A new report focusing on how the 13-member LA Metro governing board makes decisions found they are not required to consider the customers’ experiences on the transit system, nor are reports on how trains or buses are performing consistently included in board decisions.
The findings, part of a larger report on LA Metro board governance and “guiding values” released Monday, April 27, drew sharp criticism from some board members, and also from ridership groups and committee members who said it’s absurd to ignore ridership observations before the board votes on multi-billion dollar projects or bus schedule changes.
“If we are making decisions on things that will impact riders, I would hope we would get that information and make a decision that actually reflects the ridership,” said Kathryn Barger, an L.A. County Supervisor and member of the LA Metro governing board.
Barger made the remark after hearing the staff report presented at the recent Ad Hoc Board Composition Committee, which she attended. The committee has been looking at the composition of the board once Measure G gets implemented fully in a few years, which increases the number of supervisors from five to nine. That could mean that all nine would also join Metro’s board, raising the number to 17, joining representatives from the city of Los Angeles and smaller cities.
While the size, makeup and regional balance of the board was the committee’s focal point in earlier meetings, the April 27 meeting focused primarily on what qualities make a good board member, and what information is provided to make decisions on a massive, countywide system of six rail lines, 117 bus routes through 1,440 square miles, reaching 1 million boardings daily that is growing.
Values being fully met by the board included: transparency/public trust, fiscal stewardship and functional effectiveness (because the board meets regularly, with long-serving members who provide an institutional memory, and members receive topical staff briefings).
However, the report said the board only partially satisfies the following values:
• Customer Experience: Customer feedback is provided from advisory groups or informally, “but this input is not consistently required or highlighted in board actions.”
• Rider Outcomes: “Ridership outcomes are often, but not always, directly measured and explicitly tied to decision-making.”
• System Performance: “Regular reporting to the Board on operational performance supports oversight, but performance outcomes are not consistently tied to decision-making.”
The staff report recommended LA Metro can improve in the last three categories by explicitly adding customer’s experiences from advisory groups or individuals to staff reports. Metro staff said one way is to include customer experience data in every board report on every agenda item and attached staff report.
Barger questioned why the agency with nearly a $10 billion budget has not included customer input to its board on a regular basis. “Why would it take a change in governance, if we are not getting information to properly make decisions on customer experience? Am I missing something?” she said.
For instance, Barger said she wants to hear from the bus and train riders about safety concerns.
“When we talk about security, I want to hear customer feedback,” she said. Barger said at monthly board meetings, the average rider’s viewpoint is not heard. Instead, the board gets one side — mostly from those who speak against more security and more law enforcement patrolling stations, on trains and on buses.
Ara Najarian, a Glendale City Council member and a LA Metro board member, praised information received from the Public Safety Advisory Committee (PSAC) a few years back. The group is made up of system riders and not politicians; ridership is a requirement for membership.
The PSAC advocated for the creation of transit ambassadors, which are now part of the layered public safety system stationed on train platforms and buses as eyes and ears on the system. Najarian said he was dead set against them, saying the system needed more law enforcement, but changed his mind after hearing the PSAC’s report from riders and voted to support the ambassador program.
While the PSAC group made a difference in safety issues, contributing to how the agency’s new Department of Public Safety will be formed and take the place of law enforcement from the Los Angeles Police Department, Long Beach PD and the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, they were limited to comments about safety, said Jeremy Oliver-Ronceros, chair emeritus of the committee.
Oliver-Ronceros, a member of the Ad Hoc Committee, was chair of PSAC for three years until he was termed out in March. The group held 16 listening sessions per year. Everyday riders would stand up and tell their experience, some complaining about feeling unsafe. They were given the opportunity to write down their comments. These were formed into reports sent to the governing board.
In an interview, Oliver-Ronceros, a regular rider of the B Line train and a North Hollywood resident, said he would like to see information from customers as well as train and bus performance engrained in staff reports and presented to the board. He agreed with the values guidelines report on what’s lacking.
“There are a number of things like customer experience and ridership outcomes and for all of these, there’s nothing saying they are required to be considered,” he said on Thursday, April 29.
“There is a perfect opportunity to enhance these concepts and engrain them into the philosophy of decision-making,” he added.
Alfonso Directo Jr., advocacy director for ACT-LA, a nonprofit that promotes riders who are transit-dependent, said the agency should borrow a page from Japan. When trains or buses are late or delayed, the transit agencies in the country make public apologies.
In an emailed response received on Thursday, Directo wrote that input from riders should not be discretionary.
“Bus rider perspectives should be a required part of decision-making,” he wrote. “Eight in 10 Metro riders are presently on the bus and no one knows the impact of a missed or late bus and bus lines with long headways better than the bus riders themselves.”
He also suggested the board makeup include an expert on the subject of transit riders. “Experts are part of other transit agency boards,” he wrote.
Fourth District LA County Supervisor Janice Hahn, a Metro board member and former Metro chair, recently said she’d like to see a bonafide, full-time transit rider appointed to the board.
“As we look at the governance of this board, I do hope we include more transit riders to the board,” she said at a recent board meeting. “Having a transit rider sit next to you on the dais will make us stronger.”
That has been a criticism of the board. Namely, that it is out of touch with regular bus and train riders, who have had to worry about crime, loiterers doing drugs, mentally unstable riders and inconvenient train and bus schedules. Being a rider is not a requirement for LA Metro board members.
Groups who have participated during public comment periods and through letters involving board decisions sometimes include experts in engineering or transportation. That would include Bob Anderson, a retired engineer, who is vice president and chair of the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Association (SOHA)’s Transportation Committee.
Anderson has been a critic of how LA Metro goes about planning its proposed Sepulveda Pass Corridor project. The board recently voted to approve an all underground train through the Santa Monica Mountains, connecting the San Fernando Valley with L.A.’s Westside.
He agreed with the staff report, saying it’s always good for governmental agencies, especially LA Metro that makes decisions on multi-billion dollar train lines and extensions as part of a rapid expansion of its rail system, to have rider experience feedback on existing lines, to help shape routes for future projects.
“Information from those people is invaluable,” Anderson said on Thursday. “Because they are the riders. Those kinds of questions should influence them (LA Metro board and staff) on future decisions.”
The next meeting of the Ad Hoc Board Composition Committee is scheduled for 3 p.m., May 20, at LA Metro Headquarters, One Gateway Plaza, Los Angeles, CA 90012, 3rd Floor, in the board room.
Riders can also share feedback by taking a survey.
For more information, go to: gometro.la/governance.