currently open space is unuseable for recreation since most of it is in the middle of busy streets. it is highly con surf tiff of water. the project will provide over 68 akers of green -- acres and parks. they have guaranteed any person affected will be moved to a brand new unit with the current rent at the time of the move. park merced is beautiful. thus the reason i moved there, and many people i know. but it clearly can't survive unless we pass this. if it doesn't pass. i am scared to see what would happen. i can't imagine any future company would want it since it needs a lot of work and not economically sound. supervisor mar: thank you. >> hello, supervisors. thank you for holding another

public hearing on this very important issue. my name is ann marie bratton. i live in merced. i have been in my garden apartment for 18 years. i am in phase one, and i will be one of the first people to move out. i don't want to particularly live in a high rise apartment. however, i think that each one of us, everyone, has a responsibility beyond our individual lives. i think the park merced plan speaks to that responsibility. san francisco needs housing. san francisco needs affordable housing especially on the west side of the city. san francisco needs, as well as the earth needs, environmental development. and this plan is a very sustainable plan. high density urban housing near transportation is becoming the

best development for sustainable living. san francisco needs economic development. the jobs that will be provided, the construction jobs, the electrical jobs, the union jobs. i have talked to my neighbors as well. i have a neighborhood who was scared to death. they are going to tear down my apartment. what am i going to do? my daughter had to move in because she lost her job. when i explained that he was going to be moving into a brand new apartment much more energy efficient, water efficient and all of that, he was very happy. i'm sure that there are many people in the residents who do not understand because they have been misled by misinformation. one of the things i think is important about these hearings is that good information comes out from people like michael varney and some of the union people, the people who support

the plan. so i urge you to support it. thank you very much. supervisor mar: please do not yell out from the awed yelps. next speaker. >> good afternoon, danny campbell with sheet metal workers 104. this is a good project. it is a smart project. time to get this off the drawing table. time to break ground. the city needs this, and the community does. you have heard before we don't -- if we don't do anything now with the traffic situation, we know it is going to get worse. but this project addresses that and a lot of other factors, too. green sustainable standards that they are going to build this project to. so i ask you to move this forward and thanks very much. supervisor mar: thank you. i will call the last card that i have from the box here. manuel flores.

>> good afternoon, supervisors. my name is hall of fame -- javier floors. i am here to support the project. one of the things i want to minx, laborers are the lowest paid compared to any other trade. we do have members. we represent members that also live in the apartments. the reason i am bringing this up is because of the rent control. if our members can afford to leaves there, is a place to live. one other thing i want to mention, the management at park merced. i get all this from our

members. they took compliments about park merced, which i think it is a good thing. i don't think there is a single unit that does not support this project. we all have something in common about this. we have an only gigse with our members and all that. i suggest we move the project forward. thank you. that's all i have to say. supervisor mar: thank you. >> good afternoon, supervisors. jeff rock a fifth generation person here. i have spoken on it. i don't know how many times i have talked with michael yarney, peter albert and the supervisors on what we have here. i think the project does come down to this is what we have if we don't approve the project. we have units that are dallas

braden dated. we have cost pass-throughs. we have san francisco state -- i would pressure you not doing that thank you. we would have the threat of san francisco state purchasing these units piece by piece. they have doctor home run 600 of them. we have had the bad traffic that supervisor elsbernd's study and the board has commissioned to show that will continue. what we won't have if i understand in talking to peter albert is some infrastructure improvements like we are getting out at hunter's point. as someone who was born and raised in west san francisco, i've got to ask you what is it about that that we don't want to do? why don't we want to improve these things for everybody? i really think if you don't do this, this developer is going to be motivated to piece this thing off and sell it. and we are going to be the ones sitting there with our foot stuck. that is not what west san

