The Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority will likely have to tap a reserve fund to balance its budget by the end of the fiscal year. Metro Budget Manager Rick Harcum, said Thursday that even though the transit system has cut expenses, rail ridership has not increased as much as the authority anticipated when it approved a $1.1 billion operating budget for fiscal 2007, which ends June 30. Instead of the projected 4 percent increase, Harcum said, rail ridership has grown only 1 percent. Bus ridership is reaching its 2 percent growth target.

Harcum did not have an estimate for the exact shortfall, but said Metro’s $10 million reserve fund would be sufficient to make up the deficit.

“It looks like we are not going to be able to stay on budget by year end,” he said at the fortnightly meeting of the Metro board of directors. “We can use the reserve fund instead of going back to the local jurisdictions and asking for more money.”

Metro is also grappling with an estimated $116 million deficit it in its operating budget. General Manager John Catoe said he expects to receive a consultant’s report Monday detailing how Metro can save money.

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The board’s discussion did not touch on reducing overtime, even though Metro is expected to spend about $70 million this year on workers who put in extra hours.

An investigation by The Examiner published Thursday found that 125 of Metro’s train and bus operators, plus scores of other hourly employees, earned more than $100,000 in fiscal 2006 thanks to hefty overtime payments.

Metro Auditor General Jim Stewart told the system’s board in January that some of the $70 million the authority spent on overtime in fiscal 2006 was unavoidable because operators were needed to the handle the scheduled routes of trains and buses.

In other cases, however, it appears Metro needlessly scheduled overtime work.

When Charles Deegan of Maryland took over as board chairman in January, he found that overtime had become standard operating procedure for even routine tasks. For example, he quickly ended the practice of having an employee hand-deliver meeting agendas to board members at their homes twice a month. The work, done on Friday nights, had cost Metro $25,000 a year.

jrogalsky@dcexaminer.com