the majority of my 57-year working career was in the city. when i was 15 i had a job opening at sharp park golf course. so, i went down there and got the job working and see the professionals, taking care of the caddy carts and renting them out. when i was a boy i started playing. outside of a four-year navy hitch, i've been playing golf ever since. for over 60 years. sharp park is a great course and it's affordable. most golfers i meet there are from san francisco and love the course. now let's talk about mr. plater and his group. they sue the city on behalf of the frog and snake who have been flourishing and coexisting with golfers for over 80 years. golfers usually stayed out of the dense rough where they were and only occasionally heard a

frog and hardly ever a snake. or ever saw a snake. but the city in good faith commissioned a study for the outcome that they would connect laguna [speaker not understood] wetlands with those in the national recreation area. that would make a better habitat and would cow some golfers to be changed. this seems to be in most golfers to be a reasonable response to the lawsuit and the court agreed. so, why is plater back? he's throwing up a smoke screen just to delay the project and ultimately to close the course. so, please tell mr. plater to go back to wherever the hell he is from and leave the golf course alone. thank you.

good evening, supervisors. i'm richard harris with the san francisco public golf alliance. there is a close connection between the lawsuit to which the city is still party, which is on appeal, and this matter that is before you tonight. mr. -- the plaintiff in the lawsuit also the entity that is here before you tonight telling you to delay, to disregard the deadlines that have been set on you by the u.s. fish and wildlife service, it is based on that opinion of the fish and wildlife service that the lawsuit was denied. if your board accepts and agrees to the appeal, then delays infinitely the directions of the fish and wildlife service, you are out

of compliance. you are subject to take in a resurrection of the lawsuit that [speaker not understood]. which is to say you are jeopardizing the golf course, which is why the golfers who are talking about golf [speaker not understood] on the golf course, they see that the golf course itself is being jeopardized. not just by the modest proposal that the fish and wildlife [speaker not understood] which turnout to be 3 or 4 feet which floods the golf course, but by disregarding orders of the fish and wildlife service and the [speaker not understood] who have told you to get this done shortly. please deny the appeal and move forward. thank you very much. i have, for the record, a [speaker not understood]

additional historical material on the golf course [speaker not understood]. >> the deputy clerk will pick it up in just a second. good evening, supervisors. my name is chris [speaker not understood]. i'm a partner at the law firm of morris and [speaker not understood] in san francisco where i head up environment energy practice group. and we have represented the sfpga court in court in litigation where the city prevailed and is now on appeal, and we also represent the sfpga in this matter ~. and i just want to address some of the alleged legal vulnerabilities that wildlife equity has raised. and the first is the ability of fish and wildlife to enforce the mitigation measures. mmd simply cannot be attacked on the grounds that its conditions will not be enforced, but also there are reasons for that. obviously as was pointed out much through testimony [speaker

not understood] to wonder whether that will happen. and as was explained, the city and fish and wildlife have for years nearly a decade worked collaboratively and cooperatively. that's all they're going to continue to do. wild equity's implicit threat to intervene before the agency and increase its work burden shouldn't be rewarded. it would be another error in law to the heckler's veto. the board really doesn't want to go down that road. second, no alternatives were analyzed for the black water law reason that no significant impact what identified in the initial study. the assertions by wild equity that they think that no pumping is taking place than is specifies in biological opinion does not amount to substantial evident and that's what you have to find as a legal matter, is substantial evident to

support a fair argument that there was significant impact. finally why not do an e-i-r when it is an legally rewired? a number of reasons. money obviously is one. [speaker not understood]. >> thank you very much. thank you very much. any other speakers wish to speak in public comment on behalf of the rec and park department? okay, at this time why don't we hear from our appellant for a rebuttal of up to three minutes as well as any questions that, colleagues, you may have. >> a couple of very quick

