okay. good afternoon and welcome to the san francisco historic preservation commission hearing for wednesday, december 4th,

2024. when we reach the item you're interested in speaking to, we ask that you line up on the screen side of the room or to your right. each speaker will be allowed up to three minutes, and when you have 30s remaining, you'll hear a chime indicating your time is almost up. when your allotted time is reached, i will announce that your time is up and take the next person queued to speak. there's actually a timer on the podium. please speak clearly and slowly and if you care to state your name for the record, i ask that we silence any mobile devices that may sound off during these proceedings. and finally, i will remind members of the public that the commission does not tolerate any disruption or outbursts of any kind. athi, i l commission. president matsuda here. commission vice president nageswaran. yes. commissioner baldauf here. commissioner. foley. commissioner vergara here. commissioner. right here. and welcome, commissioner baroni. present. first on your agenda, commissioners, is general public comment. at this

time, members of the public may address the commission on items of interest to the public that are within the subject matter jurisdiction of the commission, except agenda items with respect to agenda items, your opportunity to address the commission will be afforded when the item is reached in the meeting. each member of the public may address the commission for up to three minutes. you need to come forward if you would like to submit any public general public comment. seeing none, general public comment is closed. i think we have somebody making public comment. debating going back and forth, but maybe i should. richard carrillo full disclosure i work for the city and county of san francisco, but i'm here today speaking before you as a resident of san francisco. so i've spoken to you about the proposal at 1687 market street, the mccroskey building, which is an historic building. this is my fourth time speaking to you. i believe the

third time there was some problems with the video and the audio, so that didn't get recorded. so since we have a new commissioner and some new information, i thought i would present the new information to you. so the project was basically the developer would like to demolish this building, which is an historic building, and put up a tower. the developer wants to bypass this commission using ab 2011, which is a state law, but they're located within 500ft of a freeway, so they can't do that. so the project was withdrawn and then it recently was resubmitted and it was withdrawn because they ran out of time on some timeline they had with the project. and they've resubmitted basically the same thing. so they're still saying that they're eligible for ab 2011. they're still located within 500ft of a freeway. so they're

they're not still trying to bypass this commission. and they should not be able to do that. so i wrote another letter today to the planning department, asked them to make sure that they're reviewing this project carefully, making the right decision about them not being eligible. i sent a copy to commissioner president matsuda and the secretary, which sucré and a few other people. anyway, my first two letters, one from may, one from july, they were all in the property information map. and then hopefully this letter ends up in the property information map as well. so i just wanted to bring that to your attention and hopefully this goes through the regular city processes. thank you. thank you okay. last call for general public comment. seeing none general public comment is closed. we can move on to department matters item one

department announcements. good afternoon, commissioners. rich sucré, department staff i just want to welcome commissioner baroni. nice to have you. as part of the historic preservation commission. i don't have a whole lot of updates for you. i do want to note that tomorrow on thursday, december 5th at 4 p.m, we are hosting an outreach meeting with the mission dolores neighborhood committee meeting about the two pending landmark districts that supervisor mandelman is interested in introducing on chula vista, chula abbey and alert alley are the two districts. it's basically the two residential neighborhoods to the north of the mission dolores church. other than that, i have no other announcements. thank you. commission matters. item two consideration of adoption draft minutes for november 20th, 2020 for members of the public, this is your opportunity to address the commission on their minutes. again, you need to come forward. seeing none, public comment is closed. your minutes are now before you. commissioners motion to approve. is there a second? second? thank

you. commissioners, on that motion to adopt your minutes. commissioner baroni i commissioner baldauf i commissioner vergara. yes. commissioner. wright. yes. commissioner. foley i commissioner nickerson. yes. and commissioner. president. matsuda. yes. so moved. commissioners. that motion passes unanimously. 7 to 0. item three. commission comments and questions. are there any commission comments or question? commissioner warren, just a question about the mccroskey building letters, whether they should be going to someone at the state level as well, or if it's only local, that would be able to route that letter? or how does that work? i think in this instance, the public commenter is interested in whether or not the project meets the eligibility requirements of the state. so the intake team is basically consulting with our

own internal staff to basically verify the claims that are being made in the letter. so right now, i think the project is going through our intake process to ensure that they basically meet all the requirements that we need for accepting an application. so the process basically is vetted on our end as the city of san francisco versus the state level. it doesn't really go to the state. correct? okay. yeah. we make the determination on whether or not an application meets state law. basically. thank you. can you continue to keep us informed about that? yes. it's an important to it's an important asset to us. thank you. commissioner baldauf. yes i just want to make two disclosures and then one comment. i was contacted by the architect on the 1035 howard street project and had a conversation with him regarding that project, and i contacted staff on that project,

and i wanted to say, for those of you who may have missed it, michael kimmelman in sunday's new york times had a wonderful article. what exactly determines landmark designation? and it is adapted from a chapter in his forthcoming book. and in it he talks about intangible landmark. and i think that this commission and staff should be very proud that the only other city that he talks about is san francisco, and he talks about the legacy business program in great detail. and i think that it's a tribute to the that we are at the forward edge of understanding the breadth of what it means to preserve our history. so i was very proud to be part of this commission after having read it. and so thank you

all for doing all the heavy lifting. i think we have some good leadership at the legacy business program and at in our planning department. so thank you, commissioner vergara. thank you. i just had a question for mr. sukhoi. if we've heard anything back from the state preservation people about our resolution. no, i have not received a response to our email other than acknowledging the receipt of the email. okay, thanks. and i wanted to make a disclosure that i did have a telephone conversation about 1035 howard with a member of the soma filipinas cultural district, and i just wanted to welcome our new commissioner, commissioner baroni, and ask if he wanted to share a few things about joining our commission and just being a part of the city and county of san francisco. thank you and welcome. thank you. president masuda. i'm

thrilled to be here serving as a citizen. and resident of san francisco. i've lived here for just under 30 years. i'm a practicing architect, and it is i've been before this commission and others associated with work in my practice. i do work for a large firm, gensler, and have been there for some time, but i've been practicing in the city for 28 years, give or take, and it is an honor to be serving with you all, and i appreciate the effort you put through all of your time on the board, and look forward to working with staff and you all on future preservation issues. thank you. welcome. we are a friendly group commissioner baldauf, sorry, commissioner august warren, i just have one disclosure for

1035 howard that i made last time as well. i worked for knapp architects, who prepared the maintenance plan for that project, although i worked there at the time, i no longer work at that firm. and during the time i worked there, i did not work on that project. and i was not aware of any of the information. thank you. thank you. any other questions or comments from the commission? seeing none commissioners, we can move on. but before we do, i'll just remind those members of the public who may have arrived late to please silence your mobile devices that may sound off during these proceedings. thank you. we appreciate that, commissioners that will place us on item four for your 2025 hearing schedule. you should have received a draft proposed schedule. we generally approve just a standard first and third

wednesday of every month. there are a couple of proposed cancellations for holidays july 2nd and september 3rd, and i will mention that the board of supervisors takes all of august off, and the planning commission has chosen to follow suit for the last 2 or 3 years now, and they cancel all their hearings in august. so just food for thought. thank you. we should take public comment. members of the public, this is your opportunity to address the commission on their proposed 2025 hearing schedule. seeing none, public comment is closed and your schedule is now before you commissioners, commissioners, commissioner foley, i think it's a good idea if the planning commission and board of commissioner foley, if you could turn your mic on. sorry about that. i think if the board of supervisors and the planning commission are out in august, it might make sense for us to be out in august. so i'd recommend that. i'd like to get

planning staff to weigh in on that. i, i'm hesitant to allow projects to wait a full month, but i think that's my only hesitation. so i certainly think that you could consider canceling at least one of your hearings in august, but canceling both. part of the issue is our legacy business program mandates us to bring forward the application to the hpc within a certain amount of time, so we could definitely live without one of your hearings, but both would be a little bit of a struggle. what do you say, commissioner foley? i've been sold by commissioner zucker to keep open in august as usual. any other comments? i think we could look at the schedule and kind of decide as we get closer to that time. so just you want to just keep all of the first and third. okay. very good. we should make a motion to that effect. okay. do i hear a motion? motion to

accept calendar as proposed. second, the proposed calendar actually has two cancellations in august. no, no. oh, yes. july 2nd and september 3rd is what. that's what you said. yeah. yea. oh keep those, keep those okay. got it. i'll second. thank you commissioners on that motion to adopt your 2025 hearing schedule as proposed. commissioner baroni i, commissioner baldauf i commissioner vergara. yes, commissioner. right. yes, commissioner. foley. hi. commissioner. nageswaran. yes. and commission president. matsuda. yes. so moved commissioners. that motion passes unanimously 7 to 0, placing us on consideration of items proposed for continuance. item five, case number 2024. hyphen 003477 koa at 294, page street. a certificate of appropriateness is proposed for continuance to january 15th,

2024. members of the public. this is your opportunity to address the commission on this item being proposed for continuance only on the matter of continuance. again, you need to come forward. seeing none, public comment is closed and your continuance calendar is now before you. commissioners motion to approve continuance. do i have a second? second. thank you. commissioners on that motion to continue. item five as proposed. commissioner baroni i commissioner baldauf i commissioner vergara. yes, commissioner. right. yes. commissioner. foley i commissioner. warren. yes. and commission president. matsuda. yes. so moved. commissioners. that motion passes unanimously 7 to 0 and places us under your regular calendar. if you could turn that off, sir. thank you. under your regular calendar for item six, a through d for case numbers 2024. hyphen 010351 lbr

2024 hyphen 010352 lbr 2024. hyphen 010353 lbr and 2024. hyphen 01354 lbr for properties at 2736 16 16th street, 762 fulton street, suite 305, 2950 1/23 street and 2019 fillmore street, respectively. these are all legacy business registry applications. commissioners. before we begin, the staff presentation, i just wanted to take the opportunity to introduce you to one of our new planners who is joining us for you for the first time in front of the historic preservation commission, i wanted to welcome kat. i'm probably butchering her name even though it's spelled phonetically in front of me. kat is currently a planner, one on our district five and eight team. kat comes from the sf mta where she worked as a transit data performance analyst. there she pioneered the special events data reporting hub, enhancing transit planning for major city

events like outside lands, esa pride parade and the giants game. kat holds a masters in city and regional planning from uc berkeley and dual bachelor's degrees in economics and business sustainability from arizona state. outside of work, she enjoys painting, camping, and exploring new eateries around the city. so welcome kat. welcome. good afternoon, commissioners. heather samuels, planning staff today we have four legacy businesses before you. staff will present and afterwards members of the public and business representatives will have the chance to speak during public comment. i will begin our presentation with ace mailing, a full service direct marketing company located at 232736 16th street. ace mailing provides services such as database creation, management and maintenance, creative services, graphic design, printing, emailing and postal mail services, fulfillment and warehousing. ace mailing was founded in north beach on

september 1st of 1977 by the mother and daughter team royce dyer and gwen kaplan in a garage on august alley. they rented space for $50 a month with building owner and retired fisherman dominic matera, who carved out space for ace mailings machines amongst its his crab nets and gear. upon moving operations to fort mason in 1979, they joined the marina merchants association as the business drive to be active in san francisco's business communities. later, in 19. later in 1983, they moved operations to the mission district and joined the mission merchants association as well as joined the san francisco chamber of commerce from north beach, the marina, and fort mason to its present location in the mission district. the business has been providing full service to san francisco clients for over 47 years. ace mailing has continued its legacy as a family business, as well as gwen caplan's children, myles and matthew, who

are fifth generation san franciscans, grew up working for the business and had returned after attending university to further their education. gwen has been has been established as a renowned business leader in the marketing field, and this impact has been felt across san francisco. gwen has been instructor at the university of california, berkeley for over ten years and an instructor at stanford university. under gwen's leadership, ace mailing was one of the first groups of businesses certified in the san francisco minority and women owned business certification program in 1984. in 1988, gwen was also appointed by the then mayor, art agnos to the san francisco small business commission and served from there in appointment in 1988 to 2004, and was its president from 1995 to 2000. ace mailing is committed to serving the community through maintaining their business as a marketing and communications company. staff supports recommend this

application and recommends a resolution to add ace mailing to the legacy business registry. thank you commissioners. i'll now hand it off to kat to present the next legacy business. thank you. good afternoon, commissioners. kat, chief planning staff, the second legacy business application we have for you today is for the african american shakespeare company. this organization is a 30 year old nonprofit whose commitment to arts education and cultural awareness has touched the lives of more than 240,000 performers, writers, students and patrons by providing a unique and irreplaceable theatrical program. as the oldest established black theater company in the united states that specializes in classical works, the organization is opening the realm of classical theater to diverse audiences by producing works with an african american cultural perspective. further, the organization plays a significant role in accessible

arts education, particularly for students of color. by establishing a school partnership program that has brought free student matinees and residency workshops to 36 schools across the greater bay area. currently, the business is facing displacement of their subsidized office space in the african american art and culture complex because the building will be undergoing a major multi-year renovation even as their focus must pivot to finding a new location, the organization remains committed to continuing to provide a platform for black artists who are vitally contributing to the rich tapestry of san franciscan art. staff greatly supports this application, and recommends a resolution to add the african american shakespeare company to the legacy business registry. i will now hand it off to my colleague maggie for the next application. thank you. oh, sorry. good afternoon, commissioners. maggie dong,

planning staff, the third legacy business that is before you is for jay's laundry, a 38 year old laundromat at the corner of 23rd street and alabama street. inside the business, you will find coin operated washers and dryers and plenty of folding tables. john mahoney is the owner, is the current owner of jay's laundry, and he named the business after his father, jabra, who was the owner of the grocery store across the street and had the idea to open a laundromat. unfortunately, he passed away during the construction of the laundromat and never got to see the business open. at 21 years old, john took over the family business and has been running it ever since. for many years, john's son jabra, who was also named after his grandfather, worked the night shift for seven days a week while the business did not always make the most

profit, it is important for the neighborhood to have access to an ancestral and essential service, and that is one of the many reasons why the family wants to keep the business open and to serve the community. the business is committed to safeguarding their giant wasco washing machines and laundry services. staff supports this application and recommends a resolution to add jay's laundry to the legacy business registry. i will now pass it on to my colleague will for the last presentation. good afternoon, commissioners william mccallum, planning staff. the final legacy business application today is for walter adams framing a custom art framing company first opened in 1978 by jane walter and robert adams. walter adams framing specializes in archival and conservation, framing shadow boxes, custom frame mirrors, acrylic boxes, and photo frames.

