continue to have this very decentralized approach that fall through the cracks. >> that required organizational changes through department and also require legislative changes to the abatement process within each one of those codes. in this particular instance one of the departments was looking at to whether or not there should be a joint emergency order and the problem we are faced with if we are issued that by the department of building inspection director, the chief fire marshall and the director of public health, one of the problems that would come up with, whose code abatement process would be the one that would be followed? because whether you are issuing any kind of a notice of violation or emergency order or whatever, there has to be the

administrative process and again, these codes were developed to operate from a code enforcement standpoint independently. so the first thing that one would look at if this is desirable from a policy standpoint would be are all of these codes do they have the same types of provisions with respect to the issuance of civil penalties, what is the criteria, what is the administrative process, are they similar, can they work in unison. all of these types of thing will be the first things to ask the city attorney. we work very closely with the land use division and the code enforcement and the groups we work very closely with them in the housing division. but i have a legal background and i understand these things in a way that perhaps others might not. so we work with them very carefully, but that will be two things that you will have to look at. let me give you

an example. section 204 of the housing code talks about civil penalties should be considered in such a way that the length and the nature of the violation, the capability of the property owner to have complied and essentially when former deputy city attorney when he was in the city attorneys office, he went into housing code and amended that. i don't believe that provision is in the other codes. that would be one thing to take a look at to make sure that if you are going to issue civil penalties or issue administrative penalties or with respect to the administrative hearing process that there will be parallels between each of the codes and i believe the director may have some comments. >> i have one suggestion. first of all we can set up a task force, either you can dictate to the city attorney or whatever department head to run and cochair with all the

other departments. the second question is regarding how to centralize it. we have available out then we can slowly to ask other department, the fire health department to skralz all -- centralize all the data into one system in the future, not now in this moment. the only thing using a phone call and e-mail right now. >>supervisor scott weiner: i agree we need to move in that direction. thank you director. okay, you can continue with your presentation. >> we were talking about the organizational process of how a code enforcement case goes through a process principally with dbi but primarily in a housing division. if we don't get a case in a hearing, we

are going to do a staff report and we are going to go to the litigation committee which is a subcommittee of our building inspection commission and go into closed session and talk with the city attorney about getting approval to the city attorney. it's a smaller percentage because of the type of criteria that the case has to meet in order to make that kind of referral. if not, then we are going to use the other code enforcement tools. we are going to ask for an order to be recorded on the property and keep billing them for assessment of cost for extended code enforcement. let me go through some of these. we have detailed procedures on how to deal with a code enforcement case which is identified by the in spector and senior inspector and myself. we have a data sheet

online now that the member of the public can look at and it's a different format because state law says that certain officials cannot have their personal information on it. essentially that is the information. the notice of violation gives detail as to the nature of the violation when the items to be completed and date and time for the reinspection. we are very specific about that. one of the things we do in housing is that notice of violation has a very detailed bullet point that tells the property owners what's going to happen if they don't comply. we tell them they have to comply within the specified timeframe and there will be a cost if they don't and they can be referred to the franchise tax board and any violation is a public nuisance and give them

information about if a permit is required and if they don't comply within the timeframe or facilitate the inspection and the notice of violation has information saying if you can't make that date and time, you need to reschedule with us and you need to notify the tents pursuant to local and state law. that's on our notice of violation. when they don't comply and we go out there and we can't determine because they didn't facilitate a reinspection and we do a reinspection, we send a warning to them and say you have not complied, the time for compliance has come and gone. you are now an accruing assessment of cost. to minimize that and avoid additional code enforcement actions, please comply and facilitate and inspection. we add that because the assessment of cost based on changes from the board of supervisors occurs now when a notice of violation is not complied with when the

