roof is considered an occupied floor. that's directly opposite to what they just said, that was the previous interpretation. the -- going forward, the hearings that i came back from, they're dealing with a 2021 international building code, and they've -- they've expanded this issue to not only high-rises but we count occupied roofs on low-rises, and what ramifications does that have, and there are ramifications to sprinkler systems and fire alarms. it's the first triem code hearings that i've gone to that, they've looked at roof decks. they're not common in the

united states, but they're low on the priority except for california or san francisco. we don't have the space for common areas. planning department requires the common areas, so a lot of times, the only place to put them is on roofs, so now, we have occupied roofs. where else? the commentary for the building code, which we use a lot to try to decipher meetings behind this stuff. in 2012, also part of your package there -- let me find it. the commentary for 2012 for permits quite sometime ago under high-rise buildings says that, first of all, the code provision is that -- or the

definition of a high-rise building located more than 75 feet above the lowest level of vehicle access, but determining what qualifies as a high-rise building is a fairly unique measurement of height and is not based on the definition of building height. the critical measurement is from the lowest ground location where a fire department will be able to set its firefighting equipment to the floor -- floor level of occupied floors, including any occupied roof. they included it back then as shown in a figure, and then, it has the figure below and in your handout. well, in the new commentary, it was probably part of the code hearings that the mayor may not have heard, but they've taken the word "including occupied roof" out of the -- out of that commentary for whatever reason,

so now, it says pretty much the same wording, determining what qualifies as a high-rise building is a fairly unique measurement of height and is not based on the definition of building height. the actual definition of measurement is from the lowest ground location where the fire department will be able to set its firefighting equipment to the floor level of occupied floors as shown in the figure. so they've specifically taken that out. and again, they don't take things out just for no reason. even -- even in the commentary, each word is important. so there had to have been some discussions on if we want to include this occupied roof or not. so kind of the net result of all this is we have differing -- differing opinions -- i think the -- the fire department has done a great job in trying to resolve previous permits up to this point. they want to handle them the way we have been handling them

according to the old interpretations we have been using, and new permits coming in, they want to handle perthe new state fire marshal interpretation, and it'll cause a few issues, but that's the law of the land. but that doesn't mean they've made those corrections physically in the building code yet. they're just interpretations at this point, which leaves building department interpreting them one way, fire department interpreting it another way, and that's never good. so we -- somehow, we want to get on the same common ground going forward. >> so just -- sorry kirk, just to -- are you finished with your presentation? >> yes. >> yes. what is the date going forward -- what's the -- >> april 4, i think. >> april 4. so if i submit a project after april 4, and it's a low-rise, for example, that has a roof deck on it -- >> currently, the building

department would probably say that it's not a high-rise, and it would get to the fire department -- and for our consideration, it is a high-rise. >> okay. thank you. >> and the date is april 4, 2018. so they've agreed to go by any preapps that were in the past, that the agreement were made, that everyone is on board with honoring them. >> i know this was the old word, the outreach that was done with regard to the industry or anybody. >> for the fire marshal interpretation? >> the architect association? how did they know. >> well, they'd request an interpretation from the san bruno building official or whoever he was directly to the state fire marshal, and then, those interpretations are published on their website, and of course, the fire department here complies with what the

state fire marshal has his interpretation of what is meant by the code. >> weif i'm in planning right now, and i've got a roof deck, and it is he aa low-rise, and i got it approved two weeks ago, and i spent the last two years getting that approved, i don't have that now. >> two years spent going to the planning department two years ago, if you had a planning permit two years ago, you're still in good shape. >> if i'm in planning right now, i'm notifying everybody. >> if you got it after april 4, and you went to the building department for a permit, is that point, there's an issue. >> just as a procedure, is this a problem? nobody's known about this other than a project sponsor -- one project sponsor called me all confused and said, you know,

just gotta profession approval looking at their drawings, and architect didn't know anything about it. d.b.i. were fine with it, but fire was saying different. >> we're not often in disagreement. fire department has different vantage point of construction. they have to fight fires. theirs usually takes precedent over ours, but we have our vantage point, too. we try to go by the code, and the discussions that have been made to develop that code. so like i said, that interpretation will probably turn into code eventually, and then, it won't be a problem for us, all those codes. in this interim time, it's an interpretation, and so it's our responsibility to interpret the code for us, and the -- interpret the code for them?

