poverty, youth, or seniors can for thursday, february 14, 2019. i will remind members of the public that the commission does not tolerate outbursts of any kind. please silent your mobile devices and when speaking before the commission, if you care to, do state your name for the record. roll at this time, melgar. >> here. >> vice president koppel. >> here. >> commissioner hillis. commissioner moore. we do expect commissioners fong, johnson, and richards to arrive shortly. first is items for continuance. item one for the accessory dwelling units and new construction planning code and business and tax regulations code amendments. item two, 2018-006127cua,

20119th avenue at the time of issuance was proposed for continuance until march 21st, now for march 14, 2019. items 3a and b for 2017-001270cua proposed for variance until april 4th. number four at proposed for continuance until april 4, 2019. item five at 448 valley street, the variance has been withdrawn. you will still consider the conditional use authorization under your regular calendar. i have no other items for continuance and i have no speaker cards.

>> preside >> commissioner koppel? >> move to remove items 1, 2, 3, and 4. after public comment. >> is there public comment on the continuance calendar? okay, with that, public comment is now closed. >> second. >> thank you, commissioners. on that motion to continue items as proposed, commissioner fong? commissioner hillis. commissioner moore. commissioner melgar. so moved, that motion passes unanimously 5-0. if the acting zoning administrator could continue item 3b. >> yes, i'll continue to the date specified. thank you. >> thank you. placing us under your consent calendar, all matters listed here considered to be routine by the planning commission and may be acted upon by a single role call vote of the commission. there will be no separate discussion of these items unless the member of the public, staff,

or commission requests, in which event the matter should be removed and considered at a separate item at this or a future hearing. item 6, case 2018-013462 cua, 3995 alemany boulevard, number seven, 2018-015439 cua. 205 hugo street. i have no speaker cards. >> yes. >> i came to ask number seven, 205 hugo street, conditional use authorization be considered a full hearing at a later date. this is not a minor planning approval. >> all we can do now is move off of consent. you've done that, we'll take up the matter under regular calendar. >> very good. >> we'll hear it. >> request at a later date? i think a lot of neighbors -- >> at the time we hear it under

the regular calendar you can make that request. right now all you can do is it be pulled off of consent. >> thank you. any other speakers? okay. with that, we're now closed. commissioner koppel? >> commissioner koppel: move to approve item 6. . >> regular hearing and the draft minutes for the january 24th regular hearing. >> president melgar: is there

any public comment on this? okay, so public comment is now closed. >> move to approve. >> second. >> thank you, commissioners, on that motion to adopt the minutes for january 24th and january 31, 2019. [ roll call ] so moved, commissioners, that motion passes unanimously 7-0. placing us on item 9, commission comments and questions. >> president melgar: commissioner fong? >> commissioner fong: thank you. i wanted to make an announcement. i have officially resigned from the planning commission after eight years and two months, but not counting those. resigned and will take the president and ceo position of the san francisco chamber of commerce. i'll have a long 45-minute speech next week, which will be my next week, but just very much appreciate this time together.

i'll get deep into it, but all the skills and education, frankly, that i've learned here in eight years will come over the chamber of commerce. the chamber of commerce is generally known for promoting business, but i think we're at a time where all of san francisco falls into the chamber's responsibilities as far as transit, housing, land use, street life, et cetera, and this all comes to play. it's purely from education that i've learned here, so thank you very much. >> president melgar: congratulations, commissioner fong, we'll surely miss you. commissioner richards? >> commissioner richards: i want to say when i heard the news i thought, there couldn't be a more perfect person for this role, honestly, because you get what's going on in the city. you've been around a while, your family has been around a while, and the wisdom you've expressed here in the commission is going to benefit the chamber of commerce. you're going to understand the pulls and the pushes that the city faces, so i wish you nothing but the best of luck. one other quick one to mention, not to regurgitate old news, but

i have kind of a connection to make. high housing costs are resegregating the bay area was in the chronicle recently, and they also had a survey of cities where there was diversity and they were kind of the outer ring of the bay area with the more youth got into the central area of the bay area, it got wider. and why am i mentioning this? don't think that's a great idea, i think we need to figure out what to do there, but two, there was an article in "new york times" called the automation agenda hidden by the davos elite, and there was also an article, i couldn't find it, about robotics. it happened in the same week, and basically what it said was economists are now rethinking the fact that efficiency and productivity is actually lifting all boats. in fact, they are now questioning the fact that boats are starting to sink. if you're educated, you know, and you're in certain

