Metra leaders must think ‘value’

If there is good news in the prospect of service and rate changes at Metra, it is that nothing will be done at least until fall. That provides a little time for the transit agency to study its options in the face of a projected $100 million deficit by 2013.

But it is very little time. And a very big deficit.

That combination doesn’t bode well for commuters who rely on the trains to get back and forth from jobs, shopping and entertainment in the city. So, it’s important that Metra directors weigh carefully every option facing them and that customers make their concerns about fare hikes or service cuts known to the agency.

Still reeling from revelations of former Executive Director Phil Pagano’s mishandling of agency money, Metra almost couldn’t pick a worse time to propose fare increases. And the size of one of the options envisioned — a 12 percent increase next year and 8 percent following that — only make the picture more objectionable.

But, for whatever it’s worth, Metra didn’t get to pick the timing of its financial troubles or the economic factors that provoke them. What matters most is that they are here now, and they must be dealt with. Even so, it’s important that Metra be extremely deliberate in studying its alternatives. It should not even begin to think about specific fare hikes, for instance, or eliminating trains until it has demonstrated that it has regained control over its purse strings.

And then, as new Metra board member Mike McCoy of Kane County said, it must show that it has installed every operating efficiency possible. Indeed, the issue isn’t cuts alone. It’s efficiency.

Metra ought to be talking now about what its mission is and about how well it is achieving it. Then it should lay out clearly why it can’t achieve its goals with present resources and how, specifically, the money spent will advance them. Put bluntly, a 12 percent fare increase in today’s economy is a figure that demands greater explanation than simply past deficit spending and increasing fuel costs.

In the words of Lake County’s Metra representative, Jim LaBelle, the agency must think more “creatively.” That term is fast growing to be a tired cliché in today’s economic environment, but it could not be more important now to Metra and its customers. We all know that Metra cannot do nothing; but we also must remember that simply jacking up fares or cutting back trains can be simplistic reactions that only hide deeper systemic problems.

Metra’s financial condition surely must be examined in the context of a difficult overall economy and a wide range of public services being lost as all governments contend with decreasing receipts and more disciplined spending. But if it’s going to start charging more and offering fewer trains, Metra needs to show that it also has some added value to bring to the table.