Remember when BART effed themselves out of that $70 million in federal stimulus money because they failed to document how higher fares and a possible "major service change" would affect low-income and minority transit riders? The government said that the planned Oakland Airport tram project could be in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, and ever since the decision BART has spent $800,000 on consultants and public meetings to solve this issue, as Matier and Ross are reporting, despite the fact that they'll never see that $70M again.

At the heart of what these meetings are trying to discover: what constitutes a "major service change" in the minds of BART riders. The definition, as it stands, is a change in routes that affects 25% of its services. But BART still feels it needs to hold 35+ public meetings in order to figure this out, and on top of the $800K, they're spending another $200K hiring two new full-time staffers to their Civil Rights Department in order to make sure that, in future, they're fully in compliance with Title VI rules.