>> good afternoon. and welcome to the san francisco historic preservation commission hearing for wednesday, december 20, 2017. i would like to remind members of the public that the commission does not tolerate any disruption or outbursts of any kind. please silence your mobile devices that may stand off during these proceedings. when speaking before the commission, if you care to, state your name. >> commissioner wolfram: here. >> commissioner hyland: here. >> commissioner johnck: here. >> commissioner johns: here. >> commissioner matsuda: here. >> we're opening the hearing in memory of mayor lee and closing it as well in his honor. >> very good. commissioners would like to open it up with public speaking. each member of the commission may address the commission for up to 3 minutes. i have no speaker cards. >> commissioner wolfram: does any member of the public wish to speak? seeing and hearing none -- would you like to speak, sir? >> good afternoon, commissioners. it's a general comment about what constitutes an historic resource. i recently had a project that everyone agreed that the building in question was of no value to anyone, no historic value. but in doing the research, the staff discovered that there were classes held at this building 50 years ago. they weren't licensed or accredited by any institution. and they felt that the holding of the classes 50 years ago, it was a special event that requires an e.i.r. or in the absence of an e.i.r., that the project be cut in half. and i strenuously disagreed with the staff and spoke with all the higher-ups, and i didn't get anywhere. at an appropriate time, maybe the commission could discuss with the planning staff what is and is not an appropriate event it tie to a building for purposes of ceqa to require an e.i.r., because i think currently the interpretation is overbroad. they're applying this regulation about historic events to buildings that don't deserve really any special review and it's overreach. so i hope at an appropriate time you might discuss that. thank you. >> thank you. >> does any other member of the public wish to speak on a non-agenda item? seeing and hearing none, we'll close general comment. >> directors announcements. >> tim frye, department staff. director will be joining us shortly, but happy to forward any questions. no formal report today. >> item two, review of past events and announcements. >> commissioners, a few items to share with you. one in regards to the outstanding malsak applications. the full board voted and we're processing a contract on laguna. 973 market. 940 grove. and 627 waller. 101 vallejo. 55 laguna. 973 market. and 627 waller have tenure limitations, as decided by the government audit and oversight committee. to those will be making their way through the assessor/recorder's office. and i did want to point out or remind that you there were two contracts that the committee decided to table or not take action on and, therefore, we're working with those project sponsors on the next steps. one was 6062 carmelitta. they had a question about owner move in-eviction. and 66 potomac street, for vertical and horizontal division. we're scheduling a special hearing at the request of president wolfram for one of your february hearings and we'll prepare some materials and some recommendations based on the committee's thoughts. second, i wanted to mention 56 mason, request for hearing that was regarding window placement. you heard the item and upheld the decision on that permit to alter. and now there's been a d.r. filed on that application. so it will be going to the planning commission in the new year. that concludes my comments unless you have questions. >> on 56 mason, is that the one there was a lot of community concern about? >> correct. >> this is in response to the member of the public that spoke about ceqa. i wonder if we could get an update of where we are with the citywide survey. >> certainly. we can schedule that in the new year. >> thank you. any further questions? >> item 3, president's report and announcements. >> commissioner wolfram: i have no formal report or announcement. but we will be hearing item 8, first item in the regular calend calendar, so before item 6. >> item 4, commission comments and questions. >> commissioner wolfram: i have a disclosure. which is on item 5, 920 north point street, the client is client of our firm, but not in project. >> all matters listed under consent calendar is considered to be routine by the historic preservation commission and may be acted upon by a single roll call vote. there will be no separate discussion unless a member of the commission, public or staff so requests, in which event, the matter will be removed and considered as a separate item at this or future hearing. 20017-0111162coa, 920 north point street. i have no speaker cards >> commissioner wolfram: does any member of the public wish to remove from this consent? commissioners? do i have a motion to approve the consent calendar? >> second. >> thank you, commissioners. on that motion to approve item 5 under consent. >> commissioner johnck: yes. >> commissioner johns: yes. >> commissioner matsuda: yes. >> commissioner hyland: yes. >> commissioner wolfram: yes. >> so moved. and places under the regular calendar. through the chair, item 8, 555-9093, 1610 geary boulevard, will be closed out of order. the commission continued the matter to september 20 by a vote of 5-0. commissioner matsuda, you were recused. and on september 20, 2017, without hearing continued, to december 6 and then continued again to this date. >> motion to recuse commissioner matsuda, because she livers too close? >> commissioner johnck: yes. >> commissioner matsuda: yes. >> commissioner hyland: yes. >> commissioner wolfram: yes. >> commissioner johns: yes. >> so proved. matter passes unanimously. >> good afternoon, commissioners. can i please have the power point. my name is desiree smith. the item before you is to recommend to the supervisors, 1610 geary boulevard in japan town. should the peace pagoda be second, it would be the first landmark designated for its association with japanese or japanese-american history. it would be the first designated for its association with the development of san francisco's historic japantown, one of only three remaining japantowns in the united states. at your december 6 hearing following public comment, discussion and deliberation, you adopted a motion of intent to recommend dis age mading peace page overwhelma -- pagoda and peace plaza. you asked that staff return today with that intent. staff has revised the resolution with bullet points to show why it is supported by staff. this resolution is in your packets. in summary, it emphasizes peace plaza as integral to the significance of the site, indicates that it can be a useful tool in guiding resolution role and not preclude or delay repairs to the plaza or the garage located beneath it. staff has amended the draft ordinance so that work to repair or remediate would not require a certificate of appropriateness. that was done for work toll proceed as efficiently as possible. this draft ordinance is included in your packets. the new proposed language can be found on page 6 and is highlighted. and i would like to remind and reiterate that they're both drafts for be revised or augmented. in conclusion, the department believes that the subject property meets established eligibility requirements and landmark status is approved. we recommend this to the board of supervisors. this concludes my presentation. i'm happy to answer any questions. in addition, we have a staff member from president breed's office that may like to say a few words or is here for questions. >> commissioner wolfram: would you like to say a few words? thank you. >> i'm caylee lloyd, legislative aid for supervisor breed. thank you for your work on this and for hearing about it. we've had a lot of conversations with timothy desiree and the community. supervisor breed believes it is important, however the community has voiced concerns that the peace plaza in its current state does not reflect the historical and cultural difference that it once did. they've said that they prefer to move forward with the pagoda and in general is supportive of the wishes. i understand that there's been work to reframe the plaza landmarking so the certificate of appropriateness is reflective of the work that will need to be done and supervisor breed continues to work closely with planning, rec park, t.a., etc., to restore the plaza to its previous state and to something that the city and community can be proud of. >> commissioner wolfram: i think we may have a few questions for you. >> commissioner pearlman: i did form ms. smith. my question is about not requiring a coa for this particular project. what would be the process to ensure that it is restored appropriately? maybe mr. frye? >> the way the ordinance is written that any type of basic, general maintenance to remediate the problems would not require a c of a. major changes may still require a c of a. we would like your feedback on that and also would be interested in hearing from the community. tim? >> this was our attempt to appease both sides of the coin in that there is concern about the quality of the pavers and water remediation with the parking garage, so this takes it out of the equation to deal with the issues, so hopefully they can be dealt with as efficiently and economically as possible, but as ms. desiree smith said, any new built structures within the plaza or major alterations would not be covered by this exclusion. and so those would still require a certificate of appropriateness. >> commissioner pearlman: so you are saying essentially that if the fountain and all of the items were originally there and brought back, they would go through the full c of a process? >> yes. >> commissioner johns: they would go through the full c of a process or they wouldn't? >> the new construction within the plaza would require a certificate of appropriateness as drafted, but any work to replace the paving systems or the water remediation related to the garage would not be subject to a c of a. >> i think this is going to come up eventually, but can you give us a further or more complete idea of what you would consider a major improvement? and maybe there are some examples, because to me, it's not really clear. i couldn't explain it. >> tim frye, department staff. i think theoretically, what the department would say is new construction that triggered a building permit. that would be the pergola, but landscaping, additions, or relocations, those seem to be minor in the department's eyes, so we don't believe those would be necessary to come to this commission, whether they triggered a building permit or not. does that help to clarify? >> it does. thank you. >> commissioner johnck: this seems highly unusual and wonder if there is any precedent on landmarking to say there will be no c of a? >> xhu, commissioner >> thank you, commissioner. it was very common on landmarks board or previous commissions. examples would include the fairmont hotel, which is very clear on excluding the 1960s portion of the fairmont hotel from that designation. another example is washington square park, where there are -- the park is designated, but there are only certain types of work that trigger a certificate of appropriateness and that ordinance