rsp. a lot of it depends on how well people are responding to it, and that helps us to lead to how easily we can do the contract. there are a lot of things that happened behind the scene that you will not see like conversion of data. i am not sorry to see what that looks like. -- i am not going to see what that looks like. >> i am talking about the user interface. to see about how it is reacting with other agencies and how it is devolving -- evolving. >> that is still going to be down barone -- down the road at least a year and a half, because

there is going to be all sorts of activity. there is going to be a change management between the various departments. suggestion probably nine months ago, and i want to make it again tonight. is there a possibility at all that you could create a timeline for your goals that people can see before the rfp phase? we could call it a discovery

phase of what is going to be implemented. some target dates. i know we do not want to hang ourselves and put ourselves under the thumb of deadlines, but they also help keep us focused. is there any possibility we can do something like that? >> there is an rfp that got us to the last point before they come to interview in the last process of doing this election. it is to come in front of the steering committee. those time frames are in me -- in the rfp. after that, it gets murky until we can see what is proposed by the various vendors. we should have a much better idea after march 3 -- i mean on march 3. they are due on march 2.

i can write something down, but i have to see what we are balking at before i can give you anything. as soon as i put it out, i will be held accountable to being able to do that. there are all sorts of unknowns right now. it is a little difficult. but i will list all the assumptions and work on a schedule for you. president o'brien: thank you. commissioner kasselman: i think now when you search for an address on the dbi web site, you can get what permits have been issued and completed. what other information will be available on the system? is there a little bit more for people to look up? >> there will be more information that is going to be available, but i am being a little reluctant to go into a

lot of detail because a lot of that is contained in the rfp and i do not want to do anything to jinx the rfp. what we are doing first and foremost is to make what we have right now better, and to be able to have more visible information so that you would know exactly where you were in the process, who has signed off, who has not signed off, what is next. hopefully, there could be some information on, you know -- i do not know what is out there in this commercial environment as the ability to be able to say, "when did you expect something like that?" how long things have been in a queue is fairly quick and easy to do.

we are looking to have more easily and meaningful information available to the public. we do realize that right now it is very, very minimal. president o'brien: what other departments are contributing to the cost? how much of the contributing? >> right now, there is two departments participating in this, dbi and planning. president o'brien: we know who pays that bill. >> it is about a 70/30 split. we have made a commitment to the mayor's office and the board of supervisors that we will fund, basically, to the existing

-- to give them what the existing have, the other departments have outside of our department. but anything specific they want, they have to fund. that way, there is some small commitment to be able to get the rest of the city online, but they have to come up with their own money. since it is two years away at minimum, and in addition to that we probably will not -- several departments are going to be -- that are going to want to wait and see how it is working before they pony up. but all the departments i have talked about, talked to, are really excited. i was talking to dopw earlier. fire is excited. mta would like to be involved as

much as they can. they are not involved that much inputing anything other than results for their designation. there is many general fund the departments that want to be involved, but, you know, as you know, the biggest problem in the and is going to be budget. president murphy: thank you for your presentation. public comments? seeing none. next item, please. >> item 7, -- item seven, presentation and discussion on the city program for small businesses and making accessibility requirements under both the federal ada and california building codes. presentation by regina dick-

endrizzi and neil friedman. >> good evening, small business commissioners and building inspection commissioners. i am here before you this evening to talk about small businesses and disability access, and issues that have been before both of our commissions regarding, sort of, how do businesses get informed in addition to the lawsuits that have been transferring -- transpiring over the last five years. over the last couple of years, our department's director day, my office, the mayor's office on disability -- we have been discussing what we can do to help educate our small businesses and de-mystify the

requirements they need to abide by. what we have heard over the years, in terms of our small businesses and dealing with the requirements, is that there is a lack of understanding of what the laws are, and that these laws are primarily civil rights laws. but they are also accompanied with building code requirements. usually, businesses, when the have code requirements, whether it is with the department of public health or when they are before the building and inspection, it is all very clear. but with this particular issue, because it is framed around a civil rights regulation, it is not as clear. there is no one agency that is charged with enforcing inspections and meeting

