>> and why is that? >> what i at this time? >> because..., >> another time? >> i believe that this is something that should come up during the rehearing request. >> why? >> because, it was brought up during the october 23rd hearing. and it was sort of glossed over. and it was. >> and you are concerned and do you have a concern with that particular special lane closure? >> yes, because it was a higher standard that is attached to mta permits. and... >> and you are not taking a jurisdiction request and you are not requesting a late filing on it? >> not at this time, no. >> and do you have any concern of the merits of that? >> i could not answer your question. >> do you know what i am asking sf >> question. >> if you don't have any problem with the merits that is what it sounds like to me if you are not bringing a request.

>> at this time, no, yes. >> and solely for the purposes of the rehearing request, and you are bringing that argument forward. >> yes, because this issue came up. >> and it is hard for me to understand the logic, so... i am trying to get that out of you. >> and yeah. i am still not understanding it if you could help me that would be great. >> i think that i have answered. >> okay. >> if you could clarify, this is the opportunity, and if you don't have anything. >> we believe that the jurisdictional issue should be considered tonight. >> the jurisdictional issue. >> no. i am not. i am asking why you didn't request an appeal for the special lane closure? >> well, we did not request the appeal of the special lane closure because we were told by miss golsty and by the clerk here that they could not be appealed. >> i think that i have already answered that. >> why are you raising that

right now today as part of a rehearing request. >> i am missing your argument. >> my argument is miss president that it was raised shorter, and haphazardly. >> how are you harmed? >> how about that? >> we are harmed because we believe that the mta permit has a higher standard. >> but you are not taking or requesting a jurisdiction request on that? >> no. not athis time. >> you are harmed in what way with respect to this? >> well, if these folks are allowed to proceed with the work along brotherhood way, we would hope that they would hold to a higher level of safety. >> okay. >> and that we don't believe that they are really committed to that from what we have observed in our community. >> i heard those arguments i am just trying to understand why the special lane closure permit

itself is problematic for purposes of the rehearing request. >> okay. >> to the procedural issues for the board. >> no, it is not for the board issue i am trying to understand the merits of the argument for today. >> if you are finished that is fine. >> i think that you have questioneder. answered. >> thank you. >> we can hear from the permit holder now. >> is the permit holder here? >> hello, i am with arbor well and i am the permit holder. and i am just here to request that i be allowed to fulfill the useful permit and fulfill the work. and i have nothing else to say other than what i said last time. >> thank you.

>> good evening commissioners public works again. and i both reviewed the brief from the appellant and his statement currently, and not to say that there are misstatements by the appellant and the permit to the arbor well. and on september 6, 2013, and the occupantcy permit, the allegation that we were stone wall and did not provide him information and he was able to appeal the permit on september 9th. and with a start date by all of the september 10, it does not appear that there was attempt to stone wall in this case or that we received a request from the appellant and we provided him with the copies of the information. and if i may, provide the overhead for me? >> and zoom a little bit to

see the whole entire permit? >> as you can see, the appellant requested a location of 41704, gonzalez however, the permit itself, clearly states that the closure was on brotherhood way, this information was provided to the appellant specifically. the information again was for the work from 9-10 to 9-20, six clock in the morning and 6:00 in the afternoon. the suggestion that brotherhood way was 150 yards away is correct, however you have to remember that lot fronts both gon sal les and the unimproved portion of the brotherhood way in this case and that is one of the reasons why when we have entered this information it need to be on the appropriate

address and that

>> there was no brief and there was no yelp and it has 7 reviews and one and a half stars for arbor well. and i am curious what the basis for this permit is.

if they are claiming that they are the trees that are not significant or part of an eir or a science report. and so you can say a google map of the vidal and garsis and this is where the trees were taken off and where the trees were taken down and these go to the safety concerns and these were two-man crew and nobody is flagging and this is low impact and this is off, brotherhood way, and this is what, the permit presumably was for, i don't know, there was nothing posted, anywhere in the park merced. and warner says that he is an account manager for the company, and here he is vp business development for the entire san francisco area. this is a hayward company. and i would like to know where the san

francisco office is. >> these are all flagging and are all pedestrians and not to be confused with the flaggers and the muni busers and the garbage caravan and they shut down a second street and i have codes in other relevant issues if you want... >> thank you, knee other public comment on this item? >> hello? >> so i was out there and i saw no signs. and we called the department, 3113 days in a row, four of us

12 complaints and with all due respect to him, he said that he had never gotten any complaints and it did not go to his personal office. and it went to 311. and only, we tried mapping and you have to understand that it is a war zone when they come out and we start cutting all of of our trees down and so it is intense but he can testified that we called, four of us three days in a row, and we got no response. and so the inspeckers came hours later. >> thank you. >> any other public comment? >> okay, seeing none, commissioners the matters are submitted.