is clear on when it needs to come to the commission and when the park can issue the permit on its own. >> commissioner hyland: i think the proposal of identifying the maintenance concerns for the project and allowing us to give that authority for the -- so it doesn't have to go through c of a was quite brilliant. i had not thought about that last hearing. it will help to even further expedite had we not come up with that. >> commissioner wolfram: if there are no further questions, we'll move to public comment. at this time, we'll take public comment on this item. do we have any speakers? if so, come to the mike. you will have 3 minutes and there will be a warning buzzer 30 seconds before your time is up. >> good afternoon, commissioners. thank you for allowing the japantown community members here to come today to express their feelings about the peace pagoda and the peace plaza becoming historical landmarks. i'm alice kowahatsu, outgoing president for japantown task force. i've been serving for three years and in those three years, we've talked about various ways that we could come to an agreement about landmarking this very important area in our community. so the japantown task force works with various committees and the land use is one of them, working with the ad hoc committee. in the last board meeting that we went to or that i chaired, we had a very in-depth conversation about which way to go on this, whether we should landmark both or have just a peace and pagoda landmarked and then later on after the renovation of peace plaza go ahead and have it landmarked. so i was the one that signed the letter that all of you got a copy of to just landmark the pagoda as it is right now, because there's a lot of work that needs to be done on the plaza and our priority is to make that waterproofing and correct all the imperfections so it becomes safe for everybody. in the long run, there may be additional things that we want to do to make it more culturally -- historical, but culturally appreciated by everybody. right now it's not to full capacity, so we're worried that if we culturally landmark them both or ask for that that it would affect our goals to, you know, make changes and improve it and restore it. so i ask today that you consider that as you go forward. thank you. >> commissioner wolfram: thank you. are there additional speakers that would like to speak to this item? >> good afternoon, president wolfram and members of the historic preservation. i'm sandy morry and i'm the new japantown board of directors president. i am here to encourage you as you consider the resolution that you are looking at today that you consider the fact that this particular plaza remediation is a huge undertaking for the city. it involves many departments, departments such as rec and park, the mta, the cao's office and district 5 supervisor's office. and you may have received some emails from members of our community who are very active in our community from ben nakogo, steve nakshima and richard ha hashimoto, if you would consider doing the pagoda presently and plaza later. we do have plans to do a community process of a design process, so we can add many more cultural elements to the plaza. right now, it's very lacking in cultural aspects of the plaza. i also attorney from the city attorney perspective, that the ordinance that this particular resolution is referring to can be amended later on to include the plaza. so please consider these points as you consider the resolution. we appreciate it. thank you. >> commissioner wolfram: thank you. next speaker? are there additional speakers? >> good afternoon. i'm karen kai. i want to tell you, first of all, how much i appreciated the principled stand that you took saying, it's one piece. the pagoda and plaza are one piece and that is something that when you go there, it's eminently clear. and the decision to separate the two does not make sense to me. i worked on the last remediation or changes that were made and i was tremendously frustrated most of the time. there was no protection for the plaza. there was no guide to what we could or should do. this is part of why i am so pleased with the report that was presented. it gives the history. it gives the reasons. it says why it's culturally important and provides a guide for anything that is to be done in the future and gives our community that ability to bring that forward and say, you know, you can't just take this out or ignore it or give it third class positioning. this is important to this place. and this place is important. and that's all in your report and i want to see that as being something that our community can do to keep the plaza as it should be, keep the pagoda as it should be, not just for ourselves, but for the city and the visitors that come to japantown and san francisco. this year is the 60th anniversary of the san francisco-osaka sister city relationship. next year will be the 50th anniversary of the construction of the japan center, including the peace plaza and pagoda. so it is the most fitting time to recognize these places, these structures, and to have -- if not in physical embodiment, at least to show that we do recognize, we treasure, and we're going to move forward, to protect these assets. and, again, i know, having sat on that side of the commission bench, it can be difficult when you've got different people telling you different things, but i appreciate how much thought and consideration you put into this. thank you. >> commissioner wolfram: thank you. >> good afternoon, commissioners. my name is john osaki, executive director of the japanese committee youth council. board member of japantown task force and co-chair of peace