our shop more aoe efficiently and how do we hire more people and i don't want to say squeeze everybody in the room to get the work down. >> 100 van ness, did we ever list it in the project reports in and it is a big conversion, of..., and yeah. >> and yeah. what is this? >> it is here and does not seem and unless there is a different address. side street?

>> >> what is that? >> no. >> >> it isn't there? >>

i can be brought to you, you know, directly, to text you, and i think that there is a way, but right now. >> this is a really large project. >> yeah. >> it is the final skin on there, and it is more than 300, i think, and at least is advertising, and there was a conversion of the commercial to residential.

>> yeah. >> what is the building with the tower goes up next to it. >> you can't miss it from the city hall, it is the biggest view, >> and that is tend to..., and it is... right. >> okay, item 4 e, update on code enforcement >> good morning, dan lowry and deputy director of services and i would like for give you an update on the code enforcement and the monthly update.

and this month, and it will depict of what we have done from june until now and instead of just giving you numbers or a break down so that you can see the history of the complaints. and one is for building, and it housing inspections because it lasts for the insections on both divisions and the other graph that you have is for the activities and what we try to do is wrap up all of the months that we have since we started this and reporting to you, and to show you the case and action and history. of the month. the other one is for the housing complaint activities and the last one is for code enforcement and complaint activities and i think that this will be helpful, and those will be graph up our activity here. for the month of february, building inspections performed

were 4168, complaints received 221, complaint response within 24, to 72 hours is 193. complaint first notice of violations were 47. complaint receive and abaited without notice of violations was 102. and abaited complaintwise notice of violations were 50. and second notice of violations refer to the code enforcement as 20 and so out of these complaints, 54 percent were responded to within 24 hours. 33 percent was responded to within 72 hours, and 13 percent were responded to after 72 hours. and that gives us 100 percent response, for the complaint investigation. and i just like to add ever since june until now we have had 100 percent of these complaints response and i will have the first chief, and housing inspection report on

housing and then report on the code enforcement activity. >> thank you, deputy director. >> ross mary bosky and you can see from the table, full number of inspections performed by the housing division has steadily been increasing with the lower red line down here. and based on the fact that in august of last year, we hired 7 new housing inspect ors in the training and so the number of inspections and the number of cases that have been abaited have been increasing. and there is a substantially a less number of inspections performed by the housing inspector and you may ask yourselves that is the case because they take a code enforcement case from the

beginning to the end. all the way through the city attorney that requires a lot of inspections and we also only right one notice of violation and have to manifest the presence because some of the code enforcement tools that we have had are not as effective such as the referrals to the state franchise tax board and issuing citations and i will get into that item when we discussed >> we have been with the outstanding cases with heat violations and life issues and we continue to send the cases to the city attorney and we have 33, to 34 cases there right now and several residential hotels, and we

focus also on we have the multiple violations on multiple properties and we have made that and we have to put all of the information on the spread sheets and move that over and those are not the things that are captured on what is before you, but i am very happy with the progress that the inspectors have been making with increasing the inspections and the number of cases that we are able to abait and being able to abait these cases, more quickly. and now, currently, the current complaint tracking system, this does not give us a useful tool at all to be able to come back and tell you how quickly we are able to abait a certain type of violation and to do that we have to crunch those numbers manually and excel will be able to help us to do that and there will be pain but there is light at the end of the tunnel and so that is one of the things that we are looking forward to with all of the great work on that but those are just some of the

tools that we definitely are going to need. and so what has housing done to be able to assist with that? >> we have taken every housing code violation, and created a standard sentence, put that on a spread sheet and gave that to the excel and developer and that will allow us to take a tablet, in the field and be able to identify those items instead of making notes and coming back from the field of putting that in the complaint tracking system and it will be more efficient and allow us to do more inspections more quickly and get that information and put it in the property's owners hands, at the same time with the end of that inspection, and so there are a lot of for that for a couple of years and we have to stay the course and help with that, and if there is any questions let me know. >> okay, commissioner mar? >> so, i heard that there is a working group, trying to go through the categories i am

