>> commissioner antonini? >> yeah. i just wanted to say in reference to this, and many projects, square footage alone does not totally describe the situation. and as was the house that we lived in in dental school and we have a lot of square feet, but the lower unit was not a functional one and the bathroom and the toilet part of the bathroom was separated from the washing facilities by two different rooms and the ceilings were too low and the cost to make that into a unit. and unless it was treated as one house and i think that you have to look at one individual and so i think in this case we have dysfunctionalty each though the staff did not say that they were totally dysfunctional. >> just to clarify that motion was to not take the dr and approve the project as proposed. >> antonini. >> aye. >> borden. >> no.

>> hillis. >> aye. >> moore. >> no. >> sugaya. >> no. >> commissioner. wu. >> no. >> president fong? >> aye. >> that motion fails commissioners, 3-4, with commissioners borden, moore, sugaya and wu, voting against. >> is there an alternate motion? >> it is preferable to make another motion. >> commissioners if you don't make another motion,... >> it is approved. >> the project will be approved. >> i move to take dr and disapprove the project. >> second. >> on that motion, commissioners, to take the dr and disapprove the project. >> antonini. >> no. >> borden. >> aye. >> hillis. >> no. >> moore >> aye. >> sugaya. >> aye. >> wu. >> aye. >> fong. >> no. >> so moved, commissioners that motion passes four to three with commissioners antonini, hillis and fong voting against.

>> commissioners that will place you on the 4 p.m. calendar, items 17. for case number 2013.0128 c. 2460 lombard street. request for conditional use authorization. >> good afternoon, president fong and members of the commission, the department staff. and the item before you is a request by the express for the conditional use authorization to establish a formula retail use at 2460 lombard street, it provides a wide range supplies. the proposal includes a pet wash area as well. and contains a building where 70,000 square feet and the parking for 22 cars in the parking lot and this building was occupied by bank of america and blockbuster video, also formula retail uses. a building expansion is not

proposed. pet city express operates three locations in the city. the pet tore is proposed for the site and is code compliant is and it would not require a hearing or notification, it is located in the m3 district one block north and the union street two blocks south and three blocks east. and nc3 districts are intended to offer a wide variety of comparison and specialty goods and services to a population greater than the meet neighborhood. other streets, include geary boulevard, mission street and portions of market street. the union street is intended to

provide the convenience goods for the residents of cal hollow, and pacific heights and draws from the larger community. also, the nc3 districts is supposed to be developed, to function as a very active shopping district, with larger uses that are attractive to the broader population. through the current mix of formula retail and independently owned retail outlets, on chest nut and ununion it appears that they can co-exist as the streets enjoy a robust commercial activity, and are considered destination neighborhoods and investment is apparent. it contains union street and 16 formula retail uses in 6 blocks. and comparison, lombard street has 8 formula retail uses and 12 blocks and does not enjoy the same level of commercial

activity or in investment as chest nut or union street this is not to suggest that opening up the lombard street is the answer, it only recognizes that the mix of the format can co-exist and perhaps lead to a higher experience. >> support for the project is focused on the activation of a key property on lombard street and the neighborhood investments that it could lead to, access to a broader range of products and currently available in the neighborhood. and the pet food express engagement in san franciscan mal advocacy community. and opposition to the project is focused on the competitive advantage of the formula retail and over saturation of pet food stores, the department received 4 additional letters of support and 21 letters in opposition to the project. and in 2009. the commission denied a similar request by the pet food request on the basis that it was not necessary or desirable

primarily due to the comparative advantage, at that time the department based the recommendation on the concentration of formula retail in the two block radius of the site. while it requires analysis of the entire neighborhood commercial district in xh the use would be located. as previously discussed, of the nct district in which the project is located has formula retail outlet and other nc districtses with higher concentrations of these uses. the purpose is to determine if the project is necessary, or desirable and compatible on a case by case basis. and at this time the department recommends approval of the project as it it is necessary for the improvement of lombard street and it is compatible of the neighborhood and on balance, complies with the planning code sections 303101.1 and the general plans as contained in the project's draft motion and thank you and i am available for any questions. >> if i may interrupt the

