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Masks are back on BART, in agency’s fourth flip-flop since April

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After a two-week lapse of its mandatory mask policy, BART riders must mask up once again, effective immediately, after the transit agency’s board of directors voted Thursday night to reinstate a face covering requirement through September.

The 6-2 BART board vote, which impacts the system’s 50 stations, puts BART at odds with county health officials who have largely rescinded their mask mandates and declined to impose new ones, even as the entire Bay Area is within the federal government’s highest tier for COVID-19 transmission risk.

Only one other Bay Area transit agency — East Bay’s AC Transit — still requires masks. Los Angeles County had intended to renew its indoor mask mandate this week, but officials ended up going back on that plan, citing a downward trend in COVID cases and hospitalizations.

Rebecca Saltzman, BART’s board president, said the agency has been disappointed by a lack of clarity from the counties in which BART operates, leading the rail operator to stake out its own mask policy.

“The counties haven’t even shared what their measures will be to reinstitute requirements,” Saltzman said before the meeting. “We know cases are high right now. If this isn’t enough to trigger a mandate – what does?”

BART Director Debora Allen voted against renewing the mandate, citing concerns that BART police’s limited enforcement is eroding riders’ trust. So did Director Robert Raburn, stating that he would not support such a policy until the public health departments endorsed it. Director Lateefah Simon was absent.

BART’s masking policy is among the most mutable in the Bay Area. It has changed four times since April, including a two-week pause in mandatory masks that started July 18.

The agency’s board has been grappling with the mandate issue since a Florida court voided President Joe Biden’s federal mask requirement. That allowed transit agencies across the country to drop face-covering rules and led to scenes of airline attendants discarding masks midflight.

While airports and nearly every other transit agency in the Bay Area have ditched masks, a majority of the the BART board has been receptive to calls from advocates to protect elderly and immunocompromised riders.

“Public transit is an essential public service and unlike a lot of other places, it’s just not optional,” said Raia Small, a community organizer with Senior and Disability Action.

Nearly two dozen people called into BART’s virtual board meeting Thursday, the vast majority of whom were in favor of reinstating the transit agency’s mask mandate. Mark Chekal said he lives in Berkeley and commutes to his job as an essential worker in San Francisco. Though he has been driving, he’ll have to go back to riding BART in the next few weeks, when he will lose his parking spot at his job. Chekal said he caught COVID-19 recently, despite being vaccinated five times, and got “pretty sick.” As someone who is immunocompromised — he takes medication for rheumatoid arthritis that reduces his ability to fight infections — having a mask mandate on BART is important to him.

“It’s very serious to me,” he said. “I need to go to work.”

Jordan Davis, on the other hand, objected to continuing the mandate in the face of widespread adoption of COVID vaccines.

“I’m sick and tired of mandates, and most of the rest of the country is, too,” she said. “There may have been a time when mandates were necessary, but those days have passed.”



After a two-week lapse of its mandatory mask policy, BART riders must mask up once again, effective immediately, after the transit agency’s board of directors voted Thursday night to reinstate a face covering requirement through September.

The 6-2 BART board vote, which impacts the system’s 50 stations, puts BART at odds with county health officials who have largely rescinded their mask mandates and declined to impose new ones, even as the entire Bay Area is within the federal government’s highest tier for COVID-19 transmission risk.

Only one other Bay Area transit agency — East Bay’s AC Transit — still requires masks. Los Angeles County had intended to renew its indoor mask mandate this week, but officials ended up going back on that plan, citing a downward trend in COVID cases and hospitalizations.

Rebecca Saltzman, BART’s board president, said the agency has been disappointed by a lack of clarity from the counties in which BART operates, leading the rail operator to stake out its own mask policy.

“The counties haven’t even shared what their measures will be to reinstitute requirements,” Saltzman said before the meeting. “We know cases are high right now. If this isn’t enough to trigger a mandate – what does?”

BART Director Debora Allen voted against renewing the mandate, citing concerns that BART police’s limited enforcement is eroding riders’ trust. So did Director Robert Raburn, stating that he would not support such a policy until the public health departments endorsed it. Director Lateefah Simon was absent.

BART’s masking policy is among the most mutable in the Bay Area. It has changed four times since April, including a two-week pause in mandatory masks that started July 18.

The agency’s board has been grappling with the mandate issue since a Florida court voided President Joe Biden’s federal mask requirement. That allowed transit agencies across the country to drop face-covering rules and led to scenes of airline attendants discarding masks midflight.

While airports and nearly every other transit agency in the Bay Area have ditched masks, a majority of the the BART board has been receptive to calls from advocates to protect elderly and immunocompromised riders.

“Public transit is an essential public service and unlike a lot of other places, it’s just not optional,” said Raia Small, a community organizer with Senior and Disability Action.

Nearly two dozen people called into BART’s virtual board meeting Thursday, the vast majority of whom were in favor of reinstating the transit agency’s mask mandate. Mark Chekal said he lives in Berkeley and commutes to his job as an essential worker in San Francisco. Though he has been driving, he’ll have to go back to riding BART in the next few weeks, when he will lose his parking spot at his job. Chekal said he caught COVID-19 recently, despite being vaccinated five times, and got “pretty sick.” As someone who is immunocompromised — he takes medication for rheumatoid arthritis that reduces his ability to fight infections — having a mask mandate on BART is important to him.

“It’s very serious to me,” he said. “I need to go to work.”

Jordan Davis, on the other hand, objected to continuing the mandate in the face of widespread adoption of COVID vaccines.

“I’m sick and tired of mandates, and most of the rest of the country is, too,” she said. “There may have been a time when mandates were necessary, but those days have passed.”

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