industries, your prospects are really, really good, but if you have a high school education and you're in an industry that's not automated, like home health care nurse and things like that, your wages are just stagnated, so whatever we do in order to resegregate the bay area, we need to take into consideration the broader social trends around how people can afford, if they can afford to live where we want them to live, so we actually have diversity. anyways, i just made that connection and wanted to share. i also requested if possible we have richard rothstein come and do an informational presentation on the color of law, if that's something the other commissioners would like to hear. >> president melgar: thank you. commissioner johnson? >> commissioner johnson: i just wanted to say thank you to commissioner fong. i think something that you said last week during our community meeting about looking for balance, i think, runs true to

your time on the commission and your leadership and your leadership style. and that's really been a benefit to the commission, and into the way that you engage with community. i really appreciate your thoughtful, personal, yeah, just generous approach to thinking about and thinking through the issues that come before the commission, and i will deeply miss your leadership and collaboration, but really excited for this next chapter for you. >> commissioner fong: thank you very much. >> president melgar: commissioner hillis? >> i too would like to congratulate commissioner fong. when i heard the chamber job was open, i was puzzled who they'd pick for that position, and i think you're a perfect choice for that, so i'm excited to see you in that role and hopefully work with you in that role, so

you're also a perfect commissioner here, it's sad you're leaving. one of the longest serving members, certainly as long as i've been here, and i've learned a ton from you. i think your tone, the balance you have, you've kind of set the tone for the rest of us and we've learned a lot from you, so thank you for everything you've done here. >> commissioner fong: thank you, rich. >> president melgar: commissioner moore? >> commissioner moore: thank you, commissioner fong. we are somewhat tired of your success, because i do believe the planning commission is a great training ground, and i couldn't be happier, having worked with you so long, also what you mentioned in the paper yesterday that the small business concerns will be as important as an ingredient as san francisco and that makes me very, very happy and hopeful to continue to work hand in hand with what we do here. >> commissioner fong: thank you, commissioner moore. >> president melgar: i will just chime in. i will really miss your

kindness. you are a kind and generous person, and i'll miss your energy on this commission. i'm bummed we're losing you, but i'm grateful for the city of san francisco that we're going to have you in that role. i think you're going to be great. okay, commissioner koppel. >> commissioner koppel: i'll quickly chime in, as well. you were one of the first commissioners i was able to talk to in the hallway back in the day when i used to attend these hearings on the public side, so privilege to have met you then and sit next to you now. sorry to see you go, but congratulations to you. >> commissioner fong: thank you, and you're all invited to speak at my funeral. >> secretary: nothing further. item 10, director's announcements. >> on behalf of the department, thank you for everything you've done, and i will say, and we can say more next week, two things, one is, i'm looking forward to working with you in your new role. i think it would be great to have you there and that

connection and knowledge working with you there. secondly, we need an appropriate sendoff in the next few weeks. >> we're due. >> secretary: very good. item 11, review of past events at the board of supervisors, board of appeals, and historic preservation commission. >> good afternoon, commission. first was the landmark designation for the sunshine school and theodore roosevelt middle school. these items were called together. the sunshine school was constructed in 1937 with funds from the public works administration. it is significant as the first public school specifically designed for children with disabilities built west of the rockies. it was designed in the spanish colonial revival style with art deco and moorish accents. more significantly, it has a floor plan and devised to combine two separate schools in one campus, one for disabled children and one for the

chronically ill. theodore roosevelt middle school was built in 1930 and is the only dutch-german expressionist building designed by timothy fluger. the hpc initiated designation on october 18, 2017, and recognized landmark designation in 2017. during land use hearing, a continuance was asked for to give the new school board members a chance to review the designation. other commenders were in favor of the landmark designation, including many from the land use community. honorific, as planning department does not review alterations to schools. staff also affirmed that planning review with alterations is usually limited to informational presentations at the historic preservation commission. the committee then voted to unanimously recommend the two

ordinances to the full board. last on the land use agenda was a rezoning for 170 valencia street. the subject property has split zoning with nct3 zoning at the front of the building and rto at the rear. this ordinance would make the entire building zone just nct3. you heard this item and recommended approval. at the land use hearing, no public comment and no significant comments from the committee members. the item was then sent to the full board with a positive recommendation. at the full board this week, supervisor mandelman for 22 beaver street passed its second read. then the appeal for 3637 sacramento street. last week the board voted to uphold the environmental determination and continue the cu appeal for one week to finalize agreed upon conditions of approval. at the hearing, supervisor stefani moved to grant a new cu that imposed the conditions imposed by the planning

