Tense words as BART board declines to reduce funding for agency's police department

The BART board and the director who represents us, John McPartland, need to think about policing in terms of getting riders back to BART. If people don't feel safe either due to the virus or personal safety, they're not going to take BART. And that only worsens the financial situation putting BART in a downward spin. Thank you Debora Allen for seeing the big picture and representing the tri-valley defacto when our Director doesn't. Anyone want to run for BART board against John McPartland?

I'm torn on this. I think the motivation to remove funding from the BART police is short sited, but there is a part of me that doesn't understand why BART has its own police force to begin with - why isn't that an extension of the existing police force for the areas BART runs through? Seems like just from an financial efficiency standpoint and core business the policing function is better left with the police and the public transportation piece better with BART.

Pleasanton Parent wrote "...but there is a part of me that doesn't understand why BART has its own police force to begin with - why isn't that an extension of the existing police force for the areas BART runs through?"

Why does there need to be a California Highway Patrol? Why can't highway enforcement responsibilities just be passed onto extensions of existing local police forces for the areas that California state highways pass through?

I would like to see reduced policing everywhere. I would like to see City of Pleasanton reduce its Police Force, become more ethnically diverse in future hiring. Money saved should be diverted to social programs, ending homelessness, ending poverty, jobs for youth, jobs for minorities. We should focus on uplifting everyone to ensure safety and reduce petty crime.

@Naveed Khan wrote “ I would like to see reduced policing everywhere. I would like to see City of Pleasanton reduce its Police Force,...”

Yeah, I bet you would like to see that - until you realize that the crime rate in your neighborhood is going up.

Wombat,
Interesting response and I could see an argument against a formal CHP. My counter would be highways run throughout Ca, BART does not. Additionally you have ACE, Amtrak, Lightrail, etc and if I recall correctly of those BART is the only one with an employed police force.

@Pleasanton Parent

I’m not a lawyer or in law enforcement, so I don’t have a clear answer to your question about why BART has its own police force. But I can see some reasons to justify it and brought up the California Highway Patrol as a Socratic question. The California Highway Patrol was formed to provide uniform highway enforcement throughout the state. Maybe the reasoning for the BART police force was similar.

As for Amtrak, it does have its own police force. Google “Amtrak police force”.

Fewer BART police will result in fewer BART riders. No BART police will lead to no BART riders.