TO Jackson Rabinowitsh @TNDC.org
Dear Jackson,
Thank you for holding a community meeting last night. I appreciate the fact that you did not
subject us to multiple choice questions. I recall writing to you ahead of time how limiting these were. They never serve the cause of dialogue.
I must tell you, however, that your program made true dialogue all but impossible. You picked the topics. You chose the 3-5 people who could respond to each of them. You stopped comments after about 30 seconds, as you stated you would. You shut people down when they attempted to discuss what they thought was important. Once again, the community surrounding 2550 Irving Street is much less interested in bay windows and who does the art work than they are height and scale of the building. Supervisor Mar started out the meeting by reminding TNDC and the audience that the amendment attached to the predevelopment loan and passed by the Board of Supervisors in July, 2021, mandated transparency and compromise in these areas. Neither was to be found during yesterday’s meeting.
As individuals did not have to give their address or neighborhood before they spoke, one had little idea if individuals lived near the building or across town. However, I am familiar with
some of the names of individuals in the Westside Coalition, individuals who, for the most part, do not even live anywhere in the Sunset, and they were out in force. And, of course, they were called upon. The comment I found the most haunting was from the individuals who said, “Build it as high as the Salesforce Tower.” How little value these individuals must put on community partnership. How little they understand about the potential damage that will be done to the neighborhood around 2550 Irving Street if the current building rendering becomes a reality.
Additionally, I would like to point out two areas in which you mislead the public last night.
One was on the topic of where the entrance and exit for parking is scheduled to be: 26 th Avenue and Irving St. You were told by many individuals who live near that corner that it is
treacherous. People enter and exit the Sunset Super parking lot from the East, South and West. There is often a line waiting for parking, blocking 26 th Ave. and parts of Irving St. When we asked Katie to get a traffic study, a few months ago, her response was “ We do not need a traffic study. The community are the experts on the traffic issues.” Well, if that is the case, you will be making a dangerous situation only more treacherous. Compound this with a desire to put the entrance to a childcare center on the same corner and you have created a deadly situation. Truly deadly. We have discovered that the traffic analysis you mentioned was done with a very short consultation. It was not a traffic study by any means. And what it showed, really, was that there was no optimal environment for entrance and exit to parking, if 27th Avenue could not be used, as it has been for parking for at least the past 50 years.
Secondly, I believe you were in error in your discussions about the DTSC results. The level of
PCE gas found in the soil, under 2550 Irving, as well as in the street and running parallel to the sewer line on Irving Street is alarming, and of medical concern. Soil sampling conducted in September of 2020 and March of 2021, found PCE levels in the soil gas as high as 2,500ug/m3 directly in front of the PCU building. The health of individuals is compromised at these levels. DTSC insists that the risk of vapor intrusion at the Irving Street PCE plume is acceptable, based upon exposure standards two orders of magnitude higher than their own published standards. This is how DTSC was able to justify your faulty Response Plan: By allowing the people in 2550 Irving Street to live with a cancer risk 100 times greater than if the building were on an uncontaminated site. This is why even DTSC is concerned about the possibility of a childcare center on the ground floor. Please reread the documents. I believe that you will find that at this point they have NOT given their approval, as a result of high PCE levels, for a childcare center. And DTSC certainly will not appreciate the misinformation you are spreading to both the existing community and the potential residents of 2550 Irving. As you well know, the contamination is not going away with your mitigation plan.
As we have mentioned to Adrienne [Pyatok] and to Katie Lamont [TNDC], earlier in the week, we are very willing to have our architects work on a compromise building for 2550 Irving Street. I cannot encourage you enough to allow this process to begin immediately. If you want to serve the community, as you say you do, then engage fully and truthfully, with the neighbors.
Sincerely,
Flo Kimmerling
President
Mid-Sunset Neighborhood Association