Good morning everybody. Welcome to the San Francisco board of supervisors budget and finance subcommittee for wednesday march 2, 2016. My name is mark farrell. I am the chair of the committee. I am joined by supervisor norman yee. Our vice member katy tang will join us shortly and i know supervisor david campos is here for one of the items today. I would like to thank linda wong the clerk of the committee and sfgtv. Madam clerk do we have any announcements . Yes mr. Chair. Please silence all cell phones and complete speaker cards and documents to be part of the file should be submitted to the clerk. Items will be on the march 8 board of supervisors agenda unless otherwise stated. Okay. Thank you madam clerk so we have five items today and one is a hearing that most of the members of the public are here and well take them out of order and that will be the longest and the others are not long and madam clerk if you call item 1 first. Item 1 is a resolution authorizing the San Francisco department of Public Health to accept and expend a grant in the amount of approximately 2. 8 million in active Transportation Program funds through the metropolitan Transportation Commission safe routes to School Grants program for a period of for the period september 1, 2017 through august 31, 2019. Okay. Thank you madam clerk so i know dph is here to answer questions unless there is anything to say . No. I am here to answer questions. Colleagues seeing no questions i appreciate it. We dont have the budget Analyst Report for item 1 so we will move on to Public Comment. Seeing none Public Comment is closed. Supervisor could i have a motion to move this forward without recommendation. Moved. So we have a motion by supervisor yee and take it without objection. Madam clerk if you could call item 5. Item 5 is line five resolution retroactive three authorizing the department of the treasurer and Tax Collector to accept and expend for the amount of 315,000 for the Mott Foundation for the period of september 1, 2015 through august 31, 2017. Today the treasurer started this program because it shows that kids with College Savings are seven times more likely to attend College Without and since 2007 kindergarten to college has opened thousands of accounts for children and the city and county provides of the 50dollar deposit to make the accounts real and 50 for the kids in the School Lunch Program but the incentives and matches to encourage families to savings and boost this comes from private philanthropy and believe in the power for them to reach their potential and they have donated more than 800,000 since the program started and the families are put tg to good use and each family are eligible for a dollar to Dollar Savings match and families are eligible for a study bonus if they save every month for six months. These incentives work. Families have saved 1. 7 million of their own money for college. Between the savings and the city and private contributions the total in the account is now over 3. 4 million. Let me tell you what the numbers mean. Nationwide only 3 of families are saving for college with a 259 which is the typical vehicle used for college and that is average 25 times wealthier than the typical american family. In k to c our savings rate is four times higher and theiron money qualify for free and reduced lunch status and families earning less 45,000 in San Francisco for a family of four are saving 500 each for college. We believe this program has the ability to reach significant more families. To this end we set a goal of engaging 25 percent of all Public SchoolElementary Students in active savings by the end of 2017. The grant before you today from the Mott Foundation will help us reach this goal. This funding supports the following core strategies. Redesigning the markets and messaging, developing and embedding vait vaitdive technologies in the program, launching an Ambassador Program and increasing direct engagement and support of k to c programs and materials and activities. Thank you for the ongoing support of kindergarten to college. Thank you. Supervisor yee. Yeah quickly i am really happy that the city has actually taken this initiative and its really one of these things that San Francisco has taken a lead on and i know since it started whenever i go around the country for Different Reasons this program is mentioned, and people are always trying to duplicate it. One of the questions i have about this is i know that we the city tries to get the initial 50. Has there been any tracking of whether or not parents add into it or other people add into fund beyond the 50 . Yes, families have saved 1. 7 million of their own money in the account and no city funding that. Is Family Savings and 50 of the Family Savings qualify for free and reduced lunch. Theyre very low income. Thank you very much. Thats a good sign. Thank you and to the department of the treasurer and Tax Collector this is a program that we lead in San Francisco and proud to have it. Thank you. Again no budget analyst. We will move to Public Comment. Anyone to comment on this item . Seeing this item its closed want motion to move it forward. So moved. Okay. We have a motion. Move without objection. If you could go to item two please. Item two is resolution approving the agreement with tegsco, llc dba San Francisco autoreturn and for Services Related to the towing, storage, and disposal of and abandoned and illegallyparked vehicles not to exceed 65,400,000 for the five year term of april 1, 2016 through march 31, 2021 with the option of extending the program. Thank you very much. Good morning. From sfmta. We have a presentation and if you dont mind we will get this up and running for you. Please. Again thank you supervisors for hearing our item today. Were very excited to bring this to you. We believe that the sfmta has done a very good job in terms of structuring a contract that we believe is in the breast interest of the city so i will begin with this slide. The contract is a not to exceed 65. 