Let's Save Muni and Look Good Doing It
Why I'm Supporting the Community Transit Act
After years of advocating for Muni it should come as no surprise that I’m a fan of the Community Transit Act. You may have seen volunteers collecting signatures to get it on the ballot at community events around town.
I like it because it’s one of those rare times when people used the ballot proposition system as it was supposed to be used, and the result has been nice to see. Bonus: Their campaign signs and flyers look really good.
Recently, the people behind the Community Transit Act submitted petitions in support of their ballot measure. While I had planned to be there, a last minute scheduling conflict prevented me from being at City Hall, which is a shame because these folks came to submit petitions and chew bubble gum, and they were all out of bubble gum. They did however, have these cool boxes, full of petitions, that looked like buses and had the names of all the Muni lines. Also, those campaign t-shirts!
They’re saving Muni and look good while doing it. What’s not to like?
I’m supporting this for many reasons, but the one most important to me is that Muni is actually doing pretty GOOD right now, and I don’t want to see it get ruined. I’ll leave the statistics on Muni for the people who know better.
For me, as someone who relies almost entirely on public transit and walking, I can safely say that Muni is a lot more reliable than it has been in the past, and I find that when I take Muni, be it a simple one-line trip or a trip full of transfers, I don’t have to wait too long for a bus or a train. Connections between the N and Caltrain tend to work better most of the time, and transfers aren’t as much of as a hassle either.
Living on the N Judah line certainly helps, but I don’t rely on the N exclusively, and when I take a longer walk across town, I don’t have to worry about getting stranded, like I did during the pandemic years.
Is it perfect? No, of course not, but it is overall a faily functional system, and we can’t let a bunch of fly-by-night politicians kill it on the altar of “political correctness.“
A strong Muni benefits everyone - even those who aren’t on the bus. If you get the people who don’t really need to drive a car onto transit, those that really do need a car will be able to get around better. ( Plus, they won’t need to download an “app” to do so ). However, to have a strong Muni we have to pay for it, and San Francisco needs to accept the reality that Aunt Dianne and Aunt Nancy will no longer be there to steer federal money to San Francisco for big transit projects.
Also, we need to keep in mind that the same Aunt Nancy, Aunt Dianne and Uncle Joe did a lot during the pandemic to keep Muni, BART and other transit systems running during pandemic chaos. It would be a tremendous mistake to let it crash now after everyone worked to save it.
So to stabilize Muni’s day to day funding, the people behnd the Community Transit Act propose a tax on so-called “ridesharing” services. I’ll let the good folks at the campaign explain exactly how it works, but reading it, you realize that as taxes go, this one isn’t so bad, and it’s still less than what comparable cities charge. More importantly, this stabilizes Muni’s budget so it will be able to keep up the good work - instead of being subject to state and local budget whimsy.
The Community Transit Act is being led by people who really like Muni and San Francisco, and are willing to do what it takes to make it better. They didn’t ask for permission from the City’s self appointed leaders, they just decided to get things done. This wasn’t cooked up by politicians and lobbyists- instead it was just people who live in San Francisco who want to make Muni work. (That’s how ballot measures are supposed to work!)
Right now the signatures are being verified so we’ll find out soon if it qualifies for the ballot, and then it will be assigned an official letter. Whatever it ends up, if you see it on the ballot, vote Yes, and know that you’re doing something good for San Francisco.
For more information on how to get involved helping the Communty Transit Act, check out their website, where you can find out how to donate, volunteer, or attend an event in support.
About Muni being better now than in the past, you're right. And I was suddenly reminded of a job interview I had years ago during which the interviewer stressed the importance of getting to work on time—before adding, "Barring the vagaries of Muni." Her exact words have stuck with me for more than thirty years because for such a long time the "vagaries of Muni" were an unfortunate (and daily) fact of my working life.