planning department was initially that we are three nights a week and holidays. >> okay.

>> and then we will move to seven nights a week as it becomes workable for us. >> so maybe to simplify where i'm heading, it could be as simple as any night you plan on exercising beyond 2:00 a.m., you'd be able to notify the commission and what i'm trying to get at, would you call dpar this a month out of when you're going to operate? >> no, that is never our intention. >> okay, perfect, thank you so much. >> i do have one more question, sorry, mr. paul. so the after-hours permits that we give are -- they are for a privileged few in san francisco, obviously, and the issue that is we run into, that we have run into in the past, are when we do grant an after-hours permit and the person we granted it to maybe doesn't take this commission as seriously as they

should, or issues arise and they are difficult to solve, et cetera, and it's really hard for us to dial it back after that. so in a minute or less, however long you can speak, but can you just explain why your client or why b.c.s. management is the kind of group that can be a good steward of this kind of permit and why we should? >> this applicant has a real commitment, both to this district and to nightlife in san francisco. i think that this operator has a broad view of their important place in the community, and in the economy overall. i mean, a great portion of our clientele are san francisco residents coming from area restaurants, and also conventioneers and out of town visitors, and there are a lot of balances that go on in making that work, and i think this particular operator has paid close attention to how to be a

good neighbor and be a good operator. >> thank you very much. >> thank you. >> all right. so before we get into motions, i think we should do public comment here. is there any public comment on this specific agenda item? all right, seeing none, public comment is closed. and director weiland, you can help me with this, hopefully, but if we're going to adopt a motion here, we do have to -- part of the motion has to be to adopt the planning commission motion number 20330 for land use reasons, is that correct? >> yes. you should refer to that memo director azevedo put together that has a staff recommendation. >> president bleiman: yeah. initial discussion as we're looking at that on this topic? >> i have some.

what i'd like to get on everyone's radar, i would like to propose if this is going to be reviewed tonight we look at the conditions briefly, i have some suggestions and we're also going to have to strike some existing conditions, because they no longer apply. >> president bleiman: these are found in our folder, but they are for the previous name of the business, is that correct? >> they are under the current place of entertainment permit. >> president bleiman: got it. >> what i'm referring to, operation should cease at 0200. >> you can't actually strike conditions from the place of entertainment permit this evening, because that's not agendized. you don't have the power to do that at this time. i was just saying that you could reference the current p.o.e. conditions and adopt whatever still makes sense for this e.h.p. this was adopted in 2002, solely

by the police department, because we didn't exist then. so some of these don't even make sense anymore, or are already included as boilerplate conditions, due to the good neighbor policy and just referencing current police code. >> got it, retroactively are operating under our good neighbor policy. >> totally. >> if i could get some clarification. if we act tonight and, for example, their place of entertainment permit says operation shall cease at 2:00 a.m. and we issue a permit that says they can go to 4:00 a.m., how will that be enforced? >> i believe by having an extended hours permit, that condition becomes null and void at that point. that's a very odd condition. i can refer to the city's attorney's office on that, but since we have it agendized looking at their place of entertainment permit, we can't make changes to that. >> what i'm trying to head is for all law enforcement, both on the commission and on the police side, whatever we move forward

on, make it enforceable and reasonable on both sides, especially for the operator. >> president bleiman: yeah, we can ask director weiland to look into that. >> commissioner falzon: perfect. >> president bleiman: other thoughts? >> commissioner thomas: obviously, this section of broadway has been on our radar for quite some time, predating my joining the entertainment commission, and i think it's worth thinking wholistically about the whole area, but i'm also reluctant for us to be holding one operator sort of to standards based on other operators, you know, not being necessarily the best actors in the neighborhood. and i think, you know, having more good actors is probably one

of our best strategies to change the way that, that area is perceived and the general safety for consumers of entertainment, as well as the staff who are working in those places. so, you know, my inclination is to follow our colleagues on the planning commission and move forward in parallel with them. and so, you know, if we're ready for a motion, i'll move forward with that. >> president bleiman: yeah, absolutely. >> commissioner thomas: that we adopt the planning commission motion 20330 and that we approve their request for an extended hours permit with the full good neighbor policy attached and with the understanding the

