>> chair borden: i like to call to order this april 5, 2022 regular meeting of the sfmta meeting. >> clerk: this meeting is held in hybrid format at city hall room 400 broadcast live on sfgov tv and by calling in (415)655-0001 access code, 2481 190, 3739. i like to remind all individuals that the health and safety protocols must be adhered to at all times. this includes wearing your mask over your mouth and nose while you're inside the chambers. failure to adhere my result in the removal of the room. there will be abopportunity for

general public comment during item 9 of the meeting and opportunities to comment on each discussion or action item on the agenda. each comment is limited to two minutes unless otherwise noted by the chair. public comment will be taken both in-person and remotely. the board will take public comment from those attending the meeting in person and by those attending remotely. number to call is (415)655-0001. access code, 2481 190 3739. please note that city policy along with federal and state and local law prohibit discriminatory comments. we thank you for joining us. we'll proceed with the roll call. item number 2, roll call. [ roll call ]

we are expecting director cajina shortly. chair borden will not be here today. all votes will be taken by roll call. item number 3, announcement of prohibition of sound producing devices during the meeting the ringing and use of cell phone and electronic devices prohibited at this meeting. the chair may order the removal from the room item number 4, approval of minutes for the march 10, special meeting and the march 15 regular meeting.

>> vice chair eaken: i like to ask for any public comment on the minutes first for those attending the meeting in person? is there any public comment on the minute? >> clerk: i have no speaker cards. >> vice chair eaken: we can open up for public comment for those calling in remotely. members of the public should dial star 3 to join the speaker line. >> clerk: i see no hands raised. sorry, one hand raised. speaker, your line is unmuted. >> caller: hello. [ indiscernible ] >> vice chair eaken: not yet on the taxi item. we are currently discussing

minutes from the previous meeting. >> caller: okay, i'm sorry. >> vice chair eaken: that's item 11. >> caller: sorry about that. >> vice chair eaken: any other commenters on the phone? >> clerk: no additional speakers at this time. >> vice chair eaken: directors do i have a motion? >> so moved. >> seconded. >> vice chair eaken: take a vote. >> clerk: on the motion to approve the minutes. [roll call vote] >> director hinze: are we doing both set of minutes? >> clerk: yes. [roll call vote] minutes are approved unanimously. next item 5 communication. i have one ripedder for our directors. we are going to use the monitors situated in front you. when you have a question or

would like to comment, please select the requested speak button on your monitor. beyond that, we can move on to item number 6. introduction of new or unfinished business by board members. >> vice chair eaken: do we have any new or unfinished business? director yekutiel? >> director yekutiel: i want to update the board of city wide tour of all the merchant association. i like to talk about issues related to small business and commercial corridors. i want to thank staff. i know i've been sending e-mails and questions to help small businesses as we can on the agency side and staff has been very responsive and helpful. let people though that's a 37%

vacancy rate in the union square. they are dealing with historic set of issues. i want to thank the entire agency that helped them out. appreciate it. >> vice chair eaken: thank you director yekutiel. i enjoyed hearing your updates about how you're getting out in the community. any other comments from board members? director hinze? director hinze, did you want to comment? >> director hinze: i will say i know we've been getting a lot of requests on the j church site se and how that's been going. if we can get a report back on that, that will be great. it's been couple of months now.

>> vice chair eaken: director tumlin? >> director tumlin: we are eager to do so. we'll soon have facing documents. we'll be reporting back to you regularly. >> vice chair eaken: thank you so much. if there are no other items of new or unfinished business. i will open for public comment. those in the room on the new or unfinished business item. >> clerk: i have no speaker cards. >> vice chair eaken: let's open the phone for any comments on the new or unfinished business. >> clerk: i see no hands virtually. >> vice chair eaken: we'll close public comment. next item. >> clerk: item 7, the director's report. >> director tumlin: thank you everyone. i am very happy to be back here in person in part because it allows us the opportunity to recognize some of the hardest working people in the agency here and in person.

i'm very glad to introduce laurie freeland who will introduce our guests today. the department of operation center, has been helping to get the agency through the covid pandemic since the very beginning of the pandemic. they have led all of our work to protect our workforce and to protect the health and safety of our passengers while dealing with new and unprecedented changes that were being thrown at us. in the work of department of operations center has been ongoing well past the toughest days back in march two years ago. in fact, just so you know, the omicron variant hit the agency hard. in the two-month period, we had

571 covid positive cases which was half of our total covid cases over the entire 26 months of the pandemic. this required immense amount of work both at our department of operations center in order to help people figure out what to do. we had to fully reconvene our d.o.c., calling people back in service for the intense work supporting our staff and reducing transmission during the omicron variant. the covid hotline team answered a dozens of daily calls from staff reporting positive status, dealing with questions about the positive cases in their families as well as dealing with school closures due to the surge. this team worked overtime for week after week routinely working more than 80 hour weeks just to keep up with the omicron variant while prioritizing the

needs of staff, identifying close contacts and minimizing the spread. the first team that we like to recognize is the covid hotline team which includes -- would like to bring folks up? >> hello, everyone. thank you director -- tumlin and members of the board. i'm honored to accept that recognition but not only d.o.c. but the human resources team who supported sfmta through this winter. as director tumlin mentioned, we had over thousand cases of covid positive cases throughout the

agency. unfortunately we lost four staff members due to covid. over the past two years, those five weeks, we went double over the amount of positivity we had. we can comparely keep up. in terms of responding to hotlines and answering peoples calls. you would get a lot of people whoer just -- who were scared in general. for us to set up the hotline and answer calls, respond to questions and direct them where they need to go. it was special to all of us. with that came the multiple cases at divisions. we had stand up multiple testing for multiple divisions. just so ensure that the safety

all staff. to ensure that everyone was working in a safe environment. with that, i'm so grateful to not only this whole team but our day job families who had to pick up the slack from when we were doing this but also our own families who many nights we were just so busy, we couldn't be with them. for all those people, i'm fully grateful for that. i can't stand up here without acknowledging the work not only this team but everyone. even all the essential workers who just kept coming through, working every day, delivering service. all our dfw staff who had been assigned to other part of the city family to assist. without that, we could not have -- gotten through the surge.

i thank everyone. [ applause ] >> director tumlin: in addition to our main department operation center, our human resources division also used their own staff to make hundreds and hundreds of calls and other communications each week to close contacts to people who had confirmed covid positive cases, the staff were in quarantine situations. they made sure everyone had the information they needed and helped staff through the process of returning back to work once it was safe to do so. we like to thank that team and key members.

all of the folks who dealt with p.p.e. distribution across the city. thank you all for helping us get through the pandemic. i'm not sure how many rest of the team is here. we have certificates for you. >> hello directors. i'm the lone representative from h.r. i want to thank the d.o.c. team who i feel like we spoke to every day, every weekend. all the names that you listed from h.r., i wish they could all be here. they were pulling double duty in

the day job. we couldn't have done it as efficiently. it was incredible teamwork across the agency as well as m.t.a. thank you. >> director tumlin: i spent most of my career in the private sector. i never had as hard working colleague as i do here at sfmta. i'm so proud to be working in support of this team. moving on to other topics. we have our vision zero report. as many of you heard on march 10th there was a pedestrian struck by a vehicle at chestnut and fillmore who suffered life-threatening injuries and died seven days later. in the case of this crash, speeding was not a factor. in addition, the new fillmore speed limit signs 20 miles an hour, were completed in march on south of chestnut. speed limit proposal is pending for the rest of chestnut street

and west of fillmore. in addition, we will be upgrading the signals with leading pedestrian intervals, probably within a month. this is an intersection routinely staffed with two crossing guard that has been modified to shorten the pedestrian crossing distances. on march 20th there was a motorcyclist fatality and hit-and-run. the quick build improvements and development on bay shore from industrial to oakdale are expected to begin construction in late 2022. additional safety improvements including protective bike lanes and access management are being considered. finally, just an update on the jones street quick build project. we opened open house that will

include the proposed quick build design options. staff will be at the april 10th sunday streets event on goldengate. i will be there. next up some interesting budget updates. governor newsom proposed a package to help fuel cost and inflation. there's a $750 million package that has been targeted to support incentive grants to transit and rail agencies to provide free transit for californians for three months. the exact process for access these funds are not yet clear. based upon information from the metropolitan transportation commission, the state department of finance and the california transit administration, it appears that the newsom

administration is open to providing some flexibility in house these incentive grants are used. rather than simply being allocated to 100% free transit for three month, we might be able to collaborate with other operators in region and come up with a common universal regional program that might offer more targeted incentives for longer period of time or even potentially help us to implement some of the fair policy recommendations that are going through the fair integration task force at the regional level. more information on that later. we're cautiously optimistic that we might be able to put together a robust program that addresses our primary goals coming out of the task force as well as our regional efforts to elevate transit ridership throughout the nine counties.

couple other events coming up that i wanted to make sure that you were aware of. secretary silva, if you can bring up the slides. as you recall, just before covid, we had what was then called infrastructure week in which we shut down the subway fairly early in the evening in order to do a period of extended maintenance in order to really start upgrading our infrastructure on the subway. it was very successful. now that we're starting to stabilize towards the tail end of the pandemic, we are eager to get moving with that program again. what we're proposing is a quarterly muni metro maintenance closure where we would shut down the subway around 9:30 in the evening and reopen it 5:00 a.m. on weekdays and 8:00 a.m. on weekends. it gives us about maintenance window that is nearly five times

longer than we normally have. allowing us to get a lot more work done. we like to do this every quarter. our next plan evening shutdown, meaning 9:30 p.m. will be april 14th through april 24th. we will be targeting bunch of improvements to the track system, the signal system, the fire and life safety systems. on to the next slides. most of you almost all of you came out on friday.

director eaken did not. we had little event on friday. reopening van ness and opening up the van ness busway. it was a wildly successful event for opening that was long overdue. here is 1906, just after 1906, van ness streetcars with city hall there in the background. van ness, of course, has a long history of being one of the widest in it city with occasionally grand visions for how it was to be designed including specialized lighting and various efforts to upgrade the landscaping. as the street evolved over the centuries, the underground infrastructure did not keep up with that. of course, our van ness busway project was about 15% busway and

about 85% digging up 19th century infrastructure that was completely incorrectly mapped and that required lot more disruption to residents and business owners. we are so grateful to have finally gotten to ribbon cutting last week. seems to be operating smoothly. we'll continue to tinker with the signal timing in order to maximize the amount of green time the buses get. i think we may have underestimated the ridership response. we'll be making some adjustments. next up you have been continually asking us about hiring. we've got about 1000 vacancies throughout the agency. the vacancies are the primary obstacle that we face for

restoring pre-covid services. we have 331 vacant transit operator positions. we are filling operator training classes just as quickly as we can. the current march class is filled with 44 new operators. while transit agencies around the country are experiencing severe recruitment challenges for new operators, we are doing better than our peers but we are still struggling. we are working together with other city agencies on a variety of hiring events. today, again on march 20th, our human resources team will be recruiting for new transit operators for full-time and part-time at our agency headquarters at one south van ness on the sixth floor.

if you interested all you need is to bring your regular driver's license, your covid vaccination proof and limited other information. if you search on our website for sfmta jobs transit operator, there's a whole page how to become a transit operator at muni. we'll be joining a resource fair for people of all backgrounds and all jobs within agency on april 23rd from 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. at the civic center plaza. please see our website for more information. another event that i'm particularly excited about is the resumption of sunday streets in collaboration with the city. there are six neighborhood events from april 10th through september starting with the tenderloin on april 10th. the tenderloin always puts on a great sunday streets event. i been to every single one. bay view is may 22nd, mission

valencia july 10th, and western edition september 18th. this program has been running since 2018 and was -- 2008. we partnered with liveable city and shape up san francisco coalition with additional resource support from whole array of other departments who take advantage of the crowds that sunday streets bring in order to give out public information, recruit for people working there and so on. we're very excited that is continuing as well as a second annual event which is scheduled for on the -- for october 16th. there are sidewalk sales, 11 outdoor family fun hubs, 15 neighborhood hosted block parties and dozens of community event. google, san francisco day, if

you're interested in signing up your own neighborhood for a special event -- that was fantastic last year. great way to mark the transition point in the pandemic and i hope san francisco continues forever. finally, i wanted to announce that the bike and roll to school week is going to be april 18th through the 22nd. it's an annual event led by our program partner, san francisco bike coalition. this year's medial highlight school is monroe element school in excelsior. it's also this year being coordinated with bike bus events that are occurring regularly now on page slow street and lake

slow sleet as well as sanchez slow streets where groups of parents organize themselves to get groups of kids to ride together on san francisco's growing slow street network in order for kids get to school safely. that's the end of my report. thank you so much. >> vice chair eaken: okay. thank you director tumlin. if you like to ask any questions, please go ahead and request to speak. i will just say on behalf of the board, first thank you for creating staff recognition opportunity. it's always nice to pick our heads up and recognize the hard work and just to say thank you to the d.o.c. staff, h.r. staff and on site testing staff. just huge gratitude for all the overtime, to their families and supporting them through all the overtime. all the long weeks and all the sacrifices. it's truly an inspiration.

director heminger? >> director heminger: in addition to the governor's proposal, there's a bill in sacramento, i believe, that would affect the bay area and prospects some kind of transit. it strikes me there's a lot of meat on the bone of transit fares. we really haven't talked about it comprehensively as a subject. we sort of barge into it during budget discussions. i know our budget, at least the budget you're proposing to us today, essentially, leaves the fares alone for a while. i wonder whether that gives us an opportunity to have that explicit conversation about our fare structure. before the pandemic, we were

making $200 million a year revenue on fares and we're down to how long. -- to 100. we're hoping that come back with passenger. i worry we're sleep walking to transit for everybody for free without ever having a debate about whether that's a good idea or ought to be our north star. i wanted you to expand just for a minute or so, on that question and respond to the request i would make that we take advantage of this sort of lull on changing transit fare policy and look at the whole policy a to z. >> director tumlin: that's a very good question. one that we've been talking about a lot internally over the last year. one of the strange factors of the amount of federal relief funding that we have been given, is that it buys us precisely two years in order to figure out

what is the sustainable financial future of the agency. something that need to be decided after the november 2024 election. i'm hoping to have that conversation with all of you and with the public over the next two years so we know exactly what it is that we need to get on the ballot in november of 2024. we're certainly open to all possibilities. our goal is that the agency have stable ongoing operating funds that rise every year with our expenses. rise with the rising cost of labor which is necessary to accommodate because of the rapidly rising cost of living in the bay area. our challenge since the beginning of the agency is that we're constantly scrambling in order to get the resources that we need in order to sustain the service.

that most of the revenue sources that we have either decline in value over time, like our parking revenue, or hold flat as our expenses rise. i really want to try to solve that problem once and for all as well as closing our deferred maintenance structural deficit. historically fares have been one of the few showers of revenue that actually does rise and fall with the economy. but, it is also a kind of revenue that creates its own obstacle for additional people using transit. we need to be very open minded about what other ways might there be in order to fund this agency and to achieve our larger equity climate and economic recovery goals. >> vice chair eaken: any other questions?

director hinze? >> director hinze: first of all, thank you to all the folks who helped us make the contact tracing happen. you played a vital role in terms of helping us keep the agency rolling. i want to acknowledge that -- i recognize some of the names you read out -- [ indiscernible ] i too was very interested to see governor newsom's -- as it relateds to gas and rebates. i'm curious --

[ indiscernible ] >> director tumlin: we think there's a chance for us to help shape what revise look like. we're collaborating with other regional operators in order to help shape that. >> director hinze: maybe in the next month or so -- thank you for your continued enthusiasm for sunday streets.

