>>hi. thank you for being so thoughtful about this issue. i apologize if people have heard me say this before. i was involved a couple of years ago with power and other groups that were talking about muni. the bureaucratic logistics when we were trying to give out the three month pilot program to low-income youth was really overwhelming. mta and unified school district did not have the staff or the money to do outreach and to do distribution. most of it happened by volunteers and if it were not for the volunteers, it would not have happened. i am for seeing that happening. if it is limited to low income use. please did very deeply into the work order -- dig very deeply

into the work order. i know you have discussed the possibility of doing it by -- [inaudible] >> thank you very much. >> my name is roland. i am in favor of the youth pass. i have not heard anything about helping seniors and people with disabilities that are also on low-income. many of them are on ssi and they cannot even have a pass.

it really needs to be addressed as far as looking into some type of discount for seniors and people with disabilities. i know we do have, you know, -- if you are offering free, it should be for all the parties involved. chair nolan: anyone else? >> it looks like there is one young lady who wishes to come forward. chair nolan: good afternoon. >> it is great to see you guys again. i want to second one of the

comments made earlier. we have seen it before, we know what it will look like. we have assumptions. it is not going to be a beautiful sight. what person is going to have the job to make sure that it is done right? that is one of the things i want to highlight. i am kind of disheartening to hear support comes down to trade-offs between maintenance and this program. we support car drivers. i see drivers all the time and died commend them for the work -- and i commend them for the work that they do. i support them, and i hope they support us, too. thank you for your time. and being involved in that this discussion with us. a year ago, we were totally not even thinking about this. [applause]

chair nolan: i declare the public comment period is over. this will be the last speaker. >> [speaking spanish] >> good afternoon, everyone. i did been a member of the organization power for 12 years. >> [speaking spanish] >> @ power, we speak clearly and what we are talking about now are free passes for youth to get to school. we should stick to that conversation because it is critical that for youth, who are

our future. we should not let ourselves -- we should stick to the point that san francisco has enough money to pay for passes for all youth. >> [speaking spanish] >> we are not asking for anything but our -- that our youth and families don't

deserve. we simply cannot afford the passes. you have the choice today. >> [speaking spanish] chair nolan: ok, translate that, and that will be dead. >> this is the work of a multiracial, multi rankle coalition of people. you have the choice -- multi lintel coalition of people. you have the choice today. [applause] chair nolan: this will be the final speaker. >> i was not going to comment,

are discussing this. this legislation is being considered 20 or 30 years too late. the day we went away from neighborhoods schools, muni should have become free for everyone. how did you tell a child, we will not let you go to the school down the street, but you have to go across town and paid to get there? it makes absolutely no sense. it is something that should have been done a long time ago. i hope you factored in at the cost of determining who is low income and who is not. you will not be able to run a program like that for free. that is going to cost you some money as well. i think you ought to do it for all children. i think you ought to do it now. [applause] chair nolan: the public hearing is now officially over.

it is time for our decision. recently i had some surgery and i was out the last two meetings. i want to thank my colleagues, very difficult issues and the vice-chairman for conducting this with a great deal of dignity and efficiency and hearing your one. i took the time to think about this in recent weeks. i thought about this for a long time. the job is -- the ultimate thing is to look out for the entire city. and its complex components will be mindful of the various communities we serve. we can adopt a policy that seems to make sense for the city as far as i'm concerned. we had occasion for people who say it does not play out well in our neighborhood or this committee or that. this is one of those examples.

if -- as mindful as we are, the job of the seven of us is to consider what is in the best interest of the agency as we serve the entire city. like my colleagues, i have carefully considered the proposals for muni. i am persuaded there is a compelling need to offer that service for 22 months, the next two years. resources might be there to provide for low-income students. i am not convinced as -- as convinced that the case is compelling for middle and upper income kids. for the sake of individuals who have other means of paying for their service. the case for muni has been well made by a large, well-organized grassroots campaign. if my view prevails that we adopt the free muni for low- income youth and a resolution that directs the staff to work

for everyone, that you will celebrate. there is a great victory they have been part of coming year to these meetings after meetings. i for one think it is going to be a great step forward in san francisco. the case for -- the money has to come from somewhere. i will talk about free muni. it is not free. mr. rieskin has done a great job of looking for revenue if we were to provide free service for all young people. i believe these are realistic. i think -- they're not at the expense of other operating programs or other parts of the agency. i will support a motion. i am open to and i requested a resolution myself. an amendment that places this board on record as supporting the overall goal as quickly as possible. finding those sources of revenue

that are specifically for this service and not the expense of something else. we're moving to this as quickly as we can. my amendment would direct mr. rieskin to find resources available and come to us. there is wild assertions made about how awful this will be. we have heard from the critics who are concerned about what this might mean. that is why it is a pilot project. the money that has been identified, we do not have it yet. we ought to go with unity and work toward this goal. that is the end of the conversation we have and the motion i would make -- i am not making a recommend -- a motion at this point. i will go on record as being in favor of [unintelligible]

