As the MBTA continues to try to operate at a lower cost to taxpayers, the board in charge of the agency is hearing criticism for a plan to cut service for disabled and elderly riders. WGBH State House reporter Mike Deehan has more.
As part of its fiscal year 2018 budget discussion, the T’s Fiscal and Management Control Board will decide next week if it will make cuts to its paratransit service’s premium rides, which the T isn’t legally obligated to provide.
“At 97 years old, my transportation options are already limited. If you discontinue the premium service area you are cutting the only option I may have to see my daughter,” Dot Macaione, who uses the RIDE to visit her daughter, told the board.
The T doesn’t need to balance its budget, since the Legislature gives it additional funds each year. But any costs saved by the T will go toward long term repair and improvement projects. MBTA managers are also considering privatizing bus maintenance operations they say can save almost $50 million a year.
MBTA managers have proposed a plan to eliminate the MBTA’s operating budget deficit which relied heavily on cost-savings from significant cuts to the RIDE, suspension of weekend Commuter Rail service and privatization of bus maintenance contracts.
The RIDE provides door-to-door paratransit service for elderly and disabled riders. Services beyond what is legally required by federal disabilities laws would have been cut under the T managers’ plan, totaling thousands of individual rides and saving $7 million annually. The proposed suspension of weekend Commuter Rail would save $10 a year, according to T officials.
The plans for the RIDE and weekend rail shutdown were met with a lukewarm reaction by board members in March and Gov. Charlie Baker also expressed a desire to keep the Commuter Rail going on weekends while also cutting costs.
To close the remainder of the operating budget deficit, the T entertained proposals from private bus companies to take over nine maintenance garages throughout the system. Citing reports that the T has some of the highest bus repairs costs in the country, manages say they could save 30 to 50 percent by switching to private labor.
The service cuts would have addressed a $42 million hole in the MBTA’s upcoming operating budget, allowing the agency to shift its annual allotment of additional state funding from day-to-day operation to long-term capital projects like track and signal improvements and new vehicles. But the “cut to invest” system, as Transportation Secretary Stephanie Pollack has called it, isn’t popular with riders reliant on the current services.
“Over the past several weeks since this proposal was put forth, you have heard from many about the impact of this service cut. You have heard from customers, councils on aging, senators, representatives and many more, all saying that this proposal should be removed from consideration. There is one voice that is yet to be heard, and that is the voice of our governor,” Kathy Paul from the Mass. Senior Action Council said at Monday’s meeting.
The board also voted Monday to reauthorize its own existence and to continue financial oversight of the struggling agency. The 2015 law that created the Fiscal and Management Control Board and eased requirements for privatizing certain functions granted the new board authority over the T for two years. Baker has endorsed the idea of the board sticking around to continue streamlining the agency, but the board was required to formally vote to authorize another two years term to begin in June.