>> in your 30 years of experience in dealing with this, how long does it take before we come to code? >> well, like i said, those -- that interpretation, i would think would be incorporated in this upcoming code cycle, especially if someone from san francisco had an issue that needs to be addressed. >> okay. >> california was -- would have discussions on it, and then, they would make a decision one way or another, and i think pretty much the fire marshal would win unless there was overwhelming response in the other direction from the public, builders and whatnot that had a huge impact unnecessarily. >> commissioner warshell? >> i agree with you that, you know, what i see constantly is to set aside the outdoor space. roof decks are more and more in demand to be in compliance.

and i'm just wondering if the recent focus on the affordable housing density bonus site program is forcing more and more buildings right out to the cusp of the 75-foot level, that this is -- you know, we almost have policies somewhat at odds with each other or interacting, and we may or may not be talking to each other about we have this desirable goal, but we have this unfavorable outcome. is this density height bonus part of the discussion that is making this more germane at the moment? [please stand by for captioner switch]

would have to change from wood construction to concrete. >> but have you heard anything to the effect of the density program where they are really getting two extra stories? which really does put this much more on the cusp sort of thing, as part of this discussion or not? >> i don't know, specifically, i don't. >> okay, thank you. >> okay, kirk, thank you for that. stay close. so the fire came on short notice, i appreciate it and will be cognizant of their time. so libby, if you will come up. the mayor's office of housing is here too, we will slot you in next. thank you for putting this on so quickly. i came to you last week. it's something we would like to jump on right now and get a

good understanding, so i would be interested in hearing your interpretation. >> good morning, commissioners, my name is lydia and i'm public relations for the fire department. we were hoping the fire marshal would be able to make it but he had a scheduling conflict. i have captain balmy here. i first found out this from commissioner mccarthy and i called the fire marshal and his response it's the interpretation of the state fire marshal, which we, on the local level have to follow. but i do think there was some sort of communication break down somewhere. we have to find out why the state fire marshal has changed the interpretation and have that discussion as it relates to buildings in san francisco. and the fire department here could start those discussions. and i'm happy to reach out to

people on the state level and try to begin that discussion in the near future. the last thing we want is to prohibit people from being able to build much-needed housing in this industry. so i would be committed to pulling a meeting together asap to try to figure this out. we are working with d.b.i. on many, many policy issues and i would be happy to take the lead on that and take any questions you may have. and if it's technical i have to kick it over to captain balmy, because i don't have a badge. [chuckles] >> if we could hear from the captain, that would be great. stay close. we may have more questions. thanks. >> good morning, commissioners. kirk gave a very comprehensive and correct assessment of not

only the interpretation of the code, and he is correct in stating that we are bound by the state fire marshal's office with their interpretations. when this project came to light, this interpretation came to light, we are bound to implement what the interpretation is from the state fire marshal. prior to that the uniform building code, '97 uniform building code was in place and there was no interpretation that said it was an occupied floor. there was an issue, apparently. jim allen from san bruno fire sent in a request for an interpretation of whether it is an occupied floor or not, an occupied roof. and as kirk had indicated, the

answer came back in the affirmative that yes, it is. because the state fire marshal issued this in writing, we are bound by that. >> i think this is our first one we ever had to deal like this. procedurally, and i know dan isn't here of the fire marshal, i won't get into it too much, i appreciate you coming on short notice. i guess the purpose of this communication today, i would hope, we could put together a more formal sit-down with the powers that be preferably at the state level to dig down further on this. i will tell you why, and i don't want to bore my fellow commissioners, i built low-rise

buildings and they work well because of our lot line adjustments and so on. our density allows us to do it in a lot of the places. and because of the size of the lots, most of the open space is put on the roof. they aren't just fancy decks for people to drink wine, it's open air open space. they are very efficient buildings. and to commissioner warshell's point, it's probably going to be one of the most -- that type of building, is probably going to be the only, in most of the part of town where a lot is built, the highest you will be going unless you are a building downtown, doing a high rise. you are going to lose a whole floor. and that could translate into units. and of course, commissioner warshell's point, we are looking at density bonuses and so on and somebody from housing could probably talk about that. those are usually corner lots.

