working on a big project out there to remodel the facility to move into a giant training headquarters for my old union, so i find it rather interesting. that property, i guess, is not going to be demolished. it was talked about putting housing in there and a bunch of other things, but i guess they're -- obviously, if they're looking at a training center, they're going to utilize this space for different things. so anything of interest on that that you might want to bring forward, it sounds like the most intriguing spot right now, just from hearing about what other people are looking at out there and doing so. might be a most attractive. who knows. that was all -- mainly talking out loud, so doesn't have to be next meeting or -- whenever you have information, or if it just

falls through, whatever. >> okay. all right. madam secretary, thank you very much. terms of the closed session deliberations, we approved the settlement, so is there anything else we need to talk about? >> no, there is deliberations for us. >> oh. >> matter that was heard on monday. >> oh, okay. all right. >> so so we have to deliberate when now? on this? >> no, for the next meeting. >> oh, put this on the next agenda. >> yeah. >> okay. all right. add that to the agenda. any other additional items? okay. thank you very much. and next item? >> clerk: the next item is

item 12, adjournment. >> so moved. >> second. >> i'd like to adjourn this meeting in honor of our vice president whose birthday it is today. [ applause ] >> the meeting is adjourned. thank you.

>> good morning. today is wednesday, january 17, 2018. regular meeting of the building inspection commission. i would like to remind everyone to turn off all electronic devices. first item is roll call. president mccarthy. [roll call taken] we have a quorum, and the next item is president's announcements. >> good morning. and welcome, everybody, to the first meeting for 2018. and look forward to another busy year here at the city and county of san francisco. a big thank you to chief and

building inspector patrick o'reardon, i believe he's here today, and the chief inspector, acknowledging highly professional and courteous service when helping with the home alteration project. thanks out to the jack pardi of the records management division, received a letter from a customer who appreciated his knowledge and great listening skills helping research records requests. and thanks to evelyn carr of initial plan review, received a thank you letter from a customer who appreciated how well she explained the permit process while effectively getting the customer out on a timely manner. thank you for that. the department will host a free brown bag workshop on january 24, 1 week from today, on the new assembly business entrance program, we know as a.b.e. this will be held in room 201,

2001, sorry, 1600 mission street, second floor, from noon to 1:00 p.m. please go and you can log on www.sfdbi.org to reserve, limited space is rapidly filling up it's a popular program. a.b.a. affects 12,000 buildings throughout the city and to gain greater access by goods and services to local businesses, and better comply with state and federal accessibility laws. to increase public awareness about the new a.b.a. program, a briefing to the chamber of commerce committee, and briefing the san francisco association membership and the business owners and managers, boma, and offering to supervisors, town halls in coming weeks. in addition, merchant district

walks, supervisors are also planned. and paid advertising campaign is underway to ensure property owners and affected small business know about the a.b.a. law, and that directly approaching may 23, 2018 deadline to submit the required compliance checklist for the exemption affidavits. that's may 23, 2018, which is a big date. although still in planning stages, d.b.i. will again host all annual earthquake safety at the bill graham civic auditorium, most likely in june, 2018, details will be forth coming, along with the save the date reminder from d.b.i. staff. and reminder to all deputies, managers, supervisors, keep an eye out for outstanding employee

and select them, so employee quarter 12018 announcement winner at the april big meeting. thank you, madam secretary, that concludes my announcements. >> thank you. is there any public comment on item two, the president's announcements? item three, general public comment. public comment on matters in the commission's jurisdiction not part of this agenda. >> good morning. my name is mary anne bockers, my husband and i have resided in our home since 1989. i'm here today to bring the actions of a developer named ashall kural. he bought the home next to us, a steep hill and the houses abutt

each other. the house the developer purchased was in bad shape. we on our neighbors tempted to work cooperatively with the developer. this did not work. we had to hire a lawyer and structural engineer. the developer signed a contract which legally obligated him to protect our homes among other obligations. within weeks of signing this contract, he violated the most important contractural provisions. this included severely undermining the foundation of the uphill neighbor's house. we sued from gudral, he signed a settlement agreement, to immediately repair the neighbor's foundation. instead of doing that, erected a 400 square foot unpermitted third floor of which you have a picture on top of this house. as far as we know, no load bearing studies or architectural drawings exist with respect to this part of the project. d.b.i. and the planning department told the developer to remove the third floor in february last year.

