TriMet will dramatically expand the number of employees whose primary duty is enforcing fares on MAX trains, while the agency relies less on uniformed police officers.

The transit operator has three dedicated fare-enforcement officers, and on Monday officials said nine more will hit the rails this week.

Historically, TriMet has leaned on its supervisors to conduct fare stops, in conjunction with police. But those supervisors have other duties, like overseeing the transit system overall and responding to disruptions.

Pat Williams, TriMet’s director of security and emergency management, said the agency wants to “reduce the footprint of the transit police” and increase fare stops.

Those transit officers, who come from police departments across the tri-county area, will still be available to help if needed and respond to crimes or incidents. But fare enforcement will be less of a priority for them.

“We don’t think that that’s really the best use of the transit police to be involved,” Williams said.

For years, transit police and TriMet supervisors conducted fare stops, often performing random missions where multiple officers would stop all riders as they got off a train. It’s a practice that sparked controversy in 2018 with the high-profile arrest of a David Douglas school board member. The incident led to a Multnomah County Circuit judge ruling those stops violated the state’s constitution, and TriMet subsequently amended its rules and regulations to codify that fare evasion is not a crime but rather warrants a fine or citation.

TriMet has said for years that its own riders want to see more fare enforcement officers and uniformed staff in general. The rail system is an unusual one nationally because it is an open system, where riders don’t have to go through turnstiles to board a train. According to Wiliams, TriMet’s fare evasion rate is 18%.

With the transition to the Hop Fastpass card and away from paper tickets, TriMet said it is committed to educating the public about their duties. Riders must tap a Hop card, smartphone with a digital Hop reader, or the paper Hop tickets dispensed at MAX platforms to pay their fare. After the end of 2019, riders will no longer be able to pay a fare with the old paper tickets or the once-popular mobile ticketing app created by GlobeSherpa (TriMet will continue to hold trade-in events where users can transition paper tickets to a Hop card).

“What we’re asking the fare inspectors to do is really take an educational component to the first couple months,” Williams said, “then we’re going to be moving toward written warnings and citations.”

Fare enforcement officers don’t currently have the ability to allow riders to pay their fares on the handheld devices they use to determine whether riders tapped their fare or not.

Roberta Altstadt, a TrIMet spokeswoman, said the officers will take discretion and walk first-time offenders or other riders who haven’t paid off the train to pay on a Hop reader on the MAX platforms.

TriMet plans to have the 12 fare officers split into morning and night shifts and spread across the metro region. They will break up into teams of two and travel with contracted “customer safety officers,” who will assist the inspectors.

The existing supervisors will continue to perform fare checks as well. Expect to see the new fare enforcement officers on the rails this week.

-- Andrew Theen

atheen@oregonian.com

503-294-4026

@andrewtheen

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