and once again, full lot coverage, open air on the roof. it's quite a problem mat ec thing. -- problematic thing. i just wanted this meeting today to see if the fire department would be willing to work with us to put together that comprehensive group to talk this through and explain is there an exception for san francisco, an interpretation for san francisco or san bruno, possibly we might get an exemption. and i asked the question in the past when codes like this won't work in our particular environment, has he ever been successful in making the case to undo a state marshal's decision on something like that? >> well, i understand what you are discussing and your examples. i do not know. and i can't answer if the state fire marshal would make an exception for a certain local. the local jurisdiction could be

more restrictive, but they can't be less restrictive, and that's part of the issue here. but i would echo olivia scanlin's recommendation that a sit-down meeting get together to discuss the issues. >> commissioner walker, please. >> thank you so much for this. i think it is really important that we resolve this issue. i know we also have somebody from the mayor's office on housing, if you could come up and talk about how it affects the issue of the density bonus and what we are looking at as far as the ability to build this type of housing in ways that is affordable. thank you very much. >> thank you, captain. appreciate you coming out on such short notice. >> thank you. >> good morning, commissioners. my name is erin carson and i'm the construction representative for the mayor's office of housing and community development. and i appreciate you taking the time to talk about this. i think you all basically talked about the same things i

was going to bring up. including the density bonus, the cost of doing housing in san francisco. the importance of affordable housing. the crisis that we are facing right now. and yes, it all comes together in one sort of confluence of challenges. we have green roof requirements. we have open space requirements. we have housing requirements. we have the cost of building. and of course, yes, we can't afford to do high-rise construction, it never pencils out in the types of projects that we do. we have very constrained sites. our sites are usually challenging in ways others aren't even challenged by, we are on top of b.a.r.t. stations, on top of muni stations, all sorts of crazy things. so to add cost or remove units is a very serious issue for us. so you all understand these issues very well. i'm not telling you anything you don't already know.

i appreciate the consideration that the fire department has. we would be happy to work with and talk about this further. talk to our sponsors and our architects about different options and different ways of looking at this. where life safety, of course, is top of our minds, always. and how we can make sure that the life safety issues are addressed, while we are also housing san francisco's lowest income residents. >> okay. >> thank you. >> thank you. >> ms. carson, just to use your expertise, i know you come from a world of negotiating and constantly trying to deal with evolving worlds, whether it's funding, is there any advice you could give us, particularly in dealing with the state. >> i think the fire department would be better at that, than i am. i have never had a lot of luck negotiating with the state. >> i think -- i'm sort of a logical person. and that doesn't always

function well in government but, i kind of look at it, this statement of where the fire department can place its equipment often is a very different place where the front entrance is. so right now, i think the interpretation is from the point of entry. our entrances are sometimes in different areas. but if a fire truck can get to, you know, a back area or side corner or whatever, that is a dimension, i think is a logical one for equipment and access. so i don't know if that is something we could do to massage around the fact we do need access, we do need life safety to, you know, save people from the roof, perhaps. but yes, they are on a roof. so the smoke issue and some other issues shouldn't really apply and that's what's supposed to trigger high-rise

is smoke control and emergency egress. >> i guess it's more -- to commissioner walker's point, what is the make up of this team we would put together, make our case why we are a unique build here. what is the make-up of that committee. it doesn't look like this has happened before. i don't think we have had to deal with this level before. >> it doesn't look like this has happened before, but just from my experience since i came from the fire department i spent time working with city agencies, pardon the pun, to put out fires. i've worked with erin coming up with solutions when it comes to issues similar to this. so i believe, if we have the state fire marshal's office at the table, with our fire

