Transform had a big year in 2025, bringing our “special sauce” of policy advocacy and programs implementation to reshape housing and transportation decision-making to center equity, climate, and community. We celebrated endings and new beginnings and continued our work on years-long campaigns where perseverance pays dividends. 

As we celebrate milestones from this year, we send a big thank you to the wider Transform community: our program partners, policy allies, and donors who power our work. The road to climate resiliency and transportation and housing equity is long, but we are light on our feet when we walk with you. 

Some of our 2025 victories were big, some small, but all moved the needle forward on equity, climate resilience, and strong communities.

Major milestones 

This year, we celebrated a huge milestone when the governor signed SB 63, authorizing a ballot measure that will raise over $1 billion for Bay Area transit. Transform campaigned hard to include provisions such as those directing all proceeds for the measure to public transit, and preserving rider-first improvements like transfer discounts and coordinated wayfinding. If passed, the measure will create a sustainable funding source for transit that will keep the Bay Area connected.

The fight to save transit from the fiscal cliff faces its biggest hurdle in 2026: convincing the public to invest in bus and train service. Transform will be at the forefront of this campaign; we’ll need your support to get us over the finish line in November.

We also helped shape California’s new Cap-and-Trade Program, now called Cap-and-Invest. We preserved $1.4 billion in continuous funding for three critical housing and transportation programs that have been documented to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and advance equity since their inception in 2014. 

Our paradigm-shifting Beyond Highways campaign made significant advances in 2025. Shifting California’s transportation budget away from highway construction and toward sustainable, equitable modes that expand people’s mobility options will be a long process. Changing public perception, moving vested interests, and transforming hidebound public agencies is a big lift that happens in small steps. This year, our campaign against expanding Highway 37 brought the folly of expanding a road that will soon be underwater to the fore and had Caltrans scrambling to justify the boondoggle project. We continue to monitor an expansion of 680 under the guise of adding toll lanes, a move that won’t ultimately reduce congestion and will increase vehicle miles traveled. And we’re ramping up a campaign to shape a project on a segment of 101 to stop Caltrans from increasing traffic through pollution-burdened frontline communities.

Our Safe Routes to Schools team works in partnership with the Alameda County Transportation Commission and continues to serve over 300 schools. We are seeing more schools embrace active and shared mobility options for students every year. A happy milestone this year: we had 168 schools registered for International Walk and Roll to School Day, including 14 out of our 15 Equity Schools. This marks the highest overall school participation in the past five years, as well as a record high for Equity School participation.

The Safe Routes team also mentored and encouraged youth from elementary to high school, inspiring and training the next generation of transportation activists.

Endings and beginnings

This year marked some major transitions at Transform. Jenn Guitart, who lifted our organization up during her time as executive director, stepped down in September. Zack Deutch-Gross, Transform’s policy director, stepped into the executive director role, carrying on Jenn’s terrific work and bringing fresh energy and enthusiasm to Transform leadership.

We wrapped up our groundbreaking Mobility Hubs at Affordable Housing pilot project with a comprehensive report that lays the groundwork for creating long-term hubs to connect residents with affordable transportation. The pilot offered tailored mobility options informed by community members’ needs and interests. At our East Oakland site, residents took more than 22,000 free bus rides with the AC Transit EasyPasses we provided through the pilot. Our webinar on the pilot and the report provided inspiration for other potential programs across the country.

What we learned from our collaborators on the mobility hubs project—the residents—guided our work in 2025. Our report and webinar, Fairness and Accessible Fares: Economic Justice in Transit, explored the ways new fare collection technologies — like MTC’s recently launched tap-to-pay — leave the most vulnerable riders behind, and what transit operators can do about it.

This year, we began new programs in Hayward, Alameda, Oakland, and Richmond — you’ll hear more about those in 2026 — to connect residents with bicycles, EVs, and other low- or no-carbon transportation options. Our creative and innovative programs team will continue to find new ways to connect with, serve, and lift up Bay Area communities.

Celebrations

Transforming the way we think about transportation and housing is hard work — but it’s also filled with joy. In 2025, we shared celebrations with numerous communities, helping people access better ways to connect with school and cultural activities.

The Safe Routes team leads the way on fun, with big and small events throughout the school year. The Golden Sneaker Contest, Bike to School Day, International Walk and Roll to School Day, and Ruby Bridges Day are just a few of the events that bring smiles to students. A huge thank you to all the staff and parents who recognize the importance of Safe Routes to Schools and lend a hand to help out.

This year, our SPOT SJ program worked with partners to raise awareness and transit options for the colorful and joyful Avenida de Altares. This Day of the Dead celebration brings huge crowds to San Jose’s Mexican Heritage Plaza and the surrounding neighborhood to view altars and performances. Transform helped more people get there by public transit, easing traffic and parking pressures. We look forward to more collaborations as we help San Jose residents and businesses reclaim civic space from car storage.

Advocacy in a changing country

There’s no escaping the fact that the environment Transform and all of us live and work in changed on January 20, 2025. The California legislature shifted its priorities to respond to threats from D.C., which meant we and our allies had to work harder to make sure California values like fighting climate change got the funding they needed. As an organization and a community, we affirmed our commitment to equity and diversity, standing strong against hate coming from the new administration. Our Safe Routes program now works with community members to help students get to school safely in a time of ICE raids on school dropoff lines, and our policy team is doubling down on our partnerships in impacted communities. 

We don’t know what the future will hold, but we do know that we will remain true to our values, even when it’s an uphill struggle.

Laying groundwork for the future

Looking ahead, 2026 will bring a continuation of many of our current projects. Safe Routes is well on its way to another successful school year. The programs team is working with residents in multiple communities to expand transportation options. We will continue our work to move California beyond highways. 

Our biggest campaign will be bringing sustainable transit funding to the ballot in five Bay Area counties. Transform is the lead organizer for Alameda County; we will be making a big push to explain the benefits of reliable, viable public transit to the voters.

And there will be new bills to support or oppose and new crises to respond to. As always, we’re in this with you. Looking forward to another great year together!