Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) today sent a letter to the General Manager of the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority (RTA), Mr. Joseph Calabrese, encouraging bold action to save RTA service.  In the letter Kucinich acknowledges budget cuts, but points out that reduced service alienates riders and forces passengers without options to stay home. In the absence of viable alternatives, Kucinich points to RTA’s suggestion in a recent policy memo that the agency operate in a deficit, which “might be the only way for RTA to formally acknowledge its status as an agency in crisis.  Hopefully there are ways for RTA to meet its budget without severing its lifeblood, its ridership.” 

The full text of the letter follows:

November 19, 2009

Mr. Joseph A. Calabrese

General Manager

Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority

1240 West 6th Street

Cleveland, Ohio 44113-1331

Dear Mr. Calabrese:

I strongly oppose more service cuts to the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority (RTA).  

Under your leadership, RTA is being diminished at an alarming rate.  I understand that our nation’s and our region’s economies are in a deep recession and this is having an effect on transit which depends in part on a sales tax.  My fear is that we will emerge from the recession without a transit system because it will have been effectively dismantled under your administration.  

I appreciate that one of the policy options before the RTA Board of Trustees is to “Adopt a budget with no service cuts and with fares reverting back to $1.75 on April 1, 2010, but with a 2010 deficit of $17.4 million.”  See “RTA Board of Trustees Policy Questions regarding Service Reductions and Fares,” Nov. 13, 2009.  I do not wish to see RTA operate in a deficit.  Doing so, however, if you cannot offer other alternatives than to continually cut service, might be the only way for RTA to formally acknowledge its status as an agency in crisis.    

Hopefully there are ways for RTA meet its budget without severing its lifeblood, its ridership.  Each round of service cuts alienates riders.  Those who have no alternatives are forced to stop going to work, school, medical appointments, or other necessary social interactions.  Those who have alternatives simply stop using transit.  RTA must stop cutting service and act boldly to remedy its crisis in other ways.

Sincerely,

Dennis J. Kucinich

Member of Congress

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