issued medallions by putting in their time. they are too old to wait. i am hoping that is not forgotten in the zeal to sell the medallions that these drivers who really do tough, dangerous work out there are the ones getting this money are not forgotten and that this system come to fruition. you know, tell hurt a lot of drivers who put their careers into this. thank you. >> i do a blog called the phantom cabdriver fights back. i think you heard one of the

arguments everyone gave you about 10 times before. i can't imagine any process that has been more transparent to the town hall meetings in which it was selected. everybody had a chance to talk. i think it has been done very fairly. we have been over and over this. i think it is time you went ahead with this. thank you very much. >> good evening again. afternoon. maybe i will take off the sunglasses. i can appreciate all of the owners that have a medallion that want to sell and want to retire. but if this is a pot of gold, why don't they retire. to say that these are free medallions, every time i hear the word free medallion, i think about the 18 years or 17 years that i served this city.

i was arrested twice on false charges by the police. taxi detail and so forth, you know. the taxi commission after five days wanting to revoke my medallion after i worked 17 years, without hesitation. they suspended it and wanted to revoke it in five days. but those were false charges. so i hardly think it is free. they don't teach that in college, ok. there is no college in the world expect london. one. not any in the u.s. to learn you have to go through the paces and survive. nobody thinks they will be a cabdriver the rest of their life. they do it to make a living and find out it is not that bad. then it gets worse and worse and worse.

you get tired of it after a while. to say that it is free is a ridiculous under statement. we worked years to get these medallions. i don't agree. i think you are ruining the service. we have it good here. we do. and drivers are helpless to do anything about anything around here. >> is there any other member of the public winner to address the board on this matter? >> so in the summary it says, i am going to focus on the repurchase obligation. it says if we act or modify to terminate the pilot program,

really the only action that would trigger our repurchase obligation would be to say if we said an already sold medallion is already transferable if we legislated the value of it right back out. >> that is correct. >> all right. so then will that apply also to the medallions that go out through the retiree program? or only to direct sales? the way i read it is that we would have to repurcha for the initial purchase price. in the retiree scenario, we at the m.t.a. do not realize the full purchase price. so for example in the retiree scenario we only get 15% of the repurchase price. >> the situation is that we currently have or we are walking towards a situation where we will have transferable

medallions and nontransferable medallions. i think you are talking about a revenue that might come monthly to the m.t.a. and when we are talking about transferable medailyions, those sold by a previous owner to new owner or that were held because of the death or surender of a previous owner and are being sold out right to the new owner. >> so it really covers direct sales situation. this is not public to a program where we will be splitting it with a retiree? >> no. other than some of the transfer fees go to the driver fund. but that is the only split. if we are forced, we will have

a situation where we realized all of the funds or the vast majority of them in the first instance. >> right. >> my question is, is there any calculation for depreciation for use of the medallions? i realize that it is hopefully something that will never come to pass. but if we did have to repurchase a huge lot of medallions it would be very expensive. to give somebody the original purchase price when they had the use of the medallion for a long time. rather clear obligation is the board passes this item and if we enter into the lender agreement it would be to provide the purchase price regardless of what you might call the current market value or depreciation.

this would only arise if you said these once transferable medallions that you bought it but you can't sell it. a lesser step if the board were to pull back on this taxi medallion program would be to say we are not going to sell anymore. but the ones that had been sold could be sold. under those circumstances you would not incur this liability. if we went forward with medallion sales we might sell 20 or 30 medallions over the course of 30 days. they could say we are not going to sell any more medallions. so long as they maintain transferable. >> it would be up to the board. it is still within your control and purview. >> that's correct. >> ok.

just to be clear this repurchase obligation will apply only to directly to medallions that have initially been resold by the m.t.a. >> it would apply to any transferable medallion, including those sold by previous owners. >> since there are no such owners now, presumably those are medallions that are going to be sold in the first instance by the m.t.a. >> i think there is potential sellers in the room today who are very much looking forward to tomorrow, assuming that the board passes this item. but the board's action is necessary to proceed. once the board authorizes this, if they choose to do so, we will be authorized to execute agreements with the lenders and the buyers and sellers will be fill filling out the

appropriate documents. currently we have about 18 transactions that are pretty much ready to go. that is as many as we know will go forward. >> perhaps i am missing something. i will try to make it as simple as we can. what is before us today, would we ever be in a situation we would be asked to pay $250,000 for a medallion that we, the m.t.a., never realized $250,000 in revenue? >> yes. >> ok. what is that situation? >> if an individual sells their medallion, we would get a transfer fee. and the balance would go to the seller. that medallion would be a transferable medallion. if we were to remove the bundle of property rights we would have to compensate the owner.

