San Francisco, CA — On September 23, the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) approved the Final Blueprint for Plan Bay Area, which is a policy document to guide the growth of the Bay Area through 2050. This Blueprint included a strategy of increasing the number of Bay Area workers that work from home one or more days per week in pursuit of a goal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and traffic congestion. It would do this by mandating all large office-based employers (25 or more employees) have at least 60 percent of their employees telecommute on any given day.

San Francisco and San Jose have been working with the MTC over the last few weeks to address significant challenges stemming from the proposal. Today, the 15 members of the Bay Area delegation to the California State Legislature issued a letter raising significant concerns.

Mayors Breed and Liccardo released the following statement about the proposal:

“As the Mayors of the two largest cities in the Bay Area, we appreciate the work the Metropolitan Transportation Commission staff have committed to developing and completing the Plan Bay Area 2050 Blueprint that will help us meet our collective climate goals. We also acknowledge Plan Bay Area’s responsibility to meet State emissions reduction targets with a fiscally constrained transportation investment plan -- especially given the more recent impacts of COVID-19 on our respective communities.

While we support many of the innovative and bold strategies MTC has developed to help address our shared transportation challenges and meet our emissions reduction targets, we remain concerned about the telecommute mandate and cannot support it as currently drafted. We look forward to working with MTC staff, and our colleagues, on refining this strategy and considering alternatives that allow us to equitably meet our GHG reduction target and support the vitality of our downtowns.”

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