A Whatcom County man has sued the Whatcom Transportation Authority after a paratransit vehicle rear-ended him at an intersection, requesting the court award him damages.

The case was filed back in February but I somehow missed. My co-worker found it and brought it to me the other day.

In the case, Jeff Goode, was northbound on Guide Meridian at Smith Road on Jan. 2, 2006, waiting on his Isuzu Trooper for traffic to clear so he could turn left. A paratransit vehicle driven northbound by WTA driver Alisha Vanderveen allegedly rear-ended him. The man was injured and his motorcycle damaged, according to court documents. He had a cervical strain, or basically whip-lash to his spine.

The lawsuit asks the court to award money based on pain and suffering (both mental and physical), emotional distress and loss of enjoyment of life, physical disability and disfigurement, income loss and loss of earning capacity, past and future medical expenses, property damages, reasonable attorneys fees and costs and other damages to be determined at trial.

WTA’s attorney, Mark Lee, formally asked for a statement of damages, and the plaintiff sent this:

Future wage loss: $50,000 to $100,000
Past medical expenses: $7,067.20 (does not include most recent medical billings)
Future medical costs: estimated at $25,000
Past lost income: $1,580
General damages: An amount that the jury will determine at trial based on the evidence. The plaintiff asserts damages in the general range of $75,000 to $200,000, but it could be more if evidence shows.

But WTA, after seeing the alleged damages, asked the court to send it to mandatory arbitration, insted of going to a court trial. Lee wrote that the judge under state law can force the issue to go to arbitration if he or she determines the damages claims are for $50,000 or less. In this case, Lee wrote, the plaintiff hasn’t sought any medical help since November 2006, and the estimates of future medical costs aren’t substantiated. Also, the plaintiff claims that he had to switch jobs after the crash, but his new job pays more, Lee wrote, making the claim about future lost wages baseless.

Today, Whatcom County Superior Court Judge Chuck Snyder will decide whether to send it to mandatory arbitration.

I’ll probably wait to write anything for print until after the arbitration and the parties know how much WTA will pay to compensate the man.

Oh, and I did a court search and can’t find any evidence that the WTA driver has a poor driving record. In fact, there were no entries for her in Whatcom County that I could find.

Click here to see the complaint.

Click here to see an affidavit in support of arbitration.

Click here to see a memo of law in support of arbitration.

Traffic Talk reader Blain just asked why Whatcom Transportation Authority is planning to ask voters on a sales tax increase in April instead of doing it during this last general election earlier this month.

I’ll put together a brief timeline of info I can find about the budget process.

July 9: Board in executive committee hears report from General Manager Richard Walsh. He’s talking specifically about new technologies on buses. He said there will be more to talk about when the board holds a budget work session in August.

July 16: I didn’t attend this meeting, and I don’t have notes for this meeting. I’ll see about getting them.

August 13: Official minutes show no mention of the 2010 budget. My notes don’t reflect discussion of the budget or a sales tax increase.

Sept. 17, 2009: Meeting minutes show that WTA General Manager Richard Walsh told the board the staff is working on the 2010 budget and will present a draft to the executive committee of the board on October 8. Changes made at that meeting would be made and presented at the November executive committee meeting. The public hearing would happen in November, with board consideration of approval in December. This appears to be about the same schedule as in past years, including last year. The minutes don’t reflect any mention of major service cuts or a potential sales tax increase.

October 15: Budget work session is held by the board. A presentation is given showing the proposed cuts for the 2010 budget. Jim Ackerman is the first person to mention a possible sales tax increase, saying the voters should decide. Seth Fleetwood then asked a question about the increase. Jack Louws spoke against the idea of an increase. Mel Hansen said he thinks asking for a tax increase is premature and argues for making reasonable cuts. Dan Pike spoke in support of a ballot measure. Barbara Ryan said she wouldn’t want to ask voters for an increase unless it would mean more service. Pete Kremen said he’s not totally against going to voters, but they shouldn’t ask them in a hasty matter. He expressed doubt that voters would approve a sales tax increase during these economic times. Jack Weiss said he doesn’t think WTA should ask voters for a tax increase based on an unsustainable model. Ackerman said he’s not saying they should go to the ballot immediately, but at some point. They should dip into reserve funds for putting a budget together next year, he said. (The following is from my notes:) Dan Pike was the first to mention that he believes they should try to go to voters in May, after Jack Louws has suggested it could take a year to get to the ballot. He said it’s responsible to give voters a choice. They could still have time to educate voters that if they go for one-tenths of 1 percent, it’s not the final solution. They would have time to put together a meaningful process to give people a real choice. (This is from the minutes): The board passed a motion that didn’t mention a sales tax increase and instead asking the staff to bring two budget options forward for public comment with different amount of service cuts.

November 12: (This is according to my notes, not the official minutes) During the executive committee board meeting, after budget presentations, Ackerman immediately moves that they send the proposed sales tax increase to voters. It passes the committee 5-0.

