The recording of the meeting is available on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yU9mHZUbwKE&list=PLAfWRxJkwPon701gc9cUsUqqBDlmiWJnt&index=3.

Consent Calendar: There was extensive discussion of item 2.6: ‘Resolution 2026-10-123: Rescinding Resolution No. 12-04-0050 and Revising SacRT’s Voting Procedures for Property and Business Improvement District Assessments’. Though the issue was a change in voting, board members discussed relationship with PBIDs (Property Business Improvement District) and the assessments on SacRT properties. The item was continued to another board meeting.

Item 3.1: Linda Hinz presented on ‘customer service response’. Her presentation was all about law enforcement and and a defense of a zero tolerance policy on fare evasion. She touted her law enforcement experience and defended the decisions that had been made to increase law enforcement action and personnel (without board discussion or approval). She said there were 2000 citations a month for fare evasion, but did not mention how many involved law enforcement. She said the target for transit ambassador employees was 51, though her slide said there were currently 60. She said a training program for Transit Ambassadors would be established. Apparently the only training is from existing ambassadors on the job. She said that a single incident of a fare evader not being cited could result in loss of all federal funding. This is her questionable reading of SB 5492 (Hagerty), which has been introduced but not passed. SacRT is piloting the use of drones, which is a further militarization of law enforcement.

SacRT has hired one ‘Social Services Practitioner’ to work with unhoused people in the right-of-way. This compares to 161 personnel dedicated to law enforcement. The priorities of Ms. Hinz are clear.

Ms. Hinz’s over-dramatization of everything in a whiny voice is typical. Listen for yourself to the recording.

My comments were:

• Policy on zero-tolerance on fare evasion, strollers, shopping carts, and bicycles has still not been brought back to the board. It was on the MAC agenda for four meetings, but there was only brief mention during one of the four, and was not addressed in the other three.
• The ‘customer relations’ approach presented by Ms. Hinz is a law enforcement priority approach, with no consideration of riders.
• Ms. Hinz mentioned a red line that could not be crossed several times. Apparently this line is not being able to produce proof of fare within five seconds of being asked. This is a very sad policy for an agency which is supposed to be providing transit service to member of the public.

Helen O’Connell spoke about the difficulty that some disable people are having using the ticket vending machines (TVMs) and presenting proof of fare due to difficulties with manual dexterity, and that some of these riders have been ticketed for not being able to produce fare quickly enough.

There was also a presentation on the incident in Folsom when crossing gates were down for an extended period of time. Apparently a lack of prompt communication between SacRT staff and Folsom Police exacerbated the issue. SacRT promised to do better next time.

Item 4: Public Addresses Board on Matters Not on the Agenda

My comments were:

• Police vehicles parked illegally for a long period of time in the commercial loading and passenger loading zones in front of the SacRT building at 1102 Q Street caused a UPS delivery truck to have to park in the bus stop (all nearby spaces were occupied), thereby causing a SacRT bus to stop in the street instead of at the curb, thereby causing two riders to have to step off the curb to reach the bus. One of the riders seemed to have disability and had a hard time stepping off the curb. This is unacceptable.
• When one of the light rail lines is delayed, the information displays at overlapping stations are changed to indicate that delay, and the schedule for the line that is not delayed is not displayed until the delay is resolved. As a result, riders don’t have any information about the line not delayed. This is ridiculous.
• The new Dos Rios station is wonderful, by far the best station on the system.
• Advocates were excited that GTFS-RT (realtime) would be implemented on the Gold Line with the new S700 rail cars, since SacRT now had GPS information about railcar locations. For unknown reasons, SacRT chose to now implement GTFS-RT for light rail. It is implemented for buses.

Other commenters:

• Evan Siroky: talked about the lack of GTFS-RT (realtime) information, which apps use to present train location and arrival information; he has professional expertise in GTFS
• Maddie Parfit: people without phones or printers can’t use free fare; the readers should be turned off for the day and covered up
• Margie Donovan: no AC on some buses; passenger names have been used on radio, in violation of rider privacy

Item 6.1 General Managers Report

Henry Li tried to address the real time question by saying that the digital messaging signs at stations would eventually be updated to provide real time information. It is not clear when new signs and a display system with this capability will be implemented. See the 2026-09-28 report, scroll down to 7.1 General Managers Report, for more information on the signs. He said this was intentionally delayed under Light Rail Modernization was completed so that there would not be new signs in old trains. At that time, he said a contract had been awarded to Clever Systems in April, but there is not known timeline.

Though the signs (and announcements?) within the new light rail cars and the station could use the same system to display information, it is not necessary to delay one for the other. Henry then launched into a discussion of vandalism at the light rail stations, apparently blaming the lack of real time information on vandalism. When questioned by a board member about how vandalism was related to the signs, Henry could not answer. The Connected Transit Card readers have been routinely vandalized, but this has nothing to do with information signs, or with GTFS-RT.

Henry announced that there would be no Green Line BRT/LRT study, due to Caltrans delay and lack of funding. His slide, not in the provided presentation, is below. Henry implied that the grant amount, $700K, might be repurposed.