Board will not take any formal action but looking forward to peoples comments and questions. Any people on the line, moderator . You have seven questions remaining. Chair borden okay, our first speaker, please. Caller hello. My name is joel kamisher, a School Crossing guard and a member of the sfciu 10 to 1 bargaining committee. We have been trying to talk about not outsourcing people to protect the city workers and im hearing that discussion about the flaggers and the pedestrian monitors. I wonder if we could use our own workforce, the parking control people and the crossing guards instead of having the contractors hire private people. I realize that the flaggers might have their own union, so maybe thats a problem. But im hoping that we can do other things to reduce the need of contract people to prevent layoffs . Thank you. Chair borden thank you, next speaker, please. You have six questions remaining. Caller hello, members of the board, my name is Hector Jimenez and im with the local 1001 and a resident of the city of San Francisco. I wanted to address the board that four of the 17 slides in the presentation that we saw today were dedicated to impossible scenarios that ask the board to imagine if the cares act funding wasnt received. We believe that this is a further waste of our time today. Done cruelly to illustrate the hypothetical layoffs in order to instill fear and to degrade morale in the middle of a feast of labor violations and unsafe work conditions that with covid19 include equipment failure of which the public is very aware of, and the equipment explosions at the maintenance facilities. This is insane. Lets start by improving your workforces confidence in order to improve the publics. Thank you. Chair borden thank you, next speaker, please. You have seven questions remaining. Chair borden next speaker. Caller hi, can you hear me . Chair borden yes, we can. Caller hi, my name is Teresa Rutherford with 1021. Im calling to speak to this issue of potential layoffs for my coworkers and to speak to the fact that, you know, as director tumlin said that these are heroes but at the same time were talking about the lowhanging fruit of laying off workers and having their families harmed. We know that m. T. A. Workers are on the frontline, theyre frontline workers. That theyre some of the persons who are helping to keep the community safe. And we would ask that m. T. A. Operate in a genuine way and treat workers with respect by not using them as bait. Because we know that this is not about this is not about the delivery of service and this is not about revenue. We know that this is political. We know that this is coming from pressure from city hall. And we know that this is directly tied to the issue of workers having a contract, which we bargained for and struggled to have. We know that also this is undermining the majority of the workers who are black and brown in the city and county of San Francisco, who are always being used, you know, whenever politicians want to make a point. This is not the time to use workers. The cares act, the m. T. A. Has the cares act, 373 million reserved, with over 330 million, and we also know that you have a Million Dollars savings that comes from vacancies, 540 vacancies and bringing in over a million for the city. These are all things that the city and county of San Francisco workers [bell] we ask that you step up and treat people with respect and you honor workers and you operate genuinely and not Pay Lip Service of the workers deserve better and, no, were not going to open up our contracts and allow you to use us as bait. Chair borden that was the time. So sorry about that, thank you. Next speaker, please. You have nine questions remaining. Chair borden next speaker, please. Hi, everybody, this is trevor adam. Im the chapter president and i represent sfciu1021 and its agency. It is always really concerning to me listening to these conversations that the board has the monthly about the type of enforcement that we do and the work that we do for the city and how out of touch you all are with how things work, even things as simple as the rules of order and migreatingreatinggre g over those things and its concerning to me and my group of workers. The main thing that i have issue with is that enforcement is always the topic how can we bring in one revenue. Never do i hear the safeguarding of the people doing that enforcement. Never once do yall say that. Thats the key. Thats the key to go ahead and safeguard these employees to feel safe to do their jobs, and its a very dangerous job. Its a thankful job. And its from both sides, from all sides, from our employer and the citizens that we serve. So i think should be definitely considered when you all talk about these types of these new types of enforcement. R. P. T. , theres always money to be made on r. P. P. With the enforcement. But, guess what, enforcement 30 seconds. Caller its hard to do when you dont have the support of your employers to keep you safe, to limit your exposure to a pandemic and things like that. So i want you to go ahead and put your shoes in the officers that you represent and that work with you and consider what you need from your employer to do your job not only during a pandemic, but on a regular day. And then maybe you could see some increase in the type of enforcement that they do. And they will be comforted in the work that they do. Its ultimately coming down to the workers and the work they do. [bell] chair borden thats the time. Caller i really hope that you consider it. Chair borden thank you for calling, no one is excited when they see a p. C. O. And so we understand that the nature of your work is quite thankless. Caller but its one thing to say it but you do not show that you understand. In your conversations earlier, you indicated that you have no idea of what goes on in parking and traffic in the city and county of San Francisco. Thank you. Chair borden thank you, next speaker, please. You have 10 questions remaining. Chair borden next speaker. Caller hi, my name is Richard Rothman and i think that the board of directors are answerinasking the right questis finally. But they need help. Either, you know, listening to these why they dont have outside eyes like having Ben Rosenfield look over the budget in the operation, and the other thing is maybe the board should have one staff member who reports to the board president and can do some of the work. You know, the board members, you know, this is just like a second job. So maybe they need somebody there fulltime they could ask to do the research and who reports to them directly and not through the executive director. I think that would help you to ask more important questions. And somebody who has worked in on retirement issues. Early retirement is off the table because you have to put it on the charter and when we did it last time, the retirement board didnt want to keep it on an ongoing basis. So early retirety buy offs are off the table unless we have to do another charter amendment. But keep up the good work and asking the right questions. Thank you. Chair borden thank you. Next speaker, please. You have eight questions remaining. Caller hi, members of the board, this is bob allen with urban habitat. I wanted to acknowledge the seriousness of the crisis that youre all facing and, obviously, the workers at sfmta and muni are at the front line of those potential impacts of the crisis. And the crisis were in play when we had a instruct really deficit over a number of years that we failed to address and thats only been compounded with covid, obviously. But some of the some of the difficult decisions that we did make on addressing the structural deficit and on some of the unfortunately, i think on some of the Capital Investments were also the legacy of what were dealing with. I really do want to say that as the community we are aggressively pursuing, you know, three avenues. One, at the regional level. I know that director heminger has in the past has talked about flexing Capital Funding and the challenges and the tradeoffs to that. But i appreciated his comments about the need to look at, you know, maintenance funds and other types of funds given the crisis and the implications of not having sufficient operating funding. Were trying to get m. T. C. To max nicmaximize that, and to gem to act as if theres a crisis at the m. T. C. Level regionally. And pursuing the groundwork for what we hope to be a ballot measure regionally to bring additional operating resources in. As well as flexing state funds. Hopefully over time well look at reforming the residentsial parking and land value and other types of potential measures to address the structural crisis. Thank you. Chair borden thank you, next speaker, please. You have nine questions remaining. Question good afternoon, chairman borden and director tumlin. This is the county operator and the Community Representative for local indiscernible . I want to thank the board for brain storming on how to bring in more revenue and how to save jobs. I really do appreciate that. And i want to speak on the record on behalf of the transit operators. Theyre out there every day and they do their job, they do their work, some from east bay and sacramento and tracy and knowing that theyre working and theyre exposed to the coronavirus and the potential of taking this deadly virus back home to their families. And i i and you, of course, i know that director tumlin does not want to see anyone laid off and i do not want to see my operators or members of the local to be laid off. And im hoping and praying that we do come together and that the union and the board and sfmta to do something, to come together so that no one will lose their job. Not only 91 the transit operators but our sfmta employees. For now im speaking for my operators and i see them every day and i see their eyes, they are concerned, they have families. If theyre furloughed, theres article 5 in the m. O. U. Stage that sfmta has the right to have all management progression prerogative, including but not limited to layoffs. But not limited to i guess that furlough would be something, not limited to just the abcd and e. And i want to thank you all and we can get together and do something and we can keep our operators working and other city departments working without laying anyone off. Thank you very much. Chair borden thank you. Next speaker, please. You have eight questions remaining. Caller hi, steven miller. Just listening to this presentation and its so sad to see. We all have to hope for georgia. But when were thinking about layoffs, just think about all of the employees that you know. These are employees who are getting, you know, assaulted at work, theyre sleeping in their cars. We see it in the news. And theyre putting their lives on the line working during a pandemic to provide us service. All of the options that we have talked about today, you know, increasing, like, enforcement and trying to raise fares through fare enforcement, all of that depends on the front line workers who are out there collecting the fares, enforcing the fares. In the offices coming up with how were going to do all of that. So, you know, the employees are really how were going to help the agency recover. The other ideas i think that the idea of furloughs over layoffs is obviously, you know, its the least worst option. There are no good options, but i think that at the end of the day thats the least worst option. And then also looking at pay cuts for the management. I know that roger morenko committed earlier this year to get a 10 pay cut along with upper management. So i think that is definitely something to look into. Other things include, like, branding stations, i dont know if that is possible, but naming it, you know, westportal station, you know, sponsored by target or Something Like that. But 38 gare sponsored by, you know really, you know, its a desperate time right now. So just looking at all options. Hopefully good news will come soon from the federal government, just hope for it. Thank you. Chair borden thank you. Next speaker, please. You have seven questions