francisco needs. we can argue and talk about this for another six months, and pretty soon time is going to kill all deals, the opportunity is going to go away. it is going to be piecemeal planned. we are not going to get any of the benefits, and we are going to sit around and point fingers at each other. we need to take this risk. yes, there the possibility that not every legal loophole get cut out. we won't through anybody out. that is not san francisco values. thank you. supervisor mar: i'm going to say if there is anybody else who would like to speak, come forward now. we are going to close public comment soon. >> craig el ib son. we need to send this probbling back and figure out how to do it without the declaration. some of the ideas are good, but the demolition is a horrible

idea. there are three problems. one, beginning with the fact that we are demolishing 1,500 units and destroying existing homes and community is not something we should be supporting. two, we have the problem that we know that any promise of rent control is risky. it cannot be guaranteed unless we get it amended. we asked the developers to try to do that. they said they could not do that. thirdly we have an ellis problem. there is nothing that can be done to prevent the garden apartments from being turned into condominiums. the case mentioned does not address that whatsoever. that is a very likely scenario. we are expecting fully that this land will be sold if and when these entitlements are given, and we are going to be dealing with a new landlord,

who did not negotiate this, who is going to be looking for ways to make money, and it is likely we are going to see the rent control promise not carried through. we are going to see ellis convictions and developments. it is all too likely that people are going to lose their homes, and people are going to lose 1,500 units of rent controlled housing. >> thank you. >> manny florez. i wanted to comment on the report earlier today. it sounds to me that the city attorney's office really wants to put some teeth into this developer's agreement. what i am hearing is to protect these tenants. that is very important. that is what we want to hear because that seems to be a huge stopping block.

but that's important, and i am glad to hear that. we look for your approval on this. thank you very much. supervisor mar: thank you. if there is nobody else after this gentleman, we are going to close public comments. >> my name is larry jones. i have lived at park merced for decades. i am one of those that got bought out by san francisco state university. i report that rent control continues. we have the same sort of garden apartment. an example of myself. also, i look forward to the improvement of the safety of the students that are getting out of the university and going half way across 19th, one of the most dangerous corners in the city, to have the muni m come across on the park merced side to board and get off would be a big improvement. there have been a lot of things

said. all those that said in favor of it, i want to endorse. thank you. supervisor mar: thank you. it looks like mr. elmer burke will be the last speaker. >> i just want to reiterate the point, as one of the other speakers mentioned, this is a return to the repudiated redevelopment policies of the past where demolition of existing neighborhoods take place. we are still looking to find homes for the people that were moved years ago. we are not doing a good job of that. the other point i want to make is the size of this demolition is the equivalent of demolishing 12 hotels. in that than context we have a developer who is going door to door -- a little intimidating

when your landlord is coming around, but they have written material that says that the rent control replacement units are guaranteed. yet when the tenants talk to the city attorney, our city attorney, your city attorney, he has said quite clearly it is not guaranteed. so obviously people's main point here is they don't want their homes, their lives or their neighborhood destroyed. but when you have people coming along and saying rent control is guaranteed, and it is a long conversation, and we have had some of the conversation why it is not guaranteed -- it starts to look kind of like a fraudulent statement made in order to get somebody to agree to something. thank you. supervisor mar: thank you. with no one else from the public who would like to speak, we are closing public comment. colleagues, are there any other

comments? >> i would ask the committee to -- i don't think you have formally adopted the amendments and then continue the item to the special meeting of march 24th at 9:00 a.m. >> colleagues, without objection to taking the amendment? supervisor mar: can we move this -- or continue this item until may 24th, 9:00 a.m., a special land use meeting without objection. thank you. thank you, everyone, for coming out to speaking. call the next item. >> number six, ordinance amending the general plan by adopting the 2009 housing element. >> thank you. supervisor mar: i believe we have a presentation on this one as well.

