Audit Says S.F. Transit System Could Save $3 Million a Year by Managing Employees Better. San Francisco's Municipal Transportation Agency could save at least $3 million a year by eliminating driver-friendly work rules and reining in overtime, according to an audit released May 11 by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors' budget analyst.
An unusually high level of operator absenteeism is expensive and creates unreliable service at San Francisco's financially flailing transit agency, the audit found.
Under the current rules, drivers have a financial incentive to call in sick and skip a regularly scheduled day because they can still work overtime and earn time and a half, even if they have not worked 40 hours that week, according to the audit.
The rate of unscheduled absenteeism for San Francisco's operators is 15 percent, compared with 11 percent in Philadelphia, 6 percent in Los Angeles and 4 percent in Seattle, the audit found.
The audit comes three days after the agency cut service by 10 percent to save an estimated $29 million a year. The agency, with a proposed annual operating budget next year of $750 million, already has raised transit fares and parking fees to help balance the books.
The auditor recommends that when management negotiates its next contract with the Transport Workers Union, it curb overtime costs by forcing operators to work 40-hour workweeks before they can earn overtime. The audit also recommends that Muni save $608,625 per year by not paying the salaries of six of the seven operators who work full-time on union duties.
Muni management's inability to use part-time drivers also caught the attention of auditors. Because peak demand for service is during the morning and evening commutes, overtime is used to keep full-time operators on the clock to cover both rush-hour periods. Many drivers, meanwhile, are pulled off the road during off-peak hours and put on paid, nonproductive standby. Standby time, ranging from a few minutes to six hours, is built into 49 percent of Muni's 1,278 regularly scheduled weekday runs. (Source: San Francisco Chronicle, May 12.)
Cal-Tax recommendation: City officials should take the auditor's recommendations, and should take control of their employees in order to deliver better service to residents at the same or lower cost. Since transit workers' have a generous pay provision written into the City Charter, voters should support a proposed ballot measure that would remove this provision and ensure that management regains more power when bargaining future employment contracts with the transit workers.
Cal-TaxReports, May 17, 2010
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