Calgary, Alberta, Canada
ATTENDEES:
Claudia L. Hussein, Chair, Port Authority of Allegheny
County
Terry Cordell, Vice Chair, RTC of Southern Nevada/CAT
| Latika Bali |
Pee Dee Regional Transportation
Authority |
| George Bischof |
Macquarie Corporate Finance (USA) Inc. |
| Carla Lakatos |
Miami Valley regional Transit Authority (OH) |
| Gordon Linton |
Siebert Brandford Shank & Co., LLC |
| Paul Marx |
DOT/FTA |
| Murphy McCalley |
McCalley Consulting |
| Carol Muller |
UBS|PaineWebber |
| Alan Pegg |
RTA - New Orleans |
| Mark Reston |
Siebert Brandford Shank & Co., LLC |
| Joseph T. Smith |
Regional Transportation District (Denver) |
| Jacque Tjards |
Spokane Transit Authority |
| Sam Kerns, Staff Advisor |
American Public Transportation
Association |
| Brian Dunlap |
American Public Transportation Association |
Chair Claudia Hussein called the meeting to order. Ms.
Hussein welcomed the committee members in attendance and self-introductions
were made.
Approval of Minutes
A motion was made, seconded, and unanimously adopted
to approve the minutes of the Financial Management Committee's September
24, 2000 meeting.
Proposed Workplan
Ms. Hussein reviewed the proposed workplan and asked
for comments. It was suggested that the Financial Management Committee
(FMC) become more involved in reauthorization. The FMC should send a separate
request to the committee members asking for comments on reauthorization.
The workplan was approved with additions for reauthorization and FASB
post-retirement benefits.
Recognition for Chris Poinsatte
APTA will send a plaque out to Chris Poinsatte in recognition
of his services as Chair of the Financial Management Committee. Terry
Cordell will coordinate additional gift to Chris (to be funded by individual
contributions by FMC members).
Legislative Update - Claudia Hussein
Current bill in Congress now equalizes maximum allowable
tax-free transit benefits to the maximum allowable tax-free parking. There
is also another bill to give a tax credit for employers distributing this
benefit. Proposed new starts funding seems to be heading from 80/20 to
50/50. Paul Marx (FTA) discussed benefits of new starts analysis and process
vs. rebuild.
The current formula used to allocate transit funds may
be revamped because some feel the northeast United States gets more than
its fair share. Peter Benjamin said he is looking for ideas for his Tax
Subcommittee. Ms. Hussein asked committee members to forward comments
to Mr. Benjamin directly via email pbenjamin@wmata.com.
Innovative Financing - Carol Müller
Ms. Müller summarized the 5309 program and the evaluation
guidelines/criteria used for full funding grant agreements (FFGA). There
is a much greater emphasis on project performance due to greater risk
because of possible breaches under FFGA. So far, there has not been a
suspension or a request from the government to return funding. Agencies
often have difficulty in securing borrowing due to reauthorization, appropriation
and project risk.
Ms. Müller described "naked" FFGA financing, which has
no "2nd barrel" of revenues. Variable rate notes have been very popular
but makes it difficult to budget interest costs. PaineWebber has focused
more on the fixed rate notes.
Ms. Müller then highlighted several recent transit grant
borrowings (Utah Transit Authority, San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit
District and New Jersey Transit). The key elements of each borrowing were
reviewed and discussed.
Lease/Leaseback Update - Murphy McCalley
Mr. McCalley distributed a handout that summarized some
key emerging issues in the lease/leaseback arena. IRS Ruling 99-14 eliminated
"leasehold structure" and the lease-to-service-contract (LTSC) was developed.
To date, LTSC has applied to rail rolling stock only, but may be expanding
to facilities.
Other types of lease transactions that are emerging include
like-kind exchanges, qualified technological equipment (QTE), U.S. leases
(Tracs and LTSC) and Japanese operating leases. Mr. McCalley then reviewed
recent agency purchases and the type of lease transaction employed.
National Transit Database Project (NTD)
Ray Ellis was unable to attend so an update on NTD was
not presented.
Training/T-Flex Update - Terry Cordell
The last T-Flex meeting was held in Tampa in March. Human
resource personnel were invited for this session and approximately 10-12
people attended. Currently Transit 101 has three modules. It is looking
to have 26 modules within the next year (to be funded by NTI). This is
to be incorporated as a web-deployed training module. Work will continue
on benchmarking. It was agreed that all members will benchmark their agencies.
The next meeting will be held in Denver from July 29-31 to focus on balanced
scorecards. They currently have 26 member agencies. Ms. Hussein and Mr.
Kerns will follow-up with APTA and its relationship with T-Flex.
Calendar of Event/APTA Activity Update
Mr. Kerns briefed the committee on the Public Transportation
Partnership for Tomorrow (PT)2 initiative, the E-Commerce initiative and
APTA's new on-line membership directory.
Roundtable
Discussion ensued among committee members on various
topics and issues including fare increases; fares - all-in-one or peak
vs. non-peak; fares to students and the elderly.
Next Meeting
Chair Hussein adjourned the meeting at 3:00 p.m. The
next meeting of the Committee will be in Philadelphia, PA on Sunday, September
30, 2001 at the APTA Annual Meeting.
Click here to return to the Financial Management
Committee page.
Some of these pages may include links to documents in the Adobe PDF format. Please download the Adobe PDF reader if you have not already done so.
