10:47:50 >>MARY MULHERN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
10:47:53 I would like to ask that we hear item 37, which we
10:47:56 asked Mr. Armijo to be here to talk about streetcar.
10:48:02 He was here at 10:30 and wonder if we can do that.
10:48:06 Move that up.
10:48:08 >>LINDA SAUL-SENA: Second.
10:48:09 >>THOMAS SCOTT: Moved and seconded.
10:48:11 (Motion carried).
10:48:13 Okay, we'll take up 37.
10:48:14 And Mr. Armijo, Executive Director for Hart.
10:48:19 And then we will come back to 34, take that issue up.

10:48:27 >>> Good morning.
10:48:29 David Armijo, the chief executive officer for Hart,
10:48:35 brought with me David, our chief financial officer
10:48:38 that I think many of you are familiar with.
10:48:42 Happy to be here today, to have an opportunity to
10:48:44 address the reorganization of the street car.
10:48:47 First let me say thank you for this opportunity to
10:48:49 address both yourselves and the public on this very
10:48:52 important issue.
10:48:53 Today I believe we are at a crossroads in the
10:48:55 provision of public transportation services.
10:48:58 Each day, each week, we have many more items and
10:49:01 issues about transportation and a number of different
10:49:04 ways both globally, regionally, certainly the high
10:49:07 cost of energy has changed the way we think about
10:49:11 travel, not just in Tampa but throughout this country.
10:49:14 We look at a lot of initiatives.
10:49:16 During the past year, it has been a significant year
10:49:19 in the growth of the services for Hart.
10:49:20 We have seen as much as an 8% annual growth.
10:49:24 We will be reporting later this week we have well over
10:49:26 a million rides again for the month and we are seeing

10:49:29 quite dynamic growth across the board.
10:49:31 This includes all of our services, the fixed route
10:49:33 services we provide bus and express services, regional
10:49:36 service, Hart plus, transit operation, and most
10:49:43 importantly streetcar operation we are here to discuss
10:49:45 today.
10:49:45 The Hart board is considering a number of issues and
10:49:48 has addressed the demand for street car service as
10:49:51 well as other programs we have within Hart both now
10:49:54 and in the future.
10:49:55 This will include implementing new services to respond
10:49:58 to the demand of transportation throughout this
10:50:00 region, including the two bus rapid transit lines, we
10:50:04 have a program right now within the central part of
10:50:06 Tampa.
10:50:07 And we will we are beginning the discussion process,
10:50:11 and in fact I'll be coming back late they are month to
10:50:13 talk about a light rail initiative that has been in
10:50:15 discussion for some time, and what does that many for
10:50:18 this region?
10:50:19 But this is only the beginning.
10:50:20 I believe there's a lot more analysis and work that

10:50:23 has to be to be done but most importantly how do we
10:50:27 fund these new services?
10:50:28 We are under a great deal of financial pressure in
10:50:30 this region as well as elsewhere in being able to
10:50:33 provide the services we have.
10:50:36 Just the increase in costs to our fuel for our
10:50:38 services this year is up nearly a million dollars over
10:50:41 previous years as we go forward.
10:50:43 We are fortunate to actually tie our fuel price to the
10:50:49 futures market.
10:50:50 We are paying much like Southwest Airlines, we are
10:50:50 paying closer to $2 for diesel as opposed to $3 plus,
10:50:55 but we are tracking the increase for next year's
10:50:57 budget will be closer to probably 3.5 dollars.
10:51:00 We are shopping around right now.
10:51:01 We have got to the end of September to find a new
10:51:04 contract on that.
10:51:05 So we are very pleased to see the numbers are coming
10:51:07 down a little bit right now but we are projecting
10:51:11 about an $800,000 bump in our budget for next year.
10:51:16 Marty is working with the city, the county staff, the
10:51:19 folks at Florida Department of Transportation, even

