really, all the units are this way. >> commissioner diamond: so you're anticipating my second bedrooms with the laundry, but i want to stick with the bedrooms. you have glass in the bedrooms, and how many nested bedrooms are in this project? >> how many are nested? >> commissioner diamond: mm-hmm. >> the majority. i

. >> commissioner diamond: if we could have some kind of departmental look at what the building code is currently requiring for nested bedrooms

in light of state density bonus legislation to make sure that the current requirements under the building code are satisfactory, the amount of glass, the distance from, you know light, whatever it is, it just feels like in light of state density bonus legislation, it might be worth another look internally, and i'm wondering how you think about that? >> i would defer to director hillis. >> director hillis: commissioner diamond, i'm going to have liz take the first stab at that. >> there is a very clear building code requirement that will be vetted when they move forward with their construction permits. basically, chapter 12 of the

california building code says that for natural lighting, a room is considered to be a portion of an adjoining room, i.e., a nested area, where one half of the common room is presumed to be open when one half of the common hall is ad joining or 25 feet, whichever is greater. we did take a look at this issue with d.b.i., but we're happy to circle back in light of the additional projects that you're seeing as well as the on-site use of density bonus. >> commissioner diamond: okay. that would be great. my second question is to staff. project sponsor has said that

putting high efficiency machines in all of the units, and i think that's terrific. we -- yeah, sometime last year, we were presented with legislation proposed by supervisor peskin based upon the fact that laundromats were necessary and disappearing. the legislation proposed a solution for a particular part of the project. it seems to me that we ought to be ensuring that there's laundry hookups in every room. that ensures that no matter what part of the market the housing project is aimed at, that there are laundry facilities in the building. to me, it's kind of the thing

that should be a building code requirement, that we shouldn't have to talk about this at the planning commission. that it is something that should be worked in the plans because it's a building code requirement. two thoughts here. one, your thoughts on whether we could have the planning department work with the building department to develop some legislation that would mandate the inclusion. two questions to staff. that's just language for a standard condition that we could use, and it comes up in the [indiscernible] street street --

in the chestnut street project, as well. i would be in favor of attaching that standard language. >> thank you, commissioner diamond. i would defer the larger policy question to director hillis or current planning director. we do have, in anticipation of this question and based on our conversation, we do have draft language if the commission is so inclined to contain in the motion to approve the project with the requirement to have laundry facilities, so i will go ahead and read that language into the record now in case the commission is inclined to take that up. the project sponsor will be

committed to provide community laundry facilities or individual laundry hookups in order to ensure there is laundry availability on-site. >> director hillis: just on the broader language, the legislation that was passed by supervisor peskin and this commission has a sunset on it, as well. i suggest that we work with the supervisor's office, and as part of that, kind of look to the permanent solution on whether it's legislatively requiring it or what path that legislation is going down because i can see some sown sides to it, as well. existing buildings that don't have laundry, if new buildings don't have it, it's going to make laundromats less viable, so i suggest we look at that as

a permanent solution for us. >> commissioner diamond: okay. i will say with respect to this project, i think it's a wonderful project. it checks so many boxes, and the inclusion of child care is just such a wonderful thing to include in the project. i'm in favor, and of course i want to hear what other commissioners have to say, but i would be in favor of approving it with the other conditions just read into the record. thank you. >> president tanner: thank you. see vice president moore queued. >> vice president moore: yes. i had expressed my concern with the project when we heard it a couple of weeks ago. what i want to call out to the commission, this is the very first state density bonus project where we see the full

requirement to prescribe the solutions to cost savings. it's the first one that was ever done, and i would like us to remember that we have an approved project, and while we were required to have such an explanation, we never had one before. this project has that explanation. the second thing i would like to mention is this project provides also an overview for all other agencies that were involved in the background for this project to be approved. we mentioned the area for another project, but this area does it, as well. there are technical stakes, but for me, they are very important because often in motions, we are implying that we have such things, but we don't, so this project has my full support, and it already -- did somebody already make a motion? >> clerk: no, i did not make a

motion. >> president tanner: no motion has been made yet. . >> vice president moore: i make a motion to approve with conditions. >> commissioner koppel: second. >> commissioner diamond: commissioner moore, would that include the things we discuss asked? >> vice president moore: i'd prefer an intelligent discussion about it. >> i'll just speak specifically about the projects that we create, not obviously about the impacts of the city as a whole. it's absolutely a requirement of our projects to put in good laundry facilities.

it's a key component for retaining residents, and i have no project with that in any project that we bring before you. >> vice president moore: hearing from the professional, i would like to make a motion to approve that. >> commissioner diamond: and i would like to second that. >> president tanner: commissioner koppel? >> commissioner koppel: yeah, not just having the architect and the developer, but the owner representative here today, i appreciate that, and the renderings and drawings just look incredible. i don't remember the last time we've seen something with a.m.i. as low as 50%. i really appreciate and feel that the developer has just gone above and beyond to earn

this bonus which we don't see all the time, and i just want to commend you. >> president tanner: i'll join the gushing over the project, whether it's the design, labor, child care, working on the alley. just the design and the thoughtfulness and thoroughness is exemplary. it's a very excellent project, and i can't wait to see the work. i know sometimes on the commission we can sometimes grumble a little bit, but it's so beneficial to the city, and i'm excited for what we've seen today, and i'll toss it over to commissioner moore. >> vice president moore: i want

to throw this out there since we were talking about bedrooms. in the design community, architect baker has the reputation of being the king designer of nested bedrooms, and i want to put that on the record because staff would be well advised of taking that to him. >> president tanner: seeing no further comments, i think we're ready to take a vote. >> clerk: on that motion -- [roll call]

>> clerk: so moved, commissioners. that motion passes unanimously 6-0. commissioners, that will place us on items 14 and 15 for case numbers 2018-009081-env and cua for 2055 chestnut street. we'll hear the appeal of the preliminary negative declaration and the conditional use authorization. as was with this previous item, you should take up the preliminary mitigated negative declaration first, and if you uphold that, then take up the matter of the conditional use authorization.

the appellant will have five minutes, and then the project sponsor will have five minutes for the appeal and five minutes for the project presence. >> president tanner, members of the board, i'm sherry george,

planning department staff. for reference, the commission packet includes the department appeal response, the appellant letter, and the subsequent letter, project sponsor brief, and mitigated declaration. the item before you is whether to accept the mitigated negative declaration or m.n.d. if you find that the project would not have a significant effect on the environment. if you could so, you may take action against the request for conditional use authorization. 2055 is located on the southside of chestnut, fronting lombard street between fillmore and steiner street.

the site is currently occupied by a one-story commercial building and surface parking lot. the project proposes to demolish the existing one-story building to construct a 40-foot tall, three-story residential building, to include 14,000 rental square feet that has been designed to accommodate a grocery store use. approximately 95 feet of curb along the project's lombard street frontage would be

converted to commercial loading and unloading zone. the department prepared a preliminary mitigated negative declaration that was published on december 29, 2021. the preliminary mitigated negative declaration found that with incorporation of mitigation measures in the document and agreed to by the project sponsor, the project would not result in any significant environmental impacts. the preliminary mitigated negative declaration was circulated for public review period of 30 days and was filed on january 31, 2022, the last day of public review period. detailed responses can be found in the appeal response.

pursuant to the california resources code section 21099, the project qualifies as an in-fill project, and therefore, parking cannot be considered as significant impact. the project's transportation analysis was conducted, and vehicle congestion in and of itself is not an impact under ceqa, and air quality concerns from increased congestion are adequately addressed in the environmental document. lastly, economic effects are not assessed as a significant effect on the environment. regarding the environmental baseline, consistent with ceqa guidelines, the department has based its transportation analysis on conditions that existed at the time of the environmental analysis

commenced, and those conditions are provided to assess the most accurate picture provided in detail. the project level and cumulative transportation analysis was conducted within ceqa guidelines. the implementation of a driveway loading and operations plan would ensure that freight generated by the project would not have a significant impact.

