Comment is closed. Next is 2. Approval of minutes for august 20, 2019. I will ask for a motion for approval of the minutes. Motion. Second. Any Public Comment. Seeing number none, it is closed. roll call . The minutes are approved. The agenda item report from executive director. Thank you and good evening, commissioners on my topics to discuss with you this evening, i wanted to first apologize as i mississaugmiss reported somethiu at the last meeting regarding streamlining. I think i said it had passed when in reality at that point it passed through first reading. My apologies. I will give you an update. It has passed now. That is great. On wednesday, september 11th mayor breed signed the legislation and it will go into effect on october 11 to enable Retail Businesses to diversify offerings to attract new Business Models to vacant storefronts and increase opportunities for retail and nightlife businesses to sell vacant storefronts. It will support live music by limiting doilycative inspections and will reduce the Food Service Requirements for new and existing entertainment venues. It will clarify planning codes provisions around Liquor License types in order to bring consistency to the process. Update on implementation. As we approach this Effective Date in october, the office of economic and Work Force Development will meet with all departments impacted by the legislation including us and we will discuss implementation and outreach included in the package. Our role in this, too, not only are we going to be educating ourselves as defendant staff on how Department Staff on how we will handle the permits differently. We will do an Education Campaign to definitely incorporate educating constituents in a newsletter as well as at the summit this year. Moving right along, i want to give you all an update on the special Events Steering Committee born out of the mayors executive directive supporting special events. A copy is in your binders. You can follow along if you want. You have seen it a couple times. This calls upon city departments to review the current permitting process and identify solutions to make the process more friendly, streamlined and efficient for event organizers as well as City Employees and residents. The mayor convened the committee to handle the review and make recommendations to the mayor. She designated two cochairs the city administrator as well as director torrez. All role in this. I am serving as a member of the committee. We are also assisting the cochair in the Mayors Office to provide research and support for the meetings. We kicked off the first meeting at the end of august. This is going to run through the end of november. From her directive the mayor is asking departments to look at a few different buckets. We are looking at digital permitting, fees and ways to reduce fees, as well as organizational structure. I dont want to get too in the weeds with those because they are ongoing topics with in the committee. As we have drafts i want to share those with you so you are informed throughout the process. The group is engaging event organizers in the process which we did prior to this committee which was the impetus behind creating it in the first place. By way of focus groups and small interviews to continue to understand the pain points around the process as well as ideas from their end on potential reforms. I will keep you informed. If you have questions along the way, i am available at any point. Finally, we have an update for you. I think i mentioned this. I might not have mentioned this at the last hearing. It might not have happened at that point. We issued an administrative citation relative to a sound truck permit that was appealed. In that process the appeal goes to the controllers office, and they assign a hearing officer there. It is much different than appeals to the Entertainment Commission or by way of Entertainment Commission decision to the board of appeals. It is handled administratively. You will see the prehearing statement we developed to support our citation and issuance of it as well as response to the appellant. We had the hearing last week. We are waiting on a decision from the controller. It is over a minor infraction of 100, but, you know, we will keep you appraised where that appeal process goes and whether or not we win. Do you have any questions . Okay. One comment on the previous item and just pointing out that in the executive directive from the mayor the actions are taken by the Entertainment Commission and staff. I just wanted to take some i want the Entertainment Commission taking credit for moving forward and laying the groundwork for the special events work being done. I am glad you are representing us in that process, and i hope it makes things easier for all of our applicants and people looking for permits. I am glad you are involved. As we all know, our department as well as commission are a little bit biased. We support our constituents who are organizers. By nature of that we want to find where the holes are and where there are potential improvements so dillons work is vital in all of that and it is great that we should always say thanks. We are looking at that work as part of the Steering Committee on how to improve it and how we can utilize that in potential future reforms. I just want to sort of second that. I want to commend the mayor for assembling the Steering Committee. It is way overdue. It can do a lot of good to make small cultural event in