timeframe is specified. it's a long administrative process. we want them to know what's going to happen and we'll inform them with the better results we get. if they don't apply, they will send a bill when the case is opened and when it's closed and this will give you an example of what the item was and the item what we bill for and that is a sample that we itemize the bill and the action we took and what the amount was that they were billed for. if they don't pay that then we come before you usually in july or august of every year and we ask for the ones that have still open cases or even if they are closed an they haven't paid their assessment of cost that we ask that you put that on the other tax bill and the board has been very supportive of that. before we get to that point there is at least two or three hearings where the property owner that is opportunity to talk with us if they think there is some

kind of an error. there is a directors hearing that the department has before we can come to you and they get it reported on their tax bill if they don't comply. that is an effective tool. >>supervisor scott weiner: this maybe more building, but in terms of moving away from the larger buildings to the single family homes or maybe small buildings where the never ending construction project or half the building is chopped off and nothing ever happens, is that more of a building division question as opposed to housing? >> vacant buildings and the construction issues will be more of something that dan lourary would address. >>supervisor scott weiner: okay. i will talk to him about that. we can do it when you come up later. >> this is to give you some information regarding our over all cases in the last couple years. normally the total

number of inspections performed is higher. we are currently have seven housing inspector vacancies which have been filled. so these numbers will go up. the number of cases to the city attorney are smaller. we have seen 11 cases in 2012. it doesn't mean 11 properties. there can be several properties that have more than one open cases of notice of violation. and that also shows what we collected in assessments of cost. but went to the board of supervisors for those years would be in addition to that department wide. there was another about $167,000 that went to the board the following year in 2013. it was about $250,000. this doesn't include city attorney awards. we are getting to that in a bit. what was the criteria that the housing division

uses and typically the building inspection. this is the criteria that the housing division as to whether or not it should be referred to the city attorney. an accumulation of open cases or properties that have open cases owned by the same person. an accumulation of maintenance issues, life safety issues or a history with this particular property owner or property where they don't respond to the notices of violation. obviously if you just have a broken window, that's not necessarily a city attorney case, but if it's the accumulation of issues that really allows us to be able to then use our resources to be able to go to the city attorney. we have found that our collaboration with the city attorney has been a productive one. there is page two of that. now i want to be able to go to one of the cases. this will be one that supervisor cohen is very

familiar with. this was the branding lawsuit. a property owner in bayview with several properties with several open cases. we sued him and got a judgment about $800,000. but as you can see we are looking at various items. we have water damage, leaks, ceiling and wall damage, floors, carpet, tiles, windows, doors, locks. each one of these items we have to verify compliance on each and every notice. so our notices of violation don't include one item, but several. the record is a 35 page notice of violation for a residential hotel. he we had what was over 400 individual items that we had to address. so the city attorney collaboration has been a very productive one for us. we have a dedicated housing inspector and senior that deals both with city attorney task force inspections and referrals.

let me say that all code enforcement cases with the housing division are addressed from beginning to end within that division. that's for consistency. now when a case gets referred to the city attorney, we will have those inspectors that specialize and are dedicated and work on that because as complaints are coming in we need to respond to those. a city case requires additional support in additional reinspection, photos and keeping the city attorney apprised. we have specialist that deal with this as well. >>supervisor malia cohen: are these specialist across the city? >> citywide. they go anywhere and deal with the cases. in 2012 we were asked to participate in citywide task force participation. they don't necessarily have to be

housing code violations. but they are getting the types of complaints in that building that cross interest departmental lines. we issued 25 notices of violation which translate to 320 housing violations. we had additional reinspections and when you get to the different departments that you have not seen before and make sure you get that information to the city attorney. in 2013, 20 notices of violations issued because of reinspection we found additional violations and because of the nature of violations we'll sometimes issue a specific notice for heat or illegal occupancy and separate notice for the maintenance items because they have a separate item for compliance and we take it through that process. some of the cases maybe opened because

the work has been done but not seen the payment of cost and this is an overall participation in the city task force case. now, let's talk about what happens as far as civil penalties and cost award. this was not collected but $2.3 million. what was collected $100,000 a little less than that and is still in the process of being collected. when you see these types of awards, other property owners might take notice. when we got the branding award, it gave other property owners that might behave in the same way pause. when we filed the lawsuit in the 600 units out there in the bayview area, i can tell you i had three other planned unit development file $1 million permits each to do compliance because they thought they were next. for those property owners whose unexpected

consequences but it was good, we know that when we file lawsuits other property owners take note of that. let's look at some before and after. this first one is supervisor kim's district, a residential guest room before and after. we have an extreme case here. this is when the property owner didn't know what was going on. >>supervisor scott weiner: what street in in district 8? >> this was on san jose avenue.

