>> welcome back to the june 19, 2013 meeting of the san francisco board of appeals. we are now ready to call item no. 8. gerald and dale sullivan versus department of public works bureau of aura ban forestry. this is the order to approve removal of one smaller tree and deny removal of one larger tree. you have seven minutes. >> thank you. good evening. madam president and board

members. we would like to take this time to dispute the ruling of the january 28 hearing that allowed the one tree to remain and the other one out. they earmarked the removal and the protest of hearing vowing for one tree to stay. we have dealt with these trees for 25 years. the property we own is on the corner of union street. in the packet you will see pictures of overhanging branches. the one tree is probably 65-75 feet tall. i would like to show you the corner property with the over hang and look down the street you can see the size of

the tree and the overhang. it's also interfering with the street light in the corner. the trees are earmarked by the dwp as being unstable and not in good health an that's why they earmarked them for removal. the next slide i have here is the episodes i have here in june of 2010. the majority of the tree fell. you can see the condition of the center core of the tree. this tree really unbalanced itself with the removal of this large portion. >> is that the big tree or smaller one, the one at issue? >> the one they want to have remain. the one we are talking about now. the little one is going any way but you can see it almost when it hit the building across the street. the

bad picture on this site here where it hit a truck on the other side. fortunately a person has just vacated a parking spot and this tree came downright in that spot. over the years, i will say the city has been lucky. nobody has been injured by this tree, although our property has been damaged. the roof has been damaged, guters have been damaged, sidewalks have had to be replaced. but of greater concern to us in this slide here you see as a matter of reference, the shoe for the raising of the sidewalk, one of the tenants in our building is handicapped needs a walker and normally parks his car in virginia street. parking in the city is very limited. he can

not now navigate his walker and has to rely on parking where he can get it. along the foundation line is our major concern. as a property owner, you can see where the sidewalk is raised along the foundation line. the roots are migrating under the building. they are putting pressure on the foundation of the building as exhibited by the raising of the flags right at the foundation line. but worse than that, all the plumbing with the three units runs on the slab starting at the back end of union street and exits at bonview street. if this plumbing is damaged or becomes unusable. this is a resident controlled unit. we are obligated as landlords to relocate the tenants at our

expense a per diem of $275 a day for each unit for 20 days. that's in the neighborhood of $15-20,000. to remove it and repair the slab, i would get it would be $35,000. this could be done -- away with with the roots being done with. we have asked for the tree to be removed and have been denied. i would like to leave one thought in your mind if any of you board members owned this property, would you feel complacent about leaving that tree in place. i will leave you with that. thank you. >> thank you.

>> good evening, carla short department of public works. i think that we are in agreement with some of the issues raised by the appellant here. certainly we have acknowledged the street has caused some sidewalk damage and it's the city's responsibility to fix that and we would need to expand the tree and probably need to do some slight heathing of the sidewalk that would correct and lift the sidewalk so it will be flat but it might be some heathing because it's not a tree that tolerates a lot of roots. it could be cut to the foundation area which we would hope would then mitigate that issue if there are roots going

underneath the house. one of the things that the department generally tries to do is to base on existing conditions and not possible damage that a tree might cause because different species react differently. foil factors that can affect what may or may not happen in the future so we don't generally condemn a tree because it's capable of doing some damage. there is no perfect tree. i do want to clarify that we did not determine the tree was unstable in our assessment. we did initially approve this tree for removal at the level because the property owners had repeatedly raised concerns about the tree. we have been monitoring it and it did lose a large limb and we thought it was reasonable for the staff to prove for removal. however there were a number of people that came to speak about the tree and how they were attached

to that tree in particular so it was the recommendation at the hearing that we should retain that tree, make the repairs around it and prune it and then continue to monitor it which is what we had been doing previously. so, i just want to clarify that while we certainly action that the tree has has issues, it did lose a large limb and there is some substantial sidewalk damage that needs to be addressed. it's not an imminent hazard and we did determine that the tree was not in stable. >> the foundation, that was raised as a concern, when you talk about cutting, you said cutting. i don't have a total image but it's very rough and we get the roots and we go in there and untdz underneath the

foundation is that what happens? >> yes, when a sidewalk is repaired, if we can't expand the basin, we do that anyway. if it's something that has to be done judiciously with understanding the tolerance for the roots. the closer you cut the roots to the trunk of the tree, the more impact it could have on the stability. we would not cut roots immediately to the trunk of the tree, but when it's removed for repairs, the immediate roots can be severed at that point. >> it doesn't look like there is a lot of structure to that. >> so there is roughly eight feet between the tree basin. >> okay. just the perspective

on the photograph. it looked like it was only 4 feet. it didn't look like a lot of space there. >> yeah, it looks like it maybe set in a little bit. maybe 6, not 8. the measurement that i have. 12 feet and 4 x 4. >> okay. is there a time table for making these repairs if that's what the decision is? >> as has been stated the other tree has been approved for removal. we were waiting for this appeal. if we are moving trees we would like to do it simultaneously. we have no more sidewalk repair funds. they have been spent for this fiscal year. we would try to coordinate the removal of the one tree and the repair of the sidewalks and we would do that for early next fiscal year which is july 1.

>> looking at exhibit is there not a curb on the street side? the picture looks like there is not and the other question, evident 33 , the sidewalk has been damaged for a while. why wasn't it been repaired? >> i think you are right, the curb has been damaged in this location. i don't have a photo specifically of the curb with me, the tree has also out grown as you can see from that photo, the basin itself. so it is very large for the existing tree well. why the repairs haven't been made is a matter of resources. our annual allocation for sidewalk repairs for streets is about $700,000 annually an we have over 5,000

sites that need repair. >> i got a notice of sidewalk repair analyzed -- and they did the repair. >> when the property owner gets the notice to repair the sidewalk, we also issue a notice by our sister agency and we prioritize based on degree of damage, amount of pedestrian activity, proximity to bus zones and things like that. >> the other question, since the limb was removed in 2010, maybe it's the photo or angle in which it was taken. the tree looks one-sided and one-sided towards the actual property. this is a very large tree. that appears to be if the tree is healthy is one thing, but from the pictures i'm looking at, the tree doesn't look very

healthy and it's one-sided an it's facing the property. >> if i can have the overhead i will put up a photo that does show. if you are looking the end tiert of the canopy, it's not so unbalanced. you can see there is a canopy on both sides. so, again, we don't dispute that the tree has some issues. that's why we approved it at the staff level. the directors department was the neighborhood outreach and the neighborhood concern. we didn't classify it as a main hazard. if we did we would have fought to have it removed at the hearing. >> if there were issues with sewage and plumbing and it caused the scenario that was described with having to move

people out with repairs, is that all the city's liability? >> i am not an attorney and i'm not with the city claims office. i will say that it is the department's perspective that in most cases if tree roots are getting into sewer lines is because the sewer line is leaking or degraded. roots don't act like bow a constrictors. generally the city does not pay for sewer damage, however if there is damage documented by tree roots, the city does pay for claims in those instances. >> if someone trips, is it the property owners responsibility or the city's responsibility. >> when we have the responsibility for the tree, we

have the responsibility for that damage as well and the liability. >> thank you. >> the shaping of that tree is kind of unusual for the species, isn't it? >> it's big and old, so i think the canopy is broader thaen often you see for the species. >> who handled the hearing? it's not the director, right? >> no, there is a hearing officer. a number of representatives that attend the hearing and make final recommendations and the director makes that decision base on their recommendations. did you want the name? >> no. >> thank you. >> is there any public comment on this item? seeing no public comment