sure, and it seems promising that we will get a better break down of the novs and i am looking forward with that and i am going to ask one thing in particular to housing and i was wondering if the future reports if we could start noting how many routine inspections that you guys are now doing. and because with that addition of the new inspectors and i know that you have started that program, already. and that we start, you know, letting the commission know as well as letting the public know that that is back on the agenda. and hopefully, we will catch things before they become novs. >> excellent, comment, commissioner and if i could add to that, the first thing is that one thing that i am hoping to look at is being able to happen and being able to supervise the district categories of types of

violations so that i can see the patterns and be able to deploy more effectively the staff. we are focusing on the inspections of the hotel and doing an audit of the amendies, do they have the elevators and the grab bars and the postings? and several other areas of criteria that were putting into a profile for the for profit and the non-profit hotels and so we figured that was because of need where we needed to focus our energy on initially and we are also doing the apartment buildings and we are focusing right now on the residential hotel and so we will be happy to come back with those results. >> right. >> i also like to know how you are doing the inspections, do you surprise the people or let them know ahead of the time. >> when we do a inspection we

do, but in this enstance we are looking at the hotel conversion items and so in this case, we are trying to get the cooperation to see if they have gotten the grab bars put into the bathrooms, etc. and if we need to come back and schedule something with them and we are happy to do so, but these hotels have a 24-7, desk clerk that is more than happy to help us. and one of the reasons why we are not announcing this is because we also want to make sure that they are keeping the appropriate records for the hotel conversion, ordinance and that is part of the audit. but we are also working with them very carefully on that and so that if they need, our checklist that we have got on the website about the things that we are looking at, and then we can get that to work with them, we are not typically going in the rooms themselves but we are also doing the heat sweeps at the same time to give them more education on what we are working for so that when we follow up with subsequent routines and inspections they will be more prepared. >> in my opinion, i think that the intent of all of this

should be to go out and seek change in behavior, if there is any changes that he made and get the owners and the property manager's cooperation, >> and so, some time, going there with a surprise inspection, and sort of like a catch you, and i caught you on something. and put the person on a defensive. basis. and then you may not get the cooperation as you would like. so i am just throwing it out there and said perhaps that you should evaluate, what is effective and whether you surprise people on the inspection or plan ahead and let them know, we are coming in a week and you have got a week to fix up your place and make sure that it is correct, i mean that is more important to have the place correct than to say, oh, i caught you. that is all that i am saying. >> i will say as a chair of the task force, that we, and we do have a rather extensive routine

request, letter package and so that is going out as well. and so that we are trying to use this as a way of auditing, and educating. and also, because >> i understand what you are saying, however, do a blanket reminder that we do inspections, you know, as we are out in the district, we hear often that people clean up the place, for inspections and then let it be for the rest of the time. and that is true with heaters and elevators and a lot of the things that we end up hearing before our abatement appeals, and so, i think that there is, as long as we notify them, that

it is likely, >> that is fine. >> or, it is going to happen at some point and we don't schedule them and we just show up, i think that that will insure that i mean, that i, you know, that i think that educating around which points you look for is always good too. so maybe workshops and in these areas, because especially the residential hotels are really focused on it. >> we have been getting a lot of cooperation and at the task force, we do have about for profit and non-profit owners there and samp a who represents the independent hotel operators and so they are aware of these audits as well. and so our goal is to work as closely with them as possible because this is more of an education but it is also to give us an audit of what are the actual amenities so that we have a better profile of what is happening in these particular properties and we are more than happy as we complete this and we are doing it for all 500 buildings to

provide the commission and others with a booklet that will have our findings within it. >> so i am not opposed to surprise inspections but i am just saying that take a look at the program and see what works and maybe it needs to be accommodation of both and maybe it may need to be more routine, more often, and more often routine inspections and to keep everybody on their toes so to speak. >> this is their and i do think that you have told us that there is a, you review it and if someone is a repeat offender. and that they get on a list more frequently, or you follow up more frequently. >> but, for those buildings, where we have a chronic problem of lack of maintenance. >> yes. >> and we decide, say that we are going to go in and get a base line and do a room to room inspection, that is independent of the city attorney task force inspection, and we are going to go in and talk with them about this and they are going to give two weeks notice because they