points. a few very wii questions were made by the board of supervisors at the conclusion of the department's presentation. one of which was is it really the case that this project can enhance the amount of water that flows through sharp park as it's implemented. the easiest answer to explain is look at the project description. the project description says on page 4 the primary purpose of this project of the proposed construction includes to remove impediments to water flow within the wetland. it goes on on page 6 to say the sediment and emergent [speaker not understood] cat tools and bull rushes [speaker not understood] removed in order to reduce obstructions to water flow into the pump intake structure. that is an indication of enhancing water flow at sharp park. i don't know what is. we didn't leave it at that. we also included in the record a deposition of the person who actually manages this pump for rec and park department, a guy named john [speaker not understood] and what he told us under oath is that the existing

pumphouse, although it has a 10,000 gallon per minute capacity, currently only operates at about 6,000 gallons per minute. this is in exhibit b of the documents that we sent -- submitted to you. we asked them a question. we said, as best as you under it from your experience, if the [speaker not understood] are removed, the pumps would be able to get water out [speaker not understood]? yes. do you [speaker not understood]. even a winter like last year when there was a lot of rain? an objection from attorneys on the other side of that question, they said yes, and we clarified this in his experience, he he said, yee, it would do good with the pumps running, it would pump that water out. that is the purpose all along of this project. now, there's been some question about whether or not there is some change in the condition that sharp park over time justified going into scaming out these wetlands. this is a photograph from the pond in 2005. what is missing from this chronology that the rec and park has presented is that in 2008, and again without any

environmental review, even proposing the planning of the project, they replace the parks at sharp park that run through the berm to enhance the amount of water flow to be pumped out. in 2008 they implemented that project with no environmental review. then in 2010 they also replaced the pump itself with this new larger pump that has a theoretical capacity of ka pass 10,000 gallons per minute. they claim there is too much vegetation in the way [speaker not understood]. since they implemented those measures, that is when this tulley growth increased. [speaker not understood]. that's what's caused the growth to increase [speaker not understood]. the biological opinion the fish and wildlife has issued has a ten-year expiration date. the rec and park department has ten years to implement this project. the only deadline is that whatever year they choose to implement it, they need to make sure the construction occurs

between june and october. [inaudible]. >> colleagues, any questions to the appellant? supervisor kim. >> thank you. actually, i really couldn't see the photos you showed of the earlier years, the pond. i don't think it's going to come up on the screen because the photos are rather dark. do you have other copies of that? it's hard to see the difference. okay. the number of years of the pond itself? >> this is in 2005. >> okay. >> it shows open water thereby the pumphouse. this is the 2008 project where they replaced the outside pipes at sharp park so they could push more water through that system more efficiently without any environmental review. two years later they also removed the pumphouse. they got this crane out there on the berm. took the pump out, large pump and replaced it with this new larger pump has more horse

power and theoretical 10,000 gallon capacity. [speaker not understood]. they show you the 2011 photo of the [speaker not understood] the reason that's been pumping is they have been pumping more water out of the system. they can only grow in shallow conditions. you know, we've submitted expert declaration upon expert declaration about how much water would need to remain in the system to keep them growing back. >> could you address that question? what i asked about -- you spoke about in your initial presentation and so the response that you heard was that actually the -- that comment, literature would state you need at least three feet of water, if not much more, in order to have the result that you had alluded to. and you had said that it would just be a slight water increase. and i'm curious as to where

your thinking led to that. >> supervisor, that is an excellent question. even if you were to disregard all of the evidence that we put in to demonstrate how a small amount of water remaining in the system would allow this vegetation to go away, you could look at the plan that rec and park actually created called the laguna solano resource enhancement plan. it's a contracted -- this organization called pwa to produce for them in 1972. it says in there the preferred solution which would both manage flood control needs of the golf course and eliminate the vegetation is to allow during the winter pumps to operate at a level about 4.3 to 3.2. it said during the summer, though, you need to make sure that water levels be maintained at 4.0 to 4.5 feet. both of those amounts of water are below the threshold of flooding at the golf course. typically, however, in the summer and springtime because it pumps so much water out of the system after the [speaker

