A newly published MSN article discusses BART’s efforts to bolster its fare evasion enforcement operations amid current budget woes, despite having no evidence that this will result in any measurable reduction in reported crimes. A report by the Center for Policing Equity (CPE) found that most arrests from these stops are unrelated to BART and that Black people, who make up just 9% of the population served by the system, account for almost half of all fare evasion citations and approximately 60% of arrests, indicating major racial disparities in fare evasion stops:
“That’s a lot of what advocates are concerned about: how much discretion are we giving armed agents of the state with the power to take away life and liberty?” Hans Menos, vice president of CPE’s triage response team, told Axios.
Read the full article on AXIOS’s website.