan and lived in noe valley for about 30 years. i remember taking my car to dan's so i remember that lot and most it is carinations. i am pleased to hear that this conversion meets the technical requirements. it meets the good government ideals that our supervisor supports, and it meets so much of what our community is about, and i wanted to briefly talk about something maybe a little subjective but it's the spiritual character of what goes on. some years ago peter invited me to join a group called the center for community

at noe valley and the people in the group were such interesting characters as michael and debra from goodwill and extraordinary characters including a minister from noe valley and the idea was to create a landing and launching pad for a spirit of a community. after the earthquake, after the giants win the world series there is a spirit of unity that comes. it's a tragedy like the earthquake or glorrous like the world series. i am one of the volunteers and i am one of the clickers and i talk to a lot of people and it's truly a wonderful experience there. i talked to people that moved into the community from texas. a young family moved and work at

facebook and asked what to do and [inaudible] i don't know what it is. we got petition pusherrings. we have music. [inaudible] political beliefs from liberal to really liberal. it's just an extraordinarily wonderful experience and i am so pleased to know that this organization, our supervisor and hopefully all of the supervisors are behind the idea of creating this space for an extraordinary community spirit. thank you. >> thank you. [calling speaker names] >> i'm going to keep it short because there is a long line of people behind me so i'm a 15

year resident of noe valley . i can't believe i have been there that long. i have three boys raised in noe valley and i'm one of the people that love the baby a ruge laand i was crushed by the whole foods scandal and still sitting there closed for all these years. it's incredible to me that is the case. i didn't realize that the farmers market was going to be more. it's amazing. you can't go there without running into someone you know and someone that wants that talk about lettuce and it's a wonderful part of the community and i was told it potentially might go away i was distraught and it would be devastating to the community to lose it now and i am thrilled to see the progress we have made and the potential

to make it more and not just half day on a saturday and seven days a week and wonderful for the noe valley and for the city. >> thank you. >> alex. >> mr. president, members of the commission, i am alex bash and lived in noe valley valley almost 40 years now and you have heard from many heroes of noe valley have speaking here already and incredible people who have done amazing things and the community spirit that has been created within noe valley through the farmers market is something that is simply wonderful to imagine going forward in time and i can only imagine what the noe valley town square is going to be like

if it is available to the people of the community seven days a week with all of the programming and the imagination that is possible from the people who have created what has come before you this morning. if we could look back 10 years from now to this moment as you are about to go forward we believe and the city going forward and the creation of this space i think people will be amazed how much progress has been made over the next 10 years even with all the incredible progress that has happened in the past 10 years. thank you for your time and thanks to all of my neighbors here. >> thank you. >> richard, christina, kate and hunter. >> good morning

commissioners. i appreciate the time to speak. this is an exciting project. i would like to speak to one of the environmental points of the project that is really important. all of the plans we're proposing will introduce more trees into this area and one of the disturbing numbers that i find when i look around at the statistics about san francisco is our tree canopy. the numbers are probably fuzzy but 12% is what we have and the national average is closer to 22%, so every opportunity to add more trees to san francisco is an important opportunity, and curiously friends of urban forest of course which is a force for good in san francisco to put more trees in san francisco they planted their tree in noe valley so that's pretty interesting i think.

this is another noe valley opportunity to plant some trees. i think therefore parks and rec and of course you people are important part of keeping the forest canopy happy so all of our plans will include trees. an very important aspect of adding these trees is these trees will be nurtured and supported and cared for in ways that not all trees have that advantage. furthermore the permeability of the surface is going to be changed from what we have now to permeable so that will allow gas exchange and moisture exchange which will give the trees a real chance to thrive and flourish so i would highly recommend adding these trees to san francisco. this is an opportunity to put them in permanently, to put them in a

place where they will be well cared for and a lot of people can enjoy them so i urge your support for this project. i hope it goes through. i am excited about it. thank you very much. >> thank you. >> christina. >> hi i am christine a i lived in noe valley about 20 years and i live around the corner from the proposed noe valley town square and i support the noe valley town square. currently with the parking lot used on saturdays for the farmers market i see people linger and chat and listen to live music and see what there is to be seen. from my house i hear laughter and

happy voices that didn't exist before. the noe valley town square will create a central place and provide a greater sense of community, a friendly place to gather and celebrate being san francisco residents. it would keep light in otherwise would be an enclosed building to building street. it will also have a far reaching benefit and people come to noe valley from the mission district, bernal heights, glen park, diamond hietds and the cast tro and beyond and all neighbors districts will benefit too. i strongly urge you to pass it. it's a wonderful place. thank you. >> thank you. >> kate and then hunter. >> hi i am indicate sherwood. i want. >> >> ditto to everyone that spoke before movement i have been a

