denied that request was a friday. i think it was april 6. on monday, we got our first communication from the appellants, first time. they say we want to talk to you, but it's according to the terms of our demand letter which we're attaching and that demand letter is an exhibit to the brief, where they say you pay us money for the damages we suffered, you pay for them and then we'll talk. we're not going to deal with that. at that point, we're not going to get involved in those discussions. so when you hear appellants say that google is a bad actor because they never reached out, it's absolutely the contrary. google reached out multiple times. the lead person of this can testify to that if you wish, but she got no response or substantive response at all. i want the record to be clear on that. again, mr. denny said they

reached out to google for four months and that's just wrong. i'm going to leave my comments there and let mr. bower address the cci experience. >> my name is eric bauer with bcci. our construction team is aware of the challenges with the mixed use building. we staffed our supervision to manage any noise complaints. bcci has been participating in weekly meetings with the commercial property manager, hudson pacific properties. and google every week since prior to this work starting to discuss any issues that come up. hudson properties specifically requested that all communication between the commercial and residential prosecution portions of the building should be to the

management and not reach out to the tenants. that was the direction we were given, there are two property managers, the residential and the commercial space. we completed over 160,000 square feet of interior demo in two months. we started in early october through early december of 2017. the work that was discussed earlier, that was work that was not associated with the google project. there is roof work that the building was doing and other work in the building that was unrelated to any google construction. we did receive two noise complaints through hudson for after hours work in mid october. when we were doing demo. and we addressed it, our protocol to shut down demo and begin clean up at 7:30 p.m. to ensure no noise after 8 p.m. we had a resident enter the

construction area and complain about the noise. and in early february we received two e-mail notifications of residential noise complaints from hudson pacific properties which we discussed in the weekly meeting with google and hudson. our management reiterated to our subcontractors that no noisy work before 7:00 a.m. and no work after 8 p.m. and we increased more monitoring of the area, of the work performed before 7:00 a.m. shortly thereafter on february 7, we were notified by the department of building inspections that our structural stair permit had been suspended and on february 8, the 5th floor had been suspended and all work associated with that was immediately put on hold. bcci developed and implemented a new policy preventing elevator access to all subcontractors

until 6:45 a.m. and no violation of noise ordinance on the active permits. department of building inspections clancy was on site regularly after the permit suspension and we worked with the superintendents and the subcontractors to clearly identify which work had been suspended and what work could proceed based on the active permits. since the suspensions for those continuedings ins and site visits -- inspections and site visits with no issues reported. bcci limits all work to be performed between 7:00 a.m. and 8:00 p.m. our team is here. we have our project managers, our quality control manager, superintendents and the rest of

the google team as well, so if there is specific questions, there are certainly some things brought up in the appellant's opening statement that weren't accurate. they weren't associated with any of the work we're performing there. and i'll leave it at that. thank you. >> i've got a couple of questions. are you finished? with your time? >> yes, we are. >> commissioner honda: so, first of all, is anyone from hudson management or properties at this hearing? >> they were invited. >> commissioner honda: wow, it's going to be hard to make a judgment without them here. how long have you been working on the property? >> october 2017. >> commissioner honda: when was the completion time scheduled.

>> substantially complete end of july with one small area that will extend until september. >> commissioner honda: so -- >> it was a later permit in the project. >> commissioner honda: unfortunately, you kind of passed the buck saying that you were not allowed to deal with any of the people that lived at the property because hudson management had given you direct orders, is that correct? >> no, i wouldn't say that. we met weekly with hudson properties, was in contact with the residential construction manager. we really had no direct channel. we wouldn't have gone onto their property without authorization. >> that's what i meant, so basically you were handcuffed by hudson properties. so i mean, you're kind of nodding around, so how many community meetings with the tenants? >> there were no community

meetings. >> commissioner honda: so again hudson property is in charge of that and there is no representative here from hudson properties. i mean, most of my questions are geared toward responsibility and there is nobody here that is going to, for me, that is going to answer that, because you're going to say hudson properties. like you said hudson properties did not allow you to meet with tenants. >> they asked us to communicate with them. i represent bcci, the general contractor, performing the work. >> if anyone from google would like to answer the same question, please come forward. >> in your dealings with the property manager, was the issue of noise transmission between commercial construction zone to occupied residential brought up?