proceedings for one moment, for those of you that just came into the chambers we can't have people standing in front of the doorway, or even along the walls, if you can't find a seat, 416 is available for you to watch the proceedings and hear the testimony that is provided and the discussion or deliberations when your name is called we will give you the opportunity to come into this chamber and make your public comment at that time. for those of you who can't find a seat make your way to 416 in the overflow where you will be able to watch these on the video monitor. >> project sponsor, please? >> thank you for having us here, good afternoon. my name is michael levy and i

am the co-owner of pet food express, i started a dove training business in 1976 in san francisco and opened my first san francisco pet supply store in 1980. and i opened a second store on 19th avenue. and 33 years later, here i am with 47 stores in northern california. and hoping to open a 4th store in san francisco. i started my business because i loved pets and i really do think that the pet food express is necessary and desirable for lombard street. we make it desirable for the people, and first, by providing the unique, self-service pet wash as well as high quality pet food and supplies, in fact, we are one of the only pet stores in the united states, that will not carry certain popular brands because the sus

speblgt ingredients such as bi product meal. second we have a very strong and caring employee culture. and we were just voted a best place to work by the bay area news growth for the fourth year in a row. third, we provide great customer service, we have 100 percent satisfaction guarantee for everything that we sell as such, we consistently have four and a half stars, on the reviews for each one of all of the stores. fourth and perhaps the most important, we encourage the pet adoption and more than 25 years ago, we realized that there were far too many homeless pets and we realized that we can be part of the solution, and just last year we donated more than 1.5 million to animal rescues and shelters and police canine departments in the bay area. and many of these groups are here tonight to show their support for us and i really appreciate that. we also host adoption of the events at almost all of our stores every weekend.

and we have helped to save tens of thousand sapeds of animals and will continue to help even more no matter what happens tonight. we hope that you give us the opportunity to do our saving of animals and participate on that on lombard street as well. okay so why do we think that the location of lombard street is a good fit. >> it is a u.s. highway that has more than 20 vacantcies. we can provide parking and we hope that it will anchor and attract businesses to lombard street, it provides a great space for pet adoptions inside and out. and if approved, we also plan to open up a permanent cat adoption center in the store in partnership with the pets unlimited who we have worked with for many years. we have 6 adoptions centers in all of the stores.

this year alone we will adopt 2,000 animals. the self-service animal clean service is the only one in the area. it will provide, 14 new jobs and grow from there. and i also have a poe pea petition signed by san franciscans in support of it at this location. over there. and i want to address the issue of big verses small. in our 33-year history we have never put a small independent pet retailer out of business, in fact, the pet food express is still independent as well. i run it with my business parter mark and we have no outside investors and never have had them and no investment banks making our decisions we are no longer small, but that does not mean that we are bad for the community. there is evidence in the economic study that these small retailers oppose our store have thrived in the last two and a

half years since we opened up the store on california street and you will hear more about that in the economic study but according to your staff report, and quote, there are three independently owned pet supply stores in the area and there are no other formula retail areas north of california street and based on a wind shield survey of the formula and non-formula retailers, it appears that such a mix can co-exist. and this project is desirable, as proven by our overwhelming support here tonight and demonstrating to the letters and petitions, and it is necessary, as proven by the economic study and from our partner, pets unlimited, to save your lives of cats and kittens i urge you to support this project so that we can continue to support the pet community and the guardians in san francisco. i would like to turn the mic over to sally at pets unlimited. >> thank you. >> good afternoon, my name is

sally workman and i am the executive director of pets unlimited co-sponsor of this application, pets unlimited is a 24-hour vetary center and, proceeds are used to support the center and pets unlimited saves the lives of hundreds of injured and abused cats and dogs every year but we cannot do it alone. and our work is not possible without the community support and generosity from the clients and donors who care about saving the lives of pets in need. it was founlded 66 years ago when a dog wondered into a yard. she took the dog to the city pound but she learned that the dog's chances for survival were slim and the pets were euthanized after a few days, she decided to take the dog back home with her and she did more. she also took all of the other dogs at the pound. and along with two other civic leaders she began her adoption

