for regular meeting of the municipal transportation agency board of directors and parking authority commission to order secretary of seville, please call the roll on the roll. director henderson here. henderson present. director hinsey. here. kinsey. present. director. so here. so present. director. tarlov. here. tarlov. present. director. kahina here. kahina. present. chair. ekin. here you can present. we are expecting director hemminger to join us shortly. and for the record, i note that director hinsey is attending this meeting remotely. director hinsey is reminded that she must appear on camera throughout the meeting and in order to speak or vote on any items, places you on item number three. the ringing and use of cell phones and similar sound producing electronic devices are prohibited at this meeting. the chair may order the removal from the room. any person responsible for the ringing or use of a cell phone or similar sound producing

electronic device places you on item number four. approval of minutes for the april 16th regular meeting. thank you. directors are there any changes to the april 16th minutes? okay. seeing none, we'll open the item for public comment. are there any comments? comments on the minutes. seeing none, we'll close public comment. is there a motion please. and a second on the minutes. so moved. moved move. approval rather. yes. second, thank you. please call the roll on the motion to approve the minutes. director henderson a henderson i director kinsey i kinsey i director so i so i director tarloff i director kahina i kahina i chair ekin ekin i thank you. the minutes are approved places you on item five communications. i have none moving on to item number six introduction of new or unfinished business by board members. board members, are there any items of new or unfinished business today? director. so. hi, everyone, i

want to take this moment to, say that we are celebrating the asian american pacific islander heritage month. this is a month of may. and then i also wanted to emphasize that, it is very upsetting for me to celebrate on the first day of this month and only to find out that we have of one of our busses on number 29, getting to an incident right on the same day when we started to celebrate our asian heritage month. and, it has the case is now in under investigation. but i want to take this as a moment to reflect and also share that with our agency of sfmta. i have repeatedly mentioned that public safety is our number one priority. in addition to embracing vision zero and

climate change and cultural diversity, we any violence and harm to our operators, our students, our genuine citizens on our fleet and our our infrastructures are absolutely not tolerable. in this case, it really hits home because i'm a mother myself, i set my some of my fellow board of directors here are also parents with young children and teenager, we are in full cooperation with our police. but this type of incidents, we need everyone to stand up to be an upstander, to, to be hold our responsibility as general citizen of san francisco . and also, i was very happy to hear, so many attention had been put in this, this case. and i would like to hear if we have any more updates on the current status of the event and

incident. and julie would you mind? thank you. thank you for raising, this important issue. we have a zero tolerance policy for hate and harassment on our system and our are so committed to all of our users, particularly our youngest and most vulnerable users feeling safe on our system. so we are coordinating very closely with the police department. we have pulled the video and, we'll provide it to them to support this investigation, when we have incidents like this, we also, issue a notice to all of our operators so that they become the eyes and ears for the police department to help, follow up and, and hopefully make an arrest in this case, we also have a, fantastic, team of ambassadors, our muni, transit

assistance program, that work closely with schools and ride the busses during school times to help support students de-escalate issues that can happen between schools. and we'll be focusing, that team on the 29 and some of our other west side school lines, between now and the end of the year to really provide as much support as we can to our students during this difficult time. and thank you for the report. and, we look forward to see us to allocate more. ambassador and also our, mtap, which is muni transit assistant patrol, which is a specific task group of very trained, well trained officer specifically to be on our bus

line that had been frequent by our sf, usd students. so please, put i know, we all know, but i think i have a responsibility to share this in public record that sfmta have been really diligent to put the resources that we had on these line with the focus of our school children and this is absolutely not tolerable. and we continue to work with sfpd. i personally have reached out to our deputy chief of police and also the, a couple of other commanders that are specific assigned to work in colab in collaboration with us and mta on muni. so we'll continue that dialog and perhaps in the future we will do some public forums to restore the fear. and also make sure everyone understanding when you're in trauma, you still need to fall. and there's a few procedures that we can remind each other to do to help our police to start the

investigation sooner than later. so with that, i have another thing to announce. it's really fun. more fun things that i got the luxury to visit our to participate. well, i was just observed. i wouldn't allow to drive the train, but i went to the train rodeo so it was really fun and i it was really heavily poor in rain. but i'm seeing be able to follow on a regular train behind. and the last, contestant to see and learn what are all these things that they need to do in order to start their train. control was phenomenal and visit everybody who actually give their entire life to muni is just phenomenal to see that it was truly a family, julie was there and i had some photos as you got to see, the all time winner of one of our operators, she got this amazing muni earrings on. so i hope that if we get the photos to share. yeah, some more muni

merch opportunity is. you can see her earrings. this is our two time winner. and she's like an all time winner for the operator in this race. first winner and she received the first winner award to this past saturday. so that was me on some of these are the teachers. they train our operators on the on the rail. yeah. and there's me and julie, and he is the division head. right. julie. he i think this is the, administrative support. yes. awesome so my fellow directors

go there next year. it's really fun. it's a good it's a good group. yeah. that's all i have to say. thank you. yeah. thank you. thank you for your comments . are there any other items of new or unfinished business from board members? okay. seeing none, i'll just i'll just offer a few updates myself. i attended the downtown first thursdays open streets event last week with our former colleague, manny pacquiao. that was a wonderful, very joyful, open streets event that i think some, knew about and are repeat and then some just stumbled upon. and i think it was very successful. i look forward to that, returning as a monthly event, i will note that we receive several hundred emails, don't know if, you know, everyone's read all the emails, but i'll just flag some about the wiggle, and the need for safety improvements along that, that corridor, which, you know,

some of you may know, some some do not. the wiggle has a deep history in our city, going back hundreds and hundreds of years as an important pedestrian and bicycle corridor. and so these folks are just flagging need for safety improvements that continue to prioritize people along that corridor. and i also had someone join my office hours yesterday and give voice to that as well. so i just wanted to bring that into the conversation. and then a couple just more items. i joined some community members last friday to do a little bit of a community walk audit on fulton street and 37th, noting the need for, safe crossings, especially considering the senior center and considering there was a fatality in that area. so just wanted to note that, strong request for more safety improvements on fulton street coming from community. i was able to join some community members out on frida kahlo yesterday. as i know, director tarlov was as well in the past couple of weeks to talk about safety and transportation issues out there. and then finally,

just one piece of positive feedback received during office hours i'll share with you was a real sense of great work on hiring new operators. and then the operators are performing at a really high level. just a bit of anecdotal feedback from community. so that's what i wanted to share with you all. and if there are no other items, i'll open it up to public comment on the new and unfinished business from the board members. anyone wishing to speak on these items raised by director so and myself seeing none, we can close public comment and move on to the director's report. places you on item number seven, the director's report, we're going to start with several recognitions, i'd like to first invite our chief financial officer, braema horta, up. she's going to acknowledge our payroll unit, i will just start by saying we probably have the most complicated payroll in the city, most most of our operators do not get the same pay even from

day to day, because it's based on the complexity of their run. we also have performance premiums, special events, anything and everything. and this group, not only makes sure that people get paid, but if something goes wrong, they really, really prioritize, being responsive. so i just want to in advance a brief express my gratitude. good afternoon directors i'm brenda horta, the cfo. and julie stole all my talking points, but sorry. that's okay, so the, motivating desires of the payroll team or the motivating values, i should say, of the payroll team are dedication, reliability, compliance, transparency, professionalism and guidance. and i actually think the last one is a really special one and a real tribute to the leadership

of that team, this team is incredibly dedicated. payroll stops for no man woman. whether or not natural disaster or health emergency. people must get paid regardless of the circumstances and this team pays over 6100 mta employees every two weeks. and that is no small feat, we have five different timekeeping systems that have to be integrated, and we have over 20 mous, all of which you have different payroll provisions, and i think the strength that this team was really demonstrated during covid when they processed over 2000 requests for federal emergency sick leave and 4800 requests for california supplemental sick leave, as well as tracking all of the additional sick leaves that were put in place by the city in response to covid, as julie mentioned, they place a lot of attention and care on

responding to employee concerns and answering employee questions and as a team, they place a lot of energy into guiding and mentoring one another so that they are working together as a team and supporting each other and learning as a team. so i want to thank this very dedicated team that is often does not often get the spotlight of a, you know, a project opening or an award being won. but i think payroll is kind of like ice skating. the people who do it well make it look super easy, but that doesn't mean that it's not hard. and it didn't take a lot of incredibly detailed, dedicated work behind the scenes. so let's bring these people from behind the scenes to the front, i want to start with sharon wong. oh, sharon sick. let's maybe just for efficiency, let's hold till the end, johnson wong. christina vasquez as

evelyn sang wilson tong bertina tan is bertina here? bertina just because she retired. okay oh, mimi. sorry. mimi. retired. mimi. retired. leanna sue. kathy. luong fengling. liao jia. kathy. lee nicole. lewis. who is already at the podium. sally lao , diana lai, agatha lagasca, gabriela lacayo, della dog, ruby kwong lam ann and michael keohane, and nicole. did you want to say a little something

on behalf of the team? i can finish, i can help hand out. that's right. thank you. good afternoon, i just want to say that this is a great team that we have. we did make it through covid, and i know we're a little bit past that now, so we're getting to focus on some other items and just really looking forward to getting fully staffed and getting our everyone up to speed and continuing to pay everybody correctly. we have new negotiations going on, so i'm sure we'll have a lot to implement starting in july. so looking forward to that. thank you everybody. thank you so much for your service. let's now do a round of applause. i would next like to invite kim ackerman, our chief people officer, up to talk about the

peer assistance program as well as the employment services unit. i'm going to be speaking a little bit later on. some of the success we're having at muni around safe city and reliability, these two teams are pivotal to that, and so i'm thrilled to be able to preside over the meeting that they're being honored, but i will turn it over to kim because i will definitely steal her talking points because these are just critical, critical groups. no problem. thank you. julie. good afternoon, chair ekin and directors. as julie said, i'm pretty excited to be able to recognize two of the hr teams today. the first one i want to speak to is the employment services team at and, chair ekin, as we were coming in, you were talking about the quality of the operators and how, you know, you're hearing compliments from citizens, which is great to hear, this team, it's amazing. when i first came here, five

years ago, i know julie probably remembers this. my first three months on the job we spent here in the city hall on a task force focused on operator hiring and what we can do. and i've even heard people say we haven't had sufficient number of operators for the past ten years, so i can't speak to that. but i will i will carry that on, we've also heard a lot about data. we've seen apta, white papers and apta data talking about operator hiring shortages, not just regionally but nationally as well. so all of those things make this moment that much more spectacular for this team. they've had their head down. they've been focused. they've worked hard on what can we do to expedite operator hiring, they basically have gone from hiring operators, 21 operators every five weeks to fill in classes of 45 and 22. they hired 245 operators in fy 23, they hired

424. so they've doubled the amount of operators that they've hired, they have done things to expedite in person hiring events in order to bring on candidates sooner. they reimagined the entire hiring process for operator hiring. i mean, they they looked at it, they said, what can we do better? how can we expedite it? how can we get people here for, for transit? they've also partnered with city departments such as city drive to see what can we do to get our applicants ready in terms of their job skills, job readiness, etc, so that when they come on board, they're certified. they have their dot's, their license, etc. so it's amazing what this group has been able to do. and i think, you know, one of the things that i'm extremely proud of is i think they really exemplify teamwork, they work together, they have their heads down. they're always focused on the goals. and you know, it's really my honor, really, to be able to recognize them today for all of their, you know, hard

work and public service. so at this time, what i'd like to do is call up bill miles. bill miles is our senior manager for talent acquisition. and then the rest of the employee services, come on up, team. come on up. and thank you. and bill is going to hand out the certificates and announce their names. coleman. hey anderson. anthony brown. wrong team, wrong team. hernandez back in action. stephanie jones. brian. will be

doing the sign here today. the lena. paulette. who's not here today. de trump . okay. the next team that i want to recognize is our peer assistance program. this is a small and mighty team that works behind the scenes that you just people don't always get to see them in their work, but they

touch so many people. they work alongside employees alongside employees, many of whom are experiencing one of the most traumatic experiences in their lives. the peers basically work 24 over seven. they work on the weekends, they come into the divisions, they go and visit employees who are in the hospital, who maybe have been involved in critical incidents or assaults. employees who are feeling scared, confused or feeling vulnerable. they're trained to help employees cope with trauma, grief, loss and post-accident stress by listening and being present for employees and providing information about what to expect when a trauma occurs, the peers show up at accident sites, emergency rooms, mta facilities any time, day or night. they're all across the city. the peer support employees also in dealing with substance abuse issues, if an employee voluntarily reaches out to a peer and is serious about getting help, the peers will

work with them to determine, of course of action. the peers are knowledgeable about available resources, including our agency's benefits, our eap, our care services, and any kind of local resources that would benefit them. the peers also meet with licensed clinicians weekly, who provide them with ongoing support and mental health and trauma response training so that they can continuously best support our sfmta's employees. so again, i'm really proud to recognize this team. they are a small and mighty team, and i'm very honored to call them colleagues. i'd like to call up right now. jean santullo. jean is our acting workforce development manager and also the peer team. if you can come up to you, please.

okay. jean's going to introduce each one of them as they get their certificate. legislation nbc news. thank you so much. thank you. thank you. thank you so much. thank you. can i just say a word or two? thank you. so thank you. so much to mister ackerman. also director kirschbaum, for highlighting the work of these teams, i am number one. i'm a very big believer in celebrating and recognizing people's performance and uplifting the work that often is a little bit more behind the scenes. so thank you. that's a wonderful management best practice. thank

you for doing that. i also think it's important for another reason. and that is something that i've experienced. and i imagine many of you experience is that sometimes people like to complain about government. sometimes people like to insult this agency. and i think it's important to uplift the people who are at the core of this agency and allow the public allow the board, allow the public to get to know the people who are at the heart of this agency. because i think when you get to know the people of this agency, you come to have a little bit more respect for how hard they work and how much they deserve that respect. so i would love to keep creating opportunities for members of the city to get to know the amazing people that are at the core of this agency, that are at the foundation of everything we do. i thank you for uplifting their work and honoring and celebrating them. and just a little note to those in the public who like to criticize. i would love to invite you to continue to get to know the

people that are at the heart of this agency, and continue to treat them with the respect they deserve. thank you and back to you, director kirschbaum. thank you, next on my update, i want to talk a little bit about the twin peaks tunnel. we recently completed the most comprehensive inspection of the tunnel. in over 50 years. we have been bringing this important topic periodically to the board. and now that we've wrapped up the inspection on our working on implementation, wanted to take a minute to talk about it, i am pleased to report that there are no imminent safety hazards that were found and the tunnel remains safe for our riders and our workers. the inspection also identified some necessary repair work to ensure that it continues to stay safe. the fact that we've discovered and are addressing these issues before they become a problem, i feel really exemplifies, guys our approach to understanding and maintaining our infrastructure,

and it's part of why we are seeing a such an incredible improvement in reliability and our riders are responding to it. the first round of work to maintain safe operations is planned for this summer, and in order to get it done this summer, we are are, we're doing things a little bit differently. we are designing reaching out to contractors and doing our public outreach all at the same time, taking this approach allows us to get this work done quickly, getting this work done quickly not only allows us the immediate safety benefits, but it also allows us to coordinate with the construction of the west portal elementary school, which will be starting this summer, we are

expecting the work this summer. the planned, work to be about an eight day closure, and we will probably have a couple of weekend closures as well leading up to that, while all, the twin peaks portion of the tunnel is closed, we will be operating trains from embarcadero to castro station and we will be operating busses from, essentially the church street safeway all the way till the end of the line on the k, the l and the m. so really minimizing inconvenience to our customers, this is a bus bridge that we've operated many times and have a lot of, experience with. we will see no impacts on the j line or the n line or the t line during this work, we have also prioritized, the results of this inspection in the capital plan

that you recently approved, so there is about $24 million over the five year period of the cip. we anticipate over the next 5 to 10 years as a regular program of investment as we work through, the capital needs identified by this study. speaking of capital, i also wanted to give an update on the geo bond yesterday. the city's capital planning committee approved moving forward with a 390 million healthy, safe and vibrant san francisco bond proposed for the november 2024 ballot. the next step is for the proposed bond to go before the board of supervisors for consideration and placement on the november ballot, in addition to the previously proposed investments in public health facilities and

family shelters, the bond was updated to include funding for transportation improvements and public spaces, which very much reflects the priorities that this board expressed during our our our budget season. 68.9 million would go towards street safety improvements and road paving improvements would include pedestrian and bicycle safety and streetscape improvements, traffic signal infrastructure improvements and street paving. there would be an additional 76 million for revitalizing public spaces and parks improvements such as accessibility upgrades at the harvey milk plaza and the holiday plaza, as well as pedestrian streetscape improvements for the public right of way near the powell street cable car and market street. the sfmta appreciates that the updated bond recognizes the critical importance of pedestrian and bicycle safety improvements to public health and safety, and the urgency around vision zero funding needs

. we also want to share a little bit about bike and roll to school week. so we've got the kind of the big pedestrian safety, but then we also have the kind of more operationalize how we teach the next generation to carry on this work, every year in april, the sfmta's, san francisco safe routes to school program celebrates students biking, walking, rolling and getting to school under their own power with a citywide event called bike and roll to school week, bike and roll to school week demonstrates the joy and empowerment that comes with choosing active and sustainable ways to move around the city and encourages students to adopt healthy habits that will benefit them for the rest of their lives. the event is organized by a san francisco safe routes to school nonprofit contractor, the san francisco bicycle coalition. this year, 50 schools registered to participate and received bike lights and reflective stickers

to distribute to students who biked, walked, or rolled to school. sfmta staff, and the safe routes to school nonprofit contractor, the san francisco bicycle coalition. why bike and walk san francisco attended events at 20 schools, helping school partners lead group bike rides, distribute incentives, and greet participating students as they arrived, these are some of the pictures that we took over over the week, and we thank everybody who participated in this wonderful program. the next thing i want to share is about earth day, at sfmta, at sfmta, every day is earth day, but in particular in april, we really, try to talk about and reaffirm our commitment to climate change as one of the biggest problems facing our world. and the work we do is a big part of the

solution. on the local level, april was earth month, and we reaffirmed our commitment to doing our part to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. transportation is one of the biggest emission sources in san francisco, with private cars and trucks emitting 30% of our city's greenhouse gases. i know i brag about this a lot, but muni emits less than 0.0001, and biking, walking and rolling emits no emissions at all. muni is already the greenest public transit fleet of any major city in north america, and is achieving the city's climate goals is only possible by making low carbon travel the preferred option with robust, reliable and well funded muni. so on earth day, we kicked off a new public messaging campaign that we wanted to share with you. it highlights muni's role in climate action with signs up on our digital shelter displays throughout the city, and more coming for our busses and trains

. earth day was just the start and will keep the messaging series going for the next nine months. the goal here is to make sure the public knows that when they choose to take muni, when they choose to walk, bike or roll, they're taking climate action and supporting a healthier and more sustainable city, so these are some of some of the examples that are going to be up in our vehicles, as well as what we have in our in our shelters. and then finally, in conclusion of my report, and i think in keeping with chair eakins theme, i wanted to share a few pictures from april 24th with ges administrative professionals day, we celebrated in the transit division with a luncheon where our administrator of staff from all over the agency came together and we got to take care of them, because

