others. again, while our issue here is purely with the illegal demolition of 426 ivy, i would temper any feelings i normally have small homeowners and trying to get to a good outcome. i'm harkened by one of the comments in public comment that this is almost a poster child of why we have this 5-year. it is purely a financial issue what is the worth of the property when it has the

restriction that you could only rebuild it within five years to the same size as it was originally there. it's not a prohibition from selling the property, it's not a prohibition from rebuilding on the rear lot. it is, however, something that is germane to just how this property has been handled. cy would agree uphold decision 5-year moratorium that it can be rebuilt to the same size or sold in its current state with that

restriction. it is an appropriate course for this unfortunate circumstance. >> president mccarthy: i'll close out my comments. i concur my commissioners here. we have from time to time have to deal with people who come and work here in this town. that's greet. they need to understand what the rules of engagement are for the lack of better word for building codes and laws. it's a shame really because i do believe you would have got this emergency demolition as i see on the building. i think you would have got all the substantial service that need to get this done. i understand the arguments about the blitheness and the danger. that's the whole idea we have those laws in place so we can strong guided principle how we approach our demolitions in this

town which is right now is a serious matter. that said, i'm sorry but the laws are the laws. what you asking us to do is rewrite the script here. we can't do that. i apologize for misinterpreting what i thought was that you can replace this property. i do believe you can financially sell the property. i do believe you have tried to sell it. the problem is that, maybe you're not getting enough money for it. unfortunately, we have to up hold the laws says. this was unlawful demolition. if there's no more questions i like the call question plaza. >> the motion is to uphold the

director's decision? >> vice president walker: i think we need the same language that we always include. >> commissioner walker made a motion uphold director decision. the basis for that motion the decision was properly issued? >> president mccarthy: correct. >> i would further add that the 5-year moratorium is an obligation imposed by the code. >> correct. >> i would second. >> we'll do roll call on the

motion. [roll call] motion carries unanimously. next item is item 6. [agenda item read] >> good morning commissioners deputy director permit services. i'm here to discuss the newly released budget and legislation in this report on average d.b.i. review of approval time. the budget and legislation analyst report does not state

the fact that 96% of permits receive are over the counter permit processes. these were stats that assistant director reported to us on. fiscal year '16-1/7/96% d.b.i. permits are issued over the counter or online. it breaks down to 25,609,000,000,000 issued over the counter. 15,610 electrical permits. for total of 59,854 permit.

these permits were issued over the counter process. secondly, the report ignores a major metric, length average time owner it takes to respond on authorizations. they lump together all other agencies. we have department public works, you have urban forestry, you have public utilities commission and you have the fire department. one of the challenges for the small businesses that require multiple agencies. we do what we currently do and it's been working very effective there, we to have over the counter process. lot of these permits has to start off with conditional use

and has to go to planning to get the authorization. we review all the permits in our division that comes from central permit bureau. we review them all. our manager and staff. any permit that's smaller project where we see a small business project, we reach out to them. we reach out and contact them that they are available for over the counter process. that's something we're setting out to the initiative to do. in over the counter process, we allow a job for plumbing and electrical, for building structural mechanical to go over the counter. we allow it on a two-week time frame. we have delay in comments. part of the problem is this is processes, all multiple agencies involved in this, when they go over the counter for example p.s.c. has to get a calculation

for the water flow. d.p.w. has sidewalk permits, building and forestry permits. if you go from business assembly area, requires the fire department, requires fire sprinklers, requires areas separations there's lot of challenges to these permits. what we have done is when we these small projects, we change the information sheet. our g.o.2 information sheet that allows to go over the counter review for all the agencies. what we do, the following permits are eligible for conversion. we can't change it in the system. we're allowing over the counter review for all agencies on smaller jobs. we are currently doing that now.

we did change information sheet when we see these small projects we are allowing them to do the over the counter process. part of the delay time that we're encountering, we're trying to do over the counter process, is eliminate the process from one department to the next.

we're letting designer professional to take those plans and walk them through. comments are issued right away and respond. lot of the delay is a delayed time it takes from the design professionals that's requested of these comments. >> president mccarthy: that's a key point. there's no way of monitoring that. when somebody is submitted and you're sending comments back out, it falls upon the design professional to return those comments back in a timely manner? some cases, that could go on for quite a long time? some cases can be five months before it comes back. that is no responsibility of the department? that wasn't captured in that survey.