[ indiscernible ] >> vice chair eaken: thank you director hinze. i'm not seeing any other comments or questions from my colleagues. i have two very quickly related to one to the governor's announcement about the supplement for transit funding in addition to full rebates for

transit. do we believe we can use those for some of the discounts that we're looking at through our budget item later today? >> director tumlin: we're checking to see what the governor office is open to. then we'll be having a larger conversation. for example, we could theoretically direct that money towards dramatic expansion to the lifeline program as well as increasing the income threshold is that lower income people can enjoy free or deeply discounted transit over a longer period of time. we might be able to use some of the funding to deal with some of the transfer issues that some of our lowest income riders who are coming from more affordable housing farther away that they face. these are questions that we're posing and we don't know what direction the region wants to take yet nor what the governor's office is interested in.

>> vice chair eaken: on van ness, that was a fun history lesson. we love that. just a question in terms of the larger land use and transportation context. is fair to say that some of the upgrades will support future growth along the van ness corridor and support future proof in that corridor? >> director tumlin: what we're trying to do with our street changes is redesign the streets so they can move more people. that busway can theoretically move ten times as many people per hour as the adjacent general purpose mixed lanes. what this does, it accommodates future growth everywhere in san francisco including in the region, van ness meaning the regional corridor by prioritizing movement of people rather than movement of vehicles. >> vice chair eaken: okay. let's open to public comment on

the director's report for anyone in the room here with us today. any speaker cards? >> clerk: no peek cards. >> vice chair eaken: let's open for member on the phone. please dial star 3 if you like to join the speaker line. >> clerk: i have three callers in the queue. first speaker please. >> caller: the director's report was all over the place. he needs to follow an acronym called k.i.s.s. keep it simple stupid. we want the transportation operations in the city and county of san francisco to have a standard. in the last five years, we have

no standards. the reports come out about your workforce that don't have sufficient attrition. can you train them within your system or are you seeking to get people outside the system? you will not get it? we must remember the van ness corridor is a state highway. it never mentioned so we have some perspective. in trying to address one thing, many businesses had to close down and suffer.

no restitution was given to the businesses. we need more action. more goals -- long-term goals. thank you very much. >> clerk: next caller. >> caller: this is herbert. actually, the van ness project is incomplete. you haven't restored the 47 line, which is a very important one applause it travels in front of the hall of justice. jurors have to arrive in a timely fashion for trial. the second thing is i know there are no travel panels announcing the arrival of the 49.

this is an incomplete project. it hasn't been finished. we desperately need to have these aspects addressed. please restore the 47 and please institute arrival times on the panels. thank you very much. >> clerk: next caller? >> caller: thank you, again. i always enjoy jeff's report. as far as this transit funding goes, i would like to see us be able to use this money to sustain discounted transit for longer period of time.

i think we should have some flexibility and develop some regional program. i travel regionally. i sometimes use three or four systems in a day. we have to make our case to the governor for something long-term that will keep our fares frozen. i'm forward to us doing more work fixing the subway. i'm okay with closing the subway early. i don't want us to go back to closing the subway totally. we want to keep that going. i'm going to be on the 16 soon. may be i'll get a chance to ride that van ness bus system. i've been waiting for that for a long time. van ness is one of my more popular routes for me. i'll get to see what that looks like. how can we get people to work

for you? i can make that case which i believe is reasonable for a person to make a good lifelong career at muni. how we satisfy the objections people might have for that? we need lot of people. lot of work to be done. i ask that you get out there and get the people in it driver seats so that way muni will be there. thank you. >> clerk: thank you. there are no other additional callers. >> vice chair eaken: thank you. we'll close public comment on item 7. next item. >> clerk: item 8, the citizen's advisory council report. i don't see chair chen in the room. we can move on. item 9, public comment. members of the public you may

address the board of directors on matters within the board's jurisdiction and not on toe's calendar. i have two speaker cards. if you're here, make your way up to the lectern. >> caller: over the last 20 years, over the next 20 years, 40% of new san francisco population will be over 65. i believe we all want to see a large versatile taxi industry. a.d.a. compliant and able to carry wheelchairs. i like to bring to your attention assembly bill vote ab5 passed last year.

it made taxi drivers employees among other independent workers. some employees managed to get raises but not taxi drivers. if the m.t.a. does not lobby successfully to get waivers, it will be the end of most taxi drivers in san francisco. taxi companies and the holders do not have the income to pay for benefits. i must remind you that taxi medallions are owned by the city and the city may have to pay for all these benefits. thank you. >> vice chair eaken: do we have another in-person speaker? please go ahead.

>> caller: good afternoon board of directors. it's great to be back here in the hollowed halls. it's good that you are looking happy and healthy today. long time taxi driver here. 17 years. there's couple of things that are not on today's agenda that i want to talk about. one is my buddy ahmad who got attacked in his cab. i don't know if you guy saw the news, abc 7. if you go to google or go to youtube it's the first thing that comes up. i think we need to make it -- [ indiscernible ] if you guys watch in the video, put yourself in the driver shoes. the guy pulls him out the car and starts beating him in the

street. less make it a felony to attack taxi drivers. let's work together. our lives are livelihoods are on the line. sometimes we take chances who we pick up just to make a living. that's one thing that's been on the agenda. i want to talk about another issue. drivers not getting paid by the fly bill app. fly bill app owes thousands and thousands of dollars to hundreds and hundreds of drivers. it's become abongoing issue since before the pandemic. i like to ask them how this happened? do you charge the customer money for the fare? you take 13% and the drivers don't get paid. board of directors, i hate to be combative, i like to ask you how you allow it to happen? thank you very much.

>> vice chair eaken: i don't believe we have further in-person speakers. we can open up the phone line. anybody can press star 3 if you like to ask general public comment on items not on the agenda today. >> clerk: we have four callers. >> caller: good afternoon. i'm calling on behalf of the leadership and membership of local 38 representing unions here in san francisco. today we call in support of the agenda item 10.5 on the consent calendar. we fully believe that the city wide -- [ indiscernible ] we're asking that you extend the muni bond today. these agreements are a model proven to work for workers, for the community, the industry and the taxpayers. please support 10.5 today.

thank you. >> vice chair eaken: thank you caller. just a reminder, at this moment, we're asking for public comment on items that are not on the agenda that item was 10.5 that's on our consent which we'll take up right after item 9. next caller please. >> caller: once again, i want to remind you that at one time we had the taxi commission. present governor gavin newsom was on the taxi commission. it was abolished. the taxi operations came under the m.t.a. some of you all, most of all, know that many of our taxi

drivers are suffering because of injustice done to them. we need to be fair to our taxi drivers, those that you harmed. medallions may not be much today, maybe nothing at all. as commissioners, in san francisco, you should have empathy. many taxi drivers are dying. some of have gotten a stroke. you need to do a needs assessment of the taxi drivers. thank you.

>> clerk: next caller. >> caller: good afternoon. this is barry toronto. i first want to do a shout out to stephanie cajinator getting these out. i'm hoping that the parking control officers will be diligent in keeping it clear. we will be serving the ballpark considering that uber and lyft do search pricing. we do not do search pricing. we go by the meter. we do have apps. with also the basketball

players, it's going to be very busy down there in that area. hoping to get cooperation from the m.t.a. in that area as well. that will be really appreciative. thank you very much. >> clerk: next caller. >> caller: thank you again. i'm speaking generally here. inmentioned -- i mentioned to you, i don't know if you know this, i, u.s. army veteran. i ask that you not forget about those of us who are reduced fare customers. we pay less but our service should be just as much. the reason why i have reduced

fare is because my service related disability is greater than 50%. which therefore, gets me a reduced fare card. it's not easy being a veteran in the bay area. it's not easy being a person who does not the definition. i'm a person just as much. i want to be able to enjoy fully just as anybody else does and the way that i do that is by paying my fare and following the rules of conduct. i hope that should be enough. i'm concerned there's some who may try to marginalize people like myself from the system because we are different.

i'm following -- i think following the rules should be enough. i'm going to be back in california soon and i think i am going to ride muni during my time. muni is very important to me. i ask that the system remember all of us and we can enjoy the system equally whether we pay full fare or reduced fare. thank you. >> clerk: next caller. >> caller: i -- i'm not representing them now -- i'm a disabled person. the office i work at has a zone in front. we have huge amount of construction around us and it's been going on for years.

i like to suggest that may be you consider creating a new type of stopping area like a paratransit loading zone that construction workers cannot park in. they put their construction vehicles in front of our office and leave them there overnight. we can't get in our office. it's terrible. they have the right to park in a white zone, passenger zone. it will be nice if you can come up a new may be a passenger zone with blue stripes that's for disabled people. that's all, thank you. >> vice chair eaken: thank you for your comments. i believe that's our public comment. we'll close public comment on item 9. i believe mr. chen has joined us. we skipped over item 8. if you like to give the code

advisory committee report now, we can go back to item 8 and invite your report. thank you chair chen. >> good afternoon. we have one item for you. it should be in your packet. thank you to staff, secretary silva for including that. it's a comment on the budget which you will see on item 13b, consolidated budget. as opposed to other times in the past where the c.a.c. passed multiple resolutions for the directors to consider. instead this year we did a consolidated resolution that reflected the priorities of the council as a whole.

they are in two categories. the first category delivering safe quality service to bring riders back to the system to implement the 2022 restoration plan for service as quickly as possible to expand service sufficiency through the transit lane project to enhance any speed liability. increasing ridership such as free muni for youth. implement a fare policy that keeps fares low and includes a fare capping pilot. section b is about sustainability and reliability. which is a subject for the council and also for the board of directors. making sure that the agency is not as dependent on one time

cash infusion including additional tax revenue. prioritizing the one-time relief funds federal relief funds towards the backlogs and moving fully realized state of good repair. accelerating delivery refuse next generation computer information and replacements to train control systems. making sure that agency continues on its maintenance and not increasing its maintenance backlog so that service can be delivered reliably. promoting safe streets and implementing a fee structure that provides revenue while considering the person's ability to pay. that's a big omnibus. i'm available for questions. >> vice chair eaken: thank you so much. do we have any questions or comments for chair chen? thank you very much. lot of these recommendations

look quite sound. i think you will have a lot of support from this board and the staff for lot of this. i have one question for you more generally about code advisory on advisory committee. >> historically it's been up to the chair and the secretary of the committee to make request from staff about who's available and because we also meet only monthly that also narrows the scope of things that we can work on. starting around this year and last year, we have made efforts with the secretary of the board and the also secretary of the --c.a.c. to coordinate the schedules so it can be useful

for the board's consideration. [please stand by]

>> deliver quality time on time and on budget while providing career opportunities to residents. it's a model that works for workers, communities and the taxpayer . thankyou for your support on item10.5 . >> thank you very much . if we have any further colors on item 8 which is the cac report." that comment on item 8 and move on to our consent calendar. >> item 10 of the consent calendar, these items are considered to be received and acted upon by a single vote unless a member wishes to

consider an item separately . if you wish to address the board on a consent item andyour joining us remotely you can press start three you can be added to the queue and when speaking please identify which item number you are speaking to . item 10.1, requesting the controller to unlock funds and draw warrants against such funds available or will be available in payment of the following claims against the sfmta. those items are listed as a through g. 10.2, approving various routine parking and traffic modifications and making environmental review of findings, items a through l. item 10.3, adopting a resolution making findings pursuant to ab 361 to allow for continued remote meetings due to the covid pandemic. 10.4, approving three contracts or as needed consulting services for public outreach and engagement withedge consulting ,davis and associates communications , contract number sfmta 20 2225

and cats and associates and inter-ethnic, joint venture, contractnumber sfmta 2022 26 . each not to exceed $3,000,025 and a term of five years. 10.5, authorizing the trade council to extend the citywide project labor agreement to cover public work or improvement projects on the by muni and street safety bond measure if voters approve the measure in the election on june 7, 2022 and item 10.6, authorizing the director to execute a memorandum of understanding between the sfmta and san francisco public works for the jurisdictional transfer of portions of michigan street in exchange for accessand use of the 11 sfmta operator

restrooms for a period of eigh years effectivejuly 1, 2021. that concludes our calendar . >> board members who would like to see, director yekutiel .>> i would like to recuse on item 10.1 . >> okay, great so we consider that to be severed. is that correct?and other comments from board memberson the rest of the consent calendar ? okay, we will now open it up to public comments on the remaining consent items except 10.4. anyone in the room would like to speak? >> i have no speaker cards. >> let's go to the phone. >> we have seven colors on the frontline, let's take the first caller . >> speaker: goodafternoon, sfmta born in chair. associated buildings on contractors , we've got over 800 apprentices in our trades and oversee the california

association and i'm calling to ask you to not extend the project labor agreement for the sfmta muni bond. the labor agreement states sfmta is not covered so what i've been hearing from them on the phone is you have assorted drivers and you are worried about the sustainability of your organization. recently there was a bid for a fulldistrict on the 18th region and we the rebid came in at $10 million over the estimate . you're not going to get the pricing and allow apprentices to live in the city to be able to work on your projects and you can also look at the data with the humanrelationship with city build improvement and look at how that's been going and look at statistics before you move into that agreement. thank you for your time .>> thank you, next speaker. >> speaker: good afternoon

commissioners, my name is danny campbell and unlike the previous color i represent 13,000 sheet metal workers, local 4 union. i'm calling to respectfully ask your support to extend the existing city project labor agreement to the proposed muni bond that's going to be going to the voters. the city poa and fsc pla as well as san francisco international airport pla have delivered quality work on time and on budget while providing meaningful career opportunities to san francisco residents . the tla's help the city and our agency me higher objectives and offers workers a path to the middle class with families sustaining wages and safe working conditions.a model that works for workers , our community, our industry and most importantly the taxpayers of san francisco.

