The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) presented the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (MARTA) Police Department with their “Gold Standard” award.  The MARTA Police Department earned the prestigious “Gold Standard” for a second time on the TSA’s most recent Baseline Assessment for Security Enhancement (BASE) for their dedication to building a strong security program. 

The BASE program is designed to establish a security standard for individual transit system security programs and assess progress in seventeen key areas. This voluntary comprehensive review of transit agency security programs focuses on prevention and mitigation efforts identified by the transit community as fundamentals for a sound transit security program. 

These categories include a review of topics such as an agency’s security plans, security training, drills/exercise programs, public outreach efforts, and background check programs. The BASE program analyzes the security program for each transit system and identifies opportunities to further enhance security.

MARTA earned high scores in each of these categories. TSA considered this caliber of performance as reaching a “Gold Standard” and recognized MARTA for having strong security programs.

TSA Administrator, David Pekoske, presented the award to the MARTA Police Department during a ceremony at MARTA headquarters. The agency was one of only five transit agencies in the country to achieve this accomplishment in 2018.