Ordinance Amending the San Francisco Transportaion Code

The ordinance that Director Christiane Hayashi intended to present to the MTA board today (it will be heard on 11/4/2010) does several things:

1. It puts the enforcement of specific laws concerning the taxicab business under the San Francisco Transportation Code.
2. It creates a class of misdemeanors.
3. It clarifies and describes various violations of the law.

For instance, it prohibits "Solicitation and Paid Passenger Referrals" and then spells out in detail exactly what this means.

I intended to do a summary of the ordinance but the Director has already done it far better than a humble cab driver like myself could hope to do, so I'll simply copy her prose for you.

SUMMARY:

 The proposed ordinance would grant express authority to Taxi Services’ field enforcement staff the ability to enforce specified parking regulations. Such authority would also support their ability to tow illegally parked vehicles in violation of those sections in accordance with state laws.

 The proposed ordinance would move several existing misdemeanors from the Police Code to the
Transportation Code: § 7.3.8 (to knowingly make false statement or conceal information in connection
with a motor vehicle for hire permit); § 7.3.9 (to refuse to pay the legal taxi fare), § 7.3.10(a) (for a Driver to overcharge a passenger); § 7.3.5(a) (to drive or operate a taxi on City streets without a permit).

 The proposed ordinance would newly create the following misdemeanors in the Transportation Code:
o § 7.3.5(b): To operate an unpermitted dispatch service or color scheme.
o § 7.3.5(c): To drive a taxi without a permit or to allow a person without a permit to drive a taxi vehicle.
o § 7.3.6(b): For any person, and for any person or business acting in concert with that person, to take
payments for the purpose of referring passengers.
o § 7.3.7: For any permit holder to solicit or accept payments or gifts from drivers in exchange for
dispatch calls, shifts, vehicles or assignments.
o § 7.3.10(b): For any permit holder to charge drivers except such charges to drivers that are authorized
in Division II of the regulations.
o § 7.3.10(a): For a taxi driver to charge more than the legal rate of fare.

The complete text, as well Hayashi's summary of the ordinance, can be found here.

Mas Dinero Por Citations

The ordinance allows police to issue misdemeanor citations to illegal limos and taxis for $2,500 for a a first offense and $5,000 for a second. This is up from the current charge of $165.

 Taxi investigators for the SFMTA already have the ability to issue "administrative" citations to limos and taxis for $5,000.

Administrative Enforcement vs Criminal Enforcement

This is an important distinction because administrative laws allow SFMTA investigators to issue fines without having to go to court. This is similar to the fines that investigators can level against restaurants for sanitary violations or bars for allowing underage drinking.

To tell the truth, I'd never heard of this field of law until I talked with Director Hayashi. Yesterday I tuned on Law and Order as a break from writing and there stood Lt. Anita Van Buren threatening to bust a bunch of militia types for carrying rifles in NYC under "Administrative Code No ...." It seemed effective. They dispersed.

Administrative fines should greatly enhance the ability of the SFMTA to go after and penalize illegal taxis and limos, doormen soliciting tips and the hotels where they work as well as others violators of the misdemeanors listed above.

If this ordinance is okayed by the SFMTA it will go to the Board of Supervisors for final approval.

TAC Votes to Limit Down Payment Assistance

On Tuesday October 12, the Taxi Advisory Council voted unanimously (William Minikel and Dmitry Nazarov were absent) to grant Down Payment Assistance only to buyers who choose to work their taxis as "gate and gas" for at least three years. 

The motion to do so was put forward by National Cab's Dan Hinds (photo, left) in order to limit the number of new buyers who operate their cabs as Owner Operators or Affiliates (i.e. owners who operate their cabs as Long Term Leases).

The vote came after a lengthy discussion of the pros and cons of GG vs LTL and the problems of trying to run a full service cab company.

Declining Profits

Desoto's Jane Bolig said that: problems with the EDD (California's Employment Development Department), the costs of medallion holder bidding wars, and the increased number of cabs going LDL were causing declining profits in companies giving full service.

(Her comments on the EDD referred to suits that the EDD had filed against both Luxor Cab of San Francisco and Yellow Cab of San Jose that charged the taxi companies with millions of dollars in back Unemployment taxes.)

