Air District pulls plug on failed RTC traffic reduction, pollution reduction program
SANTA CRUZ, CA, February 25, 2014 – Five years after awarding a $120,000 grant, the Monterey Bay Unified Air Pollution Control District has pulled the plug on the Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission’s (RTC’s) Carpool Incentive Program for non-performance. The impotent RTC project failed to achieve 1% of the projected traffic and pollution reduction goal. The abysmal result achieved was with the Air District bending over backwards for the RTC by extending the original two-year publicly funded project to three, and finally to five years.
A Stop Work Order, and Notice of Termination issued by the Air District on January 7 demands all work, and further expenditure cease for this AB2766 grant funded project that was promoted as the ‘Cash-for-Carpools’ program. California drivers pay for the AB2766 grant program through a $4 per year surcharge on vehicle license fees, contributing over $200M per year to the AB2766 fund that by law, should be spent on effective traffic/pollution reduction projects.
Stop Work Order, and Notice of Termination can be seen here:
https://greenstartupstory.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/dondero_swo_grant9-36_1-7-2014.pdf
This is a welcome step from the Air District. Although this Stop Work Order was issued just one month before the grant was set to expire on February 5, 2014 the Air District’s action has potentially saved the majority of the $120,000 AB2766 grant award from being further wasted.
Air District action validates 2012 RideSpring report
The Stop Work Order, and Notice of Termination issued by the Air District to the RTC validates many of the concerns raised in the 2012 RideSpring report:
| Concerns raised by RideSpring in 2012 | Validation by Air District in Stop Work Order / Notice of Termination |
| 1. Less than 1% of the expected benefit delivered over three years for the RTC two-year project | 1. [the project] yielded 962 trips and a VMT reduction of *12,966 miles (well short of the two year projection of 8.2 million miles as stated in the grant agreement *12,966 of 8.2 million miles = 0.16% of projection . |
| 2. RTC program was fundamentally flawed, making it extremely unlikely that performance could be significantly improved | 2. Stop Work Order shows performance of CIP program dropped even further after the 2012 RideSpring report, with the RTC delivering zero results from 2012 – 2014 . |
| 3. Recommendation of further investigation of the RTC Carpool Incentive Program | 3. “District would like to discuss the grant activities that have been reimbursed to date to determine to what extent that they satisfy the grant agreement requirements” . |
This action taken by the Air District opens the door for a full and open discussion of how this happened and what can be done to prevent this happening again.
The huge challenges of traffic congestion, air pollution, and global warming emissions demand that our limited resources be directed toward truly effective solutions. We cannot afford to waste more time and money on bogus programs that only achieve high-performance on paper and predictably fail in the real world, as was in this case with the SCCRTC Carpool Incentive Program.
Positive action taken by Richard Stedman at the Air District
Richard Stedman, Air Pollution Control Officer at the Air District, deserves credit for taking this courageous step. This action will certainly demand further scrutiny of how the RTC failed to serve the Santa Cruz community, and failed to provide any perceptible benefit in terms of traffic or pollution reduction.
This evaluation by the Air District also contradicts attempts by the RTC to dismiss concerns, and discredit the report issued by RideSpring in June 2012.
RTC statements reported in Santa Cruz Sentinel, July 2012:
“It is too early to view anything that we’ve done so far as results. It is only preliminary data. We are in the midst of a five year program” – statement made after the RTC program stopped producing any results whatsoever.
“We still believe this is a great program” – statement made after it was clear program had no possibility of achieving even 1% of the projected traffic/pollution reduction benefit that the RTC were contracted to achieve by the Air District.
George Dondero, RTC Executive Director, June 2013:
“Our staff discussed it [RideSpring report] with the Commissioner and responded to over a dozen misleading or untrue statements made in the report” – statement made a year after Santa Cruz Sentinel reporter Jason Hoppin confirmed accuracy of the report with the Air District.
It should be noted that Mr. Stedman was not in charge at the Air District in 2008 when the original decision was made to fully fund the RTC’s unrealistic and fundamentally flawed program.