planning commission will be reviewing this in a year and we should also follow if the planning commission makes another decision that we then review our decision, as well. >> i'll second that. >> i just need a question to etiquette. what if i have another motion, how do we act on that? >> then we amend it. >> i believe a friendly amendment to commissioner thomas' motion, or you can do a vote on her motion, and if it doesn't pass, you can propose a new one. >> commissioner falzon: so if it's appropriate now, i would like to propose a friendly amendment. if everyone wants to take a peek at the existing place of entertainment permit, i do think, considering -- because i absolutely agree with my colleague, that i think asking officer matthias himself, this is a responsible operator, but i do think this is an opportunity, they have existing conditions

that have worked well for them. they've clearly never been brought before us in the past. i would like to see them remained and added to the after-hours permit, and i can either read them or i can go by number, if people are interested. real quick -- >> are you talking about the one that's labeled police department permit and then the second page is permit conditions? >> commissioner falzon: correct, the back side. yes, and i don't want to use the incorrect term. i'm actually proposing we leave all of them and then ignore, so i get the nomenclature correct, number four is way too ambiguous, but i think the other conditions have served the community well, and i think it's in the best interest of all parties to leave them, and i would also like to add two more. one that states that a calendar is provided both to the commission and to the police department one month in advance

of any scheduled after-hours operation, so we're all prepared for it. and then similar to my colleague, i was going to propose a condition that we, too, moving forward have an annual review of performance before the commission. and i think that would be a great tool, as we're moving on these after hours to hopefully applaud them when they come here annually, but i think it would be just a great checkup. anyway, those are my friendly amendments. hopefully, they meet with everyone's approval. >> can i make one staff suggestion before i respond? number five, i don't believe, needs to be there, just because we -- that's a part of our boilerplate, is referencing article 15.1, 15.2, article 29 and 49 on every permit. >> commissioner falzon: my only counter to that is, this is a little bit more specific, but i would defer to my fellow colleagues. i don't believe those laws you just referenced, those statutes,

speak to doors and windows being closed. >> but the good neighbor policy does. >> commissioner falzon: then i would concur, then, let's strike it. we're not striking. we aren't recommending it. so i would take number five off my recommendation list. >> got it. so you are proposing an amendment to my motion to add the number of existing permit conditions to the extended hours permit, specifically numbers 2, 3, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, and add a request that the operator provide the calendar one month in advance and that we do a review in a year. >> commissioner falzon: yeah. i would love to see that moving forward, just annually, kind of work that in as they come forward. i think it would be a great thing annually to have them come in. like i said, hopefully it will be a celebration and not a critical attack. >> yeah. i'd like us to review that in a year, too.

i don't want to load staff down with reviews of good actors, necessarily, but i appreciate -- >> commissioner falzon: point taken. >> -- agree with you, that we should have them come back in a year, for sure. >> i have a question anyway. if planning cancels their zoning anyway, then the entertainment goes out. yeah. >> wouldn't be open after 2:00 if planning takes away -- >> discretionary review. >> i'm very optimistic this will be a positive experience. >> i accept your amendments. >> commissioner falzon: thank you. >> president bleiman: that is seconded. >> i just wanted clairification regarding the previous p.o.e. and numbers you listed, commissioner thomas. you excluded number 10.

>> commissioner thomas: didn't mean to. 2, 3, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11. >> thank you. [ roll call ] >> president bleiman: your extended-hour permit has been granted. congratulations. please follow up with the deputy director at your earliest convenience. thank you. all right, moving along, one more item on tonight's permit calendar. >> our final permit application for this evening is a change in ownership place of entertainment permit application for vertigo, located at 1160 polk street. vertigo has been a part of the low lower nob hill many years and the owners intend to have

deejays and live bands perform. the applicant has been operating under a temporary p.o.e. permit, which allowed entertainment until 1:30 a.m. the new applicant would like entertainment until 2:00 a.m. daily. in your file you'll see the e-notification they sent out to their neighboring businesses, neighbors, and community groups, along with signatures they collected from supportive patrons. northern station approves this permit with no added conditions, and here to tell you more is owner angela voloshyna. >> good evening, commissioners. i'm representing anzhelika voloshyna for vertigo. as indicated on your agenda, vertigo is under new ownership, and i might add, responsible ownership, and i can say that with great qualification, because i, my wife, and daughter, small daughter, live directly across from vertigo,