Yellow Cab's Jim Gillespie said that the EDD "only has issues" with GG drivers and leaves LTL alone. However, he added that it was possible to structure GG leases in such a way that "doesn't" turn GG drivers into "employees." He gave the practice of having drivers pay for their shifts in advance as an example.

Jane Bolig said that she thought that giving Fleet Medallions to full service companies would be about the only way for them to survive.

Green Cab's Athan Rebelos (photo, left) said that he agreed with the necessity for fleet medallions and added that he'd been in the taxi business in New York City where they had a combination of Fleet medallions and individual medallion holders and suggested that San Francisco follow a similar policy.

But he also said that declining profits were a "national problem" and that in many cities neither the taxi companies nor the cab drivers were making any money at all.

Scheduling Problems

Lease Driver John Han (photo, right) said that he wanted to be a GG driver and that, if taxi companies would actually honor the "Independent" contracts that their drivers sign, fewer drivers would want to become LTL drivers.

Han gave the example of his own shift which is listed as being from 7:00 am to 5:00 pm according to the lease he signed. He usually can't get started driving, however, until 9:00 or 9:30 am - unless he pays the dispatcher "some huge tip."

Council President Chris Sweis chose to describe this as "a scheduling problem." And, indeed, it no doubt is. The company Han works for is clearly scheduling a "short" that overlaps John's shift. The "short" apparently runs from 3:00 am or 4:00 am to 9:00 am. This allows the company to get an additional three or four hours of profitability (not including tip) from the medallion. The "short" takes up part of Han's shift  because the company would be unable to sell the "short" without including the 7:00 to 9:00 morning rush hour.

But I digress ...

Unintended Consequences

Dan Hind's original motion didn't impose any time limit but Jane Bolig said that having a GG taxi wouldn't do Desoto Cab any good unless they could keep the taxi for three years.

Lease Driver David Kahn (photo, right) then proposed an amendment to the motion calling for a three year time limit.

Athan Rebelos backed the motion saying that the Pilot Plan "had been developed around a gates and gas program" and that no one was prepared to deal with so many Owner/Operated taxis hitting the streets at the same time.

The unanimity of the vote came from the perception that the conversion of GG cabs to Owner/Operated leases has been having a negative effect on almost everyone in the business except the new buyers.

• Companies have been losing revenue from cabs.
• Drivers have been losing shifts.

"Warp Speed Scottie."

The Taxi Advisory Council, as its name suggests, can only advise the MTA on a policy. The MTA has to okay a change and then a new policy does not officially take effect for 30 days.

The San Francisco Federal Credit Union, however, already put the new Down Payment Assistance rules into effect on 10/14/2010. As of that date, "Supplemental funds from the down payment assistance provision in the Pilot Program are not acceptable for financing" Owner/Operator (aka Affiliate) leases.

TAC 10-12: This and That

Most of the TAC meeting was concerned with leasing but a few other subjects came up.

1. Chris Hayashi, wearing her flashiest dress ever, mentioned that she was re-staffing in order to end various backlogs.

She also said that an owner/driver has been putting stickers on cabs calling for an end to Paratransit. The man apparently has a website advocating violence against handicapped people. Chris said that she has started revocation action against the owner and added that any other drivers who knowingly placed anti-Paratransit stickers on their cabs would face disciplinary action.

"This goes way beyond the rights of free speech," she said.

2. Hayashi has revised and re-written Article 7 of Division 1 of the Transportation code to add several new misdemeanors. I intend to write a post on the subject later but the ordinance would:

• Allow MTA investigators to fine illegal limos and taxis $5,000 for violations.
• Make enforced tipping illegal.
• Make it a misdemeanor for a customer to refuse to pay the fare.

The ordinance will go before the MTA Board on Tuesday 10-19-2010. Public comment will be allowed and is usually listened to by the Board.

3. Speaking of public comment, I quietly suggested that TAC's policy of requiring public comment to come before the council discussed a subject instead of after was, "unheard of, ridiculous and outrageous" adding that TAC was the only committee that I knew of that followed such a policy.

