exemption status and avoid the proper and necessary environmental review. minor addition to schools, class 14. it reads, consist of minor additions of existing schools within exiting grounds where they do not increase original student capacity by more than 25% or 10 classrooms. which is more. the french american international school, nor the san francisco planning department mentioned this section 15314 of the ceqa california guideline. as if this section does not exist. it applies specifically to schools. we can only sur mice they do not like the word, additions to exiting school with an existing school grounds. for this reason the project does

not satisfy the criteria for categorical exemption. the ceqa paper work and in it they did not check the box which would have necessitated environmental review. instead, they just wrote in demolish an existing one-storey office building and create an open fenced yard for use by the san francisco french american school. it does not say change of use or new construction anywhere. article 1530, identified one of the reasons they got a

categorical exemption. the key wordings here -- the key consideringation is whether it's negligent able. with a key consideration whether it provides no expansion of an existing use it does not qualify for exemption. demolishing the building and changing the site for an warehouse to a school yard is far more than a negligible or expansion of a existing use. there's a major change of use here so the cite exemption does not satisfy the criteria used for this exemption. exhibit 4. 15403. also identified by the project sponsor and the city of san francisco. new construction of conversion of a small structure.

class 3 consists of construction and location of limited numbers of new, small facilities and structures. the conversion of a existing small structure from one use to another were only a minor modification are made to the exterior of this structure. a minor modification. they're raising the building and they're going to put a school yard in. that's more than a minor modification. >> thank you mr. collins, you will have more time in rebuttle. we'll hear from the other appellant. mr. newcome. >> thank you. first, let me thank you commissioners for hearing our concerns. mine and those of my fellow tenants. i hope to garner your support with my remarks. for the record, my name is

daniel newcome. i want to state i reside at 76a paige street next door to the 84 paige street property in question. i filed this appeal on behalf of myself and the tenants of 74-78 paige street. several of my neighbors are here tonight to support me in this appeal. can i have some of them stand up. this is on behalf of myself and my neighbors. what i want to do is speak to the potential noise impact this school yard may have on us in the nearby residents. i would not have brought this appeal if i didn't feel that the impact would -- if i felt the impact of the project would not be significant. i hope to illustrate that with my own sound measurements and statements tonight. on july 20th, 2017, i intended at a community event hosted by aaron lavigne at the french american international school grounds. and on july 28th, little over a

week later i received an e-mail from him thanking me for attending but i have no further information until the filing of the building permit. my main avenue to having my voice heard is the appeal process that we were in tonight. so i hope you consider my point of view as a tenant and a resident of san francisco and i hope that aaron lavigne and the french-american international school will work with the tenants regardless of our outcome here. so i want to start by saying my light well windows would be above the proposed school yard. even above where their sound reduction measures end. it's just from the property boundary and property line. just maybe 20 feet above the ground level. i'd like to show you a few photos to illustrate that. i'm going to put this up. >> overhead, please. you can just set it down.

>> this is my kitchen window looking out onto the property. you can see the brick wall there is the boundary line. so, that's essentially where the sound mitigation measures would be. actually slightly above that, maybe a foot higher. certainly, it's their intent to help us with noise. my concern here is it's going to be insufficient. based on other evidence i'll present in a bit. this is another window. this is my office where you can see it's looking right down into the proposed development that is the building. you can see the wall here. that's the property line. this is the bedroom. all of our windows except for the front ones look out on to this proposed development. so the impact would be high. this is the front looking out on to page street.

here i believe the impact would be less. this is like 1/4 of the windows in the place. here, you can see plan view or sorry elevation view of the side of our building. the current building. and my window goes along the top part of this fenced area. hopefully it gives you context of the impact this could have. so, i also garnered letters from my neighbors and i submitted them as exhibit 3 in my appeal brief. i have actually gotten another letter translated from me from another of our neighbors. i'd like to read some of that right now. the letter reads my name is jose. i have lived in 74 page street number a for more than 20 years. and it is a place that is a

tranquil and without noise. i am a person that works six days a week during the nighttime and sleep for the daytime without any noise present. my worry is that if a playground is constructed by the school, there would be a lot of noise during the day which wes would e horrible for me. i am against this construction project seeing as it would cause me as i sleep during the day because i work at night. that's a transition so there's a few parts of speech that are a little bit different there. so i want to read one more thing from valerie diaz. another neighbor. the translator of that message. and she writes and i quote, as a person actively suffering from an auto immune disease, i lived at 78 page street because the neighborhood fit the lifestyle i needed in order to maintain good health. the area is rare and centrally located nair quiet and friendly. it's located close to where i receive my medical care.

