D.C. Council member Charles Allen is preparing to introduce a bill to provide a monthly subsidy of $100 for the District’s residents to cover their use of public transportation.
Funded by surplus taxes, the planned payment would be spent for Metro rail and bus service in the city, according to NBC Washington.
Speaking to the news outlet, Allen said that he planned to introduce the legislation on Tuesday. Residents would need to apply for the program in order to benefit from it. The money then would be loaded onto the applicants’ SmarTrip cards.
The proposal was initially reported by The Washington Post.
Could it work? $100 per month for DC residents to use (or lose) every month for transit? Councilmember @charlesallen who is leading the charge on this new bill answers some of the most important questions around the issue @nbcwashington #wmata pic.twitter.com/XeqjHvWgmI
— Adam Tuss (@AdamTuss) March 3, 2020
Allen previously introduced several bills relating to transportation. One of them was the Transportation Benefits Equity Amendment Act. It stipulates that employers give a Clean air Transportation Fringe Benefit to their workers if they refuse to receive parking benefits in the same amount.
Another transit-related bill sponsored by Allen is the Vision Zero Enhancement Omnibus Amendment Act, which requires 10 days’ notice regarding statements about regulating vehicular or pedestrian traffic (if the proposed installation, modification, or removal of the statement will increase safety at a location identified as a high-risk intersection in the Multimodal Long-Range Transportation Plan.)
The second bill also requires the city to install sidewalks on both sides of a street, to connect new sidewalks to existing sidewalks and to mark unmarked crosswalks.