HomeMy WebLinkAboutTransportation Agency, FY 2014-15 DEPARTMENTAL BUDGET REVIEWS 4/14/2014
DEPARTMENTAL BUDGET REVIEWS 2014-15
TRANSPORTATION AGENCY
April 14, 2014
Transportation Agency (ss)
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There being no objections, the Committee was called back to order at 11:29 a.m., and
proceeded as follows:
Transportation Agency
Honorable Mason K. Chock, Sr.
Honorable Ross Kagawa
Honorable JoAnn A. Yukimura (present at 11:31 a.m.)
Honorable Jay Furfaro, Council Chair
Excused: Honorable Tim Bynum
Honorable Gary L. Hooser
Honorable Mel Rapozo
Chair Furfaro: We are back from recess and we will be starting
the presentation of the Transportation Department. The rules are suspended and I will go
ahead and ask Transportation...all three of you can come up at once. We would like you to
make your presentation and we will hold all questions until we have two members that will
be right back. You will have the floor, Celia.
There being no objections, the rules were suspended.
CELIA M. MAHIKOA, Executive on Transportation: Thank you Chair.
We have two other representatives from the Agency here today.
KALAWAIA LEE, Program Specialist III: Kalawaia Lee for the record,
Program Specialist III.
ROBYN NAKATA, Accountant II: Robyn Nakata for the record, Accountant
II.
Chair Furfaro: Okay.
Ms. Mahikoa: We want to thank you for the opportunity to be
here today and to discuss our budget request for this year. Just to start out, we wanted to
share our mission. At the Kauai Bus is providing the Kaua`i community accessible
transportation services with professionalism and the Aloha spirit. We are fully dedicated to
doing that for each individual that we serve each day. The successes and achievements
that we wanted to share with you for this day...the first one was the fact that we were able
to implement additional mainline service to address the on-going overcrowding that we
have had on several of our routes. This on-going crowding was causing some occasional
denials of passengers in the past which was definitely not something that we would want to
be doing at any time. However because of the lack of additional options available when
these routes would reach certain locations, they were overcrowded and we were unable to
provide service at that point. However because of the additional funding that was provided
in this Fiscal Year, we were able to implement two additional runs coming in in the
morning from Kaumakani to Lihu`e. We implemented that last month and that has
certainly relieved the overcrowding on those runs for commuters and school commuters and
others coming in in the morning, high demand times. Additionally there was one run
headed north in the morning, early in the morning that was also encountering similar
situations that we implemented an additional run that is leaving Kaua`i Community
College at 5:55 a.m. which assists with the overcrowding that was occurring there also.
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Another success and achievement that we have had for this year is the new buses that were
received. 20 new buses were received. We had 20 buses come in of which 5 are fourteen
passenger para transit buses. 15 were the fixed route buses, mid-size and larger-sized fixed
route buses that were placed in service. The larger fixed route buses were purchased with a
bike rack that contains three slots so that we are now able to accommodate three bicycles
on those vehicles which definitely helps when we pull up to a bus stop and there are
additional individuals there. Typically the unfortunate thing is that if there are not enough
slots, they would have to wait for the next bus or lock their bike up at the stop there. We
are hoping that this will allow that to happen much less often, where people will be able to
get around and this will encourage more people to use bikes on Kaua`i as well as transit.
As far as our small equipment, repair and maintenance section, over the past year, we have
conducted 316 equipment repairs. Turnaround time remains consistent at approximately
50% of repairs being completed within a week. About 25% of them being completed within
three days. This is facilitating greater potential productivity for the equipment operators,
which we find certainly a high priority ensuring that we are repairing the equipment
promptly so that the operators are able to maintain the areas that they need to. An
additional success that we had this year was that we have been receiving regularly Federal
grants in the past that have funded the new vehicles, vehicle replacements. We have been
regularly receiving historically it has been about $500,000 per year we have been receiving
operational funds from Federal Transit Administration as well. Additionally, with these
grants the operations ones typically require 50% local match and the capital grants require
a 20% local match, which we address through the General fund and Highway Fund
currently. As far as our fleet management, which is closely tied to the need to regularly
replace the buses to keep them in a state of good repair. The Federally-designated useful
life of transit vehicles of the size that we operate is currently five years or 150,000 miles.
Due to the practice of regularly complying with the manufacturer's recommended
maintenance schedules, most vehicles in our fleet are able to be kept in service until at
least 300,000 miles, has been the practice. We anticipate proceeding with the purchase of
20 additional vehicles in the very near future and working with Purchasing on the bid right
now. We anticipate additional funds being made available within the next year. That all
depends upon the Federal Transit Administration awarding those funds. We plan to
include several larger-capacity buses with the goal of increasing the efficiency of the fleet.
