Civil Rights and Accessibility

MTC Seeks Comment on Two Clipper Title VI Reports

While transitioning the region’s transit agencies’ paper tickets to the electronic Clipper® fare-payment system, MTC is working to ensure that transit riders who are minorities or low-income or have limited English proficiency are not adversely affected by the transition, consistent with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Environmental Justice (EJ) principles.

MTC’s Draft SamTrans Fare Media Transitions to Clipper® - Title VI Analysis and Draft VTA Fare Media Transitions to Clipper® - Title VI Analysis, which summarize the agency’s assessments of any adverse impacts on Title VI-protected and low-income SamTrans and VTA riders, respectively, were released on April 2, 2012 for public review.

The draft reports provide background information on the two agencies addressed and summarize MTC’s requirement that transit agencies transition selected paper passes and tickets to Clipper-only availability and how these changes may potentially impact Title VI-protected and low-income individuals. They then compare the features of the paper passes and the Clipper-only passes and discuss any potentially disparate impacts and proposed mitigations for those impacts.

The public is encouraged to provide feedback on MTC’s efforts to mitigate these potential adverse impacts for Title VI-protected and low-income individuals. Comments are due by 4 p.m. on May 2, 2012. Email written comments to info@mtc.ca.gov, or mail them to MTC Public Information, 101 Eighth Street, Oakland, CA 94607-4700, fax: 510.817.5848.

After receiving and addressing public feedback on this draft report, MTC’s Operations Committee, which sets the policies of the Clipper program, will adopt any resulting changes to the Clipper Operating Rules.