next fiscal year we'll have hearing at preservation commission in january to start the process and the budget is due to the mayor in by the end of february secondly in the dortsz the written director's report the pipeline the residential pipeline you'll notice the numbers in the pipeline are continuing to increase from the previous quarters i'll point out that the departments new application are continuing at a nearly record pays for smaller projects there is a substantial increase in the smaller projects coming down and my thought die to the low interest rates as the desire to roommate building rather than move because of the cost of real estate in san francisco thirdly, want to point out i

believe you received an e-mail from our communicated director with the annual report is out in on our website we'll be giving us hard copies in the next couple of weeks there is a new available on the departments website the annual the fiscal year 2013-2014 annual report on the departments website with that i'll close by wishing you a happy holidays and see you next year. >> commissioners that places us 80 on item 6 past event with the planning, zoning and economic development. >> good afternoon repairing no planning things but clean up items one the first one is the

moratorium dispensation afro-for the pdr this passed it is second read and 639 asian pacific islander at that avenue continued until january 7th for us introductions the first one introduced by supervisor tang which is an planning that the businesses retain a permit this will be coming for our review and comments the second one a noise regulations relating to residents on places of tenant sports audio supervisor breed and supervisor wiener that amends the administrative planning and police to require a continuation for new field testing under circumstances amongst this requires that the

planning department and planning commission consider the noise issues when considering new projects that it will be coming to you also introduced were the general projects for the unifying you've reviewed and the article two was adapt are introduced at the board and heard at the land use committee on january 26th that concludes my report. >> he read it was appealed to the board do you know when that is heard. >> it was appealed january coming up. >> coming up. >> and it might be continued i think there was a request to have it continued yeah. >> thank you. >> commissioners the historic preservation commission did meet yesterday it was a record short

meeting that laughed a record 15 minutes most of the items were continued with exception to one the recommendation to the board of supervisors to landmark the goldberg building and i don't believe we have a board of appeals report so commissioners, if there's nothing further we'll move 101 on to item 7 discussion for the environmental review reports. >> good afternoon, commissioners sarah jones environmental review officer, i'm here today and happy to live thank you for the opportunity and explain one aspect of our sequa work at the planning department for people that don't do sequa everyday it seemed sausage is making inside a black box i'm giving you ingredients there's been lack of clarity about the issue of common

periods on draft eirs there's uncertainty about the who is responsible for granting that extension and the circumstances under which it would be extended i don't feel there's a need for a lack of clarity and happy to have had the opportunity from the here level of confusion around the 5 m issue to mitigate this situation i'll talk about my considerations and this questions come up and also talk about how the planning commission might act on this issue so the standard review period and i prepared a memo on this issue that's excluded in our

packet hopefully, you've had a chance to review that i'll go over it the standard review period on a draft eir established in sequa is 45 days the eros roll in general and implementing what sequa says and what's in the sequa guidelines so as i think through the length of the period i'm thinking about the appropriate comment period based on circumstances with a particular a eir that makes the period inadequate to fulfill the purposes of the comment period those circumstances are due to the timing of the eir and the complexity and maybe the opportunity for public review that have already occurred in the environmental review process

on the project in my view if the comment periods need to be longer 45 days we can establish that at the time before publication of the eir i think this is a much better practice and there are circumstances that are known at the time of the draft eir politician take into account i've spelled out in my memo some of the reasons a longer than 45 day comment period one involved multiple sites in multiple locations throughout the city one a situation in which we not prepared an issue study when we prepare an eir we identify the topics for not a significant impact that is circulated at the time of the notice of preparation of the eir the public has a chance to you

review and comment and that goes into the eir further if the issue study is not prepared so that the draft eir is the first chance the public has for substantive comment options is impacts of 0 project so i think in that circumstance it may be that a longer comment period is warranted another situations a major holiday we've gone through the calculation you can't have a 45 day period that doesn't include a holiday and if you throw in the times people are busy you're in a situation you'll be expending that but times of the year right now the multiple major holidays and if a comment period is spanning that

it needs to be longer sometimes assess considerations due to language or online issues depending on the location and sometimes, we need to reline particularly meet that so those are the circumstances i'm asking to consider a longer comment period is sometimes something unknown a politician arises and because of that i might extend a comment period after the publication of the draft eir usually that's a noticing error there are a lot of nos o notices we've inadvertently missed that we extend the comment period for 45 days sequa is 60 days the need to be reasons it has to be longer than 60 days without such