commission, related to design modifications. the design modifications are intended to reduce the bulk of the building by providing a three-foot setback at either end of the fourth floor and modify the design to be more in keeping with neighborhood character. this passed unanimously. the cu and environmental appeals for 1052 folsom street were all continued to april 9th, and that concludes my report, and i would also like to share my thanks to supervisor -- maybe some day, commissioner fong, for his time on the committee. thanks. >> secretary: i have no -- wait a minute, maybe last minute. nope, no hearing last night for the board of appeals. placing us under general public comment. at this time members of the public may address the commission on items of interest to the public that are within the subject matter jurisdiction of the committee, except agenda items. with respect to agenda items, your opportunity to address the

commission will be afforded when the item is reached in the meeting. each member of the public may address the commission for up to three minutes. when the number of speakers exceed the 15-minute limit, general public comment may be moved to the end of the agenda. i have no speaker cards. >> president melgar: we have no speaker cards, but if you can come up for general public comment. go ahead, come on up. okay, anyone else for general public comment, please come up. >> secretary: for items that are not on the agenda. >> items not on the agenda today? >> secretary: right. >> it's possible it could be that way. i am here regarding an item that i'm asking for the item not to be heard today. >> secretary: you should make that request when the item is called. >> okay, thank you.

>> president melgar: thank you. anyone else for general public comment for items not on the agenda? okay, well, with that, looks like public comment is now closed. >> secretary: very good, commissioners, that places us under your regular calendar. item 7 was pulled off consent, will be considered now. 205 hugo street conditional use authorization. >> good afternoon, commissioners. commissioners, the request before you is a request for conditional use authorization pursuant to planning code sections 186 to allow a change of use from an existing limited restaurant to a restaurant and in a limited commercial use space within the rh2 zoning district. the application has been reviewed under the community business priority processing

program. staff has received one letter of support from the office of district 5 supervisor valli brown and since the staff report was published, four letters of opposition have been received in opposition to the requests. on balance, necessary and desirable for the community and thus recommends approval with conditions. thank you, and i'm available for any questions you may have. >> president melgar: thank you. do we have a project sponsor? >> we've been up and running for about six months now -- >> president melgar: speak into the mic, please. >> hi there, my name is kenzy, one of my business partners is rika. me and my wife, along with the support of my friends have opened a small cantina on 205

hugo street. the space has been a cafe since around 1988. our landlord and a sister started it. we've luckily taken over the space, have a lot of experience in the restaurant world. we were working on numerous restaurant projects at a farmstead and now back in the city. the space is definitely tiny, it's around 500 square feet. we are food focused. we're not trying to get this beer and wine license to become a bar. we're only trying to extend our hours from 5:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m., thursday, friday, saturday. it is a large residential area on our side of the street. there is actually a lot of commercial space beside us, uc market, they are a liquor store open until 11:00 p.m. on the other side of us is a

bike shop. beside them is a laundry mat that's open until 10:00 p.m., and there's some residential properties in between that and another space on 4th and hugo, which is actually zoned commercial, underneath, and apartments up above. so i know there's been a few people concerned that we'd be extremely noisy and that this would become more of a bar-centered cafe, which i want to bring forth that we're not. we're trying to only serve a couple beers, a couple wines on tap. we have very limited space, so the storage, we'd have a couple kegs, couple natural wines, and another issue that was brought up was parking. the block's hard to park. i think it's going to be really hard to park there no matter if we have beer and wine thursday, friday, saturday or not. yeah, i'm very open to answering any questions. >> president melgar: we may have questions. thank you so much. >> thank you. >> president melgar: with that, we will open up the item for

public comment. whoever pulled this off consent. all right, gabriel ricketts and matthew bruno, and whoever else wants to speak, please line up. >> my name is gabriel ricketts. i've lived in the neighborhood off and on for 30 years with my family. i do live across the street from the cafe. it has been a cafe as far becauback as i can remember. i'm here today just because i'm concerned about not so much the food part, but the cafe being small, the last owner kind of spilled out on to the street. we have now there's tables for people to sit, because there's not much room inside the cantina to sit, and with having beer and wine, the noise to me seems to be an issue.