>> yes. absolutely. we met weekly. that was something -- >> but were there mitigating -- >> we only put in a few -- >> i'm saying before you started construction. >> before we started construction, we knew it was going to be challenging, we were aware there were residents above us. >> what did you do? >> we implemented policies to manage any noise outside of the hours of construction. per the article 29 i believe it is, you're allowed five decibels above am byient noise. >> i know the code for that. >> once we received complaints,

we restricted any work. >> if you're allowed 5 over ambient and this board deals with a lot of sound issues, do you have an onsite monitoring system? >> we did set up some for general monitoring. those were set up by our construction personnel, not by a professional. just to get a general -- >> so how do you -- that's my next question, how do you determine if you're 5 db over ambient. >> that's why we eliminated work outside of the hours. when we got the complaints that we had noise complaints after 8:00 p.m., then we shut down at 7:30 to allow everybody to get tools put away and out of the building by 8:00 p.m., so there is no gray area there. when we got a noise complaints, or a couple in the morning, and we got notified by dbi there were noise complaints in the

morning, then we implemented a new policy to ensure we didn't have any subcontractors on site at all before 7:00 a.m. there was no gray area. there is a gray area and that's how we eliminated that and ensured we were operating within the restrictions. >> anyone else with a question? >> one of the things -- there is the -- we adjudicate according to the law and statutes, those which you quoted. then there comes to the public sensitivity piece. so you work for a great company, sophisticated man, you know radiation of sound when you're

grinding away in a building is a lose-lose situation. in 20-20 hindsight, if you were the lead resident here and you were living in that apartment, how would it as an experienced construction person, how would you have alleviated some of their pain. it's a lose-lose situation, you can't help it, you have to grind, it goes to the 25th floor. we know that, but these are people, too. how has a sophisticated professional working for a high quality company, how would you alleviated the situation and ultimately emerged so it didn't overflow into a situation that exist now? with side effects? how do you do that? >> well, i'm a resident of san francisco, i certainly

understand the frustration that. that would be very frustrating to have that work directly underneath my bedroom. i get that. there is a nine-inch slab between the residential and the commercial property. that only occurs in a few buildings in san francisco. we do a lot of work in san francisco. going into this, we knew it would be a challenge. we talked to the building engineers, we asked about the experience they had in the past. we took remediation prior to even starting construction, they said noise travels off the trash chutes. we ordered aqueues cal blankets. we increased our staffing on site. coustical blankets. we increased our staffing on site. we limited the types of tools they used during the day. in addition to the residential,

there is occupied commercial spaces within the building and on the ground floor is retail space. so we're limited with noise not only that we can make between 8:00 p.m. and 7:00 a.m., but also restricted on noise that we can make during the day. so we're very sensitive to that. we talked to the subcontractors, we have weekly safety meetings. noise is always a topic. there are things we watch closely, that if you're not supervising closely, people will drop pipes on the ground. they'll drop studs on the ground, knock things off benches without placing them on the ground and it makes an enormous difference if you're not going out of your way to try to work quietly. not just after hours, this is all of our construction throughout the day, we're monitoring that very closely to minimize the sound. in some cases we put carpet in

an area. if we have a commercial space below us, we'll put carpet in that area to help absorb the sound between that area. there is little we can do with the concrete slab above us. but we go out of our way to try to minimize the noise. it was something that we knew was going to be a challenge. the fact that we weren't able to communicate what we were trying to do to them, to me, we were communicating with the property manager and any complaints we did get, we were addressing immediately. we limited tools that slow down production, a lot of the guys prefer to use impact cordless drills. it's a lot quieter to use a regular cordless screw gun. so in sensitive areas, especially on the 6th floor,