We have a fleet replacement schedule that we have provided in our presentation as well. It
shows our plan over the next five years as to fleet replacements and the funding that will be
recommended for or required in order to conduct the fleet replacement to keep our fleet in a
state of good repair. Another topic we have service demand that I wanted to share with
you. We have provided a chart here showing the continued increase in fixed-route and para
transit ridership each year. Fiscal Year 2013 was minimal in growth due to no further
investments in transit service being made during that period. Frequency of passengers
denied boarding remained consistent until last month when we implemented the additional
service specifically to address that challenge that we had.
As far as our goals and objectives for this current fiscal year, a major objective is the
construction of the bus stops that we discussed during the CIP discussion with you. We
originally set up the eight bus stops and initiating construction of one volunteer-built bus
shelter. We also...I will go into that and explain that and then I will go to the next goal
that we had for this year. Our fixed-route buses currently provide service at 119 stops. Of
these 88 are currently without some form of shelter or adjacent to a bus stop and our
commitment to have all bus stops sheltered by the year 2020, we continue the management
and design and engineering contract that was originally scheduled to provide plans and
permitting for 49 bus stop passenger shelters by May 2013, but a delay of one year was
accepted in order for us to provide community meetings so we could get valuable
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community input, as well as addressing some of the concerns about the design of them and
the clearance that was provided on them, that was given to us through the Disability and
Communication Access Board to better address the locations that we were proposing within
that contract. So in order to address those sufficiently, we extended the contract. We are
looking at being able to right now it is looking like nine...is that right? We are going into
contract for nine hopefully within the next month or two and proceeding with construction.
Our goal was initially to initiate construction of one volunteer-built bus stop shelter as we
entered into further discussion and had individuals interested in supporting us in this
endeavor, we were able to amend the scope of the project to where now we are asking
volunteer groups to assist us with assembling each of them, each of the bus stops so there
will be volunteer hands involved at each location in the first phase of the bus stop
construction.
A second goal that we had for this current fiscal year is revenue structure
refinement. One part of that was through implementing the bulk rate discount bus pass
agreement with Kaua`i Community College which we were able to successfully do. We
entered into a two-year agreement with them, which the agreement currently requires $20
payment by each registering student and allows them unlimited use of the public transit
system during that semester. The revenue generated by the program was $28,640 for the
fall semester and $25,080 for the spring 2014 semester. Additionally, as far as our revenue
structure refinement goes, we had the bus pass price increase approved when we were in
budget negotiations for last year which increases our bus pass prices...the monthly pass
price by $5, first increase of July of last year and a second increase scheduled for this July
that is going to occur and there is an additional increase coming up July 1, 2015 for another
$5 per month. We also continue researching requirements, common practices within the
transit industry to determine potential improvements to the existing fare and bus pass
policy. Once we are completed with that a proposal for additional changes to the fare
structure for fixed route and para transit bus service will be submitted for consideration.
We provided a chart that shows the steady increases in revenue that shows our revenue has
probably quintupled up the past ten years because of the increases in ridership and
increase in investment in public transit and the public's increased demands for the service.
Additionally we had set a goal to have a short range transit plan initiated this year.
Unfortunately we have not been able to get the funds yet. We are still in discussions with
the funding source on that. So we are hoping to be able to proceed with that in the near
future. As far as our upcoming goals and objectives, again our primary one is to get the bus
stop passenger shelters completed. So I had gone into some discussion with you on the
prior section about that. Additionally, we have requested through the Legislature $600,000
to assist us with this as well. So we are hoping to be able to proceed with construction of an
additional 40 above and beyond the nine that we currently have funded through the CIP.
So if the contract that we have for the design and engineering of bus stops is for 49
locations right now if we are able to get the additional CIP funding we are requesting for
next year, as well as the $600,000 from the Legislature by the end of 2015, we should be
able to complete 49 bus shelters constructed on the island. For next fiscal year our goals
are also to provide additional holiday service. We do acknowledge the fact that people do
not stop moving around simply because it is a holiday, particularly here. We have the
visitor industry is a very strong employer here and we in the past have been closed on
Thanksgiving Day, Christmas Day, and New Year's Day, and for this year we are proposing
to be able to address the needs of the community better by providing service on those days.
So on Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year's starting with the year 2014, New Year's
2015 we are going to be adding holiday and weekend scheduled service on those days.