additionally, walter adams supports local artists through showing of artwork and framing, cost assistance in preparation for art shows. walter adams has had ongoing relationships with many prominent san francisco residents and designers, including joe montana, the getty foundation, loxley design, tracey simmons design, and kendall wilkinson design. walter adams framing contributes to the cultural fabric of san francisco as an lgbtq plus owned, veteran owned business and participates in several community organizations, including an annual fundraising event for ucsf health care alliance called art for aids, and a collective of neurodivergent artists called creativity explored. since 1978, walter adams framing has operated six different locations in san francisco on presidio avenue, fillmore street, ninth avenue, and west portal avenue. the fillmore street location is particularly vulnerable, as several businesses on that street have recently been displaced. the frame shop is committed to safeguarding their

identity as a custom art framing company, and to continue providing the highest quality framing services. staff supports this application and recommends a resolution to add walter adams framing to the legacy business registry. thank you. commissioners. this concludes staff presentations. we'll be available for any questions. thank you. i think we can now entertain public comment. thank you. with that, we should open up public comment. members of the public, this is your opportunity to address the commission on any of these legacy business registry applications. please feel free to come forward. i'm sorry. the side screen. i just noticed that myself. hello. hello, my name is sherry young. i'm the executive director and founder of african american shakespeare company, and i want to thank you,

commissioners, for offering this opportunity for recognizing the invaluable role of legacy business in shaping the vibrant cultural fabric of san francisco. we are deeply honored to participate in this process. african american shakespeare company has been more than just a theater organization. it has been a historic pillar in our community, a space where stories are told, voices are amplified and lives are transformed. for decades, we have brought the works of shakespeare and other classics to life, weaving them with a rich cultural lens that reflects the diversity of our audiences through our productions, educational outreach programs, and community partnerships. we've had the privilege of positively impacting the lives of countless individuals, from inspiring young students to lifelong love for the arts and audience of all ages. one of our claim to fame

actors is colman domingo, who is now one of the chairs for the met opera, doing fabulous thing, and he helped us out during the pandemic. san francisco has always been our home. it's more than a location. it's a heartbeat that drives our work. we are committed to being a beacon for the arts, a sanctuary for underrepresented voices, and a source of inspiration for generations to come. our dedication to the city is unwavering because we know that art is an essential part of life and heritage of any community. we proudly make sure that african american shakespeare stays in san francisco, so we hope that our legacy resonates with you as it deeply does with us. we carry the immense responsibility of preserving, foster and cultural history in our city, and we're grateful for any opportunity to expand this work. thank you so much for your consideration and for

supporting. i hope this legacy business, like ours, to help make san francisco a city of innovation, creativity and resilience. thank you. thank yo. yeah. come on up. sure. hi. my name is mark brogger. i'm a newly engaged citizen at this process. so i just had a question. what does a legacy business designation mean to the business? what protections does it get by this application if it was granted? we have isn't really a question and answer period. this is submit testimony comment. but questions like that are probably better addressed by the planner. maybe sitting next to you, planner or a member of the office of small business sitting a couple rows behind yo. next, public commenter, please. good afternoon, commissioners woody labounty. i'm the

president and ceo of san francisco heritage. just maybe for the benefit of the new commissioner, the legacy business program came out of a program that san francisco heritage came up with. that was legacy bars and restaurants. and i can't tell you how gratified we've been that a diversity, a wide range of businesses are now included in the legacy business program. and i think every time you see a slate of these come before you, you see how many different kinds of businesses support the cultural vitality, but just the community of the city as well. so i just want to call out definitely the african-american shakespeare company. and by the way, they won't be the only nonprofit impacted by the seismic upgrade work on the african american arts and culture complex. so it's something we have to pay attention to, but also ace printing. and you have a laundromat here today, and all of these things help make san francisco what it is. so we ask you to support all these

businesses and to enter them into the registry. and thank you. thank you. good afternoon, commissioners. my name is lloyd haddad. my partner, keith and i are residents and business owners in san francisco, and we own walter adams framing a little over two years ago. excuse me. we got a phone call from the then owners of the company saying, hey, we want to retire. you guys are seasoned business owners. do you want to buy our company? we saw it as an opportunity to not only grow our business, but also recognizing that they'd been around for at the time, about 44 years. the business process is a long process, and after the dust settled, we recognized that we did not have legacy business status, that we that the company before the owners before had not done that. and we saw this as a wonderful opportunity to help us continue to not only grow the company, but continue to grow within the communities that we

serve. west portal, lower pacific heights with our presidio location and of course, our fillmore location, which is our corporate office, and that is the one that is most vulnerable at this time. so we just wanted to come up here and say thank you for the opportunity. we look forward to hearing positively from this commission and being part of the legacy business registry. thank you so much. thank you. hello. good afternoon. my name is debra mejia. i'm the manager at j's laundry. it was great to see all these legacy business applications. i hope you all get it. the shakespeare one is seems amazing because i love shakespeare, so that's awesome. i want to first start off by saying this program is amazing because it is the spirit of america and entrepreneurship.

everyone is a legend to somebody in this world. it's very difficult to become famous, but it's really other people who tell your story. when i heard the planner talk about my grandfather, it was a little tough for me. so i had to really. i was crying back there, but it's okay. my father started the business in the middle of construction when his grandfather passed away. it was very difficult for him. he did persevere. he conquered and he was able to get the business up and going. and the business was going strong for many years. i would help him out seven days a week after i graduated and i started off going when i was like ten years old. one of the best stories i've had is interacting with the customers and talking, talking, talking about their lives. and over the past, over the past three years, the business has kind of gone

down a little bit. but we are committed to keeping the laundromat open, and we're hoping that this business, this legacy business registry could be the support and guidance we need. thank you guys so much. thank you. thank you. okay. last call for public comment. seeing none public comment is closed. and these legacy business registry applications are now before you commissioners thank you, commissioner foley. yes. so i think i know we sound like a broken record up here, but to woody labounty's comments, this is actually what makes san francisco work and what makes san francisco a diverse community. i walk all over the city, all the time, and i've

never known was it for 60 golf. so i really appreciate now that i know that. and thank you all for being here. thank you, commissioner vergara. i just wanted to say that hearing these stories is another reason to be proud to be a san franciscan. wonderful tapestry of the city. thank you for the work that you did to submit the applications, and i'm looking forward to your joining the list of legacy businesses. yes. thank you, commissioner wright. thanks. i want to echo the support of my fellow commissioners. i want to thank the applicants for the work that goes into this application and for sharing your stories with us. it's really heartening. always. and we have quite a variety of different businesses that are, you know, applying for this program and that are here represented today. so it's just always great to

hear your stories. and you are what makes san francisco great. thank you. thank you commissioner nageswaran, i very much appreciate the question about what legacy businesses do, and i hope that question was duly answered. and all of the testimony and what san franciscans bring to the community. and just i just can't emphasize enough that these these businesses are part of our daily lives and unsung heroes. so the legacy business program is sort of the oscars of that. so i really appreciate all of what small businesses do in our communities, and i'm grateful to be able to appreciate them. so i thank you for having your businesses doing them. so well and submitting the application. it's a really important process to do and to be recognized.

thank you. yeah, thank you for persevering. i think supervisor preston's support letter said it best about the african american shakespeare company, that it definitely makes more accessible to diverse audiences to provide actors of color, particularly in mainstream theater. i really, really agree with that. and i know there are some vacant space on fillmore street. i wonder if they could that can be temporarily used for somebody for various nonprofits. mr. sukrit. i thank all of the small business applicants for their time and effort and for staying alive. it is not easy to run a small business, particularly in this very expensive city, and i really hope that we can help you by approving your applications today. and also supporting them

on a regular basis. so do i hear a motion motion to approve and a second, second? there's no further deliberation. commissioners. there is a motion that has been seconded to adopt recommendations for approval for all for legacy business registry applicants. on that motion, commissioner baroni i commissioner baldauf i commissioner vergara. yes. commissioner. wright. yes. commissioner. foley i. commissioner. warren. yes. commissioner. president. matsud. yes. so. moved. congratulations. commissioners. that will place us on item seven for case number 2024. hyphen 007142, pta 1035 howard street. for a major permit to alter, please note that on november 20th, 2024, after hearing and closing public comment, you continued this matter to december 4th, 2024 with direction to staff by a vote of 5 to 0. commissioner

wright, you were recused and i'm assuming you will be recusing yourself again today. commissioner baroni, you had not yet been sworn in nor seated at that time. so in order to participate, you need to acknowledge on the record that you have reviewed the previous hearing and all of the materials. yes, i have, thank you. request to recuse, be recused. again, i moved to recuse commissioner wright. second, thank you, commissioners, on that motion to recuse commissioner wright. commissioner baroni i commissioner baldauf i commissioner vergara. yes. commissioner wright. yes. commissioner. foley i. commissioner. nickerson. yes. commissioner. president. matsuda. yes. so moved. commissioners. motion passes unanimously. 7 to 0. commissioner wright, you are hereby recused. and as is our practice, when we have heard and closed public comment, we will hear three minutes from the sponsor and one minute from

members of the public. three. good afternoon, commissioners, and welcome, commissioner baroni. monica yamauchi with planning department staff. the application before you is a request for a major permit to alter for the property at 1035 howard street. individually designated as a category two building under article 11 of the planning code and located within an mug zoning district. this project does, jonas noted, was before you at the november 20th hearing and was continued to today's hearing to allow the project sponsor to revise plans, particularly at the ground floor. as a reminder, the property is developed with a three story reinforced concrete light industrial building constructed in the art deco style in 1930 by a.c. griewank, who was an architect of the port of san francisco and is one of the most architecturally expressive art deco industrial buildings in the city. this commission previously approved a project that included a vertical and horizontal addition and conversion of portions of the

existing building to office and laboratory use. in october of 2020, but this project ultimately was not pursued due to feasibility concerns. the project before you today would instead convert an existing vacant lab and office use to 1540 gross square feet of ground floor. social services use 23,911 gross square feet of self-storage use and approximately 43,996ft!s of commercial storage use. the new social services use is a change from what you reviewed at the last hearing, when the project only contained storage uses, and the possibility of adding social services was discussed at that time, but not formalized in plans. likewise, ground floor storefronts on the howard street facade will be uncovered and infilled with new steel sash storefront windows. this is another change from the version of the project that you reviewed last time. when the storefront windows matched upper level windows in terms of muntin pattern, the hpc requested that the architect revise the ground floor windows so that a tripartite storefront window is

now proposed in each bay, and that configuration takes its proportional cues from the six light transoms above. the storefront also now wraps the corner from howard onto ross street and infilled storefronts will be reserved for mural or murals administered by the social services operator. otherwise, the scope of work remains the same. a one story mechanical room at the rear of the building will be demolished, and existing skylights will be infilled with their curbs preserved for future restoration. the howard street main entry would be restored and original industrial steel sash windows on the primary facade will be repaired and rehabilitated, with glazing salvaged from windows on less prominent facades. windows on the russell street facade will be replaced with new single pane transparent laminated glass metal sash windows to match the existing in terms of panel size or, i'm sorry, pane size and configuration. and a new main entry is proposed for the russell street facade. the project also includes improvements to an existing surface area at the rear on the russell street frontage to allow accessory parking and loading,

including a new simple vertical picket fence. as a reminder, the sponsor is requesting two modifications provided in the planning code for historic buildings in order to execute the project, as it's currently proposed to institute the proposed self storage use, the project sponsor is requesting approval under planning code section 803.9 b, which allows any land use except nighttime entertainment in historic buildings, regardless of the underlying zoning controls. in order to approve the proposed self storage use under section 803.9 b, this commission must find that the project meets the secretary of the interior standards and that the proposed change of use will enhance the feasibility of preserving the landmark building. upon review of a historic building maintenance plan, and that was included in your staff report. the project is also requesting a waiver from active use requirements under planning code section one. 45.1, which governs street frontages for most development projects. this section of the code allows the planning commission, on the advice of this commission, to modify or waive certain street frontage provisions for historic buildings, including those