still stands. multiple abatement orders against it. my neighbor's foundation is unrepaired and house is in danger of collapse if an earthquake repairs. cost to be in excess of $200,000. we have been forced to spend tens of thousands on attorney and experts fees with no end in sight. this developer has a number of other projects in the city suspended by d.b.i. and the planning department for building beyond permit limits. since 2016, defendant in three other lawsuits. one suit claims drainage and sewage pipes were not properly installed, sewage throughout the home. and other construction and foundation work. and a third an abutting property had foundation like my neighbor. lawsuits, permits and existing regulations are apparently not a deterrent to this developer. i invite you to contact d.b.i., the planning commission and the

department about the developer, in order to educate yourselves about his troubled construction projects and to help you formulate solutions, which will prevent these practices from continuing in the future. i would be happy to entertain any questions that any of you may have. time limits prevent me from telling you the entire horror story that we have endured. >> thank you for your comments. >> thank you. >> good morning, president mccarthy, members of the commission, director, my name is joe butler, architect here in the city, member of the a.i.a., 30 years in practice. i have been bringing building department applications over that whole period of time and i've seen, i've seen a lot worse than what she showed on the wall there. we have three f.t.e.s in the back row. how much money do they represent in the budget of this

department. those guys, not this woman who takes time off from her day to come down here, those guys should solve these problems. well, then you look into it, and you find out that those guys are the reasons we have these problems. the senior managers continue to do permit intake in your department, tom. i mean -- i think it's below their pay grade. i don't know. because usually when you come in and you bring a permit in, the people behind the desk are not the senior managers. for some developers, some contractors, they come in and they get their permits approved by ed sweeney or mr. duffy or, or quality control by ron thoum. how does that happen? why are these senior people taking in permit applications. oh, well, if some one else being too in the application it might be sent to planning. ah, ah, ok, we are talking

months now. months that go by. i have a permit application in planning. it has been there for almost a year with everything in place but they have not looked at it yet. so, i understand the problems. i'm an architect i try to make a living in the town the way the others do. when these guys come in and they soft shoe the senior managers and end up with a permit that isn't legally binding until somebody goes down and finds a third floor or goes down and finds a basement that's now a story, how does this happen? and why does it continue? five years ago the whistleblower complaint told sweeney to stop taking in permits. they said it's not your job. so, now, now duffy and others do it. but it's the same old dodge. favoritism is rife in the department and the reason that we pay so much in fees when we come down is because others

aren't paying anything. they are lowballing their costs, describing parts of the work already done and just need an inspection. are you kidding me? when you go in for a permit at planning, they look up the building online, they look and see what it is. they have a system that you have tried to prevent your department from having so that the two departments can't go across platform and see what's going on. when you hide things from planning, you are not doing the public any service. >> thank you. more public comment? go on to item number four, commissioners questions and matters, 4a, increase to staff. at this time commissioners may make increase to staff regarding various policies, practices and procedures, of interest to the commission. >> vice chair walker, please.

>> yes. clearly we have some issues on the agenda today that are going to be delving into the issue of our permitting systems and these issues we just heard about at public comment. but, and it's also attached to our sella process, i agree we have taken way too long to do. so, i would really like to be able to restart the conversation that some of us have had where planning and building came together, our staff and planning staff, to figure out some of these issues so that we can avoid these kinds of things, and it's around defining demolition and how permits are issued, and how we cue people in, and i mean, it's a broad conversation but we need to have it. and we'll probably be more specific after having more

discussions, but i just want to go on record that i really would like this to be fixed or at least better because you know, i look at all of these projects that we are going to be talking about and it makes me angry as well. we should be farther along in resolving these things. so -- sorry, that was such a long comment, i just want to put a marker in that we need to talk about it. >> any further comments, commissioners? >> item 4b, at this time, the commission may discuss and take action, date of a special meeting and determine these items placed on the agenda of the next meeting and other future meetings of the building inspection commission. our next regular meeting is on february 21st, but we have two

special budget meetings that were on january 31st and february 7th that i sent you guys notice about. on january 31st and february 7th. >> are we all ok with those dates? >> yes. >> ok. ok. thank you. >> could i just follow up on a previous item, it was regarding the code enforcement outreach issues. there was, we wanted to get an update about housing inspector classification just as an informing us, you know, what the qualifications were for those seats, specifically dealing with i think the qualification of being outreach doing more service calls.

