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tv   [untitled]    August 2, 2010 12:00am-12:30am PST

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feels kind of like an empty room all of a sudden. full house to an empty room. >> good evening, again. steve mathias central station. just going over kind of a recap of the last couple of week, we just had an event on sunday, all shook up. it was kind of similar to the old north jazz festival, different name and different people. but it's the same type of idea that went real well. we're extremely happy with it. i was out there along with some other officers and we made sure that the club complied, which they definitely did. but actually went out to each club on the hour and just checked in with them, see how they were doing. we said our big concerns was overcrowding. what we didn't want is people drinking all day and having it overcrowded and getting fights started. we checked in every single hour and they really did a fantastic
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job. misking was doing the job of the entertain -- miss king was doing the job of the entertainment commission and she was doing her job as well. as far as incidents going on in the district, just a short recap. we had an assault on bimbo on 724 at about 7:00. it's an isolated incident. one person hit another person. it wasn't like a major fight. swig bar had a pickpocket on july 23rd. it was a battery of the valet worker of the hustler club. sounds when he left the hustler club he was pretty intoxicated and then he got into a fight with the valet guy and tried to beat the valet guy. a question there is maybe overserving at the hustler club. maybe recommend leads training for that. we already talked about the
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shots fire on bay street regarding the jumbo establishment or jumbo shrimp establishment. there were two pickpockets on july 17 at 447 broadway, club atmosphere. and then we had a battery at the parlor bar on 2801 levinworth and that was after a patron was ejected for not complying with the dress code. there was probably more to it as far as the patron and the establishment, but still i want to talk with them as far as you're going to be dealing with drunks on a regular basis. and so the less times that we can actually have to grab them out to somebody, we're going to be doing at the game. one of the concerns and i've talked with miss with jocelyn kane about it with birth fly. over the last couple of months, i as well as the captain have
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asked them for a complete safety plan and we haven't been real happy with what we've gotten so far. pretty vague. you know, what to do with the drink -- a drunk patron and lead them out and give them a bottle of water and a cab ride. we'd like to see more -- a better plan there. and so i'm asking for a sitdown with the entertainment commission, myself as well as the people from butterfly just to get a safety plan in order. let's see. ok. and part of that was based on the last time i spoke, i brought in the report regarding the security from butterfly, assaulting one of the patrons. there was a fight. but it was way, way overboard. that was the one with the photos where they had to drain fluids from the brain. they had tubse coming out of his head. we need to -- yeah, we need to have a better way with dealing
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with that. commissioner joseph: too much information. [laughter] commissioner joseph: when they gave you a safety plan, did they tell you how many security they had? >> i -- i can't recall. commissioner joseph: but all their security was in-house? >> they -- one of the -- one of the nights they were bringing in people with their promoter i believe. i'm not sure, but i think that they have that. commissioner joseph: yeah, that's a problem for me. promoting security. >> yeah, i would just like more a concrete thing to deal with all the different issues that we have just so we can deal with it on paper. even talking with mr. castro, with the impala talking about the security that he goes over with his securities on a regular basis. it really pays off in having the same regular workers there on a regular basis to let them know the team concept. i'd like to have that over at
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butterfly as well. another issue that we have came up. we've had a real spike is the cellar and that's at 685 sutter street. this is a note they got from my sergeant that worgs the midnight shift just the other day. steve, we recently had a number of calls to sutter and taylor around the cellar. the caller reported fights between large numbers of people between 1:00 and 2:30. there were reports of shots fired. this place is becoming a nuesans and the clientele is far from desirable. i will keep a fire on the calls or service, prohibitouts from this place and the reports -- print outs and this place and the reports generated from this report. please let me know if you have any suggestions from action to be taken.
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a couple of days later, i got an e-mail from my captain that was from a neighbor in the area. dear captain brown. we had near-itis. they sig any fide hostile occupation of the neighborhood through encan tations and chanting. the cellar's occupancy is 49. it remain as hot spot of vibrant night life incompatible with our neighborhood. with patrons occupying our sidewalk disturbing nearby residents. is your department pursuing remedial action? i want to bring him in and have a sit down.
