>> good morning. today is monday, january 30, 2023. this is a special meeting of building inspection commission. i would like to remind everyone please mute if you are not speaking and the first item is roll call. [roll call]

>> please have a quorum and next is our land acknowledgment. >> we acknowledge that we are on the unceded ancestral homeland of the ramaytush ohlone who are the original inhabitants of the san francisco peninsula. as the indigenous stewards of this land and in accordance with their traditions, the ramaytush ohlone have never ceded, lost nor forgotten their responsibilities as the caretakers of this place, as well as for all peoples who reside in their traditional territory. as guests, we recognize that we benefit from living and working on their traditional homeland. we wish to pay our respects by acknowledging the ancestors and relatives of the ramaytush community and by affirming their sovereign rights as first peoples. >> thank you. next for any members of the public that are listening and calling

in, our public comment call in number is 415-655-0001. the access code is 24882826640. to raise your hand for public comment on a item press star 3 and also the webex webinar password is 0130. our next item is item 2, discussion and possible action on proposed budget of department of building inspection for fiscal years 2023-2024 and 2024-2025. >> good morning commissioners, members of the public. alex, deputy director administration. we are here today to discuss the budget for the next 2 years

and say it now and reiterate it throughout the presentation but the budget is is in a preliminary stage now. we are still developing our budget and dbi is very much looking forward to working with the commission, public, all stakeholders to insure the department is able to function properly and meet all of the commitments it needs to meet and really do what it can to help benefit the city and navigate this difficult economic climate that we find ourselves in. so, can we go to the presentation? the first slide, please. this is a bit about the schedule, what to expect from the budget process. you are in the first of two special budget meetings. this is the kick-off meeting to

solicit proposals from the commission, from the public and to show what the current state of things are, what little has been determined so far. the next special meeting will be february 14, that is one week before the department's budget submission is due and hopefully it will be more of a finalizing and final approval from the commission of what we discuss now and put in over the next few weeks. then on february 21, the department submits its formal proposal for the next two year budget to the mayor's budget office and controller office. february through june is what is known as the mayor's phase of the budget where the mayor budget office works with dbi and adds the

mayor's priorities and any other technical changes that may happen and on june 1 the mayor will submit her proposed two year budget which will be built off the department submission but may include other changes. then in june, the board of supervisors reviews the mayor's proposed budget, they will hold hearings and the budget and legislative analyst will ask questions and there will be more opportunity for public feedback. in late july, the-and also in june in the board of supervisors phase of the budget, the supervisors may cut items from the budget and add back other items. they are allowed to add back up to the amount they cut. then in-that

is the budget committee of the board, it isn't the full board. once the committee votes to approve their modified vurshz version of the mayor budget, in late july the budget with go to the full board and once approved the mayor will sign the budget and it will become final. next slide, please. so, now we are get nothing to the numbers themselves and again to reiterate, these are very preliminary. upon instruction from the mayor's office, many policy decisions were purposefully omitted from our department submission and so as you-as the commission is aware and public may be aware, dbi is undergoing a fee study and the results of that fee study will not be ready until

appreciately april, and so the results of that fee study will be incorporated into the budget in the mayor's phase of the budget, and so likely what will be revenue increases will happen then. some of these numbers that you see here, especially use of fund balance will likely come down in the mayor phase, however the policy decisions have not been made yet. walking through the revenue side, the different columns show prior year-walking through all five, the first column shows the previous fiscal year 22-23 adopted budget. next column shows our proposed budget for the first year of our two year budget, 23-24, and following column shows the change between the

two. the fourth column shows the second year. the 24-25 proposed budget. the final column shows year over year change from 25 to 24. the most significant change on the page is charge for services so that is our-the majority of the revenue, those are our permit fees. upon discussions with our deputy director of permit services, he-it is very difficult to project these revenues. it is hard to know what projects will be built, what projects will be planned, what will come in when, but from discussions that neval has had and from the revenues we have been seeing the worst case that we can imagine

that we expect would be 18 percent drop in permit revenue year over year, and so we have conservatively assumed that that will take place so $8.6 million year over year change from 23 to 24 we are hoping that does not come true, but we feel at this point it is most responsible to assume the low end of the revenue spectrum and to spend and save accordingly. we have two new revenues totaling about $1.7 million. the first one is not really new, it is just an acknowledgment that all edrt, all peer review [speaking in the background] will be recovered by the department and so the department will

not-the expenses for plan review, all of that will be recovered, so this ask more of a technical entry and not a new thing. the third line down also is new revenue, but there are corresponding expenditure increases, so items 2 and 3 do not really have a net impact on the budget. the disability access transfer function, there are inspections currently done by the mayor's office of disability that are in the building code, supposed to be done by dbi, so to acknowledge that, those function will be transferred to dbi, however there are associated revenues with that work, so we are assuming at this point that it will not effect dbi's bottom

line. interest and investment income is there interest on the fund balance so the controller's office will project exactly what that will be, and really that's determined-hard to project, but determined on the interest that the itisy gets on its entire pool of savings. licenses, permits and franchise, that is entirely the apartment license fee. this we are holding study, however, this is a very conservative projection we feel and the prior two years we have received more then budgeted, and we don't feel that-we feel this is a fairly stable source of revenue, there are not big changes to the number of apartment buildings in the city and so this is revenue we can count on. we may be able to increase some and also the fee study will inform what the appropriate fee level

will be. operating transfers in, this is a technical entry. this is from board of supervisors add -backs so as mentioned during the board of supervisors budget they can make cuts and add thing tuesday the budget and in the previous year they added a $300 thousand item, so this is a transfer in from the general fund. our expenditure recoveries are modest. the services we perform for other departments are relatively small compared to the overall budget. we are investigating as part of the fee study potentially collecting additional revenues for unfunded work that the department does for other departments, so this may grow some, but at this point it is premature to increase that. the last two lines should be looked at together.

