that is what the code says. that is the interpretation that a reasonable amount of time is three years. that has been our policy, it is reasonable, three years, and that has been adopted and the approval for the variance and conditional use is quantified as a reasonable amount of time. in looking at this and the project in the history and how we work with them to come to resolution, we think a reasonable amount of time is the time that it takes to get the project approved. we feel it's still complies with the time limitations of the planning code for conditional use. vice president goh: okay. i'm still able bet unclear. i know you addressed this earlier. why wouldn't product sponsor have been asked or required to have an extension, or whatever mechanism it would be?

>> it could've been the determination of the staff working on the project at the time. they still had not cleared up the variance issue, it was still a project in motion, and we had not started the time clock then. the department work with the project sponsor at the time and to my knowledge have not requested they go back and obtain an extension of conditional use, because we were reviewing this project actively over those years and felt it was still consistent. vice president goh: when you mentioned the people in your department who were involved in that are no longer with the department, you mean we cannot bring them forward and ask them why? >> i am the person who was last involved in this case on behalf of the state. it vice president goh: okay, thank you. >> three minutes. >> thank you. this is what 605 kearny street

looks like today. with, ironically, the help of the appellant, the project sponsor it retained two preservation architects, and they put together 37 pages of job orders that resulted in the stop work order on june 17, 2010. we're trying to stay positive as well. to me, that is a preservationists dream, to have that type of effort and care put into a project like this. in addition, the appellant says he wants it to be built, but this is what it would look like if it was built. we don't want to force a new environmental review when none is necessary, bicol's -- because

the goals have been accomplished. there are people in place who are ready to start working on this project tomorrow. forcing any type of further delay would leave a gutted property and blight on kearny street in chinatown. the planning department has overseen a vigorous environmental analysis, and the 605 kearny street development team has fully worked with city officials during this project. extraordinary efforts have been made to follow the guidelines of the city planning department and dbi. the time it took to obtain the building permits, to get everything in place was well worth the effort, and we are requesting the board allow this project to move forward without delay. thank you. >> thank you.

commissioners, the matter is before you. commissioner fung: i am sure everybody in the audience recognizes that i could speak for hours if we were to discuss the nature of ethnic enclaves, the nature of chinatown. many of us have been in that very discussion, such as myself, since the early 1970's. the issue before us is relatively narrow, but it has wide ranging impact. i think i would share with my fellow commissioners that is not necessarily the formal process, but during my tour at planning,

we used to hear the continuation of conditional uses, and we would always ask the question why they were not proceeding. they range from those, predominately at that time, because we were in recession. a lot of projects were not continuing because of the economic and financial issues. housing projects, large ones, etc. one could almost predict that there was a reasonableness to allow for continuances of conditional uses. very rarely did we hear one that was based on the type of ongoing

dialogue that may have been necessary to finalize a particular item on a particular permit. in the time that have been on the board of appeals, it has also been fairly consistent that the zoning administrator office has in general provided continuances, and it is something that is relatively easy to get. reasonably easy to get. the question, then, is, why wasn't that done here? if you look at it, the overall process and the time line, it is apparent there were a number of steps. i am not sure they were so difficult that it would have taken that much time to accomplish each, but it is also

not very easy sometimes to navigate through the city processes. i will not name any names or apartments. that is not always so easy. -- i will not name any names or departments. it is not always so easy. in this particular instance, if one accepts the start time, then, yes, the three years elapsed and there was no continuance of that entitlement offer. i choose to interpret the period that it should have started as when the final entitlement was in place, that allows one to have built with this particular use asked for, and for me that would be the time that the variance was finally recorded. so that is 2008, and therefore the three years, in my opinion,

ran from that point in time. vice president goh: i am taking kind of a different view of the start time. i mean, based on the clear language, the three years running from the date of the adoption of the motion, even apart from that, the difficulty, where the time, i understand the project sponsor has been involved with the department throughout, but there are these various points where the time that was running really seems like maybe a choice of the project sponsor. i am thinking about that variance code change that was mentioned. the other thing, we heard a couple of times, the noncompliance of the n.s.r.'s

was so great that the printed sponsored at the preservation architect involved and has a long list of things to pay attention to and sort of fix. but the preservation architect was required by the n.s.r., so the time that was eaten up by that seems to me on the printed sponsor and not on the city department to explain -- seems to me on the project sponsor and not on the city department to explain. we heard that they did not apply for an extension or l.o.v. to extend the c.u. maybe it would have been granted relatively easily, i don't know. and then more globally troubling for me, and maybe it is sort of bad timing for this project, and mr. wong said that, he said the

application of the laws should be applied similarly to everyone, and i think that is true. i think we have had trouble with that. we heard some of the people involved are no longer with the department, and we heard from the very beginning of this hearing, during public comment, we were reminded of a permit expediter who was facing 200 felony counts for dealing with the same department in a way that was not -- this is mr. bley's language, it was not above board. mr. bley has been saying he does not think this is above board. taking that all the consideration, i have a harder time explaining away or excusing the time that has passed and caused the c.u. to expire. i think those are my comments for now.

