difficult to come in and actually have to support something wholeheartedly. and i think this plan is absolutely worth supporting wholeheartedly. when the bnp plan was drafted and proposed, with the proposal to tear down the japantown japan center and renovate it, renovate the area, they completely missed the fact that by the demolishing of the japan center and the disruption in traffic and parking, it would have destroyed japantown. that was one of the real core concerns of the community. what i find very valuable is that the vision, the objectives and the goals have remained constant from what was planned at the beginning of the bnp to how the j chess rolled out. and it makes a very powerful

touch stone to look at future proposals against. and i really at this time want to ask the planning commission to -- when you consider proposals for the japantown area to recognize the consistency and the efforts behind drafting that vision, goals, objectives. the effort, the vision, and the consistency of purpose that has been shown across the community participation from the beginning of the 2007 plan which was when i first got involved. finally, i really want to commend paul lord, steve wirtheim and shelly whose last name i will tangle up terribly, for the incredible collaborative outreach with the community. it's outstanding and they really are to be recognized for that. thank you. >> thank you. good afternoon,

commissioners. my name is alice kamahatsu and i've been a long-time resident of japantown. and my husband is a minister for [speaker not understood] church of san francisco which is on laguna street. my family is [speaker not understood] terrace which is a complex. it has a tower for seniors and then town houses that surround that complex. so, i've been there a long time. when we first started to go to the meetings, my kids were in grammar school. now they're in college and my oldest daughter has graduated from college. so, it has been a long journey for all of us, but i'm glad that we are back here. i fully endorse the documents that have been set before you. and i know that september is just around the corner. so, please take a look at it closely. i also, since working at the church, i also do a culinary tour of japantown where i bring

people from all over the world and different corporations into our community. i take them around to the different restaurants. we do taste scenes, but i also have a chance to share the history of japantown, the history of the japanese american community and we meet people along the way as we go through this tour. so, this is my way to contribute to building community and, you know, helping the businesses to thrive. so, i'm very excited about this document and about the mayor's program and i just again want to thank you for your patience and your support on this. good afternoon, president fong, commissioners, director ram. my name is karen [speaker not understood] and i'm a member of the japantown organizing committee. i co-chaired the land use and [speaker not understood] forum committee of that larger committee.

and it's really been a pleasure to work on this long term. lots of hard work. but with people that i want to acknowledge. we've had a tremendous organizing committee that's been a broad cross-representation of the community. we've had committee chairs and an executive committee that has put in countless hours. we've had dedicated community members who bore no title, but who really were sincerely interested and wanted to help. and i think that that shows in this document. we're not the typical thing. and i really appreciate that this commission set us on this path, allowed us to grow, that director ram, you assigned us tremendous staff people and nurtured this. [speaker not understood]. and i know bureaucracy tends to like doing things in formula ways, and you didn't do that. and i think the result is

you're getting a very exciting document. it's our hope that this will help future communities plan. there are other communities. there is a community gathering a few weeks ago that was focused on sustaining our cultural communities in san francisco and people were sharing this kind of planning and saying, this is where we need to go. it's not the traditional, here's how you build a big building in this part of town. it's really, how do we sustain the communities that make san francisco diverse, unique, and wonderful? and we really feel that our document is one of the first. we have a lot to share with you. so that i hope when we come here in september, we'll get an endorsement, but we'll also continue to work with you because i think our experiences -- our learning experience will

help this commission and help other communities build as well. finally, i want to invite you all to come to japantown. you are now fully part of it. look how long we've all been associated. and this weekend there is indeed one of our traditional festivals, the abon festival at san francisco buddhist church on octavia between pine and bush. this is [speaker not understood]. thank you. >> thank you. good afternoon. my name is rose hillson and i want to thank director ram for the patience that he has shown, putting up with us and taking this long, long time to come up with the japanese heritage and economic sustain ability [speaker not understood], j chess. i want to thank the previous