Additionally we are looking at making bus schedule improvements. Steady increase in
traffic and other frequent roadway delays have negatively impacted our bus riders. The
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existing alignment of our mainline and shuttle route connections was established probably
ten years ago when roadways were much less congested. Things have changed in those
years. So we have been doing some fine-tuning to address that. What we are planning to
do is do an overhaul to address the ongoing delays of certain areas. The issues that certain
riders have with connections, the missed connections, and we are looking at trying to
strategize a better layout on scheduling to better serve the community. So that is what we
have planned. Ultimately hoping to take it that missed connections are taken down to zero.
That covers our goals and objectives for this upcoming year and we can go into
discussion on our budget. The next three pages within the budget presentation are our
General Fund budget comparative showing Fiscal Year 2014 versus 2015. Then it has the
Highway Funds budget and we have a combined one, which I am going to be discussing just
generally what has contributed to the changes from last fiscal year to this fiscal year.
Excuse me. So there are several significant factors that influence the need to increase the
Agency's budget requests this year. First of all the salaries and wages, you will see overall
has an increase of $605,000 of which is accounted for through Collective Bargaining
increases, the additional bus service that we have implemented this year, which was to
address overcrowded routes, the addition of the three holidays, that is also included in
those line items, as well as the fact that we have been operating with a little bit of Section
5311 grant operating fund carryover up until this fiscal year. This fiscal year marks where
we have caught up with all of the existing awards and now we are exclusively spending out
of current awards. So there is no carryover funds available. Additionally the benefits line
has increased by $127,000 and those are simply a function of the salaries and wages that
would be the social security, OPEB, and retirement. Utilities have not changed. The
vehicle and equipment line item, there was an increase of $17,500. With that we have
asked for additional funds to serve as 20% match for the grant that we were recently
awarded, which is going to allow our repair shop to purchase a portable lift, an AC service
unit, and a service vehicle to accommodate the utility worker who needs to go out and
service the bus stops and make sure that they are maintained well for the public. As far as
operations, the overall operations category there is a reduction in the volume in the large-
cost vehicle repairs and maintenance, which is why you see the reduction there and we are
anticipating that because of all the new vehicles being added to the fleet replacing the very
old ones, that we should see some of a reduction in the repairs expenses on those.
Therefore, we have reduced that line item. I have provided some information regarding the
position changes that occurred within our Agency over the past year. We are asking for
three new on-call driver positions in the upcoming fiscal year. What that does the on-call
driver positions are basically a pool from which we draw from to fill in partial shifts or
when we do not have sufficient coverage for the scheduled shift for our drivers. One thing
that occurs and that we are fully committed to doing is ensuring that absences will not
affect service to the public or will minimally affect service to the public. So if we have
drivers calling in sick, there is...so there is no option other than locating someone to cover
that shift. So we have a couple of floater positions, full-time floaters that are called to do
that if they do not have a prior assignment and if not, we use our on-call driver pool to come
in and fill in those prior to going to having to request overtime from our full-time drivers.
That is the reason why we are asking for additional on-call drivers positions. The changes
that we have had that we are asking for is having two bus driver positions reallocated from
on-call to full-time additionally. In doing that what we are doing is taking existing parts of
shifts or several on-call driver shifts and merging them into a full-time driver shift. That is
to avoid having on-call drivers getting up to working 30 something, almost 40 hours a week.
That is not something that we would want to continue. We have on-call driver positions
over the past year. We had our clerk dispatcher group needing additional support and
therefore, we had over the past year had an on-call van driver position vacancy that we had
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reallocated to part-time clerk dispatcher to help support our dispatcher team. We had
reallocated Accountant I to Accountant II in order to fulfill operational needs at this point.
As far as vacancies we currently have, we have based on our presentation here, we had
stated that we had plans to fill the vacant bus driver on-call bus driver positions on April
16th and we are grateful for excellent support from HR to fill that as of April 1st. So we have
three new gentlemen who have joined our team who are now currently in train and helping
to lighten the need to go to overtime with full-time drivers. We also have a Departmental
Transportation Coordinator position right now that we are currently looking at reassessing
the needs of the operation and what would be the best use of that position. Instead of just
simply refilling it, we are trying to see where the missing bases are where we have
uncovered bases to be able to better have our organizational structures. Beyond that I have
provided the information regarding contractual positions that has been requested. As far
as succession planning for our Agency, there are no impending employee retirements or
departures that have been communicated to management. Our practice is to ensure
sufficient backup is available at any time to ensure that absences will not result in jobs not
getting done. So that is about all I have for this morning. If anyone has any questions.