364 days of the year, they really take care of us, i am so grateful. in our leadership team is so grateful for the contributions of the administrative staff, at sfmta, we are a complex, regulated, organization. and without the administrative support that we receive, we would have a number of challenges. we also would not have important programs like operator of the month celebrations or any of the things that we're doing to celebrate the merit and success of our system. so i am so grateful to all of our amazing employees, but particularly, this month, our administrator of professionals. thank you. thank you, director kirschbaum, for that very thorough report. are there questions, colleagues, on item seven? archer hemingr, please. thank you, madam chair,

julie, i did want to ask you about the tunnel, and, when ernest hemingway was asked how people go bankrupt, he famously said slowly. and then all at once, and i guess i'm looking for some reassurance that we're not going to have an all at once moment out there, obviously you're emphasizing the seriousness of the work and the need to do it promptly, and that obviously triggers the endorphins about, well, if it's important enough to do that, is it important enough to close, because it's in danger of any kind of all at once moment. so here's your chance to reassure. thank you for that question. i do want to absolutely reassure her that there is no imminent safety risk in the tunnel, and that this work will allow us to

pace our improvements over a 5 to 10 year period, which aligns with our service needs and also what we can afford. we would absolutely come to you and ask for a tunnel closure. if a tunnel closure was warranted, it would not be easy, but it is not something that jeff and i would shy away from. we, we are confident that we have world renowned tunnel expert s. they have gone through every inch of this tunnel tapping and scraping and they have written up an extensive set of next steps, all of which can be done over a series of time rather than kind of an immediate one time shutdown. what about, its seismic status is the tunnel. i mean, first of all, how old is it, and is it up to current

seismic standards? yeah. thank you for that question. the tunnel is over 110 years old, it did have some pretty significant , earthquake upgrades when we did the track work in twin peaks, particularly around, the, old eureka station, we are going to be doing an update to that seismic assessment to identify any additional work that would complement the tunnel structural work that we are doing. and when will we have results from that? i within the next 12 to 18 months. okay. thank you, madam chair. thank you. director henderson. thank you. chair. i just wanted to echo your comments and sentiments about staff and the importance of, really appreciating and getting to know the staff that are behind the amazing work of this

agency. and i am particularly interested in hearing a little bit more about the peer program that the, staff were recognized from because, i yeah, i'm so i'm very interested in i think that in the past, i don't know, five, six months that i've been here, i don't know that i've had a chance to, become acquainted with that part of the operation, but i think it is, an admirable position for them to be in. and one that is super important and example that might be used in other people's jobs or, or profession. so i'm super interested in hearing about that if whether it's here or a briefing, i'm happy to make time to hear about it because i would like to learn more. so i just wanted to point that out and, request that. and then also i had a question about the geo bonds that you mentioned for the potentially for the november ballot. you said 68.9 million,

but how much was the other 68.9 million for street safety and then how much was the other amount, 76 million for revitalizing public spaces and parks and the total bond amount is 390 million. okay. and so is there. do what is the timeline? you said it will happen at the board of supervisors is the next step. and then after that, do you anticipate that we will, that sort of this board will hear or see anything related to this item before if assuming it makes it through the, board of supervisors. i that that's an interesting question. i think i'm going to turn it over to the city attorney's office. so your question is more so one of just timing or. yeah, like timing and. yeah. yes. i don't have the precise timing offhand, but i

can get back to you with an answer once i find that out. okay. thank you. sure. but i think also director henderson was asking, would will this come to this board? and my understanding is not for a formal vote, but it could be brought for some sort of informational item or something, if that's what you're requesting. so once it makes it so assuming it makes it through the board of supervisors and we know that will happen sometime before november. yes then i guess my question about timing is will we ever hear about it at the at the board level. or is this something that we just engage with as members of the public? you will get to engage with it as members of the public , and i again, will have to double check there may be an opportunity to hear more about the project s that are associated with the geo bond, and then that is something that would be within this board's, discretion. but that is that is more so related to, the approved geo bonds and then projects that

would flow, from the, the moneys , any monies that, if it, if it is approved. got it. that's right. thank you. once once it is on the ballot our role becomes strictly informational, and the approval process really is turned over to the voters. thank you, director tarlov. please thank you, chair ekin, so i just have a little question about the tunnel project. i know that there's been a lot of upgrade work recently on the elevator at the castro street station, is the elevator going to be operational during that time? if people are coming up from the station and transferring to a bus, i will have to find out the timing of the completion of that project. and staff will will follow up. thank you. any other comments

from board members on the director's report? i'll go. if i could. thank you. director. i just i just have a follow up question to director hammer's question on on the tunnel work, julie, you mentioned this was a five year, five years sort of renovation and makeover. what's sort of the lifespan span of the fixes that we're going to be doing, i.e. the fixes that we're doing now, are they still going to be good five years from now when the project, the project is over? or are we are we going to reach a point where we have to reconsider doing the part that we're doing in the summer again, in like five years? thank you for that question. the work is additive, and it is all focused on, strengthening the structural

walls of the tunnel. okay. so it's additive. and by the by, by the time the, the end of the five years will be set and we won't have have to do any rework for several other. i want to clarify, i do believe this is a 5 to 10 year, in in investment program. and, i think it will have a life that goes beyond the current five year plan. we will need to continue to prioritize it for capital investments. okay. thank you, madam chair. okay. thank you, director hennessy, not seeing any other board members wishing to speak, i'll open it to public. comment on item seven. the director's report. i have one speaker card for michael petrilli's. what is the time? two minutes, two minutes. okay hi. my name is

michael petrilli's and my hands are painted red to symbolize the blood of the fatalities on our streets. the blood is on the hands of mayor breed and the sfmta. i am very disappointed that, when julie made her presentation about the bond measure and she mentioned vision zero, there was nothing said about the failures of vision zero that have led to too many deaths on our streets. why was nothing said about about the, state of vision zero is deplorable and is not working. i also have to address what amanda was saying about, respect for

the agency workers from your critics. yes. there needs to be respect for people in the agency . there also needs to be a lot more respect from the agency toward the public. the public is still traumatized by the deaths of four people almost two months ago. at west portal. we have been begging for changes in the traffic, design at that location , and it is being pushed off again. it is being delayed. that is going to lead to more harm for everyone. let's have some respect for those of us in the public who want no more deaths on the street and action on

vision zero from the agency. thank you. thank you for your comment. next speaker, please. hi. board members, luke bornheimer, i just want to address two different things, in the director's report, the go bond and climate action, regarding the go bond, i've had significant trouble finding specifics on the $69 million, all there is just a really brief description. it's like bulb outs, pedestrian improvements citywide, e.g. sloat boulevard, so it'd be great to see that. and for the public to know exactly how that $69 million is going to be broken down. both both on a project breakdown perspective as well as like what it's going to be spent on, how much is going to be spent on outreach, how much is going to be spent on actual physical infrastructure, how much is going to be spent on process, with that, it'd be great to see as much of that funded,

restricted to specifically physical infrastructure for walking and biking rather than outreach, or other expenses that often. get bundled into projects like drainage, transit, overhead wire moving, transit, stop, you know, building or moving. those are oftentimes bundled into street safety projects. that is not specifically for street safety, i also just want to point out that repaving streets without protected or separated bike lanes or transit only lanes oftentimes results in people driving faster and more recklessly. so we like to say repaving is a street safety thing, but it actually may decrease street safety if we don't install protected or separated bike infrastructure or transit only lanes on those streets. so i would encourage restricting it to just streets that we install those things to, finally, on climate action, when the 80% mode share goal was originally set, it was about non-automotive mode share. since

then, we've now shifted to sustainable mode share, and now we include all ev trips and all car trips with three people in a car or more. i would encourage the agency and the city to go back to the original goal, which is non-automotive. so no electric vehicles and no car trips at all should be included in the 80% goal. thank you. thank you for your comment. next speaker, please. any other speakers wishing to comment on the director's report? i do have one accommodation. okay. go ahead. you've been unmuted. this is herbert weiner. my concern is the vision zero has not been, assessed, basically, it's been unrealized planning through input from the public. and to achieve a goal that was impossible to achieve. and my

feeling is you should be consulting with the police department, and the police should be on the ground floor of the planning. thank you. thank you. no further speakers. oh, maybe. would you like to speak under item seven? please? please approach the podium. hi there, alan burdell. i hadn't planned on speaking about this director's report, but the caller just now mentioned, that the problem with vision zero is, is that it's totally unrealistic . and that caller is totally right. it's a unrealistic goal. we need more, enforcement by police officers on the ground. we need more public safety outreach that reaches pedestrians, talks about how pedestrians need to cross a crosswalk. we don't have anything like that. they need to get off their phones. they need to pull their head sets off, and

bicyclists, need to follow the same safety precautions. it's a effort between pedestrians, bicyclists, car drivers, and it's not all on the car drivers. this is really about all i wanted to respond to. but that caller, just before he nailed it. this is an unrealistic goal. vision zero. it's unrealistic. thank you. thanks for your comment. are there any other speakers for general or for comment on the director's report ? okay. seeing none, there were some questions posed by the first speaker, and while we're not allowed to engage in a q&a here because we have to notice all the topics we are going to speak on, i'm going to tell you two things. one is i have office hours on the mondays prior to our board meetings, and that is an opportunity. we can have a little bit more engagement. those are 4:00 on the mondays before our board meetings. i do this every monday. i will not do it next monday for the next meeting because i will be out of

the country. but generally that's an opportunity where we can engage a little bit more. second, for those interested in vision zero, our next vision zero subcommittee of the board, which is where we go deep into the topic of vision zero, because this board cares so much about vision zero. and that is that is june 11th at 1 p.m. over a one south end nest. that's a chance for us all to sit around a table again and have a conversation together and problem solve through this essential challenge for our city. thank you for your comment that will close public comment. it's thank you. so let's go on to the citizens advisory committee report. thank you. item eight, item eight. the citizens advisory council report . hi there. can everyone hear me? yes. go ahead. okay, great, we had three, presentations at the citizens advisory council this month, two of which are we had motions on, which are, rather important issues. i think, to members of the public, the first one is in regards to west portal station, the cac recommends that the sfmta implement safety changes in the

area of west portal station in collaboration with community partners by the end of the year 2024, to provide a little color commentary on that, i think there is a lot of urgency around this issue, for the reasons others have already mentioned. today's meeting and, and, we know that, the merchants association, along with supervisor melgar, have convened a committee to review, the sfmta's, proposed plans and discuss them, while i think we view, community engagement as incredibly important in this process, we don't want this to become another project that becomes eternally bogged down by process, hence, the end of year 2024 as a goal, our second motion was on the frida kahlo quick build project, it is, and the motion was. that is the opinion of the sfmta, cac that

the proposed recommendation would be of significant benefit to the citizenry of san francisco and the san francisco municipal transportation agency. that concludes my report. thank you so much, chair leifer, for joining us and for your report, colleagues, are there any questions for the cac chair for. okay, chair lafer, i don't know if we can have you back on this screen, perhaps, but i have i do have one question for you. i'm still here, great. is could you just help us to understand? because frida kahlo is going to come up a little bit later today. could you just help us understand some of the themes that the cac discussed and debated when you considered your support for the project? that will be helpful to inform our discussion a little bit later? yeah, if i can. i think we felt that it would be basically i mean, it was a case of the benefits outweigh any of the drawbacks of it. and, it's i

mean, there is going to be an issue of a loss of certain parking spaces, but, i think from a safety perspective, that i think was of more of greater importance, and that that the project would be a benefit to the folks, at city college and in that area. okay. thank you. and would you just not to put anyone on the spot, but just to, just to make sure we understand. would you be able to share, if you do take roll call, vote is the person who is representing that district. the person who's appointed to represent that district? did that person vote eye on the project? i believe they did, yes. okay. thank you. that's very helpful. any other questions from my colleagues? yeah. well, actually i should say one did. and then one person who's a mayoral appointee in the area voted no. okay. thank you. okay if there are no other questions, i'll open it to public comment on the cac report

item eight. hi. board members, luke bornheimer, i want to thank the citizens advisory council for supporting both the west portal improvement project as well as the frida kahlo quick build project. but i urge you as the board to direct staff to bring forward the west portal improvement projects proposal at the next board meeting and make it an action item rather than have an informational item, and then another action item which will just drag this whole thing out further, as you all probably know, almost all of these proposed improvements were proposed back in 2019 when then norman, then supervisor norman yee asked mta to improve this area. staff did a lot of work, concluded that these improvements would be very helpful. these proposed improvements are almost carbon copy of those back then. back then, those improvements were not implemented because a small

group of mostly merchants opposed the improvements to improve safety in the area and the area more broadly, so we're back here again, coming full circle. and, and i just fear dragging this out over multiple meetings that we know the outcome of that will just be more contention, versus just actually implementing things on the ground, which is what the vast majority of san franciscans just want. we just want safer streets. we want muni to run more reliably. we want our public spaces to be safer and more welcoming for people. the proposed improvements, which don't go nearly far enough because we should install transit only lanes all the way to 15th ave on both west portal ave and uloa street are a step, and so we just need to implement them and go through this process. and we can always add improvements for other streets, but dragging this out further and having committee after committee is exactly the opposite of what the people of

san francisco want. so thank you so much. thank you. are there any other speakers on the citizens advisory council report item eight? thank you all limited to the citizens advisory comments, as i've registered it, the vote was 8 to 4, that this was not a unanimous vote. and there were there were strong feelings being expressed by some members of the cac. and i would hope and suggest, out of respect , we want to talk about respect all up and down. this organization, including respect for the cac members who have questions and concerns that are compatible with some of the questions and concerns of the general public. those of us who use those roads. so, i hope you register for a two vote difference would have changed the recommendation on from 8 to 4 to 6 to 6. and then one more. so please keep that in mind. thank you. thank you for your

comment. next speaker, please. hi. my name is jess nguyen and i'm a student at city college. unfortunately, there's not that many students and teachers who can be here because it's final exam and i'm here again at the cost of my own work and my own studies, to speak on how important it is to not go through with the frida kahlo way. the people who think it's just parking spots and to disregard the entire school's opinion on the fact that the ccsf student trust, student trustees and students unanimously passed to be against this project. and yet it was not acknowledged by the cac. they were never inviting students to, give public comment or even walk the proposed area that i, i have to suffer because i have to carry over 50 pounds of equipment at night and the

closest place for me to park is at the end of where you're fixing and removing the 29 parking spots. there is no increased public transit. the cost is not. the cost is becoming more of a problem for a lot of students who have suffered during the pandemic, and i think it's kind of unfair for someone to just say, oh, let's just not, not delay the project because of some people. and the thing is, some people represents thousands of san franciscans who rely on public transit, who are working 2 to 3 jobs, who are caring for other people and taking night classes. and we deserve to have quality, safe streets and options. sorry, i'm shaking. take your time. there was a lot of privilege for people in the room who think they can bike and take everything they can on public transit, when it's not even safe

for someone like me and other people who experience hate crimes. earlier this month and asian pacific islander, it's not. it's not fair for someone who's just trying to be a small business owner. oh, thank you for being here today. next speaker, please. yes. my name is harry bernstein. i just wanted to make a comment about the, cac report, i spoke recently to one of the merchants in the west portal area, just interested in getting his perspective on, at. this was just after the proposal from the city. and i think supervisor melgar and mandelman and a few others came in from his perspective, was this was a project from 2019. it was

suddenly being imposed with ten days given to comment, and then they were going to go ahead with it, imagine the extraordinary amount of community and merchant action, against that. it was seen as an opportunistic effort, especially because there were really no safety. there were changing the traffic patterns. they were routing, traffic onto streets that weren't meant for them. instead of going into the area in front of the twin peaks tunnel, but that was, it was going to have an untold impact on, on the merchants, on the residents. and he just didn't understand it. and it was never explained, especially the urgency that it had to be done. there wasn't even yet a official report on the accident, so you

have to keep that in mind. it's not just a matter of what goes on at the cac, but tremendous amount of community interest. otherwise as, so i'll have to report back that, this person here advocates that you consider that report and act on it for next month, i hadn't understood that kind of, calendar, so. thank you. okay. thank you for your comment. any other speakers on item eight? the cac report? hi, michael petrilli's again, i am glad that the, advisory committee mentioned west portal, and, i guess my basic question is, why is it san francisco? so witnesses the deaths of a family of four waiting to take a bus

that that, four people have died and it is not enough to convince the merchants at west portal and the mayor and the supervisors and the sfmta to change the traffic patterns. are more people going to have to die before there is some serious wreckage condition that the traffic engineer, having contributed to the deaths of those four people and the traffic engineering is not improving to protect anyone who is on the streets of san francisco. i'm going to be silent for the next 10 to 15 seconds in memory, for that family of four who died and for everyone else who has died on

our streets. while vision zero has not really taken effect. so here are some silence. in memoriam of those who have died on our streets . finally, we're in the middle of an election year, and i want every candidate running for mayor to come to this panel and address this committee on vision zero. thank you. thank you for your comment. any other speakers on item eight, the cac report? okay. seeing none, we can close item eight and please move on to the next item on the agenda. places you on item number nine. public comment. members of the public may address the board of directors on matters that are within the board's jurisdiction, but not on today's calendar. i

have one speaker card for michael petrilli's. just a moment. hello, michael petrilli's again, i am holding up a sign that reads patch potholes. i used this sign on friday when the mayor came to the castro district for two months. the friends of jane warner plaza have been begging the city to fill in the potholes. these potholes at the gateway to the castro district have existed for at least three years. we do not want someone to die or harm themselves because of these potholes. we have been sent to sf, dpw, sfmta, the mandelman office and no one is taking action. we're talking about potholes. why can't the

sfmta send out a crew and fill in these potholes that have existed for three years? we've made the request in writing several times and nothing is happening. we asked the mayor for action and she said all we had to do was ask, and then she laughed. we have asked the mayor, but sf mta is not addressing the pedestrian jeopardy! the pedestrian hazards at this plaza. in addition to the potholes, we want the sfmta to fulfill a number of requests. i have a written document that i'm going to give to you all that i want included in the minutes that lays out what we need, starting with weekly wash downs of the urine and feces that are being left in the plaza. i made the request to df to come clean this plaza of, the

feces and urine, and they they've passed the request over to sfmta. we cannot have urine and feces in this plaza and at any time, much less as gay pride begins. thank you. thank you for your comment, let me give you this, please. okay here for i have five copies. one is for the secretary and one is for julie, one is for amanda. okay. one is for dominica. dominica. sorry if i'm mispronouncing your names and, janet tarlov, i asked that this be entered into the record. please. thank you, thank you. next speaker, please. hi. board members luke bornheimer i wanted to address three things today one, no turn on red to arguello boulevard and three valencia street, regarding. no turn on

red, i urge you to direct staff to bring forward a proposal for a citywide no turn on red policy at all. signalized intersection in the city with a plan to implement those over months or years on a prioritized list of high injury networks near schools, near playgrounds, near senior centers. but very explicitly for a citywide policy at all signalized intersections, so that we can increase roadway safety for all people, including people who drive cars, if staff is unwilling to just present a citywide policy, they could present their own current, you know, iterative process alongside a citywide policy, and then you could have an action item to decide which one of those the agency should move forward with, secondly, arguello boulevard, ethan boyes was killed on arguello boulevard in the presidio over a year ago, months before that, a 14 year old boy was hit and critically injured on arguello boulevard near california street, more

than 2000 people have called for protected bike lanes to be installed on arguello boulevard. sfmta's staff created a preliminary design for plastic posts separated bike lanes within a month of ethan boys being killed in may 2023, assembly member ting secured $1.2 million from the state budget to install those bike lanes on a boulevard and yet we have seen nothing done on the ground, and i have heard that staff is considering a center bikeway, despite what we've learned from valencia street, so strongly encourage staff to just implement the already created design for separated bike lanes along the curb on arguello boulevard. finally, valencia street. it would be great to see you and staff just work to implement curbside protected bike lane design as soon as possible so that we can make the streets safer for all people and better for business. thank you. thank you. any other commenters on general public comment? item nine. okay. seeing none, we'll

close. i do have one accommodation one okay. go ahead . speaker. you've been unmuted. preference herbert weiner, one thing that i really want to address is paratransit. now, on the whole, i think it's a wonderful system because the drivers have been vetted. they're courteous and they're attentive, but it can really go awry when it takes a long time for a van to come by. i had to wait about 15 minutes last friday for a van, give me a ride to my destination, and it was very inconvenient and frustrating. i don't know what the solution is. perhaps you need more, vans, but something should be done because i think other people have been inconvenienced too. and as to vision zero, i would like to see

the safety on the sidewalk from bicycles that ride on the sidewalk, from scooters that ride on the sidewalk. they shouldn't have their mission, simply, circumscribed to the street. there's safety on the sidewalk, too. thank you. thank you. no other callers. okay. if there are no other speakers, we'll close public comment on item nine. move on, please, to the consent calendar. director is that places you on item ten. your consent calendar. these items are considered to be routine and will be acted upon by single vote. unless a member of the board or public wishes to consider an item separately. for all speakers providing public comment, please identify which item number you are speaking to. and additionally, we did receive a request to sever item 10.4. so item 10.4 will be heard after the other consent item is your consent calendar includes item 10.1 requesting the controller to allocate funds and to draw

warrants against such funds available, or will be available in payment to the listed claims a and b against the sfmta. item 10.2 approving various routine and parking and traffic modifications listed under items a through f in the agenda item 10.3 approving roadway shared spaces, street closures on larkin street between eddie and o'farrell streets on saturday, may 11th, 2024 through saturday, may 10th, 2020 5:11 a.m. to 8 p.m. the second saturday of each of each month. the street between bush and sutter streets. wednesday, may nine, 2024 through thursday, may 8th, 2020 5:08 a.m. to 10 p.m. daily maiden lane between kearney street and grant avenue saturday, may 18th, 2024, through sunday, may 18th, 2020 5:05 p.m. to 10 p.m. each tuesday through friday and 12 noon to 10 p.m. each saturday, and making environmental review findings again. item 10.4 has been severed. moving on to item 10.5, adopting a resolution of

local support for allocation of regional measure three bridge toll funds in the amount of approximately $18 million for two sfmta projects. the new flier mid-life overhaul phase one for approximately $11 million, and the vintage streetcar rehab for approximately $6 million and providing assurances that the mta will comply with the metropolitan transportation commission policies. that concludes your consent calendar. thank you. so, colleagues, i would like to first take items 10.1, two, three and five. and are there any comments or concerns from board members on these items? okay, $18 million. oh i'm sorry mta project okay. if not, i'm going to open for public comment on the consent calendar minus item 10.4. are there any, not 10.4 everything, but 10.4, 10.1, two, three and five. any public comments on those items? okay. seeing none i can take a motion to approve

those items. i did actually have one, one accommodation. i'm sorry. let's go to that speaker. you've been unmuted. thank you, good afternoon, commissioners. i'm addressing you on item 10.4 authorizing the director. i'm sorry, ma'am, item 10.4 is going to be heard separately. we will come back to you when we're ready to take that. okay. thank you, thank you. sorry for the confusion. so, motion ten, please, for items 10.1, two, three and five. move to approve a second, second. thank you. please call the roll on the motion to approve with item 10.4 severed. director heminger heminger, director henderson henderson i director hinsey. i kinsey i director. so i so i director tarlov i tarlov i director kahina i kahina i chair. ekin. hi. can i thank you? that is approved bringing you back to item 10.4. okay. thank you colleagues, does