thanksfor your support, item 10.5 today . >> thank you, nextspeaker . >> good afternoon director and staff.my name is greg hardeman and i represent the men and women that build, maintain and fix the elevators and escalators in northern california and san francisco and i'm calling today to respectfully ask for your support to extend the existing city project labor agreement to the proposed muni bond going to voters. the pla and the sf puc have delivered quality work ontime and on budget while performing meaningful careeropportunities to residents . it's all model that works for workers,community industry and taxpayers and i look for your support on item 10 . thank you very much . >> next speaker.

>> speaker: good afternoon, this is john doherty with local 6 calling in supplied support of item 10.5,extending the citywide pla to themta bond. we urge your support for local workers and local apprenticeship , thank you . >> next speaker. >> speaker: this is very toronto again.no real objectives to the consent calendar except 10.6 has 11 restrooms. is there any way the taxi drivers couldhave access to these restrooms ? it's right by a nightclub so it would be convenient for the cabdrivers to stop there and use the restrooms rather than deal with some of the issues in trying to find bathrooms in th tenderloin which is not safe

for a cab driver to get out of the vehicle over there . pleaseconsider access to these restrooms for taxi drivers. thank you . >> next speaker. >> speaker: [inaudible] this is eric kristin with thecoalition for fair employment and construction, a statewide organization formed 23 years ago to oppose discriminatory and wasteful project labor hearings . i want to identify quickly the orwellian language that's used to justify discrimination that you're supporting today. goal numberone, identify reduce and produce disproportionate outcomes or past arms towards marginalized communities . that's the exact opposite of what a project labor agreement does . 70 percent of the workforce and 87percent of california chooses to work wake up on a daily basis andgo to work in the union free environments .

that's what the markets determined, that's how these workers want to work . your labor agreement which forces nonunion contractors to use their own workers all the restrooms have to be unionized with a couple that are used have to pay union health pension plans . that's wasteful so apparently that'sthe progressive value now is waste to the workers that would otherwise stay in their pockets and nonunion apprentices are not allowed to work at all . that's what your project labor agreement does. when you talk about equity and your goals you talkabout helping to reduce outcomes and reduce past arms towards marginalized communities . the majority ofminority business enterprises, women business enterprises and disabled business enterprises in san francisco like the rest of the country are nonunion . their nonunionized . especially smaller companies just starting out. your project makes it almost

impossible for them to get work. san francisco managed to build itself for decades without a project labor agreement until a couple of years ago when big labor special interests pushed one through.don't kid yourselves and pretend you're doing anything other than placating the demands of big labor interest you're not doing anything for the communities that are being disproportionately hurt right now by the pandemic and by this project labor agreements, thank you . >> next color. >> speaker: john corso again calling in on behalf of local 38, union plumbersand steam fibers in the city. once again calling in in support of the agenda item 10.5 on the consent calendar . we're respectfully asking that you extend the citywide pla to cover the bond. citywide project labor agreement works. it gets the men and women paid a good wage apprenticeship hours, all the

things we need . so we ask you respectfully to extend the citywide pla and to cover this bond. >> we will take our last color. speaker, go ahead. >> speaker: my name is sam robbins with operating engineers and i'm urge you guys to support the 10.5 measure. we have lots of apprentices and the city and pla and sf puc have delivered qualitywork on time and on budget while providingmeaningful career opportunities to residents . it's a model that works for workers, humidity and industry . thanksfor your support on item

10.5 . >> thank you, no additional speakers online . >> thatwill close our public comment on the consent calendar minus item 10.4 . i'll ask my colleagues if anybody has any items they wish to discuss further except 10.4 or any items raised during public comment you'd like to ask staff for any follow-up on . so seeing one. okay, great we have a motion in the second . please call therole. >> on the motion to approve the consent calendar with item 10.4 severed , [roll call vote] thank you, the consent calendar is approved. >> chair: we will then take up item 10.4. any board discussion on this item ? director lai. >> thank you chair eaken.

the staff wants to make any presentations , thank you. >> directors, vacations, marketing and outreach directo . i have someadditional staff behind me to answer any questions you might have . >> great, i'll start then. thank you. so i wanted to inquire for a little bit about the cultural competency requests of these contracts. that is i think a widely acknowledged challenge that sfmta has withtheir outreach. i certainly understand we have such limited in-house resources . we don't have enough on our staff in-house and we do need a lien on external slopes

especially because of the increasing demand on outreach that even us as the board continues to ask of staff. this really isn't line item to question the need but just wanting perhaps some insight and reassurance that we are structuring in to these agreements that cultural competency is a core requirement, not just an option.did you want to just try to address that? >> i can also pull in my senior publicmanager who helped put the contract together for me want to elaborate more . but a couple of things first and foremost, how we evaluated these firms, the vendors and the ones that we arrived at had to demonstrate, they had to understand that understanding of san francisco's political environment . they had to experience, they

had experience in engaging with communities ofcolor, committees with limited sufficiency. i had to show examples oftheir work. they also had to have a minimum of five years experience working with the public sector clients including transportation and planning and the ceos that we've discussed at length . and then how were going to hold them accountable aswell moving forward . very important to discuss establishing metrics by which we can measure the efficiency of the progress on outreach. going to have an evaluative process of the vendors who helped support this contract and report back to the board if you'd like on a quarterly basis what some of that progress is . provide a quarterly update and also we discussed which i would be accountable for is sitting

down with the vendors and making sure they understand the deep level of engagement we need to conduct with our cbo's that are educating them on that. the process and making a mandatory process included in our public outreach and getting guidance with them so that we are sure that we are working and utilizing the ceo those are some of the steps that we put in place and also that would be accountable for as well as how we conducted the evaluation process . there's one more step we could which is our public participation plan which would help us take even that a step further if you'd like to hear more about that because that's our true work with our cbo's coming up that will use some of that consultant help because we have a limited staff capacity to do that level of outreach that we need to wear the actual cbo will tell us what's their vision and what's the perspective of how cultural competence outreach is because it may be perceived differently by different peoplebut that's the baselevel . we did our public participation

plan about six years ago and got our baseline for what they reallyconsidered the best way to engage with them, how they want it to be utilized .we are coming back now and we're going to go through thatprocess again so it's accommodation of our efforts but also input from the most valuable cbo's across the city that help us but that benchmarkingplace . >> . >> chair: you put out a number of things so i'm going to try to follow-up questions there. first of all could you elaborate a bit on how you have, what are the actual tricks that you will be evaluating on these contractors because frankly, some of these entities have been part of our outreach programfor a while . and i think we have seen feedback from the community regarding their level of appropriate engagement and i think at times even i would characterize it as failed attempts at outreach . so i understand.

i like the direction that we are going to be assessing them into the future but can you talk about how are we actually hearing that? whatare the measurements you would be imposing ?>> a couple of things and if you'd like you can add some more but we did look back and establish the baseline for how our actual consultants have worked with the cbo's in the past and to what level and we look at the bulk of this band that we had on the contract and what that percentage was so we see now that 12 percent of our work was with the cbo's. there was a way that we gauged that amount, the level of the work that's our benchmark to make sure that has increased by a significant amount meaning that it's mandatory now that we work with these cbo's for any project that impacts the public whereas before i think it was

more of a fight to do that now it's going to be a mandatory action for them towe should see a significant increase and a level of work thatwe conduct with our cbo's . >> i don't know, was there anything else ? >> can you address, i think you had shared with me previously that the way the work order happens is when there is an engagement opportunity with these eventually preselected contractors staff will still issue a request for the work which that is essentially the step where mda staff conveyed to the contractor the amount of outreach and the specific cultural competencies you're looking for. >> i apologize, say that again. >> can you go over what is staff level of control over the work request and how staff is able to influence apprenticeships.

>> all the staff that comes into our agency goes through what we call our poets process. a public outreach engagement strategy and it specifically trains them on the fundamentals of outreach engagements, and techniques they should be applying upon the decisions of the project. that public information officer or planner that's leading that project has little control when working with the consultant to makesure they're working with community-based organization that they're actually implementing the outreach taste upon their training . we also make it mandatory that the vendors go through public outreach and engagement training and follow the same outline we have with the agency . does that answer your question? >> let me make my point clearer. i feel like we have not done a good job with leaning on these outreach consultants. and i think we have some pretty clear and recent examples

including the transit survey restoration outreach work which really i don't think was sufficiently done partly due to time constraints and a lot of other constraints. and some of the folks that are appearing as contractors so i'm just trying to understand how are we improving on our not so ideal outreach process? what's different about these contracts? what are we doing now. >> director lai if i may interject.we agree with your assessment. secondly, the solution goes well beyond just these contracts so part of the solution is rethinking the way we hire. cultural competency is something we need to own, not just rent occasionally when we need it from consultants. as we staff in local government affairs as well as in communications, where adding

cultural competencies to do the desired qualifications for those positions so that not only can we get people cultural competency but get people who really know sanfrancisco and be invested in the transportation issues as well as the community issues at the same time and that we have access to them all the time . the other is some ofthe work that the state has been doing as well in building and stronger partnerships with community-based organizations . so cultural competency like, it's a very important but remarkably rare skill in the consulting world but it is a very powerful skill in san francisco community-based organizations in every single neighborhood. one of the things for example we've done successfully in the tenderloin is code design our work with community-based organizations in the tenderloin. we want to make sure we are applying that model in other

neighborhoods as well, thus the emphasis on divinity based organizations . in a neighborhood like chinatown it's anobvious opportunity for us to develop longer relationships that i think are necessary . >> chair: i think you made an important point which is part of my question. given how important it is to actually have the courtagency, our staff to be very much so involved and really be the ones establishing these relationships , why are we allocating life with $9 million over five years for this outsourced work as opposed to bringing it morein-house . to your point we need to be wrapping up our own internal capacity and learning on social competency and not to go into our budget item but just as a reference point. we're spending more on consultants than we are on our allocated budget for the next two years. if you divided up by fiveyears

. i mean, per year we are spending more externally than we would be internally i think so i'm just trying to understand why we want to lean on this dollar amount. >> again, we're doing both. this is a two-pronged approach. we're working as quickly as we possibly can to staff up and ownthe skills that we need to have in-house . we're in complete agreement on that strategy. by the same token however we can only staff of in-house to the trough of the vagaries our project funding that comes in so project funding goes through cycles and we need to staff to the trough of those funding cycles. because we need to make sure that our in-house people always have enough to do. how we use consultants is both for kind of unique skills that we don't necessarilyhave in-house but to also deal with

the vagaries of workloads on a project , often times there are credit incredibly intense period of outreach and engagement we could not possibly staff for so we're reliance on consultants in order to be able to continue delivering as many projects as we're delivering on the timeline you all want us to deliver them on so the components take up the slack and we meanwhile are continuing to build or strengthen in-house. >> i appreciate that. i think i have to challenge that a little bit . it's obvious as an observer who isn't on the day-to-day of the agency that we have a ton more demand on our outreach then i think our in-house staff can provide. my question really, i don't disagree that we have to use slow contractedwork is very important for most entities, really to be efficient but it's

the question is really about the balance , comparing to how much we are really budgeting permanently as opposed to how much we're contracting out. it seems out of whack for me and with one last question, why are we not updating our public on participation plans ahead of essentially issuing new contractsbecause . >> it's also i don't know if kathleen you want to track the timing but i should have cited within that 2 to 6 years there is an update that we had to do but it wasn't as extensive as the amount of fundingwe spent on something that's about to happen intimately . and if i may, the whole way i work at this contract is a bridge approach. the first thing we're doing is we've lost any 5 to 30 percent of our existing staff for outreach and engagement and marketing creative services specifically so first i got a backfill thattrough. about backfill those people . then we also after thebudget workshop you made it very clear we had to get our house in order , we look at some of the

gaps and deficits we have. those tapping after that has already been approved to help usbalance out some of the additional work you're speaking to . and some of it came from surplus funding and other things. so there is additional staffing. i can't say that 100 percent is what we need but it would help us within the next year to use this contract as a bridge to get us there cause right now you're absolutely right. we don't have enough staff for the level of outreach we need to conduct on a daily basis but this is something that willhelp as a bridge while we do supplement the additional staffing that we need . >>.[inaudible] please do bear in mind this is a five year not to exceed soundtrack so this is the ceiling, not the floor. we could spend zero dollars but it is providing that float that we need over a five-year period