>>supervisor scott weiner: how long did it take? >> the homeowner abandoned the property. these are ditch -- difficult cases to deal with. the department is working on a pilot program working really well in boston. we had one of our first training sessions on this a couple fridays ago where we are working with code enforcement and trying to identify and inter seed on these types of properties before they get this bad and get people to say the sf mental health association has an excellent peer group that deal with hoarding and cluttering because we don't want to see someone displaced but we also don't want to have a situation where you have a lot of health issues, egress, fires, it's. in this case,

the property owner was able to get in and do this and clean this rather quickly but it was because the premises were abandoned by the previous tenant. this is the same property in the bathroom. >>supervisor jane kim: we don't know what happened to this tenant because they abandoned the unit. >> the tenant left. we had no information otherwise we would try to get the tenant to working with sf mental health association. he just abandoned the property. >>supervisor jane kim: i know mha has a limited cohort for cluttering and hoarding. but it's not a group that we can unlimitly send to. there is more residented that you encounter with dbi that mh

can take. what happens to this group? second, i wanted to follow up last year through the budget process the board asked for dbi to include a line item for mental health component for housing inspectors understanding that housing inspectors deal with many tenants and also property owners that deal with severe or just mental health issues and they alone are not going to be able to address the housing issues if there are no mental health services in training the inspectors. i'm wondering what happened with that budgetary item as well? >> i can tell you in partnershiping with them and bringing this program, the department of building inspection took $15,000 of that set aside of that supervisor to initiate the first year expenses of this pilot program where we are

partnering with dos. in these types of situation, they are very difficult to deal with. we want as much information in assistance to the person upfront as soon as we find this out. there was a lot of tools in this training in that individual from boston is coming back. i would invite anyone of your staff to come back and i will be happy to let you know when that was. there were a lot of things discussed and this is geared towards code enforcement but doing it in a way that is as sensitive as possible where a program and occupant are having to face. >>supervisor jane kim: thank you. >> now we are looking to repair of the exterior of properties. this was a city attorney case in district one. this is in district eight. the

front of the building. it needed major renovation. with that, the first consideration we talked about the code from an abatement standpoint and the mechanism from a complaint standpoint as the complaints come in. i would love to not only be able to see actions taken by the department but other documentation by any photos or other reports etc that would allow us to have a much stronger code enforcement citywide. if these cases have to go to the city attorney and get litigated, i can tell you a judge or jury is going to look at them much more carefully if they see the weight of the departments from the fact that these are important violations. >>supervisor scott weiner: in terms of referring to the city

attorneys office obviously there is a cost involved. can you comment on to the extent to which that impacts departmental willingness to refer. i'm not saying there shouldn't be a cost. legal services are not free. but i have heard not just with dbi but other departments as well sometimes the hesitation to refer. i'm sure the department of the resources the need to do code enforcement. >> i will give you an overview and i'm sure the individual departments will address that. with dbi one of the things to consider is we are on the general department. we are not part of the general fund. when we send a case to the city attorney, we are funding that initially. the city attorney is going to bill us. we have to be able to address the

city time and effort should we not be able to collect on that case. some cases aren't always winners but you have to get them over there depending on the situation. you have to have funding to be able to address that. that could be for certain departments that is going to be definitely they are going to have to look at. a couple years ago we were in a deficit and sending the case to the city attorney was one thing the litigation committee would have to look at whether we have the funds and staffing to support that referral. if we are dealing with a general fund department then obviously can the general fund address that as well. in overview, those are some of the things that the departments have to look at. once the case gets over to the city attorney, that's just the binge of that process. there is reinspection, a documentation, they may have prep for

