Okay, good afternoon and welcome.

To the San Francisco Planning Commission hearing for Thursday, November 6, 2025.

When we reach the item you are interested in speaking to, we ask that you line up on the screen side of the room or to your right.

Each speaker will be allowed up to three minutes.

And when you have 30 seconds remaining, you will hear a chime indicating your time is almost up.

When your allotted time is reached, I will announce that your time is up and take the next person cued to speak.

There is a very convenient timer on the podium where you can see how much time you have left and watch your time tick down.

Please speak clearly and slowly and if you care to state your name for the record.

I ask that we silence any mobile devices that may sound off during these proceedings.

And finally, I will remind members of the public that the commission does not tolerate any disruption or outbursts of any kind.

At this time, I'd like to take roll.

Commission President Sohn Vice President Moore.

Commissioner Braun.

Here Commissioner Campbell.

Commissioner Imperial.

Here.

Commissioner McGarry and Commissioner Williams.

Here.

Thank you, Commissioners.

First on your agenda is consideration of items proposed for continuance.

Item one, case number 2024, hyphen 011548 DRP, 02.

At 2867 Green Street, discretionary review is proposed for continuance to November 13th, 2025.

Item two, case number 2025, hyphen 006246 PCA.

Definitions.

So we should take public comment.

Members of the public, this is your opportunity to address the commission on their continuance calendar only on the matter of continuance.

You need to come forward.

Seeing none, public comment is closed.

Your continuance calendar is now before you, Commissioners.

Commissioner Brown.

Move to continue all items as proposed.

Second.

Thank you, Commissioners.

On that motion to continue items as proposed.

Commissioner Campbell.

Aye.

Commissioner McGarry.

Aye.

Commissioner Williams.

Aye.

Commissioner Braun.

Aye.

Commissioner Imperial.

Aye.

Commissioner Moore.

Aye.

And Commissioner President Seo.

Aye.

So move Commissioners.

That motion passes unanimously seven to zero.

Placing us under your consent calendar.

All matters listed here under constituted consent calendar are considered to be routine by the Planning Commission and may be acted upon by a single roll call vote.

There will be no separate discussion of these items unless a member of the Commission, the public or staff so requests.

In which event the matter shall be removed from the consent calendar and considered as a separate item at this or a future hearing.

Item 4, case number 2025, hyphen 001905, CU8 440 Petrero Avenue Conditional Use Authorization, and item 5, case number 2022, 008315.

Members of the public, this is your opportunity to request that either of these two consent calendar items be pulled off and considered under the regular calendar.

You need to come forward.

Seeing none, public comment is closed, and your consent calendar is now before you, Commissioners.

Commissioner Braun.

Move to approve items four and five on consent.

Second.

Thank you, Commissioners.

On that motion to approve items on consent.

Commissioner Campbell.

Aye.

Commissioner McGarry.

Commissioner Williams.

Aye.

Commissioner Braun.

Aye.

Commissioner Imperial.

Aye.

Commissioner Moore.

Aye.

And Commissioner President So.

Aye.

So move Commissioners.

That motion passes unanimously seven to zero.

Commission matters item six.

Land acknowledgement.

I'll be reading this.

The Commission acknowledges that we are on the unceded ancestral homeland of the Ramatushaloni, who are the original inhabitants of San Francisco Peninsula.

As the indigenous stewards of this land in accordance with their traditions, the Ramatus and Loni have never ceded, lost, nor forgotten their responsibilities as the caretakers of this place, as well as for all peoples who reside in their traditional territory.

As guests, we recognize that we benefit from living and working on their traditional homeland.

We wish to pay our respects by acknowledging their ancestors, their elders, the relatives of the Ramatushalone community, and by affirming their sovereign rights as first people.

Item seven, consideration of adoption draft minutes for October 16th and October 23rd, 2025.

Members of the public, this is your opportunity to address the commission on their minutes.

Again, you need to come forward.

Seeing none, public comment is closed.

Your minutes are now before you, Commissioners.

Commissioner Imperio.

Move to adopt a minutes.

Second.

Thank you, Commissioners.

On that motion to adopt your minutes, Commissioner Campbell.

I Commissioner McGarry.

Commissioner Williams.

Commissioner Braun.

Aye.

Commissioner Imperial.

Commissioner Moore.

I Commissioner President.

So I just to move Commissioners that motion passes unanimously seven to zero.

Item eight, Commission comments and questions.

Commissioner Imperio.

I just want to follow up with the planning director on the study analysis on SB79, and when will that be at the Planning Commission?

Yeah.

Commissioner Imperial, thank you for that.

Um we uh we did present on SB 79 at the land use committee of the board this week, um, so that Commissioner so that the supervisors had that information in hand as they were looking at the family zoning plan.

Um, what I will do is follow up um with information for all of you, and we will look for the next available scheduling opportunities so we can present that here as well.

But we'll get that information to you more quickly than the hearing.

Thank you for that request.

Commissioner Moore.

Uh we all read the papers on particularly the news surrounding Union Square.

And I'm delighted that some of the larger retailers which had exited the city before around COVID are coming back, and exactly creating that critical anchor between high-end and normal shopping.

And I'm delighted to see that the larger store funds are filling, and we can recapture the importance of downtown and union square.

All right, Commissioners.

If there's nothing further, we can move on to department matters item nine, director's announcements.

Commissioners, great to see you today.

Um I wanted to talk about a couple things at the city level before getting into some more direct department matters.

Um, I think as a city, um, we were incredibly proud to be distributing um replacement food benefits for those who who lost um what we now assess is probably a month gap in service and receiving needed nutritional benefits from the federal government.

So between a partnership um of city funding put on reserve and philanthropic funding, we were able to um get within um within striking distance of the total dollar value of the benefits that were lost or delayed by the federal shutdown.

Um the city has been actively through HSA and many civic partners, including here in the tenderloin, distributing um cards that will help the families that miss those benefits get those.

That's been actively underway for the last couple of days.

Um, so I just think it's a real point of pride for our city.

I also want to note that I know we have as a city we received many requests from other cities asking how we pull this off.

And I think looking at that as a model for their city as we continue to look at federal uncertainty.

So we're we're very proud of that support that the city executed here.

Um, you the Urban Land Institute conference is also in uh the fall meeting is in San Francisco this week.

And I only mentioned that because as Commissioner Moore noted about um the you know burgeoning a start of some improvement in tenanting in um union square.

We are hearing from many of the attendees who are from out of state, out of town, out of state visiting here for that conference, um, that they are seeing the improvement in San Francisco, and they're feeling it, and it's really wonderful to have just like we do with so many of the actual business conferences held at Moscone, real land use professionals looking and seeing that you know, at the success that I think we've all been working so hard on over a number of years across all our communities.

Um I also wanted to announce that we are very sad to be losing one of our senior leaders this week, Miriam Chong's last day was yesterday at the planning department.

Um, she she wanted to keep it very quiet, so we're respecting her wishes, but I did feel I had to share with you today.

Um, as you know, Miriam um played an invaluable role in reshaping how the department the planning department works with communities and how in that work with communities how we actually do our work.

So it has been incredible growth for our department through her leadership.

So there are three areas of work that Miriam led our equity plan, our policy and strategy work, and our community work.

That work will all transition to some new teams.

Lisa Gibson who you all know very well who is our ERO is also going to step into a leadership role to provide senior management oversight and support to the equity plan and the equity council so the same staff that has been leading that work will continue that work and Lisa will step in to provide senior leadership to make sure there's extreme continuity and then the staff working on community planning and development and policies and strategies including our liaisons for communities across the city will be joining the team looking at advanced planning led by Rachel Tanner.

So that's how we're going to continue that work in the near term and we appreciate your support as we um navigate on with all that Miriam has helped infuse the department with in a broader way.

One of the things we're particularly excited about even with Miriam's loss is it does present an opportunity for us to take our equity work and our equity plan out of a division level and put it across the entire department across all divisions and so you we now have an organizational structure that will allow that work which Claudia Flores also leads and you've known Claudia has been with the department for a long time to infuse um not just the community equity division but our citywide division our environmental planning division particularly given Lisa's leadership and our current planning division so we're really excited about that that infusion with this with this slight shift as well.

And then the last thing maybe I'll just note is I think we've had a couple commissioner questions on the city economist report on the family zoning plan simply because that didn't come to this body I know Aaron Starr in his report will address that a little bit but if you have further questions after he gives that report we can dialogue at that time.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Commissioner Imperial I have questions Director um Phillips on the reorganization because of um Ms.

Chiyam's departure and sounds like Ms.

Ms.

Tanner is going to take on and what's going to happen in terms of the the city wide my understanding from the last year is that the equity work will be infused under CDY is that was that because of that plan or so there's kind of two ways our and this is an extreme oversimplification as you know but um to for a minute if you'll humor me with the extreme oversimplification there's kind of two directions our our our equity work um has really deepened one is how do we work as a department internally and externally to make sure we're meeting our our equity based goals and you know we have our phase one and phase two plan that that exhibit those goals and so that work again will be kind of elevated out of the division and at a department level you know some not living within a division to be um led by Lisa Gibson with the current team still working on that and that's you know that is how are we hiring how are we uh how are we doing community workshops in general how do we make sure that folks understand the changes in state law as we see ministerial changes so they understand their options then there is the community equity work we do at the ground level whether that's the tenderland community action plan our recently initiated Fillmore community Action Plan, the mission 2030 work that we are working on, those community plans will um continue with the teams they have reporting to Rachel Taylor.

Thank you.

Commissioner Williams?

Yes.

Thank you uh that that's really sad news uh uh for me personally um uh a couple of questions uh around the folks that are gonna step up into leadership positions for the equity division.

Usually those those people in those positions have you know good relationships or at least good with communities.

And so I'm just wondering, you know, if that was part of the decision to put those folks in those positions.

I think um that those relationships, I know Miriam had uh those types of relationships with a lot of communities of color around our our city, and so I'm just a little concerned, or I should say um I just would like to um make sure that those those relationships still continue on that positive track.

Uh and and so that would be my first comment on that, and then you know, as far as the the um the equity division is um is is there gonna be an ex- is there plans for an expansion?

Is there is it retracting?

Is it um because I see there's folks moving around?

I mean, what do we have any um kind of vision for that department is moving forward now that uh Miriam's gone?

So maybe I'll I'll answer both sides of your question.

So one, I mean, we're right there with you.

Um relationships are incredibly important, and while no one can ever replace Miriam, um we obviously will like we we have great leaders in staff on the planning department staff who you know, um they'll definitely have to expand some of their relationships to get to the level that Miriam had, and we're committed to doing that work.

It's something agencies always have to do as as staff moves around, unfortunately.

So we're committed to doing that work, and we're excited to do it.

And I think what is um most important acknowledgement within that is that um Miriam, as most good leaders do, has built a great team of staff doing the work, and that staff will continue to do the work, so um, we also have those staff relationships continuing to happen.

None of that will change.

Um, and then on the second one, um no new vision other than I think what I think Miriam has established a great vision that we've embedded within the department, and we're just carrying on that work.

Um the the only slight shift I would say is that you know our department-wide equity work really has the ability to be department wide now.

It was nurtured and incubated within our community equity division, which was fabulous.

Um, it got to a place of strength understanding and frankly plans with implementation actions that allow us to kind of elevate that up to a department-wide level so that we're really executing it in all corners of the department.

I'd be interested in and you know, kind of understanding more about how that is all gonna happen.

Um is there any yeah, I'm thinking about community and relationships with with the planning department, and I was just wondering, is there was there any outreach to any of the community organizations that work closely with the planning department to see like maybe who who they thought might might be uh someone that to step into the role um of you know of leadership um and so just more you know out of uh an equity perspective, these these community organizations they do a lot of work uh with the planning department, and and so I was just wondering if that was something that was a consideration uh when picking someone for Marion State.

So again, I I there is no there, there's no picking of anyone.

We're just trying to continue the work with the the leadership team that we have, but I think to your point, one of the things that um has been critical is as we've been knowing that Miriam's transition um was coming, that we've been working with our partners with the equity council and with staff to figure out the best path for this work.

So, yes, we've been so you so you haven't really talked to community or any of the organizations about who they thought.

So I guess that that has not been the question.

So I think as you are aware, Commissioner Williams, we we do know we are in a hiring freeze in the city, so um there are no new positions that we're creating, if that's the question you're asking.

No, I'm I'm just with the existing staff.

Uh I was I was kind of just getting to uh who who would work best with community as far as a representation from the planning department because I know that there's been there's been many years of conversations and people that uh have you know have developed important relationships with community, different community organizations.

And I was just wondering if uh again, if that was something that was well, I I think it's important.

Let me just put it that way.

Um, obviously it's up to you.

You're the director, but I just kind of wanted to throw that in there that uh that um I think it's it's also important that whoever steps into those roles has a good working relationship, an existing working relationship with with community.

We appreciate that comment, and that obviously is fundamental in how we move forward.

Yeah, thanks for that.

Thank you.

Um it is I really want to just say a very uh brief appreciation for Merriam's legacy in uh shaping our city with her leadership and help our department when we start to adopt our racial equity as part of our mission statement and her um leadership and success to help our department implementing that become part of our DNA for every urban planning staff.

What we have under your leadership now.

It is um admirable and I really wish her uh well in her future wherever she wants to pursue it and thank you for sharing with us with this announcement.

And I appreciate all my commissioners' comment, but I also think that Merriam is a really highly respected um urban planning uh experts in the Bay Area, and her legacy is forever respected in our department.

So thank you.

Do we have any other um updates or comments?

We're ready to move to the next item on our agenda.

Very good.

Item 10 review of past events of the Board of Supervisors and the Board of Appeals.

There was no historic preservation commission hearing yesterday.

Uh good afternoon, Commissioner Zaren Star, manager of legislative affairs.

This week the land use committee first considered.

Excuse me, frog in my throat.

Um Supervisor Walton's ordinance that would amend the planning code and zoning map to establish the San Francisco Gateway special use district.

Commissioners, you heard this item on September 25th and recommended approval.

At the hearing, there was a comprehensive presentation by staff, followed by public comment.

Public comment offs start off strong with opposition to the project, calling it union busting.

However, most of the comments after were in support of the proposed project because of the jobs that will bring several union representatives spoke in favor of the proposed ordinance during public comment.

After public comment, Supervisor Walton thanked everyone for coming and reiterated that labor has been at the table uh with this project from the beginning.

Uh with supervisor that was with that, Supervisor Melgar made a motion to move the item to the full board with a positive recommendation, and this motion passed unanimously.

Next, the committee considered the mayor's ordinance adaptive reuse of historic buildings.

The mayor's office requested that this item be continued so that additional amendments could be made based on community feedback.

Because it was an agendized item, the committee did take public comment.

Many spoke in opposition to the item.

Community members uh from North Beach cited concerns over the changes that would allow formula retail in North Beach.

Community members in Chinatown expressed concern over the fact that it would allow cannabis retail in Chinatown, and hotel union members took exception to the idea of allowing hotels without ACU in historic buildings.

There were also some public commenters who spoke in favor of the ordinance.

The committee then continued the item to the call of the chair.

Next, the committee considered the mayor's ordinance on planning fees.

This ordinance would shift the timing of fee collection from the issuance of a building permit to the submission of a development application.

Second, the ordinance includes changes to the environmental fee review fees.

Commissioners, you heard this on October 23rd and unanimously adopted a recommendation for approval.

There were four public commenters in opposition to the proposed ordinance arguing that developers should pay fees up front.

However, it's not clear the commenters understood what the ordinance did as it would make developers pay fees up front.

Without any questions or discussion in the matter, the committee voted to forward this item to the full board with a positive recommendation as a committee report.

The committee then considered Supervisor Connie Chan's ordinance that would require a conditional use authorization if the new use would displace a legacy business.

This item was continued from last week's hearing because supervisor made a series of amendments.

Those amendments include first general plan findings, since this commission determined the ordinance to be inconsistent with the general plan.

Second, she added legacy added legacy business to the definition in planning code section 102 and categorized it as a use characteristic.

Use characteristics are things like formula retail or a drive-thru, something that can apply to a wider variety of uses.

Third, she added a provision that exempts businesses categorized as small business enterprises from the CU requirement.

A small business enterprises defined in the business and tax code as those making under $5 million a year.

The Office of the Treasurer estimates that 96% of businesses in SF fall under that threshold.

And finally, she amended the administrative code to allow businesses that have been in operation for 15 years the ability to be considered as legacy business.

Prior to this, the minimum to be considered was 20 years.

During the hearing, Supervisor Melgar indicated her support for the proposed ordinance with the amendments, as did Supervisor Cheyenne Chin.

Supervisor Mahmoud though was more skeptical and asked staff questions relating to the amendments.

