Transportation Development Act Allocation & Unmet Transit Needs:

1. RECEIVE list of Monterey County's unmet transit needs; and 
2. APPROVE Monterey-Salinas Transit's application for state Transportation Development Act funds; and 
3. ADOPT Resolution 2017-20 allocating $16,655,774 in Transportation Development Act funds to Monterey-Salinas Transit for Fiscal Year 2017-18.

The Transportation Development Act provides two major sources for funding of public transportation in California. The first, the Local Transportation Fund is derived from a ¼ cent of the general sales tax collected statewide. The second, the State Transit Assistance (STA) fund is derived from the statewide sales tax on diesel fuel.

Each February, the TAMC prepares an estimate of the Local Transportation funds it expects to be available in the coming fiscal year. LTF funds are apportioned to eligible uses in the following priority order, pursuant to state law:

1. Transportation Agency Administration and Planning;
2. Bicycle & pedestrian projects via the TDA 2% program; 
3. Public transit by jurisdiction, based on population as reported by the Dept of Finance; and 
4. Construction and maintenance of local streets and roads.

There are no prescribed priorities for STA funds. Transit operations and capital projects are equally eligible for funding.

Prior to allocating Local Transportation Funds, TAMC is required to conduct a public hearing and outreach to identify unmet transit needs. Because TAMC no longer allocates Local Transportation Funds to local streets and roads, TAMC is no longer required to adopt a finding on unmet transit needs. However, TAMC still continues to solicit public input on unmet transit needs. This process is outlined in Attachment 1. The unmet transit needs comment list now serves as a public input tool for MST’s short- and long-term transit service planning and improvements, and assists in prioritizing transit projects as funds become available. All comments are reviewed with MST staff to consider options to implement requests based on the time frame in which unmet transit needs can be met. Next, the Mobility Advisory Committee reviews the comments and provides input, and then the TAMC Board receives the final unmet transit needs comments list.

There are two unmet transit needs that are now on MST’s implementation priority list. These are:
• More frequent service to Gonzales and Soledad
• More out of county medical trips that cost less

MST is planning to expand transit service for Line 23, with the goal of providing hourly service in the near future. MST is using Measure Q funds to expand the out of county medical trips program frequency and reduce the cost to passengers. The out of county medical trips program service area will also be expanded to Gonzales, Soledad, Greenfield and King City. Both of these transit needs are pending MST driver availability. Additionally, MST now provides real-time bus arrival information to passengers via the smartphone Transit App. The app shows next bus arrivals, locates their nearest bus stop, and allows the user to set alerts for preferred routes. The app is available at: https://transitapp.com This improvement will make it easier for passengers to use public transit, as they will have information bus arrival information readily available via their smart phones.

In the upcoming fiscal year, MST is unable to meet the unmet transit needs listed on pages 2, 3 and 4 in Attachment 2. For example, service expansion on Route 18 (Monterey – The Dunes via CSUMB) and service to San Juan Grade Road and Russell Road in Salinas are both unmet transit needs that are cost-prohibitive at this time. The unmet transit needs requests that are not able to be addressed this year will remain on the list and will be part of next year’s unmet transit needs process.

Staff recommends that the Board approve MST's application and adopt Resolution 2017-20 (Attachment 3) allocating $16,655,774 in Transportation Development Act funds to MST for public transit service in Monterey County for Fiscal Year 2017-18.