Public transit riders can expect to see more uniformed officers and agents on light rail systems and stations this winter.

“Nothing is more important to us than providing a consistently safe, clean and welcoming experience on transit,” Metro Transit General Manager Lesley Kandaras said during a press conference. “Our customers have told us they feel safer when we are highly visible, so we are working hard to coordinate and expand all our layers of official presence this winter and beyond.”

In an effort to promote safety on public transit systems in the Twin Cities, Metro Transit announced Wednesday that there will be an increase in Metro Transit police officers, agents and staff presence on rides during peak travel times and toward the end of operational hours. The effort is a part of the agency’s Safety and Security Action Plan.

“Our message is clear,” Interim Metro Transit Police Chief Joe Dotseth said during the conference. “Crime will not be tolerated on Metro Transit, and those who commit crimes will be held accountable. But we also recognize some people in our system need help, not handcuffs.”

Reducing crime and providing resources

Earlier this year, officers implemented a new initiative, Safe and Strong University Avenue, which involved coordination between law enforcement, service providers and prosecutors aimed at reducing crime and providing resources, including addiction treatment and housing services to those in need. Dotseth said the Safe and Strong model has become a part of the department’s normal practice in their approach to public safety.

“Our officers want to get people the help they need,” Dotseth said.

Dotseth referred to the partnership initiative between Metro Transit police officers and Community Service Officers, Transit Riders Investment Program (TRIP) Agents, and supplemental security officers as a multi-layered approach.

Officers are expected to not only increase their visible presence on rides, but also show an increase in proactive enforcement, Dotseth said. Community Service Officers, TRIP Agents and outreach workers are tasked with educating riders on codes of conduct, providing people with support services, are available to answer riders’ questions and are trained in de-escalation tactics to ensure the safety of passengers, according to Dotseth.

“This coordinated approach means we can, we will, and we are improving the rider experience,” Dotseth said.

More officers and staff employed

According to Metro Transit, the agency is at its highest staffing rate since 2021, with a current total of 116 police officers and 26 Community Service Officers, close to 100 TRIP Agents by the end of the year and more than 200 supplemental security officers who “are being trained to provide coverage at high-traffic locations,” according to the agency.

Security officers who “serve as eyes and ears on the system, discouraging behavior like smoking, and contacting police when there is criminal activity,” have been contracted to add to the onboard presence from police officers, Community Service Officers and TRIP Agents, according to Metro Transit. Metro Transit has to have security officers stationed at 15 “busy boarding locations” for up to 24 hours a day, according to the agency.

Security officers are currently at nine locations and will be added on the Green Line’s Snelling Avenue Station and the Blue Line’s Warehouse District and Nicollet Mall stations.

“We’re more visible and present than anytime that I can recall in my 21 years,” Dotseth said during the conference. “With the signs of this progress, we know we still have work to do. The job is not done until every rider feels safe on every trip.”

Metro Transit’s 2025 budget for public safety-related expenses, including the Metro Transit Police Department, Transit Rider Investment Program and supplemental security was close to $74 million. The proposed 2026 budget would increase spending to more than $93 million, according to the agency. The operating budget relies on a mix of funding from the motor vehicle sales tax revenue, federal grants, a regional sales tax, fares and state general funds, according to Metro Transit.

Rider perceptions

Dotseth said that serious crime on public transit is down 21% percent in the Twin Cities and officer-initiated calls for service are up 129% compared to 2024.

“We are making a difference,” Dotseth said. “There is still work to do, but we’re making a difference.”

Kandaras and Dotseth said many riders have already expressed feeling safer with the increased visibility of officers on public transit. Kandaras said the agency conducts an annual customer satisfaction survey and is currently running one for 2025. Based on responses from last year’s survey, Kandaras said riders reported feeling safer than they had before.

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“We’re eagerly awaiting results from the survey out now,” Kandaras said.

Dotseth said that on top of pursuing initiatives to encourage rider safety, Metro Transit’s marketing team is actively trying to find new ways to encourage people to take public transit.

