March 11, 2025 • 26 mins
Texas legislators have introduced bills that could slash DART funding by up to 50%, threatening the survival of Dallas's transit system in one of America's fastest-growing regions.
• Six Dallas suburban cities initially supported cutting DART funding by 25%, with Plano leading the charge
• Unable to get enough board votes, Plano representatives took their fight to the Texas Legislature
• House Bill 3187 would reduce the sales tax funding and allow diversion of additional money to non-transit projects
• If passed, this bill could effectively cut DART funding by 44-50%, making system survival impossible
• The Dallas Area Transit Alliance (DATA) is organizing concerned citizens to fight these cuts
Contact your state representatives and join DATA to help protect public transit funding in Texas. Visit DATA's links in the description to get involved.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Doors are closing.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
Public transit, that's my way to roll On the
metro.
I'm taking control.
Bus stops, train tracks it's mydaily grind.
Transit, it's the rhythm of mylife.
Speaker 3 (00:19):
On this episode we dive into bills that have been
introduced into the Texaslegislature aimed at killing
DART, the transit authority inthe Dallas metro.
Could they succeed?
What would the real impact looklike?
All of this and more on TransitTangents.
Speaker 4 (00:33):
Hey everybody and welcome to this episode of
Transit Tangents.
My name is Lewis and I'm Chris,and today we are going to kind
of revisit a topic that westarted to get into last year
when we were in Dallas.
We met with a group in Dallascalled Data, the Dallas Area
Transit Alliance, and we'retalking about some potential
cuts to the DART system, whichis the Dallas Area Rapid Transit
(00:57):
.
There essentially are a fewsuburban areas that are part of
this transit authority that wereessentially just looking to cut
the funding.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
Yeah, and the way that this is sort of set up.
Dart, like you said, is aregional transit system.
There are 13 member cities thatmake up the sort of DART
service area and they all sendboard members into the DART
board.
The board members are sort ofapportioned based on population
size of these cities.
But the way that DART is fundedis a 1% sales tax that goes
(01:30):
into this sort of regionaltransportation authority.
This is under Chapter 452 ofthe Texas Transportation Code,
which we'll talk about, I think,a little bit later, and it's
been running this way since DARTwas founded in 1983.
Speaker 4 (01:45):
Yep, and it is a pretty this way since Dart was
founded in 1983.
Yep, and it is a pretty commonway for transit agencies at
least in Texas, but I'm sure ina lot of other places to be
funded by a sales tax like this,to give them their kind of base
of funding.
Obviously they also earnrevenue from selling fares and
all that sort of stuff for folksto ride the transit ads, all
sorts of random other littlethings, but the predominant,
safest way for the fundingmechanisms to work for these are
(02:06):
through this sales tax.
So last year in November, whilewe were up in Dallas, we had a
chance to interview some folkswith data.
We've posted that on thechannel, which we'll link below,
but we're going to cut rightnow to just a short clip to hear
directly from them about whatthese cuts actually entail, what
caught our attention at firstis a bunch of cities starting
with Plano.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
This is Tyler Wright, the vice president of data.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
They passed a resolution that they supported
cutting darts funding theircontribution by 25%.
So if they get 1% of that salestax, they want 25% of that back
for their own purposes.
They did this very suddenly,without really taking public
comment, and it passedunanimously without discussion
at the meeting.
In the weeks following, fiveother member cities it's a total
(02:53):
of six, right, connor, I thinkthat passed resolution.
So five other member cities,some big, some small, passed it
too.
Same kind of thing.
They just did it all of asudden.
Very similar language.
Uh, no real public comment.
Engagement period.
Yeah, it's really alarming.
Speaker 5 (03:08):
This is the president , like before.
They voted on it, but that's it.
It's literally just popped upon the agenda.
Then five days later it wasvoted on and I mean, I've seen
zoning changes that have had alonger, more public outreach and
deliberation.
Uh, it's for such a majordecision.
Um, not all cities are ascommitted to it, though.
(03:29):
Some cities just kind of signthe resolution.
It's like, ah sure, why not 25less?
But we're not really going topush for it.
But, um, the city of plano,they're really the ones pushing
for this and they really want tosee it happen.
They want want to see DART'sbudget cut by 25%.
One thing to note when they cutthe budget by 25%, it lowers
(03:49):
everyone's contribution, notjust their own.
Speaker 4 (03:51):
So, to reiterate this , plano was proposing, instead
of the one cent sales tax thatthey charge, fully going to DART
, only 75% of it would actuallygo to dart and they would keep
25 percent uh for themselves,which would be a huge hit to the
system because, as mentionedthere, uh, this would have to be
(04:12):
something that would take intoeffect for all of the dart
member cities, because they allhave to agree to do the same
thing.
Um, fortunately, uh, well,unfortunately, I guess.
So there was a symbolic vote.
Six of the 13 members' citiesvoted to kind of be on the side
of Plano here.
However, because the boardseats, like you mentioned
(04:33):
earlier on, are allocated bypopulation and all of the larger
population centers, like Dallas, garland and Richardson, are
very pro-Dart, the likelihood ofgetting enough votes to make
this happen is low.
So it's been kind of a while.
That has been a risk.
It's not as much of a risk aswhat we're talking about now
(04:55):
with what's happening in thestatehouse.
Speaker 3 (04:57):
So the Texas statehouse historically not the
most friendly to transitprojects.
We deal with this a lot inAustin, houston deals with it.
You know all the big cities inTexas.
But the plan from Plano's sidewas to go to the state house and
see if they can get some typeof preemption put in to.
You know, circumvent this DARTrestriction, this DART board
(05:19):
restriction, where they don'treally have the votes and they
have to rely really heavily onDallas to get anything done
Right.
Speaker 4 (05:25):
Just like any small government conservative would do
, they would go up to the largergovernment so that the big
government in the statehouse cantell the localities what to do.
Yeah, so conservative.
Speaker 3 (05:37):
Those are Texas values, absolutely.
Speaker 4 (05:40):
Sorry to interrupt.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
So Plano's leading this effort and they have
introduced a bill.
Rep Matt Shaheen, I think ishow you say it is a Republican
representing parts of Plano hehas introduced House Bill 3187,
and this would cut the sales taxrate by that 25%.
