do see a lot of these landscaping projects in rear yards. and the decks if they're below 30 inches or more, you don't even need a building permit for that. there was a slope going back -- there are photos going back of a retaining wall. if we could determine where the existing grade was and then if they proceed from that point on a different permit maybe they could get what they want in the rear yard so that's my opinion anyway. >> so anything less than 30 inches does not require a permit? >> nope, not for a deck. from the lowest point, you know, so -- >> so for, like, a terrace yard. >> yeah. >> the exposed portion -- >> you'd have to use the high point from 30 inches. >> okay.

>> i believe planning has some other issues with that code as well. people use it and use it all the time. >> okay. last question. i've heard that the -- you guys have the ability to go back and show historic photos of the property? >> building department? >> yeah. >> sometimes we use google earth. we didn't do it in this case. i think in this case it's pretty clear you can see that. i don't know about the property being in fore chloric sure. closure. the people doing the work came into me recently so i wasn't aware the property had changed ownership since we changed notice of violation. there is other permits for the main house that remodelling

kitchen, doing other interior work that seems to be going okay and i believe that's almost completed. my biggest fear as well was when i heard the building was for sale and i didn't wantsome new bier y buyer to be buying this with the problem. i don't think it's fair when you have a property for sale with this hanging over it so -- that's still in contract be pending this. >> /tha*bg thank you mr. sanchez. >> thank you. so the subject building permit application, which the project scope is pretty clear to place an older retaining wall. clearly that's not what's accurate or an accurate description of the work that's been done, but given the scope that's been presented to staff we did not review it because a replacement of an existing so we did review that it was not

applicable. what has been done does not comply with the planning code and would require a variance. the deck would be higher than what would be allowed as permitted in a rear yard. they would be allowed to deck up to 36 inches above grade given that grading on rations have occurred here without proper permitting is difficult to evaluate what the previous grade was. unfortunately we don't have a really good catalog or resource of historic photographics that would allow us to do that. the google photos are /raeplly not of sufficient resolution, but also the angle in order to determine that. the best case scenario if there are no historic photos would be to probe and see how far down the foundation of the building would be and maybe that would give you an idea where grade may be relative to that foundation to the footing ing

to that foundation, but beyond that the permit, in my opinion, would be invalid and request that the board deny this permit and require the permit holder to submit new permit that does everything this person should have done and is accurate. >> mr. sanchez, one could almost approximate a little bit from where that concrete existing one was and rough thely the height and perhaps a little bit of a grade in. in your opinion then, and just based upon my eyeballing, that exceeds the 36 inches that you brought up for the deck to be allowed in the rear yard based upon the planning code.

>> exactly. if the deck, and even the plans submitted by the permit holder, which gives some great elevations, it's clear from that that the deck is more than 3 feet above grade and would not comply with the planning code. thank you. >> public comment on this item? step forward. >> hello. i'm residing at 70 win field and my backyard is diagonal to the rear yard of 37 prospect. i did submit a letter of support. i hope you got it and i had a look at that. rather than repeat that i'd just say there's a long history here. to clarify, these are the same owners that did the original work. we approached them and if i

could bring the overhead up, i have additional image that shows the yard after the mayor regrading one was done and at the point six 4 by 4's about 10 to 15 feet high were set in cement pilings in the yard. essentially, the point is that the material regraded the deck, they pushed the dirt from the west side of the yard back to sunny moon's property and they added retaining walls and this is the framework for retaining wall, but it was now north of 7 feet high from the rear wacway of walkway of the house. i approached courtney who was leading this work as a contractor and asked about the work and asked about a permit and he told me they didn't need it, this they were just landscaping. that began conversations and concerns and we were ignored.

there were three notices of violations sent to the owners. there was a director's hearing at which i spoke. order of abatement was issued and we thought that was great. and nothing had changed. instead they sold the house for $1.2 million. they're investors, and they wanted to take their money and pass this on to the next buyer. that's when we went back with sunny moon and repeal the process. here we are today. they've agreed to remove the deck, however the grade is materially changed, the height of the deck is a lot higher than it should be so we're asking for your support on up holding the appeal. and also, you know, i think there should be fines and penalties for the developers and investor who is are trying to flip this property and pass this on because that's all their care about is money. that's the best way to send the

message that this is not okay. thank you. >> thank you, next speaker please. >> i'm a little nervous. i'm sunny's tenant. if i could use the overhead, please. going up the /stpaeurs to the deck would be able to look directly into my living room window.

