the rationale is that the city policy supports such uses whenever it can. however, just because we do not charge impact fees, it does not mean that there is not an impact. what our proposed legislation does is to deal with the inconsistency in the process to mention the their properly assessed and to make sure that the city collects the appropriateness of impact fees. these of the spouse of the changes being proposed this is a reflection of different studies conducted. -- changes being proposed. this is a reflection of different studies conducted.

development will be credited for institutions on-site at over $19 per square foot. another change proposed is to close the loophole by which uses such as wholesaling, and autorepair and others -- and automotive repair and others are considered. in rincon hill, other residential uses a of a $3 per square foot. in market octavia, they would be credited at $1.70 per square foot. in balboa park, it is 75 cents per square foot. we are promoting the adaptive re-use. as you may remember, we established fee tiers. each parcel in the eastern

neighborhood was assigned to one of three tiers. these apply to any develop and on a given parcel -- these have applied to any development on a given parcel. it creates a disincentive to use existing buildings. the policy was to support adaptive re-use, and it is obviously greener to use an existing building. for all of these reasons, we are doing this. price chicks in the lowest -- projects in the lowest fee tier would have no changes. in 3, there would be a reduction for both residential and nonresidential use. that concludes my presentation

on the proposed ordinances. i am happy to answer any questions. chair maxwell: thank you. colleagues, any comments or questions? why do we not open it up for public comment? seeing none, public comment is closed. thank you for your work. it has been a long time coming. you have done some good come in debt to work on this, so this will make it easier. -- you have done some good, hard work on this. colleagues, we will continue this item until next week. without objection? so moved. madam clerk, item number 5, please. clerk somera: item number five,

the california environmental quality act procedures, appeals, and public notice. >> supervisor alioto-pier will not be here today because she is attending a funeral, so we will ask for a continuance. i just wanted to talk about why this is before you. in 2002, california passed a law. in the last years, we have not enacted permanent procedures to deal with this. we introduced this legislation back in april, and it went to the planning commission, which recommended its approval 6-1.

in san diego, there was a 10-day deadline. what we have done is try to take into account our existing planning code. pitt -- chair maxwell: all right, again, we will hear this item, and you will be able to comment, and you will be able to, the following week, as well. planning? >> thank you, chair maxwell, supervisors. this was reviewed by the historic commission and the planning commission, in both recommended approval with some modifications. the planning commission listed 11 modifications, -- and both recommended approval with some modifications.

the department wishes to remain our gratitude to supervisor alioto-pier for incorporating the vast majority of the recommendations. i have the complete list, and i will spare you from that. chair maxwell: i think we should hear all of the recommendations, yes. >> ok, these are all from the planning commission. the first one was they wanted to add in the community planning exemption as an exemption. it was not listed in the same with the others are in the statutes, and that has been done. the second one is we requested more preparation time, and this has been accommodative, so there will be more time to prepare for the hearings compare to currently. we also requested the environment -- there be a certain number of copies to the board, which is to be at the

discretion that may be e-copies. we requested an adjustment to the response deadline. currently, they have to have the responses in in advance of the hearing, and some pilots do this up until the day of the hearing, and is very hard for the department and project sponsors to prepare a response to that, so the supervisor has put in staggered deadlines, where appellants have to have all of theirs in 15 days prior to the hearing, and others need to have their information in 10 days prior to the hearing, and then that is the cut off for submitting. we will not see what we have seen in the past. the planning commission also requested a change in the requirement for board action within 45 days of filing, and this has been changed generally to know within 30 days of

filing, unless the board is not meeting three times that month, and they could be extended 40 days, or if the full board is not there, similar to the way that you'd do ceqa appeals, it would be pretty much the standard way we do things. we also note requesting clarification on remanded decisions, so when the board overturns, it is unclear what would happen to further subsequent appeals. if you overturn this decision and send it back for more work, now it is clear. only the matter that you were concerned about in your appeal could be subsequently appealed, and things that were not appealed would not be subject to the subsequent appeal. that has been incorporated.

the planning commission requested clarification that would require objection in order to maintain appeal rights. this is no longer relevant, and the requirement that you have to have a prior has been deleted, so that is no longer relevant. the supervisor can specify what kind of demolition would be applicable to this, in section 317 of the planning code, as well as alterations to buildings of a surge in your or older. -- of a surge in year or older -- a certain year or older.

