San Francisco County Transportation Authority - Regular Meeting

Good morning, everyone. Welcome to the May 19th, 2026 regular meeting of the San Francisco County Transportation Authority Board. I am Commissioner Myrna Melgar, chair of this board. Our vice chair is Danny Sautter. Welcome, colleagues. The clerk today is Amy Cy Young. And I would also like to acknowledge Susanna Enos at SF Cup TV for staffing us during this meeting. Madam Clerk, please call the roll and then make your announcements.

Commissioner Chan. Chan present. Commissioner Chin. Chin absent. Commissioner Dorsey. Dorsey absent. Commissioner Fielder. Fielder absent. Commissioner Mahmoud. Mahmoud present. Commissioner Mandelman. Mandelman absent. Chair Malgar. Present. Melgor, present. Vice Chair Sauter? Present. Sauter, present. Commissioner Sherrill? Present. Sherrill, present. Commissioner Walton? Present. Walton, present. Commissioner Wong? Wong, absent. Chair, we have quorum. Also, the Transportation Authority welcomes your attendance here in person at the Legislative Chamber, room 250, second floor of City Hall. When you can't be here, the proceedings are streaming live at sfgovtv.org or airing on SF cable channel 26 or 78. Written public comment may be submitted by sending an email to clerk at sfcta.org or by mailing comments via U.S. Postal Service to SFCTA 1455 Market Street, 22nd Floor, San Francisco, California 94103. I'd also like to acknowledge Commissioners Wong and Commissioner Chen are present. Thank you. Thank you so much. Madam Clerk, please call item number one. Item two. Item two, chair's report. This is an information item.

Colleagues, May is Bike Month, and we have had several events to highlight the health, environmental, and citywide benefits of biking and rolling to celebrate the positive steps that we're taking to promote this fun and affordable way to get around. This includes the Bike and Roll to School Week event with the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition, Mayor Lurie, and the MTA at John Muir Elementary School, which was attended by Director Chang, as well as Bike to Wherever Day last week, which I attended with the Bicycle Coalition, Mayor Lurie, MTA Chair Janet Harloff, and members of the San Francisco Youth Commission. We at the Transportation Authority Board are proud to be strong partners and funders of bicycle education and infrastructure programs such as protected bike lanes, quick builds, traffic calming, and safe routes to school classes. Having provided $125 million since 2019 for these programs from the Prop L sales tax and other voter approved funds that we manage. I also want to congratulate MTA, WalkSF, and Families for Safe Streets on the one-year anniversary of street safety cameras in San Francisco, which the community celebrated last month. Thank you to everyone who helped win the ability to pilot these lifesaving cameras. The Transportation Authority provided $150,000 in Prop L sales tax funds to support outreach for the Speed Safety Program, a proven tool that is the foundation of the San Francisco Street Safety Initiative. Thank you to Commissioner Dorsey for speaking at the event and to the MTA for administering this highly effective program. San Francisco is proud to be the first city in California to implement the cameras, and they're working extremely well. In just one year, the cameras have massively reduced the share of drivers speeding by roughly 80%. This translates to 40,000 fewer speeding incidents every day, across camera locations. It is also great to see that two-thirds of the drivers who have received a warning or citation did not go on to receive another one indicating that the cameras are a successful deterrent. Finally, turning to transit, I wanted to thank my colleagues on the Metropolitan Transportation Commission and staff at MTC for recommending endorsement of the Transbay Joint Powers Authority Portal Project application for $750 million in State Transit Intercity Rail Capital Program. grant funds. The TJPA submitted the application yesterday, and I want to recognize Commissioner Mandelman for his work as TJPA vice chair, as well as the SFTTA staff team who are supporting Director Vandewater in completing the project's funding plan. Securing these critical state funds for the portal will eventually link Caltrain, California High Speed Rail to nine other transit services at the Salesforce Transit Center, connecting travelers across the Bay Area and state right here in San Francisco, reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 3.3 million tons and anchoring our downtown recovery with thousands of well-paying jobs. Thank you, and I conclude my remarks. If there's no other questions or comments from colleagues, let's open this up for public comment, please, Madam Clerk.

Is there anyone in the chamber who wishes to speak on item two, the chair's report? There is not. Okay, my comment is closed.

Call item number three, please.

Item three, executive director's report. This is an information item.

