The Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) on December 9, 2024, approved a motion directing staff to conduct public opinion polling on three scenarios for a potential 2026 transportation tax measure. Subsequently, State Senators Scott Wiener and Jesse Arreguin introduced SB 63 which states content will be added “based on continued stakeholder engagement and consensus.” Such a measure is needed to avert deep service cuts by BART and other transit agencies, and could spur implementation of the Bay Area Transit Transformation Action Plan to improve the customer experience for transit riders. The Valley Transportation Authority (all of Santa Clara County) board has voted to support its own countywide, 30-year sales tax measure. The three scenarios under consideration are:
Scenario 1A
10-year, ½-cent sales tax that would appear on the ballot in Alameda,
Contra Costa, San Francisco and San Mateo counties, with a join-in option for Santa Clara County. Under this scenario, the sales tax would generate about $560 million each year, with 90 percent of the money used to support transit operations and the remaining 10 percent reserved for Transit Transformation.
Hybrid Scenario
30-year, ½-cent sales tax plus a parcel tax of nine cents per square foot of any building(s) on the property. This measure would appear on the ballot in Alameda, Contra Costa,San Francisco, San Mateo and Santa Clara counties. Marin, Napa, Solano and Sonoma counties would have the option to join. It is estimated to raise $1.3 billion to $1.5 billion each year. This measure would only be pursued if Santa Clara County wanted to participate. 90 percent of the money from the sales tax portion would be used to support transit operations and 10 percent would be invested to improve the customer experience for transit riders. Sixty percent of parcel tax revenues would be used to support transit operations with the remaining 40 percent reserved as a “county flex” available to address a range of transportation needs in each participating county.
Variable Rate
The Commission also endorsed staff coordinating with various transit agencies on polling a variable rate option. Developed by the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency, this third option features a higher tax rate in San Francisco (which has proportionally higher transit operating needs than other counties), a lower rate in Santa Clara County, and equivalent rates in Alameda, Contra Costa and San Mateo counties.
MTC directed staff to share polling results during meetings in February 2025. MTC also endorsed several policy provisions for inclusion in enabling legislation, including requiring stronger oversight of transit agencies’ financial information and requiring transit agencies to adopt policies to help improve the transit customer experience as a condition of receiving new funds. MTC recommended against including transit agency consolidation as a topic for enabling legislation. There are 27 transit agencies within the 9-county Bay Area. League Day on March 8th will include an update on SB 63.
Plan Bay Area 2050+ Timeline and Website
MTC approved the Final Blueprint for Plan Bay Area 2050+ on January 22, Item 10am.
Much detail is provided in the attachments to the agenda item. Most interesting are equity priority communities, blueprint strategies and the transportation and resilience projects lists. Next steps are to prepare a programmatic environmental impact report. A draft EIR, Draft Plan and Implementation Plan are expected sometime this summer. The final EIR and Plan adoption will probably be in the fall of 2026. If you are interested in more information, email lwvbayarea [at] gmail.com. General information on Plan Bay Area 2050, approved in 2021, is available at https://planbayarea.org/.