anyone wish to speak on item 10.4? i'm going to go ahead and read the item. i did need to update and clarify the language. so item 10.4 authorizing the director of transportation to execute contract number sfmta 2020 406 with the san francisco bicycle coalition education fund for the not to exceed amount of approximately $1.5 million and an initial term of three years, with two options to renew the agreement for a period of one year each, for a total of two additional years. and so, directors, i will ask request that when you make the motion to please amend the resolution to update the contract term to indicate a term of three years, with the option to renew the agreement for a period of one year each for two additional years. thank you. colleagues who would like to speak on item 10.4. director kahina. yes, i can start. i see we're all queuing up right now. thank you

colleagues and staff for creating, the staff report that thoroughly describes this, this contract. i did have a few questions. and so i believe we have some staff here ready to answer those, if you can approach. that would be awesome. thank you. good afternoon, thank you. tracy and so, could you walk us through how this contract is funded? what are the funding sources for this contract? yeah, a quick introduction. tracy lynn, travel choices manager, and our streets division, so the contract is a little different this time in the funding and that we have multiple funding sources. so we have a bicycle component as well as a new scooter component. and so the bicycle component is funded through prop l. so that's the local sales tax administered through the sfcta. and then for the scooter component we have

coming from a scooter permit fees as well as from our taxi and mobility services, general fund. and do you know approximately like the split of the pie on this one, what's coming from each bucket? yeah. so, on an annual basis. so per year, 200,000 is coming from prop l, and then the remaining 100,000 out of the total of 300,000 is coming from our scooter component. and i'd like to invite my colleague danny up for the scooter split. hi, directors, for the scooter share component. about maybe around 10,000 from each permittee will be used to fund this program, and then the rest of potentially from remaining general funds. we don't know what the upcoming number of permit fees will be for the upcoming permit term. as we've just received applications and are scoring them right now. and when you say, danny, when you say general funds, does that

mean general funds from the sfmta's budget or or, is that from the city's general fund or which general fund are we talking about? it's the general fund from sfmta's taxis access and mobility services division's budget. so that's kate's job. okay. got it, perfect. thank you for that, and, tracy, could you tell me how many, companies or organizations applied for this rfp? yeah, so let me start from the beginning of the rfp process. so we brought this contract to the civil service commission back in august of 2023, they approved it at that meeting. then we opened up the rfp process in november of 2023. so it was open for about a month , staff held a pre-proposal conference, and that was really intended to help provide information for interested parties who may have wanted to submit a proposal for this contract, and i think about 3 to 4 individual groups did attend that meeting, and then when our

rfp process closed in december, we received one bid. and that is from the san francisco bicycle coalition. so only one bidder. and so only one awardee. correct, is that typical for rfp processes like these, for these types of projects to only have one bidder, so i can't speak for other projects, but i understand for this one, it's a very specialized, piece of work that we are asking for in terms of operating a bicycle classes. and then for this contract, adding that scooter component. so it may be a niche, contract, but i can't speak for exactly why we only received one bid this time. and i ask because we obviously get a lot of contracts to approve and a lot of rfp processes that, you know, you all go through your process and then we get the contract, and, you know, whenever we do enter these sorts of dynamics where we see that it's just one applicant, it's a red flag for all. it's kind of like, what's

going on here, and so i, i, you know, i, i don't doubt that staff did their utmost to do outreach and engagement on this. and so i do wonder, if there's a sense of kind of like the root cause of this, is it we just don't have a lot of folks that do this type of work in the city. is it? you know, a matter of the field is so niche, as you mentioned, or we just don't have a lot of, you know, even regional partners that could do this type of work. is it that specific, i'm not entirely sure, but we did, you know, kind of consider that this may be a situation. and of course, we would love to have as many bids as possible in this rfp process. so our contracting team, i double checked with them. they did send out the solicitation to 180 contacts. and then staff had also included additional organizations just through our work to solicit them. we also reached out to the board of supervisors office and asked them to share with their networks. so we have really sought to get the outreach out

about this opportunity. all right, still, yes, it is still, a bit disheartening to hear that we just had one applicant, and so i just want to flag that for the team as something that i'm particularly concerned about. and i do hope that as we do get more contracts before us, that that there is really a robust process to make sure that it's a competitive process thoroughly and that we're reviewing multiple different, vendors for all these different services that we want to provide the community and, and, san franciscans, and so how long have we been providing or doing this type of educational program , what's the what's a little bit of the history of that? yeah. so for the bicycle component, we've been operating this program for about 15 years. so as i mentioned we do have an additional scooter component. and if i may i can expand a little bit of what this program is, so our bicycle safety education and outreach program,

we hold a number of bicycle safety classes. and so these classes are a free resource for san francisco residents. and they're really intended to provide information and increase awareness. so the classes go over basic bicycling skills. so that's literally how to ride a bike how to turn and brake. there are also classes on maintenance how to kind of keep your bicycle in good condition. these are things that you know, a regular person may not have access to, and maybe they want to learn how to ride a bike or use a scooter, and they simply don't have the opportunity to be able to learn that, we also have night and all weather biking, recognizing that people may bike during all kinds of weather as well as times of day, and then we've also added a new e-bike class for this contract, recognizing that they have increased in use, throughout the city. so that is a need that is there. and then that is the same

reason why we added the scooter component, because we see an increased use of scooters on our streets as well. so the scooter classes will also include basic scootering skills, like how to safely ride a scooter, how to navigate with one, proper scooter parking which i know is very important for a lot of people in this room. how to ride with other road users and on road practice as well. great. thank you so much, tracy. and it's been 15 years and that we've done this program. like what are some successes that we've seen with it and what are some, how is it? and i ask mostly because, you know, we did pass a really tight budget, and so it's important for us to kind of take a little microscope to, to all the different, ways that we use our funding, and ensure that it really is, you know, helping us achieve key strategies that we have as an agency and as a board, and so what if you can indulge me a little bit and just tell me some of the evaluation metrics that you use to assess this program

and you, can highlight some of the successes of this program over the years. yes. so definitely agree with you there. we definitely want to make sure that this program is performing the way that we want it to, and that it has the outcomes that we'd really like to see, and so we definitely do evaluations every year. so we don't wait until the end of the program. we evaluate it on an annual basis so that as the program is running, we are aware of how it is performing and how it's being received. and so we administer surveys for the classes with attendees before they take the class. and then we follow up six weeks later so that we can see over time how the impacts of the classes have really held up after they have taken them. and so i do have some 2022 data as well as data from 2019 to 2022, i don't have the last year's data because the last contract just ended literally two weeks ago. so we're still finalizing that data. but for the most recent data that i have, some of the survey results that we have pulled, 90% of attendees rated

the classes as either good or excellent. so they're able to choose from different options on the survey of kind of the content and quality of the classes, we also saw that 70% indicated that they felt that their knowledge of their rights and responsibilities as bikers was either good or excellent. after completing a class, and then 38% indicated that they ride more frequently after attending a class. so we do take these as all good signs that people are coming out of the class and really feeling like they gained something. their time was spent well and they feel more comfortable and better equipped to ride in san francisco, and then we also have some demographic data. this is purely from 2022, 69% of our attendees identify as women, and then 74% of attendees are typically between 21 and 50 years old. we don't have an age requirement for this class. the classes are largely geared towards adults, but we also have a freedom from training wheels

class that is geared towards young children, and that was included as recognition that a lot of adults who may be interested in learning how to use bicycle infrastructure, scooter infrastructure, they may also have families. and so they might have young children who they would also like to have taught how to safely use these, non-motorized vehicles. and this program really complements safe routes to schools, safe routes is geared towards schools, so they tend to be school aged children. but again, this program does not have any age restrictions. so anybody who would like to attend the class is welcome to. and it's free, so we have kind of looked at these samples of success metrics and evaluations to really see how we are doing with the class and really seeing that the classes are beneficial and interpreted that way by those who take them. i'm sorry if i missed this in the contract, but are we focusing our strategy with this contract on specific geographies or demographics? great question.

it's a city wide program, so we're not specifically focused on any particular geography or area, but we do try to have a presence in every single district. and so i asked this also just to make sure that as we, you know, are doing this critical work, we're really amplifying the work that we're doing in our equity neighborhoods. and so i do hope that, you know, as you manage this, this agreement that that is, a focus that that you encourage the contractor to have , i did see that there was some, allocation for language services, can you speak a little bit more about how you see that resource being used, and what your plans are for that? yeah. so, there's an outreach component that comes with these classes. so the contractor is also required to, basically put out information that these classes are available and they largely do that by attending a lot of community events. we do ask that most of the engagement is in person, because we want to

have that community presence. and so the outreach materials that can be things like fliers, they are required to provide them in english, chinese, spanish and filipino, so all of the resources, in need to be translate covid. and then we also offer classes in language as well. so we've offered specific classes that are dedicated to spanish speakers, for example, chinese speakers, filipino speakers. and so, i would definitely encourage, that the use of, of that particular allocation or line item be used in certain geographies within our equity neighborhood, i know we have a lot of strategies, to improve our bicycle network and our different systems in those neighborhoods that really don't have them right now. and that's often a barrier for folks to even want to engage with this mode, and if our hope is to encourage mode shift, it's important that we meet folks where they're at and that we're supporting them where they're at. right. and so as you're looking at these evaluation

metrics, i hope mode shift is, is prominent. and i'll entrust you, tracy, to develop. what are those metrics to ensure that we're encouraging mode shift and that we're actually tracking like what it was as of today and as of three years from now when this contract concludes. right. and it's up for renewal again, and i say this because i and thank you so much for walking me through the, the funding, tracy and danny, because it seems that, part of it is restricted to education, but another part of it is not as restricted. and so i want to make sure i'm encouraging folks to be creative with, with our strategy and our solutions of how we want to encourage mode, shift it. this may not be the plan, and you'll assess that three years from now, but i want to make sure that you, you feel like you have the freedom to, to dream up a different solution if this isn't working, because i certainly, would hope that, if after 15 years, not to say that this is

happening, but after 15 years, we're not seeing that, you know, it's mode shift is actually being achieved through this, let's give it another three, see what happens, and if it doesn't happen, then i think it's time for a change. right, so i just want to give you some carte blanche with that and feel like. yes i can i can go a different direction if i need to because i think ultimately, i just want to make sure we're using the funding as best we can. yes. we try to do a lot with 300,000 a year, but thank you very much. thank you. thank you, director hemminger, please. thank you, madam chair, and i do share some of the concerns of, director kahina, you know, i colleagues, i've been uncomfortable, for some time with this practice, and it's not unique to mta or the bike coalition of, on the one hand, providing public funds to, an organization that, on the

other hand, advocates in front of the board of the funder, and i know a separate entity has been provided to receive the funds. and again, i'm not alleging any conflict of interest, but i think the appearance, weighs on me. and as i indicated, this is not a practice unique to this agency, and candidly, it arose from the fact that we are trying to be more, forward looking and, more in touch with the public and communities. and a lot of these organizations represent those communities. so, it's, it's a bit of a of a dilemma, i think in this particular case, it's compounded by the fact that we ended up with a single bidder, which i think was the result the last time, and they did go

through a competitive process, and i have no doubt you gave it the old college try, but we ended up with something that might have as well have been a sole source procurement, so i think that adds to the concern, i want to be constructive here, though, because we're at the tail end of a procurement and however it ended up, i think i, i would rather not interrupt, that work flow. so, but i do think we could take advantage of the structure of the contract, which is five years in total, but it's three years to start and two options. and what i'd like us to do today, if possible, is to direct the staff to take advantage of that three years before we get to the options and do an analysis of alternative delivery. means here that could be bringing the function in-house. although

we're going to have a hard time beating your price. i think, that could involve a different kind of contracting approach that wouldn't result in, one bidder again, and at the appropriate time, madam chair, i'd like to suggest that as i, something to accompany our motion, which i would support to move ahead with this contract, but again, take advantage of its structure, to perhaps come up with a better mousetrap. we may end up where we are today, but i'd like to give it a shot. thank you for offering to make the motion director hemminger, i see colleagues tarlov and so. and maybe you can just share if you have any reactions to director hemingers motion or any, any inclination that would be helpful to hear, well, thank you, chair. i think just in response to the idea of, moving

forward with the three years and, and then and taking that time to look at how this is proceeding and, to director kahuna's point about, the efficacy in terms of, you know, how we're seeing, mode shift occurring. i i do feel just as a, as a person in the city that there's more and more cyclists all the time. i don't have the, the data to back that up. but i do think that with, more, bicycle safety infrastructure and, and people, riding with their children to school, the cargo bikes and everything, there are a lot more bikes. it feels to me like, all the time. but, maybe we could, find out more from staff about the status

of that, mode shift, but i, ■i o have a question about what what would happen if we were. i wouldn't be in favor of this. but if we were to not approve this contract as a board today. what what would what would happen then, so i might ask council to, to add in, but from my understanding, if it doesn't get approved today, then we could reopen the rfp process. so that means starting it over from the beginning and opening it up for all new bids, our rfp process took one year in this instance. so it does mean that the classes would pause until next spring. so that is something to consider. it would go back to the civil service commission, we would need to get brand new approval for that. and then we would go to the to for the prop l portion of the funding and ask for the allocation there. and that process took a few months this time as well. okay. that's a

that's a pretty serious consequence, that i would personally like to avoid, i'd like to ask a little bit and i don't know how much you know about the difference between the san francisco bicycle coalition and the sf bicycle education fund. they're they're two different entities. i imagine they have two different nonprofit, or, you know, government ids and is the, the leadership for the two different entities is different, yesterday i. was fortunate to have a briefing with you and you were explaining some of the, some of the, the rules about how the san francisco bicycle education fund must behave differently, than the bike coalition is permitted to as as a, as a body that that,

comes and lobbies our organization so i can speak to the contract, and then maybe i can invite, bicycle coalition to answer directly. but for the contract, the funds go to their education fund. it does not go to the advocacy arm of the organization. and we do have stipulations in place in the contract that says the money can only be used for the outreach for the classes, so they cannot be used for advocacy. they cannot be used to gain membership into the organization and so on and so forth. so we have pretty strict text within the contract to make sure that the funds are spent purely on the classes and for outreach for the classes themselves. hello, board. christopher white, interim executive director at the san francisco bicycle coalition, on, yes. thank you for the question, and we the two

entities are distinct from each other legally. and in reality, we maintain on separate boards for the two entities. we've got different bank accounts for the two entities. we you know, are, financials are audited each year to account for the different activity of the two different organizations and the funding that goes towards any contract that we have is kept distinct and the funding that, comes from , city agencies is used purely to execute those contracts. it does not touch the advocacy work of the organization. thank you. that's it for me. thank you chair okay. thank you director. so please, thank you for everybody. here that, share all your information. and i think that, i wanted to come in on my

fellow director hemingers point about, the contracts. i am for the, putting in, like, three years and then reassess because as to, our co-chair, i mean, vice chair, sorry, i like co-chair. i'm good with that. thank you, it's, it's been a while. those contract, you know, it's repeatedly the only one. entity being awarded and, there's sets of checks and balances. i think we should really look into the primary writing of the proposals. right, in my experience with other, publicly contracting processes, is that if we ended up only

having one person bidding on the contract, this is not $10,000. this is actually like you're add like two more digits to it. right? and it's a long process. and we actually will have to go back and redo the outreach for the rfq and rfp process. that's the only way that is fair, right, it's kind of unfortunate that it's going to be another year, but, i what i'm trying to say is that i'm challenging the fundamental way how we write our proposal to an enable and welcome more people to participate when we write the original contract back, like a whole decade ago, time was very different, now my school has like these bike, bus, you know, going to school, you know, it's become like a party to go to

school, which is awesome, they actually form a bike bus, and it is so cute and adorable. and i think, like, everybody is like, so excited to do that, right? it's becoming like, actually, like a real party every morning. so, so to, to get to now where we are, i'm just curious what not having the ability or having the bandwidth or. i trust everyone's doing their really amazing job. is that what, what have we, put in our verbiage to attract, more people or have them easier to participate? maybe we can do unbundling the contract to allow multiple vendors, and i'm pretty sure there's, like, new scooter and new bicycle. not even new. like our legacy business, who? you know, the. i'm not going to bring name because i'm not here to advertise any, shop. but i in my capacity serving and my

previous, other commissions that i am aware of, there's a lot of legacy business. some of them actually operate in sell and repair bicycle for san francisco for like, the past two decades. right. so, like, how can we actually utilize our resources as limited as we have now to enable more participation specifically to benefit back to our small local businesses and legacy businesses? owners who have been obviously struggling through the pandemic and out of it and still not having to be able to stabilize their business. i think we can collectively be in it together and do more together, and i would think that, bicycle coalition will be also be a champion to kind of help elevate all the communities together, and also, you probably know we had a briefing and thank you for all your time. i would love to see the outreach because i have not receiving the outreach. where can i wear it? where like

i'm not even knowing. how can i actually get better educated for me is more on, if you're riding a bike or riding a scooter, how can we educate our public and the one that we decided to get on this on two wheels to do the proper signaling. so then we can also be responsible to be a better stewardship on our streets. so i, i don't know, like in the timing of things, i would like to actually hear some of the answers of like, where are you going to go? outreach. outreach to our community of women of color like myself, i would like to see it because i have not been seeing it, yeah, i think it might be a bicycle coalition question, but in general, my fundamental question is probably is the culprit of the contracting language to make sure that we can get enable more

people to participate. or do you do that? i'm just going to ask everyone to please silence your devices. someone in the audience has some device making noise, do you want to answer these questions? yeah. so i don't have new outreach locations because we need to execute the contract before we can move forward. but did want to point out that sfmta does pre-approve all of the outreach locations, the materials that are developed and then also where classes are being held. so we do have an auditing process that we can do to kind of hold the contractor accountable for what they said they are going to do, and we're able to track their spending just to make sure that that money is being used the way that it is supposed to, as for the previous contract, some of the locations, as i mentioned with you, is they went to different farmers markets. we're trying to spread the outreach, across many, many supervisor districts.

so, you know, the places that have generally gone and maybe bicycle coalition can fill in some of my gaps here. but farmers markets, public libraries, certain schools, the classes, you know, need a specific venue in order to have some of the classes which are off street and so there needs to be an outdoor space that was large enough and has enough, maneuverability for a class or a students who are taking these classes in order to have enough space, there's also been specific communities that we have specifically gone out to knowing that the communities are primarily in language. so, for example, we have gone to the tenderloin community elementary school and elm alley, and that was really to serve spanish, arabic and chinese speaking families. that's just one example. so as we are kind of evaluating these outreach locations as well as class locations, especially moving into the new contract, we can continue to bring that intention as we are kind of seeing if we are doing good at, you know,

just having a presence in all of the communities. and that's something that we can definitely work with our our contractors with. i don't know if, they wanted to add additional to the outreach piece. sure hello, board. my name is cecilia vega mayer. i'm the director of community programs at the san francisco bicycle coalition. and i just wanted to reiterate a lot of the things that tracy has said and share a little bit more about the communities that we aim to serve with both our outreach and our classes that usually result in our subcontractor doing outreach in these communities. as, as tracy said, we do all of our outreach in multiple languages. all of our outreach materials are in english, spanish, tagalog or filipino and chinese or mandarin. and these outreach materials are not only advertising our classes, but they also share best practices for biking on the road. you know, they start to get people interested in what you can learn at our classes. you can learn how to signal and navigate traffic and navigate intersections. you can learn about all the new types of

bicycle infrastructure in the city, and as tracy said, we do outreach in every supervisor district in the city and often multiple times throughout the year in multiple or in in certain districts. and we really try to pair our outreach in those districts with classes that also happen in those districts. and we work really hard to make sure that our outreach that is usually through a subcontractor is done in a very culturally responsive, multilingual and kind of in-group way. that's something that is really important to us, that i think we have developed a lot over the last five years of our recent contract and developed even more since the previous contract before 2019, i'd like to share that. as tracy said, we're at farmers markets, we're at public events, we're at every sunday streets event with our outreach and with our freedom from training wheels class. that is a part of the contract, we are at other cultural events, street festivals, art markets, art fairs. we also are doing specific outreach in communities that we would like to serve. like tracy said, we have a very

successful in this past contract. we started a very successful collaborative program at the monroe elementary school in the excelsior, which we worked on with y bike, the y excelsior collaborative. and for this program, we worked with a community based organization called community well to do our outreach and to provide some language services so that we could make sure we were working very directly with the people in the community. and serving the people in the community. and at these events, we were able to do, not only provide outreach and information about our classes, but like actually provide the classes to these the families in these communities. and since we offer classes for both adults and children's and all ages, we were able to provide really comprehensive family bike practice days in this community. we've we aim to recreate this program in lots of other communities that we wish to serve. we've done something similar at the tenderloin community elementary school, and

overall, our, our statistics for who we're serving has increased in the positive direction of who we're trying to serve. as tracy said, in 2022, nearly 70% of our students identified as women and non-men. and that is trans inclusive and non-binary, inclusive, in 2022 or since 2019, the percentage of our students that identify as nonwhite has increased from. from about 60% to over 70. so our specific outreach efforts and our attempt to be culturally responsive and culturally engaging, i think, have shown we've shown that we've really improved that. and we have lots of ideas about how to continue improving that, because as we know it is really important to be offering this work to people that are not already involved in the cycling community, people that are not already feeling safe on the streets. and we understand that there are lots of different ways that safety can be considered for people on

the streets. so that's something that is very well integrated into our programing. any more specific questions i can answer? oh, this is phenomenal. do i, can i add two location or reference point to your, outreach shopping list? alemany farmers market is one the largest one. yes. maybe we just crossed paths. i've never seen you. there's a lot going on. every other saturday. and also, would you mind, please? outreach to. you know, we have a lot of, chinatown streets, night market. and it's not just in chinatown, but it's actually there are some over in, the west side of our community. can you please also go go there as well? absolutely. we're at the outer sunset farmers market, and we will be sure to be at more chinatown events. thank you. thank you, director hennessy. please. director hennessy, i believe you had your hand raised for this

item. director hennessy up here, muted still. okay. did you want to speak again director tarlov okay. let's do that. while director hennessy works out our technical issues. thank you. chair i'm sorry to double dip here, but i'm. i'm very impressed to hear from, christopher. and i'm sorry. i forgot your name. cecilia. cecilia about the work that you're doing, i think it's really tremendous and done with a lot of sincerity and integrity, i would just say that, because the bike coalition is such a, an influential organization in san francisco, i think that, well, i have one question, which is, is, is this

is this money the everything, all of the funds that are used for this purpose by the bicycle education fund organization is that the sole funding source, the short answer is no. so we also have a contract for safe routes to school. there are other contracts that we have, with, with, other agencies as well as other, you know, businesses in san francisco to provide education outreach. for example, the, the scooter education we have experienced doing the scooter education because we've been hired by some of the scooter rental, companies to do education with their, with their services, and so there it's not the sole source of funding is the short answer. okay. thank you very much. so, yeah, i just think that it's

important for us to make the, the distinction that there, you know, we i mean, even just here now we've talked about oh the bike coalition is doing this work the bike coalition. and it's and there is, i think a lot of attention paid to separate the two organizations. and probably there's more that could be done. and and more, just i think it's, it's a wonderful organization. the, the education action fund, bike education fund, and, and i and i'm and i'm really glad that we're supporting that work. but, it's just, just, you know, as, as it, as it grows, it can, you know, have its own identity much more. so, and then, i just want to point out that, you know, there was a public commenter earlier

who, was talking about, pedestrian safety, and, and the contributing factor of, of distracted, you know, the phone and all of that. and, and i feel like this, even though it's bike and scooter rolling safety, i think that that speaks to it. and i do think that's a valid point. not that any person driving a vehicle doesn't needs to be the most aware person in a, in any interaction. but, there, you know, education for everyone is really important. and i'm not saying that you need to take that on, but i just feel like that really speaks to it. and it's, and it's unfair to say that, you know, all cyclists are, you know, flaunting the laws and riding unsafely. and a lot of that is due to your work. so thank you very much. okay

with that, director henzi, we'll come back to you. did you want to speak in the same? thank you, madam chair. and thank you to towel off for asking another question while i've fixed my computer, this is probably a question for cecilia, you had mentioned that you use. i don't know what you call them subcontractors, but i'll call them subcontractors for this purpose. i didn't see any other subcontractors. listed in the art, contract itself. so could you talk to us a little bit about how that works? yes, absolutely. thank you for your question, part of the, part of our proposal included aligning with the, the requirements in the rfp to have over 10% of our work be subcontracted to a, a, a