to deliver the ambitious project schedule we have laid out in front of us. >> i will for my colleagues consideration, i'm not comfortable moving forward with this because i haven't heard i think the answers in terms of ensuring we are not going to fall back into old patterns . i'm still not super clear on what metrics we are holding these consultants to. i'd be morecomfortable awarding a one-year contract seeing the metric , seeing as they're delivering what they're supposed to be doing in terms of cultural competency and then revisiting extensions of those contracts. i understand that's a change to the core of what this is but that's where i'm currently at . >> should we get staff feedback on that idea? >> i'll defer to the city attorney but i believe such a substantial change wouldrequire

rebidding and would lose us nearly a year in the schedule . >> sorry, deputy city attorney. the question is whether changing this to 2 year two of 1 year. it would definitely require going back to the contractor so not acting today and seeing if that is something they would be amenable to changing without other terms of the contract and if other terms of the contract change significantly it could possibly leadto a need to reinvent the contract . >> let's go to director yekutiel as we contemplate director lai's suggestion. >> i understand we're asking your department to do a lot with less people and also

understand you've been doing this for 14 years and you know this department through and through and that we are well served by staff. i had a couple conversations with you all and we have a wonderful staff doing this work and i understand it is a do not exceed. were not complying this amount of money to be spent but i'm still uncomfortable with this for a variety of reasons. one as directorlai said we haven'tgotten the best report card on outreach and we're asking a lot of the same people to do it . looks like eight consulting firms , both main ones and side ones.we're increasing the budget for these firms do this work over the next five years. i know you've undergone a strategic review on how we do ouroutreach to do a better job and i think all this is great . but i understand you need to

float when you hire your department, it just seems like a lot of float. it's asking $10 million over the next five years while you staff up which seems like a lot. uncomfortable with director lai'sproposal. when i first read this i wanted to vote against it completely just the idea , if you ask the average san franciscan what we're about to vote on they'd say whatyou're asking for almost $10 million to ask consultantsto do the work of the department but all this context is important . i think uncomfortable with one year . and i'm comfortable having to go back to the contractors because it's still a lot of money and it's still good work, it's work we've been doing for a while. i'djust say on the outset i'm not interested in getting everyone's opinion under the sun about everything we do i know that's not how we operate i'm interested how we get the real strategic outreach done to the communities most impacted by our work . in particular.

if we are interested in utilizing cbo's more i'd be more interested in taking this money and getting it to cbo's in the community thengiving us it to firms outside of town. that's how ifeel. i'm uncomfortable with it . i've been thinking a lot about it . i know we've done a lot ofhard work and i hope you can staff up expeditiously so we can do this work in-house . >> director yekutiel if we may respond. if i may respond one of the things i think that's hard about this contract is that it is an on call contract overfive years . if you don't have a specific scope of work for an actual arrangement of community-based organizations and firms here before you but the result of that is you have every year the ability to shape how we use thiscontract so you provide

direction for me and i provide direction for staff . we can course correct during the course of these five years taking adjustments as we go along, shifting the balance more orless to community-based organizations usingfor some firms more than others. there is flexibility to guide utilization of this contract as we move forward but simply undoing this whole process sends a signal to the consulting community that we are not serious as a business agent and actually damages our ability to attract and retain the best consultants . >> thank you director.can i ask a question about the contract ? i don't think i understood it possibly . it's the calculation of charges and there's a direct hourly rate that seems to range from $30 an hour to over 100 but then you lookat the fully burdened hourly rate it's twice, sometimes three times

that and wheni looked at the note it saysnothing about percentage overhead . that gets to over $200 an hour .>> i need jonathan to help me answer that . >> what isthat? >> sorry, overhead. it's page 150 . the calculation of overhead is what the consultant staff makes on an hourly basis plus their benefits plus all of the overhead costs whether it's rent, equipment and whatever else that they're doing as well as unbillable time so for example administrative staff has process invoices. that time is usually included in the overhead rate over most consulting firms the overhead rate exceeds the hourly rate that actual staff. that's just what it takes to run abusiness . >> what i see is in most cases this is triple the hourly rate.

when i think about the total amount of money we're spending itseems like we're spending a whole lot more money on the rent of these consulting firms than the actual work they're doing and to me , as a fiscal , fiscally responsible board member i just don't think that's a great use of our money. we at the sfmta have an overhead rate that is comparable to the overhead ratesof many private companies so wealso have to pay rent for buildings, for businesses . we have administrativestaff whose time wecharge to capital projects . >> understand that but we are , our only customer is our users whereas these firms have many , many government entities that charge them fortheir work. most of the people were looking at and i looked at their client list , we have very large clients from all over the country. it's a good thing, i'm glad they have those clients but thesenumbers are very high and if we're going to spend up to $10 million over five years i'd much rather go to the work

itself . and it's triple the amount. that just seems like a very ... >> overhead is the work itself. >> okay. >> could you remind us how we got here? we did dig this out and these were the responsive letters to we did get a sense of ... >> how we got here just your concerns, i want to make sure we're getting our best rate . >> there's two things, there's the question of how this rate is and in which thank you director tomlin for explaining it and the general feelingabout using consultants while we're trying to staff internally . >> the answer that question and try to give context on this answering the vice chairs question about how we got here. there's typical rfp process. to get us here has taken 62 8 months of going through that process, hearing back.

then the staff do go through the process to negotiate the specific contract. if the board is uncomfortable with some of the terms of the contract as proposed today you may send it back to us as the city attorney is telling you we can renegotiate some of those terms. we can talk about the overhead rate, the total period of the contract. we scored the various firms based on the qualifications that were in the rfp so that's the process that's required. with regard to what director tumlin said and issues around cultural competency this is an as needed contract based on requirements that in the rfp but each individual pass holder has to be written and if we write those on the scope of work and what we expect if there are expectations from this board on the project for the use of these contractors in the course of doing outreach

then again that is direction to the director of transportation that's passed on to staff and we can ensure and those individual tasks both on cost and scope and process that your will is included in those individual tasks. that is possible and we can do that.this is just a process. each task is individually written for each scope of work and if there's certain expectations of this board related to a specific project we will be sure to include that . kind of lastly i do want to address , i think there is firm agreement on the outreach and process that we conduct for a capital project so as director tumlin said that abs and flows. we have a bunch of projects in design before it gets to the board with legislation. there's high levels of outreach that our staff alone manage the process but they need help getting that done and i want to be cognizant that this team is taxed and they need help right now. they need help if we want them to be successful and not burnt

out. outreach related to the operations of the agency like service changes that are not capital project definitely is an area of weaknessthat i think we have all recognized . we essentially use the tools and processes we have to and apply them to some of these big policyoperational issues . and as part of the budget we're correcting for that. i think all of us recognize that and the positions that are proposed in the budget are meant tofix that very specific issue this contract in the past is largely been around the geo bond passes . we have to do a higher level of outreach .were going to have state grants coming up . we've got todo the events and get that opened and this team needs support on setting up those specialevents . that's historically what this contract has been used for . in prior areas a good example was ourrelationship with small business . it was not good. 2 to 3 years ago chinatown, central subway object where we

probably weren'tcompetent about what we were doing to small business in san francisco and that's when we created the construction mitigation program . the on a hazard business group where we built thecompetency around the needs of small businesses and dns team is committed to doing that with various groups across the city with city staff, with staff at the mta. that again there's staff proposed in the budget to address that issue . so we can definitely make changes to the contract based on how long you want it to be recognizing the issue but i want to be cognizant that this team needs time and supportnow . it took us a year to negotiate and get this contract here so just a one year of work to get a one-year contract really i think binds the staff to some extent before we have to spend

all that time again to do it again so i'm laying it out in the context . >> i'd like to bring john into the conversation . >> thank you vice chair eaken. i think my colleagues said most of what i was going to say so i appreciate that i'm not going toreinvent the wheel with my comments but i don't see anything wrong with going back to our vendors and asking if they're okay with contract training for one year . as we create theseprocesses and metrics to then see how we reposition our agreements for the next following year for the renewal . with those metrics embedded in and abaked in . i'm a true believer thatbudgets tell a story and i know i say this often to staff . i sent it to john about five times yesterday . and what i'm seeing here, i don't really see a space for cbo's to be engaged or accountability measures there so i'm not seeing it in the agreement as it stands right now. i do seelocal business enterprise participation goals

25 percent . and it seems like the subcontractors that these primary contractors are utilizing may fulfill that requirement so it's not an incentive for them to engage cbo's. i don't think that the incentive, that 25 percent . i would like to see something that is better structured that really targets that bowl to really engage cbo is in the process. i'm working for a municipality i understand it can be quite challenging to have a series of discrete agreements with many cbo's. so in terms of just efficiency withprocesses i understand the need to have , to work with our vendors to subcontract with those instead of us being the lead contractor so i understand this mechanism and this process and can appreciate that this is the avenue that we take to

engage with cbo but as it stands right now it doesn't seem like there's a real incentive i guess for the engagement of cbo is. i don't know if it's like a line item in a budget saying this is how much you get for this percentage of the award can be used or this contract can be used. it's just something there that calls it out. there's nothing there right now. that makes me uncomfortable because it makes it seem as if that's at the discretion of i don't know. i don't know who thediscretion is it's at the discretion of leadership . i need them to provide me with policy level leadership and guidance on how to allocate our limited resources. this contract isjust an empty tool.we get to shake it as we move along. we get to shape andhave our

needs changed . that's why we have these on-call consulting contracts . there's no specificity about how it is to be used and that's the point. what i'm looking for from all of you is guidance on how to use it. please do not constrain our ability to actually get the business of the agency done. instead please provide me with direction on how to use this tool that's what i need from you . you've all asked me to rapidly accelerate project delivery in order to deliver on our values. this tool is an essential part of that. we cannot move forward with our project work and do so responsibly without tools like these. this tool does not lock us into how we're using it . we have a lot of flexibility here and that's what i want from you is direction on how, not on the technical nature of the instrument itself. >> sorry toafter that. what i'm seeing here from the labor and recent positions from what's written in the agreement

, there are gaps with the consultants abilityon cultural competency. just from what i'm seeing from that particular spreadsheet . i think everyone understands that there's staff gapsaround cultural competency and we're building up and scaling around that . i see cbo is filling that backlog that we don't have right now. that the consultants will have, that our staff has, that our community doesn't have. we need a mechanism that allows us to really utilize the communities know how . there the trusted partners on the ground when we are trying to promote projects we need a mechanism to utilize that asset that we haven't for our staff to utilize that asset so they can successfully create these outreach and engagement plans. i see this as a mechanism for us to do that but let's figure out how to do it in a way that sets us up for success as we

proceed to use these projects. >> with all the respect i but it's more of responsibility on our agency and on me as engagement manager to ensure that these cbo's are used. i have is just said. ready to make sure that the consultants are actually using these in a manner that i want them to be used. i think there's maybe a discussion here. we've all talked about the cbo situation with each other and we've determined we need to raise the bar in the way that we bring the cbo'sand we that we use them for that cultural competency outreach . so i think it's two-sided here because for me, one of the commitments i made to our staff was to make sure we put some training and we make it a mandatory requirement within our public outreach and engagementplanning and guidelines . the best part of the process now where before maybe it was someone thought this was a

stakeholder, this is a mandatory component so i can't say it's a consultant, i haveto say it's on us to and i take that responsibility and i've heard loud and clear from all the directors . that's my job is to make sure that happens but i have to say i get a little nervous when i hear one year because when i think about the scope of projects coming down in the next year, i don't honestly know how we could deliver without the bandwidth and capacity that we don't have right now and in the next couple of years i mentioned to someof you already i will take about a year to backfill. we lost 25 percent of our staff . additional supplemental staffing that director tumlin approved which permanent translation in house, things thatwe've never had before. that takessome time and when you bring a person in to do outreach and engagement you can

agree we're talking cultural competence . data walk out the front door higher . it'sa whole year process . off-site training, all kinds of training involved to get them up to speed, to feel comfortable they're going to talk to thecommunity so when we have a public participation plan that's a huge left for our staff which is me and one other manager to do some of the work we need to do . i hear you but i need some flexibility in how i can manage this over the next 2 years and one of the things we discussed was coming back on a quarterly basis or regular basis and letting you know those metrics, the cbo's that we're working with. we can be accountable for that and we can have more discussion and frame it in whatever way we need to make sureyou feel where doing the job we need to with the money we're spending and giving you an update onour staffing so that we are fulfilling the staffing we have

committed to . >> so the contract as it stands right now , does it give you the flight ability to engage cbo's? in the outreach and engagement process and is there, when i say engage them or i guess utilize them as assets, does it allow for the consultants to provide funding? how extensive, i guess what's the range of engagement? >> i want to be a little careful about having conversations about directing funding to cbo's. there's a lot of conversations the city has been having around whichand why and who's deciding, who's getting the dollars . what i can say is deanna and i had this conversation yesterday. we all agree on cultural competency. we agree cbo's are our best path to that when our staff doesn't have the internal

expertise and where that's required and as we're generating tasks, if that's a method by which we achieve projectscope than i think we've justified it , it's legitimate and it's the way to do that and we know that's a weakness and until deanna's team is in place, citywide cbo's are our best source of cultural competency indifferent parts of the city. again, this contract is a tool through each individual task . if that's required elements of the staff for us to be successful we will use this tool to do exactly that . >> just to clarify the question, do cbo's have to be a local enterprise to be subcontracted or isthat flexible ? >> that's getting complicated, i might be the city attorney cell but we never direct our primes on what they should be using.

