is impact. that is a heartfelt, you know what, me work want in vain. that work is unmatched so to speak. >> they like family. they help, they check in, call me, see how i'm doing, you know? and i'm very thankful. they have that good at mosphere where you don't have to be scared, you don't have to feel you all by yourself, because they there and they have been there.

. >> good afternoon everyone. this meeting will come to order. welcome to the march 10th 2025 regular meeting of the ladies and transportation committee of the san francisco board of supervisors. i'm supervisor marina melgar, chair of the committee joined by vice chair supervisor cheyenne chen and supervisor bilal mahmood, the committee clerk today is john carroll and i would also like to thank alina mendoza at s.f. captive for staffing this meeting. mr. clerk, do you have any announcements? >> yes, thank you, madam chair. please ensure that you've

silenced your cell phones and other electronic devices you may have brought with you into the chamber today if you have any documents to include as part of any of today's files you can submit them to me. public comment will be taken on each item on today's agenda when your item of interest comes up and public comment is called please line up to speak along your right hand side of the room. alternatively you may submit public comment in writing in either of the following ways. first you may email your written comments to me at g o h and period s.r.o. l l as f g of or g or you may send your written comments via us postal service to our office in city hall. the address is one dr. carlton be good place room 244 san francisco, california 94102 if you submit your public comment in writing i will forge a comment to the members of this panel and also include your comments as part of the official file on which you are commenting. items acted upon today are expected to appear on the board of supervisors agenda of march 18th 2025 unless otherwise stated. >> madam chair, thank you so much mr. clerk.

>> please call item number one agenda item number one is an ordinance accepting irrevocable offers of public infrastructure associated with the treasure island and yerba buena island project for the bruton sanitary excuse me sanitary sewer pump station on bruton street and the cravath sanitary sewer pump station on cravath street both on treasure island and the mccullough sanitary sewer pump station on mccullough road and the north gate sanitary sewer pump station on north gate road both on nearby bueno island dedicating this infrastructure to public use, designating it for utility purposes or accepting the public infrastructure for city maintenance and liability. approving a grant deed for the mcallen pump station adopting findings under sequoia, making findings of consistency with the general plan in the eight priority policies of planning code section one and 1.1 and accepting a public works order recommending various actions in regard to the public infrastructure as well as authorizing official acts in connection with the ordinance. >> thank you so much, mr. clerk. we are now joined by a frequent

guest of the ladies and chance rotation committee at district six supervisor matt dorsey. >> so i'm going to turn it over to you before the tharp presentation. >> welcome back. thank you so much chair melgar and thank you committee members for being here today and for calendaring this item as chair melgar knows for many hearings that have happened in this committee over the last few years we have finally begun to see some real progress on the long planned development of treasure island with the buildout of housing parks, infrastructure and other public benefits. many of the earliest announced plans for treasure island actually paralleled my own earliest roles in the buildings here in city hall more than 20 years ago. so it's incredibly gratifying to see the promises that were made to treasure island finally being fulfilled. and when we talk about the amount of housing production that's going to happen there, it's close to 8000 units which is close to 10% of the the housing element reach a regional housing needs assessment targets that we have for our city before us today is

the acceptance of a key component of wastewater infrastructure the sanitary sanitary sewer pump stations on the islands which sometimes for those of you new to treasure island will sometimes refer to the islands because it includes yerba bueno island. >> we are joined today by staff from public works who will give a presentation on this acceptance and a brief overview of the new island infrastructure as well. tido director bob beck is here and available. hi bob and thank you for all your work on this. but he is here i don't think he has planned to speak but he's available for any questions as the person who was the you know, the most knowledgeable authority on this through the chair i'd like to invite up desmond chan from public works for a brief presentation. >> welcome.

good morning supervisors. my name is desmond chen and i'm a project manager in public work with the infrastructure task force. joining me today is bob beck, the director of title. i'll be presenting bob's file number 250098 for the treasure island of baboon island development project regarding for acceptance of public improvements which includes four sanitary sewer pump stations, two on treasure island and two on your boat an island. and we're requesting acceptance of this public infrastructure for public use as a general overview of this development, this project is a major development agreement project that is being developed by the treasure island community development or to produce up to 8000 homes including below market rate units extensive parks and open spaces, a ferry terminal and expanded marina hotels, restaurants, retail entertainment and art.

public works has managed the design and coordination and we're bringing the four pump stations to you today for acceptance and to update the committee on the progress on the islands. the project has constructed 974 units between a mix of affordable rental and market rate housing. in the next phase there is approximately 1250 units planned 725 market rate units and stage one and 490 affordable units in upcoming stage two. as for the recently completed and upcoming parts parks we have four that are constructed and open to the public and we have three that will be completed this year. >> and just to orient you with the project as part of stage one shown here in the colored portion of the map there will be roughly 2000 residential units 10,000 square foot of retail space and 16 acres of parks and open space. back on february 6th, 2024 of last year the street and public infrastructure for stage one of treasure island and your viewpoint island was accepted under b o. s file number 231245. this included new streets,

sidewalks, curb ramps and landscaping. >> it also included all the underground public infrastructure such as wet utilities, sewer storm drains, low pressure water, recycled water and supplemental fire water system and dry utilities joint trench electric communications and street lights. this last item remaining for acceptance and stage one are the four pump stations that we're presenting you today. the locations of the four pump stations are shown here on the or in orange on this diagram these pump stations are currently operating and a pre acceptance license agreement between the sub divider treasure island development authority tighter and the city acting by and through spc sipc will be owning and maintaining these pump stations and tighter and sipc have provided their recommendations for acceptance . >> here's an overview of the new sanitary sewer system and the pump stations on treasure island and river point island. the pump stations are all operational but has final punch list work to be completed so previously it was not ready for acceptance for full formal acceptance in the city's effort

to partner with a developer to support housing production, the street and public infrastructure which includes the sewer infrastructure for stage one was accepted in advance of the pump stations. now that all the work is complete, the last item remaining is for this acceptance of the pump stations . >> >> here are some photos from 2022 and 20 23 of the construction progress of the new pump stations on the islands. >> here are some photos from last year of the completed pump stations that are discreetly hidden behind these metal enclosures on the islands. >> in summary, the following is the proposed legislation acknowledging titus recommendation to accept the pump stations adopting bio's phone number 250098 that recommends acceptance of these pump stations adopting findings under the california environmental quality act making findings of consistency with the general plan and planning code section 121.1 accepting the pump stations for city maintenance liability

purposes and dedicating the pump stations to public use. with your recommendation to the full board we need to accept these last remaining four pump stations so that the pre acceptance operating license between the sub divider and the city can end and the city through spew c can own and operate these pump stations. this concludes my presentation and i can answer any questions related to the pump stations. >> thank you. >> thank you mister. yeah i don't have any i don't have any questions. >> i don't know if colleagues do. i don't have any questions. >> thank you, mr. champion. thank you. presentation. and with that let's open this item up for public comment please. >> mr. clerk. thank you, madam chair. land use and transportation will now hear public comment on agenda item number one. if you have comments for this item related to these pump stations on treasurer winner treasure island excuse me in your else please come forward to the lectern at this time. >> and madam chair to press we have no speakers. >> okay. without public comment on this item is now closed.

>> mr. clerk. i'd like to make a motion that we send this out to the full board with a positive recommendation on the motion offered by the chair that the ordinance be recommended to the board of supervisors vice chair chin chin i. member marchman mahmud i melgar i melgar i. madam chair there are three eyes that motion passes. >> thank you. congratulations. supervisor dorsey mr. clerk please call number two and three together. >> agenda item number two is an ordinance amending the general plan to reduce commercial development requirements in the central soma area plan and the transit center district sub area plan areas and agenda item number three is an ordinance amending the planning code and zoning map to reduce commercial development requirements in the central soma special use district and remove the transit center c30 sd commercial special use district. both ordinances affirm secret determinations from the planning department make findings of consistency with the general plan in the eight priority policies and planning code section 121.1 and adopt findings of public necessity,

convenience and welfare under planning code section three four zero and 302 respectively . >> thank you again. supervisor dorothy lazarus. >> continuing on with my role as special guest star for the land use committee meeting today. thank you chair melgar we had a very informative and productive hearing last week where the planning department presented an overview of the central soma plan the commission's recommendations and in turn the amendments that my office and planning have been working on. we had a fantastic showing of support from various organizations and stakeholders and there is a lot of excitement to move forward on on this these legislative items and these amendments these amendments to item three the planning code language propose providing flexibility for developers to either build commercial or residential product projects within certain parameters while still ensuring that the expectations of the central soma plan come to fruition. the final version of these amendments have been circulated to you and to your staffs.

