NYC TLC Commission Meeting/Public Hearing October 3Rd, 2018
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NYC TLC Commission Meeting/Public Hearing October 3rd, 2018 1 NEW YORK CITY TAXI & LIMOUSINE COMMISSION 2 ----------------------------------------------X 3 COMMISSION MEETING/PUBLIC HEARING 4 ----------------------------------------------X 5 6 7 8 9 10 October 3, 2018 10:14 a.m. 11 12 Alexander Hamilton U.S. Custom House One Bowling Green 13 New York, New York 14 33 Beaver Street New York, New York 15 16 17 18 Reported by: 19 Danielle Rivera 20 21 22 23 24 LH REPORTING SERVICES, INC. 25 Computer-Aided Transcription (718)526-7100 NYC TLC Commission Meeting/Public Hearing October 3rd, 2018 2 1 A P P E A R A N C E S: 2 NEW YORK CITY TAXI & LIMOUSINE COMMISSION One Bowling Green, New York, New York 3 4 MEERA JOSHI Chair and Chief Executive Officer 5 LAUVIENSKA POLANCO 6 Commissioner 7 NORA C. MARINO Commissioner 8 BILL AGUADO 9 Commissioner 10 KENNETH C. MITCHELL Commissioner 11 THOMAS SORRENTINO 12 Commissioner 13 JACQUES JIHA Commissioner 14 CHRISTOPHER WILSON 15 General Counsel 16 TANYA SCOTT, Assistant to the Commission/Chair 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 NYC TLC Commission Meeting/Public Hearing October 3rd, 2018 3 1 A P P E A R A N C E S: 2 NEW YORK CITY TAXI & LIMOUSINE COMMISSION 3 Venue of hearing was relocated to 33 Beaver Street, New York, New York 4 MEERA JOSHI 5 Chair and Chief Executive Officer 6 LAUVIENSKA POLANCO Commissioner 7 NORA C. MARINO 8 Commissioner 9 BILL AGUADO Commissioner 10 KENNETH C. MITCHELL 11 Commissioner 12 THOMAS SORRENTINO Commissioner 13 CHRISTOPHER WILSON 14 General Counsel 15 TANYA SCOTT, Assistant to the Commission/Chair 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 NYC TLC Commission Meeting/Public Hearing October 3rd, 2018 4 1 MS. JOSHI: Good morning, everyone. 2 I know everyone is here in anticipation 3 of what should be an extremely 4 interesting and very public hearing. To 5 make the most time of the day -- to make 6 the most of the day, because we have 7 this room only until 4:00 p.m., we are 8 going to start with a few items of 9 Commission business that we need to take 10 care of before we open up for the public 11 hearing. 12 So, the first item is the adoption 13 of minutes from the May 7, 2018 14 Commission meeting. All in favor? 15 ALL: Aye. 16 MS. JOSHI: With that, the minutes 17 are adopted. The second is base 18 applications for determination. We are 19 going to hear from Licensing on that. 20 MS. MEOLA: Good morning, 21 Commissioners. My name is Angelique 22 Meola, Director of the Base and Business 23 Services. Today, we have thirty-one 24 bases for your determination, one new 25 application, twenty renewals and ten NYC TLC Commission Meeting/Public Hearing October 3rd, 2018 5 1 with various changes. 2 MS. JOSHI: All in favor of adopting 3 Licensing's recommendation on bases? 4 ALL: Aye. 5 MS. JOSHI: With that, the base 6 applications for recommendation are 7 accepted. 8 Next, we have two votes; both on 9 rules that we had public hearings on in 10 May. The first is a Clean-up Package, 11 which basically did some technical 12 amendments to rules, existing rules. 13 And the second was changes to our 14 FHV Accessibility Mandate that were made 15 as a result of litigation and actually 16 enhanced the mandate adding an 17 additional year of service requirements 18 and requiring companies to provide us 19 with additional data, including wait 20 times between passenger requests and the 21 car pick-up for every trip. 22 With that, I'm going to turn it over 23 to Chris Wilson, our General Counsel, to 24 administer the vote. 25 MR. WILSON: So, first, on the NYC TLC Commission Meeting/Public Hearing October 3rd, 2018 6 1 Clean-up Package, these rules were 2 published in the City Record on 3 June 28, 2018, and I think the comment 4 deadline was August 1st. The Public 5 Hearing was held on these rules on 6 August 2nd; no public comments were 7 received and no changes have been made 8 to the rules as proposed. 9 As local law requires, the final 10 rule for Commission action was posted to 11 the TLC's website on September 26, 2018, 12 and sent to the Commissioners on that 13 date. All in favor? 