MTC, California legislators reset effort for voters to have say in future public transportation projects

The Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) will hold a meeting on June 12 to discuss building regional consensus for legislation in California that would authorize Bay Area voters as early as 2026 to consider a transportation revenue measure to preserve and enhance public transit in the region. The scheduling of the meeting comes after the announcement by California Sens. Scott Wiener of San Francisco and Aisha Wahab of Hayward that they will pause the Connect Bay Area Act (Senate Bill 1031) introduced earlier this year and will introduce new legislation in 2025. 

“Our Commission is most effective when it’s united,” said MTC Chair and Napa County Supervisor Alfredo Pedroza. “Discussions about Senate Bill 1031 at our regular May meeting made clear that the legislation as currently written doesn’t have the broad support it needs to be successful but I know every one of our Commissioners is committed to working with all the members of the Bay Area’s legislative delegation to structure a ballot measure we can all get behind.”  

During the upcoming months, MTC will convene key parties to help inform Sen. Wiener’s and Sen. Wahab’s efforts to reshape and refine the Connect Bay Area Act.   

“The Bay Area’s future depends on robust and reliable transit,” said MTC Vice Chair Nick Josefowitz, who serves as the San Francisco mayor’s appointee to the Commission. “That requires robust and reliable funding. It’s a smart investment to spend more time developing a framework for legislation that will help meet the Bay Area’s transit needs.”