SFMTA Launches Citywide Muni Safe Day Out to Combat Rider Harassment

Shahin Shaikh was riding a Muni bus on April 2 in a bright volunteer vest, helping lead chants of "Keep Muni safe! 311," handing out pamphlets in English, Spanish, and Mandarin, and trying to convince fellow riders that filing a harassment report actually changes something. Whether it does is a harder question than the chants let on.

Shaikh, an SFMTA volunteer, was one of more than 60 staffers and community partners who fanned out across the city's buses, light-rail vehicles, and stations for Muni Safe Day Out. The outreach campaign had a pragmatic pitch: transit is statistically the second most common setting where harassment occurs, yet most incidents on Muni go unreported, leaving the agency without the data it needs to respond. "When we get out and they see us with all faces, all colors, it gives a message to all our Muni riders," Shaikh said. "It takes a village to raise a child and it takes a village to keep that child safe on the Muni as well."

The day began at SFMTA's atrium, where acting director of transit Brent Jones addressed the assembled teams before they dispersed. "You guys are all representing us and ensuring that our customers feel safe and confident to ride our service every day," Jones said. "Today, we want to double down and ensure that our customers and our agencies partner together to ensure that Muni remains safe, clean, and reliable."

The numbers framing the campaign cut in two directions. SFPD-reported crimes on Muni declined to 423 incidents in 2025, the lowest total since 2020, and a recent rider survey found roughly 75% of respondents said they felt safe on the system. Yet Chief Security Officer Kimberly Burrus acknowledged those figures represent only what riders actually report, a fraction of what likely occurs. Harassment, she said, remains chronically underdocumented. "We use data to assist us with our deployment," Burrus said. "That data ebbs and flows one month to another. We really rely on the data to tell us where to go and where to be."

That dependency is the campaign's central gamble. SFMTA's Safety Equity Initiative, which Muni Safe Day Out formally feeds into, uses incident reports and annual rider surveys to identify specific routes, stations, and neighborhoods for targeted interventions: adjusted security staffing, improved lighting at priority stops, and service planning that incorporates harassment patterns. The December 2024 Safety Equity Action Plan identified corridors where those investments are already underway, but the agency is explicit that better data drives better resource allocation.

Officials advised riders wanting to file a report to note the vehicle's route number, vehicle number, and the time of the incident before using 311 or the online Muni feedback form, details that allow staff to pull onboard camera footage for investigation. SFMTA said onboard cameras are now installed across all buses and light-rail vehicles.

The agency has been direct that April 2 was not a one-day exercise. It intends to monitor reporting rates and rider survey responses in the months ahead to measure whether the outreach produces a durable shift in behavior. If it does, policymakers will face a follow-on question: whether sustained funding and staffing capacity can absorb a meaningfully larger volume of complaints and convert them into visible changes on the routes where riders feel most at risk.