responsibility for complaint inspections within their district and they also conduct referral inspections so for fire clearance if the health department or another agency is requesting clearance in the district that is their role -- >> if you could speak into the mic so people can -- >> i'm sorry. high rise and getting back to the health and safety code we're mandated to inspect every high rise and we have a division and inspectors assigned to that section and 525 high rises in san francisco and we inspect them annually and then we have the port of san francisco. we have a captain of the port and inspector assigned to the port and that is more or less a one stop shop for the port. they do everything in relation to the port whether plan review, permits, inspections. they do it all for the port. likewise the sfia, the airport same thing. we have

a captain and a lieutenant inspectors down there and they handle all inspections, plan review, et cetera for the airport. schools have to be inspected annually. we have a inspector there. residential care facilities every two years and public education. we have sro's single room occupancies where the owner can request the fire department come down and give safety talks and which we do on a regular basis. our r1 and r2 programs the inspections are conducted by our engine companies. we have approximately 3800 r1 and r2 inspections annually. to date we have completed about 700 and their role is determine the level of fire life safety in the department of building inspection. if they see an. >> >> >> issue that needs attention

they call us directly and a that is a sprinkler or system that is down or alarm or exiting and not only do they put it into the report and into the system and flagged and routed directly to the district it's under they also call us and we would send an inspector out immediately on something like that. so our current initiative -- the question came up what are we doing to promote greater safety or fire prevention out there for the people of san francisco? we are currently working with supervisor kim's office to examine the possibility of retroactiving three -- retrofitting apartment buildings for sprinkler installation. it is that's currently being reviewed. it's worth voting with sprinklers statistics show over the last 10 years

residential facilities that had a sprinkler system for residential there hasn't been one reported fire death to a resident nor a firefighter, responding firefighter over 12 years and it's something to look into and we're actively doing that. in addition we're looking at ways to communicate better with the public and the people that we serve. we're trying to mimic what the building department does where you can go online look up your residence, where you live, and look up if there is any complaints or pending inspections et cetera and if you have concerns you can call. they can call us directly on that. in addition the fire department is working with the american red cross. they have reached out to us and we're happy to work with them identifying high risk areas and the goal there is to provide and

install smoke alarms to needy residents, and the new smoke alarms starting this july and with the california fire marshal need to have 10 year battery lives in them so that's a new provision that's out there, and it's worth noting that 2/3 of all fire deaths that cause -- that have occurred that where residents had smoke alarms 2/3 were due to they were disabled or they didn't have them either, 2/3, and the reason they're disabled is nuisance alarms or sometimes the battery fails so this is a step in the right direction and we're going to work with them on that. and other current initiatives we're working on, things to consider, just throwing them out there and

let you know we're kind of trying to think outside the box a little bit here. the building department has a self certification program for building owners so if you pull a permit -- i don't want to speak for the department, but if you pull a construction permit for a thousand dollar or greater you have to self certify that all of the units have smoke a alarms. we're looking to enacting a requirement where on an annual basis the owners of the apartments have to go through and certify every one of their units has a smoke alarm and the thing to take note they're different from smoke detectors. they're stand alone units. they can be strung together but they don't have a control unit like a fire alarm would be so they're inside the individual units themselves and the fire department's role when we do an inspection for this is the base areas and look in the lobby, the

garage and common use areas, the exiting et cetera. this stops at the entrance to the unit. unless it's a brand-new unit we don't get vision inside the unit. of course if there is a complaint we would and we would reach out. also we're thinking about possibly extending the sro program for education to the r2 units so building owner could reach out to us and we will come and provide talks, safety talks for any of the residents that are concerned for r 2.. currently we have that program for sros. and lastly i would like to talk about -- it's interesting because i know we had issues with fire escapes recently. the fire code and i know the building department

looks at them the fire code did not adopt the provision in chapter 11 for maintenance and existing buildings and good operation of fire escapes. i suggest that we look into that and add a provision that they're testing annually that the ladders are operated and dropped annually and have a way to certify them on an annual basis. >> thank you captain. i have a question just generally about fire prevention. >> yes. >> my understanding is there are three different agencies involved. you have the fire department, the department of building inspection, the health department. in terms of the inspections what's the difference between what you and the fire department does and what the other departments do? >> so for the building department the fire department has jurisdiction over r2 and r1 occupancies so that is meaning more than two units so if you have a single family dwelling