service, which proved amazingly successful at finding loving homes for animals in need. the risk of euthanizing to cats and kittens still exist throughout the bay area, while they have the opportunities to get out in the opportunity to rock the adoption events and so on, the felines are not so fortunate. the average length of stay in the shelter is three on four weeks for adult dogs and ten to 12 weeks for adult cats. and we see the length of time that the animals stay in the shelter helps to achieve life saving measures first the animals are healthier and less stressed. and second, this freeze up the capacity for us to rescue, and rehabtait and house another animal in the space, while our existing shelter finds many permanent homes, expanding our adoption services into the marina will give us a broader base and visibility to achieve the mission. but the pet food express is willing to devote the floor space to us and we could not

afford as a non-profit to pay the cost for a facility. we ask that you help us to save the leaves of cats and kittens in our city. >> thank you. >> commissioner, good afternoon, miem denise from the conducting group and we were asked by the pet food express to take a look at the economic impact of the proposed store and we are on the city's economic panel and they asked us to take a look at this interesting issue and we are entreinged and it is not the thing that we typically do. we found that in our research, that the pet supply industry is $104 billion in the united states and kind of a shocker. but most of those sales are mass merchants and big box stores and super markets and

the vet offices >> this is a especially store. and you only go there for the supplies and, san francisco's unique dem graphic means that there is a larger share of sales for pet supplies, at especially stores and other market areas, and we have a population here that looks very different than the traditional population that supports pets and in san francisco, there are more households less pets than there are households by children by a factor of two and san francisco, is a very pet friendly city, and health conscious households often translate that consciousness to what they see for their pets if you decided to eat a healthy diet and when you think about fido and kitny and you think about the healthy diet too that draws you to the especially and premium and super premium foods that are available at pet supply specialty stores and so there is a higher proportion of our sales going to those stores

in san francisco. and very strong performance of those sfoers? san francisco. and so when you look at the questions, what would the impact of the new pet food express stores on that industry as a whole? you are tempted to look at research performed on different kinds of retail stores and try to extrapolate this type of a store to the pet up ply and specialty store segment and in this case, even though it is interesting and kind of they have loved the idea of figuring out what that data looked like we don't need to do it. in fact we have the actual data. we know how that industry performed when pet food express stores were introduced to san francisco, and ve we have the data in the report that shows as a group, the industry continued to grow with the addition of the 3 other

[inaudible]. >> i would like to summarize for you why this project deserves your approval. this project is about a mid size bay area company with roots in san francisco that would provide an anchor to the west lombard corridor, it is a six lane divided highway with

many vacant store fronts and minimal traffic, motion lock completed a traffic study that showed union and chest nut street both have two times more pedestrians than lombard street. it has a 20 year record of giving back to the community and contributing to the local economy. this project is about creating 15 new jobs and about providing necessary and desirable serves and programs that are not currently available and with our partnerships with pets unlimited, this project is about preparing awareness and adoption opportunities. this project is about adding diversity to the mixed use on lombard street and uplifting an area that has been negligent. as you know, lombard street was celebrities as one of the 25 commercial corridors for the city's investment neighborhood program. this project is also about minimizing vacancy and blight on the one hand and providing

synergy and merchants of the district in the other hand. if we can have the overhead. retail synergy is the key consideration in selecting oh occasions, a pet specialty store in the marina that hoped at third store just around the corner, we welcome them as neighbors. in close, i would like to quote a statement in the city's website in the invest in neighborhood program, every neighborhood economizerabler district is different, the lombard district has its unique challenge, we hope you will support the staff recommendation to move forward with this project so that the lombard district has an opportunity to thrive like the streets and surrounding neighborhood. thank you. >> thank you.

>> i would like the take this opportunity to remind people who came in to the chambers just recently, there is an overflow room number 416, where you can watch these proceedings, if you can't find a seat, you will have to leave these chambers and watch the proceedings in room 416, when your name is kauld, you'll have ample opportunity to submit your public testimony. so, that means those people standing in front of the doors need to actually move. >> the project sponsor has 42

seconds remaining. are you done with your presentation? >> yes, thank you very much, and i'll be available to answer any questions, thank you. >> in that case, we did receive a request for organized opposition from the marina neighborhood association or community association, and that request was granted. so, you do have a 15 minute organized opposition. >> i will remind the room that when we do grant those 15 minute block, we are assuming you are representing members and sorest of this particular organization so you're speaking on their behalf and we request that each one of them doesn't come up for an additional public comment. that's more to the members of your group. >> good afternoon, commissioner, my name is ar y*el kelly and i'm the president of the marina neighborhood association, the mca was founded in 2006, we have over 500 members consisting of tenant, home