“If people have ideas on what we should do, they should definitely send them to Metro Transit,” Dotseth said.

An additional campaign focused on attracting more police officers to the department will launch this fall, and a program that provides Community Service Officers with tuition assistance as they pursue law enforcement degrees will continue, according to Metro Transit.

A friend once complained to me that people would sigh and roll their eyes when she used a credit card to pay for her $3 coffee. This was about a decade ago, and I admit, at the time I silently judged her. What kind of psychopath, I thought to myself, forces everyone in line to wait for their coffee while her credit card transaction is approved?

How times have changed, and I’m not talking about that $3 coffee. Today I feel that same impatience when someone ahead of me rummages through their wallet to find exact change to make a cash purchase. Electronic payments are much faster and have become the norm, even for small purchases.

Now it is cash that carries a social stigma — as this survey of Generation Z consumers makes clear. Conducted in September, it finds that 53% use physical cash only as a last resort, and 29% believe that people who pay with cash are “cringe.” I will ignore the generational insult and focus on the implications of this shift for both consumer behavior and public policy.

The first thing to note is that, while Cash App certainly has an interest in people using an app instead of cash, the survey results mirror trends tracked by the Federal Reserve. In 2024, only 17% of respondents to a survey said they preferred cash for in-person transactions, down from 27% in 2016.

Older and lower-income Americans are still more likely to use cash, but even for them it is becoming less common. Only about a quarter of transactions by people with income under $25,000 involve cash, and they amount to only 19% of transactions made by people over age 55.

With more phone-based payments and almost every merchant taking electronic payments (with the notable exception of several Italian restaurants in New York City, you know who you are), cash is destined to become even more obscure and old-fashioned. That means consumer spending patterns may change, as well as federal regulations.

The prevailing presumption is that people spend less when they use cash, because it makes them more aware of what things cost. It also puts a hard constraint on what they can buy, since they are limited to what fits in their wallet. The evidence in support of this view, however, is mixed, with some studies finding little impact on spending depending on means of payment. That may be because most day-to-day transactions are fairly small.

Credit card transactions, meanwhile, have explicit costs: swipe fees, the term for what banks charge merchants to accept cards (usually 2.5% to 3.5%). This cost is often passed on to customers.

Some members of Congress are taking aim at these fees, but new technology will probably do some of the work their proposed legislation aims to do. The passage of the Genius Act means that stablecoins may replace credit cards, especially for people who don’t have access to credit. But to make them viable, customers will either have to bear some risk on their accounts or pay fees that are at least comparable to credit or debit cards.

The data also show that lower income Americans are already using electronic payments for most of their transactions. A more viable option that could disrupt credit cards is digital currency issued by a central bank.

But it would be a mistake to overlook the drawbacks of cash — or the benefits of non-cash. Cash involves what economists call shoe-leather costs, basically the time and effort it takes to go to a bank. Cash also carries a greater risk of theft. And electronic payments make it easier to track spending, which brings the promise of much more accurate inflation data than current survey methods can produce (as well as the potential for more invasions of privacy).

The bottom line is that, cringe notwithstanding, cash will never totally disappear. Like gold, it satisfies some deep primal desire for security. We humans need cash just in case things go horribly wrong and the global economic system crashes — or the power grid is taken out and our credit cards are rendered useless. According to the Fed, on any given day, four out of five Americans still have some cash on them, and nine out of 10 have no plans to give it up. That is their right, just as it is mine to silently judge them when they are ahead of me in line at the coffee shop.

Allison Schrager is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering economics. A senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, she is author of “An Economist Walks Into a Brothel: And Other Unexpected Places to Understand Risk.”

President Donald Trump’s reelection stirred concern among many that constitutional protections, including the right to marry, could be put back on the table.

The Supreme Court put those fears to rest Monday when they decided to leave it well enough alone.

At issue was a petition from a former county clerk from Kentucky who had asked the court to revisit its landmark ruling on same-sex marriage.

