>> i will call this meeting to order. it is currently 5:33 pm. hello and welcome to the tuesday , january 15th 2019 commission meeting at the san francisco entertainment commission. i am the commission's president. if you remember the public --dash if you are a member of the public and you like to speak today, there are speaker forms you could fill out. or you can line up and come to the microphone when we call you for public comment. we do ask that everyone turns off their cell phones or put some on silent, including commissioners and staff. i want to thank san francisco government t.v. and media services for sharing this meeting with the public. we can start with a roll call.

[roll call] >> commissioner perez and thomas are absent. they have escapes just excused absences. >> thank you pay the -- the first order of business today is public comment. is there any public comment for items that are not on tonight's agenda? saying none, public comment is closed. the next agenda item is item number 2, approval of the minutes for december 18th, 2018. >> i will make a motion to approve. >> i will second. >> is there any public comment on the minutes from december 18 th?

saying none, public comment is closed. >> vice president? [roll call] >> it is so moved. the next item agenda is a report from our executive director. >> thank you. that evening, commissioners. this evening on my director's report i wanted to begin with just saying happy new year to everyone. this is our first commission meeting of 2019, so in that same vein, i just wanted to give you all an update around new year's eve events. this year we worked diligently with the san francisco department of emergency management. we had a senior analyst dale in the right, and the senior inspector really taking the lead on new year's eve event planning with the department of emergency management and i also

participated in a call with all department heads from other city departments working with them on this activation in advance of the evening. we also had inspectors attend the emergency operations centre on the night of new year's, working with all of those agencies in realtime, looking at any issues that may have been occurring, and going out and visiting as many venues as they cut that were hosting entertainment events that evening. in lead up to that event, we did personalized outreach to about 89 venues, reaching out via e-mail, asking them to sign up for alert s.f., which is the emergency management platform for alerting people of any emergencies that maybe occurring in this case, it was specifically around new year's eve, because of that outreach, and also having inspector burke

's enforcement team go out and fire about 400 fliers were sent out to people, they were 4,000 new people that subscribed to alert s.f. that night. that is pretty huge, and that media campaign also had about 500,000 impressions, so that's just great for the city of san francisco in total, and i got a lot of positive feedback from our venues on that effort. so we will continue to do that for any large-scale city events continuing on with pride and halloween this year. there are documents in the file to support that agenda item, but those were the highlights. i also wanted to give you an update on the board of appeals action. this is not with the board of appeals, but with a hearing officer for controller's office on that citation appeal for

halcion, and just to let you know, we have not received a response from the controller yet , we went on january 3rd as a staff and represented the ec, and we are to hear a response from the controller by this thursday. i will let you all know what comes of that, but if anything, that hearing helped improve some of our standard operating procedures for our enforcement team when they went out into the field specifically in calibrating our metres between every single time we use them. if you have any questions for me , let me know. >> all right, thank you very much. his or any public comment on the report while seeing none, public comment is closed.

the next item is agenda number 4 , this is an informal presentation from the office of economic and workforce development regarding board of supervisors file number 181211, and now to present is, he is told, he is smart, and he is one of the best beards in the business. [laughter] >> thank you very much for that introduction. good evening, commissioners. i'm from the office of work fork and economic development. i know you have a busy agenda tonight so i will try and keep my remarks brief. i am excited to discuss with you this small business streamlining resolution. as i'm sure you know, there has been increasing concern about storefront vacancies in recent years from a number of different stakeholders, small business

people, government as well, and in december, the mayor announced a citywide storefront vacancies strategy which has three different components, legislation, new program investments, and administrative reforms, and i'm going to speak principally about this new legislation which was introduced by the mayor mayor and supervisor brown in december, and this is sort of the beginning of the commission presentation roadshow for this. as i think i mentioned at the commission retreat, our office had conducted a retail study that was prepared by strategic economics, a consulting firm, and it was released in february 2018 on the state of retail, the opportunities and challenges facing neighborhood commercial districts in san francisco. it is a very in-depth report

available on our website, but among the key findings from that study were that retailers were experimenting with new strategies, they are looking at bringing food and beverage into the retail environment, doing entertainment and events, which is something that is in alignment with an uptake we have seen and limited live performances that we have seen. they are also -- there is also a relationship between nightlife and entertainment and retail in that nightlife and entertainment businesses can draw people to neighbourhoods to complement retail offerings, and another key finding was that land use and permitting challenges are a big obstacle for businesses trying to get open, or trying to expand or adapt their offerings. in developing the small business streamlining concepts that i will talk about, we were informed by the retail study and informed by a number of folks in our department do interfacing with small businesses, and the individual challenges they have