to restate the concept of the amendments we are first focusing the exemption on the from the two thirds nonresidential ratio to only residential projects under 600ft through a residential density program and to retaining the key benefits negotiated for the plan's key sites. as you'll see in the language, we are creating this program by calling out the key sites and the benefits that are associated with each. i do want to note the change to the long title so this will read and i was told i should read this into the record ordinance amending the planning code and zoning map to reduce commercial development requirements for certain residential project projects and modify the land dedication requirements in the central soma special use district and remove the transit center see three zero sd commercial special use district. >> affirming the planning department's determination under the california environmental quality act and making findings of consistency with the general plan and the

eight priority policies of planning code section 101.1 and adopting findings of public necessity, convenience and welfare under planning code section 302i want to once again thank all the city staff and district six community stakeholders for their work and engagement on this thanks especially to madison tam from my office for her tireless work on this and she asked me to extend my gratitude to others including from the office of economic and workforce development and topia and jacob bentley from the planning department director hillis audrey malone maloney joshua swiss ski and from the city attorney's office austin yang and peter mill, john miller, john h. and if i'm leaving anybody out i blame me not madison. after public comment i would respectfully request that the committee incorporate these amendments and send the items to the full board with a positive recommendation. >> thanks so much. thank you. supervisor dorsey we have a

audrey maloney i don't see josh so it's key but at whoever is going to presenting or did you have anything to say? thank you chair melgar the department doesn't have anything additional to present. >> okay. thank you ms. maloney let's go to public comment first and then if you then we can adopt the amendments and okay, let's have public comment first. >> thank you. land use and transportation will now hear public comment on agenda item numbers two and three related to central summer and transit center district commercial development requirements please come forward to the lectern if you have public comment for these two items. hello supervisors david wu with soma filipinas i wanted to again thank the planning department and the planning commission the mayor's office supervisor dawsey and iwd for moving forward these amendments so my pilipinas and som can and other community advocates have been calling on the city to keep its promises to community members regarding central soma and promise community benefits. we are glad the city has

responded to our calls and amended the legislation to ensure that the key side benefits are retained. so my filipinas and and community members spoke at the planning commission hearing for this legislation last november regarding our concerns as a result of community advocacy, the planning commission made a recommendation that the key side benefits be retained in this legislative change to the plan. we are glad that these recommendations have been incorporated and that the needs of low income working class and immigrant residents and families reflected in land for 100% affordable housing, public open space and other neighborhood amenities are being prioritized. we hope that there could be more proactive ways that impacted communities are reached out to before legislation is introduced in the future and we look forward to working collaboratively with the mayor's office and the board of supervisors. >> thank you. thank you for your comments. next speaker please. >> good afternoon.

supervisor zack eisenberger with young community developers. i just wanted to reiterate my comments from last week in 2021 why kd was awarded affordable housing development rights for the key site at 88 bloxham in central soma. initially we were concerned that this legislation would jeopardize our ability to deliver much needed affordable housing to the soma community. however, we are encouraged by the inclusion of community requested amendments that guarantee the retention of public benefits including land dedication 400% affordable housing. >> these changes will safeguard our development rights and ensure that the city honors its commitment to the soma community. again, i want to thank supervisor dorsey, the mayor's office and the planning department for addressing the community's concerns by ensuring that public benefit commitments remain intact. as a city we must prioritize community serving infrastructure particularly affordable housing in high risk displacement areas like central soma. these amendments ensure that this priority is upheld. so i want to thank you for your partnership and consideration and thank you for your comments.

>> do we have anyone else who has public comment for agenda item numbers two and three? >> madam chair okay with that public comment on this item is now closed. i would like to make a motion that we adopt the amendments as presented by supervisor dorsey at the file 2407873 on the planning code and zoning map. >> okay let's let's take just amendment first. yeah we have a motion from the chair that the zoning map amendment item an agenda item number three be amended on that motion vice chair chin chin i member marchman my committee chair melgar i melgar i madam chair there are three eyes and then i'd like to make a motion that we send item to the general plan amendment and the amended planning and zoning map item three forward with a positive recommendation to the full board motion offered by

the chair that agenda item number two be recommended to the board of supervisors and agenda item number three be recommended to the board of supervisors as amended on those motions. vice chair chin chin i remember one moment i chair melgar i melgar i madam chair there are three eyes once again right. >> thank you. congratulations supervisor dorsey and thank you for all the community input into this really important item. >> thank you planning staff okay let's go to item number four please. >> agenda item number four is an ordinance amending the planning code to allow tourist hotels and motels to be used for interim housing without thereby abandoning or discounting sorry discontinuing the hotel use classification under that code it means the building code to allow interim housing without thereby changing the underlying occupancy classification of the property and amends appendix p to remove restriction that emergency housing be located on land owned or leased by the

city. the ordinance affirms the planning department sequel determination and makes findings of consistency with the general plan and the eight priority policies of planning code section one a 1.1 and findings of public necessity convenience and welfare under planning code section three zero two okay i thank you so much. >> hold on ms. flores i'm going to have a supervisor dorsey share a few remarks. >> thanks so much. thank you chair for letting me speak briefly once again on on this just before the presentation i understand that there are some amendments that will be offered today and that there are is some concern from labor stakeholders. for what it's worth, i want to express that i share concerns of labor about the loss of hotel jobs and more broadly i have concerns about losing tourist hotels even if temporarily while lower hotel occupancy rates and hospitality is struggling right now. i think there are legitimate worries about the message that might be sent were it to be seen as us giving up on hotel

uses for the long term. and i think this is particularly worrisome knowing what we know now about the unanticipated costs in damages to shelter in place covid era shelter in place hotels that were many of them i think probably a disproportionate level in my district that incurred significant you know, not just damages but deterioration in street conditions but for the shelter in place programs damage costs alone ended up exceeding $60 million. so i do want to express my strong support for the sober living pilot that h. s h is working on in my district at the civic center motor inn. i really appreciate the work that you have done on this. we had a very promising community meeting on this project last week and it was gratifying to hear from neighbors and residents who obviously express legitimate concerns whenever there is a project in the neighborhood. but it was gratifying to me to hear from people who really

understand the importance of doing more to support and incentivize long term recovery from those of us who struggle with addiction. there is no higher priority for me in this building so i really appreciate the exception for the sober living pilot. i think it's a narrow and appropriate exception. so thank you again chair melgar for having me and letting me speak to this item as well to run the table on every item that i have something to say about and i promise this will be the last thing i say unless there's a question for me. but all i just appreciate it. >> thanks so much. okay. thank you. supervisor dorsey. >> now let's have ms.. flores to the presentation. thank you, chair melgar, veronica flores planning department staff i'll keep this brief. >> the planning commission heard this item on december 12th and adopted a recommendation for approval with anticipated amendment and that anticipated amendment eight was to require h s h to work with the interim housing provider if any to relocate

existing program participants when the interim housing closes . i believe that amendment is reflected in the revised version that was circulated this morning and we ask that that amendment be moved today. this concludes the planning commission report and i will hand it off to deputy director emily cohen. >> good afternoon chair members of the committee my name is emily cohen, deputy director at the department of homelessness and support of housing and i'm happy to be here with you today to discuss an amendment to the planning code that would allow hotels and motels to be used for interim housing without abandoning or discontinuing their land use designation. noting that through our engagement with stakeholders community stakeholders over the last several months we are bringing forward some amendments today to speak to some of the labor concerns. we have heard and to narrow that to narrow the scope of the ordinance as well as to call

out three specific former cip hotels that need to return to tourist status when they wind down their use as shelter. so a lot of amendments at the end of this very brief presentation. but first i want to thank chair melgar for your support in this for continuing the item in february giving us time to work with the community to come to amendments that i think everyone can get very close to agreeing on. >> so a little background on the amendment or on the ordinance. this is intended to be a tool to help us engage hotel and motel owners citywide to support the diversification of where we housed temporary shelters. you know, we did a request for information a few years ago to solicit interest from hotel owners in partnering up with us to open shelter and frankly all we got were hotels downtown and some of the feedback we got and by downtown i really mean tenderloin and soma and the

feedback we got from hotel owners at that time was that there designation as a tourist hotel was too valuable in that even if they were compelled and interested in working with us on the short term they did not want to give that up and that's where this ordinance was born out of was intended to be an incentive for hotel owners to work with us. so we could diversify the location of many of our shelter programs as we look at expanding capacity, this legislation also aligns with various pieces of state legislation that that the governor has recently approved to support the use of hotel and motor underused hotels and motels for interim housing. so the amendment or excuse me the ordinance amends the planning and building code to authorize interim housing as hotels and motels without the site abandoning or discontinuing its hotel youth

use authorization under the planning code the site owner will submit an application for interim housing to the planning department which would alleviate them of the onerous and often expensive process of regaining their tourist status. >> it exempts the conversion of interim housing from development standards typically applied to new construction supporting a more cost efficient and timely process. it also allows interim housing to be located on city owned or lease property or through a contractual agreement between the city and a third party such as a nonprofit service provider . >> as was mentioned before this ordinance was heard at the building inspection commission in november and the planning commission in december and was supported. >> so as i will read when we get into the specific amendments we are narrowing the use of this ordinance because of the concerns of labor largely to focus in on the one

pilot or the one pending project we have that we are looking at a motel conversion for a motel use and this is the sober living and sober independent living pilot program that we are in the process of opening in partnership with positive directions and the salvation army and this is an up to two year transitional housing program for people experiencing homelessness who are committed to require to recovery and sobriety. and it's a really unique model for us and it's very exciting way to diversify what we have to offer people coming out of the crisis of homelessness and really provide a more client centered way to support folks in recovery who are also experiencing homelessness. >> and this property would require this kind of process through the through the planning department in order to retain its tourist designation after the use as a transitional housing program is up.

