Post Type
Bay Area Transit Funding
About the Campaign
Even before the COVID-10 pandemic, the Bay Area lacked enough transit service to meet the needs of transit riders or California’s climate goals. The primary cause is not enough dedicated funding for transit operations and the pandemic exacerbated the problem, especially for agencies dependent on fare revenues. Currently many Bay Area transit agencies are operating at service levels lower than 2019 and without additional funding by 2027 will have to cut service drastically.
The Voices for Public Transportation coalition has been working since 2018 for a regional measure to fund transit operations. Our key demands are equitable and transportation funding levels from a progressive revenue source to projects and services that are climate positive. We advocated at the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC)—the transportation planning, financing, and coordinating agency for the nine-county San Francisco Bay Area— and the California legislature for legislation to authorize a regional ballot measure that meets the needs of transit riders and workers.
Along with our partners in the Voices for Public Transportation coalition and labor partners in Bay Area Forward, we advocated for a progressive gross receipts tax on the top 2.4 percent of Bay Area businesses that would have raised enough funding to maintain transit service levels. While gaining support of some Bay Legislators the gross receipt tax didn’t make it into the final bill. However, our advocacy ensured a number of improvements over a previous bill in 2024.
Sen. Scott Weiner and Jesse Arreguín’s Senate Bill 63 authorizes a citizen signature-gathering campaign to put a multicounty transit sales tax measure on the November 2026 ballot. If the signature gathering is successful, voters will decide whether to establish a half-cent sales tax in Alameda, Contra Costa, Santa Clara, and San Mateo counties, and a one-cent sales tax in San Francisco – creating a 14 year funding stream to preserve most public transit service. In San Francisco, the Muni Now, Muni Forever coalition pushed for a progressive parcel tax ballot measure that together with the regional sales tax will maintain Muni service levels.
Resources
Media
Campaign Partners
Voices for Public Transportation Coalition
Labor Organizations:
- Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) California Conference Board & ATU Locals 192, 265 1555, 1575, and 1605
- Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 1021
- Transport Workers Union of America, AFL-CIO (TWU) and TWU Locals 250a & 200
- International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail, and Transportation Workers (SMART), Smart-Transportation Division, and Sheet Metal Workers Local 104
- American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees, AFL-CIO (AFSCME)
- International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT) Joint Council 7
- International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local 6
- Inlandboatmen’s Union of the Pacific, Marine Division of the International Longshore & Warehouse Union
- United Auto Workers (UAW) Local 4811
- Oakland Education Association (OEA)