Friday, July 12, 2002 | 8:52 a.m.
The Regional Transportation Commission board approved service reductions and one outright route elimination to Clark County's bus service Thursday, while RTC officials warned that more cuts will almost certainly be needed.
The approved changes will take place in September and are necessary because of an ongoing $3.5 million deficit for the RTC's Citizens Area Transit arm, RTC General Manager Jacob Snow told the board. The package of 21 service changes included about a dozen service reductions, including shorter operating hours and truncated routes.
The one eliminated route serves Mesquite, and was identified by staff members as one of the most under-used routes in the county. Snow said the route costs the agency $750,000 a year to operate, but generates about $50,000 a year in fare revenue.
No one from the board or the staff, however, welcomed the prospect of trimming the service.
"Another bitter pill for this commission," said board member and Boulder City Councilman Bryan Nix, who will see two daily bus trips to his town eliminated in September on route 116.
Those routes with the lowest productivity "are the sacrificial lambs in this process," Nix said.
The board needed to approve the service changes now to give time to make changes in route schedules and to go on the agency's website, RTC spokeswoman Ingrid Reisman said.
Snow offered some good news to those who depend on bus service, especially seniors. The bus service will begin three "silver star" routes targeted at seniors, but open to the entire public. The first will begin serving Charleston Heights, a neighborhood between U.S. 95 and Charleston Boulevard just west Decatur Boulevard, Wednesday.
Another serving Boulder Highway is scheduled to begin July 31, and a third, to serve the Sun City-Summerlin area, is scheduled to start in mid-August.
The three routes join one silver star route already operating in Henderson.
Snow said the buses, which are smaller than the full-sized, 40-foot buses operating regular routes, are significantly cheaper to operate for the RTC.
The existing route has "been a terrific success and very cost effective," he said.
The RTC also is getting a boost from the Nevada Division of Aging Services, which will fund the Charleston Heights and Boulder Highway silver star routes.
Even those riders in Mesquite are likely to have some relief before the September cut occurs. Snow told the board that the RTC staff is working to bring federal funding to support a "dial-a-ride" service that would better serve the community of about 10,000.
"Ultimately, I believe this will be much better transit service than the one we currently provide," he said.
The bad news for RTC riders is that another round of service reductions are likely in January, Snow told the board.
"This is the first round of service cuts we are considering," he told the board.
Actually, the RTC already implemented one round of cuts earlier this year. But it will be the first in this fiscal year, which began July 1.
The service reductions will affect more than the riders. Jim Long, chief executive of ATC, the bus service operating company, warned that the company would need to cut jobs.
"Certainly we would need to trim back staffing," Long told the board.
He said a few minutes later that when the cuts would come has not been determined. The first goal of the company would be to save jobs -- which include the drivers and mechanics for the bus fleet -- through the elimination of overtime and other wage-saving measures, he said.
"We are in the process of understanding the impact of that," Long said. "There are realities of service levels."
Long, members of the drivers union and RTC staff agreed on one thing: the need for a proposed $2.7 billion tax package that will be on the ballot this November.
Frank Opdyke, president of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1637, led about 600 drivers through a month-long strike that wrapped up two weeks ago. The union had said during the strike that it would not support the ballot measure as long as the strike continued.
But on Thursday Opdyke spoke the words that RTC officials wanted to hear.
"A new day has dawned with the ATC, the ATU as well as the RTC," he told the board. "We apologize to the Las Vegas community for the interruption in service."
He said the union was fully behind the tax package, most of which depends on a quarter-cent increase to Clark County's sales taxes.
"We're probably going to lose some employees," Opdyke said. "We're sorry to hear that."
Snow told the board that many of the service reductions can be reversed if the voters and the Legislature approve the tax package -- but not before more cuts would be needed in January.
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