Post by TheShadow on Jun 3, 2009 16:09:58 GMT -5
www.sfgate.com
Phillip Matier,Andrew Ross
Take-out pizzas, spending sprees at the Apple store and a $1,600 "team-building" trip to Angel Island are the latest bullets being fired at BART by unions upset over the transit system's attempts to solve its $250 million budget problem in part by cutting back on worker benefits.
BART credit card bills show that over the past year, top management and staff spent:
-- $27,000 for take-out food and catering.
-- $18,570 at the Emeryville Apple store.
-- $1,500 at the REI outdoor-gear store.
-- $1,629 for a tour of Angel Island.
"The district has a budget problem, but part of the problem stems from people at the top making poor decisions," said Jean Hamilton, president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees union local that represents BART supervisors and middle managers.
BART spokesman Linton Johnson said the credit card attack was just another "attempt to deflect attention from our efforts to find $100 million in savings."
The union's spending slam comes hot on the heels of BART's own opening salvo, a Web site that highlights worker pay and benefits. The BART site takes a swipe at some of the system's more bizarre work rules - such as the one that requires two workers to change one train seat (one to snap the seat snaps, the other to turn the screws).
As for the specific spending that the union is criticizing, BART says:
-- Some of the pizzas and other food were for union workers handling after-hours emergency work.
-- The REI spending was for bright yellow, all-weather jackets that BART's public information officers wear for outdoor media events in the rain.
-- The Angel Island trip was a team-building exercise for the 64-member BART computer squad.
-- The Apple store spending was for BART-TV, the agency's new public information program.
"BART-TV?" Hamilton shot back. "I thought we were a people mover."
Red and silver: The 49ers' chances of landing financing for their proposed $937 million stadium in Santa Clara may well hinge on bringing along their crossbay rivals, the Oakland Raiders, as joint tenants.
NFL officials have already hinted that the only way to guarantee the league's assistance in paying for the stadium may be for the Niners and Raiders to be roommates.
"The plan works a whole lot better for everyone with two teams," said Ron Garrett, the Santa Clara assistant city manager who has led the city's negotiations.
Niners spokeswoman Lisa Lang said the team is open to the idea of rooming with the Raiders but insisted the team could go it alone just as well.
Still, the team is being asked to put up a big chunk of change for the stadium, which may be why Niners front man Jed York and Raiders chief executive Amy Trask said at a league owners meeting in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., two weeks ago that they would consider a joint stadium.
"We are keeping an open mind," Trask said.
"That said," she added, "we like the site on which we play - and think we should consider sharing a stadium there."
Heads up: Caltrans officials say they have no choice but to shut down the Bay Bridge for the full Friday before the Labor Day weekend as part of a tricky maneuver to replace a section near Yerba Buena Island with a temporary roadway.
The construction project for the new eastern span was already going to necessitate shutting the bridge for the full holiday weekend. Now, drivers will have to contend with the first-ever planned closure on a workday.
"We've got 7,000 tons of steel that has to move in two slides - one section in and the other out - and it's 150 feet in the air," Caltrans spokesman Bart Ney said Tuesday.
To pull it off, Ney said, Caltrans must shut the bridge sometime Thursday evening, Sept. 3, and reopen at 5 a.m. the following Tuesday.
The region's Toll Bridge Program Oversight Committee is expected to make it official Thursday.
Team building: San Francisco dealmaker and lobbyist Darius Anderson, whose Gold Bridge Capital has come under scrutiny as part of an ever-widening probe of pension fund corruption, has enlisted the services of top-flight criminal attorney Cristina Arguedas.
Arguedas has represented some of the biggest names around, including ex-Giant Barry Bonds and former Raiders coach Jon Gruden.
She also advised her own domestic partner, Carole Migden, the former state senator and current member of the Integrated Waste Management Board, on her recent high-speed traffic woes.
On the PR side, Anderson is getting an assist from Dan Newman, the onetime communications director for 2006 Democratic gubernatorial nominee Phil Angelides.
In the past three weeks, both New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo and California Attorney General Jerry Brown have issued subpoenas to Gold Bridge, a firm jointly owned by Anderson and his brother Kirk Anderson. The states are investigating placement agents who help secure pension fund investment contracts for their clients in return for hefty commissions.
Anderson's firm hasn't been implicated in any wrongdoing, and Newman says it is cooperating with the feds.
OMG SFPD: San Francisco police are investigating a crash Sunday involving an on-duty bomb squad officer.
Two people were hurt in the midday accident at Duboce Avenue and Otis Street - though apparently not the cop. Police aren't saying much about what they know, including who was at fault.
As for rumors swirling around the department that the officer ran a red light while texting?
