not ada accessible. the plumbing services are outdated. the plumber who spoke earlier talked about the adequate plumbing. i know, because i have my neighbor's a dirty bath water come into my tub at times. it is stated. i live in a two story where the bathroom is upstairs, in item anytime and that is becoming challenging. the current space at parkmerced is mostly unusable, like he said, because it is in the center. this will create parks and fields for community use. this would continue for 20 or 30 years, and right now, we have a 25% unemployment rate. the current gardenias are reaching the end of their life. i have only moved once and one time, and there was the rent control. this newbie with replacement homes. a washer and dryer. safety will be improved, since buildings will meet and exceed requirements, which addresses the issue of constant maintenance in the existing homes. because replacement homes will be more efficient, we will probably have lower utility bills, and the community as a whole will benefit, especially seniors. i urge y

the project will also include a lot of improvements to our ada accessibility. we will have solar panels on the roof. it's a been tested project. we're thrilled and prowl that we will be able to hire some of resistance -- then we will be able to hire a san franciscans. our department has worked very hard to make sure we're giving them every opportunity to work. this past summer, we hired over 100 local people as part of our jobs now stimulus program. during the summer, we will hire 100 local children to help us with our summer camps and summer programs. we are absolutely joyed to be a part of this program. we want to thank the city family and the city community and everybody was a part of this legislation for allowing us to be one of the first projects out of the chute. thank you very much. [applause] >> next, i would like to introduce manny flores, the representative for carpenters' local 22. >> ok. i will be brief. you heard the mayor and he said it all. this has to work. what is really important for these kids and these san francisco residents is the training

deck two feet narrower, and we have a circulation cuts reducing the usable area in terms of ada accessibility for my client. you have pretty much destroyed the deck by moving it to the other side. that from a usability point of view would not be highly desirable. commissioner sugaya: how far to move it to the celotex -- how far do you want to move it? if he is only going to move a foot, you might as well keep it where it is. >> i think there is not much that would be accomplished. commissioner antonini: i think we are getting into privacy issues that are not an impact on the adjacent neighbor so much as the earlier things we have talked and -- we have talked about. leave that out. >> the staff recommendation also included modifications on the second and third floor. i hope you keep those modifications. thus did help us. the project's sponsors will do them. it is a combination of the steps recommendation -- of the staff recommendation on the second and third floor and this recommendation on the first floor. >> one of the things we did on the third floor was to move the deck back from the prope

there is no ada accessibility. if i want to shop in glen park at canyon market or if i want to go there for breakfast or to the library or to the bookstores, i am going to walk or take the j line and walk up that miserable, fifthy staircase. the idea of serving one part of the patronnage at the expense of the other won't make it. if we can make improvements on the line that is another. from my understanding that the f line operators pulling out via the j line are supposed to carry the folks. most do. but the few that don't make quite an impression. and if there is an opportunity to work with the sfmta at training, in an opportunity to make sure these operators know what the community interest is i look forward to the opportunity. i think i can do it without venting. the idea is community of interest. if the people on either side of the j line see a way to improve it i don't want to tell the people on church street they should take away stop signs or consolidate stops. historically there were many more stops on chur

title two of the ada addresses access to public services, including public transportation for personsh disabilities. tips for respectful communication for people with disabilities brochures are available. call sfmta accessible services at 415-701-4485 for copies.

presentation and discussion on the city program for small businesses and making accessibility requirements under both the federal ada and california building codes. presentation by regina dick- endrizzi and neil friedman. >> good evening, small business commissioners and building inspection commissioners. i am here before you this evening to talk about small businesses and disability access, and issues that have been before both of our commissions regarding, sort of, how do businesses get informed in addition to the lawsuits that have been transferring -- transpiring over the last five years. over the last couple of years, our department's director day, my office, the mayor's office on disability -- we have been discussing what we can do to help educate our small businesses and de-mystify the requirements they need to abide by. what we have heard over the years, in terms of our small businesses and dealing with the requirements, is that there is a lack of understanding of what the laws are, and that these laws are primarily civil rights laws. but they are also accompanied with building code requirements. usually, bu