>> it was not captured. that's a big issue. we're calling them and asking them to bring the comments back but there's a delay. lot of times the design professional doesn't want to go over the count for permit. they're saying we don't want it at that time. we want to wait? >> vice president walker: why is that? >> they're not ready to respond to all the comments at that time or busy with other projects. >> president mccarthy: are you finished? >> i want to say we are doing. we are looking proactively at the smaller projects for allowing over the counter. we're actually screening the job. we reach out and call out to them to encourage that so we can get passedor approved.

>> vice president walker: on those, you issued -- you talked about couple of situations that requires noticing. like going from a partial restaurant to a full service restaurant and assembly. do nose noticing requirements, are they bypasse bypassed with r expedited service? >> planning still has to do the notice. that's why there's a delay in planning. we have a few cases now where there's notice of special restrictions involved from planning. they're okay in the review for us and we're putting planning as the last station. even though they are not complete with all their processing, we're doing the review on it and they're doing the last place where they can get the complete process. >> vice president walker: they can wait for the notice and any kind of thing what happens around that. everything else will be ready?

>> it's difficult. when you go to a restaurant, requirements, the fire separation, majority of times, there's units above with the fire separation and there's lot of back and forth with many agencies to get it corrected. >> vice president walker: they are doing equivalencies trying to do what they can. there's no safety lessening on those issues in order to expedite the process. safety issues being evaluated but the process itself is being expedited. >> yes. >> commissioner lee: i do understand that there are delays and calls by the designer not

responding to the department's questions on their permit applications. i find that this happens a lot. there's misunderstanding on their client's part. meaning that the property owner or the shop owner hired these professionals and these professional interact with d.b.i. sometimes these owners don't understand what the professional is doing with d.b.i. all they understand is that the permit application is held up. why? they don't know why. they say, it's stuck in d.b.i., it's stuck there. my question to d.b.i. is, is there a way to also inform the owners of the stores that hired these professionals that we responded. we asked questions to your

designer to your professional and we're waiting for them to respond to us. is there a way to get that message across to the ultimate personal? which is the owner of the business? >> there could be a way if it's in the building division. they're lumping all the divisions together. comments may not be with d.b.i. it might be with a different agency that's not under our control. they can track it. they can track it to see where it's at. if we're familiar with it, we do ask. >> commissioner lee: let's say for d.b.i. for our department, is there a way we can communicate with the owner? >> we can send out the information to the design

professional and the comments and owner. >> commissioner lee: that might help with the misunderstanding. lot of these owners don't know. they're saying the permit is stuck. we hired somebody to get it moving. it's not moving. the last question that i have, one of the recommendations in the budget and it report about simultaneous review of the permit. is that possible? is that practical? what is the sequence routing the permits now? is it practical to send the plans to everybody gathered the response. >> we do have a working group that's working effectively a a.d.u.

lot of these small commercial places takes six months for agency to review. we had one recently where we went through all the review and health department sent out location where everything is placed where they wanted to have revision of that. we have d.p.w. as far as our review, it could be down in the future. we don't do that process now. we're allowed to go over the counter. it still has to go station per station. you have to have a building look

at. we have to have fire look at. fire talks to building about it to see if that's doable and other agencies. we try to encourage over the counter process. >> commissioner lee: my last question, i forgot, -- >> the health department is not there. we're releasing permit allowing the health department to give it right away. >> i applaud any efforts to take the a.d.u. coordinated.

