Published: October 11, 2009 12:50 am      

In for the long haul

City buses serve need now, in future

DANVILLE — Even if Danville Mass Transit receives less state and federal funding in the future for operations, DMT Director Dick Brazda doesn’t see the bus service going away anytime soon.

“With the aging of the community, it’s a significant need. Ecologically, we’re important as well,” Brazda said about mass transportation.

DMT is paid for mostly by state and federal funding, but also local money. The city’s required “local match” to fund DMT is about $20,000 a year. In this fiscal year, 2009-2010, the amount is $22,302. Brazda said the annual amount was set years ago and can’t drop below a certain amount.

Mayor Scott Eisenhauer said the local funding is paid with sales, income and other tax revenues.

Some cities, where bus service relies more on local tax revenues such as sales tax, have had to cut back service.

Eisenhauer said the city’s portion is worth it, especially as ridership has increased annually from 301,369 in 2002-03 to 520,510 in 2008-09.

This breaks down into, for example, about 350 passengers a week day or 20 per run on the Main/Fairchild route of DMT’s 14 total routes. That route runs 18 times a day during weekdays.

The Georgetown route, which sees only five runs a day, saw 701 passengers in August — about 33 each week day or seven on a run.

This year has seen some lower numbers due to the recession, but additional evening routes, such as to Danville Area Community College, are turning the numbers back up, Brazda said.

The new Dial A Ride service, on weekday nights on three route portions, saw 35 passengers in August.

FUNDING BREAKDOWN

Danville received more in state operating funds this fiscal year, and budgeted less federal funds for operations.

“(State and federal money) are apportioned through various means and allocated to us (through applications),” Brazda said.

DMT is receiving $1.3 million in 2009-2010 in state operating funds and budgeted $292,000 in federal funds for operations. These numbers compare to $1.26 million and $302,000, respectively, in 2008-2009.

State funding is based on sales tax collected. DMT receives about 65 percent of its estimated budget from the funding. DMT has sent some money back when it overestimated expenditures.

Federal funds are based on population and ridership and total money appropriated annually for urbanized areas. DMT uses these increasing annual funds for capital items, and some for operations. Fiscal year 2009’s apportionment to the city was $672,368.

Other estimated annual revenues to cover DMT’s $2 million 2009-2010 budget include: $3,000 in miscellaneous fees (charters, parking lot agreement, etc.); $231,000 in fare box revenues; $1,000 for the regional maintenance center (work performed on other organization’s buses); $10,000 in bus advertising; $140,000 in Job Access and Reverse Commute grant funding; and $7,000 in municipal contracts (Georgetown, Tilton, Westville).

Funding transfers within DMT’s budget address overtime issues.

The city also has helped with other past capital purchases, such as a bus washer, when there is a 20 percent match required to 80 percent federal funding.

JARC funding has helped DMT use less federal funding for operations. But this would change if Danville loses its urbanized status after the 2010 Census. Danville lost its urbanized area ranking in the 1990s due to population losses determined after the 1990 census. An urbanized area is defined as having a population of more than 50,000. By picking up Catlin and stretching south along Route 1 to Georgetown, Danville’s urbanized area population now totals about 53,000.

City officials were surprised about the return designation in 2002, after the 2000 Census, when surrounding villages all lost population. Danville’s population was boosted by the prison being annexed into the city. The urbanized area includes Danville, Tilton, Catlin, Westville and Georgetown.

“It’d be a significant blow,” Brazda said about an urbanized funding loss.

Rural funding, such as which CRIS receives and the city did in the past, would be available.