experienced. a lot of this stuff is pretty technical. a lot of these are technical fixes, they truly are informed by individual business experiences. and then the concepts were developed and refined in consultation with city permitting departments, and folks from health and planning and other departments informed with what we are looked, and really helpful and productive way. the goals and this legislation or how can we help new businesses save time and money in the permitting process to get opened and a faster way so that they aren't burdened by so many months of rent before they can open their doors? often times a storefront that appeared to be vacant are actually in some part of the permitting, the long journey to being able to successfully open their doors. secondly, to strengthen existing businesses by helping them adapt and be able to experiment and revise their offerings in order to meet evolving consumer demands.

i think there's about a dozen different concepts in the legislation itself we've tried to distill it down into four big buckets. we want to help diversify offerings, we want to increase opportunities, fill vacant storefronts, we want to strengthen live music venues facing some burdensome requirements, we also want to clarify ambiguities in the cold be getting people to process your kind is to highlight the ones that seem to me to be entertainment related. i'm happy to talk about any of these moving forward. in terms of enabling retail businesses to diversify their offerings, one of the elements of the limited life performance permit requirement is food or beverage will be served in conjunction with the permit. i think it is fair to say it is something worth looking at him that if you want to have -- if a

retailer wants to do limited live performance and wants to have music in a permitted weight , they ought to be able to do that without the requirement to stipulate serving food or beverage, which a lot of folks don't want to do because it brings other health requirements and other sorts of things, so eliminating the food and beverage requirement from the permit requirement. in terms of increasing opportunities to fill vacant storefronts, one of the items that we found is around arcade uses, that if there are 11 or more arcade machines, that is what the planning code defines as an amusement game arcade use, which are actually pretty restrictively regulated in terms of the number of different zoning districts where that is a possible use. this package proposes to reclassify, which i think by the way is more omission than anything else.

in terms of where the zoning tables are, there are a lot of places -- in arcade is not mentioned at all, as a result, it is not permitted. this package proposes to reclassify those arcade uses as general entertainment to, similar to pool halls, bowling alleys, other similarly situated uses which would enable a lot more districts to have an amusement game our kale dish arcade style uses. in the past, there have been great arcade uses coming before this commission that have had to head legislation individually adopted to make those possible moving forward. in terms of entertainment venues ,, a couple of things to highlight. in the permitting process, one of the pieces of feedback that we had heard from businesses is they go through the building permit process, they get sent off on final inspections on the

building department to, they get their health department sign off , and then in order to go through the entertainment process they have to have inspections from all those same departments that have just signed off on their business. so what this package proposes in order to help reduce that duplication, save businesses time and money and being able to open and have entertainment, would be too if there is a sign off from one of those departments, a sign off that the building department has signed off on the inspections related to the building permit, if there is a health permit vestment issue that is currently valid, if there's a place of assembly permit that is currently valid, that the documented evidence of those permits shall be sent efficient in order to avoid the need for an additional inspection. the other item here supporting the music venues in order to be able to admit patients under 21, as you all know, but many people are surprised to learn, a venue

needs to have a restaurant style liquor license, a 41 or a 47, which also makes that venue classified as a restaurant under the planning code. what is being proposed here is to undo, or to opt entertainment venues that are established and entertainment uses out of the local bona fide eating place requirements, there's obviously still state liquor license eating place requirements, the some of the local requirements are really challenging for music venues in terms of having the majority of the gross receipts come from food sales as one of them, having their toys -- doors open five days a week is another requirement of restaurants under the planning code. this proposes to take entertainment venues out of some of those requirements. finally, a lot of code cleanup around liquor license types, how they are defined in the planning

code, some stuff around accessory food use, i am really happy to talk about any of these , or any of the things i mentioned or didn't mention in more detail. the only other thing that i would highlight briefly is that in addition to the legislative work, there was administrative reform that happened late last year through the building department that i think is a real positive for our small businesses. when a business has to do neighborhood notification, which is required to establish a lot of different types of uses in neighborhood commercial districts, including entertainment, if you want to add entertainment as a use, you have to do the mailing, have a signed poster in your window for 30 days, it is often thought of as a 30 day neighborhood notification requirement, because that is the duration of the notification. but the reality is that when you give your application in, in the planning department takes it into do that notification, that permit stays with the city departments. instead of a person being able