okay, so lots of amendments that we want to make today and all of this is really has been really developed out of talking with members of the board labor neighborhood groups, coalition on homelessness planning advocates really a whole host of community folks and i think we've come to a fairly agreeable term here so as i mentioned we're proposing amendments to the ordinance to limit the scope to the civic center motor inn for uses the sober living transitional housing program so the big the first amendment chair i assume you'd like me to read this into the record. okay. a general finding on page seven lines 16 and 716 through 17 and line 24 would be adding see a hotel or motel identified in this subsection 202. 15c

interim housing is authorized at the following location block 3519 lot 006 in section 2o2 .15 page seven lines 223 and 24 to read a hotel or motel existing after april 1st 2020 5th may apply to establish interim housing pursuant to this section at the request of supervisor chen we're also adding a finding related to our intent around labor and union workers at hotels. so this is general finding i page six lines one through three historically and programmatically it just h works with our contracted service providers to try and retain any existing staff. this practice encourages continuity and offers existing workers to continue employment

in their existing capacities. >> hsa has already begun conversations with west side community services, the nonprofit operator of the plan sober living program to engage the existing property owner in those conversations around staff retention continuing with the amendments the general finding page five of lines 21 through 23 i many hotels and motels are currently staffed by union represented workers. nothing in this ordinance is intended to interfere with successorship and suppose under federal law then the amendment that was discussed at planning commission is generally finding page five lines one through 11 the department of homelessness and supportive housing has expertise working closely with building owners, nonprofit providers and clients to

responsibly wind down shelter programs in the client centered manner in advance of any interim housing ceasing its operations. hsa has slated that it intends to offer program participants a housing assessment through the city's coordinated entry system. h. s h intends to offer housing to any such participants who are designated as housing referral status through that assessment and comparable shelter placement while the participant awaits housing placement participants who are not eligible for city funded housing will be offered a comparable shelter bed if any all program if available. excuse me all program participants will at a minimum be offered a congregate shelter placement prior to the closure of interim housing. prior to the closure of interim housing h. s h intends to notify a broad set of community stakeholders notify excuse me community stakeholders section the next amendment is section 2021.5

page eight lines 20 through 25 and page nine lines one through two termination of an interim housing use prior to the termination of the interim housing authorized under section 2021.15 the department of homelessness and supportive housing shall work with the interim housing service provider if any to relocate to relocate existing program participants prior to the time of expiration of any agreement to provide interim housing, the property owner or landlord shall provide notice to address each of its intent not to renew an agreement with the city or the interim housing provider in order to allow h s h and the service provider time to assist in relocating existing program participants of the interim housing is a little bit of administrative cleanup on page nine line 25 we're removing the word planning code from line 25

sorry this is really in the weeds for everyone but the second set of amendments that i'm going to read into the record are really intended to to support the hotel owners who partnered with the city during the shelter in place crisis when the shelter in place or excuse me when the covid emergency ordinance wound down came to an end h s h closed the vast majority of our shelter in place hotels and because those were closed during the period of time of the covid emergency, those hotels were able to go back to their tourist use without a belabored process. we did hang on to three properties that have now been open past the covid window and are therefore no longer able to access a speedy process for regaining their tourist status. >> so we did create specific amendments to call out the covid the monarch and the dante

hotels. the covid is already closed but the monarch and the dante are still open. but when they close the intent is for them to be able to regain their tourist status without a burdensome process or extensive fees. >> and this is really in response to concerns from the supervisor but also from the neighborhood advocates who really want to see these properties return to a tourist use when they're done providing critical shelter capacity. and so this is an amendment to the long title page one lines five through five through six and eight. our ordinance amending the planning code to allow tourist hotels and motels to be used for interim housing without thereby abandoning or discontinuing the hotel use classification under the code and authorizing the reestablishment of hotel use for certain shelter in place hotels amending the building code to allow interim housing without thereby changing the

underlying occupancy classification of the property allowing reestablishment of hotels use for shelter in place hotels general findings j and k with background on this the shelter in place hotel program an expansion of the unintended consequences a former cip hotels not struggling to regain their tourist status the amendment is on page six lines four through nine item k as part of the initial response to covid 19, the city launched the shelter in place hotel program. the cip hotel program made a historic commitment to serving the unhoused population by providing non congregate shelters for over 3700 people experiencing homelessness who are most vulnerable to covid 19. over the course of the program hsa served 3356 adult guests in these non congregate hotel sites and two thirds of eligible guests were exited to

permanent housing. >> page six lines ten through 14 item l. one unintended consequence of the cip program is that participating hotels could have abandoned or discontinued the previously approved hotel use their previously approved hotel use it is reasonable to permit the hotels that participated in the cip program to reactivate their hotel use and not require strict compliance and then going on to page nine lines three through 18 i think you just read okay go back to the title page which is just specific just because you read this. okay perfect. >> okay. so then back to the long title page one lines five through eight and authorizing the reestablishment of hotel use for certain shelter in place hotels amending the building code to allow interim housing without thereby changing the

underlying occupancy classification of the property allowing reestablishment of hotel use for shelter in place hotels. >> thank you for your patience while i read all of that detail into the record i'm happy to take any questions and just want to thank so many folks in the community from the tenderloin neighborhood stakeholders, labor stakeholders, hotel owners, shelter operators and certainly the advocates supporting the sober living program for working with us to come to what i hope is a set of amendments that everyone can be pleased with and we can continue forward with implementing to support our hotel partnerships. >> thank you. thank you so much, deputy director cohen and so before we go to public comment, i had a couple of questions for our city deputy city attorney if that's okay. so a deputy director cohen read two sets of amendments one having to do with just

shrinking this to the civic center hotel. >> so are those substantive? good afternoon supervisors deputy city attorney brad vessey the first set of amendments that relate to the initial proposal the interim to establishing this interim housing use those amendments are not substantive and so the the committee can move them today and forward the amended version to the full board the second set of amendments that relate to the shelter in place hotel those require referral back to the planning commission and they're substantive. so i think what the committee could do is make the initial set of amendments duplicate the file, make the second set of amendments and then that duplicate would go back to planning and then eventually come back to this committee after planning as considered at okay, thank you so much. let's go to public comment on the sidewalk and think thank you for the clarification.

>> thank you madam chair. land use and transportation will now here agenda item number four we'll hear public comment for this item. if you have public comment for this item please come forward to the lectern and you can use either of those microphones. either one is fine. >> hello my name is david murphy. it's an honor to speak with you folks today. this is my first time ever doing this so please bear with me. as deputy director cohen spoke of we are participants of the salvation army harbor lights program and the joseph mcphee program you might recognize tim timothy stewart from the channel seven news. they did a spot on him with the bell ringing and what he's doing today at the joseph mcphee. but we are all grateful recovering addicts and we strongly support the interim housing ordinance as it offers an important tool to engage hotel owners. this ordinance is critical for opening the pending sober

living transitional housing program and we respectfully strongly urge that you do not delay. we need this ordinance to bring the sober living program to life and it really helps us people in recovery as we transition from addiction to sober, productive, sober living. >> thank you. >> thank you for your comments. next speaker please. hi. my name is timothy stewart and i'm a recovering addict and alcoholic and i just graduated from the salvation army and moved on to joseph mccarthy. had it not been for joseph mccarthy i would have had to go back to the streets and i know i would have went back to use it. i'm so grateful for joseph mccarthy so i fail in my heart. we need more places like joseph mccarthy. thank you. thank you for sharing your comments. >> next speaker please. hi, my name's brendan harris. i'm also a resident over at the harbor light center salvation army.

you know, i'm also a former formerly incarcerated individual that just reentered society a couple of months ago and the need for housing is real especially for people in recovery who are serious about it. you just walk up and down these streets and you see the fat and all crisis and how bad it is and there's a lot of homeless people because of that more places like the mcphee center and other sober living areas need to be established in this city. if people want a healthy place that they can recover. yeah, that's all i have to say . >> thank you for sharing your comments. next speaker please. hi my initially gomez and i'm a resident and harbor light so program for six months and then they offer us the next thing which is for another two years i'm told. so with that being said, i look forward to continuing this program. >> however, i do not look forward to it to our to wait for housing. so if you can help us get more

housing available i would greatly appreciate and more motivating for us to continue to get into a better lifestyle and to support the community because we're all in need and we really do appreciate all your consideration. thank you. i say thank you for your comments. >> next speaker please. >> good afternoon supervisors cynthia gomez with know your local to the hotel workers union. so as mentioned we have been involved in a lot of conversations and with them and and those have led to some amendments but the problem is there's a poison pill in the amendments. the amendments were intended at least in terms of how they were described to really narrow this conversion program to only one site and then an amendment that just landed in my inbox at 1:00 this afternoon and it was read into record here said any hotel existing after april 1st 2020

5th may also apply to this program. so the scrambling to get these amendments done at the last minute was not our doing and it leads to unintended problems. so we've come here to ask that there actually be enough time to look at the text of these amendments to make sure that something that is permanent and long lasting doesn't inadvertently get sneaked in here against anyone's intentions. the intentions behind this particular program are very good and very strong. >> there is a huge problem, however, with introducing something and passing something that allows hotels to convert back and forth, back and forth, back and forth from tourist hotel to housing and it's a with a very good intention that there's language saying we would like you to rehire the workers. >> it's unenforceable when workers lose their good union jobs with a pension and benefits and health care they can't retain any of those

benefits in the new location. and so we've been asking that there actually be enough time to look at the full text of these amendments to talk through them, to understand what they mean so that nothing gets introduced that ends up having long lasting consequences. >> so that this can actually be done right to the maximum benefit and without inadvertently sneaking in harm but no one wanted to cause thank you. >> thank you for sharing your comments. next speaker please. hi, good morning supervisors. my name is destiny pletcher. i'm with the salvation army and i am here to speak in support of the interim housing ordinance in particular as it relates to the proposed site on ninth street at the james baldwin place. i think you're going to hear today from our peers and colleagues about how important this site and the potential it has to make a difference a real difference in the community, particularly in the recovery community. it's going to be apparent and i think that this is a model and

i am going to lean on the expertise of s.h. and the city attorney to to deploy this across the city. and i'm just want to be supportive of this ordinance. >> thank you. thank you for sharing your comments. next speaker please. >> good morning supervisors. my name is steve adami and i'm here to support the interim housing ordinance as a critical tool to open up the james baldwin place to sober living pilot project. it's going to be located on ninth street in soma. the city is in so much need of sober living. >> mr. dominick, could you pull the microphone right up to you? sure. there we go. the city is in desperate need to expand housing options for people struggling with addiction. and this project a joint venture of the salvation army and west side community services is much needed and really critical to the success of people leaving drug treatment. so i hope you will help us and extend a yes vote on this ordinance.