historic buildings designated under articles ten and 11. the planning commission can only modify or waive these requirements when the hpc advises that the requested waiver or modification will also enhance the economic feasibility of preserving the historic building. just like 803.9 provides in this case, although the project now includes an active social services use at the howard facade and a portion of the russell facade, active uses are required at 25ft of depth for all ground floor frontages that face a public street, and 15ft of depth for all floors above. the social services use does not extend to 25ft of death of depth at the ground floor, and neither self storage nor commercial storage are considered active uses under the planning code. therefore, the active use waiver is required with the addition of the social services use of the ground floor, the department finds that the proposed waiver would enhance the feasibility of preserving the building over its current vacant condition, while still activating the primary street frontage on howard, partially findings for making this determination have been

included in your staff report today. and if this commission finds that a waiver of the active use requirements would support the building's preservation, the planning commission will review your advice at its hearing tomorrow, december 5th, and either grant or deny the waiver through a resolution. again, as a reminder, the department received a number of formal letters of opposition to the proposed project from members of the public and one community group. the south of market business association. opposition centers around the proposed storage uses, with correspondence stating that the lack of an active use of the ground floor will exacerbate existing issues on rush street. members of the public also expressed concerns about the environmental impacts of the proposed storage uses, particularly pollution from truck emissions and general increased vehicular activity at the site and surrounding blocks of soma. in general, commenters would prefer residential, retail, or even school uses at this location, and then this morning you may have received a letter from the filipino american development foundation in support of the project

because they will be using the social services space based on information included in your staff report, the department recommends approval of the proposed project with conditions the project would improve along vacant and actively deteriorating building by establishing a tenant that has committed to enacting restorative scopes of work outlined in a historic building maintenance report. the project meets the secretary of the interior standards for rehabilitation and the intent of article 11 of the planning code, and this concludes my presentation. the project sponsor is also here. if you have any questions. thank you, thank you, thank you. project sponsor. you have three minutes. thank you. commissioners i'll get the computer screen. good afternoon. john kaplan here. on behalf of the project sponsor. so we're back this week to present the modifications to the project plans in response to the commission comments from the last hearing, as well as to affirm our nonprofit space agreement. in short, the project before you as a proposal that will achieve four key policy goals. first, it will support the necessary $10 million in costs to rehabilitate this historic building. it will reactivate the howard street frontage, contribute to the soma

pilipinas cultural corridor on rush street, and also provide a secure, long term and very below market rate space for the filipino american development foundation to start, this is the only project that will support the $10 million in costs necessary to save and restore this historic building. the current owner has spent the last seven years exploring multiple uses for these for this building, including advanced manufacturing, pdr uses retail, uses office uses lab and life science uses educational uses residential. none of these have been able to generate the income necessary to just get this building off the ground and have it restored, and be able to be usable again. we've been responsive to the commission's comments from the last hearing. we've worked with staff to refine the storefront design, and we're more than happy to continue working with that to the degree the commissioners have further comments on that. very flexible on that. we've also wrapped the transparency to the first bay along rush street, and we really did explore, but were unable to commit to further transparency and retail and commercial space along rush

street. wreally tried, but there were a couple of reasons that didn't work. first, the loss of storage space would result. resulting from this would really cross the line of infeasibility to restore the building. in addition to the rehabilitation, the building also needs a seismic upgrade and there's also no market demand for office or retail space. so it really this is just lost revenue that would otherwise be put towards preservation of the building. second, the area this area on rush street is an important location for a community mural, and we've committed to this as part of our agreement. and so finally, we are proud to have a signed agreement with the filipino american development foundation to provide them the entirety of the storefront space along howard street for their cultural and administrative space. this will give the organization a secure, very below market rate space for a generation. so again, not only does this project rehabilitate this important historic building, but it also strengthens an important local filipino group and contributes to the esthetic improvements proposed for the heart of this cultural district. this is the only project that has shown itself to be viable after many attempts. after seven

years, this is a one of a kind opportunity to achieve multiple policy objectives. i think everyone understands that without this project, this building is going to sit vacant for many more years and that is particularly relevant for this important historic building, which is already in serious disrepair. and we'd lose the opportunity to provide the filipino american development foundation a secure office and gathering location in the community for a generation. so with that, we ask that the hpc approve this project. thank you. and we're here. if you have any questions. thank you, thank you. with that, we should open up public comment. members of the public, this is your opportunity to address the commission on this matter. again, you will each have one minute. okay. one minute, one minute. may i make a request? since there is probably 75 of us here and we got 100 more. i don't want to waste your time. i can speak for all my people. who's here? if you give me at least three minutes so we don't have to be here for two

hours. because we really got to go pick up kids at 230 in the neighborhood that we're discussing. if you don't mind, mr. president, through the chair, you could recognize it as organized opposition, if that is opposition, 100%. commissioners. okay. you got three minutes. thank you. thank you for honoring. so, commissioners. thank you, mr. president. i love san francisco, but does san francisco really love us? black, white, latino, filipino? everybody who we are talking about is san franciscans are standing here. stand up y'all. we got over 100 and probably 50 people all around this building. we downstairs who oppose this project because it's not no value to our community. it's a lot of good speaking rhetoric coming up here. they're not willing to even give us space in

a neighborhood where i'm born and raised, our building. 1035 we're. 1038 third. 1035 we look at the building every single day. we just was able to purchase 1040 for the street that they're built. they want to build their building on is named united players. but you're not willing to meet with us and give any type of space where there's no value for our community. you talk about the travesty in san francisco. we stand here in solidarity with our brothers from urban alchemy, who's downstairs just fighting to get some money to keep this city safe. and so when you talk about community, you talk about preserving a historical organization. we've been doing this for 30 years, saving hundreds and thousands of kids lives. you got west bay, who's in solidarity with us? the oldest filipino organization in the south of market, 56 years, has these filipino organizations

you mentioned that wants to get space in there. talk to them? no. have they talk to us? they don't want to talk to us. we are the natives. we are the people from the community. you see us standing here. and so we're all we're here just to share what you guys, that this project is not community. we want a thriving community that has businesses, that has stores. we want to bring education to our kids. we want to bring a school front to help our people. so our community can thrive, and it can grow. we have 100 year celebration of a lady today who is her birthday. victoria manalo draves, whose birthday is today, who, after we leave here, our staff is going to go down to the school, the elementary where all the kids live, who the parents who live in the community also is going to be at victoria park. so we live there. we stay there. i'm born and raised there. i've

been there all my life. we live. my family grew up on howard street. our buildings and our properties are there. and so for anybody to pass this without having the real community involved in this is a travesty to this city. if we're trying to move forward. thank you. okay. next, public commenter. commissioner. commissioners, my name is alex ludlum. i'm a neighborhood resident of ten years, and i'm involved in a lot of other organizations like the community benefit district and so on. but i'm here as a private citizen to say that this site is an anchor of the local fentanyl trade. it has been due to the current bad landlord who has completely neglected the

property and allowed it to be a permanent base for drug dealing drug using and encampments. the waiver of active uses at a certain point would ensure that this is a permanent, non-active building and keep it just as it is. and given all the kids who use the facilities right there and walk down the street to bessie carmichael, it would be bad for the neighborhood to have a building that the project sponsors estimates will have one employee active during business hours in all the storage space. thank you sir. folks, if we can refrain from clapping, we would certainly appreciate that if you want to show your support, you can wiggle your hands silently or something like that. jonas. good afternoon commissioners. my

name is misha olivas. i live less than a block away from this proposed project. our neighborhood already has enough struggles having a storage facility on a route that children and seniors. travel is a huge concern to us with the traffic that trucks and people moving in and out of there and just having a lot of unknown people in that corridor is very concerning. no matter what anyone says, the traffic, the trash that is left behind from people moving out of or living in their units would only exacerbate existing problems, to the detriment of those of us who live there. the prospective owner is two states away and i have no confidence they care about this community or the impact of this project, and i have no confidence that they will be able to respond to concerns in a timely manner. crisis happens in an instant in our neighborhood, and we don't need yet another challenge. additionally, this farce of a community benefit is no benefit to those of us who actually live in this community. it is shameful to me that this entity was willing to agree to such a minimal benefit without engaging other community stakeholders or

residents, and was willing to exacerbate our very real safety concerns purely out of their own self-interest. you have lots of opposition and one letter of support from someone who directly benefits. please reject this project. folks, if you guys can't follow the instructions, i'm going to be forced to call the sheriff up. okay? so please respect the process. hi everybody. my name is justin appleseed. i spoke at the last meeting. i own 112 rust street, which is directly across the street from 1035 howard. i'm also a local firefighter, and i organize the opposition, so i got in touch with the soma business association. i handed out hundreds of fliers on the street, talked with my neighbor, talked with deli board and the united players club, my man rudy back there, all these folks. and after the last meeting when commissioner foley and baldauf spoke, i was i sent out an email

to all my contacts saying, let's go. it worked. they're going to they're going to get the community involved. they're going to put in some commercial space for, i don't know, whatever, maybe the united players club, maybe a grocery store, a gym, something that will bring people to our neighborhood in a positive way. i met with the developer and the soma president, the soma small business president, yesterday and was super disappointed. they did not add any of those spaces that you guys had asked them to add. that is your time. please, please say no to this project. they will add those spaces. thank you sir, thank you, thank you. hi, my name is benita and i was born and raised in this city. i'm a single mom. if it wasn't for places, places like united players, i would have probably flourished and not ended up in places that i had

ended up in. like prison and jail. if you guys don't give space to this place, who knows where our children will end up? i don't want my kids ending up in prison, in jail like i did. i actually work for urban alchemy today, so i'm here in two different matters. i'm here to support the company that i work for, but also i have to support where my children are safe. and by having this building and having just a safe space for our children as the best for our city, i, like i said, i was born and raised here. we already lost mission girls. my kids can no longer go there. so now what are the safe spaces that are left? thank you. and if you guys end up putting a storage facility there, then we are going to have

drug addicts. thank you. that's not okay. please. next speaker. good afternoon, commissioners. henry cornelius on the president of the south of market business association. this building has a lot of potential. it's really if some work is done to it, to really restore it to what it should be a really beautiful art deco building. we had a meeting yesterday with zoom with the developers rep and honestly, in about providing this first ground space to commercial businesses, whatever they may be, would be really beneficial to all the community. there's so many square feet in that building with three stories for storage. and yet when i look at the facade, even the facade, i don't see where they're putting the glazing back on again. on the howard street side, also on

the rush street side, there's areas where i thought was going to be some glazing. that's not being put in. from what i could see. i think it needs to go back to the drawing board. thank you. thank you. hi. thank you for your time. my name is vanessa biss. the south of market neighborhood is home to many native san franciscan families, including myself, for 32 years. right now we have one of the highest homelessness population and mental health crises in the city. building, storage units in an already overly burdened community will only exacerbate issues affecting our quality of life. number one, storage units are often used as an alternative for affordable, affordable rentals for housing the less fortunate creating more chaos. these places are not the solution for a much bigger issue. it has no value to the people of the community that

live and breathe. here. families continue to continue to experience displacement and gentrification facing us with more social burdens targeting minority communities with lower socioeconomic status. it is time for the rest of sf neighborhoods to share this burden, along with us, not just soma. the tl or bayview-hunters point. if we are about preserving life and history. we. hello, my name is maverick. i work for u.p. west bay. our neighborhoods deserve more than quick fixes and short term gains. we deserve investments that breathe life into our streets, bring neighbors together and create lasting opportunities for everyone. a storage facility that's just space taking, not space giving. it does nothing to heal the challenges we face daily challenges like the lack of accessible groceries, safe spaces for our children, and

clean environments where we can thrive, not just survive. i'm a resident. some were born and raised, and all my life walking down rush street, i've always seen that building not being used and now finally seeing it being put to use for a storage space is crazy to me. it could be used for so much more things that actually benefit the community. yeah, it's just crazy to hear that some people who say that they are for our community with backdoor and not really, you know what i'm saying? for their own benefits and couldn't talk to the people of the community themselves. our neighborhood is more than just a collection of streets. it's a living, breathing home. we need developments that honor that, that invest in us as people, not just as data points on a developer's spreadsheet. storage spaces don't build futures. thank you. good afternoon, commissioners. my name is carla laurel. i'm the director of west bay filipino multi-service center. we've been serving the south of market community for 56 years. predominantly recent

filipino immigrant youth, seniors, and families. honestly. 1035 this is not the first time that an outsider has tried to come in and develop this space in a way that won't benefit our community, but it really feels like a slap in the face to settle on storage for what our people and what our community deserves. we want more than this, and honestly, i just want to be real and say 60,000ft!s. we're talking about a community benefit of 1800, 1800 square feet, 3% of the building. we deserve more than that. our community deserves to be activated, thriving and vibrant and this is not the way. hi commissioners. my name is mark brogger. i live at 142 rust street on the third floor, looking directly at the warehouse building which has been there all nine years. it is an abandoned building. it is a magnet for fentanyl. it is a homeless encampment. open area.