resident for eight years which maybe the shortest time of anyone so far. i live on the border and my kids go to school. i am here as a resident and taxpayer of the city in large part because of the noe valley farmers market. my husband has made friends with the farmers and cooked from food from the farmers market and it might not be significant but it doesn't happen when you go to safeway and we came into the community from those that came before us and double income no kids. we thought we would move when we had kids and we are staying because of the farmers market and i urge you to give my kids a place to play other than my living room and dining room and

chandler. i request your support. >> thank you. >> hunter. >> good morning commissioners. so i too am a noe valley resident along with my family. just a couple of things because so much good has been said about this project but we urge you to approve the acquisition. the cost is the cost but there's two benefits to this that i see that people have not brought up. the first it's truly community transaction. you heard a lot about the community where the project has come from but it also benefits it is ministry and to me when i arrived in noe valley it was the heart and soul of noe valley and the ministry will benefit greatly, its building and ability to serve the community will

benefit. all the money does stay in the city and noe valley and that is an important consideration. the second is i had the privilege of serving on the go back and the citizens oversight community and when rec and park came and shared this idea and to me this was clever and genuine thoughtful smart things that any agency in the city and county of san francisco has put together, the concept of a open space fund. it's not probably as much money as everybody would like but it helps create the kind of community you have heard today. it's very valuable and i didn't know -- obviously none of us did when this was shared with us when the first bond with the open space fund was considered and approved, but this is exactly the project that i would have thought would come about and it also shows other people

in the city and other areas what can happen so we urge you for a lot of reasons to support this but there are reasons on top of reasons within reasons to say yes so we urge you to say yes. >> thank you. >> meredith. >> good morning commissioners. i am with the san francisco parks alliance. you have heard from my colleagues why we support the project. i'm the person that citizens came to see with this idea about transforming a parking lot into their town square and they had enthusiasm and desire and intention and i could see they were committed to this project and i remember saying there is this open space fund but in my head i was seeing the complexity and the lift they would have to take to make the project a

reality and i am here today to support their efforts and may met every request made of them. they have gone above and beyond and demonstrated as a community they're ready to take on the challenge. they're prepared to pay for the development. they're prepared to support the on going maintenance of the space and not trying to achieve this by taking away from anything in the city and i believe we need a process for this. this is the first town square in recent memory we're seeking to add as a city and i would like other areas to do it and i think the residents of noe valley have put together a private public partnership and in a way that is broadly supported by officials, by members of the neighborhood, by general citizens who didn't realize they could have a voice and process in of this magnitude and really it's gone well and i

urge you today to take action on it. it's incredibly tight time line. we have no room for error if we get to the prop 84 grant funds and i urge you support and take action today to move it forward to the board of supervisors. >> thank you. >> is there any other public comment on this item? seeing none public comment is closed. >> commissioner low. >> i am wondering if dawn can come back because i have a couple of questions. i understand their agreement between the buyer and seller is sill in a draft format. >> that's my understanding. i'm not sure if john is still here. the head of real estate can speak to the status explicitly. >> good morning commissioners.

i john uptight, director of real estate. it is still in draft form and the major rational why it's not completed yet we need to analyze the property's environmental condition. that took longer than anticipated. just received that report in the last month. that had to be digested and informed the terms and conditions and we expect that to be wrapped up and executable form in a week and a half. >> what are the environmental condition? >> so this is a follow up to a review of the property following the removal of an under ground storage tank. both the city and the seller as well since there are requirements that the seller has in delivering either a clean property or accepting responsibilities for the condition of the site so these told us exactly the condition of the site and gave us a cost

estimate and program to appropriately remediate the site so there are no contamination concerns and develop the property in the form that rec and park wants so we have the i's and t's crossed. >> one is appraisal and one is a draft format. >>i am pleased to say that the second appraisal that we were waiting on has been received so i have just read it and it's exactly as promised by the appraiser so we have two reports. quite a variance in what value. that's not surprising in an active market whether up or down in a fast direction. that isn't unusual but we have a half million dollars differential in the reports that lead to the negotiated price between the city and the seller.

>> do you have any further -- >> i will go after meagan levitan. >> commissioner levitan. >> i ask this from the perspective of somebody that does this everyday for a living and real estate sales and tractions and what not. do we have anywhere in writing and understanding between buyer and seller this is the negotiated price? >> in the form of -- i will back up a second. normally we would have a letter of intent executed between the parties and that will define the terms and conditions making the agreement easier to write. in this case we had collaborative on going discussion with the ministry and their representatives so we didn't feel it necessary to go to that extent. we have a lot of email discussions and these days that is written communications and the price has been agreed to in those

exchanges with their representative. plus we have a board action taken by the noe valley ministry that authorized the execution of documents at agreed upon purchase price which is the price before you today and that gave me certainty that we have understanding of the terms and conditions. >> commissioner low. >> i like this idea. i like the story. i think it's a creative and collaborative process. certainly i will have to figure out what baby a ruga is but i know mr. gable has a big heart and i stall with the agreement within the buyer and the seller and i maybe a lone wolf on this and i would like to make a motion to continue this to the next hearing or to a