the city more frequent. I also think it is fantastic we have a meaningful seat at the table that is a wonderful thing. I am happy that you are doing all of this extra work on it. Thanks. I want to give a shout out to oawd forgetting the streamlined legislation passed. There is a long road. I know that ben is watching this and i am excited for him and everybody and i commend the mayor for signing this. The hard work paid off. Is there any Public Comment on our directors report . Seeing none, Public Comment is closed. Item 4 is report from the Deputy Director. Thank you and abou good even. I will take you through the report on the highlighted sections. Page 1 with club 26, you have seen this on your report for a few weeks now, and i want to let you know that we are responding to complaints that come in on the weekends. I have spoken with the head of security and it is about the outside dispersal at 2 00 a. M. They are in compliance with the security conditions on their permit. However, during the week that is when we receive the complaints. We dont have inspectors in the field on sunday through thursday at 2 00 a. M. I have asked the station to help us. We are still working that out. I will say of the times we have responded on the weekend, they are in compliance so that is where that stands. If we go on page 3, looking at royal oak, just letting you know we have received 8 complaints since the last hearing about this location. They are not having live entertainment, it is streamed music they are playing with doors and windows open, and we have been receiving neighbor complaints. The inspector has responded and determined it is not live entertainment. I have spoken with the owners and let them know we are receiving these complaints. They are not eligible for appeal due to the Zoning District unless they do conditional use authorization. They are willing to go for llp. The bulk of people come after 10 00 p. M. We will see where that gets us. I looped in northern station and asked for support on this as well. On page 7, just bringing to your attention there is a flea market on saturdays and sundays. We are receiving complaints about them, quite a few complaints. Again daytime events unless we schedule an inspector for the daytime we are in the field at night. It is hard to respond to. Now we received complaints two weekends in a row we will coordinate an inspector to determine if they need a permit for this and what has happened. Inspector roberts is in contact with the complaints, and we are doing our best to respond when we have people in the field. Moving on page 12. Virgin hotel. The inspector went to conduct a routine site inspection and this is a complaint i will let you know this came in on sunday after he responded excuse me. This came in on sunday after he conducted the routine site inspection on saturday night. We have been receiving complaints about this location specific to the rooftop bar. On saturday night when the inspector went to do the site inspection he did find the dj after 10 00 p. M. It was close to midnight. It only allows entertainment on the roof until 10 00 p. M. They were issued a notice of violation for this. Financi want to bring to your attention there was an outdoor event that happened with quite a few complaints about it. We did contact the event producersers. We will set a sound limit for Outdoor Entertainment events prior to the next event that they host. We were informed no more Outdoor Entertainment with music events happening until next summer. The rest of the year we will have and into the beginning of next year we are keeping that on the radar. That is all that i have highlighted for you. I am happy to answer any questions you may have. I am curious if they dont have a poe and they are playing their music just cranking it up, what do you tell them . They have no permit and no dj, not in our purview. They are disturbing the peace. What is the next recourse . Royal oak . That is one example. Anybody for my own information. What generally happens the inspector collects Contact Information and then i reach out to the Contact Information, hopefully, the owner to follow up to say this is not permitted. You must have an entertainment license for this. Sometimes that works. Some people comply because they didnt know. In the event it is an out vitthat they are not wanting to get a permit, then we have to bring in pd. Correct me if i am wrong. Are you referring to places that dont host entertainment at all . If they cant get one and just play streaming music way up there without disregards we cant do anything about it, what is the next recourse. A venue that doesnt host entertainment we would take investigation in pursuing that. They don dont want to pursue e would engage the Police Department to enforce. We are looking at code relative to this today. It is not that common where we are dealing with a place that has no oversight from the Police Department to regulate. Within police code, you have to be in compliance with the eight decibels. Are we allowed to give them a ticket . That is where it is very odd. When we look at actual staff within the city that use sound meters and understand sound code, it really is us relative to entertainment or music. We could set a limit. It is not attached to an entertainment permit. We are trying to sort that out. We dont want to use staff hours on things we cant cost recover on through the permit application or license process. We want the neighbors to