TAKE ACTION! Thursday April 18 @11am: Let's Make Metro's student GoPass Program Permanent!
Our advocacy worked! After sending in 530+ emails and a support letter with over 40 organizations, Mayor Karen Bass and members of the LA Metro Board want to make Metro's GoPass – the Anywhere, Anytime Student Transit Pass program - PERMANENT!
We need you to show up on Thursday April 18th at 11:00 a.m. at One Gateway Plaza (3rd Floor) for the Executive Committee Meeting to say YES to Item 22: the Bridge to Farelessness Motion. Each speaker gets 1 minute!
Can’t make it in person? You can call in and make public comment
(TALKING POINTS BELOW):
Dial-in: 202-735-3323 and enter
English Access Code: 5647249#
Spanish Access Code: 7292892#
Public comment will be taken as the Board takes up each item.
To give public comment on an item, enter #2 (pound-two) when prompted.
Can’t attend the Executive Committee Meeting? Then hold the date for Thursday April 25th at 10am when this goes to the full Board for a vote and a second opportunity to speak
And you can still email the Board below!!
TALKING POINTS
- Share your name, affiliation, and personal story
- I support Item 22: the Bridge to Farelessness Motion
- GoPass is key to Metro’s ambition to build transit ridership to pre-pandemic levels
- It is central to regional efforts to reduce automobile travel, traffic, and emissions
- GoPass is an immediate and tangible benefit to struggling K-12/community college students
- When you give a pass to a student, they ride!
- Fare programs alleviate poverty, increase social mobility, and improve health
- Metro’s GoPass program has been a phenomenal success. In November 2023, Metro’s GoPass pilot program saw a 28 percent increase in one year and just surpassed 35 million rides!
- Metro’s GoPass Program a permanent program and include it in the Metro budget...forever.
WANT MORE BACKGROUND?
Move LA has been working for 15 years to create “insurance-like” transit discount programs – where all students pay a little, and all students get a pass - at transit agencies across California for students at K-12 institutions, community colleges, and our state’s universities. These programs have been proven to create a culture of ridership immediately, reduce VMT, and cut greenhouse gas emissions. But beyond that, the social welfare benefits bring value—from reducing absenteeism at K-12 schools to increasing graduation rates at community colleges to reducing poverty and homelessness, these programs are proven to work…and work quickly.
CLICK HERE to read a brief history of Move LA’s work to expand access to public transit for students.
GOVERNOR NEWSOM
Hold Caltrans Accountable to California's Climate Goals
California Governor Gavin Newsom is leading on efforts to fight against climate change, yet the Governor's transportation agency -- Caltrans -- is undermining critical climate action goals.
Reporting in the Los Angeles Times has revealed that over the summer, a Caltrans executive and former policy director for CalBike Jeanie Ward-Waller, exposed that a $280-million repaving project along a stretch of Interstate 80 was surreptitiously widening 3½ miles of the freeway while "at the same time top state officials were pledging to end traffic-inducing freeway expansions to help meet ambitious climate goals."
This is why we joined 60 organizations calling on Governor Newsom to show Californians -- and the nation -- that health, the environment, and the fight against climate change are a top priority.
Click ‘START WRITING’ to sign and send a direct message to Governor Newsom requesting accountability for Caltrans and allocating more funding for public transportation now.
