i am a concerned resident and a worker at the mental health clinic located at 3901 mission st., the site of the proposed antenna. wireless facilities like at&t typically require the use of backup batteries to provide power to the facility. these types of red acid batteries make the proposed wireless facilities incompatible with the clinic and the surrounding residential area. included was the lead acid battery materials for the sites used in san francisco. we are located right below this antenna. on any given day, we can have 60 patients on the premises. should anything go wrong with

this equipment, it would not be easy to evacuate the building in a timely manner. in addition, these buildings vibrate stronger waywhen buses pass and increases the risk to our patients in the case of an earthquake. please vote to deny at&t a permit for this application. >> next speaker, please. >> good evening. i have been a resident of st. mary's park for 20 years. this is truly an issue of, not in my backyard. the proposed tower is in my backyard. the back touches what i am touching. this impacts me for several reasons. if you look at the material shown to you as far as at&t

coverage in the area, it does not show the need for an additional tower in that location. it comes down to whether there are enough bars on your phone and whether you can get internet reception. i do not have a problem. i work at home. in 10 years, i have never had an internet or phone outage. there are multiple computers used in my home. i do not think this is the appropriate place for it. you look at the maps of ohtether things shown to you. those are more useful areas than something that gives me a stronger signal. tell me why there is a need for an additional tower or eight

tower in my backyard. me as a user of your product has no problem getting reception. >> thank you. next speaker. >> thank you, supervisors. i am a member of st. mary's park. i have been there for five years. not only for the reasons i have been given, but i do not see more cell towers as a scalable solution to the issues they will face in the coming years. will we have a cell tower on every corner because bandwidth is so obtuse? let me tell you what the problem is. it is not a problem with signal. it is coverage. if you read it one of the many

e-mails in the report, there was one that contained information from an engineer. problem does not signal coverage, but what happens during high volume times. what is referred to as agap or dropped call. they have got too many. fueled by greed, they joined forces with apple for greater market share, which cannot be sustained. they wanted to share resources, share cell towers, upgrade the existing cell towers and not put in more and more of these power hungry transistors. where are you going to draw the line? if you do not like any of the above, i refer you to the

locations of these cell towers. the second location in the guidelines, co-location sites and encourages at installation on buildings with -- that already have wireless facilities. >> next speaker, please. >> i am a proud member of st. mary's park. i have been living in st. mary's park for about five years. i would like to speak about the devalueing of our community. the st. mary's park has been in existence for many years. we plan events for our neighborhood. we talk about how important community events are. we have a newspaper that we put together. this has been put together by people in our neighborhood.

i am really concerned about the devalueing of our neighborhood. this could affect the property tax revenues. if our homes are devalued by the cell tower and we have to close, it is a big concern to me. why would we have to deserve that. if we do have to disclose this, it is going to affect our property values. it will affect the property tax revenues that the city can obtain from us as residents. they go hand in hand. i am hoping that you will vote in favor of us, the community and residents instead of voting in favor of big companies. and taking some of the responsibility to represent us

as residents. please vote to deny at&t a permit. >> i have a question about the last speaker. i am curious to understand better your thinking about the impression that your home will be devalued. >> i have been informed in the meetings we have had in my community -- >> who is informing you of this? >> the first speaker today and somebody who has done a lot of research on this issue. do you mind if bay -- >> cite your source. i just want to know. >> can we just not tell anybody? nobody is really going to be

able to see it. it is a violation. you cannot lie? neighbors do not like to live next to a cell tower and 10 up. you are supposed to disclose any matters that you would know about the value of the property. you cannot lie. if you do, it is against real- estate law. they can fine you up to $200,000. >> the public perception is placing something on the market. the person that assesses property value has the ultimate say as to whether or not a property has been devalued.

>> if people start leaving the neighborhood and prices go down, there is a possibility that they have trained their appraisers to adjust property values from 2% to 20% depending on how close you are to the site. the closer you are, the market affects your property values. home buyers and families, in particular with children, may sean away from these properties. we have a problem in sanchez because they had the uv box. it could have a tremendous impact on property prices. many neighbors have stated that they would like to move out.

it goes on top of the mental health. that is what we mean by property prices and property devalueing. >> being a real turk, the national organization of appraisers, are they basing their devaluation of property based on any sort of statistical relevancy of a home being placed so close to cell towers? >> there were studies done in europe. we are not supposed to talk about that. that is what we were told last time. there have been some studies where they have analyzed the data of properties near these facilities. that compared to when the facility came into town and after. >> thank you very much.