4 million. Were recommending that autoreturn was selected as the highest rank proposer. We had three bidders in a competitive bid process. The initial term is five years with an option to extend for up to five years. The Business Model has changed. The current way we do business is based largely on volume and very dependent on volume for the contract to stay in business. Were switching that so now the contractor is paid a fix Management Fee for the two facilities and reimbursed a per tow charge and this is remitted to the mta and sets the flexibility and manage the contractor and contract and in this agreement for approval is the property agreement for the 2650 bayshore boulevard longterm facility. What this contract brings to the city is allows us to clear our streets and driveways for public mobility. It moves abandoned and illegallyparked vehicles. It provides customer service. It allows owners access 24 7 via the phone or internet. Also owners can retrieve their vehicles 24 7. The tow trucks are gps so it provides efficiency. It also tows vehicles for sfpd and investigations. So the tow volume has declined dramatically over the term of the current agreement. The number of tows have declined approximately 41 since 2005. Thats 30,000 less when the contract began. And this is sort of a slide to show you the impact. So the mta has we believe that getting the car towed is absolutely no fun at all, but to sort of mitigate that we have been doing Public Outreach and doing things on the website that help people know when you know the tow restrictions are. We have new tow signs. We have parking meters that display restrictions. We see data to apps that help the public know when their car can be towed and were also developing online maps so we can identify tow way zones and other restrictions. So through this process this tow program is a Cost Recovery program. The cost of the program is approximately 24. 1 million. Of that 12. 3 is for the tow contractor. 9. 1 million is sfmta cost and 2. 7 is the cost of renting two facilities. However, through this process were able to reduce the fees by 22 in terms of the base tow as well as hold the fees flat or stable through fy 17 so for the next 15 months they wont change. In addition to that we extended the stolen vehicle waiver. On december 1, 2015 we implemented a waiver for victims of stolen vehicle and waive the fee for San Francisco residents as well as provide a 48 hour grace period to pick up their car. Were extending that to non San Francisco residents so we are a transit first agency and the cost of the towing is born by the folks that generate the cost of the tow. And by if we subsidize the cost of the program it would take away our revenue for transit. And im happy to answer any questions. So thanks for the presentation. I think the contract itself is not something that gives me too much pause but its part of a broader thing. Obviously the cost of getting towed in San Francisco. Look theres no excuse if youre parked illegally, what have you. Thats going to happen but its a huge amount of money. I forget. I had my car towed two years ago and 500 something dollars. It was shocking and i think the real kicker is when you get your car there is a ticket that you have to pay to the mta, so a few questions so the fees for the mta, could you talk about them, the things charged back . Sure. Because i think they have risen over the x number of years and i want to understand what they are and i hear it from my constituents all the time i cant believe it costs this much to get my car towed in San Francisco and most or not all watching on sfgtv but at least talk to them would be helpful. Absolutely. There are two components related to the base tow. There is the administrative fee and theres the tow fee. The sfmta fee is currently 266 which were lowering to 261 through fy 17 so the sfmta cost is 9. 1 million and that includes 46pcos that are dedicated to clear the streets for commute lanes, driveway tows, abandoned vehicles, the whole 9yards, so thats a pure straight cost of that included in that is the cost of the hearings which is 15 of our Hearing Division activities related to tows so those two combined we have a work order with sfpd to do the after hour tows and mou with the department of Emergency Management to do the after hours dispatch, so that total comes to about almost 5 million and then we add our mta overhead to that and makes it 9. 1 and divide that by the number of vehicles claimed right. Help me understand thats 4 million in overhead generically. How does that break down . Overhead is 87point 6 so the direct cost related to enforcement are just the pure salaries as well as the fringe for the employees that includes Social Security sure. I get it. Pension and things of that nature. The overhead applied to that are my salaries, my staffs salaries that we spend a lot of time monitoring the contract. We have accountants that make sure the money is correct. Its the rent for all the buildings that we occupy, the equipment, the go fors, the fuel, insurance so all of that is included in the mta overhead. That is not charged directly. Okay. So you have the burden and overhead are there Similar Program where you apply the same percentage . When its Cost Recovery, yes. That is the standard overhead. Got it. Okay. That is helpful. So again one comment if theres a way for the