and we're relieved that we don't have to deal with anymore noise, crowd control issues, et cetera. it's been very quiet. i actually asked the new owner when she was going to open. she said she's been open for quite some time, so that indicates it's been very quiet and respectful to the community. vertigo has gone through a revival under the new ownership. she took about a month to get the place cleaned up. it had fallen into disrepair. there was actually shrubbery growing over a window that didn't exist. they had removed the window, the previous owners. always wondered why we could hear noise coming so clearly from the establishment, and that was the reason. she removed the shrubbery and added double-insulated, noise-proof windows. i want to also add that ms. voloshyna is the vice president of the lower polk business collaborative. she's very engaged in the community and facilitates an in-house outreach meetings put

on by different city departments, as well. she's also -- she holds an entertainment permit at topsies, with no incident on record for five years. she's planning to install high-resolution cameras. they are on order, and they are going to be installed very shortly. she has great management staff. i know them very personally. they work in the neighborhood, as well, extremely qualified. and ms. voloshyna is here to answer any questions that you might have. >> hello, everybody. any questions? we actually already installed the cameras. >> president bleiman: so tell me, i mean vertigo has been there so long, i remember -- so tell me the difference between your style and the previous owner. >> so my style, i want to bring

a different crowd. not only a young crowd that comes to polk street on fridays and saturdays. i want to have an older crowd also that can enjoy live jazz. we have live music at topsies, and it's doing really well, so i would love to bring soft live jazz music for happy hour. no one is actually doing that on polk street, and we also want to have craft cocktails, so we want to be open for different kind of clients. not only for young crowds on friday and saturday. >> president bleiman: and you've run your own sound system there? >> yes. we updated the sound system. we installed sound-proof windows, because one window didn't exist, another window was broken. we have in-house security that have been trained.

we have training. and for any kind of entertainment, we will have security. depends on entertainment that we have. with the deejay, more security. with live music, little bit less. >> president bleiman: okay. thank you. any other questions? >> commissioner falzon: just real quick. looking at your application, your security plan is pretty vague. do you want to just very quickly speak to it, what your game plan is? >> sure. as i said, it depends on entertainment. if it's live music, let's say during happy hour, it's going to be very low-key live music. nothing very loud. so we'll have just one, maybe two guards. if it's a friday and saturday, a deejay event, we'll have three to four securities. we have two exits, two entrances

and exits, so we'll have securities there, and we'll have security inside of the venue, making sure, like, everything is safe. >> commissioner falzon: okay. just very quickly, just so you're aware, looking at your application, it appears you're going to hire your own security. just so you know, legally to do that, you have to be licensed as a security provider, not a difficult thing to do. you might want to follow up on how to do that. because technically, if you're going to hire security on your own, you have to be licensed to do that. >> okay. >> commissioner falzon: and that's done through the state. >> sounds good, thank you. >> commissioner falzon: when you mentioned your daughter, she's not going into the place, correct? i met your daughter, i know. just wanted to make sure. thank you. >> just walking by. >> commissioner falzon: perfect. >> president bleiman: i did have a couple questions. in all your years of working,

especially as a server, did you ever have a favorite general manager? >> of course. >> president bleiman: who was that? >> you. >> president bleiman: strike that from the record, please. no, you have a history of responsible operating. i think our careers in owning establishments started almost at the same time after we left harry's, so thank you so much. i have no further questions. you can sit down. >> okay, thanks. >> president bleiman: is there any public comment on this specific agenda item? seeing none, public comment is closed. discussion? >> i motion to approve the permit with the good neighborhood policy, and i'm sure commissioner falzon might have some extra things. >> commissioner falzon: i wanted one easy, friendly amendment now that i know the vernacular. looking at the existing conditions, most aren't relevant today, but one i thought would

be valuable, notice placed on the entrance of the establishment urging patrons to leave the establishment and the neighborhood in a quiet, peaceful, and orderly fashion. i think that would be helpful, just because we know the density of that area. >> president bleiman: okay. >> if we pass the new version of the good neighbor policy tonight, that will also be null and void, but yes. >> commissioner falzon: can't get it both ways. you wouldn't let me strike earlier. >> commissioner tan: i agree. >> president bleiman: we have a motion, just to be clear, this is their license to go all the way to 2:00 a.m., no? >> that's correct. >> president bleiman: and it's adopting the good neighbor policy. >> and sign postage. >> commissioner thomas: i'll second. [ roll call ]

