Welcome back to the february 11th meeting of the board of appeal, were calling ie pel number 8, appeal number 14196, stavroula skinas versus the department of building inspection manbacker Planning Department, the property is 15 allison street, to replace floor beams with psl and replace columns with ts steel post and footing, well start with the appellant ask the appellants agent. You have 7 minutes. Good evening, my name is nick skinas and im here representing my number voula skinas and i would like to respectfully withdraw our appeal to this project. I spoke with one of the architect ts and we are we think you could find the solutions to the problem wes eel be having, and as such ill withdraw the appeal. Okay, mr. Skinas, we always tell folks would want to withdraw their appeals to understand that if you do so, the board will no longer have any jurisdiction over this matter. Yes,. Okay, thank you. Good luck. Okay, so item number 8 has been withdrawn, well move on to items 9a, b, c and d, this is appeal number 14197 14198 and 1419, against the building inspection with the Planning Department approval. The properties at 1325 kansas city, the first appeal is protesting the issuance on november 13th to Michael Welch to remove ill laoem permit and bathroom from second floor legalize illegal bathroom the next is for an electric permit and the third is plumbing permit to remove illegal cap all utilities at the source. We will start with the appellant, there are three appeals so you have 21 minutes if you need to use them. Im alex, the attorney for the appellant, i dont plan to use the full 21 minutes. The situation here, there was a Single Family home that was built over a century ago and when the permit holder and Property Owner bought the property he constructed an unpermitted unit in the basement area, and that is the unit that mr. Mccabe has reined for the last 10 years. When it was van taij yours for the permit holder to rent the unit and receive rental income, he did so now when it is advantageous to demolish the unit and sell the property as a Single Family home in this insane Real Estate Market, he is trying to take advantage of the farting that he built an ill laoem unit and sell it as a Single Family unit and demolish it. This will result in the displacement of a long term permanently disabled tenant, it will change the nature of the property so it will not be rent controlled housing anymore, its currently two unit, both units are covered by the rent ordinance and the rent control protections of the rent ordinance, if this eviction happens, the upper unit will be a Single Family home which is not subject to the rent control protections of the rent ordinance so we will be losing not only rental stock but rent controlled housing in San Francisco, and that is in couldnt ra ensuing of the mayors executive direction 1301 which asks the board and all city agencies to preserve and promote rental housing so i ask that these permits not be issued so that mr. Mccabe can maintain his tenancy in this unit. I also want to point out there is no notice of violation on this property. There is no action from ddi requiring that the property that the unit be demolished so the permit holder hand is not forced here and i am certain that mr. Warren stein is going to make an argument that this is an illegal unit and no Property Owner should be required to continue renting an ill laoem unit and i would say to that, that this unit could be legalized, they could seek permits to legalize it and maintain the rental stock in the city, but that is not the goal of the permit holder the goal of the permit holder is to cash in on this Real Estate Market and if it evicts a long term permanently stable tenant, so be it, and that is not just my opinion, that is what the permit holders been doing for over two years now when they first issued on november 19 2012 an illegal eviction notice claiming the permit holder wanted to come into the property then he said he wanted a relative to move into the property that didnt work, they tried to buy mr. Mccabe out of the property that didnt work, so now theyre here trying to capitalize on the fact that the permit holder built an ill laoem unit. And then the other thing i wanted to say is in the opposition brief there were some demeaning personal attacks on mr. Mccabe and the way he has lived in the unit and they showed pictures from his unit and i want to invite mr. Mccabe to talk about the condition of the unit and to describe when those pictures were taken and also to explain his situation. My name is russell mccabe, ive lived at 1325 kansas street for over 25 years now, as far as the pictures go, they were taken as far as i know over 2 years ago. When my life was in a very tumultuous moment and they must have taken with the lan lord entered my apartment without my knowledge and that has all been taken care of. My land lard has been in my unit many times since that photograph was taken and that has not been a problem at all for years. I would just like to say 2012, end of 2012, i got sick and spent the year of 2013 in the hospital. The first two yearser of those were in a coma where i had a series of small strokes, during in time, my rent and utilities were still paid as far as i know on time. Rent was definitely paid on time every month for entire year i was in the hospital so i would have a place to live for future convalescence. Thank you. Okay, nothing further. How many