Good morning, Chair Malgar, commissioners. I begin my report this month with an update at the federal level. The federal surface transportation bill has been introduced in the Congress, and this is the draft Building Unrivaled Infrastructure and Long-Term Development for America Act, Build America 250. representing the 250th anniversary, I believe, of the nation. This bipartisan bill would replace the current Surface Transportation Act, which expires in September. It's a total of $580 billion over five years, which represents a modest increase from the core transportation spending in the current Transportation Authorization Act. but would not carry over additional stimulus spending that was part of the current Infrastructure and Investment Jobs Act. It does pivot toward consolidating discretionary programs, capping award amounts to ensure wider geographic distribution, and heavily prioritizes the lifespan of existing assets, particularly bridges. Now, uniquely, the bill does include new fees on electric vehicles and hybrid electric vehicles. which would supplement gas tax revenues and reduce the need for general fund transfers to help keep the Federal Highway Trust Fund solvent. It includes new autonomous vehicle policies focused on trucking and commercial fleets, which we are still assessing, and we anticipate bringing a more complete update to our June board meeting. Turning to autonomous vehicles, state regulations in California were just issued by the California Department of Motor Vehicles. This was anticipated over a two-year period. They've been working on these new regulations. The new regs do document moving violations committed by autonomous vehicles, which you may have seen in the news. However, contrary to some of the headlines, these are not tickets or citations in the way that we receive them as human motorists. Officers can issue notices of noncompliance for moving violations by autonomous vehicles, which results in a documentation of the infraction but does not hold the same consequences as human drivers in terms of penalties of fees or points on records affecting permitting. So therefore, we do believe there's some gaps there and we'd want to continue to work with the Department of Motor Vehicles and others to close those gaps. There are other provisions as well, which again, we will be bringing to you in a future meeting. State bills in general have advanced through their various fiscal committees. May 15th marked the last day for those bills to report to the chamber floor and heading to the other house of origin. All bills for which the Transportation Authority took a position have advanced through the legislative process and are expected to be considered in the next chamber except for one which is the SB 2276 by Soria known as the Stop Superspeeders Act. This bill died in committee amidst a myriad of concerns from organizations such as ACLU and California Public Defenders Association, as well as concerns about the bill's fiscal impact on the DMV, which has faced some insolvency issues over the recent years. SBA 1411 Stern, which was on our watch list and would have authorized spending of cap and trade revenues outside of The initial high-speed rail segment in the Central Valley also died in committee, and we'll be providing a more comprehensive update on these legislative outcomes next month as well. As Chair mentioned, the TJPA submitted an application for the portal to seek $750 million in what's known as the Transit Intercity Rail Capital Program. These are funded by Greenhouse Gas Reduction Program. FEE PROGRAM OR CAP AND INVEST PROGRAM REVENUES AND I JUST WANTED TO UPDATE THE BOARD AGAIN, THIS WAS REPORTED BY STAFF AT THEIR LAST MEETING THAT ON MAY 28, THE CALIFORNIA AIR RESOURCES BOARD WILL CONSIDER POTENTIAL ADMENDMENTS TO THE STATE CAP AND INVEST FRAMEWORK THAT COULD GREATLY REDUCE THE FUND REVENUES BY UP TO 2 BILLION ANNUALLY. THAT'S ABOUT 50% OF THE 4 BILLION THAT IS GENERALLY available through that program. And this could affect the critical programs that we care about such as the TIRCP as well as affordable housing and other fund programs under this greenhouse gas reduction overall program. So released in April, the amendments were developed in response to concerns around oil and gas companies raising leakage concerns as well as some affordability concerns. for rate payers and the governors may revise, does not discuss or incorporate these funding impacts resulting from potential changes that could be approved later this month by CARB. So we have seen widespread opposition from the transit community, labor, housing, builders, and environmental organizations as well as elected officials. Mayor Lurie has signed on with three other mayors of California to oppose the policy, and we will be preparing a chair for Chair Mulgar as well to represent us here in San Francisco at the TA. So we'll keep you all apprised of developments because this is a very crucial policy, and we do hope that we can avoid these deep cuts, and certainly would be working on backup plans if they are approved. Turning now to the local level, some outreach has been taking place across the city. The Ocean Avenue Transportation Town Halls were held. This was sponsored by Chair Melgar in her role as supervisor for District 7, Chair Chen from District 11 as well, excuse me, Commissioner Chen, Supervisor Chen from District 11 as well, meeting with community members two meetings in April 11 and May 4, where there was a lot of presentation of the Kay Angle Side Rapid project design and feedback from the community, which was heard and incorporated into some of the final design plans. Residents discussed the future of the corridor, including side street traffic, parking, and loading, as well as need for additional traffic calming and safety improvement features. And so we appreciate SFMTA staff as well, Michael Rhodes and Anna Harkman for leading the discussions and incorporating public feedback into the project design. For more information, folks can visit sfmta.com slash rapid K. Western Edition, the Geary Boulevard Community Study has been sort of convening and the community-based organizations have chosen a new name for the study, in fact, which was previously known as the Geary Fillmore Underpass Community Planning Study. And the community-based organizations and the community council did vote to rename the study to the Western Edition Dash Geary Boulevard Community Study to be inclusive of all the communities represented on the council. So they've been meeting and will proceed with the first season of outreach coming up, which will be led by the community council member organizations themselves, supported by our staff, led by Rachel Hyatt and her team in the planning division. Folks who are interested can sign up for updates at sfcta.org slash Western Edition Geary. A couple of more final updates on project delivery. The Larkin Street Quick Build project is now complete. Happy to announce that SFMTA completed this project in early May. It is on Larkin between Market and Geary and was funded as part of SFMTA's 2023 Vision Zero Quick Build program. The TA provided funding $4.5 million in property T&C tax funds and $345,000 from our sales tax. And the project included painted safety zones, signal timing changes, and parking and curbside loading changes, encouraging safer driving speeds and improving pedestrian safety at intersections. And then finally, the 20th Avenue neighborhood, excuse me, neighbor way between Golden Gate Park and Stern Grove is also now complete. SFMT's 20th Avenue project was funded with the $560,000 in Prop K sales tax funds and upgraded existing sharrows to designate bicycle lanes, installed a new bicycle signal at Lincoln and 20th, and implemented safety and traffic calming measures such as speed humps and daylighting. In addition, SFMTA converted angled parking to parallel parking throughout the study area, a 1.9-mile segment of 20th between Golden Gate and Stern. Finally, I do want to add one more thing, a shout-out to Caltrans District 4 Bay Area for completing the second phase of the 19th Avenue repaving project. There's one more weekend to go this coming weekend, so thank you again for everyone's patience, and to Caltrans for completing this important work. Thank you.