He wanted to know if staff could support the program with the proposed amendments.

As we represent you, the planning commission at the land use committee.

Our recommendation to the board cannot change unless you change it.

However, as staff, we did not feel the amendments changed the fundamental issue around requiring a CU for replacing a use.

CUs are designed to determine if a particular use is necessary or desirable at a given location, not whether a new use is worthy of displacing the previous use.

There was public uh comment mostly in support of the ordinance with some detractors.

In the end, the committee voted two to one to send the item to the full board with supervisor Mahmoud against.

These items were continued from the October 20th hearing.

To begin, Ted Egan, the city economist presented the Office of Economic Analysis Economic Impact Report for the Family Zoning Plan.

This report looked to assess economic impact of the rezoning.

This analysis was intended to determine whether the family zoning plan would have a positive or negative impact on the city's economy and not to assess or question the proposed rezoning's capacity.

The report found that the family zoning plan would have a positive impact on the city's economy.

It stated that more housing that is produced in the future is greater benefit to the city and that the current economic conditions for housing production are very challenging, regardless of zoning.

This echoes the feasibility study the planning department published earlier this year.

During public comment, there are approximately 65 speakers.

Comments vary greatly between being opposed to and supportive of the rezoning broadly and various amendments proposed.

Regarding the general plan amendment, there was no specific discussion by supervisors and little comments from the public regarding the matter.

For the zoning map, Supervisor Cheyenne Chen proposed to further amendments further amend the map by removing parcels in D11 from the rezoning.

This is an addition to her prior proposed amends to remove all local parcels located in the priority equity geography's SUD from the rezoning.

This proposed amendment removed all parcelals in the Ocean Avenue in C District on the south side of the street that constitutes the 10 blocks within D11.

This amendment was incorporated into the duplicated file for later consideration.

For the planning code text amendments, Supervisor Cheyenne Chen, Melgar, and Soder proposed clarifying amendments to their proposed previously made amendments from October 20th, which were accepted and incorporated into the duplicated file for later consideration.

Next, the committee voted on previously proposed amendments from the October 20th hearing.

These votes were to move the amendments from the duplicated file to the original file.

These amendments are characterized as amendments that do not have a substantial negative effects on the rezoning capacity and did not um introduce notable new constraints to housing development.

The first exempts the demolition or conversion of hotels from the local program.

I would note that sites with motels are not exempt.

The second affirms that nothing in the local program or housing sustainability district abrogates other requirements outside of the planning code.

The firm, the third affirms existing law that protects using the local program are required to comply with Article 4 of the planning code.

The fourth adds additional incentives to the local program to provide two-bedroom units.

The fifth strengthens review of the residential flat modifications, and the sixth adds limitations on significantly altering historic buildings if using the housing sustainability district ministerial program.

All other amendments proposed at the October 20th hearing, of which there were approximately 20, were maintained in the duplicated file.

At the end of the hearing, the committee continued all pieces of legislation to the next land use committee hearing on November 17th.

And that concludes my report.

I'm happy to answer any questions.

Okay, seeing no questions from the commission.

We can move on to general public comment at this time.

Members of the public may address the commission on items of interest to the public that are within the subject matter jurisdiction of the commission, except agenda items with respect to agenda items.

Your opportunity to address the commission will be afforded when the item is reached in the meeting.

When the number of speakers exceed the 15-minute limit, general public comment may be moved to the end of the agenda.

Again, you need to come forward.

Seeing none, general public comment is closed.

We can move on to your regular calendar commissioners for item 11, case number 2025.

Excuse me, tenant protections related to residential demolitions and renovations.

This is the planning code and administrative code amendments.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Commissioners.

Um, good to be back here.

We got a full house today.

Um, very excited to bring before you the tenant protection ordinance that has been in the works for a while.

And before we kick it off, I want to thank Commissioner Imperial.

Um you are instrumental in helping us get on this path, and we're with us with several meetings, and it's really great to have such collaboration from our leaders like yourself.

Um, want to recognize Supervisor Cheyenne Chen, who is here from District 11, as well as Supervisor Mirna Melgar from District 7.

Thank you both also for your incredible leadership.

Thank you, Charlie.

Also for your tireless efforts and expert facilitation through many, many, many, many meetings.

Um, so we're really excited to bring this forward today.

This um this bill has a lot of support because we are a city of renters and a city that supports renters and supports protecting our housing stock, but also the humans, right?

The people, the households that are living in those homes, and making sure that we can grow, and as we grow, we don't leave folks behind or leave folks out that we're building more housing and not not losing our existing housing.

So um, I will uh first ask uh if the supervisors want to share a few remarks, and then we will have our staff person, our senior planner, um Melena Leon Ferrera, who will give the staff presentation.

So, Supervisor Cheyenne Chen.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, thank you, Director Tanner.

Um good afternoon, commissioners, and good afternoon, Director Dennis Phillips.

Um, my name is Cheyenne Chen.

I am the District 11 supervisors and the vice chair of the land use committee.

And thank you for the opportunity to speak about tenant protection ordinance this afternoon.

I come before you with this legislation to extend the rights of tenants who face displacement when a developer or landlord pursue the demolition of a property that houses tenants or may have in the past in order to build new housing.

San Francisco has always been a city that protects tenants, but due to recent law passes by the state of California, tenants are now exposed to a host of new displacement risks.

There has been so much focus at the state and local level on housing production and entitlement.

This legislation attempts to recenter the conversation to address the impact to existing tenants and residents.

SB 330, the Housing Crest Act of California, created a pathway for developers to demolish, to demolish existing homes and to evict existing residents.

It is imperative that we take steps to the local level at the local level to help stabilize tenants and local communities.

The proposed legislation establishes common sense rules for the developers and common sense protection for the tenants and residents.

The ordinance applies citywide.

It creates a set of new policies and system of enforcement.

The legislation provides for extensive tenant notification that is linguistically accessible at all steps of entitlement, relocation assistance to all displaced tenants with additional assistance to low-income tenants, a relocation plan and specialists to facilitate the implementation of required protections, a right for tenants to remain in their home for at least six months with time-specific notifications.

A right to return at prior rental rate if demolition does not proceed, and units are returned to the rental market, a right of first refusal for lower-income tenants to move into newly developed units at prior rents or an affordable rent, whichever is lower, replacement of all protected units with a combination of rent control and below market rate units.

Updated finding in the conditional use process to ensure objective standards that consider the impact of tenants, additional tools to protect the rights of tenants in the event that land laws seek to avoid this requirements.

The legislation designates tenants who may have been displaced as a result of harassment from land laws, owner moving evictions or by our agreements, as current occupants, thus conferring the same route as existing tenants when this development projects occur.

Additional relocation assistance to tenants who are temporarily displaced as a result of capital improvement projects that extend beyond three months.

The change in the state law as well as the family zoning plan have provided a tremendous amount of fear and anxiety amount tenants from elderly tenants who are reliant on their support network in existing rent control housing, and they are terrified of displacement from their home when landlords choose to redevelop, or the real fears of tenants who are forced to absorb unmanageable rent increase on the private market when their landlord redevelop their buildings.

We have been working very diligently to ensure that the strongest possible protection and the work continues.

I will be introducing additional amendments to the legislation to this legislation that are responsive to the community priorities and that we have heard, including one, a five-year look back to clarify the requirements for buildings that withdraw units from the rental market under the LS Act and then proceed to them to demolish and redevelop.

The amendment would establish protection for those tenants who have been displaced.

And including in the definition of that development project would be evaluated under the standard of demolition under the planning department in section 317 B2B in order to trigger the protection and requirements under this ordinance.

The language in private right of action will be amended to match the language that currently exists in the rent ordinance.

Clarification that project sponsors are required to contract with a relocation specialist form from a list of from a list provided by the department.

A clarification in the criteria that must be met when tenants who experience harassment file claims before the rent board prior to project sponsors submitting development applications, a clarification regarding the disclosure provision of buyout agreements in the finding for conditional use authorization.

This legislation is informed by on the ground experts of tenants and counselors, lawyers, and advocates who have been taking calls that is really panicking from our community members when things when displacements happen.

So they are really fair of evictions.

I also want to acknowledge the leadership of our race and equity in all planning coalition, and also the San Francisco Anti-Displacement Coalition for their strong partnership in crafting this ordinance.

I also want to appreciate the planning department staff, Molena, Melena, Leon for Leon Farela for her technical expertise and my staff team, Charlie Shamas, for his stewardship for this legislation.

I also want to really appreciate uh the partnership of the planning department from Joey Kumas of the Renboard, Manroop, Prehen, and Audrey Parrison from the City Attorney's Office.

And I also want to appreciate their partnership in continue the amendment that we're going to work on together.

I will also pass it alone right now to the department for their presentation.

And I know that the community stakeholders will continue to work together to provide critical input, and I look forward for their testimony as well.

And I also look forward for your support and also continue partnership.

Thank you.

Thank you, Supervisor Chen and Supervisor Melgory.

Hi, Commissioners.

I am the supervisor for District 7.

I am here in full support of this important legislation introduced by Supervisor Chen as one of eight supervisors co-sponsoring it.

I also want to thank the community groups, in particular, the anti-displacement coalition, Charlie Shamas in Supervisor Chen's office, and Jennifer Fieber in my office who have worked with your staff arduously to get us to the finish line.

You know, Supervisor Chen and I are limited in what we can discuss as I am the chair of the Ladies and Transportation Committee, and she is the vice chair, so the Brown Act does not permit us to work on things together, unfortunately, but we are all on the same page and want to meet the same goal.

I want to assure everyone that these are meant to enhance and not compete with the ordinance.

They are the byproducts of many discussions that my staff, Jennifer Fieber, had with tenant advocates, anti-displacement activists, and also our own knowledge of the code and the rent control ordinance, and the longstanding concerns that we've had with upzoning in the city.

As a former commissioner, I am interested in giving you useful tools to make targeted decisions at hearings that will both encourage new construction and protect existing residents from unfair displacement.

To that end, the first amendment I want to describe is to reorder the conditional use criteria.

There are 12 criteria in Supervisor Chen's legislation, and I'm not changing any of the words in those criteria, but I am suggesting that we pull out three of the criteria that you must follow existing in and say that you must follow existing rent laws and make those three criteria a requirement, not an optional part of the objective standards.

Then for the remaining nine criteria, we I'm suggesting that we lower the percentage to 70% because there's now less criteria, there's nine not eleven.

I have run some real world scenarios in sort of at back of the envelope, and I and I, you know, suggest that you do the same.

And I believe that this new formula will allow owner occupied projects that are small, so they have nothing to do with inclusionary or replacing rental units to easily meet the threshold and be approved.

At the same time, it would make it more difficult and unlikely for someone who would seek to demolish rent controlled units unless they are including many of the other desirable traits that are in the objective standards.

The second amendment addresses a conditional use authorization inside and the inside the PEG and outside the PEG distinction.

State laws have changed since we wrote our section about when CU applies, and it is now very convoluted to understand.

For example, SB 79 projects, there's an outright prohibition of demolition of more than two rent controlled units if they're occupied by tenants in the past seven years.

We have not incorporated that prohibition in our code and probably should.

But then SB 423 says you can't get streamlined approval if a tenant has lived there in the past 10 years.

So I'm suggesting that we go with the SB 423 definition and do a 10-year look back outside of the priority equity geography, in that inside the PEG, it remains as written.

This is just to trigger ACU.

That's it.

This decision whether to approve demolition and why still lies with you.

The longer time period will also help curb speculators from evicting all those tenants and letting it sit empty to get around replacing those units as we have seen happen.

Otherwise, we may lose a rent controlled stock outside the PEG.

After speaking to the city attorney, there's also an interest in cleaning up this language, you know, to make it consistent across the board and with the state law more generally.

So I remain committed to doing that when things calm down and we get things done the way we're supposed to do by the state deadline.

But I remain open to hearing back from you about that.

And finally, the third amendment, I am suggesting that we use a similar project for LS Act notifications that LA has adopted.

We have been working with them, with folks in LA and also Berkeley on all rent controlled issues because they have very similar issues in responding to all of the new state laws that have come down.

There, when you file an LS petition with the city, you are also asked to disclose if you intend to demolish the building.

You can change your mind down the road if you haven't made that choice, but we are just asking for transparency when you know what you're doing and you follow established housing policy.

Otherwise, Ellis could be used to get around the replacement unit requirement and enhanced relocation that you are about to adopt.

So those are the things I'm proposing.

I've all sh already shared them with planning staff earlier this week.

We will also be sharing them with HCD staff as we have all the other amendments to make sure we get to the finish line and are still compliant.

I am looking forward to hearing your thoughts today.

I'm available to discuss these things any time.

And again, I want to thank uh my staff, Jennifer Fieber, for her uh dogged uh stick to it in all of these issues and planning staff and my dear colleague Supervisor Chen and her uh staff Charlie Shammas.

Thank you.

All right.

Good afternoon, Commissioners, and Melena Leon Farrera, department staff.

I will be going over the proposed ordinance known as tenant protections related to residential demolitions and renovations, sponsored by Supervisor Chen and co-sponsored by seven other supervisors.

For brevity, I call the proposed ordinance, I'll call the proposed ordinance the TPO.

Commissioners, you have before you a complex proposed ordinance.

I will do my best to cover the most relevant parts.

City staff and Supervisor Chen's office staff are here to respond any follow-up questions.

Okay.

I will first cover the background for the TPO, then I will go over the changes the TPO proposes to the planning and administrative code.

Then I will talk about anticipated amendments, followed by the department's proposed modifications, and finally, I will offer closing comments.

Let's dive in.

San Francisco's existing regulatory framework includes some of the strongest demolition and tenant protection controls in the country.

In 2019, the Housing Crisis Act, also known as SB 330, was adopted.

It introduced replacement unit and tenant protection requirements when demolitions happen.

Since then, planning has been implementing SP 330 according to the director's bulletin number seven.

The TPO is in response to community advocacy for stronger residential tenant protections associated with redevelopment and major rehabilitation projects in light of the family zoning plan.

The TPO codifies and expands upon the requirements of SB 330 to achieve these goals.

Thus, it's important to understand SB 330 demolition requirements.

SB330 requires no net loss of housing, meaning any unit demolished must be replaced.

It also establishes special requirements for the replacement of protected units, which it defines as units occupied by lower income households, permanently affordable units, rent controlled units, and units with Ellis Act evictions.

For protected units, SB330 requires those to be replaced at equivalent size, meaning the same number of bedrooms and at affordable rent or price.

It mandates units to be affordable for at least 55 years.

SB 330 also extends for tenant rights to existing occupants.

Right to remain up to six months prior to demolition, relocation, relocation benefits for lower income households, right of first refusal for lower income households for a unit at an affordable price or rent, and right to return if demolition does not proceed at prior rental rate for all tenants.

SB 330 has not changed our demolition controls or their impacts.

Demolitions in San Francisco remain rare, with only 18 units lost per year, representing 0.1 sorry, 0.0004% of San Francisco's housing stock.

Furthermore, 90% 95% of evictions are due to other causes, namely owner move-in, Ellis Act, and capital improvement evictions, which could be related to demolitions, but those are the reasons why people are being evicted.

The type of eviction pathway people are using.

The goal of the TPO is to create clear, consistent, and transparent policies to ensure strong implementation and enforcement of its tenant protection and replacement unit requirements.

The TPO also aims to minimize and mitigate the risk of displacement due to residential demolitions as new housing is built to replace it.

Finally, the TPO addresses other tenant protection issues such as those just covered, as well as tenant harassment.

It is important to note.

Sorry, I missed the slide.

It is important to note that the TPO was developed through a collaborative process between CETAR leadership, tenant and housing advocacy organizations, and in coordination with other city departments.

Leadership came from Supervisor Shane Chen's office, the planning department and the rent board in coordination with the mayor's office.

City leadership actively collaborated with the Race and Equity Null Planning Coalition, also known as REP, the San Francisco Anti-Displacement Coalition, and members of the public such as Georgia Shuddish.

This work was also done in collaboration with other divisions within planning, MOCD, and DBI.

While SB 330 establishes minimum requirements to be met, the goal of the TPO is to stretch and strengthen those requirements to better protect tenants and to ensure proper replacement housing.

To achieve this goal, the TPO proposes amendments to the planning code and administrative code, namely the rent ordinance.

The TPO proposes amendments to the planning code that go beyond SP 330 in three main areas enforcement, tenant protections, and replacement units.

Together, these changes close key gaps and ensure stronger, more consistent implementation of tenant protection and replacement of protected units citywide.

Before I discuss the most impactful amendments, I want to clarify that when a project is submitted, the first thing we establish is if the project is a demolition.

If it is, we then establish if the project requires a conditional use authorization, a CUA.

