Hoping to make some money-saving changes, new Council of
Governments member Anthony Botelho has asked for a comprehensive
report on the county’s public transit system, a fleet of 17
sometimes-empty buses traversing the county.
Hollister – Hoping to make some money-saving changes, new Council of Governments member Anthony Botelho has asked for a comprehensive report on the county’s public transit system, a fleet of 17 sometimes-empty buses traversing the county.
Dist. 2 County Supervisor Botelho, who recently took office on both the board of supervisors and COG, has called for a full report on the bus system’s ridership, revenue, and overhead at COG’s next regular meeting in February.
“There’s some critics in the community that feel that there’s a lot of buses running around empty and they want to know why, and I think we have an obligation to explain that and justify what we’re spending their money on,” Botelho said Monday.
Botelho wants to evaluate the financial viability of the entire system, he said. He can’t see how the 75 cent – $1.75 fares can cover the overhead of running the buses back and forth across Hollister and San Benito County when they seem to be so frequently empty, he said.
In 2004, the county’s state-subsidized public transit program averaged about 14,000 riders a month, according to COG Transportation Planner Mary Dinkuhn. That gave the system about a 15 percent “fare box recovery,” meaning the fares collected 15 percent of what the system costs to run, she said. The revenue and overhead for the system is measured in fare box recovery and not specific dollar amounts, she explained.
COG is mandated by the state to meet a 10 percent fare box recovery, she said.
“In rural counties, 10 percent is actually pretty good. So 15 percent is actually considered to be a pretty strong amount,” Dinkuhn said.
Local transportation lawyer Joe Thompson disagreed with these numbers, saying COG doesn’t follow the same generally accepted accounting principles private sector transit companies are required to follow.
“The COG financial reports for county transit are what I call a ‘fraud on the public’ because they are not prepared in accordance with GAAPs. If the reports were prepared the way the private sector has to prepare them, it would be down to about 1 percent fare box recovery,” he said.
Thompson was excited to hear of COG’s willingness to look into cutting back public transit costs.
“That’s music to my ears, and it should be music to the ears of every San Benito County tax-payer,” he said.
Robert Scattini, a fellow COG director, said he was also concerned about the amount of money the county may be spending on empty buses.
“I don’t know why you have these buses running; there’s nobody on them. If there is it’s only one or two people,” Scattini said.
The system currently runs eight routes and has about 17 buses, not including several that are waiting to be sold, according to Dinkuhn.
Steve Haro, a bus driver on the Nash Road line, said Monday that it is fairly normal to see empty buses, like the one he was driving during the afternoon, but that things pick up in the mornings and early evenings.
“It’s busier in the morning and in the afternoon when school lets out, but in the middle of the day, not too much,” said Haro, who has been a bus driver since April.
While Botelho said he didn’t know yet what kind of changes he might like to see made to the bus system, he does think some elements need to be kept intact.
“I want to look at which routes are economically feasible, which ones are not, and evaluate the different programs. We do have to have some kind of transportation system for our disadvantaged folks and our elderly folks that have need, but to a different extent,” Botelho said. Currently, the County Express contracts with senior non-profit organization Jovenes de Antano to provide specialized care for their elderly and disabled.
Hollister Mayor, COG Chairman, and Jovenes de Antano Executive Director Pauline Valdivia said the public transit system helps the organization transport seniors to out-of-town medical appointments and to and from the grocery store.
Valdivia also defended the bus system’s other endeavors, but said she was always ready to look at ways to make the program better.
“There’s always been a concern because people see the empty buses and think that people aren’t using the service. The thing is people probably see them when it’s not peak time,” Valdivia said. “But I think it still needs to be looked at in terms of how to revamp; there’s always room for improvement.”
The previous COG board revised the public transit system almost six months ago, according to Botelho, after which it was set for an evaluation.
The decision to revamp in August was aimed at increasing revenue without sacrificing rider convenience, which should be the case if COG overhauls the system again next month, according to Dinkuhn. The previous revamping mainly changed only one route and the number of buses that ran on it, she said.
“We used to have a pretty unproductive route that went in circles around the whole city. So we don’t run that unproductive circle any more,” she said. “With the changes we made in August, that was our intention: To increase our income without changing the routes.”
COG’s next regular meeting is scheduled for Feb. 17, at which the board will be receiving the full report on the bus system.
Jessica Quandt covers politics for the Free Lance. Reach her at 831-637-5566 ext. 330 or at jq*****@fr***********.com.
