1071 COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PHILADELPHIA PUBLIC HEARING BEFORE COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE FY02 OPERATING BUDGET - - - Room 400, City Hall Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Tuesday, February 20, 2001 9:30 a.m. - - - underscore BILL NO. 010005 RE: FY02 OPERATING BUDGET PRESENT: COUNCIL PRESIDENT ANNA C. VERNA COUNCILMAN JAMES F. KENNEY COUNCILWOMAN JANNIE BLACKWELL COUNCILMAN DAVID COHEN COUNCILWOMAN MARIAN B. TASCO COUNCILWOMAN DONNA REED MILLER COUNCILMAN MICHAEL A. NUTTER COUNCILWOMAN BLONDELL REYNOLDS BROWN COUNCILMAN W. WILSON GOODE, JR. COUNCILMAN ANGEL ORTIZ COUNCILMAN FRANK DICICCO COUNCILMAN DARRELL L. CLARKE COUNCILMAN THACHER LONGSTRETH COUNCILMAN FRANK RIZZO VINCENT VARALLO ASSOCIATES, INC. Registered Professional Reporters Eleven Penn Center 1835 Market Street, Suite 600 Philadelphia, PA 19103 (215) 561-2220 1072 I N D E X William Johnson, Commissioner, Streets Department. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1073 Clarena Tolson, Deputy Commissioner, Streets Department. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1083 Councilman Frank Rizzo. . . . . . . . . . . . 1088 Councilwoman Jannie Blackwell . . . . . . . . 1093 Councilman Blondell Reynolds Brown. . . . . . 1099 Charlie Trainor, Chief Traffic Engineer . . . 1103 Councilman Darrell Clarke . . . . . . . . . . 1109 Larry Moy, Streets Department . . . . . . . . 1110 Joseph Doyle, Chief Streetlighting Engineer . 1132 Councilman Angel Ortiz. . . . . . . . . . . . 1139 Councilman Frank DiCicco. . . . . . . . . . . 1149 Councilman Michael Nutter . . . . . . . . . . 1159 Councilwoman Donna Reed Miller. . . . . . . . 1172 Councilman David Cohen. . . . . . . . . . . . 1178 Michael Zacagni, HR Director, Streets Department. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1190 Councilwoman Marian Tasco . . . . . . . . . . 1207 Robert Dubow, Acting Budget Director. . . . . 1214 Councilman James Kenney . . . . . . . . . . . 1224 Andres Perez, Jr., Commissioner, Department of Public Property . . . . . . . . 1246 Riley P. Harrison, Fleet Manager, Waste Management. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1345 Richard Tyler, Historic Preservation Officer, Philadelphia Historical Commission. . . . . . 1357 Edward J. McLaughlin, Commissioner, Department of Licenses & Inspections. . . . . 1358 Richard Felgus, Administrative Director, Board of Licenses & Inspections . . . . . . . 1424 Richard Felgus, Administrative Director, Board of Building Standards . . . . . . . . . 1425 Richard Felgus, Administrative Director, Zoning Board of Adjustment. . . . . . . . . . 1426 Richard Roy, Commissioner, Water Department . 1428 1073 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings
Good morning. This is the Committee of the Whole regarding Bill 4 No. 010005. The first department to be called this morning is the Streets Department. Good morning, Commissioner. Please identify yourself for the record. And may I suggest before you start your testimony that we do have copies of your testimony. The stenographer also has a copy. If you would simply summarize your testimony, we would appreciate it. The stenographer will, in fact, print your testimony in whole. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Good morning, President Verna, Members of City Council, ladies and gentlemen. My name is William M. Johnson, Commissioner of the Department of Streets. I'm here this morning to present testimony on behalf of the Streets Department's proposed fiscal year 2002 Operating Budget. We're requesting a General Fund appropriation of $116,821,073, and an all-funds appropriation of $146,562,073. Our proposed budget reflects a net 1074 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings General Fund decrease of $1,645,044 from fiscal year 2001 estimated obligations. The overall request for the Department for all funds, General, County Liquid Fuels, Special Gasoline Tax and Grants Revenue is $36,824 higher than our fiscal year 2001 estimated obligations. A net decrease in the General Fund of overestimated obligations is the result of reductions in temporary seasonal hires, one-time bonuses in 2001 and reductions in overtime. These reductions more than offset contract increases in sanitation for landfill fees plus full funding of wage increases through 2002 and increments in longevity pay. The Streets Department's authorized position levels remains 2,232, the same as our 2001 budgeted level. With this budget, the Department will continue to provide in 2002 the levels of service that it will achieve in 2001. I would like to briefly highlight some of the goals that have been achieved in the areas of refuse collection, street cleaning, recycling and street maintenance. 1075 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings Our Sanitation Division has maintained on-time collection at a rate of 95 percent for the year 2000. A number of recent winter storms have affected the 2001 on-time percentage, which would have reached 96 percent in 2001. We project to maintain on-time collection at 96 percent in 2002. 72 tons per crew for the year 2000 to tons in 2001 and 2002. 12 In 2002's request for sanitation funds, 13 the current scheduled cleaning program for arterial 14 and commercial corridors and the neighborhood cleaning programs initiated last year, the redeployment of mechanical broom fleet and mechanical broom purchases has enabled the Department to increase the cleaning frequency in commercial corridors from monthly to bi-weekly to weekly. In 2000, 44,978 tons of recyclables were collected, and the current projections for 2001 and 2002 of 44,682 and 46,700 tons respectively. Due to favorable market conditions during the first half of 2001, the City received 1076 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings $311,826 for the sale of recyclables. The Department launched a pilot program in May 1999 to test the effect that switching from bi-weekly to weekly collection of curbside recyclables has on participation rates, the amount of recyclables collected and net tons. The pilot program targeted neighborhoods with varying levels of participation as Center City and the Northwest sections of the City totaling 85,910 households. The areas included in the pilot have generated an additional 2,201 tons of recyclables since the beginning of the program. This recycling expansion was facilitated through the acquisition of vehicles with 90 16 percent of the cost of the vehicles being provide 17 through State grant funds. 18 In 1999, businesses recycled 288,875 19 tons, up from 204,596 tons in '98 as the Department took a number of steps to improve compliance with the City's commercial recycling regulations including intensive field education, building inspections and code enforcement.
6 percent in 1999 excluding construction and demolition debris. 4 percent. The Highway Division resurfaced 154 miles of streets in the year 2000 and plans to resurface 156 miles in 2001 and 2002. We also expect to line stripe 2500 intersections and perform 7500 ditch restorations in both 2001 and 2002. The Department repaired 16,023 potholes in the year 2000 and projects to repair 30,000 in 2001, an increase due, primarily, to harsh winter weather conditions. We performed over million linear feet of crack sealing, a maintenance technique that extends the life cycle of the City's streets. This procedure prevents water from entering the sub-base of the street which is a major cause of potholes. Each time the street is opened by a 1078 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings utility or telecom company, it significantly shortens the useful life of the street. The Department is currently working with the Department of Public Property, the Law Department, the Managing Director's Office to develop new regulatory mechanisms, update regulations and improve workflows to better coordinate street openings and minimize the number of times that streets are opened. In addition, the Department is working with City utilities in an effort to coordinate their routine maintenance work with the City's resurfacing program so that utility maintenance can be done in conjunction with the street repair process. The Streets Department worked with the Managing Director's Office and the Office of Fleet Management to revise the City's snow fighting plan in order to increase the ability of the City to plow neighborhood streets. Under the new plan, which the Mayor announced in December, the City is now plowing over 900 miles tertiary residential streets during significant snow storms for the first time in the City's history. 1079 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings By the end of the year 2000, the Department replaced over 6500 lights as part of its ongoing Citywide program to replace obsolete light fixtures. Under the program, old lights are being replaced with energy-efficient, high-pressure sodium fixtures. When the entire program is completed approximately over the next six years, the Departments projects that a total of 75,000 lights will have been replaced. In addition to being more energy-efficient, the new fixtures require fewer repairs than do the old ones. As a result of the program, streetlight repairs decreased dramatically to 15,000 in the fiscal year 2001. The need for major maintenance repairs will continue to decline as more of the replacement program is completed. A major goal of the Streets Department is to respond quickly, courteously and efficiently to customer requests for service. To this end, the fiscal year 2001, we improved our call center by installing a 1080 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings state-of-the-art automated call distribution center. With this system we now automatically distribute incoming calls to the next available representative, thereby reducing wait time for citizens. We also monitor the quality of our customer service handling. In addition, in fiscal year 2001, the Department installed an E-mail based service request tracking and recording system for all City Council's service requests from inception to completion. In summary, the employees of the Streets Department will continue to work diligently to deliver the services to our citizens and neighborhoods and to improve the quality of life in our City. Therefore, we request your favorable consideration of this budget request. I'm available to answer questions at this time.