really it's-the department accumulated savings, how much we need to use to balance the budget. the first year of the budget we are just showing all of it in use of fund balance, so there is no change from the previous adopted budget, year two last year is now year one this year, so we need to use $33.6 million of our savings to balance the budget. this is much higher then we like. we have made proposals to the mayor's office to bring this number down, however, as previously discussed, those policy decisions and revenue increases we were instructed to not add those to the budget so use of fund balance remains what it was for the last year budget for year one. for year two, that is a brand new

year and we-in order to close the budget assuming no revenue changes we need to use the entire remaining fund balance of about $21.1 million to balance the budget. the difference between 23-24, 24-25 revenue on that-on the first line, the charges for services, we also have to assume an increase of about $14 million as a result of the fee study, but we dont specifically know what that will be at this time. so, much of the revenue side of dbi's budget really depends on the results of the fee study and policy decisions from the mayor's office. next slide, please. moving to the expenditure side of the budget, i like to acknowledge

that i believe a large portion of the public is here today to speak about the cbo community based organization grants that the department currently-these programs that the department currently funds and i like to stress to everybody watching at home and everybody in the audience here that no policy decisions have been made, no request has been made to reduce or eliminate any of these services to any organizations. the department budget submission currently assumes that all current services will continue to be funded by dbi, however, dbi has requested that the mayor's office partially or completely fund these services, so we have requested a transfer of general fund dollars to dbi

to fund this work, so no one to my knowledge is making any proposed changes to any scope of work that is currently being done, only the funding of the work. we are hoping to transfer money from general fund to dbi to fund this work. so, moving through on the expenditure side, the columns are the same, and i will move down through these quickly. salary and fringe benefits, so, the change from last year is primarily due to cola increases. the difference between 23 to 24 is cost of living increases built into the union memorandum of understandings negotiated by the city every 3 years so outside the departments control. same for 24-25 that

those increases are largely cola. the exception to that is some of the transfer function that we had mentioned or i had mentioned from the mayor's office disability, we are envisioning two new positions for inspectors to do that work, however, that work would be funded by revenue you saw on the previous page, so it will not effect dbi's bottom line. and the final change-final significant change worth mentioning on the labor side is a realignment of positions, permit tech 2, many years ago there was a change of class where a certain job class, 1408-i forgot-some administrative class, the exact

classification name escapes me but those were changed to permit techs and in that change there was also a change to the memorandums of understandings where staff who are previously allowed to supervise other staff per their memorandum of understanding are no longer able to in this new job class that they are now, so in order to keep the previous functional structure of the department, we are proposing to increase or change substitute many permit tech 2 positions to permit tech 3 so that they are able to supervise, and we are able to keep our same organizational structure, the same org chart. without this change, we would have-one top level manager would be forced to

supervise up to 14 staff, which organizationally doesn't make sense and anything beyond really 5, 6 people accountability begins to suffer and so we feel that this change is important. that would be approximately 200 thousand dollars to substitute all the permit tech 2 to permit tech 3 and of course those positions, hiring for those positions would go through a full competitive civil service hiring process, which would be open to everyone and our hr would reach out to as many places as possible to insure that a diverse candidate pool was found. so, moving on--overhead allocation, the third line down, this

is city wide overhead the department pays for that all departments pay for. it is the share of city attorney cost not directly billed, the board of supervisor salaries, the city administrator salary so these are general overhead costs shared by all city departments but not directly billed for. the controller's office sets this amount and we do not have control of it. it will invariably change as departments develop their budgets and change their costs, then the controller's office will spread those costs and it will change. non-personal services, so these are professional service, rental, intangible items is how i with like to think of it and we are making-this we are get nothing to the discretionary spending of the department and

here we are proposing to reduce about $700 thousand between materials and supplies and non-personnel service. discretionary spending. $1.5 million you see here is a acknowledgment of the reduction in discretionary spending and some other non-reoccurring items that happened in 22-23 that will not continue. the next line, grants. these are the community based organization services. you can see that the amounts are unchanged from what had been budgeted previously, $5.2 million was approved last year for fiscal year 23-24. that amount remains unchanged

for 24-25. the only request here, dbi request here was for the mayor's office to give us revenue, so if they were to agree then on the previous revenue page we would add $5.2 million transfer of revenue from the general fund. again, i like to stress, nobody is proposing these services be reduced, eliminated, changed in any way. only the funding source in order to help dbi navigate these challenging economic times. the next line, materials and supplies. these are again tangable small items below $5 thousand per item with useful life of year or less, and we are-dbi's budget is not large to begin with but we are further cutting where we can to recognize the difficult economic situation we find

ourselves in. programmatic projects. these are-we are eliminating these and acknowledging that at this time we do not know of-we do not plan on undertaking any multi-year capital continuing projects. some previous year projects included in-law program, soft story program, we do not know of any of those projects on the horizon and due to the economic climate we find ourselves in, we do not feel it is appropriate to undertake any long-term commitments. and the last line, services of other departments, these are work orders. these are services that other departments provide to dbi, so city attorney services, controller's office, financial systems, and

various other workers comp from human resources department and we are proposing various reductions to these work orders, and some of them-many were approved last year. you can see in year two of last year's budget. fiscal year 23-24 was taken down from $20.6 million to $17.4 million. we have requested additional reductions, however those are policy decisions for the mayor's office and negotiations we need to have with other departments so they have not been finalized yet and are not yet assumed here, but we are hopeful that this number will continue to fall. so, next slide, please. so, before i talk about the fund balance, i just like to

acknowledge and reiterate that dbi finds itself in a very difficult challenging economic climate. since the pandemic, requests for new building permits have drastically reduced. our revenue has fallen approximately a third in the past few years, and this-the department expenditures are largely labor and so are very inflexible, and in order to provide the same types of services we need to spend approximately the same amount. there is also a lot of new work that has-that the department is required to do that did not exist before. the department has changed dramatically in the past few years, and undertaken significant reform

measures to improve the public trust and improve stewardship of city funds, and make sure that dbi processes are transparent and fair and proper and those reforms include things like a new compliance manager and various other initiatives that create additional work and have additional expense but don't necessarily generate additional revenue. cutting expenditures is very difficult and while we do have less permit related work, our overall level of work is-remains the same or has in some cases increased and a report just recently came out that showed that dbi's funded vacancy rate was at zero. all funded positions that the department has are currently filled and there is no

