San Francisco taxi drivers want financial relief from medallion debt [Video]

SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) — The taxi industry in San Francisco continues to experience hardship even after the pandemic. The closures of downtown businesses and fewer conventions have aggravated the situation even further.

Taxi medallions look like a mini license plate.

Once worth tens of thousands of dollars like fool’s gold, today they are a nearly worthless investment after ride sharing companies came online.

“They took all of our business and our business is dead completely 100%. We don’t have any business and most of the drivers leave the taxi business because they don’t make money,” expressed Wahab Al hindawi, a medallion holder.

Here’s how it all started. Sometime in the early 2000s, before Uber and Lyft, the demand for more taxis grew in San Francisco.

So in 2009, then Mayor Gavin Newsom came up with an idea.

MORE: San Francisco taxi drivers partnering up with Uber to pick up passengers

Since the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency had a $129 million budget deficit …