and having it open with beer and wine past 5:00 when everyone's coming home from work and on weekends when that's the time when you kind of want your neighborhood to be quiet, i just have big reservations about that. hugo street is kind of a quiet little street. we do have irving a block away and lincoln a block away, and a lot of the restaurants that are open that late and serve alcohol or are, you know, in a five to ten-block radius around the neighborhood. so i just want that to be noted that i'm objecting to the idea of having an establishment that's going to have beer and wine outside on the street after 5:00. being across from that place there's no way to protect for sound. you know, if it was inside and

it was insulated it would be one thing, but having it outside, the sound just echoes through that block of hugo street. and the couple times that there's been private events there, it's just hard not to hear the noise. it doesn't matter, even if a window is open, any music just comes across the street and bounces around our apartment building. and it's been disruptive, so i'm just having my voice heard about that. >> president melgar: thank you. next speaker, please. >> good afternoon, commissioners, my name is matthew bruno. i live at 204 hugo street, directly across from the property in question. i've lived there for eight years, grew up in coal valley, with the exception of a few years for college, i've lived in san francisco in that neighborhood my entire life. the property in question has existed as a cafe. however, there's never been a single restaurant or cafe that served alcohol on hugo street, with the exception of that,

those four small commercial units in one building there, the rest of the street is exclusively residential and has been always. again, there's never been any alcohol served there whatsoever. i request this be continued to a later hearing date, because i think a lot of the neighbors are just finally starting to understand what the actual -- the change that's being sought is. to be honest, when they saw it was on the consent calendar today, they weren't quite sure about that, wasn't sure if they were going to have an opportunity to then voice their opinions, so for those reasons, we really want to continue it to a later hearing to allow the rest of the neighbors to fully grasp what's going on and let their voices be heard. again, there's never been alcohol on that site. if you look at the plans, the property is very small. the cafe's tiny. at least half, i would say maybe the majority of their seats, are outside. on the evenings where they have had events in the past, the noise just comes right into our building. we can have our windows closed, but in my bedroom, which fronts

the building, as every other unit in my apartment building, so whether we're in our living rooms or bedrooms, that noise can come filtering in. especially if there's people on the sidewalk, there's no way to soundproof that. i saw in the conditions for approval they had some language there about soundproofing. that's not going to happen. there's no plans that i'm aware of to insulate soundproofing, install soundproofing or install double-pane windows. obviously, if half the customer base is outside, you can't soundproof that. so really i don't -- essentially, i was surprised to see this on the consent calendar. to me this is a major change. you're essentially going to vote to allow an open-air beer garden on an exclusively residential street. they have picnic tables and they are serving beer and wine. i don't know what else to call it. they don't want a bar, but it's in the name of their business, cantina. we're concerned about noise, not concerned about parking or anything else, whether they are

vacuuming, whether they are playing amplified music, which they say they want to do and have done, that music comes straight into our apartments. again, a lot of the neighbors have not had an opportunity to fully understand what is being proposed here and they were confused by the consent calendar item, so respectfully respect to allow the neighbors to come in and voice their concerns about the noise from this project. if you have any questions, please let me know. >> president melgar: thank you very much. any other speakers on this item? okay, with that, public comment is now closed. commissioner hillis? >> commissioner hillis: can i ask a question on this item? what's the proposal for hours for the use? is it just what our -- we're not approving hours, we're just approving it to a limited restaurant so they can serve beer and wine. >> yeah, so this is a limited commercial use space, lcu space.

planning code section 186 they are limited to certain hours, 6:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m., i believe, but those are up to your discretion, is my understanding, as well. >> commissioner hillis: okay. can i just ask the operator, can i ask -- what are you planning to do, hourswise? you're only lunch, right? >> currently open at 8:00 a.m. and close at 3:00 p.m., we're open wednesday to sunday, and if this is approved we'd want to be open thursday, friday, and saturday from 5:00 to 9:00 p.m. so we don't plan on operating past 9:00 p.m. we just wanted a second shift during the day to try and help financially make this -- >> commissioner hillis: okay, thank you. to me that seems reasonable. i get the concern of the neighbors. it's somewhat unusual to have this small commercial strip, i'm very familiar with it, i've been to the market and the cafe that's there before. they exist throughout the city. sometimes there's restaurants with beer and wine.

i think it's a stretch to call this a beer garden or anything beyond. it's a small neighborhood restaurant. i've got one in my neighborhood that kind of sits in the similar residential area. i think there's nothing we're going to do necessarily to, you know, work things out or make things quiet or when they are not. i think you guys are going to have to work together and have a dialogue about this, but i think it's reasonable to have this restaurant be open until 9:00 and be able to serve beer and wine. so i would be supportive. i mean, maybe we limit the hours until 9:00, if that's what the owner wants to do, but i would be comfortable approving this. >> president melgar: commissioner richards? >> commissioner richards: i'm comfortable with the project. we have these kind of restaurants in my neighborhood, as well, sitting in these spaces that are all residential. i support the hours until 9:00, but i would put a restriction on amplified music outside. acoustical music's okay, but amplified music, no.

