Published Wednesday, November 7, 2001, in the San Mateo County Times

BART, Santa Clara County strike deal for extension
BART Board of Directors to vote on pact next week

Agencies agree to share $4 billion price

By Sean Holstege
Staff Writer

BART and Santa Clara County transit officials will announce a
landmark cost-sharing agreement today that clears the tracks for a $4
billion BART extension from Fremont to San Jose.

The deal was struck after months of secret negotiations between BART
and the Santa Clara Valley Transit Authority and comes one week
before a final deadline imposed by the regional Metropolitan
Transportation Commission.

The VTA governing board is scheduled to vote on the deal on Friday,
followed Tuesday by the BART Board of Directors.

Roy Nakadegawa of Berkeley, one of nine BART directors, has called
the San Jose extension a boondoggle. Other directors want to ensure
it doesn't further stress the existing BART system.

The MTC told both sides to ink a deal by Nov. 19, or the BART
extension, approved by voters in Alameda and Santa Clara counties,
would be excluded until 2004 from a wish list for federal funding.

Friday, the MTC is set to adopt its 25-year, $82 billion spending
plan, which it updates every three years. Projects not on MTC's list
cannot apply for federal money.

Alameda County voters are contributing $50 million from a 1996 sales
tax measure, while Santa Clara voters agreed last year to spend $2
billion in sales taxes to connect the Bay Area's largest city with
the rest of the region.

Last year, California chipped in an extra $725 million in surplus
funds, leaving the 20-mile, 10-station rail extension in need of an
estimated $834 million in federal dollars.

Transit officials are likening the agreement to a 1988 regional rail
accord which ended years of Bay Area squabbling over how to pay for
BART's extension to San Francisco International Airport. Under that
arrangement, BART extended 8.5 miles into San Mateo County, a non-
BART county, and in return San Mateo helped pay for extensions to
Dublin/Pleasanton and Pittsburg/Bay Point.

In this week's tentative pact, there was no mention of any
similar "buy-in" arrangement, notably for proposed extensions to
Livermore or Antioch.

But the deal would accomplish much of what both transit boards
insisted on when negotiations began last spring.

VTA agreed to pay BART for ongoing operating costs of the new
extension. Santa Clara also offers to cover the wear and tear on the
existing 95-mile, 39-station BART network caused by flooding it with
an extra 39,000 daily passengers at start-up. The extension is not
expected to open before 2010.

VTA will be lead agency to plan, design and environmentally clear the
work, and has agreed to meet BART specifications. The extension would
be owned by VTA, but operated and maintained by BART. The two
agencies would form a joint operating board.

VTA also agreed to pay into an account that covered future wear and
tear on the extension.

Officials on both sides of the county line appeared pleased.

"We're headed down the right track," said BART Director Tom Blalock,
of Fremont. "I don't see any stumbling blocks."

"The mayor is very pleased that BART and the VTA folks have reached
agreement and put this forward to the next stage," said David
Vossbrink, spokesman for San Jose Mayor Ron Gonzales. "To make an
effective funding request with Congress it's imperative that BART and
VTA are on the same page."