SF Chronicle
BAY AREA
These Bay Area lawmakers oppose raising bridge toll fees to bail out BART, transit. Here’s why
Ricardo Cano
July 2, 2023
Cars and trucks approach the Bay Bridge toll plaza in Oakland. Tolls at seven Bay Area bridges would increase if Senate Bill 532 is approved. Noah Berger/Special to The Chronicle Several Bay Area lawmakers say they don’t support a bill that would temporarily raise tolls on seven state-owned bridges to give BART and other transit agencies more money to avoid service cuts.
That’s the main aim of Senate Bill 532 by San Francisco state Sen. Scott Wiener, unveiled June
23. The proposal, if passed by two-thirds of the Legislature and signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom, would increase bridge tolls by $1.50 — resulting in $9.50 tolls through 2028 — to raise $900 million for regional transit agencies struggling to recover riders after the pandemic.
BART and other Bay Area operators projecting “fiscal cliffs” will receive about $400 million of the $1.1 billion subsidy transit agencies won in California’s budget. But transit officials say that money isn’t enough to rescue them from ballooning deficits starting in 2026, and, without additional funding, would still have to consider steep service cuts.
Seven Bay Area legislators signed on as coauthors to Wiener’s bill, including Assembly Members Phil Ting and Matt Haney of San Francisco and Buffy Wicks and Mia Bonta of Oakland.
However, at least six Bay Area lawmakers representing constituents who would be most affected by the toll increases told The Chronicle they oppose SB532. “I think it is regressive, inequitable and doesn’t force the kind of accountability that we need on our transit agencies,” Assembly Member Rebecca Bauer-Kahan, D-Orinda, said of the proposed toll increase. “We need our transit agencies to get to a place where they are sustainable … and they are looking to us to just bail them out indefinitely, and I don’t think that’s the right thing.” The Chronicle reached out to Bay Area lawmakers who weren’t already signed on as SB532’s co-authors to inquire about their position on the bill.
The six Democratic lawmakers in opposition represent districts outside the Bay Area’s urban core. Along with Bauer-Kahan, they are state Sens. Bill Dodd of Napa and Steve Glazer of Orinda, as well as Assembly Members Timothy Grayson of Concord, Damon Connolly of San Rafael and Lori Wilson of Suisun City.
Spokespeople for state Sens. Nancy Skinner, D-Berkeley, and John Laird, D-Santa Cruz, said they haven’t decided their position on the bill.
Sen. Aisha Wahab, D-Hayward, said in a statement that she is in favor of more transit funding to shield transit-dependent residents from service cuts, but wants lawmakers to consider more accountability measures with “a focus on integration, streamlining and consolidation” of Bay Area agencies.
Nine other Bay Area lawmakers did not respond to The Chronicle’s inquiries.
Legislators who responded to inquiries offered varying reasons for their opposition, though the disproportionate impact to commuters in their districts emerged as a common theme. “It’s primarily drivers in my district that (Wiener’s) asking to open their pocketbooks up to BART and other regional transportation agencies again,” Grayson said. “I think we need to focus on ensuring the $1.1 billion we just approved through the budget is spent prudently by agencies across the state.”
Transit officials and advocates support Wiener’s bill and say the toll increases would give agencies financial security before they plan to ask local voters to pass a tax increase in 2026. “This is so important for our future. Transit is not optional,” Wiener said at a Sacramento news conference last week, surrounded by transit advocates and supportive lawmakers. “I think for anyone who’s thinking about this, the question that you need to ask yourself is, will the Bay Area be a better place or a worse place if we see massive transit service cuts?” BART’s Board of Directors voted 7-2 at a special meeting Friday to endorse Wiener’s bill. Of the Bay Area’s 27 transit agencies, BART is the most financially imperiled because of its heavy reliance on fares.
“We need to really support any efforts to bring revenue to this agency,” BART Director Rebecca Saltzman said. “Because if we don’t, we know what’s on the line. We know we’re going to have to make awful cuts to service.”
Drivers would pay the higher toll on seven bridges: San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge, San Mateo-Hayward Bridge, Richmond-San Rafael Bridge, Dumbarton Bridge, Carquinez Bridge, Benicia-Martinez Bridge and Antioch Bridge.
If it becomes law, bridge tolls for most vehicles would go up from $7 to $8.50 in 2024. Tolls are already scheduled to go up by $1 in 2025 as part of voters’ 2018 approval of Regional Measure 3, which pays for transit and highway infrastructure projects.
The potential $9.50 toll rate would be almost double what it cost to drive on state-owned bridges in 2018, when tolls were $5.
Like other legislators, Dodd said he wants to see that BART and other transit agencies would be held accountable for their spending. The proposed increases would especially affect residents in his Wine Country district, Dodd said, who will also be tolled driving on Highway 37 later this decade.
“I think it lets the (Newsom) administration off the hook,” Dodd said of the bill. “And I think it lets legislators off the hook in terms of working harder to get what we need to keep these transit operations running.”
SB532 will be heard in the Senate Transportation Committee on Wednesday. The legislation is a “gut and amend” bill, meaning its original contents were entirely amended. State lawmakers sometimes use this method as a way to introduce a new bill later in a session after the Legislature’s official deadline.
“This is a measure that circumvents the voters of the Bay Area,” Glazer said.