>> that is if we did not allow them to sell it. >> an individual would gain the right to sell the medallion as to us selling it directly. is that essentially how that would occur? >> we have about 16 individuals who were ready to sell their medallions tomorrow. >> i continue to be confused. i guess i have a concern about the fact that we may have to repurchase a medallion with money that we never received. but i understand that this is an unlikely event hoping that we would be hampering the transfer ability. >> i think we pick up that liability if we do not allow the purchaser to subsequently sell that medallion in the future. >> now if the market price on medallions were to go down, that would be all the more reason for the board to continue to allow those

particular medallions to be transferable because they could transfer at whatever the market price was at that time or whatever the appropriate price was. >> maybe i should back up and say i certainly have no intention of reversing the transfer ability. the reason why we are doing it is to see what effect it will have. that is why it is a pilot program. the repurchase program concerns me because i don't think it will convince anyone else. that was my one concern. the ayes have it. it is unanimous. thank you very much. great work. ok. >> chairman murphy of the c.a.c. is not here today. so there is no report. we will move to public comment.

>> good afternoon. >> good afternoon board members. my name is martin mcclain. the reason i came over here is that we have experienced a situation where the residential parking, the two-hour parking, automobiles or vehicles without stickers on the bumper being abused. apparently by the agents of the department of parking and traffic. perhaps i could put this in the form of a question. if there is someone here who could tell me, how is it that when we park in a zone that is labeled two hours, 8:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m., and we park there

after 4:00 p.m. we get a citation on the car. that happened once in late 2008. we sought to have that reversed. we encountered run-around for our efforts and it never got resolved. the treasurer of san francisco wants to confiscate the property. now maybe this would appear to be just an unfortunate occurrence if it only happened once. but it happened repeatedly. i am hoping there is a referee or somebody that can run spreerns on this.

thank you. >> thank you. >> ok. next speaker. >> jamie whitaker followed by mark gleason. >> good afternoon. >> my name is jamie whitaker. i am speaking to you. i would like to thank you for the additional bike racks in the neighborhood. we appreciate them. anything to mitigate the air toxins is wonderful. main reason i came today is that we are excited to see the temporary terminal opening this week. excited to have the opportunity on the street. many of us walk. some additional eyes and ears to help keep the neighborhood safe is wonderful. if you could turn to the laptop

image. one thing we are not excited to see is an additional left-hand turn at main street. because a lot of us moved here in order to walk to work, we are very sensitive to traffic changes and anything that might increase the probability of dustin pedroia injuries or deaths. and we believe the second left-hand turn is increasing the likelihood of pedestrian injuries. there are about 800 kids that are in the rankin hill neighborhood on a workday basis primarily in the day care centers connected to the office buildings. so is it important for all of us that live in the condominiums, thousands of people who do enjoy walking.

hopefully we get more of our neighbors walking if conditions are safe. please pay attention to pedestrian safety. can i use this opportunity for the temporary terminal to pay close attention to how to improve pedestrian safety. thank you. >> coming to you today to inform you and not just asking you to take a side in this. to inform you of a group of workers who work on muni yards, tire installers who work for a subcontractor, the bridge stone tire group. obviously there will be union issues involved there. i am not asking you to directly be involved in that. i did want to alert you to conditions and concerns that these workers have brought to

us. they are responsible for physically inspecting and visually inspecting and installing 20,000 tires on the muni fleet annually. they are describing to us conditions that are, in my view, subpar. they are working for $14 an hour, just on that note would be below what i believe to be market rate for commercial tire installers. they are also talking about a lack of access to the medical benefits that most san franciscoians enjoy. in addition to access and knowledge of the sick pay for instance that workers in san francisco in the public and private sector enjoy. oftentimes service workers in my view are like the canaries. you know what is going on. i would say someone in authority could look at what is

going on here. i know with the tow yard things have improved. as we all work together with these workers who are maintaining the tire fleet, we can find the same type of improvement for those workers and for the muni riding public as well. i thank you for your thoughts on it. >> the bus line has been rerouted to 14th avenue in clement street with 15th avenue being a passage point for this run. the noise level has disrupted a formerly peaceful street, caused traffic problems and is difficult for buses to navigate. i do not live on this street but i am a concerned resident

