In December, 191 Metro trains were emptied of their passengers and taken out of service because of mechanical and door problems. That was a 56 percent increase over the previous month and does not include incidents involving ice on the tracks, sick customers or a train that was emptied Dec. 14 because of graffiti.
If this service record worries you, you’re going to love Metro’s new strategy to plug its operating budget’s holes by skimping on preventive maintenance, even as it adds new bureaucrats to its staff. Metro is facing a $40 million operating deficit, and in two weeks its board will hold a hearing asking commuters whether the transit agency should cut service, raid its capital fund (i.e., skimp on safety and maintenance), or increase fares by adding a 10-cent “surcharge” to each ride.
We would like to suggest a fourth, heretofore unexplored option: Cut Metro’s staff pay and benefits. We have often criticized Metro for overpaying its unionized labor force while neglecting basic maintenance in its train and bus system. Metro has defended itself by arguing that its operating and capital funds are separate and cannot be commingled. We expect to never again hear Metro officials repeat this intellectually dishonest argument because they are now proposing to commingle those funds, but not in a way that addresses the system’s fundamental problem. They want to raid essential capital funds to protect their padded payroll and avoid anything beyond symbolic layoffs.
Having removed a mere 25 employees so far, and having just suffered its deadliest year ever, Metro officials now want to raid $10 million from the agency’s preventive maintenance fund in order to cover operating expenses, including salaries and benefits. Metro managers would rather skimp on passenger safety and reliability than clear out the system’s deadwood and force serious concessions by the transit union.
Moreover, even as it asks riders to sacrifice, Metro is fattening itself up, hiring two new “senior planners,” one to a newly created position. According to Metro’s official job description, they will be “responsible for participation in the development of an annual business plan … identifying opportunities for future growth and development” and “defining future strategies.”
To spare Metro from hiring these supernumeraries, we offer this “future strategy” free of charge: Stop expanding your staff and forget about “future growth” until you can make the trains run safely and on time in the system you already have. Much of Metro’s loss of ridership in the last year is because of unreliable and unsafe service (especially on the Red Line). Fix these problems first, then maybe talk about “future growth and development.”