special hearing when the parties reached the agreement. >> i am going to take the prerogative and i share his concern but i don't think it should be continued. i think our primarily responsibility is urge the board of supervisors to do this with knowledge this is appropriate use of the funds and it's appropriate use of the space, and given the community work and the staff work that's been done it seems to me that the board of supervisors will have to have these documents in place before they can make any judgment. now, i don't want to get into a dispute over this. i think that rarely do we have an item before this commission which has unanimous support of the community and the kind of work that has been done. i personally think that having a farmers market sends yet

another message to the broader community about sustainable agriculture, community and how we treat the community but those are side benefits. i think this is community generated bottom up movement and we do have the funds and have unanimous agreement so with that commissioner low your comments. >> we're not disputing. we're just discussing. all right. so again i don't doubt the merits of the project. i support the public policy goals. i like the idea. it's creative and it's going to be a great project. i'm just at a point before we can authorize the expenditure of public funds i would like to see an agreement in place and at the continued hearing there will probably be

u nan mowses support. >> commissioner. >> i want to see between now and the sale that the price would increase to a significant level. >> commissioner i am happy -- >> or stay what it is? >> at this point it seems unlikely that the board the noe valley ministries has taken their action to approve this price and chris keen is here and the secretary of that board and i am sure he is happy to speak to the action they took and commitment in moving forward with the project. >> yeah. i would like to hear from them as to whether the price that we're looking at right now will still be what

the board of supervisors will be under taking when they -- when they move on this. >> i am chris keen. one of the hats i wear i'm the corporate secretary for noe valley ministries. that board has taken unanimous agreement to accept the net price which is the price being proposed here so there is -- from our perspective that that price is -- >> right. so discussions on that are closed at this point? so there is no more going back to the drawing board on this or anything? >> exactly. >> okay. >> john and our representative negotiated and came to a price and the question was how to handle the remediation cost so that has been the only question.

>> okay. >> thank you. seeing no other questions from the commission i have commissioner low -- do you still want to go forward making a motion to delay? >>i would like to use the term continue. >> continue. >> versus delay. just allow the parties to get it under contract to a date either for a special meeting or for next regularly scheduled meeting. >> is there a second to commissioner low's motion? seeing none that motion fails. is there a counter motion? commissioner levitan. >> i don't know necessarily if it's a counter motion but i want to say i'm struggling between commissioner low and you mr. president and i appreciate where commissioner low is coming from and as i said in my daily business you see deals fall apart all the time so it makes

me nervous not to have this in a ratified agreement. i appreciate the due diligence waiting for the second appraisal. i get it but at the same time i don't want to send a message to the community that we're opposed to this on a technicality and i appreciate that we have a short time line and one thing that we have a concern about and maybe this a material part of the motion that goes forward and if the price changes it would have to come back to us. >> commissioners, if i could speak to that under the parks mandate if the price changes we absolutely need to return to the commission before we move forward to the board of supervisors because of the commission's unique authority with respect to the open space fund so if the price were to increase or change we would have to return to the commission. >> i appreciate that and it's ultimately the board of supervisors' decision and moving

to the board but we're trying to do our job and making sure a document that can stand up to any challenge is what is being offered to the board of supervisors. >> absolutely. >> commissioner low. >> commissioner levitan if you would pursue that you need to change the agenda item. the action item under the agenda. >> because the item is just for approve -- >> the agreement for purchase of real property. >> right. >> i think it's to recommend to the board approval, so this is really recommending to the board that they approve the use of these funds and the price that has been suggested. go ahead commissioner low. >> well, reading the action item it's to recommend that the board of supervisors approve an agreement for the purchase of

real property and that's in initial caps. >> yeah, that's the problem. >> okay. is there a motion to approve this item? >> yes. >> it's been moved and seconded. all those in favor. >> aye. >> opposed? hearing none it's unanimous. thank you very much. [applause] let's go back to item number eight. >> we are itemmite john shelley drive road closure. >> good morning commissioners. i am here to present a action item to approve a temporary road closure of john shelley drive west from cambridge street to mansell corridor street and with connection with the million dog

march sponsored by sf dog. the idea is march of dog and owners and attempt to break the record for the largest dog march however they will not be close this year. the number is quite sizable. the march is staged from the jerry garcia parking lot and set up in that area and no impact on the grass and that is where the booths will be and a portion will be on john shelley drive and requiring closing part of it and as you head off of cambridge from the west and the rest is open. there is a festival. fun activities for dog. dogs will remain on leash. there will be doggy pick up

bags along the route. attendance is expected to be 1,000 dogs and 1500 people with it and participants are asking to pay -- depending when they buy $25 and will go to benefit sheltered animals. park patrol will be stationed on both sides of john shelley drive for the road closure. we will post a notice a week in advance so regular users are aware it's coming as well as notices to divert for people that might be looking to use it. the fees for this event are our park impact fee of 50 cents per walker which is the standard impact fee plus 556 for the use of the parking lot. they will