Thank you. Before we go on to action items, Madam Clerk, I want to excuse Commissioners Fielder, Dorsey, and Mandelman from this meeting, please. Let's go to public comment on the executive director's report, please.

Is there anyone in the chamber who wishes to speak on item three, the executive director's report? There's not. Okay, public comment is now closed. Let's go to item number four, please. Item four, approve the minutes of the May 12, 2026 meeting. This is an action item.

Okay, I don't see anyone on the roster with comments about the minutes. Let's go to public comment on this item, please.

Is there anyone in the chamber who wishes to speak on item four, the minutes? There is not.

Public comment is now closed. Colleagues, may I have a motion and a second to approve the minutes? Sauter, seconded by Walton. Let's call the roll, please, Madam Clerk.

On the motion to approve item four, Commissioner Chan. Chan, aye. Commissioner Chin? Aye. Chin, aye. Commissioner Mahmood? Aye. Mahmood, aye. Chair Malgar? Aye. Malgar, aye. Vice Chair Sautter? Aye. Sautter, aye. Commissioner Sherrill? Aye. Sherrill, aye. Commissioner Walton? Aye. Walton, aye. Commissioner Wong? Aye. Wong, aye. There are eight ayes. The minutes are approved.

Thank you. Let's now go to the consent agenda, Madam Clerk. Items 5 through 10, please.

Items 5 through 10 comprise the consent agenda. Staff is not planning to present on these items, but are available for questions.

Okay, colleagues, we don't need public comment on these items. May I have a motion and a second to approve the consent agenda, please? Moved by Sauter, seconded by Chen. And I think we can do the same house, same call. Yes. Those items are approved. Let's go to item 11, please.

Item 11, introduction of new items. This is an information item.

OK, I don't see anyone on the roster with items to introduce. So let's go to item 12, please.

Item 12, public comment. Is there anyone in the chamber who wishes to speak on item 12? There is not.

OK, public comment is now closed. Let's go to the last item, please.

Item 13, adjournment.

We are adjourned. Thank you.