SACRAMENTO, CA – The California Legislative Bay Area Caucus released the following statement on preserving the Bay Area Transit Bridge Loan:
“As members of the California State Legislature’s Bay Area Caucus, we strongly urge the Governor and Department of Finance (DOF) to reconsider their decision to pause the $750 million dollar bridge loan funding agreement. Denying funds needed to prevent service cuts will be detrimental to transit operators throughout the Bay Area.
This financial assistance is critical to stabilizing and improving our regional transit systems---BART, Muni, AC Transit and others. The bridge loan would accomplish exactly what the name suggests: provide necessary funding to bridge the time gap between now and 2027. This body has worked throughout the year to finalize the terms of this loan while crafting a ballot measure for November 2026. If our transit systems do not have confidence that financial support is coming, they will be forced to start making cuts to service; damaging the Bay Area economy.
We saw just last Friday the impact that riders might expect when a networking problem shut down BART for a better part of the day. Our constituents rely on these trains and buses to get to work, school, medical appointments and other important daily pursuits. Reducing these services not only harms riders’ livelihoods, it puts more cars on the road reversing the progress made on California’s clean energy goals.
Pulling the plug on this agreement now will have severe impacts on our constituents who rely on our transit systems. The Governor and DOF need to step up and join Bay Area legislators in our commitment to developing solutions that will support riders and transit agencies alike for the short and long term future.”