to take it from counter to counter, it goes from inbox to inbox through the department. you can have permits where there is really no work being done. if it was previously a restaurant, want to add entertainment use on top of that , is still has to go -- doing no actual physical work, after doing neighborhood notification, still has to go from inbox to inbox to inbox, which true -- adds on time and is both unpredictable and an unnecessary delay. late last year, the department of building inspection issued some new guidance that now empowers business owners to be able to take control over these permits. where again, if it was not for no defeat -- neighborhood notification, it would be truly over-the-counter work. after this is completed, that business owner who is trying to start the business can actually request to have that permit reclassified. essentially as an over-the-counter permits. they go through the notification , than they can grab that permit, to have it changed and be able to go counter to

counter. instead of months, someone could accomplish accomplish that over-the-counter process in a day or a couple of days. it is subtle at a very technical but very positive step as well. i tried to be brief, but i'm happy to talk about any of the ideas that were mentioned before or didn't talk about. >> i know we have been working on this thing for a while. you have been asking a lot of questions from different people and my question is, now that you have all these new streamlining possibilities, the biggest problem i think, and i have heard this from when we have other meetings with other venue owners or even promoters that just want to do a weekend concert or something that has 1,000 people, and they were

saying that the best thing, if it is possible -- if it is possible to have an assigned entertainment specialist on the planning commission, on the planning when you go to the counter, they will just check the address, and it will say what you can or cannot do. after that, they say here are the forms, fill them out there but what you want to do, and let's say there's an open storefront, a ton of them, you give the guy the address and say , what can i do here, is there any kind of entertainment possibilities or ideas that maybe i can think about. what i understand is a lot of the planners get assigned to the case so whoever is available, there is no planners available, you still have to wait for your turn, which is also another delay. landlords are not waiting for us to do our c.u. process because we are not -- either they're not giving us free rent or they only

giving you three months free rent, and whether or not it will take six months, analogies with a rent of going $5,000 or so a month, people are spending $36,000 and they don't know if they will get a c.u. i am just wondering, in addition to all of this, do you think the planning department will have an entertainment specialist that knows all the planning codes, all the new streamlining ideas, and i'm pretty sure when cannabis comes up, that would be a great idea for cannabis because there's a lot of these things that are -- just listening to you is great, i can understand it, but there's a lot of it that i don't understand. it is always good to have a specialist to help you out, and make the decisions. i'm just wondering if that might be on the table as well. >> yeah, commissioner, one of the things i should mention is it is helpful for us to acknowledge that an entertainment food and beverage,

in public assembly -- the projects in the entertainment universe can be among the most complex in terms of different layers of local and state regulation and can be among the most challenging, but it can be really different than i want to open a bookstore in what used to be a record store. that is the exact opposite of, old, i want to bring a new entertainment use with food and beverage and alcohol and all of that. from my perspective, this is one of the areas were thinking more about how things can be as clear as possible, and also about making sure there is consistency of guidance given. that is partly what you are talking about. that if the code isn't clear, it can be tough to give consistent guidance, but also, how can we further support city staff

expertise development on issues of entertainment which i think is a really good question, against the backdrop that entertainment is different than some of this other stuff, it is harder to navigate. it is something to think about. i also think that part of what you raised if the idea that we are going through the process, but what can you do while you are going through the process, or what can be done on a pop-up or temporary sort of basis while you are navigating that lengthy process. i think that in the flexible retail legislation last year, it created, in addition, some new temporary use permits from the planning department that i think are still in the process of being implemented, but could also, i think there is certainly additional interest in talking about temporary uses and what that means, and how to better support pop-up style activity in a way that is fully compliant

with all the concerns around safety and everything. i think these are all really good questions. as we continue forward to think about how can we make sure there is consistency so people really don't feel like they have heard device -- advice to go one direction, and find out that they can't, or that they went down the wrong path and part of it is you look at the code around nightlife, and is not always -- the terms don't always match up with the business offerings. this reference is in the planning code to discotheques. >> some of it has been written so long ago. like the chinatown master plan was written in 1984, which really does not apply right now to a lot of the. >> just checking it wasn't 1894. [laughter] >> and i guess they are working