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i'm very optimistic as far as working with jocelyn and just being able to get some things that there's issues. i know that they have the seven-day cooling off period. but in my mind even more importantly is having a sitdown so we can find out, ok, what's not working here? and getting them on the right track. commissioner joseph: i want to address the seven-day cooling-off period. it is not a seven-day cooling off period. it's an actual suspension of the business. and i am concerned that too many people do a knee-jerk reaction and they think this is the first thing that we have to do. let's suspend them. and you know, i've been hearing it from other permit officers. let's just do the seven day suspension. and that is not kind of -- i'm making this comment generally and the police comments and stuff. i am not putting it on you. this is a general comment.
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>> what do you do on the eighth day? commissioner joseph: here's the things. be have a mediation process in the entertainment commiggets and what we'd like to do is bring people in and mediate for unless there was something egregious, a shooting a homicide where we think there will be a retaliation. we have a 72-hour suspension. we have a seven-day suspension when people need to cool off when it's been egregious. but if someone had loud noise or maybe a boisterous crowd one night. the knee-jerk reaction of the seven-day suspension is inappropriate at best. >> i might bring your attention to this section cc-32 that i think the officer was refering to which is again the imposition by the director to revise a security plan and present it, you know, in a more formal way in an order as it
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were that served but is simply our vision of a security can that we can do together with the police department and the permitee and the entertainment commission to come to some agreement. it is a mediation but it's maybe on a taller order of formality and is what i think the officer is asking for in terms of butterfly and the cellar and staff is certainly in agreement that we will move forward on both of those as quickly as staff resources allow. the officer has been great about sending reports. so we have adequate information to in fact contact a venue and feel pretty confident that we have enough information to have as much concern as he's having, in fact, and to move in that regard. commissioner joseph: this seven-day cooling off period was mentioned. and so that is what i'm
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responding to. i want to make sure that in no way do we have an abuse of power here. so that's just simply what i was stating. not you. commissioner allan, you have something to say. commissioner allan: i was just going to say that i think i was hearing from officer mathias that the process for both butterfly and cellar will allow an intense security plan. i underscore that because that is the process that the entertainment commission has set forth as being the first step, so i wanted to thank you for embracing that and working with staff and the venues. i think as we've seen with places like the impala pro tracted period of time before they're actually giving them a permit gives us and them a chance to know the seriousness of what they're getting involved in. in retrospect we have to come
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up with a new way to make sure that there is that same seriousness of intent that we put on the new -- on the permit. and if it's necessary to recondition the permit, we will. but i think that it's -- the perfect first step to bring them in with the commission staff and underscore, well, things are not going well, we need to make some changes. and if necessary the commission can schedule as we have before a hearing to recondition their permit and then get more serious about it. so i want to thank you for getting that first step lined up for us. >> ok. thank you. i consider it two or three-prong approach. you have the thing of the discipline. but then you also have the ability to bring them to the table and find out how do we fix the problem. that's what we're looking for. commissioner joseph: the only thing i responded you said a seven-day cooling off period. >> discipline or duss pension, whatever you want to call it,
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it's still a tool that the commission has. commissioner joseph: but it's not our first tool. >> not at awe. it's bringing them together for mediation. commissioner joseph: commissioner meko. commissioner meko: using 1060-32 think of that mediation with teeth. i wanted to talk a little bit about the san francisco marathon. did any portion of the marathon pass through your station, your district? >> you know, i don't have an answer. i came in at the beginning of the north beach, all shook up portion. but i don't remember seeing any signs for the district. >> that's ok. let's talk about it anyway. there are reports -- well, first i should mention, it's kind of become a tradition over the years that rock bands do set up along the route and then runners tend to appreciate it and all of that they do get out of control on occasion
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especially since its sunday morning. i remember a few years back, they set up right outside the home of commissioner jordan shlain who was president of this commission at the time. he was a little bit unhappy about that at the time. the news reports now say that i think we had about a dozen complaint this is year and that's kind of a record. and that again, this really upsets me when this happens that when people call the police, they were told they have a permit. there's nothing we can do about that. now this would be a loud speaker permit. and these are issued as a matter of course by our staff. they don't come before us. but staff always includes a whole list of conditions one of which is automatically is that their sound is not to be
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audible more than 250 feet, i believe from the location of -- of the band or whatever. so there is something that the police can do about it, a couple of things. number one, they can ask to see the permit. and they can read the conditions on the permit. and if the band has been in violation of any of those conditions to one extent they can simply tell them to turn it down and to another extent they can issue citations if the sound is audible beyond 250 feet. so to make a long story short here, how would you recommend we get the message back to the police officers that there are things that they can do even if they have a permit. >> i would just say one of the ways is just in the fashion that we're doing right now. i don't think to answer your previous questions, i don't think the marathon went through
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our district because i didn't get a single complaint come across my desk or my captain's desk as well. but i think just know, gee, we have this problem last year oftentimes at the end of an event we do an after actions what went right and what went wrong and putting it in there. so for the affected districts they can put gee, if there's a noise complaint this is the pro toe call. find out what the real issue is. maybe it's turning it down a little bit that can make somebody happy. now they can -- now they can sit in their house and read a book sunday morning. if we can do that just by going out there and find out, you know, is ate band? is it someone just screaming out there, one person? find out what the actual complaint is. commissioner allan: thanks. commissioner joseph: please continue. are you done?
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>> i have one last part. i can't take credit for it. it's just an idea that i think it came over from the mayor's office. and it got sent our commands staff. and that's the clubs turning to texts. commissioner joseph: say again. >> bars turning to texting to warn of rowdy patrons. it's kind of an idea -- i was reading about it. basically if a bar -- let's say that kick somebody out. the guy's drunk causing problems, they can have a texting tree and say we just kicked this guy out. he's been a problem. the article talked about well, gee, what if people overuse it. what happens if people are misidentified. it's more of an identification tool, at least a club won't be blind-sided. all of a sudden they have a problem coming down the street that they had no idea about. if they had more information
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they would look at this street closer. commissioner joseph: that's provideed that the guy at the door doesn't get fired for texting on the job. >> maybe go to your manager and say, this is the problem that i have with this person. it's an idea, that you know, this was in portland, maine. and i hear they're using it in different areas. maybe we can give a specific area to use have a trail use. >> we have other cities, seattle, chicago are also trying some version of this. i think the most complicated version of this texting with a photo. they can take a photo of the person they booted from their club and it gets sent out so other clubs can visually identify a problem walking down the street.
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it's a good thing. commissioner joseph: yeah, it's a great idea. it's a great idea. i think years ago we eyesed to do like telephone trees in the area. if the guy's out front and he's supposed to be patting people down and he's on the text -- i mean, it's a great idea. we just have to refine it. >> send on some information on to a supervisor. anyway, i saw it and thought it was a great idea. commissioner joseph: great idea. >> this is the last thing. commissioner joseph: this is the last, last thing? >> we've been talking about readers. they're expensive. i was wondering if we could get some people from the industry -- people that use them and the manufactures that come in and talk about what -- you know, what the positives and negatives are about how much they cost.
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commissioner joseph: we could do that. commissioner allan arranged for a presentation here a number of years ago when the technology was new and at that time they were amazingly expensive. they were 30 grand. amazingly expensive. >> we've done research just recently on this topic. commissioner joseph: what do they cost now? >> price point what we found is between $450 to about $1500. and obviously, the more money you spend the more bells and whistles are attached. at the end of the night you can u.s.b. port them to laptops. i have to agree that it would be greet to have more information. commissioner joseph: can they read passports? >> yeah, the nice ones, the one that you can spend a lot of money on, they can read passports, state idea and even -- commissioner joseph: military?
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military i.d.? >> those are the more expensive ones. it completely actually takes a digital scan of the i.d. so again, i have to agree that, you know, director kane and i have talk about and i think it's something to be great to get more information. commissioner joseph: yeah, i think it's a great information. when you do lead training, one of the things they talk about is having this i.d. and the kind of i.d. we can use, we just don't take california i.d. we take drivers' license from all the state. we take military, we take passports. in some cases we take immigration points -- as long as there are five points of i.d., a picture. it's got to have a picture. a physical description including height, hair color -- it is five points which is i don't particularly recall at the moment.
