Twenty-nine members of Save Our Transit took their demands for increased state funding for public transit to Harrisburg on June 4th. While at the State Capitol they delivered more than 3,000 signed postcards to an aide of Governor Mark Schweiker. The postcards asked the Governor to make sure that the state budget provides enough money for public transit so that the Port Authority will be able to maintain its present level of service with no fare increases.

There has been no increase in state funding for public transit in five of the past seven years. This year will make the third year in a row that state funding for public transit has been frozen. This has put Port Authority Transit in a 10-million-dollar deficit. State law, however, requires that Port Authority Transit maintain a balanced budget. So, needless to say, PAT is in a crisis.

One must question the rationale behind a policy that freezes funding but still requires a balanced budget. Are lawmakers in Harrisburg trying to destroy public transit? Maybe some of them are. It is no secret that some Republican politicians and others with neoliberal attitudes hold all things "public" in disdain.

To balance its budget without any help from the state, PAT will shortly be forced to make substantial cuts in service and implement a fare hike. Hoping against hope that this could somehow be avoided we went to Harrisburg to demand, plead and beg for more money for public transit.

We spent around 20 minutes with the aide to Governor Schweiker. We gave him the signed postcards and he seemed impressed. He congratulated us for engaging in the democratic process and then told us to go see our legislators. We obliged him by splitting up and visiting with various members of the Allegheny County legislative delegation. All reported a sympathetic hearing but not much more.

We left for home at 4 p.m. sharp. We were 3,000 postcards lighter but still with at least some hope. We remain grateful to the folks at PAT for providing us the bus and crew for our trip.

Since June 4, however, the news has not been good. It now seems a certainty that the state budget for Fiscal Year 2002-03 will continue the transit operations spending freeze. There was a hearing on June 12 to inform the public about and take public comment on the major service cuts and fare hike that will be implemented on September 1.

It was very saddening to hear the mostly-poor users of public transit tell about how the service cuts and fare hike will add to the difficulty of their lives. Some people who rely on bus routes that PAT intends to eliminate testified that these cuts will cost them their jobs. As one sat through this public comment meeting it was easy to imagine that we were witnessing the beginning of the end for public transit in Allegheny County.

Service cuts combined with a fare hike will cause a steep decline in PAT Authority riders of choice. Needless to say a transit system needs riders. When a transit system exists only for captive riders it is usually allowed to deteriorate and in some cities it has simply been allowed to die. This must not happen here.