accessibility requirements. but that may not bring them into full compliance under the federal ada. also, many of these small businesses may not even engage with the department of building inspection. their tenant improvements may be putting something on the walls, putting in some countries, may be adding shelves. there is no opportunity to engage with the department of building inspection in order to have the department take a look and work with them on some accessibility improvements. we have seen a number of businesses that have incurred these lawsuits. they bought their business as a turnkey operation. there is not any particular agency that is intersecting with them to say, "you may need to take a look at your business and the space you are in, and check on accessibility." with these lawsuits, what we have seen is that some of the key triggers that are triggering new lawsuits is that they are -- that there is a step at the front door. the front door may not be wide enough for easy to open. the service counter -- they do not have an ada service counter acts 48 inches. the restro

business owners are still obligated to make efforts to achieve access compliance under the ada and we'll talk about how some of those things get triggered. there's the state stuff, there's the ada compliance, and the ada uses something called readily achievable and we'll talk a little bit about what readily achievable means. in your handouts today you will find these defined much more closely. if you have an employee who requires some accommodation for their physical disability, you are required under federal law to provide some accommodation for their needs and this andout today, which is available at the building department, call us at 558-6205 and we'll send you a copy of this -- can include everything from your work station to your tty telephone. two more things i want to define. one is temporary usage. someone says, oh, no, i'm just selling hot dogs off a stand so i don't have to comply. >> i have heard that occasionally. >> people say that. they have to comply? yeah, they have to make reasonable efforts, they have to meet standards for disabled access even for temporary uses. if pe

whenever you do any work on a street you have to make the sidewalk next to it handicap accessible under the federal ada rules. and that meant dropping this sidewalk about 11". no sooner had the concrete dried on the new sidewalk, however, than they found out that the fire hydrant that was once here didn't fit any more so they had to move it across the street to its new location. the problem was they hit a pg&e pip while they were doing it and blacked out the whole neighborhood. >> about every month or so looks like there's been some blackouts and stuff like that. >> reporter: plus, in order to accommodate the new lower sidewalk they now have to lower the street. a job that has proven just as challenging, for example, today they had a tree expert on the site to make sure that the new digging doesn't hurt the roots of the very tree that they are trying to save. so far the cityest they have spent over $100,000 on the job but neighbors are betting the final tab will a lot higher. >> there are between 5 and 10 people here most of the time and these huge -- >> reporter: every day working? >> yeah. >> reporte

you do any work on the streets you have to make the sidewalks next to it handicapped accessible under the federal ada rules. and that meant dropping this sidewalk about 11 inches. no sooner had the concrete dried on the new sidewalk, however, than they found out that the fire hydrant that was once here didn't fit anymore. so they had to move it across the street to its new location. the problem was they hit a pg&e pipe while they were doing it and blacked out the whole neighborhood. >> about every month or so it seems like there has been, you know, some black-outs and stuff like that. >> reporter: plus, in order to accommodate the new lowered sidewalk, they have to now lower the street. a job that has proven just as challenging. for example, today it they had a tree expert on the site to make sure that the new digging doesn't hurt the roots of the very tree that they are trying to save. so far the city estimates they have spent over $100,000 on the job. but neighbors are betting that the final tab will be a lot higher. >> there are between 5-10 people here most of the time. and these huge -- >> repor

ada says and make life more successful for people. >> disability rights movement, the city has the overall legal obligation to manage and maintain the accessibility and right of way. with regards to the curb ramps, bounded by a groove border, 12-inch wide border. for people with low vision to get the same information. the shape of the domes, flush transition between the bolt bottom of the ramp and gutter. >> we have a beveled transition on the change in level, tape on the surfaces, temporary asphalt to fill in level changes, flush transition to temporary wood platform and ramp down into the street under the scaffoldinging. detectable ramps. they are all detectable. nothing down below or protruding that people are going to get snagged up on. smooth clean that nobody is going get caught up on. >> our no. 1 issue is what we see here, the uplifting and shreufting to concrete due too street tree roots. here is another problem we have with street trees. if i have i was a person blind, this would be an uncomfortable way to find out. >> we don't want to create hazards. >> sometimes vendors put sidewalk cafes where people push the chairs too far out. >> s