i talked to the san francisco police constantly about clearing. i'm with justin on russ street that when we heard about this project, we were like, oh, great, business will be coming. some sign of life will be coming to our street right after years. but this falls way short of that. i see kids from bessie carmichael school have to walk down the center of the street because of encampments that are on the sidewalk. so kids are walking into the center of traffic so they don't walk into homeless encampments where people are shooting up and united players. these people are doing god's work to support our neighborhood. so take a look at this. show us you have some heart and support the neighborhood. thank you. hello, commissioners. david wu with soma filipinas. i'm going to be

reading part of a letter from the filipino american development foundation, the filipino american development foundation supports the renovation and rehabilitation of the existing historic building at 1035 howard street and community serving and active uses in the building. while we would prefer more active uses such as housing pdr or mixed use, if this commission determines that the proposed use of commercial and self-storage is currently the only viable option to restore the building to the foreseeable future, we support the project approval. given that the project sponsor has entered into an agreement with fatf that includes over 1500 square feet of ground level street facing multi-purpose space, dedicated space for a public facing mural at the building's ground floor, cooperation on projects along rush street, and outreach to local community serving nonprofits when seeking potential candidates for entry level job openings. thank you. thank you. okay, last call for

public comment. good afternoon. my name is pietro d'amato. i grew up in the excelsior district of san francisco. i'm a first generation italian, and one thing we care a lot about at united play is because i work there. i actually work in the childcare sector. i am a kindergarten through second grade coordinator. one thing we really cherish at our organization is family and community. we would just like to stress the importance that it takes the hood to save the hood. and if that doesn't resonate with anyone in this room, we can break it down as an old african proverb, it takes a village and, you know, i don't think a storage building with one worker and a bunch of cubicles that

will later be taken out for another business deal will benefit this community full of young kids who need inspiration. and they need to find themselves. so that's what we're working on every day. and, you know, thank you. that is your time. thank you. thank you. okay. final last call for public comment. seeing none public comment is closed. and this matter is now before you commissioners. thank you. a commissioner foley. so i have all sorts of things to ask and all sorts of things to say. i think the first thing i said last week or two weeks ago is i don't like self storage. i think it's a really bad use of a of a property. i do have a question though. how many square feet is soma filipinos going to lease? roughly 1500. and for how long? i'm actually for a generation is

the word that we use for a very long time. i will be very old when this lease is up. thank you. yeah. is the current project sponsor the current owner? no, they're not okay. thank you. i just want to mention i renovated a church that was vacant for ten years at 10th and howard. it took me ten years. ten. and it is active in the community. westbay uses it, united players uses it. it's a nonprofit art foundation building. and it was covered. we had to actually deal with meth and fentanyl addicts daily, and we did. and we kept the community safe. and we spent ten years working on it. i think that what commissioner waldorf's idea was, was trying to find a middle ground a couple of weeks ago, and that is activate all the ground floor space. and that's what we have to do. we

can't just put another dead building in the heart of a community that's actually trying to come back. they spent four years raising capital to build the new building right across the street for a parolee reentry program. do you know what happens when you get out of jail after 30 years? you get 200 bucks. they're actually doing god's work. i'll leave it at that for right now. thank you. commissioner baldauf. yeah, i want to pick up commissioner baldauf. could you please turn your microphone on? yes. i overwhelmed by all of you in the community who've taken the time to come here and educate me and educate us. and, you know, one

of the things that it's interesting that michael kimmelman's intangible history and that this is historic preservation, the intangible history of your community is incredibly important. and you've given great voice to that. and so i want to say thank you for that and that i, i'm an architect and i believe in getting projects done. and i offered the suggestions that i did last week as in a way, a modest proposal. i thought at the time to try to get to. yes, because i do think it's important to get to yes on projects. and i was profoundly disappointed by the project that was brought back to us. and it actually makes me feel like after hearing what was said,

that my proposal was too modest, to be quite honest. and i, i think that we need to have courage. i think there's a lot of, of pushback against historic preservation right now because we're holding up development and we're making life harder. and all of these things. and i. i think we have to have courage to believe in the city that we want to have. and so i, i'm in the current form. i'm opposed to this project. i will vote no on it. i, i think the amount of square feet of opening up rust, the one full day bay depth, and the one full bay on howard in my mind, it was what i thought was reasonable under the circumstances. after hearing

what i heard today, i'm not sure it is reasonable and so i'm not quite sure how we get to something that is reasonable. i believe in getting projects done. i told the planning department staff that yesterday when i called and had a conversation about how disappointed i was and i think that i think the question i want to ask is that in a way, what we're being asked to certify is that this is the only ecological economic way to do something. and you're standing here as the department saying that this is the only economic way to do something. and i'm not convinced i haven't been given enough data. i don't know, other than anecdotally that this is challenged. and i think that i'm not clear on the ownership status of this building in terms

of who is the applicant and who is not. but what i understand is that upon conclusion of this process, were we to conclude it that the current owner would be selling this building at some profit, i assume to another owner who would be carrying this out? well, i am not very excited about giving an owner a windfall when they haven't been policing their building. thank you. are there any more, commissioner nageswaran? so i'll say this is a tough one because historic preservation commission is called to look at historic preservation and not necessarily the use of the building or the ownership of the building. so i,

i also feel very strongly that community and this is your city is an important part of this. so i, i, i am impressed and appreciate that you all participated in this process to come here. i know that it took time out of your day to do that. and so my comments are going to be on the preservation side of it. but i appreciate all of what you've said here. and my first question is to mr. sucré, does this go to the planning commission? correct. so keep in mind the action before this commission is twofold. so one, we are asking the commission to provide advice to the zoning administrator on whether or not the proposed use would enhance the feasibility of preserving the historic building. and then the second part is to basically

opine on the active use waiver, which is going to be before the planning commission. is that correct? yes, that's correct. and also there is a permit to alter. so it's really three actions. thank you. so and the permit to alter relates basically to the modifications, the exterior modifications to the building and whether or not it meets article 11 standards for review okay. very good. so i'll just run down some of these comments which you know, will be somewhat familiar from last time. and just for the entry doors, i see that you've made them more compatible with the historic intent of the facade, which i appreciate. they are a bit taller, so i can see that the, the, the small kind of

space at the top of the historic image on the historic drawings is not used. and but i will say one thing is that if this were to become a accessible door and these are quite large leaves, and you might need an operator that potentially you could reduce that door height and have the operator on the inside and that kind of space above the door. that is shown on the historic drawings, so that the historic outline of the i don't know how much purchase you have on that historic part of it. so just small comment. there. and but i do appreciate that you made the stile and rail a little bit beefier to kind of be compatible. and then as far as the power operator, i assume that you would maybe include it

in one of the bollards, correct. on the. okay, great. and then as far as glazing goes, i'm always of the mind of doing clear glazing that doesn't have a tint. blue green and or reflective tint or reflective quality. so i would encourage clear or a light gray tone if at all, just to be appropriate. historically, one of my questions i. i tremendously appreciate that the storefronts were clarified. i feel like it reads a lot more consistently with the rest of the facade. it's hard to tell in the historic photo what kind of mullion division it had, and there was a change between solid after storefronts existed. and my understanding this historic drawings showed storefronts

along howard and all along russell street, five bays along russell street is what i understand. so we have we have the full breadth of howard street and one bay on russell street, which we can come back to. but i would like to know if the frame of the storefront is a steel frame or aluminum frame, steel frame, steel frame. okay. and then. let's see, although, you know, generally i don't comment on interior spaces, one of the things that i noticed right away was that wall that you have that's, you know, outlining the social services area is pulled in front of the columns. and in the maintenance plan, i noticed there's i think it's figure 14 that has the walls between the columns. and that's where those historic stepped windows existed. i think

it'd be interesting to have the wall align with the columns so that you could reuse those. and again, that's a separate comment and just something to think about. and then. the, you know, i noticed that in the maintenance plan that it indicated that the original black or dark tile that you see in the images is, has been painted over. and it, it it's not a requirement to peel the paint off or take it off and restore that, but i just wanted to know what your intention was, whether to leave it painted or to you know, take the paint off and restore. the intent is to strip the paint off of the ceramic tile and replace the ones that are missing. not that

many are missing, and they're not a special tile. they're pretty easy to replace, i see. okay. and then going back, let me look at my notes here. on on on. russell street. you know, i wonder if the planning commission would some of the thoughts that i had were to consider that mural wall and the trees in that area in the previous hearing there was, you know, discussion about how the trees are kind of. sheltered, sheltering some activity in that area. but i thought maybe they could consider lighting. i don't know if that's part of the plan in that area to have some sort of lighting or there's no proposed site lighting, which i

think is what you're referring to. i saw some street poles. i don't know if those are existing. those are existing, i see, okay. and then i those are my comments for the various kind of historic preservation sorts of things. so thank you. thank you, commissioner foley. yeah. so i, i appreciate vice president richard's comments around us really looking at the historic building. but it's not just the historic building, it's the community. it's the intangibles. and when i start thinking about an active use waiver, except we're actually not having an active use, all we're doing is continually destroying that neighborhood. we're just going to hurt it more and more. and again, i want to go back to a building that i owned for ten years. and every day we went out there and we

moved the meth addicts out, and we brought the cops out, and we moved the homeless encampments and had a big yard. and it was drama. it cost a ton of money. it was a lot of drama, but we kept it clean and we're not keeping it clean. the owner's not keeping it clean. we got to keep it clean. so i am i am totally against this project. i'm totally against the fact that it's against community. i'm totally against the fact that we're gonna have a dead building again with self storage that's going to be there for 50 or 60 or 70 years. it's never going to change. it's never going to change. i'm done for now. thank you, commissioner baldauf. so to move to this just as a building for a second, because i think the vice chair made the point that we need to address that. and i will do that. now. i still would like to hear from department staff the economic analysis that underlies the

assumption. but let me finish my comment and then we can we can go to the economic analysis par. this building is a corner building. the applicant actually accentuates it being a corner building by putting a second main entrance as part of their design on the building, the idea that in the name of it being a mural that we would leave the bays all to the left of that second entrance on russ walled up and projecting an image of a walled up building in a neighborhood. to me is not historically either accurate nor appropriate to this. and i would say, and i do want to hear staff's economic analysis, that

that we all have seen the economy of san francisco turn on a dime. and the idea that we would cordon off space on russell street for 40 years because we're in a five year cycle where things are not good when and i think i calculated that if you just did the first bay to the concrete column, it was like 5% of the building last time. i find it disingenuous to say that economically that's tanking this deal. i really would like to see here some math, see some math to substantiate that. commissioner baldauf, can i just address your question regarding an economic analysis? keep in mind that's

not a requirement that we analyze projects based on our our purview is to basically review a project that we have before us in front of the planning code. i'm sorry, mr. craig, can you repeat what the historic preservation commission is asked to do today? so again, the hpc has three actions. this is a property designated in article 11, which is basically one of our designation programs that we have. so the three actions are to review the proposed alterations and ensure if they are compatible with the standards outlined in article 11 of the planning code. the second part is to opine to the zoning administrator on whether the proposed use would enhance the feasibility of preserving the historic building. so this is one of the various zoning incentives that we have within the code that are special to historic buildings. so normally

self storage is not a permitted use in this area. under this provision of the planning code, an owner can agree to basically institute a historic building maintenance plan and then allow for a certain use upon the advice of the hpc, and then the final action is to provide advice to the planning commission on whether or not you think an active use waiver is permitted. questions on the economic analysis or the underlying need for development on a site are probably better addressed to the owner. so if you want to, you're welcome to ask the owner to come up and probably ask the finances of this. well, except that i heard from staff. i think that this was perceived as the only alternative to preserve this thing. and when something is said is the only alternative that suggests that there is no other economic way to save this

building. keep in mind, if you look at the history of this particular property, and i'll have miss monica address your conversation with her, it was entitled as laboratory and office. correct. so the hpc actually approved a project to convert the building into an office and lab building. that project never got off the ground. so while it received its entitlements, the owner at the time, or whomever it was that was sponsoring that original project, never actually built it or constructed it accordingly. so for staff's purposes, and from our analysis right now, we have seen a building that has remained vacant for about eight years. and so what we're now doing is looking at the proposal that's currently before us. and then weighing in the analysis that we have to take, which is to review the project. per the city's codes, and then obviously bring it forward to the hpc. so questions on the feasibility of

what else could have happened here or would have happened here are better addressed to the sponsor itself, rather than the staff. i agree, monica yokomichi, department staff. i just want to kind of speak to your concern and your question, and i'm sorry if the way i responded to your questions on the phone was mischaracterizing what is the requirement here? so section 140 5.1, which is the active use section, requires that you make advice to the planning commission on whether the project before you would enhance the feasibility of preserving the building. there's no qualifier of it's the only use i think perhaps what i was trying to suggest was just that i had been working on this project in my role as staff for over five years, and this is the only time that the project has gotten to this point. so that's all i wanted to clarify. thank you. thank you, commissioner foley, what is the specific code requirement for active use on

