Monday, Oct. 5 2009 @ 11:35AM
 |
| Jim Herd |
| Whoosh! There goes your parking revenue! |
As first
reported on Streetsblog and then this morning in the
Chronicle, Mayor Gavin Newsom has made clear that he's no fan of alleviating Muni's revenue headaches by extending parking meter hours. Muni's pledge to study the merits of extended parking meter hours was one of the
only takeaways for progressives during the
painful Muni budget dustup from earlier this year; let Newsom's current behavior be a warning to anyone else who sees fit to shake on a deal when the other party merely pledges to "
commit to analyzing" your suggestions.
Muni spokesman Judson True noted that the parking analysis is still weeks away from being complete, so it's hardly clear that Newsom even bothered to read the draft version floating around ("Of
course he didn't," said one rankled City Hall insider, who accused Newsom of "cute populism."). The mayor, it seems, is channeling the Groucho Marx character Professor Quincy Wagstaff, who sang "
Whatever it is, I'm against it."
If you're scoring at home, by the way, this marks game, set, and match for Newsom in the Muni budget battle. The Municipal Transportation Agency board -- every member of which is appointed by the mayor, not coincidentally -- in May
proposed a budget that slashed services while charging more for riders and did nothing to prevent other departments from pillaging Muni funds. Talk of rejecting that budget by the board of supervisors' progressives then
led to a compromise that saved $10.3 million -- in a budget exceeding $760 million -- and extracted the aforementioned pledge to "commit to analyzing" the merits of longer parking meter hours.
Supervisor John Avalos --
who refused to drop the idea of rejecting Muni's budget, even after Board President David Chiu signed off on the compromise -- told
SF Weekly that he believes Muni has lived up to its promise. They said they'd look into Avalos' brainchild of longer parking meter hours, and, lo, they did. Now Newsom has, in essence, stated that whatever it is, he's against it (
even if you've changed it or condensed it, he's against it). And since every member of the MTA board is, again, appointed by Newsom, it'd be a jaw-dropping turn of events for the board to go against the mayor's explicit wishes and greenlight extended parking meter hours.
And yet, Muni is -- surprise, surprise, surprise -- facing a multi-million dollar operating deficit. Folks in City Hall
SF Weekly spoke to expect this situation to result in less pleasant -- and potentially more costly -- Muni rides for the non-driving public.