, a women owned business or minority owned business, or, and a locally owned business, so our outreach and translation services will be run through a, a business called inter-ethnic. and they're san francisco based and they have lots of, multilingual staff members that are going to be working with us. and we're really excited to work with them. and then i'd also just like to add that, throughout our previous contract, we found many opportunities to work with community based organizations, and that's something we aim to do. again, we are constantly making new connections with community based organizations and even smaller entities throughout the city that we are always really excited to work with and do. those community based organizations that you work with, do they get, some money? do they get paid them out of this contract at all? yes and the previous contract, there was actually a specific pot of money to go towards community based organizations that we worked with. and the specific work that they did was often outreach and

sometimes translation services. okay. that's good to know, with respect to our path forward today, madam chair, i'm comfortable with with director hemingway's, your proposal, i think it's an elegant way to pursue the three year contract going forward. and then having them come back to us for the two, two, one year, two one year options. i think that'll work. and then we can have a broader discussion about how we want to proceed going forward, once we have that, analysis in the hand that we were working for as we try to better our contracting, outcomes with this. so i would be comfortable with, supporting language that director hemingway

would like to add to the motion. once he has that confirmed council. okay that's very helpful. thank you, director henry. so i'm going to give you a moment. director hemminger to gather all of your thoughts before your motion. and we have to go to public comment. so you have a moment, opening public comment on item 10.4. anyone wishing to speak on the bike coalition contract? education outreach. go ahead. hello, michael petrilli's again, i am asking you, out of respect for the public to delay the vote, why? number one, the contract is not available for public inspection. it's not here on the table. two, i feel very disrespected that the contract is not on the agenda. there's no link to the actual contract. so how is the public supposed to inspire affect what you're going to vote on? that's disrespectful

that the contract is not available for public inspection. i also think that eventually you should reject this contract because it will make the, nonprofit a bit, an extension of city government. and there is too little, that the city is doing to monitor all the nonprofits that get money. i, heard the, staff person say that there will be annual, evaluations. not good enough quarterly evaluation plans are needed, and maybe you should be happy. i'm not asking for monthly evaluations of how this money is being used. quarterly evaluations are needed, it's nice that their own surveys find that the public liked what they were getting, but i'd like to

know this information about how many people attend it, i'd really like that information before the public so that we can really have an educated view of what you're going to be voting on, and to the bike coalition. you take this money. i don't ever want to hear you say anything about any proposal from the city, because you're basically going to be an extension of city government. you're not going to be able to make an opinion about anything to do with bicycles. thank you. thanks for your comment. other speakers on this item. 10.4 cheri and i did want to, to confirm that the copy of the contract is included in your materials. the contract is in the staff report and item 10.4, which is which on sfmta comm, you can go to the board. the link is not on the agenda. you don't tell us that on the agenda. how am i supposed to know the link is on the website.

so okay, secretary silva, it's not meant to be disrespectful. we can follow up with you offline on this one. could could we have the next available here? okay. i hear what you're saying. can we have the next speaker please for 10.4. okay. i think there are one accommodation, one accommodation. go ahead. speaker you've been unmuted. good afternoon commissioners. so the original, contract says authorizing the director of transportation to execute contract number mta 24 six with the san francisco bicycle coalition education fund for the amount of 1.5 million. now, instead of a five year term, it's a three year term, with the option of adding two additional

terms. right. so you divide. so now that it's three, it's $1.5 million divided by three years. that's $500,000 a year when, you're doing this with a sole source contract, and these are folks that have a particular demographic that does not reflect the entire city. who's getting paid to do this, this this is a nonprofit, right? then they should be doing this for free as being volunteers to be organizing volunteers to do this. but they're not, being a nonprofit. they're, being hired as consultants by the city to do this. and there's a community organization in the mission district called bcc por el pueblo. and, they, refurbish, bring the bicycles, and then they give them to the kids. i can see the bicycle coalition giving bicycles to the kids, and they're not serving the kids either. they're serving the they serve the 25 to 50 year old ladies, primarily. and so i see

a great inequity here because the paid jobs are going to the 30s and they can say they're serving the communities of color, but they're not sharing the glute. the $500,000 a year with the community organizations that are serving the community. and so i don't feel that this was really well vetted or and i urge you to postpone, signing this contract until you come up with some error. and i'm not sure that it was really. i can't believe that these people in pueblo didn't know, didn't apply for this for this grant, because. thank you. your time is up on on big runs, with. thank you. your time is up. go ahead. hi there. alan. burdell. i just simply want to say i agree 100% with that caller. thank you. thank you. any other speakers on item 10.4? good afternoon,

steven martin pinto, resident of sunnyside. i agree that we need to delay this, approval of the, funding of the bike coalition. there has been a lot of trouble with transparency and nonprofits lately. i do think that there is a chance for this contract to go out to other, organizations and give them the chance to have a bid on this process. if the i believe that there could be a more opportunities to rewrite the contract and break it into smaller parts so that it would be more manageable by other organizations. thank you. thank you for your comment. any other speakers on item 10.4? hello michael adams again, i just want to register that i agree with the previous speakers, as a former contract compliance officer for, the public needs to

see every word in that contract and how the public can access employment opportunities under that contract. subcontracting opportunities under that contract. and rules that are being followed in engaging the public and the customer base, if you will, and the consequences of not doing that creates a lobbying group, that is very narrowly focused on their own particular agenda, and so we've been hearing about diversity to the point of almost. well, i'll leave it at that. look, look at look at their affirmative action program in terms of who's getting the distribution of this money and match it with your inclusion and belonging, project that i think right now is understaffed. thank you. thank you. other comments on item 10.4. hi, my name is liana louie

and i'm a resident of san francisco for 45 years. i'd like to say that i agree with the last three speakers, that we should delay the approval of the contract and we definitely need more transparency and accountability with the nonprofits. i know i run one, i don't get any funding from the city, which has nothing to do with this. but, the fact that there's so much money going to this one organization is very concerning. thank you, thank you. next speaker, please. i live here, selected you, again, resident of san francisco. so i again, i support what i'm hearing today from the residents that we should delay the contract, there's a lot of questions and doubts around the integrity of the bike coalition and its influence on our political system, and i agree, if there's more transparency and if the residents knew more about what was going on, i think there would be more trust. and we could, figure these issues out.

so thank you for your time today. thank you for your comment. i see one other person walking to the podium. did you want to speak on this item? my name is harry bernstein, so i was wondering there was a budget hearing scheduled, i believe, for april 23rd, which was canceled. and, maybe people here can elucidate that, so this is a grant, for toward a nonprofit, at the same time, there is the muni budget, can someone say what what are the cuts that are being proposed? because i know there's a considerable deficit. and with that in mind, has is there any connection here? in other words, are we having to reduce bus service or raise. no

so there is a deficit, but it's not affecting muni. okay. i just wanted to be sure that there wasn't a, and yeah. and unevenness in able to engage in a q&a. unfortunately the city attorney is going to cut me off. i wonder maybe julie, if cfo marauder is here. she can speak to the gentleman in the in the hallway to speak about the budget items. perhaps we just can't really engage in a q&a. did you have any more comments? no. i just wanted to bring that up because it seems to be this is a matter that's being done in isolation, but i do tend to, agree with many of the last comments that things should be balanced and transport current and open. the opportunities i appreciated what was said about the, other nonprofit in the mission who might be interested in this project. great thank you for your comment. i think with

that, we will close public comment on item 10.4 and director hemminger, are you prepared to make a motion? madam chair, i am, before i do, let me make clear though, because i think we've all been using slightly different terms that the underlying. oh, pardon me, the underlying, structure of the contract i'm not proposing to change. and the amendment that i'm going to read in a second here will make that clear. and so why don't i do that? i would move the item as amended, as follows. and i'll use the acronym mta, a, b direct staff to evaluate alternative. pardon me mta b direct staff to evaluate it prior to the first option period in the contract. alternative delivery methods for bicycle scooter training including but not limited to

bringing the function in-house. so that's the amendment. it would presumably go in the resolve clauses. and i would make that motion as amended. okay. and you also by by way of doing that, you're incorporating secretary silver's amendments to the item that she read off at the beginning. that would be to clarify the contract term of, three years with the option to renew, two additional years. thank you. is there a second? okay. great. second. thank you. please call the roll. i'm going to go ahead and reread that. just for the record, on the motion to amend the resolution to clarify the contract term of an initial term of three years with two options to renew the agreement for a period of one year each, for a total of two additional years to direct staff to evaluate prior to the first option period in the contract. alternative delivery methods for bicycle and scooter training, including but not limited to, bringing the function in-house and approving, as amended. on

that motion, director heminger heminger i director henderson, a, henderson i director henzi i henzi i director so i so i director tarlov i tarlov i director karina i karina. hi. chair ekin hi ekin i thank you that item is approved. thank you. please call item 11, placing you on item number 11, approving transit accessibility and active transportation safety improvements on frida kahlo way between ocean avenue and sunset avenue and on judson avenue between frida kahlo way and forrester street, including adding two way protected bikeways plus four on the east side of frida kahlo way and the south side of judson avenue. within the project limits, implementing pedestrian safety improvements such as intersection, daylighting and traffic safety islands. transit prioritization elements such as transit boarding islands and bus stop consolidation, vehicle circulation safety measures near archbishop riordan high school and associated curb use changes including parking removal. thank

you, secretary silva, colleagues , we have, emma harkin from supervisor melgar's office, who's been patiently waiting for our extended conversation about item 10.4. i'm going to ask her to speak before we have the presentation. go ahead. great. thank you. chair. ekin and, thank you for all the members of the mta board here today, my name is emma harkin, and i'm a legislative aide for supervisor myrna melgar of district seven, which, this project falls in that district, as you all know. and i'm here today to voice, i'm here today to voice supervisor melgar's unwavering support for the proposed frida kahlo quick build over the coming years, we will welcome thousands of new residents to the west side, including its stonestown near laguna honda and directly adjacent to frida calloway at the balboa reservoir development in recognition of these new neighbors, we need to act proactively to ensure our streets are safe for those driving, walking, biking, and taking transit. as a city

dedicated to progress, these proactive changes must embody our san francisco values of climate resilience, divestment from fossil fuels and improving air quality for our most valuable and vulnerable communities, implementing the changes in frida kahlo quick build is one small step in the right direction for the sustainability of the city college, for the sustainability and the city and county of san francisco, and the health and safety of our residents over the last many, many months. my office has been working with sfmta to conduct robust outreach to get feedback from the neighbors and the community members on this design between sfmta staff and our office and supervisor melgar's office, we've met with reardan high school. we've met with city college students, faculty, and organizations. we met with the sunnyside neighborhood organization. we met with ocean avenue association and many, many more, this process led to multiple design iterations, results in the current design, which preserves a dozen vehicle

private parking spots that were previously proposed to be lost. this proposal today is a compromise, and it is informed by folks who want it to go further and folks who want it to go not as far, but this isn't just about parking or bike lanes . this is about a greater vision for our city. this is about generations of san franciscans commuting together on bikes, on transit, walking. this is about paving the way for city college students from around the region to have safe and simple access to an education. and this is about a deeply interconnected transit system that serves san franciscans of all modes. supervisor melgar looks forward to executing on our shared values of making san francisco transit first city, reducing our greenhouse gas emissions, and securing the future of the city college for generations to come.

so thank you. thank you for being here. and thank you for your extended engagement on this project, could we have the staff now run through the presentation ? good afternoon. madam chair, members of the board, my name is elliot goodrich. i'm the project manager for the frida calloway quick build project, joined today by other members of the project team and staff in liverpool streets. this is a multimodal safety project with a focus on improving safety and access to city college and high school. the sunnyside and ingleside neighborhoods, and ocean avenue commercial corridor and other key southwest

destinations for all users, including people biking on frida calloway and judson avenue, which bound city college on its west and north sides. and i'd like to first off acknowledge that this is a quick build project with a scope that is limited by the nature of that program. we understand that there are other needs and barriers in the area, especially at the frida ocean geneva intersection and these deserve our attention and we'll get it. but the scope that i'll be discussing today will complement future work, as well as provide independent utility. me, as all of you know, this project has proved sensitive for some people , especially within the city college community. we have extended the public process over the past six months to hear from those affected and this has

prompted our team to look very closely at our proposal. and we've come to you today with the confidence that this project is important it and to frame why i'm going to zoom out and give some context on the project area. thank you. so the project area is transit rich, served by six different bus lines proximate to balboa park, bach, bart, and muni metro station, and will be served by other major projects such as the recently approved k ingleside rapid project. the latest numbers on city college mode share that we have are from the from before the pandemic, but they indicated that about half of trips by city college students were taken by transit.

however, we do understand that muni won't work for every body and that city college relies on a variety of modes for people to access this institution. students travel from all over the region to take advantage of the college's excellent vocational programs, or have jobs elsewhere, and have to trip chain before or after class. i'd like to really emphasize that the purpose of the project is not to make it harder for those who have no choice but to drive to school, but to respond to changing land use and provide safe and reliable options for those who do have a choice. the biggest ticket item in the quick build is a suite of bikeway improvements and i'd like to refer to this map to emphasize why frida and judson are the right corridor for a low stress bike network connection between the southwest and destinations

to the north and east. just north of the corridor are two pleasant neighborhood bike routes hearst avenue and holloway avenue, that get people around some of these stressful, built out corridors that surround frida and judson, such as the 280 and ocean interchange. the built out ocean avenue corridor and steep topography to the west, and furthermore, the project provides direct access to city college, the major trip generator in the area. additionally, this connection should not be viewed alone, but as a piece of the low stress bike network puzzle. we've recently completed quick builds to the east on san jose avenue and alemany boulevard, and we're working on new bikeways on sloat boulevard and the recently completed lake merced boulevard

quick build, which will connect people to recreational spaces like lake merced and the zoo. and these recreational spaces are increasingly citywide destinations and also neighborhood gathering spaces like hearst avenue. with this context, i'll walk through the project goals. the first goal is to improve bike connectivity to city college, riordan high school, other transportation hubs, and between neighborhoods. to achieve this goal, we propose to construct a two way protected bikeway on frida kahlo way, north of ocean avenue and on judson avenue west of forster street. we'll use the same design principles that our team proved successful when we designed and implemented the central embarcadero quick build project, and this bikeway will be coordinated with other projects that both necessitate and complement the quick build.

and the work being done by these projects will change the character of the project. vicinity the two existing surface surface parking lots west of frida will be gone, and on the lower reservoir lot we'll see 1100 new mixed unit housing units and associated open spaces and amenities, and state of the art new campus facilities on the upper reservoir lot, including the diego rivera theater, which will feature a mural by its namesake. this construction will result in the reduction of 1800 existing parking spaces, which is about 60% of the existing supply per a city college transportation demand management study that was completed a few years ago. so parking demand will outstrip supply unless mode shift occurs and new residents will need safe and comfortable ways to access nearby

destinations. without a car. and this development will affect users in the near term. they will feel the effect of construction traffic and other disruptions to the transportation network. traffic is already congested on frida kahlo way, especially during drop off and pickup hours for the high school and the street network that surrounds the corridor is built out. the surrounding bottlenecks constrained vehicle capacity as much as the transportation conditions on frida and judson themselves. we are not proposing to remove any travel lanes on the corridor, and this project can address congestion by making it more convenient and safe to use space efficient modes like transit, biking and rolling. as we've heard from our leaders, safety is just the floor, and if we're making bikeway improvements, we want to build attractive state of the art facilities, which is why we're proposing a robust two way

protected bikeway adjacent to the campus open space and using durable materials such as concrete islands to protect the bikeway. city college relies on transit, so the second project goal is to improve reliability and comfort for the 43 masonic bus route, which operates on the corridor. the project elements, which were thoroughly vetted by our colleagues in transit engineering, include transit boarding islands to provide level in lane boarding for riders and decrease pull in pull out time for the bus. we're also proposing to consolidate the three existing stops on frida kahlo way into two stops, removing the lowest ridership middle stop and improving stop spacing. and finally, our design team will evaluate signal timing to minimize delay for busses and also for private vehicles. finally, the project includes proven safety countermeasures to

proactively improve safety for all users. the bikeway and safety islands will shorten crossings for people walking between campus and new facilities. transit stops and the neighborhoods. and we've focused on the frida judson elbow intersection, which becomes gridlocked by turning vehicles at some hours and sees unsafe speeds at others, turn restrictions and a new hardened median will address the former behavior and traffic calming will address the latter, and active users will be shifted into the bikeway out of the fray of that intersection entirely. i'd like to acknowledge that the quick build will likely not be the end of the story. at this intersection, and will carefully evaluate the intersection and identify next steps through this project. to bring these goals and elements together, here is a map giving an overview of the project. but again, the key

elements are a two way protected bikeway on the east side of frida kahlo way and south side of judson avenue. some transit stop changes and safety improvements at that elbow intersection. i'd like to highlight the bicycle connection at the bottom of the screen to the existing lee avenue stub along an existing multi-use path , which connects to the street network south of ocean avenue, allowing users to bypass the frida ocean geneva intersection. and we're working very hard to formalize that connection by working with the public utilities commission and balboa reservoir development team. you can also see on the map, the new extended lee avenue, which will connect to north access road. the footprint of the balboa reservoir development and the footprint of the new campus

facilities, the steam building and diego rivera theater. and again, to highlight that in the medium term, the project will connect nicely to, a grid of pleasant neighborhood streets. to be constructed by the balboa reservoir. you can see the site plan on the screen there. so how did we get here? to inform the project scope, we conducted extensive stakeholder engagement and public outreach over the course of about a year. first, we worked with our partners at city college and riordan high school to identify some of their needs. we actually implemented a set of preliminary improvements last summer to address some high school loading issues, and we've identified coordination opportunities as well, tracking progress of city college facilities construction and working with their staff to identify construction efficiencies. we've met with a

diverse range of stakeholders advocates, neighborhood groups, advisory bodies at the college and other existing groups, and we held a combo pop up event on the corridor and open house in december, which was widely advertised to the college community and we've given presentations and heard feedback directly from city college leaders, including their board of trustees and ocean campus student council. and we have received a majority of comments echoing the need for safer bike facilities on the corridor. broad consensus for traffic calming and vehicle circulation, and pedestrian improvements, and also general support for improvements that make the bus run more smoothly. we have also heard concerns about the project. some people don't think that the collision data supports the need for the project, but

indeed, this section is not on the high injury network. some people don't think that the project will address traffic congestion and particularly people are concerned about the effects of removing some of the on street vehicle parking on the corridor. i'd like to highlight that this is free, unmetered parking, so it's especially sensitive for students for whom transportation costs may be an undue burden. related to that, and as representatives of the sfmta more broadly, we've heard a desire for support for muni fare costs from the student body . we've tried really hard to be transparent about our work and about what we've heard. we've had a very detailed outreach summary on our project web page for months, and we have tried very hard to respond to the concerns that we've heard in response to the parking removal concerns. in particular, we revised the project around the turn of the new year using some

creative design approaches, removing the existing southbound bike lane, which was at one point proposed to remain to accommodate a wider buffer between the two way protected bikeway and travel lanes. and we moved the existing bike share station and modal parking spaces that are on the west side of frida to this buffer area. this revision would or has accommodated the add back of 13 on street vehicle parking spaces. there would actually be more vehicle parking on the west side of frida than existing under this proposal. and as you can see in the curb changes table, approximately 29 parking spaces would be removed as part of this project, which is less than 1% of all of the parking spaces currently available in the area, less than 3% of what will be available following all of the construction that's occurring, there would be more

bike share docks, slight reduction in the number of motor parking spaces, and no changes to the number of blue or white zones. and of course, we can always adjust how curb space is allocated following implementation. i'd like to specifically respond to some of the concerns that we've heard from the city college community and again, emphasize that this project is not intended to make it more difficult for those who have no choice to drive to campus, but to improve options for those who do have a choice, so that there's less competition for the limited vehicle infrastructure in the area. we've heard again the need for transit fare subsidies and will continue to facilitate conversations as best we can around how students can take advantage of existing and new fare programs. and we're excited to work with the campus community to identify ways that the project can highlight the new facilities and magnify campus gateways. and again, this is just one piece of a longer

term puzzle. which could connect ocean avenue and balboa park directly to campus via a conceptualized multi-use path on the south side of the campus, which would connect directly to this two way bikeway if approved. we're prepared to expedite implementation during the college's upcoming summer break to minimize construction impacts and then evaluate the project in accordance with our safe streets evaluation program and make data driven adjustments, as well as work directly with those affected to identify tweaks. in the next year, we will continue to work with the developers to realize the lee avenue path connection and support changes related to the completion of the steam building and diego rivera theater. the theater in particular, will lead to circulation changes, which would provide opportunities to add

back parking or other curb uses to the east side of frida and scheduled repaving in the coming years may also provide another bite at the apple, so our work here would not be done. this is only the first step, and we hope to continue building relationships with leaders at the college high school and their neighbors. in conclusion, this project would provide a safe and comfortable bike network connection to city college and between the sunnyside and ingleside neighborhoods, improve reliability for the 43 masonic bus route. make vehicle and pedestrian safety changes, and respond to and support land use changes around the balboa reservoir. thank you. thank you very much for the very thorough presentation, callie, i know that my colleagues are gonna have questions for you, but i'm going to go to public comment first, and then we can have our board dialog. so i'll open it up for public comment on the item.

