we are talking about something really exciting, a local hiring plan around landscaping. i would strongly encourage the we consider this simple fix that builds upon the idea is that supervisor kim introduced at treasure island. we can adopt this amendment today, or if you want to take a few more days to get this in before the full board, we will be building this. this is great legislation already. it has a broad amount of support. i think i have enough copies. i hope that we can add this amendment that will make great legislation even better. thanks. supervisor chu: thank you. next speaker. >> good morning, supervisors. thank you for introducing this legislation. i am supportive of my brothers

and sisters in labor who are speaking on behalf of this ordinance. also, all of your support for the landscaping, this came to my attention last night at 5:30. i worked with my lawyers and everything together. i.t. mailed it to the supervisors. i also have a copy here. -- i he mailed it to the supervisors. i appreciate all your support. whenever you can do, i appreciate it. supervisor chu: thank you. next speaker. >> good morning. i am experienced in this trade.

everything that was done was done by hand. that was at a time when economic times were not as effective. i feel the time is more than right for all the workers especially to be given full consideration for a raise in pay so they can get adequate support to their families. especially older people who do not have the energy to come forward. i stand before you today, and my

intellect is just as firm as it was years ago. my trade was being a cabinet maker. there is no type of machinery that i cannot work. however, i am turned away by certain people. that is the big difference. i was not hear from the beginning of the proposal. whatever it is, i give my wholehearted support.

supervisor chu: thank you. are there other members of the public that wish to speak on item 11? seeing none, public comment is closed. colleagues, this item is before us and there is an amendment before us as well. supervisor weener, did you have any closing comments? supervisor kim? supervisor wiener: yes, thank you for those of you came out today, supporting those, i made earlier, as well as earlier legislation. there is always give and take. i appreciate on all sides, labor, departments, nonprofit, there has been give-and-take on this, and i appreciate that. i think with these amendments, this is strong legislation, and i hope we can move forward with

a positive recommendation. i do want to note, with respect to landscaping services, the issue raised by local 261, my office had previously indicated my commitment to work with them, to work on drilling legislation, related to landscaping services. i think there is work to be done there. however, we also agreed we need to do more iresearch to see what contracts were at issue, what the issues were, etc. we want to make sure, when the talk about prevailing wage legislation, potentially expanding the contracts covered, that we are doing so based on precise information, what is covered, what is not covered, where we want to go, where we do

not want to go. i appreciate the work that was done on the city amendments. we will take a look at them. i am sure we will be meeting and talking about trailing legislation. for now, i would request the city adopt the amendments offered at the beginning of the hearing, and i hope, moved forward to the full board with positive recommendation. supervisor chu: thank you. supervisor mirkarimi? supervisor mirkarimi: thank you. sorry i was late. i was at the demolition of our jail no. 3, which was quite a milestone, since it has taken several decades to get the wrecking ball in place. that was an important event for the city and county of san francisco, and our sheriff's department. my decision remains the same, as i indicated before. it has my full support. i am aware of the amendments

proffered by supervisor wiener. i wanted to come back and take part in my last participating role here on the budget committee. more than happy to make a motion to accept the amendments and move forward with recommendations. supervisor chu: thank you, supervisor mirkarimi. supervisor kim? supervisor kim: i want to support the recommendation to move forward. i want to thank supervisor wiener's office for their work. i also appreciate the cleanup around this law, especially around establishing the prevailing wage, and i appreciate the amendment around ensuring prevailing wage for all the workers here with city contracts, and also providing a

logger employment transition period. when these contracts have been, they have huge impact on employees and their families. six months is a more humane amount of time to give to folks in order to find new jobs, even in an economy as difficult as today. i want to thank supervisor wiener;s's office. supervisor chu: thank you for being here. supervisor mirkarimi, thank you for participating in your last board hearing here. [applause] of course, also the last budget meeting in particular. we want to thank you and wish you the best as sheriff of the city. i do want to articulate a few points. when this item came before us previously, there was a lot of

concern in my mind about it because there are a lot of components that conflict with some of the things i believe in. for example, eliminating the small business exemption was something i was concerned with. i have been a purported to make sure we provide opportunities for small businesses. having an exemption seemed to make sense. one of the big concern for me on the small business component was to say, do we have the same level playing field at small businesses would have for participating, bidding in work for the city? that is why i appreciate the amendment made through the help of ms. kelly and supervisor wiener to make sure we are providing the cost estimates, so that they are more in line of what i have been supportive of. i do appreciate that amendment. the other component that was