commissioner garcia: i will go. if other people want to wait. it is very hard to ignore the fact that so many people care so deeply about this project that they gave up an evening to be here late. obviously, they care about this. but as was stated early on by mr. bley and others, this is a very narrow issue. the issue is whether or not this is a valid c.u. because the language in paragraph 2, of the motion, -- i am sorry, in the n.s.r. that had to do with the motion states that after three

years, after that motion was adopted, which was 2005, i think, february, that the conditional use would be invalid and expired. but there are several things that really troubles me, and it occurred to me when i was reading this. the statements i am going to make our legalistic, and it is certainly not from going to law school or treading as a lawyer, but it stems from the variance here, we have dealt with the issue of stock border. had this been brought before the planning department, to declare this was now an invalid c.u., i would think someone, certainly i would have argued, strongly that the city should be stopped because a lot of the delays were caused by the city.

and also, it seems -- and i am still not clear on this -- i guess when you have a project and it is required that you file an n.s.r., and has to be attached to it. the world will know it is special requirements and anybody buying the property would know that these special requirements go in perpetuity with the property. the other reason i want to stop the city, this n.s.r. is filed be on the date on which this would already expired. so if you go back to february, 2005, go three years forward, it would be february, 2008, and this is recorded by the hungs themselves and is dated march 2008. i would argue with the city they should have caught that.

they should have alerted these people that this project sponsor that there was a problem. but beyond that, i think a great argument was made by the fact that, as has been stated by several people already, not all these delays were caused by the project sponsors. if anything, most of the delays were caused by lack of action by the city. but all that aside, i still find it very reasonable that the actual date, at which time the clock should start ticking, would be that date in 2008 when the variance was decided on. i am sorry? >> 2007. commissioner garcia: 2007.

but at any rate, the city feels as though this is a valid c.u., it is still valid, has not expired, and i agree with the city and i tend to uphold. -- i intend to uphold. commissioner hwang: my analysis is not as complex as with my fellow commissioners have stated. simply put for me, if this is a technical concern, and the zoning administrator and planning feels that what has happened with this project is in part connected to the process- related issues, then the zoning administrator has discretion to determine what would be a reasonable outcome here, i

would defer to that in this case. i would support the movement of this project going forward. president peterson: i will say lastly, it does not appear to be anything simple about this matter. there certainly are some well articulate concerns by the appellate. but i also think that having the city issued the work order and obtain a number of changes out of concern, in essence it delayed the project. i think we have to concern, balance these concerns with the community presence and the architectural concerns. it sounds like a lot of those have been made.

now to penalize the project sponsor over this matter, when there has been a lot of the late not as his fall -- there has been a lot of delay not at his fault, i would tend to agree with commissioner fung as to when you would start the day. that is my inclination. commissioner fung: commissioners, i am going to move -- there is a hand raised, madame president? president peterson: yes? >> i just want to remind you again, there are substantive issues. president peterson: okay, we're not having argument. >> i did not get there because i thought we would have a hearing before the planning commission. the planning commission approved one building. this is something completely

different. it has been changed. the building has been presented to the chinatown community as being a building that is of equal height to the buildings next door because that serves the purposes here. in fact, it is 15 feet taller. if there were no problem with that, why not have pictures that properly show with the building would look like? president peterson: thank you, sir. commissioner fung: everybody should remember, then that is a c.u. issue. we are dealing with the zoning administrator's release of suspension. i find it was a reasonable decision by the zoning administrator, and i so move that the appeal be denied. >> if you could call the roll, please? >> the motion is count -- the motion is from commissioner fung

to uphold the zoning administered's release because it was reasonable? >> there were no errors on the part of the zoning administrator. >> again, to uphold the request for release of suspension on the basis the zoning administrator did not abuse his discretion. on that motion -- [roll-call votes] thank you, the vote is 4-1. the z.a. is upheld on that basis. >> president peterson, since the next items were withdrawn, there are no further items. [applause]