the project's proposed streetscape plan, including location of on and off-street loading zones has been reviewed. a geotechnical investigation was conducted for the project. the department has conducted an adequate analysis of the cumulative impacts as required by ceqa. for completeness, the fmnd was

updated to address new cumulative projects, some of which were not accepted by the department at the time of publication of the pmnd. this analysis is included in the packet. on march 16, 2022, the appellant submitted a subsequent letter of correspondence via e-mail. the subsequent letter was written by the appellant and was due the same day the department response was due to the commission. department staff have reviewed the letter and determined the substantive concerns addressed in this letter have been addressed in the ceqa response and fmnd.

in each case, this department has found that there is no substantial evidence provided to support a fair argument that the pmnd files to conform to the requirements of ceqa. the department has addressed all issues raised in the appeal. by upholding the pmnd, you do not restrict your ability whether to consider or approve the project in detail. this concludes staff presentation, and staff is available to answer your questions. >> clerk: i believe the project needs to be presented, as well. >> good afternoon, commissioners. matt dito, department staff.

as a planned unit development, the project is providing additional dwelling unit density beyond what's principally permitted. the project is requested two modifications from planning code requirements as part of the p.u.d. proposal. a modification to the rear yard requirement is proposed. the project provides various courtyards and lightwells throughout the lot to more appropriately respond to adjacent massing. additionally, they're asking for a modification from the parking lot entrance requirements. [please stand by]

will contribute to enhance the neighborhood allowing for diversity in uses and use size. the project is necessary and desirable and compatible with the neighborhood. if the appeal is a vpmd is final and the department of recommend approval with conditions t and you this completes my presentation. >> thank you, we should hear from the appellant. >> first of all i asked for a continuance. i will go ahead. i am asking, i wanted to put on the record that the stakeholders concerning this were not informed of an open meeting downtown and we feel it's a

disservice to us because we're not getting a fair hearing. we feel it's lick what indication. i asked a family were they never developed this lot. subsequently there was a case at 202 sixth lombard and had the exact same issue of pulling water out of a liquefied area and in this case there are nine buildings to the right that can i count that have 1920 brick foundations. i want to put on the record, that should any of these foundations be built, be damaged, the department knows that you were informed of this.

number two, this case has been looked at bit millennium people because they called me on it. we could ask that we get an outside group of engineer to study this like they did 202 sixth lombard and make sure that the next door neighbor, the small property owners and the small businesses next to their property are protected. that is what we have asked for. and they have not given us one ounce of information of how this is going to be implemented. a lot of people's lives are at stake on this and this is my big complaint. now on the conditional use, there's no necessity for a gross row store. within less than an eighth of a mile we have three. and all of them, two of the

three are very affordable in fact, it's (inaudible) wall greens so what is the real purpose of this? i would rather see the council association ask for them to put the mechanical from top to the bottom and i don't see why and it's 80 bike lanes, bike racks and we have that many around us and they're being stolen by the drug dealers. we have issues on this case. what we're asking for is a continuance so that we can bring our own people into give you, let them give you their arguments. we were not informed of it was a meeting downtown for some it

upsets me and this they have not given one thing to the neighbors or the neighboring merchants. we can't lose white zones for this building. our little merchants, with the parklets, we're hurting so badly you can't believe it. i think we should be compromising. they haven't compromise once. they didn't even answer e-mails for two years and showed up at the meeting and said we've decided to modernize the building and the street has a certain gem that people came from all over the world and we have to worry about the future of my businesses. so this is my deal and i would like to ask you guys for continue and ask them to come up with come compromises on this. also we asked for 15,000 square

feet on the lombard side for senior housing, we need senior housing in this neighborhood. desperately because most of our businesses are buildings that are owned by retired military of world war ii, korea and vietnam and houses with no place to go and this was the ideal location. now to take a white zone away from that block of we were going to suffer with parking spaces. we've tried to come up with answers and we need to do it. now on chestnut side, we have drivers coming in because we don't know where they're going to go. >> thank you. that is your time. >> thank you. >> ok.

project sponsor you have five minutes for the appeal and five minutes for your project.

>> good afternoon, commissioners. i think we're ready if we can show the slides. thank you. my name is emily, principle at jensen architect and project lead. i'm here today with the project team to answer your questions. we are a locally based san francisco team. it's a local san francisco real estate developer with a mission of providing great places for people to live, work and connect and unlock their potential and we have a project of the highest

design quality. this is our existing site which you will be familiar with. it's a car dominated site with a parking lot and drive-thru bank. it disrupts the walkable neighborhood and creates a missing piece. this is our proposed project and it's walkable, bike friendly and a mix of uses providing housing and neighborhood serving retail and it mends the missing piece in the streets and including by remove shall curb cuts on chestnut street. our aspiration is to provide build upon the walkable nature of the neighborhood, chestnut and the marina both providing shops and homes and sustainability development that compliments the context. these are some of the project data which the planning department already presented but i'll repeat some of them. 49 units, 30% of them are family friendly by which we need two or

more bedrooms and 19% on site affordable and four to five row tail space and 20 parking spaces in the basement and targeting lead gold for the commercial and lead silver for residential and with $3.4 million in city impact fees. these are two different street front ages as you will be aware and two long interior lot lines so in response, we are proposing a modification to the rear yard requirement. on the left of you see the traditional approach to the rear yard and then passing to the right you see our more taylors approach where we broke up the yard into light wells that do respond to the a joining neighbors to provide a maximum of light and they're both to the neighbors and the new units. here you see that again on the second floor plan. this is the residential floor plan. i'm going to speak morphicly mok

more specifically. before i do that i just want to talk about the over all building design. our goal is to harmonize with the scale and materials and so in looking at the context here you see the two street front ages, the block context rather than one single architectural style we see areas and styles on the block itself as well as on chestnut street so in order to address the neighborhood context we focus on material and we're inspired by the texture and shadow play and depths and relief you see on some of the a joining building and we think it's an important character to bring into the building design so we've proposed vertical textual accent material you see on both chestnut and lombard and the other thing that is important to the character is the storefront and the sidewalk experience. so, in looking at our building

design, we really focus on the details of the storefront creating human scaled components like signs, anings, bulk heads and texture accent paving. we've also focused on transparency of the street front trying to connect the sidewalk to the retail spaces and balconies on the chestnut facing units for eyes on the street and increase safety for the sidewalk. here is a look at our better streets components. we have street trees as well as setting back the storefront to create a ample sidewalk space and adjacent to the residential lobby and on lombard you see the two commercial loading zones that sherry mentioned to

facilitate the ease and speed of truckload forgeron the project. so returning here to the facade on the left you see chestnut and the right you see lombard in both cases you see the vertical accent material and transparency at the storefront as well as the street scape features i mentioned. here is the typical building section. i want to emphasize we are bowl the 40-foot height limit and the configuration of over retail and the white rectangle represent where the residential white walls exist so to focus on the design of the residential light walls we knew as a result of our rear yard modification we would have smaller light wells and we wanted these to be a amenity and benefit to the residential benefits despite their small size. so what we've done is conceived of these as viewing gardens so we hope they're lush, soft grown space us look into from your unit and to try to alleviate some of the potential accuse acc

between a usable, occupied space next to a bedroom window so what we're doing is providing all the open space up on the roof where they have the best access to light and views and alleviate that conflict of uses that you might have on the residential level so here is a few views concept renderings. again, by moving the open space occupied open space up to the roof we provide more greenery as a screen between the units that face one another. quick peek at our units. this is going to be very similar topic to the one in the previous project so we have prioritized providing light and air to the common spaces of the units and we do have 20 junior one beds or studios and they have nested bedrooms and you see those in the upper right as would be typical of that unit type. in the entire rest of the. project with 51 bedrooms, four are nested and those exist in

