Commentary - State is raiding local transit dollars

Every nonholiday weekday, 52 weeks a year, the Route 390 SamTrans buses start their southbound runs from the Daly City BART station, while their northbound counterparts roll out of the Palo Alto Caltrain station. From 5:30 a.m. through 1 a.m. the next day, the 390s are traveling up and down El Camino Real, completing a total of 72 circuits and carrying more than 6,220 passengers daily Monday through Friday. During the morning and evening commute hours, some 11 buses are simultaneously running Route 390.

Route 390 is SamTrans’ busiest line. The next three busiest — in order — are the 391, the 120 and the 292. All four run seven days and collectively carry more than 21,000 people a day, keeping some 20,000 cars off the highways. The four routes’ collective annual cost is approximately $12 million, which includes fuel, oil, parts, plus drivers’ salaries and benefits. Of that amount, $7 million is needed to cover just routes 391 and 292, with fares paying for very little of those costs. In fact, if Route 390 wanted to break even on fares alone, each bus ticket would be in the $10 range.

So SamTrans, as is the case with the vast majority of public transit agencies nationwide, relies heavily on state and federal subsidies. And in California, such agencies also rely on something known as “spillover funds,” revenues above and beyond projected income from the state sales tax on gasoline. When pump prices rise, so does sales tax income from gasoline sales.

For fiscal year 2007-08, according to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s May budget revise, SamTrans will not be receiving more than $5.1 million in expected spillover funds. That is almost half of SamTrans’ anticipated $10.5 budget shortfall for the same fiscal period. Across the hall at Caltrain, the governor is diverting some $4.8 million in spillover funds.

In other parts of the nine-county Bay Area, the governor is offering even bleaker transit numbers. San Francisco’s Muni is missing nearly $36.4 million; BART’s hit is $28.5 million. Santa Clara County’s Valley Transportation Authority is down $14.1 million in spillover monies, while the East Bay’s AC Transit is looking at a $10 million hole.

For the 21 public transit agencies ringing the Bay, the combined shortage tops $145.5 million in spillover funds.

Fuel, oils and parts aside, health care costs continue to skyrocket and transit agencies statewide are mandated to comply with newly established emission standards. At SamTrans, that means purchasing new buses, with greener technologies, at a cost of approximately $5 million in federally required, SamTrans matching funds for FY 2007-08, plus another $5 million in local matching funds for FY 2008-09. The total price tag for 126 green-technology buses is in the neighborhood of $57 million.

The resulting, logical conclusion is the people of the Peninsula could be enjoying new, modern, less-polluting buses a whole year earlier. Additionally, the argument could be extended regionally, that bus emissions could be reduced sooner for millions of people from Healdsburg to Fairfield to San Jose to Livermore.

Instead, already-strapped agencies are dipping into reserves and people are enduring at least another year’s worth of existing emission levels, rather than breathing cleaner air. Meanwhile, cash is pouring into the Big House with no end in sight, eclipsing even California’s commitment to higher education!

During the upcoming fiscal year, our youth, environment and commuters all lose. What happens for FY 2008-09 is anyone’s guess, but Sacramento has a long-standing habit of cannibalizing critical local services to feed voracious state appetites.

We should all keep our hands on our wallets.

Adrienne J. Tissier is vice president of the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors. She also sits on the board of directors for SamTrans and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission.