Hillsborough County Public Transportation Commission aims to improve its image

Victor Crist, chairman of the Hillsborough County Public Transportation Commission, and Kyle Cockream, its executive director, both pushed back Monday against St. Petersburg GOP state Sen. Jeff Brandes‘ call for an opinion from Attorney General Pam Bondi on the legality of the agency hiring a lobbying firm.

Brandes request came days after a Fox-13 report questioned the agency’s using the lobbying firm of Corcoran and Johnston in Tallahassee. The story made it appear that the agency has only begun using such a firm now that state lawmakers are discussing dismantling it, but the fact is that the agency has used lobbyists since at least 2007. Both men claim that the PTC can hire such lobbyists.

Whatever the outcome, the story reflects the continuing assaults to its mission that the Hillsborough PTC has had to encounter for years, some of it self-inflicted (critics might contend most if it is).

“The biggest problem the PTC has is that nobody really understands what it is,” Crist complained — in 2013.

Since Crist made that remark, the agency has sought to be neutral in the PR battle between taxi cab companies and popular ride-sharing services Uber and Lyft since they began operating in Hillsborough County in 2014, but to the much of the public, it appears that they have been supporting the status quo, which is the taxi services. Now with the Legislature scheduled to convene in January, the PTC has hired St. Petersburg based public relations firm B2 Communications to try to inform the public that the agency actually does a lot more than regulate ride-sharing companies, though it’s questionable how much people are willing to hear that.

“There are two sides of the story, and if I don’t have somebody like B 2 Communications telling that side of the story, I can only touch a very small number of people given my other responsibilities,” says PTC executive director Kyle Cockream.

Before Uber & Lyft even came on to the scene, calls for the agency to go grew after former chairman Kevin White was indicted on federal charges of corruption in 2011. The indictment stated that White used his position on the PTC to take bribes in return for favors to a towing company.

Then there was the problem with previous executive director Cesar Padilla’s moonlighting escapades, which led him to resign in September 2013.

State GOP lawmakers like Brandes, Dana Young and Jamie Grant grew disillusioned with the agency during the Republican National Convention back in the summer of 2012, when Uber Black, the San Francisco company’s limo service, said they couldn’t operate in Hillsborough County, since they weren’t about to abide by the agency’s $50 minimum fare (which has subsequently been challenged in the courts).

In April 2014, UberX and Lyft begin operations in the county. Since that time, PTC agents have made more than 200 citations of Uber and Lyft drivers, saying they were out of compliance with PTC rules. As a good faith measure, the PTC announced a few months ago that they would stop citing those drivers until a solution can be reached in Tallahassee.

The new message they want to get out is that the PTC is more than just busting Transportation Network Companies (TNC’s).

“Uber/Lyft tends to just swallow everything else in the room, and it obscures the fact that the PTC is a regulatory outfit that is not trying to put anybody out of business, but is trying to make sure that people get safe rides,” says B2 Communications Kyle Parks.

For example, Parks says that the PTC is the local agency for citizens to call in Hillsborough County who think that they’ve had their automobile unfairly towed.

Statewide regulations regarding TNC’s could finally be arriving in the upcoming legislative session.

Fort Walton Beach Republican Matt Gaetz has introduced such bill in the House. Cockream says he’s OK with most of what he’s seen, though he takes exception with a provision that says ride-sharing companies need to a pay a $5,000 one-time fee to operate in Florida.

“If the state’s going to pre-empt and say, we’re going to regulate this with the Florida Dept. of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles Driver License Bureaus, great that’s fine, but for a company that admittedly makes an excess of $20 million a year in the state of Florida, we’re only going to ask $5,000? I don’t think that’s a fair shake from a taxpayer/consumer side.”

Last month, Tampa state GOP Rep. Dana Young criticized an advertorial published in the Tampa Bay Business Journal, questioning why a public agency was using their dollars to advertise. Cockream doesn’t have much positive to say about the lawmaker.

“Representative Young has never reached out to us, to try to find out why these things happening,” Cockream says. “Can we have a discussion so that we’re both better educated. There’s been no communication.”

Young agrees there hasn’t been any direct talks, but says that communications are a two-way street.

“While he has on multiple occasions commented to the media that I have not met with him or reached out to him, I would add that he has never reached out to me, and if I’m willing to meet with someone I would normally call them,” Young says. “I have yet to receive a call from Kyle or anyone from the PTC at all. It is correct that I haven’t reached out to him, but I think the phone works two-ways and he has not reached out to me, I’ve been in Tallahassee, I would say I’ve been a little more tied up these days than he is.”

At times over the past year, Uber has issued out statements claiming that the PTC has been trying to put them out of business, something that riles up Cockream.

“We have never ever tried to stop ‘em,” he insists. “What we have done, in fact, when we went in and asked for injunctive relief, the judge, Judge Huey said ‘This is very unusual,’ typically for an injunction, the petitioner says I want this activity stopped. We never said that. We said we don’t want them to stop, we want them to comply to these three simple safety issues (regarding background checks, insurance and getting their vehicles inspected). Back in April 2014, we sent a letter to both Uber and Lyft asking them to come here to meet with these reps so we could work thru the issues and adjust rules, whatever we needed to. We have never, ever, ever tried to stop them. We’ve done nothing short of invite them here, but only if they just abide by a few safety things.”

“Rather than engage in constructive dialogue, the PTC has repeatedly used public funds collected from taxi and limo companies in a legal, marketing and public affairs campaign to eliminate ride-sharing as we know it in Hillsborough County,” says Uber spokesman Bill Gibbons in response. “We hope the PTC changes course in the coming months and Hillsborough County joins the more than 20 states and dozens of other jurisdictions across the country that have created a permanent home for ride-sharing with modern, sensible regulations for this new industry.”

On Dec. 8, the Hillsborough County Legislative Delegation will meet to discuss local bills that they are proposing to be introduced during the 2016 session. That’s where Brandes says he’ll introduce no fewer than six bills against the PTC.