MINUTES
MassDOT BOARD MEETING OFSEPTEMBER 12, 2012
At the call of the Chair, a Meeting of the Board of Directors of the Massachusetts Department of Transportation was held at the Aldermanic Chamber, Somerville City Hall, 93 Highland Avenue, Somerville, MA on Wednesday, September 12, 2012.
There were present: Messrs. Jenkins, Davey, Alvaro, Whittle, Bonfiglio, Macdonald and Miss Loux, being the Board of Directors of the Massachusetts Department of Transportation.
Also present were Acting General Manager and Rail and Transit Administrator Davis, Rachael Rollins, MassDOT and MBTA General Counsel, Frank DePaola, Administrator of the Highway Division, Rachel Kaprielian, Administrator of the RMV Division, Christopher Willenborg, Administrator of the Aeronautics Division, Owen Kane, Special Counsel to the Board, and Paula Fallon, Recording Secretary.
The Chairman, Mr. Jenkins, presided.
Chairman Jenkins called the Open Meeting to Order at 1:42 p.m. and presented the order of business. The Chairman announced this is the first meeting of the reconstituted Board of Directors of MassDOT. He welcomed the newest members Alan Macdonald and Joseph Bonfiglio. He began by asking the two members to give a little background about them.
Director Macdonald stated that his career has been in public policy issues for the last 23 years with the Massachusetts Business Roundtable where he also has served on a number of committees dealing with transportation infrastructure. He appreciates the chance to serve on the board.
Next Director Bonfiglio gave a brief description on his background. He stated that he is the Business Manager of the Massachusetts and Northern New England Laborers’ District Council where he represents many construction workers who are involved with in manual and semiskilled labor. They also represent several people who work for various municipalities, cities and towns in public sector but their roots are clearly with construction. He noted that they deal often with MassDOT on various road and bridge projects and the MBTA. He has been affiliated with the organization for over 30 years.
Chairman Jenkins also welcomed back some of the other members and the other new Board member Secretary Davey. He also thanked Director Liz Levin for her service on the Boards over the last three years.
Chairman Jenkins also thanked Mayor Curtatone for hosting us today in the beautiful Aldermanic Chambers at Somerville City Hall. The Chairman also noted that Mayor Scanlon from Beverly and Representative Denise Provost was there as well.
Chairman Jenkins asked Mayor Curtatone to come forward to make the first comments.
Mayor Curtatone began by thanking the Board for coming to Somerville and for their efforts to show transparency to connect with the constituents in every region of the Commonwealth. He noted that it was very important that the Board was meeting in Somerville today because of the item on the agenda to authorize funds to advance a final design and preliminary engineering for the Green Line Extension. He stated the vote will have tremendous impact not just on Somerville but Cambridge, Medford and the Commonwealth as a whole. This project will provide Somerville and the Commonwealth with economic development worthy of the demonstrations that are shared in our commitment that we signed to work together back in July. The Green Line Extension in the Union Square and the Washington Street Stations are near prime transit-oriented land which is supported and ready to develop and could generate up to 8,000 new jobs. The Mayor ended with his appreciation to Secretary Davey, the Governor, noting that Somerville has enjoyed exemplary cooperation not only from MBCR but from the MBTA, MassHighway, and the entire state transportation family.
Next Chairman Jenkins asked Mayor Scanlon to come up for comment. The Mayor read a brief letter regarding the MBTA Commuter Rail Garage that will be built in Beverly. The Mayor stated that he is certain that this garage will be highly successful from day one and thus reduce the number of cars commuting all the way into Boston from the North Shore. Therefore he strongly recommends the Board to vote in favor of the item authorizing the ISA amendment between MassDOT and MBTA contract number CMR-62 entitled “Beverly Depot Parking Garage”. Mayor Scanlon closed his comments proudly noting that the City of Beverly has committed $500,000 for the finance of this important project.
Next Representative Provost came up to say a few words. Representative Provost thanked the Board for bringing the meeting to Somerville. She thanked the Board, MassDOT and the Commonwealth for sticking with the Green Line Extension project through thick and thin and she encourages the Board to vote in favor of the item on the Green Line Extension on the agenda today.
Chairman Jenkins opened up the meeting for public comment.
The first speaker was Karen Wepsic from the MBTA Rider Oversight Committee. Ms. Wepsic wanted to express her support for the item on the agenda for solar photovoltaic system and she hopes the MBTA continues with the alternate energy process. She also noted that she is a part of the Design Advisory Group for the Casey Overpass in Jamaica Plain and she stated that the process is going very, very well.
The next speaker is Ken Krause a resident of Medford. Mr. Kraus was there to speak in favor of the Green Line Extension item on the agenda.
The next speaker on the agenda is Heather Carito of AMSNA. Ms. Carito came because she stated that she has great concerns on how the process for the Casey Overpass has been proceeding. She noted that in the beginning there were a number of bridge designs and she wasn’t sure how those designs got eliminated. She asked that MassDOT complete a thorough analysis before going forward.
