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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMIN PSMTC 2018/09/18 2016-2018Committee on Public Safety and Mass Transit 15th Session West Hawaii Civic Center 74-5044 Ane Keohaokdlole Highway, Building A Kailua-Kona, Hawaii September 18, 2018 CALL TO The regular meeting of the Committee on Public Safety and Mass Transit ORDER: was called to order at 2:15 p.m., in the Council Chambers, Kailua-Kona, by Ms. Karen Eoff, Acting Chair. ROLL CALL: Present: Ms. Karen Eoff, Vice Chair Mr. Aaron S. Y. Chung, Member Ms. Maile Medeiros David, Member Mr. Dru Mamo Kanuha, Member Ms. Susan L. K. Lee Loy, Member (via videoconference from Hilo) Ms. Eileen O'Hara, Member (via videoconference from Hilo) Absent & Excused: Ms. Valerie T. Poindexter, Member Mr. Herbert "Tim" Richards, III, Member Ms. Jennifer Ruggles, Chair. STATEMENTS The Chair directed the Committee to proceed to the next order of business, FROM THE Statements from the Public on Agenda Items. PUBLIC ON AGENDA ITEMS: The Chair called Monotui Fuiava, who registered to speak in support of Comm. 411.2, and came forward when called. COMMUNI- The Chair directed the Committee to proceed to the next order of business, CATIONS: Communications. Comm. 411.2: REQUESTS A PRESENTATION BY THE MASS TRANSIT AGENCY FOR AN UPDATE ON PASSENGER STATISTICS, OPERATING EXPENSES, AND OTHER MEASURABLE DATA REGARDING THE HELE-ON KAKO`O PARATRANSIT SERVICE From Council Member Sue L. K. Lee Loy, dated August 29, 2018. Motion to Close File: Ms. Lee Loy moved to close file on Comm. 411.2. Seconded by Ms. David. PSMTC-15 September 18, 2018 ACTING CHR. EOFF: We have from Mass Transit, Ms. Tiffany Kai, and I think you're going to do the presentation first, right? Okay. (Note: at this time, Program Manager Tiffany Kai came forward to address the members of the Committee.) MS. KAI: Aloha Council Members, thank you for this opportunity today to share and provide an update on our Hele-On Kako `o Para -Transit Services. My name is Tiffany Kai, I'm the Program Manager for the County Mass Transit Agency. (Note: At this time, Ms. Kai provided a PowerPoint presentation to the members of the Committee. For viewing of the presentation, see the DVD copy of the meeting proceedings on file in the Clerk's Office. A copy of the PowerPoint presentation is made a part of the record, see Comm. 411.3) MS. KAI: That's all I have as far as the presentation. And I'll be happy to answer any questions the Council may have. ACTING CHR. EOFF: Okay, thank you very much, Ms. Kai. Ms. Lee Loy, would you like to have the floor? MS. LEE LOY: Sure. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Ms. Kai. And I'm going to start with, you know, what our testifier spoke about, which is the ability to expand this program. You know, to provide the services so desperately needed for this segment of our community. And I'll start with Ms. Kai. We recently passed the GE surcharge (General Excise Tax Surcharge). How is that surcharge going to be helpful to this program? MS. KAI: The General Excise Tax will allow this program to grow, you know, as mentioned by Mr. Fuiava and myself. We do see this program growing, and we do want the participants to participate in programs that would allow them to have a better and good quality of life. So I believe by having the GE Tax funding come through, we will be able to expand our services. And not just within Hilo and Kona by extending hours, yes, that's a plus. But also reaching out to the rural areas where paratransit or transportation is not available as frequent as we do have it in the urbanized areas. We're looking and noticing that Puna will probably be the next district that will have these services for the individuals with a disability. MS. LEE LOY: So follow up to that question, how are you folks identifying that measureable? Why Puna, why not Kohala, why not Ka`u? How is some of the data that you folks are getting from the requests from eligible paratransit users driving an outcome or a measureable, so that this body can help get the funding into those rural areas in a systematic way? Share with me that data or if you have that data, and how these pieces are being identified in a systematic way. Page 2 PSMTC-15 September 18, 2018 MS. KAI: Well basically because we live in Hawaii, we do hear by word of mouth that there are a lot of demand in those areas of Puna. Our next steps for this program is to actually do a survey, to see how many people are out there. I mean in the beginning when we first created or established this program, we did have some data that we collected from the Disability Council, from the Office of Aging, and from different agencies. But we would like to collect more data ourselves to see where these communities are, so we can make sure that we're providing the services in the right areas. MS. LEE LOY: Okay, so for that needs assessment. I