Active Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Meeting - January 29, 2020
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Active Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Meeting - January 29, 2020
The Active Transportation and Infrastructure Committee of the San Diego City Council met on January 29, 2020, at 10:00 AM. The meeting covered the FY20 CIP mid-year budget report, the five-year capital infrastructure outlook, approval of design-build contracts for golf course improvements, and setting committee priorities for 2020. All votes were unanimous.
Consent Calendar
- Approved meeting minutes from December 11, 2019.
- Approved one consent item (no details provided) unanimously.
Public Comments & Testimony
- Non-Agenda Public Comment:
- Nicole Burgess spoke on street safety, noting that SB1 funds for resurfacing should include pedestrian and bike improvements. She cited specific streets (e.g., Copley Drive) missing these elements and argued that some streets scheduled for overlay do not need it, calling it wasteful spending.
- Nebo Magezi echoed concerns, referencing City Council Resolution 312383 and stating that many streets being repaved (e.g., Texas Street, West Chy Primera, Copley Drive) lack planned bike lanes or pedestrian improvements despite being listed for complete streets elements.
- Martha Welch made disjointed comments about federal audits, checks, and alleged misconduct by officials, asserting that the city is not following rules for bonds and federal funding.
- Braer Marsh (North Park resident) shared a letter about Texas Street, where two fatalities occurred in the past year, urging safety improvements as the street is set to be repaved under SB1.
- Public Comment on Agenda Item (CIP Mid-Year Report):
- Marshall Anderson (Downtown San Diego Partnership) requested that a CIP project be created for the Gaslamp Promenade, noting $1.5 million in community parking district revenue allocated but needing a formal project account.
- Public Comment on Committee Priorities:
- Andy Hanshaw supported prioritizing bike facilities and Vision Zero strategies, urging adoption of modern design standards and pursuit of grants.
- Nicole Burgess (Bike SD) emphasized that resurfacing should be aligned with safety and bike infrastructure, not just car-oriented pavement. She suggested reallocating some of the $80 million resurfacing budget to bike/pedestrian projects.
- Jennifer Hunt (San Diego County Bicycle Coalition) supported comments on hiring processes, design costs, and the need for flexibility in project planning.
Discussion Items
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FY20 CIP Mid-Year Budget Monitoring Report and Revisions:
- Tracy McCraner (Finance Director) and Karen McGriff presented the consolidated budget action, including $19.7M in new appropriations (71% from sewer funds and developer fees), $49.1M in transfers (92% from public utility funds), and $22.3M from fund balance. Key allocations: $1.9M for median installations, $1.9M for Olive Street Park acquisition, $1M for Torrey Pines golf course improvements. TransNet fund balance reduced from $55M in FY16 to an estimated $25.4M by end of FY20. All gas tax funds fully allocated. Also requested $1.4M from general fund for drainage projects.
- Councilmember Kate moved to approve the report and budget revisions, but asked to delay a $957,621 transfer from the Mira Mesa Community Fund to the Wagenheim Joint Use Facility, citing community plans for that fund. The motion passed unanimously.
- Councilmember Ward and staff requested that a CIP project be opened for the Gaslamp Promenade to allow the $1.5M parking district revenue to be used. The motion included this request; staff agreed to work on it.
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Five-Year Capital Infrastructure Planning Outlook (FY21-FY25):
- Myrna Dayton and Mark Nassar (Public Works) presented the sixth annual outlook. Total capital needs: $6 billion; available funding: $3.86 billion; resulting gap: $2 billion (a 70% increase over three years). Priority needs (health/safety, mandates, core services): $4.76 billion with $3.47 billion funding, leaving a $1.29 billion gap. Discretionary needs: $1.27 billion with $393 million funding, gap $876 million. Stormwater infrastructure needs grew to about $1 billion, making up 40% of the total gap. Enterprise funds (water, wastewater, pure water) are fully funded. The report highlighted capacity constraints: Public Works has a 20% vacancy rate (over 150 positions), and external consultant/contractor shortages limit growth.
- Councilmember Moreno expressed concern about street light backlog ($44 million) and proposed dedicating a percentage of gas tax to street lights. She also raised issues with unimproved streets policy.
- Councilmember Kate noted the capacity challenge and asked about street reconstruction history (about 1 mile per year at millions of dollars per mile). He also inquired about the timing of upcoming developer impact fee (DIF) formula changes, which staff said would take effect next year.
- Councilmember Ward highlighted the growing disparity and the need for long-term solutions, questioning the priority/discretionary categorization that places bike facilities, sidewalks, and some building repairs as discretionary.
- Chair Kirsey questioned the methodology for determining priority vs. discretionary, noting that for bike facilities it was based on funding source (grants) rather than need. He also stressed the need to reform hiring processes to reduce vacancy rates.