be able to enjoy. We dont want them to say, well i dont think that is the issue. We reglate sound when somebody has a permit and the police regulate if there is no permit. In this case the applicant may be applying for limited live. In that case we will have the opportunity to talk. So say if they get an llp and do entertainment until 10 00. After 10 00 they stream music, if they want to go louder after 10 00 thanks is not acceptable. They have to be in compliance with the sound limit at all times. They can be regulated by us. If the place has sound complaints currently pd enforces that and says turn it down when they have the availability to do so. They are working on heavier things. The neighbors have a number evera numberof number of the. You know you have local pd, local politicians, neighborhood groups. All of these things get together, trust me. I know. I have never been on that side of it. We have never had a problem. His all have permits. My personal feeling that is not we have laws around what it is we can and cannot do. We keep responding to the calls and we are not getting recovery from it. When we respond, we look to investigate on the entertainment front. I am not going to have my staff go out multiple times if we are not finding entertainment. At that point we have to send it to the Police Department. We have a sound monitoring fee so we could cost recover on that if the Police Department wanted to utilize our services in setting limits and enforcing them in some way, shape or form. I think commissioner lee is bringing up an interesting conversation. I want to go back to where we started at the meeting with both executive directors comments. I am looking at the flea market right now. I certainly dont want to understate the frustration of the neighbors. I also think this could be exactly what we are talking about when we talk about small cultural events. Maybe we could get in front of these things and see if we can get this to be an approved event because i think we are just so darn bureaucratic, it is a complex process. Part of our charge is to promote entertainment. This flea market could be a good fit. I know there are a lot of things to overcome. As we have said in the past. This flea market would be easier managed if they were actually permitted. What i am putting forth to you and your staff is seeing if we can license them at least in some capacity and actually turn this into a positive and make this to what president blieman was saying earlier, a real cultural event. I have no idea what the flea market is. It could be a asset and attract people. I think that is what we are all shooting for. Instead of looking at these straight up violations, which it is, but if there is an opportunity to make good out of it and meet the mission that is put upon us to promote entertainment and bring about these little events, this could be an easy one, and, hopefully, satisfy the concern of the neighbors. Thank you very much for the report. Any Public Comment on the report . Seeing none, Public Comment is closed. Moving along. We are on number five. Police department comments and questions. I dont see any officers present. We are moving to number 6. The next item is hearing and possible action regarding applications for permits under the jurisdiction of the Entertainment Commission. Deputy director please introduce the items on the consent agenda. The two permits on the agenda are accessory permits. They both received an outpouring of support. The Police Department had no added conditions and i am happy to answer any questions you have about these. Motion to approve. Second. So there is a motion to approve the consent agenda. Any Public Comment . Seeing none, Public Comment is closed. roll call . All right. Congratulations. Your permits are approved. Please follow up with the Deputy Director at your earliest convenience. The final agenda item number is number 7, commissioners comments and questions. I just would like to propose we close tonights meeting in the memory of a dear friend who passed away presently. He and his band mates were my introduction of the San Francisco live music. I would like to dedicate the session tonight to the base player of native elements jamie durand, jimbo, may you rock on forever. Anybody else have anything . I have a few things. First to congratulate commissioner coulcommissioner cg reappointed. I want to point out the three cultural institutions near the ballpark that closed this week. Padros and petes tavern shuttered out of the blue. Nobody saw it coming. It is an indication of the state of Small Business in the city right now. The costs and everything that is going on that is making it regard to do Small Business. I am just want to continue to think about ways, for example the streamlining legislation and Steering Commission to make Small Business easier to flourish. I want to say the 4 00 a. M. Bill which became the 3 00 a. M. Bill died in the assembly, never came out of the assembly. It is not on this calendar this year for legislation which is very sad and i think it will show us the rest of the state still views nightlife as a nuisance. In San Francisco we see it as a economic and cultural driving force. It makes me proud to live here. Knowing senator wiener, it will be back. He is the energizer bunny. Maybe the 12th time is the charm. Any Public Comment . Seeing none, Public Comment is closed. We will close tonight in honor of jamie jimbo durant, and the meeting is over