Update 3:15 p.m. 

Metro will no longer consider offering free rides to feds after President Trump announced that the government will reopen on Friday.

https://twitter.com/wmata/status/1088885505549365248

Original

It’s the 35th day since the federal government closed down over a border wall funding stalemate, and the local impacts continue to pile up. Some restaurants are reporting businesses losses as large as 60 percent, and federal workers are struggling to stay financially and emotionally steady as the days stretch on. Every weekday, Metro is hemorrhaging $400,000 in lost rides from federal employees who aren’t going to work.

Starting Friday, we can expect yet another hit: many federal workers (even essential employees required to report to work without pay) are losing their SmartBenefits, commuter benefits disbursed by an employer. The federal government won’t be releasing its February benefits because of the shutdown. The transit agency estimates that 21,000 federal employees are losing their benefits starting Friday, according to the Washington Post.

So Metro’s board is considering allowing federal workers to ride the service free until the shutdown ends and they get their benefits back—federal workers would simply have to flash a federal ID card to a Metro employee and walk through the fare gates. The board is holding an emergency meeting at 3 p.m. on Friday to vote on the proposal.

Ward 2 councilmember and chair of the Metro board Jack Evans told the Post that he and D.C.’s other representative on the board, Corbett Price, will vote in favor of the measure on Friday. Both of Maryland’s representatives are also expected to vote in favor (Maryland has already made its state-run public transit free for furloughed employees). Virginia’s representatives were checking on the position of their local jurisdictions before making a decision one way or the other, according to the Post. Board rules require at least one member from each jurisdiction (Maryland, Virginia, and D.C.) to approve a measure before it can go into effect.

The loss in SmartBenefits and federal commuters is expected to cost Metro even more money than it’s already losing. Allowing feds to ride completely free will cost the agency millions of dollars, Evans said at a D.C. Council working group on Friday, which was convened to discuss the effects of the shutdown on the region.

Despite his support of the measure, Evans also raised questions about how it would be enforced. “What if somebody just walks through without an ID? What do we do? Do we stop them?” Evans asked at the working group. “[Metro employees are] very worried about their employees…at the front line of enforcing this.” Evans said the agency “faces the prospect of many, many people riding for free,” whether they’re federal employees or not.

If the measure passes, feds could begin riding free on Monday.