the largest unit type the three bedroom unit in the bottom right and the reason why that is that way, the reason we designed it that way to provide ample light and air to the common spaces of the unit. so i just have a few renderings. focus on the same topics i mentioned earlier. this is focused on bringing feet down to the street, a sense of activation and safety for the sidewalk and i'll hand it off to dan here to speak about neighborhood retail. >> thank you. i'm dan with the prado group. i wanted to just touch on one of the questions that came up with retail viability on this project. as some of you may know, our company focuses on urban mixed use and urban retail and we have for two decades here in san francisco and we have deep

background in experience and neighborhood retail in addition to our housing background. we truly believe the best projects were projects that enable residents to live, work, shop, and walk within their neighborhoods and get all of the services that they need and while we have read a lot in the press about indoor shopping malls and high street department stores, getting ravaged by the internet, not all retail is equal. we've seen a really surgeriance in the neighborhood and in fact have seen quite a bit of row tail viality, even during the covid period on streets like chestnut through our decades working here in san francisco we have ensured our neighborhood-serving businesses are stay vibrant and provide value and convenience to the communities they've served and we have worked on chestnut for

many years and fill more, ninth avenue, dolores, market, including the mission and valencia corridor with respect to chess nut street itself there are 113 retail spaces in the core of the chestnut street area. there are currently three vacant spaces about 3% pre-covid and the retail vacancy was about 2% and during the covid period, the retail vacancy reached as high as 6% and so what i want to tell you today is that we are incredibly confident with the retail we're putting in this project it's not only going to be able to serve the residents in this project but serve the local community and provide more opportunities for people to walk to and meet their neighborhood

needs well beyond a single bank building with a surface parking lot and a drive-thru. thank you. >> does that conclude the presentation? very good. members of the public, this is your opportunity to address the commission by pressing star 3 to be added to the queue or if you are here in the chamber in-person, please lineup on the screen side of the room. if there are no people in the chamber that wish to speak to this matter, we will open up the remote callers. through the chair, you each have three minutes to comment on the negative declaration if you chose to. and the project, you have three minutes. when you are hear your line is unmuted, begin speaking.

go ahead, caller. >> caller: hello, good afternoon commissioners. my name is trish robins and i live in the marina directing district of san francisco. i'm against the 2055 chestnut street project. it's not compatible with the neighborhood. chestnut street line the pack let's with very few parking places and just losing the parking lot would be a great loss to our neighborhood. we're already subjected to traffic due to double and tripping parking for current small businesses and i'm wondering if the marina district is logistically to prepare what it would bring to our streets for deliveries, sewer, paush,

emergency response and taking over a big spot on the newly opened lombard street. there are currently 13 at least residential construction sites already a process in our neighborhood and shouldn't a neighborhood be livable for current residents. please consider the noise and to troy from the building construction currently on us and it's a lot already. could the commission please take a breath, rethink this project potential threat to our health and well being and just as we are emerging from a pandemic. thank you commissioners for your consideration and thank you for hearing me today. >> thank you. press star 3 for any member other public. seeing no other members of the

public requesting to speak at this time, public comment is closed and this matter is how before you commissioners. >> thank you city staff and the project sponsor for the presentation. anybody want to kickoff the discussion today? >> commissioners and again i will remind you take up the matter of the appeal of the negative declaration first. >> so at this point, i have questions both on the projects. you want just the questions on the negotiate deck? >> i can separate them out. >> let me start with the neg deck. just clarification from staff, the project, the pmnd is a

14,000 square foot project and the approval is 15,000 square foot and project and 15,000 square foot that a difference due to useable versus gross or the consistent. >> the pmnd is consistent and acknowledges that the 15,000 gross square footage for environmental review and calculating the transportations trip generation and loading demand and we sometimes per our guidelines we use the active square footage versus the back up housed vehicle circulation uses and so we wanted to distinguish the amount.

however, between 14,000 and 15,000 gross square foot, the difference is negligible between trips and travel demands at the loading demand still remains the same. the determination still is consistent and the same between the two. maybe this is nor the city attorney. it appears that one of the i am paths of the project is that 50-foot vans need to back into the off street loading dock and in the course of doing that they block all three lanes of traffic and going in one direction on lombard. there's a mitigation measure and i want a evaluation report that is done with the ability to

revise conditions if necessary and i want to make sure that the authority that the city retains in that condition is sufficient lee brought that if it turns out that no matter how you change the hours of delivery or the days of delivery, that we really can't deal with complete blockage of three wave on lombard that we have the ability to say to the project sponsor, you can no longer use the off site loading but for the 50-foot trucks you have to deliver by the curb. is the authority brought it up in that condition to allow for that? >> yes, through the chair. deputy city attorney kristen jensen. the provision is broad enough that ta laws staff to make revisions as necessary in response to the report back requirement. so, they could in factory strict

the hours to zero hours of operation at that location for example so the answer to your question in short is yes. >> that isn't due until the the final cfo and do we have to wait 18 months if it's negative after several months that the do we have to say we need to change this condition? >> the question both i don't know what the city attorney question or whether it's staff question? >> i think that's probably a staff question and it's nothing in the dlop that would require or permit an easterly year so leave it to staff to see if there's another way to get a earlier report.

>> yes, as city attorney mentioned there isn't anything for precluding an easterly year evaluation, especially if conflicts are opened and reported and i think the short answer is i believe it can be -- >> the staff could say to the developer we need that evaluation report sooner than 18 months even though the condition says 18 months? i'm just thinking maybe we ought to change it to more than 18 months? >> it may be fine but you know, because it's lombard street it's part of the state highway system i just really want to make sure that we are not put ourselves in a position and we have to live with this condition as it turns out to be really the problem.

>> especially and i understand the developer has the option of just having to see pulled and alongside the curb. >> yes and so, i think reviewing the dlop and that means the reporting and evaluations can happen sooner than the 18 months it has identified that over all timeframe. that answers that first question. and then, the 18 month and just realistically versus the timeline of a project coming in and under operations it's

premises on the notion that other parts of the city whether it's w will approve changes to the color zones along the curbs and i know that they have to apply with it and i know you've had conversations with dpw and sfmta and you are sure they're going to say yes but what happens if they say no? >> let me, if i may, i could maybe describe the process that insures or provides more clarity to this mta approval process. the sfmta color curb program and application review is a two-step

divorce and preliminary review and in the case of 2055 chestnut that occurs with this extensive coordination that happened during the environmental review process and during the review and approval and so, so the second step is the final review which is so it's not the standard practice to deny the approval of loading zones that completed this extensive preliminary review and.