at 6 01 p. M. Thank you. [inaudible] im a illustrator by day and a [inaudible] composition teacher. Right now im practice by transscribing [inaudible] that is what i have been doing the past couple years, teaching myself. California college of the arts, illustration there has really great teachers. Robert hunt, vance story taught me a lot. What im working on is a portfolio [inaudible] riding a donkey unicorn in the process. My name is dawn richardson and musician, drummer and drum teacher. I guess i would say i started my professional path quh i started playing in bands and teaching drum lesson when i was in college. They were definitely not that many women that would do what is doing. In 198 8 i graduated from cal state los ang and studied mostly classical percussion and Music Education but at the same time i was in hollywood so played at night in rock bands so was doing two different things. The reason im [inaudible] the people. There is a extremely vibrant Art Community especially arounds the red poppy art house [inaudible] as a artist in the past 2 or 3 years there is a event called the [inaudible] every 3 months a free art Music Festival that i usually play at and just met so many people. I was teaching a little bit and doing odd jobs like waitressing and going at night and playing in bands and meeting a lot of people. I chss in ban that had cool break jz get parts on tv shows or things like that. A friend of mine, we had mutual friends that got signed to a record deal in San Francisco called 4 nonblaunds and i addition frd the bands and moved to the bay area. I think things are different now than 30 years ago, the World Evolved a lot. It could be a challenge but have to know how to negotiate everything and sometimeatize is [inaudible] it was great to get to a point where i was just treated like another one of the people, a musician not a female musician and that is always what [inaudible] you dont hear stuff on the radio [inaudible] i need to write music [inaudible] be more conscious in their decisions and somehow make that poetic so they will be convinced. I think i will do that. [singing in backgrounds] drawing and writing music since i was a really little kid and fortunate enough to have a good education in art and parentss who supported me. I hope my life will continue to allow me to do both. For me now having all male, female girls, boys students it shows the world has changed a lot and people areope toon open to a lot more than they were in the past. You can get a deep satisfaction from responding a lot of year practicing in one thing and becoming really good at something. Sometimes i think that it is better to get lost. You have to practice and become good at what you do, so if you have everything together then go out in the world and do what you do and then i think people weal accept that. We are ready to begin. Good morning. Today is wednesday, september 18 th, 2019. This is a regular meeting of the Building Inspection Commission. I would like to remind everyone to turn off all electronic devices. The first item on the agenda is roll call. [roll call] commissioner moss is excused. We have a quorum. Our next item is item two, president s announcements. Good morning and welcome to i announcements onto timer time or 18th, 2019. If i mispronounce anybodys last name, please forgive me. Thank you to tom who spoke to a delegation from south koreas local construction Safety Center about San Francisco department of Safety Inspection to ensure the buildings in San Francisco are safe for residents and visitors. Stefan provided a great overview of d. B. I. s permit process for the Restaurant Owners and the efforts that the department has made to streamline these process these processes in the recent years. Im looking forward to seeing more feedback on that. We really need to do everything we can to keep that process as smooth and as productive as possible for these businesses so they can get their goals. Thank you to david jones from our clan review service team for taking part in the presentation on the permitting process of a. D. U. S with a small Property Owner institute. Thank you for your reference to educate stakeholders on this important program. Id like to commend our very own commission secretary, sonia harris, received a very nice note from a longtime customer thinking for her for professional, respectful, and very Competent Service to the Building Inspection Commission. Thank you, i know you are in the frontlines all the time and you get no credit. Finally, there is somebody out there who gave it to you. Thank you. [applause] thank you to matthew from the Technical Service division who received a letter stating he was very helpful in accommodating details when helping a senior customer with their Home Improvement project. Well done. Those small little thank youse are important. A letter of appreciation was also sent to mr. Shaw of plan review services for helping a customer through the process of getting parking permits. The customer said she was great and consistent with her service and was very kind to her. A big thank you to others from the central birdsall Building Permit to received a letter from a customer thanking them for resolving a difficult case regarding missing address. Thank you for that. Congratulations also to director he we who participated in another Seismic Safety Outreach Program graduation in chinatown last week where another 70 residents graduated for a five from a five day