reasons would constitute usual u unusual circumstances i consider 60 days a good period that's the perimeter i'm considering in those extensions i also want to talk about the planning commissions consideration obviously you are not operating under exactly the same set of responsibilities as a ero, however, i recommend you strike with clarity in our decision again you have a question about a review period and act as a body by taking a vote chapter 31 the extension of review period is granted to the commission therefore acting as a body is an appropriate way to go sequa also says that 60 days should be the outside limit

unless circumstances if you're going to consider a comment period longer than 60 days r days you need a presence of what is unusual circumstances those are my recommendations to you i'm happy to answer any questions you may have. or discussion on the matter. >> okay opening it up for public comment first any public comment on this item? item 7 ? >> sue hester who's been doing eirs in san francisco since i started one of the things that really is unclear to me and other members

of the public who is in charge of the public this is not explained clearly and one of the unusual circumstances for example, on 5 m you had a presentation that started with the planning department but quickly transitioned to ken rich and the developer we have other projects that are being handled by missouri he had and other parts of the city you've got to tell people where to find files abused a person like me that reads an eir not only reads the eir but looks at for the file to know the project there was a lot of a.m. gut about the 5 m recorded that has multiple approvals in multiple places it wasn't an area plan and the first preservation we've

had was before the eir i have been looking in the eir for who i contact who's in charge of the project that should be explicit in the eir partly because go planning is good about providing records we see get records fast in the planning department thank you sensitivity people and the bureaucracy dealing with requests missouri ed is not i have a request in for files because it is observe they're involved i'll get the answers after the first of the year because they have bureaucracies beyond belief to get files it needs to be understood the project description a often been the approval files that are not the ero files

second thing is information items have to be considered on complicated cases like on c pfc and the neighborhood plan on the multiple area plans there should be information hearing not before the hearing on the eir because that's dirty pool but structured to people said what the project is that is coming especially on a complicated area plan or i give you the academy of arts you're about to have the academy of arts eir which is 60 sites and 12 areas that are geography areas and the world's most complicated eir in my opinion the academy of arts you need to do some ground rules.

>> is there any additional public comment? okay seeing none, public comment is closed commissioner antonini >> i'd like to thank sarah john's for on excellent presentation and tend to agree especially i don't know you've mentioned an initial study and presentation with a notice of preparation and i think if we have a situation as we will later today, we're to hear about a project long before the draft eir comes down i think the public should know what it contains as sue hester said i see the reason to expend the comment period if we have the information ahead of time unless there's errors or new information possibly multiple sites for the 4 reasons the

fourth a lot of holidays but as you pointed out the eir comment period for both hunters point shipyard and park merry kidney were shorter periods of examine but it's important if there's any of the above we allow a few more days if there's a problem that on the environmental does it could have catastrophic consequences if an appeal is supported in the future basically can end a lot of projects so adding a few days is not the worst thing in the world i totally agree with the perimeters you've set and the more we can learn about projects ahead of time we tend to shape the scope of the project particularly larger projects

than the environmental piece didn't come as a surprise because people can fourth about traffic and other impacts of those projects we have. >> director ram. >> i wanted to reinforce one recommendation part of the lack of clarity on that issue, the commission when the commission has requested a request it is a table we have discussed which she is recommended we're recommending a table vote which like a continuance vote and have to that on the calendar so a vote to extend the comment period it's within our authority to do that so our recommendation just to again reinforce the clarity i take a vote when you choose to extend the period.

>> commissioner richards. >> ms. jones this is a great memo he appreciate how it works especially the 5 m we have a process it could be complicated because of the extension criteria on and on on the grounds i don't in the make every hour 60 days and forget about the process. >> i guess we can i think that - you know this is sort of a question that i thought about a little bit as i was preparing this sequa indicates that 45 days is considered an adequate amount of times under normal

circumstances so i not think scliend without cause to go longer than that i think you know making sure that we've provided that consideration about times with the time period sufficient is an important step but you know we stick closely to the sequa guidelines and will stay with them and i'm coming from in light felt project planner takes several months we can subsequential 15 days in the light of a project didn't seem long tell you. >> in the predictability is a big thing for project sponsors so i'm not suggesting the reason not to do it because project sponsors won't like it is more our compliance with sequa. >> thank you. i do want to ask

that the memo be hyper linked to today is agenda this morning it wasn't there. >> i tried to do that weigh make sure of that and i'll post it for general reference on our website. >> okay. thank you. >> sxhovks. >> thank you thank you, ms. jones i definitely agree with the departments recommendation we take an objection o action for the motion on extension of examine period and i wanted to say a couple of other things but in the comment period i definitely agree we should be following sequa guidelines 45 days minimum that shouldn't be within the pressure view of the staff to say now it is 60 i think the commission has to take action to extend it but beyond extending it i made a recommendation that the excision