Even with Whatcom Transportation Authority asking voters next April to approve a sales tax increase, the agency’s staff is looking at some cuts starting in 2010.

First, managers plan to cut the equivalent of 3.4 full-time positions starting January 1, simply by not filling positions that’ll be vacant after people choosing to leave. That’ll mean that starting next year, there will no longer be customer service people at the downtown station to answer questions or sell bus passes.

Also, management is still proposing to cut about $850,000 in expenses by doing the following:

1. Replace high-maintenence bus fleet: $115,000 savings
2. Reorganize workload: $215,000
3. Change laundry vendors: $10,000
4. Print fewer transit guides and change bus pass vendor: $92,000
5. Reduce professional services and advertising: $99,000
6. Long-term telecom contract: $18,000
7. Reduce IT licensing and services: $40,000
8. Reduce utilities costs: $25,000
9: Defer capital purchases: $224,000

The agency is starting from what General Manager Richard Walsh in 2008 said was a bare bones budget. The 2009 budget was already slimmed down quite a bit from the 2008 one. Staff managed to cut expenses without cutting any service. Specifically, $4.83 million in expenses was cut in the 2009 budget, including everything from delaying capital purchases to cutting positions.

Still, an employee at WTA, Mike Toner, spoke this morning to the board and urged it to require more cost-savings measures in the agency. Through his 20 years of working for government, he’s seen a lot of waste. He understands that it happens, he said.

Now is the time to keep transit going, but the board should ensure the staff spends money responsibly, he said. You have to look at every little cost and ask whether it’s something that can be put off until there are more funds available.

The fare increases at Whatcom Transportation Authority drove down ridership during October, the agency’s general manager reported this morning.

Effective October 1, WTA increased fares for a single ride from 75 cents to $1. Months general permits were increased from $20 to $25.

The results was a 5 percent reduction in ridership in October, compared to the same month last year.

Overall though, WTA’s ridership continues to climb this year. Looking at the whole year through October, ridership is up by about 6.7 percent, compared to the same period last year.

More than half of Whatcom County residents say that Whatcom Transportation Authority bus service has improved over the last five years, according to a new survey.

Over that time, the agency rolled out lots of new service, including the new once-every-15-minutes GO Lines on highly traveled arterials in Bellingham.

The survey results were released this morning at the WTA board meeting. They’re preliminary, and more detailed results will be released in January.

The survey, by Redhill Group, found some interesting things:

- 54% of people thought service has improved over the last five years
- 20 % thought it was the same
- 5% thought it was worse (the rest didn’t know)

- 51% said they’ve heard of GO Lines. 49% say they haven’t.
- Of the people who have heard of them, 42% heard they run more frequently, 45% didn’t know how they’re different, and the remaining 15% said “other.”

- 87% said the current levels of service should be maintained or increased.
- 4% said decrease the service
- 9% said they didn’t know
- There was slightly more support for maintaining or increasing service in Bellingham compared to outside the city.

- 27% of residents who there was a funding shortfall before taking the survey.
- 73% said they didn’t know of a funding shortfall
- Awareness of a funding shortfall is higher in Bellingham compared to outside the city

How do we balance revenues and expenses?
- 37% said increase the sales tax to maintain service
- 22% said “reduce service”
- 18% said increase sales taxes to expand service
- 10% said “raise fares”
- 6% said “don’t raise taxes”
- 8% said either “other” or “don’t know”

And this is the one that disappoints me a little bit. The question is: Have you heard or seen information about WTA in the media in the past few months?

The answer, only 45% said they had, and the rest hadn’t.
- Of the people who had heard or read something, 13% heard revenues are down, 37% heard service may be cut, 28% said “other” and 31% said they didn’t recall what they heard.

Our daily audience is right about 60,000 people a day, and I’d hoped that more people would be aware of what’s happening at WTA.

The survey, which is ongoing, has so far contacted 739 people between Nov. 4 and Nov. 18. The overall sample yields accuracy of plus or minus 3.5% at the 95% confidence level. As I understand it, that means that if you were to do the survey 100 times, in 95 instances the results wouldn’t vary by more than 3.5 percent.

Click here to see the survey summary.

The Whatcom Transportation Authority board voted to ask voter next year to consider approving a sales tax increase of two-tenths of 1 percent.

The board voted 6-2, with board members Mel Hansen and Jack Louws opposed, to send the request to voters. Board member Pete Kremen was absent.

The board made some changes to the staff’s proposal, including sending it to the ballot in April, not in August. The board wanted to get an answer earlier so it could decide earlier whether to cut expenses by cutting service or not. It also wanted to run the ballot when Western Washingon University students would most likely be able to vote.

Along with that, the board decided to make the tax increases, if approved, effective Oct. 1, 2010, instead of Jan. 1, 2011.

If the ballot meaure fails, WTA will be able to make service cuts in the fall and save about $400,000 next year. If it passes, then the sales tax boost would also take effect in the fall and yield the agency more than $1 million more next year. Those numbers came from Patricia Dunn, WTA’s finance director.