>> how do you develop language in the traffic study is that we have to have the color curbs in place? >> so for that question i'll defer to matt. the project planner. >> hello, again. so, in discussing the best way to do this, our preference was it would work in the condition 58 use if you decide to the pm for the conditional use and you can add a condition that they build off of the d lots that says they need to apply and the conditional use condition can say and it's not approved by mta and that they will work in conjunction with mta planning and to find an and then ceqa is

taking and i have full read forecast you want that but that's the bones of what the condition would be. >> read the language. >> ok. >> the condition could read the sponsor shall apply to the san francisco municipal transportation agency sfmta for the color curbs described in the project application in the event that sfmta does not approve the color curb they shall work with the planning department to design and eg different locations of color curb zones, to accommodate any commercial or passenger loading demands of the project. >> can i ask the project sponsor if they're ok with that condition? >> yes, commissioner. that continue is fine with us as

was spoken into the record. thank you. >> o. thank you. >> so i do have other questions about the project itself but at this point, with that information, i am prepared to vote and deny the appeal but i want to hear from the other commissioners. >> i was going to touch on your issue commissioner diamond so thank you for getting that ut of the way. i want to express my support for the project. >> vice press moore. >> the only question that would ask is commissioner diamond, doesn't this state of this is a highway and seeing or observing the loading operations at safeway a few blocks away, it is not just kind of like blocking lanes for a moment but there are

several attempts to align the trainer in a manner it just fits into the loading documents and it's not just zip and it's in and i'm very concerned driving on lombard street frequently this is not just of a street this is a highway. and i would like to actually add that caltrans is being asked whether or not to pursue. >> my understanding commissioner moore, i asked the exact same question is caltrans has to issue an encroachment permit and for this project and that they may have more to say about this when it gets in front of them but i do defer to staff because i'm just hear say. >> that's correct. the project is being a state highway work that is done within state highway may require an

encroachment requirement for that and so that is correct in that statement. i also want to clarify and note that sfmta also works with caltrans and sfmta makes the legislative changes and a approval for curb modifications on the street as well. >> i would like to go back actually since i'm still speaking. i have a separate question. the discussion about loading and curb clutter is the use it is supposed use. i question the gres row store. it was the size of retail. for that i would like to ask the project sponsor, please, to come back one more time and describe in more detail, for example, who is your potential lease year of

the grocery store and how do you respond to, as of yesterday evening, it's abandoning the retail retail location on chestnut street. we have for the last couple of years seen other successful larger retailers and we have successful an chestnut street and now it's pottery barn and so i would like you to hear a little bit more and in that particular and dynamics. >> commissioner. in reverse order the bot respace is apparently leased already and retailer and the last and we are seeing a lot of leasing activities as i mentioned and in

the neighborhood are similarly situated. we do not have a specific tenant for this space at this point and it takes a long time to go through this process and when the project is finally approved, we would start the marketing of the project as the commissioner knows, we've done a lot of work around the necessity-type of retailing and we've worked with retailers and grocery stores as large as 30,000 square feet and others that are 12,000 square feet and there are probably five or six different stores within san francisco that i could name off that would fit within the general space size of this retail space in the basement and

i would also say that this is not a typical for a gross row stores, especially in more dense, urban areas as they start to dense fie to actually put these uses in the basement because typically, and i think as this commission has seen, there are often grocery stores that end up with large storefront windows and they put merchandising racks over those store windows so they actually can utilize basement space much better than typical refailers that want to have a transparent storefront. >> let me get a little bit more specific on my question. chestnut street like other successful neighborhood retail streets in san francisco, for years and years have carefully coordinated with neighbors and

merchants who they want as a compliment to what is there. there's a certain kind of dna different to each of those particular neighborhoods for commercial space. the additional formula retail in many of those streets is a rather major deterrent for originally were all smaller businesses supporting each other. you have basically here over 20,000 square feet or 24,000 square feet of retail and i would really, today, hear a little bit more clearly in what wave you are basically trying to orchestrate this? this is a lot of retail space as also potentially a lot of opposition to who the formula retailing chestnut street and today it's not a food desert. i with like to hear clearly what you have in mind. particularly increments on chestnut street, the majority of new buildings that we see and

that is not just like this year or last year has been building up on new buildings which have ground floor retail are basically only presenting vacant retail space, nothing is happening there and how do you think you can deliver something different? this is very, very important and a very, very large project and i think we would be doing ourself a big disfavor. one building a large underground retail space and the parking and not having a clear idea of what you are trying do. >> yeah, so i think i'll answer the question commissioner in a couple of ways. one is, i think as this commissioner knows, we have false prided ourselves on working with local communities and done a tremendous amount of outreach on our projects including when we're bringing

retail to a street. we started this early on in california street project where we went to the neighbors and we asked the neighbors what they were actually missing in their neighborhoods. that's a typical approach first. we work with good leasing brokers. i would say that there has been a change over and this is one of the things that i think is just on going is the evolution of retail spaces, restaurants come and go and different types of uses come and go and our approach would be very similar which is to actually at the

determine what the right tenants are for that space so there's compliments to the other

businesses that are there. >> thank you so much. >> thank you so much. >> commissioner imperial. imperial.>> i want to touch on t commissioner diamond is saying on. i would like to highlight in terms are there any analysis on the anticipated public transportation delay on lombard? >> and whether that can be highlighted in the dlop? or is that highlighting? >> yes, to answer your question, the impact -- the analysis for specifically for loading the mitigation measure is in place and the dlop is in place to reduce any significant impacts to in fact public transit. so the dlop measures focus on reducing those conflicts and to

reduce any conflicts with public transits. >> and i hope that it would also be part of the monitor yum process too. >> ok. >> those are my questions. thank you. >> i have a question. for the dlop and the loading and thank you for bring up public transit, my biggest concern is even if it is only two and a half minutes to back up the big rig into the loading that's a long time for drivers who are impatient and that is when accidents and danger occurs, not on environmental level but people nevil addition to transit being delayed. we talk about improvements for buses which make a big difference over all and so i think that the mitigation measures do outline not having those larger trucks during the peak hours but i'm concerned the peak hours are too short of a window. could you go into how we define those hours that are speak in the morning and the evening.

my experience of being on that street is almost always peak. early morning or through the third shift is to me the ideal delivery time for some of those larger vehicles that need to back into the loading zone. is there an opportunity to expand those waiting to see if there's problems? >> the peak hours were derived based off of observations actually of grocery store uses to feel confident of the loading on site. we observed other similar grocery store uses of size to make sure we understand the types of trucks, vehicles, times they come and based on those observations, very large trucks occurred only one trip during the observed grocery store

period and that occurred as you said in the morning and as noted with the discussion about location of on sight versus the garage i believe the dlop would have that ability to change hours as well. >> i think for the peak hours i was saying is the peak hours of the traffic on lombard street because i think it's 7:00 to 10:00 and 4:00 to 7:00? is that right? >> yes. i think 4:00 p.m. is late and traffic is picking up. i just try to understand where we derived those hours. is that from measuring traffic flow and comparing it to its self or is it saying what's a traffic flow under which a truck can back up for two and a half minutes and not disturb that

much traffic? >> the peak hour for vehicle travel is coming from our transportation impact annal sits guidelines and we defined those and made those updates also based on data object investigation. >> there was a motion the appeal so if you are interested, i'll give you the floor. >> yeah, at this point i would be prepared to deny the appeal. >> second. >> commissioners, if there's nothing further there's a motion that has been seconded to uphold the negative declaration on that motion. commissioner diamond. >> aye. >> commissioner fung. >> aye. >> commissioner imperial. >> aye. >> commissioner koppel.

>> aye. >> commissioner moore. >> aye. and commissioner president tanner. aye. >> that motion passes 6-0. >> onto the projects itself. vice president moore. >> i would like to have the rest of the commission comment on the below grid use of the space given the uncertainty of who may occupy it, including the size of the chestnut street facing space dedicated to retail? the other question i have is the court yard that you described very eloquently as lush and green and soft and planting are

not on grade court yards where plans grow to be lush and thriving but concrete surfaces where it's introduced and in most cases it's a very carefully taken care of most of these particular types of light wells or court yards aren't particularly green and water restrictions make it very difficult, particularly right now, to keep them green. the next question is that when cpg3.1 we are being produced tod to a roof deck and we have a roof deck placement it sits too close to chestnut street so hold back fight feet and since there's no dimension strain you

can abstract from width of stairs, et cetera, how close it sits to the edge of chestnut street it could be held back further and it also needs to be held back from the property line to the building to the west. those are just observations that i would like to throw out and just listen to what other commissioners think about the project. >> thank you. do you want the project sponsor respond on the plants. >> can you repeat the page number for the roof deck? i'm just scrolling through. >> that's page 31. >> thank you. >> call propose roof plan.