The next speaker is Wig Zamore, from STEP. Mr. Zamore asked that the Board vote unanimously on the Green Line Extension item on the agenda.
The next speaker is Michael Epp from the Casey Work Group. Mr. Epp stated that he feels the Casey Overpass process has been transparent, respectful, professional, rigorous, based on facts, and I support the at-grade solution.
The next speaker is Todd Consentino from the Casey Overpass Design Advisory Group. Mr. Consentino also supports the process so far for the Casey Overpass and agrees that it has been transparent and noted that the design team has been very responsive to the Community input and he too supports the at-grade crossing.
The next speaker is Lee Auspitz, a Somerville resident. Mr. Auspitz is a strong supporter of the Green Line. He would like the issue of the Medford Hillside issue to be thoroughly looked at.
The next speaker is Marilyn MacNab. Ms. MacNab thanked former Director Levin for her service and her dedicated work over the past three years when it came to examining the paratransit system.
The next speaker is Lynn Weissman, Friends of the Community Path. Ms. Weissman stated that their mission is to connect the two miles stretch to reach the Minuteman which is a 23 miles of path network along with the Charles River path which is another 23 miles of path along the Green Line Extension.
The next speaker is Ellen Reisner from STEP. Ms. Reisner is also there in support of the Green Line Extension item on the agenda today.
The next speaker on the agenda is Sarah Freeman, WAG/DAG, and Arborway Commission. Ms. Freeman believes that the process so far for the Casey Overpass has been thorough and they are thankful for everyone involved and she believes the at grade solution addresses the long-term problems.
The next speaker is Marguerite Rosenthal, from Boston BDS Coalition. Ms. Rosenthal is concerned with the contracting process of the Commuter Rail and specifically with Veolia because she said they have been cited worldwide for being a human rights violator. She also is in favor of getting rid of the overpass at Forest Hills.
The next speaker is Jeffrey Ferris from Bridging Forest Hills. Mr. Ferris believes that eliminating the overpass will make is worse for cars and bikers as well as regional traffic and pedestrians. He believes the process hasn’t been transparent and he noted that he too would like to know why the bridge options were eliminated.
The next speaker is Peter Stidman from Boston Cyclist Union. Mr. Stidman commented on his support for the bike path to go along with the Green Line Extension and he also noted that the process with the Casey Overpass has been the most involved and informative process that he has seen and he urges the Board to look at the public comments when deciding on the Casey Overpass.
Chairman Jenkins closed public comment.
Next Secretary gave his report and he also thanked Mayor Curtatone for hosting the MassDOT Board. The Secretary began by noting that today’s meeting of the Board of Directors marks a new chapter in the MassDOT era as we continue build on the good work of Transportation Reform and look forward to tackling new challenges. To that effect, this newly constituted Board of Directors will consist of seven members, which includes the Secretary and CEO as a full voting member of the Board. The Board will have a new set of responsibilities and will be comprised of members that represent an even broader set of backgrounds and viewpoints. From here, the Board will turn its focus more to the development of policy as we continue to make progress on our many successes in the past few years.
He ended his opening remarksthanking everyone who is helping us take these steps forward. The Secretary also gave a special thank you to former Director Liz Levin for her service. He noted that he had asked and she has agreed to remain as an advisor to him, this board and to the Governor. (Full Report Attached)
Next Frank DePaola, Administrator of Mass Highway gave his report. Mr. DePaola began his report by giving a brief overview for the new members. He went over the makeup of the division noting they have 3,200 positions within Highway who are responsible for 9,500 lane miles over 5000 bridges with 1,500 traffic signals and also 25 miles of highway tunnels. He noted that we have the largest highway tunnel system in the United States. Mr. DePaola announced that this month marks the end of the fourth year of our Accelerated Bridge Program and so far the program has been meeting all the requirements and metrics that were set out for the original legislation. He stated that currently we are inviting proposals for both the Longfellow Bridge over the Charles River and the Whittier Bridge, which is Route 95 over the Merrimack River up between Amesbury and Newburyport.
Chairman Jenkins took this time to note that the Board will be scheduling a half-day session to update the new Board Members and to set the stage as we move forward.
Next Rachael Kaprielian, Registrar of the Registry of Motor Vehicles gave her report. She began by giving a brief background on her tenure at the Registry along with a background of the agency. The agency serves virtually 4.6 million licensed drivers, 2 million phone calls a year in the phone center, 30 branches stretch from North Adams to South Yarmouth and they have approximately 780 staff and about a billion dollars every year in revenue the agency brings in. They have about 3.3 million branch visits and 2.9 million online visits.