marshal chief cossio saying we need flexibility. and bringing erin and bringing in maybe some of our state representatives, i would be happy to reach out to them and ask them to sit at the table and try to hammer out some kind of compromise. so it's just about getting the right people to the table and making sense of why they made the change and does it really apply to san francisco. because the one fix doesn't fix all. san bruno is not san francisco. i'm happy to start the ball rolling. i can hopefully pull something together by the end of june. >> commissioner, if i could, i do think the affordable housing industry would be a good representative to be at the table. whether it's through a group like n.p.h., non-profit housing or some of the bigger building developers. it's not just that we need the roof or outdoor space, the majority of our buildings have

free child care, so we have even more outdoor requirement and lots of times -- so, we wouldn't be just designating housing. our industry secretly provides a great deal of free and low-income child care. so we would also be putting that at risk. if i could just say, recently there's been precedent of all the towns in california saying we shouldn't have one size fits all for things like zoning and housing. i'm surprised that, you know, it's not applying here as well. >> okay. next steps would be? >> next steps would be, i would reach out to various different organizations and people to pull this meeting together. i will reach out to the state fire marshal first and open that line of communication. i haven't worked a lot with the

state fire marshall since i came on board. it's something that would be beneficial. this could be the beginning of a relationship. use this issue as opening that door. >> director from d.b.i., we would have a person to help facilitate and put that comprehensive team together. somebody who is really affected by this. whether it's the non-profits, the private sector, the industry and so on. >> depending how this conversation goes, we can bring in elected officials. that would be like the second step. >> i think that would be a really good idea. >> somebody particularly representative of that area, mostly downtown and stuff. or these buildings will be built, along the transit corridors and so on. the whole planning is built

around the fact there's mostly low-rise buildings here. all right. thank you. >> all right. i will keep the director's office in communication of when the meeting is taking place and follow-up with you, commissioner mccarthy. >> would that be unfair to say a couple weeks, or do you want 30 days? >> i would like to pull it together by the end of next week because the following week is a holiday. i'm all about getting it done. the list of work doesn't go on. >> at least we could have the four sit down. okay, appreciate that. thank you for all your work on this. >> kirk, you have some words? >> i want to add that co-cycle i mentioned. the submission of the state fire marshal amendments for the next upcoming code is right about now. so there's deadlines on the state level that would be good to try to fit within. >> would you be able to find that for certain and get that to olivia? >> sure. >> yeah, because that's

important. thank you for bringing that up. commissioners, if there's any further comment? >> is there any public comment on this item? okay, seeing none. item 6. discussion regarding d.b.i. update on civil grand jury recommendations from both fiscal year '15-'16 and fiscal year '12-'13. >> i would like to thank commissioner warshell for putting this on the agenda. unfortunately william strong is our staff expert and he is unavailable today so i would suggest this be moved to the next meeting. >> if there's no objections, thank you, commissioner warshell. >> are commissioners okay with this? okay, thank you. is there public comment?

for anybody who wanted to speak on this item? okay, thank you. our next item is item 7. discussion regarding d.b.i.'s policies and procedures for vacant buildings. >> good morning, commissioners. ed sweeney, deputy director. i'm here to speak mostly about vacant store fronts and also touch on the vacant buildings, which i think you are much more familiar with since it's been with us since 2014. the definition of what is

vacant, according to section 103a.4.1, a building shall be defined as vacant or abandoned if it is unoccupied or unsecured. is unoccupied and secured by boarding or similar means. is unoccupied and has multiple code violations or unoccupied over 30 days. a building which is partially unoccupied and cited for blight under chapter 80. also shall be deemed a vacant or abandoned building that is subject to this section. commercial residential programs. legislation for commercial is ordinance 182/14 for the residential. it's ordinance 194/04. the commercial came into effect