If the project is considered a demolition, then it must comply with SB 330 requirements, regardless of whether or not it requires a CUA.

The TPO strengthens enforcement of SB330 requirements by making sure it is the planning code's demolition definition that is used for all state laws and projects, which is more expansive.

Once SB330 requirements are triggered, the TPO proposes proposes tying project approvals to tenant protection compliance.

For replacement units, the TPO proposes tracking new newly created protected units on PIM.

We want to emphasize that the TPO is not proposing any changes to the standards that trigger a CUA.

Through the TPO, you, the planning commission, will retain the discretion you have today.

The TPO retains this discretion by creating 12 objective findings in line with state law requirements.

Project sponsors would have to meet 80% of the findings or the application at least 80% of the findings, or the application would be denied.

This slide provides a summary of these 12 findings.

To strengthen tenant protections, the TPO proposes to expand the definition of existing occupants from tenants in occupancy at the time of the project application to also include tenants in occupancy at the time of a preliminary application, which happened six could happen as much as six months earlier, tenants who vacated the unit due to tenant harassment, non-compliant bio agreements, owner move-ins, as well as tenants who were temporarily evicted for a capital improvement project that is now seeking a demolition permit.

Different look back periods are offered for some of this.

The TPO also proposes greater relocation benefits for lower income households.

All tenants will get local relocation payments that are already in our rent ordinance.

Under the TPO, lower-income households would also get additional monthly relocation payments for up to 39 months.

These payments would be equivalent to the difference between Section 8 fur market rent and rent affordable to that lower income household.

Oh, I guess my thing didn't work.

Okay.

As an example, say we have a family of four at 50% AMI in a two-bedroom unit.

Section 8 fair market rent for a two-bedroom unit is $3,981.

Rent affordable to that family would be 1,754.

Thus, this family would get an additional monthly payment of $2,227 for a total of more than $86,000 if the project takes more than 39 months.

In the back of the presentation packet are tables of these payments and what they will look like for different AMIs and unit sizes.

The TPO proposes to expand the rate of first refusal for lower income tenants by offering prior rental rate as a choice for rental projects.

Rent increases for these tenants would be subject to rent control.

Above lower income tenants would also have right of first refusal for a rental unit, but at market rate with units subjected also to rent control.

The TPO would also grant a private right of actions for tenants and organizations representing them so that they can seek penalty penalties and damages if project sponsors violate their rights under the new requirements.

Finally, the TPO would require extensive tenant notification that is compliant with language access requirements from application to lease up.

Tenant notification would inform the tenants of their rights and necessary actions.

The shaded boxes show notifications that the planning department would be responsible for.

To strengthen the replacement of protected units, the TPO proposes that all protected units be replaced with comparable units, which it defines as having the same number of bedrooms and full bathrooms, at least 90% of square footage, and accessible when applicable.

Replacement of protected units would be as we are currently requiring it and in line with SB 330.

However, the TPO proposes that all affordable replacement units are affordable for the life of the project, not 55 years as required by SP 330.

To strengthen other tenant protections, the TPO proposes amendments to the rent ordinance in the administrative code to address temporary evictions due to capital improvements, tenant harassment, and buyer agreements.

For capital improvements, tenants would get additional monthly payments when a temporary eviction is extended past the initial three months.

And this is for lower income tenants, sorry, with the goal of avoiding rent evictions.

It provides more effective tools for the rent board to make tenant harassment findings when sufficient evidence is presented, which could preserve tenant rights when the unit they vacated is redeveloped.

And for buy it agreements, landlords would have to disclose the impacts of a tenant's eligibility for SB 330 rights if the tenant were to come into such agreement.

There are many more changes proposed by the TPO, but this is some of the ones that push the envelope farther.

I will now cover anticipated amendments for this ordinance.

As we heard from this sponsor, Supervisor Chen during opening remarks, she's introducing five more amendments.

The planning department has collaborated closely with Supervisors Chen's office in drafting them.

We have evaluated them and we're in full support of these amendments.

We also received communication yesterday from Supervisor Melgar about the amendments she outlined today.

The department would like to have time to evaluate them further, but we look forward to the commission discussion about them.

Sorry.

You can see the proposed changes in the handout with distributed.

These changes differ slightly from what was on the staff report in that we have removed the last sentence for residential mergers to ensure internal consistency in line with community feedback.

The proposed changes simplify and replace complex lineal food requirement measurements with square footage to make it easier to interpret by sponsors, analyzed by planners, and enforced by inspectors.

The proposed amendments allow you to partially lift a whole building without classifying it as a demolition, ensuring consistent treatment of projects of the kind.

The proposed amendments not only simplify the definition for better review and enforcement, but catches more projects as demolitions, triggering the proposed tenant protection requirements.

The second recommended modification is to add to finding B of the project that the project must not propose changes to more than 20% of character defining features.

In practice, the Historic Preservation Commission has the power to allow certain modifications to historic buildings as long as preservation standards are met.

This proposed amendment promotes alignment between preservation and planning review processes while maintaining character-defining architectural features for these projects.

The third recommended modification is to change rental units in Finding C to residential units and to add compared to the existing residential units and unauthorized units as defined in section 317, subject to the same rent increase limitations to the end of the finding.

The text in the staff report had an error that we are we have fixed here.

This change aligns the definition with planning code terminology, and it ensures that the comparison is against the total existing units at the site, including unauthorized dwelling units.

The four recommended modification is to merge finding D and D.

This change would support smaller projects that add housing units, but that don't trigger inclusionary housing replacement, house inclusionary housing or replacement requirements, with no impact to setting high standards for other projects.

We believe supporting projects that go from a single family home to a four ownership unit to four ownership units have a positive impact on housing supply.

I can provide further analysis on this topic during discussion and how it aligns with Supervisor Melgar's proposed amendment.

The fifth and final recommended modification is in alignment with supervisors' supervisor Chen's modification.

The department is recommending to amend Section 317.2 to ensure that project sponsors contract with a relocation specialist from a vetted list provided by the department.

This change would help better support tenants during relocation and project sponsors in complying with state relocation laws.

To close, the planning department recommends that the planning commission adopts a recommendation for approval of the proposed ordinance with modifications and anticipated amendments by the sponsor, Supervisor Chen, because it supports stronger tenant protections, enhances accountability, mitigates tenant displacement, and balances growth with housing stability.

Before moving on to the discussion, I would like to elevate the importance of this ordinance, not just in its impact, but in the way it was developed.

A truly collaborative process between elected officials, city agencies, and the community.

I would like to acknowledge community members and Commissioner Imperial for advocating for this work.

Rep and the anti-displacement coalition for the dedication, patience, and steadfitness.

Supervisor Chen and her office in particular, and in particular, legislative aid Charlie Shiamos for being a fantastic collaborative partner.

Rachel for being so supportive of supportive of this ordinance, and Lisa for giving me the honor of working on it.

Joey Kumas from the Rent Board who joined us every week to guide us and answer questions.

And Audrey Pearson and Manu Prathan from the city's attorney's Office for their work on such a complex ordinance.

As you can see, there are many more to thank.

To everyone, thank you for your time and support.

The proposed ordinance is now before the commission so that it may adopt a recommendation of approval with modifications and anticipated amendments by the sponsor, Supervisor Chen.

Thank you.

Okay, if that concludes staff presentation, we should take public comment.

Members of the public, this is your opportunity to address the commission on this item.

If you plan to speak, we ask that you line up on the screen side of the room or to your right.

Yeah.

Come on up.

Good afternoon, Commissioners and Director Phillips.

My name is Tina Valentina Aguirre.

I am the director of the Castro LGBTQ cultural district, and I'm here to strongly support the TPO ordinance as proposed today, including the amendments by Supervisor Melgar.

What I could share is that our work with the Cultural District privilege prioritizes housing and tenant protections.

And my district in particular acknowledges the need for many more units for queer and trans folks in the city.

We are experiencing great oppression on the federal and global level, and we serve as a location for refugees coming from throughout the world looking for respite and uh safety.

San Francisco as a Mecca still stands as a great symbol for all of us throughout the world.

And in order for that to happen, we need rent control units.

We strongly support what has been proposed.

What I can share is through our findings of our chess report, is um the only thing that I can add is I hope that there are cultural competent um location specialists that are able to provide services when they're needed.

Um, through our assessment in the chess report, we found there was a great dearth, a great lack of data collection in terms of sexual orientation and gender identity throughout the entire city.

Um simply speaking, there is no data collected in many of these, many services that are provided by the city.

So it's impossible to say how many people are queer and trans that are receiving services right now, and therefore it's impossible to assess if the providers are actually able to represent communities that are underrepresented in a culturally competent way.

More than that, I want to share on a personal level that I am a renter in the 94114 zip code, that's the Mission Dolores Castro area.

I've been there since 1987, and my building just got sold last year.

Thankfully, the new owners were great, and they work with units, buildings with units like mine.

I acknowledge that I am extremely lucky, and many others have been displaced, not only in the Castro, but throughout San Francisco.

Because of that, I urge you to adopt the TPO with Supervisor Melgar's amendments.

Thank you.

Hello, I'm Fred Scherbensimer from Housing Rights Committee of San Francisco.

We support new housing, especially affording affordable housing, but no tenant should have their home bulldozed, whether they're a low-income senior or a janitor, or whether they're a couple who are teachers with two kids.

But if their home is going to be demolished, as we seem to be required to let people do under state law, we need real protections for those tenants to return.

I really want to thank Supervisor Chen and Charlie for the long amount of work they've done to put the TPO.

This has been complicated, hard, to get around all the finaglings of the small print of state laws, so that we can actually protect the residents of San Francisco.

But we know that landlords, investors, and realtors lie regularly to tenants.

This is one of the reasons we need a strong look back, and we needed even a stronger definition of demolition.

I want to tell you all a story.

A friend of mine lived in Noi Valley in a three-unit building that had 12 tenants living in it, many of them for decades.

Someone bought the building, he said he was going to do an owner move in with his family.

Everyone in the building ended up taking unrecorded buyouts.

My friend said it wasn't worth fighting if the other two units already were going.

Three years later, the landlord never moved in.

She went by recently, and there was a notice about demolition.

One of the tenants who was evicted, an eviction that never shows up on any record, isn't recorded at the rent board, is still living on their couch three friends' couches three years later.

Another lives in their car, others left San Francisco.

My friend lives nearby, but pays a lot more than she did in that unit.

This is why we need the strongest protections we can.

This is why we need this legislation with all of its amendments, and we need to strengthen the definition for demos.

We need to not reward landlords and investors for LS acting or other problematic, shady or under the table evictions.

Thank you very much.

Good afternoon, Commissioner Jean-Tal Laborinto with the Rep SF Coalition.

I want to focus my comments on the collective work we've all done so far and work we can all continue to do to make this tenant protections ordinance as strong and supportive of tenants as possible.

First, we're very appreciative of Supervisor Chen and are especially grateful to Charlie Shiamas from the D11 office and Melena Leon Ferreira from the planning department for the long hours dedicated to researching, coordinating and drafting the TPO, and working in coordination with Rep SF and the anti-displacement coalition over the course of many months.

We also want to appreciate the hearing on tenant protections and displacement that was held earlier this year in February in front of this commission that was initiated by Commissioners Imperial and supported by Commissioner Williams.

We know there are amendments coming, and we're optimistic that the District 11 office and planning staff will continue to work diligently to make the necessary changes possible.

As you've heard, together, we're navigating a complex web of state laws and local programs that make this ordinance necessary.

This legislation aims to accomplish much of what our coalitions set out to do, including enhancing noticing and language requirements, expanding relocation assistance, and establishing consequences for tenant harassment, among many other interventions.

However, there are still some significant issues that have not been fully resolved, including issues around the Ellis Act, conditional use findings, harassment and wrongful evictions, and the definition of demolition.

Today you'll hear from members of our coalitions about crucial outstanding concerns and recommendations.

Addressing these issues to close loopholes and strengthen the TPO is imperative.

So we request that, as you all are doing.

Listen carefully to the proposed amendments and discuss them during your deliberations.

It'll take all of us working in coordination to ensure that this TPO is as strong as possible.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Commissioners.

Joseph Smook with Rep Coalition.

How we define demolition is more important than ever.

We're grateful to Malena, Matt, and Kelly at Planning for working with us on this issue and for Georgia Shudish's thorough work to analyze a massive list of case studies that substantiate recommendations for improving the definition.

Staff's recommendation moves in the right direction, but it doesn't address some substantial issues.

The TPO deals with a complex set of issues, including SB 330, which dangerously allows the demolition of existing sound housing.

When tenants are displaced by demolition, the TPO will ensure access to relocation benefits, a right to return, and replacement units.

But what happens when a sponsor games the calculations and avoids qualifying as a demolition?

Consider a likely scenario where a project proposes to move a rear facade back several feet.

The amount of demolition to the front and rear facades, roof and floors would be calculated to be less than the threshold, but they would use the new density decontrol provision to convert three two-bedroom flats into five studio units by gutting and rebuilding the interior.

This scope of work must be considered a demolition, but even under planning's current proposal, it wouldn't be.

We support Georgia's recommendation to lower the threshold from 50% to 32%, but currently that only addresses vertical and horizontal building elements and does not address interior walls.

We request that the department study one, a threshold for removal of interior walls, and two, the most appropriate way to treat modifications to door and window openings, and three, treating as a demolition, whether a building is raised a partial or a full floor.

Both are major scopes of work that will displace tenants for longer than three months and should be considered demolition.

We hope you will direct the department to study these recommendations expeditiously so we can get this definition right for the TPO.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Commissioners Virginia Barker.

The proposed tenant protection ordinance is not strong, it is empty.

Although the city has the ability to do better, the proposal only conforms with the state.

And I do appreciate the presentation and the outline of where planning staff thinks that the ordinance goes beyond the state.

However, those are administrative implementation issues.

They're really not substantive.

The proposed ordinance allows the rent control stock to be diminished by demolition and tenants to be diminished by menace and eviction.

It shifts support for those who are not served by an unregulated market, including the city as a whole, from rent control to means tested affordable housing.

This is privatizing the commonwealth and socializing cost burdens.

Not only is there no funding for affordable housing construction, the stability of rent control is gutted and tenants are made vulnerable.

Both affordable housing construction and rent control are needed to provide adequate housing.

Rent control provides stability to tenants and a fair profit to landlords.

A fair profit is one that is commensurate with the risk taken.

Residential rental is a low-risk business.

People pay their rent before anything else.

What has shifted here is that landlords are no longer satisfied with a fair profit.

The upsoning legislation is bullying forward policies that will allow investors to better control the supply of units and increase their advantage over tenants.

They are creating risk for tenants and reducing risk for themselves.

Also, they can profit not by providing a product at a fair price, but by extortion.

It is an extractive economy where people become the objects of strip mining techniques and devastation ensues.

There are so many things lacking in this ordinance, among them no right of return at the old rent and no right of first refusal for all tenants, and no recognition of tenants' financial losses.

But with my limited time, I will focus on one critical life-saving modification that you can make.

Give all tenants, especially seniors and those with disabilities.

If evicted one year to move.

It is brutal and cruel to expect that one could move in six months in this market.

For seniors and people with disabilities, the housing search is much more complex as the city recognizes with one year for Ellis evictions.

Earlier notification of a planning and a project and planning does not count.

This is the very least that we should expect of our government.

If you are going to kick us out, don't kick us to the curb.

Better.

Just cease this unsavory upsoning business altogether.

Good afternoon, commissioners.

My name is Zachary Friol.

I work with SomCAN, a member org of both Rep SF and SF anti-displacement coalition.

We would like to elaborate on the issues we see with SB 330 and why it is absolutely critical that we get the TPO right to address these outstanding concerns.

The Housing Crisis Act passes SB 330 in 2019, presents a host of new threats to tenants that did not previously exist.

SB 330, one streamlines housing project approvals and allows for demolition of existing sound housing, including tenant-occupied and rent control apartments.

Two establishes a requirement for relocation payments to be paid, but no system for enforcing it.

Three establishes a requirement for developers to replace demolished units and provide displaced tenants with a first right or refusal to move back, but does not provide any system of accountability for these obligations of tenants.

And four, requires developers to provide notices to tenants but without sufficient lead time for tenants.

SB 330 also creates incentives for displacement.

Project sponsors have been known to use the Ellis Act, owner movement evictions, capital improvement evictions, harassment, and other means of forcing tenants out of their homes.

Project sponsors will take advantage of these eviction pathways to get around their obligations to pay tenants relocation benefits and to avoid providing tenants the right to return.

The planning staff report characterizes SB 330 as a tenant protection measure when in fact it is a measure that preemptively allows developers to demolish existing housing, including rent-controlled and tenant-occupied apartments.

