BART is broke. Muni is broke. And now they're coming to you — the taxpayer — hat in hand, asking for a bailout via not one but two November ballot measures.

Let's be clear about what's happening here. Bay Area transit agencies are staring down historic deficits, with BART floating the possibility of station closures and eliminated lines if voters don't open their wallets. It's the governmental equivalent of "nice transit system you've got here — shame if something happened to it."

But before we rush to the ballot box, maybe we should ask an uncomfortable question: How did we get here?

BART's ridership has never fully recovered from the pandemic. Remote work hollowed out the commuter base that once packed trains during rush hour. Meanwhile, the agency's cost structure — bloated pensions, generous overtime, deferred maintenance that somehow always needs emergency funding — remained stuck in 2019. Revenue cratered. Spending didn't.

This is the pattern with Bay Area transit. Build expensive infrastructure. Neglect operational efficiency. Ignore declining ridership trends. Then tell voters the whole system collapses unless they approve another tax.

Here's what nobody at BART wants to discuss: maybe the system needs to right-size before it asks for more money. Close underperforming stations. Adjust service frequency to match actual demand. Renegotiate labor contracts that consume an outsized share of the budget. Explore public-private partnerships. Do the hard, unglamorous work of running a lean operation.

Instead, we get the usual playbook — scare voters with apocalyptic scenarios, secure the funding, and kick the structural problems down the road for another decade.

San Franciscans deserve a transit system that works. But we also deserve agencies that respect the money we already give them. Voting yes on a blank check without demanding real reform isn't compassion — it's enabling.

BART doesn't have a revenue problem. It has an accountability problem. Fix that first, then we'll talk.