anyone standing on the deck would be able to look directly into my bedroom window. i've lived in this unit for over ten years so i've seen what the property of the backyard looked like ten years ago. and the property was overgrown. it was rose bushes and rose mary bushes and concrete. and the grade was way below the deck. this is the deck sunny had tucked about. it was way below that deck. now with existing deck at 47 /-p prospect i suddenly got an audience and i don't want an audience. and the deck, as you can see, is not 36 inches above the grade, it's at the very top of the property and the grade had been pushed up to a much higher height than it had been previously and that's all i

have to say. thank you. /stpwh >> thank you, next speaker please. >> my name is duncan patterson. i'm a resident at 49 prospect avenue the immediate neighbor. i'm here to support the appeal. i'd like to address the conduct from one of the previous comments, the conduct of the contractor and developer and throughout this whole project has been a willful and complete disregard for the city's building code and processes. there's been no consultation with the neighbors, no information about what's happening w for any of the neighbors and no consideration given for execution of the work. they're incon sit incon

-- >> we can't hear you sir. can you speak into the mic. >> this is where the deck is and down to the lowest point of the grade so while it may not be evident from the foundation lines, it has changed significantly here as evidenced by the whole works. another point i'd like to request is they've planted numerous trees in the property line and sprinkler system. i'd like to show this. thises the deck, this is the side of my house, these are trees planted here. to give some idea of what these trees might look like in the future. this is a grown verse of that tree, which is 12 feet hide and

wide. there's also a sprinkler system you can see here, this is a trench where the concrete laid and that concrete was only laid after they were required to do so. this retaining wall was installed without it. this is now embedded concrete. i get saturated soil day in and day out. the removal of deck, the grade needs to be legal and permit and the retaining wall. i'm not an expert, but given the shotty workmanship for the rest of the outside, i'd be surprised of the retaining wall. >> can you go back to the foe

foe of that excavation? >> yes. >> if you see that portion of that site above that -- let's say that red line. >> yeah. >> is that pretty much natural grade at that time? >> this is where they built this soil out down here. what this grade really looked like, you can kind of see if you look at the photo directly, this you can kind of see where the grade kind of is, loose soil on top. what's happened is they've moved soil from the front here up here to get -- >> so portion isn't built up you're saying? >> i can't say for sure how much, but in this area i would estimate somewhere in the area of 12 inches and this is where this leading edge of the deck is so when we talk about the elevation of the deck, we're talking about this leading edge here. >> thank you.

next speaker please and that photo is in the packet if you wanted to see it in person. >> my name is nicki patterson and i reside at 49 prospect. i was contacted by our neighbors to the other side of the property at 45 who wanted to send a confirmation that there's never been any build up on that deck, which i think has been satisfied. i've lived there for over ten years and there's never been anything on that back deck. these people are the same people you're now -- there was no foreclosure. it's the same people. they had complete disregard for us when we tried to work with them and ask them what they were doing. of course we want somebody to live there. nobody lived in that house for many years and we're happy for it to be developed to code, to permit.

we've been let down by the city. there are rules in the city of what you can do and we are reasonable people and that's all we wanted to happen and it didn't happen. we've had a director's hearing and they've been told to take down the deck and they didn't do it . they've been told what they have to do, they've ignored it and i have no faith that whatever happens here today they're going to do what you tell them, so i'd like to know what you can do to make them do what they're supposed to do. take down the deck, be reasonable, make the house next to the house is safe. i don't believe any of the work in that house has been done properly and i thank you for your time. >> is there any other public comment? seeing none, we'll have rebuttal. you have three minutes of rebuttal. >> the only thing i want to

mention is it's the same people, same developers. there 's a little bit of a scandal on this property. it was owned by several people, all the developers and one of the people involved was trialed for attempted murder and he was going to jail and so they waited for the foreclosure to go through and the other partners bought him out so it's always been the same people. they've always bought it through the foreclosure, so it's always been the same players. these people didn't just buy the property. it's the same people so, i

mean, that's all i can say of that issue. >> miss moon, you know your building has some unusual aspects also. >> yes. i mean, i -- >> let me continue a little bit on that. you have rear wall that is at the property line at the rear. there's no rear yard in your building except for the portion of the deck on the side. the windows -- when you're at the property line windows have to be rated. i'm telling you you have some unusual conditions. when i bought that property five years it was the way it is. that house has been there since 1980 so i assume that this house is -- was under code and compliant, you know, when -- i mean, that's -- i mean, it's not new construction, but it was built in 1980 so, you know, i can't speak of it, this is

not my area of expertise. >> okay. >> do you have any rebuttal? you have three minutes? >> commissioner, i don't want to belabor about who owns it now or not. on this drawing that i handed out to you before, you can see where we proposed to put the deck. also the height of the retaining walls -- i can assure you that the upper retaining wall, which is this one over here is less than 30 -- it's 46 inches. you can see where the foundation next door is so there hasn't been all this soil moved up as what's being claimed. it's difficult to get it to the