currently i work from home as working a normal job would not allow me time to rest in order to operate day-to-day. end that quote. i currently hear the french-american street yard on the next block from my unit, so you know, that's one of the things that kind of made me start investigating what the potential impact could be. i found the traffic noise during rush could be 70 de decibels so that's a baseline. it's pretty loud to start with. and the in front of the yard exceeded 80. these were peak measurements. we'll talk about that a little bit. peak were maybe 82 to 84 which is significant. on the occasions i visited during the times of playground use, difference represents the doubling in the loudness as opposed to 74 70 des bills and e know from reading documentation

generally available about noise. this is a lot more significant than the impact cited by the study done by charles salter. i do want to -- hopefully you will indulge me. i took a video of me making a measurement. it's noisy of course. but i just wanted to illustrate -- overhead, please. >> can you move the phone. here can you see me switching between average mode and peak mode. it can range in the range of 74 all the way down to 70. so you can see that's in deed more than 1-4-decibels. >> where did you take that?

>> fell street looking at the grown fence ogreen fence. >> your time is up, sir. you will have more time in rebuttle. >> thank you, very much. >> we'll hear from the permit older. is mr. abrams present? you have 14 minutes. >> good evening, president fung and commissioners. jim aprograms. i represenaprograms.we ask you e permits. the permit was productioned througprocessed.it went throughg department, the appellants did not request any discretionary review hearing to the planning commission for the permit which would have been potentially appropriate place to hear noise concerns. they also appealed the community

plan exemption, the ceqa document to the board of supervisors. we had a hearing at the full board of supervisors a few weeks ago and the board of supervisors denied the appeal unanimously on the grounds of school yard is a normal use in san francisco and the noise impacts that are claimed by the appellants are not substantiated by evidence showing there should be a significant impact under ceqa. the board of supervisors heard this matter. this is a permitted use in this district so the planning code anticipates play yards in this district. the school did work with the planning department to ensure that the play yard is designed in an appropriate matter and there's shielding to the adjacent building for noise. in addition to that, the school had offered to retro fit the building and replace all the windows in it to make them more soundproof. we were working on agreement with the property owner and this

summer wher we were working thrh the agreement. the property owner stopped working with us and filed these appeals. there was a number of opportunities to properly appeal this project to the planning commission, which didn't happen. it was appealed to the board of supervisors and the board of supervisors denied the ceqa appeal and now we're here. we request you up hold this permit. there's not grounds under the building or planning code we see it necessitates it being rescinded. aaron lavigne is here to make a few remarks. thank you. >> thank you. my name is aaron lavigne. i work at french-american. i'm primarily responsible for our facilities project. the school has been around 56 years. 21 years at our location in

hayes valley. believe me, this is the last place we wanted to end up. we're a school. there are kids, we're by no means perfect. we've tried to be reasonable and good neighbors. we've had a history of being reasonable on this project and on our other projects. most recently on our early childhood center in the lower hayes. i had forwarded over about 100 letters of support for our project to the board. i didn't ask folks to come to this meeting, although we actually had some letters of support that came from some other neighbors directly across the street. jim already mentioned the appeal was heard at the board of supervisors so you are aware of that. in addition, mr. collins made some reference to the hac unit.

it was a project heard at this board twice and so that was something different. for 84 page street, as jim mentioned, we followed all the processes we were asked. we invited all the neighbors to a community meeting in our cafeteria as mr. newcome mentioned july 20th, 2017. 12 neighbors came. at least one was a resident of the 74 page building. mr. collins did not attend that meeting. at the meeting, we did hear comments about noise, light and hours of use. we welcomed any further comment from any neighbors. i'm fairly certain the planning department was also accepting comments during the time it was in planning. several neighbors did want to talk more.

we met with groups of neighbors from 75 lilly street, which is also a property that's directly abutting the property and 55 page street, directly across the street. in addition, we reached out directly to mr. collins. we did not receive any further comments from residents of 74-76 page during that period of time. it was being reviewed at planning and there was no request for a discretionary review. at the meetings with the two other groups of direct neighbors, on lilly and page, we talked to them and we did make some changes to the plans. we also made some changes to the plans that the planning department had directed us to make over about a two-year period that this was being studied. during that time, we had numerous conversations with mr. collins, who i believe was acting in the good faith interest of his tenants.

and we had made several changes to the property line that he mentioned. we put up shielding for noise. and in fact, i believe i had believed we had reached an agreement with mr. collins. obvious low that waobviously th. when i informed him the permit was issued, he told me he would appeal it. we tried to reach an agreement. we did not. i do hope, when this is finally approved and hope of thely i ofn work with the residents of 74-76 page to see if there's anything we can do. our school has been around for a long time. we're not out to make enemies. we would rather not spend money on attorneys. and as far as the project itself goes, besides some pretty obvious benefits to the school, we think it has some benefits for the neighborhood. we think it will be improving the street scape, in terms of

activating an unused and abandoned site. we think it will bring se secury to the street. we have positive feedback. we did work very proactively with neighbors on the early childhood center. having this field nearby the school, will also enable us to reduce the use of buses to transport our kids across town. we think it will reduce congestion in the area. it will be a walkable resource from our main building. we won't pick up or drop off. one of the neighbors on page said bringing something other than an eating establishment or boutique would be a nice change of pace for the street. so i feel like we went through all the process we needed to with the planning department. we did two studies with charles salter. there's a memo from mr. chris

thomas from the planning department, which talked to the noise issues. that's all i have to say. thank you. >> question. >> go ahead. >> i thought that i saw reference in the materials to additional playyards in that vicinity? >> yes, we have two other playyards in the area. >> what does this provide that those don't? >> so, we actually -- the main campus at 150 oak has about 1400 students. we share the site with the chinese-american international school. all of those locations are currently over used and don't provide a place where, for instance, we could hold an outdoor physical education class on a turf field. [ please stand by ]

>> you know, having -- having been to oak street for away games for my kids' schools, i mean, don't you think it would have been a -- fair for the neighborhood to include a test of that -- of -- of the active playgrounds? >> actually, i shouldn't even say if i know what salter test is on that. you know, i think we relied on the salter study. we trusted him to do the appropriate studies and planning to give us direction. and in fact, after the initial salter study, the planning

department asked us to do a further update to that study, and they did it further. >> commissioner honda: okay. thank you. >> president fung: actually, have a corollary question on that, and a couple of other questions. >> okay. >> president fung: the salter report usually has pretty well defined how they estimate the potential sources. this report is anonymous of where they took it. there's no identification of where they got that particular sound level for a similar type play yard, but it -- in theirs, they listed a smaller number that had turf. so is there some definition as

to where their source of level of sound came from? >> so just to be clear, the salter report is a report that was directed by the planning department and not by the french or american international school. it was directed by the planning back for the ceqa process. >> president fung: it was paid for by you. >> correct, but that's directed by the environmental planning department staff. >> president fung: i will ask planning then. >> all right. >> president fung: two other points. one is that in the planning department's acoustical person or their analysis, they reference limited evening and weekend. is that the case or not? i mean, is there any special conditions here on the permit that limit the usage to be

between 10:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m., monday through friday? >> that's a good question. the -- the description of the project that it was processed through the planning department has the hours limited to those daytime hours. and my -- my -- so it's a good question. i don't know the specific answers to whether or not the permit has a condition on it that says it cannot be used for -- >> president fung: okay. we can come back to it after your rebuttal. okay. >> clerk: you still have six minutes, though, mr. abrams. >> president fung: okay. were you folks finished with your presentation before i have questions? you still do have rebuttal. one last question. >> yeah.

>> president fung: is that can you flush out a little bit on what the offer was on the potential mitigation of improvements to an adjacent property? >> yeah, i can speak to what i thought. we offered mr. collins a sum of money that he could make improvements -- i believe he wanted to make improvements to the windows, and i believe he wanted to make improvements to the facade of his building. >> president fung: this was 7478 page? >> yes. >> president fung: what about the other buildings? >> sorry. could you just repeat the question. >> president fung: you have two buildings adjacent to this lot. >> yeah, and then, on the other side. the folks on one side, they wanted improvements to their windows, and so we -- >> president fung: oh, you arrived at an agreement. >> yes. >> just to be clear, there were agreements with other neighbors that were effectuated.

>> president fung: to allow them, i presume to improve their windows. >> yeah. >> president fung: okay. >> clerk: okay. thank you. we will now hear from the planning department. >> good evening. scott sanchez, planning department. the subject property is an approximately 6,599 square foot lot. this is the moderate scale neighborhood commercial transit zoning district. the subject permit underwent the neighborhood notification under section 312 last year between february and march. during that time, no discretionary review requests were filed. as noted by the permit holder, the permit itself and city's review of it has taken the course of the past couple of years and has involved

environmental review and sound study that the planning department has reviewed. the permits were issued in october of last year, towards the end of october. there are two permits that are on appeal to you. the appels of those permits were filed at the end of october and early november . there was an appeal made to the board of supervisors made of the ceqa determination categorical exemption determination that was made by the planning department. the board of supervisors considered that just a few weeks ago on january 15, and at that hearing, the board of supervisors voted unanimously to deny the appeal of the ceqa determination finding that the planning department did properly review and issue the categorical exemption for the property. the project is code compliant. the appellant has not provided any arguments in their brief as to how or why the permits would not comply with the planning code. this use is principlely permitted use in the subject

zoning district. educational uses as this is are often conditional uses, so there is a higher bar, necessary or desirable, that would be typically in our residential districts or lower density district does, but here, it's principlely permitted use. it does not require a conditional use authorization or any other special entitlements. the planning department reviewed the plans that are now on appeal to you and approved that as code compliant. it's my understanding that the noise study, their sound study that was prepared by salter and associates is based upon those plans and was information that led to the production of analysis as information that was given to the planning department by permit holder indicating how they would intend to operate the subject play area. and that fed into the analysis and the planning department reviewed that, found that there was no negative environmental

impact of that. and as such, the permit was issued. to my knowledge, there are no additional conditions that were imposed. the project -- what we do is analyze a project description -- a proposal is given to the city. we review that for compliance with the planning code and make that determination and that is what was made here, but there were no additional conditions or bounds that were put on the use as part of the permit process, and i'm available for any questions. >> president fung: in terms of times of operating? >> correct. >> president fung: questions? how about my question to the permit holder who threw it onto the planning department about the acoustical analysis? >> well, the acoustical analysis is based on a project description, and the project description -- >> president fung: no. my question is they use for a source part of their analysis to be able to determine whether

there was significant -- an example where they took measurements of some other play field that had -- i think it was 25 kids playing in it with turf on it, but they don't identify it, they don't show anything related to that as a way of backing up their statement. >> my understanding -- >> president fung: that office is usually pretty good. >> i would agree. the analysis is based on the project as proposed. they're basing the calculations on the hypothetical of what is before them in the plans. the analysis is based upon the proposal in the application. that's how they draw these conclusions and do their study. >> president fung: that's part

of it. they took, as part of their analysis, measurements from another source to be able to justify those calculations. and what i'm saying is they provide no background or back up to that. >> i don't have that fine of level of detail. i can look through the materials, although i know that the issue of noise, this is not the first time. >> president fung: it's not in the report. >> this is not the first time it's been discussed. it was the primary topic issue at the board of supervisors, and the board of supervisors which is the body to hear the appeal of the ceqa determination upheld the ceqa determination. >> president fung: you know, they wanted that. the b.o.s. wanted that. have they ever overturned determinations? >> many, many, many times, yes. >> president fung: okay. >> there are many more stories

about that. >> commissioner honda: one more many, and we're going to actually change your title to being the acting c.a. >> thank you. >> clerk: thank you, mr. sanchez. mr. duffy, do you have anything to add? we'll hear from the department of building inspection. >> so the building permit was approved by -- has been issue., it was reviewed by building, structural, mechanical plan check, fire department, d.p.w., p.u.c., and that's it. i didn't hear any building code issues that were part of the appeal, but -- and as far as i know, the permit has been properly reviewed by d.b.i. plan check. thank you. >> clerk: is there any public comment on this item?

okay. please approach. >> i'm susan maury, i'm a tenant in the apartment, 768 page street. i've been there three years. i absolutely love my apartment and my neighborhood. i'm very concerned about the noise. i've intended to stay in this apartment for a very, very long time, and i'm pretty concerned i won't be able to. so i love children. we all love children. when my niece was shrieking at christmas i literally had to go outside it was so loud. i am very concerned that was going to be my day in and day out existence with hearing lovely children using their outdoor voices on a playground like they should be. it's a significant change to --

to my daily life. the other point i would make and at the risk of being blunt, we all agree that rent control is super important. i think a lot of us really support rent control. at the risk of being very blunt, i feel that we are choosing children over long-standing rent control tenants. i'm concerned that many people on our side of the building, especially the other two apartments, i'm concerned that they may not be able to find other apartments at current market rates. so i would offer to our neighbors at the school, i would offer a suggestion that perhaps we investigate doing an indoor space, like, a basketball court with good ventilation and great windows. something -- we'd all like the children to play, but maybe there's some other opportunities and other options. thank you.

>> president fung: miss -- >> maury. >> president fung: is your unit adjacent to one of the light wells? >> yes it is. >> president fung: that faces the proposed playground? >> yes. >> president fung: and what floor? >> 76 a. >> president fung: which is what floor? >> the middle floor. >> president fung: okay. >> clerk: okay. next speaker. >> my name's steven polk, and i'm a tenant. although i'm not in 74 or 76. i'm actually at 72 lily street, so where my apartment is, if i am in my apartment at 72 lily street, there's one sidewalk, another sidewalk, and lily street is a one-way, one-lane street. so between where i am and not

even the full distance to the back of the wall, i would be dealing day in and day out, five days a week, with this noise. and it is true that i did see that limited use in evenings and/or weekends. i did sit down with mr. levine because i never did get that card in the mail that talked about the july 2017 meeting. so when i heard that jesus had sold their lot and was going to turn it into a playground area, i sat down with him and i was concerned. and at that time, he also told me that there would be limited use, although he couldn't say how many limits use, and that's a very vague term. so not only are we dealing with it from 8:00 to 6:00 monday through friday, but limited use could be every other weekend, it could be three nights a

week. there is not a limit to -- i mean, there's not a definition of what limited use is. because 7476 page street has gotten a lot of attention, when i sat down with mr. levine and i expressed my concern, too, no offer was made to me about reinforcing my windows so i wouldn't have to hear the noise. and i know the woman above me who has been in her apartment over 30 years who could not be here tonight. she is in her second year of a second cancer episode that she has in her life, and she also is having to be at home during the daytime. so this level of stress and quality of life, address david had said, is going to impact a lot of us -- oh, i didn't know

i had -- >> clerk: you have 30 seconds. go ahead. >> well, the other concern i have is i don't know how high those walls are going to be, and if balls are going to have an issue of coming over. but the other thing i told mr. levine when i sat down to talk to him, the traffic issue. he said he didn't think it would happen on page street, but that it might happen on lily street. it is a small street, and i'm out of time. >> clerk: thank you. >> thank you. >> clerk: thank you. >> president fung: thank you. >> sure. >> hello, board. my name is michael kramer. i am a resident at 78-a page street, the floor above the other residents who spoke to you this evening. we live on the top floor. we would be directly overlooking this playground. i work and i'm a member of the

leadership of local 110, the union that handles a good part of trade shows in san francisco. we are experiencing the busiest year to my knowledge in trade industry in san francisco. i am under a lot of pressure to work literally around the clock, often with eight hour breaks that are random. i'm in a situation where he could very well -- where i could very well get off work at 6:00 or 7:00 or 8:00 from moscone center and be expected to work at salesforce or any of the other giant shows that are rolling through our city. i'm also someone who has lived in a rent controlled apartment -- house, became a house, because the unit was taken out. i was dislocated the beginning of february 2018 in a costa hawkins relocation.

going to another location just to go to sleep doesn't seem reasonable to me. my first notice of this building was seeing the posting on their window when i came back from work. i mean, their playgrounds are loud. and it's not just the playground. the children are coming in and out of the playground, and they're walking on the street. they're loud on the street, they're loud at the pizza place on the corner. they're kids. we love our kids but i would ask could a working-class san franciscan in an apartment afford to send their kids here? could i as a union member born and raised in san francisco, could i afford to send my children to this school? i don't know, but i kind of suspect not. >> clerk: do you have anything further, sir?

