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Committee approves limited reserve release for Bay Trail link, forwards and continues major bond items pending technical amendments and CEQA appeals
Summary
Committee approved a $130,463 reserve release for the Pier 43 Bay Trail Link, forwarded certain park bond items per budget analyst recommendations, forwarded a supplemental appropriation for waterfront projects without recommendation, continued the Pier 27 cruise-terminal reserve release pending CEQA appeals, and moved most multi-bond authorizations to the next meeting for further review.
At the meeting the Budget and Finance Committee took multiple actions on port appropriations and a package of general obligation bond authorizations.
Port and budget staff briefed the committee on three related items seeking to make interest earnings and sale proceeds available for waterfront projects: a supplemental appropriation (item 7) and two reserve releases (items 8 and 9) tied to the James R. Herman Cruise Terminal at Pier 27 and the Brandon Street Wharf project. Port staff noted pending CEQA appeals related to the Pier 27 cruise-terminal project that are scheduled to be heard by the Board of Supervisors; they recommended the committee forward the supplemental appropriation without recommendation and continue the reserve release for the cruise terminal until the appeals are resolved. The committee amended item 7 per the budget analyst recommendation (placing $247,000 on controller reserve) and forwarded it without recommendation. The committee continued item 8 (Pier 27 reserve) to January 25 and approved item 9, releasing reserves for the Brandon Street Wharf project at the committee level.
Lane Forbes of port staff presented item 14 (a $130,463 release of reserves for the Pier 43 Bay Trail Link project) describing the project to restore about 550 linear feet of waterfront, replace a failing timber seawall and create a promenade; port staff said previously appropriated bond proceeds plus port and grant funds complete the project’s funding. The committee voted to release the Pier 43 reserves.
On the larger bond package (items 10–17) the Office of Public Finance and the budget analyst described proposed general obligation issuances for earthquake safety/emergency response, clean and safe parks, and road repaving/street safety, with projected interest rates around 6% and amortizations over 20–25 years. Budget staff recommended several technical adjustments, including reducing a park contingency allocation by $990,008.61. Supervisor Wiener’s office offered amendments to the road-repaving bond to add SFMTA signal-prioritization projects, raising a requested appropriation to $76.5 million for that series. The committee accepted the budget analyst recommendations for items 12 and 13, agreed to Supervisor Wiener’s amendments for items 15 and 17, and moved most of the bond items to the next week’s meeting to accommodate technical corrections and public comment. Public comment on these items was not offered at this meeting.
The committee’s actions were procedural: several items were continued to allow the board to resolve pending CEQA appeals or to include recently submitted technical amendments; the committee approved the Pier 43 reserve release and forwarded other waterfront and bond files as described.
