ordinance<\/a> was approved unanimously by the council. It will create a program for households making less than 80 percent of federal poverty level, or about $21,000 for a family of four, and allow them to use Metro services free of charge.<\/p>\nThe county estimates that about 54,000 people in the county would be eligible for the program. The program’s net costs will likely be $6 million the first year and average about $10 million in subsequent years.<\/p>\n
To receive fully subsidized fare cards, individuals would also have to be using one of six state programs. These include the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families; Refugee Card Assistance; Aged, Blind or Disabled Cash Assistance; Pregnant Women Assistance; Supplemental Security Income; or Housing and Essential Needs programs.<\/p>\n
“Unfortunately, for many in our community the cost of transit is a barrier to being able to get or keep a job, get an education and access health care. Too many of our most vulnerable neighbors living on the margins are being impaired by a lack of affordable access to mobility. This program removes the burden of a fare that they cannot afford to help them take a step toward living life to its fullest potential,” council member Jeanne Kohl-Welles said in a statement.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Low-income transit riders could see their King County Metro fares waived beginning in July, after the King County Council voted Feb. 25 to approve a new program.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":463,"featured_media":44617,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,4,24],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-44616","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-home2","category-news","category-northwest"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44616"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/463"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44616"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44616\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44617"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44616"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44616"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44616"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=44616"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}