on that as well to update that, but like i said, bookstore is, they might be -- and might be a great place for a bookstore, but they want to add a dual, like a guitar player in there, and having coffee, and you can't do that, but then there might be a great site that is empty that could do that, but a planner, when you go to apply, if that person really knew his coat and everything, right away they would say, hey, that might be a great idea, and the next week you might file the application, or file for a temporary just to see if it works. i think what you are doing is great because it is a big first step to help the lease and pete -- empty storefronts. at least district has at least 10-15 empty storefronts that i see, and i think this will help. when you get to the planning, as

commissioners will say, when you go to the a.b.c., it depends on, you bring your application, but it is so huge that you have to come back, but then you get the different guy at the front desk in the front desk will say, well you don't need that, and then his situation is totally different. and then suddenly they say, you forgot this, and the other guy said, i didn't need that. here we go again. i think the city process should be a lot more streamlined. i'm hoping that happens. >> thanks. >> good job. >> i just want to applaud yet again that you dive in with the topics and you make them very specific to san francisco. i know we all like to say san francisco is very unique and very special, the factually speaking, it really is. as we all know, it is a very dense city. it is dense when we look at the entertainment environment, are nightlife, that government -- beverage and food environment, one of the densest in the country. certainly the state, i appreciate the fact that you are really looking at it with a focus on san francisco.

the other thought, just listening to you, i think this is the essence of what you're saying, or where i hope we are heading, what i have always experience in this city is things worked great when you have a person who is a go to person who knows their topic and they really get it, and they can work around the challenges that you are referring to. it would be great if we could get to a .1 day where our policies actually reflect our practices so any person we plug and can actually do the job. i suspect that is kind of your long-term overarching goal. >> thank you. >> and i should have said before too that the more that in this evolving retail environment that we are also making it more challenging for our staff at the front lines when we are saying, oh, i want to do something that is coffee, music, some old sort of boxes which may have been easier to apply it for folks but

bringing consistency absolutely. >> and the only last comment i would make, and i know you are cleanly aware of this as is our commission and executive director, this is an incredibly fluid -- i recently use the analogy, our and entertainment nightlife communities certainly as creative as hollywood is. we really need to be looking at whatever we are doing today is great, but it might not work in six months. that is literally how quickly things move along. unfortunately to speak to commissioner lee's comment, chinatown is working with a 40 -year-old planning policy. that cannot be helping them. thank you. >> thank you. >> i didn't hear you mention the patio portion of this, and i just want to hear a little bit more about that too. >> of course,. that's fine. for outdoor activity areas, that

is the planning code term for front patio, back patio, rooftop patio. in most of the neighborhood commercial districts, outdoor activity area in the back is a conditional use authorization, which means if you are a small coffee shop just trying to get open a back patio, you have to navigate that process. that is a process -- some of the conditional use processes can be accelerated, but that's one that can't be accelerated. the proposal and here is for outdoor activity areas in the back that would operate between 6:00 am and 10:00 pm. that it would be principally permitted. neighborhood notification would still apply. the 312 notification was still apply. folks would have an opportunity to weigh in, enter the discretionary review and those processes, if need to be, liquor license conditioning would still apply, entertainment commission permitting for a fixed place

amplified sound or entertainment would still apply, or from a land-use perspective, a back patio, again, if you are proposing hours between 6:00 am and 10:00 pm, that would be principally permitted use. >> for me, that is the greatest coup in this whole thing, and i know there's a lot of really good things. we went through a three year long nightmare at a bar that i own to permit a patio, which is now requiring hundreds of thousands of dollars of renovation fees and costs and as well is a lot of uncertainty for us. i'm always surprised at how for a city that prides itself on outdoor activities, how weak our outdoor game is. we are just so bad, and there are cities that are much colder and much less fun then we are that have incredible patio and front and back scenes, and i'm always shocked. this could be a real coup. i applaud you for that. i have one more question. i didn't hear you say this. what is the next steps for you

on this. >> sure. going to the small business commission and a couple of weeks , and then the planning commission. i think tentatively we are looking at late february. and after that, it would be to land-use at the board. still a lots of work to talk with all of you, and folks like you, and get feedback i get the word out. >> we have no agenda items specifically around this and endorsing it, or anything tonight. >> know, we usually don't take -- yeah, but i've told them that i will support him in any way and can help present any of those commission meetings. >> all right. anymore questions? thank you very much. it was very important if. great beard. [laughter] >> is there any public comment on the presentation, seeing none , public comment is closed.