11 frida calloway, who would like to speak first? i have several speaker cards more marilyn hearn, michael adams, steven martin pinto, madeline mueller. you can start to queue up on the tv side of the room, and any of those folks can come up to the podium to speak. we don't want to let frida speak first. by any chance. good afternoon board, i would ask that the board consider some of the people who will be impacted by the inaccessibility created by the loss of street parking. for example, veterans who come to the veterans center there at city college, not only from san francisco, but regionally and as far away as humboldt county, who use the veterans center for mental health services. as a combat veteran myself, i know i'm i'm very familiar with the struggle that many veterans have with mental health, and

accessing services is critical to their well-being. the other thing i'd like to add is to please support the higher education team's proposal to move the bike traffic onto lee avenue and lee avenue extension. it would make for a smoother connection to holloway and avoid the geneva ocean avenue frida calloway, which is a huge, dangerous intersection and chokepoint altogether. what i haven't heard too much of, but was briefly touched upon, was the signal, timing, and, adjustment. i know that a lot of the backups are artificially created by misaligned signals, and i think that one thing that could be done and needs to be explored more is to realign the signals so that they go to flashing yellow during off peak hours when there is no traffic or no students in school. oftentimes i see cars stopped and queued up for no reason, when there's no students crossing in or out of the college or, vehicles coming in out of the driveways there. so

thank you for your time. thank you for your comment and thank you for your service. next speaker, please. hello. good afternoon. my name is nikki trasvina and i disagree with the frida kahlo quick build. not everybody rides a bike, seniors, students, families do not all ride bikes. and whenever it comes to taking parking away from san franciscans, i have to speak up. i've been associated with city college, along with my friends, family, colleagues for many, many years. i was a counselor and instructor at city and at san francisco state, where many, many students come from. city college and i know the profile of that student and those students are not rich kids, as you know, they're mostly poor kids, low income kids that are juggling school,

juggling work, juggling responsibilities at home, maybe of their own children, or maybe their siblings. and they're helping their parents take care of the siblings. so these kids are running between school, work, family. they have many, many commitments, and they need to be able to park near the school. but this is not just the student issue. this is an issue for part time staff and part time faculty. as you might know, higher education has shifted and , no longer do we have full time professorships. it's becoming a gig, a gig economy, where there are many part time faculty and lecturers that are shuffling their themselves around from school to school and they also need places to park. so i really see the elimination or the reduction of parking is very cruel, very harmful to the people that are the vital members of that city college community. and i grew up near san francisco state, and for years my parents and my brother

and sister. we struggled with the students and parking. you know, parking is a big commodity and we struggled with block driveways and students parking there for a really long time. and that's what's going to happen to the sunnyside community. if these parking spaces are eliminated. thank you. thank you. next speaker, please. good afternoon. board members. heather brandt, working student, parent and mother of three, serving as a student trustee on behalf of city college of san francisco, i'm here to remind you that as you make the decision regarding the frida kahlo quick build that students and our college community continue to have legitimate concerns, as well as alternative plans and ideas that could have potentially been or be incorporated. as previously mentioned, amid public comment in prior meetings. i myself am a transit rider and cyclist. in fact, my own sibling was struck by a car while riding a bike in the mission in a designated bike lane and suffered a traumatic

brain injury. that being said, i understand and care about safety . i am and we are not anti safety. in fact, we are so much about safety that our vision for safety includes our students ability to access an education without barriers. please consider a version of safety that includes fare free transit passes for our students. lastly, i just want to remind you that our associated student council opposed this project and our board of trustees opposed, unless amended, to meet the ccsf community concerns. please think about our most marginalized and vulnerable who will be impacted by the current proposed changes. thank you. thank you for your comment. next speaker, please. good afternoon, directors. i just wanted to speak in support of finally bringing these safe, protected bike lanes to frida kahlo way and increasing this important link in the bike network. in january, the city college trustees passed a truly bold commitment to a green new

deal, giving the college a scant seven years to reduce carbon emissions by 75. one month later, the very same trustees voted to oppose this project because they believe 29 parking spaces. that's 29 versus thousands of students on campus every day are more important than providing safe and sustainable transportation options to campus and throughout the neighborhood. i'd laugh if the stakes weren't so dire. the reality is that this question was settled 15 years ago, when the board of supervisors enacted the better streets policy, quote, decisions regarding the design and use of the city's limited public street space shall prioritize space for pedestrians, bicycles, and public transit over space for automobiles. that's the law. city college students certainly need and deserve better transportation options, and i hope the college can engage with mtc on joining the clipper bay pass program so that students have access to the fare free transit they deserve, and that's enjoyed by berkeley nsf state students as i understand that process. the ball is currently

in city college's court on that. and finally, i just have to say, we heard in the presentation that the team held over 24 outreach events for this project. some of those definitely helped improve the project, but that's also nearly one outreach event per parking space that we're talking about here. and it's a supposed quick build project that began over a year ago. staff has done an extraordinary job working through the process they've been given to get this done. it's no knock on them, but it's time that we literally can't afford. so i hope that we can work to fix this process so that quick build projects are the public outreach process and are back to the six weeks or so that was originally conceived when the program started. thank you. thank you for your comment. next speaker, please. i'll read more speaker cards. fred mülheim, ed pike, adolfo velasquez, luisa gutierrez guzman good afternoon. my name is adolfo velasquez, former student and retired faculty at city college. i'm here on behalf of the city

college board of trustees. in their motion to oppose the quick build motion that the board of trustees opposes the sfmta quick build plan. unless and until there are amendments to the plan that resolve the concerns raised by members of the city college community regarding the safety of the. regarding the safety of the proposed protected bicycle lane, blue zones, loading zones, drop off zones, the revised bus stop and loss of parking spaces. additionally, the board strongly urges the sfmta's sfmta to continue meeting with and responding to city college constituents. the people who will be the most directly impacted by the project until an alternate plan is produced. thank you. thank you for your comment. next speaker, please. hi, i'm fabian skibinski. i moved to san francisco in 1992,

i paint houses for a living. i drive a truck, when i moved here, i drove a car and a truck, things have changed, you can't drive as much anymore, what i want to say is that i think we have to start changing with the times. i think, you know, i've been watching, every project that comes up, there's a lot of, resistance to losing parking spaces, i've adapted my painting business. i don't go to oakland. i don't go to, woodside. i don't go to marin. i stay in the city, instead of driving every day, i drive once a week, drop off my supplies, walk, take the bus, i want to say that busses have been great, my daughter takes a

bus. she doesn't even know about driving. she says, look, dad, people in the car, you know? so, san francisco has changed. and i want to just say we have to appreciate, the improvements and not just say, hey, when it's in my block, i want that extra parking spot. i've also had taken classes at city college. i can get there from the panhandle. one bus, 43 bus there and back, and i and i also bike. thank you. thank you for your comment. next speaker, please. hello again. my name is jess. i'm a current student at city college, and i just want to say that no one else speaks for city college students except current city college students and the entire associated student body passed a resolution to oppose this specific quick build. we

are asking for you to reconsider lee avenue, which is in an alternative solution. it does not make sense for the cac to disregard two large stakeholders, which is the ccsf board of trustees and also the students, which is thousands of students. some people might think it is just a parking spot, but it's people's livelihood. their home. they live in an rv. i'm a student that has to carry around 50 pounds of equipment for a night class two times a week. there is no closer part for me to park where i can safely go to my class and not get robbed, and i told this board before i have problems because i cannot take the bus to my class because the bus where i get on is not safe. i would not walk around 16th street in mission bart and with with over $1,000 worth of equipment. i don't think it's fair for a lot of people to say, oh, it's just 29 parking spots. do you know how many thousands of students

come from different counties to park there? and this is their livelihood. if they can save like an extra $300 a semester, that's one whole book, or it's a meal for a whole, like a whole week's worth of meals. and i think this project does not add more public transit to the area. and we do not qualify for bay pass, during the pandemic, the bus service has decreased and not having a drop off zone on two sides of the campus is a real problem. i think, sfmta could have been done a better job. i did not find out about this until january of this year, and i have not been outreached by sf mta committee, and i think there's alternative routes that does not negatively impact parking for students. and having a street like valencia, where bart bikes, pedestrians and cars are running on the same street quite dangerous. i almost got hit by a bicycle. six other people almost got hit by a bicycle last week. thank you. that is your time. thank you. next speaker, please. good

afternoon, directors. do i have this under the right camera? oh, okay. i'm fred mulheim. i am a lifelong learner, and i hope that this plan is centered so you can see it, i'm here presenting an alternate plan to the board, and we're not here to stop this project, but we're urging you to seriously consider this alternate plan developed by heat, it's been developed over time since the project was presented to the community in july by. the focus of the heat plan is to make the frida kahlo judson curve safe for cyclists and to provide an efficient and safe path to ocean and beyond, continuing to the east west holloway bikeway, it also removes serious negative impacts

to the college and the surrounding communities that are built into the proposed sfmta plan. the heat plan incorporates the quick build, double build, double protected bikeway from genesee to frida kahlo way and lee. at this point, it heads west and transitions to the wonderful balboa reservoir project lee avenue bikeway. we got to walk this path yesterday with director egan. the lee avenue bikeway is clearly laid out and detailed on in the planning department. balboa park , neighborhood design and development standards. we suggest implementing the lee avenue bikeway now. the plan. balboa reservoir protected bikeway, lee avenue is currently

paved from frida kahlo way to ocean, with only a short break near ocean, where there is a break in the yellow blue line on our graphic. this point requires grading, and elliott spoke about that. but if that were done, the essential north south link to the city bikeways would be achieved, and that grading would also make implementing the sfmta shared future muni path as possible. thank you. that is your time. thanks so much for your comment. next speaker, please. greetings. my name is madeline mueller. i'm chair of the music and theater arts department at city college. i've been there forever as a faculty since 1965, and i've served on facilities, master planning efforts and kept all the paperwork in my living room for

all those years. and what i'm hoping you will do is not have a quick build, but a correct build. there are elements in here we are meeting. i don't get much feedback. too bad because i'm on the facilities committee now, but there's a there's a really win win plan in here, but it's not here yet. and you know the word quick, bill. really kind of, let's take our time a little bit of time and do it right. and what was just suggested in lee street is in the city college master plan, in the charter approved right now. we are in conflict with this plan. i don't know how that works in the charter. we should straighten that out. so and this plan was done with the bicycle clubs on campus that i worked with for years. we had lots of facilities. why not have our courses back in bicycle safety? we've had sustainability plans since the 80s. we invented them even before al gore, so the college is really into this. we want we used to have 110,000

students. now we're getting it back after all this stuff going on the last couple of years. but we need to look to the future. this is not a sideways street. this is a major thoroughfare now because of the two big buildings being completed, not on parking. that was only temporary. while we got the buildings put together, i had an accident on ocean avenue years ago. i think my knees are still suffering from it. i landed on my knees, but other people almost got killed and i don't see the point of right now putting more bicyclists on frida kahlo and then dumping us onto ocean avenue, which is totally dangerous. it hasn't been. i looked at your plan and the m plan, and there's no there's nothing in there. so we're just like lemmings. we're just pushing people off to this very dangerous street. i think that's that's not right. so let's take our time and do it right. thank you. thank you for your comment. that's your time. next speaker, please. hi. my name is ed pike,

and i've been a sunnyside resident with my family for over 25 years, many of those, sharing parking on street parking with city college students. so very aware of the parking issues. i also drive and bike, trying to stay on my bike, using the frida kahlo road. so, seeing that from both perspectives and right now, due to medical issues, i'm trying to stay on my bike when i can, and that pretty much limits me to frida kahlo. i can't bike a lot. areas where i used to go on so i really need that space, i support the project, you know, i think it's really important to provide safe alternatives for people biking in the city to get through that neighborhood, i think we need to, you know, accommodate the needs of students, you know, and i also am supportive of, you know, the

transit options, which i think are maybe not in front of you here today, but, you know, having free, free transit, which my daughter different school actually had free transit. i know, we were fortunate to be less dependent. other students like, very dependent on that. so, you know, i think that's also something that should be pursued. but is not a reason to block this project. it's an independent idea that's valuable on its own. non-conflict with this project directly, i would say, and, you know, it's my understanding most students don't drive to city college. so you know, it's important to have all of the different options available. and, i'd just like to , to, urge you to support the project. and thank you for your time. thank you. thank you for your comment. next speaker, please. a few more speaker cards. mikhaela godwin left, illfurth and leona lewis. you okay? oh, no. oh, here. are you

all right? can. yeah. sorry to interrupt. you know, you're going to take a ten minute recess. i'll come back convene this may 7th, sfmta's board meeting. and we will reconvene where we were on public comment. thank you for your patience, hello. my name is lisa gutierrez guzman, and i'm a

retired school teacher. but what's important today is i'm a lifelong learner and i have been studying for the last 20 plus years at city college, most of the time on the main campus. and i'm here today to oppose the project, the quick build project on frieda calloway. and this is why during my 20 plus years of taking classes at city college, most of them were at the main campus. and i know from experience that the quick build plan is unsafe for basic bicyclists, and even drivers will be very confused and i know from what's happened on valencia street that maybe possibly caused injuries to the bicyclist and to themselves. but speaking as a student taking enrichment classes, obviously, i know that the quick build project would not be safe for me either, in quick, bill needs to go back to the drawing board quickly. not only may we get injured, but if we have to drive like the woman

that carries 50 pounds of equipment at night, or 73 year old retired school teacher who's speaking to be for you today, many parking spaces will be lost and many students going for a degree or people like myself that are going for enrichment might give up and stop enrolling. we do not want that to happen to our precious city college, because we don't want more reasons to drop away and give up. for students to drop away and give up on their education, please go back and find another solution. thank you for your comment. next speaker, please. i put this down. just give a one moment.

i'm looking at you'll recognize that diagram as a profile of a particular portion of the of the frida kahlo. the red that i've added is bicycle related. the blue is automobile related. motion in motion, you'll see the hash mark blue for the parking lane. that's that's when you add the two reds together and the two blues together, you see almost close to an equal distribution across the cross section for cars. and bicycles. okay, that that looks interesting, but that's that's just one slice. if you look back . and not enough room, apparently. but if maybe i can

turn it this way. if you look back, one star equals four vehicles. so the big star on the upper right hand corner is four vehicles that are bicycles. the rest of those are approximately 170 vehicles, divided by four for the stars, meaning that's the comparative traffic that flows in a one hour, observe portion of cars and bicycles. so when we talk about equity, we need to understand what the starting point is, and the. parking turnover was mentioned on where we have 60 or so parking spots. please remember that they turn over about every two hours. so that's 60 spots

every two hours all day and half the night with people coming and going. and so that's, that's a much bigger picture than, than is being presented to you. thank you. thank you for your comment. next speaker please. i believe this. hi. my name is robin. pam and i'm here today representing both kidsafe san francisco and neighbors for slow hearst. i live in sunnyside, the neighborhood adjacent to city college, and frida kahlo is my bike route to ocean avenue and points south. neighbors for slow , hearst represents over 100 people in sunnyside who want safer, slower streets in our neighborhood. we all came together around the slow street, and we also support better bike connections from sunnyside to other parts of the city, including on frida kahlo and to the glen park bart. most of my friends in this group and neighbors couldn't take time off work today to be here, even

though they've sent letters and they've met with city college stakeholders, and they've met with our supervisor multiple times about the project, a kidsafe we believe that every street should be safe enough for kids to walk and bike to school, to the park, their daily destination. right now, frida kahlo is not safe enough for kids to bike. last week, my son's school in sunnyside had a bike to school day. his best friends family biked from ingleside over to our neighborhood and they remarked on how treacherous the connections felt with their elementary school kids on bicycles. there's no way they would let their kids bike to school today. on a normal day, with the current conditions on frida kahlo, projects like frida kahlo are about taking preventive measures to make our streets safe before someone gets hurt. sfmta's should be commended for being proactive here and not waiting for a serious injury or death to implement this best practice street design on an important connection in our bike network. i hope that we can find real solutions for the city college students who are asking for better transportation alternatives, getting them enrolled in the bay pass program would be a great start. lee

avenue also should be a bike route, but that street actually doesn't exist right now as a real street. so in the meantime, we should do this project on frida kahlo building this bike lane may also encourage some students to try biking or scootering and slowly reduce the demand for parking. as our neighborhood welcomes more residents in the coming years. whatever we do, delaying the project is not the answer. let's not wait for someone to die or get hurt before we redesign the street to be safe. thank you. next speaker, please. good afternoon, directors. my name is rachel clyde. i'm the west side community organizer for the san francisco bicycle coalition. we are here in support of the frida calloway quick build project, and we are also in support of ccsf students receiving every possible option for sustainable and affordable transportation. students are the future of our city and they are the reason that we work towards transportation and climate goals

. the frida calloway quick build is one of several projects happening in the southwest corner of san francisco that will transform an overlooked and transit poor part of our city into a connected and safe neighborhood. we cannot overstate the need for connectivity in our city, for active transportation, for everyone who uses our streets. we need to have protected bike infrastructure on frida calloway and citywide for students who are already biking and those who would like to bike if street conditions were safer. we need to offer free muni for students who want to take public transit, but find the cost prohibitive. these solutions together and more, will take the pressure off private cars being the only realistic way to get to campus. for many students, and can free up car space for those who really need it. thank you to the sfmta staff, especially casey hildreth and elliot goodrich, for making themselves available to so much feedback and working so hard on this project. thank you to ccsf students for long speaking up for their transportation needs. we hear you. the san francisco bicycle coalition urges the board to vote to approve the quick build today, and to continue working on programs and policies to support affordable and

accessible transportation for low income students at ccsf and across the city. thank you, thank you. next speaker, please. thank you. board, i'm matt boschetto. i'm a west side resident and small business owner, i think it's first, just look at where we do have agreement. i don't think anybody disagrees with making the streets safer, having better transit, dedicated and protected bike lanes, i did think it was quite insightful that we spoke about the projects as not mutually exclusive with the other projects in the district and in the area, including the changes to ocean avenue. and while i do think the mta sometimes looks at their changes as mutually exclusive, a city is not. and there are different dynamics that are at play when changes are made. and if i think if you look at taraval and valencia street and what has happened there, we should consider the fears of ccsf merchants on ocean as real. and i think when you also look at the $1 million that was given to

the merchants on taraval, the call yesterday by the merchants on the valencia corridor to, to reverse the changes made there. and now with the new process that was implemented at west portal with the committee to find a better solution and a better process there, i think we should do that here, not just for free to call it, but also for ocean as well. look at how these changes can actually impact the neighborhood negatively as well as as positively. and consider all thank you. thank you for your comment. next speaker, please. hello again, commissioners, so yeah, i don't go to a lot of these hearings, but, the ones i have been to, most of the comments are either for or against today. it sounds like it's against the proposed changes, so i would assume you would take that into consideration as part of the city's vision. the gentleman who spoke earlier said they did do

the public outreach and they discussed it with the stakeholders, mr. fred marlenheim, he gave a very thoughtful and logical alternative by using lee avenue. so i would just i'm just curious, will this be taken into consideration and if not, why, and where is the data to support that? using frida kahlo way would make it any more safe. has there been anything in the past similar that's been done which has proven to be safer? again, we're not against it. we just want more data and we want to be able to, convince the residents that took time out of their day to be here today, that this will, in fact, make their neighborhoods safer. thank you very much. thank you for your comment. next speaker, please. hello again. good afternoon. my name is leanna louie and i'm a resident of d 11, which is actually very close to city city college. and i've been there a few times the last couple of

weeks, and i found that parking for me is difficult, and one of the reasons why i drive is because i have a full time job, and i still have other duties that i have to do. i'm also a us army veteran, so i have discovered that there is a veterans services that i might be using regularly. but one of the most important things to me is that we've heard from quite a few people here who represents many people, such as jeff nguyen. and she had talked about her representation of the student body, mr. fred morheim, representing heat, stephen martin pinto and d11, i'm sorry, d7, elisa gutierrez, lisa gutierrez guzman, mr. michael adams and mr. boschetto and lefteris, they have all voiced some very important concerns. i think that at the least you should delay this vote. vote? i don't think this is necessary to

rush into this quick build, because once you build and lay foundation, lay cement on the ground, it takes a long time to make any changes. so before we make any changes on the ground, it's important that we do further study. thank you. thank you for your comment. next speaker, please. good afternoon, directors. i just want to my name is merrily hearn. i am part of heat. i'm a retired teacher like lisa. i'm a lifelong learner and i have been working very hard with our group to make sure that we are representing everybody's concerns and that the whatever comes out of this meeting is in the interest of all the parties.