(06:03):
So again we're looking at that1 cent to 0.75 cents.
But then in addition to that,the cities that are part of the
START system can take anadditional 25% and put it into a
general mobility fund that canbe used for any transportation
product that's not specificallyDART related.
Speaker 4 (06:23):
So roadways and Streetlights, random maintenance
projects.
Knowing a lot of these areas,it would go towards roadways,
yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:31):
And so now we're looking at if this were to pass.
Not a 25% cut to DART, we'relooking at a 50% cut to DART.
Speaker 4 (06:39):
Right.
Yeah, it's pretty shocking andwe actually got to speak to some
folks Towards the end of thisepisode.
We're actually going to playmore of the clips.
But one of the folks we wereable to have on a panel was
actually interviewed in a MassTransit Magazine article here.
His name is Enrique McGregor,and I'm just going to read
(07:00):
directly from the article here,just to get the full context.
Again, he is a DART boardmember.
To read directly from thearticle here, just to get the
full context Again, he is a DARTboard member.
The sum total of the bill,including the cutout for the
general mobility program, islikely to result in an effective
44% reduction in funding forthe agency.
North Texas is one of thefastest growing regions in the
country.
We need leadership thatunderstands that transit is a
(07:21):
necessary investment, not aburden, said McGregor, who
represents Cockrell Hill inDallas.
Instead of gutting publictransit, lawmakers should work
to strengthen it.
He said Rep Shaheen's bill is ashort-sighted attempt to divert
critical transit fundingwithout regard for the long-term
consequences of the region'seconomy or our quality of life.
Speaker 3 (07:40):
Yeah, and Sean Duffy said what's your fertility rate?
Yeah, it might be OK in some ofthese Dallas suburbs.
Honestly, I don't know.
Speaker 4 (07:46):
I don't know, but you know it's it's.
It's sad to see again.
First off, that like you're nowlike trying to run up to the,
to the state house to go do this, it really could go either way
in the state house.
I know data is kind of readyfor this fight there.
Go either way in the Statehouse.
I know Data is kind of readyfor this fight.
(08:08):
They've got active days to bedown here in Austin advocating
on behalf of making sure thisbill does not happen.
There are going to be plenty ofrepresentatives who will be
happy to support them.
But you really never know.
Speaker 3 (08:19):
Well, it is going to be a big fight too, because I've
read some competing articlesabout this and one did call out
that DART, with a 25 cut, it'sgonna hurt, they're gonna have
to cut services, but dartsurvives.
A 50 cut, dart doesn't survive,right, which is going to be
devastating to so many people inthe dallas, uh, in the in the
dallas area.
(08:39):
Um, as we mentioned earlier, uh, member cities, they can't get
this done on their own, so, likeyou, they're going to the state
house.
Um, we did see one positivething so far, and that is the
city of Rowlett has, uh,rescinded their support of this
Plano initiative, right, and nowthey are looking uh at DART and
saying, actually, we want tokeep this funded Right, and that
(08:59):
was one of the six cities whenwe mentioned there was kind of a
symbolic vote six of the 13cities.
Speaker 4 (09:04):
So one of the six cities has said you know what
this is, we don't like this.
We're actually going to keepour support of the full one cent
tax, which is that is apositive, and I mean that also.
I mean, some of these membersof the state house represent
Rowlett and they're going tohave to take that into
consideration when they'reactually going to vote on this.
So going to vote on this, andyou know, again, this transit
(09:26):
cuts last week's episode weliterally did Dallas in a day
using only public transit.
If you haven't seen it, you cango check it out.
There are plenty of things thatcould be improved, frequency
being the kind of main one.
There were a lot of reallygreat context things included in
the comments too.
So thanks for folks whocommented on that.
But frequency is an issue, andthe bus network commented on
that.
But frequency is an issue andand the bus network, I think,
(09:48):
was kind of an issue.
So cutting this is going tomake it harder to get around and
you know we have a little bitnow of a firsthand experience
with it, although folks who livein Dallas obviously have a lot
more.
Speaker 3 (09:59):
So, yeah, Another thing to note here.
We're not trying to do any sortof fear mongering for other
Texans in the state.
This is very much a Dallas orDFW issue that's really focused
there At the moment and this isknocking on wood at the moment,
thank you, there is no furtherrisk to Austin, houston, san
(10:22):
Antonio or any other major metroin Austin for these projects.
And the reason for that wementioned before.
We have two different chaptersin the Texas Transportation Code
451 and 452.
451 is mostly focused onmetropolitan transit systems, so
things like what the city wouldrun like Austin or Houston, and
(10:45):
452 is regional transit systems.
Speaker 4 (10:48):
Right.
So like Cap Metro, for example,is part of a metropolitan rapid
transit authority and DART is aregional rapid transit
authority we're getting intosome wonkiness there, but yeah.
But again, they do functionvery similarly with a one cent
sales tax revenue.
So it's definitely something tobe concerned about, but right
(11:09):
now this is specificallytargeted.
Speaker 3 (11:10):
Yeah, and one of the big fears I know that I was
reading from other people oncomments online was if they do
this to Dallas, what's to stopthem from doing it other places?
Would this have a statewideeffect?
And at the moment the answer isit won't have a statewide
effect Right, and we're going toknock on wood again here.
Speaker 4 (11:28):
Have a statewide effect Right, and we're going to
knock on wood again here.
But while Austin is currentlyunscathed in that element of
this, there have always kind ofbeen a.
This is a recurring theme now.
There has been a billintroduced by Representative
Ellen Troxclare.
Speaker 3 (11:44):
She's probably up there as one of our top two or
three transit villains for.
Speaker 4 (11:47):
Austin.
Yeah, she should have made thelist for the national one even.
But yeah, if we had a locallist she'd be on it.
This is HB 3879.
This one essentially kills thefunding mechanism for Project
Connect.
We've done quite a few episodeson Project Connect at this
point that you can go check out,but it would make Project
Connect very difficult to happen.
(12:08):
This did get introduced in thelast legislative session and our
mayor, kirk Watson, did somebackroom smoke-filled room
dealings, from what I canunderstand, to make sure it
didn't get through.
I think I talked about this ina previous episode.