remaining. Caller hi, my name is Nicole Christian and i am a member of sfciu local 10021. And im calling today because im really disappointed with this conversation. I am disappointed that you think that layoffs or furloughs are the only way to bridge a budget gap. And also disappointed that this board seems so out of touch with the daily operations of sfmta. You made the statement of canceling r. P. P. , that shows how out of touch you are. That program not only pays for itself, but the employees who administer that program. Which means that you are canceling services and youre canceling jobs. And to make a correction, no, you cannot just impose layoffs on us. We have a say in that as well. And we will fight back against layoffs and furloughs every step of the way. And as for deferring retirement contributions, in 2008 there was concessions and those employees have never been made whole to this day 12 years later. And during a pandemic, the one thing that you dont want to do and i dont have a business degree in this but im pretty sure that last thing that you want to do is to dry up current revenue streams. R. P. P. Is valuable. Our employees are valuable and i would ask you to use more thought in generating new revenue and finding new Funding Sources than falling on the easy decision to cut those socalled heroes that you just described. You dont fire your hero. You protect them, you support them, and you save them. Thank you. Chair borden thank you. Next speaker, please. You have six questions remaining. Caller i ride muni regularly and now one thing about layoffs, what about layoffs for management. You keep talking about layoffs for drivers, you never mention management and they have to make sacrifices too. And also i think that some of these projects could be frozen as much as possible. That money should be freed up for public transportation, which is a primary mission of m. T. A. You have no business throwing workers, throwing public under the wheel. Now certainly sacrifices have to be made, but lets start with management and lets start with the project, even dont even have new bike lanes because you need that money for public transportation. Public transportation should have priority. So, you know, the whole thing is so misthought with slow streets and youre creating congestion. Youre penalizing people because they have to drive cars. Charging people a fee for parking in front of their own house . Pretty soon theyll charge people for sleeping in their bedroom. This is totally ridiculous. So those are my thoughts about it. For gods sake, you know, really make sacrifices and dont sacrifice drivers and the public. Thank you. Chair borden thank you. Next speaker, please. You have five questions remaining. Chair borden next speaker. Caller thank you, chair, and the members. My pronouns are she and her. This is challenging. And i think that we have to consider all options on the table. Its sad to say, including layoffs. Not consider all options would be remiss and equivalent to sticking ones head in the sand. I dont want to see anybody laid off because i personally know what it is like to be laid off. And unemployment doesnt pay very much. I think that we certainly have to look at efficiencies and how we find sources of money, and this may require for longterm rethinking in how we fund public transportation. And that will take action at the state and federal levels. And it wont happen today. I hope that we get more cares funding but we do have to consider if we dont, because hate to say it, but the cares funding is not going to be permanent. It gives us time, but it, unfortunately, delays the inevitable unless we can find something else. And Public Transit is essential to this city. And we dont want anyone to be left behind. We dont want anybody to be left behind at bus stops. That should never happen. Especially for people with disabilities. And we have to ensure the state of good repair. So these are hard choices. And they may require charter amendments. And other changes that are much bigger than ourselves. So i ask that you do consider all of the options, because we cannot stick our heads in the sand. The reality is that this is hard and we must continue thinking and talking about it. Thank you. Chair borden thank you. Next speaker, please. You have four questions remaining. Chair borden next speaker. Caller hi, my name is Kristen Michael and a planner with local 10201. I thank you for that analysis that was provided to the agency staff yesterday also. And while i appreciate the transparency around the budget i want to present facts around the presentation and how it has impacted staff since yesterday. So, first, i think that some of the facts and the scenarios were unnecessary dire, a scenario as if cares act funding was not received. Additionally, before the impact of the pandemic, m. T. A. Was projecting a 520 million structural deficit. Now postpandemic that fiveyear structural deficit is 600 million. So how could that 15 increase in deficit in five years result suddenly in needing to lay off 22 of the workers . Finally, 540 vacant t. F. E. S has a savings of 101 million annually and you have to take into account the staff that are still at the agency that are absorb other the work of those 540 people. So, second, i wanted to make sure that the board and the director know how scared staff walked away from the presentation yesterday without a feeling of next steps. I have heard folks saying they are trying to close the gap enough to save 22 of the f. T. E. Jobs and they feel that the only direction they got after all of the sad new was to go talk to your union. So i just want to say that m. T. A. Staff, we love our jobs and we care about the city. It will be a giant loss to lose the agencys heart and morale by losing their staff. So i ask for care and thoughtful partnership as we move forward with these discussions. With a clear analysis of the facts and the clear next steps so folks arent left in fear with little direction on what to do next. Thank you. Chair borden thank you. Next speaker, please. You have three questions remaining. Chair borden next speaker. Caller good afternoon, directors. My name is cameron and im an engineer and a member of local 21, professional technical engineers and planners. And it is clear that we are in a very tough time, specifically for our Transit Agency and the budget presentation, especially scary and bleak going from the last speakers comment. So i think that it is important to point out that the sfmta does have a healthy reserve fund balance, called the Rainy Day Fund. Most recently in april it was listed as nearly 300 million and the citys job fund also had a large reserve balance of 1. 4 billion. And we are definitely part of the city so its to be considered. And the reason that m. T. A. And the broader city have these reserve funds is partially because of the wage freezes and the vacancies held over since the 2008 recession. So, please, please, remember that your employees have been bearing the burden of the 2008 recession for a decade and our current contracts are only going beginning to make up up for years without cost of living adjustments. So you should use the Rainy Day Fund before having any employee layoffs. Among the discussions already it does seem like the ideas about stimulating revenues and your reserves align with what im kind of thinking. So i push the board to increase revenues on the areas that we do manage and like the parking idea and others. So i trust that you all will be considering all of those options before resorting to any staff layoffs. Thank you. Chair borden thank you. Next speaker, please. please stand by federal government. We dont print money, and unless we can make them print it for us, were not going to be able to do that. I just want to present the level set and our commitment in where we are to you in maintaining levels and jobs. So with that, i dont know if any directors are any had any other comments that they wanted to make at this time. Looks like director heminger and director eaken. Looks like director eaken had the jump on me. First of all, ill just say hear, hear, madam chair. We all stand with you on those comments. A couple of additionalme comments. When we look at potential revenues, i think we should be looking Thornton Thomasetti implications of those different Revenue Sources, and who would pay. I know were doing that robustly with the congestion pricing Scenario Analysis thats going on, and i just hope we can extend that to, you know, thinking about parking, thinking about new transit fares what are the implications of all of those Revenue Sources in last budget negotiations. Secondly, i just want to support director hemingers concept of sort of everybody kind of spreading the burden across potentially the entire agency as opposed to concentrating the burden on the layoff of very few. I know through the private sector, many are you ctalking 10 or 20 of layoffs across the board in this extreme financial stress, and if theres a way that anyone can take a little bit of reduction to reduce, that would be great. It seems like we ought to be, and i have to imagine, were working in close collaboration with our colleagues in l. A. Metro and b. A. R. T. , if is there if theres a way to project the need across all of our urban transit agencies and raise those to our colleagues in sacramento so we could look at a transit package across the board, not just m. T. A. , it would be great to be that strategic and have a conversation when we get together in february, what are those potential state funding pathways that we could pursue. And then the last, just a question i have for jonathan is think thinking about the vaccine and thinking about what director heminger said about ridership returning, and also thinking about director tumlins projection that our ridership is not tracking with our fare revenue. What do we assume in 2022 about returning ridership and about returning fare revenue . Yeah, i think thats a great question, director eaken. I think this is what we talked about in developing scenarios that we brought before the board. An outstanding issue is going to be lets assume, you know, the vaccine is widely available in the spring and starts to spread globally, whats going to be believe it or not, one of our highest sources of fare revenues is tourists that come to the city in the months of july to october. That is a huge boost, and then, we start with a huge boost, and then, the weather tapers off, and we start to see seasonality. Im thinking that people will be tired of being hemmed up and will be looking to go placed around the globe. I know that airlines are hungry to move people around the world. Thats going to be a definite sign for us. I think there are two signs. Ones going to be, you know, is there some sort of federal relief between now and the inauguration, what the new administration proposes, and the timing for that, and then, what do we see with travel patterns, and that mobility data, both globely and in San Francisco globally and in San Francisco. The revenues are growing, but theyre growing 1 a month, 1 . So we have to rebaseline and assume that what we will take in as fare revenue and the ridership, the ridership, were still generally going to assume probably now, i would guess, would be able in the 40 to 50 level. Its part of the reason one of our recommendations is, you know, those peoples are riders that dont participate in the free programs and arent on the lifeline pass. How do we actively get them to come back to the system as soon as were ready to reopen, and we want to starts developing those programs now. I think director hemingers idea is genius. What if you could prepay for an annual pass now . That buys us time, it allows the riders to use the system when its available. Thats something i think we can definitely price out. If theres a discount like, if you prepurchase transit, we will give you a discount, and what might we receive . Those i mean, to be honest, you know, and kind of to respond to some of the Public Comment, this is why we want to have this conversation now, to be transparent, to get