>> thank you. thank you for sharing your comments. next speaker please. >> good afternoon ladies and gentlemen. my name is erin lauer's and i direct the joseph mcphee center a sober transitional housing program that houses nearly 100 men and women here in san francisco. >> and i can say that it is a resource that we are in dire need of more i am here to support the interim housing ordinance as it offers an important tool to engage hotels owner owners. this ordinance is critical for opening the pending sober living transitional housing program. please do not delay. we need the ordinance to bring sober living program to life and i have a waiting list of individuals who are in dire need of this resource. thank you. thank you for sharing your comments. >> next speaker please. good afternoon ladies and gentlemen. my name is louie gomez and i'm a grateful recovering addict as well. i'm here to support the interim housing. understanding that it's really difficult to find housing upon completing program and it being

an essential need to be able to continue on this recovery path you know enough so i'm here to support this. >> thank you. thank you for your comments. next speaker please. >> hello, my name is ricardo contreras with the positive direction program and upon my completion i'm afraid of being homeless. thank you for sharing your comments. >> next speaker please. all right. good afternoon supervisors. so i wanted to say that i truly support this amendment and i just pray that we be able to work together as a city and work together to be able to effectively give people various options and especially keep a safe environment for those that are fighting sobriety and be in a safe place, a healthy place and be a part of a community within and also the

outside community that's the city. >> so i thank you. >> thank you for your comments. next speaker please. oh good afternoon supervisors. >> my name's kevin baker. i'm with a positive reaction to r p i think this will be a great investment for the city in the long haul because it takes a large people who's formerly incarcerated at home this getting job ready putting a place back in community where they can be an asset to the to the city you know the more people we know we help you know, get jobs and get off the streets that's better for the city. you know, the city needs that. so i think it'll be a great investment. thank you. >> thank you for your comments. next speaker, please. good afternoon. my name is joshua banks. i'm a resident at c r p a branch of the corrections community and i think it's very important for housing after

leaving drug treatment because a lot of people do this homeless on the streets after leaving treatment and it's hard to focus on your recovery when you're homeless and surrounded by people that are stuck in their addiction. it's hard to focus on school when you're around people that are stuck in their addiction. it's hard to focus on sobriety when you're homeless and you're stuck in your addiction. so i think the interim housing ordinance perfect place to start. >> thank you. thank you for sharing your comments. >> next speaker please. hi, my name is delbert young. i think the amendment ordinance and wonderful thing i'm greatly in positive directions regarding attic i often think about housing what i'm going to do when i leave the program so i think the more available housing the better i definitely contemplate where i'm going to go and live when i leave the program. so the more availability of

housing the better. >> i think it's a great ordinance. arden's you thank you for your comments. >> next speaker please. my name is greg works i'm able to help program and i think it's very important that they keep this program going because there's a lot of people out there homeless and don't have nowhere to go, nowhere to stay on the street and if we don't keep the program that's going to be more people. >> thank you. thank you for your comments. next speaker please. and while that speaker is coming up, if we have anyone else who has public comment for agenda item number four from whom we have not yet heard, you can line up to speak along that western wall. >> please begin. good afternoon. my name is james dilworth and i'm here in support for interim housing ordinance. i'm actually a participant at the joseph mcphee center who one thing i will say is that this is a place that is not only designed to keep you recovery, it also encourages

education, financial literacy, high school g.e.d. dog grooming you actually have plenty of participants that are already graduated in the culinary arts and are back into society making big differences in who are actually community and politically involved now. so that's all i got to say and so i hope that you put that into consideration. we definitely need more programs like this. >> thank you for your comments. next speaker please. >> hi abigail morales coming through salvation army harbor lights program you guys if you guys go through with this, we appreciate it. it's going to help a lot of us that are coming out of jail or just wanting to change our lives. >> that's all i have to say. thank you so much for your comments. do we have anyone else who has public comment for agenda item number four madam chair, thank you so much. supervisor mahmood yes, thank

you chair director cohen can ask a couple more questions based on some of the public comment we heard of course i just to double check given that this ordinance is just a double check there was a comment about some april 1st deadline april t that is? >> yeah, absolutely. so originally we had intended to amend the ordinance to be hotels that entered into agreements to operate a shelter after april 1st so that it would prohibit hotels that you know, for years and years and years had maybe had done this and we didn't we wanted to make sure that there was a clear line that we weren't going retroactive live and that's why we included the the date that does not supersede the narrowing to just the civic center motor inn. so it is intended to note that we want to keep that amendment in so that it does not allow sort of historic partner hotel partners to access this

provision but it is narrowed to the civic center motor in the monarch, the dante and the covered hotels. it's actually just a correct so you can it's a it's in there to actually ensure that the that no one else can do this effect correct yeah okay great. and then second is the the hotel that this does apply to is there's no union workers there currently. >> correct. okay. thank you. okay. i'm trying to figure out what our best way to proceed given the the comments from labor from ms. gomes. >> so i think that the first set of amendments are relatively non controversial. >> there's lots of community support so we i still want to make sure that everybody is okay so we could adopt them and i think we could continue it and vote on them next week if

that's amenable to you. the second set of amendments i would like to give folks a little more time to read and perhaps talk to you and so we could i guess after we amended the you know, the first set of amendments and duplicate the file. yes. deputy city attorney brad rusty so in order to provide the public access to the document with the amendments, i think the best way would be for you to make the initial amendments duplicate that file and then make the second set of amendments and then continue both till next week and then we can vote on them next week. you could do that? yes. okay. is that acceptable to okay. so just to be clear, if miss gomez is still here, the second set of amendments still needs to be re referred to the planning commission so there is an opportunity for the planning

department to recommend modifications for the planning commission to do whatever they need to do and then it would still need to come back to this committee to be approved before it goes to the full board. >> right? ms. flores yes, yes, that is correct. >> chair so we'll still have that referral and come back to you with that recommendation. okay, sounds good. so then you know there will be plenty of opportune nity for input from folks to the second set of amendments which is what folks were saying you know they've just got and haven't raptors mind around deputy city attorney i just wanted to skeptical yeah i just wanted to make sure that i'm not miss i'm not incorrectly stating what's going to happen with that duplicate and if the clerk can confirm what can the committee do duplicate amend amend that and we'll continue it to next

week or would it automatically get referred to planning at that point? >> it's highly unusual. okay to handle things in that way i will once if the matter gets amended on the duplicate i will refer it to likely tomorrow or on wednesday to the planning commission in that form. >> okay. but then if it was for whatever reason to be amended in additional time when it's heard at a continued date if there are additional changes then those would also be referred to the planning. >> okay. sorry supervisor mahmood so then perhaps to get to the goal that we're all sort of it sounds like we're all on board perhaps then we would be better off duplicating it next week when we vote on the first set of amendments and then doing the second set of amendments then because you can then just refer them immediately after that works as well. >> okay so that's what we should do then just adopt the first set of amendments then continue today and then continue it to next week. >> is that is that work for you? okay. all right.

>> consensus okay. introduce a motion to adopt the first set of amendments at this time. >> okay. and madam chair, before we take that motion, just a bit of housekeeping, could you close public comment? >> oh, i'm so sorry. thank you, mr. clerk. public comment on this item is now closed. >> thank you so member mahmud made a motion to adopt the first set of amendments presented to the committee on that motion vice chair chin chin i remember mohammed mahmood i chair melgar. i melgar i madam chair there are three eyes on those amendments and i want to introduce a motion to continue to the next meeting to next week the 17th of march on the motion offered by member mahmood that this ordinance be continued as amended to the 17th of march meeting on that motion vice chair chin chin i member marchman my committee i chair melgar i melgar i met him

here. >> there are three eyes on that motion that motion passes. thank you and thank you to all the members of the community for coming and are there any other items on our agenda? mr. clerk there is no further business. okay, we're now adjourned

come on out to u.n. plaza well we have the most recent addition to our fabulously renovated un plaza. it's 21,000ft2 of incredibly designed space by alexis sablone who is a nationally recognized skater and architect . >> and this particular project is a great partnership between the richmond park department, the civic center cbd converse and the skate park foundation. and ultimately the goal here is to make sure that un plaza is a

place where we are all welcome, where we all feel safe, where we can all enjoy each other and recreate and we've had over 350,000 visitors to this space and very significantly we've seen a reduction of unhealthy activity and crime here approximately 80% and skaters are absolutely welcome here. we want to celebrate the skating community, its incredible history and what it's done for the texture and fabric and culture of our city. >> good morning. the meeting will come to order. welcome to the march 5th, 2025 meeting of the budget and finance committee. i'm supervisors connie chan chair of the committee. i'm joined by vice chair

