Our Improving Transportation in City Heights (ITCH) team and colleagues at Youth Empowerment spoke during the SANDAG Board of Directors meeting on Friday, March 28 to advocate for the extension of the Youth Opportunity Pass (YOP) beyond June 2026.
ITCH member Maria Cortez shared a wonderful story with SANDAG board members while making her public comment.
"When I'm taking the bus or the trolley and I see them (youth) use the (YOP) pass, I tell them thank you and that we got this started - it was for you guys. And they said, 'Thank you, ma'am, because now, we're able to get to our high schools. We're able to to go places where we haven't had the chance to before. Please thank SANDAG for us.'"
Alexis, Chief of Program and Development at Youth Empowerment, talked about the importance of YOP to youth and also for their organization which has a limited budget.
"We have taken youth who are born and raised in San Diego to the beach for the first time in their entire lives. That is extremely, extremely upsetting. Cutting the Youth Opportunity Pass program is going to be very damaging to grassroots organizations like ours. It is the only way that we were able to bring our kids on these enrichment activities," she said.
"I'm hoping that we can work together to identify how we can keep this going. Our young people need us to do better for them. Our young people need opportunities. To go out of their communities and bring back all the positivity and beautifulness that San Diego has to offer to them.
Please do right by our youth. Please do right by San Diego and continue to support the Youth Opportunity Passes. It is the future."
Our team members also held up signs reminding SANDAG about the countless benefits of continuing YOP. The program aligns with Mayor Todd Gloria's priority of giving "access to opportunities" to every San Diegan. Ridership also remains at a high level.
E-mail SANDAG to let them know to extend YOP!
Public Comments
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