i move to approve with hours until 9:00, the days specified, with no amplified music outside. >> president melgar: commissioner moore? >> commissioner moore: i second that motion, but i would speak from experience, as well, i live in a neighborhood where there is a small restaurant in the middle of the block, completely surrounded by residential to all sides, and it's up to the owner, who is trying to run a successful business, to basically adhere and be in sync with the needs of the neighbors. i've never seen anybody operating within a neighborhood or restaurant where he was totally at odds with all neighbors. the success of the business greatly depends on having your neighbors wanting to come and bring their own guests through to attend the restaurant, so i'm in full support and second the motion of mr. richards. commissioners richards. >> secretary: seeing nothing further, there's a motion, limiting hours to 9:00 p.m. with no amplified music outside. on that motion -- [ roll call ]

so moved, commissioners, that motion passes unanimously 7-0. that will place us on item 12 for 2018-015471crv. fy 2019-2021 proposed department budget and work program. this is for your consideration for approval. >> good afternoon, commissioners. jon rahm, department staff. we are asking for your approval today on the budget that will be sent to the mayor's budget office next week. as a reminder, all department budgets are due to the mayor's budget staff by february 21st next week, and as we presented to you a couple of weeks ago, this year's budget is kind of a steady state, if you will. we are not -- the budget office has asked all departments to not add any additional staff in this budget round.

it may be possible later in the process to add, but we don't know yet. and we are proposing, because our current year revenues have dropped somewhat, drop in applications, we are proposing about a million dollars less in revenue for next year, so this budget does reflect that. i will say that we're trying to not overcompensate, but we're trying to be cautious. seems like the right amount. our revenues go up and down monthly. so the first six months of this fiscal year ending in december we saw a drop in revenues. we might see an increase. we don't want to overcompensate, so we're just trying to be cautious. with that, i'll ask deborah landis to give you the details, then i'm happy to answer any questions. thank you. >> good afternoon, commissioners, deborah landis, deputy director of administration. i am going to briefly review the budget overall and highlight the changes that have happened since

the last time i presented here to you. and so we're going to start with the mayor's instructions, go through the volume trends, and revenue and expenditure. pretty straightforward presentation today, i think. so i think that the two highlights from the mayor's instructions are what mr. rahm has already mentioned, no new positions and there's also a general fund support reduction of 2% in each fiscal year. so the general fund support is equivalent, the amount we had to reduce was about $80,000 each year, and we were able to achieve that. so again, we base our budget on the projections given the current year and any trends that we're seeing. we had a couple of years of plateauing in volume and then the current year it looks like we're going to be a little bit down. january was much stronger than december, so, hopefully as the director mentioned, we continue

to go up. we're not totally sure, but given the first six months of the year, we are anticipating to reduce our general fund fees by about a million dollars. so in the revenue budget here, we have a few changes that have happened. we have about $320,000 increase in expenditure recovery from ocii, the office of community investment -- and i forget what the other "i" is for. infrastructure, thank you. the former redevelopment agency, because they are expecting some projects and trends where they are going to require a lot of work from us, so we've added that to the budget. we have also decreased our grants expectations. we got instructions from a funder about the maximum allocation. it was a little bit lower than we had understood previously, so we've brought that down to be the maximum that we could receive. and we have also increased

enforcement revenue to better align with the current year revenue projections, so that's why even if we've decreased the general fund charges per services, because we're increasing nongeneral fund, you're not seeing the big change in the numbers from prior year to current year. so we start with the top line, which is charges for services. those are our fees. and the vast majority of those, about $42 million of that, is general fund. grants and special revenues are the second line. again, as a reminder, we budget generally one year out. there are a few grants we know we get regularly annually, so the second year, the out year, we have those we anticipate receiving as we have for the past several years. otherwise we will rebudget that second year when it is the first year, a year from now. development impact fees have gone down a little bit from last year to the -- excuse me, from current year to next year, because we are doing a nexus

study, so that's not required next year. the expenditure recovery is -- where we see the ocii change, and the general fund support, that 5.1 is the target reduction that the mayor's office requested. on the expenditures side, again, salaries and fringe that people are by far the largest, largest cost of anything in the department, and we continue to be more expensive every year. the overhead number, i do anticipate that will change. it's set by the comptroller's office and loaded by them. that will happen later after the department phase is complete. nonpersonal services is everything from, oh, leasing our copy machines, to contracts, anything that's not a good, it's a service. and then materials and supplies, we have bumped that up a little bit for next year and the following year related to the

move to 49 south van ness, and we are planning to buy one printer next year. anything over $5,000 with a useful life of three years or more. we don't anticipate equipment or capital in the new year, because that will be in the new building and we'll be outfitted, we understand, when we move in. for the projects line, that is really mostly related to grants and impact fees. that is where we have unprogrammed money, so we're not sure yet if we're going to get a grant, if it's going to go to salaries or a contract. we put it in projects to give us that flexibility for when the award does come in. and the services of other departments are, the big ones, are rent and city attorney. so, generally, the same budget as you saw last time, just a couple of changes that i'd highlighted, and the schedule has not changed. so that remains the same.