>> that's it. >> clerk: thank you. >> definitely a concern. >> clerk: thank you. any other public comment? okay. aside from this gentleman, is there any other public comment? okay. >> my name is jose menquivar, and i'm the one that's been there more than 20 years, and i'm the one that sleeps during the day, work graveyard, and i go to bed around 9:00, so imagine that noise just there next to my apartment. so that's all i want to say. >> clerk: okay. >> president fung: which building are you at, sir? >> 74-a. >> clerk: can you fill out the speaker card, please. okay. so no more public comment. we will move onto rebuttal. mr. collins, you have three minutes. >> thank you.

mr. sanchez, right? yeah, can you tell me why the top box that reads change of use end of construction is not checked off which would have triggered the necessary environmental review? >> president fung: sir. >> clerk: okay, this is your time to address the board, not to address mr. sanchez. >> okay. this top box should have been checked because it reads change of use and new construction. do you guys agree with that? >> clerk: right now, it's your time to give a presentation. >> i know. i'm asking you a question. do you agree we're talking about a change of use and new construction because if we are, then that box would have been checked, and if it were, that would have -- there would have been the necessary environmental review, and we wouldn't be here right now, okay? there was only one meeting, okay, scheduled prior to this project being initiated, okay,

with the neighborhood, okay? one meeting, okay, and that was july 22, did you say, when most people travel. people with families, they travel. i go back to cape cod. that vacation is sent in stone every year at the same time. any way, this proposed school yard is three blocks from the school. three city blocks. the children have to walk-through streets just to get to the school yard, okay, so that's a danger for the kids, okay? nobody's talking about that. right across the street from the main schoolhouse is a lot that the school also owns, okay, which would be a great place for a school yard. it's right across the street from the school, and it's a more commercial street, franklin street. they can make all the noise they want, they wouldn't bother any tenants. right here, we have 180 housing

units surrounding the playground on all sides. six in my building, 75, 72, lily street, 24 unit residential building, all long-term tenants. 100 law street, another mixed use building with 18 units above, all facing the proposed school yard. long-term te long-term tenants, san francisco, that have been in that neighborhood when it wasn't such a psosh place to live. i've owned that property 15 years, long before the french american school has been buying property on that street. so i've been invested in the long run. i'm here to protect my tenants, okay, who i actually like, okay, and i don't want to see them displaced. and i think that you guys have to take a look at the school yard, okay? and you guys, this is what we can expect. can you focus on that, okay?

this is the kind of consideration, okay, that the school has for its neighbors, okay? >> clerk: okay. sir, your time's up. thank you. >> president fung: mr. collins, there's a question for you. >> i understand that you and mr. levine said you met elevate to discuss litigation. what were some of the topics discussed and some of the ideas that surfaced? >> well, i was opposed and ammo posed, for the record, okay, i object to the project, okay, so let's make that perfectly clear, okay, however, okay, i didn't want to go through this fight either, okay? and i didn't want to -- and they did make a -- an offer, but it had conditions, conditions that i couldn't accept, so they did -- they never made me an offer that i couldn't refuse, they didn't make me an offer that i could even accept, okay? i showed the agreement to a lawyer, and he laughed at me,

okay? we weren't dealing in good faith, and any amelioration efforts were not sincere. they offered me to reface -- it's not the prettiest building. it's a 1950's sand stone facade. they said they would offset the cost of that. double paned windows, but the double paned windows, dan already has the double paned windows in it his apartment, and he will already hear -- can already hear the lily street school yard, so that's why those guys are here tonight. >> so you guys weren't able to calm to an agreement. >> they withdrew the agreement when the tenants filed an appeal. >> i'm not asking him a question, i'm asking you what you would like for your

mitigation measures. >> okay. i think that the -- he mentioned that the long-term plans is to change it again into a gym. okay? all right? i think that works, and they can put a school yard on top of the gym. they can have an outdoor play space because noise goes up, and they can have an outdoor basketball court like susan suggested. another good suggestion would be to place the school yard across the street from the main schoolhouse. >> your suggestions would be to building a building or to move the play yard. >> even if they have a lot across the street from the school. >> i just wanted to be clear what it was that you wanted. >> yeah. i want peace for my tenants. that's what i want, and that's all i've ever wanted. >> thank you very much. >> clerk: thank you, mr. colins. >> you're welcome. >> clerk: we'll now hear from mr. newcome.