supervisor matt dorsey and members supervisor joanne gaudio our clerk it's brant holt leeper. >> i would like to thank as i've got tv for broadcasting this meeting particularly jamie archer very and so with that mr. clerk, do you have any announcement? >> thank you madam chair. just a friendly reminder to those that attendance to please make sure to silence all cell phones and electronic devices to prevent interruptions to our proceedings should you have any documents to be included as part of the file they should be submitted to myself. >> the clerk public comment will be taken on each item on this agenda when your item of interest comes up and public comment is called please line up to speak on the west side of the chamber to your right my left along those curtains and while not required to provide public comment we do invite you to fill out a comment card and leave them on the tray by the television to your left by the doors if you wish to be accurately recorded for the minutes. alternatively you may submit public comment in writing in either of the following ways email them to myself. the budget and finance committee clerk had been for

you and tkl i pay had f g l v.org if you submit public comment via email it will be forwarded to the supervisors and also included as part of the official file. you may also send your written comments by a u.s. postal service to our office in city hall at one dr. carleton big other place room 244 san francisco, california 94102. and finally madam chair items acted upon today are expected to appear on the board of supervisors agenda of march 11th unless otherwise stated. >> madam chair, thank you, mr. clerk. and before we start as a reminder to everyone that typically when we have a budget and legislative analyst reports we will go to the city department and then the ballot and then we will have comments and questions from this committee and then we go to public comment. and with that, mr. clerk, please call item number one. >> yes, i remember one is a

hearing on the first year free program including a report on the number of small businesses supported since the program's inception remaining obstacles to full implementation and necessary steps to make the benefits to new small businesses permanent. >> madam chair, thank you. and we want to welcome supervisor steve sheryl here and really thank you so much for calling this hearing and the floor is yours. >> well thank you chair chan vice chair dorsey supervisor and garcia for scheduling this hearing today. i'm deeply appreciative for the opportunity to be here the subject of this hearing is the first year free program which waives initial registration license permit and other applicable fees for new small businesses and existing eligible shops that are opening a storefront. >> now this item was my first introduction at the board because i strongly believe the programs like this are and are are an example of city hall being a partner not an obstacle to the success of entrepreneurs

and to the vibrancy of our city making it easier to open and thrive and as a small business in san francisco must be a shared priority for city leaders. empty storefronts need to be filled. creative small business entrepreneurs must be empowered. >> i believe that today we will hear about the massive successes of first year free but the reason we are here today is because first year free will sunset this july unless legislative action is taken to extend this program. >> now as is discussed weekly at this committee, the reality of our budget situation will call for hard decisions on what programs we prioritize to further our city's post-pandemic recovery if we are to renew first year free which i believe is again imperative to our success as a city, we must enable it to be as efficient and impactful as possible. i'm extremely grateful to my colleagues. chair chan vice chair dorsey supervisor and engardio for

weekly engaging on this incredibly difficult work here on the budget committee to reckon with our shortfall. i hope this hearing will offer us a forum to discuss the program's budgetary impacts and the challenges hindering smooth inter-departmental coordination and the opportunities to strengthen the program's effectiveness moving forward. i want to thank office of small business director katie tang and amanda freed from the treasurer and tax collector and call them to the podium to provide a quick presentation and engage in this critical discussion with us today. >> we really owe the success of this program to you and to your teams. thank you very much for being here today. >> good morning. thank you so much for having us. my name is amanda freed, chief of policy and communications from the treasurer's office and i'm joined here by katie tang, the director of the office of small business.

and before we dive into the meat of these slides, i really just want to acknowledge that first year free is truly a multi departmental labor of love. >> there are folks in departments across the city in customer service teams and accounting teams and city attorney's office who really every day are working to make this program a success and we could not do it without all of their help. >> so since the program began in november of 2021 we've seen 9400 businesses enroll all in first year free and we've waived nearly $5 million since the inception of the business and since the inception of the program. and you can see here a breakdown by department of which department fees have been waived through the program. first year free was first

created as a one year pilot program during the pandemic and we've been really happy to see it extended several times as supervisor sherril mentioned, we are coming up on the end of the current extension and so look forward to speaking with you. >> we all about that the program waives the cost of the initial registration fees for businesses when they first register as a business there permit fees in the first year any application fees and their initial license fees and this is a program that works both for new businesses that are starting in san francisco for the first time but also for new locations of existing businesses and to qualify a business has to have $5 million or less. in san francisco, gross receipts and have a registered location for commercial use. >> when we started first year free we thought it was really important to create a program that didn't have an application

that was really automatic and seamless for businesses that wouldn't give them sort of one extra step to take but just be something that happened to them. and so i'm going to walk you through a little bit of how we've made that happen. >> when a business registers with our office and that's generally the first step that a business has to take when they're starting in san francisco they use a form called new business registry option and every business is probably somewhat familiar with this process and we ask you a bunch of questions you know who you are, what are you doing so that we understand that and can properly assess you taxes everyone's favorite activity in san francisco during this process we also have embedded the questions for first year free so we're automatically figuring out who might be eligible for this program and once they register they get a pop up that says, you know, congratulations, looks like you qualify for first year free gives you some instructions and

then immediately after you're finished you get an email from our office with more instructions and then a letter in the mail. >> what those instructions say are basically hey, you know, you can take this letter with you when you go to any permitting agencies and let them know you're part of first year free even if you don't have the letter the departments are able to look it up. >> we have a look up system that all of the departments can share and then you never should have to pay the fees in the first place. >> it is fully automatic so you go to dba and you're pulling a building permit and you tell them i'm part of first year free and then when it's time to pay the fee it is waived and that works the same in d h in planning sort of across our city family similar processes if you're opening up a new location. >> so let's say you have a thriving business in one commercial corridor and you're opening up your second or your third and you still meet the qualifications for first year free, you just simply add that location to the information

that the tax collector has about your business and then the same thing you're prompted with the first year free questions and you immediately get enrolled in the program and here are the fees that have been waived by fiscal year and by department. as you can see here the dbe fees are the most significant followed by fees collected by the treasurer's office. >> these are both business registration fees but also license fees that we collect on behalf of other departments. so this is a spread around as well and and happy to answer questions when we get into that portion. >> but one of you ought to have this sort of just broad overview of the program and i'm going to turn it over to katie for the much more fun part of this presentation which is talking about some of the success stories. right. good morning supervisors and also want to thank amanda and everyone at the treasurer and tax collectors office for their

excellent management of this program. i will also start by saying that this program has been such a great marketing tool for businesses whether new or those who want to expand really sending the message to entrepreneurs that we are open for business in san francisco. so has been truly valuable especially when people are either starting out new or expanding and really don't have a whole lot of resources. they're trying to juggle rent, they're trying to buy equipment. they're trying to figure out how they're going to maybe even pay themselves or not pay themselves. and so when they get that surprise at the permit center and they don't have to end up paying any fees, it's it's really wonderful. and in fact i've encountered business owners who said, you know, i they open up a new shop in san francisco they were going to initially expand in another jurisdiction. they when they were faced with potentially $20,000 in permit fees alone in that other jurisdiction, they changed their mind and decided that they were going to go and expand in san francisco.

so we do see on a day to day basis that this has been a really great attraction tool. >> we have a couple of examples here on the slides before you of a few businesses that have benefited and there's a whole range of how much and permit fees have been waived. so casa guadalupe on cesar chavez and the mission they saved about $1,800 in fees through the program. we've got a running wild in the castro and you know again any basically expressing that any assistance that they receive was so much appreciated. el mm they actually opened up in the mission and saved about $11,000 in their permit fees. again this is just permit fees alone. there's so many other costs to starting up a business and in fact andrea is starting are expanding very soon in another location in the city same with teller wines that it opened up in excelsior and moving on to

blue truck studio they had about $2,500 in fees waived and cafe de casa also had a first year fee waive for one of their expansion to fisherman's wharf and all the fees the permit fees that are waived really depends on the scope of the work. so the more intensive the the project the tenant improvement the more fees will be waived and the less than less permit fees will be charged. and then here are just a few additional examples that you can see here with s.f. taxicab amie actually and glazed donuts and mama who who restaurant having been assessed some of the larger ones you could see on this list. so with that i think amanda and i are happy to answer any questions that you have. we know that as we're heading into the budget season we have difficult decisions and tradeoffs we have to make here. but we certainly from at least off a small business would love to see the first year free program continued.