10:51:20 the new regional association TBARTA, as we start to
10:51:24 look at with our various spending partners how do we
10:51:28 address these challenges as we go forward?
10:51:30 But the question today is why reorganize the
10:51:32 streetcar?
10:51:36 The background to get a little bit of sense of the
10:51:39 challenges certainly today and in the future.
10:51:41 But how does this affect the streetcar?
10:51:44 Well, the streetcar is maturing.
10:51:46 It's now in its sixth year of operation.
10:51:48 We have been looking at a number of ways to deal with
10:51:50 the growth and the plans for that future.
10:51:53 We are currently carrying about 36 to 38,000 rides a
10:51:56 month.
10:51:57 We anticipate that we are probably pretty close to
10:52:01 last year's level 440,000 rides.
10:52:04 Streetcar since its inception operated as an entity,
10:52:08 as a separate independent contract to the city, and
10:52:13 Hart itself, through the THS board. The budget of the
10:52:17 streetcar operations is operated as a separate entity
10:52:20 and is budgeted separately and has a number of funding
10:52:21 elements to it that includes fare box recovery,

10:52:27 advertising, special assessments, grants and an
10:52:30 endowment. And I know this council is very familiar
10:52:30 with some of the challenges of the streetcar budget,
10:52:30 and the fact it's operated in a deficit mode.
10:52:39 Each year the streetcar has been a little short in its
10:52:41 budget and the shortfall has continued to utilize an
10:52:47 increasing amount of funding from the endowment.
10:52:51 During this past year we began updating the 20-year
10:52:53 plan, as we began looking at what we could do to
10:52:56 extend the streetcar.
10:52:56 So in order to do that, we had to find a way to
10:53:00 balance this budget.
10:53:01 There were a number of initiatives that the program
10:53:04 discussed last spring which included everything from
10:53:06 enhancing revenues and reducing costs.
10:53:09 More specifically in the case of cost, we are now
10:53:12 looking at going into fiscal year '09 with the first
10:53:15 balanced budget in the history of the streetcar.
10:53:17 However, to do that, we'll include minor increases in
10:53:20 revenue, but most importantly will include a reduction
10:53:24 of service cost.
10:53:28 Many of our services are now operating on a 15 minute,

10:53:33 which will be scaled back to about 20 minutes.
10:53:35 We will still have key services on weekends 15 minutes
10:53:38 with a service frequency of about four vehicles but
10:53:41 currently we are operating on peak and offpeak means
10:53:45 three vehicles.
10:53:45 Cost reduction budget will be a reduction of $490,000
10:53:49 which represents about a 17% reduction in the current
10:53:52 fiscal year '08 budget.
10:53:54 That will bring our budget to next year at $2 million
10:53:57 roughly.
10:53:57 Fiscal year '08 budget was about 2.4 million.
10:54:01 (Bell sounds).
10:54:02 In review of the street car operation it was Clare
10:54:04 that the streetcar is very dependent upon heart
10:54:07 services.
10:54:07 Although the street car operates with 25 staff
10:54:11 members, it operates with staffing that is provided
10:54:13 from our bus system, all the coach operators, the
10:54:16 service, mechanics, are in fact from the Hart family
10:54:20 of services.
10:54:22 Many of those services and operations are from our bus
10:54:25 operation at 21st street.

10:54:27 The connectivity of support services for the street
10:54:29 car is of course from within heart. This is also true
10:54:33 of our paratransit operation, our Hart plus, and
10:54:36 fortunately for the streetcar it has been operating as
10:54:38 a separate entity, it's been limited somewhat by its
10:54:41 budget, and a very restrictive budget that did not
10:54:46 allow the services that were required to maintain the
10:54:49 service to keep pace with inflation and all the other
10:54:52 associated costs.
10:54:53 So in part due to expenditures, staff and resources
10:55:01 were somewhat limited to greater efficiencies.
10:55:04 In a year in which we are already looking at 17%
10:55:06 reduction in the budget it was very difficult to add
10:55:09 another mechanic or servicer or whatnot.
10:55:11 Purpose of the street car reorganization is to in fact
10:55:14 integrate the service operation of the streetcar
10:55:16 within the park family of services.
10:55:18 Those services being the bus system and of course our
10:55:21 paratransit program.
10:55:22 Why do this?
10:55:24 This will provide in my mind a greater access to the
10:55:27 staffing and resource available within Hart.

