Don’t Pay the Ferryman
I sat in the back of the Council Chambers on Tuesday night, confident that what actually transpired on the issues of the ferries (voted to hold a meeting, accept the staff recommendations and work on the problem in the clean up language) and Alameda Municipal Code changes (approve them) would transpire.
I left a little unsatisfied, I would have preferred at least a statement about adding language to take over the ferries, it wouldn’t have helped, but at least there would be an official record. I also left befuddled. During the council discussion, Councilmember deHaan mentioned that the MTC had produced an emergency ferry plan about a year ago (they didn’t). Staff came to the podium to say that it was a state blue-ribbon panel and that it was about six months ago (it wasn’t either). All of this was proof that this proposal was not a surprise, that it had been in the works for a long time, except…it hadn’t.
The “Blue Ribbon task force” was not an MTC or State Legislature panel, in fact it wasn’t put together by any governmental entity. It was the Bay Area Council, a business advocacy group and was headed by Ron Cowan. (He of the “friendly” lawsuit against the city of Alameda to build houses in a business park, with friends like this….). And the report was issued 18 months ago. (and it didn’t call for the takeover of the Alameda Ferry)
“The system was recommended in a report by a blue-ribbon task force, assembled by the Bay Area Council in February to hastily prepare an emergency ferry service plan for possible inclusion in a state infrastructure bond measure.”
…..
“The recommendations are similar to those in a 1998 report by a Bay Area Council task force that called for developing “the world’s best” ferry system on San Francisco Bay with 70 new fast ferries serving 28 landings. That report, and support from state Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata, D-Oakland, prompted the Legislature to create the San Francisco Bay Water Transit Authority to study possible expansion of a bay ferry network.”
…..
“Ron Cowan, an Alameda developer who headed the task force, said research convinced the group that an 8.0-magnitude earthquake would damage many or most of the Bay Area’s bridges or their approaches, as well as BART’s transbay tube, paralyzing the region until repairs could be made.”
…..
“Despite the expansiveness of the emergency plan and its similarity to the 1998 report, Cowan said the goal was not to create a massive new transit system on the bay but to prepare for an earthquake.”
Also from the San Francisco Sentinel:
“SB 976 was the product of two years of work by the Bay Area Council and its Blue Ribbon Task Force, supported by Senate President Pro Tempore Don Perata. The Task Force was chaired by Ron Cowan, the Chairman and CEO of Harbor Bay Isle Associates.”
The Bay Area Council does a lot of good work, but to take their report, give it the weight of public representation, rather than a reflection of the needs of the Bay Area’s business community, is quite a stretch.
And what kept getting lost, once this part of the discussion got started, was the fact that mandating the taking of two local ferry systems, was added in the dead of night at the last minute. Yes there had been a recommendation for a regional system, but it never called for the state to force some ferry systems to join it.
There appears to be very little political resistance to the idea of creating a regional Ferry Agency, and in fact the city council had already been in discussions with the existing entity (WTA) about a possible take over of Alameda’s system, there were just some details to look at, but the idea appeared to have support of possibly the whole council.
It looks like there will be a special meeting of the Transportation Commission on Oct. 17th (Next Wednesday) to get rider and resident input into the process moving forward. The specifics are not set up, but will be announced by the end of the day.
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