>> thank you both very much for being here today and for your presentation. i've got a few questions and my colleagues may as well but first i just want to it was great to see the some of the success stories there but have we heard stories of entrepreneurs who are hesitant to open in san francisco but kind of decided to do so upon learning about first your free are yes i think it's both first year free as well as the i would say the wrap around services that we offer as a city many other cities don't have as robust of a say you know office a small business so we're very proud of that that can offer a whole range of services from leasing support to permitting help to helping people navigate local, state or even federal forms that they have to fill out. so i think that on top of the permit fees being waived has really convinced a lot of people to open up or expand here in san francisco doesn't mean that we don't have

challenges that we still need to address. we certainly can always improve but we do offer a whole lot of support. well, maybe on that on that topic of challenges, would you mind detailing some of the obstacles that small businesses are currently facing either when attempting to utilize first year free benefits or even just being aware of the program? >> yes. so i think as amanda described the treasurer and tax collectors office has tried to make it as easy as possible for people to enroll and to to not even miss that step of of getting into the first year free program. certainly we have many different departments and agencies. it's not always the small business owner that's pulling a permit. for example, it could be contractors, it could be architects, it could be permit consultants, lawyers even and that business account number that is tied to the permit may not reflect that actual businesses it might be again the architect, the contractor.

and so sometimes that fee waiver might not be applied when it should have been so in that case we will ask for refunds to be processed. but that would that is one of the key things as well as just the certainty of knowing that the program can continue that that's that's interesting you talking about certain situations in which eligible businesses end up paying a fee. >> do you mind walking us through the process for getting those those fees reimbursed? yes. so if we find out that a business had paid for their permit fees when they really shouldn't have then our office will initiate contact with that relevant agency and we will say hey, here's their business account number they were eligible for first year free which we can easily look up and the treasurer and tax collectors website and we will request the refund on behalf of the business and and loop them in so it yeah we just basically

communicate with the different departments on that great. you talked a little bit about the different departmental silos and then this also has been in pilots since its inception since its inception excuse me what have been some of the hurdles that the program has faced being a pilot instead of being a permanent or at least longer program to our and i'm happy to also have amanda chime in as well. but i think from what we've seen is that when it's a pilot some of the departments may not feel that it's necessary to invest in certain changes in technology or systems in order to more easily process these types of applications and making sure that the permit fees are waived. and so i think when it's renewed on a year by year basis there's just that element of

well we're just going to kind of keep things as a status quo and there's no need to improve on the process so and i see amanda here i'm sure she can speak to more. >> yes. thank you. yeah, thank you. i would say i would add to that i think that our department works directly with many of the permitting agencies to do their billing and collections so for for the departments that we have that sort of direct relationship with, they're already we're already pretty linked technologically and have a lot of day to day contact. i think where we've had the most most growth and opportunity is with db. i and planning because we don't typically do their billing and collections and so our systems are not necessarily as integrated and we see the most opportunity there. >> as katie said the identification of a business when they're pulling a permit and that process to say okay this is the actual business who is going to benefit ultimately versus this is the individual or the entity that's pulling

the permit isn't necessarily an important distinction for that agency but for first year free it does matter. and so i think figuring out a way to solve some of those those issues will take some resources and that hasn't been something that we've been able to prioritize during the pilot. >> is there a kind of return on investment if we invest up front on those resources to streamline the cross-departmental coordination inter-departmental coordination how how would we what would the long term impact of that be on on the budget? >> yeah i mean i think it's hard to project exactly i can say you know i think the board under the leadership of then supervisor to now city attorney to worked on a massive overhaul of license collection more than ten years ago. >> i want to say it was like 14 years ago to put a d h fire

police entertainment on one single billing cycle that our department would bill and collect for. that was a big undertaking. it took a lot of time and effort to kind of legislatively fix all of the deadlines and the penalties and all of that work. we also sort of built a technology to allow the city to collect. >> i think we had some idea of how that was going to help the city but we've seen that return, you know, way more than i think anybody might have projected because we started to really understand how a business is interacting with the city as a whole all of the different touchpoints that a particular location has, all the different inspections, the permits, the fees that they're that they're paying and ultimately that investment is what helped during prop m last year to identify that small businesses are being disproportionately harmed through license fees and we were able with many of your support to eliminate $10

million in license fees for small businesses. i don't think that type of effort would have been possible without a unification, without a technology infrastructure behind it and without some real legislative clean up to align things. and so i think when we're talking about some of these incremental steps that could happen through first year free, i think we're hopeful that we would also then see some benefits more broadly both for businesses and for the city. >> thank you. you know you brought up prop m and eliminating somewhere around $10 million in licensing fees for four businesses. do you mind talking a little bit about the overlap between prop m and first year free and kind of specifically i guess my specific question would be does prop m alleviate the fiscal impact of the first year free program at all? >> now the short answer is no and i think let me explain a little bit about how these programs overlap. >> so if you're a new restaurant and you're starting out, you know your typical thing might be might register

with with our office you'll get those business registration fees waived then your next step might be to go to db i r planning and you know do some work there get those fees waived then you're going to apply at deep h for your health permit and you'll pay you won't pay an application fee that will be waived through first year free. once that gets approved then your first year of your license fee for that health license that's associated with that permit that will be waived as part of first year free. when we look at the waivers and prop m only that very last piece that first year of the annual health license is getting waived through the prop m waivers and so there's an impact but it's fairly modest and generous. we we see it as covering like the increases in cpi that many departments, you know, will see an increase in their fees year over year and then these the prop m reductions kind of they balance each other out so it's

a bit of a wash moving forward and a lot of the conversation when when we were talking to businesses during prop m was a real desire to help businesses that were already operating in san francisco and to really focus on like okay, we're already here how can you show us that we matter and so that that prop m license is really focused on existing businesses whereas first year free is alleviating the costs in that first year. >> thank you. it have there been you know talking about overlap and budget impacts have there been any unexpected budget challenges or overruns associated with the program over the last few years? >> i don't think anything unexpected. i think as the departments change their fee structures so we saw some increases last year for certain departments in their fee structure and then of course that makes first year free more expensive. so you know it's not it's not unexpected. it's just we can't necessarily plan for it until we see

department budget submissions and what ultimately gets passed by the board. >> gotcha. and in terms of kind of planning for it, you know we talk about obviously normally these fees would go to cover staff time and resources. do we have a sense of how much staff time and resources are currently spent processing these applications, verifying ability handling appeals, etc.? >> yeah, i think in in the treasurer's office we have two positions that are funded for first year free. one is for our accounting team they're the ones that are working with all of the departments to make sure that they get reimbursed from the first year free pot in the general fund for any fees that they've waived. and then we also have some customer service time and a supervisor in our customer service unit. >> i would say the the impact that we see again is accounting teams, fiscal teams throughout they're the ones that are really submitting and kind of making sure that we're waiving appropriately for customers and

then moving money from from one spot to another spot every month and then you know there is certainly some customer service impact both in our department the office of small business, the permit center and you know, i think there's staff that are really working day in and day out with businesses to help them navigate generally through the city processes and first year free is part of that and there is also some annual work on you know upgrading the forms and making sure that the technology is working as well. >> got it. do we have any projected kind of revenue generation as a result of first year free whether it's increased sales tax revenue, other economic indicators at this point i think i would defer those questions to the comptroller's office generally to to help understand. >> thank you. so we talked a little bit just now about some of the processes that that go under there as we look towards the future or a potential for future, what are some ways that we can maybe streamline either the

qualifications, the fee waivers or other ways to look at decreasing the costs of the administration of the program? >> i think in terms of the identifying location the process generally works. i think there's again some work to do to really better link up the process of do you have to register first with the office of the treasurer and tax collector or can you pull a permit at tbi without doing that? so i think that's an area where you know, we've we've been working and trying to figure out a better pathway so it's more clear for businesses if they start and they pull a permit and they haven't registered they're not qualified for first year free. and so i think that's an area that you know, we want to keep looking at. we don't want to make things any more difficult for businesses but we also want to make sure that we're kind of operating appropriately. >> i don't think there's a lot of administrative cost to this program. it's pretty well built into how we're doing business and it's not really a i don't think

there's a significant administrative burden that we're trying to remove. >> you talked previously i mean there are some i hear you loud and clear on the low administrative costs generally but you talked about some of the hurdles of on the technology side collecting the permits. how much time would that take if we look at these kind of one year pilot cycles we've done is it a three year pilot, a five year pilot permanence? what does it take in terms of of renewing this program for you for for the city as a whole to look at actually investing in in a in a fully efficient really streamlined process is that you know, when you're looking at the extension of the program in the future, what does a perfect world look like there to make this program really run the way it should be in a perfect world is generally for us like a ten year runway. you know, to say this program will be here for ten years and then we can make the appropriate investments in technology that generally for us seems to be the runway

where you know, after ten years whatever we do we're going to have to upgrade anyway. but that would give us enough time to really work with our colleagues, invest in the technology and the systems change and i think it's really important. it's not just cyst, it's not just like throwing a new system out there but it's really working together to reorient some of the the processes that we have on all fronts and make sure that the flow for businesses makes sense and that they're getting what they need through it. so technology is one piece of it but that would be you know, i think that would be the perfect scenario. >> i think five years could work as well and and extending it by a year. do we have an opportunity to invest in some of those program efficiencies if we only do a one year extension? >> i think in terms of all of the work going on to improve how the city is functioning for small businesses, we will continue you know we work together i think i talked to katie almost every day. >> i think we'll continue to work together very closely with our other agency partners as well and we have many different touch points.