some of our cop vendors were wondering what the classifications are, and if they are tenant outreach and awareness of our social services, which -- >> i believe staff is working on preparing that information for the commission. >> okay, thank you. >> thank you. is there any public comment on item 4a and b? seeing none, we would, we are going to skip item 5 for now, the presenter will arrive about 10:00, if that's ok. presenter will not be here until about 10:00. >> so we are going to go to -- >> item 6. >> building, ok. perfect. >> item 6, update on tall building process review.

>> good morning, commission ergs. ron thoum, assistant director. item 6, the update on the tall building review process with the department. since we had the last presentation, we have had some progress in improving that process. i want to thank you for giving us this opportunity to get the update, and we really appreciate that the inspection commission continues to have oversight and work with the department. and we continue to look forward to collaborating with all of you. the updates will relate to the letter issued by president

mccarthy on november 20, 2017, to the director. first item has to do with the structural engineers association of northern california. and this technical task force has completed its review of a.b.82. and now the board of directors is taking action on the task force recommendations, and we expect a response from them by january of this year or early february then the task force r begin review of 2083 in january of 2018. now, since december 27, 2017, we now have an information sheet s-18, structural, it's a

structural information sheet, and it's the titled interim guidelines and procedures for structural geo technical and seismic hazard engineering design review, for tall buildings, and applies to any building 240 feet or taller, and the project is located in the city's softest soils, or liquifaction zones. now the very viewers beyond the engineering design review team unless the project includes piers or piles that reach bedrock. new requirement in s-18, for the owner to monitor a settlement for a duration of ten years, after the c.f.c. or the t.c.o. has been issued to the project.

also a notorized legal document against the title, listing the qualified monitoring surveyors and instrumentation contact details, and part, and become part of the permanent records and are readily retrievable from d.b.i. settlement monitoring data submitted annually for each of the ten years to d.b.i.'s building inspection division. is if it exceeds the estimate by a factor of 1.5 or more, any annual data reporting period, the project sponsor is required to immediately notify d.b.i. director for inspection services. and once the deputy director has been notified, the department

will take additional investigation immediately. information sheet s-18. r.f.q., the r.f.q. for panelists participating on the design review panel, that was -- applications were received on january 5, 2018. now, due to a legal technical posting error, we are once more extending the opportunity to enlarge this pool of experts with the new posting this friday, january 19th, and the deadline is february 9, 2 weeks later. prequalified lists will be posted on february 28th, and

providing extension just two weeks, as i said. today the d.b.i. selects the design review, panelists, but the sponsor still currently pays for their fees. the future, d.b.i. will pay the fees and charge the sponsor. the ordinance to enable this cost recovery for these third party design review experts will be at the land use committee of the board of supervisors on january 29th, and expected to take legal effect on march 2. d.b.i. also continues to work closely with the city administrator staff on the new applied technology council tall building study, expected to be completed in september of this year. now, no updates to the report at

this time is available, but when we receive it, we will pass it on to a commission. in your packet we have two lists that have been updated and they are for completed tall buildings, the first one is a list of 22 buildings, they were completed between 1999 and 2013. you have a second list, these are buildings not yet completed, and they are for tall buildings and nonliquifaction zones and liquifaction zones, 2013 up to today, 11 total projects. finally, with respect to 160 folsom street, second geo

technical expert review was performed with a collaborating letter issued on december 19, 2017. the district supervisor was also updated, and you'll see that on the second list, for 160 folsom street. that concludes my update for the tall buildings review process, happy to answer any questions the commission may have. >> commissioner walker, please. >> thank you for this. so the second page lists projects that are, have been in our approval process and under these new rules or under, but have not been started yet. >> yes. >> in fact, i think we even reached back to one that was just started construction and had them add the second geo technical reviewer.

