(Photo by Julian Ortiz)

The D.C. Council Judiciary Committee unanimously voted Thursday to advance a bill that would decriminalize fare evasion on Metro, reducing the possible penalty to a $50 fine.

The bill was originally introduced in June 2017 by eight councilmembers, and was widely expected to pass the committee vote. It now goes before the full Council to vote, likely later this month.

This comes during a time of some controversy around Metro Transit Police’s handling of fare evasion cases. In just the last year, police have drawn criticism for an incident where they pinned down a woman for fare evasion, exposing her breasts in the process, and another where they slammed a woman to the ground outside a bus stop because she failed to pay her fare, breaking four of her teeth. In yet another case in late September, bystanders said Metro police pepper sprayed young teenagers for dodging their fare (though Metro holds that incident was not related to fare evasion at all).

Over the last two years, Metro has begun a crackdown on fare evasion cases that officials say stems from a desire to both collect all owed money in a time of funding shortages, as well as keep Metro transit operators safe. Nearly 25 percent of assaults on bus operators stem from fights over dodged fare, according to data from the Metro Transit Police.

The transit agency this year also stopped allowing negative balances on SmarTrip cards.

But data shows that the crackdown isn’t affecting everyone equally. A September report by the Washington Lawyer’s Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs shows that 91 percent of fare evasion citations between January 2016 and February 2018 were given to black people. Seventy-two percent of the citations were handed out to black men, 20 percent to black women, and 46 percent to black young people under 25. Police have stopped black children as young as seven, according to the report.

Since 1978, D.C. law has held that fare evasion is a crime punishable by a fine of up to $300, a ten-day jail sentence, or both. According to the committee report, police generally don’t seek the highest-possible penalties—law enforcement more commonly issue warnings, $50 fines, or arrests. (Metro’s position is that police resort to arrests only when people ignore officer commands, try to run away, or assault the officer, not for fare evasion alone.)

The current bill lowers the fine to $50, in line with what Metro already generally charges people, a decrease from the $100 limit for a fine in the original bill. Both versions decriminalize fare dodging and prevent people from getting sent to jail or incurring a criminal record.

“I don’t think you should end up with a criminal history because you dodged a $2 fare,” says Ward 6 Councilmember Charles Allen, Chair of the Committee on the Judiciary and Public Safety. “There’s no world in which if you don’t drop a quarter in the parking meter, you walk away in handcuffs.”

The bill also decriminalizes several other relatively minor infractions like playing a radio, riding roller skates, and eating and drinking food. All these actions are currently characterized as “unlawful conduct” under the D.C. code, but under the new bill, they will also carry a maximum $50 fine.

Metro police have also been criticized in the past for the way they’ve dealt with these types of minor faux pas. In 2016, they arrested a high school student for refusing to throw away chips and a lollipop. In 2000, police arrested a 12-year-old girl for eating a french fry. Thursday’s committee report on the bill cites these cases in its arguments for decriminalization.

“The young people arrested in these incidents will likely forever have a changed perception of law enforcement because of the MTPD officers’ unnecessary conduct,” reads the report.

The bill preserves criminal penalties for other actions, like carrying flammable liquids or corrosives on Metro, and messing with an escalator or elevator.

Metro Transit Police, for its part, has testified against the bill, arguing that it’s not necessary. Chief Ron Pavlik told the D.C. Council in October of last year that more than 90 percent of stops for fare evasion result in a citation, and juveniles usually only get a warning, according to the committee report.

Citing Pavlik’s testimony, the report reads: “In 2017, leading up to the hearing, more than 400 individuals with outstanding warrants had been stopped through fare evasion, and WMATA had experienced a twenty percent decrease in violent crime.”

At the Thursday committee meeting, there was some discussion among councilmembers about whether decriminalization is the appropriate direction for the bill. Ward 3 Councilmember Mary Cheh cited testimony by Pavlik saying that, if it’s true that the agency never arrests for fare evasion directly, the bill may not prevent these arrests.

Cheh cited conversations with Ward 2 Councilmember Jack Evans, who is not a part of the Committee on the Judiciary, but who sits on the WMATA board. He has been the lone voice of opposition to this bill on the Council.

Despite the questions raised, however, the bill sailed through committee on a unanimous vote. It will likely come up for a full council vote later this month.