Thank you, Commissioner. What is the total amount of delay in filling of new positions reflected in your General Fund accounts? I believe it's over $3 million. 1081 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings How many positions does this represent on an annualized basis? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: We would have to calculate the number of positions that it represents. But I will say, Madam President, that we focused on seasonal hiring and overtime as a means of reducing our Class 100 expense.
By our calculation, it would indicate that $1,743,000 is in Sanitation alone. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: That's correct. That may be correct. In Sanitation we go through a seasonal hiring process where the volume of waste generated fluctuates with weather conditions and the time of year. So, typically, in our Sanitation Division we will increase our staffing as we go into the spring and through the summer.
But, Commissioner, it would appear that your overtime is really being reduced quite a bit, and your seasonal employment is also being reduced to about half of what you had last year. 1082 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings Are you telling us you have sufficient funding to meet your service goals and objectives as you identified for FY02 and that you will not be requesting additional funding for your department later in the year? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: We believe that we'll be able to manage overtime and to manage our work force in a way that we won't need as much seasonal hiring and won't incur as much overtime, given normal operations. Obviously, during inclement weather, we do incur a lot more overtime than anticipated as evidenced by our performance over the last month or so. But given normal operating conditions, we think that we'll be able to manage.
Okay. Commissioner, on of your testimony, it has a section titled "EXPANDED STREET CLEANING." Yet you state, "The FY2002 request for Sanitation funds the current scheduled cleaning program for arterial and commercial corridors, and the neighborhood cleaning programs initiated last year." Are you intending to expand street 1083 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings cleaning in FY2002? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: We don't have sufficient funding to substantially expand street cleaning. We plan to continue to work with the pilot program that we have operating right now and to continue to try to improve some of the conditions that we're running into in the pilot program before we were to look at aggressively expanding it.
(Inaudible) Councilmatic District Pilot Program for street cleaning? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Yes.
When was the pilot program for expanded recycling initiated? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: I'm going to ask Deputy Commissioner Clarena Tolson to address the specifics.
Thank you. DEPUTY COMMISSIONER TOLSON: Good morning. Clarena Tolson, Deputy Streets Commissioner. The recycling pilot began in FY99.
'98? DEPUTY COMMISSIONER TOLSON: 98. I'm 1084 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings sorry. Yes.
What are the findings and recommendations based on the pilot program? Why are you only requesting funding for the continuation of the pilot program and not for its expansion? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: The pilot program -- the weekly recycling pilot program?
Yes. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: -- (continued) did show in those areas that there was an increase, I believe, of percent in the amount of material 14 actually collected. 15 So there was a slight increase in the 16 amount of materials set out for recycling. However, 17 the cost of collecting those materials is over $300 18 a ton. 19 We are also looking at some other 20 modifications that we're going to be testing during 21 the next physical year to look at ways to decrease 22 the cost of actually collecting the recycling. 23 It would not be prudent at this point to 24 look at trying to expand the program Citywide at the current cost. 1085 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings
Why is it costing so much? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Well, recycling is an expensive proposition. One reason that it's expensive is because you never will get to the point where a hundred percent of the people are recycling every week. And when you look at the tonnage that's placed out at the curbside for collection, it's always going to be less than the total tons of waste that's placed out for collection. So when you measure it based on the cost per ton, it's always going to be more. There are some collection methodologies that we're looking at where we're going to test the concept of co-collection which would include potentially collecting recyclables and solid waste at the same time in the same truck. We think that if it's successful, it will substantially decrease the cost of collecting recyclables and make it a more viable option to look at expanding weekly recycling Citywide.
Your testimony on deals with a new multiyear comprehensive solid waste management plan. 1086 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings Your second objective is to develop pride in neighborhoods by forming partnerships with community groups to help keep streets clean and ensure that residents follow refuse and recycling guidelines. These partnerships will feature more aggressive outreach, educational campaigns and a greater emphasis on customer service. What funding has be provided to your Department to accomplish this objective in the FY02 budget and the out years for the five-year plan? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: We are taking our existing operating dollars and looking at how we provide service with existing operating dollars to fund the program. This is a new approach or a different approach, but it's basically providing the same services that we provide but looking at a different way of doing it. A couple of the things that we're doing is we're taking some of the work that's currently being done, for example, through the Philadelphia More Beautiful Committee and asking the people that are doing those things to refocus their time and their efforts on recruiting and promoting the program, trying to heighten awareness of a lot of 1087 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings the things that are going on and just have not been, in my opinion, adequately communicated to our communities or adequately pushed in our communities to get more people to participate and be active and to take pride and where they live.
Thank you. What are the response times to repair potholes and ditches, traffic lights and streetlights in the current fiscal year, and what are your projected times for FY02? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: The response times for potholes were currently running three to four days. We anticipate that the response time will remain about the same for next year.
How about ditches? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Potholes and ditches --
Three or four days? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Yes, ma'am.
Traffic lights? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Traffic lights -- 1088 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings one moment, please. Traffic lights, we a have repair person there within eight hours, and, usually, it's repaired within that time.
I'm sorry. I didn't hear you. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: For traffic lights, we have a repair person there within approximately eight hours, and it's usually repaired within that time.
How about streetlights? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Streetlights, our goal is hours. 16
Do you have a 17 point of order, Councilman? 18 The Chair recognizes Councilman Rizzo. 19
Commissioner, 20 occasionally we get a situation -- you said a 21 pothole response could be three to four days. 22 Occasionally, we get a situation that is 23 damaging. 24 Nothing upsets me more than when I see a pothole that is causing people to have broken rims 1089 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings and blowout tires and we need almost an instantaneous response to correct a very dangerous highway condition. Is the Department prepared at o'clock 6 at night -- Councilmember, police officer -- and I 7 know I'm talking to you about maybe getting a little 8 more proactive with engineering students -- to go out and look and see the same things that I see? 8 o'clock at night, we have a situation that five or six cars are severely damaged, hubcaps all over the place, cars disabled. How do we get that condition fixed as quickly as possibly? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Yes, Councilman. The Streets Department makes every effort to be responsive to what we consider emergency situations. A prime example occurred last week where there was a pothole situation that we considered dangerous that was actually aired on a news broadcast. And on an emergency basis we were able to rally a crew of people to come out and repair a pothole that really was not even the City's responsibility. We were just proactive in going out and taking care of that right away. And that was 1090 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings done on the same night as soon as we became aware of the situation.
That's great. Because there's times when we'll see a situation like that, see vehicles being damaged and call municipal radio, call the supervisor in the switchboard room and just say, 'Please do whatever you can do.' And then two days later you ride by, and it's still there. So it's good to here that we'll try to get to those things quickly. Thank you. Thank you President Verna.
You're welcome. Commissioner, I've been asking for a list of what streets in my district have been resurfaced during this last year, and I'd also like a list of what streets are planned to be resurfaced for FY02. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Yes, ma'am.
Would you see that I get a copy of that, please? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: I will. In fact, 1091 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings I came prepared with a list of streets by district and maps by district.
For resurfacing? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: For resurfacing for the current year and proposed for fiscal year 2002.
Wonderful. I'll just take mine. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: There should be one there for each Councilmatic District.
Commissioner, as part of your modernization and repair of streetlights, will you be increasing the number of streetlights in the City? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: We are taking advantage of opportunities to increase streetlights where we can. We have a program we look at where there's a request for additional streetlighting. And there may be wooden poles owned by PECO that do not currently have streetlights on them. In some cases, we're able to go out and actually add a streetlight on some of those wooden 1092 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings poles. We don't have capital funding to do a Citywide broad-scale program. That's something we looked at and that we recommended, but we were not able to obtain funding to do that program in the current year. But we're hoping we will be able to do a program like that in future years.
So we're simply putting new streetlights on existing utility poles? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: In locations where there's a deficit of streetlighting and where we can locate an existing wooden PECO pole, we have added streetlights, yes.
Thank you. Commissioner, again, I'm going to ask how are you reducing your General Fund over time by $6,200 -- $62,000 in FY02? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Some of the overtime that we incur is by design. During holiday weeks where our collection schedules are shifted, the work that occurs either on a holiday or on a Saturday is overtime by design. There are other times when we incur 1093 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings overtime in trying to keep up with our on-time collection schedule, if you will. If there's inclement weather and we have to call on our Sanitation Division, for example, to go into a snowplowing operation, we can't collect the trash during those periods. What we're trying do is to stay ahead, if we can, of our regular collection schedules so that if we do run into a situation like that, we'll be able to recover without incurring substantial overtime in the future.