plaza committee. the history of our community is one where historically we've had individuals or institutions tell us what we could do. we've had people tell us what is good for us. and the japan town task force was specifically put in place so that our community would have a voice on matters related to the preservation of our community and our long-term sustainability. our board members were nominated and selected from a cross section of our community to analyze, deliberate and make decisions about what is in the best, long-term interest of our community. and at this time, our organization overwhelmingly feels it's in the best interest of our community to delay the landmarking of the plaza. and our reasons are very simple. the plaza as it exists right now is not what this community wanted. it was not a design that this community approved. and we have not even begun the process of envisioning what that plaza will look like. so there may, in fact, be many structures, many moves that we want to eventually do with that and we want to be free to make sure that this community can decide what ultimately becomes of that space. i'm sure i don't have to tell many of you here today that our community once lived in that space. people's homes were there. people's businesses were on that space. and they were forcibly removed by this city. not many years later, our entire community was force ed and removed by the united states government. it is our time to decide for ourselves what japantown should look like. i realize a tremendous amount of work went in to getting to where we are here today. if necessary, if the pagoda and plaza cannot be separated, then at this point in time, i think both should be delayed. because it really -- we need to take the time to reach out to our community to hear the voices of everybody to create a vision for what that space should look like. and i ask you to listen to what this community wants and how this community feels it should move forward. thank you very much. >> commissioner wolfram: thank you. are there additional speakers that wish to speak? seeing and hearing none, we'll close -- yes? >> thank you, commissioners. my name is judy yamaguchi, board member of the japantown task force and current president of the japanese-american citizens league, san francisco chapter. as i listen to all of this, i feel such emotions about this. i think i'm one of the oldest ones. i was living in japantown before the peace pagoda, right after world war ii. so historically, emotionally, it means a lot to me. i'm here really to just say that the board almost unanimously voted on the letter written, september to you november 8. after a lot of discussion, years of research and listening to people that we trusted, we decided that would be the best move for the community. and i feel a little blindsided by this and i think other members of the board field this way as well, that we thought we were moving forward. we thought we had a good plan with everyone's interest in mind. and what was going to be best for japantown. and here we are, again, trying to discuss this and resolve this again. i'm asking the commissioners to please look again at our november 8 letter. it's what our community has said they would like to see done. i think it's the most sensible thing to do at this time. and i hope that you will consider it. thank you. >> commissioner wolfram: thank you. any other members of the public that wish to speak? seeing and hearing none, we'll close public comment and bring it back to the commissioner. >> commissioner johns: i would like to -- i would be interested from hearing from the representative of supervisor breed's office on the question f of whether -- what you heard today about -- from mr. frye, about the effects of a landmark of both the pagoda and the space around it. influences how the supervisor approaches this problem. >> yeah. caylee lloyd, again. i think that's a fair question. depending on the next steps of the commission, if she were to receive the recommendation to landmark both, i believe the next step would be for the supervisor to review and speak with folks at mta and rec park and understand the implications. as you heard from a few community members today, one of their main concerns is being able to have the freedom to reinstate the plaza to what it should be. we know there will not be a significant structure beyond what is allowed by the charter. rec park cannot build without ballot initiative, that sort of thing, but i think it would result in her needing to have conversations and understand what the visions would be and depending on that, it may delay things. >> commissioner johns: this leads into something that i said earlier -- >> commissioner wolfram: do you have further questions for caylee? >> commissioner johns: no. it seems to me there is confusion and uncertainty in people's minds over what would be allowed if the whole package were landmarked. and that is whether both the plaza and pagoda are landmarked or only the pagoda is landmarked. if somebody wanted to restore that fountain or build something in the plaza, would that person be required to get a building permit? >> tim frye. yes, rec park through dpw would have to issue a building permit and that triggers the c of a unless the ordinance says otherwise. >> commissioner johns: so this is another way of making sure everyone understands what would be the effect of landmarking both of these on the community when they are formalized to fix up the plaza in the way they would like to see it fixed up. >> commissioner hyland: i had a question. and i don't know if it's for ms. smith or the mayor's aide. why does there seem to be a change? i thought it was always understood that these two pieces were of one. i'm struggling with why the change now and in response to public comment, it seems to be a lot of fear about what can or cannot be done based on the fact of it being landmarked, which i don't see -- i don't find that to be a founded fear. and my opinion is that the current changes wouldn't have occurred had it been landmarked to begin with. so having the appropriate guidance in that process so that the community could actually do what they wanted to do, i certainly don't want to impose my opinion on what that should be, but it does provide guidance around what is appropriate and what is not appropriate. i don't know if there's an answer to that, if it's a rhetorical question. >> desiree smith, planning department staff. i think that's a question for the japantown task force, in terms of their position. i cannot speak to them. but i can say that we've been meeting with them since -- this designation was initiated back in 2013. there was another planner that drafted the document and at that time there were meetings and conversations that took this issue back up again -- tim frye and supervisor breed's office has had several meetings with community members and there were questions about -- remaining concerns about the plaza, but i cannot speak to the change. someone from the japantown task force, if you would like to invite them up? >> yes. maybe a representative frcan co forward. >> could you clarify your question, commissioner? >> commissioner hyland: why the change now? it seemed to me that it was understood that the plaza and pagoda were one. and our position, and the reason we're talking about this, i feel like there's some information that may not be in alignment. and so i -- i'm really trying to understand where the fear is coming from as far as why the necessity to pull the two apart? >> i know philosophically, the japantown task force sees the pagoda and plaza together, but when we started talking with city representatives of all the departments in terms of the cost that will be incurred to do this remediation, the number now is about $24 million. and our discussions with rec and park, mta, mayor's office, all has to do with the cost. so we're not -- it's one of these situations, because it's a complicated project, not a simple one-department responsibility, and even between rec and park, there is differences of opinion about what each department is responsible for and we've been meeting with them for the last five months on this issue. that's about all i can say for now, commissioner. >> commissioner hyland: i guess i have a follow-up question. for us, it's perplexing, because there's been a statement that there are many city agencies involved, but japantown task force doesn't want this commission to be involved in the redesign of the plaza and you put more faith in all the other city agencies and entities. so that's my first question. why doesn't the task force want a commission that deals with historic resource and design to be involved? >> i don't think the task force has that philosophy at all, commissioner. i think representatives from the task force have been involved with representatives from your department and your commission in the discussions. so all along, there's been sharing of informational along the way. so there is no direction from the japantown task force board that we don't want the participation of the hpc, not at all. >> commissioner hyland: i guess my sense is that by having the hpc involved and the plaza landmark, there is a benefit to give guidance to departments that work in very different directions to coalesce with a project with the support of the community. otherwise, i'm not sure -- i hate to speak poorly of other agencies, but they don't always have design-thinking or historic-thinking as a priority. >> that's why we're constantly advocating with each department and the task force is an entity that tries to advocate for what we feel and the community feels is the correct thing for the community. >> commissioner hyland: and a follow-up question. some members of task force stated they would like the plaza to be landmarked in the future. is that correct? >> yes. >> commissioner hyland: if the hpc is not involved -- we would not know if it's possible or not -- >> we have not even talked or started any design process. we're saying we need a design process to start and so that hasn't -- there's been no discussion other than that we need one. >> commissioner hyland: leaving out the hpc from the process, the future landmarking of it is unknown -- >> commissioner, we're not excluding you in the process of design. that's never been indicated at all from the task force perspective. >> commissioner hyland: that's what we heard from public comment. that is the result. and from public comment that i heard, apart from ms. kai's comment, that that was the sense i got. >> our understanding is that hpc will have a say-so in the design. >> commissioner hyland: not if it's not landmarked. we will have no participation in any of the design. >> can i add a comment? >> yes. >> commissioner pearlman: part of the review whether something is landmarkable or not or historic or not, would not necessarily include things that were designed today. i understand you don't have a design process yet. but you will go through a design process, and i agree that your community should be totally in charge of what is appropriate for a plaza that is in japantown. so you go through that process, things get built. then you want to landmark it. there's no integrity, no integrity to the historic fabric done in the 1960s. so everything on that plaza is essentially new and not