(The following story by Jere Downs and Amy Worden appeared on the Philadelphia Inquirer website on February 10.)
PHILADELPHIA — SEPTA’s funding crisis appears to be over for now, as Gov. Rendell pledged yesterday to infuse more federal highway cash into transit agencies statewide, enough to delay service cuts and layoffs until June.
Changing positions on using road money, Rendell said he would ask regional planning agencies to transfer as much as $85 million to close budget gaps crippling SEPTA and other transit agencies in the state.
“I’m prepared to ask, but there’s no guarantee,” Rendell said yesterday. “I wouldn’t be surprised if they rejected such a transfer.”
Last month, the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission formally transferred $9.8 million, from highway projects to SEPTA, that Rendell had requested in December as a short-term bailout and said it was prepared to divert more. The commission, which guides all federal transportation spending here, has grumbled over such transfers in the past but has never declined one.
State Transportation Secretary Allen Biehler said yesterday that, within a week, he expected to request that planning agencies transfer $70 million statewide.
If the regional planning agency approves, the money would postpone service cuts and layoffs through June, SEPTA board chairman Pasquale T. “Pat” Deon said yesterday. “I am very happy. We want to work together to come up with a more permanent fix,” Deon said.
With SEPTA generally receiving 70 percent of state transit funding, the additional aid would fill the $49 million gap in the transit agency’s $920 million fiscal 2005 operating budget. SEPTA had threatened to cut service 20 percent, raise fares 25 percent, and lay off 500 employees effective Feb. 27. Another fare increase, of 13 percent, was to begin March 6.
Asked whether SEPTA would still raise fares before June, Deon responded: “I have to confirm this news and meet with my board and look. We still have to push the funding issue forward.”
Although a shift of federal highway funds appears to solve SEPTA’s funding problems for its current 2005 fiscal year, the transfer does little to erase the agency’s red ink over the long term. SEPTA projects a $92 million budget deficit for its next fiscal year, which begins July 1.
Taking more money from road repairs to keep buses and trains running “will have a substantial impact on the program,” said Donald Shanis, transportation director of the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission.
About half of PennDot’s $320 million annual road budget in Southeastern Pennsylvania is already committed to projects under way. That means the commission will be examining $160 million and very likely postponing projects meant to begin construction later this year, PennDot officials said yesterday.
Shanis confirmed that strategy. “It’s obviously very difficult… . You really hate to pull back the reins,” Shanis said. “These are tough times. We care a lot about highways and transit.”
Mayor Street applauded Rendell yesterday for warding off SEPTA’s latest doomsday scenario. SEPTA is restrained by court order from implementing service cuts and fare hikes as a result of a lawsuit filed by the City of Philadelphia.
The proposed use of more highway funds “is a step in the right direction,” Street said. “I look forward to working with our elected officials to find a solution to this chronic problem… and determine which of our critical road and bridge projects will be delayed.”
Transit agencies statewide have lobbied for an additional $300 million a year. Rendell came closer yesterday to meeting demands by the the GOP-controlled legislature that a permanent transit fix must also meet the increasing needs for roads and bridges.
“Any long-term solution has to include a gas tax increase for highways and bridges,” Rendell said at an afternoon news conference. “With gas prices creeping up again, this is not the time for that.”
Rather, Biehler told the Senate Transportation Committee earlier in the day that PennDot would like to see enough stopgap funding for both highways and transit to last two years, allowing room for comprehensive study, including “operational audits” of transit agencies.
Roads can be addressed by freezing for this year and next year a recent increase in the wholesale gas tax, Biehler said. That brings in an additional $230 million statewide for roads. He declined to describe a stopgap transit solution that would last through Rendell’s first term in office, at the end of 2006.
“The answer is to bite the bullet on a short-term solution. I have to tell you that, at the moment, I’m not feeling comfortable to suggest to you a long-term answer. It needs combined analysis,” Biehler told the committee.
Some Republicans took a dim view of that path.
“The mass-transit crisis is not news to anybody,” Sen. Jane M. Earll (R., Erie) told Biehler. “It has not been a priority in the administration to deal with these transportation issues.”
Rendell has repeatedly switched positions on using highway money in recent weeks, threatening to transfer highway funds early last week in Pittsburgh and then denying it later in the week, noted Rep. Rick Geist (R., Blair), the chairman of the House Transportation Committee.
“Every week, it is something different,” Geist said, adding that he was looking forward to Rendell’s annual budget address today for a definitive transportation policy. “He has got to quit dancing around.”
Rendell said that the emergency transfer was needed in the absence of a consensus with the state legislature on mass-transit funding reform.