planner also, paul lord, ~ shelly [speaker not understood]. [laughter] and my main emphasis in my past is language and, therefore, i take great care in trying to pronounce people's names accurately. i also was the unofficial editor of some of this writing and what got me to doing this is i had an english teacher -- english is my main language. i had an english teacher. if you had something wrong with the grammar your grade was dropped by one grade level. if you had a problem with punctuation, you dropped aft a grade level. so, i tried my best. if there is still some other things in there, i apologize that i missed. thank you so much and i look forward to your supporting this document. thanks. good afternoon, commissioners. tim colin from the san francisco housing action coalition. the first thing to say is

congratulations to the planning staff for the excellent work they've done over the years on this. the second thing to say is that this plan, the j chess plan, is sound, its vision and mission statements of san francisco values and deserve your support. i hope that it will be adopted. my speaking here is to bring attention to something that struck me in the presentation, and i should say at the beginning i and my family adore japantown. i use the kabuki spa for 30 years. we go to the kabuki theater more than any other theater. we like the restaurants there. but in looking at and listening to the presentation today, one can't help but be struck by the vast difference between what the desires are to fund this and to the improvements that are necessary in japantown to revive it to bring more people there, to make more successful businesses, and the resources

available to fund it. what i heard from the city is we've got some tools, the public tools or city tools, but you're on your own and we hope this will help revive it. the garage, the cash cow, is in need of seismic work, a lot of work. at a minimum, it will have to pay for itself, which reduces its ability to fund anything else there. what was interesting is that the hack was involved in the better neighborhoods plan back when. and we liked the direction it took. what struck me is one of the first things that was taken off the table in the j chess is there will be no increase in height and density. that's off the table. and yet what we've seen again and again in other neighborhoods is that if there's any prayer of getting the funding we need for our infrastructure and better streets and better open spaces and the things that we say we

want, the public resources we have are utterly inadequate to the task. it's not said -- it wasn't apparent anywhere in the presentation how to make japantown more attractive investment to bring people in. that's where the funding is to bring the benefits that are required. we've heard, and i would agree, that it's getting tired. the businesses are getting tired. it uz didn't get the tourists. it's not overcrowded down there. it's not particularly high density. and this is not a complaint against the j chess or the work that the community has done. it's simply to recognize there is an enormous belt here between the aspirations of what what its expected to do and the resources that are available to do it ~. and barring somehow getting more attention focused, certainly private sector attention, it's hard to imagine how maybe developing south side

of geary alone, that's the answer to the problem. so, i'm looking forward to watching how this conversation evolves. thank you. >> thank you. i also want to -- my name is kenneth kachi. i'm a resident and business owner in japantown. i want to talk about cultural sustainability. culture is sort of like esthetics. there are some who might think a particular cultural phenomenon is great and the same reaction from another person would be that it's not sufficient or it's very bad. so, it's very subjective. but how do you go about sustaining cultural viability in a community which is very complex? and i think the planning staff

working with the community residents had begun the process of broadening the observations and identity of what culture might mean before we had maybe 20 item to look at as to what was an expression of cultural community, cultural expression in the community and now we have over 200. so, this process involves is a dialogue and a discussion between the experts, residents, on what this actually is. and i think it's very important and i commend the planning staff that has taken the patience and the courage to begin this task. thank you. my name is [speaker not understood].

i'm [speaker not understood] currently. and i'd just like to say that as a japanese, grew up in japan, i just discovered [speaker not understood]. the space of japantown is a result of long-time interaction of people. as a japanese in japan, i recognize the potential of heritage tourism and i respectfully like to experience and learn [speaker not understood] in japantown frequently and learn the city and history of japantown and american people. thank you so much. >> thank you. is there any additional public comment on this item? okay, seeing none, public comment is closed. commissioner moore. >> i normally don't start my

comments with a wow, but the last speaker has got me to say that because it couldn't be the greater compliment and appreciation of this particular piece of work than somebody from the country to speak to this particular plan. now back to my comment. i think it is in need of a [speaker not understood] work and i am thrilled with the depth and significant digging down and tool and innovative process the department has used. i would like to hear more about the things mr. wirtheim hinted on, the culture, the structures, the organizational institutions, the businesses and cultural activities and events. that sounds like [speaker not understood] where you really put the stakes down for what is permanent. and that is a very rich framework when you look at the drawings and how [speaker not understood] themselves. i'm guessing that is where you're going.

