>> good afternoon, mr. president. >> is this about the item that mr. reiskin discussed? >> two thing has there have concerned me about the report, and one is special recognition award. now i'm not up here for a special recognition award. i'm here for the greater good of san francisco, as well as california and the bay area. and what i'm concerned mainly about we have a creative concepts or concerns -- creative something or other -- and then at a zero cost. well, my friends, this is a little creative -- what is it called? if you could correct

me? concerns? thousand customers surveyed every year for the last 15 years. this is what it looks like. this is the first -- i did 500 the first year in 1998. creative concerns. whatever you want to call it. creativity. these are free. i submit them. you can put it on the screen. submit them -- i splited did for the san francisco taxi commission until they were absolved or dissolved or mergered. and mr. [hao*-efrpg/] knows all and heinicke knows all about that. the report you cannot find online anymore. it's deleted but mr. heinicke said in '07 he was willing to pay extra for services in the sunset, where he lives. he knew that dispatch issue couldn't be addressed then in '07.

it hadn't been addressed since '07, since 1998. >> thank you. >> thank you. next speaker. >> that is the last person who submitted a card for this section of your agenda. >> then no. 8. >> item 8, citizen its' advisory council report and i do not see mr. murphy here. no. 9, public comment. >> members of the board, probably most people here this afternoon for the taxi item and i was wondering if we could move to that and come back to the public comment afterwards. >> agreed. >> all right. so que with call that. >> moving to item 11, authorizing the director to issue 150 to 200 tetchry full-time medallions for a limited period of time to be leased to certain color [skhrao-epl/]s based sleeps

based on objective criteria. >> i think the issue is somewhat straightforward. we quite a while again it seems engaged a consultant to undertake best practices study in a public convenience and necessity study to in part answer of question of what is the right amount of taxi cabs in san francisco? that process has been ongoing. it looks at this point like we're probably december/january timeframe by the time we get those results. but in the meantime, the demands on the taxi industry have been strong, if not increasing. the kind of other factors at play, such as some of the many non-taxi means of transportation that have been proliferating, that have kind of come into the picture since we started this process and given the special events and

demand that seems pretty clear that we're unable to meet with the current level of taxi service. what we bring this proposal forward, it had been my desire for the last year to not do something in advance of the public convenience and necessity study and i thought and still feel that the data will serve us best in helping to inform a decision that will ultimately make -- however i think it's pretty clear and i did speak to the consultant who is doing that discussedy. i think it's pretty clear that the shortage of supply that people perceive will be validated in that study. the magnitude of that, i think, is an open question and i look forward to seeing the study. but i felt given these kind of external factors, that it was important to not wait another four or five months, but to bring something forward now.

so what we are proposing for your consideration is the issuance of up to 200 permits. these could be temporary permits. they would be direct leased, two color schemes to the taxi companies. one of the reasons to do that is that would be revocable if the demand profile changes or some other factors change or depending on what kinds out in the public needs and necessity study we can make adjustments in the future. in order for these to be kind of viable economically, that they would need to be three-year permits, but at the end of those three years, we would be able to not renew them or do something different at that point in time. we are proposing to make them available to the color schemes, based on dispatch performance.

basically looking at the ratio of service calls, radio calls that they take as opposed to just street hails as being a measure of how effectively they are meeting that radio service demand, when people pick up the phone and call or go through an app, to hail a taxi, which is one of the biggest challenges that we have outside of the airport and the downtown. it's very difficult for people to get them. we want these permits to incentivize those companies affiliating with dispatch services that service that lesser met need the best. so we would be proposing to allocate on that basis with some kind of adjustment for some normalization for size of the variation of sizes of the taxi companies that we have. so that is the proposal that is before you. we did post this about a month

ago, the transportation code requires that we post notice of any consideration of something like this with 30 days in advance, which we did. i imagine there will be quite a bit of public comment, but that is the basis proposal for your consideration. >> thank you, mr. reiskin. members of the board? anything else before we do that? okay. >> brent johnson. followed by tim santos and john biterros. >> is mr. johnson here? >> brett johnson. here he comes. >> good afternoon, mr. johnson. >> good afternoon, and thank you for the opportunity to speak today. my name is brett johnson and i have been a taxi driver in san