owners and property owners in the marina district, the mca has an 11 member board of directors, a monthly newsletter and monthly board meetings, in 2009 when this commission denied pet free express its permit, the mca did not take a position. we felt it created a deep divide and our board decided to not take a formal position but educate our members and know what was going on. in 2009, pet food express was denied the conditional use permit but with two extremely different conditions, one, pet food express has since opened a store just one mile away on california street so any marina resident can access a pet food express store, it has been an absentee tenant for the last four years, since 2009, many neighbors have grown increasingly frustrated by the graffiti, litter and homeless

chaserbacker camping taking place aon a regular basis on lombard street, we filed complaints with various city agencies but the problems were never addressed and only seemed to get worse, for three year, neighbors assumed it was vai can't or no one would lease it, but there was a tenant that had a lease, pet food express, i was contacted wi jim moore and tom sing v*its, they asked to meet with the mca board and pet food expresses along with jim moore presented to our board last september, we heard presentations from two local pet store owners, based on their, our board of directors voted 7-1 to deny pet food express's conditional use permit for this location, we are against locating a pet food express at this particular location on lombard street but not against pet food express, not formula retail and not other pet food stores in san

francisco, the mca board decided we wanted to take a vote because of the dangerous precedent that this could set for the marina and other residents, if it has your vote of approval today, it sends a message, which is come to our city, buy a lease, try for a permit but if you don't get it, leave your building vacant to rot, don't be a good neighbor, don't clean up your mess and don't try for a permit, this can happen with absentee tenant, since pet food express presented to us, we tried to get them to take responsibility by maintaining their building by painting over their graffiti or cleaning up their litter but these have gone to deaf ears, with the graffiti finally painted over and the litter removed from the parking lot, we tried to get information

from pet food express express, the facilitator of the merchant's association who works for jim moore about what their mandatory community meeting would take place, but we never received any information to inform our member, we found out after the fact that the so called community meeting did take place about a mile away in pacific heights, maybe pet food express was confused to invite the community over to their proposed location on lombard street for their meeting. thank you. >> good afternoon, commissioner, any name is nick davis son, i'm the vice-president for the marina association, it was established in 1929 and is the only merchant's association recognized by the san francisco planning, and i would like to read a letter that was addressed to supervisor farrell, thank you for your continued support of our neighborhood and your ongoing

[inaudible] of the marina, by a vote by the mma general membership, we are asking for your support in denying a conditional use permit of pet food express in the marina, after attending many meet, speaking directly to the pet food express own e we have concluded this business is not something that the maer chant's agreement can agree with, we feel the merchants have spoken and we are asking support from you on this issue. sincerely, mike [inaudible], the secretary of the mma, myself, nick david son of the mma and alex, our past president from the marina merchant's association. >> good afternoon, commissioner, my name is keith jerdano and i have resigned? the marina far years, in our

planning code regarding formula retail state, the formula retail in the commercial business areas if not monitored and regulated will have a diverse retail base with distinct retail and personalities compromised with a mix of businesses, pet food express's conditional use application would be a complete disregard of the section, pet food express has attempted to paint a picture of a general local business merely trying to serve the community and serve animal welfare, pet food express purposefully utilizing their because. at the same time, they have whether intended or not created an extremely decisive caustic at mot fear and employed questionable tactics of this project. first, pet food express recruited pets unlimited to be

a partner in this application, but pets unlimited -- but the pets unlimited portion of this partnership will consist of 4.6% of the available square footage, i ask you to consider when does charity when achieved to ceasing *f seize self-interest goals have a desired function, their first application in 2009 for a conditional use permit at this location, pet food express began buying multiple pages of advertising in each issue of the mar wraen na times making them the largest buyer of ad space in the paper, they testified in favor of the project and offered a series of one sided articles for pet food express in our paper, for months, regular pieces have been written vilifying our pet stores and our owners which have been incorrect and nasty and unbias, the fact is that pet food express