Late last night, your San Francisco Bicycle Coalition staff, along with our WalkSF, Chinatown Community Development Center youth and our other Vision Zero partners, were literally walking the City Hall corridors advocating for “add-back” Vision Zero funding to make our city streets safer for all of us.
With the delay of the Vehicle License Fee — which was expected to bring significant funds to street safety needs — it was especially important to fund Vision Zero projects through the budget process, so that the SFMTA and the Department of Public Works have the funding to move forward with critical safety projects.
While we weren’t able to convince Supervisors to backfill the entire Vehicle License Fee hole (which comes out to about $13 million dollars for Fiscal Year 2016), we received great support from various Supervisors who requested funding for Vision Zero projects in their district. We also were excited to see our Bike It Forward program partner, PODER, secure funding for continued programs.
Here’s a full list of the last-minute secured funding:
- D1 (Supervisor Mar): $120,000 for Vision Zero projects
- D2 (Supervisor Farrell): $50,000 for crosswalk restriping, $50,000 for speed bumps (note: these projects are not based on the specific high-injury corridors)
- D5 (Supervisor Breed): $500,000 for improvements along the pedestrian pathway and throughout the Panhandle
- D6 (Supervisor Kim): $250,000 for Vision Zero project implementation
- D7 (Supervisor Yee): $150,000 for Vision Zero project implementation and $300,000 for a student crossing guard program
- D8 (Supervisor Wiener): $100,000 for Vision Zero project implementation
- D11 (Supervisor Avalos): $140,000 for a community partnership which supports the Bike It Forward program
Thank you to these Supervisors for prioritizing street safety! If your Supervisor is on this list, send them a note to say thank you for putting much-needed funding to street safety.
All told, we ended the night with over $1 million more in funding for safety projects than we had when we started! Thanks San Francisco Bicycle Coalition members for your support and donations to make our advocacy possible.
Representing you at City Hall is one of our main jobs as bicycle advocates. Please support this ongoing work by Joining or Renewing your membership with the SF Bicycle Coalition.