as we grapple with the problems, keeping our middle class in san francisco and most notably those to whom we need their presence this hours a day, often. president miguel: commissioner sugaya? commissioner sugaya: yes, from a business times article from the 10th to 16th, oakland to streamline project approvals. it says part of an update to oakland's general plan, city drafters drafted an e.i.r. that would address most of the areas available for residential development as part of their general plan update, i guess. it says the document should clear most of the groundwork developers typically have to do to gain approval and some developers may not have to do any e.i.r.'s and some only have to do supplemental, rather than a full one.

the planning commission discussed it a december have differs ever does 15 this and public comment is open today. more information from staff? >> i think, because i saw that same article, it's essentially the equivalent of a neighborhood-planned e.i.r. which allows projects to do what we call community planning exemption. in some cases those projects would have to do a supplemental or what we sometimes call focus e.i.r. i think that's it. but i will confirm it. commissioner sugaya: thank you. president miguel: commissioner moore? commissioner moore: i am glad to see a term sheet was submitted for the america's cup and hope we will find and ongoing dialogue about how to get the best out of that city wide

planning. president miguel: since we last had public comment, i would like to mention i met with people regarding the booker t. washington project, cpmc. i was at the planning department out of the south mission surveys, the stark area, which was quite nicely attended, as far as the neighborhood was concerned, with some very intelligent information and questions and interests. had the pleasure of being a guest, again, at the neighborhood network. did a very interesting presentation this week on hope s.f. they had previously done one on the physical characteristics of the buildout. this was interesting because it did not concern the physical aspects that usually concern commissioners, but the support services that would have to be

in place and that would work with the residents, work with them before, during and after, and are extremely extentsive. and they presented, did a very, very good job with that one. also last night the housing action coalition which gave this body the housing award, last year held their housing hero award for this year. and i know commissioner antonini and director rahaim were also present. this was given to three people involved in the hunter's point project. coffee bonner, michael commissioner antonini, and mike cohen, and supervisor maxwell,

with a very interesting, as usual, intro by former mayor brown. and i just wanted to announce that both commissioner olague and myself were present this morning when the board of supervisor's rules committee passed the mayor's recommendation for gwennyth boarding to continue as a member of this body, and did so by committee report to be acted upon next tuesday at the full board. commissioner sugaya? commissioner sugaya: yes, a couple other things, commissioner olagui, myself and commissioner martinez from the historic preservation attended a meeting with staff on the subject of social cultural heritage preservation in the

city and were presented with ideas from the planning department, associated with planning going on in western soma, with respect to the filipino community in that area and also the lgbtq community. and had some interesting documents for us to review. the purpose of the meeting was to involve as much as possible, staff from eowd. the meeting as an initial kickoff went well and there will be follow-up from people. claudia from the staff who is involved in some similar things in the mission and then paul lord not only has been working in western soma, but now has been assigned to japan town. i think the scope will expand a bit and include those communities, as well. and then i also attended a saturday meeting of the south

mission survey. and i think attendance was a little bit lower there, because there were some concerns from the community about not having the word out enough. so i think staff -- it was recommended to staff to continue community outreach through, perhaps, the organizations, the community organizations in that area. so i think instead of the planning department sponsoring the workshops, the idea was then to have -- to go through some of the existing organizations. so hopefully they will follow up on that. president miguel: commissioner antonini? commissioner antonini: since we last met i met with both neighborhood groups and representatives from cal pacific medical center. neighborhood groups with concerns or questions about the booker t. washington project, and also talked with some of the sponsors for the project. of course, president miguel mentioned the housing heroes

event last night. clerk: thank you commissioners, we are now -- on item 11. it's an item on calendar for your discussion and possible action for park merced. president miguel: director rahaim? >> commissioners last time you asked we had a discussion about this item because there was some concern about the scheduling of park merced, a project on the west side which is nearing a time that we would be bringing it to you for action. our current proposal to you is to have the initiation hearing. where you would initiate the code changes and the general plan amendment changes on october 21st and then have the actual hearing on the project