Thank you. And, Commissioner, I want to publicly thank you for being very cooperative to the needs of my district. And people thought that you would never meet me at 7 o'clock in the morning to walk through a certain portion of my district. And I truly want to thank you for that and for all the cooperation you have shown thus far. The Chair recognizes Councilwoman Blackwell.
Thank you, Madam President. 1094 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings I'm really very excited about this repaving schedule. Thank you. We have an excellent relationship with Commissioner Moy, and we appreciate the ongoing excellent relationship. You're doing a great job. And, certainly, Miss Tolson is as well. We're very, very glad to hear about four scheduled cleanings per year which is very good. My question in that regard is: For commercial corridors, the main one in my district is, of course, 52nd Street and then 60th Street. They the two main ones. And then we have Chester Avenue, Woodland Avenue, Spruce Street, Baltimore Avenue. Can we have a regular schedule for them? We're trying to, with OHCD, do some revitalization of our commercial corridors again. And I think if there's a way that it can be regular -- our biggest problem has been over the years -- I mean, I've been here in my own right since 1992. But long before that when former Congressman Blackwell was in City Council, I think the biggest issue has been, you scream and you get it cleaned, but then after you get it cleaned and the trash is removed, we don't 1095 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings have a regular program for commercial corridors. So we would ask if that could be considered. That would make life a lot easier. I wouldn't even mind supplementing them if we need to in between if we knew that at X time that our commercial corridors would regularly be cleaned. Then you know how to work with your business association and all that stuff. So that would be a big, big, big help. Many years ago -- this is just a general question on solid waste management. Many years ago in the City, we had problems, and as you know, we had a ship with waste on it out in the sea for a while and all that sort of thing. With all the new hotels and everything we have, how do we deal with our disposal? Do we have extra sites, other places in the country, or what do we do in that regard? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: We currently have contracts with private companies to provide us with waste transfer and disposal options for the waste generated within the City limits. Those contracts, 1096 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings I believe, have an additional five years or so remaining in life. As we come to the end of those existing contracts, we'll need to take a look at the overall waste system here and decide whether or not we want to bid for what I consider short-term disposal or long-term disposal options. Many cities look at 20-plus year disposal contracts, provide long-term security for Cities' disposal.
Commissioner, I'm just going through the list that you gave me for the resurfacing. I'm having a little difficulty in trying to figure out what streets have been resurfaced and if they haven't been resurfaced when it is anticipated that they will be resurfaced. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: The maps that were provided is a distinct map by district.
We have the maps. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: And on that map you should see a legend that should show the 1097 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings proposed streets that will be paved under --
But one of the lists is from the year 2000. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Madam President, all of the streets identified if your packet are proposed.
So none of these have been resurfaced? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Those are the proposed for resurfacing under fiscal year 2002. We can provide you with a list of all the streets that have been done for the current year and all the streets that will be done once we start resurfacing again probably next month or April, as the weather continues to break, under the current fiscal year.
I would appreciate getting a list of what has been completed. Also, if we could be told when the street will be resurfaced, I think we could advise our constituents so they don't park their cars and get tickets and it deters you from doing the work that you're supposed to be doing. 1098 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: First of all, I would remind you that the schedules that we provide you in advance are tentative schedules because part of the scheduling process is outside the control of the City. We work a lot with the Federal Highway Administration and with PennDot, and there are other approvals that have to take place. But those are the best projections we have at the time. What we will do to try to improve our communication in terms of when the work is actually being done is try to give you periodic updates on major resurfacing and reconstruction projects and also try to notify you a week or two in advance --
That would be wonderful. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: -- of when construction is going to start.
But I notice that there is a bid number all of these, so I assume that all of these have gone out for bid? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Many of them have gone out for bid.
I beg your 1099 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings pardon? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Many of them have gone out for bid. In some cases bids have been -- or will be -- there's an anticipated date when bids will be received.
Thank you. Commissioner, what we have here is the year 2000 and 2001. I know you can't give it to us now, but if you would let us know what's being proposed for 2002, it would be appreciated. The Chair recognizes Councilwoman Brown.
Good morning. Let me first comment on the discussion that you give on of your testimony, last paragraph, to improve management responsiveness to citizens. I should let you know that the staff persons in our office have been extremely encouraged by exactly what you say here, to respond quickly and courteously. And, specifically, I need to mention to you Laird Lewis, who has been truly responsive to our office. You simply need to know that we 1100 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings appreciate that very, very much. Secondly, as a follow up to the Council President's questions regarding the analysis you're currently undertaking with regard to the pilot, program, you mentioned outreach efforts that you're doing around the recycling pilot program. And you indicate that you're doing advertising to local community newspapers as well as community groups. With regard to your outreach, have you considered school cluster leaders in the targeted pilot areas, informing them of what is happening with the recycling program? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Yes. We are currently working with the School District in looking at school clusters for education purposes and the comprehensive program.
And I should assume from that that includes those cluster leaders that are in the selected geographic areas where you have the pilot program implemented, correct? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: That would be correct.
You also responded that, currently, given the cost of the pilot 1101 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings program, it's just cost-prohibitive to expand it. How long anticipate your analysis as the program currently exists? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: The analysis of the changes that we're going to be making in the new program would take to months to complete. 8 Some of the things that we'll be look 9 looking at is a new type of vehicle that we're going 10 to try to introduce, again, to try to co-collect 11 some of these materials. We already know that that 12 vehicle probably won't work in all parts of the City, but we're going to look at what sections of the City we think it will be a viable option in. And that's going to determine how quickly we'll be able to expand and to what extent we might be able to expand.
Also in your testimony there's discussion of the SWEEP program, . And you mention, and I quote, the SWEEP program currently is divided into commercial corridors and educating residents in the recycling street cleaning project. What does that mean when you say you're educating residents, specific about what happens 1102 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings when you do that? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: I'm going to defer that question to Clarena Tolson.
Sure. DEPUTY COMMISSIONER TOLSON: Good morning, Councilwoman.
Good morning. DEPUTY COMMISSIONER TOLSON: The SWEEP program is intended to educate citizens regarding the code and enforce the code were necessary. SWEEP officers who are uniformed go through our communities, particularly where we have the pilot programs going on, and they educate with regard to things such as the appropriate day to put out trash, how to properly containerize trash, how to properly sweep sidewalks and be good neighbors in our community. They specifically address quality-of-life issues that also impact our operations. Through intensive education, door-to-door talks with citizens, printed literature, attending community meetings, they make the efforts to communicate, Government to citizen, 1103 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings with regard to the laws and the code so that the community can be impacted in a positive way with a cleaner community.
I would like forwarded to the Chair specifics about those clusters that you're currently working with. So I simply want to be informed to what degree the School District is involved and what are we doing with regards to educating the next set of taxpayers around this whole issue of recycling. So if you can provide that to the Chair, it would be appreciated. DEPUTY COMMISSIONER TOLSON: Yes.
Finally, could you, Street Commissioner, or a member of your team please speak to policy and/or procedure around the installation of school traffic signals, the 15-miles-per-hour school traffic signals? Could someone please speak to the policy procedure around that? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Yes. I'm going to ask Charlie Trainor to come up.
Good morning, Councilwoman. Good morning, Council President. Charlie Trainor, Chief Traffic Engineer. 1104 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings The school flasher program started approximately 1997 when Council passed an ordinance 4 basically having the City install the flashers, and the school maintained the flashers. The installation is done from Capital Funds. We receive applications from a school for the flasher. Prior to our putting out a contract for the installation of the flashers, we will draw a line, basically, as to accepting applications. We're actually still accepting them, but if they come in after a certain date and we don't advertise that date, they won't be considered for the contract that we're putting together. We then take those applications and we prioritize them by Council District from 1 through whatever number there happens to be. We have the City Council Districts review the list while the contract is being bid, et cetera. When we start construction, we start at, shall we say, Council District 1, and we do the first school on that list for Council District 1. 1105 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings We then go to District 2, all the way out to 10. 3 And then we start back at 1, and we continue the same process all the way to 10 until we run out of money. If a particular district runs out of schools, we skip that district. If we have additional funding when we run out of schools, any applications that came in after our date, we then reprioritize it and just continue on.
I'm trying to follow the number of steps you outlined. So there's one date per year that community groups must apply if they're interested in having a traffic light installed?
The application must be received from the school, and it must be signed by the school principal. And, yes, there is one date, and it's a floating date based on our funding and our anticipated contract aspect.
We do not advertise that 1106 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings date. Right now, Councilwoman, we have approximately 42 schools' applications on hand that we will be putting into our next contract already. That's more schools than we have funding for.
I'm sure. I'm sure. Why don't you have to advertise? I'm curious.
As I said, we have 42 schools already that are waiting for the flashers.