Chair Furfaro: First of all, thank you for another year of
running a very successful operation. I really want to thank you and your staff for doing a
really good job there. It costs us $4.4 million a year to run the bus. But it really addresses
a lot of needs on the island that could be more complicated and more costly for repair,
maintenance, capital improvements, than anybody even dreams of than what we invest
here. I have to say one thing I am concerned about I think future expansion of the bus will
require a very thorough evaluation of our costs per rider index. That means on the
scheduled shifts that we have that have very low-ridership, it would not be my motive to
cut that money out of your budget, but it would be my motive to ask you to re-evaluate
where you can direct those costs to first support the higher-demand areas? I have to tell
you, I am very pleased with the report that you and Nadine put together for me and gave
me some time to identify, but we do have seven troubled routes, routes that are in the
schedule that are averaging a low of 1.7 riders to a high of 2.9, which gives us a cost index
per rider of about $29.40. That money has to be better used to the areas that you say where
you have overcrowding and so forth. I am going to send over a memorandum to you,
identifying those shuttles. I have one Hanalei evening ridership. I have one Kekaha, one
Koloa shuttle, one Kapahi shuttle and one Lihu`e shuttle and I have to tell you the 15
minutes between the Lihu`e lunch time /week day shuttle, there is 15 minutes between the
two riderships, but there is over $9,100 dedicated to that extra 15-minute interval. That
comes to a total of$94,300 and can you evaluate a way to shift the $94,000 towards bigger-
demand shuttles? Bigger-demand ridership? Other than that, I have read your
presentation and I have looked at your budget and I certainly just want to say that is the
next step for me and I compliment you on your operation. I have no other questions for you.
I just want you to look at those riderships that have 1.7 riders and the costs are pretty high.
So there are seven routes like that and I will send you that in a follow-up.
Ms. Mahikoa: Thank you.
Chair Furfaro: Mr. Chock.
Mr. Chock: Thank you, Chair. Thank you for your
presentation, Celia. I have two questions. The first question I had was about the small
equipment...now that you folks have taken over, can you explain what that entails? What
kind of small equipment maintenance and repairs are you folks concentrating on? I am just
unaware of what they are.
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Ms. Mahikoa: What we have been asked to do is take care of
basically all the small equipment within the County which is primarily Parks and
Recreation and Public Works, weed whackers, hedge-trimmers, anything that is four
cylinders and below is what we have been asked to maintain and repair. So we have two
mechanics that focus on those repairs.
Mr. Chock: This is a cross-departmental way of saving
money as well?
Ms. Mahikoa: Yes.
Mr. Chock: That is good. Now I know Kaleo is no longer in
your Department. Have you filled that position? Okay. That is accounted for this budget
as well?
Ms. Mahikoa: Yes, that position was filled and now we need to
fill it with the individual who took that position.
Mr. Chock: Interesting when I look at the other budgets that
I have seen so far, the utilities have gone up, but in your Department it has practically
stayed the same. I am particularly looking at electricity and I know the scale is different in
Public Works, yours stayed the same and Public Works is $130,000 more and to understand
a specific reason why?
Ms. Mahikoa: Why we are not increasing?
Mr. Chock: Yes.
Ms. Mahikoa: Honestly we have not seen an increase this year
thus far and we are committed to taking steps to actually reduce the amount of electricity
that we use, whether that is just turning on half of the lights we have or whatever
measures we have. We recently had our air conditioning for our building switched out and
hoping that lend its own efficiencies electricity-use wise.
Mr. Chock: Do you have a set of guidelines? I am wondering
since the savings is there for you folks why that cannot be duplicated in other Departments,
if you might be on to something that we need to share with others as well? If you do not, I
am just asking.
Ms. Mahikoa: Kalawaia is our representative with the Green
Team and representing our efforts at becoming more energy-efficient. So if you could share
some.
Mr. Lee: To answer your question specifically we do not
have a set of guidelines or standards that we follow. We would use what we call "best
practices" for utilization of our resources. So whenever we are not in a room we make sure
we turn off the lights and keep the temperature on our thermometer set at a pre-
determined setting and we are almost a 24-hour facility and to keep our utility cost baseline
of last year is a step in the right direction. As Celia mentioned I am part of the staff-level
Green Team and take advice from the guys from OED Sustainability Workers, Ben Sullivan
and Glenn Sato, to be able to keep our operational costs down.