floors to this building . Its two floors. Inger two floors . Okay. You live on the second floor, right . I live on the first floor. I think theres an error on the permit, it says work identified on the second floor. My unit is above the garage, so maybe thats so the garage level your level and then the owners level . Yeah. Thank you. We can hear tr the permit holder now. Good evening, im Daniel Bornstein im the attorney for the actual owner and permit seeker, i want to emphasize one very important point. My clients do understand the nature of the decision to seek to legalize the unit and they understand that it does come with a request to seek a transition of a tenant from a premises, and as a result, what theyve done is hired an attorney to make sure that all the appropriate steps are done absolutely in compliance with San Francisco rent control law and california law, and in particular, the steps that had been taken was when i was retained we served a notice of intent to demolish the unit in october, notifying mr. Mccabe of the intent to seek to restore the unit, the Single Family home to its original status and thereafter after october, in november we sought the permits that were before you tonight. We thereafter served a 60 day notice of termination of tenancy and that 60 day notice of termination of tenancy articulates the rules ask regulations that an individual must follow in San Francisco in order to actually remove a unit from housing use. This is strictly a requirement of the San Francisco rent ordinance and that notice has the permits attached that notice articulates the just cause under the rent ordinance, and that notice also includes a notification that the individual is entitled to relocation payments and our office of course at the beheads of the owners have asked us to ensure we do everything properly and that includes providing relocation payment and is pursuant to the rent ordinance, the relocation payments that he would be [inaudible]. I think that its not a difficult decision it does come with a difficult transition for someone, but the contrary position would be to compel my clients to maintain a relationship that is not permitted by law and that creates all types of liability for my client and ill give you an example. My colleague mr. Merchant who i have a great relationship with, during the december rains was very forceful in emphasizing that this unit, his clients unit is being flooded and we have noted that part of the issue is that this unit isnt supposed to be a separate residential unit and as a result, we need to clean up the situation and in order to clean up the situation, we unfortunately have to remove the unit, and in some respects we cant have it both ways, we cant create a situation which we legalize the structures of Single Family home while maintaining the individual inside the unit and thats because the status of this house as a Single Family home and it was never the proper permits established to create that kitchen inside the space and what you see in front of you at this point is a from my clients to clean up a situation, be in compliance with the law and most importantly while mr. Merchant speaks to some sort of endeavor where my clients are seeking some kind of [inaudible] they are trying to anticipate living in this structure in compliance with the law and most importantly has done everything that the San Francisco rent ordinance states must be done in order to properly seek a termination and in some respects he omits that this isnt the end, were simply seeking to confirm that the permits were issued properly, but after hopefully you rule favorably on behalf of my client, we still have and mr. Merchant still has the rights to seek redress from another administrative body which is the San Francisco rent stabilization board and he also has the right to proceed in defending his client in unlawful detainee action, so there isnt the clear directive of you grant the appeal or you deny it and therefore you prevent an eviction. In fact, mr. Merchant has many other ways more properly to contest what is happening in a form thats more properly positioned for that inquiry which is the San Francisco county courthouse and or the San Francisco rent board. I stand here before you stating that on december 1, the rent board received the notice of termination that mr. Mccabe has received all of the relocation payments hes entitled to receive at this time and that we intend to be compliant with the law, we intend to do what is necessary to place this structure in its proper status and we also understandably intend to continue to have a fair and reasonable dialogue with mr. Merchant and mr. Mccabe in the hopes we can seek a meaningful resolution thats fair and equitable, but nonpayment, we believe this structure that is owned by my client is right now out of compliance and it is my clients right and i believe community obligation to make sure they correct what is needing to be corrected and that mr. Corbe the general contractor pl pulled the pelters,. Perms were issued and we think we have the right to proceed. Did your client create the unit in the first place . My client did not create the unit in the first place, when they bout the property my understanding is the property down below or an inlaw unit was down below they did renovate the unit but they did not create the unit because the unit had been created prior to them being an owner of that property. Sing did they understand the unit was illegal at the time . The term illegal unwarranted nonpermitted. They understood this was a Single Family home and they offered that unit for rent. Theres no doubt or dispute about that. However, the Public Policy behind the thrust of my argument is as follows and i think this is very germane, to the extent were a community and we seek individuals not to engage in what would be unpermissible activity, when there is a route to undo that unpermissible activity our community should embrace it and that is what were here right before you which is were pulling permit, were seeking to restore the status of the unit and were seeking to do it compliant with what the San Francisco rent ordinance states, we are terminating the tenancy pursuant to 37. 