Basically, the main reason Ivoted for him again in this last
election was so that he willthen go reenter the smoke-filled
(12:29):
back rooms and drink whiskeywith folks in the Senate to make
sure that this bill doesn't getthe votes.
For the context, kirk Watsonwas a Texas state senator before
his current stint as mayor ofAustin.
Speaker 3 (12:43):
I just have this image of dogs playing poker.
You know the painting and KirkWatson's in the middle of them.
Yeah, and the dogs are all ofthe anti-transit people around
the state yes.
Speaker 4 (12:53):
Yeah, I also will say one potential positive, one
potential reason to be a littleoptimistic about the Project
Connect House bill is that, ifwe'll remember back to an
earlier episode we talked aboutthe Texas speaker race the
speaker of the House was kind ofthe more favored Republican by
(13:17):
Democrats.
He was elected with moreDemocrats than Republicans to
get into the seat, including bymembers of the Austin delegation
.
So I'm hoping that there weresome arrangements there to be
like, hey, we're not going toput this up for a vote.
Speaker 3 (13:30):
Maybe, but he also kicked Democrats off of every
leadership position ofcommittees in the state house.
So Democrats have no chairs ofany committee or leadership
positions in the stategovernment.
Speaker 4 (13:42):
So we'll definitely see.
I would say it's moreoptimistic than if the I forget
his name but if the more MAGAright-wing person won, I think
that there'd probably be astrong likelihood that this
would get a vote Under.
Now I'm not so sure.
Speaker 3 (13:55):
And another good thing here is that so many bills
that go into committee don'tmake it out.
It varies by year.
Some years the statehouse isvery productive and 70% of the
bills get voted on.
In other years, 40% of thebills get voted on.
So let's hope it's not a veryproductive year.
Speaker 4 (14:11):
For sure for both of these bills.
With that, though, we lightlymentioned here that we a couple
weeks ago were able to have anevent with folks from Data.
We had a Dallas city councilman.
We also had a DART board member, and we're not going to post
the whole conversation here, butwe are going to take a couple
(14:34):
clips here, some highlights forfolks to see and get the
perspective from a DART boardmember, a city councilman as
well as an advocate on some ofthese potential state cuts.
Now, the bit of information hereis this bill had not been
introduced yet, but we wereexpecting it to be introduced,
so we did get some questionssurrounding this.
(14:54):
So we'll, in a second here, cutto that conversation.
But first, if you haven't likedthe video, please consider
doing so, subscribe.
If you haven't subscribed, andif you want to support us
directly, you know the place todo so Down in the comments.
You can look Patreon, you cancheck out our merch store, all
that sort of stuff.
But without further ado, let'sjump into some of our
conversation from back in Dallas.
Speaker 3 (15:15):
We constantly in Austin are battling the
statehouse.
I mean it's always there, it'salways in the news.
I mean they just walk up thestreet, right, but we get a lot
of preemption laws where thestate comes in and they tell us
we can't do what we need to doto make the city run more
efficiently.
Do you foresee that as a riskin this battle currently, that
(15:36):
they will be successful by goingto the state legislature and
the state legislatureintervening?
This is Enrique McGregor, aDark Board member.
Speaker 6 (15:44):
We're all biting our nails over my personal view, not
having had experience lobbyingin Austin and not knowing
personally the senators.
I think Senator Nichols isgoing to head the Committee for
Transportation, that's going tolook at this, and there's a
Senator Parker that's also inthe committee.
Speaker 7 (16:08):
Yes.
Speaker 6 (16:09):
Thank you, and my frustration is that, from what I
can see, the anti-DART membershave very good connections with
these senators and are feedingthem the same misinformation
that we've been seeing formonths.
And I don't know them.
(16:29):
I can't say, hey, can we havecoffee, can you give me a minute
?
And I believe that we as aboard, our leadership, including
our CEO and our chair, reallyneed to not wait till the day of
the hearing, but ahead of timeto hear.
Here's what you've been hearing, here's what the facts are.
Let's you know.
This is why it does not makesense for you to do it.
(16:50):
Everybody across the boardagrees that it would be a
disaster if Austin got into this, and try to resolve the issue.
Speaker 7 (17:01):
I wanted to take this opportunity to give a data
follow-up to this question about.
Speaker 3 (17:08):
This is Hexel Colorado.
Founder of the Dallas Urbanist.
Speaker 7 (17:11):
If data didn't exist today, I'd be very, very worried
about it, but now I almost feelexcited about it, ready for a
fight.
Yeah, because in the last fewweeks, and I think in many cases
the last few days, you know, wehave, you know, over 100 people
on our group meeting, ourDiscord, and we have, you know,
(17:34):
60, 70 people coming to ourmonthly meetings and, but on top
of those, just constantcommunication amongst ourselves,
we got people in this room whomet with their representative,
sat down with them, called them,emailed them.
I mean, you know, kind ofcalling back to the legacy of
Mary Collier.
I mean, you know, kind ofcalling back to the legacy of
(17:54):
Mary Collier, like shepersonally, at every event she
was like, you know, I wantpeople to stay here after the
meeting ends.
I want you to call, I want youto email on the spot.
In December we had our holidaysocial gathering and it's like
for our holiday social, so it'spassing out papers.
I want you all to.
Okay, here's a sticker.
Each of you are divided intogroups and you're all going to
take turns learning how to callwho your representative is, how
(18:16):
to call them, write down theirphone number.
We're going to have practicesessions where you can practice
what to say, and so and we havepeople who are signing up to,
like you know, maybe carpool orget a bus down to Austin to, you
know, to talk to these people Ius down to Austin to talk to
(18:36):
these people.
I think the fact that, heck, wehave people who data is so
organized, we have someone who'stheir main role within data is
just to hit refresh on the filedbills every day to check when
they come through on theirthreat to file something.
It's so easy to get a meetingwith your representative, at
least right now.
The deeper we get into thesession it'll become impossible.
But we've started this work ofmeeting and talking and email
(18:59):
and calling.
Mary was canvassing on trainsDuring the state fair.
She had flyers and she'd roundup a whole bunch of us and they
would go and just get signaturesand get people signed up on the
trains and she was responsiblefor hundreds and perhaps
thousands of communications.