training course. That brings the total number of seismic safety ambassadors to nearly 4,000 since the Program Began in 2015, and that means we are better prepared to respond and recover quickly after the next big one. Well done on that, particularly on the 4,000 people qualified. Earlier this month, the director took part in the ribboncutting ceremony for the new chase center. Well done, director. Special thanks to you and your team for everything you did to ensure that the project was completed and ready to go on time. What an incredible achievement that was. Was it done under time or was it right on time . Right on time. I know that was monumental. It was a sprint from the minute it was approved to get it done. I know the inspectors worked really hard on their. Special thanks to all the d. B. I. Staff and management who worked hard to ensure normal operations when many of their colleagues were taking part in a mandated training at the work conference. I know it is hard to juggle schedules and duties, so we appreciate the efforts made to ensure that services to d. B. I. Customers were not disrupted. I know everyone has to do double duty in times like that. We appreciate it all in the interest of Getting Better service. That concludes my comments. Onto the next item. Thank you. Is there any Public Comment on president s announcements . Seeing none, item three, general Public Comment. We will take Public Comment on matters within the commissions jurisdiction that are not part of this agenda. Good morning, my name is jury with the San Francisco landuse coalition. I am going to repeat comments i made at the august 29th Planning Commission meeting regarding one of four unpermitted demolitions that were on the agenda that day. 4118 201st street represents the failure of the city to enforce the building and planning codes. The Planning Commission is once again being asked to find a just solution for a project that should have been stopped. This project is one of many troubled projects for d. B. I. And planning. They should have intervened and stopped the project at an earlier point and put the project on an acceptable trajectory. D. B. I. s solution to the problem is to assign two senior building inspectors to handle similar troubled projects. D. B. I. s solution is not working if we recognize this project, as well as 347 18th street as examples of projects that should have been stopped and redirected , we should examine both projects from a clinical perspective and asked, at one point should there have been a major intervention, and what solution should have been imposed . I asked the Planning Commission to task with this assignment. I was at a meeting yesterday with a district eight supervisor , and other members of the San Francisco landuse coalition. He discussed his proposal for d. B. I. A supervisor mandelman is planning to meet with members of the Planning Commission to develop a solution. I urge the Planning Department and Planning Commission to support supervisor mandelmans efforts. These are my comments, in addition to the comments i made on august 29th. On august 29th, many Planning Commissioners expressed frustration at being asked to address demolitions d. B. I. Should have addressed. The citizens of San Francisco have lost confidence in the department of Building Inspections, in this crisis of confidence has spread to the Planning Commission. How does the Building Inspection Commission plan to address this problem . Thank you. [please stand by] for these situations where either an error has occurred on the part of the project sponsor. Two demolitions are needed at intake, the tearing down of structure, and the second one that follows section 317 with adjustments in the demo cal collisions. Calculations. This is a way to preserve housing that should be preserved. Also, studies need to be done to preserve viable relatively Affordable Housing that can be sensibly updated. There are four pages here, and it shows the different definitions. One the 200 7 staff memo on section 317 prior to the passage. Building 103a demolition without permit. Building code section 10 6 00 12 including other parts of the code. Also, d. B. I. Sheet. This came up at the 49 hopkins hearing or some hearing on the 29th. Information sheet so4 dated jun. These are my comments. That relates to crown terrace. Anyway, i just think that is a problem. One definition is not going to solve it in the beginning of a process. You still need to. You dont need one. You need one when you have a problem when people have not followed the law. Thank you very much. Have a good day. Thank you. Is there any additional Public Comment . Seeing none, next item is 4. Commissioners questions and matters. 