>> supervisor campos. supervisor campos: thank you, mr. president. i know we still have to hear more public comment. this is an important issue. i do not want to take anything away from its importance. i understand why people are worried about property values. i do have a question for the city attorney. my understanding is that as important as the issue is, as i understand it, the issue of the possible devaluation of the property is not relevant to the underlying discussion. i wanted to make sure that we are clear on that. that is an important issue. i wanted to make sure that we were focused on what was before the board. >> supervisor campos, the board may not base its decision to

deny a conditional use if the grounds are the environmental effects of radio frequency emissions. that is what you are not allowed to consider in making your decision. it is pre-empted by federal law. >> that may not be a proper basis for a denial? thank you. >> this is a clarification to my colleagues and members of the public that may not be fully versed on laws that govern on this particular issue. it is a very complicated and challenging issue, one bank that we have been supportive in dealing with i do not know how many times in the next three months.

>> why do we not hear from our next number of the public? >> thank you. my name is ian wang. i am within 300 yards of the proposed site. i am here to support my community. i asked you to deny at&t the right to build at that site. i have been a resident of this community for five years. i am a long-term at&t user. i have never had an issue or a dropped call within my area of service or might baseman or my backyard. our service has been excellent with at&t. i echo everything that my neighbors have said. excellent service, a blight on the neighborhood. we feel like thiscell tower is

not necessary. please say no to at&t and say yes to our neighborhood concerns. >> good afternoon, board of supervisors. i live within 300 feet of the proposed site. i am a longtime at&t subscriber as well. i have perfect reception. never a problem or a complaint to at&t about service problems. i understand that there is a cell tower on the same block. i do not understand why they need another one in an area that has good service. does that not make sense. i don't see how they can improve

my service more than it is. i am a longtime resident. i have two kids. i look out my window and it is there. i can see it from my living room. like i said, i do not see the need for it. if there is areas that they want to cover an increase their service, put it in those areas. i implore you to disallow this solution. they want to put another one in in the existing place. thank you. >> thank you. next speaker. >> i don't live here, i am a

visitor. are you serving the 1% or the 99%? i did not hear anybody who spoke that said they were not getting enough service or enough coverage. what is enough? is it enough when every single person has a device watching a movie all the time? i would like to make an appeal to the federal government that you cannot make a decision based on the health risks. that is why the property values are lower and near the cell towers. everybody understands that there is a serious health risk. i live in a progressive county. they'd c justabed to serve the 1%. -- they just caved to serve the

1%. i have seen some beautiful areas that are close to a help the habitat for the wildlife. who is going to speak for them? who are going to speak for the bees that get disoriented because of all of these signals. when is it going to be enough? when are you going to serve the people instead of the corporations that hide behind these federal regulations? you have stood up to the federal government, let's see you do it again. let's see at a healthy habitat for everyone. >> thank you. next speaker, please. i would remind folks to please refrain from applause or any opposition to speakers. >> good evening, supervisors. i live in san francisco for 40

years. i live in st. mary's park for 10 years. i live in st. mary's park for 10 years. i have had at&t for 15 or 16 years. i have never had any problems. the city of san francisco built the playground for the kids and the children. so many children play there. i do not think it is good for the children. i need your help. thank you. >> thank you. next speaker. >> i purchased my house in july of last year. had i known we would have this

tower, i would not have purchased it. i have great service. i have no complaints or problems. i asked you to deny at&t the tower. >> members of the board of supervisors, i am the director of san francisco open government. i listened very carefully to the speakers to come up here. it is their right to speak to you to ask you for consideration. i have heard a lot of things here. we can get into technicalities. the federal government says that there is no danger. my father was a real-estate broker in florida for 40 years. when a person is buying a home, there is a significant portion of the population that decide that there -- this is something that i do not want to live near.