Yes. Last year we did get a contact within the School District, itself, rather than from their Government agency, the Government group, rather than their maintenance group. And they did speak to, I believe, the cluster leaders and the principals. They were talking about putting it into the Principal handbooks as to the availability of the flasher and the need to get an application in. If we don't have an application, we can't even consider the school. 1107 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings
Excuse me. Of the 42 applications you have, how many do anticipate installing?
I believe we asked for approximately $500,000 for school flashers. And they run about $15,000 apiece. So 30 would give us $450,000. So we're around 33 schools or something like that. We haven't necessarily designed or even estimated each individual school yet.
If we do one per year -- it seems to be an expensive item, though. If we do one per year per school, my problem is, for example, we had a child, an elementary school child -- a first grader I think it was -- hit by a car, and the school had in an application for flashing light. Now, we can't tell them, 'It's going to take ten years for you to get it,' especially when an emergency occurs. 1108 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings So I don't know what we do. Can we make some kind of allowances for emergencies? What I've been trying to do is ask them if they think other signs will help since this a big money item. And this is a problem. Obviously, it's fair to do one per district, but if you have over 200 schools, we could be into years getting every school to get what 10 they need. 11 So we need to consider maybe some kind 12 of system for emergencies and/or some kind of 13 process maybe for outreach if there is an accident 14 or a really, really -- obviously, if people ask for 15 flashing lights, they think all the corners are bad. 16 But that's a problem for us. 17 We need some king of system for 18 emergency situations. 19
Doing approximately 30 20 schools, if you will, at $15,000 apiece or $450,000 total, that averages out to about three per district.
If we have the 1109 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings applications for the district.
So we can get three and not one but three per district per year?
If we only have one application from that district, it's only one school. But if we have three applications, we can get three schools done in that district.
Okay. I'll take it, and I'll be quiet. Thank you. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: I would just like to add that the funding for our school program comes from the Capital Budget. It's a Capital Budget issue. We requested about 750,000, and we were actually funded 500,000 for the program this year.
And 300,000 for FY003. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: That's correct.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Good morning. 1110 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings Can you give me an update on the Avenue of the Arts North streetscape? I need to know what the schedule is. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Avenue of the Arts North. Bids are scheduled to be opened in June of 2001. We anticipate that we'll be able to start construction around October of 2001. That's going to go into inclement weather. And construction is anticipated to be completed by December of 2002.
So it's pushed back. I thought we were going to start earlier, like the spring of 2001. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: We have an estimated bid opening date of June 2001.
What's the first phase going to be? Is it going to be the installation of the street poles, or is it going to be the sidewalk reconstruction work? How are they going to phase it? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: I'm going to defer that question to Larry Moy. He might be able to give you more specifics on the different phases of the project.
Good morning, Councilman, 1111 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings Council President. My name is Larry Moy, and the answer, Councilman, is that we got probably the lighting and the sidewalk that will be done. And then we will coordinate with the State on the signal work followed by, finally, the resurfacing. There was a delay, we acknowledge, in terms of the plan development. And our target is June, the proposal being received and then starting in the fall.
Commissioner, earlier on, I think I may have had some discussions with you somewhere. I understand you had a lot of creative ideas associated with the service delivery. One of the things I never understood or -- my understanding on a sanitation crew is there's three people on a crew? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: (Shakes head.)
There's, like, one driver and two people who collect refuse. I always wondered why we didn't have a driver -- since those sanitation crews travel every street in the City of Philadelphia -- why we don't have them take down problem issues. As an example, they ride down a block 1112 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings and see a vacant house or an abandoned lot that needs to be cleaned or some other City-associated problem, why they don't have a sheet, like a trouble sheet, where they write that down and at end of the day they turn that in and it's forwarded to the appropriate department. Because the realty is that we're never in a position where we get enough phone calls from the citizens or the Inspector. We just don't have enough City Inspectors from L & I or whatever other department to go around and write up all these various problems. Would it make sense to have the driver -- because based on what I see, he moves maybe 10, 15 feet and stops and waits for the guys to pick up the refuse and throw it in the truck. And they say, "Yo," and he moves ahead 15 more feet. Would it make sense for the driver to maybe have like a trouble sheet where he can take down these various problems throughout the block and then have that referred to the appropriate departments? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Councilman, it would make a lot of sense to be able to do something 1113 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings like that. There are a couple of things that we often don't really understand about what it's like to be a sanitation worker. It varies from crew to crew. In some locations we have drivers who not only drive the truck, but they get out and they throw trash in inclement weather, in the heat, all day long. And their goal is to get done as quickly as they can. It's probably one of the most physically demanding jobs that the City has to offer.
I agree. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: And when we start asking our sanitation crews to take on more responsibility, their first reaction is, 'Well, gee, do you really understand how hard my job is already?' So in answering your question, yes, I think it would be a great benefit if we could gain that level of cooperation with our sanitation crews. And we're looking at and working with our unions and talking about how we can provide our laborers and our drivers with more incentives to want to finish their work sooner, to want to do more work than they've historically done and to take on more 1114 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings responsibility. So we are looking at that opportunities to get more productivity, if you will, out of the work that's already going on in the field. But it is very demanding work, and it's kind of a sensitive issue for our sanitation workers.
PennDot, I understand -- and, Mr. Trainor, you may want to step up here for this one. PennDot, in my years in government, I've always been told that certain things associated with what constituents or Councilpeople or staffers have asked for regulated by PennDot. And I'm assuming that PennDot has some uniform rules associated with the governance of traffic lights and other things within their realm of responsibility. But sometimes those things simply don't make sense in a City like Philadelphia as opposed to some small city in the middle part of the state. And my question is: Do we have the ability to have PennDot alter or give us authorization to do some things here differently in the City of Philadelphia? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: I think what 1115 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings you're referring to are the warrants that are set up by State regulation to determine where a traffic signal might be warranted or whether or not a stop sign or four-way stop might be warranted.
That's the main one. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: And I've questioned this issue since I've been here. And it's my understanding that we are obligated to follow State guidelines on warrants for placement of traffic signals. My first question was whether or not a warrant meant that it was justified or if we had the ability to say we could place these traffic control devices as locations where they are not justified. And it's my understanding that when we do that, if there's an accident or something occurs at that intersection, the City has taken on a tremendous amount of liability as a result because that traffic control device was never warranted by the State, and we did something outside of State mandate or State --
So who takes the responsibility when we don't place a light and there's an accident and in most people's minds, it 1116 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings happened as a result of there not being a light? Is the State then responsible for that? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Well, I think without speaking out of turn, I think what happens is if an accident occurs at a location where there wasn't a control device warranted, then there's probably some other reason for that accident occurring besides the fact that there wasn't a traffic light or a stop sign there. There was probably some driver error or some other reason that may have caused that accident. I know this is a sensitive issue and it's a very hot issue in the City given the number of requests that come through my office for four-way stops and stop signals and turn signals and all kinds of things. But the City has an obligation to follow State guidelines when it comes to that.
So do we have the wherewithal, or do we care about possibly asking for some of these warrants to be changed? Because we simply get PennDot, PennDot regulations, no more discussion. Sometimes that just doesn't work. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: I agree. 1117 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings
Are we proactively seeking to change -- I mean some of these regs go back 45, 50 years. I mean, the City of Philadelphia has changed particularly in the Center City area and some of the outlying areas. We have more pedestrians in certain areas as opposed to prior years. And at some point you need to look at this and possibly change some of these PennDot regs or at least ask them to change them. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: I think that's probably going to require a greater discussion and include people from both our Law Department and definitely some folks from PennDot to explore what other alternatives we might have and what opportunities we might have to go to PennDot and say that we need exceptions or that we need certain warrants or some of the merits of some of the warrants looked at.
Can you initiate that as the Streets Commissioner, that discussion, the minimum? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Yes. We can initiate that. 1118 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings
This is, in fact, a pet peeve of mine. What is the law governing the placement of a stop light? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: There are a number of warrants. I'm going to ask Charlie to come up and walk us through. I'm going to ask Charlie to be brief in walking us through those warrants because there's a lot of detail involved in them.
Councilman, for a traffic signal, currently there's approximately, I believe, eight warrants now recognized in the Federal manual on uniform traffic controls. But, basically, I'll go over the top three. The first one requires 500 vehicles per hour on the main street plus 150 vehicles an hour on the cross-street for each hour of eight hours. They don't have to be consecutive eight hours but have to have eight hours there. The second warrant is --
Of eight hours. 1119 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings So if you had up the eight hours, the main street needs 4000 vehicles on it. The second warrant is 750 vehicles per hour on a main street plus 75 on the minor for each hour of eight hours. The third warrant is 200 pedestrians crossing with 600 vehicles on the main street. And I'm not sure of the hours aspect of that. So, again, that's per hour per X number of hours.
So it would be either of those. It doesn't have to be all three.