So I say right now, yes, Ithink the fact that, like they
(19:26):
were saying, if you don't dothis DART board, we're going to
go to the state, and then thefact that the board you know it
was this big battle we weregoing to all of these board
meetings, and the fact that Ithink we had a role in making
sure that the board didn't budge, and the fact that they have to
go to the state.
I take that as a data win.
And then data is going to bethere and we have so many people
(19:48):
who are now trained.
So many people in this room havenot done anything like this
this time last year, and so I dofeel excited.
There is a battle coming.
It's going to happen, but thisis not the first time that state
legislature, people,representatives and special
interests from Plano have triedto cut dark funding.
(20:08):
They've done that for the lastthree sessions consecutively,
but they failed before, and eventhough they're gonna put up a
bigger fight this year, theyhave not faced data yet.
Speaker 2 (20:22):
And so.
Speaker 4 (20:23):
I'm really excited about the legislature, honestly,
and I think we'll get thecouncil member in too.
Speaker 2 (20:28):
I'm gonna go with the simple.
I'm not worried either.
Speaker 3 (20:30):
This is council member Narvaez of the Dallas
City Council.
Speaker 2 (20:33):
Keep doing what y'all are doing Data, because it
helps us, the city of Dallas,dallas County.
So you have to also know howthe legislature typically works.
Right, I know you guys do, butusually if it's a local issue,
the rest of the legislators donot want to get involved.
If you ever watch this on citycouncil and you see us start
(20:54):
fighting with each other, it'sbecause you played in my
playground and I'm like get outof my.
Why are you messing with mydistrict?
I did all my homework.
I'm done Like.
Why are you jumping in the samething with state reps and
senators?
There might be a senator fromPlano who will file it who's
failed three times.
No state rep had done it.
(21:15):
There are more state reps,including a Republican, who
favor DART being fully funded.
And I'm not saying that thingscan change.
You never know.
You have to keep educating,keep fighting like y'all are
doing, and Mary was an amazingperson when it came to
organizing and making things getdone.
So take that spirit, take thatenergy that she taught everybody
(21:36):
and keep it going, because youcan do that.
You yourself can be Mary withthree people in your household
and you know when you're ridingthe bus or the train or whatever
, and get those things going,because the more they hear from
you, the more they will.
And I can you that angie chenbenton, state representative um,
she's she my understanding.
She served on the board of dartat one point and um, she's pro
(21:59):
dart, they're not gonna changeher mind.
So you know, that's, that's abig win for us.
And um, right now, just gonnasay, with the numbers, with the
member cities and the state repsthat represent those um, and
you know there's more Dems thanthere are Rs in the House for
DART.
So that's where I see some win.
(22:21):
And the other thing is, on thatTransportation Committee in the
Senate, both Senators NathanJohnson and Senator West are now
committee members and those twoare huge for Dallas County, for
us, when it comes to DART.
So I think the ball has movedto our side and not really
theirs.
They're going to have to do waymore offense and I mean they're
(22:44):
going to I don't know we'regoing to we're going to be able
to defend yeah Right, we'regoing to be able to defend DART.
And also I've been appointed byour legislative ad hoc chair,
who hates DART, to be thecouncil member who goes down to
Austin for those DART issues andI have relationships with all
of those folks.
You may not, I do, and y'all aregaining them and learning them.
(23:04):
Keep it up, because, let metell you, I'm gonna give you a
secret about politics the thingthat we, as politicians, are the
most scared of is you guys.
We're scared of voters, andwhen voters start showing up, we
start to listen, we start to goah, I mean, we do, because
we're like y'all, they fill thechamber across the street.
Speaker 7 (23:24):
I'm like what are they here for?
Who's that?
Speaker 2 (23:26):
Whose neighborhood is that?
What's going on?
We all do.
We all want to, because theyknow I'm going to represent them
(23:53):
.
It's not what I want, it's whatmy constituents want, so that's
why I think that we're going tobe able to.
We're going to be able to winthis, but we can't let up
because they'll sneak somethingin.
Speaker 4 (24:03):
They like sneak attacks, yeah, no and I think,
yeah, I just want to share a fun, funny, uh, quick thing on the
when you guys show up.
Speaker 6 (24:11):
In the earlier times, when Data was showing up to the
horseshoe at DART at the board,one of the anti-DART members
came up to me and said who arethey?
Who are they?
I said, well, I don't know.
They're like you know, it'slike a group of people that
write DART.
He said, oh, are they funded bythe Source Foundation or
something?
Speaker 3 (24:30):
I said I said.
Speaker 6 (24:30):
I said I think, I think they're actors from Austin
, you know, like students, andthey bus him in, they give him a
sandwich and then they come andspeak.
So that's.
Speaker 4 (24:39):
that's amazing.
Yeah, that was funny.
I'm glad you like we're like.
I need to say this yeah, thatwas, that was good and I think.
Speaker 6 (24:46):
I think he was probably joking, but but you
know that how the mind works,you never know.
Speaker 3 (24:50):
Yeah, so huge thanks to the Dallas Area Transit
Alliance for inviting us up tohelp host this event.
Also a huge thanks to HexelColorado, who runs the Dallas
Urbanist Group and is such agood advocate, to Enrique
McGregor, who's part of the DARTboard, and to Councilmember
Narvaez, who is thererepresenting the Dallas City
Council.
If you want to see the entirepanel discussion, you can see it
(25:13):
on our Patreon or you can checkit out on Data's.
Speaker 4 (25:17):
YouTube, yes, but with all that, let us know what
you think.
If you're in Texas and you wantto get involved in this, we're
going to have all of Data'slinks in the description here.
The easy things you can do,though I mean writing letters or
calling your representatives,goes a long way, but if you're
looking to get involved withanother group of people who are
actively working on this, thefolks at Data couldn't be nicer.
(25:40):
We've met them a handful oftimes now and they're doing
really great work, and that'sthe reason why we keep talking
about them in multiple episodes.
But with all that being said,thank you all so much for
watching and enjoy the rest ofyour transit.
Tangents Tuesday.
Doors are closing.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
Public transit, that's my way to roll On the
metro.
I'm taking control.
Bus stops, train tracks it's mydaily grind.
Transit, it's the rhythm of mylife.