>> i don't see the evidence to base that. >> i move to deny the rehearing request. >> >> we have a motion then from commissioner hurtado to deny both hearing requests. on that motion, commissioner fung? >> aye. >> president hwang? >> aye. >> vice president lazarus? >> aye. >> and commissioner honda? >> aye. >> the vote is 5-0, both rehearing requests are denied and notices of decision and order shall be released. >> okay, thank you. >> so we will move on to item 5 a bc. these are three appeals filed by lagos, 13-130, 605 gonzalez

drive. and 13-131 at 811 gonzalez drive.protesting the issuance on september 18, 2013, to parkmerced llc, tree removal permit (removal of one (1) tree with replanting of three (3) trees of similar canopy and of largest size available). order no. 181658 >> you have three appeals filed and so have you 21 minutes. >> good evening again, commissioners on behalf of the coalition of safe park merced i just want to fill you in on the fact that i intent to share part of this presentation with another community activist, miss cathy lenz who has the expertise in the issue of tree preservation and she will be speaking tonight as a co-presenter on behalf of this appeal.

the reason why we are appealing this particular, these tree removal permits, is because, we are rapidly losing our canopy in the park merced at one time when it was designed we had over 2,000 trees. and we are now down to 1500. and we believe the reason why we are starting to see a major loss in trees is because of park merced's rush to get their new project under way. and there has been reference to that by a couple of people that submitted letters, to this board. and on behalf of this appeal and we believe that is the real reason why these trees truly are being removed and it is unfortunate that we have a particular department the bureau of urban forestry, and

approving the rapid deforestation of our community and so that is why we are here today to preserve at least three more significant trees, these are trees that are called significant because of their size, their age, and their proximity to the street and they are in ten feet of a public right-of-way. and i would like to mention the fact that thomas church is the landscape architect. that is or was responsible for the landscape design of the park merced and he is also responsible for the landscape design in the goalen gate park and stanford university and cal berkeley just to name a few places and well reknown architect. i mentioned the fact that there were 2,000 trees at one time. as a matter of fact it is one of the reasons or one of the

main reasons we are trying to protect these trees and that they are habitats to while life in our community. we have 50 different species of birds that fly through the community and park merced is considered a major union site by the arbon saturday for bird watching and so that is something that needs to be considered, and when, you will listen to this appeal tonight. and it is also habitat to a number of other species of animals and wild life. and we have raccoons that make these trees the habitat. and we are seeing squirrels, skunks, and occasional cat that might use a tree as a habitat. and so, that is something that we don't believe the bureau of urban forestry took into consideration when they came up with their evaluation of these

trees and approved the permits for removal. one other thing that we want to mention is that there is a widespread use of pesticide on the property. and i was told that about ten days ago that round up was being used throughout the property and the round up is a very toxic chemical for the trees, plants, wild life, and we believe that they may be a contributing factor to the death of these trees that they allege is happening. so, i would like to get on with the issue of the trees themselves and i am just going to briefly go through each one of them because miss lenzwill cover the issue of the trees themself and why they need to be preserved. and she will get into the science of it. and i would like to go to tree number one here which is at

603-605 gonzales drive here is a picture of it. >> and this tree is about 60 feet tall and has a 20 foot canopy. as you will see, that tree is very green. it does not look like it is dying, it is the only significant tree on this particular side of the block. and there has never been any kind of a complaint from the residents or any reports of it being an accident or a street failure, or a tree failure with this tree. i might mention the fact that all three of these trees do not have a sprinkler system and so there is no means to maintain these trees, with water. the second tree, here is at 811

gonzales drive and it has a 40 foot canopy and it is very green and shows no sign of disease at least to my eye, i am not an arborist, but you will hear the testimony tonight that there really is no signs of health issues with this tree. this tree is also run of those trees that is one of the few significant trees on this particular block. and finally, this is for the final tree here that we are appealing tonight, at 840 gonzales drive, it is 50 feet tall and 20 feet canopy and there is no sprinkler system for this tree either and so it is not being watered by the park merced and yet, they want to remove it and claim that it