Much to my surprise, Council President Chris Sweis discussed the issue with me after the meeting. I told him that the public could make more meaningful contributions if they were allowed to speak after the councilors but before motions and voting. I was backed up in this by Barry Korengold who noted that both the Board of Supervisors and the MTA Board conducted their public meetings in the manner that I was suggesting.

Sweis said that his main concern was that my approach would be less efficient. I told him that I thought that doing it (taxi reform) right was important than doing it quickly.

Swiess said that he'd look further into the matter and presumably make a ruling on it next meeting.

4. Mark Gruberg of the UTW, in one of his stranger (considering that he's supposed to be representing lease drivers) speeches, passionately attacked the provision in the MTA ordinance that would make tipping illegal. He said that it would be unenforceable.

Nonetheless it'll be on the books, Mark, making it more enforceable the than nada we have now.

5. As the meeting was winding down, John lazar, out of the blue, said that the taxi industry was being run by an agency that didn't know anything about taxicabs and was doing nothing. He added that the room was full of people who really knew what they were doing, implying (I think) that the cab business would be better off if it wasn't regulated.

Director Hayashi  responded heatedly to Lazar saying, "I take exception to the idea that we've done nothing here." She went on to praise her staff for their hard work and accomplishments under trying circumstances; and pointed out that, among other things, they'd re-written all the rules and regulations concerning cabs and cab driving in San Francisco.

I would add that, while Lazar and his knowledgeable pals spend over 20 years trying to get the right to transfer medallions, Chris Hayashi is the person who made transferability happen. She also:

• Negotiated the Pilot Plan.
• Set up a realistic method to rid the City of illegal limo and cabs.
• Created the Taxi Advisory Council that has empowered Lazar to influence the way the industry is run.
• Etc. Etc. Etc.

Although I no longer think that Chris Hayashi is perfect, she's close enough for the cab business.

Next: More on Leasing.

TAC 9-27: The Driver's Fund

As of last week, some numbers for the Driver's Fund were:

• 13 = Total Medallions Sold at $250,000 each.
• $162,500  (5% or $12,500 for each salex13) = Total in Driver's Fund.
• $92,026 = Taxi Wrap Fund balance.
• $254,526 = Taxi Wrap and Driver's Funds combined.

                                                The Taxi Wrap Fund

was a holdover from the Taxi Commission and has been administered by Taxi Services since last year. The money coming from the current taxi wraps ($141 to the MTA while $265 goes to the companies) is currently being put into the fund.

The Taxi Advisory Counsel, in an unanimous vote, decided to wrap the Taxi Wrap Fund into the Driver's Fund.

Director Chris Hayashi said that she was working to make sure that future wraps would not cover any windows in the cabs and that taxis would be clearly recognized as such by the public.

The Driver's Fund

There were an abundance of ideas about what to do with money (see top photo.)

Jane Bolig said that what was done with it would depend upon whether it was "a popcorn fund or a plasma tv fund."

Chris Hayashi did some arithmetic showing that the sales of 100 medallions under the Pilot Plan would bring in 1.25 million dollars.  If such sales continue beyond the Pilot Plan (almost a certainty), the fund would definitely grow way beyond the "popcorn" category.

There were several ideas about how to increase the money in the fund:

1. Put the money into an interest bearing account instead of just letting it sit as it does now. Chris Hayshi said that she would look into this.
2. Councilor William Minikel had the intriguing idea of makiing the MTA give part of its advertising revenue to the Driver's Fund since the MTA gets money from us. Quid Pro Quo. Great idea. Good luck with that Bill. 
3. Mininkel also proposed that each driver give one dollar to the fund every shift echoing a plan laid out by Barry Korengold last year. 

Who gets the money?

Barry Korengold (photo, right) wanted a vote to insure that the monies in the fund be used for non-medallion holding drivers - as the people at the Town Hall meetings intended. He said that it shouldn't even be necessary to discuss it.

Director Chris Hayashi, on the other hand, has expressed the idea that the people at the Town Hall meetings had left it up to the Taxi Advisory Council to decide who the money was to be used for - an interesting view to me since the duties of TAC were never discussed at Town Hall meetings.

My impression agreed with Korengold's so I checked my notes and, indeed, that the monies in the Driver's Fund should be used for non-medallion holders, was a basic cornerstone of the Pilot Plan.