landmarkable. we're not included then and not included now under what is being requested of us. that's a statement of fact. not a statement of if i agree with that or not. i have opinions separate. >> commissioner wolfram: any other questions? >> commissioner johnck: yes. i think some of the comments from my fellow commissioners to date in this hearing are good and right on. overall, i think our role can be of help to the process. by keeping the two -- this is my initial inclination, by keeping the components as a unit. i do have a question because i want to get more information before i finally come up with a conclusion as we will, and that is, our -- the worry about the landmarking -- i've heard a couple of things. one, that there is -- i heard the word timing. are you expecting grants that would come to -- or not -- the process for remediation and rebuilding that would not come if it were landmarked? do you have any information relative to anything that's come to you that they say, well, if you are landmarked, then we won't contribute? is there anything like that? >> no, commissioner. we have not even started the issue of fundraising or funding in terms of this whole project, other than talking with the various departments and i would like to ask a clarification question. are you saying that even during the design process before landmarking is done that we could not involve your staff and your people who are experts in this field to be participating in the process of design? am i understanding that correctly? >> commissioner wolfram: that's a correct statement. planning staff would be involved at a certain level, but it would be a rec and park project, correct? >> correct. >> commissioner wolfram: so there may not be be involved in planning preservation -- >> even if we wanted to invite a representative from your staff to be part of the process? in other words, is there something excluding that ability to happen? in other words, is that something that another department would not want either? you said rec and park would have a say-so, so i'm raising it as a possibility. >> to directly answer the question, because it would be essentially an mta or a rec park project, whether or not the planning department was involved or this commission would be involved, would be purely add an advisory role. there would be no requirement. therefore, whether we participated at the very beginning or the very end, there's really no mechanism unless we had a landmark resignation in place to require us to be at the table. i mean, certainly we would be happy to offer our services if we were asked, but because we're not the lead agency, we're generally not involved in projects until the very end. >> and typically rec and park, they have their own planners and they're talented people there, but they typically do not -- they have their own commission, so they typically don't ask us to be involved or the planning department to be involved. >> even if there's a collaboration effort here? there are so many departments involved in this kind of a project that from a community perspective, you know, collaboration is open to the city. and i heard mr. frye say being invited, there may be an opportunity but due to staff time and i understand the issue of resources. >> if it were landmarked, we would have a statutory obligation. >> i understand. >> and my experience with projects being involved in rec and park, it's unusual for them to ask us to be involved. >> they would rather us not be involved. >> just stating, past experience. doesn't mean it couldn't happen, but it would be unusual. >> we started this discussion years ago when i first came on the commission and it was an excellent process. and to me, there's a very strong report, strong evidence, that's supporting this landmark status, which that's our hallmark for the commission, when we do make landmark approval and recommendations that there is strong evidence behind me and i don't see any questions about the report, but i will ask you, do you disagree with that report? because there was some testimony earlier that somehow i felt or what i was hearing or sensing that there was antipathy to the evidence of supporting -- >> we support the whole report. >> and the report recommending, which provides the evidence for the landmark, right? >> right. but we're saying not together. >> i understand that. >> commissioner wolfram: are there other questions? >> commissioner johns: our commission now could recommend something. >> commissioner wolfram: we have a resolution before us at this hearing. we can recommend to the board of supervisors or we can modify it. this is the second time we heard this. >> commissioner johns: let's get -- that gets to the point i wanted to make. it's why i asked the question to the representative of supervisor breed's office. if we recommend that both the pagoda and the plaza be landmarked, then what will happen is it will go forward to the board of supervisors. and at that point, it will be essentially, up to supervisor breed, as i understand it, to move the project on. and the terms upon which it's moved on. is that right? is that how you understand it, too? >> so it would come to -- i presume that supervisor breed would introduce it to the board of supervisors and then it would be assigned to land use, since it's a land use matter, and the committee chaired by supervisor farrell would make a recommendation. >> so at that time, in that process, at the board of supervisors, then the supervisors could alter the recommendation and just move forward with the pagoda and move forward with the two of them together. >> that's an option, yes. >> commissioner johns: and in that process, do you understand