San Francisco Supervisor Alan Wong announced Thursday the winner of a “dumb laws” contest he launched to help identify city rules that may be considered outdated or burdensome.
“San Francisco’s Municipal Code has accumulated for more than a century,” Wong said at a briefing. “Laws get added in response to problems, but they rarely get removed when the problems are solved, when industries disappear, or when modern standards make local old rules unnecessary.”
The contest launched last month and allowed all San Francisco residents to share laws they think are “dumb,” with Wong saying he would try to repeal or modify some of the laws that were submitted. The contest received hundreds of submissions, according to Wong.
“This contest was never just about finding the weirdest laws on the books,” Wong said. “It was about identifying rules that create real costs, real confusion and real barriers for San Franciscans, especially when those rules can actually be fixed.”
The winner of the contest is Katherine Roberts, a resident in the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood who has faced challenges trying to get her home into compliance with room dimension requirements.
The law she submitted states that all habitable rooms, such as bedrooms and living rooms, must have a minimum ceiling height of 7 feet, 6 inches. California standards are less restrictive, requiring that ceiling heights be no less than 7 feet tall for one and two-family dwellings.
“That 6-inch difference may sound small,” Wong said. “But in practice, it can create a major barrier for homeowners trying to legalize existing in-law units, basement units and ADUs.”
No ceiling on city permits
Roberts purchased the three-story home around 23 years ago. Before she bought it, the former owner turned the lower floor into a living space but did not get the required permits from the city.
She has spent years trying to legalize these units to rent them out to tenants. Meeting the requirement, she said, would force her to excavate the entire building.
“I’ve gone through every city agency that you can imagine, including all the way up to the board of supervisors, trying to get some kind of abeyance on this issue,” she said. “It’s just been absolutely impossible.”
Mike Nohr, a resident in the Sunset neighborhood, also submitted the same law. He has also encountered issues trying to rent out an in-law unit in his home because of the ceiling height requirements.
The rules for ADUs, including the ceiling height standard, have served as a deterrent for homeowners who may have extra space that could be rented out to those seeking housing, Nohr said.
“None of my neighbors are willing to rent out because of the imposition and the potential cost of up to a half a million or more to try to get the house up to code,” he said.
Wong wants to try and amend the rule to reduce the ceiling height requirement to the state standard of at least 7 feet.
“None of my neighbors are willing to rent out because of the imposition and the potential cost of up to a half a million or more to try to get the house up to code.”
Mike Nohr, Sunset District resident
“Our office is already at work to address this issue and create a more reasonable path towards legalizing existing units,” Wong said.
A written draft of the proposed legislation is underway. It will then be reviewed by the Board of Supervisors before being sent to a Board committee for consideration. Then it will return to the full Board for a vote.
‘Silly laws’ baked in the past
The contest also identified other laws that are “partly silly,” Wong said. He wants to try and get them repealed.
One of them is a rule that says it is illegal to carry bread or pastries in open baskets or exposed containers through public streets.
“That may have made sense in an earlier era, but modern food safety rules already address those concerns,” Wong said. “The Department of Public Health told us that this is likely an ancient law that stemmed from the plague.”
Another is a law that Wong wants to repeal is one stating that a person under the age of 21 must get written consent from a parent if they want to rent or lend a book from a circulating library, which are for-profit lending libraries. These libraries were popular in the early 20th century, but they largely ceased to exist by the 1950s when public libraries began to provide free borrowing of books.
Wong also wants to get rid of a rule that requires the sterilization of wiping rags used for commercial purposes, such as wiping down machinery, locomotives and steamships.
The law was written during San Francisco’s industrial era in the early 20th century for workplace regulations in factories and automotive shops that often used rags and cloth, including under garments and old clothing, as wiping rags to clean machinery. The law requires all soiled rags and cloths to be sterilized by boiling continuously in a caustic soda solution for 40 minutes.
“At the time, this law had a real purpose,” Wong said. “Nowadays, federal and state laws are in place to protect employees from and the public from those sorts of health concerns.”
While some of the laws chosen likely have less of a negative impact on San Franciscans in the 21st century, modifying ceiling height regulations for habitable rooms could help add more housing units to a city that “badly needs it,” Wong said.
“That could legalize hundreds, maybe thousands of units that are not public right now because people are not sharing those unauthorized units,” Wong said. “If we were able to legalize it, it will increase housing units in the city.”
