permit issued to the gray area gallery for an event that had been previously scheduled and they had limited their hours for for that event to midnight -- we did that in the permit so in any case we've had a little experience now and the applicant is here again to -- i think that she sent me today some more information about outreach to neighbors and so if if you can find this, front and back, take a look at that. i'm going to ask josette to come up. it's toward the back of your packet. okay. i don't know where it is. looks like this. >> yeah. >> thanks for having me back again and i'm happy to be here. it took us a little while to do all

the outreach necessary to reach all of our neighbors. we've logged all of the communication based on some consultation with joslyn as well as mr. pauley. we were in the tenderloin for almost 10 years and we never experienced this before and this is our first time and we got a lot of feedback on how do on how to do this and how to reach out and we kept a log on every single time we talked to a neighbor or sent out a letter or had a facebook exchange and i have our acoustic consultant here and he came out several times to our building and did a site survey and we've been working with him as well as barry synoground and so

last time i was here i wasn't able to respond to many questions about the sound system but we have people here today that can respond to our sound system and we've implemented many of the recommendations that were made and i'll go through these here and you can speak up if you want. prior to -- can i use this? all right. cool. so prior to april 7th we were operating our sound system in this sort of wall of sound just because it was easier for us to operate and connect so we have based on shane's recommendation we have reconfigured it and so i have a site survey from shane who can probably talk in more depth about it. i'll go

through the changes and allow shane to speak and we covered up some some of some of the ducting that existed and there used to be a whole right here and we covered that up on one side as well as completely covered up the duct on another side and this was actually shooting sound directly to our neighbors prior to april 7th and and it was an open 4-foot by 2-foot opening that was kind of crazy crazy we also installed locking exiting door hardware and prior to to april 7th our doors did not have proper emergency exit hardware and the fire marshall was making us leave our doors open during the events and really impactful to our neighbors obviously and this made a huge

difference. we also installed sound curtains that are going in the center of the building. i don't know if if you can really see that. there's a there's a big, large screen curtain that's surrounding the theatre area and cutting down the middle. these are really dark but there's a sound curtain here. moving forward, we're also going to be installing an additional vestibule that will be sort of a second entry and a sound mitigation tool on top of the locking doors and another thing we're doing is on the roof there is an old duct here and we're covering that up. last night we did a sound

test with our neighbors so we actually went into 2 units we went into 2677 mission who actually did e-mail message us on facebook during our saturday performance at at 1130 and said she could hear our sound system so we reduced the level immediately right when she got in touch with this on facebook and immediately gave her my phone number and scheduled a sound test. i'm actually excited to say it's something that manageable i thought it was a a lot worse and when we communicated we adjusted the levels and barry can speak to that more than i can but we were on the phone and talking and limiting the system to something that she agreed was okay. so i don't know if you guys want to say anything on p on top of what i'm saying. can

i can i invite shane? >> i'm cheyne mer merbeck it's kind of a general draft the easy things to do they have already done close up the holes and change the sound system turn it down a little bit the next step would be a more extensive survey to do the true test of ambient noise at night in the neighborhood in general and issue more details on how to close off the smoke exhaust vents and the doors so -- i'll be happy to take any questions. >> so when you covered up the holes did you simply cover them up with plywood? >> no we used denim. >> the mic. there's only

one mic working. >> we also used about 2 feet of denim stuffed into all the ducts. >> and you noticed that reduced the sound? >> so when you originally are in that old ducting area you could basically hear it like you are inside and when we put that in it basically muffled that entire sound there. >> and that staircase that you are building over that door, are you going to put something -- is there a way to get to that door from under the staircase? i don't understand. >> yeah so the envelope of the theatre is between 12 and 18 inches of concrete. there's a wood floor with about a 5-foot crawl space underneath so the idea is that you would have to penetrate that floor and close off everything to

the slab on grade and to the concrete walls so you know you would basically be creating a vestibule and not have to put sound lock doors on the outside. >> so creating a sound trap? >> yeah. >> okay thank you. >> so based on all the feedback from the neighbors and the fact that the last 2 we that the last 2 weekends that we had an event they warmed up to us we listened to them and we want to do that and they have slowly warmed up to us and to understand that we're not trying to be a bad actor i wanted to propose two options for a permit as as as we build trust because i think it's really about building trust with our neighbors. so one option i was going to propose is that on week nights we close at midnights and saturdays and fridays and holidays to 2:00

a.m. and a second option close the music programming regularly at 12:00 a.m. and one to two-times a month be able to operate to to 2 and one of our neighbors is here to speak. i think they want us to operate it's just a matter of limiting the hours. so yeah i just want to find a middle ground with the commission so that we can run our programming and -- >> great. commissioners. do you have questions? >> a simple one. >> sure. >> just for safety reasons you have plugged up all these vents? how are you getting your air? >> we only covered up the side that's bothering the neighbors so we only have one side of the building that's affecting our neighbors and there's the south and north side so we covered up the south side and not the north side so there's still