so it's not as if we're not going to do anything if we don't get a longer runway for first year free. but there's an operator i think will miss the opportunity to really change the like the infrastructure. >> yeah. thank you. and then my my last question and then i'll turn over my colleagues. are there any specific best practices you've learned from first year free and to either of you this question can be directed that would help us shape the next phase into a specifically more effective program. i know you've touched on a little bit here and there but i read key things where you said if we could really focus yeah in a welcome your your point of view as well director tang but i think from from our perspective it was really important to figure out a process that would work at scale for businesses and that wouldn't rely on like word of mouth or communications but that everyone would just sort of magically get. and over time we've tweaked the definition of who qualifies as for first year free to respond to where there was some friction so you know i forget in our first year but we had some it was like only ground

floor businesses and then we were excluding some and we spent a lot of time like kind of nit picking with businesses whether or not they could qualify and the board was very open in the next year to say like okay let's let's broaden that definition. i think where we've landed now is it's it's pretty open ended for businesses. >> it's you know it's a revenue threshold and that's a data point that we collect for taxes. so we feel really good that they're giving us accurate information and i think it's helped us really make sure that everybody who can possibly qualify does upfront except in some of those instances as i've mentioned where somebody is going before they've registered as a business or as director tang mentioned when they're somebody other than the business owner is the one pulling the permits. those are kind of the two areas i think we still see from time to time. >> right. well thank you. i have no more questions but as we heard today, i think there are many successful examples of small businesses who've

benefited greatly from this this first year program and really giving these businesses a leg up. you know, i think we see in our small business corridors in our incredibly diverse communities in many of our immigrant communities the challenges with opening up new storefronts are myriad and helping them open stay open flourish is really critical during this time when our retail and restaurant sectors are still struggling to recover. >> so i really think it's pivotal that that this hearing helped us understand how we can expand upon the investment especially you know, given the really critical fiscal situation of the city and so amanda freed, director tang, thank you so much for being here to present on this item and and my colleagues on the on the budget committee and church and especially thank you very much for hearing this this item today. i want to look forward to continue working with you to build on successes and continue to make san francisco the best

city in the world to open a small business. >> thank you. thank you. supervisor sherril. and with that let's go to a public comment on this item. i don't see any name on the roster and therefore let's go to public comment on this item. >> yes. if we have any members of the public who wish to address this committee regarding this hearing, now is your opportunity. >> madam chair. >> we have no speakers seeing no public comments. public comment is now close. what is your will supervisor share? would you like to continue this hearing or would you like us to have this item heard and file? i'd love to have this item heard and filed. >> wonderful. thank you supervisor and with that i would like to move this item as heard and file and with and roll call please. >> and on that motion that this hearing be heard and filed to place her dorsey and dorsey i remember engardio and engardio church can i can i have three eyes the motion passes thank you supervisor mr. clerk,

please call item number two. yes. item number two is an ordinance amending the business and tax regulations code to authorize the tax collector to waive taxes penalties and or interest under a program ending december 31st 2027 that allows unregistered taxpayers to voluntarily voluntarily disclose and pay back taxes and to authorize the tax collector to collect fees through december 31st, 2027 for reviewing applications for and providing advanced determinations to taxpayers. >> madam chair, thank you. >> actually could we also call item number three? yes. yes. item number three is an ordinance amending the business and tax regulations code to suspend the empty homes tax pending a final decision. and eric durban et al versus city and county of san francisco adult in san francisco superior court retroactive to january 1st, 2024 and to reinstate the tax

that tax so that the tax first applies in the tax year immediately following the calendar year of that final decision. >> madam chair, thank you. let's go one item at a time but thank you. >> hello again. it's going to be sick of me after this morning. apologies on item two is an ordinance that authorizes a voluntary disclosure program for unregistered san francisco businesses to come forward and address unpaid taxes. yes, this ordinance also authorizes our office to charge a fee for a separate advance determination program that will provide guidance to taxpayers before they file taxes. >> first a little bit of context in november, as you all know, san francisco voters approved proposition m which is a significant restructuring of the business the city's business tax system in preparation for the reform we held a series of interested

parties meetings in 2024 to gather feedback from the business community and we heard loud and clear during those meetings and also during the formulation of prop m that there's really a need for more clarity and transparency from our office about how taxes are administered. so the two components being presented today are a direct result of taxpayer feedback and these include a voluntary disclosure agreement program which we like to call vba and an advance written determination action fee authorization program so let's first review the voluntary disclosure agreement program and this ordinance authorizes us to waive taxes, penalties and interest for businesses that voluntarily come forward to pay unpaid back taxes and interest. it's a chance for unregistered businesses to get these tax

obligations in order without facing the full weight of penalties and back taxes they have to disclose and pay for the previous six years and to qualify for the program they can't already have a business registration certificate and they must not have already been contacted by our office. so as we like to say they have to be completely off of our radar completely new to us in order to take advantage of this program and this is a program that exists in nearly every taxing agency around the country. so the state has a similar program. the irs has a similar program and we've had one informal lee for a long time and what businesses said is it would really help us to have this legislatively authorized to have the rules clearly spelled out and to have the timeline, you know, kind of firmly there . so if the board approves this ordinance we will be ready as soon as this ordinance is effective to take to take

applications for this program. >> we believe that this program not only improves compliance but is actually a revenue generator and our informal program has already demonstrated this we've generated $2.9 million in back taxes and $1.6 million and ongoing tax revenue through our informal or voluntary disclosure program. so based on the success of the informal program that we have now and the certainty that we think this is going to bring and what we've heard from businesses we do we do expect to see the following revenue over the next three years if the program is authorized about $1.5 million in prior years and 1 million ongoing so small but maybe the advance the second component of this program of this ordinance is the authorization of a fee for the new advanced written determination program and prop

m included a requirement to establish this program and we're on schedule to roll it out this spring pending pending your approval. this program allows tax payers to request a determination in advance which is a significant step to step forward in terms of providing more clear clarity about somebody's tax liability and for applications filed on or before december 31st the fee is $250 and then after december 31st the fee will be no more than than our actual cost of providing that determination. >> and again, this is something that really came from a lot of conversations with the taxpaying community who feel like in our current state without a program like this their only opportunity to get a formal determination from our office is upon audit or in a lawsuit. and so this is our you know, our hope is that we can really engage in some more serious

conversations and provide these determinations up front so that businesses know where we stand on implementing the law and can make their their best decisions moving forward. >> and with that i'm happy to take any questions. thank you. it's interesting. i'm kind of trying to understand so the business that came forward and that which resulted in roughly $1 million revenue generating so they're so are they really like micro small like small business and how how what is the size usually that end up coming forward yeah there's there's really a range and that is super fascinating. often what happens is one business will acquire another business and then their due diligence they're like ha doesn't look like you've been filing local taxes and so that's that's sort of our kind of most common use cases during an acquisition. as you might recall some years ago there was a ballot measure that changed the thresholds for when a business has to file and

pay taxes in san francisco. and so if a business is doing more than $500,000 in sales into san francisco even if they don't have a single employee here, they have no physical nexus with san francisco, they're still required to file and pay. and so that has also changed the landscape of who became a tax payer. and so of course our team is actively looking for folks who are unregistered and we have a full program and we send you know, everyone's favorite letter from a tax investigator that we think you're you're an unregistered business and you must register immediately that that happens very regularly. >> but of course we miss things as every tax agency does and so this is a chance for people to come forward and typically in other jurisdictions when they've passed an ordinance like this there's a bit of a flood of applications. people are kind of waiting and then we see a lot of activity and then it kind of normalizes over time. interesting because basically one of the criterias here that

you listed is that you must not be notify like you must not have gotten a letter to say hey, you need to register in order for you to actually qualify for this program right . interesting. thank you so much. we're ready for the next item. >> okay. i think we're ready yes, we're ready. okay. last one. i promise. >> item three is an ordinance that suspends the empty homes tax pending the resolution of an ongoing lawsuit that currently present prevents the city from collecting the tax. so to provide some background in 2022 san francisco voters approved the empty homes tax which applies to certain residential units primarily apartments and condos that remain vacant for more than six months in a calendar year. >> the tax took effect on january first, 2024 shortly after the tax was passed, a lawsuit was filing filed challenging its constitutionality and

in november of 2020 for the san francisco superior court ruled in favor in favor of the plaintiffs and prohibited the city from taking any action to administer or collect the tax. the city is appealing this decision but the legal process could take years which would leave that both the city and property owners in limbo during this time. we believe this ordinance provides a practical solution to that uncertainty if the city ultimately prevails on appeal our office will face enormous administrative challenges in attempting to retroactively collect back taxes from the prior years. >> one unique challenge of this tax is that it requires property owners to file every year even if they don't owe the tax. this is similar to the commercial vacancy tax which i have come in presented on several times but on a much larger scale many more tax payers so if forced to collect the tax retroactively our

office will encounter some serious obstacles. property ownership may have changed during that time. many required records may no longer be available making it nearly impossible to determine tax liability and taxpayers may not have documentation to respond to audits or compliance efforts. i know the blr will be presenting on this item and so i just want to emphasize that the primary driver of any revenue loss is not the ordinance that you're voting on today but the court order which prohibits the city from collecting the tax and it also prohibits the city from communicating with taxpayers about the tax. so we can't use this time to do any education about the tax and make people know about their obligations. additionally, even without the lawsuit, revenue collections would likely fall below initial projections due to the natural ramp up period associated with new taxes which require significant education outreach and compliance efforts. and we've seen that too with

the commercial vacancy tax. it's takes a lot of effort to help people understand that they have to file a tax even if they don't owe it. and that's really where the bulk of our work is in the first few years of the tax. so whether or not this ordinance passes we can't take any action to administer to communicate about or collect the empty homes tax due to the court order and we believe this ordinance acknowledges that the retroactive collection would be administratively impractical financially burdensome and unfair to taxpayers. >> we believe passing this ordinance would provide clarity and a reasonable path forward ensuring that if the tax is ultimately upheld it can be implemented effectively moving forward and i'm happy to take any questions. thank you. >> good morning. nick bernard from the budget legislative analyst's office. so item three is an ordinance that pertains to the empty homes tax would amend the

business regulate business and tax regulations code to essentially push the start date of the tax from january 1st 2024 until the the the resolution of the litigation that is challenging the validity of this tax. as we summarize on page three of our report. >> what this means is that if the litigation is resolved in the city's favor rather than the tax being retroactively due back to january 2024 it would be due in the year following the resolution of that litigation. there is a revenue impact from this ordinance. i believe because according to the comptroller's office nine the comptroller estimated that $9 million in revenue would be collected from this tax in 2024 rising up to $15.4 million and in later years there's a lot of uncertainty with that revenue. there's an education campaign that the treasury tax collector would have to go through but it does that is a loss to the