and the co-changes on november 18th. so there would be four weeks between initiation and your actual hearing on the project. that's been our standard practice is to have at least three weeks between initiation and your hearing, because the required notice period is 20 days so your practice has been to have at least three weeks between initiation hearing. since there has been discussion of having an entitlement hearing on the 21st there was an ad placed in the newspaper this week, so on the 21st you will have to continue that item officially to the 18th when that item comes up before you. but just to reiterate, what we are now proposing is the initiation of the code, and general plan amendment on october 21st and the entitlement hearing and the certification of the e.i.r. on

november 18th. and we plan to have the packets to you and the comments and responses to you, the document to you, two weeks in advance of the hearing date. president miguel: thank you. vice president olague? vice president olague: i just want to say that i am relieved to here that that has changed. the reason i requested that this item be placed on the calendar wasn't as a result of my overreacting or anything like that. i was hearing that we were going to be attempting to initiate this project on the 7th of october with an approval calendared for the following week. and i was concerned that it felt, at that point, that it was a little bit out of the hands of the planning commission. it was always my impression when it comes to big projects, the planning commission should -- i know the president clearly has a role in calendaring these items, and he represents the

commission. many times in that way. but when it comes to projects of this size, i just felt like that was too much of a rush to get it through, especially given that we are in the middle of cpmc with comments due to the 19th of october. at the fairmont we are having a joint hearing at the end of october and we are hearing comments, some comments on the housing element and in the early part of october. so i just felt like this is something that this should be an issue that the commission should have some jurisdiction or say over and i felt a lot of our say was being removed from our realm and there were outside forces -- i am not saying outside, but other departments in the city

that were kind of influencing it in a way that didn't feel comfortable to me. also, historically, when we -- even though it's legal to initiate one week and calendar an item for approval the next -- historically we have never done it that way. usually we calendar an item for one week and then there's a 20-day noticing period that allows members of the public to digest the information and review the information. and that sort of thing. so it just felt sort of like we were going a little bit out of what is the norm here when it came to the calendaring of this project, because of the size of this project and the level of interest that i have received from members of the public, i felt that to kind of -- what i felt we were kong rushing it through wasn't appropriate in

this case. that's why i felt we needed to discuss it here. i guess the calendaring of items is one we might want to discuss when we discuss commissioners' rules in the future so that we can avoid these types of situations and have a more, maybe more process when it comes to some of these issues that are of great issue to the public as they are discussed here. then there was a lot of controversy, because i know there was some political implications. i know, that were written about in the "guardian" around park mersed and certain offices in the city. people were calling me with those kinds of concerns. i didn't want the public to get the impression we were favoring one project over other projects. that's why i thought we needed to disclose and make it apparent here that we had the best

interests of the public in mind and that we're not swayed by political interests, and whatever. i just thought we needed to have a public hearing about it. president miguel: commissioner moore? commissioner moore: other comments i received, that this is the largest rezoning project for a very large part of the city which does not have much identification at this moment. and since this will affect a large number of people. not just the park merced neighbors themselves. people felt that compared to market octavio and the eastern neighborhood, nobody else was asked to comment or participate in any kind of neighborhood considerations. based on that, i would be very much in support of it. i would also say that very view people realize what it takes if

you honestly dedicate yourself to looking at an e.i.r. there are thousands of pages, and why i myself pay particular attention to a large percentage of particular issues, there's hardly anybody who has as much time to do this pro jess justice. i believe particularly this year and other people have confirmed that to me, the planning department seems to be crammed with major projects in a way there is no precedent in previous years. that puts not only a burden on us -- and i don't want to complain -- but i do believe it does the public unjustice to participate in the manner that public comment is encouraged and we look for a broader vision than what we bring ourselves to those discussions. so i am actually interested in seeing all of us take a broader look and continue to look at the potentially longer term of deciding these issued.