francisco for 17 years. i have been working full-time in that capacity. i am concerned about the medallion situation right now. i have been on the list for 16 years. it took a year of driving before the old timers talked me into going down and [phr-ufrpg/]ing down my money and putting my name on the list and it's what i have had to look forward to and my years of driver is one day getting a medallion and changing my lifestyle a little bit. not greatly, but being able to adjust myself to my now 11-year-old son, my wife and the highlight that we like to become accustomed to is greater. there is no room for advancement in cab driving other than the opportunity to one day get a medallion. i'm here today because at the last meeting which i was not able to attend, the pre-k medallions are now going to be sold as part of the pilot program being made official and all the medallions being held

by the city are going to be sold, which in effect is pulling the carpet from under me and my fellow drivers who have been working as cab drivers for 17 years plus. i am wondering about these medallions that now will go to the companies. i personally have been working at luxor cab and have no problems with luxor cab and think it's the best company to work for as a leased driver like myself. they have done me right. and i am happy to see them have an opportunity to get some of these medallions as well. but i'm here today to talk about the driver. in some of the minutes that were read just now, it sounds like the companis and the dispatch systems are being talked about as if they are the ones picking the people up and they are not. the dispatch service doesn't pick up people. the cab driver picks up people. last week i picked up a psychotic patient from the hospital who freaked out when i

wouldn't let her smoke in the taxi. i'm lucky i worked as a psych tech in a houston hospital and i have dealt with that. >> thank you >> is that my time? >> yes, it is. >> i just wanted you to see a real cab driver and i represent hundreds of others. thank you so much. tim santos. john bisteros. >> good afternoon, mr. is on thas. >> hi, thank you for having me my name is tim santos with the company taxi magic. we are the no. 1 electronic hailing system for taxis in the united states. we work with about 100 plus fleets in about 100 plus cities in the country. working with hundreds of thousands of drivers and millions of consumers all over the country, in san francisco, we work with luxor cab since 2008. for more than four years, our year over year ride brother and growth and this is about data continues to double, but each

year our demand has vastly exceeded our supply and what we have realized is that here in san francisco, technology like ours can't solve all of the problems. accordingly san francisco has the highest no-show and cancellations. san francisco is widely known as the most difficult city to get a taxi. as demand for taxis in san francisco has exceeded supply, you are seeing new, unregulated tanki transportation and tech companies enter the market, who are preying opinion the well-known fact it's impossible to get a taxi in san francisco. these taxi replacement companis have introduced hundreds of new vehicles into the city, with very little regulation, while the taxi companis have waited patiently. it's time for san francisco to

help the taxi fleets, like luxor, meet the demand with more cabs on the road as san francisco as a taxi-friendy city. so please add more cabs to san francisco. >> last year over 3.65 million visitors came to san francisco and they contributed $525 million to the budget. over a third of those visitors came here to attend meetings in our hotels, business meetings in our hotels or conventions. one of the biggest complaints we received time and time again from meeting planners and convention planners and these are the folks that bring the people to san francisco and

make those decisions are that there is not enough taxi service in the city. in fact, i have received a recent letter from one of our biggest convention planners asking what is the city doing about this? by adding 150 to 200 new medallions, you will be taking a great step forward in trying to meet the demand of this traveling segment that brings so much to the economic vitality of the city. so with that, san francisco travel association encourages your support of the matter before you now. >> thank you. >> next speaker. >> barry toronto, jim gillespie, phillip ward. >> good afternoon. >> good afternoon chairman nolan. i am disappointed you are only giving us two minutes considering this proposal hasn't been properly vetted by the taxi industry. i don't know when this appeared in a town hall meeting to give

you a proper recommendation on this. also the issue as you in effect will become the medallion holder you are basically making cab drivers employees of anings that is regulating the industry as well. there is somewhat of a conflict of interest there. as some of you are lawyers and have legal background should be concerned about that. if you get sued, due to improper workers' compensation, who is providing the workers' compensation? it should be the medallion holder, which is you. you are the medallion holder, not the company. you are leasing it to somebody else to run the medallion. also, in the $3 million, $4 million you will get per year, there is nothing included about how many employees you will add