4a. At this time the commission may discuss and take action to set the date inquiries to staff regarding various documents. Future meeting and agendas. At this time the commission may take action to set the date of a special meeting and or derm those items that could be placed on the agenda of the next meeting or other future meetings of the building inspection. The next scheduled meeting is october 16th. No organization is perfect, but all of us have an obligation to look honestly at our organizations and do everything in our power to improve or organizations in every possible way. For this reason it is disturbing to find several high profile cases of actions which our systems did not prevent or detect at the earliest possible time. These cases have used serial permitting, work beyond the scope or inaccurate representations to subvert our systems both ours and planning. Illegal demolitions, destabilizing Neighboring Properties and other egregious results have happened. We have had strains developed with colleagues in the Planning Commission where the Building Inspection Department and by extension this commissions confidence or integrity have been questioned. This has to stop. We need away forward where we are working closely with commission colleagues and respective staffs to uncover the source of these problems and develop remedies required to fix them. To this end, i recommend we schedule a joint Planning Commission meeting to review all major cases which have brought attention to failures in both our systems and the course forward on these to ensure they are now properly monitored and recommend des strictly enforced. We need to do this because systematic failures can be exploited again and again. We should not be naive to think these were the only instances of wrongdoing. We share the goal of making bad actors and making it hard for those following the rules. We need to know that we are addressing them firmly but consistently and fairly. I ask we set up such a joint building, planning meeting at the earliest possible date to explore these issues as we Work Together to find effective and targeted remedies to prevent or at least significantly reduce the occurrence of further cases. Thank you. Is there any Public Comment on item 4a and b . Our next item is item 5, directors report. A. Update on d. B. I. s finances. Good morning, commissioners, Deputy Director for department of building inspection. Before you is the august 2019 Financial Report covering july and august 2019. I will give a brief summary. On the revenue sides 12. 4 million this year compared to 11. 8 million the same time last year. That is an increase. Increase is due primarily to increase in plan checking revenues. That is reflected also on page 2. I usually have revenues and expenditures and Building Permit data. As you can see the valuation of the issue permits have gone up. Normally when you see it go up we expect to see the revenues go up. They are based on valuation. For instance, during this time period, we had actually one permit of 100 to 200 million issued. That didnt happen last time period. On the expenditure side, expenditures are slightly higher due to an increase in salaries. Salaries have gone up. This is two months. It is very preliminary. We dont see a pattern. If you look at the report on the projection of the first page we project apartment budget. With a few more months we will see where everything is going. I am happy to answer any questions if you have any questions. Thank you. Thank you, Deputy Director. 5b update on proposed or recently enacted state or local legislation. Good morning, commissioners, john murray, legislative affairs. A few updates for you. The plumbing code Cross Connection ordinance supposed to be heard on monday was continued on the advice of the City Attorney to accommodate the code cycle. We want the new limits to go through and it will be added on in january. Supervisor peskin introduced legislation to notice tenants for soft story additions of the right to return before the cfc. We met with staff from the rent board. They would be the ones required to notify us that the landlord has fulfilled that obligation, both departments have concerns how this would actually work. We are going to reach out to peskins office and walk through those. We will have an update for you down the road. As you know, the level of compliance for the accessible Business Entry Program is not where we want it to be with about 9,000 noncompliant Property Owners. We have the director has been in contact with supervisor yee about amending legislation to push that deadline to extend that deadline to july 1st from december 1st. We sent out a notice to those noncome miant Property Owner compliant Property Owners in december. It was more official looking than previous ones so we will see where that goes. Compliance is not where we want it. We are working on doing that. As president mccarthy mentioned, steve from our plan check staff presented in front of the Landuse Committee on monday on restaurant streamlining. It seemed well received. I subject we will see legislation down the road dealing with that. Maybe not on the d. B. I. Process but other departments. We will keep you updated on that as well. Any questions . Thank you. Next item is 5c update on major projects. Good morning. Director of department and building inspection. I see on the filing of the permit people want to get filed before the new code cycle kicked in. Any questions . Roughly 2 increase. Next is item d. Update on Code Enforcement. Good morning, ed sweeney. I have the august numbers. Bid Building Inspections performed 6294. Complaints received 519. Complaint response 24 to 72 hours, 504. Complaint goes first notice of violations sent 66. Complaints received without nov, 278. Complaint was notice of violations 48. Second notice of violations refer to Code Enforcement 28. Housing inspection services, housing inspections performed 1,134. Complaints received 334. Complaints response 24 to 72 hours, 323. With violations issued 146. Abated complaints 552. Number of cases to directors hearing 42. Routine inspections 185. Code enforcement. Number of cases to directors hearing 191. Number of order of abatements issued 59. Number of cases under advisement 24. Number of cases abated 174. Code enforcement inspections performed 295. We did not have a Litigation Committee last month, and that case is referred to the City Attorney was two. Code enforcement outreach programs on a quarterly bases we are awaiting the next quarter. Any questions . Thank you. Any Public Comment on the directors report, items 5a through d. Next is item 6 review and approval of the minutes of the regular meeting of august 21, 2019. Move to approve. Second. There is a motion and a second. Is there any Public Comment on the minutes . Seeing none. Are all commissioners in favor . Any opposed. Thank you. The minutes are approved. Next item is 7. Discussion and possible action on the annual performance evaluation for the bic secretary. 