in 2014. residential came in 2009. the annual fees are the same. the difference being that once we establish a vacant commercial, there's a hold of 9 months. that is to give the person time to lease. these leasing aren't like buildings. they are constantly being turned over. this is to give the property owner a chance to lease it. the requirements is properties need to be registered within 30 days, if they are vacant or abandoned. they need to maintain the maintenance, security and property owner info posted on the building. d.b.i.'s process. d.b.i. receives complaint or vacancy is observed through field observation. d.b.i. adds property to program database and track monitor its progress. d.b.i. researches property using permit tracking system and conducts physical on site inspection to ensure a building

is subject to the program. once confirmed, the property is added to the registry requiring code enforcement, they contact the building owner to inform them the program responsibility provide information on next steps to being in the program. what is not ordered abandoned property. if the property owner wishes to contest the property is not vacant or abandoned, they may provide the following documentation to be removed. a copy of the pg&e. garbage bill. p.u.c. water bill. and a copy of the current lease oren tall agreement. -- or rental agreement. break down is shown on the next slide. as you can see, the richmond, we have more under the richmond than anywhere else that's due to the board of supervisor out

there, supervisor fewer, she had her citizens go out and canvas the district for us and we really appreciate it. >> are these both commercial and residential? >> no, this is just commercial vacant store fronts. >> okay. >> vacant store front status in the database we have identified 383. that includes 80 properties from the richmond district. the registered buildings are 21, the director's hearings are 29 and receive notice of violation 96. additional complaints to be processed, which means we have 302. we have to physically go out there and see them. we are getting a lot of help from other government agencies, board of supervisors. it just takes time. and we are putting more resource in it. it's quite involved.

this is like a live lift. there is constantly vacant buildings coming off the list, going back on the list and quite a few protests. some of them are being used as storage. some are being used as part of another business off site so there's not a ton of usage. >> if something is retail or zoned for that, is storage allowed in 100% of the building? >> no, but what they will say is that they do use it as a store room. what comes to mind is a business on ocean avenue, they have washers and dryers in there. they say they do open the door and bring people in there and they take washers and dryers out. they big to differ with us, that it's just storage. it gets complicated.

the code enforcement process, we have either complaint, or systemic enforcement. we have to physically go out and see it. we have a code outreach. notice of violation is issued. they have to obtain the required permit. we do reinspections. director's hearings. it either gets abated, if not abated, we give them an order of abatement. assessments are issued. we use the franchise task board litigation committee, citations. city attorney, district attorney and hopefully at the end they are all abated. there is our contact if anybody is watching this, they can call directly to d.b.i. and we will get them on the list and we will go out there. i'm ready for any questions. >> thank you, deputy director sweeney.

this is a very watched commission, a lot of people watch. [laughter] >> you'd be surprised. >> yeah, they do. commissioner walker? >> tell me how we determine $711 is a fee that is appropriate. >> that is based on vacant building when we came in 2009 we figured so many hours and it came, actually it was more back then, it was 750. now we charge $711 for the administrative costs of keeping this process. we have a full-time d.b.i. employee, full-time clerk. we are about to put more resources into it. and also having people come to

the a.a.b., come to the meetings, the costs associated and keeping the records. >> we went down. how come we went from $750 to $711? >> recently, off the tip of my tongue, i can't remember. >> i mean, it seems low to me, as far as something that would be a prohibitive type of thing. i would love to push that envelope. i know we aren't the body to do it. but maybe comment to the powers that be. >> we base it on the vacant building. it's much easier, it's either vacant or not. like i say, i have actually driven in a car on saturdays a couple times to get a feel for what's involved. a lot of times i'm putting it on a list. it's a coin toss. it's a saturday, it's a closed, is it a vacant store front? >> i hear you.

