longer allowed. the energy code says you have to have lighting that is high- efficacy, meaning lots of lumens per watt. you can't just screw bulbs in any longer. it may not be done. i want to mention, it's not just the front of your building, it's your yard, too. the preventative maintainence would say, get some hot nails or screws or something designed for exterior use and screw them on. fix it before it breaks is the goal. everybody has a shed. the code says you can have a

shed as long as it's not over 100 square feet of projected roof area. >> california code says 120 square feet. san francisco says 100. fire escapes need lots of maintainence. this requires a fire escape person or contractor to test it, lube it, maintain it. you have to keep it painted and scrubbed. wire brush. this is one of those folding ladders, which we used to approve. we still approve other folding ladders. what do you have to do? >> if any of you have a ladder

you are depending on for eggress, you don't want to wait until there is a fire. there is a lever to pull, and you should check it once a year to make sure it is still working, the bolts haven't rusted out, the mechanism still works. they're dangerous enough to use in a fire, but if they aren't working perfectly, there is more of a danger trying to use these ladders than there is running through fire. bucha>> you can climb down easi. my mother can. my wife can. >> if you are trying to get out

with a toddler or a baby, forget it. >> for that reason, we no longer allow people to put those letters there and say it is equivalent, because clearly it is not. >> it was the code for years. >> fire escapes are much better. they provide a spare and a handrail. and at that point, we expect the hard part will have a letter at the bottom. >> it is a bold. it could rust out. you have to make sure it is the cure. -- it's a bolt. it could rust out. you have to make sure it's secure.

>> check it and fix it before it is a problem. and here is a wooden ladder. about six months ago, the board of supervisors passed a law that said every wooden ladder must be removed. that follows the unfortunate death of somebody who fell backwards and died. you cannot use these, and i would never encourage somebody. i certainly could not climb one of these. who knows what is holding it on? rusty nails? let's talk about groups. we did not expect homeowners to get on the route to often, but sometimes you can get up on your flat roofs. what do you have to do for routine maintenance on those?

>> you can always tell, if groups are starting to bubble, that is a sign, it protect the roofing membrane from the sun so if there is none, ultraviolet light will be deteriorating, and it will start to bubble. all of the route jacks are the first signs of with a member in fails, so you want to check around those. all of those areas you have to check. anywhere there is penetration, those are the areas you really want to check. >> a flat roof like this with reflective coating needs to be recut it regularly. if you fail, the protection is gone and the roof deteriorate rapidly. it is not just silver paint, it is roof coating. so typically you need to hire

the report to come back and apply a new coaching. you can say you want a uv- resistant coating, but it has to be compatible with what you have up there. roofs need maintenance. call and ask. if you do not do that, the life is short and pepper sibley. go over it and fix it up, that is a good savings. >> if you go up there in your coaching is not peeling or bubbling, it is fine. the group is good for 30 years.

it needs to repaint every 5. if it starts peeling, that means it is time to do it. if it is solid, it is fine. >> you should climb into your well and clean that shock, those ducks. there is a drain out there. this is an endless source of leaks. there are all of these penetrations, so it must be kept immaculately clean. hardwood floors? here is what you do not do. you do not wash the floors with water. they get warped and water gets underneath the finnish and so on.

there are special product. but the worst thing you can do is wash them with water. wipe them up. >> at most stores there is a system called bona. it comes with a mop and a spray , and we recommend for all of the installation we do. >> good. we also talked about carpet cleaning, that is straightforward. but one thing wall-to-wall carpet can have done is have it restretched, and if it starts to fold and bubble and so on, you can't have people, and they can knock it back in and restart the carpet and get more time out of it. also, i have this done every few

years, go round with blue tape, and every place you see a thing or death, you take this tape and say it needs a touch up there. just walk around and figure out where it goes and have a touch up paint day or two, and then the house look so much nicer after you do that. use blue tape, because it does not use an adhesive residue. you do not want to walk run with a paint pale wondering what needs to be punched up. i asked my wife to go around with tape, right? that works really well. sometimes you see sash cords on these wood frame windows. i brought these weights here with some old courts. you probably have seen these

things. if the court breaks, this thing is going to drop. so a lot times in these columns, you hear a huge raveling and great pounding noises. that is mostly these weights banging around in the little box channel, the little wooden boxes there. so if you ever wonder why is it so loud, these guys, hanging around. they are tied on there. it is easy to do to take off the tram and replace the court, but it is not something every homeowner wants to get involved anin. it is straight forward if you're ready to do, but a homeowner might have a hard time making it look good.