we're paying particular attention to, on 5, a little bit of a barrier there, but we do go out of our way. we understand the frustration. we don't want it to slow down our work. in fact, we were supposed to be done in july. we've had all these suspended permits, we're now going to be going you know, two months later at least. >> could you answer the question? >> with all your sensitivity, your sophisticated, experienced, you're good at what you do, you're sensitive, you said you were sensitive and worked hard to mitigate any opportunity that would cause stress to the people in the building. with that, why did we see a video -- i didn't see 5:00 in the morning, what i saw was the appellants said 6:00-something a.m., all that sensitivity and the other elements, what happened at 6:33 in the morning and why was there grinding and

why was there noise, and why? >> i did see the video. there was no grinding. that was torch cutting. we had olsen steel and i have a report here, they brought out one acoustical meter, they went from the parking garage that video was taken from. measured the ambient noise at that hour that it was taken from. and recreated on site torch-cutting, the same type of metal. they took ambient levels from there. you could see nothing from across the street. the birds squawking -- it didn't register from across the street. we took measurements within the space and we have this report if you're interested to see it. >> are they supposed to be working at 6:33 in the morning? >> they took the readings from the rooftop at that hour.

>> commissioner swig: but it was clearly from 6:33 in the morning, with all your sophistication and knowledge, knowledge prior to that it was going to be upsetting, you probably had to be mitigate and be sensitive, why at 6:33 in the morning was heavy construction going on in that building? >> again, that was torch cutting. when we recreated that a few days later after we saw -- >> that's not the question. >> it was only four decibels above ambient. >> commissioner swig: you're not exhibiting the sensitivity i hoped you would have, but that's ok. >> as soon as we -- >> commissioner swig: the question is, are you supposed to be working at 6:33 in the morning? >> there are restrictions on the levels and that's when we changed the policy. we still feel confident we were not exceeding --

>> i'll ask the department. thank you. >> i'm pretty familiar with the case, given the fact that mr. denny met with me when i was at dbi when he filed his complaint. so it was immediately, i did know about it. i won't bother reading out the details on all the permits, i think we've got that. they are part of a larger tenant improvement job at this building. some of the points, i think -- dbi gets a lot of noise

complaints. generally, construction is no y noisy. all over the city. we issue night noise permits. >> i didn't make that code. anyway, so, it is pretty liberal i think, 93 hours a week, that he can work. we get noise complaints for noise during the day. noise at night. just like this. so i'm well used to dealing with that type of situation and indeed, mr. denny did meet with me. i'm a little disappointed that

he said he didn't get a response. inspector clancy responded very well i thought. has updated his sheet. the notification for the building permits, there wouldn't be notification required. i think we talked about this before on other cases. the notification on a building permit for the demolition of the whole building is something that is done. and for this type of work, even though there is interior demolition, it doesn't fall to the notification per the building code. there is nothing in the building code to tell a contractor to inform residents they're going to start working, but we do

encourage notices. you see it all over the city. this is the number to call, a hot line. you know, in this building, like they had a building manager. unfortunately, we can't accept those, we generally require that from our acoustic engineer. dbi did suspend the permits when they were appealed. there was work allowed to take place because all the permits were not under suspension, so work did continue. we see as as well there are 0

mer mitts on the -- 20 permits on the project. only four were appealed. so work was able to continue. it does state that the section 2907, permitted construction site, except for impact tools such as jack hammers. the standard in 2907, 80 decibels when measured at a distance of 100 feet from the equipment or 100 feet from the construction site boundary. measurements may be taken at different calculations. at 100 feet. construction is allowed during the day time hours, 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. every day of the week.