you have three minutes. >> i did want to respond that although aaron levine has been working with dave and some of the other property owners, i have not had any contact, and they have not reached out to tenants, which is part of the reason that i'm here, is to have that voice. i feel like i didn't even though about dave's -- know about dave's dealings with them until i filed the appeal. you already heard about the salter study not using a named play field because one of the first things that i wanted to do was see hey, is there merit to their study? i have sound equipment. not type i sound equipment, which is what the salter review used, but i have two equipment,

it's within 1 or 2%. it's sort of citizen science, but i wasn't able to actually go to the site that they used in their study, which i think was a huge hindrance. that's all i've got. thank you. >> sorry mr. newcome. you reported when you did the ambient sound level at peak time, what was it compared to there. >> can you be more specific? >> well, to compare the school yard to another area in the neighborhood because it's a pretty busy area, pretty urban, i would say, so there would be some day level sound which is what reported in the other report and planning also emphasizes that. there's a pretty loud ambient sound, so i'm wondering if you recorded sounds at other areas, what those levels were?

>> i waited until the children broke, and measured what those levels were. it was rush hour, 5:00 p.m. on bell street. it was 70 decibels. >> certainly, the video you showed it was going up in a range between 70 to i think 82 or 83. it's not a consistent 85 that's always going to be there. it's already a pretty loud neighborhood, if i'm understanding the readings correctly. >> indeed. >> okay. thank you. >> clerk: thank you. we will now hear from mr. abrams. you have six minutes. >> thank you. i just wanted to underscore that we understand the neighbor's concerns. we understand that a playground creates noise, but i do want to point out that the school has followed all the applicable law, as well.

the planning code, the city's laws permit this use here. it doesn't matter if it's a private school playground or a playground run by a nonprofit or by the sfusd, it's just a playground. the planning code doesn't distinguish between them. it also doesn't distinguish between loud playgrounds or less loud playgrounds, so all of the rules and regulations were followed here, and i think the school went above and beyond to meet with some of the neighbors, and i think the playground is legally permitted here. i really respect your input and ask that you please uphold the permit. we also just want to note that, you know, the playground was designed, again, with certain sound attenuation features that the schoolworked with the planning department and the neighbors on. thank you. >> commissioner lazarus: couple questions. it is a turf surface, so it's

not a hard surface. >> president fung: plastic. >> commissioner honda: tires. >> commissioner lazarus: right, and you said this was going to be for sort of organized practices and that kind of thing, so it's not sort of the typical school yard where the kids are taking a break in the middle of the day and sort of allowed to be at their noisiest. >> correct. so it's not going to be your regular random playground with kids on jungle gym equipment. it's going to be organized sports activity. the kids that would be using this facility now have to travel to an area in the south of the city to be able to use a playground or play field, so it's going to be used for structured sports, not for a ran dam jungle gym activity. >> commissioner lazarus: is there a particular age range for that use. >> for grades one up to potentially grade 12.

>> commissioner lazarus: so the entire range. >> correct, but as jim said or as you said, it's for structured play, so what jim was referring to was currently middle school, go to a bus and go to crocker-amazon to go to middle school practices. this won't fill all the needs, but certainly half the practices could be held at this site for middle school. >> commissioner lazarus: okay. thank you. >> president fung: but your permit has no conditions. how are we to know that this is only for structured play? how are we to know that it's only monday to friday? >> right. so the the -- the -- the planning code doesn't restrict it to monday through friday. there's not a classification for playground only monday through friday. >> president fung: well, there's no code, but if it had -- it could have been conditioned by planning.