not understood], there isn't enough water remaining in the system after rapid trans [speaker not understood] drown them out in the spring and summer. the water levels we're talking about have been demonstrated by the rec and park department's own documents to be lower than the threshold for flooding sharp park golf course. >> so, your response to that statement that common literature says -- and again, none of the members of the board of supervisors are experts in this. so, the response from rpd was that common literature states that at least three feet or more of water is required to have the impact that [speaker not understood], but you're saying based on what even rpd has done, their evidence shows that much less water can have that same result. >> i agree that you need to have a certain depth of water for it to drown out. where we disagree is whether or not the amount of water that needs to drown out this vegetation would somehow flood

the golf course. that simply isn't the case. you need to keep in mind, supervisor, there is always at least some water in the system at sharp park. and depending on which measurement you use and which gauge you look at, it's very close to three feet as it is. it just needs a little bit more water on top of that to eliminate the tully's from the area they're talking about in this connecting channel. >> i'm sorry. i just want to make sure i understood your point. i didn't mean to interrupt. you're saying you already do hit three or more feet of water and that, and that amount of water is not flooding the golf course. >> that's correct. i mean, the water is at three feet compared to sea level -- sea level baseline. there is no flooding of sharp park golf course. flooding doesn't happen in sharp park golf course until you get close tore 9 or 10 feet to sea level. that's where the flooding becomes significant. maybe somewhere around 8 feet. there is really no difference -- there is no -- there has

never been a flood at sharp park during the spring and summertime and that's not going to change under this alternative. it's a little more water that exists in that level to crowd that owl. ut. >> thank you. that's my question to the the the appellant. i would like rec and park to respond, but i'll allow my questions to ask questions to the appellant before i do that ~. >> okay, colleagues, any other questions to the appellant? supervisor kim, do you want to ask your questions to the department? >> i am just hoping you could respond to the statement that was just made by the appellant that we already have close to three feet or more of water and that doesn't currently flood the golf course. >> supervisors, lisa waynn, san francisco recreation and parks department. it is correct, there are a lot of ways to look at the numbers out there on the course. but what he's incorrect about

is that when you -- and i've been watching those pumps for over a decade and working with our station engineers to manage those pumps. so, i can tell you when the gauge board at the pumphouse reaches 2.8, doesn't matter what the value is, but 2.8, the golf course floods. currently right now the pump level is at about 1.9. so, if you add another foot to what it is now, you are beginning to flood the course at 2.8. and then the suggestion is that we could eliminate that vegetation by drowning -- basically drowning it out. we would have to go yet another two feet beyond that to effect -- that vegetation you see he in the photographs that he's provided, many of those photographs are sitting on the ground right now. they are not in any water. so, you have to go three he

feet beyond what it currently is. and it would, in fact, flood the golf course. >> have you ever gone beyond 2.8 feet? >> yes, we have, during the wintertime when there are extreme floods. we've gone on the gauge board up to 3.5 and at that point -- >> and what happened? >> at that point there's basically a large lake or lagoon in the middle of 14th fair way as well flooding around the 12th hole and the tee box ~, a number of places flood at that point on the level of the gauge board. >> thank you. >> supervisor, if i may clarify, the gauge board is -- the gauge board at 1 -- >> i'm sorry, supervisor kim, were you asking the appellant a question? >> i had not asked a question. but i'm willing to hear the response. >> i apologize. so, there's a little bit of a conversion factor issue here. the gauge board doesn't have

any units on it. what the gauge board has is a set of numbers they use to colloquially figure out how high the water level is. the gauge board has been determined that when it's at 1, it's actually at 5.7 feet compared to sea level rise, which is the standard for measuring just how high the water actually is in a more absolute level. so, i just want to [speaker not understood] the amount of water that we need during the wintertime and right now we just had another rain and there is a little bit more water in the system. is not going to be anywhere near what's necessary for flooding the golf course presently. but if we can keep that water level around that height in the spring and the summertime by not draining it all immediately after the egg masses hatch, that is when we can make sure these tullies and cat tails are round out and we no longer have this problem. >> thank you. >> colleagues, any final questions?