and then it just goes on to say that dbi and dpw can issue permits allowing work outside of the hours. so we do get a lot of complaints on the jackhammer and impact tools, the noise. they are exempt. so why we sympathize with anybody having to put up with noise, there is not much in our code we can do, or the police code to stop someone from using a jackhammer between 7 a.m. and 8 p.m. and again, you know, we did suspend the permits, that's as much as we could do. and in regards to the noise before 7 a.m., we did receive a complaint and we saw the videos that were sent to us as well. our building inspector went out there, spoke to the superintendent and told him to stop it, basically start work at 7 a.m.

the 5 decibel exception is -- it's in there because there are certain types of work that happen in san francisco. there is maintenance of buildings. there is people that change light bulbs, there is different types of work, especially in the financial district. so there is that exception, but i personally think that the 5 decibels, it's not for doing this type of work. it shouldn't be used. now, inspector clancy told me they were responsive, they got it, they shouldn't have been doing it, they stopped immediately. i was then encouraging mr. denny and the contractor to get together. you need to talk about this, because if you're allowed to work from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. and there isn't anything i can do to stop them from using the jackhammer, the best thing to do is get the two sides together, sit down and try to figure out can you do the jackhammering

between 10 a.m. and 3 p.m., so these people can plan their day around that. they know they're not going to be there as much as they can. people certainly need to be in their home, but there are solutions to that. what was disappointing from where i was, was that i saw e-mails, they're in my phone, i looked at them again tonight, where i was asking mr. denny to reach out, go speak to these people. get some sort of meeting going. and i did then get an e-mail from one of the attorneys, i think it was 1st of march, which i was copied on to mr. denny asking to meet and two weeks later i saw there was no response. so it's obvious they wanted to come to the hearing tonight to get this out. i would have preferred them to have a meeting and get this resolved and move forward. so i don't think i missed anything. if anyone has questions, i'm

happy to answer them. >> i asked ahead of construction, if he was allowed to build before 7 a.m. and he didn't answer. he said for certain types of work. so is there work he can do on a construction site before 7 in the morning? >> section 2908, that's probably what you're asking me, it says construction work enforced by dbi and dpw, the limits do not apply during emergencies. it applies to 8 p.m. to 7 a.m. the standard is five decibels above the ambient. it's a maximum allowable level for noise produced from any

construction equipment located on a permitted construction site. so there is -- you actually technically could work -- >> under emergency. >> no, you can do it as long as you're not above 5 decibels, but we've consulted with the health department who help us with signed reports, meetings with contractors, because they're the experts. dbi does not have an acoustical engineer on staff. >> so even when the permit is 7 to 7 p.m., a contractor can work 25 hours a day as long as he doesn't exceed five decibels over ambient. >> yeah, but that's hard to meet. you could be in the building changing light bulbs, painting, doing something that is very

quiet. and i'm sure there are people doing this. >> from the video you saw as well, you know, you've got six or seven construction guys walking around with belts and hammers and moving things around and we're seeing sparks. >> that was definitely against -- like i would agree with you on that. but they stopped it. i've seen that happen on many projects. you get a lot of contractors, the workers that come in from out of city. they start early, they like to beat the traffic. they get in, they get out. it's not right. dbi gets a complaint. we go down and tell them to stop it. it does happen. >> a lot of people from 209. >> there is a lot of people that try to do it. once we're told about it, we go down and stop it. in this case, that did happen. it might have taken maybe a week or so. i think mr. denny referenced that and the contractor spoke to

it as well. it's not unusual for work to happen before 7. if we're told about it and informed, the inspectors do go out and stop it. we'll call them and tell them, we've got complaints. and a lot of sites you monitor, because someone will get blamed for noise and it's not them. so a lot of the big sites, like the new high rise buildings, they'll have video monitors and we'll be sent the videos saying it's not us, there was no one there. >> after five and a half years on this board and we have a lot of complaints of working before and after, this is the first time i heard that you can work 24-7, as long as you're somewhat quiet. thank you. >> ok, we will now move onto public comment.