Either of those will justify it. So if you have 80 percent of one or two -- but you have to have both -- you can justify a signal. If you have five accidents that are correctable, reportable, they could reduce the numbers that you need.
It requires a cross-street, yes. 1120 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings
Why is there a light on the southwest corner of City Hall?
The traffic signal at the southwest corner of City Hall, basically at South 6 Penn Square and Ranstead was installed many, many 7 years ago. It was discontinued as a result of the 8 Meridian fire. 9 The anticipation of the Meridian 10 building coming down or new use coming for it, we 11 included it in the southwest quadrant upgrade for 12 traffic signals. That signal, basically, is for 13 pedestrians crossing specifically from the 15th 14 South Penn Square side over to City Hall. 15 Prior to the fire, there was a heavy pedestrian activity crossing there.
That met, I believe, the third warrant, which is the pedestrian one. At that particular time, there were 600 pedestrians crossing there an hour.
Back then, but they're not now. You just put the light back up, right? 1121 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings
With the closure of the sidewalk from the result of the Meridian fire, no, we did not have any pedestrians crossing because no 5 one was crossing right to that point. But we do anticipate that to come about again.
So if you anticipate that, then you can put the light up?
Yes. That's one of those lower warrants, but at the same time, you have to go back and check it six months later.
So that could very well be a temporary light. So six months from now, if they're not -- what did you say? -- 500 people crossing --
-- 600 people crossing that intersection, that light is no 19 longer warranted?
Then that light is no longer warranted. 1122 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings
Councilman, can this be your last question until we have the second go around? There are a number of Councilmembers waiting.
I'm going to try. 33rd and Berks, there's been a request for something to be done about that corner for a long time. And there have been numerous accidents most associated with speed. You get that run from Norris Street and they see that light down there at Cecil B. Moore, and they try and make that green light. And they travel upwards of a hundred miles an hour. I'm not going to say what Councilwoman Tasco said. And I've actually asked for something to be done about that intersection. And based on the numbers you just gave me, I'm willing to bet that we 1123 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings meet, number one, with respect to the amount of traffic at 33rd Street, particularly in the morning rush hour and the evening rush hour. What's going to be done about that? I asked again.
Councilman, when we studied this, it's not just the traffic that's on 33rd Street, but it would be the traffic that would be on Berks. And, usually, when we study an intersection, especially one that's meeting an arterial street, the traffic on the arterial will meet the criteria. It's the traffic on the cross-street that is way below the criteria.
But there's no 16 cross-street over there on the southwest corner of City Hall, and you just put a light up.
We reinstalled the light that was there many years ago. And with the opening of that sidewalk area, the anticipation and the use of that sidewalk for pedestrians coming over to City Hall here is what we're putting that light there before.
I don't understand how you can -- that makes no sense to me. 1124 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings You can anticipate how many people are going to walk across there, but, yet, you have 4000 cars going down 33rd Street a day, and you're going to say that doesn't qualify. But because you anticipate that pedestrian walkway is going to have whatever number of people, then that qualifies? I don't understand that.
The pedestrians are crossing in front of the traffic. The problem on 33rd Street --
There's no 13 pedestrians on 33rd Street because people don't want to get killed.
And, unfortunately, an intersection control device which is there to assign the right-of-way at the intersection is not a speed control device.
Proper speed limits posted 1125 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings and enforcement of those speed limits.
That I cannot answer, but I assume that they are there. I can have them double check.
Well, then it's not working. There's a problem here, Charlie. They have accidents every month there. People are going a hundred miles an hour. You ask these little old ladies to catch the "A" Bus, the 32 or whatever it is, and they can't across the street. People riding down the middle of the lane three abreast. It is ridiculous up there, Charlie. I keep asking you to do something about it, and you keep telling me about PennDot regs. At some point you got to do something about it. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Councilman, may I suggest that our Department will take a look -- I'll take a personal interest in this particular corridor. We'll take a fresh look at what can be done in terms of calming traffic and in terms of looking at what we can do to slow traffic down and 1126 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings make that corridor more safe. And we'll get back to you within the next 30 days on this issue.
Thank you. The Chair recognizes Councilman Rizzo.
Thank you, Madam Chair . Commissioner, I just want to hit on momentarily the cost-effectiveness of the recycling program. We sold our recyclables for around $312,000. If we it would have just paid to get rid of 45,000 tons of trash -- and, again, this isn't a fair question, so we have to do the mathematics -- how much would it have cost the City to get rid of 45, 000 tons of trash? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: I think we're paying $45 a ton right now, $44 and change, per ton for disposal. But you can't really look at this years fortunate situation where we were actually generating revenue from recyclables. As you may know, the recyclable markets are highly volatile. There have been a number of 1127 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings years where we actually paid money to get rid of recyclables, not really to get rid of them, but a processing fee for processing them. And the net result was that we still ended up owing the contractors that are processing our recyclables because they aren't receiving enough revenue from the sale of those recyclables to even cover the cost of sorting them and packing them up to shipping them to market. So this year we've been in a fortunate situation where net revenue from the sale of recyclables has been positive. We've seen that start to drop off here recently in the last few months, and there's just no selling where the market is going to go two, three, four months from now. We may be paying again.
Are there any municipalities, major cities, that don't recycle? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: I think across the country, most major cities do recycle. They do have recycling programs. And part of the reason for that is because the public demands it and it's absolutely the right thing to do. But they don't recycle at all costs. 1128 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings Many cities and many communities actually charge a fee for the recycling service provided. By then again, in many communities, people actual pay a fee for the waste service that's provided too.
Commissioner, you just said people demand recycling. Some people demand recycling. I know that most people in this City, if you told them they didn't have to have their little recycling bucket, they would be just thrilled to throw the soda bottle in the trash and other things that get recycled in the trash. I understand the political ramification of recycling because it would be terrible if we didn't have a program like that. But, obviously, this program is costing the Streets Department money to manage, to operate. Even though you've made a small amount of money in selling the recyclables, it's probably cost us -- do you have a feel for what the recycling program truly costs the Streets Department? Do you know how much money you spend to make $311,000? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Our total budget 1129 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings is approximately $10,000,000, and that includes about million in grants, and an additional 5 4 million in operating. 5
Does that make good sense? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Most states have state laws that were passed to try to divert waste material from landfills. Landfill space across the country is somewhat limited. The City of Philadelphia has had its own very personal experience with situations where we ended up with waste that was generated and we didn't have a place to put it. We don't want to find ourselves in that situation again. And part one of the strategies to prevent that is to have very aggressive recycling programs to divert waste from landfills and also to conserve on the use of our natural resources. Recycling is something that has become part of the fabric of America, and I think the City of Philadelphia is going to have to continue to try to find ways to make recycling more cost-effective as opposed to abandoning the concept altogether. That's what we're going to try to do. 1130 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings
Commissioner, I have a list of things here that I want to review with you. The list time I think we went through this process, we found that we had a potential problem with the number of streetlights that are out throughout the City of Philadelphia. There's a lot of problems associated with the streetlights that are out. We pay the utility company for a light that's not on. Not many people are aware of that, but we do. And I'm sure a there's a credit process. But I would appreciate you addressing and talking a little bit about the condition because being a Councilmember at Large, I'm in every neighborhood of the City, and I see that we have JFK that's been out for months going up to 30th Street Station, a major artery in Center City with no 19 streetlights. We have Kelly Drive -- and I met with you -- that has wires tied off to trees which is dangerous and just not a condition that should exist. West River Drive, we have streetlights out there, a dangerous, curvy roadway. 1131 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings Where are we? Again, it's a big task to keep a major municipal streetlight system operational. But could you bring your Streetlighting Engineer to give us a report, or if you'd like to, on exactly where are we and why in every neighborhood -- I could understand a streetlight being out here for a week, but I can't understand streetlights -- we're talking about more. I'd be happy with the ones we have being on. And the last time at this hearing, I pointed out a location at Shawmont and Ridge. The streetlight at that corner was out for a long time, and unfortunately, it fell through the cracks or there was just a mistake. We can understand that. But Kelly Drive, that job has been hanging -- tied off the trees -- streetlight standards for years. JFK, as we leave work at night, West River Drive. Where are we with all these projects, and how many streetlights do we have out? Because I think the last time we asked that question, we were quite surprised to hear how many streetlights were 1132 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings out. And I know shifted contractors. So could you just give us a report on where we are, please? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Councilman, a couple of quick comments. As you know we maintain over a hundred thousand streetlights here in the City of Philadelphia. And I know that the Kelly Drive project has been one that's been going on for a while with PECO. Our best information in this case is we should be receiving bids this month for that project, and we anticipate that construction should be able to start around May or June. For the remainder of your questions, I would defer to Joe Doyle.