>> that's great. so, on this list in the front page, we don't have the data, the detail that we have in the second page about instruction or where the piles go. how many of these buildings would, would have required our new -- and how do we deal with them proactively? >> well, commissioner walker, these buildings have been completed and occupying, you can see some are quite a few years old. and yes, today if we apply s-18, some would apply, would have to conform to s-18. going back to retrieve data for each individual project would be quite difficult. reason being, you have to start out with first soil report and

understand what the foundation is supported. how it's supported. the type of foundation that they use. keeping in mind that if you see the column structural design review panel, the majority of these, since 2013, have had a panel convened for those projects. >> right. >> and so as we recounted last year, today's process is wholly different in the sense that i issued a memo that said all the staff with these type of projects had to maintain records and put it into a common drive retrievable by staff. the supervisors, the managers, etc. some of these people who were reviewers at the time are no longer with the department.

they have moved on or retired. so, their personal records would be very difficult to retrieve them. >> just -- is it possible that the building owners could be required to provide some sort of ongoing reporting? i know it isn't agreed to ahead of time like we are doing now as part of our process, but it just seems like it might be a good idea to be proactive. especially in some cases. and i guess we don't have any authority to do that, or -- >> yeah, it is -- it would be extremely challenging, i mean, to say the least. that's why we thought we have kind of a benchmark, we changed the system, and we reached back for something that's even under construction. but it -- but it was under construction, but we were able to still impose a second geo technical reviewer. once it's already completed and now we -- as you understand and

know, a lot of these buildings may have been, the developers no longer are available, the corporation more than likely dissolved as they normally do for large projects, so reaching back historically would be quite an extremely challenging effort. >> might be able to prioritize based on location and some of the other conditions to be proactive, i'm not trying to create unnecessary work, but i think it might behoof us to -- >> commissioner, we will take it under advisement and see what we are able to come up with. >> and if -- if we could be just apprised of how many on this we might be talking about. >> ok. >> thank you. >> very good. >> thank you, very much. >> commissioner. >> obviously it's an improvement that we are looking at a

ten-year monitoring, and that's big step forward. when we do the notification, 1.5 or more is exceeded, how do we handle notifications of all parties involved? i understand that the building owner should be made aware of it, but -- there are tenants groups, there are owner, you know, ownership groups if it's a condo, there are others involved. when it's exceeded, how do notifications occur? >> commissioner, i think that's a very good question. those type of details, we still have to work out, meaning that if it's a condo ownership, they certainly would have it as a recorded document.

if it's a tenant, i'm not, you know, frankly, that kind of tenant and owner relationships may vary quite a bit between building between units. that one may be -- perhaps we have to think about postings on a building's lobby, i'm just throwing an idea out, so that, we do that now, in residential projects where action by the city is required of some sort. and usually there's a sign, let's say, 30 by 30, needs to be posted for x number of days and you have to have proof that you posted it, and so everybody walking past the lobby gets to see the sign and be, and understand that there's an issue. i mean, that kind of detail we have not -- we have not thought through yet, but you have

engendered a thought about how we would execute this requirement and i think we will bring it back and have internal discussion and work out these details. >> thank you. a second question. we always seem to look at things in terms of the actual footprint of each individual project as, you know, kind of unique. and yet what we have seen with dewatering issues, other structural issues that neighboring properties can very easily be impacted as well. so, when we have a situation where a building is a cause of concern, i would also like to, you know, think about, you know,

how we then look at a broader adjoining property and if there are impacts that neighboring buildings even need to be notified about and considerations of monitoring put into effect for them as well. >> to my understanding of the planning process, notification of a significant project, so they under stand the elements, subgrade excavation, for instance, like for a sub terranean garage, and we do -- the building code does require

consideration of adjoining properties in terms of excavations. and you have to, as the sponsor, you have to consider it and you have to actually submit your assessment to the building department when you are going to do an excavation right next to another property. but again, you know, this is -- what you bring up engenders more thought and a very valid considerations. because historically we know that san francisco, based on many elements, it could be topographical, geological, and development layout of our lots. this is a problem we have to deal with as a city, maybe more so than other jurisdictions. >> i would appreciate your incorporating those thoughts