problematic, not necessarily the concept, but how it would apply. this is the issue of the retention going from 90 to 180 days. while i agree it makes it easier for families to figure out what to do next to be able to survive with a 180-day window, as opposed to 90, i appreciate the fact that there are obstacles with keeping individuals for that long, if there are individual -- issues that come up. i want to thank the labor union as well as supervisors for having the foresight to include exceptions when there is a layoff of some of the new employees. i think that is a strong provision of it. if there are issues of performance, making sure this does not apply when the contract is supposed be one time in nature. this makes sense and helps to ease my mind with regards to the

retention time. i want to thank the labor union for agree to that, supervisor for adding that component. the third area where it was problematic for me, in terms of legislation, the issue about the nonprofit exemption issue. as we start to take a look at our budget and we look at what the impact on our departments will be, it is a potentially large impact, if there were certain nonprofits included in it. as some of the departments have articulated, our largest contractors departments go out with millions and millions of dollars for lots of services that we sometimes do not think of, but have ancillary services that include janitorial. if this would apply to all those contracts as well, the impact financially on the city would be a much larger one that we would have expected. whenever we ask these departments to cut even a

million dollars from their budget, it is painful. to see how these amendments would actually play out, proposals, is something that we would not anticipate just yet. i want to appreciate very much supervisor wiener's two amendments, which would include janitorial services, disabled individuals. i also want to appreciate the clarification language that you are including. the intent of this was never to include organizations like larkin, homeless shelters, where we are providing residential service, contracting for residential service, whatever service it might be, mental health facilities. but there is an ancillary component that was janitorial. it was never meant to apply to that, but that was the intention of the law. i appreciate the clarification.

i know our office will certainly work with you, supervisor, to make sure that the language included is tight, and i hope that the departments will help us make sure there is nothing we have overlooked in that regard. finally, the last component that was not clear in my mind was the issue about the definition of the employees. as i stated, the intent was to make sure individuals who were working were getting paid a prevailing wage. not necessarily which relationship is better, but the fact that they're getting paid that amount. it sounds like there are many reasons why we do have to indicate it is an employee relationship, as opposed to independent contractor. at this time, i am comfortable moving forward with the legislation as amended, but i do hope that we can work in the ensuing week to clarify the

employee-employer relationship, so i can better understand the issue. i think it is incumbent upon us to see whether this is the best approach. many small businesses, minority individuals work through an independent contractor relationship. that is the crux of why i am concerned about it. who gets left out of the employment opportunities and who does not? i really want to understand that component. based on those comments, comments of my colleagues, why don't we go forward with the motion. there is a motion to accept the amendments that supervisor wiener move forward, recommendation to move to the full board. again, with the caveat that the employer works with the office to make sure that the languages all something that we intend. without objection. [applause]

thank you again, supervisor mirkarimi. i wish everyone a happy new year. we have no other items before us. we are adjourned.

chairperson nolan: good afternoon and happy new year. welcome to the january 3 meeting of the board of directors of the san francisco municipal transportation agency. please call the roll. director bridges: [resemt/ -- present. director oka: present. >> announcement of prohibition of sound-producing devices at the beginning of the meeting. pagers and similar devices are prohibited. anyone responsible for one going off may be asked to leave the meetings. item four, the approval of

minutes of december 6 regular meeting. chairperson nolan: all in favor? >> item 5, communications. there will be no discussion of anticipated obligation under a closed session today. item six, new or unfinished business by board members. >> i was aware of the advertising leading up to new year's eve. there were television commercials which were very well done. from my point of view, it worked out very well. it was like a trial of our boarding, since it was free, despite the fact it's sort of like a cocktail party. but it was great. well done. chairperson nolan: thank you. other directors? >> item 6, -- seven, executive

directors report. executive director reiskin: welcome. i am happy to be here with you. this is the first reading of 2012. happy new year, everyone. we will start of the year acknowledging some of our outstanding employees at the as 78. we are going to start with the transit division. i would like to ask patsy came -- cain and ricardo del barrio to step forward. they are the dispatch team at the green division, the division out of which most of the trains run -- the lrv's as well as the f line. the dispatch function is not well known or understood, but these are the folks responsible for getting service on the street every day. it is a very challenging job in

any of the divisions, but green more so, because it is the focal point of all of the train service that carries the large percentage of our public. we have not the number of trains we need to be able to meet our service needs every day, because we have trains that are failing due to maintenance problems, or out of service due to rex -- wrecks. and we often do not have the operators we need because of people who are not available for duty because of the challenge of getting people trained and ready to be rail operators. you put those two things together -- often not having enough trains or people -- and that is when coco and ricardo go to work, making phone calls, shuffling, doing whatever it takes to get service on the streets so people can get to where they need to go every day. really, it is an amazing feat

that accomplish everyday. throughout operations, and they are well known for their dedication in an extremely challenging role. coco is the lead dispatcher. she has been with the agency 38 years. is that right? 38 years. ricardo is the new guy. i think he has only been around about 25 years. [laughter] so he is still learning from coco. they have done amazing things for special events. but the day-to-day service would not happen without the work of these two. i want to ask john haley to say a few words and to join me in congratulating them on learning this award. -- earning this award. >> i would say happy new year, and turn it over to the professionals. i think you would guess which one is miss coco.