requirements. also, there is a great misconception that businesses are grandfathered in, so if they have been in business before 1992 they are covered and protected. and there is a big -- many businesses are not aware of the concept of what is readily achievable and how this gets defined. part of that difficulty is because the final determination of what is readily achievable is not done by an inspector, but done in the courts. there is also a lack of understanding of what dbi's role is with regards to meeting accessibility requirements and the fact that one may get a sign off and a permit of occupancy but still may not be needing federal ada requirements. many of these businesses, our

small businesses, when they are engaged with dbi are doing work which is under the above which and fresh will. then they are required to spend that additional 20% toward making accessibility requirements. but that may not bring them into full compliance under the federal ada. also, many of these small businesses may not even engage with the department of building inspection. their tenant improvements may be putting something on the walls, putting in some countries, may be adding shelves. there is no opportunity to engage with the department of building inspection in order to have the department take a look and work with them on some accessibility improvements. we have seen a number of businesses that have incurred these lawsuits. they bought their business as a turnkey operation. there is not any particular

agency that is intersecting with them to say, "you may need to take a look at your business and the space you are in, and check on accessibility." with these lawsuits, what we have seen is that some of the key triggers that are triggering new lawsuits is that they are -- that there is a step at the front door. the front door may not be wide enough for easy to open. the service counter -- they do not have an ada service counter acts 48 inches. the restrooms are not accessible. knowing that there are these sort of gaps of availability of information meeting our small businesses -- i am really talking about the businesses

that do not have the availability of having a lawyer on retainer. i worked for a small business that grew and eventually we had legal services that were on retainer and advise us of these laws as we opened and expanded our stores. but with many small businesses, they do not have this. what our departments have done is come together to try to fill this particular role. what we have taken a look at is how we can easily explain the federal ada, the california building codes, and the enra act. you have a packet of information we have recently put together. this is a one-page sheet that outlines the laws, talks about the inspection, which i will get into in a bit, and ways they can

afford to bring their business into compliance. part of our education right now is focused on, because there is a rash of lawsuits, what businesses can do to prevent a lawsuit. but i think ultimately our message and what we want to focus on is that access is good for business, and that it is something that is, in many times, readily achievable. we really want to encourage businesses to do this well in advance, so there is no need to be concerned about lawsuits. a corps -- one thing that has transpired that i think has been really helpful for our department and our businesses -- when i first started working

with the office of small business, there was not be -- the cass certification and inspection. i know you have had some discussions around those inspectors and the upcoming training that is going to be happening with more of your inspectors as it relates to your department. but what we do have now is a program at the state level where architects or other individuals can become certified access specialists. a certified access specialist can come into a business, assess the business, help the business determine what is readily achievable, what is not readily achievable immediately or may never be readily achievable, create a plan, and then produce a report so the business has some -- it is a little bit of a

protection. i think previous to this, even if the business brought in somebody who was an accessibility expert, while they may have had an inspection done, there was not something there that they could present for you, except for if they were sued. there would have to go all the way to court to prove what is readily achievable for them to do. in your packet, there is a nice flow chart of what the cas inspection does if a business does this. if for any reason a business is sued and they have had a cas inspection -- i am going to take a moment and introduced barney lerner -- arnie lerner, who is

on the appeals board and is a cas inspector. if you have any questions, he is answer -- he is available to answer for the cas inspection. a business has 30 days to file for a stay. this is a core component for a business to be able to create a state. the court orders the stay, schedules and early evaluation conference, and 15 days before the defendant must provide the cas inspection report and the plaintiff must provide a statement or case. in the early evaluation conference that takes place, one issue is entitlement of a stay, under what time frame the violation can be fixed, and

conditions of a settlement. the state can continue for up to 90 days. the plaintiff may ask the court to terminate for good cause, and the court may extend the stay for up to 90 additional days if good cause is shown. should the stay been lifted, litigation resumes. the defendant must file a response or amend it and already filed a response pleading. what is important about this is with many of the businesses we have seen, the readily achievable component or doing access improvement is not what is costly. it is defending themselves in court. that is what has -- that is the difficulty that i think -- defending oneself in court is

not readily achievable for most of these businesses. that is what is important about the sb-1608. this is something we are encouraging businesses to do well before they have a lawsuit. but should a letter be sent to them by an individual, they can engage in a cas inspection. that can help prevent any lawsuits. your packet is, in addition to that, what we have also put together. we have reached out to opportunity loan fund. they have put together a loan program. we also heard for many businesses that they did not have the funds to get a casp