i will move onto the next agenda item which is a report from our senior inspector. >> thank you. inspector shawn burke here. it is a great beard he has. i have been trying to mimic it for a long time, and it is just not working out for me. [laughter] you will see the new complaints section. most of the new complaints will have a follow-up inspection below. i have tried to do notes where complaints came from on anonymous sources, i've tried to denote if a complaint come in on a night where we did not have an inspector on duty. on the second page, there is a chunk in the middle of all new year's eve inspections, and a basically denoted the inspector that performs the site

inspection, and we just had one venue that was found out of compliance. it was at capacity. not necessarily under our purview, but we did make contact with the fire department and they assisted on scene. this is at omg 436th street. that was just after midnight. otherwise, new year's eve was uneventful. leading up to new year's eve, we did a bunch of flyers as the director had sent, we got away with no major incidents. there are a couple of entries towards the end of the sections list that are out of order. i'm working on trying to create systems to make this a little bit more foolproof as far as the date and time and the order of these things as they come in. please forgive me.

there's a couple of entries under citations and notices of violations. fourteen double dutch. they issued an administrative citation for them being above the sound limit, and at temple, he issued a notice of violation for them operating with an open door, and outside of their internal sound limit. on the very back page, we have a few ongoing complaints. malibu has made it back on the list. halcion, we did get a complaint since the last hearing. two complaints four double dutch , one for jones, and one for mission street sports bar. i will try to give you a very brief update about where all of these stand. halcion was closed upon arrival new year's eve, malibu was

recently issued a citation. we are working with them to establish a new sound limit inside based on work they said they have done. double dutch i think it's probably a training issue. they have a few different managers and we need to make sure that they all are familiar with the use of the meter. for jones it seems as though the weekend night complaints have stopped. the most recent ones -- one is a weekend. and then it looks like one was left off of the list. we did get a complaint for the past sunday. that is one i will have to continue to investigate. mission street sports bar, i talked to the owner there. they are in touch directly with the complainant in and that investigation is still ongoing. if you have any questions please let me know.

>> hi, so you said jones had a complaint this weekend. >> i feel like at the last meat and they were just also aware of what the rules were and their outdoor amplification and were trying to come into compliance. i'm curious why they're still getting complaints. >> they have gone twice what weekends without a nighttime complaint on a weekend night, and then just recently, this past sunday, they had a complaint. i think that they have been out of compliance on the weekend nights, and unfortunately, we have not had coverage on a sunday daytime to give an inspection to see if they are in compliance with the conditions. i don't have a whole lot for you at the moment and i am hoping to get one of the guys or myself out on a sunday here soon to take a lesson and a look.

>> i see them promoting that brunch event pretty widely, so i feel like if we are not able to help them figure out how to deal with it than the neighbors are just going to continue to complain. >> yeah. >> cool. in terms of double dutch, i know you mentioned right now, it is a training issue, but i feel like we have seen them repeatedly for the better part of a year. is it just a rotating staff that come in and out, or is it that there are multiple managers on site that aren't trained? >> this most recent inspection, we did meet up with a manager that i hadn't met in my inspections. this is the first time that the inspector had met this particular person. so i'm not sure. i know that in this case we have

one manager at least on site who knows how to operate the meter. as far as, except for the most recent citation, when we do visit, they have been in compliance. i'm not sure if it's a timing issue, or what it might be. >> it sounds like whoever is complaining is also just complaining about people in the street, maybe yelling and things like that, which we don't have much control over. i think just seeing this venue here kind of repeatedly, having complaints is a concern. because i'm not sure if they are altering anything or if it's just a new neighbor that happens to be really sensitive to that particular corridor. >> we are in touch with one neighbor directly, which is the top complaint on the list. and then the complaint from the thursday evening is actually, i would assume to be a different complainant due to the fact that it is anonymous.

i think it is time to do another visit and make sure the guy is out front and the security team are minding the good neighbor policy. >> great. >> right. okay. i think if we continue to see them in the next month or two, i'd be interested in bringing them in. but we will just stay tuned. thank you. i would like -- you guys have covered a lot of ground in the last month. great job. >> thanks. >> i just had a question about spin. they seem to be just routinely in our -- brought to our attention here. are the complaints that they're bringing -- is it a supplemental sound system, are they augmenting their sound system are bringing one outside? >> this is another case of revolving door management.