into future development of this. you know, we are doing the tall building development in very concentrated areas, it appears, and so taking into account these affects not only add construction and what we anticipate to be the effects on adjoining buildings, but now in keeping with this new effort to monitor and have action plans where we see things in excessive expected standards, that we have a thought out plan to reexamine all these potential effects. >> thank you for those thoughts. >> thank you. >> thank you, ron, for this update and thanks for the

report. just to hitch hike a little bit off the commissioner's point there, you know, the dewatering and so on, and i know we went through this when we had a situation where it was written in the environmental report that the department was supposed to be monitoring the dewatering or issuing the permit, whose responsibility that issues the permit and i believe we have a clarification on that, maybe you could update on whose responsibility and who issues the permit for dewatering and so on now. >> i think the public utilities commission of san francisco and also because there is normally discharge at the public into the combined sewer system, public works as well, and then also the health department to watch over, and ensure that there are no contaminants that are being discharged in our water sewage

system. >> so a lot of agencies involved now, up there, a flat statement that we were responsible for it, but i think it's been clarified particularly in the reports earlier on when you went through the checklist, you know, who is responsible for what, it's in there. so -- i think we have done a lot of good housekeeping, obviously now with the enforcement and making sure that all the boxes are ticked when the applications, very happy to see that you were able to, i think it was a good -- commend the director for taking the strong stance on the project out of the ground there that you went back and got that and everybody cooperated, i think that's a good thing. and looking through your, looking through all your reports, i think he only see one project, which will be the 500 folsom that does not have the second. >> doesn't have the review, you

mean? >> yeah. >> that because that one has gone far ahead? >> well, you know, 2015 precedes the s-18, and i believe -- i don't have the information in front of me but i believe the building was under construction. foundation constructed. >> yeah. so you know, i -- so i'm -- there's probably no problem with this, it's just that that's the only one that kind of got away from us, so we start enforcing the new policy, so i found that pretty good. so, i guess to commissioner walkers's points, we understand the train has left the station, but check off the point, if we could maybe review these buildings and what she was asking, and if there's any settlement issues or any kind of violates that would highlight there could be potential

problems down the road, might be a good signal. but i do believe to the director and the staff and the work we have turned the corner on here where we stand exactly with the projects going forward, i think the city will benefit greatly from our new tall building policies. and thanks to the staff of keeping the top of this and getting through the difficult period to get the questions addressed. >> i think the commissioners would, very thoughtful comments over the last year made us at the staff level think more thoroughly and you have challenged us, and hopefully provide you the information that you just said, to assist you and thinking holistically that we have improved the system itself. especially current and for the future. and we'll take back, you know, take to heart the comments that we received this morning and see

what we can do to address some of them, and the first list of the tall buildings already completed. we'll go back and see what we have and as i said, more challenging because some people aren't even around any longer and find the data may not be that easy. >> appreciate it. thank you for your time. >> thank you. >> good morning. >> thank you. any public comment on item 6? >> madam secretary, go to item 7, i know there are people here that want to speak and bring it up forward, rather than come back, if that's ok. if there's no objection. and item 5 after item 7 is completed, if that's ok. >> 7, d.b.i. inspection staff update and discussion of 49 hop

canes, 841 chestnut/950 lombard/25-17th avenue, subject of "chronicle" newspaper story. >> i'm here to speak in record to unauthorized demolition beyond the scope of approved permit documents. so, example properties are as follows, we have 49 hopkins avenue, which was a demolition of the majority of the building in excess of the approved permit documents. complaint was filed, permit was stopped by d.b.i. work stopped by d.b.i., and planning review is currently underway on newly filed permit documents. 841 chestnut, which is also known as 950 lombard street, exceeding the scope of the demolition. in that case, there was a

