Muni Employee Cashes In With 'Fix Muni Now' Commercial

Lights, camera, action

​The "Fix Muni Now" campaign -- whose Proposition G is reviled among Muni employees -- brought in a highly paid hired gun this weekend: A Muni employee, counter-intuitively.

The campaign filmed its first TV spot at a bus stop on Church and 20th. Per Muni bylaws, an agency employee was present the entire time -- and earning $80 hourly.


Filming lasted from 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. on Saturday -- meaning the folks pushing a measure to sever Muni drivers' salaries from the city charter showered about $560 on one Muni worker.

That being said, Supervisor Sean Elsbernd, the author of Prop. G, said he got his money's worth. "That guy did a hell of a lot of work," said the supe. "Anytime we needed a bus to stop, he stopped it. We were very lucky to have him there."

It must have been a bittersweet day of business for the Muni employee. Elsbernd's measure would eliminate a strange exception enjoyed by the Transit Workers Union, who don't engage in collective bargaining but instead earn at least the second-highest salary in the nation based on provisions in the city charter.

Yet, the most powerful portion of the "Fix Muni Now" legislation doesn't deal with money. If it were to pass, drivers could well earn just as much or more than they do now -- but during the give and take of collective bargaining, TWU employees may be compelled to modify or discard a number of archaic, unproductive "work rules" which bind Muni's hands and cost the city millions.

The permit for this commercial, however, only cost $3,000. That's exactly twice as much as it'd cost to do the same shoot in Los Angeles -- but, hey, who's going to film a commercial about L.A.'s bus system?

Follow us on Twitter at @TheSnitchSF and @SFWeekly