the sound system was inside, and they had like a brass band as well. the weight was described to me was like a warriors drumline deal kick and i think this is just management not knowing what's going on and not knowing the limitations of their permit and what they are about to do. it seems like every time an inspector does go out there, we are met with someone different and we have to retrain them. >> i think i will take this one into my hands at this point and reach out to their management in new york. maybe bring susan sarandon and for a hearing or something. just kidding. i will speak with their new york office and then have -- i'm sure there is a new manager and have

them come in and meet staff and get to know their conditions a little bit better. >> okay. the other question i have it's about jones. we don't have any indication they are continuing operate after their l.l.p. time limit? i know it became like they had to routinely done that. >> and our most recent, i don't think we have had a visit where we have found them to be intentionally operating outside of their designated times since we last met. >> okay. >> thank you very much. >> thank you. >> is there any public comment on the report? sea and non, public comment is closed. the next agenda eight -- seeing none, public comment is closed. we now have an a report from dylan right. >> good evening, i'm the senior analyst for community and cultural events. i wanted to update you on a very special edition of the s.f.

outdoor events network. the next mixer is coming up on january 28th, on the topic this time is cannabis and special events. it is a very timely, a very exciting, and i'm also excited to be collaborating with the president on this program. he will be moderating a panel discussion. but the context for this is that with the state and governor passing legislation recently that allows local jurisdictions to decide if and where they would like to have temporary cannabis events in their jurisdictions, what does that mean for san francisco? what is next for special events that want to add cannabis sales and consumption to their event, it is early, but what kinds of things should event producers and other kinds of industry people start thinking about in terms of the rules and to the

best, and the models. a lot of folks are asking me about what are the opportunities for revenue, how does that work? how does that work within the legal framework? and very excited about this. we have a really powerhouse panel, so obviously it will be moderated. on the policy side, we have the director of the office of cannabis, nicole elliott, and we will have supervisor rafael mandelman joining her, and on the industry side, we have a couple of reps. one of them is a gentleman who runs a company that provides vapour tent lounges for outdoor events. his name is fernando alvarez. [please stand by]

. . . >> we want them to remember being responsible and safe. and so i think this will be a really rich discussion. there will also be ample time for audience questions, which i think that is where the real gems come out. so that will be very good.

that's all i have to say unless you have any questions. >> during your last event, i think there was an attempt to stream it live. is there an intention to stream this talk? >> the director brought it up today, and i think we should try again. we had some technical problems again with the last one. we learned that when you have ambient music in the background, facebook algorithm recognizes it as a copyrighted song and limits the amount of time you can have that for a stream. something good to know for the future. that would be really, really rich stuff. >> that's great. thank you. >> dylan, i am wondering for those who can't attend, and might max out at capacity. could we have some sort of highlights, presentation, forthcoming for the entertainment commission meeting? you don't have to pull the panel together. >> highlights like excerpts or just report back? >> like a report back, but i

think some of the questions that are going to be discussed and the opportunities for revenue. >> an i would love to do that. i will do some sort of report back and pick from some great ideas and i think as someone who enjoys writing public documents, especially for education, i'm sure i will be writing a lot of the stuff and publishing it, too, for the industry. >> great. i think that if you have a quick power point of how this goes, but also just the questions that are being discussed. >> awesome >> great. >> yes, thank you. one thing i would throw out is coming from the entertainment world as many of us do if there are questions that you think should be asked, please email them to analyst rice or to the director so that we can compile these together.

it is definitely timely. the interesting part is how many of the questions are unabled to be answered right now, so we're trying to get people to ask the right kinds of questions going forward, but still a timely engagement. i think we should do one now and we should do one after the regulations come out as well. this is going to be a big deal. >> yeah. >> thank you very much. >> are there any public comments on senior analyst rice's presentation? seeing none, public comment is closed. the next agenda item are police department comments and questions. i am seeing no officers here, so we will move on to the next item as well. next item is agenda number 8, hearing and possible action regarding applications for permits under the jurisdiction of the entertainment commission. we will begin with the consent agenda which will be acted upon by a single roll call vote of the commission unless a member of the public or commission requests to make a comment t

consent agenda will not include time for discussion. i will ask deputy director acevedo to introduce the items on the consent agenda. >> good evening, commissioners. so tonight's consent agenda includes four permit applications. they are all four accessory use permits. there were no letters of opposition submitted, and p. d. signed off on all applications without added conditions. if you have any questions, please let me know or if you wish to pull any of them off into regular agenda, that is your discretion. >> i'll go ahead and move to approve the consent agenda. >> i'll second. >> is there any public comment on the consent agenda? seeing none, public comment is closed. >> vice president caminong. >> aye.