we have a representative from the planning it department. >> yes. good afternoon. i am from the planning department. i am joined by sarah dennis phillips, project manager for this project. i am here before you to discuss the 2009 housing element update. quickly, i have a brief presentation. i understand that you guys had a substantial discussion about this last week at the full board. quickly, the housing element itself, which was approved by the planning commission unanimously on march 24 is a component of the city's general plan. it helps guide discretionary decisions our commission makes or other decisions about housing projects. it is required to be updated by the state every five years. we think about it as our chance

to show the state what good work we are doing with our planning surf as market, octavia, the eastern parks and other things the development area is doing. there are six general categories that the state asks us to report on. those include adequate sites, a couple of issues around affordable housing, and issues around preserving existing housing stock. in addition, the housing element before you includes policies and objectives around three san francisco specific areas. connecting housing growth with infrastructure development. prioritizing sustainable development, and then also maintaining the unique and diverse character of san francisco neighborhoods. those three issue areas came out of our work with the community, the advisory body and the 30-35 workshops we held

throughout the city. in closing on the discussion about the state, the state wrote us a letter accepting this version of the housing element pending local approval. i just wanted to make really clear what this 2009 housing element does not do. it does not call for future rezonings to represent meet our housing needs. the things we have been doing between the redevelopment agency and the planning department and our infill capacity more than meet our needs. it does not call change the development of any site or location in the city. that is really important to keep in mind. in terms of the process, we started the update in the fall of 2009, and we have been doing two years of outreach with the community first through a community advisory body and then through a broader city-wide strategy.

there are a few things i really wanted to call out. the first is really focusing on making any further changes to zoning or development capacity through community based planning processes. it is spelled out and defined in the housing element itself, but that is a process, like market octavia where the board and the planning commission enacts staff to undergo a plan for a neighborhood. staff works with community for a number of years before an environmental review process is initiated. there are a number of procedural steps before the planning commission and board before any changes. the other big thing going throughout the housing element is that we don't have a one size fits all response for our city.

we have never really done that. we have looked at the history of zoning throughout san francisco and going back to like the 60's. we wept from four residential districts, to six, and now we have 13. the last zoning round added a few more. as we do more work in more localized areas, we get more complex and nuanced to how we respond to the context. that asserts and boosts that approach. the third theme is about affordable housing. while we don't have to do any rezoning to meet our housing needs allegation, we have a lot of advocacy work to do to meet our share of housing. the data calls out the different incomes levels. those are kind of the major themes in terms of the next steps. we are here hoping to have a discussion in front of the land

use committee on this item, and then hopefully move on to the full board. then after that, our implementation strategy includes finalizing pieces with the state and then the implementation. i look at the implementation section today. it spells out what steps the city has to take to implement all the objectives and policies. there are 108 implementation measures called out. roughly 12 of them call for new little programs such as adding information to the reports planners use with where we are for housing production. or developing a definition that every agency uses. there are six that are a little more substantial. one which we heard about was a one-stop center for affordable housing.

right now it is very difficult for households to know which agency to contact. that was something we heard loud and clear and got a commitment from those agencies to do. the remaining 90 were generally continuing what we do. continue what the planning department does frfment continue the redevelopment agency and others to protect existing stock and provide housing for others. with that i will leave for questions and public comments. sarah and i are here, and we appreciate your time and attention to this issue. thank you. supervisor mar: thank you. colleagues, if there are no questions, let's open this up for public comment. i have several cards. paul, kathy, matt and barbara morgan zaney. if there is anyone else that would like to speak, come forward as well. there are a bunch more cards

here as well. i will call these as the speakers finish. >> good afternoon, supervisors. my name is paul wormer. i am urging you to send this back to planning for some more work for two reasons in particular. the first is that all of the wonderful discussion about sustainability in transit corridors presumes we have a method to get a working public transit system running in this city. as someone who on occasions takes the bus down town or home from commute hour, i can wait for one, two or three bus toss get on. if we are talking about denies flying, there clearly is not the capacity to do that, to support new traffic. when you look at the transit

