City takes fresh look at taxicabs

Jan. 16--A city commission has now issued business licenses giving two new companies the green light to grow Gloucester's taxicab fleet.

Those companies were created to fill a void left behind when Lighthouse Taxi went under.

Even before the two new companies' vehicles hit the streets, officials are drawing lessons from the Lighthouse collapse, with eyes on stepping up cab inspections and monitoring, and revising -- perhaps rewriting -- the city ordinance governing "vehicles for hire."

Christopher Sicuranza, the city's director of constituent services under Mayor Sefatia Romeo Theken, concedes that, had a Lighthouse Taxi cab not been involved in an accident last August, it may have been months before the city had any inkling the company was having problems.

"We were getting complaints about service, they (Lighthouse owner Sean McKinnon and associates) weren't returning phone calls, and we knew there were problems," Sicuranza said. "But we never would have known how bad it was."

How bad was it? The downtown accident, a traffic stop three days later and calls from City Clerk Joanne Senos showed that Lighthouse's insurance coverage had lapsed for its vehicles, while the company's 20 employees had been without any workers compensation coverage for four weeks. Police ordered Lighthouse to pull all of its vehicles off the roads. Senos suspended the company's operating license. And the city Licensing Commission -- comprised of Senos, interim police Chief John McCarthy and Fire Chief Eric Smith -- finally revoked it in December. That left rival Gloucester Taxi and Livery Service's 10 cabs covering the city.

During and after last week's meeting of the Licensing Commission, when it granted licenses to Sandra Johnson and Diana Tuomivirta to launch their NorthStar Taxi and Ocean Side Taxi services, respectively, McCarthy said he had taken steps to have police personnel carry out regular inspections of taxis. Sicuranza, Senos and General Counsel Chip Payson are all trying to update regulations that are nebulous and outdated, Sicuranza said.

Safety inspections

After the August suspension of Lighthouse's license, a number of drivers came forward to question not only their insurance coverage but to highlight safety concerns. Driver Leslie Asare spoke of the hazards for elderly summer riders in cabs that had no air conditioning. She also told the commission in November of twice getting flat tires on cabs while carrying fares down Route 128.

"The tires were beyond worn," Asare said at the time. "They were right down to the metal. This was dangerous."

McCarthy said police, who have authority over enforcing safety issues, will step up inspections of cabs.

"We had been doing that at one time, but just got away from it as some point," he said, adding he wasn't sure when the department's inspection role changed.

The city's ordinance does not mandate any safety inspections of the vehicles; it only calls for annual inspections of the taxi meters "by the sealer of weights and measures at least once every 12 months."

Taxi ordinance

Also, during the early weeks of the taxi shortage, city leaders were under the impression the ordinance allowed only two companies to operate at the same time. But it says that "no permit shall be issued that will increase the number of taxicabs or private livery vehicles in the city ... until the Licensing Commission shall have determined that the public convenience and necessity require the additional operation."

The approvals granted to Johnson and Tuomivirta to run four cabs each keep the number of licensed taxis at 18. Senos said the commission could expand that number if it or the companies document a need.

Sicuranza said he believes the city should update the ordinance to reflect changes in the hire-car landscape -- most notably to place some type of local requirements on drivers working independently under services such as Uber and Lyft. Neither the online app-driven companies nor their drivers operate under any regulation from the city, Sicuranza said, noting that the state continues to wrestle with similar issues.

"If you're not getting ahead on this, you're going to be behind it," he said, "and that's not where we want to be. Here we've had (Johnson and Tuomivirta) come in, submit their paperwork, get proper permits, and yet these other drivers don't do any of that.

"We recognize the business is changing, and we want to promote and reflect positive change," he said, "but we want it to be fair, too. Having these two new businesses coming on board presents a good opportunity to look at all of this."

Staff writer Ray Lamont can be reached at 978-675-2705, or via email at [email protected].

___

(c)2017 the Gloucester Daily Times (Gloucester, Mass.)

Visit the Gloucester Daily Times (Gloucester, Mass.) at www.gloucestertimes.com

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.