the ground floor? sure. and i'll have planner yamauchi fill in any holes that i have. but in most cases, our ground floors are supposed to have uses that are considered active in nature. and so there's a provision specific for historic properties that allows the planning commission to grant a waiver from this requirement upon the advice of the historic preservation commission. so, for example, things that are active use would be things like a retail shop where someone can kind of come in and out. i'm sorry to interrupt you, but could i ask you the size of it? what's the size requirement? there's no sort of overall gross square footage requirement. it's just a depth of 25ft in every bay at every street facing frontage. thank you very much. commissioner nagasawa, commissioner baldauf, did you

have other questions? okay, commissioner nageswaran, so then going back to the mandates that we have for historic preservation commission in terms of adhering to the secretary's standards for rehabilitation, i would say that it does comply with that rehabilitation is not restoration to a certain period of time where if we had a historic building and we have this historic building and it was constructed in, you know, 1930s, we're not going back to that era to make it just like that. we are rehabilitating a building that has changed over time. and, you know, one example is that at the first floor there were windows there and then there weren't windows there. now we're restoring or reinstating windows, but because that's an area of alteration, the windows

can look different. so in that respect, you know, and then the other aspects of preservation that are being addressed here with restoration of the tile work and with the windows, there is a lot of there are a lot of windows that are going to be enclosed on at least one of the facades. and i saw that they are going to recess them to have a reveal there. and understandably, there's a feasibility issue with making historic windows, and maybe that's part of it. but rehabilitation does not require us to restore those windows when they're beyond repair. in any case, so that that particular item, i feel that they have addressed the permit to alter exterior alterations. that is

basically the same sort of thing. and then the active use waiver. i'm i'm going to ask for a little bit more clarity on what we are opining on in terms of active use. we know that on the first floor, on a in a regular situation, we'd have 25ft depth on the two two street facades as mentioned, and then on the upper floors, 15ft depth on the same street, facades on either side, on howard and ross. so we are how are we opining on that? the planning code doesn't actually give you a lot of parameters to weigh in on. on this particular one. so, for example, in looking at your various actions, for example, if you think that the project

itself meets article 11 standards, you could certainly move towards approval on that. if you don't think that all of the proposed uses meet the bar for active use, you could also recommend denial of those actions towards the planning commission. or you can also introduce conditions upon that fact. so for the active use waiver in particular, and as well as the provision for the advice to the zoning administrator, you have some latitude in terms of what what the commission may propose. so the planning code itself doesn't offer any criteria by which you opine on. so obviously, the project's facts and the statements before you all can weigh in on your decision for this. thank you, commissioner foley. yeah. so i have a question. we have a self storage, which i understand, and

we have a commercial storage. and the commercial storage is the majority of the project. how does staff make sure the commercial storage is commercial storage. well, we do in most cases trust our owners to do what they say they're doing. it. if, for example, at any point that we find that they're not doing it, that's when our enforcement team would come in to help rectify the situation and ensure that the sponsors are using the buildings according to what we permit them to be. do we have a minimum size of a commercial storage requirement in the code? no, we do not. so the owner can propose whatever ratio of uses that they want within the building. i might just add monica fauci, department staff. the building previously had production, distribution and repair uses, so commercial storage is a production, distribution and repair use. so it's kind of a

change of use within that exact bucket of 43,000 something. i don't have the exact number off the top, but there's not a code minimum. but in this case, in order to avoid running afoul of section 202.8, which requires replacement of pdr uses at certain ratios. that's why commercial storage is at that amount. i mean, i mean, my concern is does it become a self storage building? and that's the reality of the truth. that's why i'm that's why i'm bringing this up. i have a question for the project sponsor. can can i ask you to. i look at this project and i look at what we are charged with. and i do see that we the project does comply with what has been asked of us to decide on. but one thing i want to know is whether you have had conversation with a lot of these organizations who have come before us today and who are opposed to this project, was there have you had

conversations? have there been any offers to offer space? i do appreciate the fact that 1500fts will be going to the filipino american development foundation, because this is in the soma filipinas cultural district. that means a lot to us that we continue to support racial and social equity. but it seems like there are other organizations that have shared with us that they feel that they should have a certain amount of space in this building. and i'm just i'm sorry. i feel a disconnect because i'm not hearing that there has been that conversation, whether something was offered, whether something was rejected, you know, can you fill me in? thank you, president mascia, for the opportunity to speak to this point. we reached out to filipino american development foundation at the same time as we reached out to the united players. so we've been in conversation. so we initiated these conversations at the same time, fatf was

immediate in terms of their engagement, and we ultimately and united players, not as immediate, but we have had a real conversation in the u.p. clubhouse discussing what exactly is that they that they felt was necessary, that this project do in order to make them feel like it's contributing to the neighborhood. it was it was a request that we seriously considered, but it really was not even close to the line of being able to make this project feasible. and so ultimately, we weren't able to agree to the requests that were made that said, we've communicated to them, we there's other ways that we can communicate, i'm sorry, contribute to the community. the conversation is not over. we've got, you know, many more months of the permitting process and construction process. but so long story short, yes, we did have a meeting in the clubhouse, had conversations about what they felt was necessary for this

project to fit in the neighborhood. and it really was a very inconsistent with what how this project could actually be feasible. so is that conversation over? i would say no at all. i would say no that the conversation absolutely can be ongoing, that i'm sorry, is the conversation over about having more community use on the ground floor level in the sense that the let me say a couple things. one, storage use is does not have to be a permanent use. this team has actually done a self storage building in philadelphia where they converted a building to self storage. and then in the 2000 teams, they actually converted it to office space because the market had shifted. these storage units are standalone units. so they're kind of just fixtures moved into the building. so not only is it possible to do it, there's actually precedent with this group having done that. so in

terms of just once the storage use is established, it absolutely can be converted to other uses as as time shifts. so, so that's one thing. two absolutely. the conversation can be you know, ongoing i guess one of the challenging things in this in the cultural district is and a learning experience too, is that it's it is a very diverse district, even within the district. and so and not all positions are aligned. and the, the i don't think there's necessarily a complete community buy in to what was proposed for the building as well. so it's not like, oh, this is just a simple solution. let's just do this. you know, it's a very challenging environment to try to kind of make make it work for as many as possible. while also actually having a project that moves forward. but but the short answer to your question is we left that conversation saying we

want to keep talking. let's see if we can make things work. but in terms of making this project work, what has been discussed so far has not gotten us close to the line. that's where i have the problem. i mean, i really appreciate and i am in full support of seeing 1500 square feet dedicated to the soma pilipinas. or i'm sorry, to the filipino filipino american development corporation. i am fully in support of that. but i hesitate to support this project unless i see that there is real good faith. i don't know, negotiation or some kind of commitment on the part of the project owner to see that there is a real, a real, genuine opportunity for other organizations to have ground floor community space because communities of color have

continually been displaced, and we are only trying to fight, communities of color are just trying to fight for what they have had. and if this is an opportunity for the filipino american community to have cultural activities, i am in full support of it. but that doesn't mean that, as you say, that they're the only community or the only residents. so i'd like to see that there be some. agreement or there is some kind of assurances that you could give us that can make sure that other community uses can happen. and what i can say is that the challenging thing here is that what i think we're all wrestling with is this is a building in disrepair and requires a significant amount of capital. so that's that none of us get to change that or, you know, impact including include ourselves. and so what i would say is that the way we've left the left, the conversation with united players is that we are more than happy to continue this conversation.

if there is a if there there's a lot of opportunities. when we talk about cultural districts in terms of public financing, grant money, you know, the in terms of if there is something that can incorporate greater community involvement in this building and it still can. i mean, and it still meets the, the, the ability to, to actually get built. the answer is absolutely. in terms of that is the critical thing here. we've dug deep to give this very long term, very below market rate lease to for pdf. and if we could ease trust me, if we could easily just give the space on on rush street for more commercial space, we would have done it. i mean, we pushed for it and it really at this point the team does not think it works. so again, coming back to your question, president matsuda, absolutely. the conversation is ongoing. the dialog, we're open for dialog.

and if we can make it work in a way that the project can actually happen, that is absolutely on the table. thank you. thank you, commissioner nageswaran, did you have i don't know. oh, commissioner foley, sorry. yeah. so i, i have a couple things to say. i've actually had a bunch to say. it's, it is about the people of color and the cultural district, but your whole neighborhood hates it. so it's not just the people of color. it's not just the filipinos. everybody in your block hates it. nobody likes this. use every neighborhood, every every person that's living there from the firefighters i know, i know a lot of owners down there that just don't like it. so yeah, we have to we have to recognize that people of color have been displaced and that's been a big issue. but nobody likes it. number one. number two, the active space is a real issue. and the fact that the property owner has not been taking care of the property is a real issue. but the only thing we can really opine on is the

active use. and if we go let this thing go in with 1500 square feet of commercial space, which that organization may or may not activate it, who knows? and we talk about below market rent, rents. everything's cheap right now by the way. so i don't know what the rent is, but everything's cheap but active space around both street frontages are critical for this community. thank you. commissioner baldauf, and i'm sorry, commissioner baldauf, before you speak, i misspoke and i went outside the authority of what the hpc should be considering. we cannot consider any additional requirement of space. correct. so go ahead. but we can we can require active space. we can't require them to give commercial space correct within that. correct. but we can have them do active space along the whole per the code and not give them a waiver on active space. that's correct. sorry

about. it and can we say that we would like 25ft of active space on howard and russ at the ground level and are willing to if they do that, waive the upper level space as part of it. we'll have staff weight on that. monica fauci department staff. yeah, the commission could make a motion to that effect. the question, you know, just to reiterate what active space requirements exist. it's 25ft of active space to that depth of 25ft at the ground floor on every street facing facade, and then 15ft of depth on upper floors of active use as well. so thank you. so i would like to

make a motion that we consider approving this project in its with that modification and the inclusion and glass storefronts all the way down russell street, and that i think that it and the applicant can choose to accept or not do the project. but we give them the forbearance on the upper levels and we create an environment that school children can walk down along a lit storefronts. and i think there seem to be a lot of community groups that would be interested in taking up an offer that could be in good faith, negotiated or retail group or anybody, anybod, anybody. so that's my motion.

okay. i think we still have a few more. okay. no, i'd like to make comment. commissioner nageswaran. so i think i'm we're kind of getting closer to understanding this to a more specific level. and i appreciate what commissioner baldauf was trying to do. it is that active use. and i have another form of clarification, which mr. craig can also help me with is that we are providing a recommendation to the planning commission on the three items, or the three things that we are opining on correct. so i just want to make sure the hpc's actions are

clear. so one, you have to approve a permit to alter for the exterior, recommend, approve, approve. so you have full authority on all the exterior work that's occurring on this property. so that also means you can add conditions as is appropriate on the exterior work. the second part of your recommendations would be a recommendation to the zoning administrator on the feasibility of enhancing on whether or not the use enhance enhances the feasibility of preserving the building, and then the third is whether and this goes to the planning commission on whether or not an active use waiver should be granted. given the building's historic status. okay. thank you. monica jacomuzzi with department staff. i just would like to provide a little more background on that. it might be helpful to kind of separate them, the three actions a little bit more. so obviously use permit to alter permits to alter all the time. so i don't want to belabor that. section 803.9 is the waiver that goes to

the zoning administrator. and what's at question under section 803.9 is whether a self-storage use in any location in this building would enhance the feasibility of preserving the building. and that's the section that requires the project sponsor to develop and submit a historic building maintenance plan. very often you see this used for conversions to office use. so that might be familiar to you. and then finally, the topic that has been, you know, mostly discussed today is the active use waiver. and that's under section 140 5.1. so 140 5.1 governs street frontages on all public facing facades of buildings in certain zoning districts. and that's the one that gets referred to the planning commission. so you make it's part of your permit to alter motion, but you're kind of making a finding about your advice to the planning commission. and that's the only

part of this project before you today that would be heard at the planning commission tomorrow. that's very good to clarify. thank you. so yeah, i'm just going to restate this. so we are recommending to the zoning administrator whether the project and project inclusion of self-storage and commercial storage enhances the feasibility of historic preservation. and we are recommending to the planning commission whether the active use waiver is appropriate for this project to provide 25ft at the first floor street facades and 15ft on the upper facades, upper floors, and then the permit to alter the permit to alter is sort of our standard. looking at the various

rehabilitation scopes of work to approve a permit to alter for those items. and with that, i'm going to think about that and pass it on. okay. commissioner foley, i'm back. i, i think commissioner baldauf is actually going in the right direction of having all the ground floor spaces being active use. i personally would want the second and third floor too, but i'm not going to be too argumentative today. i'm trying to be nice in my in my december year or december month, but i would like to have the streetscape and the lighting on the building be pretty. and i think that goes to what i did at 1401 howard, there is a very robust exterior lighting plan. there is a very

robust streetscape plan. there's a very robust trees. so i think that if we had a very robust street plan, streetscape lighting plan, active use on the first 25ft on both howard and russ, i think i could i think i could buy off on this concept. commissioner baroni. thank you. i have a question to the sponsor, and it's with regard to the transparency of the glazing on the ground floor, architectural or otherwise. i think either one of you could answer, but as transparent as we can make it clear glass. okay. thank you. thank you, commissioner vergara. thank you. i have a question. i guess it goes best to mr. sucré since

we're asked to be doing three things. is it appropriate for us to take three separate votes, one on the permit to alter a second on the recommendation as to whether the use enhances the feasibility of preserving the building and then the third is on the active use waiver. does it make sense to have three separate votes? it might make sense because it does not sound like the hpc is 100% in alignment on terms of the direction on the project. so given that there are six commissioners up here and a different opinions on each of the matters, it might make sense to bifurcate the issues that way. and we can make amendments on all three. is that correct? correct. so right now keep in mind i don't think there has been a seconder to commissioner waldorf's original motion. right. and going to commissioner baldo's motion, an active use waiver would mean we would we would waive the 25 foot depth on the first floor of active use.