with small businesses there maybe more agencies involved. it's complicated. as we were raising the issue, the perception it's stuck in d.b.i. they come to planning and planning is a separate thing that they come to d.b.i. they get everybody else kind of when they are there. the perception is our way -- this is where it resides. >> commissioner warshell: i understand some things are out of our control. to whatever extent we can use our learning from the a.d.u. program and apply them, to speed up and simplify the process, i think it's highly desirable. i talked to small business owners. their biggest concern is, they

sign a lease, they're paying the rent plus all the fees and anticipating all the costs and time is the biggest issue that they have. as we all know, rents not inexpensive. paying with this with no income coming in is horrible for them. understanding the constraints that we have of control over other departments. it's our goal to make this process as simple, speedy and transparent as possible. to ensure that the property own -- or business owners as well as their agents are appraised of

where everything stands. maybe we would have fewer delays should clients understand what's going on. i appreciate everything that you invested in this. i think you're on the right track with everything. next step i think is transparency of information t notifications and working with all partners to bring that a.d.u. process to small businesses. they need our help. it's rough and if we don't want more vacant storefronts, if with don't want more small business

failures, this is the way to really impact it. i would implore you to -- even though it's not our mandate to take upon ourselves, leadership role as much as we can to facilitate the goals that we all share to make it as speedy and effective process. while maintaining the correct notification and public safety concerns. i applaud your work and we recommend that we take upon ourselves as much as we can to reach the ultimate goal. >> gary lowe has taken over the counter permits.

if he doesn't hear back from them, he does follow-up calls. he try to get the comments issues to move forward with the process. >> president mccarthy: thank you. my comments just as i read in the newspaper. i know for a fact how much you are doing behind the scenes to help the stakeholders and so on. i felt we keep communicating as best we can. you trying to do -- when these reports come out, there's a lot of moving talks attached to them. not just d.b.i. i think to commissioner lee's point, there's that misunderstanding what a delay is there for and why it happens. sometimes design professionals s are quite convenient. unfortunately we get blamed the reason why we're in trouble. particularly in the court of

public opinion. that's the key for me. i know i talked with lot of people who understand the process and can actually identify when they are held up. they don't make a big deal about it. they understand why they are held up. it's usually due to issues. in the case i just talk -- unfair to d.b.i. i want to keep communicating those facts and keep educatingesquing everybody. thank you for that. >> i hope that it will help the public know where the permits are and if there's an issue with it, for example the department has design professionally to respond to questions.

i hope that is indicated. that will go a long ways into helping owners understand the process of what need to be and pushing the professional law. the health department. i know i ask this at the last meeting about the new permit centre and new building. it's my feeling that brick and mortar spaces -- retail entry iy slowing down. there's going to be more cafes. that usually means more health department overview. i was hoping that maybe in the new building we have space for the health department to be up on that permit centre.

>> thank you mr. president. ron thomas, assistant director d.b.i. you want to speak to two items. one item is with communication. when we examined all our business process during the build process or s.f. permit. one thing identified was that we currently on our forms, don't have email address requirements. an email address is most expeditious way to communicate and memorialize the time frame upon which it was issued. we decided collectively, the best thing to do is start asking for these up front when an applicant comes in.

once d.b.i. collects that information, once they issue a comment, they issue c.c. to the oner. you're sending it to the design professional regardless discipline, but the owner gets to a copy. that can be immediate approval. secondly, speaking to the new

permit centre, if it's brick and mortar what we're looking at, our agency has the largest number of staff there. there's a director who has been hired to handle all those issues our understanding is, health department will have a presence. the whole idea is not to have an applicant go knirl else to get their brick and mortar3related permit. they need that information the permit centre as well. even though it's not permit. it's a start of deciding whether you want to do business in san francisco or not. there will be presence in that s.f. permit centre. i hope that answers couple of questions. >> president mccarthy: thank you for that comment. >> any public comment on item 6?