have to give the notice to the people within the unit and so we work closely with them and they get a package of information so that we know what we are coming in to take a look at and so that they can plan for that because it does take a tremendous amount of their staff time as well and we want to make sure that they are aware. >> okay. >> that is especially if that advance notice is given to the tenants. >> yeah. >> that is right. >> talking to us than to their landlord. >> do we engage our landlord out reach people in this? >> i was just going to say thank you, one of the things that we do is generally for those types of inspections we will usually give them more than two weeks because we want to encourage the occupants to let us in, so that we can get in to as many units as possible. and so we will engage, out reach and encourage the property owner and the on sight operator, to work with out reach so that we can get into these rooms and that, if there is some concern, our out reach

contractor can alleviate those concerns of the occupants so that it is a win-win situation for everybody. perfect, thank you. >> >> for the section and you have been given the overview of the complete activity for june and so i will give you a quick look for just last month. so, we took 64 cases from the building and electrical and plumbing to the director's heating and outdoors, 18 orders issued and 12 were held under advisement, and for the month of february, and then we abaited a total of 128. that concludes our report. >> thank you.

>> thank you, is there any public comment on director's report, items 4 a to 4 e? >> it is on, now. >> okay. robert davis, i was wondering about one more thing code enforcement related and that is this sign. according to the ordinance, this sign must be posted in a vacant and an abandoned building and i have never seen this sign anywhere and i don't know if anybody else has either, could you put it on the overhead. >> it is on, and this is supposed to be posted and here it is, sign posting in the ordinance and as far as the abandoned buildings go, i hate to keep harping on this, but if the director knows that the building is abandoned, which he would know if the building was registered last year, and the building was abandoned sort of, that you are obligate by this

to send out a notice saying that the building is abandoned or is vacant and it must be registered within 30 days. and so, essentially you could send out a notice every year, to buildings that are already abandoned or vacant, and without having to wait for the building owner to register it every year and go through the notice of violation, the directary hearing process again and again, and this is a time saving at the point and another thing is that a building that is abandoned has no power or gas and no electricity. and you could say that all of those buildings are known to pg&e and all that you need to do is take the pg&e of lists and the buildings that have no power electricity and the list that you have already of buildings that are abandoned and registered and the city list of public addresses merge and purge and you would find most of the buildings in san francisco that are vacant and abandoned, thank you. >> sorry.

the department of public health does exactly that with trash collection if it is a city address, and you don't have trash service and it is not a vacant lot they send you a letter and you have 30 days to reply or they sign you up automatically, that one person in the department does the whole city and very easy to do with a computer. thank you. >> hi, and getting back to commissioner about the supplies inspection at the svos and i am a frequent visitor to these places and so i can tell you that a lot of the tenants are not comfortable with that and they want to have a 24-hour notice and we had a inspection the other day and got a complaint that they never got notice on this and i just want to bring that across and i am sure that if you can catch somebody doing something wrong a lot of times these are

existent and have been around for a while and i will tell you that and you need to give your tenants notice and they do regard their place as their homes. so they don't want to be invaded, thank you. >> thank you. >> and deputy, director lowry, just a secretary on the abandoned building you shared a statistics with me yesterday, and talk with regard to what you did there, for one of the supervisor cohen i believe. >> right. >> we had a meeting with supervisor cohen and we were asked about the vacant buildings. and a couple of years ago there was over 600 vacant buildings. as of this share, we are down to 235 and so we are done and so, the program from the building inspection and point of view is working and when we are aware of it, and we do do the proper notification and process, and it does work, yeah. >> yes.