>> what we're experiencing is beyond the pale. the caveat to what i said, i'm a new resident of san francisco. i've been here a year. i don't know how all the codes and systems work here, but i'm starting to learn it. i think the real issue is that we are on the 8th floor, we're measuring decibels at 70, 80. we're one florida removed from the construction, but there are shafts adjacent to unit.

you know, we hear noise, it's not like coming up through the floor. we hear noise from the side, from the top. it could be coming from anywhere. we don't know where it's coming from. and we're sick about the whole thing. no defense, no protection, from property management, from google, from the building owners, from the management of the building, from the contractors. it took us weeks, even months to find out who was even doing the work. we didn't know it was google. nobody knew. we kept on hearing the worse is going to be over in november, over in december, over in january. we tried to be good team players and tough it out, but the reality is, like two days ago my wife and i were trying to talk over breakfast. we had to stop talking. the noise was that loud. as somebody new to the city, i'm looking at the codes, they're obviously very flawed.

i think that the code that allows the 80 decibels, that is clearly designed for noise that is going out into the public right of way and affecting adjacent properties. we're having those levels inside our apartment. can you imagine that? living that every day, six days a week, with no clear end in sight. i invite you all for a sleepover and see what you think before you make your determination. it's ridiculous. the applicable code i think is the one that has to do with allowable noises within a residence, which are 45 decibels at night and 55 during the day. >> you have 30 seconds. >> now i don't know what to say. anyway, so the impact is real. i ended up in emergency on january 10 just because my

nerves were shot. i get no rest. i have a more than full-time job. i have the tools and the ability to kind of dig into this, but i don't have the time. you know, so nobody is looking out for us. nobody, that's why we're here. >> i have a question, sir. so how long have you been at the property? >> since march of 2017. >> and then what communication if any have you had with hudson management in regards to this? >> well, the residential tower is managed by gray star, so it took us months to figure out they had no power and no ability to advocate on our behalf. >> so it's not hudson, it's gray star? >> yes. >> and you don't have to answer if you don't feel comfortable, but what is your rent? up to you.

>> 2000-something. >> 37. >> that includes parking. >> thank you. no more questions. >> ok, public comment. >> hi, thank you. my name is clinton, i live at 88 howard street, i'm on the 9th floor. which is three floors above the 6th. lived there for five years. never had this issue before. just loud this evening, in my apartment, every morning at 7 a.m. it's crazy. it's causing anxiety. caused insomnia, i wake up at 2 and 3 a.m., can't go back to sleep, don't know why. haven't seen directly about it,

i have to get a prescription for medication. it's just driving me nuts and really getting to miyazato and i hope you -- me and i hope you can help us out, narrow the hours, anything. i'm asking you guys because when i haven't been reached out to directly from hudson or google or bcci or the dbi or anybody. no one reached out to me. that's all i have to say. keep it simple and short. >> same question. have you reached out to management, gray star, and what was their response? >> yeah, i reached out to general people in the lobby who are employed by gray star, and it's basically, there is no true -- i haven't been given direction on how to reach any sort of resolution from them. >> as a tenant, we have a lot of

parties that ask us to limit construction hours. but when you do so, you also extend the construction time. i mean -- >> yeah, i mean -- >> in your mind, what would be a starting time and ending time? >> gosh, that's an excellent question. i would say 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and i know that could double the time it would take, but at least i'm not experiencing these health issues that i have been. >> ok thank you. >> any other public comment? seeing none, we will move -- oh, i'm sorry. >> hello, my name is james miller, i've lived in rincon since 2001, was on the 14th floor and moved down to the 12th

floor. we are along the embarcadero. we have plenty of distractions that can occur. a lot of distractions that happen at night. most recently, we had the fog horn going off all day long for a couple of days straight. we have night clubs and restaurants down stairs that have people who come in, collect trash, and recycling bottles, throwing bottles into their trucks, they're not licensed or allowed to, but they come by and they're throwing bottle after bottle into their trucks. that distracts us, keeps us up. there is events like beta brakers which starts right in front of our apartment complex. we have giant tanker ships that come through when there is fog and they blow their horns. part of the nature of living in san francisco.

