BayRail Alliance

February 24, 2008, San Jose Mercury News -- Internal Affairs column

“No Brown Act violation -- If you're paying attention”

Prop. 111, passed by California voters in 1990, doubled the state gas tax and directed revenue to the state Congestion Management Program. It specified among other things that each county designate a county-wide body, i.e. a Congestion Management Agency (CMA) to put programs in place to keep traffic levels manageable. Whereas state gas tax revenue had historically been used to fund highways, the idea behind Prop. 111 was that the additional revenues would fund road, bicycle, pedestrian, and public transit projects in addition to highways to help manage congestion, i.e. they would be used for multi-modal purposes. The CMA was charged with helping to coordinate land use, air quality and transportation planning among the local jurisdictions and to prepare a Congestion Management Program to spend these funds. Among the duties they still carry out today is to monitor levels of congestion on major roads and analyze the impacts that a proposed development will have on future traffic congestion.

The creation of such a plan required creating a governing body that is representative of the local elected councils and agencies. The accepted method of ensuring this representation is to appoint elected officials from these entities to the governing board. In many cases an existing county-wide transportation agency that was already programming transportation funds from a variety of sources became the CMA after Prop. 111 passed.

In practice many CMAs only grudgingly became multi-modal agencies, and many continued to emphasize road and highway improvements to "manage congestion". CMAs did not have direct authority over land use -- only local city councils, and the county (over its unincorporated lands) had that power -- and while in theory they could deny funds to a local government whose plans were not in compliance with the coordinated land use, air quality and transportation plans, they found it difficult to enforce such. Local decisionmakers serving on these boards often engaged in mutual back-scratching so that each jurisdiction could receive funds for their pet projects. Eventually state laws were changed to weaken the enforcement power of the CMAs.

While Prop. 111 requirements for the establishment of CMAs were overturned by subsequent California state legislation, in practice it is necessary for urbanized counties to have such a governing body in place in order to program state and federal transportation funds. Additionally, the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC, the Bay Area’s federally-designated Metropolitan Planning Organization) has required the preparation of a countywide transportation plan, and also a prioritized expenditure plan, to include in its regional transportation plan in order to meet federal requirements.

Through the continued establishment of a CMA, the county is able to receive state
transportation funds, federal Surface Transportation Program (STP) funds and other funds
that are apportioned to Urbanized Areas. It is also able to enjoy certain benefits as well
as comply with the additional requirements of being a designated federal Transportation
Management Area.

Sources:

Barbour, Elisa. Metropolitan Growth Planning in California. Public Policy Institute of  California, 2002, p. 75-76.

San Francisco CMP Nov. 2007, p. 9

MTC Library Glossary

July 10, 2007, Gilroy Dispatch

“VTA Seeks Smaller Tax Increases”

September 4, 2007, Gilroy Dispatch

“Sweeping Changes Arrive at VTA”

Note from executive director Margaret Okuzumi:

After years of frustration and puzzlement about why the normal public process wasn't working to make any difference at VTA, and why the board was failing to exercise any real oversight, in Jan. 2005 I did a lot of research, and wrote a 37-page white paper analyzing how and why VTA was messed up, and how to fix it.

The March 2007 Hay Group organizational and financial assessment of VTA, the 2004 Grand Jury report, and my own white paper of January 2005, identify structural problems that hamper the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority board's ability to govern well. All of these reports express concern that the current rotation of city representation for 2-year terms create a high level of turnover that hampers board members' ability to gain needed expertise and exercise proper oversight. The Hay Group report expresses additional concern that VTA lacks an audit committee (in my white paper, I suggested VTA needed an Office of Inspector General to perform a similar oversight function).

Of all the possible reforms that were suggested in my VTA governance paper, I believe the most important one, is to give all cities (and towns) in the county representation on the Congestion Management Agency (CMA) board, eliminate the rotating 2-year terms, and use a weighted population-based voting system for major votes. This would strengthen representation in a fair and equitable fashion  and make VTA more consistent with the systems that the CMAs in San Mateo, Alameda, and Contra Costa counties successfully use.

I describe the specific proposal below. But first, the advantages of this proposal:

WHAT THIS MEANS POLITICALLY

•  Major decisions of the VTA board could no longer be passed if just two cities join San Jose representatives in voting in the affirmative. Instead, at least 5 out of the 15 cities in the county -- a third of the cities in the county -- would have to agree with San Jose (out of minimum requirement of 10 unweighted votes to pass), or 7 out of the 15 cities if both county reps vote no.