there is disability access, another very important feature of the capital plan. we fully fund our ata program -- ada program. it is a critical feature of all of the programs we do, as it is mandated by the federal government. whenever we touch a building, typically, we are making significant ada improvements, and that goes with parks and other things. we are still differing $694 million. there are various other improvements at, such as the library, the branch library improvement program, in some of the others. the next slide gives you a sense of where we are with respect to where we are and what we are deferring in the pay as you go situation. you can see it is a little difficult to see because of the scale. this is still outside of the 10- year capital plan. this is assuming we are going to grow our cash commitment by 10% per year. real inflation, 5% for growth. it is a catch up. even at that level of investment, you can see the sort of dark black line that is going up rather dramatically. that is the backlog that we need for our pay-as-you-go program. this line is what would be going up if we were

title 3 of the ada, which applies to private businesses, it is an ongoing obligation. you may not be able to make everything accessible in one year under the readily achievable standard, but it does not matter. every year you have an obligation to do what is readily achievable, or to save up from year to year so that at the end of five years you may have saved up enough money not to hurt your bottom line, not to lay off staff, not even to cut that far into your profit margin, but enough that you can put that ramp to your front door. if you have been in business since 1992, 19 years, you are in a difficult position to say you cannot have saved up enough money, that you did not have what is a $10,000 or $12,000 project in leeway during that 19-year period. that is where the confusion is over the different obligations between title 24 and title 3 of the ada. this is an ongoing obligation every year, and i am happy to take questions if you have them. president murphy: questions? seeing none. >> i just wanted to respond to the commissioner about making a list about what businesses are fully compliant. i think one of the un

ada says and make life more successful for people. >> disability rights movement, the city has the overall legal obligation to manage and maintain the accessibilitynd right of way. with regards to the curb ramps, bounded by a groove border, 12-inch wide border. for people with low vision to get the same information. the shape of the domes, flush transition between the bolt bottom of the ramp and gutter. >> we

ada standards for that. >> so the code makes distinctions between an individual work station that can be modified to meet an individual's need and a general employee area that needs to be accessible to all. >> here is a guy's work station at a sign company here in san francisco. what's interesting is he is inserting little braille symbols on signs. so here is a sign, it's a sign that says women's room and it shows the international symbol of accessibility as well and then it has these little braille dots on the bottom here. we're going to ask tom what they actually say here. what do they actually say, tom? . >> it actually says in what looks like code braille, women. it doesn't say women's room, it says women. that's fairly obvious. >> sometimes i wonder what they actually write on these. >> we change them at night. nasty remarks. >> so these signs, to change the sign from just saying women that you might have to one that says women in braille cost $9.95 for the sign. and readily achievable, i think it probably is. i wanted to talk just for a second about parking. the requirements for access when you are doing construction include the path of travel to the area of remodel, which

accessible public transit system like meany -- muni. >> the americans with disabilities act of 1990 is a wide-ranging federal civil- rights law that prohibits discrimination against persons with disabilities. title two of the ada addresses access to public services, including public transportation for persons with disabilities. it requires transit operators to call out stops at transfer points, major intersections, and major destinations, and to announce particular stocks requested by customers with disabilities. stop announcements are especially important for passengers who are blind or have low vision. these individuals cannot travel independently if they are not assured of getting off at their intended destination point.

accessible public transit system like meany -- muni. >> the americans with disabilities act of 1990 is a wide-ranging federal civil- rights law that prohibits discrimination against persons with disabilities. title two of the ada addresses access to public services, including public transportation for persons with disabilities. it requires transit operators to call out stops at transfer points, major intersections, and major destinations, and to announce particular stocks requested by customers with disabilities. stop announcements are especially important for passengers who are blind or have low vision. these individuals cannot travel independently if they are not assured of getting off at their intended destination point. >> welcome to "culturewire." since december 2005, the museum of the african diaspora, known locally,moad, has presented programs that celebrate and explore the culture, history, and art of people with african descent throughout the and added states and throughout the world. the director of cultural affairs recently met with the museum director. to learn more about the current expedition, textural rhythms, constructing the jazz tradition, contemporary african american quilts. >> welcome to "