Drafter
Clerk 10/12/2017
Title
AN ORDINANCE related to the provision of discounted transit tickets to human service agencies; amending Ordinance 12643, Section 19, as amended, and K.C.C. 4A.700.210 and declaring an emergency.
Body
STATEMENT OF FACTS:
1. K.C.C 4A.700.210 authorizes a program for the sale and distribution of transit tickets to human service agencies at ten percent of face value for the purpose of meeting the transportation needs of low income and homeless populations.
2. The King County council increased the dollar amount of the total annual subsidy amount of the program in 2014 in recognition that the 2015 fare increase would otherwise have reduced the number of tickets available to human service agencies.
3. In 2016, the King County council reduced the cost to human service agencies purchasing tickets through this program from twenty percent of face value to ten percent of face value, in order to increase the number of tickets agencies could purchase to serve the needs of their clients. The effect of this reduction in cost to the agencies is that agencies have greater financial flexibility, including possibly increasing the number of tickets that some agencies could purchase.
4. While agencies have the ability to purchase more tickets, the code imposed dollar limit of such subsidy will not allow Metro to sell to the agencies in excess of the subsidy limit set forth in K.C.C. 4A.700.210.
5. King County declared a homelessness emergency in November 2015 in response to the growing number of people experiencing unsheltered homelessness. The homelessness crisis in King County continues to persist, increasing the public transportation needs for low and no income individuals lacking permanent shelter.
6. A survey of human service agencies conducted by Metro in 2017 found that despite recent increases in the number of tickets available for purchase through the human services ticket program, the demand for tickets among agency's clients contin...

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