it is time for review of fare structure. this is not the only one that is inequitable. we do not have time in the current budget year but i hope over the next year, your staff could look at how we can address some of those inequities that are truly there. i -- to do want to any -- add anything else? >> thank you for that helpful and constructive speech. i want to echo something you said and i want to speak to supervisor campos and his staff and others to answer and others who have come together, particularly the student to of come to see as. there is perception of a well- founded this building and city leaders do not pay attention to

the city's youth the way they might in other cities where they have a stronger political voice and greater numbers. i as a parent of three young children feel that and definitely share that perception and frustrations sometimes. i still love the city, however. i want to say that you folks who have organized, thank you. as mr. reiskin just reported to us, under the staffer -- staff proposal, it is still a significant measure. half of the children ride the muni for free. that is a big deal. this is something that was not on the table while ago. this is something that sends a clear message to the children and parents of the city that there are organizations in the community that care and politicians to care and hopefully there will be more action here today that many cares about families. i will say a simple thank you as a parent. on the issue that i raised last time which is we need to see the

economic trade-offs. i want to thank you, director for the very informative and thoughtful piece that we have been given. and in light of those trade- offs and the fact that this is a pilot proposal, i am in favor today of the staff proposal providing these passes for the low-income youth. first and revisiting what we can do later because of the trade offs. not only the economic trade-offs but it is important that we take time to review the potential service trade offs that will be implicated year. and how we can better serve not only our working commuters but our school-age to compete -- commuters. i say all this and this thank you and this note of respect, signifying this is the beginning of the discussion and that is how i view it. i strongly suspect, i do not want to speak for him. one of the recent super kaiser campos is proposing free muni -- supervisor campos proposing free

muni -- because of concern that if we limit the free muni to certain segments, we will create an administrative bureaucracy and from that, there will be a problem. the very people we're trying must to help for whatever reason, intimidation, fear of administrative red tape, delay, you name it. will not access the service we need. when this discussion started you and i talked about how this is important that it be a clipper based program because that will make it simpler. that will allow us to load it for a longer time. there are other things as we started this, we need to address. it is very appropriate we revisit the threshold. we have started from using the school lunch program threshold as the proper threshold. we need to evaluate whether that is a proper threshold in a city as expensive as this one and

whether we will be hitting and helping the committees and children that we want to help. i would start with that. let's revisit that. i would also say we need to do everything we can to learn from lessons or mistakes, i will call it lessons from the lifeline programs before. and we need to make this a supreme the easy to access program. the school to lunch program benefits from a fairmount of aes. i think we can learn from that. -- fair amount of ease. we can have dialogue to see what their thoughts are and also to dialogue with the schools. this to me would be most simply run as a school based program. we know where our children are during the days when there are supposed to be, we have information and we should work with them to make sure we have a program that is easy to administer.

once we have done that, i think we need to commit as the chairman has said to visiting this and revisiting this quickly. we not -- we need to know not at the end of two years, we need to know at the end of four or six months whether it is an -- whether it is possible to design the and administer this program. we need to know that. if it is not possible, we need to revisit free passes for all youth. in addition, we need to revisit what the impact -- budget impacts are. you did the best to look into your crystal ball but you cannot predict reliably but we need to know what the trade-offs are turning out to be. and also importantly what the service impacts of this are. and then i would be with you, chairman nolan that as time goes on in this pilot program, we need to revisit whether this program is working, or whether, given administrative savings, given trade-offs and the overall policy benefit of having all of

our children write for free if that is the way to go and if so, can we identify the resources. something you said -- this is a victory. this is a good day. if you support our children riding the muni and it may come out more measured than some of you want but this is the start of the discussion. i will say again as a parent and i am happy for what is going on here. commissioner ramos: so i do not think anybody has articulated more support for the concept of free muni for all youth than myself appear. i certainly voted for it previously. and was prepared to vote for it again today. had there been different circumstances. it is clear now, however, that the funding mechanisms would lead to taking money out of

maintenance and operations which none of us have been supportive of, not even in. it is convoluted, it is a tough process to follow when you have someone or folk saying the money is there and theoretically, it is there. but it is also money that is competitive for other resources that we need for other things that are going toward low-income communities, people with disabilities, and folks who have a hard time getting to transit. that is what the concept of life in funding is, it is for that explicitly. -- a lifeline funding is, it is for that exclusively. that is true, that funding would go to -- toward the low-income youth there. there is not enough money within the lifeline but to handle all the needs we would need for even just the low income youth given the fact that we're not receiving funding from these other sources that we're hoping