again within the scope of the task itself we canrequire cultural competency. they need to have these requirements and certain abilities and we may suggest based on information we know we can never direct our prime contractors on who they should select . >> just clarification, one of the things we talked about was i was talking to johnson about this earlier because we had discussion about cbo's and funding mechanisms and we came across this bridge not long ago and that's how we established a constructionmitigation plan. a process to follow and funding to determine how weuse it for those merchant corridors as you recall . i actually have had a discussion earlier today because i knew this would, and i said i'd like guidelines there's specific guidelines so we are clear when we bring our cbo is in on what the funding mechanism is if there is one . for example, when we do our public participation planning

we do fund the cbo is to help them provide food and hand out surveys and do a lot of these focus groups and in language can medication so it's there i'd like to maybe remind somehow so the board can hold me accountable. maybe you agree shouldn't have worked with one cbo when i do another . drill down a little bitmore with our cfo and come back with something you can feel confident about how we use that . >> i want to make sure this agreement has a limit. the contract allows me to work with this and not localbusines enterprises . i wanted to make sure you have the mostflexibility . >> at the end of the day i help people .but at the end of the day my staff can tell the contractor, i'm sorry, the consultant. we laid out the plan and try to build that relationship but there's so many projects we don'thave the bandwidth to do that right now . as we staff up we will go less

and less on this contract because wewill have more people in house to do the work and i' rather have someone in-house because it takes me two years to get someone to feel comfortable in the public and keep them for the next 10 years and have a career path then to hire a consultant if this is the bridge that is desperately needed . >> thank you, director hinze has been waiting patiently on the phone and i like to bring her into the conversation . >> you can address one of my questions and then i'd like to bring one for our consideration . i too am going to associate myself with commissioner yekutiel's comments. is it possible for more funding for cbo's? [inaudible] i look forward to

an update on that in the next couple months or so. and given director lai are into rims on this, is there a way to do this? and hearing from staff that they really need this now. but we're also hearing that we want that further evaluation and examining the metrics so i'm wondering if potentially we can go back and see about thes two-week contracts . and see if there's a compromise there.so staff, i don't know if they like torespond to that

idea . >> again, we're hearing clear direction from all of you about cultural competency and using cbo's. this contract is not an obstacle for any of those goal . in fact we aretaking that direction and will use it for shipping every task order in this contract . it's also an on-call contract for them not to exceed. we could spend zero dollars on this contract . i don't want to and i want to be able to do project planning over a significant number of years which is why we've asked for a five-year contract. if it's not working out, youare able to provide a course change to me and our team at any point in this process . i'm also very worried about going back to our vendors who have agreed on contract terms to change any of the rules. it creates problems for all sorts of contracting.

the potential for all search of contracting problems as well as makes us look like maybe not the bestpeople to do business with . so i think we can achieve all of your goals with this contract as it stands. and i'd really rather not try to reopen it and go back and take more time and waste staff time in revising it. >> director heminger. >> thank you madam chair. colleagues, i'm as you might imagine have sat through this debate quite a few times in my career, usually in jeff's chair, not in a board chair and striking the right balance between how much resource you have in-house versus how much you contract for is obviously more art than science. i think these consultants in my opinion are essential and expensive. and it is in many cases better to develop the resource that

you want to have in-house but in our case, weare starting 25 percent down in-house . so look, city employees don't cost as much as private-sector employees but you also get that result sometimes in terms of attractingpeople to positions. so i do believe and look, i can't speak for the particular consultants that are written down on the contract here , but in general in concept, i think you're going to need both resources to produce the results you want. i do have a specific reaction to the idea of aone year contract .it can take you a year to change a lightbulb in cityhall . so i really do think director lai letting it run a few more years would make sense to me and you don't want to put it to

the point where it's not where somebody's while to stick around and bid on or work on thecontract . so what i'd suggest is you consider colleagues is if you do want to deal with the time frame of the contract that we get a lotcloser to five and we get to one. thank you . >> thank you director heminger. we have director lai and then i like to propose the task force. >> appreciate all the comments that have been made. the reality is from my limited experience that from my perspective i feel like i have been spending a lot of energy on this board since the beginning providing direction on outreach and calling attention to the fact that we need to get to a place of

better competency, whether it's cultural or just outreach competency. idon't actually feel confident that that direction has ledto anywhere very promising . >> . [please stand by]

>> i like to be able to give staff the tools they need to execute the work that's necessary. is it possible for us to maybe create that set of policies and metrics up front before we go ahead with executing these contracts? that will give me a lot more higher level of certainty that what we're opining here will actually get implemented. it makes me comfortable that we're going ahead and selecting folks that we know they haven't done good job before. we don't have a clear plan how to course correct. not an official one. i appreciate staff opening this

during the conversation that you will be taking our direction. i haven't really seen that executed in the last two years. i'm just really uncomfortable with it. i appreciate my colleague's position -- if you feel like this is the right call, go ahead. i would probably vote a no at this point unless there can be some additional reassurance before we take the vote. >> vice chair eaken: we do need to get public comment on this piece, 10.4. may be we can go in the room and on the phone public comment. >> clerk: i have no speaker cards. we have two hands raised on the virtual public comment. >> vice chair eaken: please go ahead on the phone. >> caller: one thing i'm wondering about contracts, i

think it will be cost effective if the community consulted more than contractors. many of them are out of state. many of the contractors proposals are so unrealistic and the community that's affected offers the best possible i believe -- input. you can save lot of money and use that money for more buses and drivers it would save the agency a bundle. lot of these contractors make unrealistic proposals. they dropped the ball in iran, iraq and afghanistan. it's cost effective and it's realistic and everyone will be better off for it. thank you. >> clerk: next caller.

>> caller: speaking to the taxi subject. i don't know if i'm speaking on the correct subject -- >> clerk: this is item 10.4. you want to wait until item 11. >> caller: okay. i will wait for 11. >> clerk: thank you. that is the last caller. >> vice chair eaken: that will close public comment on item 10.4. i really appreciate this discussion and all of the concern voiced by my colleagues. at the same time, i do want to remind us that we have asked with the vision zero action strategy staff to significantly accelerate the pace of projects so we can reach our goals. we heard again and again from the public that they want more outreach not less. we know staff is limited in --your ability to conduct that outreach. we need to supplement staff

ability to do outreach if we're going to achieve our vision zero goals. i will be inclined to say let's move forward, given this tool to staff and to give some very clear direction to staff. i do feel at some level we have to trust our staff. we hired jeff to do this work. at some level we have to trust our staff and give guidance. i will propose couple of point of guidance we might consider directly staff today. one will be to return to the board with a quarterly report on the partnership on the consultancy and how c.b.o.s are gauged. then the second to your point director cajina, is there's

something we want to maximized partnerships with community-based organizations and engage their competency to improve the quality of the sfmta outreach. i would propose that with a path forward and will be happy to hear reactions to that. >> director yekutiel: would you like a motion? >> vice chair eaken: i would like a motion. >> director yekutiel: i'll make it. >> vice chair eaken: thank you. >> director hinze: second. >> vice chair eaken: any refinements? >> i have of follow-up question to the director. i want to understand this, is our standard contracting term usually five years? >> yes. >> vice chair eaken: there was one other piece to director lai's earlier point.

what i heard you articulate, you will be comfortable approving one-year funding and not more. could we also put that in direction with staff and go ahead with a year of partnership and then not approve further funding beyond one year until we have had a report back? >> director tumlin: the contract will be a five-year contract, not to exceed. what you can do is direct me and staff to allocate our consultant dollars in the way that best achieves the direction. this is not to exceed contract. it's a ceiling rather than a floor. we can use it as little as we like. >> director lai: i'm not comfortable with the five years. i feel like there isn't reassurance in the structure of this agreement that -- we're not

seeing metrics up front. we know where we want to get to. we framed that part of the agreement. that's different. we're kind of seeing let's go ahead and keep selecting the same people we've been using and hope for the best. i feel like we're at a point that the public has run out of patience. i think we have to take this seriously. is it possible for us to -- maybe my friendly amendment suggestion, can we add a whereas where staff is required to provide to the board -- provide the policy to the board prior to first payment of this new contract? i will explain, i want to make sure that we have clear guidance

and policies in place before we continue to pay out. as i understand, all the work that you're planning with the consultants, you're setting the scope now. i want to headache sure -- make sure we are setting those clear refinements up front before you finalize your initial work order scope. >> i respect that. with all due respect, what my track of thinking is, as i just mentioned for the first time now, the public participation plan is -- this is the first thing we'll use this contract for is to help. we are meeting with c.b.o.s across the city to discuss what their vision of cultural competent outreach. with all due respect, i like to go through that process with them so i'm establishing these metrics with these consultants

that they are held accountable with the c.b.o.s. we can put some metrics in place, like assurance of c.b.o.s being utilized. that can be definitely a metric that we can very much marry. -- measure. i like to have the public participation plan to help me weigh in on what the c.b.o.s like to see as well as from my staff. that's the first time in six years. because we've been in a hybrid model, we'll see a much deeper level of engagement and request what they consider good outreach. i like to have the ability -- we're coming back every quarter to give you an update on our public participation plan. those metrics are a combination of that. >> director lai: you using the external consultants? >> i don't have at bandwidth in language. they are russian and vietnamese.

i need help with that effort. i think that is what's going to help us truly shape what the board is asking for here. by the end of the year, we're done with the public participation plan? by the end of the year, public participation plan efforts all the out reach, we're pulling that data together in december. >> sorry, we'll be coming back to you. every two years we have to do a title 6 program update that's due to the m.t.a. for this year we have the both public participation plan, but we also have the language assistance plan. it's such a heavy lift, it's focus groups. it's having the c.b.o.s actually dictate to us, here's where you need to be, here's where you can join on and here

are the participants that will give you good feedback. also meeting doing c.b.o. leadership interviews. that's what we'll looking to you. help us with those names. help us know who you want us to interview through your contacts and organizations to get that vital information. 63 them the questions what does your constituency look like now. we want to directly from them. with the language assistance plan, we are doing it in language with moderators it taking the lead of the c.b.o. leadership on how these should run. we're getting vital information what's considered vital. what information do they want? do they want notices in windows? do they want social media or are they looking for tv ads? this is a critical efforts that has been to do through

contractors. it's a ton of analysis. we need to look at the 2016 results. we need it look at the 2019 results and look to see what is our path forward on the best ways to do outreach and to process their feedback. it's quite bit of data. >> director lai: can you introduce yourself? >> i'm the regulatory manager for sfmta. >> this is what will help us shape our approach and the techniques and the way we conduct our outreach moving it forward. the public participation plan is the benchmark. that would help us establish those metrics in a very professional way that you're asking for. >> director lai: i want to ask about the contract structure itself. my understanding, it's not to

exceed contract. we just stated we can use none of it or all of it depending on the situation. let's say a year or two years in after we've established a baseline gotten the c.b.o. feedback, we realized that the pool of candidates that we currently have as our five-year consultants don't meet the needs, what is our ability to solicit additional consultants or terminate the existing ones? >> in that particular case, that's a new procurement. the r.f.p. process resulted in this pool of consultants. if it's the pool we do not like, we need to solicit again. >> director lai: we have the ability to terminate early and redo the solicitation if needed? >> director tumlin noted, if you

are feeling as a board that you are no getting the services you think are present from any of our contractors or staff that is direction to the director of transportation for him to work it out with those who provide services to the agency or you can direct him to terminate the contract. >> just point of clarification, this contract ended with us not spending all of it. we don't have to spend. when it ends, if if we haven't utilized the services for whatever reason, we're not obligated to spend all the money in five years. >> director lai: i understand. i want to make sure we're not locking ourselves in. it's the order of operation here. we actually don't know what we need until we do the baseline analysis with the community. it is, again, little odd that we're going ahead and picking the consultant before we know what we need.

>> director tumlin: we're doing that because we desperately need it. >> director cajina: i want to get a better. understanding of the baseline analysis. do you think that will be done in six months? what's the timeline look like for that? >> we'll be working within the public participation plan timeline. by the end of december, we have a report that's due. i believe we'll have most of the data compiled at that point. what we will do is take that data. it would probably take us little bit of time to get that data. we shape our outreach and engagement requirements which we actually have. il-- after december, within 1st quarter, we would have a fully vetted data-driven feedback on what the c.b.o.s and what the public has been asking us for which we could bring back here.

those will be the metrics that we'll be using to establish. we'd have those in tandem. here's what we heard and here are the metrics we're developing based upon that. here's how we're going to measure the progress moving forward. >> clarification on timeline, december 1st is when -- what we use as an internal deadline is september 30th. we have to do all this outreach, everything has to be completed and both the public participation plan and the language assistance plan have to be updated to become before you by september 30th to get in the board process. we usually come to you beginning of november and hope it's not pushed to another meeting. it has to be uploaded in the system by december 1st. that's why it's critical. that's why this summer will be so intense. hopefully late august and september we'll be dedicated to

all the data crunching and comparison to the prior data that we have in the prior programs. then that's when we can draft the two reports. the title 6 program update, back in 2019, sean kennedy, jessica garcia they take half of it. the other half is outreach complaint process, other general requirements that you have, federally funded agency that we have to comply for title 6. these are just two of the many attachments that will come under title 6 updates. >> we could have metric done by the end of the year that we're organize on based upon the data that we've gotten. >> we have to take all the data that we've collected and put them in the reports that will come before you as title 6 program updates. we have people who do the data

crunching. he look at the trends and help us predict here's the tools we're using now. these are the ways that people want to be communicated with when we did this in 2016 and the mission, they said, don't bother putting them in the buses. we want to see the notices on our storefront. that's why it's critical. we take all this information in. we look at what we're doing now and we look at how we're going to pivot. our language assistance plan, they talk about new ways of doing outreach. what still works. we do surveys with lots of responses. then we'll know what works base the on the the surveys and data collected. then you'll have these plans that talk about what we'll do moving forward. of course with your approval. i think it's a really critical point that the consultants will be side-by-side with us. they are learning as we learn.

