Street Roots • April 24-May 1, 2015
Editorial
Page 3
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TriMet policies shifts burden to low income, nonprofits
B
efore I start this column, I would like to say that
I’m a huge fan of public transit. I haven’t owned or
driven a car since I was 21. I’m now almost 40.
Without public transportation, my experience in Portland
and in many other cities would have been dull and bland.
Saying that, there are some unsettling trends developing
in Portland.
TriMet is proposing raising the fares for Honored
Citizen passes from $1 to $1.25.
Honored Citizens are anyone 65
or older, people on Medicaid along
with people experiencing mental or
physical disabilities.
The agency hasn’t increased
Honored Citizen fares since 2010,
and told Street Roots, “It’s never
By Israel Bayer
easy to raise fares, but fares play a
role in helping to pay for the cost of
service. The Honored Citizen fares
remain deeply discounted. At the
same time, we’re expanding our mitigation efforts to
minimize the impact to low-income riders.”
Fair enough, right? Everyone needs to pay to support
a world-class transportation system.
That is until you understand that the overall additional
revenue that’s going to be raised with the fare increases
is a mere $650,000 annually.
That’s not to say $650,000 isn’t a lot of money. I’m
just not sure it justifies increasing fares to our region’s
elderly population and people with disabilities - 63
percent of whom are experiencing poverty.
TriMet’s budget is $504.8 million. There are a lot of ,
ways to think about trying to. capture $650,000 without
having to raise fares on senior citizens, the disabled and
the poor.
For decades, Portlanders enjoyed traveling on public
transportation free of charge in Portland’s downtown
core. It was revolutionary — until it wasn’t In 2012,
TriMet decided to no longer offer Fareless Square, one
of our city’s prized treasures, due to budget shortfalls.
Things haven’t been the same since, especially for
people experiencing poverty and the disabled in the
downtown core.
In fact, I believe that by taking away Fareless Square
we have sparked an increase in law enforcement oh
TriMet resulting in exclusions that ultimately have ended
up costing our system an enormous amount of money.
There’s no question it’s a windfall for law enforcement,
but at the end of the day, let’s not kid ourselves, it’s
taxpayers and the poor who are ultimately paying the
price.
Street Roots’ recent coverage (TriMet Exclusions: One
wrong step, Emily Green, March 10,) revealed that many
people are charged with “interfering with public transit,”
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or IPT after being caught on TriMet after being
excluded. The charge is a Class A misdemeanor, which
carries the same weight as a drunken driving or
misdemeanor assault charge. The definition of IPT allows
transit officers to issue this serious criminal charge in
circumstances that - Were they to take place anywhere
other than on transit property, - usually Would result in a
ticket or Class C misdemeanor. Class A misdemeanors
are punishable by up to one year in prison. A Class C
misdemeanor is punishable by up to 30 days in jail.
That’s no joke.
One public defender told Street Roots that these
charges make up to 25 percent of their caseload right
now. That’s ridiculous.
“TriMet doesn’t have to pay for the jail, the public
defender, the court systems cost or anything like that,”
Chris O’Connor, a public defender, told Street Roots. “I
think the rest of the taxpayers in the rest of Oregon do
not realize the cost in money, court time, jail time and
other expenses that the current statute allows.”
We can’t think about issues of displacement and
equity, access to jobs and services, child care and
socialization, education and housing, to name a few,
without thinking about how TriMet is regulating and
charging people for services offered on public
transportation.
When Fareless Square ended in 2012, TriMet created
the Fare Assistance Program and the Fare Relief
Program. One program offers discounted tickets to
nonprofits, while the other offers grants of up to $25,000
in the form of fares to support poor and disabled folks.
While these programs are great, in many ways they
create more bureaucracy and paperwork for already
underfunded nonprofits, while pushing the burden of
transportation accessibility onto the nonprofit sector as a
whole.
Now, with the proposal to increase Honored Citizen
fares TriMet is saying it will boost its support of these
programs by 5 to 20 percent. Again, a noble effort, but
TriMet assumes that the nonprofit sector can help
alleviate the needs of people needing to access public
transportation. It can’t even come close.
In my humble opinion, TriMet and local and state
government, non-profits, the business sector and the
general public need to be working more closely when
thinking about its equity- outcomes that affect our entire
region — especially when you think about a new digital
system that will be unveiled in the near future.
We need to create a more humane and cost-effective
way to deal with exclusions on TriMet Nobody should
ever go to jail for trying to ride public transportation. It’s
ridiculous. And finally, the TriMet that I love shouldn’t
raise fares for our most vulnerable Honored Citizens.
Hours; 7:30 a.m.-3 p.m. M oivFii, 7:30
a.m.-2 p.m., Sat., and 7:30-11 a.m. Sun.
Interested in advertising in Street Roots?
Contact Israel Bayer at israel@streetroots.org
Staff
Executive Director Israel Bayer
israel@sUeetroots.org
M a n a g in g E d it o r Joanne Zuhl
joanne@streeiroots.org
Vendor C o o rd in a to r Cole Merkel
cole@streetroots.org . .
O perations D ire c to r Sarah Beecroft
P rogram A s s is ta n t Grace Badik, Jesuit
Volunteer, grace@streetroots.org
Developm ent D ire c to r Sarah Cloud
Developm ent A s s is ta n t Ann-Derrick
. Galliot
Reporters Emily Green, Sue Zalokar,
Christen McCurdy, Sarah Hansell, Sam
Bouman, Jacques Von Lunen, Jared Paben
Photographers Diego Diaz, Joe Glode
Canvasser Desmond Hardison
Board of Directors
Chairman Bruce Anderson
Vice-Chairman Brad Taylor
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