Chris Hayashi (photo, left) had said, "Nobody will get everything they want but everyone will get something." Her vision of fairness and justice - in a business with little of either - is what turned so many of us into her groupies.

The Driver's Fund was the "something" that 5,000 or so non-medallion holders were supposed to get. The medallion holders would be given the right to sell their medallions and the non-medallion holders would have the right to benefit from the Driver's Fund. Quid Pro Quo. That was the compromise. That was the consensus. That was the deal.

Nonetheless, Hayashi wrote it up differently than the vast majority of Town Hall participants had purposed and insisted that her Taxi Advisory Council decide for whom the money should be used.

The Vote

Despite the fact that eight of the fifteen members on TAC are taxicab company owners, managers or stockholders, I still thought that Korengold's motion would carry the day. My reasoning was:


3. Those 5,000 non-medallion holders make up about 75% of the drivers in the business. Simple logic would dictate that, if TAC is supposed to be representing the taxi industry, something should be given be given to the majority of its workers.

2. Retired medallion holder Art Lembke has often said that the reason that taxi companies can't give benefits to drivers is that the profit margins are too low. But the Driver's Fund is new money. Allowing regular drivers to keep that money would give medallion holders and company owners the chance to unleash the true generosity of spirit that Lembke claims has been held in check by the harsh realities of the taxi business.

1. Taxicab owners and medallion holders are very sensitive to the public's perception of them as greedy, grasping, self-serving, venal and corrupt sharks. Allowing non-medallion holders to keep the money in the Driver's Fund could help to change this bigoted and unjust stereotype.

After Korengold introduced the idea that the non-medallion holders should keep the fund, the ensuing discussion was initially lame, as if the councilors couldn't think of what to say. Then Luxor Cab President John Lazar (photo, in center), claiming that medallion holders could little more afford to pay for a catastrophic injury than a regular driver could said,

"Its a Driver's Fund ... yea, the medallion holders make a couple a thousand a month more ... but they don't have so much either ... they're all drivers ..."

A slight gasp of relief could be heard from around the room and one councilor after another soon gave a variation of the "we're all drivers" speech. I half expected them to break into a chorus of We Are the World.

Of course, one could have pointed out that:

• Lazar had turned the question on its head and was using semantics and sophistry to spin his argument. 
• Since the fund is about money and not sentimentality, the essential fact IS the $25,000 more a year that the medallion holders make, not the fact that some medallion holders also drive.
•  The "couple of thousand" more that we medallion holders make a month could be used to purchase the accident insurance that non-medallion drivers rarely can afford.

One could have added that:

• Being able to sell the medallion gives the medallion holder an additional $250,000 more than non-medallions drivers.
• Giving medallion holders access to the fund would be double-dipping - in effect giving them a rebate on the 5% that they are charged for transferring their medallions.

One could have concluded that the reason the Driver's Fund was set up in the first place was to give the non-medallion holding drivers, who make half as much money as their medallion holding brothers and sisters and won't be paid $250,000 when they retire, a little pocket change.

But one wasn't allowed to point anything out. TAC president Chris Sweis (photo, left) has decreed that (unlike at SFMTA board meetings or at most public government committee meetings of any kind in San Francisco and California) the public is not allowed to speak after the councilors and before a vote, making TAC's claims to meaningful public participation and true transparency largely bogus.

Thus, did semantics and sophistry carry the day. And, thus, the public's unfortunate prejudicial, bigoted and unfair perception of taxicab owners might continue.

Only Korengold,  John Han and David Khan voted in favor of reserving the fund for non-medallion holding drivers.

In sum: A victory for TAC over the Pilot Plan. A defeat for Chris Hayashi's vision. And, a defeat for those 5,000 non-medallions holding workers who are "all drivers" too.

TAC 9-27: Gate and Gas vs Long Term Lease

The main topics of the latest TAC were Gate and Gas (GG) vs Long Term Lease (LTL) and the Driver's Fund. Both subjects were discussed at length and in depth so I'll deal with them in separate posts.

