News - Local News

POSTED: Thursday, Nov. 12, 2009

WTA considers asking for sales tax increase

Voters may be asked to increase the local sales tax for Whatcom Transportation Authority, after some agency board members expressed interest in putting it on a 2010 ballot.

Meanwhile, the union representing WTA employees plans to hold a rally to urge the agency's board to avoid service cuts and layoffs in 2010.

On Thursday, Nov. 12, the executive committee of the agency's board voted 5-0 to have staff return to the full board with a plan for going to voters. The full board includes nine members, so more than half already endorsed the idea of a vote, and at least one other member who wasn't there, Bellingham Mayor Dan Pike, has done the same.

"I've had 17 phone calls since this started, and I've not had one person that said, 'Yeah, go ahead and cut,'" said Jim Ackerman, mayor of Nooksack and a WTA board member. "I'm from a rural area where we don't have near the ridership Bellingham does, but I think the people have a right to vote."

Under state law, the transit authority could ask voters for up to an additional three-tenths of 1 percent of local sales tax. The agency, which is running deficits and facing big service cuts and layoffs as sales tax revenues falter, currently collects six-tenths of 1 percent. Roughly 90 percent of WTA's income is from the tax, with fares providing most of the rest.

If voters approved an additional two-tenths of 1 percent, it would generate enough money for the agency to start taking in more than it spends and avoid service cuts. When it collects more than it spends, the extra money goes into reserves, which are important for a rainy day. It's been draining its reserves down.

With a two-tenths of 1 percent increase, the reserves would climb to about $20 million in 2013. Without the increase, they'd drain down to the legally required minimum by 2012.

One proposed 2010 budget option would have the agency cut bus service by about 14 percent next year, including eliminating all Sunday service. It also would mean eliminating the equivalent of about 28 full-time employees, many of them drivers.

The union representing employees, Amalgamated Transit Union Local 843, opposes cuts to jobs and service, and it's scheduling a rally before a public hearing on the budget to put pressure on board members. The union wants to ensure "the human face of this decision gets heard," said local 843 President Mark Lowry, a WTA bus driver. "We're agitating to come up with a different solution and maintain current levels of service."

The administration is proposing to balance the budget on represented employees' backs, he said. It's been a long-term goal for everybody to make bus service attractive not just to transit-dependent people, but to people with other options, like car owners, he said. They've been very successful. Cutting service could send those people back to their cars, he said.

They'd like the board to either continue dipping into reserves to balance the budget, which carries a risk if the economy doesn't turn around fast enough, or seek a tax increase, he said.

In terms of job cuts, the administration is proposing to cut positions in departments that have seen the most job growth in recent years, said Richard Walsh, WTA general manager.

"We built it the same way we're proposing to cut it back," he said. Cutting support personnel, who are already efficiently staffed, would mean eliminating entire programs, he said. About 60 percent of the job cuts would be to fixed-route and paratransit bus drivers.

The only department that would see job growth in 2010 is information technology, which would have one of its part-time employees go to full time. That proposal has seen much scrutiny inside WTA, but the need has been there for years, especially as the system uses new technologies, and employees desperately need more support on the internal help desk, even now, Walsh said.

ATTEND THE HEARING

What: Whatcom Transportation Authority hearing on a proposed budget for 2010. The agency is considering a plan to cut bus service by 14 percent (which includes all Sunday service) and a plan to cut by 10 percent (which includes just weekday service reductions). WTA staff also will have a proposal for putting a sales tax increase to a public vote next year.

When: 8 a.m. Thursday, Nov. 19.

Where: County Council Chambers, 311 Grand Ave. in Bellingham.

More information: See the proposed budget at ridewta.com.

ATTEND THE RALLY

What: Amalgamated Transit Union Local 843 will hold a rally to support maintaining current bus service levels. The rally is called the "Don't Trash Transit" rally.

When: 7:30 to 10 a.m. Thursday, Nov. 19.

Where: Bellingham Public Library grounds (across from council chambers in the courthouse), Grand Avenue and Lottie Street.