Speaker 3 (00:19):
On this episode we dive into bills that have been
introduced into the Texaslegislature aimed at killing
DART, the transit authority inthe Dallas metro.
Could they succeed?
What would the real impact looklike?
All of this and more on TransitTangents.
Speaker 4 (00:33):
Hey everybody and welcome to this episode of
Transit Tangents.
My name is Lewis and I'm Chris,and today we are going to kind
of revisit a topic that westarted to get into last year
when we were in Dallas.
We met with a group in Dallascalled Data, the Dallas Area
Transit Alliance, and we'retalking about some potential
cuts to the DART system, whichis the Dallas Area Rapid Transit
(00:57):
.
There essentially are a fewsuburban areas that are part of
this transit authority that wereessentially just looking to cut
the funding.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
Yeah, and the way that this is sort of set up.
Dart, like you said, is aregional transit system.
There are 13 member cities thatmake up the sort of DART
service area and they all sendboard members into the DART
board.
The board members are sort ofapportioned based on population
size of these cities.
But the way that DART is fundedis a 1% sales tax that goes
(01:30):
into this sort of regionaltransportation authority.
This is under Chapter 452 ofthe Texas Transportation Code,
which we'll talk about, I think,a little bit later, and it's
been running this way since DARTwas founded in 1983.
Speaker 4 (01:45):
Yep, and it is a pretty this way since Dart was
founded in 1983.
Yep, and it is a pretty commonway for transit agencies at
least in Texas, but I'm sure ina lot of other places to be
funded by a sales tax like this,to give them their kind of base
of funding.
Obviously they also earnrevenue from selling fares and
all that sort of stuff for folksto ride the transit ads, all
sorts of random other littlethings, but the predominant,
safest way for the fundingmechanisms to work for these are
(02:06):
through this sales tax.
So last year in November, whilewe were up in Dallas, we had a
chance to interview some folkswith data.
We've posted that on thechannel, which we'll link below,
but we're going to cut rightnow to just a short clip to hear
directly from them about whatthese cuts actually entail, what
caught our attention at firstis a bunch of cities starting
with Plano.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
This is Tyler Wright, the vice president of data.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
They passed a resolution that they supported
cutting darts funding theircontribution by 25%.
So if they get 1% of that salestax, they want 25% of that back
for their own purposes.
They did this very suddenly,without really taking public
comment, and it passedunanimously without discussion
at the meeting.
In the weeks following, fiveother member cities it's a total
(02:53):
of six, right, connor, I thinkthat passed resolution.
So five other member cities,some big, some small, passed it
too.
Same kind of thing.
They just did it all of asudden.
Very similar language.
Uh, no real public comment.
Engagement period.
Yeah, it's really alarming.
Speaker 5 (03:08):
This is the president , like before.
They voted on it, but that's it.
It's literally just popped upon the agenda.
Then five days later it wasvoted on and I mean, I've seen
zoning changes that have had alonger, more public outreach and
deliberation.
Uh, it's for such a majordecision.
Um, not all cities are ascommitted to it, though.
(03:29):
Some cities just kind of signthe resolution.
It's like, ah sure, why not 25less?
But we're not really going topush for it.
But, um, the city of plano,they're really the ones pushing
for this and they really want tosee it happen.
They want want to see DART'sbudget cut by 25%.
One thing to note when they cutthe budget by 25%, it lowers
(03:49):
everyone's contribution, notjust their own.
Speaker 4 (03:51):
So, to reiterate this , plano was proposing, instead
of the one cent sales tax thatthey charge, fully going to DART
, only 75% of it would actuallygo to dart and they would keep
25 percent uh for themselves,which would be a huge hit to the
system because, as mentionedthere, uh, this would have to be
(04:12):
something that would take intoeffect for all of the dart
member cities, because they allhave to agree to do the same
thing.
Um, fortunately, uh, well,unfortunately, I guess.
So there was a symbolic vote.
Six of the 13 members' citiesvoted to kind of be on the side
of Plano here.
However, because the boardseats, like you mentioned
(04:33):
earlier on, are allocated bypopulation and all of the larger
population centers, like Dallas, garland and Richardson, are
very pro-Dart, the likelihood ofgetting enough votes to make
this happen is low.
So it's been kind of a while.
That has been a risk.
It's not as much of a risk aswhat we're talking about now
(04:55):
with what's happening in thestatehouse.
Speaker 3 (04:57):
So the Texas statehouse historically not the
most friendly to transitprojects.
We deal with this a lot inAustin, houston deals with it.
You know all the big cities inTexas.
But the plan from Plano's sidewas to go to the state house and
see if they can get some typeof preemption put in to.
You know, circumvent this DARTrestriction, this DART board
(05:19):
restriction, where they don'treally have the votes and they
have to rely really heavily onDallas to get anything done
Right.
Speaker 4 (05:25):
Just like any small government conservative would do
, they would go up to the largergovernment so that the big
government in the statehouse cantell the localities what to do.
Yeah, so conservative.
Speaker 3 (05:37):
Those are Texas values, absolutely.
Speaker 4 (05:40):
Sorry to interrupt.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
So Plano's leading this effort and they have
introduced a bill.
Rep Matt Shaheen, I think ishow you say it is a Republican
representing parts of Plano hehas introduced House Bill 3187,
and this would cut the sales taxrate by that 25%.
(06:03):
So again we're looking at that1 cent to 0.75 cents.
But then in addition to that,the cities that are part of the
START system can take anadditional 25% and put it into a
general mobility fund that canbe used for any transportation
product that's not specificallyDART related.
Speaker 4 (06:23):
So roadways and Streetlights, random maintenance
projects.
Knowing a lot of these areas,it would go towards roadways,
yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:31):
And so now we're looking at if this were to pass.
Not a 25% cut to DART, we'relooking at a 50% cut to DART.
Speaker 4 (06:39):
Right.
Yeah, it's pretty shocking andwe actually got to speak to some
folks Towards the end of thisepisode.
We're actually going to playmore of the clips.
But one of the folks we wereable to have on a panel was
actually interviewed in a MassTransit Magazine article here.
His name is Enrique McGregor,and I'm just going to read
(07:00):
directly from the article here,just to get the full context.
Again, he is a DART boardmember.
To read directly from thearticle here, just to get the
full context Again, he is a DARTboard member.
