SMART Measure B

SMART tax triumphs in landslide

Austin Murphy, PRESS DEMOCRAT

What a difference six years made for SMART.

Measure B, the ballot proposal to extend the quarter-cent sales tax that is the lifeblood for Sonoma-Marin Area Rail Transit system, remained about 20 points clear of the 50%-plus-one-vote it needs to pass in the two counties as of the latest updates Wednesday.

After a yearlong campaign staked on the very future of SMART, supporters were jubilant Election Night.

“This has felt like an existential situation,” said SMART board Chairman Chris Coursey, a Sonoma County supervisor. “Had we not been able to extend it, we would have come back in 2028. People would have been looking for jobs. We would have been planning on how to wind it down.

“Now, we’ve got another 30 years. This is my grandkids being able to grow up and have this train.”

Read more at https://www.pressdemocrat.com/2026/06/02/tax-measure-smart-train-election/

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SMART needs just a simple majority on Measure B to lock in crucial tax revenue for 30 more years

Austin Murphy and Emma Murphy, PRESS DEMOCRAT

Was this the SMART train, or the Lexington Avenue local during a New York City rush hour?

It took several minutes on the morning of April 18 for passengers on the platform at the Santa Rosa Downtown station to pack themselves onto a southbound train. With the Butter & Egg Days festival happening in Petaluma, four stops south, this was an especially crowded day on SMART, with over 7,200 riders — about 2,500 more than its daily average.

“There’s nowhere to park near the parade,” a mom explained to her two young children, once they were all aboard. “So we’re taking the train!”

On one side of the tracks, as SMART trip No. 9 eased into the Petaluma North station 20 minutes later, was the paved pathway for cyclists and pedestrians, part of a trail network that one day is meant to stretch 70 miles when completed, from Larkspur to Cloverdale. On the other were seven half-finished apartment buildings on land sold by SMART that will eventually hold 131 affordable housing units.

The bustling tableau — packed trains within walking distance of low-cost housing, connecting communities with less reliance on automobiles — was precisely what the founders of the Sonoma-Marin Area Rail Transit district envisioned in their successful campaign almost 20 years ago to return passenger train service to the North Bay after a decades-long hiatus.

Read more at https://www.pressdemocrat.com/2026/05/09/smart-tax-measure-2026-election-sonoma-marin/

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