understand and we had a great base line presentation from the previous paratransit coordinator. And there was a survey results on the Hele-On Kako `o survey results for Kako `o ridership. MS. KAI: Correct. MS. LEE LOY: Did we do something like that for this year since this baseline was developed? MS. KAI: We actually started doing the survey, I'm going to say last week. So we haven't collected them back yet from our participants. MS. LEE LOY: What's the timeline on that, and when would we be able to get some of that data? MS. KAI: We should have all the survey responses by the end of the month, and maybe two weeks to compile that data. MS. LEE LOY: Okay. I wanted to move on to something you mentioned during the eligibility of riders, you mentioned 27 new eligible riders and an annual renewal process. I just had a question as to why, like why do they have to renew if we identified them as me having a need? MS. KAI: Okay. Just to clarify that the renewals can be different per participant. The baseline, we usually go by three years eligibility, so prior to their three years before their eligibility is expired we would notify them. But the reason for them going through the process again, is because their status may change. Some people might improve or their health may decline, so that is the reason why we go through the process again. You know, and it's not to weed out those whose health has improved, and if it did, well, you know, that's always a blessing. But what we do is just to kind of reassess their eligibility, to see if there has been an improvements or decline in health. MS. LEE LOY: That makes a lot of sense. Sometimes they have a broken foot and they need help. I want to move on to the ridership in Kona verses Hilo. And you've mentioned that you know, the numbers are much higher in Kona but you Page 3 PSMTC-15 September 18, 2018 also qualified that with Hilo has a shared ride program. What are those numbers for the shared ride programs in Hilo, and is there a way to build that number into what we're providing in Hilo? MS. KAI: Yes. So I'm sorry, I don't have the numbers for the shared ride program with me, but I can get that to you. Let me just make a note. MS. LEE LOY: Just to clarify, there's no shared ride in Kona, correct? MS. KAI: That is correct. MS. LEE LOY: Do we know why? MS. KAI: I'm going to say that when the shared ride program first came out we did have participants with the shared ride program, but I believe because Kona is so spread out and the limitation is nine miles there's no benefit to the taxi cab operators. But we are looking at ways, you know, being creative perhaps with taxi cab companies to jump on to the shared ride program in Kona. Perhaps if the County has Capitol funds or if we do get Federal funding purchasing accessible vehicles for taxi cab participants in Kona and maybe 50 percent off. You know, or do some type of incentive, so we can draw these taxi cab companies to be part of this program. And getting back to the first question about the shared ride in Hilo, another reason is the cost difference. For paratransit it's $4.00; and the shared ride taxi program is $2.00 per ride. You can go up to nine miles, and there's no eligibility as well on the shared ride program. It's opened to all. MS. LEE LOY: Do you have the average for the paratransit shared ride? MS. KAI: The cost per ride? MS. LEE LOY: Yes. So we have shared ride coupons that students can use, but we also have shared ride coupons that paratransit eligible users use. Do we have the difference or the break down between a shared ride coupon user, and shared ride paratransit user? MS. KAI: No. So basically—hopefully I can explain this right and if I'm understanding correctly. So the shared ride or I'm going to say the paratransit coupon user it's $4.00 whether they use the coupons, or whether they're going to pay cash. And of course they have to be eligible for the paratransit services. If you have the shared ride taxi coupons those are sold for either $2.00, $3.00, $2.50 or $6.00 depending on the amount of coupons you purchase. I'm sorry, I'm hoping that I'm answering your question correctly as far as the breakdown. Page 4 PSMTC-15 September 18, 2018 MS. LEE LOY: I'm going to move on and maybe. some of my other colleagues might be able to pick that one back up. You mentioned for the Hilo with the, I guess it's with the shared ride that there's seven, but two have that accessible paratransit. How do we increase that number? MS. KAI: Well what we were—what's outlined in the Transit Master Plan is for those taxi companies who have five or more vehicles, is to impress that they need to have accessible vehicles as well. So that is one way we can build additional vehicles for the Shared Ride Taxi Program. MS. LEE LOY: Yeah, thank you. Got to start somewhere. And I guess this would be my last question, and just to clarify I heard you say it's $83.00 per ride