city. it is not a general fund revenue. the the empty homes tax as a special revenue essentially dedicated to various uses for affordable housing so there's not a direct impact on the general fund. but this is still i think a policy matter for the board to decide. >> okay. thank you. we do want to thank the city attorney's office for their effort in defending the suit and defending the city against this suit and it's regrettable that we're here with this situation that we are facing that we have to suspend temporarily until it's resolve. of course i wish we are not here but but here we are. and i think that both based on advice from the city attorney's office and i think treasures collectors office indicated that this is temp does temporary approach in suspending the collection

clearly lead to fine where the city is makes sense both for the city and for the people that we eventually have to reach out to collect this tax should we prevail in our appeal of the suit? >> so so vice chair dorsey thank you chair chin so i think i agree with the sentiment that chair chan is expressing. it is hard in this role to say no $2 but i've also been around this building long enough to see that tax litigation can create some really big uncertainties and when i first started in the city attorney's office actually it was then city attorney louise rennie was settling. gross receipts tax case for $80 million that could have been had that gone to trial up closer to 600 million. so i'm sensitive to some of the uncertainties that litigation may create even when we think

our city attorney thinks that we may prevail on things. so i'm inclined to support this. >> thank you. >> and so with that we'll go to public comment on both items. >> yes, we are now opening public comment for both items two and three if we have any members of the public joining us today who wish to address this committee. >> madam chair, we have no speakers seeing no public comments. public comment is now close and colleagues, i would like to move this forward to full bore with recommendation and a roll call please. >> and on that motion to forward the both ordinances to the full board to the positive recommendation vice chair dorsey and dorsey i remember engardio and engardio i chair can i can i we have three eyes. >> the motion passes. thank you. and with that i would like to call items number four and five together. >> yes item numbers four and five or resolutions approving

modification number two to an airport contract for project management support services for the san francisco international airport both for a new total not to exceed the amount of 13 million and extending the contract for services an additional four years from may 1st 2025 for a total term of may 2nd 2024 through may 1st 2029 respectively pursuant to the charter and making findings under the california environmental quality act hydra member for is for cargo building 626.1 project with consort pm cm inc to increase the contract amount by 10.3 million and item number five is for cargo building seven 20.1 and gsc building 742 project with westfield consultant a joint venture a joint venture between wsp usa inc and agc inc to increase the contract amount by 10 million. >> madam chair, thank you. we'll take the item separately

in presentation since one of them has to be out a report but please go ahead. they both have bill reports. >> oh my apologies. thank you. no problem. >> oh, would you like them together or separate us? let's do separately. >> separately? okay. thank you. so the first item before you requests approval of modification number two to an existing project management support service contract with consort pmc for the cargo building 626.1 project. >> the first item increases the contract amount by 10.3 million and extends the contract duration for an additional four years through may 1st 2020 nine. >> the project demolishes existing facilities and constructs a new cargo facility to support the future development of the westfield area which will modernize facilities, improve operational facility and support future cargo demands. >> the contract results from a 2023 competitive request for qualifications request for proposals, process and concer was the top ranked proposer. >> the contractor provides overall management expertise

and oversight of the project and services include design and construction management project controls, contract administration cost estimating and field inspections. >> contract costs are funded by the ascent program and there is a local business enterprise some consulting participating sorry local business enterprise sub consulting participation requirement of 20% the airport conducted a formal performance evaluation of the contractor in 2020 for and the contractor met and exceeded expectations in 25 of 27 measures. >> the blr has recommended approval and we are happy to answer any questions. >> item four is a resolution that approves a contract amendment between the airport and concer which is a project management firm that the airport hired to manage a

construction project at the airport to demolish a building used for cargo operations and build a new one. we detail the budget of this contract on page eight of our report. it is rising from 2.7 to $13 million largely due to the extension of the contract from 1 to 5 years. i think the rates for this service are reasonable. there's no performance issues with this contract here and this is funded by the airport capital revenues which are airport general airport revenues and airport revenue bonds. >> we recommend approval of item four. thank you. >> we will go to the item number five. >> okay. this item also requests approval of modification option number two to the existing project management support services contract with westfield consultants for the cargo building seven 20.1 and ground services equipment or gsc building 742 project. >> this item increases the

contract about by 10 million and extends the contract duration for an additional four years through may 1st 20 29. >> similar to the other project it demolishes existing facilities and constructs a new cargo facility and gsc maintenance building to support the future development of the westfield area. >> it is also a result from a 2023 competitive rfq rfp process and westfield consultants was the second ranked proposer. >> the contractor provides overall management expertise and oversight of the project and services include design and construction management project controls, contract administration cost estimating and field inspection is similar to the other contract costs are funded by the ascent program and there is also an lbc sub consulting participation requirement of 20%. >> the airport conducted a formal performance evaluation of the contractor in 2020 for and the contractor met and exceeded expectations in 25 of

27 measures the blr has recommended approval and we are also happy to answer any questions on this item. q item five is a resolution that pertains to would approve a airport contract with west field consultants. they're a joint venture of wsp and ags which are to san francisco based engineering firms. this amendment would extend the agreement from 1 to 5 years and increase the contract value from 3 to $13 million. we detail the budget on page six of our report and the rates and overall contract budget are reasonable with no performance issues. this contract is also funded by the airport capital plan. we recommend approval of item five. >> thank you. i appreciate the concern. while it's the only remaining bidder of that process is that

correct? but then it's the fact that they honored local business enterprise agreement to the 20%. i appreciate the airport continue to to ensure that. and even though i know is probably pose some challenges with that requirement and thank you for bringing both items to us today and i don't see any other name on the roster. >> we'll go to public comments on these items. yes, we're now opening public comment for anyone who wished to address this committee regarding these items four and five and that was your opportunity. >> madam chair, we have no speakers. no public comments. >> public comment is now closed. colleagues, i would like to move both items to a full board with recommendation and a roll call please. >> and on that motion to forward both resolutions to the full board with a positive recommendation. vice chair dorsey dorsey i remember engardio and engardio i church can i can i have three eyes?

>> the motion passes. thank you very much. thank you. and with that, mr. clerk, please call item number six. >> yes. item number six is a resolution approving and authorizing the general manager of the public utilities commission to execute amendment number one to the radio communication site lease dated april 1st, 2015 between the city and county through the puc has the tenant and communication and control inc as the landlord to allow the puc to expand the leased premises on a portion of a parcel hidden under inc alameda county and operate the additional radio communication equipment on the tower located on the premises for an initial monthly base rent of approximately 9000 for the lease of the expanded premises . >> affirming the planning department determination under the california environmental quality act pursuant to the administrative code and authorizing the general manager of the puc and or the city's director of property to execute

documents, make certain modifications and take certain actions in furtherance of this resolution here to authorize the puc general manager and or city director of property to enter into any amendments or modifications to the amendment including without limitation the exhibits that the general manager determines in consultation with the city attorney are in the best interests of the city and did not materially increase the obligations nor liabilities of the city and are necessary or advisable to effectuate the purposes and intent of the amendment or this resolution pursuant to the charter. >> madam chair, thank you. and today we have space here. thank you chair and good morning. supervisor is josh keen, assistant real estate director for the s.f. c. i'll be brief on this one. this is a lease amendment of a previously approved radio communications lease was approved by the board of supervisors most recently in 2015 after replacing an original lease from 2005. so we have a long term lease that allows us a c to be there

until 2040. this is an amendment of that existing radio communications lease to allow an expansion of the premises so that the sfp can install, operate and maintain additional equipment within the existing equipment shelter and an expansion within the apartment tower. so what this equipment does and it's more timely than ever obviously with the tragedy down south in the los angeles area the mount mount allison radio communications site is part of that space. he's got a system which is critical for the water and the power transmission operations across the san joaquin valley. the site also provides voice radio communication capability for the watershed staff which is especially critical when managing fires, search and rescue coordination and other emergencies in the watershed. this site in particular is invaluable due to its geographic location, sightlines and ability to satisfy coverage requirements. all of that is part and parcel to the original approval. today is an expansion of the

ongoing needs here. >> what this amendment itself is doing is effectively all it's doing is increase in order to accommodate the increased equipment and premises space. it's increasing the existing rent from 5550 $700 per month to $9,000 per month. so just over $40,000 per year and this was actually contemplated that from time to time there would be an expansion and we would return to the board of supervisors and that's what we're doing here. one additional modification is the spc will be assuming responsibility for the electrical utilities but the landlord will be agreeing to pay for all of the gas and the spc radio communications staff using data available from the state of california verify the appropriateness of the increase based upon those equipment rates. >> so this was approved categorically exempt from sequa and allowing this to move forward will allow that support to procure the equipment that's already been in the budget and

to move forward with the installation of the new equipment. i'm happy to answer any questions. i've also got staff from the sfp to see if you have any technical questions. >> thanks. thank you. sorry. yes i actually now i certainly have a quick question because i don't see that in the or in the resolution or in the legislation. so with this expansion, does that also mean that it's inclusive of the lease the original lease that we set forth in 2015 all the way to 2040? >> that's correct. so it's effectively amending the premises and the rent for as though we did this in 2015. understood. and it was actually contemplated this would happen and we have authority to do this administratively but it was a there was a threshold amount that required coming back to the board rather than at our commission level. >> got it. and so we are sorry. and so this is applicable to all the way to 2040? >> that's correct. we just to note though the other options to extend at our choice through 2040. so there are five year options. so theoretically if