should make finding if they want to make that the case can you give example of findings i personally synthesis we have a lot of eirs published during the difficult times of the years and not only winter but summer months i'm struggling to get a real good set of criteria for finding to extend beyond 60 days if you get could give us examples. >> the only thing i can tell you sequa says there's unusual circumstances in terms of but this is is not defined within the status or the guidelines this is you know something to look at the city attorney for guidelines i don't

know if ms. burns wants to add anything at this point. >> deputy city attorney marilyn burn it is not a bright line test it is very fact specific because it is unusual circumstances about the project or something to do with the circumstances surrounding the project that would be what the commission will look at if the commission step up to the plate it beyond 60 days our office recommends it includes the unusual circumstances that are presenting itself to the commission that makes sense. >> okay. thank you. >> thank you commissioner moore. >> i'm glad that i wrote the memo and were standing her pretty much standing up for our practice the question i want to ask you in our using the word

subject to the quality you're not lvns to the circumstances surrounding c p 1930 c is one example that requires an extension it is circumstances but a complicated project and was mentioned by you on the other hand, for example in the particular case of 5 m it involves multiple sites it involves more than 5 or more special use districts which all needs to be considered it involves a larger area plan still to be determined so i think even that what sequa says is generalized for the state of california where primarily you have community and circumstances multiplied as context as the city of san francisco and since i think the city practices are rigorous the department is vote to it sequa practice i assume

you'll broadened the definition of what you consider means the sites like 5 m would automatically fallen into the definition and again, i hope that we find more common grounds i'd like to say that large parts of san francisco, california is there a clear areas where the entire story has been recorded and reviewed previously with a lot of public input it's easier to do the eir and practice the practices that you are successful with but when things are a unclear in the details and i think the 60 day period is more appropriate i'd appreciate if you'd ghetto it a lot of thought and come forward and

possess the question whether 60 or 45 or courage the department to bring it forward we'll have the same thing with western - with central selma. >> deputy city attorney marilyn burn if i could jump in i want to note ms. jones notes it is the prerogative of the commission to extend the comment period as with 5 m it gets the commission in their judgment the comment period should be extended the commission takes a vote simply because the ero went through her analysis not to exceed didn't mean the

commission can't do so. >> thank you commissioner richards and i think hester mentioned something about the mayor's office with the mo d would you that that is extraordinary circumstances with multiple files and places hard to get to them. >> that's really a case by case question you know the draft eir is intended to contain the information this is the review period of the draft eir specifically. >> i think the access to file you know an important issue in its own right may or may not have any bearing on whether the review period for the draft eir is sufficient

okay. thank you. >> commissioners that place you under general public comment not to exceed 15 minutes all matters listed hereunder constitute a consent calendar, are considered there will be no separate discussion of these items which event the matter shall consent calendar and considered as a separate item at this or a future hearing. i have no speaker cards but i see one in the box. >> any general public comment. >> sue hester back again i sent an e-mail to all of the commissions two weeks ago telling you i thought i needed to have on our calendar revision

of the rules because the staff has changed practice when documents are due to come to the commission without bending the rules that's one of the things you have to have before you i asked you all to look at our own rules and the amendment process because a lot of people don't understand how the commissions rules are amended it's different than announced today are your amending them next week, and, secondly, some things i think are needed i found the practice for the two weeks recorded to be lacking because the planning commission has a miss understanding why the tweaks are important it it allows the public to submit comments on the staff report it's innovate a convenient for

the commission it is a convenient for the public and when i have a large project that you get the staff report after the deadline for submitting comments have you no idea what's in the staff report and the final project it because it comes out on friday afternoon when the agenda comes out and the deadline is for submitting comments is the monday before how do you submit the comments you have to be a mind reader so accrual rulings rule that's gone backwards every single authorization for all offices should be tweaked every project that is massive not this tiny projects the planning commission

has begun backwards on that with the advent of two or three hundred reports occasionally you need an index as exercise are forcing the staff numbers and put package numbers i occasionally only read three or four different motions or whatever have to print out the 3 hundred packages to photo where they are some discipline from the staff needs to be that they have an index and you can't issue hundreds of packages of documents on one link without an index i'll pleading with you to amend the rules of law for those 3 issues reconcile the fact of the index and into the reporting. >> thank you. is th