10:55:32 On the latter, this includes both line and streetcar
10:55:36 functions.
10:55:36 On the latter, the previous streetcar structure
10:55:39 included both the streetcar manager and two assistant
10:55:41 managers within those 25 positions to manage the
10:55:44 service.
10:55:45 Having a manager in both the maintenance and the
10:55:47 transportation side, assistant manager reported to the
10:55:52 streetcar manager.
10:55:53 While this is not a great opportunity to manage the
10:55:55 system, it was also somewhat impractical and not very
10:55:58 cost effective.
10:56:00 The new organization structure splits the
10:56:02 responsibilities of transportation and maintenance
10:56:03 between two assistant managers, having them report to
10:56:07 manager that is support both bus and paratransit
10:56:10 operations.
10:56:11 These two manager versus access to greater amount of
10:56:13 resources, staffing, maintenance and facilities
10:56:16 support, but they will require -- services than the
10:56:21 previous structure had.
10:56:22 The elimination. Manager for the streetcar did result

10:56:26 in about a $100 that you savings within the budget.
10:56:29 That allowed staff to add those services that were in
10:56:32 fact underserved, including additional mechanic, to
10:56:36 add to the -- there was no mechanic at night.
10:56:40 And a maintenance attendant to assist those vehicles
10:56:45 to close down for the next day.
10:56:47 This will help in the maintenance of the fleet.
10:56:48 It was a results in a net reduction in the '09 budget
10:56:51 of $29,000.
10:56:52 And I believe that that's going to improve upon the
10:56:55 service of the street car.
10:56:57 And it will also help reduce or mitigate any
10:57:00 additional support required from the endowment.
10:57:02 I feel confident that changes we made will improve the
10:57:04 quality of services and Hart's commitment to improving
10:57:08 service now and in the future and I will be happy to
10:57:10 entertain any questions you may have.
10:57:12 >>THOMAS SCOTT: The chair recognizes Councilwoman
10:57:14 Mulhern.
10:57:15 >>MARY MULHERN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
10:57:17 I asked last weak to put this on the agenda, because
10:57:22 the Tampa historic street car board of directors had

10:57:30 not had a chance -- we had not had a meeting since Mr.
10:57:34 Armijo reorganized the streetcar employees.
10:57:40 It was a shock to everyone on the board, I believe,
10:57:47 from way heard from rumor, since we haven't been able
10:57:51 to meet, that the -- our manager, streetcar manager,
10:57:55 who is basically was the director of street car
10:57:58 operations, Ken Borchard, had been, I guess, laid off
10:58:04 or organized out.
10:58:06 And it happened in early July, I think, when after the
10:58:12 street car board had agreed not to meet in July
10:58:16 because so many people were on vacation, so it
10:58:19 happened while no one was really around, and there
10:58:22 wasn't any -- the only public discussion of this
10:58:28 happened, last week we had a Finance Committee meeting
10:58:30 of the streetcar board, but it was only attended by a
10:58:34 few members of the board and some members of Hart.
10:58:38 So I felt, since the city, through our CRA money, and
10:58:46 because the street car is operated in the city and
10:58:53 because the City of Tampa and Hart have an interlocal
10:58:56 agreement, the terms of which I think may have been
10:59:01 not adhered to in this decision, it agreed in the
10:59:10 operations agreement that there would be a

10:59:12 dedicated -- I am going to read it from a maintenance
10:59:17 staffing agreement.
10:59:18 Hart proposes to provide management and supervisory
10:59:21 staff that are assigned exclusively to the streetcar
10:59:23 system.
10:59:24 The manager and superintendent, supervisor, will have
10:59:29 a strong background in the maintenance field.
10:59:31 Staff to support the maintenance of the system will
10:59:34 fall into three categories.
10:59:36 It basically says, as it said there, the
10:59:39 superintendent will be dedicated, and also says that
10:59:41 we will have two dedicated maintenance people, which I
10:59:46 guess -- I assume we'll continue to have.
10:59:53 When it happened, there was no statement, and there
10:59:56 was no statement at our streetcar finance meeting last
11:00:00 week, that there was any cost savings involved, and I
11:00:03 find it hard to see how eliminating the manager, whose
11:00:09 responsibilities will still have to be fulfilled, and
11:00:12 I'm told will be fulfilled by the person recently
11:00:17 hired by Mr. Armijo to be the bus manager, or bus
11:00:25 operations manager, who doesn't have any experience
11:00:27 with rail, is not going to perform the duties, of who