Former Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis in 2015 refused to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples after the Supreme Court’s Obergefell v. Hodges ruling, denying residents in her county the ability to marry under civil law. She spent some time in jail for contempt before her office ultimately complied. She was also ordered to pay monetary damages.

If Davis believed the law conflicted with her personal convictions, the appropriate step was resignation, not obstructing couples’ access to a legal right. The issue was not Davis’ faith. The issue was that a public office cannot selectively withhold rights the Constitution guarantees.

Davis’ case now dead, Obergefell stands strong. The precedent remains intact. It’s nice to start off the week with some good news.

Civil law is not the same as religious law, and if you want the government to protect your right to live according to your faith, you must protect others’ rights to live according to theirs.

Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing for the majority in Obergefell, said, “It would misunderstand these men and women to say they disrespect the idea of marriage. … They ask for equal dignity in the eyes of the law. The Constitution grants them that right.”

Yes. The Constitution requires treating people equally under the law, pure and simple.

We have long held that protections and privileges that same-sex couples take for granted — including tax breaks, property rights, child custody considerations, the ability to visit a partner in the hospital or participate in medical decisions — should not be denied by the state on the basis of sexual orientation.

Remember, that’s how it worked before Obergefell.

Dissenting justices in 2015 worried that the court was usurping states’ rights in determining their own rules. We wrote: “That may be true. But waiting for all of America to get on board is not what the Constitution demands. Our rights are not subject to majority rule.”

This time around, with the court declining to hear Davis’ challenge, no justices issued public dissent. The absence thereof is something for all freedom-loving Americans to cheer.

The court’s refusal to take up the case reinforces what the Constitution already demands: equal treatment under civil law.

— The Chicago Tribune

Construction crews have pulled a building permit to add a U.S. Customs and Border Protection facility at Holman Field, St. Paul’s downtown municipal airport.

Construction contractor Shaw Lundquist Associates was issued a building permit for the $15.6 million project at 670 Bayfield St. on Nov. 4. The land, currently empty, sits between two 3M hangars and the administrative building that houses the Holman’s Table restaurant and bar on the north end of the airport property.

The facility, spanning 4,800 square feet, will process 100 to 150 international flights per year, for a total of about 200 operational hours annually, according to a permit application on file with the city’s Department of Safety Inspections. Customs and Border Protection staff will travel from Minneapolis-St. Paul Airport to the facility for expected flight arrivals. Planning documents call for a LEED gold certified facility with a green roof.

In a written release last May concerning airport runway and construction projects statewide, the Metropolitan Airports Commission announced it was set to begin construction later in the year on a stand-alone U.S. Customs and Border Protection facility in St. Paul “that will improve processing of international passengers and cargo.”

Jeff Lea, a spokesperson for the MAC, said Wednesday that the downtown St. Paul airport receives dozens of chartered international corporate flights, and the new general aviation facility will replace “an extremely small existing CBP location” currently located within the administration building.

In July, Finance and Commerce reported that the MAC had opened five construction bids, each of which came in above the estimated $12.24 million project cost.

Construction, which will be funded with federal and state grants and General Airport Revenue bonds, is expected to include pre-processing and post-processing waiting rooms, a passenger processing area, office space, utility rooms and restrooms.

The building will feature cast-in-place concrete, mass timber columns and beams, a structural wood ceiling and roof, and a 1,000 square foot intensive green roof system. Other sustainability features include geothermal heat pumps, air handlers and solar panels.

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“The building is designed to produce more energy than it uses,” Lea said.

The project also will include new utility connections, new sidewalks, native plantings, decorative metal fencing and additional landscape improvements.

The downtown airport, one of the state’s busiest airports for business aviation, closed its primary runway from June 2 through early August for pavement reconstruction and other airfield safety improvements. The mile-long section modifications included improved lighting and surface drainage in pavement first installed in the 1980s. The runway is the longest general aviation runway in MAC’s airport reliever system.