for a paratransit user. MS. KAI: That would be the cost to the County. Yes, correct, $83.00 per paratransit ride. Where it would cost the user itself $4.00 per ride. MS. LEE LOY: And is that one like one way, per ride? MS. KAI: Per ride, correct. MS. LEE LOY: Okay, thank you. Thank you, Chair. I yield. ACTING CHR. EOFF: Thank you. Any other comments or questions, Council Members? In Hilo, Ms. O'Hara. MS. O'HARA: Chair? ACTING CHR. EOFF: Go ahead. MS. O'HARA: If I may ask a few questions of Ms. Kai? ACTING CHR. EOFF: Can you speak up just a little bit, Ms. O'Hara. MS. O'HARA: Yes, can I ask a few questions of Ms. Kai? Okay, I am a little confused on this topic of trying to break out the cost per ride. Now I understand that we have an average of cost per paratransit ride, but what complicates the equation is shared ride piece. Now I'm always seeing the shared ride piece in Hilo, because we don't have that same service in Kona. But it's hard when you're talking about the cost to the customer $4.00 and the purchase of a distance coupon for the ride. It's hard to equate that to the average of $83.00 per ride for the paratransit. What I'm getting at Tiffany is whether or not it's more cost effective to build up the shared ride piece, because I'm not clear on what the County is paying for Page 5 PSMTC-15 September 18, 2018 those shared rides. I understand that what the customer has to pay for that, but what is the County's support on that. Because I realize also that perhaps shared ride doesn't work for every client, every customer. Some have needs that require the full paratransit equipment. So I'm just trying to figure out where expansion is best in the shared ride portion in Hilo, or with additional paratransit equipment. MS. KAI: I see. Yeah, unfortunately I don't have the break down for the shared ride side, per ride. But I do know that the County pays approximately $950,000 annually to operate the Shared Ride Taxi Program. But I can definitely get you the cost, break downs for those. MS. O'HARA: Alright, thank you. I realize that's kind of a difficult thing to break out since we're doing the shared ride for non-paratransit ridership as well. And I'm not sure that we can really break those apart or if you have a way to do that in terms of how the purchases are made or some—there needs to be some qualifier in order to separate out that data so we have that information. Because I think it's really kind of critical, if we're looking at adding services into the Puna District you said it's probably the next area that's most likely to receive paratransit services. And we would also need the results of the survey that you're just getting started, in order to understand why people are requesting the service to begin with. And what kind of ridership we have in terms of what type of equipment is most appropriate.' So we need a way to be able to break that apart, so we can kind of study that issue right there. Just my thoughts. Thank you. MS. KAI: Thank you. ACTING CHR. EOFF: Thank you. Any other questions or comments? Ms. Kai? MS. LEE LOY: Final comment? ACTING CHR. EOFF: Oh, Ms. Lee Loy. MS. LEE LOY: Yeah, Ms. Kai, if you could bring some of that information back at maybe some later date, when all of that is in like the surveys. And maybe an opportunity to break that out, you know, and share that with the Council at some future date. I think that would be very valuable for us. You know, Mass Transit has gotten a lot of attention from this body, and we just want to keep everybody on task and focused. And you know, delivering a transit system that everybody can rely on, which you know, I know and everybody on this body knows to be the goal and the mission of this department. So I look forward to some of that. Thank you. MS. KAI: Absolutely. Page 6 PSMTC-15 September 18, 2018 ACTING CHR. EOFF: Thank you. Do you have anything further to add Ms. Kai? MS. KAI: No. Thank you. ACTING CHR. EOFF: Okay. Thank you, very much. Then Council Members all in favor of filing Communication 411.2, please say "aye." Vote on Comm. 411.2: Filed 0 n MT TT?NT_ ILVAINOWN Approved: The motion to close file on Comm. 412.2 was carried by the following voice vote: Ayes: Committee Members Chung, David, Kanuha, Lee Loy, O'Hara, and Acting Chair Eoff — 6 Noes: None. Absent: Committee Members Poindexter, Richards and Ruggles — 3. Excused: None. ACTING CHR. EOFF: Thank you again, very much. There being no further business, at 2:55 p.m., Ms. David moved to adjourn the meeting. Seconded by Mr. Chung and carried by the following voice vote: Ayes: Committee Members Chung, David, Kanuha, Lee Loy, O'Hara, and Acting Chair Eoff — 6 Noes: None. Absent: Committee Members Poindexter, Richards, and Ruggles — 3. Excused: None. ACTING CHR. EOFF: This meeting is adjourned. Thank you very much. ,f,. --e, j k Ms. Karen Eoff, Acting hair Public Safety and Mass Transit Committee KE/rk r r. /. 19 - Date Page 7