ducting coming in from the north side. >> i will say there's there's a series of recommendations in the report. >> our sound inspector earlier said that you had some events a couple of weekends ago can you tell us how that worked out and there was one complaint at 11:30 p.m. or something but besides that did it work out? how did it go? >> so i called martin who i think one of our neighbors who is here and he mentioned that fridays seemed reasonable to him and also saturday he was sort of with guests and it didn't really bother him they were just really appreciative that we closed at midnight so even though we can hear it they they are closing up at night. so i talked to danielle

gilbert she just said it reduced the level and it also she was appreciative that we were closing at midnight and beyond that everyone thanked us for reaching out. we haven't gotten anything -- the tone has shifted with with our neighbors. >> that's wonderful. we like always hearing that when you come to us and they get to us about noise to know that that you can turn it around and i'm glad you are experiencing that. commissioners you have questions? >> i just want to acknowledge i think you did an awesome job with your neighbors in a meaningful way and you responded in real time to a facebook post-its not easy -- a lot of other organizations are not looking at their live feed and i think it's great that you heard that and acted on it. >> . >> they haven't always been nice but

we're responding to them. >> and they have your cell number too? >> yes a hundred percent. we were shocked when that petition came we didn't know that it was even an issue. we're an organization that wants to be public and reaching out to our community so we want to shift this conversation for sure and i'm happy to give my cell phone to to to any neighbor. >> you are required to if you get this permit actually. . have you seen the police commissions? >> it was about security. >> yeah. i'm not reading it all but also security should not let intoxication people pass the line and a calendar will be e-mailed to them. >> uh-huh. >> okay. great. >> so open to every neighbor

that we have we did send a letter of all of our programming i think you have a copy of it up to july so they were aware and they were able to say that they wanted our place to close at midnight and we've allowed that to happen and to be required to send that to our neighbors in the future every month and we don't mind we want to make sure we're working with them and be be -- we haven't booked anything until july 2nd because we don't know where we are with the permit. >> okay well we'll figure it out tonight. are there any police comments or questions just so we have on paper here? is there any public comment on gray area? come on up and speak into the microphone and let us know who you are.

>> hi. i live behind the gray area theatre. that's nice what she said it's mostly true. i have a thing from samantha from my show she wrote this is ridiculous it shakes my apartment it's been a rave for the last two nights and super annoying. >> what date was that? >> may 23rd, the night of the show. this was the sound test last night. i said i wrote her, i'm going to the permit hearing today let me know how it went. let's see, she said, well, there were two subs were blown during initial testing and two others were here it was still loud.

i wrote that i saw josette after she had been there. she came by to test at my house but i was going out i directed her to the other neighbors. i think she just said that to all of you. josette said she thought it wasn't that loud. she said two subs were blown during the tests i can't believe she said that. . sedrick came by tested again everything was working and was surprised at how loud it was not just the base but the highs were totally audible. looks like josette was -- i'll leave that out. she really acted like she cared. oliver lives two doors down

from me and he called the police at 3:00 a.m. on the 23 rd because of the after party they were having and he tried calling them but there was no response he went around the corner and banged on their door they didn't let them in i'm surprised he didn't mention that to you when you were there. okay as far as the test i think after experiencing the base in in my backyard no one could argue that the system is important if not the root of the sound problem the low base frequencies can be felt with almost un un noticeable difference this was most clearly demonstrated at 3:00 a.m. after the system was in use until midnight and i'm sure those involved felt the system was adequately lowered not to

upset neighbors but the fact that the building's level of sound proofing -- the real problem and here we're discussing about buildings moving in where there are already existing venues and you are trying to protect them but you should protect neighbors when new venues move into their neighborhood. this building is inadequate for what they want to use it for. they have a a cement wall and what they really need is a wall inside of the wall in order to stop the base nothing is going to stop the base from penetrating sound curtains are useless. putting denim over their over the top of the ventilation system is going to be

useless and their base -- you can feel it in your body it may not sound really loud but it's irritating and the longer it goes on the more irritating it is so the neighbors and i think there's a list of 30 neighbors who have signed asking for a maximum of midnight and most of them are asking for 10 o'clock during the week especially and so what we're asking is for you to give them a permit until ten during the week and midnight on the on the weekends until they can establish that they are not going to disturb the neighbors i was here 4 weeks ago you were discussing the club malibu and ongoing problems for over 2 years we don't want to be coming in here every -- i would urge you to restrict this permanent until

permanent restrict this permit until they renovate this building adequately or give up the idea of having these loud parties in their establishment until 2 o'clock and beyond. >> i think your time is up. thank you. >> additional public comment? >> i have a question. >> hello commissioners. hi, i'm scott . i'm familiar with gray area foundations and in my work i've worked with responsible operators and irresponsible operators they are definitely responsive and they are reactivating an old movie