>> thank you so much. >> hello commissioners, real quick, i'll address the roof decks. commissioner moore is correct it doesn't lineup with the policy we recently adopted on roof decks so particularly with respect to the side building walls and the property lines there should be a minimum of five foot setback there and it looks like the front property line on chestnut does have a compliance setback but the side should include a setback to be in line with our current policy. >> thank you. >> are you looking at page 39? i do not believe the chestnut street is five feet. no. >> i think there's a little space between the edge there. >> it's not five feet. >> it's less than five feet. there's an indication of a railing and --

>> would it still need the open space requirements? >> emily. yes, we could adjust the specific layout of the open space on the roof, minor adjustments to be able to meet the requirement and have the open space we're citing. >> great. >> all right. there koppel. >> yeah, other than those smaller issues i'm generally in support. i think it's a good reuse of the parking lot and i'm still open to hearing what the other commissioners want to widdle away at. >> i'll share my thoughts. i'm generally supportive of the project. i think adjusting the roof deck was wise. i thought it was thoughtful to the the light wells so i appreciate that, especially i'm sure your neighbors, i hope they appreciate it.

how many times do we hear about people who want light wells aligned with new buildings and it's a great and thoughtful gesture. do you have any concerns about the planting establishing itself and being sustained in those interior court yards? there are light wells or do you feel like with the experience you have that they'll be able to be maintained? >> if i can just show you the slide again just to describe how we're imagining it. >> sure. >> so i think you can see here, it's a podium so we won't put trees on top of the podium they need soil. in the case of the light wells it's so mound up the surface of

the ground to a com diet the tree well and also, to create a little more screening so you would look out your window and see that surface as you look out many of that's one of the answers and the other -- it's a little difficult to see. in the smaller court yards, we are envisioning these as the location of the planters for stormwater mitigation. we have located them in this smaller court yards because they're quite deep and in order to not obstruct the view out of the units in. you would have a soil depth to work with. of course the plant selection is critical as is main tins. they need it get flushed out and we would have to select the appropriate species and i believe currently and you will see -- apologies and they exact

bamboo that is but that is the initial concept. >> thank you very much, i appreciate that. >> commissioner imperial. >> i just, for my understanding, it looks like this rear yard purpose is for the light well and it doesn't look like a person can enter this light well it's mainly for viewerring. is that the main purpose? the roof deck is the open space. is that the understanding i'm having here? >> that is correct and against and the mainreason is the lighte narrow. we didn't want occupied space outside of a bedroom window and so in order to make that space as usable as possible and to have a littletation on the conflict of use where you might have neighbors gathering right outside of your private space, we elected to put the open space up on the roof where it can be a little bit more useable and accessible for gatherings and

also not to create that potential conflict. >> thank you. >> i think for the purpose of the light well in terms of the rear yard i'm supportive that in terms of the roof deck, i would follow what commissioner moore has intended in terms of its setback just to be consistent with our rules. another thing too is -- i am more actually in the dlop and more in the traffic and the monitoring of it. i would support what commissioner diamond in terms of monitoring less than 18 months. if anything, i don't know what would be up to six months just to see the dlop because i am concerned in delivering, loading and the possible delays. so, in terms of a public transportation, especially if that's what wore trying to highlight on so, i would like to

hear what other commissioners have to say on that. >> i would grow with that. commissioner diamond. diamond.so several comments and questions. i think the first evaluation report should be submitted before 18 months. i worry it's too long and we should be clear when we want to see the first one and i would be much more open indicating that first evaluation report has to be submitted in six months. does staff have any problem with that? >> no, that's fine. >> i do see the product sponsor waved his hand. >> i was going to go to them next. ok. >> thank you, commissioners. dan fratten for the project sponsor. i don't think we have any problem with the shorter period. i just would like it to be clear

that the six-month period really should not run from the time when we get the first certificate of occupancy for the building. we anticipate it's going to be after that when we actually have a tenant using this space so we'd like to make sure that six month period runs from when the space is tenanted. >> i think that makes complete sense. it should be six months from when the grocery store moves in. [please stand by]

>> commissioner diamond: i wonder if the architect could bring up or someone could bring up the plan for the three bedroom unit which shows the nested bedroom in the corner.

>> it's up on the screen. thank you. >> commissioner diamond: thank you. so you have a number of bedrooms -- maybe you're going to make to the, and i was

wondering if you were working with the planning department to make modifications to the plans, if you could take a look at the building community. it feels to -- to me like you can do that. >> first, commissioner diamond, i will say that we appreciate the comment, and we are not opposed to daylight in

bedrooms. we just thought up this large living space with the idea, as the previous applicant mentioned, with the idea of bringing light into the living space. you're absolutely right. this particular bedroom does have a fairly small amount of shared wall with the living space and, thus, small amount of access to the daylight, and we're okay to look at ways to have more light. we've looked at it before, but we're certainly open to studying ways to have more open light. >> commissioner diamond: and i liked the fact that you did not put all the rear yard into one end or the other. i think breaking it up between the lightwells and the rear

yard makes tremendous sense to me, and i think it works quite beautifully. the last question has to do with laundry. it looks like you have laundry hookups in every room. is that correct? >> yes, i believe the project sponsor is open to providing laundry hookups and community laundries, as well. >> commissioner diamond: okay. would you be open to the condition that you either provide laundry in each unit or laundry rooms? >> so the language on that was the project sponsor shall be required to provide on-site communal laundry facilities, individual in-unit laundry, hookups or some combination

thereof to provide sufficient laundry on-site, so it gives them the flexibility to do what they want. >> commissioner diamond: to the project sponsor, is that an acceptable condition to you? >> yes, it is. >> commissioner diamond: so i would be amenable to the laundry condition, the color curb condition, and having the first evaluation occur within six months of occupancy. that's my motion, but i of course still want to hear from the other commissioners.

>> vice president moore: the other condition is to modify the roof deck. >> commissioner diamond: oh, absolutely. yes, slightly. >> president tanner: is that a motion? >> commissioner imperial: is that a motion? okay. second. >> vice president moore: i didn't make a motion. i think commissioner diamond made a motion. >> president tanner: okay. great. we have project sponsor. did you want to add something? >> yes. we just have a request to the six-month occupancy. if we could say six months from operations, that would be glaet. thank you. >> vice president moore: i don't think you can evaluate the real impact of large trucks coming in until you have your grocery store in place. i think that's the wrong way of trying to understand the problem, so i think the

original intent is what commissioner diamond says. >> that's our understanding, right? >> president tanner: i think is saying that it's when it's operational, not occupancy. i see commissioner diamond nodding, so i think we're all on the same page. >> clerk: okay, commissioners. if there's nothing further, i believe we have a motion that's been seconded to approve this project with conditions that have been amended by staff, including the roof deck

setbacks, and a six-month monitoring update, and that was a hearing or just a memo. >> president tanner: i thought it was a report -- >> clerk: it's a report to the department six months after the beginning of operation. on that motion -- [roll call] diamond dime the laundry condition and the color curb condition. >> clerk: right. both were read into the record by staff, i think. [roll call] >> clerk: so moved, commissioners. that motion passes 5-1, with commissioner moore voting against. >> president tanner: thank you. and before we move to our next items, . >> clerk: commissioners, we left off on your discretionary

review calendar, and as previously mentioned, item 16 has been withdrawn, leaving us with items 17 and 18. we'll take up rutledge street first, for case 2021-0018 # 9-drp at 315 rutledge street. we should hear from the project project -- d.r. requester present. oh, hello. i'm sorry, mr. winslow. >> clerk: you know, since you don't have to share your screen, why don't you go ahead and make your presentation. >> good evening, president tanner, vice president moore, and commissioners. david winslow, staff architect. the item before you is a

publicly initiated request for discretionary review, 2021.0128.3503 to construction a three-story over basement single-family residence on a vacant lot within an rh-1 zoning district. the proposed alternative is to remove the third floor, ensure proper trees or other privacy

measures or screening are immediately put into place, and ensure proper measures are taken before and after construction to maintain the integrity of his upslope home. public comment to date, the department has received no letters in opposition and one letter in support of the project. planning department's review of this project finds that it conforms with the residential design guidelines. the plan read as a two story over basement that transitions with the neighbors. the third floor is also minimally visible due to its

13'3" set back. staff views no exceptional or extraordinary circumstances and recommends not taking discretionary review and approving. this concludes my presentation, and i'm here to answer questions. >> clerk: thank you, mr. winslow. d.r. requester?