9 and it is a permissible endeavor and let me emphasize, relocation payments have been provided and to the extent will mccabe transitions out of the property it doesnt mean hes given up claims or allegations that he may have against my client. It simply allows me client to get out of an endeavor that is not permitted at this time. Are you finished . I am. Okay, counselor, you made earlier in your presentation, you made a statement about legalization of the Single Family home. Did i mishear that is this . When i say legalization of a Single Family home i mean it should be treated as a Single Family home and not as a multiunit property as it is treated right now and also in order to legalize the status of that home, we have to correct the unpermitted work i understand that portion of it but does planning concur with you or the Building Department concur with you that this was originally a Single Family home . Yes. There is no dispute that it was a Single Family home. Thank you. Mr. Sanchez . Good evening, scott sanchez, Planning Department, the subject property at 1325 kansas is within an rh2 dwelling unit, which would allow up to two dwelling units the three hour report on the [inaudible] indicates it is a Single Family dwelling theres three permits, a 1990 permit for roofing and then two permits from last year one which is on appeal and one for some repairing cracks and some other minor work, those are the only permits i see on file. I would like to note that the subject permit is not subject to the requirements of planning code section 317 or to the mayors executive directive which applies to building which has existing legal units three or more, and this has come up many times before, i wanted to reiterate that for everyones benefit. Certainly the second unit could be legalized either through normal process because it is an rh2 Zoning District or 2003. 7 of the planning code which allows legalization of such units and reduces the process thats needed. Thats not to say the process is simple and straightforward, there are Building Code righters that need to be met. Whether that is easier or not for this unit, i would defer to senior building inspector joe duffy i know we have a copy of the plans here. While it is not summating to 317 or the executive directive one item of note which i think is important and is new information i just was able to share this with the permit holder this evening and the appellant i think may not be aware of this, although i think they probably should be but on november 10th of last year, mr. Merchant did file a bbm request which is a black book notification request, it was entered into our Computer System on the 12th but we count the one year date that its valid from the date they submitted it so its valid from november 10th last year to november 10th of this year. The permit was reviewed by the Planning Department on november 12th which is the same day i think it was entered into the Computer System, i would say staff probably may have not seen this, it could have been entered in the afternoon and staff reviewed the permit in the morning, i feel we must honor the bbn request, the appellant did not make any arguments regarding the bbn or failure to get bbn notice as part of their appeal, the purpose of it is to inform the party of the permit application gives them the ability to take it to the Planning Commission. If they have no intention of taking it to the Planning Commission, then i think this matter would be mute, if they do have an intent to take it to the Planning Commission, then i think it would be best if the board were to deny the permit and we can go through that proper process and as we saw in the case last week with cesar chavez, its something we need to be cautious and were trying our best to implement these appropriately. I will note that and in the case of cesar chavezfinger we recommended approval to the Planning Commission, recognizing it was an illegal unit, it wasnt subject to the regular directive, in that case, the Planning Commission did not align themselves with staffs recommendation and voted to deny the permit and i dont want to talk too much about this case, its not on the calendar but will be back before you and i want to avoid the same scenario apologies for the lateness of this information but if during the rebuttal, the appellant can indicate whether they would have any indication of taking the discretionary review, i think that would help us inform the board. Theres no long gap in time like the last one . That is correct. And a lot of process in between. Yes, and just for the boards kind of informati
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