☆ VTA State audit set for winter release
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On September 21, the State Auditor announced a winter release date for the audit of the troubled Valley Transit Authority (VTA). This audit could offer further insight into the murky reporting VTA staff has provided regarding the wild BART cost overruns, ever-lengthening completion dates, and ever-shrinking ridership projections. An Opp Now exclusive.
Back in March 2023, a committee to state legislators voted 11–0 to authorize the State Auditor’s Office to conduct an audit of the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority (VTA). The audit was requested by Assemblymember Marc Berman. In a letter to the committee asking for the audit, Berman said:
Year after year, VTA operates one of the most expensive and least efficient transit systems in the country. Empty or near-empty buses and light rail trains clog the County’s streets but are used regularly by fewer than 5% of the County’s commuters. Operating costs increase continuously, and taxpayers subsidize 90% of these costs, to the tune of about $5.50 per rider for each bus trip and $10.75 per rider for each light rail trip.
He also noted:
The opaque, political nature of VTA’s board member selection process has fostered an unwillingness among board members to adopt audit, Grand Jury, or consultant recommendations. In VTA’s 2021 Board Self-Assessment, board members reported that “cities or agencies often select a VTA representative based upon that individual’s interest in higher elected office, and not on their interest in and familiarity with transportation.”
The audit is now in progress and is expected to be released this winter. Among the audit’s objectives are to “determine the extent to which the VTA has created an agency culture focused on effective and efficient performance and compliance.”
More information on the audit's content can be found here.
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