i'll admit that at 7:15 the last couple of days, i do hear noise on 12th floor, there is noise. i'm not on the 7th floor, so i can't speak for those that are lower below me. but i just wanted to mention that it's part of living in san francisco, we have to be able to find a happy balance. i, personally, would much rather have this end as soon as possible than lengthen it out and have any delay that causes it to continue and have more noise in the long-term. >> ok thank you. is there any other public comment? you're a party, ma'am. so you'll have an opportunity to speak during rebuttal. are you going to be speaking for rebuttal? so no more public comment. >> no, no, you're part of the

party, so your time is -- >> but she's a named appellant, so she can only speak during your time. i assume we're done with public comment. we'll move onto rebuttal. we'll hear from the appellant first, you have 12 minutes. >> please just identify yourself again. >> steven, the attorney for the tenants. i'm going to turn it over to mr. denny and he's going to talk about if google reached out. but my part, i want to focus and bring to your attention the declaration of policy, police code, 29, we believe that the noise levels exceed the acceptable levels as defined by

world health organization guidelines of community noise. with that i'm going to turn it over to mr. denny. >> i just wanted to respond to some of the comments that were made by the legal counsel for google. first of all, he states that we didn't reach back out to google. that is really just not true. actually have the dates here. we reached out to gray star. personally, i have 30 e-mails to gray star. every morning, we would go to the lobby and complain. every single morning. so subpoenaed, i'm sure there is a lot of records there and hard data. as i mentioned before, this was an act of sheer self-defense. we were at a point where we had no more options. and we filed the appeal on february 7. we asked gray star for a meeting with hudson and with google. it went into the ether.

nothing happened. we had to defend ourselves and pick up sticks and defend ourselves. five days later, i get an e-mail from google, after i've suspended their permits. that's factual. i then reach out to them on the 22nd because we'd already started to discuss our legal options. but i wanted to go through these administrative remedies before opening that door. in the -- on the 22nd i responded to rebecca and said, unfortunately, this situation has moved forward and we're now in discussions for legal protection. she said i'm so sorry to hear about that and i said to her, is there any way you can pass on your legal representative contact? she did that. that was the end of the

conversation. she reached out again on march 1, saying can we meet again? i reached out to her on -- that was march 1 and the 14th. on the 9th of april, almost three weeks later, because we were still gathering all our information and as part of administrative remedies, it says by law we have to actually make a mediation request, or a demand, so we did that. we didn't put any dollar amounts in there, we asked to be rehoused because the situation is so dire. we have lost earnings, my wife works from home. and so i'm sure there are other people who have lost earnings also. we asked for those things, also, yes we did, but primarily it's for the protection. and we stipulate who was harmed and what was harmed and how it's ongoing.

on april 10, we e-mailed again to get a clarification that she'd received the demand letters. there was no response. i e-mailed again on the 12th to ask her, would you please mediate the situation? we have reached out. absolutely reached out. mr. duffy is correct that he has tried to put us together, but that's after the fact. that's after google pops up, that we have suspended their permits. it's only after that because they're forced to do that. in addition to that, if you go to -- i show that the information portrayed by the legal counsel is false. if you go to exhibit 2, exhibit 2, they say they're going to finish in july. exhibit 2, it says we've received requests.

this is from gray star. we have received request for updates on the status of the renovations occurring in rincon center, commercial space. the work has been halted -- i'm reading the wrong one first. we received requests for update on the status of the renovation. >> into the microphone a little more. >> we received request for updates on the status of the rincon center, commercial space, we requested a schedule that notes the impactful noises caused by a process called roto hammering is estimated to be completed by march 15. we have multiple e-mails that it was november and then december. at this time, when we get to december, this push it to march.