>> today, i'm here as a neighbor on this project. we have been trying to have our views heard with this design since the beginning, both with the design board and through the design process, and -- in which we've not been heard at all. the response it fits code, it fits code, it fits code has has -- our position has never been taken into account. there's no other homes on this single block of rutledge are

three story over basement. if they are, they're condos or multiunit buildings. it's building to the max capacity and max height for max dollar. this is particularly going to box us in, our home, more than any other home. we're a two-story design cottage as the quintessential home to keep the character of bernal heights. we have large homes above us, large homes down slope, large homes in front of us, and now, we'll have a large home in back. we want to approve this home, but now, it's too tall. now my wife and i are forced to raise our two children in this

home. what are we supposed to do? during this design review process, the developer told us, build a third floor. that's your choice. that was how they engaged us. i want it on record here because they are not going to be the owners of this home in the long run. if i have to build a third floor, there's a new neighbor that is going to challenge us, and i want it on record that we have been forced to build a third floor. four homes that have been sold on our street, two stories over basement. this home is 3500 square feet, as opposed to 1500 to 2,000 square foot, completely different from the homes in

this neighborhood, the homes that this neighborhood is known for. thank you so much for your time, and i appreciate your perspective here. >> clerk: project sponsor. >> not sure if i know how to work this. >> clerk: like any other computer. >> how do we get it on the screen? >> as soon as you start speaking, sfgov will start your slides. >> good evening. my name is eric staten. i'm the project architect and also a bernal heights resident. thank you for the opportunity to presence our response to the d.r. application. next slide, please. next. per the drfaq on the project website, we believe no extraordinary circumstances exist. the project is designed to be compatible with the surrounding

neighborhood character in terms of massing, set back, and architectural character. next slide -- no, that's good. go back. immediate side context of the building usually consists of two to four stories, highlighted in yellow. the slide is a typical upslope lot in san francisco. it's typically 2.5 feet below and 70 feet away from the applicant's house. there are no impacts to light and air to 261 rutledge. per the residential design guidelines, views from property are not a protected resource.

our project has minimal impact on the vees from 261 ripley as shown in -- views from 261 ripley as shown in the slides. we are proposing to add landscaping to provide additional privacy and match the previous landscape conditions. regarding the fire and life safety issues raised by the d.r. applicant, there was no door or stair providing such access to it when the project sponsor purchased the site. any life safety decisions that cease or may not exist at 311 rutledge are not the property of this project sponsor. next slide. we held multiple community meetings with the neighborhood with the east side [indiscernible] of which robin

has never been a member. next slide. this project sponsor will happily agree to add a fencing and landscape at the rear of the property to improve privacy for both properties. we ask the planning commission to approve the d.r. as designed with no modifications, and thank you for your attention. >> clerk: thank you. members of the public, this is your opportunity to address the commission on this matter. for those persons in the room, please lineup on the screen side of the room or come up to the dais. okay. seeing no members of the public in the room wishing to speak, members of the public listening, this is your opportunity to begin speaking, and you'll each have one minute. >> hi.

i'm doug [indiscernible] and i'm the owner and resident on 251 ripley street. my building is part of a two-building condominium unit. my living room is several feet down from 271 and the proposed project at 315 rutledge will literally be a towering structure that pushes right up to the sky. i've lived here since 2003, and the developers bought the home behind me and beside me. i saw them tear down a staircase, cut through a sidewalk, and cutoff all egress to the house east of the lot, and i think that's an illegal apartment in the d.r.

application. >> clerk: thank you, sir. that is your time. okay. last call for public comment. seeing none, d.r. requester, you have a one-minute rebuttal. >> first, i'd like to apologize. i thought robin was in my research, and i own that, and i'll apologize for that. i'll note that most of the structures that were highlighted in yellow were actually multifamily units with condos in them. they are not the typical single-family home, and i'm looking at rutledge and ripley street. we love living there. we live there for the families. this is not about the view. we just don't want to live in a canyon. we have decisions to make where we live there and build a third

story or move somewhere else. i'm not dealing with a neighbor, i'm dealing with a project sponsor, and then a neighbor with all of this baggage. >> clerk: thank you. couple of points of clarifications. robin and i are residents of bernal heights, and we care about the neighborhood and want to build something good. regarding the d.r. applicant's statement that he -- that we asked him to build a third floor, we just merely stated that that is his right to do, but we never made any request that he do that. we'd also point out that we have e-mail from him that he has already purchased a house in marin county. the house is approximately 3100

square feet gross and just under 2700 square foot family living space, with a first floor above the garage, with bedrooms above that, and a flexible living space on the top floor. >> clerk: that concludes the public hearing -- sir, that concludes the public hearing, and this matter is before you. commissioners? >> president tanner: commissioners? commissioner koppel? >> commissioner koppel: i'll be supporting staff's recommendation. >> president tanner: commissioner imperial? >> commissioner imperial: i have a question to the project sponsor. what is the total square footage of your development? >> one second, please. >> gross? net? what's the --

>> commissioner imperial: gross. >> gross? okay. they had a death in the family, so everything is a little bit -- hang on one second, please. the total gross square footage is 2,994 square feet. >> commissioner imperial: okay. thank you. >> president tanner: do you have anymore questions, commissioner imperial? >> commissioner imperial: no, president tanner.

>> president tanner: commissioner moore? >> vice president moore: i just want to say that the project is tucked into a small lot. i do not find anything exceptional or extraordinary and find it a pleasant addition on a vacant lot. >> president tanner: thank you. i agree with my fellow commissioners and definitely understand your feelings towards the project, but i think it's a very tastefully and thoughtfully designed project that's providing family housing, so if there's no more comments, commissioners, we might have a motion. >> commissioner koppel: motion to approve. >> vice president moore: second. >> clerk: thank you, commissioners. on that motion to not take d.r. and approve the project, on that motion -- [roll call] >> clerk: so moved, commissioners. that motion passes unanimously,

6-0, and that'll place us on item 18, commissioners, for case 2020-009321-drp-02 at 2132 16 avenue. mr. winslow? >> thank you, sir. good evening, president tanner -- sorry. good evening, president tanner, vice president moore. david winslow, staff architect. item before you is a public initiated request for discretionary review of building permit application 2021.0903.3083 to construct a 557 square foot third story horizontal addition to an existing three story, one family resident within an rh-1

zoning district. the neighbor to the north is concerned that the project would impact the character to the neighborhood and would impact the view from his house. to date, the department has received no letters in support nor any letters in opposition. the planning department's review of this proposal confirms support of the project as it conforms to both the residential design guidelines and the planning code. there is a clear pattern of nine houses with third stories that are set back from the prevailing two-story street wall. the height of the proposed addition is 9 feet floor to roof and is entirely behind an

existing hit roof to preserve the existing character. the d.r. requester is uphill of the proposed project, which along with the five-foot set back of the property, provides additional light and air to his home. therefore, the staff recommends not taking d.r. and approving. this concludes my presentation. thank you. >> clerk: thank you. d.r. requester? d.r. requester? d.r. requester may be calling in, i believe. is this the d.r. requester? >> yeah, this is the d.r. requester. >> clerk: okay. you have three minutes. >> thank you. first of all, i want to address the fact that i'm not appearing in person today. we received a notice that the