First, I want to apologize in advance for any omissions or errors. I recorded the proceedings and slacked on my note keeping. When I listened to the tape, however, the only people I could understand were myself and Carl Macmurdo, who sat next to me. This article, in other words, will be even more a stream of consciousness than usual.

                                   Random Stuff

San Francisco, the third most expensive city in the country, has the 10th highest taxi fares.

Some Pilot Program Stats:

• 18 medallions are being issued to people on the list.
• 1 SFMTA held medallion has been transferred (i.e. sold) to a buyer.
• 19 medallion holder medallions are in the process of being transferred.
• 9 Pre-K medallion holders have died during that last year.
• 3 Pre-K medallions have been sold.

Quote of the week,

"Cab drivers are all schemers and frauds ... and need to be watched." Bill Mounsey  (photo, above) on the drivers ahead of him on the Waiting List.

Leasing vs Leasing 

The above title is my way of noting that no other system  (like a split of the meter) is in play. 90% of the county may work on some form of employer-employee relationship but we in the cab business prefer to stay in the same league as strippers, office temps and call girls.

The Name Game.

The initial discussion centered around tying to decide what to call the new owners who chose to work their cabs as an LTL. Some people wanted to call the relationship an "affiliate" because the new owners would usually be affiliated with a color scheme but I think Rebecca Lytle of the San Francisco Federal Credit Union carried the day by calling them "Owner Operated" leases (OOLs.)

The Owner Operated Lease.

It's basically the same as an LTL, except the owners don't lease it from a company. They buy their own cars and chose their own drivers. If they associate with a company, they pay for the radio and the color scheme.

There are significant differences in the way the contracts are written because the credit unions demand certain information from the owners (I'll cover this later in an interview with Rebecca Lytle) but the taxis themselves are worked much like an LTL.

The Leasing Debate.

There are strong feelings on both sides of the GG vs LTL issue.

Cons
Green Cab manager and councilor Anthan Rebelos said that he had "about five pages" of things he didn't like about the LTL. Councilor and driver John Han, Mark Gruberg of the UTW and myself also spoke strongly against the practice. Putting our ideas together, you could come up with the following partial list:

• Hundreds of experienced drivers have lost their shifts or their jobs.
• They've been replaced by drivers with less knowledge
• LTL drivers are less likely to take radio calls.
• LTL taxis hurt service in the neighborhoods.
• LTL cabs are frequently subleased to brokers.
• These brokers are charging desperate people illegal amounts of money to drive shifts.
• This brings a criminal element into the industry and, as such, creates situations of potential violence.
• This is almost impossible for the MTA to police.
• The companies themselves often don't know who's driving their cabs.
• This increases the potential for catastrophic insurance losses; and 
• Endangers the public.

Pros

• Jim Gillespie of Yellow Cab says that LTL drivers are as likely to take radio calls as anyone else.
• In the past, he's also claimed that LTL drivers get into fewer accidents.
• A man whose name I didn't get (photo, right) said that he'd been driving for 34 years and had been given junk taxis under the GG system.  He now works under an LTL  and loves it because he's got a brand new cab and makes a lot more money.
• Driver Ton Lee, who represents Asian drivers at the airport, said that LTL drivers work hard just like everybody else and deserve consideration.

The Devil Made Him Do It.

John Lazar of Luxor Cab said that he resisted LTLs until 2004 when he "lost 24 GG medallions."

This echoed Jane Bolig of Desoto Cab who said, "medallion holders are diving the system" by setting up bidding wars between companies (Hmm - guilty). She also said that "insane" liability insurance rates were forcing companies to change the way they do business.

"Force" is a big word with Lazar who claimed that new buyers were "forced" to go OOL because of the high cost of their loans. At an earlier meeting, he had said that a buyer making $2,300 a month couldn't cover $2,700 a month loan. This time he asked Rebecca Lytle to confirm his theory.

Ms Lytle, however, did nothing of the kind, saying that their cheapest monthly rate was $1,446 per month for a 25 year balloon loan. She later told me that the rates for the other loans that she had underwritten were:

• $1,798 for 15 year balloon loan.
• $2,304 for a 12 year fixed rate loan.

Not Forced - Wanted.

