Bill would put $2.9B in T debt on state’s tab
By Marie Szaniszlo
Thursday, June 7, 2007 - Updated: 09:23 AM EST

Some of the MBTA’s most outspoken critics plan to pack today’s State House hearing to support a bill that would relieve the T of most of its massive debt, one reason why the transit agency has doubled fares over the past seven years.

Senate Bill 2029 calls for the state to pay $2.9 billion of the T’s $5.1 billion in debt, which according to T officials would otherwise cost the agency $8 billion to pay off over 30 years. In return, the bill, filed by Sen. Jarrett Barrios (D-Cambridge), would limit future fare increases to the rate of inflation.

“After years of fighting fare increases and cajoling the T to improve service, we recognize that the core problem is the way the T is funded and its huge debt,” said Eric Bourassa, a consumer advocate at the Massachusetts Public Interest Research Group.

Although the T receives money - primarily based on population - from the 175 cities and towns it serves, the only state funding it receives is 1 cent for every 5 cents of sales tax revenue the state collects.

In 2000, when the state implemented that formula, sales tax revenues were projected to increase from 6 to 8 percent per year, said Jonathan Davis, the T’s deputy general manager and chief financial officer. Instead, they have increased an average of less than 2 percent over the past seven years.

To make up for the loss in projected revenue, Davis said, the T has tried to cut costs by reducing overtime and absenteeism and freezing wages in the first year of its most recent union contracts.

It also has raised the public’s ire by raising fares from 85 cents in 2000 to $1.70 today for subways, and from 60 cents to $1.25 for buses over the same period.

But the T still takes $375 million - 30 percent of the its total budget, or all of its fare revenue - just to pay its annual debt service, said Davis, who plans to testify at today’s hearing.

“It’s gotten to the point where the T can’t raise fares any higher without substantially losing customers,” said Carrie Russell, staff attorney at the Conservation Law Center. “And if that happens, we’re going to see unbelievable gridlock and air pollution, and all the health effects that go with it.”