december, convents and monasteries. or instead of the warehousing, but the word facility. please consider that. thank you. supervisor wiener: thank you very much. next speaker. >> good afternoon, supervisors. i am here on behalf of the housing action coalition. it is taken as two years to get this here. first, i want to thank supervisor wiener for terrific leadership and on taking sponsorship for this. second thing is i cannot say enough good things about how they were planning to permit staff did on this, including emily and sophie. we need to get this through and pretty soon. if san francisco is ever going to adopt a housing policy for students other than craigslist, it is going to be this. is it ever going to try to reduce the very, very intense demand on our scarce rental

stock, it is going to be this vehicle. we need to get it going, get it adopted, and see how the market will react to this. if we can start building the housing that we need. i should of this size that over the last two years, double- emphasize that over the last two years, we have stayed strictly away from a given the rental housing to student housing, i think that is absolutely is the right path to take. leave it alone. build new housing, which is what we implore you to facilitate here. please get this going. thanks. supervisor wiener: thank you. >> mr. chairman, supervisors, have been involved in this issue for five or six years with the housing action coalition and others. i was being done by former supervisor dufty in the legislation that he got past which was not vetted

sufficiently with institutions. we have tried to correct that this time around. the original legislation talked about institutions owning, operating, or controlling student housing under leases for 20 years. we discovered within the 25 or so institutions in san francisco that most were not particularly interested in owning. many were not interested in operating. some were not even interested in collecting the rents. and there needed to be a more flexible legal arrangements set forth between a developer who would build and own and perhaps operate and perhaps collect the rents and the institutions in order to get the waiver of subsidized housing to make these things affordable. and so we hope this language will do the.

in the last two years, there have been no student housing developments under construction. we have one fellow who is interested in it, but he has assured us that he needs this more flexible language to go forward. [bell rings] so i hope you'll take up what supervisor wiener has proposed and moves it forward. and then let's hope that we have not reached the point where we have the critics -- let's hope we have reached the point where we can build several hundred units of housing specifically for students. thank you. supervisor wiener: thank you. if there are any final speakers, please line up? >> lynche that shipment from nob hill nader's -- neighbors. -- linda chapman. i want you to understand what the neighbors are going through. at the time the student housing conversions occurred -- and was

not involved with that and have not been until this legislation came up. but before that, we had a similar phenomenon or whole buildings were in doubt. hundreds and hundreds of units for short-term rentals and tic's and demolitions and so on. people suffered. it is the same phenomenon. it is easy to get rid of them. one night, the tennessean in one of the to help it and 18-unit building where they were told they had to leave for demolition -- the tenant's union. but i had to leave a building and could not get there. there were offered $750 a piece of the would agree to move. they signed and left. 18 units gone. at the same time, we had a 22- unit building for empty up there. if you say to people that it will not keep them off the market for reasons unrelated to the condition of the building -- it had no violations at all. they kept it in deeper seven years. people suffered. in that building, someone had

lived for 52 years when they made her get out of the other one, 35 years. in another building, an older man called me who was disabled. he lived with his elderly mother there for 35 years -25-unit building, which was going to be a tic. then they told me about their neighbor who was older than they. they searched for the server -- elderly men and cannot find anything. they found him in a pool of blood. that is what happens. this is the type of thing you can expect to happen in these buildings. it is no different. they can tell you the people moved voluntarily. people did not just pack up and moved voluntarily. the way the legislation is written, it allows a grandfather in. it must not allow grandfathering. that was not the intent. [bell rings] supervisor wiener: next speaker. >> good afternoon. my name is caroline. we represent the university of

san francisco. i am here on their behalf. we're here generally to support supervisor wiener's well- reasoned amendments. i do understand, from public comment today, that there is concern about the use of the word "similar" and the context with religious order facilities. i think the use of that word is important because a clarifies, with the exception of not limited, to confidence in monasteries. i think the other point is that the use of the word "similar" is to allow the flexibility. that is exactly the point. we support the amendment as currently drafted. if you have questions, i am here. thank you. supervisor wiener: thank you. any additional speakers? seeing none, may we close public comment. supervisor mar: yes. supervisor wiener: colleagues, comments or questions? >supervisor mar: i just wanted