The sum total of the bill,including the cutout for the
general mobility program, islikely to result in an effective
44% reduction in funding forthe agency.
North Texas is one of thefastest growing regions in the
country.
We need leadership thatunderstands that transit is a
(07:21):
necessary investment, not aburden, said McGregor, who
represents Cockrell Hill inDallas.
Instead of gutting publictransit, lawmakers should work
to strengthen it.
He said Rep Shaheen's bill is ashort-sighted attempt to divert
critical transit fundingwithout regard for the long-term
consequences of the region'seconomy or our quality of life.
Speaker 3 (07:40):
Yeah, and Sean Duffy said what's your fertility rate?
Yeah, it might be OK in some ofthese Dallas suburbs.
Honestly, I don't know.
Speaker 4 (07:46):
I don't know, but you know it's it's.
It's sad to see again.
First off, that like you're nowlike trying to run up to the,
to the state house to go do this, it really could go either way
in the state house.
I know data is kind of readyfor this fight there.
Go either way in the Statehouse.
I know Data is kind of readyfor this fight.
(08:08):
They've got active days to bedown here in Austin advocating
on behalf of making sure thisbill does not happen.
There are going to be plenty ofrepresentatives who will be
happy to support them.
But you really never know.
Speaker 3 (08:19):
Well, it is going to be a big fight too, because I've
read some competing articlesabout this and one did call out
that DART, with a 25 cut, it'sgonna hurt, they're gonna have
to cut services, but dartsurvives.
A 50 cut, dart doesn't survive,right, which is going to be
devastating to so many people inthe dallas, uh, in the in the
dallas area.
(08:39):
Um, as we mentioned earlier, uh, member cities, they can't get
this done on their own, so, likeyou, they're going to the state
house.
Um, we did see one positivething so far, and that is the
city of Rowlett has, uh,rescinded their support of this
Plano initiative, right, and nowthey are looking uh at DART and
saying, actually, we want tokeep this funded Right, and that
(08:59):
was one of the six cities whenwe mentioned there was kind of a
symbolic vote six of the 13cities.
Speaker 4 (09:04):
So one of the six cities has said you know what
this is, we don't like this.
We're actually going to keepour support of the full one cent
tax, which is that is apositive, and I mean that also.
I mean, some of these membersof the state house represent
Rowlett and they're going tohave to take that into
consideration when they'reactually going to vote on this.
So going to vote on this, andyou know, again, this transit
(09:26):
cuts last week's episode weliterally did Dallas in a day
using only public transit.
If you haven't seen it, you cango check it out.
There are plenty of things thatcould be improved, frequency
being the kind of main one.
There were a lot of reallygreat context things included in
the comments too.
So thanks for folks whocommented on that.
But frequency is an issue, andthe bus network commented on
that.
But frequency is an issue andand the bus network, I think,
(09:48):
was kind of an issue.
So cutting this is going tomake it harder to get around and
you know we have a little bitnow of a firsthand experience
with it, although folks who livein Dallas obviously have a lot
more.
Speaker 3 (09:59):
So, yeah, Another thing to note here.
We're not trying to do any sortof fear mongering for other
Texans in the state.
This is very much a Dallas orDFW issue that's really focused
there At the moment and this isknocking on wood at the moment,
thank you, there is no furtherrisk to Austin, houston, san
(10:22):
Antonio or any other major metroin Austin for these projects.
And the reason for that wementioned before.
We have two different chaptersin the Texas Transportation Code
451 and 452.
451 is mostly focused onmetropolitan transit systems, so
things like what the city wouldrun like Austin or Houston, and
(10:45):
452 is regional transit systems.
Speaker 4 (10:48):
Right.
So like Cap Metro, for example,is part of a metropolitan rapid
transit authority and DART is aregional rapid transit
authority we're getting intosome wonkiness there, but yeah.
But again, they do functionvery similarly with a one cent
sales tax revenue.
So it's definitely something tobe concerned about, but right
(11:09):
now this is specificallytargeted.
Speaker 3 (11:10):
Yeah, and one of the big fears I know that I was
reading from other people oncomments online was if they do
this to Dallas, what's to stopthem from doing it other places?
Would this have a statewideeffect?
And at the moment the answer isit won't have a statewide
effect Right, and we're going toknock on wood again here.
Speaker 4 (11:28):
Have a statewide effect Right, and we're going to
knock on wood again here.
But while Austin is currentlyunscathed in that element of
this, there have always kind ofbeen a.
This is a recurring theme now.
There has been a billintroduced by Representative
Ellen Troxclare.
Speaker 3 (11:44):
She's probably up there as one of our top two or
three transit villains for.
Speaker 4 (11:47):
Austin.
Yeah, she should have made thelist for the national one even.
But yeah, if we had a locallist she'd be on it.
This is HB 3879.
This one essentially kills thefunding mechanism for Project
Connect.
We've done quite a few episodeson Project Connect at this
point that you can go check out,but it would make Project
Connect very difficult to happen.
(12:08):
This did get introduced in thelast legislative session and our
mayor, kirk Watson, did somebackroom smoke-filled room
dealings, from what I canunderstand, to make sure it
didn't get through.
I think I talked about this ina previous episode.
Basically, the main reason Ivoted for him again in this last
election was so that he willthen go reenter the smoke-filled
(12:29):
back rooms and drink whiskeywith folks in the Senate to make
sure that this bill doesn't getthe votes.
For the context, kirk Watsonwas a Texas state senator before
his current stint as mayor ofAustin.
Speaker 3 (12:43):
I just have this image of dogs playing poker.
You know the painting and KirkWatson's in the middle of them.
Yeah, and the dogs are all ofthe anti-transit people around
the state yes.
Speaker 4 (12:53):
Yeah, I also will say one potential positive, one
potential reason to be a littleoptimistic about the Project
Connect House bill is that, ifwe'll remember back to an
earlier episode we talked aboutthe Texas speaker race the
speaker of the House was kind ofthe more favored Republican by
(13:17):
Democrats.
He was elected with moreDemocrats than Republicans to
get into the seat, including bymembers of the Austin delegation
.
So I'm hoping that there weresome arrangements there to be
like, hey, we're not going toput this up for a vote.