referral to the city attorney's office from the planning department regarding what had transpired there, and litigation followed and the case was eventually settled and a permit was issued to document what had transpired. so, the other 1, 25-17th avenue, that was, in my opinion, misrepresentation. the building itself was not demolished. three-story bay, a deck adjacent to the south side of the building, which was also the bay side, and a three-story chimney were demolished. and really, the rest of the building, the envelope is still there. but the bay was in fact not shown as an existing condition and we were able to determine that that bay was in fact there, and had been demolished based on

misrepresentation. >> chimneys, what's the department's stance on chimneys there? >> it was more of a -- rather than a full-on chimney on this case. so again, it was not shown on -- it was shown on existing conditions -- stop order put against that order? >> absolutely. a stop order put on that works, i have the information here, but in the july of 2016 time frame, all work was stopped, and the permit applicant was required to come back to d.b.i. with a new set of drawings and permit

documents showing what the entire scope of the work was and showing what the correct existing was, based on the information we had, which did indicate that there was a three-story deck. a three-story bay, deck and the chimney as existing conditions. >> ok. >> i know we have a lot of questions here, but just -- i want to -- so i understand, and i want to open it to the public here, so it's possible we have speakers here on it. did this ever come in front of us as abasement scenario, as abatement, for example? [please stand by]

>> litigation wise, has any of the projects been in front of a litigation committee? >> i think they would come in front of you by a litigation committee. i'm not sure they have, they have all been progressive in seeking the necessary permits. we wouldn't have a reason to -- >> so none of them to be

referred to the city attorney. >> the only one was 841 chestnut. that was referred by planning. >> when i read the -- we had never been on our radar on any committee form before and i kind of knew the answer but i wanted to be sure that was the case. commissioner walker please. >> so i'm just curious, what were the penalties for this? >> the penalties were -- >> i'm trying to see, if this happened -- this seems to happen a lot. if people get a feeling that it's easier to ask for forgiveness or permission, we are doing something wrong. >> i can assure you, we are doing everything in our power to follow up on these and the penalties are mandated by the san francisco building code and i'll get into those later. but --

>> maybe something -- >> to speak to your question before moving on, yes, i agree, not enough. we have a two time penalty base -- >> two times the -- >> the value of the permit based on the valuation of work performed to that point. if we're thinking about, it's demo, right? what is the cost of demo? there are no materials. you go out there and pull down a couple of walls and a deck and a bay and a chimney or whatever it might be. there's little real dollar cost associated with that. then they come to get a permit to remedy that. the notice of violation will state something like two times penalty based on $2,000 worth of work because it wasn't much. if they don't have a permit,

then it's a different story. the code speaks to that in regards to a nine times penalty being applicable. most of these scenarios is where there is a permit. they have gone beyond the stop of the permit through misrepresentation or we might have the odd contractor, we might have someone just messing up. they might just look at the drawings and understand from one area of the drawings that they can remove certain elements of the building or do whatever. there may be more restriction like in the architectural side shows with regard of planning and has approved. the way i see it, miss

representation, rouge contractor. i think a lot of these people are out there and we're inspectors and we want a good safe building and everybody wants to see the priority line being updated to be fire resistant and weatherized. the other thing we think, i'm jumping ahead on the presentation, they have portions of the building to do what is necessary. you have to put in a foundation. to put in the foundation you have the wall and the floor and they're out there doing what's necessary and meanwhile, we don't always get out there and see what the shoring is because there's no complaint and we have no reason to go by there. what concerns me a bit, the worker working underneath the shoring of the elements of the building they're trying to

preserve that need to be updated anyway. you might have a 2x4 stud wall that now needs to be a 2x6. they're looking at their demo calculations and seeing they got to maintain, preserve the wall. so the engineer looks at it and says you need a 2x6 and in a lot of case they throw it up against the 2x4 and make it structurally sound. but sometimes a contractor will say why is the 2x4 there, we just needed a 2x6 wall. that's the mess up, they might take out that and the 2x6 goes in its place and we get the complaint and go out there. those are the scenarios and those are some of our

challenges. the way i think about it is, a set of drawings are approved by planning and by d.b.i. and that set of drawings has demo calculations on it that shows what has to be remain existing or be preserved and what can be removed and replaced. that is approved. there's no structural relating to that at the time. a structural will follow. the contractor ends up looking at structural drawings and the inspector looks at the same drawings, it looks like a lot of