or two or fewer that's building department and not fire department. the fire department may look at it for sauce but it's not our jurisdiction. >> >> as soon as you hit three units or greater it false under fire department's jurisdiction and we look at base building for that. the individual units and inside the door and that's the building department inspections. the health department -- they don't enforce fire code. we're enforcing fire and building code. it's worth noting that the building code because there was talk that the building didn't have sprinklers or a fire alarm what have you. many of our buildings were built when these systems were not required so they're conforming at the time but not today, so that's why we're looking into retroactive. >> how many inspectors do you have in the fire department in terms of looking at these buildings that you're

responsible for? >> so i would say that we have -- again i'm going to give you an estimate. close to 40, 37 if i am not mistaken but they're all broken down in different districts and have different roles. we have high rise inspectors and that's a full time job and walk the entire building, every floor, et cetera, so again they have different roles. fire permits. that is a fire code -- they enforce the fire code for operation and maintenance so if you need to pull an annual permit for let's say hazardous materials storage, fuel storage, open flame, assembly you would go to permits and not the districts or submit a plan through mission street [inaudible] >> finally how often are these buildings inspected by the fire department? >> so again that depends. it

depends what the use is. if it's residential care every two years. if it's a school every year. if it's a high rise every year. and again it's triggered by inspection requests when you pull a permit, so it depends on the volume of the construction out there. otherwise if we get complaints, again referrals from other agencies so it's not se. there are certain use where it's set and we go out annually but otherwise it's as the request comes in. >> is there a place that you report all of the inspections you did? >> correct. we have a data base where the inspectors log the findings into that base where it's visible to any of the inspectors or to anyone within our department or if the public comes in we can share that information. >> thank you. chief i want to turn it back to you. >> thank you captain. and on that final point one thing we believe we can do a better job

on is access and transparency and modeling what dbi does and it's a technology piece and we worked with the department of technology and engaged them. if someone calls for the building history we can provide that but there is no way they can go online to do that. that pretty much concludes our presentation. i know a few things and you have been very good supervisor campos as your colleagues related to fire and life safety issues and coming up with different ideas and we know there's a delicate balance between the tenants and the owners but we believe there are solutions -- actually one of the aids for supervisor tang and i had a conversation -- somers and she's a tenant and she brought up a great idea in the leasing process when you're about to lease an apartment to be able to require the owner perhaps to provide what the exit plan is that when you're signing on that the extinguishers and

the smoke detectors and as the captain said we can't look at the individual units but in the lease process the owner and the tenant could have have a sign off related to that and i think collectively we can talk a little more about public education. we know now -- i was talking to one of the investigators the other day there are older buildings in the city. we have a huge stock of buildings that are wooden buildings and with our windy conditions and the topography of the city there is a fire problem existing in the city but a building done in the 30's or 40's and one electrical outlet in the living room and i'm a mom of three and each of the boys has computes and the need for electricity is greater than years ago so we need to make sure that with power strips and so forth we're mindful of that so there are reminders that i think we need to continue to

get out there as well as the importance of smoke detectors. i know you had questions. i believe we answered all of them. there was one we didn't address yet and had to do the fire at 24th and tweet and with the ambulance response time. did you want to do that? >> yes. >> i will ask our staff to answer that. >> chief if i may frame the question that came up to my office at least some media reports have indicated that it took as long as 13 minutes for the first ambulance to arrive at the scene of the 24th street and tweet fire, and i wanted to know whether or not that was true and we know in terms of response time 13 minutes how does that compare to what is a best practice? i am wondering chief

if you can discuss that. >> good afternoon supervisor. good afternoon everyone. yeah, it is correct it was 13 minutes to give a pers of that day, a snapshot of that day. we had 11 units in the system and transport and ambulances both public and private. at the time of the day on average we average five calls a day. at the time there were 14 active calls so when the fire came in right around 430, 52 seconds it was dispatched. they got it out quick and did a great job. the first engine got there within three minutes. they had to find the ambulances so they did find them in six minutes and once they did the first ambulance got there in six minutes from that point of dispatch. the next one in four minutes from that point of dispatch and six minutes and a fourth one then came the