is that what we would be? it would be the 25 first depth on the first floor, as well as the 15 foot depth required on the upper floors. if we were to give that. correct. so if you're if you are wanting to support that waiver, that's basically what your support. you're basically telling the planning commission that you're supportive of that waiver on the ground floor and the upper floors, because right now i'm for a permit to alter, i'm for rec, and it seems to me that any use of the building as proposed here would would be more likely to preserve the building. but i'm not in favor of waiving the 25 foot depth on the first floor. i'm okay with the second and third floor, but not the first. so i'm two yeses and a no right now, if we were to break it up. commissioner baldauf, i guess i've done some thinking about this issue of breaking things up, and i think it would behoove us to have a

unified position on all three of these things, because i'm nervous of the developer going around us to planning and overturning something. and i think if we present an entire package that is thoughtful and considered that, then it becomes a more difficult thing to overturn. i think that many of us are in agreement with commissioner vergara about the first two. i'm not sure if all of us are in agreement about the third issue. so i think we yeah. can i make a can i can i make a push on a motion? i was going to say, and commissioner baldauf, i do want to assure you that if the hpc, regardless of whether or not it's unanimous or if it's by majority, decides on a

feature that the building needs to look at or be our department staff and or the planning commission will typically respect that fact. right? the planning commission doesn't have the ability to overrule the hpc on determinations that they make on landmark properties. so if you make the call on what a feature should be, planning staff institutes, what that feature should be, can i make a shot on a motion? sure. so is this a motion? just to clarify, is this a motion to add to commissioner baldock's motion or a new separate motion? just a little bit. a little bit of addition to commissioner baldauf. well, there was no second to commissioner baldock's motion. so it's sort of. so you're starting anew. i'll be a second. commissioner baldauf, with the, with the, with these additions. and that is to have a streetscape and a lighting plan to act, to light the building up 24 over seven and to have a street plan that's acceptable to the planning department. commissioner foley, the only issue we have a little bit with

the first part of your condition is that the streetscape work is not usually subject to the landmarking provision, so what you could do is encourage a streetscape plan as part of the permit to alter if the element is on the building itself, you have purview over it. if the element is on the street, you're the hpc does not have purview over it. you can also put it as a condition in terms of your motion for, for example, for to the zoning, your resolution going to the zoning administrator that you would want to enhance the adding these features would enhance the, you know, feasibility of preserving the building. for example, you could also include a finding recommending that the planning commission make that as a condition of approval. that is something that would be within the realm of the motion. but to commissioner baldock's point, the way i see it, because the

motion, the way it's drafted now is a single motion, there will be a single vote on that motion. so if you could find consensus throughout the three pieces or elements that you were making recommendations and approving, i think we're getting close. why don't why don't we do this? i just wanted to encourage you to get that. so commissioner baldauf is a much better communicator than commissioner foley. so why don't we let commissioner baldauf try to restate, restate a new motion that i would love to? second is that the chair's desire as well? i'd like to hear your motion. okay. and full. i would like to amend the motion that is has been presented to us by with the following that that active use be required on howard and russell street to a depth of

25ft. at the ground floor that no active use as is. i think currently contemplated be required at the upper levels that storefront glazing exist in all bays on russell street, as well as howard on the ground floor. and that we ask the planning commission. to. request or for street or sidewalk improvements that include street trees and lighting on the. we can't do that. i'm saying we are

asking the we're recommending to encourage or encouraging. i'm sorry encouraging the planning commission to do that. and i would say that what we could do is to actually ask for lighting on the building. that would would help with the safety on both howard and which would consist of howard and russ, howard and russ and frankly, all the way down past the parking lot so that it's a increases safety on on the way home. and this is all in addition to what has currently been proposed about the mural, about f a d f having their community space. is that correct? well, the mural would need to be relocated if, if the requirement to be

supportive of a mural we are supportive of. i'm supportive of the mural. it would need to be relocated. so, commissioner, you're getting close. just as a point of clarification, just to help provide some clarity in the motion before we get a seconder, i might add, for the storefront glazing that's there, i would just make sure that you put some parameters on it. so for example, we do have a 1976 photograph of the property that shows glazing on the facade. basically it's simple plate glass from floor to ceiling more or less is what happens. i suppose what i would have the intent of my proposal was to just continue the pattern that they had established in the first bay on russell street, down russell street. on well, i

thought it was important to try to carry it all the way down russell street because and replace all of the russell street bays in kind. but you're saying it's existing. is that what you're saying? well, i suppose that they could leave it and have that active use behind the existing. and it would only be the, the, the five bays or four bays. monica fauci, department staff, is it okay if i just provide some background on how the building was historically kind of composed and maybe that will help reach clarity on the point. i just want to make sure so that the motion is clear. the building was constructed in the 1920s to have a very expressive art deco sort of front portion that faces onto howard street, and then a much more utilitarian rear

portion, and that kind of accords with what the original use of the building was, which was both offices and production for a company that made artificial flavors, which is kind of interesting. but aside from that, we have a situation where half of the building is extremely expressive and that's where the storefronts existed historically. and then there's sort of a point of demarcation between that section and the utilitarian section, where there were roll up doors or more industrial steel sash windows that we wouldn't consider storefronts. so i just was hoping to clarify whether the intent is to have a storefront, a true storefront, run all the way down, russ, or some combination of active use in that front portion and non-active use later. just i'm saying active use in the whole front. but the storefronts can be differentiated between the bay that's been designed for the first bay that runs to the would

be the new lobby, and then after that, we could retain the existing glazing. but it would still have active use behind it. okay. can we leave that up and could we leave that determination the final what that's going to look like to staff the which portion is the storefronts on that on the russell street. no i want they've already designed it okay. they've already designed a bay. the first bay on on. russ and i think we can just say it's the five bays. okay. so basically ensuring that the storefront is consistent on the five art deco portion, basically the expressive pieces. yes. oka. so the other one that i would recommend that you give us some parameters on is, is the lighting on the building and making sure that it meets our typical standard for lighting, which is basically to avoid penetrations where possible. and

also ensure that we have historically compatible fixtures as part of your motion. that way, then we have a bucket of around that. so it's something that we can work with the owner on. i'm happy that you include that requirement. those requirements. and then just to be clear about the active use, because i'm a little confused myself, in short, is to not grant the active use waiver on the ground floor, but to grant it on the upper floors. yes. correct. perfect. i second that motion project sponsor. thank you. commissioners, i appreciate and respect where the commission is going right now. so i'm not here to debate that. the one thing i do want to make a point about is to the left of the russell street entrance, right at the center, essentially very costly, but able to be converted into active space. it's a it's something that is doable to the

right of the take a look at that frontage. i don't know how we're going to get an active use behind a concrete wall. it just the it's not set up in any way whatsoever that it could be something that is actually usable here. so to have it tied to the just have it tied to the storefront that's open. so it's going to have some space behind it over there. okay. i just want to point that out and make that point. so thank you commissioner. it just makes it bigger. that's fine. okay. i think we're finally reaching a consensus here. we have a second. i believe there's a motion that has been seconded. commissioners, any other final comments on this agenda item? the only question i have just so that we haven't shot ourselves in the foot in any way, these community organizations, are they considered active use? yes. so the one social service use is considered an active use under the planning code. good. okay. commissioners, there is a motion that has been. yes, commissione.

commissioner, don't hesitate. so i guess the one clarification i'd like to make sure associated with that active use is that we maintain transparency in the glazing on the ground floor. i think they're proposing translucency on the upper level. can staff answer that? monica fauci planning staff, thank you for bringing this forward, because this is something that i also did not consider while this motion was being made. so section 140 5.1 governs sort of all aspects of street frontage. and that includes active use, which we have talked about extensively today, but it also includes transparency and fenestration. and there is a requirement that ground floor spaces need to be 60% transparent. so we would need to take a look and do some math on these portions. or i should actually let me repeat restate that any active use has to have

60% transparency. if that's helpful. so that's why the version today has transparency where there is an active use, but not where there is not. so i do just want to say that a consequence of the motion that is before you is that we will have to make sure that mathematically, it meets that 60% transparency. i'm not sure if that's exactly what your question was, but it made me think of that, and i wanted to make sure it was on the record. thank you for reminding me of that. i think the question is whether we want to enable staff to continue to work with the sponsor, to maintain that 60% at the ground level and not have that requisite at the second floor level, which still requires active use in that. yes. i mean, that's your decision, obviously, as a commission, but when there's not an active use. so in the situation where an active use waiver is approved for the ground floor, but not upper floors, then the transparency requirement would not apply. just to clarify that point. and

then of course, you could always direct staff to work with the architect to on any details. we do direct staff to work. okay. commissioner warren, i, i would i would like the upper floors to be transparent glass rather than translucent. and if there was some sort of opaqueness, it would be done with something like a shade rather than changing the glazing. yeah. and that's typically what we advise applicants. it's easier to do a simple shade or. right. so otherwise it's inconsistent. so i would amend the motion to include to provide the waiver on the second and third floors with the stipulation that the glazing remain transparent. is that

okay? with our project, our motion? yes. with the addition that the glazing on the first floor should be 100% transparent to. so howard and russ, i would avoid requiring i would stick to what's in the planning code commissioner, just because especially with ground floors and storefronts and based on uses, there's often things that which you may well know that an architect has to put on the facade with regard to venting or lighting or fixtures and other things that need to get tucked that you don't want to be transparent from the street. and so if you make it 100%, it hamstrings the architect's ability towards tucking those things. 60% is not a very high bar. if i may, commissioners, please. i think it may have been confusingly stated earlier by me. so the section 140 5.1 requires that the ground floor

in total is 60% transparent, not that glazing is at least 60% transparent. so the ratio of solid to glazed. yes. okay. so do we have do you approve, commissioner then. and commissioner foley. great. i think we are finally ready. all right. i'm not sure i am, but let's let's see if i can restate this. there is a motion that has been seconded to not provide the exception to active storefront uses on the ground floor along howard and rest streets, preserving the 25 foot depth but providing the exception for the upper floors for no active uses. yeah, provided that the glazing remained transparent and then adding a recommendation to the planning commission to condition a robust streetscape and lighting plan on howard and russ

street rough streets for increased safety, avoiding penetrations and making sure it's compatible with the art deco architecture. did i capturing and didn't you say tree tree scape? yeah. well, streetscape a street scape. sorry. okay, i think there are two pieces to the lighting. there was the lighting on the building which has to meet the historic requirements regarding penetrations and the like. and then there was the landscape and lighting in the street. and so i think there are two things. wel, i just want to be captured in a lighting plan. but, but, but but the building lighting is the responsibility of the building, not. a landscape, whoever pud or whoever is doing it, we can, as i understand, just to help in this, the hpc is authorizing the

owner to put lighting on the building according to the provisions that we typically do on landmark properties, which would include avoiding, you know, a number of penetrations and ensuring that the proposed lighting is compatible with the building. overall. similarly, authorizing or requesting them to do this, we are authorizing it as we work with them on a lighting and streetscape plan. so, okay. and we are reflecting that we are making all the bays glazed. yes. okay. that was part of the motion. yes. okay. on that motion, commissioner baron. i commissioner baldauf i commissioner vergara. yes. commissioner. foley i commissioner warren. yes. and commissioner. president. matsud.

yes. so moved commissioners motion passes unanimously 6 to 0. great. thank you. i know we have some big agenda items still to review, so if you commissioners are willing to plow ahead without a break, let's go. let's go forward. okay. very good. commissioners that will place us on item eight for case number 2024. hyphen 007308 mta for the property at 430 bush street and 555 pine street. this is a major permit to alter. good job. excellent work. i wasn't going to reject it, so i'm glad that we came to this conference. thank you. i mean, i know they're slimy developers, but, you know, it's so hard to get community space. i know, i know, you know what what did i do? yeah. very good.

what did i do. very good, very good, very good. i know. i see. i get you a glass of purple wine tomorrow. you're so. great. all the time. okay. i think we're ready. alrighty. good afternoon, commissioners michelle langley, planning staff before you is a request for a major permit to alter to make exterior alterations at 430 bush street, located on the north side of bush street between grant avenue and kearny street. constructed in 1924 and designed by walter d bliss, the subject property is a six story category two building in the kearny market. mason sutter conservation district. the proposed scope of work includes the installation of a