>> commissioner lee. >> a commissioner tan. >> commissioner falcon. >> the consent agenda has been approved. congratulations, everyone. please follow up with deputy director acevedo at your earliest convenience. moving along. we'll get to the regular agenda. item number 8, hearing and possible action regarding application to permits under the jurisdiction of the entertainment commission, and once again, deputy director acevedo, please introduce the applications for the evening. >> the applicant for first permit application on the regular agenda has asked for continuance to the february 5, 2019 hearing date, to permit officer bryant at richmond stations intention to provide a verbal recommendation of denial at tonight's hearing. >> so there is a request for continuance to -- can you say

the date one more time? i'm sorry? >> the next commission hearing, february 5, 2019. >> all right. we will need a motion. do we hear a motion to continue this agenda item to february 5? >> so moved. >> second. >> is there any public comment on continuing this agenda item? seeing none, public comment is closed. >> vice president caminong. >> aye. >> president bleiman. >> aye. >> a commissioner tan. >> aye. >> commissioner lee. >> aye. >> a commissioner fallzon. >> aye. >> it is continued. >> the next item please. >> the next permit application on the agenda is the place of entertainment permit for phonobar at 370 grove street. the applicants currently hold a limited live performance permit and recently received approval from the planning department to be zoned for a poe permit. they have worked with charles salter to draft a noise abatement plan and install a high fidelity sound system.

they will continue to have d.j.s have play and occasionally host dance events. eight letters of support. northern station approves this permit with no added conditions. and here to tell you more are owners chuck and tom. >> hello. i'm chuck. >> i'm tom. hi. >> i think it was nearly a year ago or around a year ago that we were in here last to apply for the limited live performance permit. we opened phonobar with the hope of trying to create a new type of music venue where music can be enjoyed seated, eat food, drink cocktail, and listen to music at a volume level which still allows you to talk, but more more importantly, a fidelity level unrivalled in the city. over the course of the last year, we built a community around the space in the neighborhood. and the music and the music

industry in general. we have had d.j.s play from all over the world, from the ukraine all the way to japan. and in terms of what we're looking for and what we're trying to do in addition by applying for a place of entertainment permit is to extend the opportunity for people to come into phonobar and have a different type of music experience, but primarily one in which people can enjoy it hopefully when they leave the opera, leave the ballet, leave the symphony or the jazz center and can extend their evening and find a place where culturally there is something still going on past 11:00 p.m. just before i came here, last year i think i don't know who is on the commission from last year who was here, but if you recall, we did have one neighbor directly across the street we had issues with. just today actually just before i arrived here at 3:12 p.m., i

actually got a reply from our neighbor. i had reached out to him, you know, in light of the fact that we're applying for a place of entertainment permit and to make sure any of his concerns were addressed before we got here. and he actually in his text to me wished us good luck with our entertainment commission hearing tonight. i think that's a representation of the commitment that tom and i both had to being good neighbors, to making sure that we're fully in compliance. and i think it also reflects the effort and money we put into soundproofing the space and generally running it in a way which has led to very little, very few issues over the course of the last year. i think the one issue we had with one of the inspectors was a door being left open. we do plan to address that and trying to run the exit and egress and the entrance through two separate doors. the exit door and we're planning

to put make it double doors and vestibules to trap sound. this is the report from charles salter the only recommendation they have given us to implement and mostly that was associated with the cost of glass front and door in the vestibule area. but also other recommendations have been implemented, and we can say very safely that we have been compliant with the sound agreement from the reading sometime in the late spring. do you want to say anything, tom? >> an i think that pretty much covers it. i think over the course of the last year, i was almost there all the time, six days a week, and one neighbor across the street angela who has a

one-year-old son and they sleep right in the area directly across from the bar. she comes in the other night and said they have never had any issues from the space. the only issue they have with sound is people coming out of some of the bigger places and whatnot, and right in front of their apartment. but in terms of basically she gave us her full blessing. i think that was pretty good thing considering they have a one-year-old directly across from us. >> i would also like to add this didn't make it into the original application, but our security plan and security company that we use. we have been in talk with enterman security, one of the largest private security companies in the world, and have a proposal from them and probably be work with them on an ongoing basis for all of our events and all the security needs that we do have. i am happy to share the proposal with you guys. i think i have emailed it to katelyn. and i think that's all. if you have any questions, please let us know.