room to reduce labor further we believe at this point, however, again we will see what the result of the fee study is, what the result of the mayor's policy decisions are, and reassess. with that said, our fund balance currently-our available fund balance-our fund balance available for appropriation uncommitted to any other source this year is $21.1 million. in order to balance the budget, we are currently using all of it as previously stated. the first year of the budget, 23-24 as previously approved last year for year two of the budget, we are using 33.6. that remains unchanged and so the total $54.7 million of fund

balance is currently proposed to be used for the next two years and that represents all of our available fund balance. in addition to that, $8 million of continuing appropriations, so these are continuing projects, part of the illegal soft story program or illegal in-law program unit, the soft story program and older projects remaining balances we are proposing to deappropriate those so an additional $8 million on top of that totaling around $60 million. and, 4th item on the page as mentioned on the revenue slide, the difference between the growth from 23-24, to 24-25 is $13.6 million of revenue that we currently do not have there details of but confident the

fee study will address. it is really just a plug recognizing that in order to not reduce expenditures, we must submit a balanced budget. we are assuming the fee study will result in at least a $13.6 million revenue increase when we have confirmed that that is okay with the mayor's office for now, but again that will be discussed in the mayor's phase of the budget. next slide, please. that's the final slide and i would be happy to answer any questions. >> thank you. we'll take public comment first and then commissioner discussion. questions. before you start, members of the public we are going to limit public comment to 2 minutes due to the number

of speakers we have present. >> (inaudible) >> good morning, my name is jerry dratler and the comments today refer to the handout you just received. section 1 shows the $85.5 million expense budget for 23-24. 58 million or 68 percent of the budget is for employment cost. the next largest expenditures are $17 million for charges for other city departments and $5 million in grants to

organizations that work with sro's. 58 million employment cost exceeds dbi plan tech fees and permit fees by $17 million. the current revenue budget is unable to fund current employee salaries and benefits. 20 percent increase in fees would only raise an additional $8 million. you have a $39 million problem. 3 9 percent of your budget is funded one time use of reserves. dbi and bic can't count on higher fees to solve the long-term expense problem. the number of employees is the problem. section 3 shows (inaudible) full time

equivalent employees. what is the budgeted number this year? a schedule at the bottom of the page summarizes the 327 full time equivalent employees in the annual survey ordinance. 138 or 42 percent of the dbi employees have the word inspector in the job title. 87 or 27 percent of the employees have the word permit technician. dbi needs to reduce clerical positions and look reengineing the inspection process. thank you very much. >> next speaker.

>> she requires interpretation. is it okay if we take a little longer? >> yes. >> thank you. [waiting for translation] >> hi, everyone. my name is amy, a community organizer for sro family united collaborative and work with mono lingual low income families in china town. i hope the department of building inspection will not reduce the budget for sro families united collaborative because the funding is essential for our work to support families. i have live in a sro with major maintenance issues for 4 years.

[waiting for translation] >> through the help of organizers, we learned we could ask landlords to make repairs and deserve the right to liveane safe building and also learned how to contact city inspectors. this was a empowering experience. [waiting for translation]

>> i have been an organizer for 7 years now. every week single room occupancy organizers and i knock door to learn to see how families are doing, building conditions and are (inaudible) address the issues for the proper maintenance and repair services. we provide workshops and training for families who (inaudible) every year. educate tenants about the sf building code and their right to (inaudible) we also

host many community outreach (inaudible) provide important information and resources to the community. [waiting for translation] >> it takes a lot of time for

families to trust us to tell us their problems in the buildings and it takes a lot of trust for families to come to us for help. that's why our work is so important. i have built trust with families not only because we speak the same language and come from similar backgrounds but because we generally care about improving family living conditions. families come to us for help if they have a problem in their buildings and we always do our best to help the family. we successfully improved conditions of many sro buldings because of the support from dbi. please continue to fund the sro family united collaborative program so we can continue our work in improving families living conditions and providing essential services. thank you. >> [waiting for translation]

>> hi, my name is (inaudible) i came to find out about china town (inaudible) building repair issues. i joined the sro family united collaborative. today i urge commissioners to not cut the budget for sro families united collaborative because the work has been doing is extremely important to us. people living in sro with low income and minimal english. two months ago the water heater

was damaged and no hot water for a month which effected the lives of every resident living in the building. we called the landlord but as soon as he heard the word water heater he hung up and didn't bother to pick up our calls later. finally got help from sro families united collaborative and through the coordination with the landlord the landlord finally changed his attitude towards residents. the landlord replaced the old heater with new water heater. everyone could live a normal life again. (inaudible) does not only provide services to help us better understand building regulations, the organizers also visit every week, provide us with educational workshops, host activities and provide important resources for us. sro (inaudible) so much help and support and it is impossible for me to list everything they have done for us in these two minutes so i

hope all commissioners do not cut the budget for sro, their support is very important to us. thank you. >> [waiting for translation]

>> hi, everyone. my name is (inaudible) my son in law has been living in the sro unit in china town for 6 years. i'm here today hoping that dbi will not cut any budget for sro families united. two or three years of pandemic,

life was extremely difficult for us families in sro's. when the pandemic started, everyone stayed at home and we all (inaudible) at one time, the stove was broken but after that all 4 or 5 of them were broken. we talked to the building manager a few times, but they never arranged for people to repair. finally, the organizers called the building management several time jz got it repaired. the stove is working, it doesn't have enough power so cooking takes a long time. there is no way to follow up on maintenance, sanitation or other

issues in our building without the help from the sro family united, because of our language skills are limited. we would not be able to contact dbi directly. i hope dbi will not reduce any funding for the collaborative in the budget. sro families united is very important for our families. thank you. >> [waiting for translation]

