The San Mateo County Transit District voluntarily posts its employees’ salaries in a public forum each year to demonstrate transparency to the community we serve. Like most organizations, personnel costs make up one of the District’s largest and most vital expenses. In the face of budget shortfalls and fiscal challenges, the District has previously sought to drive down costs through lay-offs, salary and hiring freezes and requiring employees to assume their share of their pension contributions and health care premiums, among other efforts. At the same time, it is critical for the continuing and effective operation of the bus, rail and transportation services it provides that the District continue to attract and retain high quality, knowledgeable employees with the specialized backgrounds that will allow them to take on our industry’s unique challenges.
The San Mateo County Transit District represents three agencies - SamTrans, the bus and Paratransit provider; Caltrain, the rail service; and the San Mateo County Transportation Authority, the agency responsible for administering the half-cent sales tax for transportation improvement projects throughout the county. These agencies combined have 744 approved positions, some of which are currently vacant. More than 300 of those positions are jobs that work for all three agencies. These employees receive a portion of their pay from each of the agencies, based on the amount of time allocated to work done for each organization.
The benefit to San Mateo County is that rather than have three separate organizations, requiring their own Finance, Human Resources, Contracts and Procurement, Safety and Security, Communications, Marketing, Engineering and Executive teams, these Transit District employees share their time across all three organizations resulting in significant labor efficiencies.
District salaries are set each year as part of a salary ordinance, its Board of Directors reviews and approves at a publicly held meeting. Salaries recommendations are based on a compensation review conducted to ensure employee pay falls in line with comparable positions in organizations that have similar sizes and responsibilities.
The District also makes its annual compensation information available on the California State Controller's Government Compensation in California website.
For additional information, about SamTrans salaries and benefits please contact communications@samtrans.com.
Employee Compensation 2022 (PDF, 298KB)
Salary Ordinance No. 102 (2018) (PDF, 134KB)
Salary Ordinance No. 101 (2018) (PDF, 235KB)
Salary Ordinance No. 100 (2017) (PDF, 261KB)