Nonetheless, all but a few of the new buyers have chosen to become Owner Operators. This is something that few people at the Town Hall meetings anticipated and it changes the dynamic of the sales. All the calculations that were done to come up with the $250,000 fixed rate were based on a GG system.

Once upon a time, Director Chris Hayashi told me that she wanted to end LTLs. Even if she still wanted to do this, it would take three years to phase them out because of the money the drivers have spent on cars. And, what about the new OOLS?

There could be a lot more said about this subject ... and there will be.

Yellow Needs More Cabs? For Whom?

There are several questions and interesting aspects about Yellow Cab manager Jim Gillespie's claim to the MTA Board that Yellow needs 139 more taxis in order to service all the radio calls that the company gets.

1. Why 139? Why not 140 or 135? Must be scientific, huh? Let's do the math:

• Gillespie says that Yellow failed to pick up 280,000 or 25% of its radio calls during the last 6 months.
• 280,000 / 139 = 2,014 radio calls that Gillespie expects each new taxi to pick up in 6 months
• 2,014 / 182.5 days = 11 radio calls per cab picked up per day.
• /2 shift a day = 5.5 radio calls per day per driver.

Sounds a bit lame, doesn't it? But, maybe Yellow doesn't expect much from new drivers. Let's look at the veterans for comparison:

• If 280,000 = 25% then 840,000 (280,000*3) calls must have been picked up during the last 6 months by Yellow's 500 cabs.
• 840,000 / 500 = 1,680 radio calls picked up per driver for 6 months.
• 1,680 / 182.5 = 9.2 radio calls taken per cab per day.
• /2 = 4.6 radio calls per driver per day.

Hmmm. Seems like the vets are even lamer. Let's do a little more math. What if each vet picked up 5.5 radio calls per day?

• 5.5*2 = 11*182.5 = 2,007.5 picked up calls per cab for 6 months * 500 = 1,003,770 radio calls picked up.
• If 280,000 = 25% then Yellow handles 1,120,000 (280,000*4) radio calls per 6 months.
• 1,003,770 / 1,120,000 = the percentage of calls that would be picked up by Yellow drivers if the vets were as good as Gillespie expects the rookies to be = 89.6% of the calls picked up.

 What if the vets worked just a little harder and picked up 6 rides per shift per day?

• 6*2 = 12 pickups per cab per day*182.5 days = 2,190 pickups for 6 months*500 taxis = 1,095,000 pickups.
• 1,095,000 / 1,120,000 = 97.8% of the calls picked up.

Well, it looks like we've found a solution to Yellow Cab's problem - train or whip the slackers.

In short, this is the only time that I can recall a company using the incompetence of its personnel as a reason to expand its business.

In short, the only science involved in Gillespie's speech was the science of bs.

2. Yellow Cab will not guarantee that all, or any, of the new drivers will take radio calls.

Perhaps you, gentle and misinformed reader, imagine that Yellow has a dispatching system that will use GPS to automatically assign the closest of those 139 cabs to one of those 280,000 radio calls?

Alas - that's not the case. Yellow's computer will inform their closest empty cab that there is a nearby radio call but whether or not the driver will accept the order is anybody's guess. He or she can take it or leave it. This also assumes that the closest driver actually has his computer on, which is problematical.

What's going on here?

3. Yellow Cab (along with all other San Francisco taxi companies) is in the leasing business, not the taxi business.

• They make their money from leasing taxis to drivers, not from the actual fares.
• The drivers pay the companies first and then make their money from picking people up.
• As long as a cab company can fill it's shifts with lease drivers, it doesn't matter how much actual business the company does.
• Mild recessions (with declining demand for taxis) are usually good for cab companies because desperate, unemployed people will take bad shifts. A little money is better for them than nothing.
• Yellow Cab, for instance, wasn't hiring in 2008 and 2009 because all their shifts were filled. 

4. Yellow Cab (along with all other San Francisco taxi companies) will never tell a driver to take a radio call. Why?

• Cab drivers in San Francisco are Independent Contractors, not employees.
• What these drivers are is independent of are all laws that protect employees.
• Cab companies do not have to pay unemployment taxes, social security taxes or (for Long Term Lease drivers) Worker's Compensation, etc on Independent Contractors.
• Telling a driver to take a radio call would make said driver an employee. 
• Telling a driver to take a radio call would mean that Yellow Cab would have to pay the taxes etc listed above.