>> director cajina: i wanted to better understand this, like, is our pathway to provide direction through the motion. this isn't a resolution. is it through the resolution that we provide direction? >> there's a resolution. >> director cajina: perfect. i wanted to understand if it's a huge list for to you say, if with add this direction of, we want to get a quarterly up date for evaluation if that's doable on your side. >> my intention will be to come as we're engaging in this process to update the board on the actual process and where we are.

ultimately, when you get to see the same results, you'll agree with the metrics that we've established. >> director cajina: perfect. >> director yekutiel: my intention with this was to give you less work to do so you can focus on doing more outreach. i'm hearing from you that you need time to staff up and you need deliver projects. i think we're hearing that. i don't want to impede our agency's ability to move. we all expressed this with outreach. i know there's a motion on the table. i will be lot more comfortable letting you move forward with the contract and limiting the time frame to create -- to make it so you have more pressure to staff up more quickly. you said a year probably to get where you need to be.

i heard director hinze indicate comfort with two years. i hear director heminger closer to five. i understand there's other motions. i don't want to create lot of extra work for the staff. i want them to be able to move forward. i don't think it's asking a huge amount to go back to these folks and say, we want to limit the timing a bit. that's my proposal. >> what if we agree as we go through the process and we on board more and more staff, there's nothing to say even if we agree to five years that we have to spend that money. that allows us to keep the agreement with the consultant to stay on track with the contract. what if something huge comes along and we don't have the bandwidth for it? we cut our legs off. this last agreement we didn't use them all.

we didn't exhaust all the funds. we opted not to. >> director yekutiel: okay. [ indiscernible ] >> director lai: we have lot of contracts. is there a reason why we can't just say, let's go ahead with the two-year whatever with the option to extend? >> director tumlin: that's already built in the contract. you provide strong guidance to me about the sorts of projects that we'll be working on as an agency and to you to deliver them. you will always be able to inform a direction on this contract. we don't need to limit it. you have the authority to direct me to take completely different

path with our outreach including going through 18-month process to rebid it. this project doesn't limit your authority as a board. >> director yekutiel: what if we included a note that in two years, we ask for a review of the contract and ability to make a decision based on that review? >> director lai: i think what jeff is saying, staff doesn't feel like there's a need for that because they will continually be reviewing, which is part of my discomfort. i think jeff called it out. it's the fact that i think there's a little bit of lack of trust, unfortunately pertaining to this. outreach has been rocky. i don't think that's going to help me in particular. i think unfortunately, adding more metrics like asking for

reporting is probably more productive and secure from my perspective. >> i think i have some more context i like to add to this too. what we're so focused on is the outreach you yourself said, there are some specialized services that come up that we need from time to time. this contract also allows us to when we don't have subject matter experts, it allows us to hire different entities that we wouldn't have in-house. there will be that mechanism to help us. this is also a mechanism for that. it's just not for the outreach. having someone that's available over the five-year period, it may not be using it for outreach, there will be times they may pull other professional services in.

>> director tumlin: i agree with your criticism. i'm eager to build trust. if this is working in the resolution a requirement to come back no less than annually to report on progress and development to key performance indicators both in terms how we're using the contract as well as the feedback that we're hearing from community. the object of this work is to develop trust. that's why we're doing it. trust is a little bit tricky to measure in quantitative basis. we can solicit feedback.

>> director lai: one additional layer of concern i have is, i want to make sure that we are doing this as quickly as possible. i heard diana's team mention end of september the earliest. you will be setting your date. >> end of september is when you have the actual reports to come back to the board and provide from which points back all the data gathered. we will take that data and start to develop those metrics. in addition to any of that we've already decided to put in place. like the use of the c.b.o.s. that can start today. >> director lai: it's in combination of the quarterly report and a date certain report back to the board no later than end of september. >> director tumlin: that makes sense to me.

>> vice chair eaken: here we go. we're going to create a new motion with three provisions. we're going to direct staff to return to the board with a set of performance metrics to guide as a m.t.a.'s outreach and consultant work scope based on c.b.o. input by end of september. to continue quarterly reports on those metrics. second piece we're going to direct staff to maximize opportunities to partner with community-based organizations to improve the quality of sfmta's outreach and third, we're going to direct staff to prioritize building further staff capacity in-house to conduct cultural competent outreach and seek to rely less and less on consultants to conduct our outreach over the scope of the five-year period. >> director hinze: second. >> vice chair eaken: can we do a roll call vote.

>> clerk: on that motion. [roll call vote] item -- that was the amendment. as you stated, director eaken. we could come back and approve as amended. >> vice chair eaken: motion to approve item 10.4 as amended. >> director hinze: second. >> clerk: to approve on the amendment. [roll call vote] thank you. that motion passes. up item 10.4ed. item 11. amending the transportation code division 2 article 1100 section

124b5. to expand the taxi upfront fare pilot program to allow taxi applications to dispatch trips that originate with third party entities which marvel fares that are not based on taxi meter rate and extend implementation rate of the pilot by 90 days. >> good afternoon. kate torren. i wanted to start by thanking my team. this has been a team effort. we have a very strong and supportive team. this is a team effort that's before you today. i'm going to set some context first. first few slides it may look

familiar. i like to set context on the taxi industry. taxis are an important mode of transportation under m.t.a.'s umbrella. we have a high level of safety requirements. we have clean air requirements. it's equity service. our regulatory framework is intended to allow the taxi industry to innovate and compete while maintaining safety and consumer protection. currently, our taxi industry is comprised of 9/11 -- 19 taxi companies. three dispatch servicings, over a 1000 medallion services. this is just context setting. the contacts -- taxi industry can be quite complicated. our taxi timeline, prior to 9/11 78, medallion they were freely

transferable. the voters passed proposition k that set taxi regulation. that has been the regulatory framework within which the industry is operated until 2009. voters passed proposition a2007, 2009 it was enacted and taxis joined under the m.t.a. umbrella. going across the timeline, to point out in 2010, the taxi medallion pilot program was established. in 2012 it became a permanent program. it was the time uber black launched and uber x started. within the medallion, we have various medallion types. you can see the numbers in which

types of medallions we have. it, quite a complicated industry to understand. the next slide, we lay out big picture you can see the dispatch services they are required to affiliate with taxi e-hill. you can see the whole schematic laid out. you can see the important industry players on this slide. like all transportation, services during the pandemic, taxis experienced a significant decline of trips during the pandemic. we're seeing the trend come back up over the past few months. this slide shows how we're tracking the health of the

industry, looking at average trips per month and another indicator of health, number of medallions in operation providing service. you'll see the steep decline and the gradual upswing. during the pandemic, -- i'll say prior to the pandemic and particularly during the pandemic staff worked incredibly hard to support the taxi industry. what we have before us today is a brief summary of a very long list of initiatives that staff has engaged on to support the taxi industry. that the board has supported starting with first item on here is waiving taxi related fees for are the current budget cycle. thank you to the board for approving that. staff handed out protective equipment, plastic shield

barriers -- did lot of training on safety, cleanliness. one of our key successes that we established our essential trip card program. which is a subsidized taxi service for older adults and persons with disabilities. that was to help support the muni service, especially during the pandemic. taxis during the pandemic are included in the temporary transit. we also launched a taxi marketing campaign. on the essential trip card program, this has been a point of pride for us. it launched shortly after the start of the pandemic. to provide additional services for older adults and people with disabilities through a subsidized taxi service. it's a win-win for us.

a program that supports the taxi industry and supports our communities. right now, we have over -- we have about 4700 registered riders in that program. there has been over 130,000 trips completed. that's something that we're looking toward continuing even beyond -- as we head out of the pandemic. the taxi marketing campaign may be important to us. i want to give a shout out to pamela johnson on the communications team. she's been the lead helping to develop key messages and to test key messages for marketing taxis. then to launch throw various channels, the marketing campaign. this is something that's ongoing. with our internal m.t.a. communications team and experts supporting this work.

under the coming attractions category is a deep link of the taxi apps to the muni mobile. this is something that the team is working on. it will take some time. currently taxi apps are linked on muni mobile punning see the image on the right of this screen which indicates the list of taxi e-hill apps. right now you can click on that and go to the app store and download the app. we're looking towards a deeper link whereby a taxi customer can do most of the work to book a trip through muni mobile and have all their trip information pre-populated. this is something the team is working on. it will be coming in the future.

the upfront fare pilot is our topic of the day. just to remind us where we started with that. that is in september 2021. the board approved -- you authorized the director of transportation to establish the upfront fare pilot. that allows the taxi e-hail apps to offer a fare estimate to a customer through the app and then for a customer to actually lock in that fare. we have many goals associated with the pilot reducing meter anxiety. probably most of cuss relate. lot of feelings come up about

that. lot of feels about the route the driver takes. allowing a customer to be offered a fare in advance and to actually lock in that fare is comparable to other services and helps reduce that concern. this is an exciting pilot for us and the taxi e-hail up front fares are estimated based on the taxi meter in miles. estimated by what it could tost -- would cost to take a taxi trip. as we were planning the program rules the board authorized staff -- the director of transportation -- to launch this pilot after we had that approval, we've been vetting program rules. working with the industry to

hear from key stakeholders on how that should look. how we should run this upfront fare pilot. during the time we were vetting the upfront fare pilot, two largest e-hail app providers saying we like to partner with a third party entity. we like to partner with uber. we like to allow trips that originate with uber but dispatch through taxi to be allowable under this pilot. we had lot of internal discussions. we decided to move this forward. we think it's a very positive recommendation. it requires a simple amendment to the transportation code.

while the words may be simple and the amendment is quite brief, the schedule is complicated and there's a lot of feelings and thoughts around how this should unfold. just to put a fine point on it, what we are requesting the board to approve today is to expand the pilot that you already approved, to allow the taxi e-hail apps to dispatch trips that originate with a third party entity. to allow those trips that originate with third party entity to have rates that are not necessarily based on a taxi meter rate. that's the request. we're also requesting that the board extend the implementation date of the pilot.

it was originally six months from the effective date and again, as we're vetting -- as we're doing our strategic outreach, we understand that there's more outreach to be done and we're still working and building the program rules. the second piece of the request that's before you today is to extend the implementation date of the pilot to no later than august 5th. which is 90 days of the effective day. upfront fare pilot goals which i hope it's clear. it will allow taxis to offer services in line with current trends. we're looking at increased taxi ships. if approved, this expands the flow of trips that can come to

taxis. taxis could have street hill pick-ups, phone dispatch, paratransit taxi trips. taxi e-hail trip. if approved it will allow more trips through third party entities. we are also hoping to increase driver income by increasing demand. we like to increase the number of drivers. we expect to see an increase in drivers. we want to improve customer service. i think it's very clear that customers like this feature. people like to be able to compare and shop and look for prices and see the price in advance and actually have the ability to lock in a fare in advance. we have lot of analytics built

in the pilot. this is a test. we don't know exactly how this will unfold. we want to test and we want to see and measure what's happening in the system. we want to test driver and customer satisfaction with the upfront fares that are offered through the taxi e-hail apps and that originate with third party dispatch, third party entities. we want to look at the impacts on our traditional taxi trips. of by allow -- by allowing this. we want to test how the upfront fares generated both by the taxi e-hail apps which are required to be based on the meter amounts and through third party dispatch entities.

we have a number of next steps. we are continuing our outreach regarding the pilot program rules. the detailed rules are not before you today. those are very technical, very specific. what we're asking for you is the authorization and then if allowed, we will continue to work with the industry and key stakeholders to develop the program rules which i know there's a quite lot of interest in. we heard from a lot of key stakeholders about. we need to update our application programming interface, our ability to collect the data. lot of this is about the data collection. there will be a requirement for all of the data that flows in the m.t.a. so we can conduct the analysis that's needed. we want to establish dashboards so we can track our metrics.

if approved, launch the pilot with third party dispatch element incorporated and we will it's rate we of -- iterate we need to track the key metrics. under this pilot, we need to pay close attention because those programs rules may need to be updated depending on what the data show us. that is what i have for the presentation today. i'm happy to answer any questions. >> vice chair eaken: thank you so much director. colleagues do we have any clarifying questions for staff at this time? director heminger? >> director heminger: thank you. these are three quick ones. the first i only heard the word uber. i didn't heard the word lyft. is the amendment that you're placing before us today amilk -- applicable to any? >> it's broad and general. it's not for a specific t.n.c.

there's been conversations with uber. what's before 11 to allow -- before you is to allow trips with a third party entities. it could be beyond uber or lyft and other types of services. >> director heminger: second question, in some of the mail we got, there was an assertion that this amendment, i guess, had not been presented or considered by the citizens advisory committee of this board. is that true? >> we have not yet gone to the c.a.c. we've been working within the taxi industry and drivers and medallion holders. we had lot of outreach. we are happy to go before the c.a.c. to develop the program rules or to hear their feedback on the program rules. the door is not closed for that.

