A $17 billion sales tax, locked in for 14 years.

“Why should we entrust VTA with a 20% budget increase when the agency has shown no real need for additional funds... Supporters of the measure want us to ignore the past irresponsible use of our tax dollars... so that our transit systems can continue their profligate spending... Voters should vote no on the tax increase to send a message that mass transit agencies must... align the cost of their services with our new transit patterns.” — Pat Waite

“It's the transit boards giving their worst case... They're not approaching it from (the perspective of) how to manage their chunk of the $6.2 billion that the agencies will continue to get from existing sources. They're acting like they'll be devastatingly broke (if the measure fails), which on that basis is kind of insane.” — Thunder Parley

“Only 48% of respondents said they would vote for November's Regional Transit Measure, or RTM, according to a poll conducted by Embold Research for Joint Venture Silicon Valley and the Bay Area News Group... If voters match the poll's 48% approval on Election Day, the measure would fail, as it needs more than 50% support to pass.”

“The demand to raise sales tax is of immediate concern, especially as the state has managed to exceed its own constitutional limits of no more than 2% over the state rate of 7.25%... This is true as well of RTM, known as the BART tax. For many, BART is already too expensive and they blew through so much money while cutting services during Covid.” — Gary Kalm

“If RTM passes, 84% of the additional sales tax collected in Santa Clara County will go to VTA, which is not at a structural deficit and is not threatening any massive cuts or anything... sales taxes hurt small mom-and-pop retail shops a lot more than the big businesses that back the Chamber, so they're literally throwing small businesses under the bus for the benefit of big business members... VTA is explicitly exempt from every accountability and oversight measure from SB 63.” — Thunder Parley

“Can we trust the sales pitch when the same interests help write the tax measure, finance the campaign, and produce the research telling us to approve it? That is the question behind Measure RTM, a projected $17 billion sales-tax increase to fund Bay Area transit on November ballots... The firm helping forecast the consequences of rejecting the tax is also financing its passage and doing substantial business with its prospective beneficiaries.” — Debora Allen

“The doomsday map is a threat not a savings plan. Taxpayer funded agencies used public money to hire a lobbying group who hired a contractor caught defrauding BART to invent ridiculous numbers and scare you into handing over billions more all so they could protect a broken status quo. So we will say no... vote no on Measure RTM.” — Thunder Parley

“The proposed tax—dubbed the Regional Transit Measure or Measure RTM —comes on top of already-existing transit sales taxes. And it falls most heavily on those least able to afford it: seniors and working families trying to make ends meet in America's most expensive region... Instead, we're racing toward what looks like a VAT for the VTA — 11.25% is an almost European style sales taxes now choking the Bay Area.” — Marc Joffe

“The new plan for Bay Area transit should require binding cost and compensation reforms, tie service levels to real ridership... Then, return to voters in 2028 with a smaller, smarter measure.” — Bill Jackson

“In endorsing Measure RTM, The Chronicle calls our suggestion of temporarily using capital funds for transit operations dubious. But California has already authorized that approach... In 2023, the Legislature made $4 billion in Transit and Intercity Rail Capital Program funding available for either transit operations or capital improvements. The precedent is clear; capital-to-operations flexibility can be created if legislators choose.” — Marc Joffe

“All it does is lock in fixed percentage handouts to fractured agencies to continue existing service. Unbelievable. It forces zero actual operational changes or consolidation. They think you are stupid and will just believe anything they say.” — Thunder Parley

“This is the most regressive tax possible... It would take the tax here in San Leandro to 11.25%. That is a joke. That is school supplies for teachers, that's clothes, that's meals on the go, those are repairs that landlords need to make that will go right up into rents making housing even less affordable... You're not voting against transit, you're voting for real accountability. We want fixes before funding.” — Thunder Parley

“Voters are being asked to approve billions in new taxes while being told RTM will force agencies to control costs. It doesn’t. The agencies receiving the money help choose their own watchdogs... Accountability without enforcement is just another empty promise.” — Debora Allen

“First segment opened, it's not meeting expectations, why would you quadruple down on the expense? ... Just because we've moved some ground doesn't mean it can't stop.” — Thunder Parley

“The Bay Area ‘transit industrial complex’ is once again demanding more money from hard pressed consumers... lifting the total tax take to as high as 11.25%... Even MTC's own benefit-cost analysis assigns it less than 50 cents of estimated benefits for every dollar spent.”

“The simplest fix would be to temporarily divert money now earmarked for California's woebegone high-speed rail project to Bay Area transit operations... Rather than wait out the federal government, VTA should cancel or truncate this project.”