the ideas out on the table, to do exactly what we did with the budget, where we were able to balance it, where we didnt have to talk about layoffs six months ago and work them in solutions and have public hearings it was your suggestion, director eaken, to have a series of workshops to work this problem through, and thats what were going to do. Were all going to work this problem and try to avoid the worst case scenario. Thank you. Did you have anything to add, director heminger . Yeah. First of all, madam chair, i would like to say amen to your remarks, as well. And jeff, that would be a good speech to play at your next staff meeting, if you ask me. I know youre in a tough spot because youre sort of shooting in the dark. You werent around in 1918, and neither was i. A few months ago, you gave us a deficit around 34, 35 million, and now, its doubled around that, 65, 70 million. And im wondering if youve given some thought to how youre going to deal with that risk other than, you know, the day before closing on june 30. Should we be shooting for a higher number than 68, should we be [inaudible] if we need them . And look, 22s, im sure, even harder to forecast, so how are you thinking through that question . Yeah, and its why we waited to get through the First Quarter because we wanted to see how our assumptions were tracking. There is definitely a higher level of risk this year, so that additional risk that were showing you, that additional 0 80 to 85 million, that is there, and that is real, so i would absolutely work under the assumption that our yearend deficit will be higher than 68 million today. I would make that assumption. Again, i think fiscal year 22, honestly, is a crystal ball. So what we can do is we rebaselined the revenues, again, based on the growth pattern, and the patterns were seeing now. We wanted to be more realistic because for you to make any decisions about solutions in 22, we have to have those discussions in the spring. Like we have to have them early to do belieessentially a midba budget, and hopefully, well get you some information to help you with that, one of those being any federal relief. I think the fisk of year 22, that additional 54 million, that was our absolute worst case. I dont think that is as likely. I do think now that we have much more surety, that theres going to be a solution in the spring, if we plan rapidly to see our fares recover, we might be more in line than what were showing you now. The revenue is pretty firm outside of new information today. I think fiscal year 21, their months in there are months in our projection lets just put it this way. Every month has to be better than the current month for us to catch, and i just dont see in parking or fare revenue. In parking, we would have to have months that the m. T. A. Has never seen at this point to be able to catch up, and its just not feasible at this point, and we want to be honest about that. We were looking for schools to reopen, we were looking for the restart of rail as sort of being that bump up to Service Coming back. That got extended. The schools stayed closed. That was part of our assumption when we approved the budget, so it just extended this period of revenue flattens for us, and so weve rebaselined everything based on that. Federal relief for more time, and to see what the impact of a vaccine will be probably in the summer and the First Quarter of fiscal year 2021. So boiling that down, youre saying we probably ought to be solving for a higher number than 68 for the current year . Yes. The other request id have, given the fact that were implicating a lot of labor issues in this conversation, is for the boord to get just a summary. I know quite a few of us really werent here when the last contract contract happened. It would be good to get a summary of the relevant provisions that affect this discussion of layoffs and furloughs and retirements and contributions to retirement and so forth. If we could get that as soon as possible, that would be helpful. Yes, we can do that. Thank you, madam chair. Okay. Do any other directors have any other comments at this time . Again, we will have a full budget workshop, and this topic will be continuous. I want to thank the whole team for all your work in this area. I know this is not not easy tou stuff, and maybe working with the City Attorney, you can come with the Creative Ideas around the other things, and i do like the idea of prepaying with the fares. Its one of the things that all companies, every newspaper magazine does, right . They sell these buy now and you can get your subscription for a year for 100 off, 200 off, so even in that regard, if we could do that around parking. If you could buy parking passes for city garages we dont usually do that, but if people like to go shopping at fifth and mission i know we dont do that now, but could we push parking passes for the garages that are kind of prepaid at a lower rate for a certain time. If we could think of things like that that could help us create some revenue right now. It would create some problems down the road, but in the short time, it can be a nice lot shot in the arm. Great. So with that, i think that ends that item, unless directors have any final comments. We can move onto our next one. Okay then. Item 12, presentation and discuss regarding Transit Service. Miss kirchbaum, were all excited to hear from you. I know this is always such a fun time for you used to be. And if we can all turnoff our screen so we can focus on julies presentation. Is it working . Yes, it is. Ill im going to keep my item brief in part because i know youve already had a lot of discussion tonight on some really important topics, and also because my presentation is interrelated to the material that sean kennedy, our transit planner, is going to be presenting after me. In general, im reporting good news. Our performance and our safety records continue to be strong. This is 100 attributable to the incredible staff that have been working tirelessly through this pandemic. When we talk about the resiliency of our bus system, what were really talking about is the resiliency of our staff. Everything from operators and mechanics and planners and schedulers and everybody thats playing a role to keep us going right now, and i am so grateful for their work. As we talked about last month, we needed to go from a schedule adherence to a head away adherence system in order to address the fact that traffic had changed so dramatically, and our schedules really didnt apply because there were so little cars on the road. Headway scheduling continues to guide us as traffic comes back in sometimes unexpected ways because operators are being instructed to operate to the conditions rather than trying to anticipate a prepredicted schedule, and our performance has been generally strong. Our three rapid routes are performing at 85 to 90 upward adherences, and the routes that were operating on a head away are exceeding 95 . That said, we do think there are some places to continue to shore up this program. We did implement it very quickly, and going back and working with our supervisors who are managing the service and our controllers in the control center, what were learning is that operators dont necessarily have the training they need to use the computerbased radio display and to selfmonitor how close theyre getting to the vehicle in front of them, so were doing a big Training Campaign right now. We also know that weve been managing to schedule for a long time, but were telling operators on a policy level to operate to the conditions and to not not operate to a schedule, but then, were giving them feedback on their performance that says that theyre theyre running too hot or theyre running too fast onto the schedule. What i think we really intended to say there is that theyre running too close to the vehicle in front of them or theyre running at an unsafe speed, but we need to work with our inspectors to change the language in how we communicate so that were talking and understanding headway performance at all levels of the transit division. So i hope that these numbers continue to improve as we refine on some of the success weve already had. Ridership, as already noted, has continued to trend up. There is probably some undercounting on this slide in september and october just because of the way we had to reinstate the rail bus substitution after the august schedule, so if anything, riderships a little bit higher than whats shown here. We dont anticipate a significant change based on the current shelter in place, and for for that reason, youll see, in seans presentation, that we are focused on adding some Additional Service and addressing the crowding. But, you know, transit ridership is very much tied into our budget, and when we look at metrics that we have historically studied, you know, like, what is the cost per trip, when our cost structures have only changed a little bit, but our ridership has changed so dramatically, and we start to go from 3 or 4 a trip, to upwards of 8, 9, or 10 a trip. Transit is something thats heavily subsidized, and theres reasons for that. Its really driving our citys economy, but the kind of service we provide is directly linked to all of these budget discussions that youre going to be having over the next several months. Crowding is currently our biggest challenge. It is primarily on the heavy bus corridors, like mission street, stockton, and geary. We are also seeing very crowded conditions on the 122 fillmore. We are going to be adding in Additional Service both to close some further equity gaps as well as to address this crowding. So we are looking at getting more service on the 22, getting more service on the 14 will really help this crowding. If we see kind of a shortterm dip in the number of trips because were going from yellow to purple, i think that will give us some kind of breathing room in our system. If not, if trips continue to stay high, which were predicting that they will, having Additional Service to address crowding becomes that much more critical, given our overall goal to reduce the spread of covid. This chart shows that we have been making incremental investments in our Transit Service, starting from when we had to make the very, very significant reductions in april of this year. We planned ongoing to a yellowredorange scheme, and we realized that due to the unpredictable nature of covid, that we needed to have our own be kind of ink own kind of incremental approach. We also have been focused throughout this pandemic on kind of the dual safety roles, keeping people safe from covid as well as our ongoing work to minimize collisions and reinforce traffic safety. Jeff outlined a number of protocols that we have in place around covid. I think one of the most promising has been the improvement that were seeing in mask compliance, and i apologize for not having that chart. It is available on our website, and i will include it in future presentations, but we are seeing mask compliance in excess of 95 , which is really critical to keep people safe through our city and on transit. We also are seeing very promising trends in our collisions. This graph here shows the black line, which is 2019 collision rate. The blue line is the 2020 collision rate. Weve seen collisions cut in more than half, while our Service Levels have been reduced, they have not been reduced to nearly that scale, and i think some of this is related to things like reduction in congestion, more protection from traffic through things like our emergency transit lanes, the headwaybased schedules, which encourages drivers to drive safely totion conditions, and then always, the commitment and diligence of our professional drivers who really lead the industry in terms of of safety. On the maintenance side, we have seen a bit of a drop in vehicle reliability. We are still above 12,000 miles between breakdowns, which is really kind of where i think the sweet spot we need to be in terms of the expectations for our fleet. We had an amazing month in august, which is kind of, you know, tipping the scale a little bit, and then, we have seen some