okay. at this time this hearing has been held and is closed. [gavel] >> and this matter is in the hands of the board. supervisor wiener. >> thank you, mr. president. i want to thank everyone on both sides who came out today. from has been a long-standing public policy debate about what should happen with sharp park, but that, of course, is not what's before us today. what is before us is the appeal of the mitigated negative declaration. there is no c-e-q-a issue here in terms of whether this should be ordered for a full environmental impact report. i think that the neglect -- excuse me, the mitigated negative declaration was correctly issued and i think that we should affirm it. and i do want to say a couple things. first, i had i guess a slightly different perspective on a question asked by supervisor

campos before. there seems to be an argument that unless you do an e-i-r, you can't know whether there will be a significant impact, and that i think is actually a circular argument that could be made on every cad ex, every negative declaration issued in the city that unless you do an e-i-r, you don't know if there is a significant impact. that would trip everything potentially into an e-i-r or at least arguably. and the fact is as the planning department described, there was an initial study done and then we go from there. so, i think the c-e-q-a review was handled correctly here and i will in a moment move to affirm the mitigated negative declaration. i do want to say that i do agree with several of the public commenters in terms of what this appeal -- this seems like this comes back to the sharp park issue comes back quite a bit, what this is

really about. it's actually not about c-e-q-a. it is about the future of sharp park. and there are people in the community, and i completely respect their point of view. it is a legitimate point of view. they're entitled to it. i just have a different point of view. i believe that we should remove the golf course, turn the park over to the national park service where the national park service will do what it is trying to do elsewhere, and that is to remove dogs and reduce active recreation. and we've seen that and we had an active conversation in the city right now about what the national park service is trying to do [speaker not understood] and elsewhere. and, so, i personally do not agree that we can do that. this golf course is long established, a lot of people rely on it. it is good to have mixed recreation as well as natural habitat in sharp park. and i for one think that rec and park does an excellent job

of balancing the need for recreation as well as preservation of wildlife habitat. but that is not before us today. before us today is the c-e-q-a issue, and i do not think that there is merit to this appeal. so, i do move to affirm the mitigated negative declaration, specifically to move item 20 and to table items 21 and 22. >> thank you, president chiu. >> thank you. i'm going to second that motion. and let me first also say that i think a lot of us have struggle with this question around where the future of sharp park ought to go. but the question in front of us today is not whether we should have a golf course at sharp park. it really is about how we protect an endangered species that is in sharp park. this has been a complicated topic. i was trying to think of a quote that would capture where we are today. i wanted to quote a famous frog

named kermit the frog. who said change happens as time passes by. let me explain why i think this is relevant to what we're talking about today. i think many of us have been supportive of the environmental groups who have been pushing the rec and park department to protect endangered species at sharp park. i want to thank [speaker not understood] and others for bringing this to our attention and just point out they brought a lawsuit several years ago that resulted in the city applying for the appropriate permits to really take care of our endangered species. and while the lawsuit was dismissed, it was dismissed because the city finally did the right thing. as a result, federal u.s. fish and wildlife service issued a 7-page lengthy biological opinion listing all the things that the city is supposed to do to keep sharp park, to really minimize the so-called taking of the species. so, in other words, because of the activism that has happened, we are now at a point where there have been protections put in place and from my perspective i feel like what we

are talking about today is we're really discussing what has been successful in trying to protect the species and what we are considering today. and i do agree with supervisor wiener that i do think the standard of review has been met here. i am a bit concerned that if we -- if it had not been met and we he were to move forward with the full-blown e-i-r as we heard from our city attorney, that could actually delay our compliance with federal environmental law. and, so, i take it at face value when the rec and park department tells us that they are going to devote resources to make sure that these mitigation measures are met, that that is going to happen. and for that reason i do think we should support the department today. but again, i want to thank the environmentalists who really have made sure that we are where we are today and i do hope we'll be able to move this item forward. >> thank you. supervisor campos. >> thank you very much.