>> president bleiman: your permit has been granted. congratulations. please follow up with deputy director at your earliest convenience. thank you very much. before we move on to the next item, i just want to call a five-minute recess, but let's really do it in five minutes. i have a feeling the next one will take us a while. just five >> all right. welcome back, everyone. the next agenda item is number 7, review and possible action to change the conditions on ec-1377, place of entertainment and premises of halcyon, located at 314 11th street, and i think to get started, director weiland will introduce this for us. >> okay. thank you, president bleiman. so we have miss milano here tonight for d.b.a. halcyon, located at 314 11th street.

i'm just noticing the notice to appear because that is what i noticed on the commission to have them tonight. the purpose of this hearing is to consider revising conditions listed on their permits, and these are relative to issues that we have had since the last hearing on april 3, 2018. so you may want to consider looking at conditions relative to time this evening, although my suggestions are primarily around notifications conditions that are currently on the permit. so currently, you have a couple of conditions, the fifth and sixth conditions on the permit that require the permit holder to share a calendar of events one month in advance. but then, there's a following condition that says, you know, notifying us if things change. we have had issues in terms of

having the permit holder notify us a month in advance. we just receive events going past 4:00 a.m. oftentimes, we hear about it after the factor whenever, when we've received complaints during the 4:00 a.m. time frame. that's something i think you should look at that that evening? i did provide items related to that? you may also want to look at some issues related to sound mitigation here? so we kind of thought up some ideas in terms of having, you know, nightly record keeping of club closing times with picture or video evidence or having the permit holder keep a nightly record of decibel levels, and

then producing them when requested. these are things that the permit holder could do on their own to prove compliance? it's something that you could require of them that we could then ask for to try to support or protest a claim or complaint from a neighbor as these are continuing to go. and then, around sound, you may want to consider, you know, issuing the entertainment commission with tasking us essentially with doing a new sound permit at the place of entertainment and extended hours premises permits? but we do not actually have a lot of evidence around doing reporting ourselves on what the ambient levels are during those times. so you could essentially task us with doing a study like that to come up with ambient levels of those times or you could have the permit holder do that themselves, hiring a sound

consultant that we would work with in concert. finally, should you probably consider having a sound permit in place. we don't currently have that. i think that would be really helpful at looking in the current limit and finally requiring that the permit holder have a staff person on-site at all times while hosting entertainment who understands how to use all of the sound equipment. just for reference on the last nine months -- or i guess it's eight months since our last hearing, we do have activity timeline the beginning of your packet as well as a complaint timeline. so we have any data that you may need tonight or if you have questions for us, we have staff available. inspector fiorentino is here

this evening. he has been going out and enforcing at this club as well as various other venues across the city, so just let us know if you have any questions. >> thank you. so i think for this item specifically, we'd love to hear from miss milano first. i just want to bring up one thing to keep in our minds, halcyon was issued a citation which is currently under appeal, so i think for the -- for tonight's uses that we should -- we should wait for the conclusion of the peal process before we use that for the discussion tonight that we're having here. we are very confident that it will be upheld, but we don't want to use that specifically as an example because that would not give them their due process. so please, miss milano, if you

don't mind, or representative. >> thank you very much. russell robinson, i represent halcyon. are these not working? >> you might need to turn on the other mic? >> thank you. there we are. i'd like to say, first off, that halcyon is aware of its responsibilities, obligations as a good neighbor in the 11 street district. it's attempted to meet or at least meet and confer with the two neighbors in particular who are voicing the vast majority of all these complaints that you see referenced. and i want to talk about these complaints, because in the greater context, that's what's driving this situation here. and i don't want to mince words here. halcyon is aware that it has stayed open past 4:00 a.m., and those nights that were not previously indicated 30 days in advance, at least 30 days in

