Plenty of red lines ahead for MBTA
Agency faces operating losses next year as federal aid dries up
The MBTA board approved a draft budget for fiscal year 2023 that increases spending by nearly 8% while acknowledging a very serious financial problem fast approaching in 2024 when federal aid runs out.
“This board welcomes every suggestion on how we might raise additional revenues from any source imaginable, in order to help deal with this problem,” board chair Betsy Taylor said Thursday before a 6-0 vote to approve the draft.
The problem, the board was told, is that though money from the federal government is keeping the service on track for now, that money is dwindling fast and ridership has not yet begun to return to pre-pandemic levels.
As of April, rail ridership was about half what it was before the pandemic and bus ridership down 30%, the board learned from MBTA
General Manager Steve Poftak.
Mary O’Hara, the MBTA’s chief financial officer, said that though the budget presented does not increase fares for any of the agency’s services this year, that’s only due to the influx of $2 billion in federal COVID-19 relief funds. After making ends meet this year there will be just $100 million left, not nearly enough to cover the following year’s deficit.
“Beginning in fiscal year ’24 and continuing thereafter, without additional, sustainable, recurring revenue, the MBTA will face a series of challenging decisions to maintain service levels and the enhanced staffing reflected in this proposed and recent budgets,” O’Hara told the board.
“It’s very sobering to look at the future beyond next year,” board member Mary Beth Mello said.
O’Hara stressed further one-time infusions of cash will not cut it.
The new budget calls for an increase in spending of nearly $200 million from last year and includes over 300 new hires. About half of those new hires, 148, are devoted to safety operations.
Those safety hires come after a Red Line rider was killed in South Boston in April. Robinson Lalin, 39, of
Boston, was killed after his arm apparently became captured by a closing train door. Lalin was subsequently dragged into the tunnel and killed, according to officials.
The doors of MBTA trains are equipped with sensitive edges, and Poftak said Thursday those trains had been inspected for malfunction
and maintenance.
The National Traffic Safety Board is investigating the accident and has not yet released a report on its findings. A spokesperson for that agency did say Lalin was exiting the train before he died. Poftak acknowledged that fact Thursday and offered his condolences to the family.
The board also acknowledged the death of Peter Monsini, 51, of South Easton, who was killed while working at the Government Center Garage above the Orange and Green Lines.
Board members stressed they wanted condolences for the families of both men to be made part of the permanent record of the board.