first imagine on scene was critical. the dispatch getting the engine there was critical to the survival of some of the occupants. i know you went to the building supervisor. you saw it. the front window over the front door was the bedroom. the first engine on scene recognized there was heavy black smoke from the window. the fire was in the corner of the living room. it was pressurized smoke and coming out of the whole window. they saw a head popping in and out. normally the operations would lead a hose line to the fire. they knew they needed an immediate rescue and possibly others in the building so they took a ladder off and put it up to that window. i would like to commend the 13 year old boy who say hero and saved his brother to the first firefighter and got the second boy after that. rescue

squad two was on screen shortly after and rushed up the stairs without the benefit a hose line and found an occupant at the top of the stairs and brought her down. this happened before the ambulances got there. they went back up the stairs further into the hallway and found another occupant. they couldn't get out the front door because the fire and heat were puck be them out and went out the backstairs. the second question you asked once the ambulances arrived -- before they arrived there was intervention done to the occupants that needed before they got there in front of the building. >> my understanding chief is that it took about three minutes for the firefighters to respond which it's great, great response, but i think the concern that i have and that many people have raised is that it took 10 minutes after that initial response from the

firefighters for an ambulance to get there. >> absolutely. >> and what is the ideal response time of an ambulance for us in san francisco? >> so we are required by the state -- we're trying to strive for the goat and 90% percentile under 10 minutes. right now we get under 10 minutes 82% of the time. >> can we talk a little bit -- go ahead sorry. >> from point of dispatch to get the code three transport unit to the scene, so again that day there was a surge in the system. there were 14 active call it is. we had 11 units in the system, both public and private that were on calls, so dispatch did the right thing. from point of dispatch we were at level zero so what they did is send the units that they can to the fire and what the units did they did a fabulous job. they got the victims out of the building which increases the

likelihood of their survivability. >> so why 10 minutes? can you talk why the 10 minute requirement is there? >> that's a standard they have given us, the state. >> can you talk about what happens if the response is later than 10 minutes? what is the reason you're trying to -- >> if it's over 10 minutes is because the call volume is exceeding the supply of ambulances -- >> no, no, in terms of best practice in terms of saving a life why is the 10 minute mark important? >> well six minute mark is important in cpr to get oxygen to the brain so the first arriving units can do that and usually get there within six to seven minutes. in this case they got there in three. >> that's not my question. why is the 10 minute mark in terms of the state important? >> because we have an emergency operations agreement with the

state and that's what they're mandateing. >> chief -- >> i am trying to get there. >> maybe the chief -- >> i think the point is two fold. the sooner you can have a resource on the scene the better. to chief gonzalez's point it's important to have someone that has basic life support skills on scene as soon as possible. the 10 minute is a threshold designated for us by the ems agency that frankly right now is a challenge to reach from our perspective as well as the private providers. hopefully with new personnel coming on we will get back to that but with a growing population and with just trying to get around the city these days it makes it challenging. the importance again is to get on the scene. as described there were dramatic rescues made and one thing to note and i didn't realize until i saw it today there may have been this perception that the members were

holding out and waiting. there were work done in terms of medical intervention to these patients so much so while that was done when the ambulances got on scene the first three were on scene for 10 minutes and 18 and 111 so sometimes it's not. >> >> >> you get the initial thought and go to the help. that's not always the case. cardio pulmonary recustation was performed on three patients and takes time to rescue the patients and on scene working on the patient it takes time to prepare for transport so that you can safely get from point a to point b so it wasn't as if -- and the noted it today the ambulances got on screen and left within a few minutes want there was a delay that the ambulance was on scene to stabilize the patient prior to transport. >> just a another question chief. how many ambulances

came to the last fire? do you know the times? i know the one was 13 minutes and the other times were? >> we have that for you. i have it in a folder. i believe we have four ambulances total that responded and so again you're referencing 13 minutes from the time the dispatch went out. i believe it was probably they all arrived within two, three minute time frame. >> thank you. >> great. thank you very much again chief. thank you to your deputy and to the captains who presented. now i would like to ask director huey for their presentation and i want to begin by again thanking the director for the very open proactive way in which you responded and worked with my office. i also read by the way that more recently your department started working with the city attorney