advance, halcyon's aware of the fact and has taken steps to mitigation that situation, and will in the future be providing at least three days notice no later than the preceding month. so in other words, on december 31st, the planning commission will have the schedule for february . and not just the late nights, but the events that the scheduling director has deemed necessary to comply with the permit. first thing i'd like to show you are the complaints from may through october 2018. that's a list of the complaints, and as to all of those complaints, only one was substantiated. that's the october 13, 2018 complaint, where the venue was found not to be in compliance for a minute going over its

internal decibel levels of 116. i'd also like to talk about the neighbor's windows. there's a disproportionate number of complaints emanating from two neighbors. one across from halcyon, across the norfolk alley and across the street. and then, the other directly across from halcyon. i want to talk about their windows in a minute, but since, the efforts that halcyon has made since october 208. halcyon made efforts to provide windows or curtains. kelly ellis, essentially at the end of the day rebuffed our

efforts to do that. i'll get to in a moment. to tony vu has always been concerned about noise. mr. vu obtained estimates for his windows in february 2016. now, if it was really about noise, if these individuals were being disturbed to such a great extent by noise, mr. vu likely would have taken steps to protect his -- his piece of mind -- peace of mind as he's so frequently complained. he would have taken steps before halcyon opened, he would have taken steps halcyon opened, he would have given halcyon these estimates before october 2018, some 2.5 years after he obtained these estimates. the windows that kelly ellis

complains about, hearing noise from, are these little windows in the red boxes. of all the people living in that building, she's the only one complaining. she rejected our offer to work with her to get soundproof curtains. mr. vu, he lives behind norfolk -- or these windows right here. he has the ability or the opportunity to get soundproof curtains, but he won't do it. instead, as unelected citizens of the city and county of san francisco, they've chosen to lobby and petition the entertainment commission, police department and other city agencies in an effort to not only limit halcyon, but to drive halcyon out of business. halcyon has spent 2.7 million

promoting, sound proofing, obtaining permits, trying to produce a venue that is not only acceptable to the commission but a vibrant part of the 11th street entertainment district and the san francisco community at large. and i want to just touch on one other issue, and that is the fact that that night in question when there was not a sound person there, i think there was a misunderstanding and miss milano will speak to that. but the venue has a sound person on staff at all times, who can adjust the sound, who can work with an inspector coming into the establishment at all times. any questions? >> any specific question? >> i do. >> yes. >> so you made reference about

offering some kind of mitigation as far as sound curtains or whatever else. do we have factual evidence to support that? >> there are some e-mails that you've been copied with, i believe, in the pact, some back and forth e-mails -- packet, some back and forth e-mails provided to mr. vu. >> okay. i only ask because i'm relative relatively new to the commission. are they aware that they've made bona fide offers? okay. that was my question. okay. thank you. >> okay. anything further before ms. milano comes to speak to you? thank you. >> thank you. >> good evening, commissioners. good evening, commissioners. jason beam for halcyon. i'll be brief. i don't want to repeat anything that has already been said. as a san francisco resident and musician for over 20 years as

well as an attorney, i just want to offer that san francisco is a world-class city. halcyon is a world-class night club. miss milano brings in top talent in the genres to perform at her night club, and i have seen firsthand that everybody from the security to the staff to the bartenders are absolutely at the top of their game, and they want nothing more than to provide high quality entertainment for their patrons and for visitors of risk san francisco so that they can come here and have a fantastic experience. and she's currently suffering from two people that are repeatedly complaining on a constant basis. and it is simply not fair to allow two people to affect the night life for an entire city. our city deserves and needs

high quality night life and entertainment options, and that's what halcyon is offering. in addition, i think it's important to consider the fact that throughout the entire period of time that halcyon has been in operation, there have not been incidents that have required the police, there have not been fights, there have not been ambulances or medical staff that's needed to be called because of any sorts of issues. it's -- it's a top-quality organization. thank you. are there any questions that i could answer? >> thank you. now are we going to hear from miss milano directly? okay. >> hello, commissioners. i didn't prepare a statement this evening because i thought my attorneys would be covering this, but i'll state what i've taken notes on thus far this evening. entertainment in san francisco is all i've ever known or done.