>> hi, everyone. my name is (inaudible) a family living in china town sro. today i urge dbi not to cut sro families united collaborative. we share communal bathrooms and showers. problems we face with toilets, leaking faucets and poor sanitation happen all the time. (inaudible) the manager or owner say okay, but it was never done. that has

a lot of trouble for us living in the building. because of the collaborative and (inaudible) we always go there for help and then our families have become part of the collaborative too. the organizers came to our buildings, visit us. they were (inaudible) on issues we have. they talked to our building managers and have helped to resolve a lot of issues and safety hazards. the sro family united not only help us improve our poor living conditions, but it also (inaudible) a lot of training that help me understand tenants rights,

building codes, fire prevention and disaster preparedness. as new immigrants we learn so much about american history and culture from the collaborative, which helps us better adapt to life here. sro family united help families tremendously. it gives us hope in our every day lives. i'm here to urge commissioners not to cut sro united family united budget. thank you. >> [waiting for translation]

>> good morning, my name is (inaudible) i have been living in the sro building in china town for 7 years. today i would like to urge the commissioners not it cut the funding for sro families united collaborative and to keep it under the management of dbi. the folks in my sro building is always broken. i tried to call the owner, but he never came to repair it. the only way i could get help is through sro family united collaborative because we speak the same language and it is easily accessible for the community. sro family united collaborative is a community service organization i informed of the building issues then

the organizer inspect and record the bidding condition with us. as well as communicating directly with the owner about the repairs. i have four children and because of sro families united collaborative help they are able to improve our building conditions and thankful for their frequent visit to our sro building and taking care of us and i feel a lot of support from them. we really need this type of service. please keep the funding for sro families united collaborative. thank you. >> [waiting for translation]

>> good morning. my name is (inaudible) i'm a part of sro families united collaborative and live in china town with a family of 4. today i like to urge the commissioners to keep the funding for the implementation and outreach of sro families united collaborative. because our sro building is very old, we encounter lots of maintenance issues. our bathroom floor is (inaudible) the water

cannot drain in the bathroom, severe leakage problems, molding ceilings and walls. these problems bothered ush a long time. my two children-these building issues are no good for their health and safety and talked to the owner many times and issues were not solved. finally i turned to our organizers. our organizers were able to help us. after the organizer communicate with the nob when the organizer comes to visit she checks and document the condition of my building. if there is a problem she request repairs or visit directly from the owner. because of the assistance all the problems in our buildings and my family overall quality of life have improved. i'm thankful for the help and dbi support. thank you.

>> [waiting for translation]

finally support us. you, you, you and you can do it. thank you so much. >> good morning everyone. my name is (inaudible) a

sro organizing with chinese progressive association and thankful to dbi support and assistance to the sro families united collaborative which allowed us to serve over 200 low income sro families in china town. i work with sro families to build relationships through (inaudible) and phone call s and assisting them in connecting with landlords and building management to facilitate repairs. we also provide services in english, cantonese, mandarin and (inaudible) the entire is sro building at 614 jackson experienced a water leakage a few days ago due to heavy rains on january 16. the family called me about the issue and i work with the family to contact the landlord and within two days the landlord

repaired the plumbing and water supply was working. i am proud of the family because the family knew how to handle the situation with our support and assistance. thank you dbi for your ongoing support and allowing us to serve sro families. thank you for not regretting our grassroots community. please continue to support us. thank you. >> good morning, my name is rachel (inaudible) health counselor with china town community development center. i'm here to urge the commissioners to keep the program, stay in the dbi and funding amount remain unchanged. i have been working closely with tenants who have code enforcement related to health issue in the city. the majority of the clients are china speaking and they came to us because of

long-term relationship in the community. they know us (inaudible) monthly sro tenants meeting. (inaudible) tenants right workshop and stuff like that. from the workshop tenants learned landlords are responsible to make proper repairs so they rely on us when a landlord or property manager ignore the repair request or when they cannot communicate with the landlords. because they have lack of language proficiency. follow up with repair request could be a long fight. some ignore repair request on purpose. last year we had a case that the property management company (inaudible) was not responsive to tenants repair requests. because tenants have language barriers and insufficient knowledge. the tenants have no choice but to seek help from us. through dbi and our combined

effort, the landlord finally hired a chinese speaking liaison and solved the issue. like repairing the (inaudible) improve the condition in the common area, the bathroom and kitchen. some problems like pest control and water leak have not yet been fully resolved, the living condition of the tenants has been improved greatly. (inaudible) work very closely in the past years and we have already established our cooperation model. it has made tenants life easier. i caents imagine how difficult if there was a change in funding support therefore here to hurj encourage the commissioner to keep the program and remain unchanged. thank you so much.

>> [waiting for translation] >> good morning commissioners. my name is (inaudible) i'm a sro resident who lives at 1449 powell street here today to urge the commissioners not to reduce the program budget and continue maintaining the program in dbi. [waiting for translation] >> in 2014 our living

condition significant decrease because the building owner changed. the new landlord (inaudible) also we had made multiple request to repair or replace the kitchen stove since it was damaged by (inaudible) but the landlord ignored our request. [waiting for translation]

>> after facing the landlord we looked for china town community center for assistance. we could express our tenant right and file (inaudible) through the rent board. during the mediation we received response from the landlord and accept our request to include remaining that the pest control service, repair the kitchen stove and doing the (inaudible) [waiting for translation]

>> therefore under the program we received reduced rent and also (inaudible) also, educate the landlord to pay attention to our future requests and so i'm pleased to tell the commissioners do not reduce the budget on the program and (inaudible) in the future. thank you. >> thank you. >> good morning. my name is (inaudible) i'm a housing counselor at china town community development center. besides providing housing counseling to low income tenants, we also cooperate with the chinese

progressive association to provide bilingual educational workshop to empower sro tenants (inaudible) also tenants rights. from 2019 to 2020 and after (inaudible) we have 65 fire prevention (inaudible) workshops which educate 3733 tenants. over 40 percent of participants shows they increased knowledge of fire prevention and disaster preparedness. (inaudible) create tenants right supporting that is worked for them. (inaudible) our tenants knew where the location and the usage of fire (inaudible) fire alarm and emergency exit in

their buildings. they also (inaudible) disaster and earthquake program they learn how important to prepare one to two safety kits (inaudible) for heat, and many first aid kits in every household. moreover, some tenants (inaudible) create a support network. inspired by bilingual workshops. (inaudible) writing about leak repairs and facilitate repairs (inaudible) they also understood- >> if you could wrap up your comments. >> sorry? >> could you finish up your comments? your time is up. >> thank you. also understood that tenants rights

regarding the (inaudible) department of building inspection during the process. (inaudible) thank you. >> [waiting for translation] >> good morning. my name is (inaudible) i'm a building coordinator living in china town. i'm here to urge the commissioners to keep china town sro program stay in it dbi funding and also remain unchanged.