Not only did this unfortunate decision back in 2008 fund a program destined to fail, it also resulted in funding being denied to Cabrillo College to implement a proven commute trip reduction program that both the Air District, and RTC had recognized as effective, as can be seen here.
With Mr. Stedman heading the Air District in 2014 and issuing the Stop Work Order to the RTC, it is an encouraging sign that we are heading in the right direction: using transportation funds as intended – to implement effective traffic reduction and pollution reduction programs.
Green Startup Story 
Finally some good news! Thanks for keeping us posted Paul.
Hi Francois. Thanks for commenting. Yes, definitely a much needed positive step forward!
It appears that we may be one step closer to having a pollution reduction program in Santa Cruz that actually will do some good. The next step is to take a program, like the one the RTC used to show its projected numbers (I believe that was RideSpring!) and implement that! Why break what is not broken? Why not use the “fix” that was claimed would fix it in the first place?! Unless there is some ulterior motive. Does the RTC really want to be 99.84% away from its projected goal? I wonder if a kindergarten class could do better in five years.
An even further step would be to take the exact program the RTC used to project their numbers, RideSpring, which was based on true data, and one might conclude that the results would be much closer to the projected goal. Even a layperson such as myself would not leave the reigns on this in the RTC’s able hands.
Slowly but surely RideSpring can win this race. Why not hand over the implementation of the program to RideSpring?
Yeay for accountability and oversight in government. What a concept!!! I’m am such a fan of government regulations, THAT ARE ENFORCED, as they are the one and only way of ensuring a humane, well-functioning entity of the people, by the people, and FOR the people (Lincoln). But, I’m crushed at what might have been in this case. Cabrillo teamed up with Ecology Action and submitted a proposal which included already up-and-running and effective “RideSpring”, in 2008, and we lost out to this one which has since been exposed as ineffective! I’ve worked at Cabrillo since ’99 and have never been happier than the first time I heard the specifics of RideSpring’s program at a meeting called by Brian King, then Cabrillo President, to reduce greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) emissions Cabrillo’s responsible for, which are scarily enormous, as we then quanitified all sources for the first time, after that same meeting. A full HALF of Cabrillo’s GHGs are spewed as a result of the daily commute to/fro Cabrillo. In particularly, my main concern lies with the MANY, many students who are in deep poverty who attend, or WOULD attend, Cabrillo, and have an impossible time just getting here. They need this program very badly, and most of all. Those who have their basic needs met often don’t “get it” when it comes to the challenge of trying to get OUT of deep poverty, and that their studies at Cabrillo are an integral part of that struggle. Just getting here is an open access issue of the most serious kind. What might have been….and what hopefully WILL be, soon…
Hi Judy,
Thank you for your thoughtful response. I appreciate you presenting such a compelling case for why RideSpring was needed at Cabrillo College for effective commute trip reduction in 2008, and why it is still needed today.
As the Cabrillo College Climate Co-Chair, I understand that you and your team volunteered and put in a lot of time, and effort in identifying the major sources of CO2; survey what would help students, staff and faculty make the change SOV (single occupant vehicle) to alternative commuting (biking, carpool, transit…); bringing RideSpring on board for a successful 6-month pilot – all achieved with a budget of zero.
From this success, you worked with your team in creating a legitimate AB2766 grant application for exactly what the AB2766 program is for – to implement an effective traffic/pollution reduction solution.
It is very discouraging to see the work of your your Climate Action Team at Cabrillo College, being ignored, and dismissed by public agencies that are paid to implement transportation solutions in our community – in this case the SCCRTC (and Air District of 2008).
Thankfully, the management at the Air District has changed since 2008, and with the Stop Work Order issued in January, preventing further waste of public funds into a program that doesn’t work, I am optimistic that this is a sign that future oversight will be more effective, and truly effective programs will be funded.
I actually met with head of the Air District this morning, and they are in a very different place today than in 2008. They do recognize the need for new solutions to the traffic congestion problem, and they would like to see AB266 funds go to more effective programs than the RTC Cash-for-Carpools. So the good news is – the Air District of 2014 has taken positive action with this Stop Work Order and wants to see success stories. I look forward to sharing more about my meeting at the Air District soon.