and we requested an additional note, -- an additional item. this was actually not incorporated. this is something that we can do to further provide clarity. i guess there are some things in the ordinance before you that describe what sort of notice is required, but we do many additional notices before you get to that step of the eir, such as the notice of preparation, and that it be codified in specified in the law, we can post the information online and make that part of the previous notice requirements more publicly known. and then there was the

recommendation of the city attorney. that has inc. -- has been incorporated. they want fairness in any potential limiting of appellants, and the was a requirement for prior participation. -- there was a requirement. they also wanted specificity in their required role in the process, and they wanted notice for categorical exemption, and they also asked about limiting future actions in that there was simultaneous approvals. this could happen with the potential historic district, and if there was a ceqa appeal, they

wanted to make sure that their potential for action was not limited. so that is line by line what those commissions wanted. supervisor alioto-pier responded to the vast majority of these recommendations. i guess i could say the examples of how she you responded, which of summarize unless you want them all in detail, is that they were setting reasonable timelines for the hearings so that all parties have time to prepare, while allowing for the additional time in case the board is on recess during that time, providing for staggered and deadlines -- standard deadlines -- staggered deadlines. other recommendations also incorporated clarify what may be subject to appeal after a

decision has been remanded, as i discussed, and then there were some minor -- minor technical issues. the supervisor did eliminate prior participation for an appeal. they expanded notice of exemption, and they included the historic preservation commission in the process. as well as the determinations of historic districts would not be interrupted by a potential ceqa appeal, so our department wants to think the supervisor for addressing this. it has long lain but we do long language. -- it has long language. i think it is a good thing to get the requirements into law so it is better for everyone. that concludes my presentation.

also, the chief of environmental review officer, bill, is here. if you have any questions, he could probably best answer them. chair maxwell: i believe, we will, and i mentioned one week, but it will probably be more like one month, because we do not have a meeting on october 11, so it will probably be beyond that. there is a lot of large pieces of legislation, and supervisor chiu will discuss that, but i think we will need more time for people to digest the changes. supervisor chiu, would you like a question, or would you like the gentleman to come up first? supervisor chiu: he can come up. chair maxwell: i saw him here.

>> a very good summary of the suggestions we made as well as the many revisions that were made, both in terms of both commissions and other members of the public both here and at the planning commission. supervisor chiu: all right, i will start with a few brief comments, and that we will obviously hear from the public. i think these changes concerning the ceqa law makes sense. i know there is a lot of legislation that clarifies things from the developer's perspective. i am just starting to hear, because this is from a lot of maybin association leaders which of not been fully answered -- this is from a lot of neighborhood association leaders. one thing i would like to suggest that would be helpful note is for my staff to potentially convene with planning or with supervisor

alioto-pier's office. they're always continues to be a lot of concerns around the lack of consistency and the lack of uniformity around public notices and environmental decisions, and i know there had been some discussion about requiring the environmental review officer, yourself, i am wondering if you could talk about the consideration around that. >> there were five specific requirements in the code. in summary, whether they are

designated or potential, the planning department code, instead of the building department, so it has always been a little bit ambiguous, so i think the notice has been addressed. i think the remaining areas of ambiguity and the lack of closure is on some exemptions which do not have a hearing before the planning commission or some kind of discretionary action, and the next step is a building permit. that remains a challenge in terms of what would be noticed that would let people know about " -- what would be noticed --

notice. a building permit for which there is not a lot of its potential documents -- a lot of extensive documents. tying it to the section 311, 312 notices. the problems that i have understood from our neighborhood planners is that those notices have been on a different timeline -- have been on a different timeline. -- happened noon a different timeline. we do our environmental documents on those kinds of projects, and they would have to change how they do the noticing, and it is not clear that the underlying purposes of 311, 3 under 12 are well served by merging them -- 312 are well served by merging them.

this is sometimes more confusing than helpful, so i think whenever we get in terms of merging, expanding our notice on those types of exemptions, it should be consistent with this and not with what people get in the mail which is confusing. supervisor chiu: i agree about the public transparency. whether saddam's or checklists -- whether stamps or checklists, does this legislation deal with the? it does not seem to. >> it does reflect what the change in our practice has been in response to that case, which the we are posting all exemptions, stamps, anything that we are aware of that is an exception.

