LEGISLATIVE ANALYST MEMORANDUM

To: Members of the Board of Supervisors

From: Miranda Meyerson and Andrew Murray, Office of the Legislative Analyst

Date: May 18, 2005

Re: Employee Suggestion - Japanese Tea Garden (OLA No. 038-05D)

Employee Suggestion

Employee suggests eliminating free admission hours at the Japanese Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park.

Executive Summary

The Recreation and Park Department (RPD) operates the Japanese Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park. It charges admission during most of the day, but provides free admission (unadvertised) for the first and last hours of operation each day. The Department itself and employees contacted for this memorandum offered significantly different estimates of the number of people that visit the Garden during free admission hours. Depending on which number is correct, there could be an opportunity to collect substantial admission revenues if free admission hours were reduced or eliminated. The Office of the Legislative Analyst recommends that the Board of Supervisors direct RPD to count the number of visitors during free admission hours and report its findings to the Board.

Analysis

The Japanese Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park was built for the 1894 World’s Fair. Many of the Garden’s plants, bronze statues, fish, and birds were imported from Japan, and some are hundreds of years old. The Garden is currently operated by RPD.

The Garden is open every day from 8:30 AM to 5 PM November through February and from 8:30 AM to 6 PM March through October. Prior to 1985, admission into the Garden was free. In 1985, RPD began charging admission for the majority of the day, but continued to offer free admission (unadvertised) for the first hour of the day and the last hour of the day. The limited free hours were offered to allow San Franciscans a low-cost means of enjoying the facility.

To collect admission, the entry gate for the Garden is staffed by a single Cashier II (class 4321) throughout the day on weekdays and two on weekends, working a nine-hour shift (8:30 – 5:30) with a one-hour lunch break. During his or her break, a vendor collects admission. The cashier spends the last 30 minutes of his or her shift closing out the register, so cannot collect admission fees during that time.

According to RPD, 6,787 people entered the Garden during free hours in FY 03-04, an average of 19 people per day. The OLA estimates that if these 19 people per day were charged admission the Department could collect an additional $59.75 per day ($29.88 per hour).¹

The Cashier II is already on site monitoring the Garden during the free admission hours from 8:30 - 9:30 AM (year round) and 4 - 5 PM (November through February). Therefore, there would be no increase in the labor cost required to collect admission, and the net revenue from charging admission during the months for which the Garden is open until 5 PM would be $59.75 per day, or approximately $7,300 per year.

However, the Cashier II is currently closing out the register from 5 - 5:30 PM and not on site from 5:30 - 6 PM, so collecting admission during this hour would require paying for an additional hour of staff time. The overtime rate for the Cashier II is currently $41.78 per hour.² As the additional labor cost of $41.78 exceeds the $29.88 in revenue that charging during this hour would generate, it would not be profitable to charge admission during this time. Therefore, according to the Department’s admissions figures, eliminating all free hours except those from 5 - 6 PM would increase net revenues from admissions by approximately $14,600 per year.

It is important to note that employees of the Garden interviewed for this report stated that there are significantly more people using the Garden during free admission hours than the 6,787 per year reported by RPD. These employees advised the OLA that during the summer months anywhere from 200 to 300 people per day enter the Garden during free hours (as many as 1,000 on some occasions), and during the winter months as many people use the Garden for free in the evening as pay admission during the day. If correct, substantial additional revenue could be generated by reducing or eliminating free admission hours. Employees also advised the OLA that the Garden is currently unsupervised following the end of the cashier’s shift from 5:30 - 6 PM, during which incidents of crime and vandalism have occurred. Cost-savings to the City associated with reducing these incidents in the future could also be substantial.

Recommendation

The OLA recommends that the Board of Supervisors direct the Recreation and Park Department to study more closely who and how many people visit the Garden during free hours and report its findings. Based on the findings, the Board of Supervisors should consider directing the Department to reduce the number of free admission hours offered. The Department might also consider enlisting corporate sponsors to offset lost admission fees during free or reduced price hours as other museums and cultural attractions have done, such as the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Legion of Honor, and the California Academy of Sciences.

¹ The current cost of admission is $3.50 for adults and $1.25 for children and seniors. In FY 03-04, 375,178 people paid the cost of admission during regular business hours. This included 317,446 adults (85%) and 57,732 children/seniors (15%). If we assume the ratio of adults to children/seniors is the same during free hours as during regular business hours, then the City could collect an additional $59.75 per day (16 adults at $3.50 and 3 children/seniors at $1.25).

² A Class 4321 Cashier II costs $58,138 per year, including $46,510 in salary and an additional 25% ($11,628) in benefits. This translates to $27.85 per hour, or $41.78 per hour for overtime (time and a half).