to monitor the program. you have to make sure you have a couple of employees to mount vernon monitor the program. also you need to alert the public about how many medallions are going where. it's not very well explained in and i think at the end of the 3-year period these drivers could lose their jobs. who is going to play for the unemployment insurance? the concern is that it would be better to actually put out 40 to 50 new medallions. you know there is an ebb and flow in the business. thank you. >> thank you. next speaker? >> jim gill [kwr-eups/]ie,

gillespie. phillipward. >> jim gillespie with yellow cab. i'm here to support the staff report and for about reason. there is a large unmet demand as all of you know for taxi cabs. even though yellow cab, luxor cab and desoto cab service 90% of all the calls that come in for taxi service, we also pick up 95% of the paratransit. there is another 30% of calls that come in that are never answered. and people finally hang up, because they can't get through. and it all gets back to this shortage of taxis and this demand. the gas and gate model we support for several reasons. obviously we have better

control. so in turn provide better service and it will provide more jobs. we have to -- for every cab put on the streets, you have got to put at least four drivers into service to service that cab. so it's going to be a good opportunity for more people to work. while at the same time, providing this good service to the city. so again, we're very supportive of this. it's been a long time coming. a lot of studies that we know being done. there was a study that we recently put together and actually been put together by a former city attorney phil ward, who i think is going to address you next and tell you about the study that we provided each of you a copy. thank you. >> thank you, mr. gillespie. next speaker, please. phil ward, john loewsar, kevin carroll. >> good afternoon, mr. ward. >> good afternoon, my name is philip ward. i'm an attorney for yellow cab

and luxor cab and have been involved as an attorney and advisory since 1989. in the report that supports this particular item, staff reached the conclusion based on various data that there was a significant unmet demand for taxi cab services in san francisco that cannot be met by the current size of the fleet. with my letter of august the 31st to the board and the director of transportation, we submitted additional data, current data from yellow cab and from luxor cab that independently updates supplements and coner firms the conclusions reached by staff in the report that supports this item. if anything, there is a huge unmet underestimated the size of the demand and if anything,

the current data through june of this year demonstrates that that demand is literally huge and there are more taxi cabs needed in san francisco than even staff has identified in its report. our data shows that telephone orders are not being met. they can't be processed. they are lost. our data shows that the hails on the streets aren't meeting my better result. one could reasonably estimate that 500 cabs would not be enough additional cabs to meet the demand that exists right now. in fact, the conclusions that we reached and the graphics supporting our letter supports the conclusion of an additional 700 cabs would not be enough to meet that current demand. under proposition a, transportation code section 1 11 5 and the city's first policy this board is mandated by law to meet the convenience

and necessity process in san francisco. it's about time that you do it now and we appreciate your attention to the matter. >> could i ask mr. ward one question? >> . >> mr. ward, could you just address very briefly the concern about workers' compensation? >> can't hear you. >> the question is about workers' compensation. all set? >> very good. >> the question -- one the comments raised earlier was about workers' compensation and i assume it's the case that under this program the color scheme would provide the workers' compensation's coverage for the cab. could you address that if would you like to? >> directors, i will confirm. as is mandated under the transportation code, as well as it has been for many, many years, yellow cab, luxor cab and the other full service color schemes are mandated to and do provide workers' compensation for all gate and gas drivers. and under the proposed plan by

staff, these will be gate and gas operated medallions. under a lease. >> very good. >> thank you. >> next speaker. >> good afternoon. here i come again, this has been since 2007s we have been screaming for taxi cabs at my company and full service companies. we have not basis point able to address our demand for over five years now, if not longer. we are maximum capacity with our system. we're putting up to 82 people a day in our taxi cabs and far exceeds the national average. creating the ability to provide the staff -- the metrics that provide the staff with the paratransit, provides a

reliable cab service chart. if you had item 7 on your chart that was sent to you, would tell you the districts by break buon of inadequate cab service. have you gotten a chance to look at that? we forwarded it to you. you can see the numbers are pretty crazy and these passengers that are calling two and three cab companies at one time are in competition with the smartphone apps or charging people credit card guarantees for pick up and it's causing extensive no-go that we call going there and nobody is there. our response time is 11 minutes, 48 seconds at normal time, but peak time hours it can really fall apart for us. our city shouldn't be treated this way. our residents of san francisco shouldn't be treated this way anymore. when we're maxed out and we have been this way for five years, how can you not think about giving you more cabs to put on the street? it's a