i bartended before owning and prasing my own club at the age of 26. i have owned and operated seven hospitality businesses in san francisco from restaurants to lounges and night clubs, often times at the forefront of the industry, doing things that were new to san francisco, such as when i owned bambooda lounge. it was the first successful liquor lounge to night club, transforming it from a successful restaurant to a night life venue. we also threw the first d.j. oriented, night life events, 2500 people-plus. i owned another club, which was a members-only-type venue and restaurant and late-night club

in a residential building. that concept has always been replicated, and i've always taken on challenging projects, and the challenge with halcyon was being the first true s.f. venue to be able to go late and go till 6:00 in the morning and offer an opportunity to bring world-class talent to san francisco. it was an effort to attract this type of talent that's playing elsewhere in the world and in america in cities that i'll reference later, to bring them to san francisco and really put s.f. on the night life map. as i've stated in previous hearings, there's very little money to be made between the hours of 2:00 a.m. and 6:00 a.m. in san francisco. it's about my commitment to night h nightlife, it's about the

ethos, it helps us compete in t the -- not only the local market, but the international market. i think halcyon is a step in the right direction in s.f. nightlife, and i think every time we are limited and prohibited to operate with the police code, i think it is a step in the back direction. the reason we showed the windows and the reason why we showed the buildings was to show that it really is two neighbors, and i'm not here to attack them. i feel sorry for them. i feel sorry for the need that

they feel the need to send these texts and e-mails to complain. i have 200 neighbors behind me on motorcycnorfolk. i have another potential 200 neighbors going in behind me -- potential neighbors, and the biggest issues that my hours have been limited because of the complaints from these two neighbors. my operations have been limited. my db limit, although scientifically proven, i'm stating this again, that it could have been louder, has also been limited because of these two neighbors. sound transition ratings for my structure are much greater than the db ratings that have been given to me. this does not mean that i am flagrantly and irresponsibly not complying with the levels that were given to me. very conservatively, a third

party whom i paid a significant sum of money to, $10,000, to come out and do sound testing, gave me a conservative level of 118, and you dialled me back to 116. again, not a reason for me to disregard this, and that's by no means what i'm attempting to do. what i'm attempting to do is preserve the reputation that i've created globally in the two years that i've been in operation by being able to successfully run an operation that's successful not only to the guests and attendees there who are having a high quality experience, such a high quality experience, that oftentimes as 4:00 in the morning, i'm forced to kick out on the street 100 to 200, sometimes more people, at 4:00, because they're still enjoying halcyon. i've beat this horse before, but they're leaving halcyon, and they're going to unlicensed venues that the city,

yourselves, the police department, city attorney has no interest in governing. so here i am before you, a governable entity, someone who's a valuable member of the san francisco night life -- i was a bartender at 19 illegally. i've been doing this illegal. at 26, i owned my first bar. i'm not doing this illegally, or wave this in the face of the san francisco entertainment commission. i'm here to say you're the entertainment commission. you're not the police force. i'm not here, saying let's take these two neighbors who are, by all intents and urps approximates, harassing me, harassing the commission, harassing the police department, and colluding to put me out of business, trying to get other members of their building on board, trying -- communicating amongst themselves with this sort of

thing. and it's unfair. it's absolutely unfair. every time i've come here, i've asked you for fair and equitiable treatment, that i be treated fairly the same way that my fellow members that are licensed in the community are being treated. i have the lowest 4:00 a.m. internal db rating of any electronic dance music venue in san francisco. not because my building won't contain the sound but because the neighbors complain to the point where you felt compelled to limit my internal db rating. it's inhibited my ability to -- to operate in the market and compete in the market. and i've done a lot of work. i think that you're probably sick of hearing me at another time my horn about how successful halcyon has been on a global scale, how successful it's been in san francisco, and the fact that people do want to stay past 4:00 in the morning. it's an injustice not only to the citizens of san francisco who love san francisco night life, who want to stay out

late, and who have every right to be in a safe, licensed venue after hours. it's an injustice to them, and it's an injustice to my staff, who works so staff to make sure that we've never had a police complaint, never had a legitimate complaint, other than from these two neighbors, never had an ambulance show up, never had any issues with the fire department, never had an issue with the a.b.c. we've never had a fight in my establish: the one time someone was hurt in my establishment, someone was leaning up against the office door, and my manager opened the office door, and he fell and his hit head. we have a security force that does its job and is friendly and kind. you have an operator who is a single operator. i have one business partner who is not involved in my