Speaker 3 (13:30):
Maybe, but he also kicked Democrats off of every
leadership position ofcommittees in the state house.
So Democrats have no chairs ofany committee or leadership
positions in the stategovernment.
Speaker 4 (13:42):
So we'll definitely see.
I would say it's moreoptimistic than if the I forget
his name but if the more MAGAright-wing person won, I think
that there'd probably be astrong likelihood that this
would get a vote Under.
Now I'm not so sure.
Speaker 3 (13:55):
And another good thing here is that so many bills
that go into committee don'tmake it out.
It varies by year.
Some years the statehouse isvery productive and 70% of the
bills get voted on.
In other years, 40% of thebills get voted on.
So let's hope it's not a veryproductive year.
Speaker 4 (14:11):
For sure for both of these bills.
With that, though, we lightlymentioned here that we a couple
weeks ago were able to have anevent with folks from Data.
We had a Dallas city councilman.
We also had a DART board member, and we're not going to post
the whole conversation here, butwe are going to take a couple
(14:34):
clips here, some highlights forfolks to see and get the
perspective from a DART boardmember, a city councilman as
well as an advocate on some ofthese potential state cuts.
Now, the bit of information hereis this bill had not been
introduced yet, but we wereexpecting it to be introduced,
so we did get some questionssurrounding this.
(14:54):
So we'll, in a second here, cutto that conversation.
But first, if you haven't likedthe video, please consider
doing so, subscribe.
If you haven't subscribed, andif you want to support us
directly, you know the place todo so Down in the comments.
You can look Patreon, you cancheck out our merch store, all
that sort of stuff.
But without further ado, let'sjump into some of our
conversation from back in Dallas.
Speaker 3 (15:15):
We constantly in Austin are battling the
statehouse.
I mean it's always there, it'salways in the news.
I mean they just walk up thestreet, right, but we get a lot
of preemption laws where thestate comes in and they tell us
we can't do what we need to doto make the city run more
efficiently.
Do you foresee that as a riskin this battle currently, that
(15:36):
they will be successful by goingto the state legislature and
the state legislatureintervening?
This is Enrique McGregor, aDark Board member.
Speaker 6 (15:44):
We're all biting our nails over my personal view, not
having had experience lobbyingin Austin and not knowing
personally the senators.
I think Senator Nichols isgoing to head the Committee for
Transportation, that's going tolook at this, and there's a
Senator Parker that's also inthe committee.
Speaker 7 (16:08):
Yes.
Speaker 6 (16:09):
Thank you, and my frustration is that, from what I
can see, the anti-DART membershave very good connections with
these senators and are feedingthem the same misinformation
that we've been seeing formonths.
And I don't know them.
(16:29):
I can't say, hey, can we havecoffee, can you give me a minute
?
And I believe that we as aboard, our leadership, including
our CEO and our chair, reallyneed to not wait till the day of
the hearing, but ahead of timeto hear.
Here's what you've been hearing, here's what the facts are.
Let's you know.
This is why it does not makesense for you to do it.
(16:50):
Everybody across the boardagrees that it would be a
disaster if Austin got into this, and try to resolve the issue.
Speaker 7 (17:01):
I wanted to take this opportunity to give a data
follow-up to this question about.
Speaker 3 (17:08):
This is Hexel Colorado.
Founder of the Dallas Urbanist.
Speaker 7 (17:11):
If data didn't exist today, I'd be very, very worried
about it, but now I almost feelexcited about it, ready for a
fight.
Yeah, because in the last fewweeks, and I think in many cases
the last few days, you know, wehave, you know, over 100 people
on our group meeting, ourDiscord, and we have, you know,
(17:34):
60, 70 people coming to ourmonthly meetings and, but on top
of those, just constantcommunication amongst ourselves,
we got people in this room whomet with their representative,
sat down with them, called them,emailed them.
I mean, you know, kind ofcalling back to the legacy of
Mary Collier.
I mean, you know, kind ofcalling back to the legacy of
(17:54):
Mary Collier, like shepersonally, at every event she
was like, you know, I wantpeople to stay here after the
meeting ends.
I want you to call, I want youto email on the spot.
In December we had our holidaysocial gathering and it's like
for our holiday social, so it'spassing out papers.
I want you all to.
Okay, here's a sticker.
Each of you are divided intogroups and you're all going to
take turns learning how to callwho your representative is, how
(18:16):
to call them, write down theirphone number.
We're going to have practicesessions where you can practice
what to say, and so and we havepeople who are signing up to,
like you know, maybe carpool orget a bus down to Austin to, you
know, to talk to these people Ius down to Austin to talk to
(18:36):
these people.
I think the fact that, heck, wehave people who data is so
organized, we have someone who'stheir main role within data is
just to hit refresh on the filedbills every day to check when
they come through on theirthreat to file something.
It's so easy to get a meetingwith your representative, at
least right now.
The deeper we get into thesession it'll become impossible.
But we've started this work ofmeeting and talking and email
(18:59):
and calling.
Mary was canvassing on trainsDuring the state fair.
She had flyers and she'd roundup a whole bunch of us and they
would go and just get signaturesand get people signed up on the
trains and she was responsiblefor hundreds and perhaps
thousands of communications.
So I say right now, yes, Ithink the fact that, like they
(19:26):
were saying, if you don't dothis DART board, we're going to
go to the state, and then thefact that the board you know it
was this big battle we weregoing to all of these board
meetings, and the fact that Ithink we had a role in making
sure that the board didn't budge, and the fact that they have to
go to the state.
I take that as a data win.
And then data is going to bethere and we have so many people
(19:48):
who are now trained.
So many people in this room havenot done anything like this
this time last year, and so I dofeel excited.
There is a battle coming.
It's going to happen, but thisis not the first time that state
legislature, people,representatives and special
interests from Plano have triedto cut dark funding.
(20:08):
They've done that for the lastthree sessions consecutively,
but they failed before, and eventhough they're gonna put up a
bigger fight this year, theyhave not faced data yet.
Speaker 2 (20:22):
And so.
Speaker 4 (20:23):
I'm really excited about the legislature, honestly,
and I think we'll get thecouncil member in too.
Speaker 2 (20:28):
I'm gonna go with the simple.
I'm not worried either.