[waiting for translation] >> i live in a sro unit for more then 6 years. in 2022 i joined the building coordinator program at china town cdc. i learned so much knowledge through a series of lessens (inaudible) and tenants rights regulations in sro building and how to reach out to the loond lord when maintenance issues were found. [waiting for translation]

>> after the workshop as a bridge between the building and our community. when there is anything (inaudible) also let us know about the community news and information (inaudible) i will tell my neighbors and friends, therefore we can be more engaging in the community. i can even speak for myself in the city hall today. this experience i have never had before i joined this

program. [waiting for translation] >> i hope more of my neighbors in the community could join this program and engage in the community actively. this program is not helping sro tenants to learn about fire safety tips or the disaster preparedness tips and also let us realize we can contribute to our society. hence, i really hope this program can stay in dbi with unchanged amount of funding. thank you so much.

>> hello, everyone, my name is (inaudible) i'm a part of the mission sro collaborative team through deloris street community services. today i'm here to speak about the community in the mission. specifically those who call sro hotels a home. the home ownership becoming increasingly out of reach san francisco is quickly becoming a renter city. (inaudible) felt the effect of the pandemic especially when it comes to housing. while people might only see the challenges i see a opportunity to leverage into additional opportunities for accessible housing and community building. with the help of dbi, our collaborative has been able to successfully advocate for those who have been intimidated and harassed but the work is far from done. this last week a tenants invited me to discuss a room change due to accessibility issue. she invited to

see the room and saw it was roach infested, water damaged from the early january storm. we are seeing similar cases arise. i want to help those in the direct line of displacement and left behind by the new information economy. i hope to continue to advocate for the mission community with the help of dbi. thank you. >> hi. my name is (inaudible) a senior tenant organizer at mission single room occupancy collaborative today here to talk about and please urge commissioners to keep all the programs in dbi. the reason why is because a lot of people in the mission do get harassed by speaking up on just basic habitability issues. those tenants coming to us and asking for help and we have to reach out to dbi. with dbi

help we enforce the management and tenants and other managers to help keep the hotel s in very good conditions because without the conditions a lot of tenants will be in more danger. this is why i am keeping-why i urge commissioners to keep all the programs under dbi. thank you. >> good morning commissioners. my name is alisia sandovol. we provide counseling for tenants regarding getting repairs done. our counseling staff speak 5 different languages. it is very important for tenants to go to an organization they feel they can trust and feel comfortable with. we educate tenants about their rights. many tenants are scared of asking for repairs

from the landlord and feel they have no rights when it come hads to repairs. when a tenants learns the right through workshops or counseling they are empowered. i do spanish speaking know your right workshops by zoom or in person. when they learn their rights they are no longer scared. they ask the landlords for repairs. there was one case when the tenant told me that after she attended several of my workshops in spanish, she communicated to the landlord what repairs was needed. the landlord didn't give her a answer. then she told him, i know my rights. i attended workshops by housing rights committee organizers alyssa sandovol. when the landlord heard that he immediately agreed to the repairs. tenants

trust us. in the field it is important to be able to-not have any cuts when it comes to the cop or dbi money that is in need to support these tenants. we also collaborate with dbi inspectors. many times a dbi inspector call us and they call us so we can speak to the tenant. because they know the work we do. they know in order for our tenants to feel overall supported that housing rights committee can go and speak to the tenant. >> if you can wrap up your comments, ma'am. thank you. >> we support tenants also by attending director hearing through dbi. thank you. >> good morning. tracey phillips, the code enforcement advocate for housing

rights committee of san francisco and work in the bayview district. i grew up in the bayview district. i grew up and work where i grew up and there is no changing. i'm 56. people have been there near 35 years still can't get the services they need. what i do, i re-educate them. i help them write letters. i go in their houses and see what need to be done and we deal with the property manager, if the property manager don't give us what we need, i'll call the owner. i'll even go and sit on somebody door to get some service needed, but dbi funding-my job is funded through dbi. if dbi get funded cut they will cut my

service and be so nervous for la salle, bayview, hunter point. tenderloin, sunnydale. we all want to live in habitable housing. everybody don't have the money to call a plumber when a plumber come down. people like us, we go out and fight for tenant's rights. you heard all the chinese speaking tenants come up here. the same problems, even a little worse in the bayview, potrero hill, sunnydale, fillmore, la salle is worse. i just-it isfunding needed. not just for me to

keep my job, but saying it is funding for people, humans that go out and vote for these positions and that really really count on you guys to do your job- >> if you can wrap up your comments. >> i want to thank you guys and thank dbi and thank you so much for listening to us. >> hello. i'm sarah (inaudible) the director of housing rights committee of san francisco. as you can see from the comments today, does really important work in the community. working with tenants in pretty horid conditions. we are a important part of dbi and work hand in hand with the amazing dbi inspectors. we do very connected overlapping things

that we need each other for. as a enterprise department, this department lowered fees during the boom instead of putting them in reserves, and in these years when the economy goes down dbi's work doesn't go down. calls go up as investors who brought buildings in the booms stop returning tenants calls and making repairs. these tenants need you to raise fees to cover the cost of the enforcement. not try to pass on to the general fund which is also being cut in a hard year, and are you really collecting all the cost you are allowed to from those landlords who are the biggest problem? we really like you to look at each and every way you recover cost from landlords who we have

to go back to over and over to force them to do this work. and thank you all for listening today and all the work this department does. >> hello. my name is becky hom the contract and service director at (inaudible) just cause. dbi needs to increase its fees so there is funding to keep the $5.2 million community based organizations under dbi funds instead of from the general fund. (inaudible) just cause and all the groups you heard from today outreach, educate and council tenants about the right to repairs. tenants are impacted daily needing the eare pairs and we work with the tenants, work with housing inspectors to resolve these issues and having consistent funding makes this possible. most of the

funding that $5.2 million pays for staff and possible cuts impact not just staff like mentioned but also impacts the tenants. less staff means less support. you say you are trying to avoid cuts to the cbo by asking the mayor to fund it through the general fund, however in this year's budget instructions, the mayor is telling departments to cut funding by 5 percent in fiscal year 23-24 and 8 percent in fiscal year 24-25. this is the only dbi program funded by the general fund what does it mean for us? and also, maybe there is a guarantee for this year what happens in future years so dbi should raise its fees.