20 foot tall rooftop generator and associated screening on the roof of 430 bush street with connecting pipes to serve 555 pine street. in the event of an emergency. situated beyond the existing parapet, the generator screening wall will be partially visible over the secondary west elevation from a limited distance along bush street. the connecting pipes located towards the rear of the west elevation of 430 bush street, will be painted to match the existing painted brick and will not be visible from the public right of way. staff finds that the proposed work will be in conformance with the requirements of article 11, and the secretary of the interior standards for rehabilitation entirely reversible. the proposed rooftop generation generator and screening wall are differentiated from the original building. materials will be painted to match the secondary elevation and will not be visible over the primary facade, and therefore therefore will not affect the building's overall appearance. situated at the

northern boundary of the kearny market, mason sutter conservation district staff finds the proposed work to be compatible with the character of the surrounding district, particularly in the massing and composition, scale, detail and ornamentation, and materials and color of the proposed screening design. the project is also seeking a downtown project authorization approval by the planning commission at a public hearing on december 12th to permit an exemption to the 80 foot height limit up to 130ft in the c, r, c3r zoning district staff's preliminary recommendation for this project is for approval. the department received one inquiry from an adjacent tenant for general information about the proposed project. this concludes my presentation. unless there are any questions, and the project sponsor also has a brief presentation of the project. project sponsor. you have five minutes. yeah. so this. let's

see if i can get this thing to stay up. so yeah this is a telecommunication facility for at&t. you probably all have a phone. and if you're in that area your phone call will more likely than not pass through that facility. this facility is, you know, all the emergency kind of things go through their government communications. everything goes through these buildings. so it's a it's a critical building. and the reason for the generator being installed is there you know, uses of communication devices have changed over the years. and so this is just a new need for the building to help with the redundancy for the building because it can't go down. so that's the reason for the new generator. 430 and 555 are connected. they've been connected since the very first

day that 555 pine was built after four, after 430 bush was built in 1924. and the there is no physical space left in 430 or in 555 pine to put the generator in 555 pine. we did look at tha, and we actually really were trying to put it in 555 pine into just the technical challenges became insurmountable. we did talk about putting the generator on the roof of 555 pine, but it's 17 stories tall and moving a big piece of equipment like that. on top of that is, i won't say impossible because we can we can go to the moon, but it's infeasible. that's i mean, that's the that's the high points of this project. it's a fairly simple thing. the visibility is pretty minimal. from 430 bush. we tried really hard. we really don't want to change the facade of the front

of 430 bush. it's a really elegant looking building and we don't want to mess with that. we did talk about other locations on the roof like to try and move it farther back to make it even less visible than it currently is, but there just aren't any good spots. you can see there's a lot of lot of equipment on that roof. the what else we've got, we've got cooling towers on the roof, we've got the generator that we're getting ready to add. we've got their cell phone equipment that's up there. it's just there's not really many choices in terms of location. i think. where's the. this, this this view which you've probably got in your presentation there shows how minimal it is from from bush street. so it sounds like chris has heard enough. unless there's any i've got, we can we can answer questions if there's any questions. but thank you. commissioner baldauf. did you

have a question? yeah, i have one quick question. question for the project sponsor? yes, for the sponsor. i assume this is a generator because we don't want phones to go down. yes, but i thought i saw piping for the fuel from the ground all the way. that's correct. how do you secure, like in the time of an earthquake? which is when i would think this is most important. these fuel lines to work out in a major earthquake situation. so this facility has about 72 hours worth of fuel in the in the parking lot. and then the fuel lines are welded. we're not putting in like some loose connected setup to go up to the roof. this is i call it standard. we do this in all of the telecommunication facilities that we work on throughout the state, and the country, really, and they're all welded. so to

maintain that, okay, i just was curious because i want my cell phone to work when we have the earthquake. yeah. so do i. are there any other questions, commissioner baroni? yes, i have a question for the sponsor. i'm not quite clear where the fuel tanks are. is that on the roof or is it? no. the fuel. so that's a complicated question. the main tanks are in the parking lot behind. it's technically part of the lot of five, five, five pine, but it's right next to 430 bush. the fuel runs into. so there's a generator on the first two generators actually on the first floor of five, five, five pine currently fuel runs to those. and then there's a transfer system that's going to run it up the side of the building and onto the roof of, of 430 bush. for this particular generator, the generator has what they call a day tank on it, which is to

give it a short amount of fuel, probably five hours or something like that worth of fuel. actually, in the on the generator skid itself. and so as that goes low, you'll pump fuel into it. does that help? yes. thank you. commissioner. right. yes. i also have a question for the project sponsor. and that's regarding the screen wall at the west side of the generator. and as i was looking through the drawing package, it wasn't there wasn't a detail that kind of showed the attachment of that or kind of like the way that it's aligned. is it is it flush? is the face of the screen wall flush with the face of the west wall below it, or is it set back at all from the wall in any way? and is there room for any kind of setback? okay, that's another good question. so originally, to

be perfectly honest, i thought we had designed it flush with the wall, was going back through looking at the package. it's actually about 18in back from the outside edge of the wall, 18in back from the from from the west face of the brick wall. yes. okay. yes. i think on here, if you look really hard at those dimensions down there, i think it says one foot five and some change down there in that corner on that, on that sheet right there. there is some flexibility to move it. but if you ask me to move it 20ft, i can't do that. oh yeah. yeah, yeah i was in my head thinking like a foot or two back from the face of the wall, just to have a little bit of a reveal. but yeah, i wasn't. i was having a hard time following the one foot five and a quarter in whether that was, you know, the back of the panel to the face. no. yeah. no, that's the front of the panel to the. yeah.

it's the front of the panel to the outside wall. okay. is that is currently shown at about 1.5ft. yep. okay. motion to approve. nope, nope. before we do that, we should take public comment if there's going to be any. would anyone like to make members of the public? is there any on this agenda in submitting any testimony? final call seeing none. public comment is closed. commissioner foley, motion to approve. what about commission comments were done. okay. we have a motion a second, second. thank you. commissioners. there's nothing further. i have a request. yes, the project sponsor to if to see if it's possible to move the screen wall back to two feet from the west face of the wall. how accommodating. thank you. yeah. so, commissioner wright, would you like that to be a condition

of approval? could that be part of the amend the an amendment to the motion. is the maker of the motion amenable? yes. is the seconder. yes. so that was two feet from where from the face of the west wall of the existing brick west wall. that was the screen. yes. very good. then, commissioners, there's a motion that has been seconded to approve with conditions as amended, to require that the screen be moved two feet from the face of the west wall. on that motion, commissioner baroni i, commissioner baldauf i commissioner vergara. yes. commissioner. wright. yes. commissioner. foley. commissioner. nageswaran. yes. and commissioner. president. matsuda. yes. so moved. commissioners. motion passes unanimously 7 to 0. and we'll place this on the final item on

your agenda today. item number nine for case number 2017. hyphen 012090 prga for the chinese american history context statement. this is an informational presentation. mike pence. good afternoon, commissioners francis mcmillan, planning department staff. the item before you today is an informational presentation on the draft chinese american historic context statement. i'm joined by the context statements. lead author grant dinh and eric ma, author of the report section on the richmond district. today's presentation will provide an overview of the project, recent community engagement efforts. feedback, feedback on the feedback on the draft report received to date,

and next steps towards finalization and adoption. initiated in 2017, in collaboration with the chinese historical society of america and supported by a grant from the office of historic preservation, a draft was completed in 2021. the chinese american historic context statement was authored by historian grant grandin, with contributions by eric ma, paul liu, steven b haynes, and william tran, with support from historic preservation consultants icf. peer review of the draft context statement was completed by scholars, planners, and community advocates in 2022, and a translation of the document was completed in 2024. over the past year, working with community engagement consultant incommon, the department has collaborated on a series of community events and projects featuring the context statement with the sunset chinese cultural district, western neighborhoods project and the san francisco public library. the chinese american historic context statement chronicles the history of the chinese american community in san francisco from

19th century through today, and covers topics ranging from immigration and community formation, the founding sorry, thank you. the founding of cultural of community and cultural organizations and religious institutions, neighborhood settlements and residential patterns, artistic and cultural expression, and the struggle for civil rights. beginning with challenges, many of them landmark legal challenges to the myriad discriminatory, discriminatory local, state, and federal laws and policies implemented in the 19th century through the asian american movement. student and community activism of the 1960s. 70s and 80s. the historic context statement also identifies numerous numerous properties associated with chinese american history that are potentially eligible for local landmark designation and legacy business registration, and includes recommendations for educational programing, programing and site interpretation. though the historic context statement is sweeping in its scope, it is not a comprehensive history of the chinese american community in san francisco. as a reminder, historic context statements are not intended to be exhaustive

histories. their purpose is to focus on key periods in a community, neighborhood, or city's history critical to understanding the built environment and provide a framework for identifying resources, historic context statements are also a foundational resource to advance equity goals and historic preservation, including the hbc's equity goals and recommendations outlined in resolution 1127. centering preservation planning on racial and social equity. they help identify sites of importance to communities that are eligible for landmarking and recommending policies to incentivize businesses, protect community spaces, and interpret significant sites. whether the physical fabric of a building exists or has been lost. context statements are also considered living documents and are updated as new information is learned about the people and places important to san francisco's communities. i will now turn the presentation over to grant dinh to talk about the development of the context statement and the history of the chinese american community in san francisco. thank you. francis. hello, commissioners. i really appreciate this opportunity to talk a little bit about the

project, the statement, this building, where can you see it? okay. there it is, is kind of a symbol of chinatown ching chong building. but you might not know the history behind it. it was built because chinatown was threatened to be moved to bayview hunters point. as many of you know, after the earthquake, the city leaders said, let's this is our chance. chinatown is in a great area. let's move it to bayview hunters point and the community actually organized. and despite it all being destroyed, worked together to even with bankers to say, we're going back, we're building right away and so people started building in chinatown and a man named looked in ely, a businessman had this vision as he marketed it as an oriental fairy palace, which would attract people from all around the world. and basically, you can see this building here with the pseudo-chinese pagoda on top, stuck on top. a western

building that worked. it kept chinatown from being pushed out of the out of the way. many buildings that came later in chinatown for example, the family associations often had a two story building. they'd add a third story with this facade. and so that's one of the things we look at in the context statement. what are where are the forces that made chinatown look the way it is, and then how the community grew and how it responded to as francis mentioned, discriminatory legislation and laws, how it thrived despite the exclusion laws and so on. and then with my colleague eric mah talking about the richmond district and then paloma, you and william tran about the sunset, able to talk about newer areas. we didn't get very far on the newest areas like visitacion valley, but we recognize that something worthy of further study. so i'll turn

it back to francis now. well, i really appreciate the outreach that planning has done, including publishing the whole context statement over 200 pages in chinese and pretty cool. quite amazing. yeah. thank you. grant. as noted, working with community engagement consultant in common over the last year, we've partnered with the western neighborhoods project, the sunset chinese cultural district, and the san francisco public library on a series of projects and public events. they've included presenting at the cultural district's open house in may, supporting the district's sunset our stories oral history project, which will with chinese american residents in the sunset, which will expand the information on the context statements. significant people, places and events in the sunset neighborhoods and our events have also included tabling at the richmond and ortega branch libraries, a community forum also at the ortega branch library and workshops, a community forum, and a focus group with the western neighborhoods project. the following slides include. thanks, eric. thank you.