While SB330 does require developers to meet a set of minimum standards in exchange for permission to demolish someone's home, we must emphasize that these standards are nowhere near sufficient, nor are they accompanied by any systems of enforcement or accountability to address these concerns.

We ask that you support the solutions outlined in the joint letter sent by Rep SF and SF ADC, and that will be further elaborated in subsequent comments.

Thank you so much.

Hello, commissioners.

My name is Teresa Dolala Sweet Song Cant.

We're asking for the strongest tenant protections for everyone from one story and above, because citywide upzoning is already unfolding.

Upzoning is being framed as a solution to the housing crisis, but in reality, it accelerates displacement, deepens inequity, and threatens rent controlled and affordable homes across our city.

My own family went through four eviction struggles, and it was hard.

No one should ever have to experience that.

Upzoning demolishes one to two-story homes and potentially three, and rent-controlled buildings, erasing the very housing that keeps working families here.

Planning department is eyeing 20,000 buildings.

That's potentially sacrificing over 20,000 people and countless small businesses at risk.

So it's okay to demolish rent controlled buildings to build new affordable housing.

That's a big question, Mark.

State laws like SB 330 and the Ellis Act make this worse.

SB 330 is not tenant protection.

It's a developer streamlining law that fast tracks demolition of sound occupied rent-controlled homes without any real enforcement or accountability.

To address the Ellis Act, developers must be required to declare their intent to evict and demolish from the start.

And tenants must receive stronger relocation assistance and the right to return, vacant or not.

Without stronger local protections, SB 330 and upzoning together will invite more Ellis Act and owner move in evictions, pushing out the very people.

These policies claim to help.

That's why the TPO must be strengthened now before upzoning begins.

We need a real enforcement, accountability, and protection for all tenants.

Let's face it, upzoning will likely move forward, but you commissioners, we rely on you.

You have the power to make sure it doesn't move through our homes and our lives.

Protect our communities.

What we see on the ground is that harassment has become a tactic of displacement.

It's not um it's how tenants are pushed out of without a formal evictions ever being filed.

That's why the harassment protections in the TPO are absolutely critical.

For years, the rent board has had the power to hold hearings on harassment and wrongful evictions petitions, but in practice, those hearings almost never happen.

Tenant files, they wait, and nothing moves forward.

The current structures gives the executive director's Christians to decide whether a hearing even take place, and as a result, many serious cases are never heard.

Supervisor Chen's legislation takes on an important step forward by removing that discretion and setting objective criteria for when a petition should move forward.

But there are still one major fix knitted, the standard that says harassment must be quote unquote, be severe that it has materially materially impacted the tenants' enjoyment of the unit.

That standard set the bar far too high and effectively prevent tenants from ever getting a hearing in the first place.

The severity of harassment should be evaluated during the hearing, not used as a reason to deny one.

As someone who works directly with tenants, I can tell you people are losing their home not just through evictions notice, but through fear, pressures, and exhaustions.

We need a ramp board process that actually protect tenants, not one that filtered them out.

I urge the commissions to support those amendments and ensure that harassment protections in the TPO are strong, enforceable, and accessible to the people who need them most.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, commissioners.

I'm Anna Christina, a member of the of the Rep SF coalition.

SFADC and Rep SF support Supervisor Chen's legislation to create clarify and implement systems of support for tenants facing increasing risk of displacement due to an expanding network of state bills and local ordinances that place tenants in increasing peril.

While this TPO is poised to accomplish much, as noted in the planning staff report, there are still issues that have not been fully resolved.

The Housing Crisis Act passed as SB 330 creates incentives for displacement.

Project sponsors have been known to use various means of forcing tenants out of their homes.

Project sponsors will take advantage of these eviction pathways to get around their obligations to pay tenants relocation benefits and to avoid providing tenants their rights to return.

Further amendments still need to be made to address harassment and wrongful evictions.

We expect that Supervisor Chen's forthcoming amendments will address this issue, but I'll summarize it here.

The TPO amends the admin code to require that the rent board executive directors schedule hearings for petitions of harassment and alleged wrongful eviction.

Currently, the TPO says the executive director may do this, but it's not required.

As written, one of the criteria for evaluating whether a tenant's petition will move forward to a hearing is that the alleged harassment is so severe that it has materially impacted a tenant's enjoyment of the unit.

This criterion must be removed so the severity of the alleged harassment is evaluated during the hearing process rather than used to prevent petitions from proceeding to a hearing.

While the TPO is still not perfect, we remain optimistic that the District 11 office and planning staff continue to work diligently to make the necessary changes possible.

We will continue to work collaboratively to ensure the TPO does everything that San Francisco tenants need it to do.

Thank you.

Hi, my name is Annabelle, and I'm an academic worker and low income rent controlled tenant in the tender line.

I wanted to voice my support for this amendment, sponsored by Supervisor Chid, and uh expanding uh tenant protections as I know many people are working on right now.

I was very concerned about the stability of my rent controlled unit after seeing the initial proposals coming out this year.

Um, and this has somewhat eased my anxiety.

But I do want to note that it's not enough to provide compensation or um remediation pathways for tenants who are displaced.

But displacement, especially for elderly tenants can be life-threatening.

In my own rent-controlled building, which has 27 units, uh, elderly neighbors rely on the network within the building to ensure that they're healthy, that they're cared for, and when something happens, someone's able to intercede for their needs.

Whether that means uh having your neighbor let you in when you lose your keys and you get locked out or having someone ensure that your unit is safe and habitable when you're ill.

Um, I think that uh it's important to note that for some elderly San Franciscans, many of whom have lived here for most of their adult lives.

Displacement uh might be damaging not only to their mental health but also to their physical well-being, and it's next to impossible for some tenants to restore those networks they've spent decades building if they are displaced.

So uh thank you to Supervisor Chen.

Um, and I also um ask that everyone here uh consider uh elderly tenants' needs and networks as this uh goes on.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, commissioners.

My name is Brianna Morales, and I'm with the Housing Action Coalition as their community organizer.

We are a member supported nonprofit that believes San Francisco should be a place where people of all income levels can live, work, and belong.

At a time when we need to produce more housing and protect housing we already have.

This helps keep long-time residents in their communities while giving mission-driven builders a clearer path to create new homes.

This legislation builds on the protections laid out in SB 330, the statewide housing crisis act, which we also strongly support.

California set up a strong baseline to ensure no net loss of homes, and this local update helps make sure San Francisco is carrying out that clearly and consistently.

These updates reinforce what's already outlined in the housing element, producing more homes while protecting the ones we have and ensuring residents aren't displaced in the process.

By aligning local rules with state law, this proposal brings more transparency and predictability to the development process.

Clear standards benefit everyone, tenants, builders, and city staff alike, and help us move towards the shared goal of adding and preserving housing in a fair, balanced way.

We appreciate the city's continued work to align housing production and tenant stability.

Both are essential to solving the housing crisis, and both are priorities for us at HAC.

So we thank the planning department, commissioners, and supervisors for your time and ongoing commitment to keep San Francisco a place where everyone has a home, and we look forward to the discussion surrounding the modification and amendments.

Thanks.

Sorry, be fair.

George Shutish.

But honestly, as the person who has probably used the word Section 317 demo calcs more than anyone else in the room, it would be better to make the threshold stronger if the goal is to live up to the words in the Section 317 findings.

And those words were right in front of me, but you know what they are.

Do I give that to one of you?

Anyway.

It's to protect rental housing.

It's to protect people who live in rental housing and need financially accessible homes.

These words, as I wrote in the letter, are foundational to the ideal of protecting tenants and creating a generous and kind outcomes under the TPO.

I urge this commission to take a bolder step with this definition beyond the recommendation from staff.

This should be a step that previous commissions did not have the moxie to take.

For years, it has been suggested that the demo calcs should have been reduced to meet the findings at least once, if not twice.

The code empowered the commission to do this.

Two times is always better than one time.

At two times, the new value for the proposed Section 317 B2B would be a threshold of 32% or greater.

The commission should give great consideration to this.

Unfortunately, San Francisco missed the opportunity to preserve starter homes, as was the approved policy in the 2014 housing element, which did not want to see this typology of smaller, more affordable family housing demolished, but many were demolished using the current demo calcs.

Now is the chance to ameliorate that missed opportunity by creating a new definition with a threshold of 32% or greater, so there was no net loss of housing while the city expands and densifies.

Please think about all the relatively affordable housing that could have been preserved in the past decade.

Housing with two units, whether they're flats or with a UDU with tenants, all of them with tenants, potentially.

Please think about what a threshold at 32% or greater would mean for the tenant protection ordinance.

And here is my little handout.

And here's my 150 words for the minutes.

Thank you very much.

Good afternoon, everyone.

First, I'd like to say thank you to everyone who worked on this.

Um, you know, it's come a long way.

I think we're moving in the right direction.

I'd like to remind you of the immortal words of salt and pepper.

Push it.

Um, you know, we've come pretty far, but there's a lot more we can do.

Um we currently have a situation where we have an upzoning plan that seems to have confused um capital markets and financing with families.

This is the last line of defense here for working families, this TPO.

So I say we do support Shine and Chen, Supervisor Chen's amendments, and let's work all together, be a city of yes, save our working families, and together we can push it.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, commissioners.

I'm Aristos Comigi.

Um I'm here on behalf of Mission Economic Development Agency, and I serve as our lead housing rights counsel uh and our founder of our eviction defense program.

Um, on behalf of my organization, I want to voice our support for um many of the provisions in the proposal that strengthen tenant protections for our vulnerable residents against displacement.

And in doing so, uh, we truly appreciate the work of Supervisor Chen and her staff.

We also want to recognize the planning staff handling the important job of adapting our code to new state regulations as well.

We understand that Supervisor Melgar has additional provisions today that will strengthen tenant protections, including closing an Ellis Act loophole.

Another addresses one of our key areas of concern.

We concur that it is important to have not only a checklist of CU criteria options, but also need to ensure that the most critical protections are enacted as mandatory to ensure the safety of the tenants we serve.

As someone who has been blessed to be born and raised in this beautiful city, I've seen the mission continue to lose thousands of low-income residents.

And as interest rates fall and the new building cycle heats up, we want to ensure that the city is doing everything it can in partnership with us to keep these essential workers, our neighbors, our peers in place, not just in the mission, but also in other PEGs across the city, which are recognized for special protections in the housing element.

So in addition to adding mandatory CU requirements, we think it's important to explore another layer of protection for demolition of protected units in these vulnerable areas, such as adding a tenant look back period or similar mechanism.

Thank you all.

We look forward to working together as always further and further.

God bless San Francisco.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Commissioners.

Zach Weisenberger with Young Community Developers.

As attention remains on the mayor's family zoning plan, I want to emphasize the importance of strengthening the citywide tenant protections ordinance.

We've submitted a letter outlining these points in more detail.

We greatly appreciate Supervisor Chen's leadership on this ordinance and strongly support both her and Supervisor Melgar's forthcoming amendments.

First, we support Supervisor Melgar's proposal to establish mandatory demolition standards that developers must meet to receive a permit.

Tenant protections cannot be treated as a checklist that developers only need to partially meet.

They must be firm requirements that prevent the loss of existing homes and displacement of longtime residents.

Second, we support Supervisor Melgar's Ellis Act amendment, which would require owners to declare any demolition intent when filing Ellis paperwork.

This ensures tenants remain eligible for enhanced relocation assistance and a right of return.

This will prevent misuse of the Ellis process and align San Francisco with best practices in other cities such as LA.

Finally, we urge the city to consider adopting additional mandatory demolition standards for priority equity geographies or PEGs.

PEGs have borne the brunt of development for decades, remain among the most upzoned neighborhoods, and continue to face the highest displacement pressures.

They require added protections, for example, prohibiting the demolition of all rent-controlled units that have been tenant occupied within the past seven years.

Provisions such as these would directly reflect the intent behind PEGs, PG designations, and fulfill the city's commitment to provide heightened protections for these communities.

Together, these amendments will ensure SF's demolition standards are both objective and equitable and grounded in the lived experiences of those most impacted.

We urge the commission to adopt both Supervisor Chen and Melgar's amendments that were presented today.

Thank you.

Some who I've had the privilege of working with and learning from, Bill Soros, of course, and Neil De Guzman, the International Hotel Struggle, people like Bao Yan Chen of the Community Tense Association, who fought for and helped establish some of our controls on demolitions and housing.

And for a reason, the those the housing that we that this city preserved in the past through the conditional use process are housing that people that people live in today.

And for that reason, we have to have much greater concern about removing erasing in many instances in the planning code those 317 principles and not just erasing them, we need to replace them with comparable standards that protect where people live today.

And in that regard, those concerns are reflected in the letter submitted by ADC and Rep.

And we raise concerns also with the inadequate, in our opinion, analysis of the risk of demolitions presented by the proposed amendments to 317 and the demolition controls.

What were the rates then?

And so those go back to pre-1986.

And at that time, the data is that there were 17,000 17,000 demolitions in the 10 years prior to the adoption of the controls.

So we urge you to consider additional protections that are actually authorized by state law.

Section 6 uh 66300.6C specifically authorizes local governments to provide additional demolition controls to protect lower income households, and we think that avenues needs to be further explored in the amendments that also need to be added to the protections that are provided in the TPO.

Thank you very much.

Good afternoon, commissioners.

My name is Sunny Angulo, and I'm speaking today as a tenant who has benefited from the stability and affordability of my rent controlled home, which is part of a very tight-knit community, a diverse community of tenants in our rent controlled building.

And I don't say unit for a reason.

These are homes.

These are homes with families, seniors, students, struggling workers who work multiple jobs, where we've built caring relationships, supported dependents, and contributed to San Francisco.

Rent stabilized homes continue to represent the single biggest concentration of critical housing that is affordable by design.

Which is why we've consistently built our housing policies around the fundamental principles that preservation of rent-controlled homes are fundamental to achieving our Casa Compact regional housing strategy, as well as true implementation of our housing element.

A spokesperson for the real estate lobby recently flippantly kind of opined online that housing advocates were far too precious about our rent controlled homes, and it's really no big deal to demolish someone's home and replace it with a market rate unit.

That is absolutely antithetical to our pro-housing and our pro-people policies, right here in San Francisco.

And if San Francisco of all places cannot execute housing strategies of thoughtful infill development, production and cons and conversion of other uses to housing without displacing existing tenants from their homes, then we are failing.

Much of the discourse around protecting tenants' homes has been kind of shrugged off by politicians as a gun to our head moment.

When if we don't accept the state's efforts to undermine our own local laws and policies, I'd say we've already lost local control.

I want to thank the supervisors here today that presented their amendments, have been working very hard on this, and especially their legislative aids.

I see legislative aides that have pushed for stronger representation and real advocacy to the state.

We are often told with respect to Trump's overreach that we must comply preemptively, and we must, you know, we must not challenge the powers that would erode our protections for our communities.

I think the same concept can apply here locally, and it preemptively gives up giving up our local control to protect tenants and the stability of our homes that hurts us all.

With that, I want to support the amendments that are being proposed today and encourage the Board of Supervisors, through your guidance, your support, to go beyond what is being proposed.

When I hear the words objective standards, I think of baselines that are backed up by facts and evidence and clearly support our stated housing goals of improving and conserving existing housing stock and preserving units at risk of conversion from affordable to market rate, which should be forcing us to be more creative and exercise more political will to get units constructed that don't displace residents.

I think there can be cases to be made that SB 330 allows us to do more for lower income households and both demolition controls and relocation, and that ensuring there are stronger mandatory controls for the priority equity geographies not only ensures the majority.

Thank you, Jonas.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Commissioners.

My name is Meg Heisler here on behalf of the San Francisco Anti-Displacement Coalition.

I first want to start, as many of us have, thanking Supervisor Chen, Charlie, and Melina for taking on this important work for their patience with us throughout this process and for their ongoing commitment to getting the TPO right.

This has been an undertaking I think beyond what any of us could have imagined at the outset.

There are many reasons why the TPO is needed, including SB 330, the various state density bonus programs, which incentivize and streamline the demolition of housing, including tenant-occupied rent controlled housing.

As has been mentioned, state laws, specifically SB 330 and also the Ellis Act, both necessitate and constrain the TPO.

So understandably, there are several outstanding issues that we have been working on diligently that still need to be addressed by amendments, including those described by Supervisor Chen and Supervisor Melgar earlier.

I will just focus on two.

Others have been mentioned already.

As written, the proposed changes to the CU process create options for developers while short-changing tenants and communities.

There must be mandatory standards that ensure landlords and developers are not rewarded for harassing and evicting tenants with a demolition permit.

Tenants must have an opportunity to share their stories in public, and the commission must be able to weigh those stories in their decision making.

So I just wanted to mention those and echo many of the comments shared earlier.