slam-dunk. i appreciate all of your abilitis to create this thing and the most important thing, this creates jobs for people. so thank you for your time. >> thank you, sir. >> kevin carroll; martin kosinskski. >> good afternoon, i am the executive director of the hotel council of san francisco. i also serve on the hotel transportation plan community advisory committee and i also am a resident of district 7 in san francisco. the hotel council is a non-profit member organization that represents over 70 hotels and 25,000 hotel rooms in san francisco. we have the pleasure of welcoming millions of visitors to our city every year. we strongly recommend the adoption of the resolution before you to expand the number of taxis up to 200 full-time taxis. the issue of lack of taxis is one of the biggest concerns of hotel industry and work we have done with our members. we have worked closely with the mta and applaud your efforts to

do more research to find out the true number of taxis that are needed. we have worked with your researcher and with the taxi companies to get this answer. when a major convention or an event is in town, it becomes even worse. we do have situations where there might be 40 or 50 people waiting for a taxi cab at one time and for hotels outside of the downtown corridor can get worse. hotel guests spend money and time out of the hotels and across san francisco. for every $300 spent in the hotel, $700 is spent outside in the city with taxi cabs, restaurants, attractions and tours. something like this that could help get more of our visitors out to be able to spend more time and money outside of the areas into more parts of our city will benefit us all. we ask your hope to help our

visitors, our taxi companies, businesses large and small and our residents of san francisco by approving this resolution to add more taxi medallions. thank you for your time. >> martin cosinskski. >> good afternoon, i'm a taxi driver driving for green cab. usually i drive in the mornings. it's amazing. it seems to me that they are working in different cities for whatever reason, because when i wock, work, i get up at 3:30 and pick up my cab by 4:30 and sometime issues wait for two hours for the first ride and

every permit is going to make me and people like me and other drivers make less money. and it's really hard to support the family on the income of full-time taxi drivers, around $35,000, $40,000 a year. i do support the peak-time permits, which you tried in single operating permit. i think you should issue more of those. they will be on the roads when needed. you know, just a general comment seems like you took 20-30 million dollars out of the industry and you haven't invested in that industry even

$1. not in working transitions for the driver and haven't approved any kind of service. i was part of the group in '95, which we supported the sharing of the dispatch data, which was greatly improved the cabs. you haven't picked that issue up and overall i'm extremely disappointed with your work. >> thank you next speaker. >> amy lawrence, followed by keith rasckin. >> good afternoon; >> ladies and gentlemen of the audience and commissioners, good afternoon. i am shocked at the speed of which you destroying the income of the average driver in san francisco. given medallions away nonstop, only to find out the story of the income of the san francisco taxi driver -- what does he actually make? do you have any idea? put it out more medallions is

fine, but san francisco has a logistics problem, and it's that gridlock and peak time that it takes place. why don't you stand around union square at 2:00 a.m. and watch hundreds of taxis centraling the city looking for income when there is no one around. you are going to add 200 cabs to that? between 2 and 6 there is no business at all. the cab firms know that, but they just collect fees. they talk a lot about service and shortages, but what you really have is income, bribes and kickbacks. most of the big firms in town i have worked for. you can't get a taxi until you pay $5 to $10 on top of regular fees. you don't talk about that, do you? you don't talk about the driver that can't pay his bills because for a given day he didn't make gate and gas. you talk about service. you talk about everything connected to the taxi industry. you hear attorneys coming up

and telling you you are short 500 cabs. that is all nonsense. you have a peak time problem that you can't control with your buses and you can't control them with the limousines, but you are going to control them with taxi cabs by putting 200 more on the streets. i will show you on the screen -- it shows in the past ten years the economic recovery has created more jobs at 7-14 dollar and hour. thank you for your time. >> next speaker, please. >> keith rasckin. [ applause ] [ reading speakers' names ]. >> good afternoon. >> good afternoon, my name is keith rasckin. so great transportation for a great city. thank you. i can believe in that. my platte