it is being posted on a weekly basis on the website. that is a practice we have changed in the last several months, and that is in the legislation. supervisor chiu: that is in the legislation, ok. and there was a new requirement about the appellants, if they want to preserve their right to appeal. can you talk about why that restriction is there? from my note -- from my perspective, i think many members of the public do not become aware until a decision is made, and that is when you get a lot more public scrutiny. tell me why that requirement was made more restrictive on who actually has a right to appeal. >> that was in the regional legislation, more or less consistent with processes with the next line of concerns.

that is no longer in the legislation and has not been in the legislation for many months, so that has been stricken from all instances. you do not have to be the appellant in order to preserve in subsequent right. supervisor chiu: there is a lot of confusion in the neighborhood as to exactly what is being proposed here, so i think it is appropriate to spend more time going into this so it is more clear what rights are being given up or restricted. that being said, i am happy to answer these questions in another setting so we can get to public comment. chair maxwell: all right, thank you. why do we not open this up to public comment? i have two cards. zach, and another. if there is anyone else who would like to speak, please lineup.

-- line up. >> my name is zach stewart, and i wanted to mention some conditions where it has taken longer -- it has not been streamlined. for example, there is something that others did. all of these individuals slow down the process of getting a new piece of the environment for the city. i would like to speak to the idea that the environmental impact reports should be made more difficult and make it slow down the construction and the development process.

developers worldwide salivate to have a project in san francisco. it is crazy tune of a project in st. francisco. we do not need to make things more streamlined for them -- note is crazy to have a project in san francisco. the new urbanists, basically los angeles, go too fast to get a good result. chair maxwell: all right, next speakers, please, and also this other. >> good afternoon, supervisors. my name is sue vaughn. the sierra club opposes weakening ceqa. i do not know if people knew about the 11 changes and the

additional ones from the historic preservation committee, but the sierra club opposes weakening ceqa. thank you. >> david. i agree completely with what sue vaughn said. i did not have much time to review this, and i have heard about it before and was concerned about it. basically, ceqa is the way to protect us, the community, and having a way to slow things down, and the planning department is consistently used in such a way where it does not follow the rules.

the public has no right to appeal if they do not find out that the planning department did not do what they were supposed to do. one thing that they have gone over and over again is that they say this project does not need to go by ceqa, and the reality is, no, actually, they should have used ceqa. with one, they claimed it was a church. it did not get the ceqa review. under guidelines like this, maybe the theater would not have been saved, so i am really concerned about this. i would like to see this not move forward. thank you. chair maxwell: nan and paul. >> oh, my name is na. i did try to go through the 60- page file. it struck me that it had a lot

of dodgy language. maybe somebody could have done an executive summary so these are easier to understand. i cannot understand that people are not having the same problem i am having. it is very complicated. it is very difficult to sort out. i will read you a message that i sent to members of the committee in regards to today's hearing. i urge leann used to not do this using mcginley alter the balance between public and private interests -- i urge land-useur -- i urged land use to not do this altering the balance between public and private interests. somehow, it strikes me that this is being slipped in here in a manner -- it should be dealt

with as somewhat of a separate issue. i got hung up on this by a next- door neighbor. however, they had 10 days after the appeal to file an appeal. rather than do that, they went ahead with the demolition, so i do feel this is an area, a specialized area, that needs to be addressed, not just in regards to appeals of this appeals ofceqa process but in regards of appeals in general, and it should include the area during which the demolition would not occur. [bell] all right, thank you. chair maxwell: does anybody else

after paul -- please line up and come forward. >> thank you, supervisors, for the opportunity to get in touch with the front of a coatt -- he the fun topic of ceqa. this is not doing a good job either for the product sponsors or as the community as a whole. i have not had time to begin the most recent revision of this proposal legislation in death, but i am extremely concerned about the timing after documents are released, the tight restrictions for an appeal. when you consider the voluminous comments, the voluminous documentation that comes out with the final eir, the short time.

i believe you will see people rushing to file appeals simply because they have no option but to do so in that time period. it also creates an incentive to hide things and very things that you do not want found if you are a developer, it is you can count on the fact that they may not have time to dig it up. it is complex comedy, and demands. this really needs to get looked at, the timing. -- it is complex, and demanding. budgetary reasons, that dropped. there were specific discussions about tiny and the importance of timing so that the community and community groups could review documents, and a 20-day notice or a 14-day period is simply not enough time to do a good job.