back to other comments. for me, this particular piece [speaker not understood] because it sheds light on the complexities and the interwove enness of all thing which indeed make this in its own right a [speaker not understood] neighborhood plan. [speaker not understood] as a cultural heritage word, it takes that title from importance. i am interested to see that the invest in neighborhoods happens at the same time. it might open doors which were not realized yet and i would also actually in this moment want to thank commissioner sugaya who actually has kept his own watchful eye and his stewardship and investment and participating in all meeting and has at least kept me constantly updated on what is going on. i am personally very supportive of the city really looking at a

cultural tourism program, including getting travel writers and travel books to offer that because i find myself many, many, many times on the 1 california bus and people having the little maps in their hands and saying, well, how do i get to japantown? what is it, where is it? and it's difficult to explain. the bus stop shall r, which gets you right there. it's difficult to describe because even the tourist books are vague, relative to the cultural component on it. so, i think it would be a great opportunity to create a much fuller program obviously where the way the planning department is doing it, which already occupy at least 10, 15 pages to describe that. so, thank you. if today were the approval day, my vote would be yes. >> commissioner wu. >> thank you. i also want to echo all the remarks around what a great community process this was, that the community decided that

the previous iterations of the plan weren't the correct ones and ended up at this place. i think there is a question of cultural preservation is really interesting. i think we're seeing it in japantown. there is some of it coming out of western soma. i think about it in my day job a lot. and how can we think about the people and the use and not just the buildings? i think we have a lot of tools around preserving buildings. so, how can we preserve the people and the use? and i think sometimes as in this example, a community just decides they want to keep it by keeping community out. and you do that until you can have more community control over the way development happens and it's not an owner in l.a. or wherever the owner ends up being. and then you can control the change going forward. to the specific recommendations and i told mr. hamaguchi this, the task with the cdc is a daunting one of course. the different functions of the

cdc can be either incubated or fiscally sponsored by an existing nonprofit. i know that there's always different personalities or tensions within a community and those have to be managed. i think instead of starting from scratch there may be the ability to get more leverage. and i'm interested particularly in the access to peace plaza. i think that with geary brt, with transportation and certainly emerging as a way we're organizing our land use to think about the connection of possibility of stop on geary and opening up that geary edge to the plaza, i think really could do a lot for the transit connection. >> commissioner sugaya. >> yes, thank you. i think we've been at this for a long time now and according to the community, we did the right thing by sending it back the first time. i think commissioner antonini,

myself, and commissioner moore were on the commission at that point. in any case, i think it's quite a different kind of document than we're accustomed to looking at and adopting. it's innovative in the sense that it goes beyond the traditional historic preservation that we've all -- that we're all familiar with and has been implemented in san francisco around the country for decades and more than decades. but the idea i think of cultural and social heritage, first i think in a way evolved out of the western soma plan. it was first mentioned i think with respect to the latino community. it evolved into the lgbt community. and was kind of a sidebar, you might say, in the western soma

plan. but then the japantown folks had an opportunity to take that and produce the j chess document which we're looking at today. so, i think the issues, as karen kai said, aren't just isolated within japantown. the forum that she mentioned which took place in june brought together not only the japanese american community, but the filipino community, latinos from the mission district, and others in a forum that discussed this whole issue. so, i think the production and creation of this document is extremely important with respect to being a model or a direction that these other communities can take a look at and adopt as they wish in terms of addressing their own social and cultural heritage issues. that said, i'm glad to support obviously.