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Approval of Design-Build Contracts for Golf Course Improvement Projects:
- The committee voted unanimously to forward the staff recommendation to the full council for approval.
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Committee Priorities for Calendar Year 2020:
- Councilmembers presented priorities:
- Councilmember Moreno: update Council Policy 200-01 on unimproved streets; dedicate gas tax funding for street lights; prioritize sidewalk repair; advance Harbor Drive multimodal corridor study (seek federal/state grants); conduct San Ysidro Boulevard mobility study; pursue grant funding more aggressively; address the $1.29B priority funding gap; request an infrastructure investment report by council district.
- Vice Chair Ward: focus on Vision Zero, complete streets policy updates, promenade creation process, and sidewalk funding policy updates.
- Chair Kirsey: improve hiring processes, quality controls for street resurfacing, and project coordination/outreach.
- The committee passed a motion (Ward/Kate) directing Chair Kirsey to develop a 2020 work plan incorporating these priorities and transmit it to the Council President.
- Councilmembers presented priorities:
Key Outcomes
- Approved FY20 CIP mid-year budget revisions and monitoring report, with the exception of the $957,621 transfer from Mira Mesa Community Fund to Wagenheim Joint Use Facility (unanimous).
- Directed staff to open a CIP project for the Gaslamp Promenade to enable use of $1.5 million in parking district revenue.
- Approved design-build contracts for golf course improvement projects (unanimous).
- Directed the creation of a 2020 committee work plan based on the priorities discussed (unanimous).
Meeting Transcript
Well, good afternoon, everybody. Thank you for joining us for today's meeting of the Act of Transportation and Infrastructure Committee. Today is Wednesday, January 29th, 2020. I'll let the record reflect that we have a full committee with us here today, including Vice Chair Ward, Councilmembers Kate and Mareno. We also have our City Attorney Representative Tina Ray, our IBA representative Jillian Cassie, our mayor representative Conrad Ware, as well as our committee consultant Justin Garber. I'd like to thank uh people who are here in the audience or watching live on City TV. We will start with non-agenda public comment. Do we have any? We have three members of the public wishing to speak on items not on our agenda. We'll start with Nicole Burgess, followed by Nebo Magezi and Martha Welch. Come forward, you have two minutes. Good afternoon. Chair all the members here. I appreciate your time. You probably know that I'm here to talk about safety on our streets. So as we're looking into transportation and transportation budgets, I I know that you guys have priorities coming, but just one thing that we are looking at is uh the streets that are missing the opportunities to really become safer. So is the SB1 funds are dedicated to ensure that our streets, when they are resurfaced, are better for pedestrians and people who bike. Those are all for resurfacing. So our resurfacing, we really need more staff to look at these opportunities as our um aggressive city policies are we're gonna do as many miles as we can in the next year, 400 miles. We just can't keep up with that. Um, and we're just missing too many rose crowns, Pack Highway, Loring, Aldean, their uh Copley Drive and D6. I mean, they're all over the entire city. And then just making sure we're mindful of which ones are being repaved. Um, my street personally in Palma does not need anything, and it is scheduled for an overlay. And that to me is wasteful spending. So thank you for your time. Thank you. Appreciate those comments. Apologize for the pronunciation. Nevo Megizi. Magnesi. Sorry. Just to give uh more context to uh what Nicole was saying uh in April of last year, the city council approved, I believe it was resolution 312383, City of San Diego, uh fiscal year 2020 Road Maintenance and Rehabilitation Act project list. Uh so basically that is taking uh funds from the state through SB1, and uh in this case you allocated it for all these uh street uh resurfacing projects, which is great. The only thing is that uh there was a bit of a check mark check uh box there that the uh city engineers or whoever uh determined which streets to pave. They said that it um that those streets would include complete streets elements. Many of those streets um have uh bike lanes proposed in either community planning group plans or in the bike master plan, and as far as we know, uh that's not happening. So a good example would be uh Texas Street and District 3, but also uh West Chi Primera in District 8, uh Copley Drive in District 6. So there's a few examples. I I have them here, I'll distribute this afterwards. Um basically these are all getting repaved, and to our knowledge, there's no addition of bike lanes, no addition of uh you know pedestrian improvements. I think maybe the description describes something about ADA ramps, but no, you know, no curb cutouts, no nothing else. So it considering some of these streets really do have uh major fatalities, it's something really worth looking into to see if there's more that we can do there while they're already repaving the streets. Thank you. Thank you, appreciate those comments. Martha Welch. Martha Wilts. Right now you can't um uh your money for the state or federal, you can't open. You have to do five um audit. If you don't do that, you need no money for you.
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