Further east in San Francisco’s Bernal Heights neighborhood, Brett Thurber, who owns the New Wheel Electric Bikes with his wife, went ahead and installed mesh roll-down gates on their storefront windows without a permit after experiencing six break-ins in 2020.
“We had this installed during the pandemic as sort of an emergency because there was nothing we could do to stop getting broken into,” Thurber told The Standard, adding that the business hasn’t had a break-in since.
Then, last December, someone reported the bike shop to the city’s Department of Building Inspection, which served the business with a notice of violation for installing the gates without approval. Thurber said the planning department ultimately allowed the gates, but he still had to pay $2,000 for the violation and a permit after spending about $30,000 to repeatedly replace the glass and install the roll-down gates.
“For the city to add another $2,000 on top of that just for like a permit [and] a penalty on a permit that was greenlighted because it was so non of an issue was a little insult to injury,” he said. “It’s money that I don’t think we should have had to pay.”