president miguel: commissioner sugaya? commissioner sugaya: , yeah, i might be somewhat ignore rant of the process that's been used in this whole park merced rezoning and general plan, or whatever we are considering, the e.i.r. process. it's singularly different than processes undertaken by the department, i think, since this is a single developer-driven project. even though it's a large area, it isn't as though the department were the ones that staff went out and conducted public meetings, and got public input and tried to craft a plan that met the needs of the community, so to speak. so i don't see why there's a big hurry here. even the schedule that's been put out seems to be somewhat contracted process. and i don't know if the department has had an

opportunity to go out and conduct its own community meetings out there, based on what the developer has put forth or not. if not, i think that kind of time should be allowed as part of the planning process for this area. so even though what commissioner olague said in terms of the original proposals has now been extended out, i still think it's too short. president miguel: commissioner antonini? commissioner antonini: i am glad to see we have so many larger projects before us, particularly at a time when the economy is not at its best.

that doesn't mean we shouldn't consider it completely, but it's a good sign we have these things happen. i am confused there was mention made of a 20-day period between the initial day and final action, is that, in fact, the case? >> the code requires a 20-day notification. not the newspaper. your practice has been that you would initiate 21 days or three weeks in advance because of that required identification. your initiation three weeks in advance is technically, legally not required, but been your practice for a number of years, because of the newspaper notice going out. commissioner antonini: so with that in mind i think the modifications made are good ones. i guess it would have been noticed that there would be a hearing on the -- maybe it wasn't the 21st but a day fairly soon that would be the action day, also. >> it was notified that you would take action on the project

on the 21st. that will not happen for another four weeks, so we will have to continue that on the 21st. >> and i would -- you know, it seems like this is reasonable, assuming there are no particular, i wouldn't think this would be the case, funding problems or anything. usually with state-involved projects, sometimes we have, you know, time considerations that are involved. i don't believe this is the case here, unless there's something i am not aware of. >> commissioner moore? commissioner moore: i would just like to add that nobody is against the project. it's just by the way it is being driven, i believe the design is substantial and it lacks in process and policy. that is my biggest concern about it. it's exactly for that reason that we need to give it the time it requires to re-zone for a property with as many residences

and with as many public policy issues, which are involved most and foremost, rent control and transportation. president miguel: director? >> i just wanted to mention that it is true that this is a very large piece of land in single ownership. but i will also say the schedule that i outlined a few minutes ago is one that we now feel comfortable with, because we have been working fairly extensively with several city agencies, all of whom have to be volumed in this because there will be a number of public streets running through the site, public utilities, all of those issues and you will see a development agreement we have been heavily involved with. we have gotten to the point where we are comfortable bringing this project to you on that code just like any project. i recognize it as a big project and clearly there has been a lot of community outreach by the developer. but we are to the point we feel

comfortable bringing it to you in that schedule. that's why i mentioned the dates that i did. president miguel: vice president olague? vice president olague: and, again, i don't like to -- usually i prefer to be discrete about some of these issued that come up. but what occurred is i sat in a meeting on monday where i was told that we would not be hearing this in october. and then two days later, based on a couple of conversations that i was not privy to, that schedule changed. and i just felt uncomfortable with it and that's why i felt we had to put it on the calendar and bring it here. i have heard from some community many but not from many community people that the developer has done any outreach to them. i am not sure what the outreach schedule to the community is from the developer, but i would love to hear it. i am not familiar or aware of any of it.

there's a lot of issues near that need to be looked at. we will have a little more time to do so. but i am not aware of any outreach being done to the community from this developer. president miguel: commissioner sugaya? commissioner sugaya: i am confused. in terms of the notification, dr. rahaim, can you clarify what you said in terms of the notification, i know notification went out in the paper yesterday or today. was that for -- >> there had been discussion that we would have a hearing on the project on october 21st -- actually approval. that's what that was for, soy you will have to take a continuance action on the 21st. commissioner sugaya: all right, thank you. president miguel: is there public comment on this item? >> good afternoon, commissioners, i am from the