we are here today, we went to historic preservation last week or the week before, and they did recommend to the planning commission to approve the budget. we have the february 21 deadline to the mayor's office and june 1 it goes to the board of supervisors and finalized in july. with that, if there are any questions, we're here to answer them, and thank you for your time. >> president melgar: thank you very much. we will now have public comment on this item. if there's any public comment, can you please come up? we don't have speaker cards, right? okay, seeing none, commissioners? commissioner richards. >> commissioner richards: that's a good budget. move to approve. >> second. >> secretary: thank you, commissioners. on that motion then to approve the proposed department budget

and work program -- [ roll call ] so moved, commissioners, that motion passes unanimously 5-0. commissioners, that will place us on item 13 for the executive directive on housing report informational presentation. >> good afternoon, commissioners. i wanted to add a sense of drama to the -- give me a second here, please. i'm so sorry.

all right. and jonas would also like to provide a pronouncement of the presentation. thank you very much, sir. all right. good afternoon, commissioners. jacob bintliff, planning department staff. appreciate this opportunity to give you all an update on the mayor's executive directive on housing production. i'd like to start off by having the ability to advance the slides would be the first thing.

thank you for your patience. first a brief refresher on what the executive directive was. i'm sorry, folks, this hasn't been the setup in the past. so the executive directive was september of 2017 issued by mayor lee. the key component of the executive directive was to establish target approval time frames for housing projects between six and 22 months after the project description was stable, depending on the environmental review for the project. there was a post entitlement requirement of having projects

be approved, issue a building permit within one year after entitlement. various accountability, and finally a requirement that departments provide processed improvement plans. the planning department's plan came out in december of 2017, focused on our internal effort and preentitlement improvements and there was an inner agency plan also issued in april for the post entitlement improvements. before diving into the status of our work, i wanted to briefly touch on a look back on how long it has taken projects to get to approval in the past, before we began implementing these improvement efforts. so the numbers on this slide reflect projects, residential housing projects of ten or more units that were approved in the past three years, 2016 through 2018 by this commission, and the projects were broken down into the different approval time frame categories with the executive directive laid out based on environmental type, and what you see is the projects,

for example, in the ceqa exemption category throughout the city, there was a nine-month target from project description stable to approval, and over the past three years from a to z, from the time the application has came in for approval has been 18 months. and you can also see the number of projects that are reflected. on the right hand most column, i would draw your attention to the second row, the number of 60 projects there. that shows you the bulk of what we're doing is the projects in the 12-month approval category. this is declarations, community plan exemptions and valuations in our area plans, really the bulk of what we're doing. both projects are to have a time frame of 12 months from stable project to approval. they've been running 20 months in the past. so this helps us to understand what we are working to improve on, it helps us understand what the baseline has been in the past, and in future reports will be comparing our performance moving forward to these numbers from the past. now moving into the actual

process improvements themselves, and i should also note that in your packets there's a brief two-page summary that kind of lists out some of the most impactful projects. i'd like to pass around a just very slightly revised copy of this, as well. there was one little typo, and there will be a gold star for the person who is able to identify what that typo was at the end of the presentation. even my desk, this is my cheat sheet, so i hope it's helpful. what i'll be doing in the presentation today is going through some of the highlights in this. so the process improvement plan, you know, it was something that we looked inside of the department, we asked around, we tried to come up from our collective experience where the log jams, the time we're spending more time than we need to and developed this plan. it had several dozen improvements in these five categories, and i'm going to go through the categories as i present the update. so, where are we in february of

2018? first and foremost, and i really want to emphasize this point, the consolidated project review, this really is the foundation of our process improvement strategy at the department. it sounds like a lot of kind of bureaucratic hoops and moving things around. it is a huge change in the way we do business, so first and foremost, the thing to keep in mind is the planning department is requiring the projects apply with all the information needed for environmental review, design review, planning code compliance, everything, and all of our responses to the projects and to the public will be combined responses from environmental planning staff, from the current planning staff who's looking at the planning code, combined information, consolidated feedback from the department, to projects. then i want to point out the steps one through five, which we'll be talking more about. this is really the new flow for how applications come through and how they are reviewed. the first step we've had for some time, the preliminary project assessment, early guidance for a project before an application.