now, you've heard different information today, probably some new i know that patricia eric from the mayor's office and in charge of the disability commission there, has written a letter and has her own concerns about it. you've heard that the students at city college have are very concerned and wrote a resolution, as did the board of trustees. so i think being an intelligent body and representing all of us, you would look at these particular concerns and sit down again and hear them and discuss them. and i really like the idea of involving more people. when it was reported that there were several meetings, i, i would ask

how many and were they really recorded and what is the data from. and i think one of the problems that kind of was, talked about earlier is the fact that of not it's the process. yes. it's not a personal thing. it's not you as individuals, we have respect for you as individuals. it's the process. so i think we really need to look at that. thank you, thank you, thank you for your comment. are there additional speakers on item 11, the frida kahlo way? good afternoon. board my name is mikhaela godwin. i'm a long term resident of the of my district.

i'm also a lifelong learner and a retired registered nurse. and i have grave concerns about the proposal as stated. for one thing, it is the quick build process represents an authoritarian approach and it is not, amenable to students. it it is a privilege and also not not taking into account i can give an example of a, a nursing student who went from elvian to our rn program, and she would go at 4 a.m. to be on frida kahlo way to wait for parking to make

sure that she did not have to deal with the added stressor of not having adequate or being able to find parking and get to her classes in time. with that determined approach, she was able to graduate and is now working successful as an rn. this is a african-american woman who had to do a lot, and parking was a major challenge. even at 4 a.m. in the morning. we do not appreciate that there is bullying associated with with the way this quick board, quick, solution is not a quick solution. it will just add to the misery of students and the community in general. thank you. thank you for your comment. next speaker please, please, no disruptions, no clapping. thank you. hi, board members luke

bornheimer, i urge you to approve the frida kahlo quick build project as proposed today, while directing staff to make this bikeway fully protected by concrete or steel, rather than only separated by plastic straws as currently proposed for parts of the proposal, convert the sections with proposed mixing zones and paint only bike lanes and so-called sharrows to properly protected bikeways, and widen the two way bikeway by reducing the buffer area to three feet, as well as directing staff to work on protected bike lanes on ocean avenue, geneva avenue, circular to monterey boulevard and alemany boulevard, in order to create a connected network of protected bike lanes throughout our city, which will help people shift trips away from cars, reducing car traffic, demand for parking, roadway fatalities, and injuries, noise, air pollution, and climate emissions. i want to thank supervisor melgar and her aide, emma heiken, for their work and support for this project that will make frida kahlo way and the surrounding area safer for

all people, including car drivers, while helping people shift trips away from cars to bikes, scooters and public transportation, which will decrease car traffic demand for parking, noise and air pollution and help our city take climate action more broadly. i think it's worth noting that the frida kahlo quick build project started in spring 2023 with a planned implementation of fall slash winter 2003 under. fortunately, the implementation was pushed back to summer 2024, in an attempt to appease or capitulate to a small collection of people opposed to the improvements. despite our roadway safety crisis and the climate crisis that would be addressed by helping people shift trips away from cars, notably through the creation of a connected network of protected bike lanes. if we continue to let a collection of a small collection of people opposed to improvements delay, obstruct and water down projects, we will never address our roadway safety crisis and climate crisis. i urge you to propose and approve agency policy that will ensure projects like this aren't delayed, obstructed and watered down going forward. thank you. thank you. are there any further

speakers on item 11? my name is harry bernstein. i'm an instructor at city college of san francisco. i'm one of the people. guilty. what? he just charged, so city college is not currently eligible for the bay path student transit program. i just want to reinforce that, mr. tumlin advocated that. he said it was a great idea. muni is now going to provide that. but there's a lot of money in this project just so we'll get to that, i've spoken to many seniors, who won't come to ocean avenue because it's too long. it takes too long. the transit is not what it should be. and this project is not adding any transit, so i'd like to go a little bit into the background of the project, vision zero, as

you know, was established in 2014 to eliminate traffic fatalities and coalition collisions over the next ten years, quick build projects began with a similar focus. you know, it's under the vision zero, so in december 2021, the ingleside light reported that $266,000 was to go to the frida kahlo ocean. geneva intersection, which the vision zero program identified then as a high injury corridor. thus, the project was addressing a real safety issue to remediate a serious traffic problem at a dangerous intersection, but then in 2023, but by 2023, this had morphed to a much more like the other, quick build projects. and there was a budget of 200, and i'm sorry, they asked for 600

more thousand dollars. so we're talking about close to a million for this project, also, mr. hildreth, who's one of the other , presenters, said that, reducing space for cars is the point of this. that's your time expanding the bicycle lanes and bike network and limiting cars. are there any additional speakers on item 11? is there any accommodation requests? yes there are. okay first speaker, you've been unmuted. speaker. you've been unmuted. can you hear can you hear me? yes. go ahead. hello yes. go ahead. this is patricia. eric. i spent 25 years teaching at city college, and i'm a member of the mayor's

disability council. please do not approve this outrageous quick, build the harm done to the low income and disabled students at ccsf greatly outweighs any benefit for the very small percentage of residents who will use this bike lane. you received a letter from the mayor's disability council stating its disapproval of this project. as a member of the council, it is clear that this project will remove critical parking close to campus for disabled students, so they will have to struggle walking from several blocks away. disabled students can't ride a bike or take the bus. they need blue zone parking close to campus. i taught english to immigrants for 25 years. these wonderful, hardworking students struggle to fit english classes into their work schedules and family responsibilities. they do not have time to take the bus or bike to class. the bike coalition lobby, which gets millions of tax mayor money from sfmta, wants to give students a free pass on the bus that does nothing to solve the problem.

ccsf has been a beloved institution that has changed lives since 1935. this project is a knife in the heart of this great college that gives hope and purpose to disabled and hard working, lower income students. the sfmta bike coalition anti-car and anti parking agenda has been systematically harming businesses, disabled and people who need to drive for the benefit of a very small percentage of people who ride bikes. now they're going after city college. please find another route for the bike lane that doesn't harm students at ccsf. thank you for your time. thank you. next speaker please. please no disruptions. next speaker this project is completely unneeded. it doesn't qualify as a high accident transit corridor. there already are bicycle lanes in both

directions on frida kahlo way. this is a racist, classist move to make it harder for working class students to access a precious education that could greatly improve their lives, casey hildreth said july 23rd, quote. we are not exclusively being reactionary to collisions. or in other words, they are not removing all of these parking spaces for safety reasons. but to further the anti-car agenda and to make life miserable for those who are forced to need to drive a car. i noticed that the sfmta is not trying to implement quick builds on chestnut street or union street, or any streets in wealthy neighborhoods just in the neighborhoods covers. among the opponents of this plan are the coalition for san francisco neighborhoods, 24 neighborhood group, the mayor's disability council, the san francisco council of district merchants representing 23 merchant associations san francisco gray

panthers, save muni, coalition on homelessness, sf accessible streets and parking, save our amazing richmond, concerned residents of the sunset, noe valley merchants and professionals association, geary boulevard merchants association, oak street collective, save our neighborhoods, san francisco real estate, and 30s, and many more. please use the money to buy more busses for the 29 bus that that crosses 27 school. they. the busses are so crowded that many students are left. they can't afford the bus. we need many many more busses on the 29 line. that goes from hunters point mission to college . please use your money for that. don't use your money to build something that is not necessary. it doesn't. it doesn't qualify. and that money should be used to serve the people with more busses and more. your time is up, not. thank you. let's try the last

speaker one more time. speaker. you've been unmuted. that appears to conclude the callers sure you can. okay. thank you. we'll close public comment on item 11 and colleagues, this item is before you who would like to speak. you may ask questions, voice comments. propose a motion if you so desire. director hinsey, please. sure. i guess want to start, a lot. a lot has come up today about bay pass or other, i guess free or discount transit solution. and we received a memo yesterday. i think about the class pass. so could someone come up and talk to us about

potential of bay pass or other sort of faroese ideas for, city college students? hi. board, casey hildreth mta, is our understanding that the bay pass program just finished up their pilot period working with a number of select schools. so this program is a universal free transit pass, not just good on muni, but throughout the region. the i think there's 27 regional transit agencies, i can't speak directly to the nuts and bolts of how this new phase of that program is going to be opening up to, to more, more colleges and more, more, educational facilities if it's

similar to our class pass, it is basically a, we look at the number of students that are enrolled in the, in the college, and we estimate the number of transit riders and the cost that that is associated with, providing transit for those students. and then that cost is then dispersed throughout the entirety of, of the, the university or the college among all students. so it helps to essentially help subsidize the use of transit for all students, even if they're taking transit or not. so that and that, that, that cost is, upfront to each student. so it's not something that you can opt in or out of. it's just part of the cost package for, the, the educational institution that's taking advantage of that program. if there is more details that julie can add, i would love for you to do so. but that's that's our understanding of where we're at with the bay pass program. and how it might

work. yeah. would cost pass be an option for city college or, director, i think director kirschbaum wants to respond, yeah. thank thank you for that question. and thank you for that. excellent response, casey. that was absolutely, accurate, you know, we currently have, free transit for any of our youth riders. attending city college as well as, seniors and people with disabilities from lower and moderate incomes, we while we're facing a structural deficit that would really preclude us from having brought you this as part of the budget process. we do have a very successful class pass program, which is a muni only program that many of our, colleges currently participate in, it is

a, as as casey described, it is an opt in program, typically one with a student referendum, which city college to date has, not pursued? we do think that, the bay pass program, which is now in phase two, which city college will soon be eligible for, is also something that would be really beneficial for the college to consider, particularly because, as you heard from many speakers today, there's both a local and a regional draw, for, for city college and the bay pass program covers not only muni service, but any regional transit service, what we are not able to do, although we have been requested, is to have a very narrow program where students would have free service just

when they were on routes that serve the university or going to or from our system just does not have that level of precision that we could isolate those trips. okay, well, it sounds like there are options, but most of them are in the court of city college to pursue at this time. but i appreciate the thorough answer, casey, we've we've we avenue as an alternate has come up a few times, in comments and an alternative proposal that some of us have looked at. can you kind of summarize the status , the current status of the avenue and what the plans are in relation to this project? sure. thank you, director, for that. good question. so our understanding is that the lee

avenue extension and the street buildout of the balboa reservoir housing development, is in the final stages of its permitting, it does have funding and we understand that it could start construction as early as next early next year, so that the extension itself and lee avenues, protected bike lanes are something that we have been aware of since we started the project. so we do see the frida kahlo quick build as complementary, not competing with those bike lanes. right particularly because those bike lanes just connect a very particular set of streets and don't provide sort of a network in the area, especially if you're trying to get to and from bart and balboa park, you know, lee avenue is only one piece of the puzzle, and frida helps to build out that network, the construction phase of the street, of the streets being built. we understand, will last a couple of years. and so that's the lee avenue as a facility that could be enjoyed by the

neighborhood, by city college students is not something that will be online for, you know, three or 3 or 4 years from now. so that was part of the intent and part of the reason to move quickly on. frida was to provide a similar facility, while that was being built out, to help build the demand for, for bicycling. and again, as, as my colleague mentioned, elliot during the construction period, wanting to provide a safe facility, through the area. and so we don't you don't do this. you don't view lee as an alternative to frida, but more so complementary. yes. i mean, certainly when lee is open that that will maybe take some demand away. if you're trying to go to the west, like that would be a street that you would use. maybe in lieu of frida, if you have a particular destination. but if you think about the types of trips that we're trying to serve, it's not just, you know, crosstown recreational trips,

although that certainly is a trip that we want to serve. we do want to serve, you know, transit access just within the college destinations itself, the growing campus you know, frida is clearly the heart of the growing campus of city college. and we want to make sure that it's serving destinations, on the campus itself. all right. and last lastly, i think the concern over our project, as it relates to the parking aspect of this is exacerbated by, i think, the loss of parking that's going to be associated with the balboa reservoir project. and it a couple of other buildings on the campus, so can you assure us that that you, you worked to and i know you have you worked at minimize the number of parking spots you're taking in relation

at least to this project. i know you've you've had one where you were going to take more parking, but worked with the communities to get to this sort of compromise, if you will. so you have been responsive on the parking side, we've certainly done our best. elliott, i think, did a good job covering that in the presentation where we originally, again, that southbound bike lane was something we weren't necessarily looking to take. we didn't know how to use that space when we heard the level of concern around the parking loss, we took advantage of that extra room to, again, do some changes, some creative swapping of curb uses so that we were absolutely minimizing our parking loss associated with our project. and again, in the near future, as the diego rivera theater comes online in a couple of years, our understanding is that that would open up another opportunity to

reduce the parking loss, to add back parking even further, including along the east side of frida kahlo way, adjacent to the bikeway right? yeah. okay. well, i, i encourage the team, and i know you will, try to add when the time comes, try to add as many of those back as possible, because i think we have heard a compelling reason to. but with all that said, i do support this project, and i do think we need to be working to upgrade our facilities and do sort of more proactive projects, and so appreciate the work on this. and that's it for me, madam chair. thank you so much, director henry, are there other colleagues who would like to speak on this project? director kahina, thank you, ali and casey, for your presentation,

and i have to say, i, you know, i grew up in this part of the neighborhood, i went to school at saint finbarr's. i went to high school at lick-wilmerding high school, attended classes at city college. my mom was a child care provider, so she attended classes at city college as well, and so i'm very familiar with this intersection and a lot of the competing uses, having been having grown up around this neighborhood, i've seen it change over the years, with the introduction of whole foods, different housing developments and you know, that that intersection between geneva and ocean, frida is terrible, it's nothing short but terrible, and it's so complicated for pedestrians, vehicles, busses, bikes or anyone to really navigate that. right. and so i look at this design and, i have,

you know, a little bit of a sense of caution as we're trying to encourage folks to use or bike to navigate that area to get to, bart or to get to other to access ocean avenue. and i see li as possibly a safer area for bikes to land on and to create infrastructure there to make turns less, less in conflict with cars, because that that intersection of geneva ocean and frida is so complicated, i wouldn't want to bike there, and i am not an avid biker, but still, i, i would, i would caution anyone else biking there. and so, li is not there yet. and so i do see this as you know, in some ways, the beauty of a quick build is that it is a temporary solution. in many ways, it's something that we're studying that we pilot, that we're experimenting with. right. and so that, that, that that

gives me a little bit of, of relief, that this could potentially be a temporary solution as we study how effectively is and how that infrastructure actually supports cyclists, although. so, casey, you mentioned that this is not a competing project. it's not that these both are complementary. i do wonder and i, i wonder deeply if li li could function as that, that, that corridor that connects the network, that that you all are trying to do with this project, you know, i also look at this project in the context of all the other, projects that we've approved over the last few months, the k ingleside improvements, the san jose avenue improvements, and, you know, i think about, you know, what, what driver behavior

is going to look like once all of these things come online at the same time, on san jose, we, we have some road diets there, we have, you know, we have transit only lanes there, on ocean, we're doing something similar. and, you know, i can only imagine the congestion that's going to happen on ocean avenue. and how it's already a terrible situation for congestion. you know, if you're trying to go to the whole foods, if there's a bottleneck right there, there's also a fire station really close by there. so i can only imagine, some of the concerns they brought up, so i, you know, this is a very challenging project for me to, to sit with for all those different reasons, so in an effort to, to see this as a temporary solution while we get more information on, colleagues, i would like to propose that, we

ask staff to come back to us, in a year's time, once this project has been implemented, because, you know, just looking at the timeline, it seems like we're going to try to do everything in the summer to try to avoid any disruption. and, in, any of the activities at the neighbor neighborhood has, but also in the college's activities. and at that point, if they come back within a year, we'll have a good fall semester, some of the spring semester to do some analysis to understand how effective, this quick build is, i would ask staff that as you are developing metrics to evaluate this quick build, that it is that they are metrics that are responsive to community concerns, i think one of the challenges is that, that community members have in accepting a quick build in their, in their neighborhood is that they think this, this temporary quick build solution is a fallacy. they're like, you

know, you guys are just going to put it in there. and that's going to be the thing that happens. and it's permanent. and you guys have decided this, right? and i, i, i do want to do away with that narrative. i do want folks to understand that we really are in earnest trying out different solutions to improve safety solutions for the neighborhood. and sometimes those those experiments take, sometimes they don't. and that we, as agency as an agency, will be responsive to community when and admit when it doesn't work, and be responsive to folks. and so, that's, you know, as, as i sit with this project, you know, it is it is a challenging one for me to vote for, because of that. but, you know, if we do have a firm commitment to say this is a quick build and it's true form and we are committed to, adjusting the design, within a year's time, if need be, as we

evaluate it, then that's something that i feel more comfortable with. but i just i wanted to make sure i vocalized that with the rest of the group. just so you all know where my headspace is at with this particular project, and i also just want to really commend staff for all the outreach and engagement they did do with the community, and working with the supervisor's office. thank you, emma, for being here. and i know that the supervisor's office has had, you know, just a lot of intention around creating safer, areas for all different modalities in her district. and so i know this is one of those, projects that does just that. so, this is i, i want to at least let the community know that there's a lot of good intention that is being placed in this project, but i don't want it to, to come off as we're ignoring anybody's feedback, because i do take it to heart, i

am part of this neighborhood, i grew up in this neighborhood. i have a lot of stories in this neighborhood. and, i just want to see it improved just as much as you do, so, so i, so colleagues, if that is amenable to the rest of us to, you know, ask staff to come back within a year's time and present the metrics for this project and the evaluation metrics that are responsive to staff, like, i think i would move forward with, putting a motion forward to approve this project. thank you for that. thank you for that motion. director kahina, is there a second, on director karina's motion. second. second. okay, great. is there any further discussion by colleagues ? i would i would also add that when staff comes back, maybe, they talk about where the balboa reservoir project is at, i think maybe by that time it'll be a

little bit further along. so thinking of making sure that they. thank you all consider this project in the context of the bubble reservoir project, so giving us a little update on on that and sort of like director aquino was mentioning the landscape of the whole neighborhood. i think that would be good to include in your, report back. thank you. director. director. so thank you. i like to add something to the fact that i felt like a lot of our community had a lot of different, various concerns. and also, some of them mentioned that, they don't know about this until a little bit too late. and i think moving forward, i would like to, to have, our mta team,

working in collaboration with the city college development team and, and i don't know if it's related to the planning department to for the all the new developments coming around the whole area because some of the slide, in the presentation mentioned about these are all, working toward our future land use requirements. so i think collectively, if even including myself, if i see a bigger picture of why we're doing what we propose to do, it's a much more, comprehensively to understand that this is a paradigm shift that we are encouraging, multi different modal of use of our transportation system, but also and dissipating population growth in our next multiple generations. i myself care about

safety a lot and i hope that like when my child is in college age, she has a much better options in order to afford to get to the classes by herself. instead of asking mom to buy her a car, so i really hope that that will be an option for her to do, i'm i'm hoping that, like many of our parents looking here, like raising kids in san francisco isn't cheap, so having different ways to, have kids to get to receive education that they need. so then they can have a better job to, uplift their economic trough. that's something that i would like to see. but to be able to inform our public on our community, we cannot do it by ourselves. and in mta and mta, we have to work together closely with the community college to get a really better understanding of what are the other things that

the community college can do that they can give out, they can carve out a specific requirement for certain education classes if they need a specific need to mobilize their equipment and their training to enable them to have a better education ability and access, so that's kind of what i wanted to see. i am all for the motion today, having a year to test it out, really just really test it out. please do come back with a lot more flexibility, to, really, get more dial in with the community and also partnership with all the other entities that had jurisdiction over this whole area of development. thank you, director henderson. i just wanted to add to the vice chairs , comments that in addition to