i appreciate those comments from our colleagues. and you know we were quoting kermit the frog, and the only quote i think about is probably not a good thing for me to say this, but it's what ms. piggy said, which is too much exercise can damage your health. and i certainly live by that. [laughter] >> but in terms of this appeal, let me simply say i appreciate the comments that have been made and i certainly appreciate the work that has been -- that has gone into this dialogue by various departments. i don't think that it really helps to question the motives of an appeal. i actually think that there are legitimate concerns that have been raised here about the environmental impact of this project. and quite frankly, i have a

different take on the explanations that have been provided by the department. i do think the arguments and the explanations are circular in nature and they really come down to there is no substantial evidence of what an environmental impact because we believe that there isn't. and i think that depending on how you define the project and how you define what it is that you're evaluating the impact of, that you come up with a different conclusion. and i do worry that in a case where we have been found in violation of endangering these two species that we might go down the path that actually does the exact same thing. and i am appreciative of what sharp park represents to pacifica, and i really appreciate the comments from

people that came here on both sides. i am not saying [speaker not understood] in term of the larger policy issue should happen to this golf course. i know there are different opinions on that and i expressed my opinion on that previously. but i think that on the environmental issue before us i have a different perspective from that. as my colleague said. so, i will be voting no on the motion. >> supervisor kim. >> thank you. so, actually probably through this weekend i had, after reading through the material, i will be affirming the planning determine today. my intionv ~ information came on monday and we don't have information from uswf from their participation on the mitigation. i don't feel comfortable voting

for the certification today either. if we're able to get that information and we continue this item, i would be happy to look at that. it just seems when reading the document that the document clearly states that it shall approve the remediation effort. and, you know, i think we should be able to affirm that when we are affirming the document. so, that, for me, was the sticking point. i don't think the consideration today for me has anything to do with the use of sharp park. previously i was looking at this appeal, i largely thought that planning and rpd had responded to the appellant. i just want to say particularly to [speaker not understood] it's clear that you are passionate about the ecological nature of sharp park and i really appreciate your commitment and i trust that you would want to do what's best. ~ ms. waynn but it's really hard from the

per spicktive of a layperson to hear the battle of the experts and be able to determine who is right and what is the proper way to move forward. ~ perspective i just think i have a lot of questions and a lot of that happens from the fact that i don't have the expertise to really understand, you know, who is correct in their assessment of whether [speaker not understood] the endangered species here. so, given where we are today with the evidence that is before us, i also will be voting against the affirmation. but i did want to appreciate the thought that went into this on both sides. it just seems like there are a number of questions and further examination does actually seem warranted in this case. largely, i'd like to support the work that we do around negative declarations and exemptions because i think sometimes we over -- we're overly cautious when we do environmental review. this seems to be one of the few cases where actually environmental review might actually be warranted and, so, just given what's before us today, i will also not be supporting the affirmation. >> colleagues, any final

comments? okay. why don't we take a roll call vote on supervisor wiener's motion to affirm the approval of the final mitigated negative declaration. >> and table item 21 and 22? >> and table items 21 and 22. >> supervisor campos? campos no. supervisor chiu? chiu aye. supervisor cohen? cohen aye. supervisor farrell? farrell aye. supervisor kim? kim no. supervisor mar? mar no. supervisor tang? tang aye. supervisor wiener? wiener aye. supervisor yee? yee aye. supervisor avalos? avalos no. supervisor breed? breed aye. there are 7 ayes and 4 nos. >> the motion is approved. [gavel] >> and why don't we now go to general public comment. >> at this time the public may comment generally for up to two minutes on item within the subject matter jurisd