Two Port Authority committees this morning breezed through several motions to extend contracts with vendors and authorize grant applications — except when it came to extending the contract for ConnectCard software and ticket vending machines.
The authority’s Performance Oversight Committee eventually recommended a contract extension with Scheidt & Bachmann USA, Inc., but not without several questions from committee members and members of the public present at the meeting.
“We need to make sure that we’re doing this as efficiently and as effectively as possible,” said board member Jennifer Liptak during the discussion. “It’s about the customer, who is the taxpayer and the constituent.”
Allowing riders the capability to pay with their smartphones and assuring functioning ticket vending machines were chief among the concerns.
“I just want to make sure we’re not muddling along with the same old system,” Ms. Liptak said.
The conversation led to the formation on a subcommittee to study the automated payment infrastructure. Board member Robert Vescio will chair the subcommittee.
Authority officials were unclear on whether the five-year contract extension with Scheidt & Bachmann would include mobile payment under the authority’s current financial terms. The company operates the proprietary ConnectCard software and hardware, including fare boxes on vehicles and the ticket vending machines riders use at stops and at Giant Eagle stores.
“Like a lot of organizations, we’re looking to adopt to the widespread use of digital technology,” authority spokesperson Jim Ritchie said after the meeting. “We know our customers use their digital technology every day, for instance to see real-time arrivals.”
Molly Nichols, director of the advocacy group Pittsburghers for Public Transportation, also raised the issue of ConnectCard machines not working.
“It was good to see the board acknowledge that they want to get more innovative, but it’s also crucial to acknowledge issues with the current [ticket vending] machines,” Ms. Nichols said.
Authority officials said under current contract terms, Scheidt & Bachmann receives a contract penalty if vending machines aren’t working during 98 percent of Port Authority’s operating hours. Mr. Ritchie could not immediately provide the penalty amount.
Ms. Nichols said she would like to see the numbers from Port Authority.
“I’ve heard from riders regularly about their machines not functioning. I’ve experienced it personally five or six times in the few years since the ConnectCards were instituted,” Ms. Nichols said.
Ms. Nichols said dysfunctional machines would be particularly problematic if the authority institutes a proof of payment policy under which riders could receive criminal citations if they didn’t pay a fare. Her group is advocating against that plan.
“There’s no way they’d be ready to implement this change,” Ms. Nichols said.
In other business, at the earlier Planning and Stakeholder Relations Committee, members approved the recommendation of an operating reserve fund to hold aside one month’s worth of the operating budget — roughly $34.9 million. The money would come from surpluses of the 10-year budget plan required under Act 89.
Mr. Ritchie said the fund allows the authority to “remain financially stable through the entire 10 years.”
Ashley Murray: amurray@post-gazette.com; 412-263-1449, or on Twitter @Ashley__Murray
First Published: June 22, 2017, 4:41 p.m.