to thank supervisor wiener and others who have spoken about this and have been working on this for many months. i appreciate a lot of the amendments that came to address different concerns from neighbors but also institutions. thank you so much for all the hard work on this, supervisor wiener. supervisor wiener: thank you, mr. chairman. i move forward this item to the full board with a positive recommendation. supervisor mar: colleagues, can we do that without objection? thank you. thank you. please call item number 7 and 8 together. >> item number 7, hearing on the city's response to americans with disabilities act based hassids brought against small businesses. item number 8, ordinance amending the administrative code and campaign in government to conduct codes to require commercial landlords losing parties to small businesses for uses public accommodations, to act in compliance with laws.

supervisor mar: thank you. there to the bottoms here. the hearing and have called on the backs of the american with disabilities act based lawsuits. in many of our neighborhoods, especially the richmond district. then there is supervisor and president david chiu oppose the legislation that should help address some of the issues that are going to be discussed today. this hearing is really important because of the recent ada-based lawsuits better threatening many of our small neighborhood merchants. in district 1, richmond district, the cafe on 12th and clement or the noodle restaurant or a long time places have been recently sued a court challenge to for not being in compliance with access laws. americans with disabilities access laws. the richmond is not alone.

north beach merchants have alerted us. many other districts in the city have businesses that have been greatly impacted or have had to close as a result of such lawsuits, but also other conditions as well. often, a lack of awareness regarding resources the small businesses and property owners can use to come into compliance and/or a misunderstanding of the danger posed by these lawsuits or challenges causes business owners to ignore the threat often. and the danger is that without assistance from our offices and relevant departments of the city, many of our existing mom- and-pop and smaller businesses, especially restaurants but also many other businesses, may be forced to close their doors in the next few years. it is important we recognize that. we will hear today that making small businesses accessible is and should be one of san francisco's top goals. however, while it is imperative to make sure all our cities businesses are brought into compliance with accessibility laws, state, federal as well,

with the requirement that the americans with disabilities act the federal level and other state requirements, many businesses are slow to comply. as a result, they're impacted by lawsuits that often put them out of business. the goal of the hearing that i will emphasize is to raise awareness and understanding on how the federal, state, and local laws govern this access improvements and work. how they come into conflict often is at the local level. also, how the city departments, especially the office of small business, department of building inspection, and others can help make it easier for small business owners to come into compliance. at the end of the hearing, president chiu will be addressing some of the issues presented today. i would like to thank the director of the office of small business for really, really hard work over, even the past couple of years, the polling this

hearing together, as well as the main presenters, the acting director from the mayor's office on disability. thomas from the department of building inspection. john from the department of public works. 10 from the planning department, who we heard from earlier. -- tim from the planning to pry. also, zachary nathan. and the attorney. special thanks to a number of business owners. i know that scott is here, representing a number of small businesses, but also season and ruspa for taking time away from their businesses to help shape this hearing. i wanted to ask it supervisor and president david chiu wanted to make opening remarks? supervisor chiu: thank you. first of all, i wanted to thank you for your work on this. this has been a problem city- wide. ever since i served on the small business commission, i have

actually gotten to know some of our small business advocates. jason and others, because of their leadership on this issue over the years. we know that in recent years, small-business owners have seen an enormous increase in ada- related lawsuits. thousands of them in california. in san francisco, our office of small business and my office, we identified hundreds of businesses that have been sued in our city, including businesses that have had to shut their doors down. i want to perch -- first mention that i know that's supervisor mar as a great lineup of folks to educate our colleagues about these issues. i crafted a proposal in number of months back that hopefully we will be able to consider today. it addressed some of the issues that we're talking about. and because i unfortunately need to join mayor lee in about eight minutes on an announcement, and i am going to step out for a portion of the hearing. but i wanted to briefly talk about some of the elements of the letters that a proposal i

