Potrero Boosters discuss Muni service, ballot measures

[Evan Goldin]

Dave Snyder of the Transit Riders Union and Gillian Gillette of Fix Muni Now discuss ballot measures aimed at Muni during the monthly Boosters meeting.

The June meeting of the Potrero Boosters organization focused on two similar, but differing approaches to improve Muni, San Francisco's popular, troubled transportation agency.

Gillian Gillette, a representative of Fix Muni Now and the chair of SPUR's transportation committee, lead off the discussion by going over the details of the ballot measure Fix Muni Now is pushing, which the organization says would:

• Allow the City to set Muni operator wages and benefits through collective bargaining, and eliminate the requirement that Muni operator wages be at least as high as the average wage rate for transit operators in the two highest paying comparable transit systems.
• Eliminate the transit operator trust fund and any City payments into it.
• Make incentive bonuses for the MTA Director and “service critical” MTA managers and employees optional instead of required.
• Require binding arbitration when the MTA and employee unions representing Muni operators are unable to agree in collective bargaining.
• Set rules for arbitration proceedings regarding MTA employees. The arbitrators would consider the impact of disputed proposals on Muni fares and service and on the ability of MTA management to schedule and assign transit employees according to riders’ service needs. And employee unions representing transit employees would have to justify any proposal that would restrict the MTA’s flexibility in deciding schedules, staffing, assignments or the number of part-time personnel.
• Provide that past practices and “side letters” would not bind the City regarding terms of employment for MTA employees, unless the MTA Board or Director has approved them in writing and included them in the affected employees’ collective bargaining agreements.

Gillette's group is collecting signatures to place this measure on the ballot, and says they have more than enough to get this on November's ballot. The changes the ballot measure would impose, Gillette said, would make empower Muni's management to come up with a better contract for its workers, instead of having the salaries and work rules in the contract imposed by the City Charter. Muni today is, Gillette said, handcuffed by the City Charter, which results in high wages and outdated work rules.

Dave Snyder of the Transit Riders Union ( "A new project to give people who ride transit in San Francisco a voice," he said) also presented at the meeting. He has been working with the Board of Supervisors on a ballot measure they have put forward, which is very similar to the one being pushed by Supervisor Sean Elsbernd and Gillette's group.

Snyder's measure also makes many of the same changes to Muni's labor laws as Gillette's measure. The main difference, though, is that Snyder wants to go deeper — taking aim at Muni's source of management power. Muni is currently governed by a board of seven, all of which are appointed by the mayor and confirmed by the Board of Supervisors. Nat Ford, head of the SFMTA, reports to Mayor Newsom.

Snyder would like to see the mayor not have such absolute control. He gave examples illustrating favoritism and poor governance due to mayoral influence, such as:

• MTA is forced to take staffers who are not effective at other departments
• When Muni got $26 million extra from Prop A in 2007, the mayor increased work orders paid by Muni by about $26 million
• Mayor introduced Culture Bus, which wasted hundreds of thousands of dollars and has since been cut
• Operators get an extra $1/hour if the bus ahead of you is late, which leads to collusion between operators and Muni

To this problem, Snyder's changes the Board of the SFMTA to be comprised of three appointees by the Board of Supervisors, three from the mayor and one joint appointment between the two. It also requires Board of Supervisors approval when Muni seeks to cut back service on a line by more than three hours/day or by more than 5%

According to Snyder, "Nat Ford is a good manager. Free him from the influence of the mayor by giving the Board more control over Muni. A board will give that person more independence."

Snyder says that if both props pass, the labor piece from the Eldbserd measure will be in place, and the other parts of the Supervisor's proposition will be made law. He's hoping for a yes-neutral or yes-yes campaign, not a yes-no campaign.