highlights of engagement materials created for recent events, community forums, workshops and focus groups presented. what is included in the context statement and ask community what they would like to add, recognize and prioritize for further research or inclusion in the context statement. these questions focus on several themes included in the document, such as arts, arts, and cultural expression. important places, community leaders and organizations. i'll now turn the presentation over to eric mah to discuss recent engagement events a little bit further. thank you, francis and thanks, commissioners, for the great work that you do. really important for our communities. i just wanted to validate the grassroots and community involvement in the planning process from the sunset chinese cultural district to western neighborhoods project. it's great that woody labounty was here earlier, the founder of western neighborhoods project and the chinese historical society of america, the living document that grant has drafted many years ago. now, even before the racial and social equity

documents and action plan that you have. but i think that it really is in the spirit of racial and social equity. it's a living document, too. so even a site like the tatung kung fu studio has moved away from clement street now to geary. but it really gave us a sense in these community engagement meetings where there's a lot of overlap with the russian statement and many other communities, and also the stories and gaps that were brought up in the various community meetings in the richmond or the sunset, allowed residents from reps, from community organizations to just long time elders in the community to share a lot of the stories. and i think what planning the planning staff have developed with audio and storytelling in mapping ways really allowed us to engage the community even more. but i'm proud to have been part of this process with all the community partners. but thank you for your work. thank you eric. so this

slide also includes a little some additional highlights from feedback we received at community engagement events. and the suggestions include expanding the discussion of educational and religious institutions, additional neighborhoods, including upper chinatown, visitacion valley, and southeast san francisco communities, including additional businesses, residences of significant community members, and neighborhood pioneers. readers also noted that where the organization organization of the report could be improved to be more reader friendly to the public and to stress the contributions of chinese americans to san francisco's history, additional engagement is planned. thank you. additional engagement is planned in 2025. in collaboration with the chinese historical society of america and with the sunset chinese cultural district staff will be meeting with hsa and the cultural district in the new year to discuss how to engage with community, identify additional partners, and plan events in the in neighborhoods throughout the city. following engagement, staff will return to the commission for adoption of

the historic context statement. so finally, staff is requesting the commission to provide feedback. one more thank you. to provide feedback on the following questions. are there areas in the chinese american historic context statement that would benefit from further research or expanded discussion? does the commission recommend specific community organizations, advocates, historians, or other groups or individuals for additional review and public engagement? and how can department staff support this project as a living document? so this concludes my presentation, and we're all here to answer any questions you have. thank you. thank you. sorry to keep you waiting. hope it was entertaining for you just in case. is there anyone who would like to submit public comment? seeing none. public comment is closed in this matter is now before you. this is just an informational item, right? commissioners. commissioner vergara, thank you for this wonderful statement. it was it was so much fun to read. one

thought did occur to me in terms of what might enhance the context statement is a look at chinese americans involved in san francisco politics. editor lee gordon lau come to mind. the more recent members of the chinese american community that have served on boards like the board of supervisors and also private citizens who've been involved in politics, rose park, and the growing number of chinese americans that have been influential in decision making. recently, i think that would really enhance the report. but thank you. it was it was a joy to read. yes. thank you, commissioner foley. so super great. and i so my son is smarter than i am like most people. but he speaks mandarin and cantonese and we walk through chinatown every day. and he is a big activist at cpa chinatown progressive association. and today you gave me something that i get to go home and tell him something that he hopefully does not know, and

that is the sing chao building. so i'm super excited about this. i'm super excited about the work. i just love it. so thank you very much. thank you commissioner nageswaran. before you know, i did a valuation of a building in the, you know, area near chinatown. so a lot of it was quite familiar. i was like, oh yeah, i remember reading about this or researching some, some of this and then just going through it and seeing that the breadth of what you've covered is incredible. but then it is speaking to the complete integration of the community that, you know, built san francisco. so the other way i connect with it is being a child, immigrant and growing up in an area not in the bay area, that i wasn't in an area where i

saw people that were like me, or we were so busy learning how to become american that we really didn't think about the history of our own background. even though i'm very tied to it. so it's lovely to see that you've monumentalized it in this work that really a lot of communities don't do and is really strikingly important in documenting history because as as we see every day, people really are, are drawn and struck by history when it is documente, whether we like it or not. you know, we have oral histories, but the written history is really quite profound in

relaying who people are, what they've done, how they are part of the community. so i really appreciate this work and i would love to see that you present this work. you know, at libraries in across the city, you know, and have lectures and presented in cantonese and, you know, and, and have people come and listen to this history and then be even more engaged, maybe they provide more to the body of the work. so i appreciate it very much. thank you. thank you, commissioner baroni. thank you. i wanted to reiterate what my colleagues have said. this is a really impressive and voluminou, voluminous document. i do have a

question. it's probably more for staff. the these context statements are they updated on a cycle or a ten year basis or something all the time to see this continue? you know, it's going to continue to evolve. history is never ending. yeah. the key thing that we've been doing, especially in this round, is making clear that all of our context statements that we've adopted are living documents and that they can be and will be updated based on when information is provided to us. you know, i think one of the things we've learned is that we won't get it right always. you know, we will get about a good 80% or 85% draft, but we will never attain 100%. and we shouldn't, quite frankly, like a lot of these stories are still being told. and we want to make sure that the city, especially, is able to continue to

recognizing them and that we can kind of continue growing the history that a lot of these communities have. so thank you and thank you for your work. thank you, commissioner baldauf. yes, i echo the thanks. i had a couple of questions. one is that because this is i think, partially financed through the state and i'm curious what other historic context statements have been done for los angeles and for sacramento. and i'm just curious if you've looked at them and how do they compare sort of structurally and the like? we're better, i expect that, but. francis mcmillan, planning department staff yes, other cities have historic context statements as well. and los angeles has an extensive collection of context statements on architectural themes,

cultural themes. and we've actually been meeting with them regularly to talk through their processes with developing different context statements, particularly cultural context statements. so i was actually very specifically interested in chinese. yes, yes. cultural statements. yes. los angeles has a context statement on chinese american history in the city. okay. and my second sort of observation and question, and i may have just missed it, but i'm struck that sort of the history of chinese americans in san francisco, chinese americans in particular, in the field of architecture, is a fairly rich one. and that that there might be work added to this, that sort of recognize that. and because it seems a little bit i don't know, the sort of asian american eclectic style seems like, well, that's one part of it, but that

there's a much bigger history that could be explored. yes. and we can update the context statement to include that information, also reflect other context statements. also have are biographies are architect bios and context statement also has information that could inform this context statement and also again refer back to other context statements where that information is the hpc previously adopted what we call architects of merit, and we were purposeful to ensure that, like we are recognizing kind of a broad breadth of architects, you know, from various backgrounds and communities. but i guess i think it belongs in part in the historic context statement, because these are architects working in our community from the point of view of that culture, potentially. and i mean, i can think of gordon chong, who was the head of the aia nationally from a seat within san francisco. and so i

think that's actually a very relevant thing. yeah. phil choy was also a chinese american architect based in san francisco, and he was a historian and documented a lot of the chinatown buildings that we refer to in this study. so we owe a lot to that. so i guess i would celebrate that. great. thank you, commissioner. right. thank you. i want to echo the comments that my fellow commissioners have made and also just thank you for this amazing document. i agree with the suggestions for ways to continue to expand the information that will feed into this and just encourage you to continue with the planned meetings going forward and community outreach going forward and incorporate anything that that comes from that into this document. it's

very rich. thank you. thank you, thank you. i really, really enjoyed reading this document. and i do have a few questions and comments, and i'm not sure if my first question is a loaded question or if it's just a naive question, but how come clement street is not a chinese cultural district? is that not a good question to ask? when i asked my twin brother gordon, when he was developing the sunset chinese doing that, no. or he didn't want to extend a chinese historic area to the richmond, he wanted to keep it to read this document. and it seems that clement street was way, way before sunset. actually, i remember sunset being pretty white when i was growing up, and by the time i was a young person, clement street had already developed a pretty good chinese community and business area. so i don't know if that's

something that should be considered, but i do think that clement street in some ways should be recognized, and i really appreciate, francis, you putting forward the effort to translate this document. it's so important because if you're chinese speaking, you, you there's no distinction between mandarin and chinese and cantonese in the writing. so it's so empowering for them, for people who are native chinese speakers to be able to read about their own history. and i really thank you for that. we didn't have to push you. you did it on your own. and i think that's something that the chinese american community really has to acknowledge, because we're talking about a totally different era where planning staff on their own sees these sensitivities and these these important cultural aspects that really need to be pushed forward. and i really thank you for doing that. and then just in terms of cultural competency, i did mention this to grant off record, but i do think it's okay

to incorporate chinese characters in a document, because sometimes the chinese characters really mean some really symbolic, significant things. and i think it's okay. i mean, we're not filling the document with a bunch of things, but i think it's okay to have 1 or 2, because if you're chinese speaking, you would really want to make sure that that nuance and that symbolism is part of any document. and then unfortunately and we want to stop repeating history, but there is a possibility that we're going to see, you know, some immigration stuff coming up. and i think it's really important for people to see the actual examples of things that were put upon chinese americans, the restrictive covenants, the, the, the nasty language that were in local ordinances. san francisco was not a friendly town, particularly to asian americans. and i think that it's important for people to see that so that people will know what we

were about and how far we have come. and then in terms of one area, in terms of cultural competency that i really learned a lot from, and i thought could be further expanded, is the symbolism particularly you mentioned it on d25 about cutting of the hair, the queue. it should be more than just a news article because that was so important to chinese men, and for them to be forced by legislation to cut that off is something that i really thought that that could be expanded upon. i thought worshiping the you know, faith based organizations could be expanded upon. i mean, christianity did play a role. yeah. christianity helped save women. but, you kno, faith based organizations play a role still today, right? in the way we in which we believe. if it's not dao, it's buddhism, confucianism, those things are still a very big part of our

community, not only the chinese community, but asian american community and sharp park. i didn't i didn't know that even though grant and i are on a sharp park interpretive committee, i didn't know that about sharp park. and then the only other area that i thought in terms of the kind of a constant consolidation was when you talk about the richmond and sunset district, you talk about it twice, one on 18 and 19, and then again on d 31, 39 and 41. i thought that could be consolidated rather than being more piecemeal, because i think that would be more effective to show the impact of chinese americans in that area. and then i really believe and support your recommendation on the further exploration of intangibles, because many communities of color didn't have the economic means to show it in built environments. i mean, the example that grant show was great, but many, many people did not have that ability. so to

talk more about the intangibles, the cultural festivals that we have, the cultural food that we eat, i think are really important. and then because this is a living document, we should start to maybe not now, but maybe 20 years from now. talk about what happened during covid and asian hate. and within asian hate, all the things we could. you know, we didn't mention vincent chin in here. but, you know, unfortunately asian hate still exists. so i think that would maybe be something that you might want to add. and that's it for me. oh yeah. and then in terms of commissioner vergara, i thought that was a really good point about bringing up leaders. you know, not only elected leaders, but community leaders like rose park. i mean, you know, there's some controversy about her, but she was definitely a leader. lim p lee was a leader, right. and some other folks and then not only for architects, but there are also other civic and community leaders. lawyers too. right? lawyers played a big role

in got to plug the lawyers you know, in community change. so maybe consider maybe just listing. that's all. i'm done. jonas. okay. just making sure. just so that concludes this this item and your hearing today. but that's the end of our hearing for this year, folks. thank you for sticking it out with us. no we don't. well, i was going to say there are no items on your december 18th advance calendar. and if that remains to be true, so i expect it to we will cancel the december 18th hearing. happy holidays. see you tomorrow at the planning department party. be in your finest. rich is collecting money and we are adjourned.

[music] >> san francisco is known as yerba buena, good herb after a

mint that used to grow here. at this time there were 3 settlements one was mission delores. one the presidio and one was yerba buena which was urban center. there were 800 people in 1848 it was small. a lot of historic buildings were here including pony express headquarters. wells fargo. hudson bay trading company and famous early settlers one of whom william leaderdorph who lived blocks from here a successful business person. african-american decent and the first million airin california. >> wilwoman was the founders of san francisco. here during the gold rush came in the early 1840s. he spent time stake himself as a merchant seaman and a business

person. his father and brother in new orleans. we know him for san francisco's history. establishing himself here arnold 18 twoochl he did one of many things the first to do in yerba buena. was not california yet and was not fully san francisco yet. >> because he was an american citizen but spoke spanish he was able to during the time when america was taking over california from mexico, there was annexations that happened and conflict emerging and war, of course. he was part of the peek deliberations and am bas doorship to create the state of california a vice council to mexico. mexico granted him citizenship. he loaned the government of san francisco money. to funds some of the war efforts

to establish the city itself and the state, of course. he established the first hotel here the person people turned to often to receive dignitaries or hold large gatherings established the first public school here and helped start the public school system. he piloted the first steam ship on the bay. a big event for san francisco and depict instead state seal the ship was the sitk a. there is a small 4 block long length of street, owned much of that runs essentially where the transamerica building is to it ends at california. i walk today before am a cute side street. at this point t is the center what was all his property. he was the person entrusted to be the city's first treasurer.

that is i big deal of itself to have that legacy part of an african-american the city's first banker. he was not only a forefather of the establishment of san francisco and california as a state but a leader in industry. he had a direct hahn in so many things that we look at in san francisco. part of our dna. you know you don't hear his anymore in the context of those. representation matters. you need to uplift this so people know him but people like him like me. like you. like anyone who looks like him to be, i can do this, too. to have the city's first banker and a street in the middle of financial district. that alone is powerful. [music]

>> my name is kristen cline the owner of two vintage stores in san francisco. vacation is a leave 11 years old. started in the tenderloin. it is vintage shop we buy from the public and keep in the store for avenue wn. it is an electic store. we moved from the tenderloin to north beach in 2022 in december we opened up our sister store 4 doors down. this is vacation and that is called work. we pay attention to the quality of things. we do everything from antique clothes from 1800s up to modern. i try to buy things that are relevant and wearable for all typeoffs people. we have customers that are in there 70 and we got customers 17.

everything is affordable as possible, but specialize in a lot of things that are expensive. you see a lot of shirts on the walls. those are super collectible and we have a big collection of those. we do vintage denim and 1930 and 40 clothe. we are saving from being gone forever. my second shop is with business partner sam and that is a a collective, 10 different sellers all under the one roof. it is fun watching people come into the shop, because you hear a lot of oo and a h or my mom had this or this looks like grandmas and i had thish in the 70 or this is what i wore in high school. the kids are trying it on. we have shoppers that know the

store and come here as a destination, but the random foot traffic is always cool to see them discovering something that maybe they haven't seen before. i love san francisco and i feel i would never want to do this anywhere else. >> i'm the commission's president. we will start with announcements. >> we would like to start the meeting with the land acknowledgment.