workers production, depositions, trial appearances. if the case goes there or if it doesn't go, a lawsuit gets filed and it doesn't go to court, then we also have to do the reinspection to implement the injunction or stipulated agreement. all of those things are the types of elements that a department has to contemplate whether or not they have the resources and staffing to be able to support. >>supervisor scott weiner: thank you. we'll now move to mr. lourey from the building division. good afternoon

supervisors, dan lourary, deputy director of inspection services for complaint process and procedures. filing a complaint. a compliant is received by telephone, e-mail, referred from another dbi agency, from the board of supervisors office, 311, visits to the counter, department of building inspection, letter of complaint. building

inspection. the evaluation occurs within 72 hours of receiving the complaint. currently within 48 hours. site investigation. building inspector attempts to gain access. regarding the validity of the complaint. if there is a code violation apparent. if access is not possible, leave notice to request access. if adjacent property where access is granted. the case is closed if violation doesn't exist or continue the case for violation. this is a sample of notice for violation. request for access. this is a sample of a door hanger we use when we can't gain entry. results based on investigation, if a

violation is verified, a notice of violation is issued. if a violation is not verified, the case is closed. if documents are requested for enabling appropriate action. if access is not possible, a request for access is left at the property door, door hanger. a letter is also sent to the owner and a letter to gain access is scheduled. if a second attempt is unsuccessful, another request for access is left for the property. another letter is sent requesting access. requirements for compliance with those violation. time of filing, object obtaining work on a permit established, documents, monetary fee documents. >>supervisor scott weiner: i have a question, so i

understand you have a very well delineated process, but we've had some situation and i can only speak for my district where there have been some pretty extreme, i'm sure there could be more extreme but some very significant situations where it drags on. i can think of one at 23rd and castro where they removed a huge chunk of the building with some project that then stopped and it turned into annen campment and i remember seeing it when i was campaigning bay in 2009 and we got a call a few weeks ago that it's the same and we got another call where one portion of a building was removed including the staircase and there was a complaint and seemed nothing

was happening. i guess question is, is the process working in terms of getting actual enforcement where you have these extreme situations where a chunk of a building is removed and a project is started and never ends. i'm not talking about six months later but years and years later. why are those, why do those sometimes not appear to get addressed? >> a lot of the complaints you are talking about is they exceed the scope of the permit and we stop the job. it then gets referred to planning. sometimes it could take a long period of time to be approved through filing process. >>supervisor scott weiner: that's one situation where a project stops where someone exceeds a scope and you order them to stop and refer it to planning. but i know there are other situations where people for many reasons have nothing to did with the scope and they may at some point run out of

money, there could be a million other reasons why a project stops in the middle or there is no project and the building is falling apart where it's a blight to the neighborhood and a danger. there might be a variety of situations, planning may or may not be involved, but regardless, it's just to the outside observer living in that neighborhood, it's incredibly frustrating that years go by and nothing is happening. why does that happen? >> it could happen as you mentioned, supervisor, a project could run out of funds, it could sit there for a while. sometimes they lose their funding. i noticed a couple projects where the banks were going under, a lot of these large projects they sat there for a couple years

and they got refinanced. some of the smaller projects, if they run out of funds, they can sit there for a while until they get sold or refunded to complete the job. >>supervisor scott weiner: if i have a building and start to work on it and i remove half the building, i'm not exaggerating but the entire building is removed. it's no longer a structure, obviously with the intent to rebuild, for whatever reason i run out of money. it's not habitable, at what point, okay, 6 months, a year, what if it's 5 years or 10 years later. what is the ultimate way of addressing that situation. i agree we should be very tolerant with people to give them an opportunity. we want to give people every opportunity