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Mr. Chock: Thank you. It just says something to me and I
might ask when we have call-backs for some of the other Departments to take a look at
that, whatever we can save would be important. Then under that small equipment budget,
I noticed that Workers' compensation went from $2,000 to increase of$18,000 if you could
explain a little bit of that as well.
Ms. Mahikoa: We unfortunately had a ...
Mr. Chock: Page 221.
Ms. Mahikoa: Thank you. We had an unfortunate situation
with one of the two mechanics in that division that we are hoping we will have resolved at
some point. We have been working closely with HR and Risk Management, as well as our
Workers' compensation insurance provider to try and get that situation resolved.
Mr. Chock: So just so I understand, how do we anticipate
this...maybe this is a question for Steve, but every year we create a budget and we need to
know foreseeable Workers' compensation and I am wondering how that is spread across the
other budgets as well? I see $20,000 again next year and that has been taken care of and I
am sure that is something that we might take a look at in the future. Is there a specific
index that is used?
Ms. Mahikoa: What we have been using is observing the
current situation and anticipating whether or not we believe it is going to be closed within a
reasonable amount of time. This one unfortunately has gone on a while and we choose to
budget for it rather than to not and not have it resolved and be in dire financial straits
trying to cover the expense of this situation, if it is not resolved in the near-future.
Mr. Chock: Okay. I understand. Chair, one last question,
regarding Transportation. I know that Auto said that they track their own gasoline,
monitor their own gasoline and Transportation does it separately. How do you folks
account for that?
Ms. Mahikoa: How do we account for gasoline use?
Mr. Chock: That is correct. Fuel use.
Ms. Mahikoa: If you are looking at as far as confirming
transactions and things of that sort, we require every driver to fuel...as long as their vehicle
is three quarter tank or less at the end of their route or their shift they are required to
refuel and bring in their signing and turning in their receipts with our dispatch team. We
have a checklist of all of the items that need to be turned in at the end of the shift and that
is one of the items. Those are thoroughly reconciled by Robyn each month. All of the
transactions occur at Kaua`i Automated Fuels. The State has a contract with Kaua`i
Automated Fuels because of the hours of our operation, we need to utilize their facility
regularly. So there is a regular reconciliation of the fuel invoices that come in each month
and the invoices do show usage as well. It shows the detail of what appears on each receipt
and each transaction.
Mr. Chock: So Kauai Automated Fuel Systems is used solely
for Transportation, not any of the baseyards?
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Ms. Mahikoa: You are saying like for small equipment, if they
need in order to test equipment?
Mr. Chock: I was thinking about buses since that is probably
your highest consumption, Automated Fuels, for Transportation?
Ms. Mahikoa: For buses exclusively there, yes.
Chair Furfaro: Before I pass this on, Kalawaia, how long have
you been a member of the Green Team?
Mr. Lee: Chair, since its inception.
Chair Furfaro: What have you folks set for a goal? Nobody
wants to respond to me on this, like every time I ask the question it is like I am the plague.
What is the goal?
Mr. Lee: Chair, of the staff-level Green Team we set a
series of goals annually. In the past year we covered a couple of Earth Day events, photo
contests. The goal for our group is to try to derive meaningful results on the County-level
for greening our environment. That can cover from our utilization of our different resources
that we currently have, cutting costs with how we procure things. So we have looked at
paper reduction and looked at how we can make our physical environments and offices
more comfortable without expending more resources?
Chair Furfaro: How about specifically to kilowatt hours? I am
interested in that because I am going to introduce a 2% cut in kilowatt equals $94,139
because I have done my homework as a hotelier, but do you have that kind of goal-setting?
What is the goal for kilowatt reduction and I am picking on you because you have no
increase in your utilities. You have done a good job.
Mr. Lee: I wish I had the answer for you and I do not want
to be like the others and treat you like the plague, but maybe Ben Sullivan can better
answer that question.
Chair Furfaro: Please take the message back that we need a
solid goal from the Green Team because I might mandate one in the budget reviews.
Mr. Lee: I will.
Chair Furfaro: Mr. Kagawa.
Mr. Kagawa: Thank you. I just want to clarify some of the
totals since we are in budget. So for the General Fund and Highway Fund for
Administration, the total budget is $1.135 million. For operations, if I add the General
Fund and Highway Fund it is $6.055 million. For the small equipment it is $258,000 out of
the General Fund. So if I add that up roughly I come up with a total budget, if you add
General Fund and Highway Fund for the buses about $7.5 million?
Ms. Mahikoa: Yes.
