Stop Service Cuts to DART!
Dallas City Council, Plano City Council
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DART THREATENS TO CUT 97 BUS ROUTES
DART is using a temporary public health crisis to justify a permanent cut in public services. DART is threatening to drastically cut frequency on 88 bus routes and to entirely terminate 9 more bus routes. If passed, cuts would take effect Monday, October 9th 2020. DART has funds available to avoid most or all of these proposed service cuts.
The DART board will vote on cuts on Sept 8th. SIGN THE PETITION AGAINST DART SERVICE CUTS BEFORE SEPTEMBER 2nd!
The last Dallas City Council meeting before the DART board vote takes place on Sept 2. The Dallas City Council members appoint an 8 member majority of the DART board. The Dallas City Council can and must tell all of their appointed DART board members to vote against cuts as a block.
Are you a Dallas resident? SPEAK OUT AGAINST DART SERVICE CUTS AT THE SEPTEMBER 2nd DALLAS CITY COUNCIL MEETING at 9 AM: sign up by 5 PM SEPTEMBER 1ST at 214-670-3738!
The last Plano City Council meeting before the DART board vote takes place on Aug 24th. Plano DART board rep Paul Wageman is the current head of the DART board and, like the rest of the 7 suburban DART board members, supports the proposed cuts. Working people and transit dependent people live in the suburbs too, but their DART board members do not represent their interests!
Are you a Plano resident? SPEAK OUT AGAINST DART SERVICE CUTS AT THE AUG 24TH PLANO CITY COUNCIL MEETING at 7 PM. Sign up online by 4 PM AUGUST 24TH at https://www.plano.gov/1227/City-Council-Agendas
Organizations please contact NTXTransitRiders@gmail.com to sign on to this petition. DART riders in all DART member cities, please sign and share this petition as widely as you can!
Signed,
Dallas Alliance Against Racism + Political Repression (DAARPR) : https://dfwalliance.org/
Dallas Poor People's Campaign : https://www.poorpeoplescampaign.org/committee/texas/
Democratic Socialists of America North Texas : https://dsantx.org/
GROW North Texas : https://grownorthtexas.org/
NTX Transit Riders : https://www.facebook.com/NTXTransitRiders/
Our City Our Future : https://www.ocofdallas.com/
Palestinian Action Committee of TX (PACT) : https://www.palestineact.org/
Party for Socialism and Liberation DFW : https://www.facebook.com/PSLDFW/
Sunrise Movement Dallas : https://www.sunrisedallas.org/
TX Campaign for the Environment : https://www.texasenvironment.org/Sponsored by
To:
Dallas City Council, Plano City Council
From:
[Your Name]
We the undersigned organizations and individual DART riders in North Texas oppose all proposed cuts to DART service, particularly to DART bus service, during the COVID pandemic. We demand that transportation services be restored to pre-pandemic levels. The pandemic is a once in a lifetime emergency, not a convenient opportunity to privatize and outsource good union jobs.
Essential workers still have to go to work during COVID. Transit dependent people who need the bus to buy groceries, go to school, go to the doctor, are no less transit dependent during COVID.
In April 2020, DART began operating at emergency service levels. Many of DART’s bus routes had service reduced – some to only one stop per hour. The decline in DART ridership over the last few months came after large cuts to transportation routes and services.
Now, at this critical time, we need to be investing in our communities ability to get where they need to go, not cutting access to their lifelines and livelihoods.
DART has proposed approximately $40 million in budget cuts for Fiscal Year 2021 (FY2021) due to declining ridership and sales tax revenue. However, this estimate far exceeds what DART’s own Finance Staff says is needed to make up for revenue shortfalls. According to staff, only $20 million in cuts are required across the entire organization.
DART has funds available to avoid most, if not all, of these proposed cuts. Under the CARES Act, DART received $229 million. However, a contingency of DART Board of Directors Members are hesitant to use those funds to protect DART workers and riders.
Cutting service, eliminating operator positions, restricting operator pay, and delaying climate action through cutting the bus electrification project, do not bode well for DART’s future or for the future of DART’s member cities. If the COVID pandemic is our current crisis, climate change and worsening economic inequalities will be the next crisis: we should if anything be expanding public transit in the face of these challenges, not gutting it.
DART must use its available funding, whether through the CARES Act or otherwise, and fully fund service for FY2021. For many riders, DART buses and trains are the difference between mobility or being stranded at home - between work and unemployment, access to food and healthcare. Failing to fully fund service for FY2021 would be an abdication of responsibility by DART as a public transit agency.
It is the responsibility of every DART board member, both to DART itself and to the public who elected the city councils who appointed you, to vote against these proposed cuts to service.
To the elected members of the Dallas and Plano city councils: tell your appointed DART board members to vote NO on all proposed cuts on Sept 8th.