>> it -- i don't think planning would -- well, i will defer to planning, but i don't think planning typically conditions permitted conditionally -- >> president fung: they condition all kinds of permits. >> for a standard permit, when you have a principlely permitted use, i think it's relatively uncommon for planning to condition permits, yeah. >> commissioner honda: excuse me. does -- does the school own the property on franklin that's vacant? >> it does, yes. >> commissioner honda: and is that a closer proximity, and what's the size, the space between that one? >> it's a large parking lot right now. >> commissioner honda: so that's the one on the corner? >> yes. >> commissioner honda: so why would you have your kids walk three blocks instead of across the street? >> the parking lot that is currently across the street is

proposed as the city's hub plan, and the school is proposing to building a parking lot. >> commissioner honda: traffic is just getting worse driving downtown. >> school's main building is on oak street. >> commissioner honda: i'm well aware of the whole parking when i drive down oak. >> okay. this particular lot is one block from our school. it's on lily. it backs up to lily street. it is not three blocks, so it's fairly close, and as jim said, there are the plans for 98 franklin. >> commissioner honda: and if we were to condition the permit, what would you prefer to see on there? >> sorry. can you -- i'm not sure. >> commissioner honda: i said, if we were to condition the permit, because to me, personally, this is institutional institutional encroachment.

you were saying that it's only going to be used for structured play, monday through friday from what time to what time? >> we wouldn't be using it on a weekend. we don't hold classes on weekends, so i don't know that we would use it on the weekend. i think what the project description said, i'd have to look that up. it may have said minimal use on the weekend or something like that, so if we had some kind of event, we had some people walking through there or on a tour on a weekend -- >> commissioner honda: we're just trying to mitigate and address the concerns for people that did not plan, when they moved there 20 years ago, that there was going to be a school playground with three -- kindergarten to age potentially high school. >> commissioner tanner: yeah. what do you think primarily --

hours 8:00 to 6:00 p.m. weekdays, with current limited weekends. this is how it reads in the ceqa exemption document. >> correct. and that's what we told our architect, and that is what we put in our application. that is exactly what we're planning on using it for. >> commissioner tanner: i think some of the questions are, what the definition of limited is. which hasn't been defined by planning or the city hasn't twined that for you. i am -- defined that for you. trying to figure out what that limited use -- >> certainly, it's going to be in use until 6:00, and certainly, it's not going to be used until after 6:00, so for sure, that's the case. i think the weekend situation is just a -- an odd event. we may have a tour, and we may walk people through that event. we don't hold classes on weekends, so -- and we --

actually, in conjunction with discussing with the neighbors, we had talked with the planning department will letting other groups -- about letting other groups use this. the neighbors we were in communication with were vehemently against that, and we said fine, we're not going to do that. we understood that. we're not going to have peewee football teams in there, or other organization ones. other organizations may not be happy about that, but we wanted to make sure we kept it as peaceful as possible. so that's the best i can say to that. i think what the word -- what you just read is what we intended for. >> commissioner honda: and last question, i'm sorry. someone from the public mentioned that you potentially are converting that over to a gym. is there any -- >> yeah, so we disclosed that when we talked to the plan, and

that's many years out. >> commissioner honda: okay. >> there's talk of that. we would like to have another gym. our current gym, it's one gym for about 1400 kids. someday, we would like -- >> commissioner honda: it's a nice gym. i've played there before. >> it is a nice gym. it's one of the nicer in the city, but it is one for 1400 kids. it's something we talked about. but we don't have the funding for that right now, and i don't know when we will. >> clerk: thank you. mr. sanchez? >> thank you. scott sanchez, planning department. just a couple of points to reiterate. the project went through section 312 notification, 30-day notice to occupants within 150 feet during that time. there were no discretionary reviews filed on the project which would have brought it before the planning commission. the planning department does not require any conditions of approval for this because there were no conditions required to

bring it in compliance with the planning code. the proposal complies with the planning code as proposed. it would have been an opportunity at a discretionary hearing for the planning department to take additional action if they felt necessary to further restrict and condition the use of the property. but this is a de novo hearing, and now this is before the board of appeals, which has the same right to have discretion over the permit. in regard to president fung's question about the source measurement and why they chose the field that they did, on page five of the noise assessment or the sound assessment, they said that was chosen because it was most comparable to what is proposed on the plans because it is a turf location, had similar number of students, age of students, and that was the basis for it. staff reviewed that, found that to be appropriate methodology for the soun