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Daily Herald opinion: Yes, the clock is ticking: Lawmakers, don’t leave transit agencies, public waiting to last minute for budget answers

Metra Executive Director Jim Derwinski's grim warning last week to the transit agency's board of directors was in many ways a natural follow-up to RTA Chairman Kirk Dillard's Jan. 15 speech to the City Club of Chicago about a looming budget crisis. Perhaps more important, it also included a deadline for action.

“If we do not see the funding gap filled through a legislative solution by June of this year,” he said, “we will have to begin the arduous work of a budget process that involves both fare increases and service cuts.”

The transit agencies are facing a $770 million “fiscal cliff” in 2026 when COVID-era federal funding runs out. Dillard outlined a proposed reorganization that gives the RTA more authority without formally merging Metra, Pace and the Chicago Transit Authority. If it operates according to its typical practice, the General Assembly won't have a decision until the last possible minute sometime around a year from now, at which point lawmakers will be handed documents still warm from the copy machine and little to no time — for them or the public — to analyze what they’ll be voting on.

Derwinski made it clear, that the agencies can't wait that long, and they need much more time to prepare. RTA Executive Director Leanne Redden offered a similar plea last week. Quite reasonably, transit leaders want to be able to begin adjusting their budgets, staffing and schedules before the federal money runs out, not after.

From the public's point of view, a June time frame seems appropriate enough for a final decision. Importantly, it accommodates our need to assess the ramifications of the monumental changes that will be taking place.

Dillard gave the City Club some ballpark promises of what could be done if the systems were not merged but merely made subject to greater authority from the RTA. Some lawmakers want even an even more dramatic shift than Dillard outlined, calling for dissolution of the three separate agency boards and full consolidation under the RTA umbrella.

Failure to get any agreement would leave a 20% budget hole for Metra and result in a 40% reduction in service, Derwinski said. Dillard told the City Club the RTA’s plan could result in $50 million savings a year and increased services for Metra and the other agencies. Redden told our Marni Pyke the changes could mean a universal fare system, more bus and train runs and even more on-demand ride options

With both the RTA proposal and the merger called for in current House legislation, leaders recognize the importance of moving toward a more consolidated approach for managing public transportation in the city and the suburbs. But what's missing now are the specifics.

Just how would management of individual agencies be aligned in both scenarios? How would budgets be produced and implemented? Even more critical, what is the specific arithmetic to justify either proposal — or any others that may emerge?

These are questions that need answers long before June. The public has seen plenty of news about the impending crisis, and we've heard some broad-range spit-balling of solutions like that which Dillard offered. But we haven't seen nearly enough about what the numbers are going to be, where the savings will take place or how train and bus schedules will be affected.

Please, lawmakers, don’t leave us standing slack-jawed gripping a fistful of warm documents to review only moments before the transit system soars into the fiscal void.

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