evaluation of the, you know, the first year, i think it's important for us to have an update about any communications that happen around the either the classpass or the bay pass or. yeah, because, it's one thing i think to talk about it here and say we're not eligible and this and that, you know, and but i think as especially the bay pass opens up, and the city college students will may become a, eligible for that second phase. i think it's important to help, frame that conversation so that we don't have a whole year pass and nothing. there's no movement. i mean, i think it's one thing if, if the trustees or or, the city college students, you know, don't want that as an option and don't want to support that. but i would like to know that as part of the evaluation

that we have helped, frame that conversation for them so that if it's presented as a, as a referendum or whatever, however, that their process works, that is then rejected. at least we've done our due diligence to try and support the transit. and i and i understand, too, that i understand the constraints of our budget and the challenges that we have. but i do think that to the extent that we can also figure out how to make our resources stretch or match or support city, i would hope that we can come back and have that discussion to. maybe there will be a magic windfall that comes in the next year that, you know, we'll be able to cover it. let's, let's fingers crossed, but i think that it would be helpful to have the transit side discussion alongside the streets with this project. i would be

happy, to provide any updates when the streets team comes back. i do want to clarify, though, that while we can make connections and provide information, even the decision on whether or not to have a student referendum needs to come from the college itself. okay. thank you. colleagues and i just want to take a moment to thank everyone who came today and has been a part of this process. thank you for engaging and rolling up your sleeves in this process. it's meaningful to us that you are here and you're voicing your concerns. and i want to let you all know we are listening to you and we are hearing your concerns and a lot of why vice chair kahin, i think, proposed that motion is because she has heard your concerns. we have heard your concerns and we want to make sure that these concerns are monitored and that we are able to in real time, adjust this project. that was sort of the essence of the quick build project, to be able to be a little bit more nimble than

transportation is typically thought of, be able to try something and adjust it. if it's not working in real time, in communication and collaboration with community. oh please. please, this is not the time for public comment, i also just do want to say thank you for many of you who have engaged with this project in a solutions oriented fashion, there have been concerns raised. but in addition to those concerns, many of you have also tried to find solutions. proposed alternatives. that is a really helpful way of engaging in the public process, and we appreciate your constructive recommendations and the hard work that's gone in around solutions. some of those are very interesting solutions. as we heard from the staff. those are not solutions that are able to come online quickly enough. but we do really appreciate the solutions orientation of those comments. and then just finally, i think just to tie this to a previous item today around, outreach and education around bicycling and scooting, i would hope that the bike coalition, if they're still here, does a lot of outreach events at city

college. this could be a wonderful partnership and marriage of these two items before us today. so, and also just want to say finally, and i think we've said this many times before, just how important city college is to this city and what a valuable and recognized and cherished institution it is. how many of our workforce at sfmta have come through city college and matters so much to this community, and how vital a partner city college is to this agency. and so with that, we have a motion on the table. i believe we have a second. please call the roll. if i may read into the record the thank you motion, the amendment on the motion to amend the resolution to direct staff to return to the board within one year of implementation to provide an update, including evaluation, evaluation, metrics for the project, and approve, as amended . i thank director henderson. wanted to add, something about the class system or the class. sorry program, including evaluation metrics for the project and, transportation options for alternative

transportation. an update about transit passes for city college students. very good. thank you on that motion, director hemminger. i'm sorry you're speaking out of turn. please public comment is closed, please go ahead. director heminger heminger i, director henderson. henderson i director kinsey i kinsey i director. so i so i director tarlov i tarlov i director kahena i kahena i chair eken i eken i thank you. that item is approved. okay. thank you, we are going to now colleagues just to keep it interesting, i'm going to reopen item six, which is new and unfinished business because during this meeting, a tragedy has occurred, which. i'm just kidding, we're very pleased and also very sad that director so was confirmed by the board of

supervisors to join the planning commission. so this will be her last meeting with the sfmta board of directors. despite my vehement no vote against that decision, they went ahead and approved it anyway. and so she is going to be leaving us. and so we just wanted to take a moment to recognize director. so for all of her contributions, director so i remember it wasn't long ago we took our orientation walk around, dolores park to get to know one another and talk about your values and your priorities as you came into your service on the board. and you have been a champion for personal security and the fact that every person should feel safe and secure on all aspects of our transportation system, and that has become one of the board's priorities for this year. you have been able to leverage your unique, background in planning and architecture and design to bring detailed comments and critiques and remarks that are strengthening our projects. and you've also just been just a wonderful colleague to work with and help bring cultural competency to

this agency and continue our desire to engage with communities in authentic, meaningful ways and help communities shape our projects in ways that are responsive to their concerns. so i want to thank you and say i'm i am still in denial of this change. it's been too short of a service, but your colleagues on planet are going to be happy to have you. and we wanted to thank you and celebrate you for your service. other colleagues, would you like to speak in director sow's honor ? director hemminger. thank you, madam chair. i tried to add a little drama to your departure. i hope i succeeded you did. and look, i agree about the. i mean, truth be told, we had nothing to do with the decision. it was. it came down from on high and we're just going to have to deal with it, i will say that if there's any justice in the world, you're

going to have to sit through planning commission meetings, which are even worse than ours. so it serves you right if we if you go, mingle with that crowd. it's been too short. it's been sweet, but too short. and i hope we'll run into you. we occasionally have joint meetings with other bodies, and maybe we could have, like, a 12 hour plan at the 24 hour, that you can bring to us. you meet in this room, right? same room. okay well, i'll leave little notes for you. and, again, it's been great. thank you. director hemminger. director kirschbaum, i, i share, the chair's sadness, to be losing director. so, you who was appointed to our board, you know, just under a year in

june of 2023, but even before, being nominated, she was reaching out to try to learn more about our system, more about our staff, she is a, just an incredible networker and bringing together of people. and i just was always, you know, giving really. i think, beautiful guidance on how we could make, community members feel more heard, and, and, when we were doing really cool things, she was the first to kind of champion them and help us get the word out. so i'm really grateful, to all the time

that you took, not just to understand our items and our decisions, but to meet with staff, your, you know, your community connections are unparalleled, but the access and generosity with which you kind of shared those connections with us, we're really grateful for, i told director so early on that our staff would just be really appreciative. to have her, address them in language, because we do have so many asian american staff, chinese speaking staff. that that work at the agency. and it just seeing people's faces light up when you were were sharing work of support and encouragement or most recently, congratulations at the rail rodeo. really, meant so much. so we will really, we

will really miss you, but i think we'll continue everything that you've helped us put into place as we work better in communities. sperm director kahina. man, this is bittersweet, but, director. so i, lydia, i'm just going to miss you, and it's the thought partnership that you've we've been able to have together has bar none just been amazing. you know, your your anecdote's your push for better graphics, like all those things, like, i think they they make us better in so many ways, but truly, i think you know, one of the things we bonded over immensely was your commitment to equity, your commitment to safety, your commitment to making sure that the most vulnerable amongst us are safe and are able to use our system in a way that they need it the most, and meeting folks where they're at. and so i just

i know that that skill set is what and that lens is what you're going to contribute to the planning department as well, and to and to that field and more broadly. and so i, i'm grateful that that this happened for you and that you're having this opportunity to use your, your skill sets and your deep wisdom and contribute it there, but we will miss you. and i will miss you, my friend, and, i just want to say that, like, i, you know, so thankful that that julie mentioned this, but you have gone above and beyond to make sure that you engage with staff and that you see, you really, truly see the work that folks are doing and that that is just, you know, our responsibility is to be here in this space and you have taken it a step further, and you're really going to wear our staff needs to visibly see the highest level of leadership, understand what they're doing and what they're holding, so i just so appreciate how how you've taken this responsibility to be on

this board and you've ran with it. and i know you're just going to do the same in the planning department. and again, when the department's going to be way better that you're part of it now. thank you. vice chair kahina director henderson. oh my goodness, i, i don't know what to say because i feel like i'm losing my director twin. since we came through our appointment process about the same time. and i really just want to say thank you so much to you for, for all of the wisdom and advice and the sort of the lay of the land that you've given me over the past six months, i think it has been, oh my gosh, you have no idea how helpful it's been, just to be able to talk to you and help have you help me navigate this process that was completely foreign to me. and i really appreciate your, you know, your

guidance. and then also just having a buddy to go through the process with was really was really great. and i am really happy for you and proud of you. i feel like it's your graduation. you know, we're just , you know, i'm gonna pull pull the tassel to the other side, but i'm. yeah, i'm so excited for you. i think that san francisco is, is really lucky to have people who are as invested and committed to the city as you are. and so i'm following, you know, following the example that you said, i think that i'm so also impressed that you go to so many of the mta gatherings, whatever time of day or night like. and i think that that's something that, maybe, maybe i'll, i'll learn to embrace to is going to the 11 p.m. and the 6 a.m. events. but anyway, i do want to say congratulations. and i'm sure that it won't be the

last time that we'll engage in this way, but i, i am so sad that my buddy is going to be moving on to other things. i won't say better things, but other things. but i wish you the best. thank you, thank you, director henderson. director tarloff i just like to, echo what my colleagues are saying. you know, just. congratulations. it's really wonderful news. i think that the, you know, the planning commission is such an important area for the future of our city. and i really can't think i don't know the other people on the commission, but but i, but i have heard from all your many comments, you know, you're just incredibly qualified for the for the position. and i'm, i'm so glad that you'll be there solving problems for me. and other san franciscans. so, so thank you. so so much. well, i've recently had a lot of

interaction with the planning department, so, but i, i but just on a personal note, you know, as the newest member of the board, you were the first director. i was, you know, i was sent to for advice as i was going through the through the process with the board of supervisors, and, and you were so generous with your time and wisdom and really helped me feel very welcome coming here and, you know, joining this board and i just wanted to personally thank you for that. and, and i just wish you all the best of luck and, and thank you so much for your service here as well. thank you. all right. director. so i'm going to have to savor this moment. i, i wrote a bunch of stuff, and i think i'm going to just go off script because,

this is just put this on record. i love sfmta, and it is. i'm still going to say it, and i will say it forever because i do, i never been engaged and work so closely from the inside of an agency that is that big, with 6 or 7000 employees and with one single mission, is to serve nothing else is to serve our city thick and thin, with any complaints or anything. we're still holding the bus. we're still holding the train. we're still paving the red carpet. and then the green lane, i learned a lot from all of you, and i felt like my status had been instantly elevated. the moment i joined this board, because every one of you came from so much expertise in

backgrounds that i don't have, sitting next to this guy is a legend. and then also, thank you for, thank you for sparing me. and let me indulge on critiquing on the engineering drawings of our staff. i like to do i do like to zoom in on details. and i do see that the improvement of those lane section diagrams, i do put a right dimension on them. so i really appreciate that. that will be my one. one legacy. that's my anal retentive nature that i was told by my former colleague from the historic preservation commission , so i will continue to zoom into the details, but i still able to fly a little bit higher and only give really high level comments, so, i really

appreciate everybody i took on upon myself to learn as much as i can because i do appreciate an agency that is and compasses not only the, people sitting in the office and doing engineering and planning and doing policy change , but also having such a robust fleet of services workers. i met them because i love to hear their stories, in that trip that i show up at 11 in that night with director tarlov and chair egan and julie told me to take a nap, and then i show up and yeah, that that ends at two in the morning. so this is your turn next time. but in there, i heard stories from the train track workers that this is the job i got when i was a troubling

teenager, and i this supervisor that you see here, he helped me. he saved my life because every day i woke up and there is a purpose of me going to work and they keep making sure to check on them. and he had never left mta and he slowly he, being promoted to be one of the managers. and he loved his job. and i see that it's a very amazing story to hear that that not only our agency is to serve people and bring them, making sure that we bring them from point a to point b safely every day. or we have, equitable parking space that charge average normal rate for people to park. we have this our family is to actually help raise a lot of san franciscans, through generations. right. your grandfather was one of our train

operators. and so this is a very special place. and i really have the honor and privilege to learn. so much from all of you here on the board, and also all of you sitting here and whoever else will be interested to watch this video again, so i am not going away. i'm not moving to east coast. i'm just moving down the street on 49 venice. so, streets and parcel and building link together. okay, so we got i'll be calling all of you whenever we, i hope, is to make sure that with the knowledge of our agency, i can bring back a different perspective. so then we can work more efficiently and effectively with our city planning, with the vision that we all try to, advocate for, for our next generations. so, i hope that i will be invited back in some of your ribbon cutting ceremonies and, and i'll see you

around the 5 a.m. yes all right. thank you, director. so and as i understand, you'll you'll very much continue to be part of the sfmta family as a as an alum, i will open it to public comment if anyone would like to comment on director seau's departure to the planning commission. i board members, luke bornheimer. i'll keep it short. thank you, director. so for your service, i appreciate it. i appreciate all of all of you who serve as well, all the staff who work at mta. so thank you for your service and thanks for your time and good luck with the planning commission. thank you for your comment. any other speakers? oh i'll be brief, but joel ramos, local government affairs manager

here, and used to sit in one of those seats up there. so i feel a little bit, entitled. to say something or two about. director. so. but really just going to say how much we all really benefited from your, your attitude and, and how light you are in terms of just your approach and the, the laughter that you have and the, you know, just but keeping it real and making sure that everybody understands that, you know, that this is bigger than just the moment in everything you do, everywhere you go, you're always looking at such, such the bigger picture. and it's deeply appreciated, i, i, i, i know that these, these issues can be really difficult because we're balancing so many different competing interests. and it takes a special person, all of you, to serve in this capacity. and i know that when you go to the planning commission you're going to bring that. and so i'm really looking forward. i think we're all looking forward to

seeing what you're going to do with their bringing our transit first ideals, because i know that they often get torn. they they actually have to make trade offs to like where to put driveways and whatnot and how it best complements our bus systems and what they and whatnot. so looking forward to you actually carrying the torch over to planning to make sure that, that they do their due diligence and helping us make this city transit first, the way you have in your term here. so thank you so much. director saw okay. thank you. just got your first homework assignment, all right. so we will close public comment on item six. we can move on to item oh. did you want to speak? no. okay, on item 12. item 12, presentation and discussion regarding a muni service update. mr. kirschbaum, switch microphones.

i'm gonna. i'm gonna eat these snacks if you're not careful. all right. there's more in the back. yeah when you come on. okay yeah . christine, i'm not seeing it. i know, i know, cecilia downloadthe it uploaded it. this i can download it from the website. okay. i can download it

from the website if you'd like. it's this. i think it's. oh, yeah. that is. that's not. i've done it as a pdf. okay. i don't know how to thank you. yeah okay . i don't need. good evening. i definitely would not have agreed to give this presentation had i known i was also going to be wearing two hats, but i, i, i am just so proud of the work that we're doing that even though it's been a long night, i really thought long afternoon. i really appreciate the time, i'm excited here today to present our quarterly update on muni service and some of the excellent news

we have to share on our ridership and our performance. i want to stress that the progress that we are making is entirely thanks to the creativity and the commitment of our staff, who are working day in and day out to deliver an excellent service. this, despite our limited resources and many of the challenges that we face. in the transit division, back a slide in the transit division. our north star is really the mantra you keep hearing jeff say over and over again, which is to make muni fast, frequent, reliable, clean, and safe. we truly believe that these are the critical elements to an excellent customer experience. so, you know, whether it's negotiating our clear channel contract to increase cleaning or how we're planning our our our

service schedules, everything that we're doing in the transit division is focused on one of those metrics. and as a result, more people are riding muni, we're seeing more than last year, more than last month. and on some lines, even more than what we were seeing before the pandemic. on weekdays, our daily ridership is up 16, when you look at the first quarter, compared to the first quarter of 2023, and, and even just looking at the fall to the winter, we're up 3, which is pretty unusual, you know, given that in the kind of winter, winter months, we tend to see less overall travel. some of our kind of real big, growth lines are routes like the 38 geary and the t third, where

we're seeing almost a 27% growth year over year. but there's a huge, variety of routes, where we're seeing growth, particularly, routes that serve neighborhoods that serve commercial corridors, and serve kind of the unique experiences that san francisco has to offer. christine, can i move to this microphone? is that possible? i'm finding it hard to not see my slides, these are some of our big hitters, these are our our routes, that all have more ridership than they did before the pandemic, in many cases, they are routes that we have made significant investments in reliability and travel time,

routes like the 49, venice, for example, where we opened the, you know, showcase brt system. but we're also seeing our small community connectors, routes like the 56 rutland that take people off of the hills in visitacion valley and connect them to routes like the, the nine and the t line, as also really thriving, i, i also want to really, you know, point out the kind of belle of the ball which is the 22 fillmore, you know, which is, since the pandemic has been rerouted as had a significant investment in reliability and frequency, it's weekday is stellar. but, you know, we are seeing 197% ridership recovery. that's basically twice as many people riding the 22 fillmore, on, on

on the weekends as and this is a route that serves so many different types of neighborhoods in san francisco, the wealthiest, you know, some of our, our, our, our lowest income neighborhoods and just, you know, really, i think is the best of what san francisco has to offer. so we're really we're really proud of these trends. zooming back out, we also had our highest systemwide ridership in four years, the weekend recovery at 87. the weekday recovered be at 72. so when you look at our seven day a week ridership, we've kind of passed the three quarter mark, which i'm really excited about. and these trends are happening

really in spite of a very slow downtown recovery. you know, we are still seeing only about 55% recovery on our rail system with the t line being an outlier, which i'm going to share in a minute. the embarcadero and the montgomery muni stations are at about 39% recovery, we are not in in competition with our our regional partners. we really work to make our service as seamless as possible. but to just give you a sense are the next largest, proper city in the bay area is bart. they are only at 42% recovered. so our our our ability to be flexible, the kind of incredible resiliency of our bus system and of our muni forward program is really driving recovery for our service. i did want to

spotlight, the, the t third line, and share with you that it really has become an outlier among our rail system, we are seeing 27% growth this quarter on the t line, it we are seeing ridership up and down the route, including at the new stations. we also, when we look at ■the ct ridership that we had prior to covid and then we look at the k and the t ridership, today we're carrying, on average about 32,000 people, which is what we were doing before covid, so we're really excited that the, the central subway project has really helped drive this ridership recovery. and over the

next couple years, we're going to be heading back out to the surface portion of the t line. having some deep community discussions, looking at our own operations, for example, some of our very slow speeds as we go over our crossovers and work to improve the travel time on the surface portion of the t. so more i see this as a trend that we want to really have a lot of care and feeding on and continue to see project up, we have achieved all of this ridership because, you know, muni is really more reliable, that comes from things like headway management, which is helping to minimize gaps in wait times for our customers. it's coming from the proactive data based approach that our maintenance teams are taking, and the work

they're doing to be more efficient, particularly around programs like fix it week. our new trains are paying off dividends, in terms of reduced breakdowns and our commitment at all levels of, transit, to have equity really drive decision making is helping to clarify our focus when we have very constrained resources, the some of the most transformative improvements have come from our service planning team led by jessica garcia, under sean kennedy's program, jessica is doing interviews right now trying to find the next generation of leaders so she can't be here today, but i did want to update you and show off about some of her work along with, her partner, susanna beaumont lopez. on the scheduling side. and they really work together to redesign in and

transform our service, the pandemic, you know, forced us to rebuild our service really from the ground up, the, the one of the most transformative things was, that it allowed us to look really at how much service we could realistically deliver for every day, we definitely had more service on paper, 4 or 5 years ago, but we were not delivering more service to our customers, and that was creating incredible trust problems, a route that was supposed to come every 15 minutes had some days that it came every 15 minutes, and a lot of days where it was coming every 25 minutes, every 30 minutes, or even every 40 minutes. and that is not a system that customers can count on, as we brought the service back, and the service grew in

unexpected places, this team reacted to that. they now look at ridership in 15 minute increments. and even though we are making only cost neutral changes, they are continuously making adjustments to try to make sure that our service, is not crowded and is meeting the needs of our customers, the subway is also operating more reliably than i believe it has in decades, we are seeing subway, moderate subway delays down 65% and long subway delays down 70. this number kind of altered states between about 60 and 80, because we are using month over month, data. but really the dramatic trend continue is. and, you know, as i

said, because we don't have more funding, we are doing some very, very precision adjustments on our service, this is just a snapshot, of the routes that we adjusted in january, to, to try to address for crowding, we included, about five months of, of data here so that you could see how in some cases, we were able to take a crowded trend and improve it. and in other cases, we still need to add more service to address kind of continued, crowding, we did shift service in order to address crowding on the routes. i just talked about. we did shift service from the five, the nine, the nine r and the 33, and then we went back to those

routes to make sure that we weren't, creating any crowded conditions, although, these are routes that it is heartbreaking thing, as director hemminger is indicating to reduce service, the, the, the one place that we did see crowding increase was at the 8:00 hour on the five fulton, particularly through the western addition, where there's a long gap between rapid stops. and so the five local is really having to do the bulk of the work. so one of the things that we're looking at for august is actually adding a rapid stop in that really dense equity corridor, which will increase frequency and reduce walk time for, for those customers. so it's just another example of sort of a cost effective way of

addressing the crowding conditions that we're seeing, all of our crowding data as along with our ridership data is on our website at sfmta's dot comuni data. we do want customers especially, you know, our really, committed customers to have access to all the same information that we do in this decision making process, here's an example, on, on on the weekend where, we did shift service again from the five, to the 28, and you can see where the really hot red, that we were seeing in august and september. you know, something like 40% of service on the 28 being crowded on the weekends, uays down to more like 8 to 10. we're now

going back into the summer season, where recreation again increases. and so we'll continue to monitor to see how these changes hold up, this is, again, just a very deep dive into how the team is using the data. the one of the routes that we added service to on was the 24 divisadero. we added a bus, in january, as you can see, before covid, we had, in some segments, almost 50% of our trips that were crowded, the service didn't start soon enough at the kind of peak frequencies, and we needed to go from 10 minutes to 9 minutes, when we made those changes, we saw the crowding significantly reduce. we still have a kind of a real tough stretch where everybody's trying

to get to school, and we're still kind of packed in, and that's the condition that we're going to be living with, you know, in this, you know, kind of current environment. but it's significantly improved. and we're not seeing pass ups for kids trying to get to school, this is our crowding data that we're looking at as we start to plan for our next, service changes, which will go into effect in august. we, are these are all the routes that have 10% or more trips that are crowded, and the service planning team is looking at these routes to, to make adjustments. in particular, we anticipate adding service, to the, to the 28. i don't want to get this wrong and the 48, based on this data, we're also in

addition to, you know, wanting service to be fast, frequent, reliable, clean and safe whenever possible, we want service to be fun, and we want to complement everything that the city is doing to bring people downtown and to bring back some of our our tourist markets, we, we're will be supplementing the f line for summer crowding in a couple of different ways, we will be adding busses on the weekend. we currently just do not have enough rail trainers to increase the f line, but we are in the process of hiring more rail trainers and hope to address that over time. we're also going to we've been working really hard on an in-house rebuild program, on our second boat car,

and so it's going to be out on sundays and mondays, providing, kind of just fun recreation trips for people that want to have a chance to go from essentially the ferry plaza near the market street railway museum to pier 39, but it will also help pick up some of that f line congestion, we're also going to be trying something that we started, last year during the 150th anniversary of the cable car system, where in addition to our our service on the california line as well as hyde and mason lines, we're going to be running on thursday, friday and saturdays. we're going to be doing one train a day, that is going to make round trips.