decline. We have been using some strategic overtime to try to address and kind of bring back up this trend, and we will continue to monitor it. But part of the, i think, volatility that you are seeing here when breakdowns the overall number of breakdowns is so low, a small number going up or down can create big swings because its not a linear function. So in addition to updating you on our service performance, i also wanted to update you very briefly around our capital work on the subway renewal program. The green circles here indicate work that is currently underway, active construction that is happening in the subway. The yellow work, both the rail grinding and the switch machine replacement, that is work that is pending but is on track to be completed before the subway reopens, so theres a tremendous amount of work thats happening, including the eureka curve ballast, which started in earnest today. We do anticipate that some of our overheadlines work will be slowed down a little bit. Unfortunately, we did have a only a second, but an example of stafftostaff transmission of covid among our overhead lines group, and as a result, we have staff that have covid and staff that are quarantining. Our thoughts are with everybody that are fighting covid, particularly with our lines team, and we are working with the Operations Team to see where we can reinvigorate our existing protocols which really have kept our staff safe up until this point. So we do anticipate that we will continue to be able to start rail service incrementally, and sean will share with you our schedule for restarting rail service, but we do anticipate the work thats happening in the tunnel west of embarcadero will be a little bit delayed. That being said, even as recently as november 20, our overhead lines group has made tremendous progress in the subway. We have received all of the new splices, and we have also run several stretches of new wire that have allowed us to eliminate splices. So by the time the subway reopens, we will have replaced about 50 splices and eliminated the splices system wide. The green shows work thats been completed. Where you see the dashed line is where weve run completely new wire, and where you see a negative number of splices, thats splices that have been removed. The slices in the background are the splices that have been replaced. The red work is work in the queue and will be finished in the next several months. So you can see it kind of moving from east to west. Were making Good Progress on this work, and its been exciting to see all of this work with the capital team and the Maintenance Team really partnering to deliver high quality investment in our subway system. So that is what i have today. I will go ahead and stop sharing my screen, and im happy to answer any questions that you guys have. Thank you for that presentation, julie. Board members, are there any questions . Theres an echo. Any questions for the director of transportation . If not not transit . If not, otherwise, i will open it up to Public Comment. No questions at this time . Great. Ill open it up to Public Comment. Moderator, are there any commenters on the line . Operator you have zero questions remaining. Okay. All right. Well, with that, we will close Public Comment. Directors, do you have any obviously, were going to be digging more into Transit Service kind of Going Forward on our next item. Are there any questions for julie before we move on . Yes, director eaken. Thank you so much. Just maybe sort of a request that when we dive into this further in february, that i dont know if well be at a point at that stage where we can Start Talking about what is the messaging to the [inaudible] but it seems that the conversation that weve had recently about confusing on the messages on the buses themselves, but i suspect some of the discrepancy between the transit ridership and the fare revenue that were collecting, if you cant pay the fare, i think some of it is people being confused and not undering whats going on. Once we are in a position to do so, getting a clear messaging and communication to the public about what is safe and how you pay, and its going to be so essential to our successful recovery. So id love to engage in that conversation, if you can, if you feel that were ready to in february. Okay. Directors, any additional comments at this point for director kirchbaum . Okay. With that, well move onto our next item. Clerk okay. Item 13, approving temporary parking and traffic modifications as part of the rail transfer project and bus route improvement project. I wont name all of them, but they are items a through y. Great. And we have mr. Kennedy here to give us the very robust update, so mr. Kennedy, our transit planning manager. Excellent. Good afternoon, or almost good evening. Im sean kennedy, the transit planning manager here at the m. T. A. We do the daytoday Planning Service of the system as well as the muni forward program, including the transit only lanes project. So i should be sharing my screen here, and, you know, were going to walkthrough this. During the pandemic, our ability to provide Transit Services has been limited in several ways. One, few you are vehicles available through the increased cleaning needs and requirement requirements, and capacity of each vehicle has been reduced due to social distancing needs, and so these challenges have led to the need to develop a core service plan, and that core service plan was based on four main factors. One service muni equity strategy neighborhoods. Two, connecting essential destinations, three, connecting geographic destinations throughout the city, and improving Transit Service. I wanted to note that before the pandemic, we had about 75 lines in service on a daily basis. The original core service plan reduced those to 17 lines, and just as a side note, 90 of those lines or that core service was along muni equity strategy onlines, and weve since added in 16 lines, and 85 of our existing service is along muni equity strategy lines. I also do want to note that this plan and the process that we use has been pretty unique. Transit center, which is an Advocacy Group in new york that monitoring transit agencies throughout north america, has just recognized us and is giving us an award for the most visionary Covid Service plan in the country, so were pretty excited about that award, and it does show that weve been really thinking through the process and using a lot of metrics to design a service that will address what the needs are out there on the street right now. So with that, this is a graph that julie just showed a few minutes said, crowding is our number one concern now. We went up on average about 2 of our trips were crowded in early r summer. Were now up in the 6 range in total. System as a total. On specific trips and specific corridors, much higher than that can get up to 9 to 10 on crowded trips. As julie noted, we are going to be adding some services the next several weeks along these major corridors too address the crowding. This is not a Major Service addition at this point. We dont have much stock to work with. Julie r mentioned that we have w trolleys available. Thats why most of these corridors are trolley corridors. Well be adding more service on the 30 stockton through stockton and columbus. Were adding a short trip along fillmore and on the 5 fulton those are being done outside of a signup. Those are really just extra trips that will show up to help reduce some of those crowded conditions. In january, we will be rolling out our next fullblown signup. Well be bringing back few rail lines. Julie alluded to the fact that we are obviously in a covid surge that might reduce some of our riders and reduce some of the crowding. We think that its super important to get these crowded numbers down and more important during the surge to address those issues. While some trips might not happen now during the surge and during issues related to transferring the covid issues, it really is important that we keep space on the buses as much as possible. We are proposing an Additional Services for right now. We know that in the future, there will be some hard choices coming up. We do have resources right now and sense the surge is warning, we want to deploy those resources as best as possible. Starting rail, well redistribute about 25 buses by starting the two lines that ill talk more about in a minute. In addition to putting more service on those lines, we also will be adding connections shown here in this slide. Im going to talk more in a minute about the 15 and the 2255. I did want to highlight on this slide that the 27 and 33 will be returning the 27 includes a small route change that will be going up 7th and 8th in soma. It should provide more reliability for the entire line. Then were going to be making modifications to 37. We will be returning the 37 to its original route, previously its been going down Market Street as far as 11th and van ness. It will go back to its old route in january. Little bit more about the 15, we worked over the last six months with a number of residents in Hunters Point and the bayview as well as supervisor wallton and his staff to design this route that augment the team and get Faster Service from the neighborhood to downtown. We used a pretty innovative outreach technique as we went through the process with the neighborhood. Were proud how that came out. Were going to continue to monitor this service and well make changes and adjustments as needed which well see it happening in the field. Additionally, the january sign up is going to allow us to extend the 22 into mission bay. A project that around about 10 years. Super exciting that is going to happen. Putting that in context and coupling it along 16th street, we will really be able to provide a lot more reliable frequent Transit Service to mission bay and the hospital. At the same time, weve been working the patch area as we know this move has been on the books and this would happen. Weve been working with dogpatch to design where the 5 will go to replace service that they are losing with the 22 moving. This service plan also implements the new 55 service that will replace the 22. We made a change to the 3 30 stockton in midoctober. We just wanted to bring that back in front of you to highlight how we are continuing to monitor and make changes to this and every service that we implement. As you will recall, we talked about this Service Several times before. Were doing couple of great things with extending the 30 including moving the terminal space, which right now at the chestnut. It helps it address the crowding and the needs that are happening along stockton and columbus. We also are expanding our access to green space. One of the really premier green spaces in north america, allowing our transit customers to get to chrissy field to enhance Transit Service in general. All of the new stops for this service are within the presidi presidios jurisdiction. Were not changing lanes or curb space. Theres no specific legislative action that you all need to take. We did want you to be aware that we have heard lot of feedback from residents along brodrick. We will have the 30 continue on marina for one more block and take a right where it will pick up its traditional route. That will just shift about half of the service, half of the Transit Service off that block of brodrick and move it over. Were planning to return march with a title vi analysis for all the Service Changes that we have made during the past year during this pandemic. Well be asking for your review and approval of that title vi analysis at the time. This change will be included in that group of changes. Another Service Change from august that actually does need some legislative action is related to the 48. For the covid response, we straightened out the 48. It used to go grandview loop around the hill there. Instead, we straightened it out so it will stay on clipper and go on diamond up to its normal route on 24th street. The clipper street several feet wider than many streets that we serve in the city in both directions. We did need to remove total