>> [waiting for translation] >> good morning. my name is (inaudible) and work with dolores street community service for more then 19 years. [waiting for translation] >> i want to remind us all we are experiencing the worst era due to the pandemic and the

sro's are in deplorable conditions and we need a lot of work to do so i'm asking to keep the funds for dbi and as a matter of fact, i'm asking you to increase the funds instead of changing them to the general funds. [waiting for translation] >> i want to make sure you know thanks to dbi we can insure housing codes. we help families and are the eyes of dbi. without dbi we can not help the community and just not continue working.

[waiting for translation] >> we focus on helping children in san francisco, so with dbi we are able to help these children. there is very little money so that is why i'm asking for an increase. we have hope in you and those kids also have hope in us to keep helping them. we believe in you and we would like to still believe in if you if you help us.

thank you. i will interpret and provide language assistance to our next speaker. >> [waiting for translation] >> hi. good morning. my name is (inaudible) and work for (inaudible) just cause since 2011. [waiting for translation] i'm here in support of dbi to keep its funds instead of transferred to the general fund. [waiting for translation]

dbi has been really helpful. the way it has been doing and going and brought good results for tenants and success stories. [waiting for translation] i have seen first hand with the support of dbi tenants repairs are happening with dbi and by doing so tenants are able to stay in their units. [waiting for translation] having a habitable unit helps tenants not doing self-evictions because the units become

habitable. [waiting for translation] helps tenants to be respected with tenant and human rights and why funds to stay in dbi will help us and-what was the last part? that was it. tenants rights and human rights all together. she is also thanking you all. >> now it is my turn. my name is (inaudible) and i work with (inaudible) as a counselor. throughout this time i have supported our black somewhere latinx communities in the mission and excelsior neighborhood to stay

in homes by informing about the housing code. works hard to provide the community with preventative information for tenants at anyhow your rights workshop. the knowledge prevents them from being afraid to request repairs they need in their homes. also provides counseling by phone. we help tenants wrilet bilingual letter to demand right for repairs and connect with dbi inspectors to insure repairs will be made. we had successful case where a tenant asked several times for repairs because of mold issues, smoke detector not working, damage to the ceiling and leaking under the kitchen sink. the tenant called the hotline. was able to refer the tenant to dbi where inspectors (inaudible) could show up to the unit and make the

landlord start the repairs the unit needed. as more repairs needed to be done, was able to communicate with inspector about the tenant availability for inspection visits since the tenant had a language barrier, as well as get the repairs needed in the tenant home. thanks to the prompt response of inspector (inaudible) and willing ness to share the report the tenant now is able to live with dignity in their home. to keep thefunding along with the funding for sro program s is indispensable for tenants and live in a safe habitable home regardless who they are or how much they pay for their rent. thank you for taking the time to listen to all of us. >> thank you. is there any remote public comment? seeing none, public comment

is closed. commissioner discussion. >> bring it to the commission for questions or comments. commissioner neumann. >> it is incredible to see the impact code enforcement outreach program is having. it is remarkable. i just have a clarifying question alex. we are still funding those programs in the budget, it is merely at the discretion of the mayor whether that is covered through increase in fee or whether funding through the general fund? >> correct. >> i believe a

guest-commissioner tut. that is you commissioner-- >> pretty sure i'm still a guest. right down there. thank you commissioner neumann, that was the question i wanted to ask. i just wanted to say thank you to all the community that came out and spoke. i heard you loud and clear for sure. thank you. >> commissioner alexander tut does have a question. >> thank you. first of all, can you hear me? >> yes. >> okay. thank you to everyone in the community who came out. i know your time is valuable, and i'm so grateful for all the work you are doing. we want to see more of you so please continue to come. you don't have to be invited or (inaudible) public comment is always open. i

disclose that i previously worked for an organization funded by the (inaudible) program. this program is very important to me personally because i continue to keep in touch with many people who receive these services and provide these services and continue to have relationships with people who provide these services as well as receive the services but i believe i (inaudible) feedback on that. i believe you made your point very clear that you want dbi to continue to fund your services. it seems from commissioners comments before that that is intention of the department is continue to have this (inaudible) i would have

two motions i think will go hopefully satisfy the community and our commission and clarify our position, and the first is, i like to make a motion that clarify our position, but it is [audio cutting out] continue to fund the grant programs through dbi. >> commissioner you can state what we are but don't believe we are entertaining the motions at this time but you can state what they both are and we can come back to that with a deputy city attorney assistance. you can state what you would like them to be and get back to that. >> my first motion would be that we take a

position statement that the grant funding continues to be in the dbi budget. the second was, i was going to refer to staff for information on this, but the board of supervisors passed ordinances to wave existing fees and then reimburse dbi for the cost of those fees, and i think that it maintains the intention of the department, but grants a level of policy protection or clarification is asking for the mayor to reimburse this-or to provide the funding that we instead do the same thing we did for other fees or the board of supervisors did for other fees, which is to request that issue a fee waver and then

reimburse us for the cost of the program. that will help to off-set the debt or sorry, off-set the cost and help us meet our budget goals, at the same time that if that fee were to expire it would automatically-the waver would expire and be funded by dbi. so, that was my second motion. is that the way that we address the request to fund the proposal is have a little more structure to it. so that's my question on those two. >> okay. >> i have other questions about the budget, but i think i can

hold those (inaudible) >> commissioner has a question or comment. >> had a couple questions regarding your presentation. thank you for it. i recall last year-i may be wrong. i recall last year there was discussions of open staff positions and potentially having those remain open. is that-as a way of reducing cost without laying anyone off. you mentioned in your presentation all staff positions arecurrently filled. do you know there is any change in staff from last year to this year, the number? >> there is distinction clarification i should make between budgeted positions and budgeted and funded positions. there are over 320 something fte that is our hiring authority in the

