Check a box on your SNAP form to get half-price NYC fares

Fair Fares cuts subway, bus, and paratransit fares in half for lower-income New Yorkers. Most people who qualify have never signed up. As of March 2026, only about 380,000 of roughly 1 million eligible New Yorkers were enrolled, in part because applying meant gathering proof of identity, age, address, and income.

This law gives people on SNAP or cash assistance a shortcut. The city must let you join Fair Fares through the SNAP or cash assistance forms you already fill out. The Council says that means checking a box when you apply or renew. You have to agree before the city uses that information. Every six months, the city must also send a personal notice to SNAP and cash assistance recipients who qualify but haven’t enrolled. The new process must be running by October 2027. The city also has to report Fair Fares enrollment every year and study automatic enrollment across all city benefits.

Council Member Crystal Hudson introduced the bill in January 2026 as an automatic-enrollment plan. City officials raised privacy concerns, so she changed it to require your consent. The Council passed it in September. Mayor Zohran Mamdani didn’t sign it within the deadline, so it became law without his signature on October 24, 2026.