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Mr. Kagawa: Okay. Because I heard like $4.4 million and I
was confused as to what is the true total? So about $7.5 million is the total. Second
question, along the lines of Chair Furfaro is how do we compare as far as services from last
year? Did we increase routes? Or increase our operations from over last year or are we
kind of status quo?
Ms. Mahikoa: The only service change we made from last fiscal
year to this fiscal year given $71,000 to specifically address the overcrowding and adding
Kaumakani to Lihu`e and Lihu`e to Hanalei route additions.
Mr. Kagawa: I heard...and this goes back to how do we expand
and fit the needs? I have heard...like, say, a Hanapepe resident wants to get every day to
work from Hanapepe to the Hyatt, is there a route that they can take in the morning and
afternoon? That would accommodate their work schedule? How would that work? Would
that entail dropping off at a certain place and a transfer?
Ms. Mahikoa: Yes. It would take them catching from
Hanapepe, you are looking at if they live in the Heights, come down to the stop on the
highway and catch the route 100 to the Kalaheo Neighborhood Center and from there they
would get a connecting bus, the Koloa shuttle and we have a stop at the Hyatt.
Mr. Kagawa: There are ways, they just have to do the proper
planning ahead of time. I like that. Some of those are available. What they are telling me,
I think, what that one person told me was that I guess the current does not allow him to get
to work at 7:00 a.m. Then we go back to the question is can it fit everyone? Right now it is
not a taxi service where we can accommodate one or two people. We are trying to fit the
shoe to the need and that is going to take some time and studying.
Chair Furfaro: Before you answer Mr. Kagawa, the webcast is
frozen. We have to take a break here. It is just stuck on the screen.
Mr. Kagawa: You got it.
There being no objections, the Committee recessed at 10:41 a.m.
There being no objections, the Committee was called back to order at 10:41 a.m. and
proceeded as follows:
Chair Furfaro: Okay. We are back here with our broadcast and
captioning. Thank you Mr. Kagawa for catching...I was referring to the money in the
General Fund and not the money in the Highway Fund. But also Celia, we do not see a
summary of the grant money. So could you send us over a summary? Because we are all
worried about losing grant money. Mr. Kagawa, you have the floor.
Mr. Kagawa: Thank you. Just a couple more questions. I
thank...commend you for following up with Senator Hirono and her requests for us to apply
for some possible free buses from the Federal government that will be cleaner, I guess,
burning biofuel. How is that going? We still have not gotten any word about our prospects
of getting those free buses.
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Ms. Mahikoa: The request from Senator Hirono's Office was
basically asking for what areas that Kaua`i County would need her support, for what our
needs are, our anticipated needs? Typically, this is at least as far as...I am not all of that
knowledgeable with the entire process, but this seems like the first step in a process of
putting support behind certain initiatives that Kaua`i County is looking at. They are
assembling what the interests are and what the needs are for the County that are
upcoming. So with that, we saw it as with the talks and discussions, the work that we are
doing with Public Works, with Kekaha, with the landfill and looking at the potential of
compressed natural gas on Kaua`i, we saw this as certainly something that would want to
be on the scope with at the Federal level because they have been providing support on
transit and in particular clean energy initiatives and if we can get to the point that we can
proceed with purchases of those on the condition of course that there is a good, consistent
fuel supply that is able to be established here. That is what we are hoping for. So this was
kind of getting our foot in the door on that initiative.
Mr. Kagawa: Well, I think the proposal that Casey Watabu is
working on is...the landfill, grow the grass and burn it and turn it into...I do not think it is
algae, but the biofuel. What kind of grass do you call that grows along the roadside? It is
like there will be actually growing those weeds or whatever and burning it into fuel that
could be used. So I guess to look at all options. A lot of times we hear that oh, this is done
here and there, but to see it to fruition, I think, any time we can go cleaner, and it even
matches the cost of diesel, it is a better option. Because it is cleaner, and we could possibly
get the buses 100% free from the Federal government and be a model for our residents that
cleaner gases or fuels would be another option for our users. I would like to see the County
be the leader with our transportation system and show the island that we do not have to
only burn fossil fuel to get around. Thank you for sharing your interest in that and I hope
we can continue work to improve the bus system. I was planning to actually spend some
time with Kalawaia and seeing how we can...how I can better understand the
Transportation Agency. I want to support it and help in any way that can I to make it as
efficient as possible. Thank you. Thank you, Chair.
Chair Furfaro: My question about the grants, not to worry,
Ashley has shared with me what the Administration has sent over. We have all 22 of your
grants isolated separately on Transportation. JoAnn. Thank you. We will break at 12:45
p.m.