budget, however, we also budget attrition, which is negative expenditure, so that we are not able to-not all the positions budgeted, not all the authority we have to hire is funded, so when i say that all positions are filled, what i mean is all budgeted and funded positions are filled. we have additional hiring authority, but we do not have the dollars to fund those positions. >> okay. >> to also acknowledge mr. dratler's comments on number of fte and positions in general, that is still heavily under development and collecting proposals from all the departments and all of their wish list items, what positions they like to fill, what positions they like to change or move, and so that is still highly variable. the only items i brought are the items that are fairly confident will

actually move forward to the full proposal and the remainder of the proposals we will discuss and see what we can fund. >> it seems like we don't yet know-you mentioned the fee study isn't included in this coming year's budget. that is the most conservative way to do it? >> yes. so, in our budget submission now our february department budget submission it is not considered. however, in april in the mayor's phase of the budget when the fee study is complete and results areprinted presented to us we will bring the resultf othe fee study to the commission and share with the mayor office and say the fee study shows in order to recover cost we need to increase fee xyz by 1, 2, 3 amount and then the mayor will make policy decisions and tweak those amounts. >> sounds like this

conversation i guess will be ongoing? >> yes, this is definitely very preliminary amounts. few changes especially on the revenue side this year. the budget is ongoing intensive process that will go all the way up through july. >> we are also projected to use up the rest of our fund balance, meaning this conversation changes in a year time i assume. we have new information and new revenues or other things- >> yes. that use of fund balance is as of today assuming no revenue increases. in april when the fee study comes up, presumably the fee study will ask for or say that in order to recover expenditures fees need to be increased. if that happens then and the mayor allows it then revenues would be increased and the use of fund balance would be decreased. that complete use of fund balance now that is

very much a place-holder and assumes that no additional revenue will come in, which hopefully will not continue to be true. >> right. i have a really miner question. more curiosity. on the proposed budget revenue side for interest and investment income, i was curious why that is projectsed to go up when the fund balance is going down? >> so, that was-again, i did not change it from the prior year submission, because that is a controller number. they say don't touch that. that will go down. >> got ya. >> when that does we'll need additional fee revenue to pay for that or additional expenditure cuts somewhere else. >> got ya. >> those numbers and for the most part many of the services of other departments, dbi does not control those,

those are input by controller office or mayor office and they just are what they are. >> thank you for your help. >> sure. also wanted to echo the commissioner comments and thank all the public comment and organizations for the work they do, and i believe our communication director patrick hanen would be would be upset if i didn't advertise dbi website. we have come out with a new website with translation for various languages and trying hard to insure our services are accessible and encourage everybody to reach out to us. call 311 and let us know and we'll try to help how we can. >> i have questions. so, i wanted to reiterate that point on the website because i did go to the website number of people were speaking. the website is much clearer and forms are easier to fill out so

encourage all the community organizations that spoke today and spread the word that the website is much clearer, much more readinable and much more accessible. thank you everybody for your comments. i do have one question though. what year-you said 24-25-we are running what will be a deficit of $12 million, is that correct? 12.4? 12.5? what year do you see that being a negative? >> so, the- >> let's forget all the scenariosism given the fact no further revenue-revenues are going to be static, is it 24-25 we hit zero on the fund balance? >> yes. if no revenue increases are projected and all of what is in here this expenditure budget comes pass

exactly as written then we would run out mid-24-towards the end of 24-25. >> so, that's not an unreasonable projection to make considering that san francisco is one of the slow est cities in the country to recover. you are basically making projection that is fairly neutral. you are saying you are not expecting it go down but not expecting it to go up considerably. >> on the revenue side we are including 18 percent reduction to permit revenues and assuming that in the next two years, so we feel like that is a conservative projection and hopeful we will collect more then that, but that is built into these revenue numbers. >> so, the reduction is built into that number then? >> correct. yes. >> that seems reasonable given where we are right now in the economy. >> yes, current year we showed

last month or earlier this month revenues are coming in lower then budget currently by a few percent, not 18 percent, but if this status quo and some projects that may have been further along stop happening then we are expecting worse case scenario of 18 percent. >> i guess a question to dbi and maybe pat hanen or director rearden, we have a second budget meeting, right? >> february 14. >> correct. do you think it is worth walking through the website for these housing inspection claims so people are aware? part of what all the organizations are trying to encourage is self-empowerment and the best way to do that is understand the resources available independently so encourage that to be part of the budget.

>> absolutely president bito. we can look at that- >> is your mic on? looks like it is. >> it is on. absolutely we can work with you on that. >> i think that walking through the forms and various languages and i believe that a lot of those are interpretative so if you can walk us through all that that would be-i think that would be eve frn the commissioners and myself to see that that would be great because i was looking at the forms while people were speaking to understand the legibility of the complaints. the fact dbi responds in 72 hours when they receive a complaint so i think that would be important in order to empower the community of san francisco to understand what dbi has to offer. >> yes, we will do that. >> i don't have further questions. >> commissioner alexandser tut has another question. >> yes, i had just

(inaudible) in order to make room for discussion. i did have questions, particularly around the 18 percent revenue estimate. i'm curious because the current is 4 percent, and (inaudible) mayor budget instructions are 5 percent in year one and [audio cutting in and out] i like to know more about how the 18 percent was found and if you could help me understand the 18 percent. the most conservative possibility when we are currently at 4 percent. thank you so much. >> i see deputy director pera. hopefully can respond. >> yeah. thank you alex, thank you for the question commissioner tut. the 18

percent as alex mentioned earlier on we are still urfly earl ea in the budget here and revenues are still relatively difficult to project, just because it is earl ea in the year. my estimate of 18 percent was based on what we saw as a result of reductions during the pandemic as well as the-which was around 13-15 percent. furthermore, the fact the economic landscape going forward has-my conversation with other building officials and members of the construction industry developers further exacerbating that number because they are less likely to move forward with their investments in

projects. projects in the pipeline would likely continue to be put on hold until the economic forecast is better. just suggested (inaudible) saw in the industry by another couple 3 to 4 percent. it is still a guess though. it is a estimate. >> did you hear that response? >> i did. is the rest of industry predicting 15 percent, all comparatively having a 4 or 5 percent decrease this year? is that apple to apples? >> no. again commissioner tut, that is a estimate.