to expedite a couple of cases of landlords that are non compliant and we work with dbi very closely, and know that they're so many good people on staff trying to do the best job they can, so with they will turn it over to you director and thank you again. >> good afternoon chairman, supervisor mar and supervisor campos and supervisor christensen. my name is tom [inaudible] department of building inspection. it's my honor to give our presentation today. first of all san francisco is a dense populated city. there's lots of fire probably you didn't hear. as the fire chief mentioned there

are lot of fires going on and last month especially some major fires occurs. for our department later on i will have my deputy director from inspection to explain how we're going to respond each fire in the city. we have 24 hours inspection -- inspector to respond to any fire, major fire called by the fire department, and also i will have my housing inspection chief rosemary to make a presentation how our housing inspection perform. the inspection, especially regarding routine inspection. before i turn over all this i want to tell you i echo with the chief.

education is number one priority the way i see. how are we going to educate the owner and the tenant? especially regarding the fire safety equipment like the fire escape, smoke detector, carbon monoxide detector and the fire alarm system. they're important for the tenant. also they realize in the room they need to have a smoke detector to get the early warning when there is a fire going on. for our inspection service -- inspector get the routine inspection usually is in a common area. that's why if the tenant have problem they should complain to our department and we have bilingual service, spanish, chinese, any language we can help and assist them. another

issue i have is since i took over as a director like i mentioned to each of the supervisors. number one priority how to preserve the existing housing stock. build a new building but we need to take care of the existing housing stock because they are old. most of them average more than 50 years old. that's why we need to take care of that part too. electrical and all those need to redo and work with the owner and streamline the process. one item is after the fire we always a how to put back the people go back to the normal life, the tenant moving, the business can open maybe. [inaudible] west portal. right

away have what we call in policy and procedure to expedite those permits. we need to work with the owner. unfortunately certain thing the owner need to work with the insurance company. that part the city cannot do anything, but as long as they resolve it we're going to jump in and help them check and inspection. it's what we call priority permit processing. then also for our response for any fire we try to help the tenant [inaudible] get into the place [inaudible] 20 sec -- 22nd and mission fire. >> >> we're trying to do more and

hopefully work with all of the supervisor in the districts to outreach to the public and also life safety is number one. we want to count down less and less this thing happening, but we will try to do more routine, and also as you see from the newspaper we speed up the process for the litigation and the city attorney. that's why instead of going into a long process and director hearing we find a substantial life issue go see the attorney and back to the owner -- especially the owners -- life safety fire escape for people to get out of it -- you know, we cannot allow it. that's why you see those --

streamline the process to speed up those. we hope we work together with the owner and tenant. make sure the tenant complain to our department. then of course we can respond right away and send an inspector out. now i will turn over to my deputy from the inspection to make his presentation and follow will be rose mary and then we can answer any questions from the committee. >> thank you director and i know that we may end losing a quorum so i know we're going to have a follow up hearing so if i could ask you to expedite the presentation but thank you. >> supervisor campos i wanted to acknowledge we have building inspectionor warren mar with us. thank you for being here with us commissioner mar. >> thank you director. good afternoon supervisor. i am deputy director of inspection

services. i oversee inspection services divisions that include building plumbing and electrical and housing. we conducted over a total of 120,000 inspections and more than 200,000 commercial and residential knowledges in san francisco. in addition to the fire and police department personnel dbi and other life safety departments on emergency scene shortly after the event. we inspect fire damage buildings for structural integrity and protect firefighters after an event and post the building no lodger inhabitantity to ensure public safety until repairs are made. often a red tag is posted. our process for responding includes [inaudible] being inform informed of the incident and we have a 24 hour on call inspection services. inspects the damage property

for integrity and inhabitantity and red tags make sure that pg&e turns off the utilities and notice of vlzs tacked on the building and in mail and the owner has 30 days to file the permit and usually 90 to 120 days to complete the work. [inaudible] engineering report if there are questions about structural safety. the owner is required to provide one as well. we usually try to work with the owner on a need to comply with the issue notice of violation. we understand the need to work with the property owner to remove obstacles to fast track the permits and inspections make sure that damaged properties get back on market and residents are back in their homes as quickly as possible. we realize that the owner insurance negotiations often take some time. in the case of t