• Major decisions of the VTA board could not be passed without the consent of San Jose, just as is the case today, as San Jose represents more than half of the county's population.

• Every city has representation, and the opportunity to reduce turnover and develop expertise on the board. Right now, for example, Palo Alto does not get to vote on VTA matters, and has to wait every six years or so to get a rep onto the board.

• There are enough board members that a meaningful audit committee, as recommended in the Hay Group report, could be formed, of people who have some financial expertise and interest.

• This structure creates a big incentive to have meaningful debate and discussion and to try to reach consensus, as opposed to the current structure.

• It is theoretically possible, and more likely in this situation than with the current set-up, for a San Jose member to choose to vote differently than the other San Jose reps -- this happens within San Francisco all the time, for there's no reason that all reps from such a large city have to vote the same way on transportation issues. If this diversity of opinion does happen, the vote of a city like Palo Alto with 60,000 people will have much more influence than say, Monte Sereno (pop. 3,500), in determining the outcome.

The Proposal

Specifically, the proposal is to constitute the VTA board as follows. Note that this proposal is an amended version of what appears in the white paper, in that it specifies a district method of electing reps for San Jose and fewer reps.

Structure

- One representative from each city or town council except San Jose, for a total of 14 members, each serving a term (whether for 1, 2, 3, or however many years, I'm not particular about) that they can be reappointed to;
- Two representatives from the county board of supervisors;
- Three representatives from the city of San Jose, appointed as follows:
   a) The city's ten districts shall be divided into a northern group of districts 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, and a southern group of districts 2, 7, 8, 9, 10. Council members within each group vote among themselves to elect which one of them will serve on the VTA board.
District map of San Jose
   b) The San Jose appointee from each grouping would be accountable to those groups. The members serve for a 3-year term (or else, a 1-year term), after which they may be re-elected to the seat.   The reason for choosing an odd number of years for the term, is that the city's odd-numbered districts have an election that is staggered two years from the even-numbered district elections. Choosing an odd-numbered year for renewal will help alternate which districts have members who have been on the council at least a year, which presumably increases their chances of being voted into a VTA seat.
   c) The third rep from the city of San Jose is the mayor, or if he or she chooses, a councilmember appointee of the mayor who is not one of the above two reps.  This councilmember serves at the pleasure of the mayor, or else for a specified term of 1, 2, or 4 years (again, I'm not particular about this detail about how long that person's term is) and may be reappointed upon expiration of the term.

- if desired, add a non-voting Ex-Officio seat for an MTC Commissioner who is not already on the board.

Total: 19 or 20 board members. This is just a few more than the current 17-member VTA board, of which just 12 are voting members and the rest are alternates. As a comparison, the CMA for San Mateo County, a county with half the size of Santa Clara County's population, has a 23-member board, of which two are non-voting members.

The VTA Policy Advisory Committee, which is currently comprised of one representative from each of the cities, would no longer exist under this scheme, as all cities would already have a representative on the VTA board.

HOW THE VOTING WORKS

Weighted voting is used for major votes.  For purposes of weighting, the vote of each city rep, except for San Jose will be considered to represent the population of the city as determined in the last major census. For San Jose, each of the 3 reps will be considered to represent a third of the city of San Jose's population. For the county reps, each would represent half of the population of the unincorporated areas of the county.

Proposed voting procedure (with thanks to C/CAG (San Mateo County's CMA) as this is exactly their procedure):
"The parties intend to strive for consensus following full discussion, but in the event consensus cannot be reached the following voting procedures shall be utilized.
(a) A quorum shall consist of at least a majority of the voting members and shall be required for all meetings of the board.
(b) All decisions and actions shall be by majority vote of those present unless the decision involves the adoption of a county-wide plan or any one (1) member requests the use of the special voting procedures hereinafter set forth.
(c) The special voting procedures shall be utilized upon the request of (1) member. Addition of Ex-Officio members to the Board, the established Subcommittees, and final adoption of county-wide plans shall require special voting procedures. Special voting procedures shall be as follows: for a motion to be successful it must receive the votes of a majority of the members representing a majority of the population of the County."

Proposal for Restructuring Transportation Governance in Santa Clara County -- The White Paper

1.4 Megabyte Pdf document (version 1.2, February 5, 2005)

Version changes to "Proposal for Restructuring Transportation Governance in Santa Clara County" white paper

October 15, 2005, Gilroy Dispatch

Letter: “Gilroy Officials Should at Least Show Up at VTA Meetings to Advocate Reform”