have, because we're going to be combining public comment in this hearing, both for my measure as well as for this hearing. we crafted a proposal to really ensure transparency, compliance with ada loss, and education with tenants and landlords. there were five aspects of what our legislation deals with. the first is it requires the city to give priority to building permit applications for work to help small business tenants come into compliance. secondly, my legislation requires commercial landlords to bring common areas bases used by all users to a space. public restrooms, grant for interested -- a entrances and exits, to come into compliance with ada laws. or else to disclose to a commercial tenant that the proper did -- property may not meet the accessibility standards the third thing would inform tenants that there might be legally or financially liable for a family to comply.

one thing we have heard time and time again is that we have small business tenants who would receive a demand letter from a lawyer and tell the city they had no idea what laws are out there. we want to make sure there is a requirement that tenants be informed about this. the fourth aspect of our proposal includes in a new and amended leases, a requirement with provisions that address their respective obligations of landlords and small business tenants to bring premises into compliance. we want to ensure that tenants and landlords are talking to each other about how they are going to comply and they for accessibility improvements so that they're doing this with each other as opposed to working together to fight off a lawsuit. the fifth aspect of the proposal would criers our office of small business to develop a pamphlet notice in multiple languages regarding federal, state, and local disability access laws that may require, and require landlords to provide such

information to tenants. we want to make sure that everyone is educated and educated in inappropriate in multiple languages. i will be circulating senate -- some technical amendments to clarify what i just described. but want to take a moment and thank all the parties that have worked with my office on this legislation. certainly the small business commission. want to single out scott for the working has done on this. i want to thank the representatives of landlords, commercial landlords, particularly from boma and the san francisco association of realtors. our deputy city attorney has worked tirelessly on this. and i want to thank my a katherine on this matter as well. one thing i want to mention, if there's one additional amendment requested by the office of small business and supervisor carmen chu, which was to expand the application of this ordinance so it applies not just to small business tenants, which is defined in my legislation as businesses that lease 75 and is

published seven of 500 square. less from a commercial landlord, but to expand the definition to all business tenants because every business tonight can be impacted. i am is open to consider this amendment that would like and appreciate feedback from the public office. with that, i know that supervisor mar as a great lineup to to get us on this. supervisor mar: thank you. the first speaker is regina dick-endrizzi will give us an overview on how we got to where we are today. >> thank you. i am going to provide an overview of where we are, somewhat how we got here. adjacent will explain the laws and will give you greater insight to that -- jason will explain the loss. then we will provide some

recommendations that our office has put together. with the years as director of the office of small business and working on this issue, the overarching element is that enforcement is through civil litigation. and i am saying this not to imply ed all that the means of making any improvement is to remove the civil rights elements from individuals with disabilities at all. but what i have come to understand is that through our government entities, both state and local, because of this overarching element that basically complaints is civil litigation. there is kind of this complicit approach that while a business can defend whatever it is doing without the understanding of the cost of that defending and

which, in talking with some of the landlords, would average about $50,000 to be able to defend a lawsuit. the other element that i have observed is that this law has been in place for 20 years. and if civil litigation is the most effective means of achieving compliance, then why are not more individuals with disabilities suing? i think individuals with disabilities do not they patronize and do business with. what that has surmised to me is we as government are failing our individuals with disabilities and our small businesses by putting them in this adversarial relationship to ultimately achieve compliance.

and so it is incumbent upon us to look at areas where we need to do improvements for ourselves and when i say we, that is the greater weight of the government, local, state, and federal. what we have seen since our office and supervisor david chiu had mentioned, his time on the small business commission, businesses that have opened -- recently opened, a high percentage of restaurants are minority-owned. businesses are sued by the san plaintiff and planned as often returned to the same area and recirculate. the average settlement is around $20,000. we have seen that and since