And these proposals are also outlined in our letter.

Thank you again to Supervisor Chen, Charlie and Melina, and to you, Commissioners, for your consideration of these matters.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Commissioners.

My name is Avi.

First, I want to thank and express strong support for Supervisor Chen's legislation, which moves the needle forward for citywide tenant protections.

Today I'm speaking on behalf of the San Francisco Communities Against Displacement Coalition, which represents communities of color in Chinatown, the Mission and the Bayview.

Two years ago, through the housing element process, the city and the Board of Supervisors recognize that these neighborhoods have been disproportionately impacted by decades of redevelopment and displacement, and that they require different solutions and stronger protections.

That's why the priority equity geographies or pegs were created.

While not a perfect framework, pegs reflect an understanding that equity requires place-based policy.

Within the context of the tenant protection ordinance, we asked that the city build on that intent and rethink what protection truly means for these communities.

And where commissioners could hold developers to higher standards of design, community benefits, and community preservation.

With the restructuring of that process, under the TPO, we're concerned that the very principles that guide guided equitable decision making could be lost, allowing developers to pick and choose what to comply with.

We are therefore grateful for Supervisor Melgar's amendment, which moves the most important tenant protections outside of the 80% pass rule that and make them mandatory.

But we ask commissioners to go further than that to strengthen these standards by explicitly directing the city to adopt anti-displacement policies for our most vulnerable communities and ensure compliance with things like existing and future neighborhood specific design standards, as well as adopt stronger demolition protections to protect and controlled tenants in the pegs.

Doing so would align the TPO with housing elements' call for targeted anti-displacement policies and ensure that state objective standards still advance real-world equity goals.

Adopting such stronger and targeted standards are in fact authorized by state laws.

We hope that you'll continue to ask tough questions and hold the city accountable in balancing our housing production goals with the preservation of our vulnerable communities.

Thank you.

Hello, commissioners.

My name is Gwen McLaughlin, and I'm here today with Small Business Forward as a part of the Rep coalition.

We are here today in support of Chen's TPO legislation and the proposed amendments to that proposal.

We're urging that you support stronger tenant protections and work to curtail the displacement of long-term tenants who can't afford to lose their rent control departments.

We know that the vast majority of small business workers who can still afford to live in our city are here because they live in rent controlled units.

Please protect our rent control homes and prioritize preventing displacement from those homes.

Thank you.

Hello, good afternoon, commissioners.

My name is Asia Duncan, and I'm with Build Affordable Faster California, and we are in support of Supervisor Chen's legislation along with the proposed amendments given today.

Thank you to her office and her staff.

And along with Rep SF coalition, this legislation establishes important protections which are very meaningful to tenants, such as expanded relocation assistance, a relocation plan, a right to remain, a right for a first refusal, replacement of protection units with a combination of rent-controlled MBMR units, and additional tools to protect the rights of tenants in the event that landlords seek to avoid these requirements.

Thank you.

Okay, last call for public comment.

Again, you need to come forward.

Seeing none, public comment is closed.

This matter is now before you, Commissioners.

Thank you for everybody being here today.

And I think in light of uh supervisors' time, I would like to see if my commissioners would prioritize questions that you have to supervisors first.

Okay.

You want to go ahead.

I know you, I know you.

Commissioner Imperial, go for it.

I'm waiting for other commissioners to go first.

It's just kidding.

Just to see.

Well, I know that the supervisors' time are limited.

Um I guess my first question is around Supervisor Mulgar's.

I don't know if Jen um addition or dear amendments.

Lowe can come up.

So I guess my question is first is you're lowering, you're proposing to lower the threshold to 70% and reducing the standard.

Are you trying to reduce and why lowering it to 70% threshold?

So this in terms of the C UA, yeah.

So the three um, so again, we don't change the actual criteria that was in the initial um substitute or the substitute ordinance, but rather there's three that we are moving towards, I think towards um requirements because they're actually required by law.

So in the the way that we had interpreted the substitute um ordinance was that you kind of get a freebie.

You get points for things that you're supposed to already do.

So by moving them out of the criteria for the objective standards for findings, that the rest of them then actually become actual objective standards where you're actually giving I'm just gonna simplify this points, right?

For things that we want to see in uh in projects when you're making that approval.

And so because the threshold uh there's less objectives, we were working with the city attorney, and again, we want this to be a fair process, right?

It can't be like impossible to meet.

And so that's why it became 70% as opposed to 80%, because the three that we took out are now actual requirements, they're not things that you get credit for as part of those objective standard findings.

I hope that makes sense.

And I'm happy to read the through the ones um that we are moving towards requirements.

So it's that project sponsor must comply with notice requirements of three point 317.2 and have a relocation plan for tenants, which is already required.

Must that have a rent board decision showing wrongful endeavor to recover possession of rental units through harassment in the prior five years.

And the last one is if the unit was vacant vacated through a buyout of a tenant, the buyout agreement must be filed at the rent board as required under 37.9e of the rent ordinance.

So all three of those have already are provisions that you need to follow as parts of other parts of the code.

So that's why it didn't make that much sense to put them in objective standards because there's supposed to be requirements already.

I hope that clarifies the proposal.

Um and the 70% is just to um because I'm trying to understand in what's the difference between 70% and 80% from what I see in in terms of the COA, and I also see in terms of the supervisor chance um and also Rep SF amendments as well, is to make sure that the COAs are um are requirements are mandatory, not just like in, and so um so you're also adding that the 70% is a requirement.

Yeah, you have to meet 70% of the remaining criteria of the nine other requirements, and maybe Melena can explain more.

This whole 80%, 70% thing was I think a little bit of an art and a science between the city attorney's office and the original sponsor as well as the planning staff.

So Melina, if you want to come and opine on that, that'd be great.

Hi.

Yeah, Malena City Steph.

Um, yeah, so they need to lower that that standard because if not, it would be impossible for certain projects that we would want to approve to pass, basically.

And I have tables on this, would you like me to share?

Sure, yeah.

What would that look like in terms of the 70 and 80 percent?

I oh, can we get the oh, this is gonna be hard to read.

Okay, so when we were looking at those percentages, we wanted to keep a high yield for people to have to clear, right?

We want good actors, we want them to do right by tenants, and so that it was a play on numbers of what was the right percentage that would really make uh project sponsors kind of be good actors when it comes to taking care of tenants.

So um this table that you see here is just analyzing the proposed ordinance as it as it stands today, right?

With the 12 different things.

Um, should I go over there?

So it on the left side you can see um three sample projects that we did, as well as just an imaginary example.

It talks about the units that are demolished and then the units that are built, and then whether or not they're getting points for these 12 different findings.

At the end of the table, you see a total count.

So basically there's 12 findings as the total, and then the sum of the findings that the project is getting and what percentage they are achieving, basically.

Um as you can see, all of these three projects, you know, there were single family homes that uh converted into several units, or uh, you know, the first one is like five units converted into three 33 units.

This were these three projects converted into condos.

Um for this one in particular, they're not getting points for increasing rent control housing, and they're not getting points for it being uh rental project.

It's still clearing, right?

It's still adding units to to um the housing market, and it so they are clearing.

But if they don't satisfy any other requirement, they already are not clearing.

So it's forcing them in a way um to just be good actors.

Um the problem with how, well, let's not talk about the staff modification.

So when uh Melgar's off this one's offering, this one's analyzing the standards by Melgar's change, and you see that the results are the same.

Uh she's had to lower that percentage because if not, now those projects would not clear.

As you can see here, they are clearing because they're coming above 70%.

But if we had kept that percentage at 80, those projects would not have cleared.

Uh we are also offering a staff modification to this, because as you can see, the last project does not clear.

And I would love to talk about that if you give me an opportunity to talk about it.

Sure, yeah, did you have good time?

Okay.

Um, so let's go back to the previous example.

Here, if you have a single family home that is demolished and then replaced with anywhere with nine units, say nine units, right?

That single family home does not qualify for replacement units.

And then because it's building only nine units or less, it does not qualify for inclusionary housing.

So it would not be generating any affordable housing.

A project like this would not be clearing the standards.

Um, and I think these types of projects are projects that we sometimes do want to be able to support.

I mean, it's it's single family homes converting into multiple units, and that's adding to our housing supply.

So we had proposed this change of merging two of the of the findings in order for these types of projects to smaller projects to be able to clear the review process.

I I don't know, something just got lost in so many changes that it didn't make the cut, but um our suggested staff modification is that those two that talk about affordable housing are merged, such that it says that it either does not demolish affordable housing or increases the number of affordable housing units.

When we make this merge, those smaller projects clear, and as you can see, has no impact on these other uh projects, the standards still high for them.

If they miss anything else on this list, they don't make the cut.

Now with supervisors Melgar, it's the same issue.

Uh it's that those projects are still not clearing uh if we don't make the staff modification.

So we still, even with supervisor Melgar's amendments, we would still uh the it's the department's opinion that we should still make this modification.

So these smaller projects clear, and as you can see, the standard still remains high for these other projects.

If they miss one, they already don't make the cut.

Uh, you know, um and you know, I we just think this would support the type of projects we do want to support.

Maybe just to summarize, I know it's complex and I know we may have more questions for the supervisors uh and the supervisors' aids.

I think that the point is um continuing work on what the standards are for the C UA findings and finding that right balance, right?

Of ensuring that we have high integrity of the projects and we're also having projects move forward that um are meeting again our our city's goals and objectives.

And so that is both the number overall of criteria and what they say, as well as what is the threshold percentage that a project must meet for you all, the planning commission, to be able to grant that conditional use.

Because if they're not meeting that 70 or 80, then there's no option for that project to move forward.

And so that's really the balance we're we're trying to see in all this.

And if you go back to that, um, do you mind putting the table up again?

If you go back to this table, these projects are concept projects, right?

We cannot force a project to build rental housing if they want to make it into an ordinary ship.

We can force them to satisfy our requirements, but we cannot force them to take it out from the rental, like that's our understanding and guidance from the city attorney.

So uh if you see here anything else that they miss in this list, they now have to turn that project into a rental project to clear.

Either you're a good doctor or you just build a rental project basically in a way.

Um, thank you, Melina.

Or yeah, thank you, Melina, for the explanation.

And again, I think it's it it sounds like there um, you know, I I am as of now leaning toward what is the ordinance, which is 80%.

Um, and I understand why Supervisor Melgar would like to do this in terms of like what kind of development, it seems like it's gonna be more applicable to the smaller type kind of development or you know, but but I you know, again, this um I'm still leaning toward what is what we have right now in our ordinance.

Um, but I think I will also leave it to the community to have this further conversation in terms of whether they agree with um supervisor milgar's um that um on the CUA trigger.

Another question, too, on supervisor Melgar, is the um the uh the look back on the um on the last 10 years, um and part and also it says too that it would amend the look back rent control units to 10 years outside of the priority equity geography.

Why is that and why not?

Sharon, if I could uh answer that first part, um the 70% again.

I think that calculation again was working with the city attorney to get to our goal.

So I think we have that shared goal is that we want to have a high threshold for good actors.

Um, and so I think that that number is fungible to be honest with you.

It it's not that we want to lower the threshold, it was more that we want to ensure that by taking out some of the criteria to make them requirements that the remaining criteria could be met.

Um so we are open to re-jiggering that because I think all of us share the same goal.

Supervisors Chen and Melgar, the community and um probably the commission as well.

Um, so that's the first part.

The second part about the tenure look back.

So one of the things that we have seen, as the supervisor had described earlier, is that we've had so many different changes in state law.

The look backs are all over the place.

At the time the city passed the housing constraints um legislation, we did put in a provision that outside of the priority equity geographies, so mainly the well-resourced neighborhoods, that if you added an additional unit, that you would not need a conditional use if if you met the criteria, and that look back was I think five years, and at the time that seemed to be on par with what everything else was right.

We wanted to push it further, but at the time it didn't seem like that was really going to fly because there was not other provisions that we could look to.

Since that passage of the housing constraints legislation, we have seen new state legislation that now have tenure look backs with SB uh 423, seven-year look back with SB 79.

And so we are trying to again enhance and and broaden that net, especially in this market.

Things aren't happening in five years.

So we're thinking that a tenure look back seems to be fair, and so that's just an alignment.

Why it's outside of the peg is because that's what was written into the housing constraints legislation.

I believe we have other provisions already in PEG, and yeah, so it maybe um this the planning staff can talk more about that.

So this is really about kind of fixing something that in the housing constraints legislation to kind of kind of be updated with the times um to provide further protections given the current conditions, and now that we have state law that provides even broader look back periods.

I hope that answers your question.

Yeah, that answers.

Um thank you.

Um, I guess for me, before I go back, because I also have other questions too, but I sorry I didn't, you know, I I just want to say thank everyone, and I want to really give a shout out to RepESAF and San Francisco Anti-Displacement Coalition to really working this through.

You guys are the experts.

And all of the experiences in the last decade has been the way I see this when I was reading this, like uh, you know, I I was I was moved by this of how extensive this is, and even though there's still a lot of amendments, I mean, if you take this like every amendment, it will take about two to five years to probably accomplish this, and to do this within a year, but at the same time, a lot of issues has been raising for the last decade on this, um, and so this is something that is um a really step um in in moving in the right direction.

Um, and again, uh, you know, it's the community that should be the experts of what's going on when it comes to tenant protections ordinance.

Um, and again, I also you know, I think the planning department to really um look working on this as well.

I also didn't expect together with uh other folks that this would go that extensive.

I really, yeah, I I was just like, let's have this conversation.

Um, but I didn't think of like really even going to the rent ordinance because even changes in the rent ordinance can be so political.

And we and uh many advocates have known this, um, and you go through a lot of opposition just to amend something in the rent ordinance.

Um, and so yes, I just wanna and also I want to mischutish.

Um, you know, there's part of me that I want to say sorry because you've been coming here in the in my tenure in five years, and we just don't know how to deal with this demolition.

Um, and I think it's really on part of you know, it's really on us at this point now with the commission to really um face this challenge and really try to um address this challenge.

Um, and we have that um discretion to do this, and we haven't really moved anything.

Um so that's why I'm in a way I'm I'm apologizing.

That I feel like I lack as a commissioner to not push this, but I think we should start, and I would be, you know, advocating for us to really re-look the definite um really look on the standards of demolition.

Um, because there has been a lot of um, you know, units, tenants lost because of this, um, and the displacement has happened in the last 10 years is it's the measurable, and many of that perhaps because of the demolition, and also the reason why you don't see that much eviction or you know, um nuisance in the rent board is because those things are not recordable.

Um, so yeah, so that's why you know when I was reading this um ordinance, um, I was pretty moved, and I know there still has um a lot has to change because it's been so a lot of years has gone by, and we you know, and things need to move forward.

Um, one thing that I want to have a question, or also with this letter from the rep SF in terms of the conditional use and to make it mandatory, um, instead of just like I think there's some some language on whether shall approve or approve, and I think we we need to make it more as a mandatory at this point now.

Um, and I support that.

What the um rep SF is also um advocating for looking into.

And in terms of the Ellis Act, and looks like Rep SF is also um, you know, there's Rep SF and Supervisor Melgar and also Supervisor Chen are aligned in that, it seems like it seems like it, and in terms of also in discretion of the um, you know, to put the intention that whether this is going to be demolished or the disclosure to um to demolish.

Um in terms of the the buyouts um as laid out by rep SF, um, that's also needs to be yeah, it seems like these are all the things that's going to that needs to be amended as well.

Um, the harassment, again, the issue of the harassment has been ongoing for how many years, and this is something that needs to be um addressed.

And um and I support 100% support on what Rep SF is advocating for on this harassment when it comes to ten tenant protection ordinance.

Many of the um eviction or displacement issue is actually because of harassment.

Um and those are um so um uh again the the demo the demolition definition.

Um I think we should start again looking into that.

I would love to have other commissioners for us looking into that and how we go with that process and how we reconsider that process as well, um, to make sure that when we're going through the idea of uh or categorizing what definition of demolition is that we're always in mind as well the the protections of tenants at this point too.

Because um in the last decade too, there has been a lot of renovics.

Um and again, this is um we need to uphold the tie um the definition of that where we make sure that the tenants are or the previous tenants are um are going to be protected and and lower or hopefully no more renovictions.

Um and one thing too that the um I know the um there are groups by we we got the letter from C C D C Meta and Y C D in terms of the priority equity geography, which they pre um, you know, they strongly mentioning to not require demolition within the priority equity geography.

Um and um and so that's something that should also be discussed.

I believe that Supervisor Chen also mentioned about no demolition of rank control under the local program, but I think it goes beyond what the C C D C meta is trying to say too in terms of like not requiring demolition within the priority equity equity geography and also requiring enhanced relocation assistance beyond 42 months, um, and also adopting the objective design standards.