Good morning. I'm Joseph 19 Doyle, Chief Streetlighting Engineer. 20 Councilman, I guess the questions that 21 you raise are sort of broad in the sense that 22 there's three major components of the maintenance 23 and operation of the City streetlighting system. The City, of course, owns and maintains the -- or is responsible for the entire lighting 1133 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings system, but we have a maintenance contractor, who currently is Asplundh, who maintains and performs nighttime service and is really the party of first investigation of all outages. Secondly, there's PECO Energy, the utility that is responsible for the underground electrical distribution system for the lighting. And, thirdly, it's our own City forces who perform the balance of the triad, if you will, for maintenance. Right now we are experiencing and PECO is experiencing a severe maintenance problem of outages, and the majority of the locations that you just mentioned kind of fall into their realm. I'm not here to pass blame at PECO because this is the season of the year, as you're well aware from past experience, when the rain, the snow, the freeze, the thaw, all of those factors are very destructive to underground electrical cable and the connections that provide to the streetlighting system. Specifically, the cases that you just described -- as the Commissioner mentioned, Kelly Drive, one of our longstanding problems, those bids 1134 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings are going to be opened; i think it's actually tomorrow. And we're looking forward to that contract starting shortly and will replace the entire lighting system. That will correct all of the aerial cable that we've seen and really have a reliable lighting system out there. Some of other specific problems that you mentioned, JFK Boulevard, that actually was repaired on Friday, by the was that is burning.
You knew I was going to ask the question, Mr. Doyle, thank you. Just kidding.
We try to provide a high level of service, Councilman, that worked out --
-- in that direction. So those lights are burning. Some of the other the locations, the fact that we've had some communication with your office, have been back on. But PECO has given us a plan where over the next month, by April 1, they guaranteed that a significant improvement -- and I underline the word "significant" -- will be made on their part to 1135 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings correct the outages, particularly the wrong circuits and JFK Boulevard type situations where they need to devote some considerably additional manpower resources to correct. And then from that point on, they have guaranteed that they will keep the number of outages to a minimum so that we do not have to experience this same cycle as we seem to be doing now.
Henry Avenue is included in the short-term and the long-term -- PECO is attempting to create not only a short-term plan but a long-term plan. Some of the corridors that we've seen before have continuing and chronic outages, Henry Avenue being one of our favorite candidates there. There is an intention to keep them on short term even if they have to provide temporary services. But a long-term plan of either replacing the entire lighting system as we've seen on Kelly Drive is definitely in the works here. Either through a PECO project or a City project, we are 1136 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings going to move ahead on that.
I hear the buzzer, so I assume my time is up, but I just want to ask this question. The problem that PECO Energy is having -- and I understand their problem. I think I understand it better than most people this room -- that they have a contractual -- am I correct? They have -- it's nice to say that they don't have the people, but, contractually, do they have a responsibility to respond within a period? They are a business, and if we're their customer, are they contractually responsible -- or are they supposed to be giving us credits for all these streetlights that don't work? If they're contractually responsible to respond to put streetlights back in service that could cause serious injury, what do we do about that? What do we do to get their attention?
Well, we have gotten their attention. What's happened is, I guess, all of the factors affecting the utility industry are kind of long documented. But what's happened with 1137 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings Philadelphia and the streetlighting system is that because of these continuous outages, we have been meeting with them on a regular basis. They have been recognizing the importance of the City's lighting system. And, in fact, streetlighting is the number one maintenance priority of PECO Energy. That's been determined. And we've been assigned that priority for the very reasons that we've been discussing. They definitely are committed to improving customer service. They see us as very important customer. And we have worked with them through their senior management staff to develop a plan to address the problems, not only the short term but in the long term as well.
Again, contractually, do they have an obligation to respond or repair these lights? I'm not talking about their willingness. I would like to know do they have a contract with the City of Philadelphia to respond in an appropriate period of time? Do they have a requirement in that contract or that relationship to bring in subcontractors, which there are dozens of, to help them? 1138 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings The personal relationship -- and you have a good one with them. I want to know what we have in writing that requires them to respond. If we don't have it, we should have it. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Councilman, I'll address that question. Anytime we contract for services as a customer, we have the ability to look at whether or not those contractual obligations are being met. And if those contractual obligations are not being met, then we have the ability to take more aggressive steps with whoever we're in a contract with for service or product that we're buying from them to deal with those issues. And we're not obligated to continue to, I guess, accept a substandard level of service. So if we determine that we're not getting what we're paying for from whoever we've contracted with, we always have options to look at and ways to get their attention. If there's some specific issues that we need to address with PECO, then we're certainly open to sitting down and working with them. But we are a very, very large customer of theirs. And when 1139 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings you're a large customer, you can typically carry a pretty big stick and get people's attention.
Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you, Madam Chair.
You're welcome. The Chair recognizes Councilman Ortiz.
Good morning, Commissioner. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Good morning.
Commissioner, Speak about the Pilot Recycling Program. That must be a new program? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: There's an old program that's going to be changed in a lot of ways to be totally different.
No longer a pilot. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: No. It's still a pilot.
I think it should be called a limited program. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Well, the thing is that --
It began, when '97, 1140 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings '98?
So it's no longer a pilot. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: I think that over the years, the City has looked at and tested a number of things and collected a lot of data. Some of the things that we're going to be looking at and tested haven't been tested before. And our purpose is to look at ways to be more efficient as we move forward, not to see just what the results are going to be in terms of participation rates or tonnages diverted but more how we can reduce the actual operating costs so that we would have as a viable option the option of expanding and eliminating the concept of the pilot and making it part of our ongoing operating program.
Well, after four years and I think more -- I think -- Madam Chair, I think we've been talking about recycling in this Council now since the mid-'80s when we first passed the recycling legislation. And from that point to this point and in your testimony, you say that with commercial and 1141 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings residential, we only have 35 percent -- we have achieved a level of 35 percent recycling. Is that true? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: That's including the commercial, yes. Councilman, I would say without --
I know that you're new. I'm not -- COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: I would just say that I've come here from a state that probably recycles more than any state in the nation. And I will tell you that while we have goals -- or while the State of California, I should say, has goals of diverting 50 percent of its waste stream, you won't find most big cities ever reaching 50 percent. They're going to have aggressive programs. They're going to divert on a commercial waste stream. They're going to add the diversion of yard waste and grain waste and lawn clippings and construction demolition debris. But it's very, very difficult to hit 50 percent diversion. 35 percent diversion is a respectable number. 23 percent diversion is a respectable number. 1142 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings I also know that historically here in Philadelphia, people really focused on just what is being diverted from the Curbside Collection Program, but I would venture to say that there's not 50 percent of the recyclables of the total waste stream you can't even find in the residential. So when we start looking at diversion rates for a City like Philadelphia, we should be looking at a combination of what is diverted from the residential programs --
So what is the percentage of residential recycling without the commercial, residential recycling that is now going on? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: The diversion rate?
Recycling. You talked to me -- COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: We measure -- when you measure recycling --
What percentage of residences in the City of Philadelphia today can have recycling picked up -- cans, plastics, if plastics are part of it, bottles and so on -- what 1143 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings percentage of residential Philadelphia can you say that they have a recycling schedule in their neighborhood? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Councilman, there are a couple of things. A hundred percent of the residential population that has waste collection service has scheduled recycling. There's a different percentage -- and I don't know what percentage that is -- for the people that actively do it every week. And then there's the diversion percentage which is how much of the total residential waste stream is actually pulled out. The diversion percentage is roughly six percent. The number of people that actually participate every week is a number I don't have here today but we can probably get. And in terms of total recycling, I don't have a number for what the total percentage of recyclable materials that are available in the residential waste stream, but it's not 50 percent of the total waste in the City of Philadelphia. I can tell you that.
I'd like to get an 1144 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings understanding of really what type of recycling program we have. You say that we have a hundred percent recycling across the City. And then you say that we have actually achieved 35 percent recycling with commercial involved, the commercial stream involved. And you say we have this pilot program that is no longer a pilot, and we're not expanding it or applying it across the board. So if we are not at 50 percent, explain to me -- and I know some people do not put out -- separate their waste in different neighborhoods. But explain to me how it is we don't have a greater percentage of the recycling program in place if we're supposed to be having recycling in every neighborhood. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Recycling is available to all residents.
Explain "available" to me. Does that mean that on Thursday on 24th and Cambridge there will be a recycling truck that goes through that street? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: That means that as part of your regular garbage service, waste 1145 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings collection service, you have the ability to recycle in most parts of the City on a schedule that occurs once every other week today. What we would like to get to is a point where that's available in most parts of the City every week. That's our goal. Today we can't do it every week because we haven't been able to find a way to do it that would be cost-effective. Right now, it would cost us about $300 a ton in order to expand that service to ever week.