11:00:31 is supposed to be a dedicated staff member.
11:00:36 The other reason why I felt like we needed to talk
11:00:38 about this here is because we keep having people from
11:00:43 other cities come in and talk about the rail system.
11:00:48 We have had in the city, the mayor has brought in
11:00:50 three different people from Dallas, from Salt Lake
11:00:53 City, and Denver?
11:01:00 Phoenix.
11:01:01 And the reality is, streetcar is light rail.
11:01:07 We have cars that are refitted and look like historic
11:01:12 Street cars.
11:01:14 But in reality the line that we have for the
11:01:18 streetcar, you could put a light rail car on them.
11:01:23 In fact that's one of the things that Mr. Borchard was
11:01:28 trying to get us a company to run modern light rail
11:01:34 car to run on the street car lanes as a demonstration.
11:01:37 So I am hoping with all our rail plans, and especially
11:01:45 because of the cost of fuel, everything has changed,
11:01:47 even in the last year in the way people are looking at
11:01:49 transit.
11:01:50 And of course for Tampa to actually be taking it
11:01:54 seriously is new.

11:01:56 And this is only -- I think we are at a point where we
11:02:03 have to have more transit.
11:02:04 And while bus rapid transit is a better option than
11:02:07 everyone driving their own car on the road, rail is
11:02:09 going to be the answer, because people will ride rail,
11:02:13 and rail presents -- transit oriented development, and
11:02:23 there's no evidence that bus light rail will do that.
11:02:29 While I think it's a very good solution in the short
11:02:31 term, I think that in looking and planning for rail,
11:02:34 which I know that Mr. Armijo is planning to do, we
11:02:37 need to keep in mind that we already have a light rail
11:02:42 system, and that we should be building on that.
11:02:46 And since our budget is going to grow smaller and
11:02:48 smaller, for everything, I think we need to
11:02:52 concentrate on the best and most efficient way to
11:02:56 provide that transit, and to stop polluting, and to
11:03:00 stop, you know, emitting all this carbon.
11:03:04 And unfortunately we are not going to have electric
11:03:07 buses.
11:03:07 Buses are going to be run by diesel.
11:03:10 And while it may be more expensive to put rail in the
11:03:16 operating costs of electricity, which is what light

11:03:18 rail and street cars, which are arguably the same
11:03:22 thing, and I would like to point out that to support
11:03:28 that, that there are 30 cities right now that are
11:03:32 looking into or planning for streetcar systems, not
11:03:36 light rail, streetcar.
11:03:37 And there are probably about 10 that are looking at
11:03:40 light rail.
11:03:43 I guess it's something we could debate, but I don't
11:03:46 think there's any point because the lines are the
11:03:48 same, and they are clearly more closely aligned.
11:03:56 Even if you think there's a difference between light
11:03:58 rail and streetcar, the street car and bus or rail and
11:04:01 bus.
11:04:03 And, oh, I had a question.
11:04:06 One question from Mr. Armijo, that I hadn't thought to
11:04:14 ask when I met with him yesterday.
11:04:16 Do you know what the total -- Florida Department of
11:04:20 Transportation and federal transportation authority
11:04:33 grants given in a year, do you know what that is?
11:04:35 >> I think David can handle that.
11:04:37 David?
11:04:40 >> Can you state your name and address?

11:04:42 >> David -- chief financial of Hart.
11:04:47 >> I'm referring to any grants, federal or state
11:04:50 grants, that Hart receives.
11:04:53 >>> We receive about $20 million in federal and state
11:04:58 grants on an annual basis.
11:05:00 >> So of that, I want to point out that of that 20
11:05:03 million, the streetcar gets, and Hart applies for
11:05:10 those grants for the street car system, we get $3,
11:05:13 000,000 a year in that money, which Hartline has the
11:05:19 ability, or the responsibility of programming for it.
11:05:24 And I would like to point out some of the other
11:05:27 revenue that the streetcar uses right now.
11:05:33 We get 150,000 a year from our CRA TIF budget.
11:05:40 The Port Authority contributes 150,000.
11:05:44 Our fare box for last year, I think, or projected for
11:05:49 this year, David can probably tell us this, 653,000,
11:05:56 and special assessment, which is one fund that will
11:06:02 only increase, because it's coming from the downtown
11:06:05 district, which we just saw from Bonnie Wise has had a
11:06:09 huge increase in tax revenue.
11:06:11 We get 521,000 from that.
11:06:14 And we have had to dip into the endowment, but clearly