Dan Pike made a motion to have the tax increase, if approved, sunset after six years. His thinking is that the agency is seeing some kind of structural problem where costs keep outpacing revenues. Even with the increase, it’s expected that WTA would have to come forward again in the future and ask for more.

He wanted to have the tax increase be temporary to buy time for WTA to go through and make structural changes. Having it sunset keeps the agency’s feet to the fire, as opposed to a permenent increase.

Also, he said, the agency is responding to a financial crisis situation, and that’s not a good environment in which to make permenent decisions.

The motion failed in a 6-2 vote, with only Pike and Jim Ackerman supporting it.

What do you think?

Roughly three dozen people rallied today near the county courthouse to support retaining service at Whatcom Transportation Authority.

Mark Lowry, president of the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 843, said he was pleased with the turnout, especially considering the weather. It was chilly and drizzly this morning.

He was pleased that not only members of his union showed up to rally, but other residents did, too.

“I’m pleased to see people I don’t know here,” he said, as he was holding a sign that read “Keep transit rolling.” “I think there are people here that just use the system and they’re concerned about the potential loss of services.”

People held signs while playing disco music and joked, which was in sharp contrast to a drab morning of the time.

Inside the chambers, I would say there are about 60 or so people, which is more than I’ve ever seen at a WTA meeting (I’ve been here for just over three years now). By far, the majority of people are arguing against a reduction of service in the 2010 budget and pushing for sending the request for a sales tax increase of two-tenths of 1 percent to the voters.

WTA is considering a couple of 2010 budget options, with one cutting service by 14 percent next year and another one by 10 percent.

WTA staff recommended putting the sales tax increase on the August primary election ballot, but a couple of officials from Western Washington University student government asked that it go on the November ballot so more college students will get a chance to vote on it.

They’re still taking testimony right now, after about an hour and a half of testimony, but it appears to be wrapping up soon.

There are eight of nine WTA board members here today, with Pete Kremen absent.

Curious how much more efficient Whatcom Transportation Authority’s new buses are compared to the agency’s 14-year-old ones?

In terms of fuel usage per mile, they’re 14 percent more efficient.

Here are some more stats comparing the buses:

Whatcom Transportation Authority staff have suggested asking voters for a two-tenths of 1 percent sales tax increase to stave off agency service cuts and layoffs.

The WTA board’s executive committee last week asked the staff to bring a proposal to the full board. The full board will decide on Thursday whether to ask voters to approve the sales tax increase, which would yield the agency about $6 million more per year.

The staff recommended two-tenths of 1 percent, although the agency could ask voters to approve up to another three-tenths of 1 percent, under state law. The staff is also recommending putting on the August primary election ballot. It’ll cost between $20,000 and $30,000 to put it on that ballot, as opposed to about $110,000 to $120,000 to put it to a vote in February or May, according to a staff report.

The board will hold a hearing tomorrow morning on budget options for 2010, one of which includes a 14 percent service cut. It would mean cutting all Sunday service and some weekday service, as well as cutting abotu 28 full-time equivalent positions, most of them drivers.

A second budget option is to cut week day service, but leave the Sunday service. That would be the equivalent to a 10 percent cut.

A third option, of course, is to hold off on cuts until after voters decide next year.

The hearing is scheduled for 8 a.m. in County Council Chambers, 311 Grand Ave. in Bellingham. A rally sponsored by the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 843 will take place at the same time across the street at the library grounds. It starts at 7:30 a.m. The union opposes the service cuts and layoff and supports either raising the sales tax or dipping into reserves further.

What do you think?

Click here to see more information in the WTA staff packet.

The other day I created an Excel document showing the growth and retraction of Whatcom Transportation Authority’s jobs since 2005.

You can draw a lot of conclusions by looking at the data. Here are just a few that jumped out at me:

1. In terms of percentage growth, the information technology department has seen very high levels of growth, and it’s the only department that the draft 2010 budget would add FTE next year. It would have a part-time help desk person became a full-time person.

2. This year, nearly 9 in 10 WTA employees works either in the operations division or fleet and facilities division. The operations division is where drivers and dispatchers work, among others. Fleet and facilities includes vehicle maintenence personnel, as well as route maintenence people, among others.

3. WTA has been slowly losing employees since 2008, when it peaked at 242.75 full-time equivalent employees.

4. Under a draft 2010 budget, the largest number of employee that would lose their jobs would be in the operations division. It would lose 22.5 people.

5. In terms of percentage cut, the finance division would lose the largest percentage of jobs next year, in the draft budget. It would lose 2.5 people.

I pulled the full-time equivalent data from past budgets of the WTA. I tried to use the previous year’s data, assuming it might be more accurate than the budget year’s. For example, I figured out how many people WTA had in each department in 2005 by looking at the 2006 budget, and so on.

It was also a bit tricky because they moved some employees around a little bit under different departments.

Click here to see the file. I tried to go through this pretty carefully, but please let me know if you find any errors and I’ll make sure to fix them.