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and so finding one that does all of them because during like fleet week or big events in the city gay pride or any of those events, people come from everywhere. they come from australia. and you to accept certain level of i.d.s in order to do your business well. >> just recently, i was out in front of an event and there was an 18-plus. and because i just happened to be staying there, one of the security on staff said, can we get your opinion on something. they had a girl who was trying to get in. and she had a passport. it was a picture of her as a 7-year-old. it was the passport that she was got it. never updated her now that she was 18. any card reader that you can verify other information would have been really handy that time. commissioner joseph: that's awesome. >> they turned her away. they said we'd love to take it.
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but we can't tell if this is you. commissioner joseph: right. >> even if it was the card reader first california e-cards are 70% of the population they get in there, at least we have 70%. if it's one of those superdupre readers then the percentages can go up. it's better than what we have now which is nothing other than surveillance or get their statements -- commissioner joseph: and all of these card readers retain all the information? and they can tell you if the -- >> we don't know. >> we'll schedule this for another day. commissioner joseph: ok. thank you. thank you, officer mathias. commissioners comments and questions? anybody? >> there's a great event in oakland on saturday. and if you would like i will pass out flyers to make sure everyone's able to attend. it's going to be an afternoon and evening event.
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it's a water event. it's a swimming pool event, it's an entertaining event. it's a col di event. it should be quide quite fun. it's called sand by the ton. i can attest to the 300 cubic tons of sand that are bringing in. it should be quite a good time if measured by the amount of sand. commissioner joseph: commissioner perez? >> i want to instrite the filipino festival on april 13 and 14. i'm organizing it. so it should be a lot of fun. commissioner joseph: awesome. commissioner meko. commissioner meko: just wanted to inform you that we coupled more than a couple of trees. commissioner joseph: any new agenda items? >> cart scanner presentation. commissioner joseph: all right. anything else?
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we are adjourned. >> welcome to coulterwire. the san francisco arts commission and department of public works has joined forces by battling graffiti by launching a new program called street smarts. the program connects established artist with private property owners to create a vibrant
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murals which is a proven an effective strategy for combating graffiti on private property. artists, along with his crew, recently transformed a building turn to vandalism into a masterpiece. let us take a look. >> part of me has so much compassion for other graffiti artists. i understand why they are doing what they do. for me, it was something that was so hard to get out of. the lifestyle in general. j and tagging is addicting. i used to be on these routes. i have compassion for these guys. a lot of these guys are super
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talented. i am just trying to find the median to still be involved but still do my thing as an artist and work with the city, like we are doing. we are doing this wall in a collaboration with the san francisco arts commission. basically what they are doing is trying to get rid of some of the tags and by putting up murals. they are cooking up graffiti artists with business owners. today, we are trying to get a lot of this wall buffed out and covered it. then we will spray on some sketches of what we are going to do. the rain is coming tomorrow. it should be here for a few days. we want others to know that there are artists working on this wall. the owner of this building, she
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has had to pay a lot of money to keep on paying over these attacks. >> we have paid as much as $400. the fed typically have been talk about four times a year. typically, it happened right after we have been notified that we need to remove it. the painter will go up there and paid over the graffiti and make a perfect canvas for the tigers to come back. this program appeals to me because we were looking for a way to stop the taggers and the ugly graffiti. this program has beautiful work done by great artists that we thought would look great on our building. cameron talked about a few difficulties that he thought would be great. he called me and we talked about a theme of what he could do to the side of the building.
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he took some pictures and e-mail them to me. >> we are going to do all kinds of animals and plants. also, we are all to doing graffiti letters. if you one other taggers to respect our, you have to respect graffiti art. >> if you had a lot of characters in it, you will get more respect from business owners and stuff like that, but letters will give you the respect of the graffiti artists. i have actually had in my name in this patch of seaweed. >> what if we did it a giant
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blue whale? >> i was going to do a puffer fish. >> the program for the children is just so important. this is important, too, but you have to get at the kids to find out why they are doing it and direct them in more positive ways. i think what you are doing is great. >> have a good day. see you later. >> dana has been great, she has been a sport about the project. it was cool for her to see it and actually like it. as an artist, it means a lot to us. we are going to make it look really clean today. then it should be done.