“Locking in new sales taxes for 14 years will only exacerbate the Bay Area's cost-of-living crisis without forcing transit agencies to rein in runaway operating expenses.”

“The proposed 14-year, over a billion-dollar-per-year sales tax under SB 63 / Measure RTM locks in bloated cost structures, high compensation, and skyrocketing operating subsidies for agencies whose ridership remains 30% below pre-pandemic levels.”

“Proponents know voters are fed up. That is why they snaked this measure onto the ballot as a citizen initiative to exploit a legal loophole, deliberately evading the traditional two-thirds voter approval required for special taxes... We cannot continue acting as an endless bailout ATM for transit agencies that refuse to reform.”

“[The ballot question uses] manipulative framing—such as asserting the measure will ‘prevent major service cuts’ and ‘preserve BART’—instead of offering voters neutral ballot language.”

“Transit officials violated California Elections Code by replacing neutral language with persuasive polling-tested rhetoric... extracting upwards of $17 billion under the guise of an emergency bailout.”

“Even the VTA board subcommittees are realizing that VTA needs to get way more serious about responding to withering critiques of the disgraced South Bay agency (often characterized as the ‘worst-performing agency in the country’) by a Civil Grand Jury.”

“Supporters of the Transit Measure need to use misleading advertising because voters won't pass the measure if they have the real story that it is a regressive tax falling hardest on seniors and low-income families for 14 years.” — Gregg Dieguez

“The (VTA board of directors) has recognized the need for additional oversight and guidance, but the board has failed to exercise its obligation to provide the strategic direction needed for a successful project,” the report reads.

“'Preserving BART' implies that it's at risk in some way, whereas funding it implies what it is, giving it more money to continue to operate... The committee argues that transit operators could utilize existing capital funds to cover operating costs, reduce overtime pay or evaluate contracts with labor unions.” — Gregg Dieguez

“We are being asked to hand a blank check bailout to agencies that have already received over $6 billion in pandemic aid over the last six years and are still staring down nearly a billion dollars in annual structural deficits... Together, we must demand Fixes Before Funding.” — Thunder Parley

“Voters are experiencing deep fatigue over stacked taxes while transit boards refuse to touch administrative overhead or hold management accountable.” — Debora Allen

“Media narratives framing opposition as ‘trying to kill transit’ ignore that working families are being asked to subsidize agencies that refuse to balance their budgets or adapt to remote work.”

“When the overwhelming share of every operating dollar at these agencies goes to labor rather than fares — including roughly a dozen employees earning more than $500,000 a year — voters deserve a clear answer about what exactly their next dollar is buying.”

“The measure will push sales tax rates above 11% in several Bay Area cities to subsidize agencies that already take in $6 billion annually, all under unenforceable, non-binding oversight mechanisms.”

“Let's stop spending huge amounts of money on planning and constructing very stupid mega projects without a purpose and use that money for other purposes, such as operating what we have now.” — Tom Rubin

“The sales tax is inherently regressive and disproportionately burdens lower-income residents to subsidize higher-income commuters on systems like Caltrain and BART, while transit boards refuse to negotiate union labor reforms.”

“VTA does not face large, near-term operating deficits... Measure RTM functions as an unnecessary burden on Santa Clara County that acts as an indirect bailout for BART extension construction overruns.” — Marc Joffe

“The VTA Board failed in its fiduciary oversight of the BART Phase II extension — whose estimated costs surged from $4.7 billion to $12.75 billion with opening pushed to 2037 — while ridership on Phase I remains 86% below initial projections.”

“For January 2026, ridership was 86% below estimates... VTA's cost-estimation practices, along with its lack of transparency around changes to project scope and cost, were identified as significant deficiencies... the board has failed to exercise its obligation to provide the strategic direction needed for a successful project.”

“Bay Area consumers are already squeezed by high taxes and inflation; tacking on another multi-billion-dollar sales tax hike to bail out struggling agencies is unsustainable.”

“A 60% surge in labor expenses with a 60% collapse in ridership between 2014 and 2024... Rigid collective bargaining agreements prevent the agency from restructuring operating costs, pushing it into an ongoing financial death spiral.”

“Watchdogs and critics characterized the plan as a high-pressure political tactic to coerce voter approval of new taxes.”

“Inflation-adjusted transit spending has doubled since 1980 despite flat or declining transit ridership... Voters must demand work-rule reforms and contracting flexibility before any new tax revenue is authorized.”

“California voters aren't choosing between SB 63 and ‘catastrophic cuts.’ They are choosing between continuing a spending model that has already failed or demanding accountability before approving another tax hike.”