can't be saved and so, i just want to mention the fact also that about a week ago, in park merced and that i spoke with, told me that they had been directed not to water these trees. and so, they have been told not to water these trees and they claim that the only source of nourishment for these trees is rain. and that is what they have been told by the maintenance department. and so, and i was wondering why aren't you watering the trees? she have been told not to water the trees, let the rain water the trees. and so i want to get on with the arguments for why we are here tonight. we believe that the duf has not made a strong case for these trees and showing any imminent possibility of catastrophic failure. and they did not do this at the

hearing in august in front of the hearing also, and they showed and i asked, do you have any accident reports, of these trees, having failed and short not to come up with any accident reports. and also, i will mention the fact that duf has not shown any die diligence comparing the reports that they are going to submit tonight, regarding their preparation or required by law, on the characteristics of these trees and i was given this and i am going to show this up and i will put it on the overhead

there is no evidence that she or anybody in the department did the due diligence in preparing the report. on the characteristics of these trees and this is what is required by law. she was supposed to have done or one of her, subordinates was supposed to conduct the report and the characteristics of these trees and the benefits to the community. and also, it was supposed to have evaluated the characteristics of these trees and how they benefit the wild life habitats and there is nothing in her preparation or in her subordinate's preparation that they have done any of this. similarly, a locational characteristics and there is no evidence, that duf did any evaluation of how the trees contribute to the community in

terms of providing shade to our community. and also, she really did not provide to this particular hearing in august any evidence that these trees are hazardous, and that the burden is on duf if they want a tree to be removed rntion that the tree has to be shown to be hazardous and she has not proven that. >> and also, she but, made no mention of the fact that there are possibilities to saving this tree, she did not offer any evidence or any kind of a report where these trees could be saved, and what is called restorative action. and by trimming and topping, she provided no evidence that she or anybody else in the duf had done their due diligence to provide a alternative solution, besides the removal of these trees. and finally, we have been told

but was short, but i should say, it was short have told the community members that all of these street trees can be preserved, and we are going to have testimony tonight to that effect that these three trees can be preserved and don't have to be removed and so i will leave it at that. and we believe that the burden is on the permit holder and duf to show that the trees are hazardous and they have failed to do that and they have not met their burden and the permit should be revoked thank you. >> and now i will show the rest of my time with miss lenz, and she will go over the three trees. thank you. cathy lenz, and i have a degree in hort culture from the city

college. and my specialty was pruning and small trees, 25 feet and under. i contacted a second arborist because although we agree, at least two of the three trees can be preserved, our original arborist i did not feel did a good job. so i got a report which i submitted to the board. and commissioners, from ted kiplin who is in my opinion, one of the best tree people in the bay area. and so i refer you to that. and i submitted it. and i want to start with the first tree, on gonzales, 605. here it is. photo. >> well, okay. there is the photo. and i am happy if my testimony is not witness enough to contact ted and have him come

in. and it was very expensive to get him, and to come in it would have been another 500. and i thought that i could prevent it. >> with 79 percent of all of the large trees in the city, being removed, i think that everything should be done to preserve the trees that we have. replanting it will not bring these trees back. ted gives 70 percent chance that this tree can be saved. ten to 15 years can be gotten out of it. there are trees in golden gate park that are 100 years old. we agree that it has needles and it has (inaudible) but ted has recommended using agrefars and petra bark to get the immunity of the trees up. as mr. roberts said the real problem is that park merced has

drawn all water from these large trees, we are condemning them to a slow death. as well as on gonzales alone, roughly 12 trees have been removed, significant trees and not replanted. and this is concern. ted also recommended that this be cabled and says that 35 years can go with cabling their turn buckles on it. i honestly don't know if arbor well has the experience or the ability to do this. i am not sure, but they can be cabled. and i know that the department's concern is insurance issues but the ted says that we are insured. and if these were my clients, and i had a 70 percent chance if i got water on me immediately he said bring a

sprinkler, anything to hydrate them. i would take it. 811 gonzales. again, i will have the photo. and thank you. again, this is an 80 percent chance of saving, we will have ten to 15 years with it and but it needs immediate hydration *, and pentra bark to pick up the immune system with the proper pruning which needs to be removed and all of this and you can only take a third of the plant off or you will kill it. >> ted also recommended the use

of the russian pines with the various planting. the third picture is 840 gonzales. and we agreed with the arborist from dpw, that it all of us that it could not be saved, however, we had rain in early september, and i took this photo two days ago. and it has bark needles it is coming back. because of that. we are told, there is a man named martin kutcins that is amazing he can bring trees back from the dead. so, i think that it is worth a chance. to save this. an