New poll calls on BART to hire more police to win back riders
BART should hire more sworn police officers and double down on keeping trains clean if it hopes to see any significant boost in ridership, according to a new poll.
The findings from a BART-specific poll commissioned by the Bay Area Council, a business advocacy group that’s supported the regional rail agency since its inception, should not come as a surprise. Crime and filth on BART tainted many people’s perceptions of the agency years before the pandemic decimated its ridership.
But the polling reaffirms the challenging path for recovery facing the Bay Area’s fare-dependent rail system.
With ridership stagnant since September, BART has a one- to two-year window to either recover large swaths of lapsed riders or secure a state or local taxpayer subsidy before incurring massive annual budget deficits. Failure could mean whittling BART service to “doomsday” levels so infrequent that it collapses the agency’s customer base.
To secure its future, BART must overcome hardened, negative perceptions from voters and riders who feel the agency hasn’t made much progress reducing crime and filth on trains and in stations.
“There can be no higher priority for BART and the future survival of the system than to direct every ounce of energy and resources into making the system safer and cleaner,” the Bay Area Council’s CEO and president, Jim Wunderman, said in a statement.
Among the findings from the Bay Area Council’s “BART Perceptions Survey”:
73% of the 1,000 respondents polled in San Francisco, Alameda, Contra Costa and San Mateo counties said they feel more comfortable riding BART when a uniformed police officer is present. Fifteen percent of respondents said more police would make them feel less safe, while the remaining 13% were unsure.
Almost 80% of residents polled said BART should act more aggressively in ejecting people from trains and stations who violate the agency’s passenger code of conduct. The code of conduct prohibits drugs, smoking, drinking and illegal behaviors.
About half of respondents said they have either seen a crime or been a victim of one on BART.
44% of the 357 respondents who ride BART regularly said they’ve never or rarely seen a police officer on the system.
About 60% of respondents said they would ride BART more frequently if it improved safety and cleanliness.
The Bay Area Council is among the coalition of advocacy groups and legislators vying to secure a $5 billion temporary bailout for BART and other Bay Area transit agencies. The region’s transit agencies project they’ll have a combined $2.9 billion budget deficit by 2028, with BART accounting for 40% of the gap.
Wunderman said the agency should “immediately and significantly increase police and security personnel on trains,” as well as remove rule-breakers more often and install its new hardened fare gates within a year (BART plans to replace all gates by 2026).
Since 2021, the Bay Area Council has conducted separate return-to-office surveys showing that crime and cleanliness have kept some would-be riders from taking the transit service. “BART must treat this like a crisis,” Wunderman said, “because it is a crisis.”
It could be tough for BART to add more officers. BART’s “fiscal cliff” starts in March 2025, and the agency’s board is debating the extent of the potential cost-cutting.
One area where respondents seemingly disagreed with the vision of the BART board’s progressive majority is in its policing efforts. Since 2020, the BART Police Department has deployed civilian staff such as social workers and crisis intervention specialists to connect homeless riders to housing and support and emergency services.
BART leaders and some board directors have touted its Progressive Policing Bureau as a humane way to address endemic homelessness on the system. However, 65% of respondents said BART is better off focusing on operating trains than acting as a social services provider.
BART officials say they’re already making changes to improve crime and cleanliness.
In March, BART’s Police Department began deploying an extra eight to 18 sworn officers on trains and stations between downtown Oakland and downtown San Francisco. The agency this year is cleaning train car interiors twice as often, BART spokesperson Chris Filippi said.
After the first month of BART’s new police officer deployment plan, the agency’s Police Department saw a 38% decrease in calls for service and a 40% increase in arrests, Filippi said.
“We are committed to building on these safety and cleaning initiatives as we move forward because we know that’s what our riders expect of us,” Filippi said.
Source: San Francisco Chronicle
