BART’s high-profile quest to cut down on its fare-evasion epidemic has produced dramatic racial disparities, newly released records show, with nearly half of proof-of-payment citations going to African American riders.

Agency officials, however, said the effort to dissuade fare cheats has built-in guards to ensure enforcement is fair and that groups of riders are targeted in a particular place at the same time, without regard to their appearance.

Of 12,207 citations doled out from July 18, 2018, to June 30, 2019, roughly 46% were given to people who identified themselves to BART proof-of-payment officers as African American, BART data show.

Passengers who identified as white accounted for 18% of citations, while 15% went to Latinos and 4% went to Asians.

According to BART surveys, African Americans account for 12% of BART riders, while white people comprise 44%, Asians make up 23% and Latinos account for 18%.

A similar racial disparity was seen last year from March to the end of August, when BART staff released a report showing that African Americans accounted for 47% of people cited.

The new figures were first revealed by transit activist Chris Arvin.

BART officials in charge of cracking down on fare evasion said the figures were not evidence of bias. All of these encounters, BART said, occurred during sweeps by the agency’s fare inspector team. Civilian officers walk through train cars or stand at an entryway and ask every passenger to show a ticket or Clipper card.

Officers ask passengers to identify their race and make a determination based on their observation if passengers refuse.

The board’s 2017 proof-of-payment plan, officials said, requires inspectors to systematically check everyone, and BART’s independent police auditor reviews body-camera footage to ensure inspectors follow that rule.

“My staff, where we can, we spot-check the body-worn camera videos from those operations,” said Russell Bloom, the police auditor. He and other officials monitor the footage to ensure a “systematic approach, that people aren’t skipped, that discretion isn’t applied, and that the enforcement is done as it was presented to the Board of Directors in 2017.”

The racial breakdown laid bare divisions among board directors, who have sparred for months over how BART should deal with gate-hoppers.

“Disparities are unacceptable,” said Lateefah Simon, who was elected president of the board Thursday. “It’s not good enough to just say, ‘Oh, well, black folks are more likely to fare-evade the system.’ I don’t believe that.”

Director Robert Raburn, who has been bullish about stopping fare evasion, said the transit agency has tried to stave off bias.

“We thought long and hard about how the citations would be issued,” he said. “We developed a whole procedure, and it’s a thick manual that the fare inspectors go through. The No. 1 takeaway from that big thick manual is that there’s absolutely no discretion. You don’t get to say, ‘Oh, I’m going to let you go this time, ma’am,’ and then cite the next person.”

BART is under intense pressure to stop people from breaching its gates. Not only does lost fare mean less revenue for the agency — officials estimate fare evasion siphons up to $30 million annually — but because riders view the issue as a sign of larger social disorder.

Paying riders cover two-thirds of BART’s operating costs, so officials felt the squeeze when riders began peeling off in the past two years, from a 2016 peak of 128.5 million passengers to 124.2 million in 2017 and 120.6 million last year.

Police view fare-beaters as a catalyst for other types of crime, including cell phone thefts and assaults. The man accused of fatally stabbing 18-year-old Nia Wilson last year had sneaked into the rail system without paying, and the man who allegedly stabbed and killed another passenger last month is believed to have skipped the fare.

“There have been cases where individuals come in and out of our system who haven’t paid, and who have committed a robbery or some type of assault,” said interim Police Chief Ed Alvarez. “That’s no different than somebody who robs a bank and drives off. They’re not going to stop at every stoplight. They’re trying to get away.”

So, BART is scrambling to stanch the problem, using a mix of law enforcement, civilian staff and “station hardening” — tall railings and other barriers that inhibit people from sneaking in. Transit agencies around the country, including in New York and Washington, D.C., are trying similar forms of triage.

But as agency leaders respond, they are acutely aware of criticism over racial inequality in policing the system.

Last year, a Chronicle investigation found that two-thirds of people who were banned from BART were African American. BART is also grappling with disparities in penalties for eating and drinking, the majority of which go to black riders.

At some stations, African Americans comprised an overwhelming proportion of people cited for not being able to produce proof of payment, according to the new data.

Simon will press next year for an academic study of the proof-of-payment system at BART, she said, similar to one that Stanford researchers conducted on police stops in Oakland. It ultimately led the city to cut back on traffic stops.

Director Janice Li recently called for a detailed report on all “quality of life” contacts on BART — any instance in which a police officer or staff member approaches someone about jumping a gate, eating, sleeping on a train, or some other nuisance. She expects it to come in January or February.

“I want the police and the general manager to be on record about why they think these disparities exist,” she said. “Let’s be honest, something is happening here.”

Each citation results in a penalty of $75 for adults, and $55 for juveniles. People can also pay it off with community service.

Rachel Swan is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: rswan@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @rachelswan