MTA Unveils $2.5-Billion Budget Plan

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority on Thursday released a proposed $2.5-billion budget for the next fiscal year that would fully fund operation of the Metro Rail subway to North Hollywood and the start of rapid bus lines from the Westside to the Eastside and across the San Fernando Valley.

For the first time in two years, the draft spending plan being offered by MTA Chief Executive Officer Julian Burke does not assume an increase in bus and rail fares. Burke abandoned two previous efforts to raise fares when the MTA declined to support them.

The spending package, which is only slightly larger than the current budget, allocates less money to rail construction because the last six miles of the subway from Hollywood to the Valley will be finished when service begins June 24.

The rapid bus service, with fewer stops spaced farther apart, is scheduled to start on the same day along Ventura Boulevard in the Valley and along the Wilshire Boulevard and Whittier Boulevard corridors.

With the subway building program winding down, the budget devotes more money to bus and rail service, to replacing more of MTA’s breakdown-prone older buses with new ones, and to covering higher payments on the agency’s debt.

What the budget does not include is money to comply with Chief U.S. District Judge Terry J. Hatter Jr.’s order to buy 248 additional buses to reduce overcrowding. The MTA this week asked the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals to overturn the order, charging that Hatter exceeded his authority when he issued it.

The order has been stayed pending the MTA’s appeal. “We’re assuming the stay is in effect for the entire year,” said MTA’s Chief Financial Officer Richard Brumbaugh.

Also absent from the budget are funds for raises above a 2.7% cost of living increase for 6,760 MTA workers whose union contracts expire at the end of June. “That’s one of the risks we have built into the budget,” Brumbaugh said.

And the spending plan does not include increased state funds for Los Angeles rail and bus projects proposed by Gov. Gray Davis because of uncertainty about future actions by the Legislature and the voters. Brumbaugh said the budget could be increased later, if the additional funds become available for busway and light rail projects and purchase of additional buses from the state budget surplus and a statewide bond issue.

MTA chief Burke said in a statement that the proposed budget “marks another turning point for the MTA. For the past three years, we have focused on putting our house in order,” he said. “Having substantially accomplished that, we can now concentrate on delivering and expanding programs and services that will improve mobility for our public transit customers and everyone else in Los Angeles County who depend on MTA.”

But to Bus Riders Union leader Eric Mann, the MTA’s refusal to include funding for the buses ordered by Judge Hatter represents a continuation of the transit agency’s refusal to abide by the consent decree it signed to settle a federal civil rights case brought by organized bus riders. “The Bus Riders Union needs the support of the federal courts,” he said.

Mann did, however, see the absence of a proposed fare increase as a victory since the last two proposed budgets were built on the assumption of higher fares. The basic fare would remain $1.35 with discount tokens and passes also available.

Burke said a fare increase may still be necessary if the MTA’s operating costs, which have been declining, should rise, or if the growth in the county’s transit sales tax falls short of projections.

The budget covers operation of the entire 17.4-mile subway system from downtown Los Angeles through Hollywood to the Valley, plus the addition of two-car trains during peak periods on the Norwalk to El Segundo Green Line, and construction of longer station platforms on the Los Angeles to Long Beach Blue Line. The Blue Line project will increase capacity on the route by allowing operation of longer three-car trains.

The distinctive red and white rapid buses will traverse the Valley from Warner Center to Universal City via Ventura Boulevard, beginning late next month. The new vehicles also will run along Wilshire Boulevard from Santa Monica to downtown Los Angeles and continue to Montebello primarily via Whittier Boulevard. The buses are equipped with electronic devices to keep traffic lights green to speed their movement along the routes.

With the addition of 502 new natural gas-powered buses during the next fiscal year, more than half of MTA’s fleet will be powered by the clean-burning fuel.

Payments on the MTA’s debt, which is primarily from construction of the rail lines, would require 13.4% of the budget, or $343.1 million, in the coming fiscal year that starts July 1.

The MTA board has scheduled a budget workshop for Monday at 9 a.m. and a public hearing on the spending plan on May 18 at 9 a.m. Both meetings will be held at the agency’s headquarters.

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Where the MTA Money Would Go

Next year’s proposed $2.55- billion budget for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority includes funding to extend the Metro Rail subway to North Hollywood and start rapid bus service across the San Fernando Valley and between the Westside and the Eastside. The budget does not assume an increase in bus and rail fares.

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MTA buses: 37.0%

Highway and other uses: 20.8%

MTA rail: 18.8%

Debt service: 13.4%

Municipal bus operators: 8.5%

Metrolink rail service: 1.4%

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Note: Figures do not total 100% because of rounding.

Source: MTA