Speaker 3 (20:30):
This is council member Narvaez of the Dallas
City Council.
Speaker 2 (20:33):
Keep doing what y'all are doing Data, because it
helps us, the city of Dallas,dallas County.
So you have to also know howthe legislature typically works.
Right, I know you guys do, butusually if it's a local issue,
the rest of the legislators donot want to get involved.
If you ever watch this on citycouncil and you see us start
(20:54):
fighting with each other, it'sbecause you played in my
playground and I'm like get outof my.
Why are you messing with mydistrict?
I did all my homework.
I'm done Like.
Why are you jumping in the samething with state reps and
senators?
There might be a senator fromPlano who will file it who's
failed three times.
No state rep had done it.
(21:15):
There are more state reps,including a Republican, who
favor DART being fully funded.
And I'm not saying that thingscan change.
You never know.
You have to keep educating,keep fighting like y'all are
doing, and Mary was an amazingperson when it came to
organizing and making things getdone.
So take that spirit, take thatenergy that she taught everybody
(21:36):
and keep it going, because youcan do that.
You yourself can be Mary withthree people in your household
and you know when you're ridingthe bus or the train or whatever
, and get those things going,because the more they hear from
you, the more they will.
And I can you that angie chenbenton, state representative um,
she's she my understanding.
She served on the board of dartat one point and um, she's pro
(21:59):
dart, they're not gonna changeher mind.
So you know, that's, that's abig win for us.
And um, right now, just gonnasay, with the numbers, with the
member cities and the state repsthat represent those um, and
you know there's more Dems thanthere are Rs in the House for
DART.
So that's where I see some win.
(22:21):
And the other thing is, on thatTransportation Committee in the
Senate, both Senators NathanJohnson and Senator West are now
committee members and those twoare huge for Dallas County, for
us, when it comes to DART.
So I think the ball has movedto our side and not really
theirs.
They're going to have to do waymore offense and I mean they're
(22:44):
going to I don't know we'regoing to we're going to be able
to defend yeah Right, we'regoing to be able to defend DART.
And also I've been appointed byour legislative ad hoc chair,
who hates DART, to be thecouncil member who goes down to
Austin for those DART issues andI have relationships with all
of those folks.
You may not, I do, and y'all aregaining them and learning them.
(23:04):
Keep it up, because, let metell you, I'm gonna give you a
secret about politics the thingthat we, as politicians, are the
most scared of is you guys.
We're scared of voters, andwhen voters start showing up, we
start to listen, we start to goah, I mean, we do, because
we're like y'all, they fill thechamber across the street.
Speaker 7 (23:24):
I'm like what are they here for?
Who's that?
Speaker 2 (23:26):
Whose neighborhood is that?
What's going on?
We all do.
We all want to, because theyknow I'm going to represent them
(23:53):
.
It's not what I want, it's whatmy constituents want, so that's
why I think that we're going tobe able to.
We're going to be able to winthis, but we can't let up
because they'll sneak somethingin.
Speaker 4 (24:03):
They like sneak attacks, yeah, no and I think,
yeah, I just want to share a fun, funny, uh, quick thing on the
when you guys show up.
Speaker 6 (24:11):
In the earlier times, when Data was showing up to the
horseshoe at DART at the board,one of the anti-DART members
came up to me and said who arethey?
Who are they?
I said, well, I don't know.
They're like you know, it'slike a group of people that
write DART.
He said, oh, are they funded bythe Source Foundation or
something?
Speaker 3 (24:30):
I said I said.
Speaker 6 (24:30):
I said I think, I think they're actors from Austin
, you know, like students, andthey bus him in, they give him a
sandwich and then they come andspeak.
So that's.
Speaker 4 (24:39):
that's amazing.
Yeah, that was funny.
I'm glad you like we're like.
I need to say this yeah, thatwas, that was good and I think.
Speaker 6 (24:46):
I think he was probably joking, but but you
know that how the mind works,you never know.
Speaker 3 (24:50):
Yeah, so huge thanks to the Dallas Area Transit
Alliance for inviting us up tohelp host this event.
Also a huge thanks to HexelColorado, who runs the Dallas
Urbanist Group and is such agood advocate, to Enrique
McGregor, who's part of the DARTboard, and to Councilmember
Narvaez, who is thererepresenting the Dallas City
Council.
If you want to see the entirepanel discussion, you can see it
(25:13):
on our Patreon or you can checkit out on Data's.
Speaker 4 (25:17):
YouTube, yes, but with all that, let us know what
you think.
If you're in Texas and you wantto get involved in this, we're
going to have all of Data'slinks in the description here.
The easy things you can do,though I mean writing letters or
calling your representatives,goes a long way, but if you're
looking to get involved withanother group of people who are
actively working on this, thefolks at Data couldn't be nicer.
(25:40):
We've met them a handful oftimes now and they're doing
really great work, and that'sthe reason why we keep talking
about them in multiple episodes.
But with all that being said,thank you all so much for
watching and enjoy the rest ofyour transit.
Tangents Tuesday.
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Introducing… Aubrey O’Day Diddy’s former protege, television personality, platinum selling music artist, Danity Kane alum Aubrey O’Day joins veteran journalists Amy Robach and TJ Holmes to provide a unique perspective on the trial that has captivated the attention of the nation. Join them throughout the trial as they discuss, debate, and dissect every detail, every aspect of the proceedings. Aubrey will offer her opinions and expertise, as only she is qualified to do given her first-hand knowledge. From her days on Making the Band, as she emerged as the breakout star, the truth of the situation would be the opposite of the glitz and glamour. Listen throughout every minute of the trial, for this exclusive coverage. Amy Robach and TJ Holmes present Aubrey O’Day, Covering the Diddy Trial, an iHeartRadio podcast.
Betrayal: Season 4
Karoline Borega married a man of honor – a respected Colorado Springs Police officer. She knew there would be sacrifices to accommodate her husband’s career. But she had no idea that he was using his badge to fool everyone. This season, we expose a man who swore two sacred oaths—one to his badge, one to his bride—and broke them both. We follow Karoline as she questions everything she thought she knew about her partner of over 20 years. And make sure to check out Seasons 1-3 of Betrayal, along with Betrayal Weekly Season 1.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.