These are really good.

Um, I hope this um um you know changes or um should also consider these things as well within the priority equity geography.

Um I even though the family zoning plan rests more on the um on the west side, I oh, you know, the the east side will also still feel the changes when it comes to the state laws, and so um, you know, I think COI should should be protected.

Um so these are kind of like my comments, and um again, um I feel like this is going the right direction and I hope that um, you know, I hope the community stays strong in pushing for all of this.

Thank you for supervisor for pushing it on this and really listen to the community when it comes to the time protection ordinance.

Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner Braun.

This is a really exciting day.

It's great to see the tenant protection ordinance coming forward, and what's really exciting is I just want to kind of echo something that Commissioner Priel said about how far this has gone.

And I remember the first hearing we had on the earliest work on the on what is now the tenant protection ordinance, and it was so rooted in the minimum requirements of SP 330.

And to see all the changes that we've made now at the local level, it's it's very exciting.

This is a this is a great day.

Um I don't want to make too extensive comments.

Uh I'll just say that um, you know, I can really see in the amendments that have been put forward by Supervisor Chen and then also uh Supervisor Melgar.

I'm seeing that there is a lot, there are a lot of issues raised by Rep SF and other S of ADC and other uh letters we've received that are really being addressed through those amendments.

And uh I I'm happy to see that.

I have no concerns, you know.

You know, I was good to see the uh the Ellis Act kind of five-year look back for identifying tenants, um, and then tightening those disclosure requirements for the buyout agreements.

Um, yeah, so it's great to see that those are being incorporated.

That has my absolute support.

Um, you know, I I think one thing that I do want to bring up is that I can see the logic when it comes to the conditional use authorization threshold.

Uh this is still a bit of a moving target.

Um, and I appreciate I thought it was very sensible to take the three mandatory aspects of those criteria and say no, you just have to do those.

Uh that that was something I when I saw that uh coming forward from the community too.

I said, yeah, of course.

Uh and so that leaves the nine.

And I think I would just uh say one thing in contrast to uh Commissioner Imperial, just the um, you know, it makes sense to me to go from 80% to 70% in those criteria when we are reducing them so much, you know, if they go to nine, and then with the staff recommended modification, it goes to eight, and I do support the staff modification of the kind of merging two of those criteria in order to support small smaller ownership projects.

Um, however, I I think that there is still plenty of room to figure out what works there, and so I support the basic, you know, direction that's going and finding the right threshold.

Um, what the number needs to be also kind of depends on the mix of those criteria in the end.

And so, but but to me it makes sense to reduce a little bit just because the number of criteria has gone down so much.

Um then uh let's see here.

Oh, and then on the definition of demolition, I I really appreciate the case studies that the department brought forward.

It's good to see how with the change to the surface area, we are catching more projects, and and with that 50% definition, we're catching more projects.

Um I guess my one question is would be maybe to staff actually, you know, what what's the there's some discussion about whether the 50% threshold is the correct threshold, and I'm curious if there's any other light you can shed on how we got to 50%.

Yeah, um, you know, with this change, what this change does is already reducing those thresholds in a way, right?

Like that's sort of the effect it's having, as you can see with the examples.

And I just want to make a correction.

We in the examples I analyze um, you know, this is changing it to square footage in their front and rear is linear linear feet.

My assumption is that if you're removing that linear feed, you're removing the whole area going up.

Um it does still we still analyze some of those, and they still trigger the demolition when you look at square footage and for the coronary lot that's there, it still triggered the demolition.

Um the new demolition definition.

So this new demolition definition in a way is having the effect of reducing thresholds, right?

It's already catching a lot more projects and having the effect that we want, which is to characterize projects that are making major alterations as demolitions.

Um beyond 50% could potentially put us in a situation where someone just altering their own home uh would trigger a CUA.

Like someone genuinely just uh trying to improve their house.

We also heard in the West side that people want support to be able to build more housing, intergenerational housing within their units.

And our concern would be that making the thresholds too low might hinder their ability to add more units or to add intergenerational units there.

So I I think if we wanted to go lower, I I would suggest we analyze what the effect of that would be, such that we're not triggering projects that really we don't want to trigger asset demolition and force people who should not be forced into a C UA to go through a C UA process.

I would also add, you know, this is our first step to Commissioner Imperio's point on addressing this topic in a long time.

Um and we can always come back and address it again.

So we can try this out.

Um we're we're not having a ton of development right now, but we can look at projects that do start coming in and understand, you know, how we gotten it right, and if we haven't, we can we can come to you all with further adjustments.

Yeah.

And we feel like this is a really positive change.

I mean, the analysis shows they'll catch a lot more projects.

It's simple to understand, both on the project sponsor side and on the on the planner side.

The previous um option gave two different options of people having playing with the numbers in a way, and it requires a lot of back and forward between staff and the project sponsored.

It was hard to conceptualize, and then it ended up causing that some of these projects that should be demolitions were not being considered demolitions.

It also starts sort of shaping buildings in a different way, right?

Because if you sort of want to blow out the rear to extend your building, then you're already at 50%, probably.

And if you want to go up, you're already at uh triggering tantamount to demolition.

So people start have to start, you know, thinking about how they're gonna be doing this work and it'll start retaining features that we want, perhaps, you know.

So we do think it's a step in the right directions, and the um the enforcement staff made some changes that also strengthen this.

Like the, I don't know if you saw, but on the second page, like including the creation of an open connection, sorry, no, that's on mergers.

Uh, where an existing ethereal open opening is in field, uh, that shall be considered the demolition.

So I feel like the changes we made, it's it's just catching projects better, if that makes sense.

No, thank you very much for that explanation.

And and like I said, you know, seeing the the examples that were analyzed, it was helpful, and and I'm comfortable moving forward with the current um staff recommended modification to the definition of demolition, but I I think it does merit paying a lot of attention given as as has been said, you know, we are that becomes incredibly important when it comes to thinking about uh what triggers the tenant protection ordinance protections in some cases.

Uh okay.

So that's those are all my my comments and questions.

And I would just say, you know, I I support absolutely support the legislation with with the department recommendations and with I'm you know in support of all the amendments I've heard so far as well.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Commissioner Moore.

This has this is one of the most massive collaborative efforts I've seen in a long time.

Uh, it has pretty much happened behind the scenes, and I'm blown away by the results that you all have created.

The list of thank yous uh which you put on the screen.

I'll echo every name.

I will not repeat it, but I want to call out one person, and that is my colleague uh Commissioner Imperial.

I do want to thank you for holding up the flag so high.

We appreciate it.

Oh, I'm just supposed to sorry.

Thank you.

It was a personal comment, yes.

Uh I appreciate it, I appreciate what my uh federal commissioners are pointing out.

And I want to drill down on two particular points as question as suggestion, all in support of what I've heard today, including the amended suggestions for further examination and expansion of uh what is in front of us.

Uh, I've heard from multiple people speaking today the importance of the demolition controls to sharpen and expand expand protections.

And I believe that so the many years that I've watched demolitions sitting here and fighting and not responding as a commissioner to the challenges that Ms.

Schudish posed for probably more than 10 years now, uh, week in, week out, week in, week out, was examples and exact pointing out deficiencies in calculating.

Uh I like to add to the list for the department to look back on 214 State Street, 655 Alvarado, 310 Montclair, 49 Hopkins, 4118 21st Street, and the list goes on.

Those are older projects, but they really hit home of what was possible.

Uh, in terms of calculation, including people finding ways to create demolitions which were not traceable because of the difficulty of pointing out exactly where the shortcomings were.

And this commission has been challenged before to amend the calculations, but we never had a perfect situation where we as commissioners had the real opportunity to do so.

Actually, supervisors in the past have attempted to do so and it never worked.

Some of these supervisors are not with us anymore.

They were people in the past.

However, I would like to see that the department, together with Ms.

Sudish and others, go back and perhaps reexamine the threshold because what we need to do is sharpen and expand on protections.

Young community developers eloquently spoke to it, rep spoke to it, and I believe that this is a time just to spend that little extra time with people of experience, including perhaps asking Mr.

Nikitas, who helped greatly in the past to really lay out what the issues are, to take one more sharp look at it because this is a major part where weaknesses lie.

If uh the department and everybody on the team is willing to do so, this is what I would strongly encourage.

Something was said today which actually uh ran a chill down my back, and that is the importance of the expansion of harassment protection.

Harassment protection is one of the most aphysical things one can think about, and to find metrics for that is even harder.

I don't even know how people today address harassment.

I do not know that.

But I I know, particularly as a person, I'm not sure if she's still here, spoke about her own experience in the when controlled unit in the tenderloin, where people showed physical and emotional consequences out of harassment, I believe that we need to spend a lot of attention to that very non-measurable piece of protection, because once people have the effect of depression or ill health, I think they are almost non-mitigable mitigable circumstances by which people are affected.

That's why I believe I would ask the supervisor and everybody else who's working with this to help clarify of how these protections can indeed be uh codified and quantified.

Uh overall, I hope that all questions that have been raised, all issues that need to be further examined, still have a little time to find their way to settle down and be addressed.

And under the leadership of Supervisor Chen, I hope that we can fully deliver this new legislation for tenant protection in the very near future.

Thank you very much.

Thank you to everybody.

Commissioner Williams.

Thank you.

Thank you, Supervisor Chen.

And staff and uh the planning department for all your work on this very important legislation.

Um I agree with pretty much everything that's been said, but um it's not a joyous occasion for me.

Um there will be people impacted by this new state bill.

Um there will be vulnerable seniors, people with disabilities that will be now legally kicked out of their homes.

That's that's not something that I think anybody anywhere, um, would be happy with, and so as much as I I appreciate all the hard work that has gone into uh the tenant protection bill, I, me personally, um there's i i come here today with with a heavy heart uh because i understand the the the situation that the city the city legislature uh the are in because of the state mandates and restrictions on tenant protections um and it it whatever we do it won't be enough because we should not be demolishing occupied housing period and um so i mean that that's just a general comment that i that you know that i want to get off my chest um but again um there's there's so many questions uh the this legislation is huge there's questions have come in from uh all over uh but one of the the things that some of the commissioners have touched on um the demolitions and the demolition calcs I think you know given you know given the fact that we might be in for a lot more demolitions in the future and given given that we may be displacing residents that I think we need to look at the demo calcs again and I think we need to adjust them uh further um and so I would be very happy to have that conversation I I think it's something that we'd all have to uh to really look into uh but I don't think anybody here um wants to see people getting kicked out on into onto the street because uh because of a technicality or because uh we didn't look at something that was important like the democracy and so that's one thing um there there's uh a question about the PEGs that was raised uh in one of the letters uh from C C D C and I think this is probably maybe more for the city attorney um possibly and I'm sorry I wasn't able to to let you know ahead of time that I'm gonna be asking this question or maybe a few but as far as the the priority equity geographies you know are can we re can we require or is there room for additional demolition controls in those areas around the city and I think that's that's the basic question that was um several several community organizations are concerned with and I was wondering what your thoughts are on that issue.

Thank you for that question Commissioner Deputy City Attorney Kristen Jensen I'm not sure I understand though the sort of the context for your question are you asking whether under SB 330 there's additional room for demolition controls?

Yes.

Well I think the sponsors have been talking to others in my office about sort of what SB 330 allows and doesn't allow haven't been part of those conversations so I'm not sure if they've explored other options um but perhaps one of the sponsors representatives could get up and and help us answer that question.

I'm I was just wondering you know because the city attorney has been you know instrumental in all of this and um and I think it's it's something that we need to look at you know given the fact that again that we're gonna be we there's a possibility that though the in these vulnerable areas where we have vulnerable communities uh that they can possibly be um be getting displaced from from their homes and so I I think it's it's worth it to take a second look especially in those areas uh to see if the state will allow some extra protections and so um that's why I'm asking you.

I can say thank you it sounds like that would be a good question and I think somebody else was about to be able to send back to staff to look at yeah and and certainly supervisor uh chen or Mr.

Siamas can can add more I think on slide 10 kind of outlines a way this specific ordinance goes goes beyond as Ms.

Leon Freire noted and adds additional protections for tenants here locally this is of course in addition to all the tenant protections we already have as a city um which many cities and cities are I'm asking uh it's specifically for the the priority equity geographies in terms of adding additional protections in the pegs I think I I don't know if the supervisor we've looked at that specifically in part because there are quite a lot of protections for the pegs but we can certainly take a look as we continue to work if there are additional um areas that folks are interested in yeah yeah I I mean you know get give again given given everything that that we're looking at I I think it is worth taking a second look I think it's a third look and even a fourth look if we have to uh if it if it means uh saving somebody's home um and so yeah and so though I guess those conversations will we we can continue um and I'm sure the the supervisors office it sounds like uh sh they are in agreement with that and so uh I'm glad to hear that um something else in in the letter that that uh one of the letters that we received uh from meta and ycd and ccd it was and it's around um it's around SB 79 and and and it says that you know it sets a floor for for protections and that the that local standards can actually um excuse me that San Francisco can exercise authority to ensure local standards reflect in our equity values and prevent future waves of displacement let's see here local jurisdictions oh here it is b 79 further authorizes cities to adopt additional anti-displacement policies targeted to vulnerable communities government code 6591 two point 157 and 66300 point six C.

And then it goes on to say that San Francisco should exercise that authority to ensure local standards re that reflect our equity values and prevent future waves of displacement um I know yeah I know SB 79 is a new law but has anybody explored that in in context of the the family zoning uh plan you know going a little bit further as SB 79 allows or or how how is that how is it how is that gonna interact with with the family zoning plan.

Thank you for the question I know we're gonna come back I think in a week or two a couple weeks with SB79 specific analysis and information so we can maybe um fold that answer into there because we want to make sure we give you accurate answers um regarding kind of where that lets us go further and what the statute says.

That said you know we continue and I think we have Supervisor Chen and Melgar and others who want to continue to advance more and more tenant protections.

I don't think this is the last ordinance we'll be having on this topic, even though it's certainly a monumental one.

So that's something we could we could look at and work with the supervisors and other offices to add more.

Absolutely.

Thank thank you um Ms.

Tanner, for that um I I just, you know, I want to just emphasize that and you know the more tenant protections that we can afford San Francisco residents, I think, you know, given what we're up against is appropriate.

And you know, I I hope that my fellow commissioners feel that that same way.

Um, there's a lot of vulnerable tenants out there.

Um it's it's uh, it's it's actually very, very unfortunate that we're in this situation.

Um I think our our residents deserve a lot better than what they're being faced with here.

Um so I'm gonna leave it there for now.

I I think I might have another question in me.

A little while.

Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner Campbell.

Great.

Thank you.

Um I think I'm thinking a lot about um this through the goals and objectives of the family zoning plan, um, which we're trying to incentivize densification and building of more housing.

Um, so obviously we want to continue the tenant protections, but balancing that with the creation of new housing and increasing density.

So I sometimes I think about this as like when we do the ballot measures in California and we're reading the proposition, and we're like, because you read the definition, you're like, of course, we want to do this, but we also want to understand the impacts of it over here.

And I guess I'm just thinking about it, you know, both economically and also with like some of our smaller builders in the city who are gonna try to do the right thing and wondering how the additional protections could impact, you know, in terms of like relocation assistance, that's more that's more dollars that it's makes it more expensive to build a unit and additional time, also adds to the expense of building housing.

So I guess I'm just wondering if so we make informed decisions here if we've done any sort of um economic analysis or if we have any data on how these additional protections might impact our you know the family zoning and the goals of the family zoning plan.

I think I'll offer and then uh Miss Leon Ferrer can add more if she'd like.

I think that kind of thought is key in this discussion around, for example, the C UA findings and how many findings need to be get met.

And I think the one case she was pointing out, a single family home becoming multifamily housing.

That's kind of what we want to see, right?

We want to say, hey, it's just serving one household now, but it could serve more.

And so ensuring that we're not um sometimes we can we can have a lot of battle wounds and scars from from the negative things that happen to our communities, and that can lead us to over-index for the bad actors, but then also we may we may inadvertently cut off what we want to see.

And so that's that balance that we're working to strike and that I know the supervisors will work together to strike that balance of being able to have that happen.

And what we hope will I think be some of the outcomes would be that what we see as terms of um housing that turns from maybe a single family home or duplex into more homes.

Um we also want to push folks to look at sites like the vacant lot or you know the single-story building, right?

And so I think that's part of um continuing to encourage that type of development on what we think of as opportunity sites versus someone wanting to demolish, you know, a large-scale building that has lots of households in it or is it filled tenants.

Um that said, we could do a little bit more analysis, and we haven't done like an economic analysis, but we are mindful because we also have the context of not adding too many additional constraints to housing, and so really it's really about preserving existing housing versus adding a constraint to new housing again, finding that that balance between those things.