of five parking space sos that the bus can make the turn at both 24th as well as at diamond itself. Were asking for that approval today. In exchange, were going to have a trip that about five minutes faster on the 48 for the entire line creating much more reliable service. That really brings us to talk about the rail network and the rail agenda on when things will start up. Its pretty exciting. We are looking to start the j the end of december and then the t at the end of january. The t itself would run from sunnydale into the embarcadero station and serve the platform there in the station. The j of course will go from church to bose back to balboa park. It will be early march before working is done up to the van ness. We can extend into the subway, at the same time we would extend the t up to west portal. We do have a shuttle that we anticipate launching at some point that would go from west portal to the embarcadero. That will really depend on when demand picks up in the subway given as were moving in purple tier. Were not sure when the demand picks back up. Well be able to add a shuttle at that point. Just as a reminder, the l, k and m will remain as bus subs throughout the spring. When the subway does return in march, we need to make some operational changes prior to covid. The subway experience, lot of reliability issues and crowded trains and platforms. One of the major reasons, we had too many lines going in through one track in the subway. Really in order to improve subway performance as we talked about back in middle of september, were proposing to take the j out of the tunnel. When rail was initially reinstituted in august, the j stopped near side of market. We called that phase one of the j project. Were now proposing to go to phase two when the j returns to service at the end of december. That makes couple of structural changes. One with this phase two, we would women temporary ke buiy key stops at church and debose. That would help support access to subway there. Going to this phase two, we do not we no longer need the northbound lane closure on church between 15th and market. The new project would not need to restrictions at 15th for example. Will be able to open up that lane of traffic. I do know that merchants are exploring the idea of having shared spaces and continuing shared spaces in this location. Those decisions and that process and discussion will be held now within the shared space program, not this transit program. Several changes there on the j church on west portal, much like keeping the j on the surface, we proposed to move the l and k from the subway in order to enhance transit connections at west portal. We did work with the community to locate two key stops noted here light green with the arrows on them. Those are the key stop locations. Ive been working with a local artist to help those better fit in to the community. We do need your approval for those locations of the key stops as well. Most of the projects discussed today obviously when respond to the pandemic, we are going to continue engaging stakeholders conducting before and after analysis and making adjustments and will be coming back to you if permanent legislation is deemed appropriate for any of these projects. Todays legislation is really just improving these changes during the emergency period and as you know, as we talked about before, these changes set 120 days after the emergency order ends unless we return to you for permanent legislation. I wanted to highlight that. I also did want to note that in writing this calendar item, we do have a few changes. We had some restrictions for the northbound direction on Church Street that were inadvertently left in the calendar item. We are requesting to amend the calendar item to remove that language specifically for item f and then modifying items d and e. We sent the board secretary the updated resolution that shows the update to these amendments. With that, i will be good to take any questions on any comments. Chair borden thank you mr. Kennedy for that presentation. Board members, are there any questions for mr. Kennedy before i open up for Public Comment . Seeing none, i will move on to Public Comment. First caller please. Hello. I was trying to speak on the last item but i dont think the system picked me up. Chair borden you can talk about those. They are related anyway. On the last item, i wanted to say im glad to see that extra service was being added. I saw extra shuttles on the 30 line. I was great to see the 5. Thank you for that. Those are my only comments on the last item. On item 13, i have several comments. The main points are we shouldnt implementing 15 line when there are other areas of the city in are completely cut off. This is essentially duplicate service all the way. It also states in the staff report that this would mean not implementing this route, the Bayview Hunter point neighborhood would have to transfer in order to get to and from downtown which increases travel time, thus increasing the risk of covid transmission. If this is the logic, how are you justifying implementing the k and l transfer project and j project. It shouldnt be that these neighborhoods get a direct line. Meanwhile we create new transfers on other lines. It doesnt make sense. The second item, i proposed the creation of flag stop. These stops should be real bus stops with the bus can pull over. That way it increases access. Then, the last thing i support the changes to the 37 routing to serve the hilly area and i support the resumption of the 27 and 33 lines. Thank you. Chair borden next speaker please. I also try to get in on item 12 and was unsuccessful. I think you need to explain how to make Public Comment on each item before you open Public Comment so people are clear about that. First comment on item 12 and comment on item 13. I mentioned earlier that i think theres a real question about the purpose of the m. T. A. Going forward. I have been traveling less. I havent been downtown in two months. Im only using muni for local trips and im walking more. If user like me is riding far less, what about discretionary riders . Are they coming back and are they ever coming back . Serious open question. I have also said for months that the agency needs to address muni passenger Behavioral Health issues. There are some seriously scary people on board. More and more of them operators are becoming more like social workers that happen to drive as opposed to drivers who happen to have the occasional social work issue. Its incredibly challenging out there. Finally, item 12, as ive said before, vehicle cleaning is clearly the real constraint about getting vehicles on the road and mobile cleaning teams at reach points would reduce congestion and allow for flexibility and more vehicles on the road. All about mobile cleaning teams. Let me move on to item 13 very quickly. I think i understand the changes under items a through l on Church Street and m through s on west portal. Those changes probably covered prior ceqa rail exemption that appeal and lost. I believe they will cause unnecessary risk to everyone. Items t through v, relate to changes on the dilemm 37 and 48t relationship items a through v approve Service Changes that took effect august 22, 2000. Contrast, items w through y will approve changes to be effective in january 2021. Items w through y are within the scope. Planning department and are not specifically referenced in the staff report. Staff should address that. I dont want to file more ceqa appeals. I would prefer discuss these issues thoughtfully before staff before hand. I say this piecemeal approach to restoring service is unnecessary. Lets just restore all saturday service already. My final question is about the 22l. I could not tell from the staff report what route the 22l would take. Would it remain on the historic route or 16th street to mission bay daytime route. Not at all clear. If its suppose to stay as it is, thats fine. If its proposed to change to serve mission bay instead of the hill, thats change in service and that needs to be reviewed. I wonder out loud what the story is with the 22l. Ill have separate comments about item 14. Chair borden next speaker please. Any name i was listening to the comments on the 15. I think one of the ways for you all to really understand the situation is to take a survey of the bayview residents. Transportation, on scale 110 to minus 4. Having said that, i heard the mayor today talk about all the problems they are having and i have attended some of the key meetings and expressed myself. I want to mention that at this time, you may not be on your agenda. When the hundreds of taxi drivers came to you pleading, saying they were suffering, very little was done. Now that you all are suffering, all youre looking for is the hand from the federal government. Youre not going to get it. You may get it after three years, but youre not going to get it in large measure within three years. Thats all i have to say. The leadership right now is very poor. Thank you very much for your 30 seconds. The leadership is very poor and i really miss the absence of [indiscernible] thank you very much. Chair borden next speaker please. Hello, my name is patricia fararo. This was done without due process. Meaning there was no Neighborhood Outreach or opportunity for public input. There was no need analysis done. No safety studies done regarding traffic impact, pedestrian, cyclist impact, nor addressing the waste limit that Marina Boulevard has weight limit. The muni bus going by are 20 tons. They go by 160 times a day. The Marina Boulevard has infrastructures of a nonretrofitted seawall and centuryold sewer lines that run on the streets. These concerns have not been addressed. The neighbors have consistently and repeatedly asked for proof that this is safe to be done. We can also cite that extension required for approval, Parking Spaces were removed specifically for the bus. Not for Public Safety and not for daylighting sean kennedy tried to tell me. We were also told that this was a temporary but they sign fiveyear permanent contract. Its shameful and irresponsible that you have empty buses going by 14 hours a day when there are lines within the city that youre talking about crowding and you cut the lines tenderlo tenderloin. Shameful and irresponsible. Chair borden thank you for your comments. Next speaker please. I wanted to follow up on that chairwoman excellent words spoke earlier. We have to cut things if we dont want to cut people. I advocate that we cut the 30 extension. I like to use the recent comments that sean kennedy just said as evidence of misleading public. Sean just said that the terminal for the 30 extension is temporary. My neighbors just articulated in early september, Jeffrey Tumlin signed a fiveyear agreement. I dont know how that is possible if its something meant to be temporary and up for review. The citing around not moving curbside saw false. We have provided you with evidence that you have taken away parking for allowing 30 extension. I request that you review the documentation and the exhibit that we provided earlier and demand that you review them and eensure our safety and use of resources appropriately given all the four hour discussion you had with the grave need where people in the city needs transit. It is a gross misuse of public resources. Thank you. Chair borden thank you. Next speaker please. Good evening chair borden and directors. First, thanks to mr. Kennedy and m. T. A. Staff for their work on this project and their continued discussion with us to address our questions and comments pertaining to the j church transfer improvement project. Were appreciative of m. T. A. Staff providing more information and identifying cleanups of the proposal set forth in the staff report. Based on conversation with staff, safeway no longer has an issue with item c the 30 minute commercial loading zone. We appreciate hearing that there are no Transit Needs for the closure of northbound Church Street between 15th Market Street given the number of muni passengers at church and Market Street. Safeway has an couple of things that seek