inspection. if they were hit by a lawsuit, they could not make their accessibility improvements or even have the funds and to consult with a lawyer. opportunity fund has put together a loan program which we are now able to provide our small businesses. in addition to that, there are federal tax credits and deductions businesses can annually take. we are actively promoting those as well. early in january, a supervisor -- in january, supervisor carmen chu -- many of her businesses have had drive-by lawsuits. she convened our office, the

mayor's office on disability -- she convened us to work together on a program, these materials you have. a press conference was held on january 13, a lot toward the chinese media to get this information out. there are many businesses in her district who were served with lawsuits. since then, which i am very pleased about, our office has also been requested to come and make presentations. we have now made presentations to the noe valley merchants association, the bayview merchants association, and have been invited to the petreo hill merchants association. last week, i met with the neighborhood economic

development associations. if you are not familiar with the renaissance center, the small business development center, these are organizations that do entrepreneurial training. the city funds them. what we have said to them is that the supervisors and the city have an expectation now that we want you to be training the business entrepreneurs about accessibility and what they need to know, and how to access that information. the city also has a program which is called the neighborhood economic development program. we have managers on the ground in different commercial corridors. they will also be actively reaching out to businesses they have worked with, to educate them about accessibility. what are the laws? it will encourage them to also do the casp inspection.

we have heard from business is a lot of frustration around this. the presentation, even though we are encouraging the casp inspection, in terms of our office -- and i think to quote arnie lerner, this is a good risk management tool. we encourage businesses to undertake it in that way. but there is a sense that people feel this is a little bit of a shakedown, just because of the fear and maybe the lack of understanding of what it may take to bring once business into accessibility, and also the fact that businesses feel that are being signaled out -- being singled out.

they would like to see the property owners be more involved in meeting the requirements as well. so i think that is where we are now. neil friedman is here to talk about helping explain, although i think this commission knows more than our commission, the distinction between the federal ada and the california building codes. moving forward, we have the casp inspection. the department of building inspection has one inspector. the mayor's office of disability has some inspectors. our next step is working together to figure out how we utilize these resources to possibly minimize our small businesses from having to pay the private sector for these services.

an additional thing, though this will take some funding and planning -- lawrence cornfield -- kornfield did a great video in 2007 explaining the difference between the ada and the california building codes. now that we have casp it would be great to do a new video, and promote that as an online tool for businesses to watch. i do have one last thing i would like to add for moving forward. that is that with the sb-1608, the california commission on disability access was formed.

i think for the department of building inspection, spall business commission, and mayor's office of disability, working for wood to star providing reports and feedback -- working forward to start providing reports and feedback for that commission. with that, i will turn it over to neil friedman. i also want to state that susan mizner from the mayor's office of disability is here as well. >> thank you very much. that was a very impressive discussion of the issues. i think you practically steal my thunder. there are just a few things left that i can say. maybe i will preface it all with a couple of items. i was listening to gina give her speech. i was watching myself in the

monitor. i saw my father there, who is 98 years old and just starting to use a walker. all i can think is we are all headed in that direction, and we had better get accessibility going pretty quickly. i know for his part he cannot navigate things like short steps to get into stores. although he is no longer actively out in the community, he does occasionally get out there. the other thing i want to say is that i found out -- i was giving a presentation last week and later when to have lunch at a small cafe which will remain unnamed. it has one of those proverbial four-inch steps in front of it. it is an old building near my office. i will not get more specific than that. i mentioned it to the owner of

the place, who i have known for many years, that he had this impediment to accessibility of his front door. he said, "i know, and i do have a couple of customers to come here in wheelchairs' under not able to navigate in to the building." i said, "you might get sued anyway." under the ada, that might be acceptable to have some means the owner can bring out and put on the sidewalk to allow people to get into the building. but it's still not satisfied ada the way it has written. i do not know if i should say more than that because i am not really an ada expert, nor do a play one on television. let me get into -- i will say one more thing about that.

this particular store owner also seemed to think he was grandfathered in because his building was the way it was. it was built probably in the late twenties. he assumed that because he has never taken out and the building inspection permits to do any work in his store that he was safe. i tried to point out to him that he was not. this apparently is a common misconception. what often happens is that people come in for building permits and think that just because they pulled out a building permit that somehow that protect them from the ada. the ada is basically a federal civil-rights law. it has been in place since 1992. it prohibits exclusion to persons with disabilities from