When Jannette Sanchez learned that her five children could soon no longer be able to ride the bus for free, she immediately kicked into action.
The City Heights siblings ride the bus almost daily, especially to and from school. They’re some of the thousands of young people enrolled in the Youth Opportunity , a program from the Metropolitan Transit System and North County Transit District that lets anyone under 18 ride public transportation for free.
But late last year, the two local transit agencies said they would begin requiring everyone who gets a free or reduced fare — including youth using the , as well as seniors, Medicare recipients and people with disabilities — to their Pronto s by the end of next month.
When Sanchez learned of the change, she first went to the MTS Transit Store to one of her children’s s. That went smoothly.
But when she later tried to her daughter’s , she was told she didn’t have the correct identification, even though she’d brought her daughter’s most up-to-date ID. She tried to use the online application but needed her daughter’s help navigating it.
Sanchez is involved in community organizations like the City Heights Community Development Corporation (CDC) and the Employee Rights Center, and she regularly tries to help guide her neighbors through processes like this one. “Before I bring them a resource, I do it first to see how difficult it is,” Sanchez said in Spanish.
Sanchez was ultimately able to her five kids’ Pronto s, but as she struggled with the process, she felt helpless.
MTS, which manages the Pronto regional fare system and the -verification platform, says the new requirement is meant to ensure that reduced fares are available only to those who qualify. But residents like Sanchez and community organizers say it creates a barrier for those who use transit the most.
And many riders, especially youth, don’t know about the new requirement at all.
“I get the realities of making things pencil out, but at the end of the day, for some people that ride transit … they depend on it to go to school, to get to work,” said Jesse Ramirez, the senior program manager of transportation and planning with the City Heights CDC. “It’s really a public good.”
Riders who haven’t verified their s by Sept. 30 will be charged the full fare starting Oct. 1.
To an , commuters must submit a profile photo and government-issued ID or qualifying documentation, such as a school enrollment form or a school ID for students. They can do this online on their Pronto , at the MTS Transit Store or at any of the three North County Transit District customer service locations.
MTS and NCTD are collecting the verification data together. Since announcing the requirement in December, MTS says it has verified 23,000 s. There are now a total of 80,000 verified s, including those verified before last December.
But those numbers pale in comparison to the task still before the transit agencies.
About 106,000 youth and 28,000 seniors still need to be verified. Those numbers include a mix of both active riders, defined as those who have ridden at least 20 times in the last 90 days, and less active riders who have an and have ridden at least once in the last two years.
The Youth Opportunity was launched in 2022 as a pilot program funded by the county and the San Diego Association of Governments, or SANDAG. At the time, to expedite the process, new applicants weren’t required to submit information like an email address or proof of identification.
Since the program launched, youth ridership has risen dramatically, nearly doubling the average number of monthly rides. In an impact study conducted during the program’s first year, SANDAG found that 93 percent of participants ride transit more now, and 79 percent said they would keep riding as adults.
For parents like Sanchez, the program has saved her both money and time she used to have to spend walking her children to school.
Riders have until Sept. 30 to their s, after the deadline was pushed back from June 30. They can get a one-time extension on a case-by-case basis after Sept. 30; they’ll just need to call the Pronto center.
MTS says it has emailed about 42,000 young riders about the new requirement. But spokesperson Mark Olson concedes the tactic can reach only a limited number of riders — the agencies don’t have email addresses for everyone who gets the free rides, since they weren’t required to sign up.
The transit agencies have been holding outreach events at schools, social service agencies and pop-ups at transit centers. Over the next two months, MTS will also spread the word at bus stops with high ridership, on a Pronto app pop-up message and with digital ads. And by the end of the year, it hopes to let schools, senior centers and other local organizations riders directly.
“We’re trying to make the verification process as easy as possible, and through that, we wanted to make sure that we were meeting the students where they are,” said NCTD spokesperson Mary Dover.
MTS is also partnering with three organizations in central San Diego — City Heights CDC, Mid-City CAN and the Urban Collaborative Project — through paid contracts to help spread the word in their communities.
Guadalupe Rojas, transportation justice community organizer for Mid-City CAN, is glad her organization is helping with outreach but doesn’t think MTS is doing enough.
“We don’t know how much outreach is being done in the southern region,” she said. “So that’s where I feel that the agency is falling behind.”
Her group, which is based in City Heights, has also been conducting outreach in El Cajon, Spring Valley and La Mesa to try to reach East County’s young riders, Rojas added.
MTS has given educational materials to community organizations, social service agencies, school districts and schools across the county, Olson said. He said only the three central San Diego community organizations responded to MTS about partnering for outreach efforts.
One afternoon last week, high school students waited for the trolley at the Palomar Street station in Chula Vista on their way home from school. Some, like 16-year-old Linda Munoz, had learned about the requirement through emails they or their families had gotten from MTS — in her case, her brother.
Others, like 16-year-old Regina Potenciano, weren’t aware of the coming crackdown but still want to keep riding trains and buses for free. “Our parents don’t pick us up from school, and we prefer to be with our friends,” she explained.
Olson its MTS “has some work to do with youth” to get the word out. But he says the enforcement will be key to how the agency resolves a growing budget deficit, which could hit $95 million over the next four years.
“The two primary ways to address this deficit are through service cuts and fare increases. We are doing everything we can to avoid these two possibilities,” Olson said in an email. “Ensuring that reduced fare programs are available to only those who qualify is one strategy to stave off service cuts or fare increases.”
Ramirez, from City Heights CDC, understands the agency’s financial constraints and challenges. But he’s afraid the verification requirement will ultimately lead ridership to plummet.
Public transportation should be as “accessible as possible” to serve the needs of those most reliant on it, and to help reduce the environmental impact of driving.
“There needs to be a conversation within the agency about their priorities, like thinking more long-term of what kind of culture they want to create around transit,” he says.