clarification. Given there are we request further clarification where the bus zone described in item b is located. Is the bus zone south of the debose avenue supposed to be in the curbway or in the center lane . Base end on feedback and comments made with stakeholders, safeway has submitted proposed resolution language yesterday for the boards consideration into the final resolution. Safeway is supportive of m. T. A. s effort to restoring muni and appreciative of this opportunity to highlight couple of things that we have questions on and to present the proposed resolution along for incorporation by the board. If theres any questions regarding the proposed language, im available for any questions. That concludes my presentation. Im available for any questions. Thank you. Chair borden thank you. Next speaker please. Good evening. Im kelly mill. Im a resident of the Marina Boulevard. Im here to put stamp on number 30 extension. I heard mr. Kennedy to speak this meeting. We werent able to give our inquiries. In addition to the weight limit to the zero people on the bus, the expense that theyve locked the city into for the next five years for outhouse i in no oe taken into consideration the danger to the pedestrian and the cyclist. You see the stops on mason street and per study yeo e this to heart and reevaluate this whole misappropriation of funds. Thank you. Chair borden thank you. Next speaker please. Hello. Im calling to support the extension of the 30 extension. As someone who resides i in per study yeo persido. And to also allow others to access open space without having to cloud up parking lots and create more carbon emissions. I urge you guys to support the 30 stockton and persido. Chair borden any additional callers on the line . Well close Public Comment. There were some issues brought up about the noticing requirements in the motion. We have an updated motion. Maybe you can cover whether or not we are able to take action with the amended motion and address some of the challenges that he raised. Yes. Deputy City Attorney cleveland knowles, in terms of the requirement under chapter 31 that the case number be included, thats not a requirement of chapter 31. The requirement is that the exemption be posted on the Planning Departments website which it was. Its good practice. We usually do include them in the staff report. It was omitted by accident this time. Thats not you may still continue tonight. I will ask sarah jones from the Planning Department to respond to the other issue. Sarah jones, sfmta planning director. I want to confirm what ms. Cleveland noles indicated. The omission of the Planning Department case number on the exemption, which was accidental but doesnt change anything in terms of the appropriateness of the exemption determination. Reading the exemption as you can see, its very clear that these items and these Service Changes are covered. We work clo closely with the Planning Department and feel comfortable with the ceqa item. Chair borden moving on to directors. Director heminger, you were first in line. Director heminger just one this time. I wanted to to go back to the issue of cleaning the buses. I know ive raised this before and maybe i will get the same answer again. I want to raise again, it does seem like were titlin fightingr fight against crowding with one hand tied behind our back. Weapon promised we would clean every bus after every run. I know the operators are reassured by that. All the signs ive been reading in the papers suggest that this is an airborne disease. The notion of like hosing everything down all the time is probably just more of a show than for good medical reasons. I dont know, jeff, if you talked to the Health Department there this. Im no expert. It does really seem to be cramping our style in terms getting more service out on the street. Which is Public Health challenge. Director tumlin we have talked to the Health Department about this. The Health Department continues to want us to minimize risk wherever we can, particularly given the fact that the very nature of providing Transit Service to the public introduces some public [indiscernible]. This is one of the topics where we will be hard pressed to back off of it until vaccines starts to come more readily available. Julie, if you want to chime in. I think the other component is that were managing fear as much as were managing facts. Its something every time we do a sign up, we going to look at. Theres so much money tied into pulling in and out of the division and it does continue to constrain our maintenance practices as well as our vehicle availability. Every time we have that discussion, at least to date, weve come to the conclusion, its [indiscernible]. It is at this point, i believe as much about managing the anxiety and fear of our operators who are delivering the service as it is partnering and following the guidance of Public Health. I appreciate the candid answer. I suppose were going to have to revisit this because when we do get the vaccine, when more and more people are vaccinated, this crowding issue is going to become acute. Were either going to have to clean the buses less often or insist on less distancing on something. We cant carry 100 of our passengers on 30 of our service. Director tumlin were going to think about what is the impact. Theres a slow rollout of the vaccine. What does that mean in terms how we start reducing our covid safety practices, particularly social distancing and the capping of capacity in our vehicles. We are still suffering a significant problem with the loss of not nearly 70 of each buss capacity as a result of social distancing. Predicting when that happens and then predicting when particularly downtown San Francisco employment comes back are two huge availabl variables. At some point, it becomes imbalance. With social distancing, you should be afraid if somebody is too close to you. You probably shouldnt be afraid even if you are, of the fact that the bus hosed down three times a day. Thank you. Chair borden thank you director heminger. Director lai. Director lai thank you. I want to confirm that the comments around the 30 mr. Kennedy. My understanding is that theres no board required action on that and that was purely an update because essentially route changes dont require us to really necessarily weigh in on that manner. Can you clarify what portion are we weighing in on . What weve changed now, does not require any board action. I was mostly wanted to bring it to your attention because we gotten lot of feedback on it. I wanted to let you know how were changing the routeing to address that feedback and make a better route but still serve all our goals that we were trying to accomplish with that project. Director lai thank you for confirming that and for bringing this back. This does seem like a line extension that has drawn quite a bit of public interest. I do want to maybe address some of the sentiment around our weighing our responsibilities versus between our budget situation and also what we should be doing as an agency. At least im only speaking for myself, i very much appreciate staff continuing to support expanding service and capacity on heavily used routes for addressing basically the overcrowding scenario. That is super important. One of the best changes that i think has occurred for the 30 is really extending it to the 60foot bus. I understand by the time it gets to the marina, theres a drop on ridership. Lot of people rely on that route early on. Thank you so much for providing that and making sure that some of our most needy communities that heavily depend on transit, their needs are being addressed. Particularly because with seniors, they cant afford to walk far. I want to make this ask again, when we eliminate stops, please make sure that you have sufficient notification and signage at the old eliminated stop so people who may have missed the hearing or broader identification, that location know they supposed to be going somewhere else. Thank you. Chair borden thank you. Any other directors who want to add any comments at this point . Seeing none, we do have an amended motion ta is in the packet that we received. I want to thank julie and sean for this. In particular to echo director lai about the 30, i know right now were still on essential trip on muni. I can see a future where to the directors point, the senior population in chinatown is going to have access to a nice flat water front walk that they can do once they take that bus down to the presidio. I wanted to thank you for continuing to look at that. Were getting lot of feedback about that. Taking the other direction back on to were continuing to work through it. I do think that will ultimately being a really valuable connection for a really crowded dense part of the city. We need to give that chance to bring ridership in that area. Thank you for that. Thats all. Chair borden thank you director brinkman. Directors this matter is before us to make a motion using the amended motion that was in our packet. I think we have to vote on amending it first. Chair borden let me double check with the City Attorney. Because the original motion was noted and even though its updated, do we have to vote to amend the original motion . Yes, thats correct. First or the amendment and then on the motion. Okay, ill read the amended portion. It reads to delete reference to northbound Church Street in item 13d, delete reference to westbound 15th street in item 13e. Delete item 13f with regard to establishing an left turn on eastbound 15th street and clarify which of the decisions can be reviewed by board of supervisors. Thats the amendment to the resolution. Chair borden is there a motion to make this an amendment . Motion to amend. Second. Chair borden great. On that motion, can you please call the roll . [roll call vote] that passes. Chair borden now i need a motion on the original item to extend the amendment. Motion to approve. Second. Chair borden you can call the roll. [roll call vote]. The item passes. Item 14, discussion and vote pursuant to administrative code as to whether to vote the attorneyclient privilege. Chair borden motion to go to closed session . I think we need to do Public Comment first. Sorry. Chair borden Public Comment. Anyone on the line . Hello. Just to conclude, back on item 13, the agenda itself fails to state that items w through y constitute an approval action under chapter 31 specifically 31. 08f1, that a fatal error. You can compare the language on the agenda for items 13 the parenthetical note at the end to item 10. 1. On item 14, if youre not going rescind the action on 13 then ill have to file a ceqa, appeal. On item 14, the agenda also misstates the closed session is correct but its pursuant to Government Code Section 549. 59 549. 