"That would be part of the furtherance of the investigation," said Sgt. Wilfred Williams.
Phillip Matier,Andrew Ross
Take-out pizzas, spending sprees at the Apple store and a $1,600 "team-building" trip to Angel Island are the latest bullets being fired at BART by unions upset over the transit system's attempts to solve its $250 million budget problem in part by cutting back on worker benefits.
BART credit card bills show that over the past year, top management and staff spent:
-- $27,000 for take-out food and catering.
-- $18,570 at the Emeryville Apple store.
-- $1,500 at the REI outdoor-gear store.
-- $1,629 for a tour of Angel Island.
"The district has a budget problem, but part of the problem stems from people at the top making poor decisions," said Jean Hamilton, president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees union local that represents BART supervisors and middle managers.
BART spokesman Linton Johnson said the credit card attack was just another "attempt to deflect attention from our efforts to find $100 million in savings."
The union's spending slam comes hot on the heels of BART's own opening salvo, a Web site that highlights worker pay and benefits. The BART site takes a swipe at some of the system's more bizarre work rules - such as the one that requires two workers to change one train seat (one to snap the seat snaps, the other to turn the screws).
As for the specific spending that the union is criticizing, BART says:
-- Some of the pizzas and other food were for union workers handling after-hours emergency work.
-- The REI spending was for bright yellow, all-weather jackets that BART's public information officers wear for outdoor media events in the rain.
-- The Angel Island trip was a team-building exercise for the 64-member BART computer squad.
-- The Apple store spending was for BART-TV, the agency's new public information program.
"BART-TV?" Hamilton shot back. "I thought we were a people mover."
Red and silver: The 49ers' chances of landing financing for their proposed $937 million stadium in Santa Clara may well hinge on bringing along their crossbay rivals, the Oakland Raiders, as joint tenants.
NFL officials have already hinted that the only way to guarantee the league's assistance in paying for the stadium may be for the Niners and Raiders to be roommates.
"The plan works a whole lot better for everyone with two teams," said Ron Garrett, the Santa Clara assistant city manager who has led the city's negotiations.
Niners spokeswoman Lisa Lang said the team is open to the idea of rooming with the Raiders but insisted the team could go it alone just as well.
Still, the team is being asked to put up a big chunk of change for the stadium, which may be why Niners front man Jed York and Raiders chief executive Amy Trask said at a league owners meeting in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., two weeks ago that they would consider a joint stadium.
"We are keeping an open mind," Trask said.
"That said," she added, "we like the site on which we play - and think we should consider sharing a stadium there."
Heads up: Caltrans officials say they have no choice but to shut down the Bay Bridge for the full Friday before the Labor Day weekend as part of a tricky maneuver to replace a section near Yerba Buena Island with a temporary roadway.
The construction project for the new eastern span was already going to necessitate shutting the bridge for the full holiday weekend. Now, drivers will have to contend with the first-ever planned closure on a workday.
"We've got 7,000 tons of steel that has to move in two slides - one section in and the other out - and it's 150 feet in the air," Caltrans spokesman Bart Ney said Tuesday.
To pull it off, Ney said, Caltrans must shut the bridge sometime Thursday evening, Sept. 3, and reopen at 5 a.m. the following Tuesday.
The region's Toll Bridge Program Oversight Committee is expected to make it official Thursday.
Team building: San Francisco dealmaker and lobbyist Darius Anderson, whose Gold Bridge Capital has come under scrutiny as part of an ever-widening probe of pension fund corruption, has enlisted the services of top-flight criminal attorney Cristina Arguedas.
Arguedas has represented some of the biggest names around, including ex-Giant Barry Bonds and former Raiders coach Jon Gruden.
She also advised her own domestic partner, Carole Migden, the former state senator and current member of the Integrated Waste Management Board, on her recent high-speed traffic woes.
On the PR side, Anderson is getting an assist from Dan Newman, the onetime communications director for 2006 Democratic gubernatorial nominee Phil Angelides.
In the past three weeks, both New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo and California Attorney General Jerry Brown have issued subpoenas to Gold Bridge, a firm jointly owned by Anderson and his brother Kirk Anderson. The states are investigating placement agents who help secure pension fund investment contracts for their clients in return for hefty commissions.
Anderson's firm hasn't been implicated in any wrongdoing, and Newman says it is cooperating with the feds.
OMG SFPD: San Francisco police are investigating a crash Sunday involving an on-duty bomb squad officer.
Two people were hurt in the midday accident at Duboce Avenue and Otis Street - though apparently not the cop. Police aren't saying much about what they know, including who was at fault.
As for rumors swirling around the department that the officer ran a red light while texting?
"That would be part of the furtherance of the investigation," said Sgt. Wilfred Williams.