essentially between hyde and chinatown, between fisherman's wharf and chinatown. there's a lot of customers that do want to take the cable car, like all the way across town, but there are others that would really just like to end up back where they started and are just riding for the sake of riding and having that experience, so it's like a hyde street, chinatown loop, and, we're also getting some support, which i'm grateful for from, market street railway. they're going to have some docents out there to kind of explain to folks this unique service along with helping us with some signage so people don't get confused, used, i think i already talked a little bit about what is happening for the fall, please note this says, july 20th, but we actually are going to be pushing these changes back a little bit, to august to address some feedback

from our operators, our operator, union, thought it would be better if we could just do a, a rollover sign up for operators at the beginning of june for people that are kind of adjusting to a summer schedule for kids and, and things like that. and then, do the school sign up in august. so rather than trying to do one sign up, we're going to be doing two in response, i think, to that very helpful feedback, all of our service changes, you know, over the last several years have been based on the values that we really hold as an agency of equity and trust, environmental stewardship and economic vitality, and we will continue that work, the not only do we look at things like, how do we

respond to ridership demands, but also what do our neighborhoods need, particularly the ones that we are tracking in the muni equity strategy? how can we continue to promote access for, seniors and people with disabilities? and also, how can we continue to maintain train minimum frequencies so that you can live comfortably anywhere in san francisco without having to, to rely on, on, on a car? so there's certainly places where if we were just looking at ridership data, you know, the bus might come every hour. you know, we don't we don't feel that that is , a service people can count on. so so we really, never go below 30 minutes. our, our, our network runs, you know, 24 hours a day at 30 minute headways. and even most of our hilltop routes

are running every 20 minutes, with a handful running every 30, as we look to the next couple of years and the need to be really nimble, to work really closely with bri as she studies our our actuals and make sure that we are, continually responding to our budgets so that we do not ever have to risk staff jobs. we are also going to be taking a really deep dive into our service, so we can continue to make these adjustments so that if our budget picture changes and we get the who talked about the windfall, if we get if we get the windfall, we're going to be ready, if we don't, though, we're we're also going to be ready, and a big part of that is, you know, we have reactivated the muni equity working group, if we do have to make tough changes, we want a group that's really been looking

at our service deeply for an extended period of time where we we've built trust that we're not just showing up and saying, this all has to change, so we are meeting every couple of months. we're really grateful to the, community leaders that are taking time out to, kind of meet us on this, on this work, and then in addition, you know, we're continuing to innovate on the service side, one of the, the programs i'm most excited about, kind of moving forward is our focus line workshops, this was initiated by, by brant jones, who's our chief transportation officer, who said, you know, i don't want to wait until lines are underperforming to go in and study them on a rotating basis. we're going to look at every

line in the system, not just from, like how a planner or an engineer would look at it, but also how the folks that are really close to the service, the operators, the street inspectors , the trainers, and our controllers are out in the system. so we meet as a group every two weeks, led by our performance team. they share what they're seeing in the data and then the staff that's been studying the system shares what they've learned from our trainers and our operators and our inspectors, and they make kind of precision adjustments based on that in order to try to make the service as reliable as possible, some of the routes that they've looked at are listed here. i won't go through them in the interest of, of time. and then we've got some big ones coming up, this quarter

, because of this innovation in, we are really trying to engage with the industry, we, we want to learn and understand best practices from really around the world, in addition to the country. that's why i'm covering for jeff today, him and many of our colleagues are at the nacto conference. we also had an opportunity to host the, international association of public transit's bus committee, they came and did a tour and looked at our trolley busses because we have the largest trolley fleet in this country. but it's a very common mode in europe, along with our transit priority work, i also had an opportunity to speak to some researchers and students, in april and talk about things like the equity analytics that we're

doing and really needing more academic support in this area, and we've been approached by los angeles, who really has the ambitious goal of making the 2028 olympics car free, and as green as possible. so they, they, they really wanted our playbook from apec. they wanted to really understand how we approached planning that event. they're going to be asking transit properties from all over the country to bring busses to los angeles, as they basically are expecting to double their their daily ridership over, over the course of the olympics and the paralympics, so thank you for this time, i'm going to continue to do these quarterly briefings with different themes today. i really wanted to focus on on the service because i think it is so key as we kind of

come out of the budget process, for you to all understand how your leadership is really helping to drive reliability and not asking us to stretch further than what we have resources to deliver. i'm going to be coming back next to really talk about our long term infrastructure needs, and really talk about how we get to, what is likely going to be a 30 year plan, to upgrade our infrastructure. we're also going to be coming with the results of the electric bus pilot, which is something that, we took, i think a really a learning approach, we found some things like that. we were worried about, like, could the busses go up our hills, you know, no problem. but then other things we didn't even know we were worried about, you know, have emerged as, as, as issues that we want to share out, this fall will also be coming back

with the train control upgrade contracts. and we will also be, activating a check in with our, our ad hoc committee in advance of that work. and then we'll continue to update you on the progress that we're making on the muni forward, program with a focus in the, coming year on the phase two of the 29 sunset along with the t line and some other key corridors. so thank you for your time. happy to answer any questions. okay. excellent. thank you so much. i am going to check in with our board secretary, about i don't i presume no one in the room wants to comment, but anyone's welcome to, if we have some remote accommodation requests for public comment. we do. we have one speaker. you've been unmuted

. speaker. you can go ahead. i don't think he knows that. we've unmuted him, mr. weiner, you've been unmuted. you can speak for two minutes to provide your comment. yeah. this is herbert weiner speaking, one, concern i have. okay. you're adding with your busses. to certain runs and , and i'm wondering if you aren't taking busses from other runs. and that's a concern that i have. and did you have the ultimate aim of restoring all the busses runs as you covid? and, this is one concern. what

about the three jackson line? and what about extending the two sutter implement street where it was before? so you know, this, i appreciate the addition of busses, but at the same time, you have to make the restoration of the fleet complete. and also, you should be having a net addition of busses. the fleet reflect the increasing population and the increasing need. so far, i have not been a net addition of busses to the fleet, and this should be the ultimate aim of the muni. it's been quite in service ever since. 2008, and fortunately i'm in assisted living and i despaired this, but i feel for the other passengers in my 30s. thank you much. thank you. no

other callers. okay that we can close public comment on item 12, directors, this is not an action. this is just an informational item. today okay. are there any questions for director kirschbaum or any comments? director kikina mostly just great work, i there we go. great job julie and team and sean, and your team as well. i think these are incredible numbers to share with us. i think how we've bounced back compared to bart, that's that's incredible. all, i had a couple of things i was just curious about, the focus lines for q1, so i'm just juxtaposing it with, like, the most crowded routes as well, like just comparing, contrasting, noticing that some of the most crowded routes aren't on the q1 focus, lines. so i just wanted to see if just get more context of kind of like, why are you focusing on these particular, grouping of

lines? and just the purpose of that. thank you for that question. we're trying, i think, over the kind, of course, of a year or 18 months to go through all of the routes, and so it may be that some of the more crowded routes have already been covered in, in the summer or the fall months. they also know, they, they, they try to look at both the heavy ridership routes as well as, the, the lighter ridership routes in in particular because like a route like the to sutter, we are running on a schedule, because it only comes every 20 minutes, i believe. and so the, the, the operations team really feels passionately that the reliability on those in frequent

routes is as important or perhaps even more important than on the routes that like the one california, which they're tackling now that, you know, comes every 4 or 5 minutes. okay, and i, just to i think as you, looked, over the, the most crowded routes slide you mentioned the 48, as one of the routes that is particularly crowded. i'm just wondering, again, just like trying to figure out, like, why is that not part of the focus lines as we're looking at, you know, the lines there, i think it's a good it's a good suggestion and feedback that i would take back. and it, it, we're always working to have like, a tighter connection, you know, so, you know, for example, the, the team did the k line kind of at the tail end of the muni forward project and then, you know, sean

kind of like brought everybody in and was like, no, this is we really needed this like six months ago. so that's sort of an example where as the program emerges because, you know, it's going so fast, we sometimes have to take a break and like kind of revisit and make those make those connections. but i will say something that, just for the public to also know, in my briefings with sean and jessica and the team, there are a lot of, like, you know, quick adjustments that are made, continuously on these routes. and so, you mentioned these like cost neutral adjustments, and, for sure, like, i can see that. i can see how that happens, in with a quick turnaround and how the team is being really responsive, to these moments of overcrowding and all these different things. so i, i guess to help you answer the question a little bit more, it does seem that that although we do have

these focus lines there, there there is significant work that's happening in parallel, to make these adjustments in real time, so, that's great. the other question i had, congratulations on forming the muni equity group and getting that up and running again, i just wanted to see if there is, well, two things, we'd love to know what the what the membership and the composition of the group looks like, and i can get that in a briefing. we don't have to discuss it now, but just something to flag as as something i'm interested in and, you know, similar to the cac, it would be wonderful to get their feedback on some of these projects that do have some deep equity impacts. and so, trying to, you know, maybe just some direction or some suggestions here, trying to figure out a way to operationalize that. is it something where, some of our more challenging items get presented before them, before they come to us or, you know, trying to figure out a way to, like, better operationalize our feedback as we can get their

feedback and incorporate it in how we deliberate on an item. so, excited that it's formed, excited it's there, and i know you did significant work, in trying to make sure that it was representative of many of our equity neighborhoods. so kudos to that, to your to you and your team for doing that as well. thank you for that feedback. thank you. director henderson. thank you, chair. and i just have a couple of maybe comments, but just question first, i saw that on the i can't remember which slide because i just closed it, but, the slide with the bar graph where it started 20 19, 20, 2020 in the service was declining. and now it's going up. that's great. but i was just wondering what happened in 20. do you remember what happened in 2018 and what the difference was between, service between 2018 and 2019? i'm wondering really, was it sort of

like the same, was it going up or down in 28 before the pandemic? i realized why it dropped, but i'm just curious what it was doing before. i, i think you might be referring to the subway delay reduction slide, if that's possible. i would love to get it on the screen, is this the slide you're talking about? no, the average weekday boarding. sorry. yeah, the slide number three, so this is the, percent ridership recovery since the, you know, we really saw a rapid decline in, in travel at the very early days of the pandemic, so this is all compared to a base year of 2019. okay okay. but i guess my question really is just what was

the trend looking like before? like before 2019? the the trends were that we were showing kind of an increasing amount of ridership on paper, but then we weren't delivering on that commitment. so right now we are getting almost 100% of our scheduled operator shifts out the door every day, that number was closer to about 96, 95% during, before our covid, that's like 400 or 500 trips a day, that we were supposed to be delivering and we weren't. so we looked good on paper. if you checked the frequency tables, you know, things were coming frequently, but not in a way that was consistent or people could count on it. okay, that's really interesting. and very

helpful, and then i, i am wondering for the service changes that you're making the, you know, seem it seems like it's like i think you said precision. you know, it seems very precise, and so that's i think that that's helpful so that it doesn't totally throw everybody off. i wonder if in those when you're making those changes, are you finding that you're, that those changes are, are to make up for the fact that there are fewer trips into and through downtown? so are you, like, shifting it so that there are more changes that are helping make connections between neighborhoods or on the periphery of the downtown area? yeah, that's a that's a great question. we are seeing that. so, for example, because we're not trying to get every body to

work from 8 to 830, and we need a lot of service in a very short amount of time. we actually have a lot of midday service that is as frequent or more frequent than it was during covid or before covid. we also, have have restored a lot more bus miles than rail miles because the rail system is largely focused on downtown and the ridership, is not as, not as as recovered. so we still have the same amount of service in the middle of the day on the rail system. you know, those kind of just, you know, people should be able to expect, you know, 10 to 15 minutes service. but we used to run like seven minute service on the n-judah, for example, in the morning and in the evening commute. and we're not we're not doing that right now. and i

imagine with the, with the proposed, you know, changes in, sort of the new and different types of activation in the downtown area that maybe we'll see even more of that sort of shifting around to accommodate for, you know, i don't know what's happening in the streets in the entertainment potential entertainment district and all of that, but it just seems like there's the potential for more of the service to sort of go not be so downtown centric anymore. and i feel like that's a big shift, probably for your, you know, for the system. but it sounds like it may still be the direction that we're going even, even as we, increase ridership and come out of the pandemic impacts. you know, i would i would agree with that, and that's why we're working so closely with the office of economic and workforce

development and with sf travel. we want to make sure that there's always enough muni service to support the downtown recovery, while also serving all of these other needs. and i think a great example of that is the, you know, the 14 mission, the owl service runs more frequently, than, than than what we had, you know, before covid, some of our service from like 9 to 11 p.m. as we sort of think about the entertainment district is more frequent than it was before covid. okay. thank you. and then lastly, chair, i just i forgot to mention this, the last meeting, but i went i was in dc last month and i went to i caught the train to philadelphia for the day, and when i was there, there was a i ran into this guy who had a hat on that had the, the i thought about

this because you said sf travel, so i'm going somewhere, but, but the he had a hat on and it had a logo that was, it looked like the muni logo, but it said something else, but it was in the, you know, like, i guess in the image of the muni logo. and so it, you know, i was like, hey, you know, what are you, you know, what are you up to? and so he lets me know that his, you know, buddy has this fashion line, blah, blah, blah. but he thought that the logo of the, of muni was super cool. and so they, i guess, put it on a bunch of t shirts and things. and so i was like one the muni brand is very the intellectual property of this agency is, valuable. it seems that, you know, i could randomly run into a stranger. really? and i'd see it across the country, but also it just reminds me about how important this is to creating that brand. and this, you know, the fact

that you're able to make the adjustments in a quick enough turnaround to, ensure. or do your best to ensure that the, the service that we're delivering to people and people's experience is one where they would be proud to wear the logo on them, even wherever they are in the country. and so i just, i wanted to mention that because i thought, i was really shocked and pleased to see it. and i think that, you know, i'm not sure if that's something that, you know, would have been the case years ago if, you know, people were walking around with the muni looking logo or muni logo on. but i just wanted to share with you that the, the brand and the, the ethos i think of this agency really are built through the work that you're doing with the with the service that you're providing. and so i want to say thank you for that. thank you. hemminger. thank you,

madam chair. brace yourself. i'm going to say something nice, i, in fact, conveyed some of this to you at a meeting last time. privately and i want to say it publicly. this is the best muni service i've seen since the mid 80s, when we moved out here from chicago. so, you know, part of it is the fleet, which is almost brand spanking new, top to bottom, except for the cable cars, i think a big chunk of it is the maintenance. the preventive maintenance that you've been talking about and emphasizing. but i think more than anything else, it's that you've figured out, and it's hard for us in government to do it, but you figured out that you ought to be under promising and over delivering, not the reverse , and that reliability has been a godsend. and i agree with you.

it it's a way of restoring trust . someone asked, you know, what was it like before the pandemic, we had people, like, hanging out the windows. it was like india, in a lot of our service because we had so much demand, and that demand went away in a heartbeat. and i look, i would never wish a pandemic on my worst enemy, but but one of the things i think we've learned by sort of having to strip the house down to the studs and build it back again, is we've learned what we really need and what we just would like to have, and i think you found a sweet spot and it's probably going to last for like ten days, but you found a sweet spot where you're telling people what you're going to do and you're able to do it, and that's a big deal for muni. so you, shawn, your whole team, all the operators. i think it's an immense accomplishment. it there

were bad old days here, and they were bad old years for considerable stretches of time. so enjoy this one while you can. thank you. thank you. jack i have so many questions for you, but i'm just going to spare us all because it's so late, so i will just say thank you on behalf of my kids for the extra 24 divisadero roots. that's very helpful, and it's just really, really clear, to me, i think, into this board how how much integrity you have, how much pride you have and how much you hold yourself to tough performance metrics. and you actually evaluate. we talked about evaluation metrics in the last item. i feel that you really take these evaluate evaluation metrics seriously. it matters to you. and it must be just incredibly rewarding to see. obviously some of these some of these delays that you

used to hear complaints about just endlessly, really falling off. so thank you for all the innovation work that responsiveness and also the proactivity getting ahead of these challenges in order to deliver great service. thank you. i'm so proud of my leadership team, who you each have kind of carved out an area of innovation vision, and then our making it compelling to, to the staff that have to deliver on it, you know, whether that's, you know, brant jones introducing, you know, performance, feedback for our supervisors and soon to be our operators focusing on career paths. you know, whether it's charles drain on our infrastructure side, who, you know, is really kind of stretching what we can do with

proactive maintenance, but also then taking on our capital program. and it's going to be coming with some pretty big asks and, and on on how we rebuild the program. our janet gallegos and mike henry working together, fleet engineering and fleet maintenance, because the secret is that not all the fleet is so new anymore, but it looks new. and it even as it gets to its half life, it's running, as well as it did on day one, and they've really taken on that commitment. you get to hear from sean and his team all the time, but i'm so proud of them. and then i can only do this job because emily williams, who is my head of business and administration, does all the parts of the job that i find really arduous, like labor relations and contracts and

budget, to make sure that we are delivering on hiring, delivering on what we can say we deliver. so i will make sure that they all get this amazing feedback. thank you. okay excellent. and the only last plug i'm going to make is we talked earlier today about a contract to teach people how to how to ride a bicycle safely in the city. and i still think there are people who either don't understand how to ride muni, they don't understand it or they don't understand to director hemmings's point how high the quality of the service is right now. and when we look at the revenue we were receiving before the pandemic from transit ridership and after the pandemic , if we could close that gap, that would go a long way towards addressing that structural deficit that we are facing in 26, 27. so i saw one ridership campaign that you talked about. i think a little bit earlier in your director's report. i still think there are more people out there that could be well served by muni that just have an

information gap. and i want to make sure that we're using all of the outreach and behavior change and encouragement and incentive and information programs to make sure. because in fact, when you ride muni, that is a very concrete way that you show that you care about this city. and i just want to make sure that we are we are making we are reaching out to people and they have that information. thank you. yeah, i think that's really excellent feedback. you know, part of why we structured this presentation around the ridership stories is to, to try to, to engage with potential customers, with the media, with kind of other sources. i'm hoping that some of the fun special events over the summer are also going to attract people to the system and to try the system, but for sure, more work to do. thank you for this update. we'll close out item 12 and we can move into our discussion next. item 13, item 13 discussion and vote. pursuant to admin code section 67. 10d as

to whether to invoke the attorney client privilege and conduct a closed session conference with legal counsel. okay, we'll open public comment on item 13. do we have any accommodation requests? no accommodation requests. close public comment. may i have a motion and a second please to go into closed session. so moved to go into closed session. thank you. please call the roll on the motion to go into closed session. director heminger heminger i director henderson i henderson i director kinsey i kinsey i director so i so i director tarloff i tarlov i director i chair ekin. hi can i thank you

to not disclose. director heminger heminger. director henderson a, henderson i director. hensey i hensey i director. so i so i director tarlov i tarlov i director kehena a kehena i chaikin i beacon i thank you. the motion passes and concludes the business before you today. thank you. colleagues we are adjourned . next meeting is may 21st and june 4th. it. by.

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[gavel] >> m. dorsey: good morming this is the may 14th, 2024 meeting of the timma board. i am matt dorsey and i serve as chair of the timma board. vice chair is rafael mandelman. thank you to sfgovtv for broadcasting today's meeting today. our clerk today s yvette lopez-jessop.ve i wouldje like to excuse commissioner ronan who is not able to join us today and i'm informed that commissioner stephanie is late but joining us sortly. >> clerk: good morning.