BART Caught In Lie About Fare Evasion
BART is praising the efficiency of its hulking new fare gates, part of the agency’s effort to recoup lost revenue. The $90 million project, initiated in early 2024, takes credit for dramatic reductions in fare evasion where gates are installed. Last February, BART announced a 17% drop in crime at stations and on trains in 2024 compared to 2023. The jump from new fare gates to less crime is so slight, it may as well be a certifiable link. But a recent independent study indicates that BART may not be telling the whole truth.
Correlation Is Not Causation
“The theory is that people who are more likely to commit crimes are the ones who are also not paying,” wrote Oaklandside editor Jose Fermoso. Read Fermoso’s piece about BART’s inflated figures here. “Cracking down on the fare jumpers would thus reduce crime, make them more likely to pay next time, and increase revenue.” This is the excuse BART presented when its ugly new gates went up, and their explanation seemed logical, if begrudgingly. Imagine finding out that wasn’t the case.
The study calling BART’s fare gates into question was no small task. It took contributions from Yale-based non-profit research group Center for Policing Equity as well as BART, in addition to the Office of the Independent Police Auditor (OIPA), BART Police, and local nonprofits like All of Us or None and the Monument Crisis Center. And yet, despite the many hands at work to make this study possible, many of CPE’s questions went ignored. The suspicious silence was BART’s, whose reaction to being observed was to provide extensive though not all pertinent data.
Missing information aside, CPE and associates completed their study with Bay Area Rapid Transit coming out of it dishonestly nonetheless. They state that BART did not adequately explain how this and other forms of fare evasion enforcement such as BART Police legitimately (re)captures revenue and safety systemwide.
“BART’s focus on fare evasion recovers minimal revenue, may be addressing an overstated problem, and is not effective at curbing incidents that make riders feel uneasy in the system,” the report concluded.
Is BART being 100% transparent?
For years now (not just since the pandemic), BART has cited fare evasion as a significant source of lost revenue. This ostensibly logical connection still justifies increased security measures, but is BART relying on that to sell you on it? How many delinquent riders actually pay their fines? Are BART’s fare enforcement methods, gates especially, as effective as the agency claims?
CPE’s study reported that fares covered only 22% of BART’s operating costs in 2024, down from 70% in 2018. With COVID to blame, the drastic plunge is why the transit agency requested state and federal assistance. BART is understandably seeking to recapture the 2018-era success rate. But while the gates might curb fare evasion, CPE feels they have little impact on public safety.
BART has placed $90 million and tons of faith on the assumption that only criminals skip fare. If you pay your fare, you are unlikely to cause trouble. I’d like to know how many of those who paid their fare proceeded to harass or assault other passengers. Then I want to know how many fare evaders commit other offenses on BART. BART reported to the Chronicle that “80% of those who commit crimes within the BART system had not paid fare.” Is that a fair assessment?
Did BART survey every rider behind a criminal offense to determine that 8 out of ten hadn’t paid fare? Or is it more accurate to say that eight out of every 10 riders cited had not paid? What was to stop 49-year-old Trevor Belmont from murdering 74-year-old Corazon Dandan at Powell Street Station last July? Does BART actually believe that a willingness to pay fare indicates an inherent benevolence? Similarly, are we expected to believe nearly every fare hopper will go on to commit crimes against their fellow passengers?
How a financial issue becomes a moral issue
Once CPE began investigating the seemingly benign semantics BART employed, the story began to unravel. Between the presence of fare inspectors, BART police, and the controversial new fare gates, the funds BART recuperated haven’t been substantial. “Between 6% and 12% of civil proof of payment citations were actually paid in 2017, the last year for which data was available,” said Fermoso, “and between 2018 and 2023, the highest cash amount brought in from citations was $86,613 in 2019.”
BART has attributed up to $25 million a year in lost revenue to fare evasion. The figure attracted doubt and criticism from multiple media outlets, including CBS. CPE found that “BART provided no proof for its claim that fare evasion costs up to $25 million a year, with Stout, the advisory firm, estimating that 2023 losses were no greater than $9.5 million. That’s significantly less than the $27.2 million the ramped-up enforcement costs BART in personnel and related fees.” (Fermoso).
RELATED: Five BART Basics For Locals And Newbies Alike
Anyone who’s ridden BART lately has probably been tailgated by some unpaid passenger as they swipe through the new gates. Even BART admits the new gates aren’t perfect, suggesting there’s another motive behind their construction. “It’s not possible to stop 100% of fare evasion, but we are seeing that these state-of-the-art, durable gates are proving themselves to be more resistant to fare evaders and are deterring unwanted activity on BART.” [emphasis mine] Is that what “fare evasion” really means: keeping undesirables off of trains and out of stations?
Barring homeless people from riding the train happens at the turnstiles. Policing who gets to ride happens everywhere else. CPE’s study also found that, “of the 20,778 people stopped on suspicion of fare evasion, 43.5% of them were Black. Black riders also accounted for 49.6% of the people who received citations.”
“If BART has other explicit objectives for fare evasion enforcement, it should clearly state those goals and explain the specific mechanisms through which they expect those activities to address their goals,” the study reported.
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