tv [untitled] June 5, 2013 1:00pm-1:31pm PDT
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>> garv, everyone, and welcome to the san francisco board of supervisors budget and finance committee meeting for wednesday, june 5th, 2013. my name is supervisor mark farrell, i will be chairing this committee. and i am joined by supervisor john avalos, supervisor london breed will be joining momentarily supervisor scott wiener and we are going to be missing supervisor eric mar who we will be excusing. i'd like to thank the members of sfgtv mark bunch and jeff as well as victor young. do you have any announcements? >> yes, please silence all cell
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phones and electronic deviceses. copies submitted to the file should be submitted to the clerk. items acted on today will be on the board of supervisors june lease termination agreement - downtown parking corporation - 833 mission street unless otherwise stated. >> okay, colleagues, before we call item number 1, can i have a motion to excuse supervisor mar who is absent for family reasons? motion by supervisor avalos, we can do so without opposition. [gavel] >> mr. clerk, can you please call items number 1 and 2 together, pleat? se? >> item number 1, resolution retroactively approving the feeder agreement between the city and county of san francisco and the bay area rapid transit district for payment for transfer trips, with a term from july 1, 2010, to june 30, 2020. ~ item number 2, resolution retroactively approving the special transit fare (fast pass) agreement between the city and county of san francisco and the bay area rapid transit district, with a term from january 1, 2010, to june 30, 2014. >> okay, thank you.
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administrator reiskin from the mta to present on this item. thank you for being back. >> thank you, good afternoon, chair farrell, members of the committee. ed reiskin, mta. i think this is our third time before this committee on these items dating back to 2011. because we've been here a number of times and talked through the specifics, i'll spare you those except to the extent you have questions. what i will say is that there are two different agreements before you. they're before you together at your request, but they're not really related. they have different reasons and histories and impetuses. but what they share is that they are both agreements that are good for transit riders, that they're good for regional transit coordination and collaboration which i think we all agree in a region that has dozens of transit agencies we need more of. they're good for the transit
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agencies. i've worked directly and personally with the bart general manager grace [speaker not understood] on these agreements to get them to the state they're in. and we both believe, and i know i've talked with steve hemingway, the executive director of the metropolitan transportation commission, and he also believes that these agreements are good for transit and the bay area, and certainly for muni. my board has approved these. we believe these are very good for muni. the feeder agreement is a payment that bart makes to muni to pay for the feeder service that we provide into the bart system. the budget and legislative analyst who did a great report on both of these, again, has -- we incorporated from previous recommendations. there's one additional recommendation here that has a 5% floor that both we
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and bart gladly accept that recommendation. and i believe the budget and legislative analyst also recommends approval with that change, with that amendment. the fast pass agreement, what that is is it basically is muni -- san francisco is buying capacity on the bart system for one with of our most heavily traveled corridors. it's really for the folks who live in districts 9 and 11 who are using transit to get from balboa park, glenn park, 24th street, 16th street, mission, those are the main beneficiaries, allow them to get into downtown and back for $10 on top of the cost of the monthly muni fast pass. so, it's a great service for the riders because for a modest cost, they get that unlimited bart service in san francisco. they get between those points faster than they would on the surface
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on muni. and it's great foremuni because anyone who rides along the mission corridor knows ~ many of our buses are at or beyond capacity. we're buying capacity on bart because we don't have it. for us to provide that capacity would certainly strain the resources that we have to manage the system. so, it's a good thing for us. it's a great thing for our riders. bart sees a benefit, too, because it fills some of their seats. although bart itself is beginning to have capacity challenges, particularly at montgomery and embarcadaro. so, we appreciate bart working with us on this to provide that capacity for our riders in san francisco. so, i would -- again, this is something that grace [speaker not understood] and i have personally put our time and attention to. we both strongly believe these are good agreements for both agencies. more importantly, for the riders of bart and muni.
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and i would, therefore, respectfully but strongly urge your support and recommending this to the full board of supervisors and i'd be happy to answer any questions that you might have. >> thank you, mr. reiskin. i know it's in here somewhere, but can you on an annual basis, how many bart rides do our muni fast past [speaker not understood] take? is it in these documents? 7 million, it likes, almost 8 million? >> yes, fiscal rider ship was 7.12 million. it's pretty significant. >> thanks. i want to thank you for also spending time with me to get educated on both these items. i know we continued it, it's been around for a while, the budget committee. i want to thank you and bart personnel as well for coming forward. colleagues, do we have any questions for mr. reiskin on this item? either of these items? sure.