2002, i'm a proximate -- i am in approximating we have 400 businesses that have been sued. going back to last a valid point on the previous white, the lawsuits are averaging $20,000, that has been $8 million that has been played. and this is to the plaintive and a lawyer. i do want to say that our office and we did go through the federal courses and trackpad the lawsuits that were done by our cereal plaintiff. >> this was in san francisco alone? >> this was in san francisco alone.

moving on to slide #4. the office of small business, we created a program working with supervisor cohen chui en david chiu -- carmen chu and david chiu's office. this launced -- launched in 2012. the program contains information that businesses that lists the federal and state laws that govern them. what is a cask program, what to look for in an inspectors, federal ada task credits and

deductions a business can take, and informing businesses that their casp inspections can be taken as a text and data -- a tax deduction. we want to put together a loan program to help that -- businesses do with improvement and pay for an inspection. and work with the sf bar association to create some initial low-cost consultant for businesses. it should be noted that san francisco is the only city to date that has developed such a program for its small-business says. -- for its small businesses. with the annual mailing sent by the texas treasurer's office to food establishments, we mailed over 3000 food establishments in

several different languages, information about needs for accessibility requirements, warnings of the potential lawsuits, and -- until we get that information to the businesses. we had three businesses contact us after receiving the mailings. since 2008, our office has conducted 51 presentations and/or workshops. i have listed here that 28 had been city-wide presentations and on the left-hand side is the district and the number of presentations per district. for businesses have access the loan program, 40 businesses have

utilized the bar association pose a legal services, we had 25 articles in print media, 10 in the chinese press, seven in the chronicle sf gate, and in the examiner. we have not done enough outrage and effort -- outreach and effort into the ethnic, primarily the legend media. that is the third biggest business sector. we did a panel presentation on your legal rights with chuck finney and our office has seen 183 clients on ada issues, whether it is getting information about an inspection , if the business has received a

letter and those that have been sued. >> we're going to ask people to be as a sink as possible. if you could start to wrap up? >> i want to highlight our page on our website that has the information. and then i will conclude with the next level of outrage that we're working on -- outrage -- outreach. this will be one of the requirements the need to fill upon receiving a grant. i have worked with holly lung to put together a small grant and asian neighborhood design has been awarded that grant to put together a program. and work with businesses on solutions and that should start

in 2012. it is a small grant so we will not be able to cover citywide. also with the -- will be educating members to help in addition with outreach. the one sort of area where hopefully with asian neighborhood decide, we will be able to increase our capacity to outrage -- outreach with businesses. >> i would like to call up jason gong, an attorney who has worked with many businesses that have been stewed and is -- who have been sued. there is a powerpoint that has

been distributed to all of us. go ahead. >> it afternoon. i am trying to make sure we are coordinated here on the overview. i would like to talk about the framework and i think that from my experience as a litigation attorney, i defend businesses, landlords, and tenants from these access cases. it is important to step back and look at how we got to where we are. when the laws were passed, the americans with disabilities act, i do not think congress envisioned that we would be where we are today. and so i am going over the different laws that make up access claims, i am going to try to talk about what the law is saying, what is a common claim i

have come across in litigation, and where there has been some cause for overlap that has resulted in some confusion based on misinformation and basic flawed assumption and how that has snowballed into where we are today. where we are today, to -- we need to identify a problem and understand how it came to me? everyone is aware of the americans with disabilities act. i will refer to it as 88. these are some common laws that, in litigation and access claims. the ada is one of the claims that are asserted, claims asserted under the california state law, also the disabled persons act. how can these laws apply and

they do because they overlap and apply concurrently. you're looking at federal standards and state standards and there are nuances and differences. the goal of both sets of laws are inclined -- are increasing access. we see is full and equal enjoyment to accommodations offered by businesses. defined as business that are open to the public. and that is a broad brush. when the ada was passed in 1990, it was not effective until 18 months later, there was a grace period. the -- it was a civil rights statute. it was after the -- modeled after the civil rights act and like that statute, private enforcement, by the individual through litigation was