hearing would be held remotely, and we received a notice two weeks ago that the meeting would be held in person, but it was not stated that our appearance in person would be required. we assumed that we would be allowed to attend remotely. in addition, we have two young children and two immunocompromised people in our home, so attending in person is not an option for us today. there are nine almost identical homes in the mission. all nine of them were built in 1938 build by [indiscernible] whose own home is a mere three

blocks at 16 and pacheco. they lie on 30-foot-wide lots and are completely detached. they share almost identical floor plans. the five homes higher in elevation include a fourth bedroom set back almost 15 feet from the back of the front roof line. the other lower elevation homes do not include this fourth bedroom as at that site, the lots begin to level out. all of those five homes with the top floor bedrooms have this bedroom only in the south half of the building, a clear intention by the designer to

preserve view and character. any alterations to these nine homes have been made in the rear of the property. this home would be an extraordinary exception and would significantly impact the surrounding homes. the enjoyment of our home would be unfairly affected by this addition, and because of the position of our home, we get the majority of our light from the alley, not from lightwells. we do understand our neighbor's desire for additional space, and we believe a vertical addition to the back of the home similar to neighbors' projects, is appropriate. clearly, this project is

inconsistent with additional homes in the area. thank you. >> clerk: thank you. that is your time. you will have a one-minute rebuttal. project sponsor, you will have three minutes. >> hi, everyone. i'm tony wright, and i'm the architect for gene mar at 2132, and yeah, there are nine houses that have basically identical plans. five of them have an extra floor. what we're doing is absolutely compatible with the design intent of those five houses, nine houses in the -- we're adding the extra floor that was not built.

the addition is 9 feet high over the flat roof portion of the living accommodation. it projects 3 feet or thereabouts over the flat roof, so the addition of the height of the building is 3.5 feet because we nestled down between the roof and the raised roof portion of the building. we considered all of these factors, and in our opinion, what we're proposing is much more in keeping with the character of these nine houses than building an equivalent area out into the back hard

that basically eliminates the backyard space. so what we're doing is creating an extra floor on the house that gives this house the same amenity that every other house has. i don't think the last house in the four-house sequence has anything to do with the change in slope of the street. i think it has to do with the developer not putting out the expense of construction. thank you. >> clerk: thank you. okay. members of the public, this is your opportunity to address the

commission. >> rob labinsky. i'm not familiar with that process, but what i am familiar is with the process of d.r. and wanting to have space for your family, up versus down. we've been here 5.5, six hours. i think you know this is hard, and you deal with it every day, but these people want to create something else everybody else has. these people should be able to build. they should be able to build. they're not asking for anything special, and we're just asking that the board approves it. thank you. >> clerk: okay. any other members of the board

requesting to speak? callers, you need to press star, three to be added to the queue. okay. seeing no additional requests to speak, d.r. requester, you have a one-minute rebuttal. >> thank you. i appreciate everybody hearing this out. i think at the end of the day, this doesn't need to be an all-or-nothing approach. our intention is not to stop them from expanding their home, our intention is to stop them from overextending their home. what they're doing is very out of character with the neighborhood. they're adding an additional 400-plus square feet, so our thoughts are that they should continue to try to find a compromise with us. unfortunately, they haven't engaged us. we haven't had an opportunity to do that, and that's my time.

>> clerk: you have 15 seconds, but if that's it for your rebuttal, project sponsor, you have a one-minute rebuttal. >> okay. so we had a preapplication meeting at the planning department with paul thompson, and as a result of that meeting, we pulled the front of the bedroom addition back, and we lowered the overall height of the building by 15 inches, thereabouts. we've gone through this whole process in negotiation with the planning department, and all we're building is two small bedrooms and a bathroom. it's not an excessive amount of space, and it's -- we did our best to minimize the impact on

the neighborhood, and we think we've done a good job. thank you. >> clerk: thank you. commissioners, that concludes the public hearing portion of this item. >> president tanner: thank you. >> clerk: the matter is now before you. >> president tanner: i just want to say before i call on commissioner moore, that to the d.r. requester, it's unfortunate that the communication happened a little too late, and just as we have commissioners appearing remotely, that does not lessen your cause. that said, i do not find the modifications burdening, and i will not be taking review. >> vice president moore: i find the addition sensitive, small enough, in the right kind of

split-level design, and in the right design of what i find the surrounding buildings to be, so therefore, i'm in full support. >> commissioner koppel: second. >> clerk: thank you, commissioners. if there's no further deliberation, there's a motion that's been seconded to not take d.r. and approve the project as proposed. on that motion -- [roll call] >> clerk: so moved, commissioners. that motion passes unanimously, 6-0. that concludes your first in-person calendar. >> president tanner: thank you, commissioners. we are adjourned, and we are going to adjourn in memory of

commissioner kathleen dooley. >> after my fire in my apartment and losing everything, the red cross gave us a list of agencies in the city to reach out to and i signed up for the below-market rate program. i got my certificate and started applying and won the housing lottery. [♪♪♪] >> the current lottery program began in 2016. but there have been lot rows

that have happened for affordable housing in the city for much longer than that. it was -- there was no standard practice. for non-profit organizations that were providing affordable housing with low in the city, they all did their lotteries on their own. private developers that include in their buildings affordable units, those are the city we've been monitoring for some time since 1992. we did it with something like this. where people were given circus tickets. we game into 291st century in 2016 and started doing electronic lotteries. at the same time, we started electronic applications systems. called dalia. the lottery is completely free. you can apply two ways. you can submit a paper application, which you can

download from the listing itself. if you apply online, it will take five minutes. you can make it easier creating an account. to get to dalia, you log on to housing.sfgov.org. >> i have lived in san francisco for almost 42 years. i was born here in the hayes valley. >> i applied for the san francisco affordable housing lottery three times. >> since 2016, we've had about 265 electronic lotteries and almost 2,000 people have got their home through the lottery system. if you go into the listing, you can actually just press lottery results and you put in your lottery number and it will tell you exactly how you ranked. >> for some people, signing up

for it was going to be a challenge. there is a digital divide here and especially when you are trying to help low and very low income people. so we began providing digital assistance for folks to go in and get help. >> along with the income and the residency requirements, we also required someone who is trying to buy the home to be a first time home buyer and there's also an educational component that consists of an orientation that they need to attend, a first-time home buyer workshop and a one-on-one counseling session with the housing councilor. >> sometimes we have to go through 10 applicants before they shouldn't be discouraged if they have a low lottery number. they still might get a value for an available, affordable housing

unit. >> we have a variety of lottery programs. the four that you will most often see are what we call c.o.p., the certificate of preference program, the dthp which is the displaced penance housing preference program. the neighborhood resident housing program and the live worth preference. >> i moved in my new home february 25th and 2019. the neighborhood preference program really helped me achieve that goal and that dream was with eventually wind up staying in san francisco. >> the next steps, after finding out how well you did in the lottery and especially if you ranked really well you will be contacted by the leasing agent. you have to submit those document and income and asset qualify and you have to pass the credit and rental screening and the background and when you

qualify for the unit, you can chose the unit and hopefully sign that lease. all city sponsored affordable housing comes through the system and has an electronic lottery. every week there's a listing on dalia. something that people can apply for. >> it's a bit hard to predict how long it will take for someone to be able to move into a unit. let's say the lottery has happened. several factors go into that and mainly how many units are in the project, right. and how well you ranked and what preference bucket you were in. >> this particular building was brand new and really this is the one that i wanted out of everything i applied for. in my mind, i was like how am i going to win this? i did and when you get that notice that you won, it's like at first, it's surreal and you don't believe it and it sinks

in, yeah, it happened. >> some of our buildings are pretty spectacular. they have key less entry now. they have a court yard where they play movies during the weekends, they have another master kitchen and space where people can throw parties. >> mayor breed has a plan for over 10,000 new units between now and 2025. we will start construction on about 2,000 new units just in 2020. >> we also have a very big portfolio like over 25,000 units across the city. and life happens to people. people move. so we have a very large number of rerentals and resales of units every year. >> best thing about working for the affordable housing program is that we know that we're making a difference and we

actually see that difference on a day-to-day basis. >> being back in the neighborhood i grew up in, it's a wonderful experience. >> it's a long process to get through. well worth it when you get to the other side. i could not be happier. [♪♪♪]

