The Rhode Island Public Transit Authority is moving ahead with service reductions on most of its routes later this month. Under the plan recently approved by RIPTA’s board, the transit agency will also tap into funds previously earmarked for expanding service. The changes are being made to help fill a $10 million dollar budget hole. Morning Edition host Luis Hernandez talked with Liza Burkin, board president of the Providence Streets Coalition, and Scott Wolf, executive director at Grow Smart Rhode Island.
Interview highlights:
Were these cuts a surprise?
Liza Burkin: We all knew that the board was put into an impossible situation, with the governor really not budging on proposing any new funds for RIPTA. They didn’t want to take that vote, but this showed us even more why the current board chair is the wrong choice. And the bigger picture, I think, is that there’s still time for the governor to actually invest and divert these drastic cuts that are going to affect so many Rhode Islanders. And if not, we are hoping to work with the General Assembly and leadership who actually care about riders to undo that harm.
Scott Wolf: I do find the situation overall to be very puzzling and frustrating because it’s a matter of will, not wallet, to restore RIPTA’s service to its current levels, which still are not what we’d like them to be, but at least to restore them to its current levels. If there’s the will by the governor and others to make this happen, it can easily happen and it should be viewed as a necessity for this to happen, not a nuisance.
How will service cuts impact Rhode Islanders?
Wolf: More than 40 routes in the RIPTA system are going to have some reduction in frequency of service or duration of service. So practically what that means is that a number of people who rely on RIPTA to go to work, to go to medical appointments, to go to school, to further themselves educationally, to send their kids to childcare, are not going to be able to do that at all, or not going to be able to do that reliably and easily. That’s the bottom line.
Why should people who don’t take the bus care about these cuts?
Burkin: Every single bus that’s full of 40 people is 40 cars that are not on the road. Every single person who is in the bus and every single person who is on a bicycle and walking on their own two feet is someone who is not in a car, not contributing to traffic, not competing for a parking spot. We all benefit from a public transit system that works for us. I think about parents who have to chauffeur their kids all around the state for after-school activities, for weekend plans. Imagine if you didn’t have to drive your kids, if they could get on the bus and know that it was going to be reliable and safe, the opportunity to have a public transit system that really works, that more of us can choose more of our trips for is just such a benefit.
The RIPTA efficiency report indicated there were no immediate cost-saving measures that could prevent service cuts.
Wolf: We’ve had eight, at least eight efficiency studies for RIPTA in the last two decades, and they all have come to the same conclusion that RIPTA is well run, efficient, but way underfunded. The only inefficiency about this whole situation is having all of these efficiency studies. Avoiding the core issue, which is that RIPTA is well run, but it needs more funding to adequately serve the needs and aspirations of Rhode Islanders. This kicking the ball, kicking the can further down the road is going to, unfortunately, potentially lead to a death spiral. The more you cut service, the lower your ridership. The more you increase service, the higher your ridership. If the governor and others are concerned that we don’t have ridership back to pre-pandemic levels, the solution to that is to make transit more attractive and user-friendly, not to make it less attractive and more difficult as an option.
What are the long-term solutions to funding public transportation in Rhode Island?
Burkin: There are a variety of solutions on the table. In 2020, RIPTA and the state adopted the Transit Master Plan, which has a 75-page book called Funding Solution Options that is extremely well vetted, which looks at transit systems across the country. And it really comes from a variety of different ways. There are broad-based taxes like sales, like very small increases in sales tax. That’s what a lot of transit systems have been doing. About 50 metro areas approved sales tax increases last year to fund their transit systems. There is giving RIPTA a higher percentage of the gas tax. So there’s that and there’s giving RIPTA a higher percentage of our highway dollars that we get.
Is there support from legislators to change RIPTA funding in the next budget?
Wolf: I think there is. I’ve noticed the speaker, who has been a tremendous leader on housing, I think he is understanding more that he can’t meet his goals for increased housing production in this state if we don’t have an adequately functioning transit system. I spoke to Representative Tanzi and she’s primed to fight for more funding and a more stable and robust system.
Burkin: I think there is a very strong appetite in the General Assembly to finally fixing this issue once and for all. We are very grateful that they allocated $15 million in annual funding. You know, it just wasn’t enough. It got us about halfway there, but I do think that there’s a strong appetite in the last two years of the Democratic Caucus at the end of the session, RIPTA has risen to the top of the priorities and that is no accident. People care about this. And back to the funding, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that Massachusetts is covering a huge percentage of its transportation budget now because of its millionaire’s tax. And we have a real shot at passing a tax on the top one percenters of Rhode Island incomes to cover the costs of RIPTA’s operating budget as well. So that’s another option on the table that we continue to fight for.
Correction: An earlier version of this story gave the wrong number for RIPTA’s percentage of the state budget.