it's taking the-what we saw as a reduction over the last 2 and a half years or so and just continuing that on with another -seeing it will increase with the economic forecast. >> sorry, seeing increase with the economic forecast? >> correct. if people are a little more uncertain about the way the economy is going to turn around so we see that developers and building officials are seeing with their constituents as well that it is going to continue at least for the next couple years to trend

downwards. >> thank you. if you-it seems extremely conservative to say we are 4 percent this year and (inaudible) that does seem like a pretty shocking blow to the economy and prediction, so if there is any information that comes up between now and our next meeting i would appreciate the most updated information on that so thank you. (inaudible) this is about a fte. if we have the suggestion for--existing or change fte, does it need to be in the budget or can that be presented [audio cutting in and out] out of budget? >> it must happen in

the budget. >> particularly for positions that the commission has authority to hire directly over. >> so, there are two pieces for department ability to hire. there is fte that is the authority to hire a position and then there is the dollars, and so yes, the department must have hiring authority to hire any position changes that we want to make. we must do in the budget. there are mechanisms to make small changes throughout the year, but there are limits on those, so departments do have the ability to temporarily exchange position hiring authority, however that is very limited and requires approvals from the mayor's office. >> thank you. is that the process wise is that something that we would make a

motion for here? is that something that we should connect with you before the next meeting? what is the right process for that? >> be happy to take any suggestions and add them to the wish-list of all positions that we are compiling from all dbi compartments and then yes, next meeting we will-we should have more solid picture of which specific position changes we will plan to put forth in the department submission. so, now or any time before the next meeting feel free to reach out and give any position guidance. >> thank you. i will make my suggestion, which nobody knows about so--i would like to explore the idea of

having a manager 1 position report to the commission with the long-term intention of eliminating the (inaudible) hopefully having this person [audio cutting out] >> can you repeat that? >> yes. can you hear me okay? >> i heard it but it went in and out. you said manager position and something else. >> [unable to hear speaker] long-term intention of having that be what replaces the commission secretary. i understood this is common in other (inaudible) other manager 1 positions that report to commissions and i like to explore that possibility.

>> so, you-to clarify because you are going in and out you said you wanted to propose hiring a manager 1 position and then to replace the commission secretary position? >> not in the same calendar, but that would be the-my hope would be so it is smooth transition. (inaudible) >> interesting. >> yes, i like to explore the idea of having a manager 1 position support the commission. >> okay. >> i think (inaudible) >> i think the request needs to go to the commission before it goes to dbi. i don't understand the

request. >> deputy city attorney, i think what commissioner is requesting is just information what that would look like at the next meeting if that could be included in the budget but agree not entirely sure what is being asked for but clarify the commission discussion right now is for further information at the next meeting so it can be part of it budget discussion but we cannot make a direct personnel decision on hiring today nor- >> not suggesting hiring we are somebody but-the secretary of the commission is separate from the staff at dbi? >> secretary of commission is defined in the charter and separate from staff of dbi, but to the excitant - >> understood, but she does function as part of the commission in service of the

commission not in the service of dbi. >> perhaps commissioner alexander tut can clarify what she is actually requesting but i think what she asking is more information what this would look like at the next meeting. >> thank you deputy city attorney. what i have come to understand is there are limited promotional opportunities within certain classifications and that perhaps other policy changes that need to take place, but in looking towards -looking for opportunities for promotion and for maybe a better job description that fits-that we require of the commission secretary is maybe a better fit of manager 1 position and it would-the term manager might be confusing but

this is more about how civil service processes in the city work and less about moving people from (inaudible) to dbi for the position in the (inaudible) i am curious exploring the possibility of having [audio cutting in and out] having the person that reports to us be a manager 1 instead of a secretary as a long-term possibility. >> deputy city attorney, i think what commissioner alexander tut is asking is the financial ramification if there was a promotion to manager 1. does that restate your request? >> perfectly. thank you deputy city attorney. >> yes, that is clear.

>> thank you. >> thank you. further commissioner discussion? >> i had a question on the deappropriation of the $8 million. so, does that just mean there isn't-enough significant work in those special programs like the soft story program and things like that you can let go of the funds and be supported through the general day to day work of dbi or can you explain how you are able to deencumber the funds. >> correct the work on the illegal in-law and soft story program are largely complete and now routine part of the operating budget and these are remaining balances that are assumed to be used until deappropriated so when we deappropriate the $8 million, that will return to the fund balance and be an additional source for us to use to balance the current budget. >> so, there are no

employees funded or depending on the funds any longer, they are all in the general day to day work now? >> correct. all current dbi employees are operating employees. there is only one possible potential future special project funded employee and that is project manager for the permit tracking system replacement and we already have budget for that position. >> i don't believe there is any further questions. >> thank you. >> thank you. >> i believe at this meeting if i'm clear deputy city attorney said there isn't a vote required on the budget at this meeting, but we are supposed to do a motion regarding the second meeting? >> deputy city

attorney, i think it would be appropriate to have a motion to consider the budget at the next meeting. >> like to mike a motion to consider the budget at the next meeting. >> are we required to have the second meeting? >> deputy city attorney, yes, by the charter we must hold two public hearings on the budget. >> okay. >> second the motion. >> there is a motion and second regarding holding the next budget meeting, which is scheduled on february 14. i'll do roll call vote on the item. [roll call] that motion carries unanimously. also i like to mention for the february 14

meeting, commissioner neumann isn't available, so all five commissioners are required to be at that next meeting for there to be a official vote on the budget. thank you. next we have item three, which is adjournment. is there a motion to adjourn? >> so moved. >> second. >> all commissioners in favor? >> aye. >> we are now adjourned. it is 1208 p.m. thank you. [meeting adjourned]

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