this is what they do. they bulldoze their way in, they keep pushing for time. there is no communication and they buy themselves another three months. now the final document that's not in the exhibit, says they're going to be q3. so that's one year of this insanity. something has to be done. we don't want to stop google. it's a progressive city, that's why we're here. but measures have to be taken now before other people get sick. and this problem gets a million times worse. we actually reached out, when i appealed for additional time, we actually started to communicate with the other people in the building and there are other people who are sick. we don't know the depth of the problem. that's why we requested that. we want to measure this. we want the department of health, we want to measure this,

we want protection. that's what we're asking for. he said 10, that's a good starting time, 4, perfect, but don't go 10 decibels over the ambient. even 50 drives you insane. try it sometime. that's what we're asking for and we're asking for mediation also. >> with that, i have a proposal that might make your determination easier. i would request a continuance to allow us to meet with the google people, because they've shown their willingness to come to the table in this hearing. and we can meet, and have the discussions that maybe -- >> can you address your comments to us, sir? >> we can meet and have the discussion we should have had before construction started. and maybe we can come to an agreement as to the acceptable

starting times, the acceptable end times. and we can do that within 60 days or so. i don't know what google has -- i don't know what google is going to say to that, but that's my proposal and request for continuance. >> ok, are you finished with your rebuttal? >> yes. >> you have four minutes if you want. >> so i actually represent laurel tester who couldn't be here today. the 4th member, she is a 25 year veteran of the building. she was rushed to hospital on saturday. heart palpitations, had to lie on the floor, screaming in agony. she has a medical condition. she won't share it, so i don't

have that information, but i suspect it's neurological. she was rushed -- we saw the ambulance as well. she was there until 2:00 in the morning. a key piece of information that is missing, that no one has addressed is that a water pipe burst in november in that commercial space. google is denying they did it. i've been told by management that they did it. so inquiry has to be opened into that. pipe burst water, the water went into the electrical room and shut off the power to the building for five full days. no power, no heat, no water. and yet we championed through. and when we went down stairs to asked what happened, no one knew a damn thing. only through investigative digging later and threats to release the information that it

was disclosed to us. five full days. they had to go and get tankers that looked like 18-wheelers and park them outside the building and run tables into the building. it took three days to get the power there. there are elderly people in the building. there are people that are sick, children in the building and yet they're allowed to do what they're doing. one more thing. when they talk about it was a torch. that is a complete lie. anybody in the construction industry knows with a settling torch, you have cables, they're attached to a tank and you have to brink it up the ladder. there is no cables. that's a hand held device. so they're lying. flat out, they're lying. also the spark, if you look at

the spark coming out at a rapid angle. a torch doesn't do that, it drops down. new evidence that's a lie. i think that concludes my rebuttal, thank you for your time. >> thank you. we will now hear from the permit holder. >> hold one second until our commissioner comes back. just one minute.

>> please start. >> thank you, president. it's evident from a lot of the testimony we've heard tonight and the appellant's papers they have a lot of anger toward the residential property management which is gray star. it's important to remember when

people complain about gray star doing bad things, gray star and google are not the same. gray star controls the upper portion of the building, which is owned by caramel, which is a separate entity than hudson that owns the commercial part of the building. when there are complaints, that is not communicated to google, i hope we understand, any aspersions are cast about what gray star does or do, doesn't affect what google does, other than the fact that gray star didn't communicate to hudson and communicate to us. when we did find out about the problem, we reacted immediately and bcci reacted immediately. i hope this is clear about this delineation. it's important to remember that as a permit holder, google,

these permits are being, the appellants want to have these revoked, they want to take away our permits, halt construction and the project. it's important when we're looking at our rights, what standards are going to apply here? it's undisputed it's article 29. and the dbi has agreed it's the section, 2907 and 2908 and we haven't violated that. there is nothing over 80 decibels. and the one instance of work being done outside of the 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. period was a video that we saw with the sparks. but it's important to remember, to have this in context. when this was discovered, things changed and things have remained