mta as much as it doesnt change the monetary outcome i can tell you it will change the peoples attitude and pay for it in one time with the ticket included and incredible helpful. Just my experience and to pay 500 to get my car and pull it out of the lot and theres a 75dollar mta ticket on the window they have to pay and write a check when i get home. If theres a way to put that, front it in the original bill, actually consider it and i can tell you peoples attitudes center around that quite a bit. I understand and that is more of a logistic issue rather than our ability to make that happen. The reason why is when you get a tow and the pco issues a ticket that particular ticket isnt up loaded into the system until the end of the shift so if you go to retrieve your car its not readily in the system. However, at auto turn Service Center you can pay for the tickets but that particular ticket may not have been up loaded in the system yet but were working on it. In future citation were trying to do things real time so if it you get a ticket its in the system immediately. I appreciate it. Okay. Colleagues any other questions . Okay mr. Rose can we go to your report for item two . Yes mr. Chairman and members of the committee. On page five of our report the estimated payments to auto return over the initial five year term are 65. 3 million and including the fee to be paid and autoreturn and the charges to be reimbursed by the sfmta to autoreturn and shown in table three on page five of our report. The sfmtas total estimated cost in 1617 for the tow program and the autoreturn agreement and the sfmtas administrative and Storage Facilities costs are 24. 1 million. That is shown in table four on page 6 of the report. I would note on the bottom of page 6 of the report we state on increased of the Budget Analyst Office sfmta included a clause in the contract should tow volume increase or decrease significantly they will renegotiate the cost so the public is not impacted. We recommend that you approve this resolution. Thank you mr. Rose. Supervisor tang. Thank you and i apologize i missed the beginning of the presentation. There are many things included in this new contract that i appreciate mta incorporating and actually listening to a lot of our concerns. For example, based instead of basing on tow volume, changing that Business Model i like they can retrieve their vehicles 24 7 and incorporated the stolen vehicle policy and if we approve this today can we adjust the contract later on in the period. For example, whether mta or autoreturn identify further efficiencies that could reduce the cost that that people have to pay either to retrieve the vehicle or for the administrative citation is there that ability to do so within the term that were approving today . Absolutely. We have a lot of flexibility to adjust the contract or amend it as necessary, and probably is our goal to be more efficient. Were partnering with autoreturn because of our ability to collaborate and their willingness to make towing more efficient, integrate with our system, so as we go down the road and the tow volume decreases or get more efficient at it we would need less pcos. We would definitely reevaluate the cost to the public. We dont want to charge that much. We understand its a lot of money and whatever we can in terms of reducing that cost to the public we will certainly strive for that. Thank you. So i look forward to that and hope you bring the information forward to us if further efficiencies are identified. Thank you. Just a quick question. As you mention it the pcos that you talk about and full cost are they just doing towing or they also giving tickets for you know, just regular parking infractions, whatever. I assume there are a myriad of things they give tickets out and if you have the full cost for them doing other things than just towing . Its a combination. Many are purely dedicated to the tow program. For instance the yellow zone along the commute lanes, driveway tows. Many are 100 but if theyre not, if there is a percentage of the fte we dont could for the other piece in the program so whatever you see in terms of fte its purely dedicated to the activities of tow. All right. Supervisor yee. Thank you. I was curious have we ever done a study to look at our San Franciscos cost versus other locations . Well, i assume theres its usually there are other places where the tow doesnt cost as much, so have we done that . We havent done an indepth study. We have on the surface looked at it. Its our understanding when you look at it its really apples and oranges because a lot of other municipalities dont do the recovery 100 . Also too the cost between San Francisco and say oakland are dramatically different in terms of salaries or. Our rent is higher. It really is no comparison when you look at it. Maybe one of these days we can meet and you can tell me how its apples and oranges. Okay. All right. Well thank you for the presentation. We will move on to Public Comment. I think you know i will be supporting this contract. I think though for most people ultimately these fees seem absurd on their face and i appreciate you articulating why they are the way they are but i look forward to look at reducing them because i think again its something i hear about all the time and it is challenging to explain it. Supervisors, if i may make one last comment . We understand the cost is high, and cost aside we believe that weve done an awesome job in terms of structuring a contract that we believe is in the best interest of the city. My function is to make sure that i protect the citys interest, make sure theyre not stealing our money, we comply with the terms of the agreement a