of the richmond district. as i noted last year, whatever street in the richmond district you place a terminal point, there will be an out cry from residents. since the inception of the transit effectiveness project and with zero increase of services by tradeoff with bus runs and ultimately human beings, the two clement has been targeted for change. the proposal is senseless, especially since it provided services to all residents. you never consulted with medical personnel about the frail and physically ill who would have to walk a longer distance to catch the 1 california bus line. in essence you have been foolish and unrealistic as to the impact of this ateration of the two clement. if you want to tie up m.t.a.

meetings with protest from the richmond, go right ahead. a more realistic solution would be to restore the previous run in its entirity i might protest about the money required to do this. it is difficult to believe that with seven deputy managers at m.t.a. on six-digit salaries that the money is unavailable. what is unavailable is the realism of this board which will hopefully listen to the public and not the mayor or the controllers office and other political hacks who have compromised and damaged public transportation. >> good afternoon again. i wanted to call your attention to the fact that the taxi

advisory council has been appointed with participation of the deputy director and that there is not a single representative of united taxicab workers appointed to this board. united taxicab workers have been involved in every major taxi issue for more than 20 years. it is the only organized group that is predominantly composed of non-medallion holding drivers. the two other cabdriver groups in the industry, which are dominated by medallion holders have appointees. they are representatives of this group. this is not personal. i did not apply to be on the committee.

i do not believe that there is a single driver in this industry with better credentials. united taxicab workers has opposeded on principle and fully within our rights the medallion sales program. i have already protested before that this committee is structurely imbalanced towards cab companies and medallion holders which have a total of nine votes aas opposed to six. i think this latest slap in the face further detracts the legitimacy of this group.

>> good afternoon everybody. i am from yellow cab. the taxi advisory committee, there are names selected in this committee. we don't know them. we don't see them. how do they work for drivers? and what do we expect from them ?

there is one person, he is all the time working with the drivers. he is trying to solve all kinds of problems with drivers. not even that, he speaks for the taxi company. he speaks, all the time looking for the well-being of taxi drivers and taxi company. he is a real worker for the drivers. we are requested -- we request to you to represent his name in this advisory committee so that

they will have the best representatives in this committee. finally we hope that there will be something good in this direction. thank you. >> 21 years now driving a cab. native san franciscoian. based on board members, taxi service, based on hearsay, she said without any debate, numbers or current facts is another government blunder too big to fail. like the iraq war. and weapons of mass destruction. enron, aig, j.p. morgan,

country wide fan and he freddie were no accidents. based on good faith, they were not accountable. it was just a effort prone to fail. board members in 2003 bruce shaller, the now president of the taxi and limo commission in new york city was hired by the taxi commission and recommended a customer survey be done. in 2006 they produced one. in 2007 the taxi commission produced one which was generated by 42 responses. they refused the taxi commission's offer to do another survey. hardly that is what was recommended, a 42-response survey.

i know the response rate and margin of error is far better than the barts, but i am sorry i am not a team player. you know, maybe you think you need a college degree to produce a valid survey. but they don't teach taxi driving in college. they don't teach common sense. i have known a few graduates from college that do not seem to have it. it is just like muni. you have a mandate on time. where is it? >> good afternoon directors. i was waiting to speak about the taxi advisory committee. drivers could not afford to spend $60 lots over here and

want to get the agenda item moved back and forth. this is a paper and they were distributing it to the drivers, the people that wanted to buy these medallions. she is a friend of mine and said they charge $500 for application fees. she said it in a town hall meeting. that is a conflict of interest. she forced a new york lender not to be part of this entire process. that is a conflict of interest. she planned to be out. she talked to several people beforehand. we need an inquiry committee on that. i don't know how they approved all of these names. question mark.

nobody knows them. not even three or five people. i have been out there for 7,000 drivers. i meet them day and night. i don't know where they came from. she could not stand my criticism. i said do it correctly. i will support you. if you do the backdoor games, there are a lot of things she is doing that i would question. i would like to know how this advisory committee could be represented. don't have even three people now in this industry. my question. so you don't want to answer this question in other words. thank you. >> mr. chairman, that is the last person to submit a speaker card. >> every member