stuff needs to be upgraded. sometimes they may have removed portion of, just for the effort of needing to upgrade a foundation or wall structurally or do whatever. i think it's a good thing if we end up with a building that in place of the old, that we can have a fire resistant wall placed there instead of what was clearly deficient. there is sometimes a disconnect between what was approved by planning and what the engineer puts in structural drawings. >> isn't there a process foregoing back to planning and getting an assessment from them

as if it's -- if it's approved what they're doing, doesn't it seem it should be -- >> the 99% of good contractors out there do that the they realize there's a discrepancy in their drawings and things don't match and say hey mr. architect, we need to sort this out before having a problem. >> but to commissioner walker's point there, my understanding pretty much everything goes to planning for the quick review, fine, no, this is not a planning issue, this is amendment to a building permit. does everything go through there? >> it depends on how much review it gets in planning that is. some of these are the larger projects. for example hopkins had an

valuation of 650,000 they would have been looking at that more. chestnut would have had a -- >> that would have gone through a planning process. >> at the end of the day, i think joel will come up here later and show you what that looks like on a set of drawings, the planning approval with the calculations. so it goes out the door with the planning approval and when the structural jobs are issued and the contractor goes to work, this universe is not very big in my opinion. we have about two of these that raise to the level of hopkins a year. we know that's what was approved

and we succeed the scope of the permit. and next step is back to planning. that usually involves a visit to us the same day we write the violation and sometimes there's peers involved and it's very impactful on people when they realize their contractor went beyond the pail and demo'd a large portion of the building they shouldn't have. they might call it a de facto demo and review it for several years. usually more than a year. in a couple of instances it's up to three years that it sits in the planning wheel house. unfortunately for the building inspector it's the 911 call. we get this call, complaint,

they're way beyond the scope of the work and we're out there and it's like this is not good. we have to deal with it then. we stop the job and have them secure the site. weatherize what is remaining of the structure, they're allowed to do that and then they're stopped and if it's prolonged then we deal with complaints about graffiti, all that kind of stuff. i think there are good elements to upgrade and comply with code, especially if they don't have visual -- >> i think the issue is does d.b.i. have the right to make that assessment if it's not approved plan. >> no, that's why we send it back to planning.

that's why they end up back in planning. >> i guess the delay and i personally think there should be more repercussions financially when people do this and the delay is going to cost money for these people, too, but it also then affects the neighborhood. so not having it happen is probably just going to be setting an example of some sort, that's usually what works. we draw lines, that our job in d.b.i. -- if it's not to the plan, someone else in planning has to say it's okay and there has to be a process for that. it includes notification. >> we're not legislatures but we would love to see something legislatively in place to make it easier to deal with.

>> continue with your presentation. i'm sure you're going to touch on a couple other things. i'm cognizant of the fact of public comment would like to get there and then we can bring people back up and discuss the different items. >> i'm happy to do that. i'm sure you all have a copy of the presentation and will be following along. the pictures are 49 hopkins is the one that shows what's left of the front of the building, garage door and wall above. not very much 950 lombard, the main building faces chestnut on

the down hill. >> so that's not the actual house -- it's a guest house. >> well, the challenge we had with the main house, to take a picture of that, which i have, it was in shrink wrap -- >> but there are violations on the main house. >> yes, they were issued a stop work order. everything here before you, that is stop work notice, shut down, secure the site and ended up back in planning for exceeding the scope of planning approved. 25 17th avenue, that was the demolition of the bay and deck and chimney on the south side of the building. forgive the poor quality of

picture. we can blame the person who took it later. investigative process, i'm touching on a lot of the stuff i discussed here. a complaint is filed, an inspector visits the site maybe for a scheduled inspection and that's when we discover we have an issue. the inspector investigates, verifies they're beyond the scope of the approved demolition. building inspector often times notes that structural drawings show more demolition than the architectural shows. it's the engineer requirements having to do with -- violation is issued and stop work notice is posted. site is secured and weatherized. the design team usually visits d.b.i. for direction. we have a problem, what do we need to do. contact planning department f