11:06:18 the reason we have to do that is because we don't have
11:06:22 dedicated, you know, enough dedicated funding from
11:06:25 other sources.
11:06:25 So I just wanted this to be aired in public because
11:06:32 the street car board won't meet again until August
11:06:35 20th.
11:06:36 >>THOMAS SCOTT: Councilwoman Saul-Sena, and then
11:06:38 councilman John Dingfelder.
11:06:39 >>LINDA SAUL-SENA: I want to thank Mrs. Mulhern for
11:06:42 bringing this to us today.
11:06:43 We all know what we read in the paper and it's really
11:06:46 helpful to have a direct conversation about the state
11:06:48 of the street car.
11:06:52 I very much appreciate, Mr. Armijo, your explanation.
11:06:55 It's been my experience that for an entity to be
11:07:00 successful, it's helpful for them to have what I term
11:07:04 generally a grown-up in charge, an individual who is
11:07:08 tasked with being responsible for that entity.
11:07:11 The concern that I want to voice here is I appreciate
11:07:17 the ways that you are trying to save money.
11:07:19 It's certainly a concern to us all.
11:07:21 But that by removing this, there are two issues.

11:07:24 One of course is the lack of communication about it,
11:07:26 because it seems that this should have been done
11:07:28 certainly in concert with your board, with the
11:07:31 streetcar Board of Directors, and secondly, that this
11:07:35 leaves the streetcar without a person whose direct
11:07:40 sole responsibility is the advocacy for promotional
11:07:43 and responsibility for this.
11:07:45 And while it's a subset of heart's responsibility, the
11:07:48 streetcar is certainly an important enough entity to
11:07:52 deserve its own grown-up in charge, and that's a
11:07:55 concern that I want to voice, because it seems to me
11:07:57 that even smaller operations need that clarity of
11:08:03 responsibility, and the spokesman whose sole task was
11:08:08 making that entity successful.
11:08:14 >>JOHN DINGFELDER: Thank you.
11:08:18 David, thanks for coming over.
11:08:20 Ms. Mulhern, thanks for bringing him over, because I
11:08:23 think as Linda said, it is important to air these
11:08:25 things out and not just, you know, talk about them in
11:08:28 the newspaper.
11:08:29 But let me tell you, David Armijo that I observed over
11:08:33 the last year, and the reason I say this is being your

11:08:37 representative over on Hart, had a chance to work
11:08:42 closely with him on many issues, and I trust his
11:08:45 judgment tremendously.
11:08:48 He came to us, I think, indirectly from Dallas and
11:08:51 from Los Angeles, bringing great skill and knowledge
11:08:55 from those major areas and now he's bringing some new
11:08:58 people from those areas and I think that's always a
11:09:00 good thing.
11:09:01 It hasn't increased our budget because some of the
11:09:03 other people who have been there before left, and now
11:09:07 we have some new vision.
11:09:09 In regard to the streetcar, I don't think the
11:09:13 streetcar is hurting at all.
11:09:14 As a matter of fact, I think ridership is doing fairly
11:09:17 well.
11:09:19 Three or four months ago, David and his financial
11:09:24 David over there put great efforts into reorganizing
11:09:29 the budget of the streetcar and the operation of the
11:09:31 streetcar to make sure it was solvent.
11:09:34 The street car was heading -- it had been in the red
11:09:37 slightly and was headed even more into the red and I
11:09:40 think that some tough decisions had to be made, and