affordable housing alliance, i am relieved to hear that you are going to go along your more typical time lines with this kind of process. i was a little concerned, like the pro verbal old gray mare who trots along deliberately most of the time, but at the end of the day when home is in site, breaks into a trot and finally a can'tor. i don't believe we are ready to do that and i am also distressed to hear of the comfort level because there is a major issue left to be resolved which is how does the promise that the developers are making that the demolition of over 1,500 rent control units will be replaced with housing that also has affordability for renters maintained. i have warned you about this before, but the bill clearly states you cannot do that and

the ellis act interferes with that project greatly. the palmer decision makes matters worse. we no longer do rental housing in san francisco or anywhere else in the state and the embassy suites case makes the matter even worse than that. we are not that close, i think, to figuring out how we are going to make that promise a reality. and i think some more discussions are going to have to occur, until we figure out what the mechanism will be. i am not sure at all how it's going to be accomplished. and i hear a a lot of wishful thinking. but an outreach is great, but the bottom line is what are the courts saying about this? can we do this? how do we do this? we don't have that answer right now. thank you. president miguel: thank you.

>> good goo afternoon, i am in the san francisco tenant's union. we, too, would like to see this move slower rather than quicker. there's a lot of complex issues and a lot of housing involved. the biggest issue in terms of preserving the rent controlled units, be were able to do something with trinity plaza as people may know, but subsequent to that, we have had some bad court decisions, the palmer case which mitchell referenced. we need time to look at how we will be able to do this in a way in which it's legal to preserve those rent controlled units, and pushing along on a fast scale, or a slower scale will help in that process. i urge the commissioners to give this the time it deserves, given the number of housing units at stake and given some of the complexity of the legal issues involved. and i think both sides want to

see something come out of this where we do not lose rent controlled units, but it's not easy. it's something that's going to have to be looked at closely by the commissioners and possibly ultimately by the board of supervisors. it would be nice if as much of that got done here as possible. again, i would urge that given the scope of this project that you move slower than quicker and let us all figure out how to make this work. >> thank you. >> thanks. >> hi, good afternoon, jim abrams, representing park merced. i want to address a few comments. we have been doing an enormous amount of community outreach on this project the past three or four years, and the year before files an e.i.r., we had monthly meetings with both the tenants and the neighborhoods around the projects and been continuing to

do that. at this point we had over 250 meetings, and they have been relatively well attended and notices sent out to all of park merced and the larger community and had a variety of beth the city hearings, the draft e.i.r. and informational hearings, and we have had informational hearings here as well or presentations here as well. so i think it's our perspective that we have don quite a bit of outreach and we documented that on our website, all the meetings and all the informational materials provided on the project's website, and then in regard to the rent control housing issue, we feel very strongly that the mechanism for doing this is a development agreement which is a contractual agreement between the city and developer that obligates us to preserve the rent controlled units and we promised to preserve the 3,221 rent controlled units that exist

there now forever. half of those london breed replaced by the project and replaced by new rent controlled units. there's absolutely a way to do this. and it is also the same mechanism at the training plaza. >> and we appreciate the time. thank you. president miguel: thank you. >> sue hester, i found the legal ad for this on the department's

website 4:30 yesterday afternoon and started calling in to find out what the expectations were. i was told the e.i.r. responses were going to be available next week, because they had to go to the commission at the 21st and to the extent they were in the office, i thought the hearing was the 21st, there are community meetings, and there is participation that is meaningful. of all of the projects, and all of the things you need, you need to have legal documents out for circulation by not only mr. olmerberg and the people that spoke here, but the attorneys they use. i am not one of the attorneys on rent issues. they had their attorneys, you cannot just drop a complex legal document on people, two weeks before the hearing and say that is sufficient. i am telling you, you can't do that. that's not fair, unless it is a charade that you are going to just rubber stamp the project.

same with the complicated issue on design and transportation. i am glad mr. rahaim has had interdepthal meetings, but those haven't been meetings that the public is invited to and has all the information. you are going to get to distill what you learned from those meetings into your staff report. people have to go back and back truck to muni, to dpw, to everybody. two weeks for a staff report for this project is insulting. it was even more insulting at 4:30 when i found this yesterday afternoon.