Jan. 25–OAKLAND — Plans for a November ballot measure to double Alameda County’s sales tax for transportation to 1 cent are being rocked by a debate over allocating $400 million of the money to a BART extension to Livermore.
A coalition of social justice and public transit advocates said Tuesday the tax proposal needs an overhaul because it gives too much to expanding BART to Livermore and not enough for maintaining and operating public transit systems like struggling AC Transit.
“When you don’t have enough money to take care of your existing systems, it doesn’t make sense to make them bigger,” said Jeff Hobson, deputy director of TransForm, a transit advocacy group. “This draft plan doesn’t cut it, but it’s not too late for the Alameda County Transportation Commission to get it right.”
The critics aired their objections at an Oakland news conference two days before a key vote. Alameda County’s Transportation Commission is scheduled Thursday afternoon to vote on a plan for spending the $7.7 billion to be raised by the tax measure over three decades. The plan would be submitted to city councils for their approval.
Several Alameda County transportation leaders defended the spending plan as spreading out the money fairly between expanding BART and carpool lanes to serve more commuters, while fixing and operating roads and transit systems.
“This is a balanced plan,” said Art Dao, the county transportation commission’s executive director.
“We’ve made several changes in the plan in recent negotiations, but it still hasn’t been enough with some groups.”
If the ballot measure fails because of discord, then no transportation advocates will be happy, he said.
Dao said the county commission has proposed AC Transit get a $1.45 billion share of the sales tax over three decades for bus operation and maintenance.
The commission also proposes to set aside $15 million to test free youth transit passes in select areas in Alameda County. Under a previous draft, groups wanting to test out youth bus passes would have to apply for grants.
TransForm and other groups said Tuesday the changes don’t go far enough to help transit systems forced to cut service in recent years because of state budget cuts and drops in sales tax during hard times.
“Extending BART to Livermore doesn’t help me if there isn’t a reliable bus to get to a BART station,” said Sheela Gunn-Cushman, of San Lorenzo, an advocate for disabled transit riders. “We need to restore transit services that have been cut.”