7a is Public Comment on all matters pertaining to the closed session. Any Public Comment on this item . Seeing none. The next is 5b. Possible action to convene a closed session. Is there a motion . Move to go into closed session. Second. There is a motion and second. We are now in closed session. O. This is the Building Inspection Commission. We are on item number 7. 7d. We convene in open session to vote on whether to disclose any our all discussions held in closed session. Can i get a motion on that . We have a motion and a second. We will reconvene and not disclose. We are on to item 8. Discussion and possible action on the annual performance evaluation for the director. 8a Public Comment on all matters pertaining to the closed session. Any Public Comment . Seeing none, 8b, possible action to convene a closed session. Is there a motion . Second. All commissioners in favor. We are now in closed session. This is the Building Inspection Commission. We are on item 8d, motion to reconvene in open station to vote on whether to disclose any our all discussions held in closed session. Move to reconvene and continue the item until next month. Second. There is a motion and second to reconvene the item to the next meeting. And not to disclose. All commissioners in favor. Item 9 is adjournment. Is there a motion to adjourn . Move to adjourn. Second. We are now adjourned. It is 10 55 a. M. A way of life in San Francisco. When the next major quake hits, the city hopes a new law requiring seismic upgrades to five story buildings will help keep more residents safe and sound. Tell me a little about the soft Story Program. What is it . Its a program the mayor signed into law about a year and a half ago and the whole idea behind it was to help homeowners strengthen buildings so that they would not collapse. Did you the soft Story Program apply to all buildings or building that were built in a certain time frame . It only applies to buildings built in the time frame of 1978 and earlier. Its aimed at wood framed buildings that are three or more stories and five or more units. But the openings at the garage level and the street level arent supported in many buildings. And without the support during a major earthquake, they are expected to pancake and flatten ~. Many of the buildings in this program are under rent control so its to everybodys advantage to do the work and make sure they protect their investment and their tenant. Notices have gone out to more than 6,000 owners of potentially atrisk properties but fewer than onethird have responded and thousands might miss an important deadline in september to tell the city what they plan to do. Lets talk worst case scenario. What happens in a collapse . Buildings have the tendency of rolling over. The first soft story walls lean over and the building collapse. In an earthquake the building is a total loss. Can you describe what kind of strengthening is involved in the retrofit . One of the basic concepts, you want to think of this building kind of like rubber band and the upper three floor are very rigid box and the garage is a very flexible element. In an earthquake the garage will have a tendency to rollover. You have to rubber band analogy that the first floor is a very tough but flexible rubber band such that you never drive force he to the upper floors. Where all your damage goes into controlled element like plywood or steel frame. So, here we are actually inside of a soft story building. Can we talk a little about what kinds of repairs Property Owners might expect . Its a very simple process. We deliberately tried to keep it that way. So, whats involved is plywood, which when you install it and make a wall as we have done here already, then you cover it with this gypsum material. This adds some flexibility so that during the earthquake youll get movement but not collapse. And that gets strengthened even more when we go over to the steel frame to support the upper floor. So, potentially the wood and the steel it sounds like a fairly straightforward process takes your odds of collapse from one in 4 to one in 30 . Thats exactly right. Thats why were hoping that people will move quickly and make this happen. Great. Lets take a look. So, lets talk steel frames. Tell me what we have going on here. Well, we have a steel frame here. There are two of these and they go up to the lower floor and there is a beam that go across, basically a box that is much stiffer and stronger. ~ goes so that during the earthquake the upper floor will not collapse down on this story. It can be done in about two weeks time. Voila, youre done. Easy. For more information on how to get your building earthquake ready,y,y,y,y,y,y,y,y,y,y,y,y,y,