>> good morning. deputy director lowery did define a serious problem and it deals with managing thousands orateds o -- or tens of thousans of permits of responses from designed professionals. i like to echo commissioner lee's comment, obvious solution is the workforce solution. one thing a tardy report by department could be issued weekly or monthly and sent to that department. you can kick them in the butt. other is commissioner lee mentioned it, if there was visibility through the citizen portal, which is supposed to be delivered, a citizen or

professional could go into the portal and clearly see the status of their permit and if there's an obstacle. i think the bigger issue here really is, performance standards. you can manage and you can report but if you don't have a standard to report against, you're reporting the standard versus performance. that's one of the issues i can h b.i.c. would address. are they doing things against the standard correctly. it's always the 80-20 rule. thank you. >> president mccarthy: thank you. >> any additional public comment? seeing none.

item 7, update on s.f. permit accela permit project tracking system. >> good morning. i'm from department of technology to give update on the s.f. permit implementation project. when i was here last month, we were just in the third day of our user acceptance testing round. as stated on the report, we completed that round only april 4th. out of that round, we had 328 issues and that was on the fourth. as of this morning, we're into the period of fixing and retesting the things that were reported as issues. we're down to 260 issues. this process of fixing, retesting will ensue over the next few week as we work that

number of open issues down to zero. these are severity one or two issues which will prevent d.b.i. from going live. that number needs it come down to zero open issues. that will be our entry point to be able to start what's scheduled to be our last round of testing. we're going to add into our acceptance testing process that next round from end to end and business simulation testing. just to show that permit and involving the various divisions in d.b.i. a large project can come in and c.p.b. staff takes it in. it goes through initial checks with fire and planning and gets routed to t.p.c. the reviews ensue, reviews conclude and permits gets issued

back again. everyone is dedicated across the department staff, they are participating as well as the project team. we're also have our dusting off what has been our plans for the three weeks of training prior to go live. in prior month report, the external stakeholder outreach which includes this commission and city hall constituents as well as the contract community and what we're calling now our resident community to make sure that all of those plans are

firmed up and in place. >> vice president walker: it's all heading in the right direction and i want to also applaud our discussions, the commissioners as we have gone through this process with accela we sea how important it is and having access to all the data in a cohesive way. it's nice to be able to talk about our processes a we talk about rebooting this system. i'm hopeful. i like that. thank you henry for pushing this

through. i know it's kind of pushing water in pail. we're headed in the right direction. >> president mccarthy: i'm the one that comes to presents. >> there's a busy team supporting this project. both within the department and project team itself. >> president mccarthy: thank you for coming this morning. >> any public comment on item 7? item 8 is director's report, update on d.b.i.'s finances.

>> you have a financial report that provides revenue and fortunes from july 2018 to marc. i'll go over couple of highlights. on the revenue side, if you look at the first page, you'll see that we're still projecting to be better than budget. that's a good thing. we've been extremely conservative since the fee reduction in 2015. we plan on experiencing slow downs. i want to be clear that there's going to be a slow down. we're better than budget. we are seeing that number less than prior year. we are seeing revenues go down. it's just a combination of our very conservative budgeting and some activities still going on why we continue to exceed the budget. we are going collecting less money. for charges for services, that's basically our fees. the fees are a lot lower. what's kind of offsetting that little bit is that interest in

investment over the past few years, we've been budgeting $500,000. we collected over $2.2 million last year in interest in investment. we projected top the same amount the charges of services are going up and interest of investment is going up. that kind of offset it little bit. that's on the revenue side. on the expense side, we're higher. we've seen uptick in salaries. we are constanting hiring. we're getting a ahead of it. we're able to keep up little bit more. we're doing little bit more hiring than to retiring. we're seeing uptick in that. we transfer money from our regular operating budget to project fund. you'll see that big number also be attributed to that.

that's all i have only the march year to daylight. i wan-- date.i want to give updn affordable housing. there will be a hearing today. the budget analyst have a report. based on their conversation with the mayor office of housing, they're anticipating about 15 small affordable housing sites that will be impacted by that fiscal year 19-20. for the affordable housing sites, and average that's about $15,000 per project. for a.d.u.'s they're projecting about 200 over that 14-month period. the average we have from audio is there $3200 in fees. that will be waived. then for the large scale affordable housing projects, the average that is about $150,000. based on the numbers that were provided to the budget analyst

they're estimating about that amount. the only caveat to that is that once again, because we don't normally collect all the fees in the same fiscal year because of you will file one year. the impact may not be the full 1.9. this is just an estimate. based on those projects over the life of the project,s, they're estimated $1.9 million of fees being waived. we don't have other details. hopefully we'll have to have them by may because the budget will be done in june. only the rent is in the budget not all the other items. those items will be costly. it will be onetime start up costs.