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we might have some more questions at the end, but thank you very much, mr. reiskin. we have a budget analyst report from mr. rose. >> mr. chairman, members of the committee, on page 7 of the report, we point out that as shown in table 1, and that's on page 6, without the 5% annual cap on payment increases for the proposed feeder agreement, payments would increase approximately 6% annually and result in a total of 33.3 million in payments to bart to sfmta as an increase of $1,197,0 93 of the term of the proposed payment with the 5% cap in place. we believe the 5% cap is reasonable despite we would be getting the sfmta would be getting less money. but there is currently no floor
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on how much the annual payments by bart to sfmta could decrease over the 10 year term, so we believe it would be reasonable to include such a floor. and as i understand from what mr. reiskin stated, the department concurs with us on that point. on page 8 of our report, as shown in table 3, based on the estimated payments for both the proposed fast pass and feeder agreements, sfmta would pay an estimated 26.4 million in total net payments to bart from 10-11 through 13-14 which represents the overlapping time period of the proposed fast pass and feeder agreements. so, or recommendations are on page 9 ~ our ~ regarding file 12-188 6. we recommend that the do a medv the proposed resolution to require that the proposed feeder agreement be revised to include a floor of no more than 5% of
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decreases in payments from bart to the sfmta and we recommend that you approve the proposed resolution as a he'ded. and we simply point out on file 12 117, we consider that to be a policy matter for the board ~ for the reasons stated on page 9. we are not objecting to that legislation at all, but we consider it to be a policy for the board. >> thank you. colleagues, any questions for mr. rose? supervisor avalos? >> yes. yes, mr. rose, if you could say exactly why it's a policy matter, not you're recommending approval. is that because fares are based -- are actually -- there could be an increase to bart fares that will put us deeper, deeper behind or -- >> no. specifically, mr. chairman, members of the committee, supervisor avalos, we're stating that because -- in fact, we state this on page 9 of our report.
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because sfmta's 2011-12-inch correctthval revenues of 3 million 6 840, from the $10 additional fee from purchasing the fast pass with the bart option ~ are 5,5 84,545 less than sfmta's fiscal year 11-12 payment to bart of 9,193,384 under the fast pass agreement. ~ what we're simply pointing out because of that differential, we understand that that may be good policy, but because of that gap, we think it's a policy matter for the board. >> thank you. >> colleagues, any further questions for mr. rose? okay, any follow-up questions for mr. reiskin at this time? okay, seeing none, we'll open this up to public comment. if anybody wishes to publicly
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comment on this item, please step forward. i do have one speaker card. zachary malet. and if interester any other members of the public, please line up on the side over there. mr. malheth? good afternoon, committee members. ~ and members of the public. my name is sack ra malet. i'm the direct 7 director of the bay area rapid district. we represent visitacion valley, bayview hunters point, silver terrace, dogpatch, mission bay, and more. i'm basically here to comment to what's the budget and legislative committee or chairperson mentioned, not committee chairperson, sorry, analyst mentioned. and i believe it is bad policy cross subsidies. as ed reiskin pointed out the beneficiaries of this program i think i mentioned districts 9 and 11 in san francisco. only those who live and work or play within the bart corridor of san francisco. but 61% of the costs are
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generated from other muni riders. it creates this cross subsidy where a select few transit users benefit at the expense of so many more. and i'm not a fan of cross subsidies. and for that reason i'm inviting you to not approve this and to join me in what i'm doing with the bart board of re-looking at this. this is a program that has -- it's just a tradition. it's been a tradition since '83 and we've never taken a second look at whether or not this instrument is being used as it is intended to be used and designed to be used and who is subsidizing who. i strongly disagree that if people don't use this pass they're going to stop using bart and would suddenly cram muni services. in fact, an analysis that i did reveals otherwise. so, i respectfully suggest that due to the efficiencies, cross subsidies and the ongoing expense that you do
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not approve this and give direction to the mta to work with bart at reconsidering it. >> okay, thank you very much. are there any other memorandum biz wire of the public who wish to comment on this item? ~ members okay, seeing none public comment is closed. [gavel] >> mr. reiskin, just out of curiosity from your conversations, i know you've been working closely with bart. maybe you could talk a little about your conversations with them on this item, taking -- we do have a bart director here who just commented on it. >> yeah, i can just -- i can restate as recently as this morning i spoke with the bart general manager and she remains fully 100% supportive of this agreement. my understanding is that the president of the bart board who represents a good chunk of san francisco is fully supportive of these agreements. my understanding is i expect that the bart board as a body,