there are other people that say i want to live near it, but since there are questions about it, i can use that to reduce the price. if you want to sell this, you have to give me a break on it. look at what i have to live with. we can argue whether the federal government is right or wrong about the health hazards. i think that the jury is out. a significant number of people when they go into the home buying market will consider it a detrimental factor. another portion of that same group will go in and look at it as a bargaining tool to bring down the price and the value of those homes. someone said earlier, the assessor is the one that decides the value of the homes. the assessor uses the sale by use of the homes in the community.

if resale prices of the homes goes down, the assessed values go down. >> next speaker. >> i go to the flea market. let's remember the farmers' market for the fruit and vegetable safety. ♪ it is like thunder and lightning it is frightening you had better knock knock knock on wood. make cell phones safe and good ♪ >> let's go to a presentation by our planning department. >> we are joined today with the department of public health. the item before you is an appeal of the conditional use

authorizations for wireless telecommunications at 3901 mission street. the question before you is the same question that was before the planning commission. is this project in this location necessary or desirable for the community and compatible with it. with six affirmative votes and one absence, the vote should be approved. both parties have presented you with substantial new evidence. today, you are being asked to reconsider this decision in light of all of the new information before the planning commission and what is before you. this new evidence includes information from at&t about a gap in coverage for their 4g service.

petitions from area residents about the assessed -- accessibility and desirability of this. i will hand this out to you shortly. evidence from the department of public health about the cumulative rf levels at this location. there is a great deal of information that was not before the commission. today, by my count, you have heard no less than 15 speakers in opposition. it is important to note what the board does not have to decide today. you do not have to determine whether there's a significant gap in coverage. as the board determined the necessity or desirability. with that in mind, this presentation will cover three topics. the description, the commission findings as to why they had approved this.

first, the project. this would be in planning section 303. this authorization offers eight- panel antennas on top of a commercial building. this would help architectural features added. it would have clay tiles to match other buildings in the area. behind these features would be the antennas. associated mechanical equipment what also be internal rooms not accessible to the public. that is the product description. this is completely within a commercial building in a neighborhood commercial district, one of the locations of the guidelines. the city has five preferred guidelines as well as limited preference sites. this site type is the preferred site type number 4.

they requested that they not approve a type 1 in a residential district. even as a tuype 4 location, this is a preferred site. in addition to review, the commission also reviews aesthetics. there are separate reviews for health by the department of public health. they can speak to their analysis of radiofrequency radiation. they have look at existing rf levels and had projected new readings to be within the limit.

when it comes to health, the federal communications act established levels. >> supervisor winner wanted to ask a question. supervisor wiener: the appellants did raise an issue with the rf report. i wonder if you could specifically addressed their argument about the alleged insufficiency about the report. >> the only discrepancy i heard was about the number of antennas. this would in that look -- enable eight antennas. they have revised their project to only include seven antennas. if be board were to see you today, you may consider modifying it down to lower numbers.

if there are no other questions, we have discussed the specifics before. we will not go into that. the appellant has said that they are not appealing the health issues. do you have any questions? >> supervisors campos. >> thank you very much, mr. president. i want to thank the planning department for their presentation. i want to thank the parties involved. i want to thank the residents of the neighborhood who have taken time part of their schedules to come out and testify today. also want to thank at &t for their work on this issue. i want to get a better sense of the information that was provided to the planning commission versus the

information that has been given to us that the board of supervisors. we have heard a lot of testimony from the community. additional pieces of information, returning the issue of coverage as well as a report from an expert hired by the appellants. i was wondering if you could say a little bit about the level of input from the community that the commission received prior to its deliberation. >> nearly all of the information that is before you is new information that was not presented. the commission did get letters from people in opposition. two in support. the initial appeal was very minimal. this includes neighborhood surveys. if there is anything else, i will ask diego to remind me.

>> the record that was included and what came out of the planning commission is relatively thin compared to what we have received since it came before the board of supervisors. a lot of information we have received is information that was not properly before the planning commission. is that correct? >> yes. >> the issue for me, i know a lot has been said about the issue of radiation and some of the health implications. i have heard about property values. that is not to take anything away from those issues. those issues are not relevant to what is before us. the big issue is the issue