to get funding for with regard to the 108, the mission mobility and all these other programs. if the funding is not there for those programs that we have identified as a need for the lifeline project, we would need to look toward that portion of the $5 million we were talking about getting from ntc to help move that around, if i'm not mistaken, to pay for the free muni for all youth and the people who have means. it is this strange, we will not get the money from here but we will take it from here but the money from here we have to take it from here. what ends up coming short is the lifeline funding. in a strange way. it is unfortunate it has to work out that way but that is the way we are. i know people of low income and of disability who have a hard time making it to the end of the month. it is not possible for me to put

those folks a risk for the sake of doing free muni for all youth. i do agree with all the comments that were set here, chairman and director heinicke., we need to push toward finding that finding and identifying that funding and it can come from a place where it is not taking -- putting additional burdens on lifeline funding or taking away from the disabilities or access in that capacity. and all those needs have been that through the founder and the ntc funding that has been available. hopefully of we have got some sources for -- from private as well. a big reason why i voted the way i did this last time was because i was hoping, we were all hoping that private sources and i do not think anyone has a few million dollars lying around to give to this program to help make it happen for free muni for

all youth. all that being said, i want to go back to this idea of what staff is saying and understanding that we have a working relationship here that we need to respect and trust and move forward. staff has taken a hard line the whole time i have been appear -- up here for year. we're going to have a difficult conversation about the budget after this. a lot of you here are not here for the low-income pass but you're here for the budget, i am sure it. we're counting pennies and dollars is literally where we're at. if we're going to go for free muni for all youth, it will be imperative that we do find those sources of revenue in creative ways like i was talking about with some of the organizers a year ago. i'm hoping we can still look towards those opportunities to find a free muni for all youth

in the future. and go with what we have got right now. we're pretty comfortable, we have funding for given the wonderful work of supervisor campos in sounding -- signing the funding at ntc. i commend that and the support from power and the community organizations that are here making that happen. there is a few amendments i want to make sure to get included in the resolution we passed to address some of the things that we can talk about that more. i wanted to explain that. thank you for that time. commissioner bridges: i would like to commend the parents and students. i voted to support this initiative last time because growing up in san francisco, i understand that difficulty in having funds to transport every day to school. also the plight of young families and families in

general. i worry about the exodus of families out of san francisco, low-income and middle-income. of all economic backgrounds. after reviewing the budget and knowing where we are with our budget consequences, we know that we can now support free muni for half of the students in san francisco. that is the funds we have identified and are available. any budget you have to make hard decisions and make decisions on the funds that are available, not the funds you hope will become available. the decision we make is based on the funds we have but that does not preclude funds that may be available a year from now. what i would ask director reiskin to do is to work with the mayor's office and see if we can identify private sources that will come through that we can advocate and we could offer a free muni for all youth.

in two years maybe or maybe one year. i would love to do it before the next budget cycle. i think it is important that as a city, we can support families, not just low-income families but middle income families. san francisco is very expensive. it is not just low-income that are struggling especially with the downturn of the economy. the everything i would advocate is simplicity. the one thing that impacts low- income families is the bureaucracy of filling out paperwork to get into these programs. we need to offer support to these families so they can get the support they need to complete the paperwork to get to these programs. whether it is the school or mta, we need to provide support for them. my last point would be if we cannot do it with the schools, to make sure the mta can offer the service. i would hate to see low-income families not get the support they need whether it is true clipper or whenever the process is. i think the pilot program should not be limited to just low-

income that low to middle. once we do this within one year, come back to the board and say we have looked at additional funds. staff has identified something but not wait until the next budget cycle. i truly feel the city should muni should be free for all use. we should not wait two years to do it. commissioner lee: i think anything that i have to say, my colleagues have expressed really well. i want to congratulate the youth that are out there. your presentations have been awesome. you are so respectful and so passionate in what your saying. -- you are saying. you still have an advocate up here. you have to look at the entire impact of the ridership.

thank you for your presentations and for your courtesy. commissioner oka: thank you. i did not want to miss the opportunity to -- first, i think we have all heard a great grass-rotots presentation and -- [inaudible] from the entire movement to make muni free for all youth. this director has heard every word you have said. i think one thing we have to be

aware of, i asked our cfo to assure me that this program of low income does not just mean public schools low income. it must include all who are in school, who are public or private schools must be put in this program. otherwise, i would not support it. we have to be able to assure thtat our city remains friendly to our youth. our youth is the future of our city, and we all know this. we know this, we hear this.

there are places in the budget that we can cut money, cut -- we need to cut into the overtime. we need to work -- work orders need to be cat -- cut. sfpd is supposed to serve all the city. what is paying -- part of it, police department budget that [unintelligible] i will be working hard to make sure we reduce the work orders. i think if we reduce the work orders, lifeline to me is too high as this. you have heard me from here from the beginning say that lifeline pass