The Registrar talked about the dashboard and noted that wait times are up this month but they are continually working on getting people out of the lines and get online. She noted that the summer time is typically their busiest time. She noted that they do have interns but as they start to level off, the branch traffic tends to go up the last week of August. She noted that the wait times are on the high side of 27 minutes and three seconds. She stated that the highest wait times are at the busiest locations. She also noted that the call wait times are about 24 minutes. They are working on better automating the phone system through some upgrades where customers will be able to self help.
The Registrar also noted that this is the season for school bus inspections. They inspect school buses three times a year August/September, December/January, and April/May. Next the Registrar gave an update on ALARS;she stated that the management team had begun negotiations with Deloitte Consulting, the winning vendor she announced last month. The team is also getting support from the appropriate MassDOT departments to help make sure the project is successful. Once the negotiations are complete the contract will come to the Board for approval. Director Alvaro asked if at anytime we can project a crossover on online transactions and branch visits. The Registrar noted that a lot of the branch visits are more than one transaction, so a visit and a transaction cannot be totally aligned but she thinks that we will be seeing more crossovers just in a number of transactions.
Chairman Jenkins noted that two Administrators are not here today. Chris Willenborg and Jonathan Davis. Mr. Davis has submitted his report for the record.
Next on the agenda is the update on the MBTA Station Cleaning contract presented by Mike Turcotte, Assistant General Manager for Engineering and Maintenance. Mr. Turcotte gave the Board a brief recap of the contract objectives as well as the bid process. He noted that the cleaning contract objectives first and foremost were to establish performance-based criteria to increase the cleanliness of our stations and facilities. The next objective was to reduce costs and increase safety by requiring state of the art cleaning equipment. We want to reduce costs and increase cleaning efficiency by modifying the current line-based approach to a geographic approach. We want to reduce the number of cleaning contracts by combining all stations and facilities into no more than four areas -- a maximum of four contracts -- to reduce management costs as well as gain efficiencies. We want to introduce green cleaning to the MBTA. We want to increase the cleanliness and safety of the stations by including landscaping and snow removal in these requirements; increase the level of management provided by the contractor by requiring contractor management qualifications.
And lastly, we want to increase the contractor's employee satisfaction and productivity by requiring significant training for the cleaning contract employees.
Mr. Turcotte stated it is a two-phase process. First phase isbasically a list of 29 items that each contractor hasto answer and supply their information on so that weknow they understand the contract, they're qualifiedto bid the contract, they understand what we'reasking, and that's a pass/fail criteria. If they meet those criteria and pass all items, they move on to phase two which is simply lowbid at that point. So their intent is to maintain thattwo phase process.
He noted that the sticking point has been staffing. Whatthe MBTA has done in the past as far as bidding goesis simply say, that is how many people you need,here's the cleaning materials, and so on. They gave us a price and there were never any performance-basedcriteria.
So with the addition of theperformance-based criteria, we originally went out to bid and said we're not putting anycriteria on personnel other than to say 50 percent ofhowever many folks you contract -- are going tosupply -- 50 percent of them have to be full-time.
We did not go through with that bid. Wedid a second time stating that all contractors haveto keep the same amount of employees that we havetoday. That bid did not process through.So they are at a point where they are coming tothe Board asking for guidance and direction on the personnel piece of the contract bid. Director Alvaro noted that Mr. Turcotte has come to them in the past about requiring a staffing level and they were told to not do it. He noted that we have gotten a lot more attractive bids when we didn’t require an amount. Mr. Turcotte answered that if they don’t when the transition happens if they don’t require this amount it could affect the safety and cleanliness of the station. Director Alvaro asked if the contract costs will decline in years two through five. Mr. Turcotte stated that is what they expect. Director Loux noted that last time she asked for an executive summary and she stated that all she has received is reconfigured words. She asked how can things be safer by cutting workers and she noted that this bid has been a mess from the start. She stated that she wanted a proposal in front of her that she could plan to support but instead what she was given does not give her any information. She noted that if we are going to take on more work and decrease staff then her opinion is that this isn’t going to work. Chairman Jenkins stated that when it comes to year one it is a little problematic but he noted that we have given the bidders the opportunity to go out in years 2 through 5 and be more creative and we have metrics to determine whether they’ve met the cleanliness and safety criteria that we have placed on them in year 2 through 5. Director Alvaro stated that he could agree with the Chairman’s view even though he doesn’t fully agree as long as we get the benefits of efficiencies in subsequent years, he will agree to the staffing levels for year one. Secretary Davey commended Mike and his staff for trying to think creatively and differently. He noted that what we are hearing from the Board is the best scenario would be trying to strike a balance between what is potential job loss but at the same time trying to make sure the taxpayer, our customer, gets the best value and a clean and safe station. He also noted that his opinion is they need better equipment which the contractors should get for them. He also noted that if the scope is growing with snowplowing there may be an opportunity here to minimize any kind of impacts on employees but get more work done in these companies. Mr. Turcotte stated that they probably won’t be back before the Board until at least December. Chairman Jenkins stated that the next time he sees them they will have a contract.