changed ever since and there has not been that early work ever since this issue came up in february. so, what happened was, i think commissioner honda question, yeah, before 7 you can do work, and it has to be quiet work, it has to be under five decibels. did they exceed it? they probably did go too loud then. but what did they do in response? they changed the protocol and said you can't even get in the elevator until 6:45. it's physically impossible now for that problem to occur. and it's physically impossible for that to occur after 8 because the protocol changed. we've addressed that. and ever since that point, that has not been a problem. that has not happened. so you know, bcci and we can

talk about more of it, mr. bower can, but they reacted and they responded to what was wrong. and if our work is 70 decibels, that's what is allowed. that's what we need to do in order to get this work done. we can't say, there are some people complaining, let's just reduce it to 60. it's going to greatly impair our rights as a permit holder to get this work done. it's important that we recognize what the framework is here. and on this mr. denny in rebuttal said i reached out all these times and google didn't reach out to me. rebecca is the one who was going back and forth with mr. denny about this. if this is an area you feel needs great are inquiry, she can stand up and talk about which e-mail she sent when, but

remember we got nothing from them after we found out about the appeals. within four or five days later, rebecca reached out and said let's talk. zero. then at some point he said, well -- i can't remember who that was -- it was in march, he said let's do it through our attorneys. i said ok, here's our attorney's information and there is no more information. dbi reflects that, too. we got a lot of calls from them after the hearing request was denied, because the ability to string this out until june was gone. because now we have this hearing and now they wanted to talk. at that point, we're already here. to talk about what kind of money they want to demand from us, we didn't feel that was productive, we'd rather exercise our rights here. now they're trying to say, we need let's continue the hearing to talk. it's been demonstrated they

don't want to talk. we tried to talk when this was an issue early on and now they only want to talk after the rescheduling request is denied. it's not going to get anywhere. they know that delay kills us. they know every day that our permits are on hold, it kills us. and our move-in dates are delayed and we have hundreds of workers that need to move in and they're on hold. delay is not our friend, it's their friend. the water pipe burst issue, he said someone told me we caused it. we didn't cause it. it had nothing to do with the permits. it happened at 4:00 in the morning, no one as on the site. that's just made up. so i don't know if we need to get that that further. again that was hearsay. if you want hearsay, with we can provide it, because ryan chris spoke to hudson and they said, you didn't do that at all.

i know it's hearsay, but there is no evidence we had anything to do with the pipe burst. that's a distraction. so here's where we are. we're operating within the hours that we're allowed to operate within. i don't think there has been any allegation that really happened since february, we operated outside of them. and the sound, again there is nothing above 80, but if you want to verify the numbers, we'd be happy to put in the type one decibel readers that the police code requires to measure this. we'll put them in and we'll monitor them and have weekly meetings with hudson and with whomever we're allowed, and provide the data or whatever, just to show our noise is ok. i mean, if that's what we're trying to do. we can't stop this. and we can't reduce our hours,

because we also have limitations imposed by the commercial landlord when we can do our work not to interfere with the commercial tenants. we're in a difficult position here, because we can't reduce our hours to make them happy, because we already have limitation on when we can work. what would be the most equitable here is to show -- to demonstrate that the noise is within the appropriate levels. so no one can argue that we are playing fast and loose with the data, or that we're being loud. we're not. we can demonstrate that for you. that's the extent of my rebuttal. i think mr. bower has a couple of points he wants to make in the remaining four minutes. >> just a couple of things. in regards to the torch, we're not being dishonest.

it was a settling torch, that's what they were cutting the metal with. it's demolition of steel spheres. you're not carrying the tank up the ladder, it sits on the ground, you have the hose, you would not use a grinder to cut through quarter inch pipe steel. you'd be there all year. so just want to be sure everyone knows we're being truthful about what we're tacking about here. and we do know what we're doing. in regards to the hours of construction, there are also the building rules and regulations for the commercial property that we're operating within that is strictly prohibits any noisy work after 9 a.m. between 9 a.m. and 6 p.m. so, there is the police code, there is the building rules. we are on a tight rope between those doing our best to manage. in terms oth