5.  Yellow Cab (along with most other San Francisco taxi companies) is more and more operating its medallions under long term lease arrangements.

• The medallions are leased by the month and the taxi companies have no control over who drives the cab.
• Hundreds of experienced drivers have lost their shifts due to this trend.
• They have been replaced by new drivers who aren't trained (for Yellow to train them would make these drivers employees).
• Most of these Long Term Lease drivers hang out at the airport or head downtown.
• These new drivers are much less likely to take radio calls than the people they replace.

And, those are the real reasons why people in the Bayview, the Sunset, the Richmond and Noe Valley, not to mention the attractive blond at Greenwich and Scott, aren't getting taxis as quickly or as often as they should.

As long as the current taxi system remains in effect, 139 more Yellow Cabs will do little or nothing to improve San Francisco's radio business. 

Gillespie was quoted in the Examiner as saying, "If we had more taxis and they were more spread out, people could get their cabs quicker and more people would call ..."

If the cabs were "more spread out" ... but they won't be any more spread out than the current cabs are. Under the current system there is no leadership or direction, there is no one to tell the taxi drivers where to spread. The new taxis, like the currents ones, will gravitate to areas where the service is already good like SFO and Union Square but service to the outlying areas would not be improved one whit.

If Yellow Cab (along with the other companies) ran their businesses in a more rational manner, if the companies were more interested in serving the public than in avoiding various forms of taxation, the taxicabs we already have on the street would more than adequately handle the radio calls.


The only people who would really benefit from those 139 more medallions would be the owners of Yellow Cab along with the new medallion holders.

TAC III Part 2

The Taxi Advisory Council spend much of their time last Monday articulating their goals and structuring their future meetings with the aim of having a report on the Pilot Plan ready by the end of the year. (If you click on the photo you can blow up a good summary etched by Chris Hayashi.)

 The subject of electronic waybills was also discussed. Director Hayashi pushed for them because they would end the possibility of anyone handing in fraudulent waybills and allow her to gather accurate information on taxicabs for the 1st time ever. Many drivers, on the other hand, were less enthusiastic about the idea. Council member Bill Mounsey especially disliked them because he felt that an electronic watchdog would restrict his freedom.

During public comment, Driver Eric Hattan brought up UberCab - an illegal, high-tech taxi service that is using San Francisco as a beta test before going into other markets.

But for me, the most interesting facet of the afternoon was a brief preview of the "Gates and Gas" (GG) vs Long Term Lease (LTL) debate.

Counciler John Lazar of Luxor cab showed concern over the fact that most of the buyers were opting for the LTL. He said that:

• Because the payments for the loans were more for the buyers than they could earn from a GG arrangement, they were "forced" to go to LTL.
• This was causing numerous experienced drivers to lose their shifts.
• The California EDD was going after Luxor as a test case and would later go after every other company.
• The EDD considered GG drivers employees and LTL drivers Independent Contractors.
• This seemed to imply that it would be less expensive and more profitable for cab companies to go to LTL.

During public comment, Hansu Kim expressed the fear that the industry would go totally LTL and that the cab companies would become little more than radio services in the future. Other speakers, including myself, thought that LTL drivers didn't take radio calls and hung out either at the airport or downtown - thus reducing the level of service to the neighborhoods.

TAC decided that they needed to know:

• How many cabs were on LTL?
• How many were GG/
• What percentage of buyers were going LTL?
• The effect on public service.

People also wanted to know how many drivers had lost their jobs and what had happened to them but one of the company managers didn't think that there was any way to find out this information. Meaning they don't keep records of who works for them? Or, perhaps he meant that he didn't know what happened to the drivers after they lost their shifts.

Council member Timothy Ajaegbu (right) said that he was very concerned about this trend because he is a gates and gas driver.

A further and deeper discussion of GG vs LTL is on the agenda for next week.

If you are concerned about your shift or the future of the taxi business, you should try to be there. The turnout so far has been amazingly small. You don't know what you've been missing. This is better than Reality TV. For one thing, it's really REAL.