>> and we also had it additional to the inspector and on the vacant building and so we could post it properly and track it properly. >> so statistically we are done to over 50 percent or 60 percent. >> yes. >> yes. >> and commissioner mar? >> so just listing off the previous speaker, are we down because some owners are not reregistering their buildings? because they are vacant and are we going solely by registration or even if therecy way besides going to pg&e and if we just compared our numbers with the department of health numbers is it the same? do we know? >> i don't know, our numbers verses the department of health numbers. >> because if it is abandoned they don't have garbage, like the previous speaker says they don't have electricity or water, and probably abandoned. right? it is probably empty. otherwise they would need those

services. >> commissioner walker? and you might have? >> and yes, i agree, i think that it is a good idea too because we can only keep track of what we know of and so the ones that seem to be sort of problems for the neighborhood, are the ones that we don't know. and so because we are not actively out there looking for them. and it might be good to try something like what was suggested of going to, and seeing how the time consuming that is, if it is feasible or if we could get that data and see how it, you know, measures up to what we know and that way, we could be able to identify some other buildings that we might need to take action on. >> and so we can do tha. >> and report back to you next month. >> perfect. >> i think that it is a good idea. >> yeah. and is the list of vacant buildings publicly available somewhere, like on the website? >> yes, it is. >> and then we can all check it and see, >> yeah, i mean that people, we could get reported by the public, or anybody, but you know this might be proactive to

if we could access that list and it might help us out a little. >> okay. >> and thank you. >> thank you. >> deputy? >> i would also like to acknowledge, commissioner melgar, present. >> thank you. >> on to agenda item five, discussion and information, regarding addressing heat complaints of the department. >> members of the commission we have a couple of handouts, one is a heat, or a notice of heat policies that was established back in november of 2011 that was distributed to the petition and subsequent to that late in 2011. and this was a response to, concerns about the alleged heat

violations, and what we could do with the existing process, to, tighten the time frames of compliance, and so we basically shortened those time frames quite considerably and so what i am here to do today, is to report to you what has happened since those policies changed. and so, what i have before you, is the fact that from january first of 2012, through december of 2013, we received 551 alleged heat violations, and of those, 94 percent are closed and the peak violations have been abaited and that is about 36 open cases of 551, and so, now, that means that these cases are getting abaited. and but how are they getting

abaited because some of the enforcement tools that we have traditionally used in the past are not that effective and quite frankly what is working is man testing presence, and the issuing the assessment of costs when it is applicable. and so when we push on a case in a short period of time because there is a history of the violations the next item that i have is a hand out for you and a case study of a particular abouting and i want to show you what happened on sunday to friday of the particular week and given this particular violation. we had a complaint come in on a sunday afternoon that there was not heat at a specific residential hotel. and so that following monday morning and immediately the inspector for the district went out and did an inspection to determine if there was heat. and he could not quite get in the first time, so he is trying to contact the property owner

to get in and see what is going on. and as you can see, from the hand out he is making several contacts a day beginning with that first working day, that monday, to see whether or not heat is restored or is there a contractor on site, and this is the building twice, at least on that first monday, and issues of notice of violations which is then because he went back in the afternoon to try to gain access. he issues a notice of violation the next morning, tuesday morning. do you remember this came in on a sunday, we are not here on sunday and so actually it is the day after are the second working day on a tuesday. and post the building with the notice of violation, and it is a two-day notice of violation because, we are using the shortened tightened time frames that was established back in november of 2011. and now, okay, the inspector keeps going back out there on a daily basis so that he could interact with the contractor, and find out what is going on,

and so this is very, labor intensive and we don't have the resources to do this on every building and because we get 3,000 complaints a year and this particular district is a very busy one but because there was a history of previous high violations here, we are doing that in this particular case. and okay. so we post the notice, and it is a two day notice of violation, and there was a contractor noted on site on tuesday, but, the heat was not restored. the inspector goes back out there on wednesday. and this is within three working days, of starting this process. and spoke with the contractor and they said that they needed a part and the heat was not restored and the inspector restores two more site inspections and going in there in the morning and in the afternoon and what he is doing is putting this in with the other inspections that he already has schedule and again,

very labor insensitive.