we focus that to give projects a better sense of what the approval pathway is going to be, to make it more tailored, and we moved the time frame from 60 days on our end to 90 days. secondly, after a project has received their ppa, then they are able to put in a project application. this is the new consolidated application that lumps in the cu, environmental, everything that might be needed for the project. once the project application is in, we have 30 days, one month, to review the application for completeness. it's either complete and we deem it accepted and move on, or if there's anything missing, we issue a notice of incomplete application that clearly indicates what needs to be done and received for the project to be complete. after that, once we have a complete application, we get into the really nitty-gritty, fine-tooth comb, planning code review and whatever issues there may be from environmental, planning code review, or design review, we issue a letter from the entire department within 90 days that indicates what needs to be done to get to a code-compliant project. once we get to that point, we say congratulations, your project description is stable,

you've been calendared in advance for an approval hearing six to 22 months out, depending what your environmental review type is, and i'm going to come back to that piece of this, as well. so with those steps in mind we wanted to report how we're doing on all of that. i should say we rolled out that requirement for the project application in june of 2018, so this report is reflecting what went on from june to december of 2018, so the first six months of implementation. i should say for ppas we began that requirement in april, so it's actually eight months for that category, and what you can see on the ppa's target of 60 days, on average out in 63 days and two-thirds of the time we're getting them out on time. because the average is so close to the target of 60 days, when we are missing, we're not missing my much. our ability to give clear guidance on a project accepted or not in 30 days, we're doing well, 17 days on average and 80% of the time we're getting it out on time, so feeling pretty good about that one. finally, with the plan check letters, we're getting them out on time half the time and half

the time we're not. average is 80 days, which is under the 90-day target, and this is to be expected. these are subsequent shl, these are the later of the three projects. fewer projects have gotten to this point, so planners have had less experience and time to do this piece of the process. we expect to see quite a bit of improvement in this category. i should also say we've already had a constant feedback loop, already making changes in terms of staffing and procedures to improve on all of this. and happy to discuss more, of course. next, a brief reminder, flashback to last year regarding neighborhood notification. one thing was to consolidate the notification requirements. we had about 30 of them. now there's only six. itty-bitty graphic, but drastically simplified what requirements are for staff to keep up with. we also modernized the process. everything is online, every type

of notice, public hearings and 311, which is a great improvement. we're mailing to tenants in all cases now, which was not happening before, and we're continuing to approve the materials for clarity and accessibility, as well. moving into the next category of routine projects and approval, the goal being to take care of the routine stuff as efficiently as possible so we can focus on things that need more attention. the planning information center is really the core of this. one thing we've done is revise the staffing, so we have more folks who are routinely looking at projects from current planning who are staffing it, so we have more of a core focus there. we also added dedicated shifts and certain areas. now adus have their own counter and legalization, which i'll talk more about in a second, design review staff has regular shifts down there, and preservation staff, which has had preservation-specific time slots, we consolidated those hours to make it more efficient and functional for applicants. there's a counter at dbi where you can now go instead of coming to pick, which helps you get

that focused attention. it's a pretty cool system. it's appointment based. you come in, get a prescreening, get the information you need, come back, get basically approved pending final review of final inner agency review, so what we have now is a super expedited process that's beyond what i described for larger projects that's been pretty effective. there will be a report on that coming up later in the spring from the team under a separate executive directive, so you'll hear a lot more about that at that time. finally, something we're excited to be rolling out just as of january this year is something called the historic resource assessment. think about this as a ppa for historic resource status. it's a pre-project type of application, where you can get the department's best judgment of whether or not a historic resource is present on the site before you go through the effort of hiring an architect, developing plans, so on and so forth, so this will provide much greater clarity to the development community for projects that are in that be unknown category or projects

that are classified as a that may want a reclassification before moving into a full project. and in the area of environmental review, we have a number of things that i'm happy to be able to report for you. first of all, this slide really has a few things that are pretty in the weeds, but make a huge difference. i'm going to try to keep it as high level as possible. transportation review, huge part of environmental review, often one of the longest parts of environmental review that can cause a hold-up. we have significantly expedited that. most residential projects now under a couple hundred units are no longer required to do a full transportation impact study, which is a consultant-provided document that's lengthy and time consuming to review, as well. rather those projects are doing an abbreviated circulation study and we're using our ability under the tdm program to essentially get to the same place for the project that used to have the transportation impact study, but now that we have that codified, we're able to get to the same place without having to do that study.