hopefully by next month budget presentation, i will be able to tell you what impact that will have on the budget. happy to answer any questions. >> president mccarthy: on that decrease in 3.2% from 19 to 18, page 2 there, how do you look at that decrease? do you factor in it could go to 5%? in your long-term thinking. when you see trends like that, i'm not sure if you have the answer for me. how do you look at the world when you see that obvious decrease happening? >> actually, this report looks at year over year. when we did the budget, we've gone to 2014 or 2015, that's when you were in uptick. we seen it's $2 million or it $3 million. not just the year over year to

look at the average. for new revenues, we're also looking at -- i talked to the cfo, they are seeing increases. although it's a 3.2% over jeer over year, for our budget in 19-20 revenue, we reduced it lot more than that. for charges of service. that's where the fluctuation is. in fiscal year 14-15, we're at about $78 million in fiscal year 14-final. just from charges of services. next year we're going to budget about $15 million. we're basing it on a trend that we see over a number of years. it's going down. but in report only does a year over year comparison. >> president mccarthy: thank

you. >> you mentioned we've had some increase in staffing over the retirements. do you happen to have the figure how high we are in terms of our proportion to full staffing? >> i think right now we're about 281 or something like that. when i said an increase if -- in staffing, i should clarify that. it hasn't been a huge increase but it's meaning we've been able to catch up when not hiring two but two people retiring. lot of times these things get itself out or somebody gets a promotion. in some instances we've been able it will slow down on retirement.

>> commissioner warshell: 280 is compared to >> our full f.t.e. is full 300. it's very close. >> commissioner warshell: second question regarding the issue coming up at board of supervisors tomorrow, i know we sent a great deal of comment and we're recommending something such as deferral of fees, which is especially would benefit the large-scale projects. as far as you know, there's not been any movement on that? >> yes, as far as i know. the average fees i cited, these are fees that included in the legislation. plan review fee and building fee, records retention fee and

site surcharge fee. only fees that are included is the d.b.i. fees. >> commissioner warshell: no other departments are waiving their fees. >> at this time. no other departments are waiving their fees. >> item 8b, update proposed or recently enacted state of local legislation. >> good morning commissioners. bill strong, legislative public fairs. to that last point, we'll be covering the g.a.o. hearing tomorrow to see if there's any discussion. your letter which included certain conditions that were preferred is certainly before them. we haven't been told anything indicating that it was going to

be a modification of the proposal. i think from the mayor's office perspective, they're looking to see how this works out in this pilot year. keep in mind with that ordinance, about 12 months before the year ends, which means roughly end of next year, january, we'll have to send a report to the board that will say, how many projects came in so we'll know what it total fee waiver was because of the way some the 100% affordable revenues come in. they wait until the project is actually completed, the number may be less than the anticipated roughly $2 billion in d.b.i. fees. i would mention also, the new ordinance by supervisor fewer on

vacant storefronts takes legal effect april 22nd. which is next week. the supervisors invited director hui to join her in the richmond district for little media announcement about that. as of april 22nd will then be on 30-day clock for owner registration, code enforcement has told us over the last few days, the word about the new ordinance seem to be getting out. we are getting more self-registrations of properties that we've had in the past. right now we have nearlial thousand vacant storefronts on our list. total number of actual registrations is still very small. it's probably less than 100. we're hoping that is the

supervisor's intent, with this stronger penalty if you don't register within the 30-day period, you'll be subject to four-time penalty. meaning the registration fee will go to about $2700. that will be an incentive for more registrations and we'll have a better more accurate account of how many vacant storefronts are out there. in addition, i would mention that the mayor's proposal ordinance on emergency shelters has passed. we're now waiting on the m.o.u. details so different departments would have guidelines. that law takes effect may 3rd. with that, i'll take any questions from you. those are the highlights.