14 ALL: Aye. 15 MR. WILSON: Next on the Commission 16 agenda are rules, as the Commissioner 17 said, modifying previously passed 18 accessibility rules in the for-hire 19 sector. These rules were published in 20 the City Record on July 3, 2018 with a 21 comment deadline of August 2nd. One 22 comment in support of the rule was 23 received. A public hearing was held on 24 these rules on August 2, 2018. No 25 changes were made to the proposed rule NYC TLC Commission Meeting/Public Hearing October 3rd, 2018 7 1 following the hearing. 2 As local law requires, the final 3 rule for Commission action was posted on 4 the TLC's website on September 26, 2018, 5 and sent to the Commissioners on that 6 date. All in favor? 7 ALL: Aye. 8 MR. WILSON: That's everything. 9 MS. JOSHI: Okay. Now, to the 10 public hearing. First of all, I want to 11 thank everybody for attending today, 12 especially drivers. Because if you're 13 here today, you're not out on the road 14 earning money and that's a sacrifice. 15 As the Commission, we are extremely 16 grateful for your input and for your 17 presence. 18 For those of you that aren't 19 familiar with our process, I just want 20 to outline it for you so you know where 21 we are. We are a regulatory agency that 22 adopts rules by a majority vote of the 23 Commission. Here, on the stage with me, 24 are all of the TLC Commission Members. 25 First, the staff proposes a rule. NYC TLC Commission Meeting/Public Hearing October 3rd, 2018 8 1 We then publish it for 30 days. That 2 happened with the rule that we are about 3 to hear today. We have a public comment 4 period where you can write in, you can 5 e-mail, you can send us your comments on 6 the published rule. 7 We hold a public hearing, which is 8 what we're doing today, so people can 9 provide the Commission Members with 10 in-person testimony. Then, after that, 11 the Commission can make changes to the 12 proposed rules based on the feedback 13 that we've received. 14 Then, finally, for the Commission to 15 vote to adopt a rule, there have to be 16 five members in agreement. And that 17 happens after the public hearing and 18 after we've had time to review feedback. 19 So, what we're doing today is really the 20 third step, the public hearing, and we 21 are really looking forward to hearing 22 your input. The way we are going to -- 23 We have two presentations before we 24 open it up. The first one is from 25 economists, James Parrott and Michael NYC TLC Commission Meeting/Public Hearing October 3rd, 2018 9 1 Reich. They will give you a summary of 2 their findings. They've reviewed 3 millions of driver pay records and found 4 that eighty-five percent of today's 5 drivers make less than the equivalent of 6 minimum wage. They analyzed the policy 7 to raise wages and protect against 8 unilateral cuts to pay by companies. 9 The TLC staff will then provide a 10 brief explanation of how the per-pay 11 proposal works. There is currently a 12 link on our homepage with pay 13 calculators so that drivers can walk 14 through what the posted pay rates today 15 are for the companies versus what they 16 would make under the proposal. 17 We'll also describe what information 18 drivers would be entitled to on a 19 receipt in their weekly pay and for base 20 and vehicle agreements, as well as a 21 decrease in expenses, and an increase to 22 incentives for yellow taxi drivers. 23 So, just a few brief words before we 24 begin. New York City is the first city 25 in the nation to embark on setting pay NYC TLC Commission Meeting/Public Hearing October 3rd, 2018 10 1 protections for app drivers. I'm proud 2 of the TLC Commissioners and of the TLC 3 staff for taking on this challenge. 4 Today's proposal represents a start, and 5 an important one. 6 Once passed, there will be further 7 debate on how it should be changed and 8 circumstances will change. But there 9 will no longer be a debate on whether or 10 not drivers deserve protections against 11 unilateral pay cuts that make it hard, 12 if not impossible, to earn a living. 13 That's tens of thousands of people who 14 drive full-time in the City with almost 15 a million passengers daily. 16 Professional drivers whose work is 17 key to the success and safety of our 18 City. So, I want to thank all of you 19 whose advocacy, honesty, acumen have 20 gotten us to this point, and we will 21 only go forward from here.