operations. i'm not five people like great northern monarch, i'm not three people like audio, i'm not five people like public works and midway. i'm one single operator, and i'm also the only operator who's at my venue every single night it is open without fail if i'm in town. and in this past year, i've been out of town four weekends of 52 weekends. i have a manager on duty from 10:00 p.m. until 3:00 a.m. i arrive with the d.j.'s, and i stay until closing. i'm on-site, i am responsible, aim he not leaving anyone else to run the club. i'm there every night. i think that the conditions

that you have put on the permit due to these complaints are very, very challenging for reasons i addressed before. i would also like to point out something that russell did not point out which is of kelly and tony's complaints claiming that i was open after hours on one, two, three, four, five, six, seven occasions, three of those occasions, the club was not open. we were not open. one of the occasions was -- the artist was off at 3:30 a.m. the -- one is a notice date. the other two dates, one was our anniversary. i sent this in a very comprehensive e-mail to you all, telling you that every

other d.j.s in the city came to halcyon, as did all the other club owners, at that point, knowing that i had not gone over, and knowing that i had people, i made an executive decision to stay open? was that an ego-driven idea? it was. i said, you know what? this is what i'm known for globally. we are supposed to be this venue in san francisco. and i'll notice that after the fact. by the way, i took that cue from steven lee who says at the last hearing, it's not always easy to know. sometimes, the d.j. comes on, and he's having such a good time, he doesn't want to stop at 4:00. every ten minutes, i give them, you have a 30-minute warning,

you have a 20-minute warning. it is a challenge, especially since that is what we built our reputation on, we built our global reputation on being the late-night venue in san francisco that could operate late. so i ask you for forgiveness on that night, and also on halloween, i noticed two days after. that weekend, i was open on the friday night, saturday night, the sunday night, and monday is when i noticed maggie. and on hoween night, it was the 31st, and i noticed her two -- halloween night, it was the 31st, and i noticed her two days later. writing an e-mail to you, i think it through, i consider what i'm going to write in the e-mail, i make sure that i word this properly, and how i

respond. with regards to kelly and tony and their complaints and texting, they text me. they only text me. they do not text any of my managers, whose numbers they also have, and i'm very responsive. i always respond, but i also say in none of the police commission statements that i have to be abused, or i have to respond to abusive text messages, and messages where i am clearly being abused, i will not sink to that level. i think that's fair, for you guys to ask me or for anyone to think at 2:00 in the morning or 1:00 in the morning, or midnight when i'm actually running the club, that i should be engaged in petty, back and forth text messages with my neighbors who are citing outdated police codes or who are claiming things that are completely untrue is not beneficial to any of us. this past weekend on sunday, i also received a text message from kelly, saying she wasn't

sure where the sound was emanating from, whether it be audio and bergerac, aor halcyo. i told her that halcyon was closed, and it was coming from audio and bergerac. if she indeed heard music, she heard it from audio and bergerac. she has no idea where the music is coming from, nor does tony. they're basically claiming halcyon. i'm under fire. i'm under fire by them. they say they're sleepless, i'm sleepless with you every time this comes up on monday. i have a $2.7 million investment, which is probably worth more than both of their apartments, that i'm staring down the barrel of losing it

all, all of this being flushed down the toilet. as far as the windows, i originally suggested at a hearing very early on, as a form of mitigation, saying that it would be less expensive than und undertaking more improvements at my venue. commissioner lee stated that that was a slippery slope. he suggested it was something he didn't want to go down this path. so recently, i did reach out to them and say hey, let's look at the windows again. here are three window vendors that i have contacted who have had very successful experiences in treating people's windows for sound attenuation. i sent the information to kelly. kelly would not engage with the people i sent along. she did not want to schedule time to have them come and see

the apartment, view the windows. and then, when we followed up on it, kelly told my attorney, who i was forced to engage to try and mediate -- better mediate the situation and take me out of the question because they are so emotionally charged when it comes to me. she refused to communicate with me attorney. she very specifically stated, don't communicate with me. tony said to me that he had had estimates done before, and he sent me the estimates. when he sent these estimates, i saw that he had requested estimates for the windows in his apartment a full nine months prior to halcyon's opening. first of all, it was very up setting to me. also, i will say the estimates were for $2,000, and the other was for $6900. the third estimate, he said the third person came out and did not give him an estimate.