>> director heminger: do you know when we took our original action in september, did you consult with the c.a.c. at that time? >> no. >> director heminger: okay. maybe that's a little lesson learned. i think we got that committee for a reason. it's to provide comment on new ideas. which is what this is. finally, we had quite a bit of conversation as you know on our last item about metrics for success. i think i got a question for you here about that. i noticed your goals were to dress this and decrease that. you're developing a dashboard of metrics. are you going to be picking numbers in saying we want to see this increased by 25% and that's the metric for success of this k.p.i.? >> yes, we are. we have some of those. i think we're targeting 10%. we're still hearing from the industry. i didn't want to imply we had it

all locked in. what's before you today is just a broad approval. we were intending to have those specific percent increase, percent decrease -- >> director heminger: you'll have those in place before bestart? >> yes. >> director hinze: i have couple of quick clarifying questions. i think i know the answer to this one. i would like to thank the director. there was some assertion in the same e-mails that director heminger was referencing. >> in terms of the fares and how

that would work, we haven't developed specific rules around that. i'm assuming there's a business relationship or intending to be a business relationship between uber and fly wheel and others that may want to participate in this. that's something we want to understand. we haven't developed a rule around that. >> director hinze: okay. that's something i think that requires deeper understanding. my last thing -- you and i worked together for several years on paratransit issues. i know you don't want this pilot

incentivize drivers away from our -- [ indiscernible ] i'm just wondering what your thinking is in that regard no incentivize our equity trips. >> thank you for this question and for allowing me to speak to the equity. this is really important. i will say something that we are so proud of that taxi have part of our paratransit program since the early '80s. before the a.d.a. was law. we are super proud of our paratransit taxi program. we've had wheelchair accessible ramp taxi since the mid-'90s. this is something that the team is very proud of and has worked

hard to make successful and still work in progress. for our hardest to serve trips, which is paratransit ramp taxi trips. we have incentive. we have incentives for those trips. there are per trip incentives. they increase if the trips are late night outside of kind of daylight hours. also if the trips are originating in outlying neighborhoods. we have incentives to support the cost of a wheelchair accessible vehicle which is more than a standard taxi. you also have incentives for maintenance of those vehicles and we have incentives at s.f.o. to our ramp taxi drivers achieve the threshold of pick-ups, they can go through the line faster at s.f.o.

we have whole bundle of incentives for those hard to serve ramp taxi trips. those will remain. we certainly had a lot of conversations with our accessible services team about this third party dispatch concept and how it would work. this is something very important to us. we will be tracking. we are excited to say that we have -- if the program needs to flex up, which we hope it does, currently we have about 41 wheelchair accessible ramp taxis and service. we have up to 100 ramp taxi medallions that go into is of. there's a lot of opportunity to flex up and same is true for other medallion types. if it works as expected bringing another revenue stream to drivers among the bundle types

of trips taxi drivers can currently pick up will make it more lucrative to be a driver. we hope to see more drivers. we have then supply that more medallions can enter service. we will continue to track all of our equity programs and we see that with monitoring the program, we have the tools in place to address or mitigate any potential negatives. it's something we want to pay attention to. >> director hinze: great. [ indiscernible ] i didn't know we were operating as less than half capacity for taxi medallions. one other question i had, you and i talked about this.

lot of concerns have come up around pricing what happens when uber does surge pricing. i wonder if you had data to compare that to? uber fare versus taxi fare. >> those are great questions and from the time we talked last week to the time i'm standing before the board today, i do have a more robust answer.

part of of this goes back to a multi-year process to request of the california public utilities commission, the entity that regulates uber and lyft that they make the uber and lyft annual reports available so that data can be understood as it relates to uber and lyft trips. the first report -- again, this is probably about 10 years -- the first report the t.n.c.2020 report has been made available. our colleagues at the san francisco transportation authority have been analyzing the data. this is all kind of very new data. i want to say, this is exciting to have some data that the team is able to analyze our colleagues at a t.a. can analyze. this is a very first pass at it. it looks like on hold from the

data that we have been able to take look at that uber fares are about 80% to 85% of taxi fares. fairly closely to the taxi meter rate. my understanding -- my thought around this pilot is that on either side, if the uber fee is too high for the driver, if the fares are too high, the customer won't want it. the driver won't take the trip. they've got to work within what's going to be successful. this is part of what we need to test and need to understand. >> director hinze: all right. thank you colleagues. thank you for getting that data for me. >> vice chair eaken: thank you director hinze. director cajina? >> director cajina: i know we have lot of public comment on this. i will keep this brief.

in terms of who regulates what, we have the cpuc that regulates the t.n. c.s. if a third party is involved, let's say there's a customer complaint, let's say something happens. just to understand, how will those things be handled if this is an amendment that we approve? just trying to better understand and appreciate, how these two entities are working in conjunction with another. are there challenges you see with that relationship? >> thanks for the question. the trip is intended to originate -- if approved -- it would originate with a third

party. it's provided on a taxi. the trip starts over but then flows through a taxi e-hail app. then it's dispatched to a taxi. we would have the trip information for that particular trip. we will be able to see it has originated with third party x provided by this driver at this time, this date and fare. we'll have all that information. if there is a compliant, we will be able to track and follow-up. part of what's really important to us is to make sure that we have the data and we're tracking and monitoring. we will follow-up. once that trip hits the taxi and the e-hail app we consider it a taxi trip. the taxi rules will apply. >> director cajina: in terms of,

will we have an agreement in place with the cpusd to understand how to handle complaints? i'm trying to understand we'll formalize the working relationship. when it comes to us and our side of things, how does that look like and to better understand that piece of it. >> director tumlin: in relationship with cpusc is very important to me. >> we have a meeting, we're working to set up next week with the team. there's been some initial outreach and communication and we'll discuss that further. as we build out program rules and clarify the specific requirements, any kind of regulatory question, we would expect to need to address. we will do so. we've built in time for us to do

so. >> vice chair eaken: director yekutiel? >> director yekutiel: i know we have lot of public comment. lot of the comment we got beforehand was about why the rules weren't set in place before authorizing the pilot. can you talk about why we're doing it this way? >> we haven't set the rules. we are actually looking for your direction first. we certainly drafted the rules. we vetted the rules. we have a working document. we've met with the industry and we've already had feedback. it's up to the board to set the direction. once we know we have the go ahead and the green light from the board, then we can really hunker down, finalize those program rules, work with the community and continue to work with our strategic stakeholders. >> director yekutiel: i have two

follow-up question. one is the baseline minimum. uber and lyft are giving attitudes towards paying people. they are going to be requiring rides to be taken without paying folks very much. one of the rules you're evaluating creating minimum baseline amount. >> that's something we're looking at now. we're allowing the uber fares to flow through. if it's too low the drivers aren't going to pick it up. if it's too high the customers aren't going to take it. there's a balance that they need to do. we are tracking. we will be tracking how the upfront fares match to what a taxi meter rate would look like. the drivers have the ability -- we are intending through the program rules to allow the drivers to have the ability to see if a trip that originates with the third party. they can choose whether they take that trip or not. it's for those drivers that do want more trips then it gives

them the ability to have another stream of trips. >> director yekutiel: point of clarification. drivers would be able to potentially have the ability to reject a ride if they didn't want to take it through a third party app? >> correct. >> director yekutiel: in this resolution, the pilot will start no later than august 5th. that's a one-year pilot. >> it could be earlier than that. it won't be any later than that is what you're voting on today. >> director yekutiel: i know you have a very thin needle to thread with a very, very, tiny piece of thread even smaller hole and a lot going on. i appreciate all the hard work that you done to get us to this point. i look forward to hearing from the folks in the industry and thank you very much vice chair. >> vice chair eaken: let's open up for public comment for those in the room. >> caller: i have speaker cards for the item.

>> caller: good afternoon. i'm the president of fly wheel technologies. our soul purpose in our company is to modernize the tax industry to be competitive. we're known for our fly wheel taxi app. we're one of the largest apps in the world today. we are in 53 cities and san francisco is one you have our key cities. i'm happy to say that we've done more than 5 million completed taxi trips in san francisco. unfortunately what we're seeing is an industry way behind in terms of technology platforming. what we want to be able to do is modernize the taxi industry so it becomes a standard service. now, that you have passed this fantastic pilot program, although it hasn't started yet

for upfront pricing, we can provide pricing dynamically where you have a flat out right price like the competitors do. passengers can actually see price compare and see the prices are very close. we're excited to be able to modernize the way pricing is done for the taxi industry. even better than that, we think we can align with our competitors to basically provide their passengers to the taxi industry. in other words, what we would like to do is take passengers from those services that they have worldwide demand, bring them to the taxi industry, and service those rides. in fact, we think this is going to change the industry for the better. going to revitalize the industry. we'll have at the more professional drivers now working. that may even increase the value of medallions and taxi permits.

we're very excited. i urge you to support this as we think it will create a collaboration and different way to do business into the future. thank you. >> caller: good afternoon. i'm the president and owner of alliance cab. we are small cab company. we've been in the business for over 30 years. i need you to support item 11 before you today. this will put taxis in a different platform. for us to join forces with them was way out of our orbit. it was incomprehensible.

there was a lot of work behind the scenes. we believe that this will revitalize the taxi industry. this will bring hope to the taxi drivers who are financially ruined. to put taxis in the uber platform will provide drivers with more ways to earn. they will be offered uber trips. this will also serve the public by giving the ridders with another transportation option. it will encourage users and shorten their wait time. the fact this will give taxi drivers access to more potential customers is profound and significant. the convenience upside is, uber has strong followers. whether we like it or not, they are widely accepted by the public.

i respectfully ask you to support this. we can make adjustments, modify some. we still have an agency that we'll have oversight of the rules for transportation. >> caller: good afternoon. i am a medallion holder. i have been driving cabs for the last 40 years. i'm asking you to consider voting on the pilot program regarding upfront fares to match the taxi meter. there are two alternatives. i am suggesting initially the

taxis operate these third party fares at meter rates. this is a very important thing. you're going go get lot of controversy over it. you have to understand uber wants to be a dispatch company. it has never wanted to be a transportation company. all its troubles are caused by being a transportation company and having cars that don't compete with the rules, that aren't proper insured. so, what will happen if you guys are not very careful is that

uber will take over the entire taxi industry by dispatch. then it can do, pay, what it likes and charge what it likes? thank you. >> caller: good afternoon. i'm driver of veterans cab. i'm here to ask you to vote no as this proposition currently stands. i really excited about fly wheel partnering with uber. i think it's a great idea. best idea for our industry moving forward. there are no rules made around the rate how much uber will take from the fares. there's no rules made up yet around will there be surge pricing. when you hear the word upfront pricing, i think you need to understand, this is going to introduce surge pricing in

taxis. it's a living wage as a taxi meter rate. what uber and lyft do, they charge a customer $28 or $30. they pay the driver 14 and 15. that's becoming the standard procedure. as this is written, it's not going to work. it's not a living wage path forward. if you believe in living wage for san francisco, we need to somehow make this work at taxi meter rates. it's that simple. my experience as an uber x and lyft driver, that app does not stop going out. it will cloud out some paratransit fares. that's the price we'll have to pay. one more thing i wanted to say, fly wheel has had a breach of

trust. i heard you talk about trust earlier with just not paying the drivers and owing them hundreds of thousands of dollars. i would almost feel better if this was coming from uber straight. it's a living wage issue. if you believe in living wage for san franciscans, tie it to the taxi meter, let uber get into the business. thank you very much. >> caller: my name is sal. i've been driving taxi cabs since 1988. i've seen all the changes in san francisco. i remember when mayor willie brown proposed to release 500 medallions at the time. the cab industry was up in arms

and we kept circling city hall for many times. we protested every single time the city proposed to release more medallions. every time the city needed more cabs, the city always needed more cabs. it was the brilliance of uber that they saw the need and they filled that need because people heard old ladies crying in the richmond. begging the dispatcher and begging driver, please old lady has been waiting for two hours. somebody go pick her up. we've always needed more cabs. right now. the nature of cab drivers and the nature of the cab industry does not like change.

we want to always be like dinosaurs. this is a brilliant idea. we need uber. we need the taxi cab industry to work together in some sort of platform. fly wheel initiated the fly wheel application. it's a brilliant application. it's a great application. it has benefited the driver tremendously. >> clerk: that's your time sir. >> caller: thank you so much. >> clerk: next speaker please. i will read a few more names. >> caller: hello, everyone. i'm a 28 years cab driver and

manager in the taxi industry. i feel strongly that this problem has to go through -- i feel strongly you should vote yes on this program. it could not come at a better time than this just coming out of the pandemic. we have about 350 medallion owners that foreclosed on their medallions. i feel this is the way to save the industry. i feel this is the way to go forward and change the dynamic in this industry. i'm hoping that you guys go through with this. i'm very responsibility. -- veryoptimistic. >> caller: i'm the owner -- i have have been seeing drivers

coming back-and-forth driving, not making any money. going dock something else. delivering doordash or other things. my implementing this e-hail with uber, it will improve the industry so much and including that i have half of my medallion. they are sitting at my door. nobody want to drive them. >> caller: i'm with the taxi workers alliance. i want to thank staff for meeting and having the townhalls and meeting with us to explain how this upfront fare pilot has morphed into a pilot with uber. we came away with these meetings

with more questions than answers. that's why we're asking you to vote no until the program rules are little bit more flushed out. many of these answers are really just a contract between two private companies. we don't know how public this information will be. what really changed my mind less than two weeks ago when the deal in new york city between uber and two taxi apps there was announced about. it was clear the deal was -- it was a win-win for everybody. we know when there's a global

monopoly. the people that lose is usually the workers. weapon want more protection. one other thing, the way uber calculates fares is different from how they driver earnings. these are separate calculations. please, ask for more education and how uber works with other taxi companies around the world. thank you. >> caller: i am a member of the

board drivers of green cab. i think this is premature. you have to realize this is the last time a you will hear of this if you approve this. the rest of the rules will simply be generated by staff. there's too many unanswered questions. my greatest concern in this is that the ability to serve regular taxi passengers. regular riders -- could be left out in the cold. secondly drivers have a right to know if they're taking an uber center -- generated drivers.

we need to know that. drivers need to know -- some drivers won't take a ride if it's uber. some won't take a ride if it's below taxi rates. next is that the commissions that drivers pay must be regulated. both uber and fly wheel benefit from these commissions. there's nothing that would stop them from going up to and possibly pass the limits that drivers can bear. i'm going to run out of time here. i'll say that if you do approve this as a pilot program, it must really be a pilot. the taxi medallions sale the program was sold as a pilot program. then they sold hundreds of medallions for $250,000 a piece. there's no way that program was going to end.