>> commissioner warshell: back to the g.a.o. thing for tomorrow, we're saying this is a one-year pilot on the reduction. i could really understand how somebody considering an a.d.u. might be able to really decide to do it and we might see an increase this a.d.u. filings. given the time frame on the large projects, do we have any reason to believe that for one-year pilot program, we're going to have any kind of result that really could be tangible and relevant to who did this? getting large projects to show

interest? >> it's tempting to speculate, i don't think we know. part of that came out of the grand jury report a year ago. that had a recommendation calling for the city to do a study. the budget legislative analyst did do a report and they generally came to the conclusion, if you reduce fees, you probably will stimulate more especially a.d.u. production. again, we don't have the data yet. i think until we get through

facilitate some financial reliefly to encourage peopl -- o encourage people to legalize and create new a.d.u.s, boths are very desirable and the cost benefit is fairly compelling. my concern is much more with the very large amount that is involved for the large-scale projects that seem to be at odds with the kind of time frame that one-year pilot might be able to entail. that's just really where i see a disconnect. >> understood. keep our eye on it and we'll keep you informed as with go along. >> commissioner warshell: thank you. >> president mccarthy: thank

you. >> item 8c, update on major projects. >> ron thomas i'm the director. compared to report between february 2019 and current one is an increase of 6.3% in total construction cost. that breaks a trend that we've in previous reports. >> president mccarthy: thank you. >> item 8d, update on code enforcement. >> good morning again commissioners. building inspector. i'm here to report code enforcement and d.b.i. monthly activity specifically for the month of march. 5,932,000,000,000 inspections were performed in the month of

march. what was up 900. it probably represents more activity after the winter months and february is 28 days. it's quite substantial increase over the previous month. it's 900 more inspections that we had in february. we received 393 complaints in the month of march. of those 393, 382 were responded to within 72 hours. 190 were closed without a notice of violation. 41 of those complaints received a notice of violation. in regard to code enforcement section, all 124 cases were sent to director's hearing in the month of march, 40 orders of abatement were issued. number of cases that were abated

was 165. the code enforcement inspections performed was 332. that's up substantially from the previous month. which was 260. i'm available for any questions. >> any public comment on the director's report items 8a through d? seeing none. item 9 review and approve special meeting march 20, 2019. >> move to approve. >> motion and second. >> is there public comment. all commissioners in favor? >> aye. >> any opposed? minutes are approved. next item is 10 motion to adjourn. >> president mccarthy: big welcome back to john.

i want to close this in memory deputy director sweeney's father, mr. edward sweeney who died last week. he was of great age. he was a tremendous character. one of the finest irishman ballroom dancers you'll see. he lived full life and one of the greatest characters of the irish community. our talks and prayers are with him and his family. that should do it madam second. >> thank you very much. we had our motion to adjourn. it is now 11:46 a.m. thank you.

>> shop and dine in the 49 promotes local businesses and challenges residents to do their business in the 49 square files of san francisco. we help san francisco remain unique, successful and right vi. so where will you shop and dine in the 49? >> i'm one of three owners here in san francisco and we provide mostly live music entertainment and we have food, the type of food that we have a mexican food and it's not a big menu, but we did it with love. like ribeye tacos and

quesadillas and fries. for latinos, it brings families together and if we can bring that family to your business, you're gold. tonight we have russelling for e community. >> we have a ten-person limb elimination match. we have a full-size ring with barside food and drink. we ended up getting wrestling here with puoillo del mar. we're hope og get families to join us. we've done a drag queen bingo and we're trying to be a diverse kind of club, trying different things. this is a great part of town and

there's a bunch of shops, a variety of stores and ethnic restaurants. there's a popular little shop that all of the kids like to hanhang out at. we have a great breakfast spot call brick fast at tiffanies. some of the older businesses are refurbished and newer businesses are coming in and it's exciting. >> we even have our own brewery for fdr, ferment, drink repeat. it's in the san francisco garden district and four beautiful muellermixer ura alsomurals. >> it's important to shop local because it's kind of like a circle of life, if you will. we hire local people. local people spend their money at our businesses and those local mean that wor people willr money as well. i hope people shop locally.

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