>> roughly five years, i was working as a high school teacher, and i decided to take my students on a surfing field trip. the light bulb went off in my head, and i realized i could do much more for my students taking them surfing than i could as their classroom teacher, and that is when the idea for the city surf project was born. >> working with kids in the ocean that aren't familiar with this space is really special because you're dealing with a lot of fear and apprehension but at the same time, a lot of

excitement. >> when i first did it, i was, like, really scared, but then, i did it again, and i liked it. >> we'll get a group of kids who have just never been to the beach, are terrified of the idea, who don't like the beach. it's too cold out, and it's those kid that are impossible to get back out of the water at the end of the day. >> over the last few years, i think we've had at least 40 of our students participate in the city surf project. >> surfing helped me with, like, how to swim. >> we've start off with about two to four sessions in the pool before actually going out and surfing. >> swimming at the pool just helps us with, like, being, like, comfortable in the water and being calm and not being

all -- not being anxious. >> so when we started the city surf project, one of the things we did was to say hey, this is the way to earn your p.e. credits. just getting kids to go try it was one of our initial challenges for the first year or two. but now that we've been doing it three or four years, we have a group of kids that's consistent, and the word has spread, that it's super fun, that you learn about the ocean. >> starting in the morning, you know, i get the vehicles ready, and then, i get all the gear together, and then, i drive and go get the kids, and we take them to a local beach. >> we usually go to linda mar, and then occasionally ocean beach. we once did a special trip. we were in capitola last year, and it was really fun. >> we get in a circle and group

stretch, and we talk about specific safety for the day, and then, we go down to the water. >> once we go to the beach, i don't want to go home. i can't change my circumstances at home, but i can change the way i approach them. >> our program has definitely been a way for our students to find community and build friends. >> i don't really talk to friends, so i guess when i started doing city surf, i started to, like, get to know people more than i did before, and people that i didn't think i'd like, like, ended up being my best friends. >> it's a group sport the way we do it, and with, like, close camaraderie, but everybody's doing it for themselves. >> it's great, surfing around, finding new people and making new friendships with people throughout surfing. >> it can be highly developmental for students to

have this time where they can learn a lot about themselves while negotiating the waves. >> i feel significantly, like, calmer. it definitely helps if i'm, like, feeling really stressed or, like, feeling really anxious about surfing, and i go surfing, and then, i just feel, like, i'm going to be okay. >> it gives them resiliency skills and helps them build self-confidence. and with that, they can use that in other parts of their lives. >> i went to bring my family to the beach and tell them what i did. >> i saw kids open up in the ocean, and i got to see them connect with other students, and i got to see them fail, you know, and get up and get back on the board and experience success, and really enjoy themselves and make a

connection to nature at the same time. >> for some kids that are, like, resistant to, like, being in a mentorship program like this, it's they want to surf, and then later, they'll find out that they've, like, made this community connection. >> i think they provided level playing fields for kids to be themselves in an open environment. >> for kids to feel like i can go for it and take a chance that i might not have been willing to do on my own is really special. >> we go on 150 surf outings a year. that's year-round programming. we've seen a tremendous amount of youth face their fears through surfing, and that has translated to growth in other facets of their lives. >> i just think the biggest thing is, like, that they feel like that they have something that is really cool, that they're engaged in, and that

we, like, care about them and how they're doing, like, in general. >> what i like best is they really care about me, like, i'm not alone, and i have a group of people that i can go to, and, also, surfing is fun. >> we're creating surfers, and we're changing the face of surfing. >> the feeling is definitely akin to being on a roller coaster. it's definitely faster than i think you expect it to be, but it's definitely fun. >> it leaves you feeling really, really positive about what that kid's going to go out and do. >> i think it's really magical almost. at least it was for me. >> it was really exciting when i caught my first wave. >> i felt like i was, like -- it was, like, magical, really. >> when they catch that first wave, and their first lights

up, you know -- their face lights up, you know you have them hooked. >> i was on top of the world. it's amazing. i felt like i was on top of the world even though i was probably going two miles an hour. it was, like, the scariest thing i'd ever done, and i think it was when i got hooked on surfing after

>> my background is in engineering. i am a civil engineer by training. my career has really been around government service. when the opportunity came up to serve the city of san francisco, that was just an opportunity i really needed to explore. [♪♪♪]

[♪♪♪] i think it was in junior high and really started to do well in math but i faced some really interesting challenges. many young ladies were not in math and i was the only one in some of these classes. it was tough, it was difficult to succeed when a teacher didn't have confidence in you, but i was determined and i realized that engineering really is what i was interested in. as i moved into college and took engineering, preengineering classes, once again i hit some of those same stereotypes that women are not in this field. that just challenged me more. because i was enjoying it, i was determined to be successful. now i took that drive that i have and a couple it with public

service. often we are the unsung heroes of technology in the city whether it is delivering network services internally, or for our broadband services to low income housing. >> free wi-fi for all of the residents here so that folks have access to do job searches, housing searches, or anything else that anyone else could do in our great city. >> we are putting the plant in the ground to make all of the city services available to our residents. it is difficult work, but it is also very exciting and rewarding our team is exceptional. they are very talented engineers and analysts who work to deliver the data and the services and the technology every day. >> i love working with linda because she is fun. you can tell her anything under the sun and she will listen and give you solutions or advice.

she is very generous and thoughtful and remembers all the special days that you are celebrating. >> i have seen recent employee safety and cyber security. it is always a top priority. i am always feeling proud working with her. >> what is interesting about my work and my family is my experience is not unique, but it is different. i am a single parent. so having a career that is demanding and also having a child to raise has been a challenge. i think for parents that are working and trying to balance a career that takes a lot of time, we may have some interruptions. if there is an emergency or that sort of thing then you have to be able to still take care of your family and then also do your service to your job. that is probably my take away

and a lot of lessons learned. a lot of parents have the concern of how to do the balance i like to think i did a good job for me, watching my son go through school and now enter the job market, and he is in the medical field and starting his career, he was always an intern. one of the things that we try to do here and one of my takeaways from raising him is how important internships are. and here in the department of technology, we pride ourselves on our interns. we have 20 to 25 each year. they do a terrific job contributing to our outside plant five or work or our network engineering or our finance team. this last time they took to programming our reception robot, pepper, and they added videos to it and all of these sort of things. it was fun to see their creativity and their innovation come out.

>> amazing. >> intriguing. >> the way i unwind is with my photography and taking pictures around the city. when i drive around california, i enjoy taking a lot of landscapes. the weather here changes very often, so you get a beautiful sunset or you get a big bunch of clouds. especially along the waterfront. it is spectacular. i just took some photos of big server and had a wonderful time, not only with the water photos, but also the rocks and the bushes and the landscapes. they are phenomenal. [♪♪♪] my advice to young ladies and women who would like to move into stem fields is to really look at why you are there. if you are -- if you are a problem solver, if you like to

analyse information, if you like to discover new things, if you like to come up with alternatives and invent new practice, it is such a fabulous opportunity. whether it is computer science or engineering or biology or medicine, oh, my goodness, there are so many opportunities. if you have that kind of mindset i have enjoyed working in san francisco so much because of the diversity. the diversity of the people, of this city, of the values, of the talent that is here in the city. it is stimulating and motivating and inspiring and i cannot imagine working anywhere else but in sannnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn

[♪♪♪] >> good afternoon, everyone. my name is sean ellsburn, and