Ms. Yukimura: Thank you for your good work. Without really
good management, the bus would not be as successful as it is today and I know it is a lot of
hard work. On your increased capacity, the 15 fixed route buses...how many riders? What
ridership capacity is that?
Ms. Mahikoa: As far as the capacity on each vehicle you are
looking at?
Ms. Yukimura: Does it vary?
Ms. Mahikoa: I will let Kalawaia respond.
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Mr. Lee: We have two types of vehicles a 31-passenger
and 21-passenger.
Ms. Yukimura: You talked about getting a larger bus at some
point for greater efficiencies and that will have how many passengers?
Mr. Lee: Councilwoman we have not yet identified the
need of that capacity vehicle right now. We are getting information about what is available
and cost estimates on those types of vehicles.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. Great.
Chair Furfaro: The largest vehicle that would fit our road is 54-
passenger.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. I am sure there are a lot of considerations
in terms of the places your buses have to go, etc. So 54 is the largest and thank you and
congratulations for getting those three bike racks. Is that happening and now fewer people
are throwing their bikes into the bushes at the bus stops?
Ms. Mahikoa: We do not have reported documentation on it.
However, yes would do see vehicles with three on it, meaning if it was a 2-bicycle vehicle
that pulled up to the stop that one person would need to.
Ms. Yukimura: I know the bike riders on your capacity routes
were really troubled because they could not get on with your bikes. So thank you for that.
On your goal this year, which I guess is going to overflow into next year, completing
construction of 8 bus shelters and one volunteer-built bus shelter. Did I get clear you are
going to use volunteers on all eight?
Ms. Mahikoa: Actually that was our original goal coming into
Fiscal Year 2014. That was modified at the point of putting the construction contract
together and we are now able to do nine and we have modified the scope to make it where
the construction will provide the infrastructure part of it and the actual assembly of the
shelter itself will be done by volunteer groups all nine of them, yes.
Ms. Yukimura: So that should cut down on the per shelter cost
at least for these nine? Because you are using volunteers?
Ms. Mahikoa: It will cut down on the costs. Unfortunately it is
on more of the simple phase of the work.
Ms. Yukimura: That is okay.
Ms. Mahikoa: So it will somewhat to me a lot of the value
comes in the hands-on of the community on these shelters as well.
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Ms. Yukimura: And the ownership that comes along with it that
will hopefully discourage graffiti and things like that, too. I do not know, but I hope so. On
your revenue structure refinement, which is accomplished through your KCC bulk pass
program, do you know how many students are using the pass? Is there any way to tell?
Ms. Mahikoa: I plan to work with KCC to get actual numbers,
but as of right now we do not have actual data.
Ms. Yukimura: Even KCC might have a hard time knowing, too.
Ms. Mahikoa: Right.
Ms. Yukimura: Once we get smart cards you could identify the
KCC cards conceivably and know how many times they are used, right? At least you could
track it that way on your mid-range plan, which has not got off the ground yet...where is it?
Where is that?
Ms. Mahikoa: Was that the short-range transit plan?
Ms. Yukimura: Short-range transit plan. Thank you.
Ms. Mahikoa: That is at the bottom of page 5 on our
presentation.
Ms. Yukimura: Thank you. You said that we had trouble with
the...due to a delay in availability of grant funds...
Ms. Mahikoa: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Whose grant? The State Department of
Transportation?
Ms. Mahikoa: Yes. We were in discussion with the Statewide
Transportation Planning Office, who receives all of the grant funds that we get through the
Federal Transit Administration and they pass it to us as subgrantees and we have been in
discussion with them as far as what they have available.
Ms. Yukimura: And they do not have anything available?
Ms. Mahikoa: We do not know if they have any available. I
believe they do, but being able to define an amount and to be able to get it authorized and
forwarded for our use for this purpose, that process is what we are working on right now.
Ms. Yukimura: Oh, I see. So we have to make a clear request
and we have not done that yet?
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Ms. Mahikoa: I have entered the request with their Office. So
they are working on identifying the funding availability.
Ms. Yukimura: We requested how much? $250,000 was our
match?
Ms. Mahikoa: Our match was $33,500 and therefore it was four
times that. $130,000.
Ms. Yukimura: Yes, about $130,000.
Ms. Mahikoa: $130,000 with 20% match would be our $33,500,
I believe.
Ms. Yukimura: So they have not been able to find $130,000 in
Federal funds coming through?
Ms. Mahikoa: I would not say they have not been able to locate
any. It is just a matter of...
