MARTA could soon get more control over its own finances, although not permanently.
House Bill 264, which passed last year in the Georgia House and is now in the Senate transportation committee, would relax for several years the 50/50 split — a mandate that requires MARTA to spend half its sales tax proceeds on capital improvements (such as maintaining bus and rail systems) and the other half on operational costs (such as salaries and benefits).
The split is a provision in the 1965 law that created MARTA. But the metro Atlanta transit authority has long argued that the requirement hamstrings its ability to operate effectively, preventing it from having the flexibility to move funds where they are most needed.
Rep. Mike Jacobs, R-Brookhaven, who introduced HB 264 and chairs the legislative oversight committee for MARTA, said the 50/50 restriction is intended to prevent the transit authority's personnel costs from crowding out its ability to maintain its expensive infrastructure. He believes that aspect of the agency's management still needs to be brought in line every few years, given the authority's long history of financial woes.
A temporary relaxation of the 50/50 requirement is “better than what we had before,” said MARTA CEO and General Manager Keith Parker. “Eventually we would like to see the limitations removed completely.”
Details of how long a reprieve could last — likely anywhere from a few years up to five years — are still being hammered out in the Senate Transportation Committee, which next meets on Monday, said committee chairman Sen. Steve Gooch, R-Dahlonega.
MARTA has had similar reprieves before. The last three-year waiver ended in June 2013.
HB 264 has changed substantially from its original version, when it mandated that MARTA privatize functions such as accounting, payroll, human resources and paratransit service.
Those mandates have since been eliminated.
Jacobs said that’s because Parker has already begun pursuing privatization of some MARTA operations since taking over the job in December 2012. An independent audit conducted that year found that MARTA could save between $60 million and $142 million over five years by outsourcing some functions.
“Members of the General Assembly are satisfied with the leadership that Keith Parker is providing,” Jacobs said. “He’s doing a very good job implementing the privatization recommendations on his own.”
The AJC’s Georgia Legislative Navigator on MyAJC.com, where readers can track bills, contact lawmakers and keep up with the latest news from the state Capitol, gives the bill an 82 percent chance of passage.
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