So every other week a recycling truck goes by all of the neighborhoods of the City? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Yes, sir.
Through every street of the City? My staff person here says he hasn't had one in months -- in a month. And you live where? You live in the Northeast. He says he hasn't had one in a month. So every other week a recycling truck is theoretically supposed to go through every 1146 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings neighborhood in the City? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Let me address your first comment, that you staff person hasn't had one in a month.
Right. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: One of the things that we've down as a result of the inclement weather is we've pulled a lot of our work crews from certain areas of the work in order to get caught up on regular waste collection, and we have experienced some delays in some areas of our service as a result of a lot of the inclement weather. So it's not unthinkable that some services may not have been delivered on their regular. But when we're on our regular schedule, your statement is correct, that, in theory, a recycling truck would go down every street at least once every other week to collect recyclables.
Does the lack of participation then come down on a lack of information given to the public? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: The lack of participation occurs, in my opinion, for a couple of 1147 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings reasons. One, because the schedules need to be more regular for people. The idea of increasing participation rates in recycling has to come down to a matter of convenience the people that are using the service. And you may notice that every week consistently people know that if your trash collection day is on Monday, people consistently put their trash out on Monday, we consistently come by and pick it up on Monday. What we would like to do is get recycling to that same type of consistent schedule where if your day is Monday, when you put your trash out, you put your recycling out and a truck comes by and picks up your trash and a truck comes by and picks up your recycling. Or it could be a single truck comes by and picks up both.
But the people know the truck will be there. That's why they put the garbage out. With the recycling, they may not know this truck is going to be there. That's why they don't put there recyclables out. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: I agree with you, 1148 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings Councilman, and that's what we're trying to find a way to do in a more cost-effective manner. Right now, in order to do that, it would cost us $300 a ton. It would cost the City about $300 a ton. That makes it prohibitive at this point.
To do what? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: To expand weekly recycling under the current system Citywide.
But even every other week, if people knew the recyclables were going to be picked up at a certain time every other week just like with the garbage, a huge majority of the people, I would say, would have it out if they had certain assurances. And the issue is: Why don't they, and is it because they don't have that assurance that those things will be picked up? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: There are a couple of reasons. One of the main reasons is that an every-other-week schedule can be confusing. When people miss a week, they may forget whether it's their week or it's going to be the next week, and that causes them to not put it out or put it out on 1149 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings the wrong day. We are trying to put more resources and more effort into increasing our education and communication to our residents on not only when their recycling days might occur but also the importance of participating and trying to work with schools and start people off at a much younger age to get them into the habit and get them used to recycling. But we do issue schedules to our residents, calendar schedules, that tell them what week they're supposed to recycle on. But it's got to be more of a combined effort that combines aggressive education, regular scheduling and every effort that we can do to make it just routine and convenient to get people to start participating more actively.
Thank you. The Chair recognizes Councilman DiCicco.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Good morning, Commissioner. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Good morning. 1150 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings
It seems like recycling is the topic of the day. In my neighborhood, directly in the area where I live, I notice on recycling day -- we do every other week -- only a small percentage of people actually participate in recycling. And it may have to do with the fact that sometimes people get confused. Even I get confused, and I consider myself a pretty diligent person when it comes to recycling. What if anything is being done about enforcement? I know that we have from time to time put information out to educate people about the recycling program. And there's that magnetic calendar that I think was distributed about a year or so ago. Hopefully, people put it somewhere where they would pay attention to it. But I notice there's very little participation in it, and I was wondering what if anything we're doing. And I hear you saying from time to time during the testimony that it's not cost-efficient to be able to do the recycling that we would like to do. 1151 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings Increasing the tonnage that is collected doesn't help that in any way, does it, or would it? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Increasing the tonnage collected would he somewhat. There are a couple ways to do that. (A) Through expanding the number or types of materials that we collect every week, make more materials available to the individual resident to place out for collection and finding ways to increase, as you alluded to, the number of people in the neighborhood that are actually participating every week. And the only way that I've known to be successful in doing that is to increase the convenience factor around the recycling and also to really focus in on increasing the educational component of the program. It's almost like safety. Recycling has to become part of the attitude of a community to want to do it. And the way that you make it part of the attitude is it's got to be something that's discussed and talked about and embraced in community groups and not just in flyers but in community groups, in the schools, in promotional opportunities 1152 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings and all kind of things. And we are as a department looking at how we can increase those concepts as part of our program to try to get more people to participate.
I'm glad to hear that. And if there's anything I can do in my capacity as the Councilperson and the Chair of the Streets and Services Committee, please reach out for me. Because nothing for me is more depressing than to see the folks where I live in a little complex of six apartments and six houses -- we do a pretty good job of recycling on a weekly basis. And then you look down the rest of the block and maybe see one or two cans out there and occasionally some newspapers that are bundled up. And we really need to do something more about that. The other question I have is -- and I raised this probably before you came on as Commissioner. When a street is being either reconstructed or resurfaced, some activity is being done, oftentimes, a lot of the debris -- the cinders 1153 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings and material that is either brought to the site or removed from the site -- generally find their way on the street surface in and around the general area of where that activity is taking place. And I asked this in the past year or years actually. Is there anything that we're doing that requires the contractor to go through the immediate area with the mechanical street sweepers that they have? Because, generally, if it's a milling job and they're going to resurface, when they mill, they come through with the mechanical sweepers to get whatever debris is left behind so that the new blacktop, obviously, has a better adherence. But they don't go beyond that. And I'm not talk about a little bit of debris that's on the street. I'm talking about a significant amount of cinders that are left maybe a block or two outside of that general area. And I think that has a disturbing effect on people who live there. And in the case where we do have a weekly street cleaning program, obviously, that is eliminated. But where we don't have it, is there 1154 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings anything we're doing, or are we making that a requirement? Because the contractor obviously has the equipment out. And why should the City have to send out separate crews? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Councilman, I don't know what we're actively doing at this point about that problem, but that's something that we can definitely --
I think it would be very helpful. I think it's one of those quality of life issues where -- with all good intentions. I think the Department has done a great job over the last few years in resurfacing streets. It's probably the most I've seen in a long, long time. So I'm not condemning what is happening out there. I just thought we might be able to do a little bit more at least for the adjacent communities or adjacent streets and do something to maintain those a little bit better. The discussion came up about the traffic signal at the northwest quadrant, I guess that is, of City Hall where it's been reinstalled. A couple of years ago, I think I met 1155 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings with Charlie Trainor and maybe Joe Syrnick and a few others. And I asked that they look into the possibility of installing a traffic signal at the southeast quadrant of City Hall. And that's, basically, if you're crossing from City Hall over to Juniper Street, which would be the side entrance to the Wanamaker Building, most people including myself, I will admit, use that as a shortcut. Unfortunately, or maybe fortunately, none of has have been injured to date. ) smiling back there. I would ask that if you would look into that and maybe submit a report to the Chair as what the possibility for that is. And as now Chestnut Street is open to vehicular traffic and it's becoming a more pedestrian-friendly street, Chestnut Street, more people are using that shortcut to get from one side of City Hall, Broad Street, over to the other side. There are courtrooms in that building in addition to the retail of Lord and Taylor. If you stood out there, you could get a real appreciation for what I'm saying. I think it's something that we need to look at. 1156 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings And one other thing comes to mind. I'm always dealing with issues on street furniture and kind of creating some kind of order out there with newsstands and honor boxes and corrals for honor boxes. I notice in a number of locations there are newsstands that are literally right on top of the area, within the area, which are the staging areas for SEPTA buses and trolleys. I believe the Code says that newsstands and other types of fixtures are not supposed to be within feet of that zone. The zone could be the 14 bus zone, whatever it is. I'm not sure what the bus 15 zone is; maybe 40 feet in length. 16 But I'll give you an example. At the 17 Northeast corner of Broad and Snyder, there's a bus 18 staging area. There's the entrance to the subway, 19 and the newsstand has been there for years. And I 20 guess the more I'm involved in this stuff, the more 21 aware I'm become of things. It's been there for a 22 number of years. 23 Who makes those decisions as to where 24 those newsstands basically -- where do they get 25 placed? 1157 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings The southwest corner of Broad and Chestnut, the same situation. Next to one of our new bus shelters, one of those really gorgeous stainless steal state-of-the-art bus shelters, there's a newsstand. It's probably been there for long time. But it's right where people have to get on and off busses. And it really poses a public safety issue, forgetting the aesthetics, which is one thing. But it's a public safety issue. And someone told me that in a number of these cases, the Streets Department over the years basically made the decision that that's where these newsstands would go. Is that true, and what can we do about it? Could the District Council people -- if we have an issue, how do we go about maybe relocating some of those stands? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Yes, Councilman. The Streets Department through its Right-of-Way unit is responsible for the placement of furniture, if you will, on the right-of-way. And we do look at newsstands and street vendors and other things, other businesses that set up shop on the sidewalks and issue permits or are involved in the permitting 1158 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings process for that.