>> take your roller. >> yes, the roller. a lot of times that painted the sash cord, also. the setscrews are tight and lubricated and you can polish them up if you want. this particular one is nickel, you can polish it up and it looks good for 60 years. interior door hardware, i like bicycle lubricants. smoke detectors and heat registers, we have registered here, these things come right off, you can lift them up and make sure they are clean, it is a convenient thing to do and reduces dust. smoke detectors, they say every

time your time changes from daylight savings, you want to change the battery. people say not to use the good batteries, the alkaline batteries. what can we do in our toilet compartment and back rooms for maintenance? >> check the four bolts. examine the line. >> they listen up sometimes and a whole plan loosens up, those are easy things for a homeowner to tighten up, extremely easy. he put on gloves and tighten it up and get underneath. it only takes a second to do it. hardware, often these things will tarnish, these nice, expensive things. you need so were polish or some other polish and polish it just like you would polish any other metal, in contact with all sorts of liquids all day long. flooring, we have tile flooring

that can be maintained and scrubbed clean. we have an list problems with showers and mold and mildew. here is my number one solution. put in an operable skylight. if you are on the top for a residential design the -- of a residential building, put in a skylight. that is the answer of 90% of the problems, because then you have a constant flow of air that leaves the sky like open. scarlets are ridiculously cheap , and an operable skylight probably will not cost $300 to buy and not that much to install. they are cheap, and you can leave it open and you always have air. you'll not have mouldy mildred build up. do you have any other thoughts on what to do about mold and mildew?

>> grout has to be sealed every year. again, you want to use a fungicide for cleaning it and seal it once a year, if you have a bathtub with tiles coming around, you want to really maintain that joint between the towel -- towel and bathtub. >> for energy consumption, the shower head has to cut off valve. you do not need water running all the time. you can shut it off without having to reset the temperature. just do not use a plumber's wrench or you will ruin the material. kitchen appliances, the lahood needs to have the screen and filter cleaned probably if you cook a lot once a month. take it out and put it in the

dishwasher. that is what i recommend. take that out. all of these goods have a screen and filter that filters out the papers, and you stick it in the dishwasher. every couple of years, take up your support thanks. every fireplace? >> you want to make sure the damper is working in the shut position and you do not have the fire on so you're not losing energy for the outside and it is easy to open when you're going to use a fire. you want to lubricate that and make sure it works properly, you want to make sure the door is sealed so if it is a gas unit, there is no gas leaking into your room, and if you have a wood burning fireplace you

should have every summer or once a year, you should have your chimney cleaned out because chimney fires are a huge cost of residential fires and that is when the chimneys are not cleaned out, they are fire starters there. so it is critical that if you are going to use a wood burning fireplace, you ain't it out once a year. >> people often say you should bring your water hero. we have such clean water in san francisco, i have not seen that to be an issue. but if you need to take action, not in san francisco. it is not an issue. this is your emergency water supply. make sure they are strapped like that. garage doors, get lubricant and just lubricate those things and clean the bottom, clean it off and lubricated. it will last an awful lot

longer. fire extinguishers obviously are good home maintenance. >> you have to make sure that they are up to date. it changes every couple of years. >> and blasting a wanted to mention was earthquake safety. when you do your home maintenance, preventing damage from earthquakes is a big piece of this, and it is a valuable piece of ceramic with the group on the bottom that keeps it from sliding off the shelf. there are so many things you can do that any home maintenance can do. preventative maintenance. there is much you can do yourself and much you can do when you hire a contractor. just send a handyman a list of stuff. you do not have to do the whole thing. just do a day's worth of work and you can do an awful lot. thank you for coming

>> when the new california academy of sciences opened in 2008, it quickly became one of the top tourist magnets in the city. part of the cal academies' astronomical success is the weekly nightlife party. >> i am joined by helen, who is here to school me on all the nocturnal activities that are getting ready to take place here. tell us a little about what we can expect to see at nightlife. >> we open up the doors every thursday night at the california academy of sciences. there are certain things you can see every week you can go to the museum, visit the planetarium, and we bring in bars and a deejay or band. it is a different feel from during the day, something different every week. tonight , we have beer and music. -- tonight we have great beer

and music. it is beer week. we have a dozen local brewers in african hall. we have a deejays to set up throughout the museum and a live performance at 9:00 p.m. tonight. >> what has been your favorite part as a participant or as an observer? >> my favorite part is to walk around the aquarium in to see people with a drink in their hands, getting to know maybe somebody new, may be looking for a day, or chatting with friends. there jellyfish. i mean, they are beautiful. >> the culmination of the animals. >> it is very impressive. we do not have this at home. >> tell us a little about some of the spider's we see here on display. >> at the california academy of sciences, there is a very large collection of preserved and live specimens, which are the

evidence about evolution. we have the assassin spiders, which are spiders that exclusively kill and eat other spiders. they are under the microscope here. research done and the california academy's i rhinology lab suggests that the assassin spiders have been doing this for over 150 million years. this glassed in room is a real scientific laboratory, and the people in that room are preparing specimens of vertebrate, that is mammals and birds. the way they do this is to remove the skin, sew it together in a relatively lifelike pose, and ensure that it does not decompose. >> i am a really big class actress fan, so i am here to see them, and beer week.