thank you. congratulations on behalf of the mta for your fine work. 38 years, correct? thank you. >> thank all of you for this. and i think you all on behalf of all my staff as well. without them, i could not make it. i could not do what i do, especially my son, as i call him. [laughter] >> mr. delbardo? >> what makes their accomplishments even more significant is being a dispatcher with the number of rules we have in our contract, and being able to apply them on a day-to-day basis and stay within all the regulatory rules, such as hours of service -- not only are these individuals

masters of charm and wit to get people to come in on their day off, they are also very savvy in applying the rules of a very complicated working agreement. with that, thank you. congratulations. >> thank you so much. happy new year's. thank you for this reward. i would like to also thank the staff and my mom here for pulling some of the miracles we do. some of the people are not here on the team. the bread and butter, the operators -- they are the ones with the good working relationship we have with one another, and the cooperation they give us. we can do some of the things we do. without them and their cooperation, there is no way we could do it. i found myself calling people sick this past week because of

the holidays and other things. "are you that sick? do you think you can help me out?" believe it or not, i get cooperation from some people who are not feeling so good to come back. it is really a good feeling, rewarding, should i say, for a lot of the operators, who put out so much, who operates so much with us, to pull it all out sometimes. it is difficult with all the special events and lack of equipment or one thing or another, especially when all departments are so short because of the budget crisis or whatever. again, thank you so much for the award, and have the new year. -- happy new year. [applause]

>> i think that says a lot about the employees of the mta, that you have people who are sick and are still willing to come to work, with the right amount of persuasion, to make sure the service gets out on the streets. and i want to assure the department of public health the we do not have anybody coming in who creates and the contagion. the next group we are going to asked to come up is from the administration division, the marketing team. i want to ask them to join debra johnson at the microphone. communications is an area that, before i joined the mta, a recognized as one that had a lot of opportunity here. we serve and interact with so many people here at the mta. the way we communicate with them is important to their experience using our system, or just living in the city. this group of folks worked together as a team.

they are part of the marketing department within the administration division. and what they are being recognized for today is an effort that they had in developing the anti-crime campaign but was up inside our vehicles, and i think on some of the bus shelters, in response to a real safety need we have at the agency, said the being the most important thing for us to be addressing to make sure people feel safer riding or system. -- our system. working with the police department to identify people being robert on board of their smart phones, this group got together to develop a campaign that by all accounts was very successful. we are not only ourselves feeling this was a successful campaign, but this group was recognized by the american

public transit association in getting an award. they were first place for public relations awareness or educational campaign for the crime campaign. they have also gotten five awards over the last three years, so their value is recognized not just in san francisco, but across the country. the team is jimmy lee, our one- person shop when it comes to graphic design. he has been with the agency five years. mark is a public-relations officer in marketing. aaron likewise has been in public relations for years. -- for four years. they are newcomers to the mta relative to coco and others, but are already having a positive impact. i want to ask debra if she wants to say a few words. >> good afternoon. thank you for those kind remarks

about the team. it is my pleasure to stand before you and it is fitting in reference to director bronfman -- brinkman's comments. it was the creativity behind this team -- we have our own advertising agency. when you talk about receiving an award, it is very highly coveted, for the simple fact that it is not done by transit professionals. these are market professionals -- marketing professionals from the private sector. that is the talent behind us. i would be remiss not to recognize the leader of this team and the deputy director of communications group. they have done a yeoman's job. it is my pleasure to work with them and i can attest to their skill set and talent. it is to die for. with that, it is my pleasure to provide iraq with his award

today, january 3. thank you so much, eric. and then mark as well. thank you, mark. last but certainly not least, our graphic designer. chairperson nolan: gentlemen, thank you for what you have done. i also understand you were responsible for the program for identification, which was done extremely well. thank you. love to hear from you. good afternoon. >> thank you, members of the board. thank you for this wonderful honor. i would also like to thank the director of corporate communications for his stewardship, wisdom, and guidance. to -- >> debra, our marketing director, -- to echo debra, our

marketing director helps us to craft compelling messages that reflect the strategic goals of this agency. my colleague, jimmy lee, whose creative contributions are nothing short of amazing. eric molina, our logistics expert, who has insured our offense come out without snafus. and finally, moran, who has done great work for the agency. >> good afternoon, chairman and board. thank you for this award. i do appreciate it. it has been a challenging few years. i want to thank my team. i can count on them because they always have my back. somehow, we turn sows' ears into purses on a daily basis. i also want to think