once established it seems it should be higher. >> probably on this program, yeah, there's a lot more to it than vacant buildings. vacant buildings are presidenty easy. >> commissioner warshell? >> first off, i would like to really thank our inspectors reardon and duffy. when i had some situations for both housing and store fronts that were vacant how quickly they got out there, issued the citations, did the inspections. unfortunately the residential has been progressing to renovation and use. store front not yet. i was intrigued when you had page 6 with that slide how effective supervisor fewer's outreach to citizens was. and so when we see something

like that, that is so incredibly successful. i know every supervisor would like this problem abated in their district, how proactive are we being in relaying those statistics to all the supervisors so they can make -- >> they all know about the program with the richmond district. 40 properties were already on the list. 28 properties were invalid addresses and we had 87 new complaints created. so far we visited 40 properties and we found another duplicate. >> okay. the graph is really compelling. it's a fascinating -- >> she got together with neighbors, concerned neighbors

association and they canvassed her entire district. >> is there a way, i think to your point, is there a way to encourage the other supervisors and talk with the other supervisors? supervisor fewer. >> has a report been given to the board of supervisors, the success of -- >> yes. the mayor's office is helping us. there's more than 300 in the queue. it came from one of the organizations. alphabet soup. >> i think that's clearly something if we could take her success and spread it through other districts, it would certainly benefit all. just speak to us a bit, once something is listed as vacant how regular the monitoring of that property. most people are very concerned

about the upkeep issues when something isn't occupied. >> right now we are putting more emphasis on this program. there's more work than we initially thought had to go into this. the list is a live list. they are constantly coming off, going back on. somebody goes out of business. i have talked to a few merchants saying it's getting tougher out there because of e-business. a lot of your boutiques, they are struggling. our district inspectors are given these lists and they can and do monitor it.

we were mainly waiting on complaints. there will be certain stores that aren't kept up we put more emphasis on. we will put it through code enforcement, all the way to litigation. >> i hear the same things from small business district council. the number of vacant store fronts based on just how tough it is to run a small business are on the increase. when we say, you know, nine months vacant, to a commercial district something that is vacant for nine months is detrimental. but clearly it's a new reality that things will stay vacant longer because it's harder to find new tenants. so i guess that really just is the new reality and we have to be sensitive to that and maybe even be willing to revisit if 9

months is the appropriate time. but that doesn't mean the vigilance on frequent inspections so if the unfortunate situation is that it is vacant doesn't mean that it have a derelict appearance and become detrimental to the entire corridor. that's what i hear more about from people, not only that we are dealing with the reality of more store fronts that will be vacant based on the change in the environment. but when they are vacant they are staying vacant longer and the longer they are vacant, the more derelict they become. we all know we are a fee-for-service business, or department. investigating the trade-off of

what is the fee for a vacant property and should it be higher, if it really can deliver a much higher level of service to the total community with much more aggressive monitoring of conditions. it would be something i would love to see us evaluate. >> okay. thank you, commissioner warshell. commissioner? >> along the same lines as the fee, speaking as a building owner, mission housing is a non-profit and we try to rent all our ground floor spaces to community serving non-profits. we have a lot of small retail like on 24th street. we have the luxury of not being bound by the "market rate" of what you are supposed to rent something.

and to be frank we have 100% occupancy always. i wonder when you talk about the trade-off. i think the fee should be a lot higher and be prohibitive to the point where i would love to know if something has been vacant for two years, what is the lease up plan. what are they asking per square foot, and what is it compared to the surrounding neighborhood. i could tell you 40% of the market rate right now makes money. just because something can be $5 per square foot doesn't mean it should be or needs to be. i wonder if that vacancy fee is a way to have the other building owners see the light, for lack of a better term and lower their -- i think there are businesses. there are people who want to rent but it's really expensive to do it right now. >> our fees right now are based on cost recovery. >> yeah. i'm saying, i wonder if we could investigate having it

based on more than that. on actually serving the neighborhood. if the end goal is to be serving the neighborhood, then i think we should make the fees do that also. >> district attorney robb kapla. it would require a study to make sure they are set at the proper amount. while it's something to explore it's not really an option. >> it is the board and mayor who initiate that. i agree, 100%. i think the market, if we are working on market influences, that's really the key is looking at that, between the fees for leaving it unoccupied. market. which is set artificially. >> are you finished? >> i'm done. >> okay. commissioner walker.