11:09:42 Mr. Borchard I met one time, he seemed like a very
11:09:46 nice chap, but tough decisions had to be made at the
11:09:51 management level to effectively eliminate one manager
11:09:55 and let some other managers do that same job.
11:09:58 And I think that's why we hire people from David
11:10:01 Armijo to make those tough decisions.
11:10:05 In regard to those management issues.
11:10:08 We are extending the streetcar.
11:10:09 Those plans are moving forward to bring it up into
11:10:12 downtown.
11:10:14 We have been very aggressive on that.
11:10:16 On the bus rapid transit, basically, $40 million from
11:10:21 the county to do two major routes.
11:10:23 And that is just the precursor.
11:10:26 Bus rapid transit is not something you just do and
11:10:28 forget about it.
11:10:29 At this time precursor to possibly changing those
11:10:31 routes over to rail, and bus rapid transit can be a
11:10:35 way to have transit oriented development.
11:10:39 Our ridership with Hart, and I believe the street car,
11:10:43 is at unprecedented levels, more than a million riders
11:10:46 a month on Hart buses, our express services are

11:10:50 overflowing, people are standing in the aisles,
11:10:53 obviously a big part of that is $4 a gallon.
11:10:55 But listen, we have to make hay while the sun is
11:10:59 shining and for rail and buses the sun is shining
11:11:02 right now and we have a good person to move forward on
11:11:04 those issues.
11:11:06 Light rail, we are doing an alternative analysis and
11:11:08 moving faster than TBARTA and frankly they don't like
11:11:11 it very much but Hart is moving faster than TBARTA,
11:11:14 you know, on these issues.
11:11:16 So we can possibly come next year, for 2010, with a
11:11:21 referendum to take to the people for a Tampa rail
11:11:24 line.
11:11:26 And at the same time we are in discussion was Pinellas
11:11:30 on ways that we can work better together across the
11:11:33 bay.
11:11:34 So those are just a handful of the things that I
11:11:36 scribbled down, you know, that I have worked closely
11:11:38 with David.
11:11:39 I'm not taking any credit.
11:11:40 David has worked hard on it and his people and I'm
11:11:43 proud of what he's doing.

11:11:44 It's unfortunate that he had the reorganization, it's
11:11:46 unfortunate that because it was summertime perhaps he
11:11:48 didn't have a chance to call the various streetcar
11:11:51 board members who I know have a very personal stake in
11:11:54 the streetcar, and feel very emotional about it.
11:11:57 But these are emotional decisions in tough times and I
11:12:04 trust him.
11:12:06 >>CHARLIE MIRANDA: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
11:12:08 I, like my colleague Mr. Dingfelder, and everyone else
11:12:11 here, I have to believe in what's brought before me.
11:12:15 I don't sit on Hartline.
11:12:17 I admire those on council who do, and do an
11:12:20 outstanding job there.
11:12:22 I have to be cognizant of the fact that we are not in
11:12:25 very good times.
11:12:26 I can himself say that when you compare budgets, this
11:12:30 year you might have a greater increase in the buses
11:12:35 and the street car because of the very large
11:12:37 convention coming to town in the next few days, that's
11:12:40 the League of Cities.
11:12:42 Before, you know, we have to realize where were we,
11:12:46 where are we, and where are we going?

11:12:50 Before there was a convention center with in a
11:12:51 convention hotel.
11:12:52 Then at 5:30 the streetcar, the sidewalks were picked
11:12:57 up and brought back down at 7:30 in the morning.
11:13:00 Now you have a means where somebody comes in, they
11:13:03 say, look what Tampa has.
11:13:06 When you think of San Francisco, it's not always about
11:13:08 the New York giants and the 49ers, you think of
11:13:11 the bridge, you think of the street cars, the
11:13:14 collective things that make people remember the city
11:13:17 and what a great place it is to be there.
11:13:19 I can't be very definitive on what the troubles are
11:13:26 when you reduce your management team.
11:13:30 That's done, I would imagine, I assume, with great
11:13:34 cause for your whole system, for those that have
11:13:38 worked diligently for you, and I don't know the
11:13:40 gentleman but I'm sorry to see anybody leave, because
11:13:42 these are tough tames.
11:13:43 But in tough times, somebody has got to take up the
11:13:47 lead, and lead the rest of the troops through the
11:13:52 forest and you are the one chosen.
11:13:53 You are the one that knows what's going on, how it has