presentations about the desperate financial straits we face over the next 30 years, it not clear to me that there is a well thought-out or an understanding as to how to move forward on this problem. that is the first issue. the second issue is we are putting forth a policy that says we will be able to build more housing, which is a wonderful ideal. the problem is it is not clear what problems that policy is solving. we have heard testimony before about the availability of market rate housing. that is really not what is needed. there is not a lot of stuff for the affordable segment. absent solutions to sort of known problems, it is not clear to me this policy is solving

anything. thank you. >> good afternoon, supervisors. kathy, representing the 13 neighborhoods that appealed the certification in the e.i.r. i have an original record for the record, and i have copies for the committee members. it would be unlawful to approve this 2009 housing element because there is no finding that there is no feasible alternative that could reduce the significant effect on transit. such alternatives were proposed by the public, and you are not allowed to skip over this finding and proceed to a statement of overriding consideration. also, provisions failed to preserve and protect neighborhood character, providing support and respect for neighborhood character, which the court of appeal held provides less protection for neighborhood character. accordingly, this would be

would be inconsistent that neighborhood character be conserved and protected. if adopted, the general plan will be internally inconsistent and out of compliance with law. also, substantial last-minute amendments not analyzed in the e.i.r. extended the scope of development outside plan areas and eliminated the requirement that density limits be maintained in r.h. 1 and 2 districts, and that would become new policy. these were unin because the element provided significantly more capacity than needed. these changes really exemplify the planning department's lack of good faith and candor. while taking abag that 17,000 infill units could be built in these expanded areas surf as a secondary unit, the department gave no explanation to the community for these changes.

the last one is certainly intended to support secondary units in these areas. so we urge you to reject this proposal with its last-minute amendment and send it back to the planning commission with instructions to eliminate the amendments or subject them to full environmental review. thank you. supervisor mar: thank you. did you sign up for both these items? >> i am from san francisco tomorrow. we have filed the appeal. if you will put on the overhead, you will notice state code requirements regarding the implementation requirements for the housing element that are

missing from the element, despite prodigious efforts being made, prodigious effort to need to be yet made regarding what is required for how you implement it. what is required and how do you make it work? then, that job becomes transferable to the board of supervisors, compared to the other priority needs for health, welfare, and safety. that is the procedure being violated. it is it legal to proceed further unless you make these changes. -- it is illegal to proceed further unless you make these changes. i have prepared most of two statewide housing elements for the state of california. i have background in this. i am also the former director of newark, new jersey, the largest model city operation in the nation. i do have official background. none of this has been acknowledged by the planning staff, neither in comments nor responsibility.

we have provided materials for your perusal regarding how to do implementation and what is needed. you need to look at this. failure to do this is an abrogation of responsibility. thank you very much. supervisor mar: thank you. i'm going to call several more names. [reading names] >> good afternoon, again, supervisors. as i mentioned before, i did sit on the cab. i want to thank the planning department for hundreds and hundreds of pages of the exceptional work. the housing element is not entirely rubbish. in fact, the vast majority of it

is fantastic. however, there are a couple of very tiny nicks that were injected very late in the process that i think have become "fight and words -- "fightin' words" for residents on the west side of the city appeared with absolute minor adjustments that would roll back to some language that would have been more prevalent in the draft that was released last summer and had an eir conducted against it, you probably could defuse a lot of the fighting half happening amongst a lot of our residents. i would highly suggest that we send this back to planning. i seriously believe that with very tiny amount of work, we could remove a very small number of offensive words that cause a problem for folks in my neck of the woods and make this a very palatable and very useful document for moving the city forward for the next five-plus years. thanks for listening.

>> i am a homeowner in st. francis would then have been for the last 18 years. the st. francis homes association has worked with the city for several years to try to protect the interest here at one point, the second draft of the housing element of just our concerns, including reference to our ccnr's and design that runs, preserving neighborhood character and given support. at the last minute after the eir had been done, changes were made that undercut our ctnr's, making it clear that we would have to protect our guidelines. other changes may affect all neighborhoods in the city, removed neighborhood support in favor of community-bit support, defining the community as