59d1. The language on the agenda on page 6 under item 14 and then under the closed session on item 3, they conflates the item. Other items 3, under item 3, in closed session just say, board will meet in closed session to discuss and take action on attorneyclient matters on the following. Its kind of misstated and misleading and ought to get fixed in the future. I dont think that is a fatal error for the closed session. You can proceed with that. I really wish you would go back and fix item 13 to save everyones time. Thank you and good evening. Chair borden thank you very much. You can note the codes thing correctly. With that, directors, is there a motion to go into closed session . So moved. Second. Chair borden please call the roll. [roll call vote] it passes. See you in the other meeting for discussion. See you in the im confirming with sf that were back. Director heminger its 7 30. Chair borden i thought 5 00 today. I was wrong. They are confirmed that we are back. Chair borden great, you can read item 15. The sfmta board of directors discuss to chin and bay area cases with the City Attorney. Board of directors voted unanimous to settle the case and took no action. Item 16, motion to close were not to disclose the information. Chair borden what say you . Second. Can you call the roll . [laughter] chair borden we cant end the meeting. [laughter] director heminger whos got the floor . [laughter] youre on mute. Chair borden youre still on mute. There we go. Im back. Ill call the roll for item 16 on motion not to disclose correct . [roll call vote] the motion passes. That concludes the business before you today. Chair borden i will make one last announcement to the public that our secretary had a healthy baby boy this morning. Which is why she miss the the meeting. Well adjourn the meeting and everyone have a wonderful evening. Thank you. Bye everyone. Thank you. Clerk on february 25, 2020, the mayor declared a local state of emergency related to covid19, and on may 29, 2020, the mayor authorized all commissions to reconvene remotely. This will be our 12th remote hearing. Remote hearings require everyones attention, and most of all, your patience. If you are not speaking, please mute your microphone and turnoff your camera. Sfgovtv is broadcasting and streaming this hearing live, and we will receive Public Comment for every item on todays agenda. Public comment is available by calling 4156550001, entering access code 1469029771. When we reach the item you are interested in, please press star, three to be added to the queue. When you hear your line is unmuted, that is your cue to begin speaking. Each speaker will have two minutes to speak. You will hear a chime when you have 30 seconds, and another chime when your time is up. Best practice is to call from a quiet location, speak slowly and clearly, and mute the speaker on your television or computer. Id like to take roll at this time. [roll call] clerk thank you, commissioners. First on your agenda is general Public Comment. At this time, members of the public may address the commission on items of interest to the public that are within the subject matter jurisdiction. Commission except agenda items. With respect to agenda items, your opportunity to address the commission will be afforded when the item is reached in the meeting. Each member of the public may address the commission for up to three minutes. We should open Public Comment. Members of the public, if you wish to submit testimony for items not on todays agenda, please press star, three to be entered into the queue. Seeing no members of the public requesting to speak, commissioners, general Public Comment is closed, and we can move onto department matters. Item 1, directors announcements. Welcome, director hillis. Director hillis good afternoon. Thank you, jonas. Just a couple of announcements. One, i wanted to announce that liz accepted my offer to be our new director of current planning, and liz is here today, so just to congratulate her and let you all know that thats happened. Thank you. Liz is obviously no stranger to the Planning Department and the Historic Preservation commission. Shes been with the Department Since 2014, started as an intern, moved through planner one, two, and three. Shes been acting director since august, and she was Deputy Director of current planning for the past seven years. So she even spends her free time in planning and zoning work, so were excited to continue working with with liz. And then, one of her priorities is definitely working on our residence permitting and budgeting this year. We continue to have problems with our revenues, which were currently projecting to be about 19 million short for the year. Were hoping we can improve on that. Liz has been working, as i have, too, with d. B. I. And the permit center to be able to open up and accept applications than we currently are allowing today. Obviously, that is s a challe with covid and the environment that were in, but well keep you updated on that. Thats all the updates i have. Happy to answer any questions, and looking forward to the meet being. Clerk okay. Seeing no questions for director hillis, item 2, review of past events at the Planning Commission, staff report, and announcements. Director hillis none. Clerk okay. Seeing none, we can move onto commission matters. Item 3, president s report and announcements. Thank you. Congratulations, liz. Were excited for you. We have one very important item to discuss today, and that is our holiday party. As everyone knows, this year, 2020, is virtual, so ours will be. Jonas, if we can, i think were going to just do it after our next h. P. C. Meeting in two weeks, so the 18th of december. Clerk yes, ill send out a virtual invite. Great. Thats all i have. Thank you. Clerk thank you. Item 4, consideration of adoption, draft minutes for your november 18, 2020 hearing. Move to approve. Public comment is there Public Comment . Clerk there will be. We should take Public Comment. Thank you, commissioner pearlman, for that reminder. Members of the public, this is your opportunity to comment on the draft minutes. You should enter the queue by pressing star then three. Seeing no members of the public wishing to speak at this time, commissioners, Public Comment is closed, and the matter is now before you. All right. So we have a motion. Can we have a second . Second. Clerk thank you. Commissioners, on that motion to adopt the minutes from november 18, 2020 meeting [roll call] clerk so moved, commissioners. That motion passes unanimously, 70. Item 5, commission comments and questions. It doesnt appear there are any. Clerk very good. Moving right along, commissioners, we can go to your regular calendar. For items 6a, b, c, d, and e for case numbers 2020010196 l. B. R. , 2020on 01 on 0250 l. B. R. And 2020010253 l. B. R. , and 2020010197 l. B. R. , and 2020010198 l. B. R. , for five addresses, 1025 columbus avenue, 420 castro street, 1942 ocean avenue, and 151 clement street, and 1737 post street number 305. Good afternoon, [inaudible] in 1951, bimbos moved to the location where it is today. The property was included within the wilgbtq context statement. As one of the oldest surviving night clubs in San Francisco, bimbos 365 club is a Lasting Legacy to San Francisco and north beach history. Staff is very supportive of this application and recommends a resolution to add bimbos to the legacy business registry. Hello, commissioners. Ernest wu, Planning Commission staff. The next business we have is marcellos pizza has San Francisco for 42 years. They actively support the Lgbtq Community with the platform they have. Some nonprofit organizations, they have supported are the San Francisco aids foundation, sisters of perpetual indulgence, a. C. T. , and many more. We recommend including marcellos pizza in the legacy business registry. The next is surfaces by david bonk, and they provide a range of wallpaper and grass wall coverings. They also hire locally, and instill people with an interest in interior design and give them real world experience. We recommend adding surfaces by david bonk to the legacy business registry. Good afternoon, commissioners. Gigi gunther, planning district staff. Giorgios pizzeran has served San Francisco for 48 years from the Prime Minister location e location at third avenue and clement. [inaudible] diners that stop in are greeted Friendly Faces and are treated to lunch and dinner in plush red booths with red checkered table cloths while being able to observe the pizza being made in the kitchen. [inaudible] and a resolution recommending that the business be added to the legacy business registry. The next business is japan video and media. [inaudible]. Clerk im sorry. Im going to interrupt you just for a second. You might try turning your camera off because were having trouble understanding you, and whoevers phone is ringing, you might want to mute your microphone. Okay. Is that better . Clerk thats better. He opened his store with a vision of helping americans and others learn more about Japanese Culture through japanese t. V. And films with english subtitles. Since then, their inventory of japanese and korean videos and t. V. Shows and film have grown to include thousands of titles in numerous generres. In 1999, the owner organized the first anime costume parade, becoming an annual event. It attracts thousands to japantown each year. Japan video and media continues to give back to the community it serves, donating large amounts of anime merchandise to californias [inaudible] to the San Francisco buddhist churches [inaudible] each year. Staff is supportive of this application, and a resolution recommending the business be added to the legacy business registry. This concludes staff presentations, and were available to answer any questions. Thank you. Clerk great. Thank you. We should go to Public Comment. Members of the public, this is your opportunity to address the commission, and you can do so to enter the queue by pressing star then three. Well go to the first caller. Youll have three minutes. Hello. First, id like to thank you for giving me the opportunity to present japan video and media for legacy business program. Id like to tell you about myself and speak about two reasons why we should be nominated. I was born and raised in japan. When i was senior year in college, i came to the united states, which was my dream to see the u. S. Through my own eyes. After graduating from university, i decided to stay to practice my english in the right place. In september 1984, i opened the japan video with a strong conviction of a promising future for the video business. Im sure you are probably wondering how does a video store stay in business nowadays . Well, i have found that many people still want to own a copy of their favorite movies. Today, we have become one of the best sources for animes, drama, and special interest films from japan and asia. In addition, we have expanded our product line from d. V. D. To a large collection of anime merchandise, such as posters, key chains, plush dolls, figures, and many more. Literally, we made another store inside video store. Ever since we opened the store, our Company Mission has been to introduce and promote Japanese Culture to the american people. For that purpose, all d. V. D. Title we carry come with english subtitles. Another point i wanted to let you know about is our strong emphasis and commitment to community events. In 1999, we organized very first anime costume event in the country to help bring the Younger Generation to the Cherry Blossom festival. Anime has added a contemporary culture to the traditional festival. It has been very successful and one of the more popular events of the festival today. In addition, to bring more people and revitalize Economic Activity of the japantown, we organized summer festival and japan center anime fair. Every year, we donate a number of the popular anime goods to childrens festival and many items to San Francisco [inaudible] church to show our support from the japanese american community. Thank you again, and i deeply appreciate your consideration for my addition to the legacy business registry. Thank you. Clerk thank you. Good afternoon, commissioners. My name is steve nakajo. Im the executive director of the Japantown Task force. As a point of information, im a member of the San Francisco fire commission. I would like today to talk and ask for your approval and support in terms of mr. Onichi japan video and Media Application to the legacy business registry. As you have heard from mr. Onishi, his long involvement in our japanese community, his vision that he had in 1984 to bring the various kinds of Media Exposure to may i approach tain our community and bridge the gap between San Francisco and japan. He also has contributed greatly to the community, particularly to the Cherry Blossom festival and several nonprofit organizations. The fact that mr. Onishi created the first festival in the united states, the anime festival, is a point to his vision and the Younger Generation, as well. The fact is that japantown has enjoyed several businesses that are a part of the legacy business register, but it is very important that mr. Onishis business be considered because of the bays of his japanese speaking origin, his japanese base, and to maintain all of the cultures that are there in terms of our japanese community. I very much hope that, again, you can support this longstanding business that has been in the japan center malls. Recently, it