i also should commend all of our staff that work on the street scape design adviso

so you get to the same place, you do it a lot faster, it's much more transparent and predictable. what we're doing is systemically improving mitigations without having to go through the uncertainty of a long environmental review process. there's a lot of precedent for this. we did this with hazardous soils and materials, dust control, they used to be ceqa topics, they still are, but now through

a more discreet and predictable pathway. the city of oakland also did this for about 150 different standards of approval and it's been working there since 2008. i wanted to just remind everyone about the changes to the discretionary review staffing that's been underway for about a year how. we have a time-certain schedule for those. the hearing will be within ten to 12 weeks of when the d.r. is filed. additionally, they are all staffed by the residential design advisory team manager, dave winslow, who you all know well, and that, obviously, is a huge time savings and morale boost for planners. rather than having dave always on the beat. we think also, at least from what we've experienced, there's a stronger tie now between what

goes on in the d.r. hearings and the way we may update and implement the residential design guidelines, so we hope that's been a benefit from your side, as well. secondly, another guideline, our ability to administratively approve all forms of affordable housing, including bonus projects that came into effect in august of last year and finally something that we'll be implementing this month, which i mentioned earlier, this will be the advanced scheduling of those residential projects that are at stable project description within the time frames of the executive directive. so the first half dozen will be scheduled on your advanced, advanced calendar, call it the target calendar, starting this month, and you'll begin seeing a regular report as to why those projects were not able to come to you on that date. finally, in the world of adm administration and technology, the goal is everything we do,

smarter, faster, better, how can we do that, few examples, one, developed our ability to generate the mailing list internally using a gis-based tool that cuts out three weeks of the process for routine types of projects, saves staff a ton of times and i think the quality of the mailing materials is the same or improved. additionally, two things coming up in the spring, one is online submittal of applications for all types of entitlement applications. obviously, there's a time and cost savings to the applicant, but also this is going to really increase our ability to get people to comply with our consolidated process. you have a lot less leeway, didn't i send you the document note in another e-mail when it's going through an online system that we can structure what is and is not acceptable. finally, dramatically will improve our reporting capabilities, because, again, we'll have it all directly linked to our database in the first place, so that should help with our reporting abilities. similar to this, another launching in the spring would be electronic document review.

this includes for the actual plans, which would be a big deal. this would allow us to receive plans digitally, review them digitally, mark them up graphically, in that format, rather than huge rolls of paper plans moving around san francisco. today i noticed several people as i got off muni to go to the office with their plan sets and plastic wraps because it's raining outside. that can be done digitally now. this will, obviously, make it easier to put in the plans and expedite the review process and increase transparency, because the documents will be available online, as well, and this is going to lay the groundwork for our ability to have nor seamless review, so will be coming online in the near future after planning gets on board. so before closing, commissioners, planning has really embraced this opportunity to look at the way we do our

work, see how we can do it in a more efficient way, the most efficient way, while actually enhancing our ability to impose the appropriate environmental review and design review guidelines and city policies in a way that is efficient and comprehensive. the improvement measures that are in your packet and that i've touched on today are things that have already begun to make an important shift in the way we do business, this kind of idea of predictable and transparent review milestones is becoming the norm now, and the consolidated review process has really been a game changer, getting all the different teams and divisions in our department to work together much more closely and make changes accordingly. i have to say that none of this would be possible without the talent and dedication of the entire staff of the planning department, almost 250 people who are working every day in a constant feedback loop on all of this to talk to me, whoever else we need to talk about in terms of what's working, what's not working with the improvements, and we're improving on it every day. so i know i am continually grateful to be part of the team. i hope we're all appreciative of

the group we have working on the city's behalf. it's a pleasure for me to work with them, and for that, commissioners, thank you so much for your attention and i'm, of course, here for any questions. thank you so much. >> president melgar: thank you very much, mr. bintliff. we will now open this item up for public comment. >> good afternoon, commissioners, steve, i want to speak to the ceqa process for large housing projects. i think it's great news that the tis reforms are being made. that seems to be working, going to a checklist, process for exemptions. i would suggest that be used for cpes, there's no reason that those exemptions should be treated differently than in-fill exemptions, so i would suggest the staff look at that so we're not having, you know, 100-page cpes, but instead we're having a

checklist. and i also wanted to really commend the staff on the notion of standard conditions of approval. that's really worked well with the ordinance on soils and other areas, dust control, et cetera, so that those -- issues don't need mitigation measures, rather they need implementation of standards, so you can avoid having to do negative declarations or an exemption that would otherwise suffice. the one issue that i'm not terribly pleased with, and i wanted to draw to your attention is the amount of time -- if i can have the overhead, the amount of time that it can take for a project to have a stable project description to begin the deadline that the mayor's directive imposed. this is sort of a standard timeline that i've seen in a lot of the projects i'm involved in that can take up to eight months from when t