>> to follow-up on that, i agree with district attorney kapla. i think we should be doing more to make sure the effects spread on the commercial corridor doesn't occur. if we are more complaint driven and relying on efforts like supervisor fewer to mobilize her community, those are good. and we shouldn't not want to do those things. but if we want to have more proactive outreach to evaluate and spot and report by all city agencies, if we are able to associate the fees that are justified to get that data and get that reporting, perhaps that's something where we can have an appropriate increase in

the fee, just as having a much-higher standard of monitoring, meaning we are going to have more people. we need more people out there doing this. and writing the reports more regularly, more frequently and coordinating. >> we are very limited to space. >> i'm sorry? >> the building department now, we are very limited to space. >> they need to be out there looking at buildings -- >> hold on, commissioner. >> i don't have any more space to put anybody. >> it's a good conversation and good points. why i put this on the calendar is the article written in "the chronicle" about district 1 and the vacancy space there. i'm very sensitive when i feel the article is a little tilted toward we are supposed to be doing a better job there. i just wanted to have the presentation looking at this is

what our rules are, how we could improve them. good to hear deputy director say you are considering more people for this. i, actually, on my way here bummed into supervisor from district 1, i told her we would have a conversation about that. i told her to make sure she watches. but also she was very interested, thank you for putting this presentation together, and i know you did it short notice. it's important this is forwarded to her and her staff. she was very open if we wanted to sit down and talk about it and how we could improve better in these districts it would be good. maybe some other supervisors should be looking at. maybe kind of looking at how they could be more proactive on their store fronts. i know we are complaint-driven. i will be honest with you, i had a building sitting for two years, and it's been marketed

everyday and every week, but i wasn't calling in on the $700 fee. >> we do windshield surveys. one person who goes out everyday looking. >> but it's hard. the point i'm trying to make you had gone by my building, i don't think you would have put me on your list because it looked clean, but there was no business going on, it was vacant and it was because of market forces. we definitely got a problem here in retail. i mean it's changing, it's evolving. what i see as a next step to where we could help even the planning department to point out that, look, we aren't getting these stores filled for whatever reason and it might be they just don't fit the profile of retail any more and maybe we should look at some of our zoning, i know on some retail zoning there's stuff we can put but people don't do it, it's not allowed, it takes conditional use, it's drawn

out, very lawyer intensive. we should be looking at all those possible scenarios to make this efficient. it might not always be money, it might be use. i would love to take this to another level. it's our job to see we are doing everything we can mandated by us. i would love to know what, if another supervisor took the same one as district one, how many store fronts would they jump up like that as well. i think we will see a lot more of this, i don't see it changing. i would be interested in a plan to see how we can really step our game up. commissioner lee? sorry i was a bit long-winded there. >> i think it's clear vacant building, vacant store fronts

are a concern of this commission and the politicians and the leaders in city as well. but to get to the next step how it should be implemented we need to get our facts down. i think that's what they are looking at d.b.i. to do. get the numbers right. get the facts down where are these vacant store fronts and maybe even develop some sort of categories of these buildings, what type of vacancies and that's what they are looking for at d.b.i. our role is to get these facts together. i think that's what we should do first. and i would implore the department to think of ways to get those numbers ready for the decision makers, or the policy advisors. >> commissioner walker, please. >> i don't know if you have done this but maybe we should

do it by district and present reports to each supervisor, what is already registered in their districts and they can maybe add to them and may be an encouragement for the next step, what supervisor fewer did, organizing people to help. >> i do understand your point you are staffed to the -- you got a lot of moving parts. but i think this is a big planning issue as well. i don't know why planning wouldn't participate as well. that's something we could bring up, maybe the director could talk to the director of planning. and see if he would be interested in doing a comprehensive survey. maybe come up with criteria, as everybody is saying, why we understand why projects are vacant so long, is it the zoning, is it the rent, is it whatever, is it just bad management, so on. >> yeah.