Yeah, I also want to add that the law does mention that um anyone who wants to demolish has to uh comply with state relocation law, and that payment is called out on state relocation law.

So, in a way, we're just making it simpler where we're providing a formula, but if you read the ordinance, we're providing project sponsors.

There's three ways in which they can comply.

They can offer substitute housing at prior rental rate.

They can offer this payment, or they can have an individualized plan that they come into an agreement with the tenant.

Uh it this plan, the sorry, these amendments also don't move away the option of doing a buyout agreement.

It simply makes sure that if they're gonna do a buyout agreement that tenants are informed and that those buy-out agreements satisfy all the requirements that the law locally says they must satisfy.

That we're looking at it in a way that still sets the ordinance up for success from a legal perspective.

And those are all my comments.

Thank you.

Commissioner Moore.

I have one additional question for the supervisor or Mr.

Shimers.

Uh when uh Supervisor Melga introduced the idea of um codifying or putting three of the standards as mandatory in the CU process.

Uh she lost she suggested lowering it to 70 percent.

And I think you yourself said, Well, I am considering that, but uh I'm also listening to people who want to keep it at 80 percent.

And I would personally voice my support to retaining the 80 percent, uh, given the fact that uh we all have experienced that it will be extremely difficult, particularly in the beginning of up zoning, to create as many credible protections and the highest degree of uh support for this this legislation.

So I would say uh that my suggestion would uh say uh supporting 80 percent.

I'd like to make a motion uh because I do not see any other names, although it is President So's uh saying I would like to uh make a motion to adopt a recommendation for approval with modifications, those which were already known when this package was issued, but also those which were read into the record today.

I think they're still the same people who spoke today are already on the team, are already part of this collaborative work effort, so all I'm asking for is that that discussion continues a little bit longer till you are all together.

You have done a remarkable job.

So this is just putting it to record that I ask for continuing uh communication with each other.

Second, okay.

Uh we have more commissioner wonder to have some comments and Commissioner Williams.

I I just wanted to remind you know folks that I know that the there's there's some issues with um the legislation, and there could be challenges and things like that, but I would just say some things are worth fighting for uh in the courts on the streets and everywhere else.

Um and protecting tenants and protecting people's homes is one of those things.

I mean, in my view, this should be something that we all agree on, and so um I would just I just want to kind of throw that in there, um, and I don't know if I said this, but I do I do um I do um I am in favor of everything that the legislation has in it as far as um some of the the specifics I think that um they're all variables of uh and getting to the same place, and hopefully that um the supervisors can work those those final details out, but I'm in agreement with most of what I see.

Um, so thank you again.

Okay, thank you.

And Commissioner McGarry.

I'm in full agreement with everything I've heard today.

Um, I would really like to thank the community and every community uh-based organization that came out here today that actively worked on all of this.

Uh, the supervisors, Georgia, you're in here too.

You're you're you're in the first couple of pages, and for the planning department who actually put it all together, uh, you know, I I would I have to look at this as this is the entire community or the entire ecosystem actually working for the most vulnerable uh and basically the good actors to be going forward for the city and county of San Francisco.

So I want to commend everybody here for that, and uh the continued dialogue that's gonna go along will only make things better.

But it's fantastic that everybody's on the same page here today.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um just a really quick comment that I would like to share here is that I'm really strongly supporting the protecting tenants.

No one should have to live in fear of harassment or displacement by irresponsible landlords.

So these amendments that we're looking in today to the tenants' protection ordinance are reasonable step forward toward this addressing those concerns.

And I really applause Supervisor Chen and Supervisor Melgards working alongside with our fellow commissioners, our team, and also with the local advocacy, like Commissioner Imperial mentioned that they are really truly the expert of this, and we see this long process.

It's been, I remember it was like 18 months of working or way more than that.

So it's really happy to see how um response responsive to what we need today and for future.

So thank you for that.

And I also wanted to say that um this is not the end of the progress, and I really appreciate supervisors working closely with our mayor's office too to to kind of create this so then everyone knows that things are more in alignment, and we have a sense of more assurance for people who live in San Francisco.

Um, with that said though, I do want to urge staff and our city attorney's office to work closely to make sure that we are in line, we're in alignment with um all these legal situations that we have to work with to make sure that the word that we put in is in alignment with the Alex Act.

Um I do, however, also hear some other sense of sentiment of thinking about this.

Is that would this changes could unintentionally, really unintentionally, like led to uh more units being kept off the market in the long run?

I think that's an interesting question, um, President.

So, and certainly I think we heard testimony a few weeks ago during the family zoning plan from folks who were saying, you know, I'm a landlord and it's challenging for me to rent my unit, and uh we need to kind of look at things for from a different angle, um, in their perspective.

So I think there certainly could be some work there to understand that, and we do hope I think to hear from more stakeholders around like are there other adjustments that folks would want to make.

Um, I think the intent, I think the intent for all of us is to not have units be vacant.

Um, and that's certainly work we need to understand what would you know what would compel someone or incentivize them to keep it vacant versus what would incentivize them to rent the unit out.

Um I think it I think it not just this ordinance, but generally speaking, if if a property owner does want to redevelop their their land, they may want to have a vacant building um and not displace people to be able to develop that building.

And so whether this creates an incentive to have that happen on its own.

I I don't believe that it does, but certainly reasonable people could disagree um you know on that, and I think what's incumbent upon us is to make sure that we're efficiently processing our permits, we are having accountability to the laws that we have, and that everyone feels that it's fair and that and reliable that we're enforcing the laws that we have and that they're clear, right?

The people understand that.

So hopefully we can do good work to communicate both to tenants and to property owners.

What are the rules?

How can they follow them?

How can they stay on the right side of everything, and that way they don't have any as many hiccups or challenges that could deter them from wanting to rent their property?

Thank you.

And can I also add that um, you know this is being done in light of the family zoning plan and SB 330 having all of these different rules?

So I I think that while I understand that fear, that should not stop us from protecting tenants, you know, in light of these two things happening.

And this already installs that.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

And I think that's why we have all these look back periods and the proposed amendments, which aim to do some of that work as well.

Okay, thank you.

Um, any more um briefings or debriefing comments or I think we're ready to vote.

Very good, Commissioners.

There is a motion that has been seconded to adopt a recommendation for approval with said modifications.

On that motion, Commissioner Campbell.

Hi.

Commissioner Braun.

Aye.

Commissioner Imperial.

Aye.

Commissioner Moore, and Commissioner President.

So I.

So move Commissioners.

That motion passes unanimously seven to zero.

Commissioners, it'll place us on item 12 for case number 2022, hyphen zero zero zero one one two ENV for the Islais Creek Bridge project.

Please note that the public hearing on the draft EIR is closed.

The public comment period for the draft EIR ended on January 22nd, 2024.

Public comment will be received.

However, comments submitted will not be included in the final EIR.

Thank you.

I can't stop seeing the Minneapolis.

Isn't it like East Las Bonitas?

Or do this one?

Okay.

I underview.

If we could get the overhead, please.

Thank you.

Uh good afternoon, President.

So and Commissioners, I'm Liz White, environmental review coordinator for the Islayus Creek Bridge Project.

The item before you is certification of a final environmental impact report or EIR for the project.

The planning department issued a notice of preparation or NOP in May 2023, published the draft AAR in November 2023, and held a public hearing on the draft DAR in January 2024.

We published the responses to comments or RTC document on October 22nd, 2025.

This document responds in writing to all substantive comments on the draft AR received during the public comment period.

Commissioners who were not on the commission when the draft ER was heard were provided the draft AR prior to publication of the RTC document.

Now we're here asking for the planning commission to certify the final EIR, which consists of the draft AR plus the RTC.

The draft motion to certify the EAR is before you.

As shown in this image, the Islayus Creek Bridge is located on Third Street over the Islayus Creek Channel in San Francisco's Bayview neighborhood.

The land uses surrounding the bridge are primarily industrial or commercial.

In 2011, Caltrans assigned a national bridge inventory rating of 20 out of 100 or poor in terms of structural sufficiency to the Islayus Creek Bridge.

The objectives of this project are to improve the bridge's resilience to sea level rise impacts, address the existing bridges' seismic and structural deficiencies, minimize construction-related transit impacts, improve multimodal transportation safety, increase operational utility to muni light rail operations, ensure the bridge is operationally and structurally adequate for its entire design life, and provide a bicycle facility as part of the project that can eventually be incorporated into the city's bicycle route planning.

The project would involve the demolition and removal of the existing bridge and the configuration of a new bridge.

The configuration of the new bridge would be similar to the existing bridge.

The new bridge would accommodate a center 26 foot wide dedicated light rail light rail trackway, two travel lanes in each direction, and a new pedestrian and bicycle path on the bridge.

The new bridge would meet current structural and seismic standards and would be resilient to predicted sea level rise impacts up to the year 2100.

Working within the city's existing right-of-way constraints, the new bridge's bottom and top of deck would be approximately four feet and three feet higher, respectively, than the existing bridge, accommodating for future sea level rise.

During the draft AR comment period, many commenters expressed concern about the Islayus Creek Bridge's construction related transportation impacts.

In response to public comments, public works modified the proposed bridge design to potentially reduce the project's construction duration by reducing project construction risks.

This design was evaluated in the RTC as the preferred project variant.

As shown on this slide, the preferred project variant proposes a single span precast concrete adjacent box beams bridge.

This design is accessible to more fabricators and contractors and would simplify construction activities, thus resulting in potential construction time savings.

Under the preferred project variant, the bridge design would be closed to vehicle and pedestrian traffic for 15 months as opposed to 24 months.

The preferred project variant would have generally similar physical environmental impacts to the proposed project analyzed in the draft AR and would not result in any new or more significant environmental impacts than those identified in the draft AR.

The preferred project variant is proposed for approval today.

For the certification, second, public works and SFMTA identified the development of a community engagement and mobility strategy to address rerouting plans around Islais Creek Bridge and reduce effects to the mobility network for private vehicles, transit riders, and people walking and bicycling during construction.

The mobility strategy identifies a public outreach component, the designation of a point of contact during project construction and development of context sensitive solutions and oversight during project construction.

Now I'll review the proposed project's impacts and mitigation measures.

The proposed project would have significant impacts to archaeological and tribal cultural resources, construction related transit delay, health impacts to off-site worker receptors at Fire Station 25, biological resources, and historic resources.

Impacts to all other topics would be less than significant.

The proposed project identified mitigation measures that reduce most impacts to less than significant.

For example, mitigation measure MAQ 3 requirements for off-road construction equipment would reduce significant health risk impacts to worker receptors at Fire Station 25 to less than significant levels, and the five biological mitigation measures shown on this slide would reduce significant impacts to less than significant.

However, impacts to construction related transit delay and historic resources would remain significant and unavoidable even with mitigation.

A Caltrans evaluation of the bridge's historic significance determined that the bridge is eligible for listing in the National Register as an example of an art moderne style applied to the bridge.

Because the bridge is a historic resource under CEQA, impacts to historic resources would remain significant and unavoidable even with mitigation, as the project would demolish a historic resource.

Regarding the construction related transportation impacts of the project, the draft AR identifies mitigation measure MTR1, reduced transit travel times for T 3rd Street and 19 Pulk Riders.

The SFMTA is currently evaluating the exact measures that could result from implementation of this mitigation.

Given that this evaluation is still ongoing and may be modified based on community input prior to being finalized, the project's potential significant construction-related delays to T3rd Street riders would remain significant and unavoidable even with mitigation.

During the RTC, the planning department modified mitigation measure MTR1 to identify measures that could be implemented to reduce the potentially significant transit delay impact to the 19 Pulk, should the Illinois Street Bridge be fully or partially closed to general vehicle traffic to prioritize T 3rd Street a transit substitute.

Now I'll give an overview of the project's alternatives considered.

The project team looked at a variety of different alternatives, including six alternatives that were considered but rejected due to infeasibility.

Ultimately, two alternatives were carried forward for additional analysis.

The first alternative is the no project alternative and would involve no demolition or construction of improvements to these Lace Creek Bridge.

The second alternative is the preservation alternative, which would demolish the existing bridge and replace the bridge at the same elevation as the proposed project.

This alternative would salvage rehabilitate and reinstall as many of the character-defining features of the original bridge as feasible, including the control tower.

The seismic retrofit of the control tower would also require a longer construction duration as well as more in-water construction, increasing other impacts of the project.

To wrap up, I'll briefly discuss the next steps for the projects for the project.

This slide shows the project's environmental review timeline that I mentioned earlier.

Should the planning commission choose to certify the EIR today, the project will seek approvals from the Director of Public Works and the SFMT board at subsequent hearings.

In summary, the draft AR and the RTC comprise the final EIR.

The final EIR reflects the independent judgment of the department and provides decision makers and the public with information to understand the potential environmental impacts of the project, project alternatives, and mitigation measures.

The department has determined that the addition of the preferred project variant as well as the modification made to MTR1 do not change the conclusions of the EIR, do not reflect any new environmental impacts, and do not constitute significant new information that requires recirculation of the EIR under CEQA.

The EIR complies with CEQA, the CECA guidelines, and Chapter 31 of the San Francisco Administrative Code, and is adequate, accurate, and objective.

We respectfully request that you certify the EIR.

This concludes my presentation.

Thank you.

Okay, with that, we should take public comment.

Members of the public, this is your opportunity to address the commission on this item.

You need to come forward.

Seeing none.

Public comment is closed, and this environmental impact report is not before you, Commissioners.

Commissioner McGarry.

So my day job as a union rep for the Carpenters Union.

We're on 18th third.

We are drywall went in this week.

So the building's gone white on the inside, and we're the other side of this building or this bridge.

Uh I heard correctly.

The rating, it's unacceptable.

And that was 2011.

2011, 2020 out of 100.

Apologies.

Yes, Commissioner, in 2011.

Right, so it's not getting any better in the last 14 years.

This bridge has to be replaced.

It will be a two-year delay.

And basically, my new for the next my new the next two years, I will be having to get to the other side of it.

So the little bridge on the side is going to be open.

And as part of that mitigation measure, there is um different a menu of options for how transit could be reduced.

It is possible that Illinois would be open, but I there is a possibility that in our mitigation measure we identified that it might be restricted to um transit only, but again, SFMTA is going to be conducting community outreach, and um that process hasn't occurred yet, so there's not a decision there and I'll look to if there's anything else to add Java or I ask because I think every concrete truck coming into the city uses that little bridge by way of cargo.

Yeah that's actually correct so currently the third street bridge which is the one considering for replacement under this EIR uh has about 5% of its traffic is heavy freight uh cargo that Illinois bridge my understanding is was actually built specifically to uh deal with the cargo and freight uh associated with all the heavy industrial work that is just to the south um so correct so um sorry and I'm Java Cronenberg I'm with SFMTA I'm a senior planning manager and I've been staffing this project with public works and I'm grateful to be working with our planning colleagues today.

As Liz just explained so uh my board will be hearing this topic and we'll be adopting findings uh as well and as part of the next phase our design phase um the MTA needs to understand from the public the community all the industry surrounding it how we're best gonna manage mobility both for the transit which is the only impact that is known here in this environmental because traffic is not um something part of our environmental documentation needs to consider um but we respectfully understand that we do need to think about it holistically and so some of the choices that that the public will have to consider and that my board will have to choose ultimately is should we how should we best use Illinois and so maybe it'll be transit only be transit and trucks maybe it'll be open that's just not a decision we're we're ready to make today but it is something we've certainly heard from others including um including whoever you're representing right now right but we'll the uh the conference union will be the other side of firehouse I'm surely firehouse 25 will have to yeah so I mean even when we restrict we always allow for emergency vehicles emergency access is always a um the paramount consideration thank you thank you commissioner Braun I really appreciate the the modifications to the project and then the robust analysis of them that's included for addressing the significant unavoidable impacts on transportation circulation so uh you know I don't think I often see a situation where uh something happens where the design of the project changes so that you can shave time off the construction timeline potentially or at least the closure timeline um as part of the project and then I also really appreciate that the um you know there's gonna be a community engagement mobility strategy that that's gonna be done in partnership with the community because I I could see this being very disruptive for the transit connection as well um Commissioner McGuire you know addressed some of the the goods movement side of this and then um and and construction vehicles and then but to me this idea that the train to bus connection that might have to happen at the bridge for a very long time potentially that was noted that that is uh that seems like a really big challenge and you know a lot of that connects to one of our party equity geographies um so I'm glad to see both of these changes being added in here and I felt the the analysis is robust and that the response to comments was um was robust and and so I moved to certify the EIR great and commissioner Williams you want to comment why not um so this this bridge is on the main it's on third street it is it's part of third street right and so um what would uh what's the the timeline like the duration uh that it's gonna be closed.