11:13:56 to be addressed and things of that nature.
11:13:57 I can also tell you that your revenues sometime in
11:14:01 September don't compare to 09 and 10 because they
11:14:05 won't be the same.
11:14:06 You have another large event coming to town where
11:14:08 people are very jubilant, will want to see new things
11:14:11 in the city and all the street cars, a lot of people
11:14:13 never see them.
11:14:14 Only we know about them because we live here.
11:14:17 But those revenues will go sky high.
11:14:20 And if you compare those revenues, you must make a
11:14:22 little note that they are high because of such and
11:14:26 such being in town, the Super Bowl.
11:14:28 So it's incumbent upon me to pass judgment on what is
11:14:32 brought before me and had the trust of the people that
11:14:37 sit on this council as our representative on those
11:14:40 boards.
11:14:40 So I think you have done your due diligence.
11:14:43 I can't tell you how you did it because I'm not a
11:14:46 member, I don't know how and when, but I'm assuming
11:14:48 you did.
11:14:49 But Harry Orr who was the city transportation director

11:14:52 once told me a long time ago, we had little tokens,
11:14:58 and he says, when we give up our right to run our own
11:15:02 city bus line, city transit, I think it was called,
11:15:05 you are going to see chaos.
11:15:06 And the reason that he was saying that is because then
11:15:10 you have to service an area largely that had no
11:15:15 population and somebody wanted a bus service and under
11:15:17 federal regulations that were giving you money you had
11:15:20 to run a bus out there, and the losses became
11:15:24 insurmountable.
11:15:25 Now the population is catching up to all the things
11:15:28 they had to do to get the funding and here's what
11:15:31 where we sit today. So it's incumbent upon myself to
11:15:35 pass judgment on what I see.
11:15:36 Since I don't know how or why, I can only say that I
11:15:39 have to rely on you, sir, to do the right thing.
11:15:43 Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
11:15:44 >>THOMAS SCOTT: Let me just follow up and just say
11:15:48 that, you know, we have a myth that given the budget
11:15:52 constraints that we are under that there has to be
11:15:54 cuts and there has to be adjustment.
11:15:56 We might as well face that.

11:15:58 I mean, where we are today with the economic downturn,
11:16:01 what the legislature did, you have to look at your
11:16:06 whole structure, and you have to make some tough
11:16:09 decisions.
11:16:13 I have complete confidence in Mr. Armijo.
11:16:18 We met a few times and talked about this whole issue
11:16:21 of light rail.
11:16:23 It's on our agenda for the 28th.
11:16:25 We have a plan that's being brought back to us that's
11:16:28 going to, I believe, move forward, enhance the City of
11:16:31 Tampa, and Hillsborough County as councilman
11:16:36 Dingfelder said, and so I think that he has -- his
11:16:44 judgment has looked at the overall structure and made
11:16:48 the decision that would be best for this community,
11:16:51 given the environment that we are now in, and the
11:16:55 budgetary constraints.
11:16:58 So I feel confident that we are going to move forward,
11:17:03 and glad Mr. Dingfelder is there to also help look at
11:17:06 this particular issue.
11:17:08 What it sounds, though, Mr. Armijo, is that there was
11:17:14 concern about communication with the street car board.
11:17:16 That's what it sounded like I'm hearing.

11:17:18 But be that as it may, I think that we are on sound
11:17:24 footing.
11:17:25 You have done a tremendous job since coming and taking
11:17:27 over Hartline.
11:17:28 You reorganized Hartline, come on, let's face it, and
11:17:32 saved a lot of money, and service is doing great.
11:17:35 And so right now I am withholding my judgment and just
11:17:39 saying keep up the good work, and hopefully when we
11:17:46 have our meeting on the 28th everybody here can be
11:17:48 excited about the plans that we talked about that you
11:17:50 are bringing forward.
11:17:51 Councilwoman.
11:17:52 >>GWEN MILLER: Hearn?
11:17:55 >>MARY MULHERN: I want to add I have great respect for
11:17:58 Mr. Armijo and I think he's doing a great job with
11:18:03 transit and Hartline and especially with the bus
11:18:05 sometime.
11:18:06 But I'm on the streetcar board.
11:18:08 And as Linda put it so eloquently, it's such an odd
11:18:13 entity, the street car, because it does not have a
11:18:19 CEO, basically.
11:18:20 So we have got aboard that's a volunteer board, we