if i had known that for $6900, i could have fixed tony vu's problems, i would have written him a check the month after i had opened if i had known that. i didn't know that information until i said let me send them people out to your apartment to do estimates, and let's look at this. i think that that clearly demonstrated to me the disingenuous approach from these neighbors. if tony was truly interested in mitigating his sound issues before halcyon opened -- which there's a complete record of himself and miss ellis complaining repeatedly against other venues in the neighborhood. there's a record of this. he owns his unit, and as an investment in his unit, he could have mitigated these issues or attempted to by spending a nominal amount of money to improve his unit.

kelly has no interest in doing this. i think you can see from the photos that he -- that russell presented, kelly has those two little bitty windows. the square footage of her windows is less van any of the other square footage available in that building, yet none of those neighbors complain. none of them complain. >> can i just interrupt you quickly? >> yes. >> i'm just curious. so today, is anything different with those windows? have you written checks or have you installed new windows? >> of kelly's windows -- >> so you've actually help -- >> kelly needs to allow vendors into the apartment -- >> so nothing's been done with hers? >> no. >> and tony? >> no. >> so they are the exact same windows that were there a year ago? >> so i don't want to cut you off, but i do want to hear from the neighbors here, and they're

limited in their time. we've heard a lot of inform from you, i can hear from them, and we'll do public comment, and then, we'll probably have you back up after this. >> all right. i would like to come back up because i would like to address some solutions for these other issues that have arisen. >> yeah. i think that's the point of tonight is to try to figure out some solutions, so yes, please. >> okay. so would you like to hear from them? >> yes. so i'm going to open public comment for this, and three minutes for this one, please, all of these. >> hi, commissioners. this is tony. i'm just sitting there listening to this, and there is a lot of false information and exaggerated what you just heard. i'm going to read you a letter. for two years, we've talked through the warnings, conditions, and impositioned placed on halcyon. i think it's quite safe to say that none of this hearts to

gina -- matters to gina, and she doesn't take this matter seriously. the latest violation was given on december 1. to me, this was really strange, because if i knew i was coming here for being over the limit notification in october, i would be probably make sure to not get caught especially if i worked at this venue every weekend. so what does this tell you about this permit holder and how she operates, especially when you think about when in one's watching, when we're not complaining and hearing how she's operating? as a reminder, when halcyon opened in 2016, her limit was set to 100 db and then increased to 110 db after a few citations, and then increased again to 116 db after many more citations through this process last year. after getting these increases, she still can't within the limit. on october 12, inspeccor

fiorention measured her db at a very loud 126 decibels. the e.c. has gone above and beyond to giet halcyon on the right path, but i think it's clear that her actions are telling you that she doesn't care. the citations and her lack of following the commissioners' directions speak for themselves. please do not let any of this distract you from the facts. and just to respond to two things that she said, the e.c. has documented from neighbors from both buildings in front and behind. i've counted ten that have contacted the e.c. that have complained about halcyon during this time period that this has been before you. there's not been just two. also, the offers of soundproofing, you would like to hear that they've been trying to help us. after three months, what the conversations have looked like is russell sending us an e-mail, do you guys want your windo windows soundproofed?

yes. silence. hello, can we follow up on the offer? silence. russell comes back, tony, like, did you want this? i thought we said yes. so it's back and forth. nothing has been done. i brought the quotes, but she's turned that against me. the one in san francisco that wanted to especially had us in all my -- that wanted to help us, in all my windows, not just the ones that she's talking about, came out to 30 to $50,000. >> hi, commissioners. also just want to point out that pictures that -- >> can you state your name, please. >> oh, yeah, sorry. my name's phil wong. and i just want to point out the photos that gina had captured of our apartment, it's actually the wrong windows, so i just wanted to point that out? >> so i really want to say that i feel like we've been having similar conversations for the past two years where gina has been giving the commissioners and us, the neighbors, the run