I I just kind of ballpark, just trying to wrap my head around uh the bridge not being there.

Um so we we did uh an additional analysis of the bridge closure for the in the response to comments and it is on page.

Um, um trying to find a page.

Um, but basically we we did an additional analysis of the construction duration closure is oh, page two six.

Um the bridge will be closed to um most modes for total 15 months.

Um it will be closed to transit for longer for up to 24 months because after they open it to cars, they have to test the trains back and forth on it to make sure there's no issues with the new tracks.

So that will be delayed a few additional months.

Um, but we have looked at it further.

We've determined that the full closure to all modes is reduced to 15 months, 15 months.

Um as far as like community uh engagement, it I I mean this is obviously it's gonna be impact this area tremendously.

It's that's the main corridor, third street.

And so um just because I I read through some of it.

I don't unfortunately I don't have the con the the uh the comments to the uh or say the um huh, yeah.

Response to comments.

Thank you, Commissioner.

Um in front of me, it's it's pretty thick, and so um, but my question is how is a community you know uh surrounding community, how are they dealing with with the fact that or what what kind of um what kind of conversations have you guys had as far as with the community and um and the impacts that that are gonna be um caused by by the closure?

Just and I know that's a lot there, but I just kind of just to get a real quick preview.

What what what are those conversations been like and who have you had them with?

Well, I will um we did do a lot of outreach for the EIR, but I'll turn that over to my coworker Thomas Reutman, PM for public works, he and my other colleague Hava have been doing a lot of outreach in the community so they can put it doesn't have to be extensive.

I just kind of you know for the public to understand, you know, what you know briefly what what's been what's been talked about and with who.

I can respond to that.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, commissioners.

I'm Thomas Reutman with San Francisco Public Works, the project manager for the project.

Um I have heard exactly the comments that you've uh just mentioned, echoed in uh community outreach activities.

We've um we've been to approximately 10 uh different community organizations in the Bayview area to introduce the project and share and be upfront about the impacts that we we know are coming, and we have heard feedback that that's obviously not welcome, the extra disruption and uh the transit impacts, and we've we've listened and we've um in working closely with my MTA counterparts, Hava and Planning Department.

We've um we've explored how can we acknowledge and address those concerns.

Um we're sympathetic to it, and you know, if I wish there were a way that we could build the bridge off site and plop it into place and have very little impact, but with the just the constraints of the project, it's not possible to do that.

Um but we've looked at ways to um introduce creative ways to reduce that impact, for instance, building components of the bridge off site so that we can shorten that downtime by um minimizing the time from when we turn it off to when we bring the new bridge in into service again.

Um the transportation aspect has been studied carefully and we're looking, as Hava just mentioned, to do more um iterative engagement with the community and how we can um maximize the transportation alternatives to reduce the impacts.

And we're we're viewing this and hoping that uh the community views this as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to uh make a major improvement to the infrastructure that sorely needs it there, and uh we're hoping that the community and businesses come along on this journey with us to and then enjoy the benefits of it for many years thereafter.

Um I can allude to the groups that we've met with.

If if you'd like to know, I um let me see I wrote that down.

So some of the groups we've met with are the economic development on third uh community group, um the Southeast Community Facility Commission, uh the Bayview Hunters Point uh Citizens Advisory Committee, Bright, which is um Bayview residents improving their environment.

Uh we've attended the ports Southern Advisory Committee, um, see the Dog Patch Neighborhood Association, the Petrero Boosters Neighborhood Association, um, and the CCDC, and also recent most recently the um the Bayview Alliance.

So we met with these groups um over the past 18 months, and any time that uh we have any updates or advances to the project, we share it with the district supervisor as well, and anyone that's signed up for updates from our project website will get notified about the updates.

I really appreciate um the thoroughness of of your outreach, and I think that you know it's very important.

Um again, it's that's very tricky uh place to have that bridge replaced, um, you know, given its central location to that community, and so um good luck.

Thank you.

And um, my you know, I I think uh all those concerns are are you know are very important that and it's it's good that we continue to highlight them because there's folks that are you know that we need to consider um all the people and organizations and businesses and et cetera that um that rely on people coming through, and so um again, I just I just want to appreciate the conversations that you guys are having with the community that is that is so very important to build trust.

Um and um great awesome.

I think that's it.

But I want to say something, can I?

Okay.

When you're done, when you're done.

Only when you're done, okay.

All right.

Um I had this luxury to kind of seen this evolution of this project from being on the historic preservation commission, this bridge.

You have to we have to make sure that it is addressing the sea level rising concern.

And then I as I serve on the SFMT board of directors, I got brief on the important um necessary to uh upgrade uh the tracks and um the ability to have to really elevate this bridge to address our sea level rising, and I believe MTA, DPW work really closely together on this for at least three or five years.

And I'm really appreciated that today, our staff brought you here with us, and thank you for Lisa's team.

Um always have a really great presentation.

Um, what I think that um the only concern I have is really is not our jurisdiction, but we it is yours, is to make sure that the community actually do have equitable access back to the city, as highlighted by the MTA staff here.

It's that is the only connector back to the city.

Number 15 and the T line.

So public awareness and also being informed of how to alleviate these uh concerns of basically inequitable access right to their to get to their job to get to their school is very important.

Um I I trust that you have a lot of robust communication staff to to really uh continue to do more, if not already have done to make that really aware of anything we can do.

If we can be helpful, um, call us back.

But um I'm all supportive of this and thank you for doing such an amazing job for this report.

Yeah.

Thank you for those comments.

I appreciate it.

Yeah, thank you.

And I think we're ready to vote, or yeah, you someone had already motioned, right?

Okay, there is a motion that has been seconded.

Perfect.

So, commissioners on that motion, um, which has a second uh to certify the environmental impact report, Commissioner Campbell.

Aye, Commissioner McGarry, Commissioner Williams, aye.

Commissioner Braun, Commissioner Imperial, Commissioner Moore.

I Commission President So, I.

So move commissioners that motion passes unanimously seven to zero.

Commissioners, that'll place us on the final item on your agenda today, number 13, case number 2025, IP-001217 C UA at 175 Margaret Avenue, conditional use authorization.

Hello, Commissioners.

My name is Heather Samuels, Planning Staff.

The item before you is a request for a conditional use authorization at 175 Margaret Avenue to allow for the removal of an unauthorized dwelling unit.

The unauthorized unit is located on the ground floor and basement of an existing two-story single-family dwelling.

The unauthorized unit is currently vacant and was last occupied in 2023.

In 1994, the property owner rented the entire home to a tenant who around 2011 constructed the unauthorized unit and rented it to subtenants without the knowledge or consent of the property owner.

When the original tenant independently vacated in 2022, the owner discovered the subtenants and completed an LSAC eviction and buyout in 2023.

The owner then filed an application with the department to remove the unauthorized unit and resolve existing code violations.

The project proposes to restore the property to its authorized single family use, which is permitted within the RH1 zoning district.

The proposed work includes the removal of a kitchen, restoration of the one-car garage and storage area, and conversion of a ground floor room into a media room.

If the property were to instead legalize the unauthorized dwelling unit, significant alteration alterations would be required, including the renovations to the kitchen, living area, and bathroom.

Additionally, they would need to either remove the interior stair and basement rooms or bring those areas into code compliance by providing adequate floor to ceiling height and constructing a code compliant stairway.

Because only portions of the unauthorized unit fail to meet height requirements, the project would not qualify for an exemption to the conditional use requirement.

The department supports the project to remove the unauthorized unit on the basis that the project meets our findings per planning code section 317, and that the property owner has established good faith effort in correcting unauthorized work.

Lastly to note, the department has received no letters in opposition or support for this project.

Thank you for your time.

This concludes my presentation.

The project team has a short presentation themselves, and afterwards we'll be available to answer any questions.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Project sponsor, you have five minutes.

Good afternoon, commissioners.

My name is Serena Calhoun, I'm a local architect, and I'm here representing the owners of the property at 175 Margaret.

With me also is Justin Goodman with Zach's Friedman for any questions you have about the tenancy questions and issues.

As uh Heather mentioned when she did a great job.

This is not a problem of our clients making.

The tenant, the master tenant of the whole house, moved someone into the garage, added a cooktop, no oven, no heater, and let them live there without notifying the uh the owner that this was happening.

And when he moved out of the building voluntarily, he left this tenant behind and a host of concern, obviously.

That tenant began filing violations for things like no heat, broken water heater, unsafe deck in the back.

We came on to try to solve those problems and obviously didn't see there was there was no full kitchen.

There was this head height issue going to the basement that Heather mentioned.

There was the unsafe deck.

Uh the garage doors just had plywood put on the inside of it.

There's no heat.

It's a really not a habitable space.

And now my client, the elderly mother who owned the building has since passed, and her daughters have now inherited this problem.

They've spent tens of thousands of dollars in permit architecture, engineering, and legal fees trying to deal with this issue.

And so we are here to ask that you support the removal of this illegal dwelling unit as recommended by planning staff.

And if you have any questions for Justin, do you want to jump in?

You have some stuff.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Commissioners, and thank you for this opportunity to speak.

And as Ms.

Calhoun said, I'm happy to answer any questions you have about the legal background of this.

I was going to speak a little bit on the history of the tenants' uh tenancy, but uh obviously planning staff and Miss Calhoun have addressed that.

So I'll just narrow my comments uh to a more pointed one about the LS Act specifically.

Um I echo Ms.

Calhoun's statements that this project meets all the um criteria for conditional use approval, uh, but we also think it would be appropriate for the commission to find that this is entirely exempt given that the property invoked her rights under the Ellis Act, and the merger provision in question here is actually preempted uh on this issue by the Ellis Act.

Um, on that point, uh, first an identical provision, just uh ordered differently in section 317 was already invalidated in the 2016 case, SFAA versus CCSF.

Um, the current version of the Chen legislation, line 11 actually seeks to delete that.

It's um 37.9 uh 13 of the rent ordinance, and you'll you'll see in that provision that's actually edited out, and presumably for that reason, just to clean up the legislation a bit.

Uh second, the legislative purpose of section 317 is to preserve existing housing, identifying it as the greatest stock of rental housing.

But the downstairs space in question here, it was never rental housing on its own.

The owner, uh the current owner's mother, leased an entire integrated single-family home, and it was that tenant who made a separate segregated space without her knowledge or consent here.

When you rent property, what you're doing is creating an exclusive right of possession for the tenant as against the landlord, uh landlord for an identifiable space.

And the identifiable space here was the single family home.

When she discovered that something had changed, something about the tenants' use of this property, she invoked the Ellis Act.

And the Ellis Act exists in part to free landlords to confer an absolute right to exit the rental market and not to be entangled with a tenant's particular uh use in this context.

Uh, to find an unauthorized dwelling unit here on these facts would be to compel the owner to create additional housing units to support San Francisco's tenant population, but this property is no longer rental property because of the invocation of the Ellis Act.

Uh, for these reasons, we ask that you find the project exempt or alternatively to find that it meets the criteria.

And of course, again, I can answer any questions that the commission has.

Thank you.

Okay, if that concludes sponsor's presentation, we should open up public comment.

Members of the public, this is your opportunity to address the commission on this item.

You need to come forward.

Seeing none, public comment is closed.

This matter is now before you, Commissioners.

Commissioner Moore.

Uh while the story seems very clear, the circumstances somewhat unusual given the length of time that there is a tenant who uh has rented this house for 28 years.

Uh and uh it is for 13 years that he kind of was able to hide from the owner that he had this uh UDU sub-lease, profiting or deriving income from this very unusual situation.

Uh I have never lived in a rental situation where the owner didn't come by at least every six or eight months because there are inspections for whatever uh smoke detector or whatever all those regulatory things are that tenants are not responsible for, but owners are responsible for, not to talk about intermittent repairs which occur in any kind of situation.

So it is really only this very unusual preamble to what we're asked to do today, because once the owner discovered that there was a uh illegal sub-lease, he would take it on with a tenant.

That would be the first uh order of recourse, including penalizing the tenant because a tenant illegally derived income that was hidden from the owner.

Uh I try to understand that part.

What physically is happening with the UDU is a completely separate issue for me.

It is the circumstance, the framework in which you saw course, which I personally do not understand.

Uh I could ask uh the applicant, I could ask uh Miss Wadi, who's always very fast in seeing these kinds of unusual irregularities.

Ms.

Wadi, what is your take?

Our take is that this this situation, the property owner had no idea that there was a second unit that was built.

So I mean I think you know, to the best of our knowledge, that seems sincere.

Um when these issues were raised, as Serena mentioned, they came in, they hired an architect to deal with the violations that that illegal tenant sort of called in upon themselves effectively of you know the DAC, the other issues, the lack of heating, that sort of thing.

Um it sounds like the property owner at that time hired an architect to try to resolve these issues, and it was at that time that they dug in.

Um I don't know if the property owners uh the now property owner and Serena can maybe opine as to why the property owner um didn't actually walk walk the property and and see that this was going on for so many years.

I don't know if they were out of state or not in the area or what that relationship was, but I think from a planning department perspective, um we do look at UDU removals very very closely.

These are not um proposals that we take lightly.

Um we did feel in this circumstance that the property owner was not at fault for creating the UDU.

Oftentimes we see the scenario of, you know, the property owner themselves has profited and now they want to remove it, which is clearly not the instance here.

And so we felt in this situation um all of the tenants are no longer there, so there's not sort of the human impact anymore at play here.

Um, and so we felt it was appropriate to um enable the facilitation of this very, very small single family home being restored to a single family home.

Uh I was never trying to imply that the property owner uh orchestrated this particular issue.

It is just very unusual, and I appreciate Ms.

Gallon being uh actually on the job uh establishing the credibility of the applicant relative to the incident, which is in itself highly unusual.

Um, um hi, uh my name is Janet Jew.

I am the current owner of the property.

Um I can speak a little bit about that.

Um both my mom and dad are immigrants to the United States, and their English just wasn't great.

And this was the first house that they bought, and they have were able to rent it out after they were able to buy another property.

So because of sort of this long-term tenant that we had, we had a lot of trust in them.

They always gave us rent on time.

We never had any reason any time that there was anything that needed to be done, they had fixed it.

Um, so a lot of times we just sort of let them do what was needed, because they were sort of my parents didn't speak a lot of English, you know, and I was younger at that time.

Um, but since then both my parents have passed, so um I would just really um hope that you guys would favor us in making this a single unit family home again.

Thank you.

Let me say uh that I truly appreciate your being here and my condolences for the passing of your parents.

This is indeed an unusual story, and I am fully convinced that what you are saying is correct.

Uh I hope that your parents were not uh get compensation for the cost you were incurring now incurring now, uh, in order to get this straightened out.

Thank you.

Um, you have further comments?

No, I do not just the case is very clear, and uh I am in full support for approving it.

This conditions.

Thank you, and Commissioner Imperial.

Um, thank you, Commissioner Moore, um, in inquiring about the situation, and um, you know, although I'm not usually a definitely not a big fan of Ellis Act, but it seems like this um, you know, this um particular situation is entirely unique and totally um um understandable from the from the project sponsor.

Um, you know, there are times, um, also I have my personal experience as well, where the landlord does not really come to the housing or um to the unit, um, especially if you are renting a single family home.

And I have one experience where a landlord and has a tenant that created also the same situation in it.

But the good thing is that they're friends.

But um, but in in this um situation, um, you know, again, I I'm fully support, and I'd like to make um a motion with approval with conditions, second.

Okay, great.

I think um we have one more commissioner wanted to comment on it.

Um it's Commissioner Williams, and then we're ready to vote.

Okay, Commissioner Williams.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um yeah, I I I just wanted to kind of weigh in that this is um a unusual situation.

Uh and I just wanted to comment that uh you mentioned that your your um your tenant fixed things.

I'm sure you were very surprised to see he went uh beyond the pale and uh really fixed uh fixed up uh the property um and downstairs.

Um it so it the am I right in assuming that the the garage is part of this what was built out, right?

And so when this if uh this gets approved, and then that will become the garage again, right?

Okay, um, you know, I'm I'm not really in favor of of um getting rid of housing.

Um I know it's not its tenants are are gone and and this is uh an unusual circumstance.

Um and so and it is you know, and so I think that that's been that threshold's been met, and so I'm in support.

Yeah, thank you.

All right, Commissioners, if there's nothing further, there's a motion that has been seconded to approve with conditions on that motion, Commissioner Campbell.

Aye.

Commissioner McGarry, Commissioner Williams, I Commissioner Braun, I Commissioner Imperial, Commissioner Moore, and Commissioner President.

So I.

So move Commissioners that motion passes unanimously seven to zero and concludes your hearing today.

Okay, the meetings adjourned.

Thank you.