>> caller: my name is mark norton. i'm not a taxi driver, nor do i own a taxi company. i used taxis. i think proposed program is close to -- to allow somebody company like uber and lyft to get their hands on taxi system in san francisco. especially with the complete lack of rules that seem they'll be coming out of somebody's head in it future. we don't know what. i can't understand why you folks would consider approving this in this form. i spent my life working in hospitality industry, hotels at

restaurants. i worked at the giants stadium now. i served lot of people. i called lot of taxis for people. you think about what you're doing. thank you. >> caller: i'm a taxi driver. i like to thank you all. you had really intelligent -- you kind of answered lot with your questions. i know we all have reservations about this. it's happening in cities all over the world now. i know there's a fear that uber will take over the taxi industry. i don't see any way to stop this. i'm hoping that this will be a

pilot program and there will be lot of attention paid to the details of the program. one important thing is the payment to drivers. i am on now a program called lien. which works well for me. not all the drivers are on that. there needs to be a timeline to set for all drivers to be on this lean. it's an instant payout program for gig workers. it's working very well. all the drivers need to be on that. i think they should all be on it before this program actually starts. there's a big controversy about payments. hopefully that 15% will be locked in. big concern is upfront pricing.

does it include the time we wait in traffic. i think that's important too. >> vice chair eaken: we can go to the commenters on the phone. please press star 3 if you wish to speak. >> clerk: we have 18 callers with 10 hands raised. first caller please. >> caller: my name is jessica felix. i'm concerned about the upfront pricing and i'm asking for no vote. the sfmta current approach to this is lacking in oversight and protection for drivers. we asked for protections and they ignored us by not putting regulations in this. there are no clear goal what success will be with in pilot how they are tracking data to determine the success. the sfmta has left all the rules

up to the third parties to figure out. which will most result in lower wages for drivers. however, if it increases surge pricing and drivers are getting paid more, paratransit customers will not get service. i heard in the meeting this can help wheelchair users to get rides quickly. there's no evidence of that. it's putting drivers at risk as we have to make quick decisions on whether or not to accept third party rides and determine if the rate is fare. it's incomplete and it's too soon to push this pilot through and change the code. for years uber has refused to abide by laws of public protection. now they trying to cement their goals in our taxi goals.

they want to do business with us and go by our rules. this board is only -- we have no say we'll be the ones left with wages. we need protections from you. please vote no without proper regulations. thank you. >> caller: i'm a longtime taxi driver. when uber surging, there are more taxi callers than taxi drivers can handle. uber callers will be calling. it will be a shame dedicated taxi callers to serve people looking for cheaper rides. the existence of uber has cost

every medallion holder over $10 million -- $10 million and counting. taxi drivers need to know in advance if it is an uber or lyft customer calling. that's all. >> clerk: i believe that was mr. please call back in.

>> caller: i wanted to mention that currently, paratransit rides pay no fees. i want to know if uber is going to be on board with this for both drivers and the riders? furthermore, who's going to pay the incentives that kate was talking about. i don't know if they will be on board with that. the last thing i wanted to say was that surge pricing is going to take marginalized population in it city and hurt them as far as like low income, disabled, seniors on a fixed income. they won't be able to take taxis on the holidays if it goes to surge pricing. i think those things need to be considered. otherwise i do think it's a good opportunity for taxis to get their business that were taken from them.

thanks. >> caller: hello. this is kim with the san francisco labor council. i have issues with this whole deal going on right now. one, i have a huge issue that there's no transparency. uber has been one of the worst employers of all-time. there's no transparency in the services that they deliver how they do business. that's a huge issue from a public standpoint. turning over public services over to a company like uber. it is just ridiculous. allowing them to profit here off working people like that. we know they have fought working

people every way possible. this got to stop. there needs to be many more meetings. i think there will be actions against the m.t.a. should this go through. this is not acceptable in any form or fashion. you all should vote it down until the public can really chime in and see the transparency, allowing a private company to profit off of these services is absolutely ridiculous in the sense that uber has been completely unwilling to cooperate with the law. they have shown they are willing to break the law. thank you.

>> caller: i want to make comments -- [ indiscernible ]

>> caller: thank you e -- thank you again. i'm just an orlando -- ordinary member of the public. i want more options not less. i want certainty. i like to know what i'm going to pay for anything. whether it's an airline ticket, whether it be a meal or a

transit fare. one thing you don't hear much about is the problem called long hauling. where you get into a vehicle of whatever strike it might be. they take all over the place. you don't know where you going and you end up paying more. you should have. i support the idea of offering all these different options. i can make an informed decision about the services that i want or need to use. it shouldn't matter if i used to request the service. it shouldn't matter ifty pay for it using my visa card or mastercard. it shouldn't matter if i'm wearing pants or a skirt. this will bring uniformity out. i have to do what i need to do to be able to travel safely.

which includes all these type of vehicles. it includes public transportation. i ask that you remember the ordinary folks like myself. i'm a disabled veteran on a fixed income. pass this. that way i can make informed decisions so i can travel in a safe and reliable manner. thank you. >> caller: good afternoon. this is barry toronto. i am very much concerned about the lack of transparency. we met with the m.t.a. staff.

i'm very much upset that they haven't worked out all the rules before they put this in effect. i used the fly wheel app. it's a wonderful app. the new payment system works fantastic. however, working with a company that exploits workers is a huge problem. a major issue with the fact that they treat their own drivers horribly. just imagine how much they will treat us. what will we do lost and found item? who do we contact? who do we contact with uber and if there's an issue of a crime is committed by one of their customers. how we supposed to get in touch with the support. we have real live person we can

talk with fly wheel. i believe uber to e-mail. sometimes they take whatever to get back to you. i urge you to please delay approving changes in the transportation code. it means permanent change to the code. i'm relying on using the meter rates. upfront pricing problem is what happens if the person forgot something at home or has to do home. >> caller: hello, there's a lot of points that can be made about the details of how this partnership can play out with

drivers and passengers. i think the most point that i like to make is that the industry in recent years has taken several blows. most recent which has been the pandemic. but at the same time, logistics have been expanding during the last two or three years. taxi drivers have professional experience. this regulation can revitalize the industry and expand by allowing this work with multiple third parties. not just our traditional taxi

customers. >> caller: my name is spanky woods. i'm a san francisco taxi cab driver and medallion holder. my medallion is number 561. i think that all t.n.c.s should come under the same laws and regulations of the taxi cab industry. you have uber and lyft drives that are driving in commercial capacities without a commercial license. they should all have to get a commercial license and pay the fees to have a commercial license. they should have i.d.s and above all, they should have commercial insurance. the city of san francisco will only allow a certain amount of

taxi cabs to drive in it, but uber and lyft drivers come as far as los angeles to drive in san francisco. whereas, cab drivers in san francisco can only work in the city city of san francisco. uber and lyft drivers with work in any area. they're not regulated like the cab companies are. that's what i'm saying you should regulate uber and lyft. first and foremost and make them get a commercial license to operate. cab companies themselves not to driverrers but the cab companies are saying if you can't beat them join them. if the cab companies join them, they'll end up working for them.

>> caller: good afternoon m.t.a. board. i'm a purchasing of a taxi medallion in san francisco. i really done lot of thinking about the situation with what we're facing now. i don't understand why we can't do the model like the taxis in new york. pay us the meter rate. people talk -- [ indiscernible ] i'm not opposed doing a pilot program. you talked about transparency that it must be transparency to me too if it's an uber ride or not. i do not support uber nor will i ever support something that is trying to kill me. they have done nothing but hurt

our industry. they expect us to pick up their rides. someone else wants to do it, by all means they can do it. i'm also supporting the taxi workers alliance. you have to regulation -- regulate to ensure taxi drivers are getting a fair rate.

>> clerk: are there any other callers on the line? we have two more. please unmute the next caller. >> caller: hi. i'm a medallion owner.

we don't go through with that and most of the drivers is the owner. the owner, they didn't decide and the company -- we are the ones who's earning the business. we pay for them 15%. how many people is voting for this and plus, the pilot program when they get the medallion is not supposed to pick up the uber

prize. can you just look at it, please. we are feeling exhausted. [ indiscernible ]

>> caller: this is herbert wiener again. my concern you are merging it two industries with different standards. the uber driver is not vetted carefully as a taxi driver. furthermore if the uber driver is in an accident, the company employs the uber driver is not sued, the uber driver is sued. they have very limited resources. this is not a signs to regular

taxi driver. there's also risk that uber to take over the industry and control the board. definitely, for the sake of the public, do not sue the pilot project. most pilot projects m.t.a. whined up being approved anyway. this one should be stopped for the benefit and the welfare of everyone. thank you very much. >> caller: my name is george. i'm a medallion. i've been driving a taxi for 20 plus years. i strongly urge the board to vote yes. this is our ticket out. for all these who are complaining, do not use uber.

leave it to us who want to use uber. thank you. >> caller: that appears to be the last caller in the queue. >> vice chair eaken: we'll close public comment on item 11. i will look to my colleagues. do we have any board discussion or a motion? director yekutiel? >> director yekutiel: i like the motion to approve the item. >> director cajina: in terms of -- i want to really understand the motion -- the resolution is to extend the start date for the pilot period from -- the end date will be april 2022 to august 2022. on top of that, to allow for trips to originate from third

party entities? >> i can read it if it will be helpful. >> director cajina: i want to understand what we're deciding today. it does seem there are a few kinks that still need to be worked out for that latter piece of the resolution. to allow third party trips from the third party entities. that's the piece that's causing lot of anxiety now. it seems that there's been considerable work that's being done to get to point of alignment and to get to point where all parties are satisfied. i do feel slightly uncomfortable making a decision about something that hasn't been fully

faced. we don't have the program rules, guidelines. there's a lot of unknown about it. as anxiety i feel from folks, i'm feeling it too. i want to vocalize that. it's scary. it's people's livelihood. i completely understand why there's uneasiness. it seems that super close to getting to alignment. i wonder if we're asking prematurely. i want to be sensitive to that too. there's lot of things that came up during public comment that gave me pause.

i don't feel comfortable voting on that latter piece of it. i don't know if there's a way to separate the two. i do think you need more time. i'm in favor of that august 2022 extension. that last piece of it, i'm not there yet. >> what i would say is comparable to the vote of the board in september. you delegated authority to the director of transportation. that has already happened. the specific program rules are set under d.o.t. authority. that piece is actually already happened with the broad pilot. that's that kind of the vote of

confidence in the team. the technical team from there develops the program rules with vetting it with the industry and that's what we did from september, we took authority that the board delegated and then we worked with the industry to set the technical rules. that's kind of the staff role if you will. very technical piece, very in the weeds. it's just a very complex industry for many stakeholders. we have three key stakeholder group. if you have two stakeholder groups on your side, you're sure not to have the third. it is a very difficult place to

get to a consensus. just to acknowledge that and to say i share that and that it's like come back in a month or two months, it will likely not be that different. with this, we take our roles seriously with vetting program rules which is why we didn't want to fully bake everything before coming to the board. we're hearing public comment. we've had many key stakeholder engagements. we actually have very transparent. we have vetted written draft program rules which the industry has seen. the feedback we're hearing is very important to us. i don't think anything will change. if we come back, it will likely be a very similar experience. i will just request that with the delegation already -- that has already occurred that this

is a slight amendment and we are certainly happy to come back and do reporting out on what the final metrics, the program rules. we do want to share that. we want to share and track our progress. it's very important to us. that's something for you to consider. that is something that we are certainly planning on doing. >> director cajina: what's your timeline for the program rules to be finalized. >> we want to continue vetting. we certainly heard that the c.a.c. is interested in weighing in. depending on when we can get on the agenda, we hope to finalize

the program rules in short order. within the time frame, if approved as it stands, we have until early august. that's kind of the outer bound. we like to finalize those program rules sooner. >> director cajina: there's nothing preventing staff realizing that work stream of creating the program rules if we decide to separate those two actions. if we hole off on that third party entity conversation, just

vote for the extension from april to august, that's something we can do. >> vice chair eaken: i'm seeing one resolve in the resolution. i'm seeing one action. i'm not following there's two separate pieces. >> maybe i can clarify. there is one resolve clause and one amendment to one paragraph of the transportation code. it has two aspects to it as director cajina said. it extends the pilot period. it allows the third party provider. it's one amendment. you would have to come back and amend the transportation code. have another hearing and amend the transportation code to put that second phrase into that same paragraph. if that was your choice tonight.

that would require another public hearing on this amendment. >> vice chair eaken: i assumed we were just providing more choice to consumers so they can always still choose to do the meter the old fashion way. or they can choose to do this up front. we don't need -- that's just correct -- >> that's right. both on the customer side and the driver side, more choice, more transparency with the fares and it allows more options. >> vice chair eaken: okay. >> director yekutiel: i am comfortable with the language. you want us to vote on this so you can start the work of developing the rule. you want to signal to the companies that this is happening. you will take the next few hours to figure out the rules. sound like it's friendly for you

to come back. my opinion of this, as a business owner, this is the potential to unlock immense amount of customers for an industry that has a demand problem. it's had for a long time. i don't know of lot of other opportunities that we have to create an unlock immense amount of demand. i'm comfortable giving staff understanding that you've been working on this issue for a long time, freedom to figure out some of the stuff and signal to companies that we're willing to play ball. i think we need to move. >> vice chair eaken: director lai? >> director lai: i want to make sure that director cajina didn't have more questions? >> director cajina: if we approve a third party, i understand there's excitement around that because it does offer folks more options to access taxi services.

that is all fine i think everyone is in alignment on that piece. i do i think there's some fundamental pieces around different things that -- all these different pieces that are really jermaine to how folks get -- paid. the devil is in the details. it's the details that i feel like need to be ironed out. it doesn't seem like we're far away from getting those ironed out. i think you need more time to do that. i don't see that separating these two actions prevents you

from still following through with the work stream. it doesn't codify that third party piece just yet. i guess that's my clarification. >> director yekutiel: i think maybe, i don't want to speak for staff, maybe part of the reason they didn't want to go through this whole process of figuring everything out before hand is because it's just a short-term pilot. may be they want celebrity to --flexibility what works. >> it's a one-year pilot. we're testing the program. you're voting on the authorization to allow this. what staff is working on is the details. that's the staff role. police department police department. -- that's what build into our draft program. [ please stand by ]

>> -- and they see this is the third-party originated trip, i don't want it, then, they can make that choice, and if another driver sees that trip and wants to participate, they can take that on. and part of what we want to look at is oh, are we getting more drivers? how can we get more trips, and what about the taxi meter fares? but the driver will have that on a trip-by-trip basis, that ability to opt in or not, so they're not required. they're not required. this is adding more trips to our taxi tr