theatre here's a real viable action of reactivating the grand theatre and they have put a tremendous amount of effort into it. their intent is to create an arts organization and they have a ten-year history of doing that they are responsible operators and i've had extensive interactions with them. they are really one of the most inspirational new facilities that's come out i hope they can work with the neighbors and get the hours that they need to serve the community that's out there. thank you for your time. >> great. thank you. any additional public comment? did you have something? why don't you come on up. >> hi. i'm the production

manager at gray area and i wanted to speak to a few things that marty was talking about. one, i'm really kind of shocked by the response about samantha because we were sound testing with her and i mean she is annoyed she had a feeling of annoyance but the sound level we talked with her and she said basically this is fine like this is -- it was barely audible in her space and we came back and i had realized that barry had actually pushed the system so hard we had blown the system because we wanted to hear how hard we could push it and i immediately said that wasn't a proper test i feel bad and i went directly back and spoke with her again and said i'm sorry we didn't do a proper test, can we try it again? so we tried and we found that the level of 70 percent was

fine. i spoke with her and she also said that's fine and i'm like we can continue to work with you. we want to have it always in compliance and i realize we can't test every single kind of sound but we pushed it as hard was we could and seemed like we came to a place that was fine with her and i'm taken a back that she called marty and said we hadn't done that. >> you have 30 seconds. >> and to speak with the other neighbor he seemed like he was also very interested in having us there and we talked about a couple of other things we could do in the back ducting and i think that being closed will completely eliminate that -- yeah . >> thank you. any other public comment? all right.

>> hello. i work with gray area. they do a lot of independent sound and media work i just wanted to mention two things and one is the nature of this particular sound system which we're installing which is designed specifically for surround sound content dispersion and not necessarily volume level. we're planning on having most of the time not so much the previous configuration you saw there was the two stereo channels setup for power and we've modified that. the other comment i'd like to make and i can answer any specific questions about the nature of our sound setup there was the purpose of the sound test that we were running with the neighbors was specifically to push the system to a level where we could gauge what is maximum

dispersion and arrange the architecture around the space and in terms of content and the programming we're normally going to have in the space i would say it is a unique scenario and doesn't necessarily represent the sort of content and shows that we'll normally be doing there. that's all. thank you commissioners. >> tell me what kind of base speakers do you have there? >> the base speakers -- it's a french company as i alluded to it's designed and there are i believe those cabinets are 15-inch base cabinets but -- >> how many? >> there are 8 of them. >> where are they in the

room? >> they are disperses around in an 8-channel configuration. >> you run them the full spectrum of every mhz from zero to whatever? >> i would say they start rolling off at 30 or something like that but the purpose of having 8 channels of base for full range sound dispersion and for spatial sound and not for reenforcement. >> and each has one 115-inch speaker in it? >> that is correct. >> okay thank you. >> so when you ran these tests, it's already setup as a surround sound configuration right now? >> that is correct. >> and you are still having issues. >> i would say the system has a capability of putting out the kind of power that's not normally going to be used for -- is not

representational of the content that we're programming. >> okay. thanks. >> yeah. >> what would happen to your base array if you cut out every frequency under fifty me mhz? >> it would be functional i would look at other arc arc arc architect ural ways and it has a false wooden floor in the theatre and i would say we're going to look at some ways to insulate a base speaker cabinets because i think it's acting as a regulator.

special foam. >> so why don't you do another sound test and try cutting out all the frequency below fifty me fifty mhz and see what happens. >> like i said we were pushing it and adjusting the level to the point and talking to the neighbors in real time during that process so any commentary or adjustments where they would like to be involved in that you know we'll be doing that again and we did it last time so they are perfectly -- they have the opportunity to work with us to make adjustments on that. >> okay. thank you. >> thanks. >> thank you. any final public comment? all right. seeing none public comment is closed. commissioners? commissioner frost, do you have a comment you would like to make? >> just a couple of things. it seems like they are here trying to get the

permit before implementing all of those sound measures. it just seems that it's a little early for me especially with the complaints we're getting from the neighbors and if we've been notified that they have done something by stuffing denim into an air duct i have no clue we have it being -- are they clothing closing off ducts? >> they sealed a duct then they covered a 4 by 2 hole or something. >> can you come up and actually clarify first? >> the two side areas . we don't have heat in the building

anymore. the furnace is no longer there and it's not needed and it was just pushing sound out. >> thank you. >> joslyn, were you going to to say something? >> we always issue permits condition ly and one of those conditions that all of those safety issues that you are talking about are approved by the agencies and with respective to sound as well we typically don't wait until you know our sound inspectors pass them to move them through commission so we do this a lot. >> many of our permits that we approve are on the condition that a sound test is done after we approve it in terms of the timing i think it's fine. >> so they wouldn't be doing anything until they built

that double door entryway? >> i >> i don't know about that but i'll tell you we wouldn't issue a permit until they were able to pass the sound test which is how we typically do this by our sound inspectors. >> it seems to me they have tried very hard i agree with dori caminong that they tried very hard. i am inclined to issue them a conditional permit by putting some conditions on their sound especially on the base so having said that, i would like to move to approve with the the base frequencies taken out below fifty me fifty mhz and the base speakers be