correct soil /hr*el. levels. you can tell from the images, the foundations where they are. again, on the property to the south, looking this -- on this side over here, this is the image looking towards that and you can see where some of that foundation is opened up because when it put bolts into secure that retaining wall into this tie back over here so there's a bit of exposed so we can't lower that anymore. if we do we'll go below their foundation. we can't do it. on here we have this image over here where this is the wall over here, one right behind the house and you can see there was a retaining wall. at the end you can see that retaining wall. you have those photos if your

package you can see there was a retaining wall and there was a fence. . it's better that we have a retaining wall because it will retain the soil and prevent erosion so it's better for the neighbor. lastly, the claim made about the trees everywhere. underneath the very, very unusual. when i saw this i thought that's a funny way of building a house where you have a cantilevered section like this and that's 3, 4 feet above grade.

again, there is no trees underneath you, however, we will take all the trees out to satisfy the neighbors. we'd like to have this reinstated with the condition to comply with all the conditions i've asked for before. questions? >> i don't have much more to add. i did look up the first notice of violation that was originally written for the work that was done without a permit. we did bring that to an order of abatement as one of the people in public comment did point out and sometimes it is frustrating as well for people when they see that even though there's a hearing and they get permit and the deck's still

there. i can see where they're coming from. all i can say in defense of that that we did realize in february that there was something going on as well based on what we were told. one concern i have about the retaining walls is maybe some of them may be under 3 feet, some more. the posts holding those were all embedded. i don't know how deep they are, i don't know what size footings they are. we didn't get the opportunity to inspect them so possibly there's some destructive testing needed to figure that out. i'm sure mr. white head knows that, but i want to point that out, that we have not inspected any of that work in the rear yard because it was done without a permit. >> there duffey, it appears the planning department feels that this permit was issued in error. >> yes. >> but the didn't went through

>> we already have an order of abatement on the the second one issued in february, but there is an order of abatement order in february so that's going to force them to do something. i think the existing grade issue is crucial here. if that can be figured out. i agree the concrete retaining wall closest to the property and whatever it slopes back to towards miss moon's property is the crucial issue here. >> do you work with that? is it your department that works on the grade issue? >> we can. we probably could help them with that. obviously we'd need both parties to -- you know, because we don't want to be showing something that's not right.

if this had been done correctly, there's a possibility you could have done some of this work without a permit, but there was a lot of dirt moved so that needs to be shown on a grading permit and the existing grades shown on a section on the plan and the proposed grade. i'm not sure how they want to proceed, but we can work with them to figure out where the grade was. >> okay. >> mr. sanchez. >> i don't have much to add. the fact, speak for themselves. i think that the city is frustrated with this as well because we have a situation where notice of violation was issued, property owner was seemingly being responsible coming in for a permit, however /tharbgs only furthered and

created new violations so they did not take the process very seriously so we request the board deny this permit and have them go over the proper plan check and review and i am available for questions. >> i move to grant the appellants denial. >> well, the misrepresentations made that served as the basis of the permit in the first instance? >> did you make a motion? >> yes. >> commissioner, when the board denies a permit the applicant

cannot reapply for a year. i don't know if the board wishes to -- >> i believe madam director, that is cannot reapply with something very similar, the same solution i don't think it' eel be similar to the same solution. >> they can reapply if they correct conditions. >> we have a motion. mr. pacheco, when you're ready. >> to recap it's from commissioner hwang and it's to deny this permit with the finding that the permit issuance was based on misrepresentation.

>> commissioner fung. >> i. >> vice president hurtado. >> i. >> president lazarus. >> i. >> commissioner. >> i. >> with a vote of five to zero, this permit is denied revoked. honda. >> i. >> with a vote of five to zero, this permit is denied revoked. >> of a request for

suspension, requesting that building permit application for tenant improvement of existing vacant retail space for new medical office and pharmacy be suspended. we'll start with the appellant. >> my name is dale, i'm the bay area regional director for aids health care. with me is zachary, the architect we've hired to oversee our project. we appeal the decision to suspend its bitting permit after it was approved by the building department. it is a organization that specializes in provoiding cutting edge medicine and advocacy for people living with hiv. we have provided care for over 25 years throughout the country and recently we sought a permit to relocate one of our healthcare centers and two of

our pharmacies into a new space. we were issued a building permit on 01-13 of this year for the rela relocation of our space after we were notified by the planning department that they had issued the department in error and were requiring us to go through the conditional use permit. we're objecting on both ground for the following reasons. first hf made all dis/kwhroerb disclosures engaged contractors and began construction. the department is stopped from halting construction and required a cua when a previously authorized permit and halting construction would damage hf financially.