Ms. Yukimura: Processing.
Ms. Mahikoa: I believe that is where it is at.
Ms. Yukimura: How long has this taken?
Ms. Mahikoa: It has been several months. I am in contact with
them regularly. I will continue to pursue it with them.
Ms. Yukimura: Then once you get it, how long do you anticipate
taking to do it?
Ms. Mahikoa: I would not want this contract to go more than
one year. So we would specifically scope it to be accomplished within one year.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay and you cannot proceed with procurement
of services until you have the funds identified and in-hand?
Ms. Mahikoa: Right.
Ms. Yukimura: So you have not gone out yet? Okay. Baseyard
expansion. I do not see anything in here about that and I just wondered what the status is
since I understood that was the bottleneck?
Ms. Mahikoa: The baseyard expansion, the actual identification
of alternate locations and a method of having them implemented was going to be one of the
primary goals of the short-range transit plan. So that was conditional in there for now,
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because we currently have a need for additional space, Public Works has been very
generous in allowing us some space in the lot that they have near the Airport. That has
been our holdover for now, until we are able to identify alternate locations that are
strategically located to help us reduce operating costs.
Ms. Yukimura: Where is the additional space we got? You said
by the Airport?
Ms. Mahikoa: The Honsador lot.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. That is convenient. It is not too far. That
is creative and then lastly now that those crowded routes have been relieved somewhat
with the addition of the new buses and on those routes...are you effectively going about
every half hour?
Ms. Mahikoa: That is basically what we have done. We have
added half-hour increments to the overcrowded routes.
Ms. Yukimura: I want to point out to my fellow Councilmembers,
you are essentially doubling the capacity of the route? Because instead of coming every
hour, you are coming now twice an hour.
Chair Furfaro: At the same time, you are doubling the costs.
Ms. Yukimura: Yes. But it is a much cheaper way of increasing
the capacity of the highways than building new roads. Much, much cheaper: So now that
those problem areas are addressed, are there any areas that stand out in terms of need or
outstanding ridership?
Ms. Mahikoa: There are several areas that the public shares
with us that they would like additional service. There are certain areas right now that we
do not serve that have been regularly requesting service. There is Hanapepe Heights that
we do not go to right now. There is Wailua Homesteads that has very minimal service right
now. The frequency of routes. Some are asking for more frequent routes on the weekends,
holidays, later-service on the weekend as well. Those are the requests that we get regularly
from the public.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. I guess I have one more question. I think
in discussions about the State's long-range transportation plan there was surfaced this idea
we might be able to have a State project along the main highways to do our transit...our
shelters along the State highway. Is that something that your Agency can propose or
request?
Ms. Mahikoa: We can look into it. For asking them to address
it as a separate project is what you are saying?
Ms. Yukimura: Yes.
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Ms. Mahikoa: We can check with them and see if they are
willing, certainly.
Ms. Yukimura: Because that is one way that they could make
the State highway system more transit-friendly. Is there a way of identifying those bus
stops and the costs? You folks have done a lot of groundwork already in terms of ballpark
costs.
Ms. Mahikoa: Because we are in the middle of the bus stop
improvement project right now, I would want to make sure there is no redundancy in that.
Ms. Yukimura: Right.
Ms. Mahikoa: The fact that the Legislature is currently looking
at assisting us with...I believe quite of few of the ones that we are looking at right now are
on the highway, is that right?
Ms. Yukimura: Could you let us know what ones on the highway
are included in the request before the Legislature? Can we get that, staff? Hello, staff?
Can we get that, please? Thank you and then also whatever other transit stops are on the
highway that you need, besides the ones that are included in the request? We should hear
about the request shortly though, yes? The State will be in decision-making soon. I think
May 1st is the deadline for adjournment. Okay. Very good. Thank you.
Chair Furfaro: We have four minutes before lunch. Mr. Chock?
No? Any follow-up? Mr. Kagawa? To the Transportation Department, I just want to say
thank you very much for a very complete presentation. Obviously there is a lot of interest
in collaboration and partnership here, and I know you feel that there is a lot of opportunity
out there and it requires you to be very focused. I think JoAnn pointed out some of the
initiatives that she would like you to take with State. On that note, we do not have a call-
back for you, and I thank you very much for your time. Kalawaia, I just wanted to say that
we are looking for some energy reductions if you could bring that message back, but
congratulations on no increases for yourself. We are in recess for lunch. Be back at 1:45
p.m.
There being no objections, the Committee recessed at 12:42 p.m.