was called the kontitsu mall, and now, its called the west mall. Thank you, commissioners, for your support of all of our legacy businesses in japantown. Thank you, commissioners. Steve nakajo. Hello. My name is tony martin. Im from giorgios pizza, and we are so honored to be considered for a legacy business in San Francisco. I think this distinction is deserved mostly because we are all about legacy and maintaining tradition for better or for worse. We are not going to change, and our great customers would be disappointed if approximate we ever did change our our booths, our display kitchen, our green awning on the corner of third and clement. We are just so appreciative of our of our Business Opportunity and being part of San Francisco community and seeing generation upon generation come through the doors, and its just its just a great business and a great situation that we have, and we look marched to maintaining that the same way that our parents did when they started the business, and it will be bestowed on our kids going into the future. Thank you so much from giorgios on clement street. Clerk members of the public, this is your last opportunity to offer Public Comment. You may enter the queue by pressing star, three. Commissioners, seeing no additional requests to speak, Public Comment is closed, and the matter is now before you. Commissioner matsuda is being asked to be recused from one of the items for consideration as she works within 500 feet of a location. Is it too early to make that motion . Clerk i dont think so. Second. Clerkokay. Clerk commissioners, on that motion [roll call] clerk clerk what i was going to suggest, as commissioner mat sued mat matsuda is recused from the post Street Property is to discuss that first and decide any recommendation and then move onto the remaining four. Okay. Works for me. Commissioner matsuda, well see you in a few minutes. All right. Looks like commissioner so, did you want to kick us off . Sur, but id like to talk or should i actually just talk about japan video and then, ill talk about other ones when commissioner matsuda comes back . Yes, please. Clerk now, well take up the post street support. Id just like to say im in full support of japantown video, to get the designation of the legacy business. It is a landmark well, im speaking for myself for friends from asian and hong kong. It is a place where you can find some cultural just a bridge of the cultural understanding and also learning and the entertainment and the japanese animation and video media is just a lot of favorite for a lot of asian communities, and im really happy to see this store and also what it does to the community, and i hope that with this legacy business, it will allow the company to carry on the legacy forward and also continue and maybe perhaps even expand more of the people to Japanese Culture and unite all the cultures together. Im in full support of this. Great, thank you. Commissioner foley . I just want to second that, what commissioner so said. I also want to say that my daughter loves anime. I dont really understand it all, but its great. Youve made a point. Commissioner hyland, so do or jonas, do we then just recommend like, a motion to recommend . Clerk yes. Ill ask for a motion as soon as im done with my comments. Any other commissioners have any other comments . I just wanted to point out, i think that i really support this legacy business, but i learned something today through this nomination, and that is how a Small Business within, you know, an important place like japantown can actually support festivals. I didnt know that they brought this animation costume festivals or event to the to the Cherry Blossom festival. Our legacy businesses are very part and parcel to our communities and our neighborhoods, and we all know the Cherry Blossom festival, and we will be seeing some challenges this coming year as japantown gets back into business this next year. So i just wanted to say that, and if no other commissioners have a comment, ill entertain a motion for this one. Motion to approve. Second. Clerk thank you. Commissioners. Seeing no additional deliberation on this matter, there is a motion that has been seconded to adopt a recommendation for item 6e, for the post Street Property, the japantown video and media. On that motion [roll call] clerk so moved, commissioners. That motion passes unanimously, 60. And well welcome back commissioner matsuda, and i will remind her that you have ten days to file with the Ethics Commission as to the reason of the recusal. Commissioners, you have four remaining legacy business registry applications before you. All right. Commissioner pearlman . Thank you. I was chuckling about this particular group because of the two pizza places, both of which i frequent. Marcellos was the first pizza place i ever went to in San Francisco, and when i was working in the castro back in the late 80s and early 90s, and volunteering for a lot of gay and aids charities and organizations, marcellos, a carried a lot of pizza boxes from them. Giorgios, the first project i worked with them was temple emanuel, and that was the place i would stop when i worked with them over there. So i think as a side piece, we should have a pizza historic noncontiguous historic district. I think that would be appropriate since there are so many pizza places in San Francisco. But i heartily endorse these two, as well as the others. All of them represent the best, you know, of San Francisco, and, you know, the best part of why were here. You know, i dont know anybody, any real san franciscan that would go to a pizza hut or a Dominos Pizza when we have these kind of places in our neighborhoods throughout the city, so heartily endorse them, endorse them all. Thank you, alex. Commissioner johns . Thank you. Well, you know, commissioner pearlman and i share many things in common. One is giorgios pizza. By the way, i happened to have giorgios pizza for lunch, so and ive been familiar with them for many years. Im familiar with two others of the businesses, as well. One is surfaces. I used to represent a number of very, very high end decorators in San Francisco, and frequently, they chose surfaces for our wall coverings on nob hill and russian hill and down in atherton, so it s a very nice company, and its so nice to have a wholesale business thats recognized. And finally, is bimbos 365. Ive had a very Long Association with it, and i did want to share with you a song, which i got from my mothers piano bench. I hope you can see it. Im in love with a gal in the gold fish bowl at bimbos 365, in 1965. The former tenant at that building received the first Liquor License after prohibition, so thats another little factor that makes this a historic operation and a a real legacy in the Drinking Community of San Francisco. So i support all the businesses, but i am familiar with those three. Thank you, commissioner johns. I was hoping to hear the song when you said you wanted to share it with us. Commissioner so . Hello. I wanted to speak to the giorgio pizza. Its always have been my favorite pizza place and also my daughters and also her girls soccer team, and also just most of the parents of San Francisco, glad to hangout at giorgio pizza saturday or sunday after soccer practice, and also, we always frequent there. My favorite pizza, tony. I would hope that you carry that legacy on through generations. Its a very special clam pizza. Its the best in San Francisco. Actually, i think its the best in the entire region of the bay area because you can never find anyone make the best perfect clam pizza, so i envy you, commissioner johns, that you just had a slice today. I really wish that i could bring myself up and get over there after were done, but this is a family business, and it just permeates from staff level, and also the chef and the cook and everyone. Weve been going there for 15 years or longer, and i am in full support. Im would love to see and hear this almost like a Community Gem continue to thrive and also pull its timeless place in the corner of the inner richmond. Its so nice to have a place to gravitate towards and hangout and also have memories. Very happy to hear tony speaking today, and i look forward to seeing you over there soon. My other thing i wanted to talk about is bimbo. Its just, like, a no brainer. Bimbo is not only had a long cultural history about music, but its also having they are one of the very few vendors in San Francisco with that kind of space that are also accepting the new band that is otherwise not known. I know it for a reason because my friend created the dad band, and they had problem finding places to play because its just a bunch of dads playing 80s songs, but bimbos is, like, come on in, you know . Well welcome you. Without bimbos, i dont think my friends dad band would have thrived as much in the past six years. So im happy to be there after we get out of this pandemic, so i am in full support with all the recommendations the staff put forward today. Theyre all really great. I only want to speak about these couple ones that i have personal memories and connections with, but all the other ones are so important to the city. So i want to leave my air time to commissioner foley now. Have y very good. Commissioner foley . You know, im actually familiar with both the pizza places, and im actually familiar with the surfaces, and as you all can probably figure, im quite familiar with bimbos and the bar. I just want to give a shoutout to the businesses, because the fact that were in covid, and theyre still surviving, and the fact that theyre excited about their business and theyre excited about the legacy, it just touches me. The other thing i learned, commissioner so, is ive never had clam pizza, so im going to have one, and maybe ill drop it off at your house, commissioner so, so you dont have to leave. Oh, that would be so great. Ill pay for it. All right. How about commissioner black . Well, commissioner foley stole my comment. Im always so impressed by the legacy businesses, and one of the things that really strikes me is these guys are constantly back. When i was on the board of an aids Services Commission back in the late 80s, early 90s, they were always providing us with free pizza. They give so much back to the community, and its really important for us now to give back to them, so i cant encourage people enough, go order takeout from any restaurant, coffee place, any kind of business that you can do to keep the other businesses to keep them going during this really awful time. And i just cant stress that enough. And weve been doing our part. Excellent. Thank you. Well, im in full support of all four of these additional businesses. I do want to say that while we urge you to keep your brand and maintain your business and your space, you are welcome to evolve and change. While im sure that people dont want to see the green awning go away, the legacy business doesnt prevent businesses from evolving. Are clams going to be the new pineapple . I dont know, but keep what makes you special, special. Commissioner johns, did you want to add something . Yeah, i would like to move that we forward the application of bimbos, marcellos, surfaces, and giorgios for approval. Second. Second. Clerk thank you, commissioners. Seeing no further deliberation, theres a motion that has been seconded to adopt recommendations for approval. On that motion [roll call] clerk excellent, and commissioners, thank you for joining us today. That concludes your extremely lengthy agenda today. All right. We well see you in two weeks. Were adjourned. Thank you. President ann will be the lead tonight. Also present is rusty that will provide the board with any legal advice this evening. Al and legal assistant katy sullivan. Im just had i did it executive director. We will be joined by the representatives Scott Sanchez with the Administrative Department and the San Francisco department of inspection. The Board Meeting guidelines are suppose to follow and turn off for silence on my cell phones and they shouldnt disturb the proceedings they are
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