Many of the newsstands that are out there today as you indicated probably have been there for years. And we would have to look at any specific situations that you may have in your district with our Right-of-Way unit. Nancy Sen and John Cunningham would be the people that you would work with on those. And we could send inspectors out and look at the placement. And if they're outside of code, we could work with you and work with those vendors to get them in compliance.
Thank you. Just in closing, I want to commend you and thank you for the job you've done in the year so -- it's about a year, isn't it? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: In May it will be a year.
In May it will be a year. One of the highlights of your Administration has been the quick response to everything whether it's favorable or not favorable. But the response is rather quick, and I want to 1159 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings thank you for that. You've done a great job. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Thank you.
Thank you, Councilman. Councilman Nutter, do you want to be recognized?
Good morning, Commissioner. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: Good morning.
Commissioner, I wanted to talk about there's been some discussion earlier about lighting, and I wanted to talk about streetlights. And I know that in a response to the Chair earlier, I think you talked about either how many lights we have or any replacement of lights. And I think we're only doing replacement as opposed to any upgrading of lights throughout the City; is that correct? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: We are upgrading lights where we are replacing old lights with a new type of light that has a longer maintenance life and greater illumination. 1160 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings
And you and I have had some discussion in your time here about streetlights. There was a report that came out or it was attached to a letter that talked about additional lights and maybe even some different column heads. Are we getting away from the cobra-type lights or cobra heads and going to a different standard, or can you give us a little information about that? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: I will let Joe Doyle give you kind of on overview of our streetlighting program.
As far as any changes to the type of equipment that we're using, we have in the past had -- the vast majority of the City's lighting system has been a cobra-type fixture. We are essentially replacing those existing cobra fixtures with newer versions of cobra fixtures. They are more efficient and easier to maintain and the other advantages of modern technology. But they are the same style of fixture, 1161 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings and that is a replacement for them. There are an entire array of more ornamental-looking fixtures that --
A large array of ornamental-looking fixtures. I have catalogs full of ornamental-looking fixtures and would be glad to share them with you. But, overall, we have taken an operating policy, if you will, of replacing existing cobra fixtures with the type of equipment.
And, Mr. Doyle and the Commissioner -- I'm assuming, Mr. Doyle, that this was your work. I received this report. I have a whole lot of commentary with it. Streetlighting system upgrade, there's a listing by Council District laying out some street length in feet and you're going to add lights and add poles. And then there's Plan A, Plan B, C and D. As I said, not a lot of info came along with this, and it was a little difficult to try to understand just what was going on here. 1162 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings Is this something that you're planning to do? Have you picked one of these plans? Are all plans operational? What is the story with this? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: What we did is we looked at the location of the streetlights across the City based on a standard, I believe, of about 100 feet and came up with a summary of how many streetlights we would look at under a program where were adding additional lights, how many streetlights we would look at adding per district, and came up with some very expensive numbers for doing a program like that, looked at what we could do within reason, short term. And I believe Plan A was about a $6.5 million expenditure for adding additional residential lights. And that looked at an aggressive program of taking existing PECO poles and simply adding lights where there weren't on existing poles that might be in our community. Again, this was something that we looking at and proposing to do as part of your capital budgeting process. That program was not funded for the next fiscal year under the capital budgeting program. 1163 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings So at this point, we have no funds to do the program.
For any of the scenarios? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: That's correct.
Well, does this need to be done? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: I think the study was done as part of a request from Council about a year ago, as I recall. So we completed the study and provided the information and in our interest to be responsive looked at, under the circumstances, what would be the most cost-effective way of adding the greatest number of lights in the City. And, again, it was something that we proposed that we weren't successful in getting the program funded under the capital budgeting process.
So this was proposed to City Planning or CPO? I mean, who reviewed this, and who denied the request? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: It was part of our Capital Budget request, our initial Capital Budget request, but it was not a program that we 1164 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings were able to find the capital dollars for this year.
Let me ask this question. When you sent the document out or compiled this -- and I do remember the request. I may have been one of a number of requesting parties. The October 6 letter -- which I will make an assumption that all Councilmembers received this -- was there any discussion with Councilmembers about this, about trying to push for funding for this? I mean, I cannot imagine a year when the Streets Department has come up and a number of us have raised the streetlighting issue. And you are correct; this was from about a year ago. And there's some other stuff from about a year ago in the streetlighting area. And, I mean, I did receive it, and I have in originals right here. There was no 20 commentary that went with it, and I never heard any more about it. So, I mean, I would at least share with you that, I guess, if I had an understanding that any one of these A, B, C or D programs or projects that you were trying to move forward, if there was 1165 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings some opportunity to get something, I guess I can only suggest to you that maybe some discussion with many of us who really care about these kinds of issues may have possibly resulted in somewhat of a different scenario. Was there any outreach, either Commissioner or Mr. Doyle, to any of us? COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: There was not specific discussion with Council on the program. We attempted to respond to Council's request from a year ago and provide the information and after we completed the analysis, included a request if our Capital Budget that was not approved.
Okay. Let's talk about some other lights and other light requests. Now, it's two days short of a year ago, on February 22, 2000, that I also made some requests with regard to examination of the streetlight level or light power in various parts of my district. And to this day and to the best of my knowledge -- and we called about this a couple of times -- my response back to you based on the October letter and data that you supplied again pointed out that I was supposed to get a random sampling of foot candle 1166 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings readings in various parts of my district. And we talked last year -- I understand, Commissioner, you were here; the other folks that are with you were -- that many of your streets were just dark. And I wanted to get an understanding of this foot candle power level or reading and be able to compare that on high foot candle power streets versus some of the lower ones. I'm a little perplexed as to why that has not been responded to. COMMISSIONER JOHNSON: The letter that you have before you from October of last year in some ways would address -- while it wouldn't give you what the specific data on what the foot candle readings are, it would address any area within your district that may fall short in terms of the number of lights. As we add more lights, we would raise the total level of lighting on the streets in your district.
Well, I understand that, and I appreciate that, but I will not direct my question to Mr. Doyle because he and I had this discussion last year. And I left that hearing with the belief and an understanding that I would get 1167 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings certain information that I had asked for. I believe Mr. Doyle, on behalf of the Department, agreed to provide that information, and I do not understand why I don't have it. So, Mr. Doyle, can you tell me what happened a year ago and what's happened since and why I don't have the information I asked for?
Yes. First of all, Councilman, we took your request very seriously. And, in fact, we developed the plan that was submitted to you as a result of that for the Streets Department, the Streetlighting Division, to really give an overview of the entire City's lighting system. One of the problems that's always existed is getting good data. We have a lot of paper maps, a lot of paper records of the lighting system. And what we have been doing over the last several years is trying to upgrade our information gathering to provide a more accurate indication of where our lighting system is. We have been working on a GIS, a geographic information system. It's a computer-based data collection. It was provided 1168 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings several years ago by the Water Department as part of a fly-over of Philadelphia. What that end-game resulted in is a map of the City's lighting system as far as the location of each lighting pole in Philadelphia. What we have been working on over the past year is adding data to that to provide the luminar size and the other specifics of the system that we need to add to provide the kind of overall view that I think ultimately City Council is requesting. Unfortunately, that's taking a lot longer than we thought it would. And we wanted to be comprehensive. We wanted to try to collect the data correctly, and we wanted to present it to you in an organized fashion. So I apologize for the delay on it, but it is not something that is going without any action at all. We have been moving ahead on the data collection ourselves to provide a true, accurate overlay of what the City's lighting system is, where its deficiencies are, what type of needs we can establish and how we're going to proceed with that. So right now we are continuing to work on that update. 1169 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings We can provide a few selected blocks for you if that specifically is your request. In the near term, we can do that for you.
Mr. Doyle, that was my request a year ago. And I appreciate the more comprehensive review and analysis. If you produce a report, I'm sure I will read it. But I asked you for some information a year ago that was specific to the issue I was raising so I could better understand the situation and be able to represent the concerns of constituents. I received no response. I received no 15 explanation. It wasn't for lack of trying because I have called about this and written about this. And I'll take you at your word, that you took the project in comprehensive way seriously. On the other hand, I don't particularly get the impression that you took the specific and more narrow request too seriously because if you had, I'd have it by now. We had a fairly long back-and-forth about this issue. We talked about the Avenue of the Arts, and we talked about Walnut Street and what the 1170 2/20/01 Capital Budget Hearings foot candle power is in the neighborhoods versus what it is on Walnut Street and which street would you like to walk down and which is brighter and which is safer. Do you remember any of that?
Okay. When will I get the information that I asked for?