Atlanta’s transit agency says the results of a second audit into More MARTA sales tax spending are a victory that should green-light the delayed overhaul of MARTA’s largest and busiest transit hub. 

The MARTA Oversight Committee on Tuesday released the findings of global accounting firm KPMG’s independent audit of the More MARTA Atlanta Program. 

That vetting of half-penny More MARTA sales tax spending—approved by Atlanta voters in 2016—shows that MARTA “operated ethically, transparently, and above board,” reads a MARTA media statement issued today. 

It doesn’t show that no More MARTA mistakes were made. 

MARTA shortchanged the program’s capital fund and overcharged operating expenses by $865,000, but that’s far less than City of Atlanta’s auditors claimed MARTA shorted the program ($70 million) in a separate audit last summer, which stoked heated tensions between the city and its transit authority. 

Back in August, MARTA blasted the city’s auditors for using a “flawed methodology,” and KPMG’s findings show they were correct, especially as it pertains to bus service calculations between 2017 and 2019, according to MARTA. 

Some Atlanta City Council members in March 2023 had demanded an audit of the More MARTA program for more transparency on spending, claiming taxpayers were being shorted on transit expansions they were paying for. Three months later, the city hired the Mauldin & Jenkins firm, an independent auditor, to perform an operational review of the program—eventually with MARTA’s blessing.

MARTA called the second audit’s results “a clear win for MARTA, our customers, and the future of transit improvement and expansion.”

A refined preview depicting how the opened-up transit hub could look and function. Courtesy of MARTA

MARTA also reaffirmed its stance that the Intergovernmental Agreement between MARTA and the city that governs the More MARTA program should be restructured to establish clear deadlines and decision makers, along with other changes, that would make the process of starting construction on new transit projects less burdensome.  

“In that spirit,” reads MARTA’s statement, “we would like to use this opportunity to urge [city officials] to expedite the approval of permits for the Five Points Station Transformation Project so that we can begin deconstruction.”

MARTA has claimed the city intentionally delayed the permitting process for Five Points station’s $230 million overhaul to roadblock progress following last year’s audit; city officials, meanwhile, have blamed delays on flaws in MARTA’s applications to begin work downtown, per the AJC's reporting.  

MARTA says the Five Points delays have put the project behind schedule. 

“It is critical,” per MARTA, “that we begin work to deliver this transformational project for our riders, our system, and the downtown area.” 

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