11:18:23 have an interlocal agreement between the city and
11:18:25 Hartline, the city is responsible if the funding
11:18:30 doesn't become available, the city is responsible to
11:18:32 pay for it.
11:18:34 And to clarify one thing, the streetcar board has
11:18:43 given -- or Hart is providing the operation, the
11:18:46 management of the street car board, because we have
11:18:49 contracted with them to do that.
11:18:51 So it's all very convoluted but basically the
11:18:55 streetcar board contracts with Hart to operate it.
11:18:58 So I think because of that alone, I wish that we had
11:19:03 been involved in this decision of reorganization.
11:19:06 And I feel really strongly that, as Linda said, we
11:19:12 have got to have somebody, one person, in charge, and
11:19:16 they can be in charge, and were and are in charge
11:19:20 under the direction, and hired by Hartline because we
11:19:24 contracted with heart lane to run it.
11:19:25 But they are they're still at least was one person who
11:19:29 that was his dedicated job.
11:19:31 And I do just want to make sure -- I think the street
11:19:38 car board will be talking to our attorney about
11:19:40 whether there is a question about the agreement.

11:19:45 And I would like the city's legal department to look
11:19:48 into whether there is any question of the interlocal
11:19:55 agreement between the city and Hartline.
11:19:59 And I want to thank Mr. Armijo for coming today and
11:20:02 explaining all this to us.
11:20:04 And I did want to point out that the total savings
11:20:09 that Hart is gaining in this, with this layoff and
11:20:14 reorganization, is only $29,000.
11:20:18 And I think that we are going to have to compare that
11:20:21 in the future with not having a dedicated director of
11:20:26 the street car system.
11:20:28 So thank you.
11:20:30 >>> Thank you very much.
11:20:31 I look forward to further conversation.
11:20:33 And certainly I take it to heart, but good
11:20:37 communication is necessary and I do plan to be at the
11:20:40 next meeting and plan to move in that direction.
11:20:43 I'm sure as we move forward that we will see some
11:20:45 better opportunities ahead of us.
11:20:47 I have asked Chuck Booth to join us on the 28th.
11:20:54 These are exciting times.
11:20:55 I sit on the reauthorization committee nationally.

11:20:58 We are in a very major battle within our own industry
11:21:02 to try to control it.
11:21:03 There's a number of us who think we should be much
11:21:05 more bold as we go forward.
11:21:07 There are those who think we should be more
11:21:08 conservative and try to keep pace with the past.
11:21:11 Reality of spending in this nation on transportation
11:21:14 is fuel, for gas taxes which are in decline.
11:21:17 It's great that the Congress made a decision to
11:21:20 improve on MPG, to actually reduce our transportation
11:21:25 funding in the future so we are going to have to look
11:21:28 at new ideas both nationally and locally.
11:21:30 I would want to say one last thing as we go forward
11:21:33 with the program, and one of the reasons it's going to
11:21:35 be critical to get the public support and the
11:21:37 political support locally, in the last restarts there
11:21:40 were actually 35 cities attempting to start light rail
11:21:44 systems in the United States.
11:21:45 Only six cities were funded.
11:21:47 And Mr. Booth was involved with those.
11:21:48 He will be able to have a lot more inside discussion
11:21:51 so we have a lot of work to do here locally on how we

11:21:53 can put ourselves in a very competitive mode as we go
11:21:56 forward.
11:21:57 Looking forward to that conversation.
11:21:59 >>THOMAS SCOTT: And Mr. Booth also gave a presentation
11:22:03 to the county's transportation task force, did an
11:22:08 outstanding job.
11:22:09 >> We are fortunate we have him.
11:22:10 >>THOMAS SCOTT: So we look forward to having him on
11:22:12 the 28th.
11:22:14 Councilwoman Saul-Sena, then we need to move.
11:22:17 >>LINDA SAUL-SENA: I just want to say that City
11:22:18 Council has been consistently supportive of transit
11:22:21 and all its forms.
11:22:22 We recognize the value to the community.
11:22:24 We'll make the land use to support decisions to
11:22:27 support it.
11:22:28 And we will be your ally in moving this ahead.
11:22:32 >>THOMAS SCOTT: Thank you very much.
11:22:34 Thank you.