>> i was here last year, but i can't remember. yo you have an in house sound system or the entertainers bring it? >> the sound system is installed and it's a mix of is a various components that we custom designed and i spent a lot of personal time testing speakers and working with various sound engineers to come up with the best solution for the space. >> do you want to know about the sound system? >> no, you have been using the same sound system. >> we have the same sound system. we had one issue with d.j.s where tom and i weren't on site -- i think this was last march. and in addition to the sound system, we did put in and put in a limiter that is operational. further to that, we have a security camera affixed to an

actual d.b. meeter that we can see so if tom and i aren't at the bar, we can see exactly how loud the sound is. we found that to be useful in keeping people in check. >> you don't plan to expand -- same sound system -- >> exactly. >> no changes. >> no changes. >> and now you will be able to obviously promote more things. so are you going to be using any outside promoters or is everything going to be in house? programming? >> we will probably work with some outside promoters, people who are a part of our sort of general or wider community. people that tom and i know personally. i have done the majority of the bookings over the course of the last year. we do plan if we get the permit to hire someone to actual help us manage all the bookings because if we are able to do them six nights a week all year round, you can imagine how busy that job can be. >> it's all d.j.s or going to be live music as well? >> it is primarily d.j.s.

we set the place up to be a high fidelity from world music and jazz to disco and house music. that said, we have had interest from bands to play. jazz mafia is well known in san francisco and they have expressed interest in doing a regular night in the space. we didn't set the space up for live performance, so it's something we're interested in exploring. but in terms of primarily d.j.s. when i say d.j.s, that doesn't necessarily mean dance club. if you have been to phono bar at the times we had the 2:00 a.m. permits, you will see half if not 3/4 of the people who are actually in the lounge area of the space are actually sitting down and talking and not standing up and not dancing. >> i think being here earlier you heard a lot of the places getting complaints are not dance bars. so the volume has a lot to do with it. not so much the dancing.

okay. that's all i need to know. thank you. >> i have a couple of questions. in terms of your programming, i think that it sounds like you will pretty much maintain the type of music, but have you had or do you have an idea of how many week -- >> we currently have people playing six nights a week. but within the confines of our limited permit. and we will continue along those lines. i think midweek music will probably end around midnight and go later on friday and saturday's. i don't know there is enough of an audience to pay d.j.s to play until 2:00 a.m. every night. >> got it. i ask that because i think it's wonderful that your neighbors love you guys and you haven't had really a problem there, but once you start drawing crowds and people waiting in line to get in after 10:00, the circumstances are different. so i want to make sure you have your bases covered, which sounds

like you do. >> definitely. i do think midweek it's more -- our concern is around the business and complementing and augments what else is happening there. but the jazz center t ballet, the opera, and bid week we get -- midweek we get a much older and i would say more sophisticated crowd and the weekends a bit younger. >> one other question, how is business going? i know that other venues have come and gone in that space. curious -- is it working well? >> i would say in general it's definitely going very well. the first year and we're building a brand. so i think that the music component of what we do being able to go lateer is going to be a really big boon for us. i can say from past experience that what you make in terms of revenue between 11:00 and 2:00 is sometimes more than what you make up until 11:00. so especially in a city like san

francisco. people go out a lot later. we like to be able to show off what that space is designed for and what we have designed it. i would say the trend sit's getting busier and busier. we haven't too much of an issue even at capacity being able to control a crowd at all. one of the things that we have done is we have a panic door on the side that is the grocery side. so people aren't entering through grocery, and only entering through goff street. we don't have anybody piling up in that side that's directly across from the residences. we keep people over on the side on the goff street side which is more traffic and really a nonissue to have people standing on that side of the street. that helps a lot. >> great. and that is always helpful for us to know. people come to us all the time and obviously getting permits and to know that the reasons behind why you would want to transition from an l.p. to a place of entertainment is important for us to know, and i think important for the city to know because we want to keep having great businesses be able

to do more. >> thank you. >> thank you. you can sit down. thank you so much. >> thank you very much. >> is there any discussion? we can have a motion and then we can do public comment after that. if that makes sense. >> i'm make a motion to approve. >> i second. >> should we qualify the motion with the good neighbor policy or just -- >> i think you should always do that as a best practice. >> i can amend it. the good neighbor policy is in the statute, but nonetheless w the good neighbor policy included. >> you still want to second it? >> all right. is there any public comment on this agenda item? please step to the microphone and state your name please. you'll have two minutes.