>> i wanted to learn something and have fun. >> i always enjoy it. i am not all is well -- always working as i am tonight. sometimes i come to enjoy the music and to dance. ♪ >> culturewire covers the arts in san francisco, and one of my favorite culture artists is here tonight. jason, thank you for being on culturewire. tell us about some of your posters that we have here today. >> most of the posters here are four specific shows or tours. i am hired by the bands or the venue. >> what is the inspiration behind these posters? >> no, disease of the related to the bay and, of course. music -- it is related to the band, of course the musical content or isn't related to the bed. album covers can come from anywhere.

♪ ♪ >> class actress was great. we have been having so much fun. i did not realize how beautiful the cal academy looks than that. what other events take place here? >> we do corporate events that night on a regular basis. but nightlife is your best bet to come in as a regular person pharmacy the academy at night, and visit with friends. calacademy.org/nightlife.

we have details for the next few weeks. you can get tickets online in advance or at the door. >> thank you so much. thank you for watching culturewire on sf gov tv. ... >> i am the chief building

inspector. we are here at the base of telegraph hill to talk about a subject of great interest for the people of san francisco which is rockslide, slope stability, which caused a dramatic front-page news. i am here with two knowledgeable and wonderful guests. i am here with a geotechnical engineer and a geologist. we are here to talk about rockslide, rockfalls, and related issues. what is the difference between a geologist and a geotechnical engineer? >> and engineering geologist deals with identifying site characteristics, mapping, the ground's surface, collecting all of this data. the engineer can come up with medications and designs.

>> the structural engineer might be working on a building if there is a building involved. what is your role? >> i am interested in the physical properties of the earth and how the earth will behave: subject to different load changes. when you are building a building, you are applying a load and you are wondering if the earth will be able to supply that load. we work closely together and we come up with practical engineering solutions. >> this is when someone wants to build something. also, we have a rock piece of land. we have to have a resolution. >> in the u.s., about 2/3 of the

population lives in areas that are prone to landslides. about $2 billion of damage occurs annually from landslides. unfortunately, 20-25 million people die as a result of landslides o. >> much of the coastline is either a bright red or a beige print th. >> here we are at the base of telegraph hill on lombard street. this is owned by the city. behind you is a large piece of something exposed. you are looking at a large class that was xextricated in a quarry about hundred years ago. this is a secretive sandstones,

shales, accumulated debris. essentially it ended up piled up here. the quarry activity was so intense and they used some much at dynamite that the kind of over blasted. 10 feet of the face was left shattered. you can see the fresh colors and a pile of debris which is precariously perched on the edge of a cliff up there. it is more fresh and more recent than the rest. it stands out because there's no vegetation. there is no weathering of material. those are the kinds of things you look for. >> there are many types of slides. there is the bedrock slides which we are looking at in is a combination of a block slide and where the material is just out of balance and is falling off.

rainfall pushes from the ground water and out of the cliff. as you can see, the slides artistic one of many types of landslides or slope failures. >> do we have all of these kind of failures in san francisco? >> unfortunately, we have them all. the rock from here is used from the sea wall. it came from this hill. it was a itgnoll that was present. because of this blasting that occurred, the rock is weak. while most of the time, there are times of heavy rain.

sometimes, this has nothing to do with the rainfall. iraq is 50 to an old and then it just falls. in this particular area where we're standing, we have seen the wall at the base. >> the big steel beams with the fence. this is an effective way of preventing the rock that does fall from causing damage. that might protect the bottom of the hill but it doesn't do anything over the hill. >> it has long been my understanding that the city of san francisco says and the building department takes this position that there is no one buildable lot -- unbuildable

lot. i wonder if this is realistic. >> if money is an issue, we can develop solutions that will mitigate the impact. that a solution can be eliminating the hill, that can eliminate the problem. or build a structure right into the hill so there is no longer an exposed face or bold enough of iraq together so that it acts as a big buttress to prevent further movement. -- or hold enough of the rock together so that it acts as a big buttress. we are allowing the wall of the building to act as a retaining structure. there was a time when we did not get any. there was an epic one before in 1982. we brought with us and rainfall charge. >> you were