>> good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us. it is my pleasure to be here with our regional fta administrator and our commissioner from san francisco who sits on the metropolitan transportation commission. we have a new development in terms of the muni metro system, one of which is the beginning of the card installation system. we have nine stations that will be receiving newgate's.

and we will be adding another 19 disabled fare gates. what we are attempting to do here is replace the infrastructure that has well tapped is useful life in terms of our fair gates, and we are cobbling that at the same time with a nuclear program, which you all should be aware of and which is the regional smart card that will be used throughout the area for public transit trips in the region. the new ticket vending machines -- we have purchased 40 of those ticket vending machines. customers should be able to go to any metro station and purchase tickets that can be used on all of the systems in the metro region. they are multi-lingual machines. they speak in english as well as spanish and chinese, so we are very excited to be here today. again, 30 years worth of work that these dates have done it, and they have done all that they can carry in over 700,000

people, and these new dates will hopefully be here in the next 25 or 30 years serving as public transportation services here in the city, getting to and from their loved ones, getting to their job, getting to education, so we do not look at these gates as just being steel and rubber and labels. we look at them as an instrument to help people achieve their dreams, and today is an important day. we expect to have the total system outfitted by the end of october. we would not be here if it were not from the parks department, with federal stimulus dollars that came to us from the fda. the project had been sitting on the shelf for quite some time here at the agency, and we were fortunately able to fast for this project through our partnership with the mtc and the clipper program, through federal stimulus dollars that were presented to us by president obama's economic recovery

program. it was clearly a partnership that got us here today, and it is i guess a signal of future unveilings we will be doing over the next couple of months over the -- with other projects that will be coming to fruition. we started this work a few years ago as it related to the clipper card. we started work as it relates to the trolley buses being rehabilitated. we have a host of projects that we are implementing at this time to get our system in a good state of repair, and today is just one of them. with that, i would like to turn it over to our regional administrator -- regional fta. >> i am especially pleased to join you here today and celebrate this wonderful partnership. this project has been forwarded with $11 million of federal stimulus dollars, and that is only one portion of the upward of $70 million in stimulus

money that came to the mta here. we're very pleased to be here today. i would analogize this project almost to that of fine wine. nothing before its time. we have been involved with translink program. we are almost there. not only did the recovery money provide and create and retain jobs across the country, it provided that additional infrastructure funding to get us over the hump. again, we are pleased to join with you today, and congratulations to both of our partners. thank you very much. >> here it is -- this is the clipper card, so everybody, have

a good look at that. i think it is a very handsome looking card. you will see the logo on all the cards, on all the machines. you just put the cards down, and you are on your way to wherever your going -- wherever you are going, and given the -- how shall i say it -- the particular special environment of the bay area, the fact that we can all get around with the same card is a wonderful thing, and mtc is delighted -- believe me, i have been there a long time. it is a great delight and a real treat to be able to have this happen today, so i hope everybody will have a chance to use the cards and enjoy it. thank you very much, and i'm delighted to be here. >> clearly, there is a group of folks we have to recognize here. we would not be here today if it

was not for the folks in the trenches with ft thec s andfmta and federal transit administration -- those are the folks that really brought this to fruition. they have a lot more hard work to do, as when you bring on any complicated technology like this. it does have its growing pains, and we will experience those, but you have a commitment from the mtc and mta that we will try to make this is painless as possible. i think it is a great day to have these new fare gauges, just another indication of how the mta is reinventing capital dollars to make sure the system is reliable and efficient and on time. we're going to have the project manager of m from theta -- from the mta take us over to the ticket machine. they will give us a demonstration of how the

machines work, and they will give us cards from the new gates. we will come back and use the clipper cards on the new fare gates. >> with my artists, eight of them are working in tehran, iran, the capital city, and one is an iranian american based in

san francisco. the problem is really a collective exploration in the day and the life in tehran. it is the largest city in the middle east. for the gallery, one of the first pieces you see is one piece which is a laser-cut peace, it taken directly from the map of the city itself -- a laser-cut piece. it represents the geography of the city. it is positioned right next to another work by an artist who took a 77 taxicab runs and let the potholes and the city turns of tehran dictate how the city would be portrayed. >> [singing]

>> one of the other pieces that to experience in the one-day exhibition is from another artist, a recording of state radio from tehran, and is played for four speakers. >> [speaking foreign language] . >> [speaking foreign language] >> [speaking foreign language] >> [speaking foreign language] >> the entire gallery is covered with white vinyl on white walls, really minimalist, and the kind of the merged -- of emerge as you walk through the room. >> [speaking foreign language] >> [speaking foreign language] >> these are excerpts from the radio broadcast that youar