but i think there are some problems that need to be addressed, and that is the document, i think, has some problems with the commission, i guess, maybe will have some problems in how to use the document within our own decision-making process. and i think that that is where the resolution that will be drafted for our adoption or endorsement or recognition or approval or whatever the language is becomes extremely important. i know mr. wirtheim is working on a resolution and i think that is where the commission can really say we don't just like this thing. and thank you, community, and you go implement it with the mayor's office of economic and

work force development. because a lot of it with the recommendations that are contained in here do go in that direction. there is a great emphasis and a lot of the dots in the may trick do all fall under that community development corporation. ~ matrix so, there is a lot of emphasis on the community moving forward after the adoption of this thing. and a lot of the recommendations falling back to them to implement. and i think a lot of it in terms of business retention and that kind of thing obviously the tools lie with the mayor's office. so, i'm pleased that everyone is on board in that regard. but then that begs the question of the planning commission and land use responsibilities and zoning and formula retail, transportation, housing which tim colin mentioned earlier in terms of density, and the provision of affordable housing, the relationship of

japantown to the context within the city finds itself trying to address the housing goals that have been put forth by abag in terms of increased densities along transit corridors. and, so, i think that those kinds of issues sort of are out there hovering around the j chess document and the commission needs to grapple with that in some fashion at some point. in the resolution i think there can be some very specific things. it should clarify, for example, how exactly we look at the document when it comes to land use decision making. i think that it can make recommendations or suggestions or i don't know what the right word is within the resolution after all the whereases when we get down to what are we going to actually do with this thing. it could address things like the garage improvement, for example, that's contained in here, anything that's contained in here we might want to

prioritize. i know former commissioner alan martures with historic preservation commission had a number of ideas with respect to how the city might address encouraging or providing incentives to heritage businesses. and there is a section in here on social heritage and the methodology that's been developed to recognize what our heritage resources within japantown. quite different from historic preservation and buildings, but businesses and festivals and shops and other kinds of things. but even though we have the mechanism now which has been developed and have begun to recognize those resources in japantown, we have not taken the next step in this document hasn't taken the next step of -- then, well, okay, so you recognize heritage business, so what? does that reflect back on our

land use decision making and how does it -- does the mayor's office, you know, will they use that in some sense to encourage or prioritize their efforts in japantown? perhaps the assessor's office should take a look at some kind of tax incentives. there is the mills act for property taxes. perhaps there could be some concessions with respect to other business taxes related to heritage businesses. i think that was one of mr. martinez's commission, mr. martinez's suggestions. encouraging cultural tourism through sf travel has been mentioned and that could be worked into some kind of resolution, i'm sure. so, those are the kind of things i think that -- because i don't want to send this document back again. we're not going to send it back and go, okay, we have these concerns. you guys go back and address and come back to us. i think we have to take the

document for what it is. it's extremely well put together. no problems with it, but then i think with respect to our role and the staff's role between now and december and with the historic preservation commission also, because i think their resolution can be targeted slightly differently than ours, to craft that so that we all end up, you know, in the position of where our role and our responsibilities as a planning commission can really take this document to heart when we make land use decisions. >> commissioner antonini. >> thank you. this is extremely well done and presents a lot of good ideas. we'll see it's refined version in the future. one thing i did want to mention, it was discussed earlier and it's more of a logistic issue, but the handling of the situation with fillmore and the cross over and the area below the cross over

and what's done there is really critical because opening up the wall of japantown to fillmore and to the area south of fillmore i think is critical. i know there was some talk of filling that in. there's also been talk about bridging over, making the car would still go below, but there would be a very wide area where you could actually develop new businesses and right on geary which would be on the top of the area, the fillmore cross over would be much wider than it is now. so, these are things to look at because i think keeping it from being the japantown from being isolated is really critical and as most of you know at one time before that, geary was changed, there was a very busy streetcar line that went down geary boulevard and crossing the one on fillmore and it brought a lot of people into the area. and i think that's a critical

how that dovetails with bus rapid transit and hopefully a future light rail line connected with some kind of subway that will connect you from laguna street all the way to the union square area and it would really open up the west side of san francisco a lot. so, those are just some thoughts that we can ponder as we go forward. >> commissioner sugaya. >> yes, just one last comment. we can refer in the future, if she doesn't remind we can refer to shelly as shelly purdue. [laughter] >> never mind. okay, people have been around know that part. >> any other comments, questions? okay, thank you very much and look forward to seeing you gun. ~ again. >> commissioners, going to take a short break here while we have a very long calendar. so, probably about a 20-minute break.

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