SB 1031

Bill Subjects

Abstract

(1) Existing law creates the Metropolitan Transportation Commission as a local area planning agency for the 9-county San Francisco Bay area with comprehensive regional transportation planning and other related responsibilities. Existing law creates various transit districts located in the San Francisco Bay area, with specified powers and duties relating to providing public transit services. This bill would authorize the commission to raise and allocate new revenue and incur and issue bonds and other indebtedness, as specified. In this regard, the bill would authorize the commission, until January 1, 2041, to impose a retail transactions and use tax, a regional payroll tax, a parcel tax, and a regional vehicle registration surcharge in all or a subset of the 9 counties of the San Francisco Bay area, except as specified, in accordance with applicable constitutional requirements. The bill would prohibit a tax or surcharge described above from being imposed for a period of time of more than 30 years. The bill would require the parcel tax to be collected by counties and the other 3 taxes to be collected by specified state agencies, and would require the net revenues from those taxes to be remitted to the commission, as prescribed. The bill would require the commission, in consultation with county transportation authorities, to develop an expenditure plan for the expenditure of the revenues expected to be generated by the tax or surcharge, together with other federal, state, and local funds expected to be available for transportation improvements, as specified. The bill would require, before the election on the tax or surcharge, the expenditure plan to be approved by county transportation authorities representing counties meeting certain criteria, as provided. The bill would require the revenue generated pursuant to these provisions to be used for transportation improvements in the San Francisco Bay area, including for various transit purposes, and would require the commission to allocate those revenues in accordance with specified requirements. By adding to the duties of local officials with respect to elections procedures for revenue measures on behalf of the commission, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. (2) Existing law establishes the Transportation Agency, consisting of various state agencies under the supervision of an executive officer known as the Secretary of Transportation, who is required to develop and report to the Governor on legislative, budgetary, and administrative programs to accomplish comprehensive, long-range, and coordinated planning and policy formulation in the matters of public interest related to the agency. This bill would require the Transportation Agency to select a transportation institute, as defined, to conduct an assessment that analyzes the benefits and disbenefits to riders, and the administrative, financial, legal, contractual, and governance feasibility, of various forms of consolidation and enhanced coordination, as defined, among transit agencies, as defined, that are located in the 9-county San Francisco Bay area. The bill would require that assessment to be completed on or before January 1, 2026, and would require, as part of that assessment, the transportation institute to identify specified information about each transit agency and to consider certain topics relating to consolidation and enhanced coordination. Based on the findings of the assessment, the bill would require the Transportation Agency, on or before January 1, 2027, to develop a report of recommendations that, among other things, identifies opportunities for the consolidation or enhanced coordination, or both, of 2 or more agencies and provides specific recommendations for the consolidation or enhanced coordination of transit agencies and their governing bodies without resulting in the elimination of programs and transportation services, as specified. The bill would establish the Bay Area Transit Consolidation and Coordination Technical Assistance Fund in the State Treasury for the deposit of moneys that can be used for specified purposes, including paying for the cost of conducting the assessment and preparing the report, as specified. The bill would require the assessment and the report to be submitted to the Legislature upon completion. (3) Existing law requires the Metropolitan Transportation Commission to adopt rules and regulations to promote the coordination of fares and schedules for all public transit systems within its jurisdiction, as specified. This bill would revise and recast this provision by, among other things, providing that the commission is responsible for implementing a seamless transit rider experience across the San Francisco Bay area and requiring those rules and regulations to also promote the coordination of mapping and wayfinding, real-time transit information, and other customer-facing operating policies, as specified. The bill would also declare that it is the intent of the Legislature that the commission implement and sustain specified outcomes in undertaking these responsibilities. The bill would require the commission to submit an annual report to the Legislature on the status of those outcomes and the status of transit ridership in the San Francisco Bay area. By imposing additional duties on the commission, the bill would create a state-mandated local program. (4) Under existing law, a transit operator within the jurisdiction of the commission is not eligible to receive funding allocated by the commission pursuant to the State Transit Assistance Program unless it has complied with the above-described rules and regulations adopted by the commission. This bill would also make a transit operator ineligible to receive an allocation from the commission of specified revenues generated by the new taxing authority authorized by the bill if the operator is not in compliance with those rules and regulations. (5) Existing law requires designated transportation planning agencies to prepare and adopt regional transportation plans directed at achieving a coordinated and balanced regional transportation system. Existing law requires that each regional transportation plan include a sustainable communities strategy prepared by each metropolitan planning organization in order to, among other things, achieve certain targets established by the State Air Resources Board for the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions from automobiles and light trucks in the region for 2020 and 2035, respectively. Existing law also requires a regional transportation plan to include a financial element that summarizes the cost of plan implementation constrained by a realistic projection of available revenues and that contains recommendations for allocation of funds. This bill would require the commission, on or before April 1, 2025, to amend or update its regional transportation plan to include a specified project operated by the Sonoma-Marin Area Rail Transit District within the transportation network identified in the sustainable communities strategy and within the financial element. By imposing additional duties on a local agency, the bill would create a state-mandated local program. (6) Existing law authorizes the commission and the Bay Area Air Quality Management District to jointly adopt a commute benefit ordinance that requires covered employers operating within the common area of the 2 agencies with a specified number of covered employees to offer those employees certain commute benefits, as specified. This bill would also authorize one of those commute benefit options to include an employer-provided regional transit pass. This bill would authorize the commission, as part of a measure to impose a tax described above, to propose a ballot measure that would require a covered employer that is located in proximity to transit to purchase a regional transit pass for each of its employees and to require a covered employer that is not located in proximity to transit to provide a subsidy to each of its employees corresponding in financial value to the regional transit pass, as specified. If the ballot measure is approved by the voters, the bill would require the commission and the district to update the ordinance accordingly. (7) The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that, if the Commission on State Mandates determines that the bill contains costs mandated by the state, reimbursement for those costs shall be made pursuant to the statutory provisions noted above.