that the supervisor's inclination would be to consult the community to find out what the community wanted to do? >> i believe so. her current stance is that she's supportive of the community's belief and what they believe is appropriate for the community. if it was something that the community didn't want to support -- >> commissioner johns: i wanted to get that out so it was clear to everybody. thank you. what i think now may be the best solution is to move forward landmarking the two of them -- recommended that the two of them be landmarked. and when it gets to the board of supervisors, then supervisor breed can have whatever input she deems to be appropriate from the community and then can decide whether or not they want to do. that gives them the flexibility of going whichever way they decide they want to go, without having to come back to us with the uncertainty that several of the commissioners have mentioned might attend landmarking a plaza that is reconfigured. >> commissioner wolfram: commissioner perlman? >> commissioner pearlman: i don't agree with that at all. i have some major concerns here. in five years on this commission, we've never had this level of discussion about, you know, and confusion, partly confusion, and partly disagreement about process and unique things going into the legislation and one thing mr. frye said about the minor -- if there were minor changes, like the water feature, and i think about, well, the water feature -- any water feature hardly seems minor relative to design. i think about if you are going to work on the lincoln memorial and then, say, the reflecting pool in front of the lincoln memorial, well, that's minor, so we'll not deal with that. so that is critical. adding elements to the plaza is something that someone said. it seems to me that the path to the pagoda. the only way to get to the pagoda is to walk through the plaza. so the getting there is part of the experience of the pagoda. so the landmarking of just the pagoda without the plaza. as we've discussed, change is happening on the plaza, which may or may not be historic, may or may not relate to the original design of the plaza, that doesn't seem like a good idea. again, the experience -- when we landmark things, there is experiencial things. we don't move landmarks. so part of the experience is the plaza. my feeling, in contrast to commissioner johns, is i would vote to not move either forward. let the process of design happy with the plaza, and come back, because then the pagoda and plaza are one piece and we have the results of the design process that the japantown community wants to go through and then we can see if it still makes sense, if there is integrity. because the plaza will still be the path to the pagoda. the pagoda will still have integrity. and it doesn't matter if everything has integrity 100%, but whether the design of the plaza is supportive of the design of the pagoda and its history, would then be bound at that time. i would vote to not move this forward at all. i would vote against this for those reasons. because i think that there isn't agreement in the community. there isn't really agreement in the staff -- well, i guess the staff has clearly given their direction to us, but i don't know if we are clear in our intentions. >> commissioner hyland: i think that my consternation, and that's what it is, is that i would implore on the task force that really, it's not, in my opinion, the right move to separate these two. and for a myriad of reasons. if the plaza was restored to its original design, it would work within the landmark. if it was rebuilt exactly the way it is, whether it's landmarked or whether we pass this, that can happen. we've identified that the c of a can exist. if we go through another design process without us being engaged, we may end up with a final solution that's comparable to what's there, meaning that the integrity would be lost and it would not be landmarkable. so that's -- i think it's a mistake. and that's the message that i said last time. >> that would be up to the community. then that would be a community decision that they've chosen a design that doesn't necessarily celebrate that particular heritage. and that's up to the community. i certainly don't -- i'm not japanese. i don't have these experiences. so i don't know what it is that would be appropriate for what you would like. >> commissioner johnck: i would like to move the resolution. i move to support the resolution by staff. >> commissioner wolfram: do we have a second? >> second. >> shall i call the question? on the motion, commissioners, to approve a resolution to recommend to the board of supervisors to landmark both the pagoda and the plaza. >> commissioner johnck: yes. >> commissioner johns: yes. >> commissioner pearlman: no. >> commissioner hyland: yes. >> commissioner wolfram: yes. >> so moved. that potion passes 4-1, with commissioner pearlman voting against. that will place us on item 6 for 2015-0112774env, 150 eureka street. this is intended to help with comments on the draft e.i.r. comments by the public will not be considered on the draft e.i.r. the planning commission will hold a public hearing on thursday, january 18, to receive public comments. written comments on the draft e.i.r. will be accepted until 5:00 p.m. on tuesday, january 23, 2018. >> good afternoon, president wolfram, and members of the comment. i'm jenny delumo, environmental planner for the proposed project. joining me today are my colleagues, joy navratti, marcel boudreau, and pillar levalet. members of the project sponsor team are present as well. the item before you is reviewing the

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