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notwithstanding individual different opinions, will also be supportive. as to the issue of, you know, who is subsidizing whom, or what the value of the agreement is or alternatives, we did do some looking at that with the bart staff. what would happen if we didn't have this agreement in place, what would the impacts be. there are different assumptions one could make about what would those people do and we looked at different scenarios, some would probably continue on bart as the director said. some would affect muni. some may leave transit, but those latter two would be bad for the city and for us, the people who are staying with bart would be paying a lot more to make their trip in from balboa and inward, which we also saw as not a good thing for transit generally. to put more strain on the muni system would have an impact to all muni riders, not just those in that
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area. so, likewise, i would argue that the beneficiaries of this agreement are all the users of the muni system. really, all san franciscans because these agreements are encouraging more people to use transit, to take advantage of the multiple transit systems to make the best choice for them, but to get them on transit, off the roads, which benefits everybody. >> okay, thank you. supervisor avalos? >> thank you. and i appreciate your work on -- your patience and getting our support and bringing in the budget analyst recommendation around the floor of the feeder agreement. the relationship between muni and bart is particularly important in my district and i would say in district 10 as well, visitacion valley. there are many people from the southern part of san francisco who are combined muni and bart users and really it's the fastest way to get to where most of the jobs are in san francisco, downtown, is to take bart.
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and, so, that agreement is really essential to make sure it's affordable for a lot of residents who are -- choose to be on our transit system and also who don't have much choices about it as well. and i think if we were to have a system that didn't quite work economically, it would have a major impact on a lot of low-income residents and these neighborhoods. so, i appreciate the work of negotiating and bringing something that i would be supportive of. >> supervisor wiener? >> i think i'll be supporting both items. and in terms of the fast pass agreement with bart, i think it's absolutely critical and, of course, you can always argue there will be a slightly better deal, but i think this is a pretty good deal for the city and for muni/bart riders. and it would be -- not to have
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that agreement i think would be just awful for transit riders in the city. and in addition, to supervisor avalos' district, the agreement is critical. in my district, both the residents in glenn park and residents of noe valley, particularly since the performance of the j [speaker not understood] is beyond acceptable. a lot of people who live beyond the jay-church line in noe valley would rather walk 3, 4, 5 blocks to 24th street or glenn park bart station where they can actually get reliable service. so, it's important to a lot of different parts of the city. >> okay, thank you. if there are no other comments, colleagues, mr. reiskin, thank you for being here again and walking that through with us. colleagues, we have for item number 1, let's take them one at a time. we have some proposed amendments from mr. rose's office that mr.
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reiskin is in agreement with. can i have a motion to accept those amendments? so moved. we can do so without opposition. [gavel] >> the underlying item number 1 as amended, can we accept that without opposition? so moved. [gavel] >> as for item number 2, is there a motion to accept? item number 2? we can do so without opposition. [gavel] >> okay. mr. clerk, can you please call item number 3? >> item number 3, ordinance appropriating $55,064,799 of proceeds from san francisco public utilities commission water revenue bonds to fund the water system improvement program calaveras dam project and re-appropriating $77,271,241 of wsip project appropriations to various wsip projects consistent with the revised april 2013 wsip program budget adopted by the sfpuc. a okay, thank you very much. we have puc here to speak on thev item. >> my neighborv is emilio cusp, infrastructure for the public utilities commission. i'm also here with our chief
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financial officer, todd [speaker not understood]. we had originally not intended on making a presentation, but we thought maybe a status of the program would help give perspective to the item before you today. under the leadership of our general manager, mr. harlan kelly and the implementation of staff led by program detector julie la bon tee, the program today is 72% complete with 61 of 82 specific projects completed with construction. we are six months past our overall peak anticipated person hours of 206,000 per year, and we only have three projects left in pre-construction. so, we are definitely at the tail end of the project, having made major progress on our system wide plan. we have had major scope changes on two projects, the calaveras dam replacement project and the alameda creek recapture project. our revised program completion as a result of these changes have increased the schedule by 8 months to april o
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