commissioner mccarthy. i did have conversation with director ryan. it's a combination of factors. one of the things is usage and he said he will look into it with so many administrator and see what else they can do. but that's one piece of it. he said he will look into it. i can ask tomorrow and friday again at their meeting. >> i think it would be a very good thing in the future. >> also i talked to, also we are trying to strengthen things out our code enforcement unit to mobilize to do all this. besides this, another thing is the a.b.e. program and that's why when we work in richmond district, we could see the store fronts ourselves too and have the neighborhood to help

us out. >> but i want to be clear deputy director, i think you are doing your job. i think the inspectors are out there doing their jobs. i just want to go on the record what is our scope of responsibility and we are doing that. if we need to strengthen that going forward. >> we do walks in the neighborhood. >> i know you do. i think that jump in d-1 we didn't have a record, it didn't read very well in the article. like we weren't paying any attention. i know it's a tough thing to do and there's many levels but if you have a focused group on it, you will get real-time data. i think that's what we are asking, if we could put something through to the two directors to do something like that. >> how easy is it to convert to offices. a.d.u. like shopping mall, like the

new one on market. >> 945 market. >> they converted part to office because of the retail situation. >> planning process. >> more for planning. d.b.i. we only do t.i. >> thank you. and thanks again for doing it on short notice. good presentation. >> is there any public comment on item 7? seeing none, item 8. update on accela permit and project tracking system. >> good morning commissioners, or good afternoon. i'm sean bulin. i work with the department of technology and i'm working with d.b.i. to help update the aclasis stem.

accela system. we are in the final stretch. the last few months. so we are focusing on testing, training and outreach. it's literally building the computer infrastructure and installing the software on it. that's where we will do our next couple rounds of testing to make sure it works and functions as needed. literally the last couple days we wrapped up our first round of user acceptance testing, that's a positive thing and training has started. we started training on june 4th. what's coming up next month, training will continue, we will go into another cycle of user acceptance test. there's also a little bit of data migration and that type of

activity that is also ongoing and should be wrapping up in the next month or so. you will see in color coding, the end of build, those dates were not met and there has been some impact on readiness. readiness is the testing and training. that's why you see the yellow for the current tasks. and i will talk about where we are under the risks and issues. the bottom line we did not make those dates at the end of may 7. there were a number of areas reporting some of the configuration, some application itself. dates were not met. what we have done to deal with that and address that is the vendor has brought on a couple more resources, that's part of it. they have adjusted resourcing a bit to adjust. and we probably the biggest thing we did is we changed some of our testing schedule. we did start testing as we

wanted back on may 30th. but it was only for a small portion. it was about a quarter or a third of the application. the rest of everything else testing is going to start on monday. so that push out of a couple weeks, we initially hoped all testing, we planned all testing would be done very late in july and now testing is going on into august as a result of that. so that's basically how we have adapted to that. the development team, the vendor needed more time. so we had to push out a big chunk of the testing a few weeks and now the testing wraps up in august. we were able to start testing on may 30th. subset of permits, primarily what we call the trade permits. primarily plumbing and electrical. it was rough.

we had an awful lot of defects and we are tackling an awful lot of defects. and that's kind of where we are right now. what's the right word? i would say it's an exciting time. but that's where we are at, we are logging a lot of issues and we are fixing a lot of issues and trying to make up for the lost time and preparing for the next big round of testing. the first time we test all of everything starts on monday. and that's the status. do you have any questions? >> i wanted to thank both you and the director for the large employee meeting that was held recently to update staff, and take input. there were a couple items that came up frequently. one was a challenge to how much

support staff would be available at all locations and i took that as a constructive concern of the employees, they want to make sure this is smooth and successful. as i recall, i don't have my notes with me, but there were 2-3 issues that kept coming up from staff and i think they were trying to be positive in making this successful. has there been follow-up from that meeting and has it been communicated to the employees? >> yes. there has been, that was before we really started doing the in-depth scheduling of the training and over the last few weeks, in fact there have been sessions with all of the management to make sure people are signed up and people are signed up for the training, th