Lawsuit claims higher CTA fares, service cuts are racist

Sun-Times:

The CTA's frequent budget "doomsdays" threatening higher fares and service cuts are the result of a state transit funding scheme that discriminates against minorities, according to a federal lawsuit filed Wednesday.

"Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr. came to prominence more than 60 years ago when minorities in Montgomery were being denied a seat on the bus," said U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., who appeared at a news conference announcing the lawsuit, filed by two CTA customers seeking class-action status on behalf of black and Hispanic riders. "Half a century later, it appears that minorities in Chicago are subsidizing all transit riders, yet still not getting their seat on the bus."

The lawsuit claims that since 1983, state operating and capital funding per rider for Metra, the suburban commuter rail service, has been disproportionately higher than that for the CTA.

For example, between 2000 and 2008, Federal Transit Administration figures show that the CTA received operating funding of 87 cents per passenger trip, while Metra received $4.42 per passenger trip. Metra's ridership is about 70 percent white, while the CTA's ridership is about 60 percent black and Hispanic.

As a result of the funding disparity, CTA riders had to pay 122 percent in fare increases between 1985 and 2005, while Metra's fares had increased only 30 percent.

Good ole Rep. Jackson! He was successful a few years ago with Metra. He referred to the Metra Electric as the "white line" complaining about the turnstyles that a passenger would have to go thru before they would be able to board a train. Those turnstyles were later removed and the Metra Electric is largely like any other line on the Metra system.

As for the states taht Metra's riders are 70% whote and CTA riders are 60% Latino and black, well CTA Tattler may be unsure of those stats however:

But I do know I'm appy that maybe this lawsuit will force lawmakers to revisit the flawed funding formula.

The CTA now receives 59 percent of RTA operation subsidies -- a figure unchanged since 1983 -- even though the CTA 82 percent Chicago-area transit users ride the CTA, says the suit. And Metra gets 27 percent of  RTA funds, even though it serves just 12 percent of area riders, the suit says.

For its part, the CTA doesn't blame the current funding imbalance on racial discrimination. Instead it says the funding formula should be changed to take into account population and demographic changes in the six counties served by the RTA.

I think in light of the money troubles CTA is experiencing at this current time, we definitely need to revisit transit funding. CTA Tattler may dispute the ridership numbers, however, the racism angle is certainly in doubt according to a legal scholar:

Even if provable, that may not be enough to pass legal muster, said Andrew Koppelman, a constitutional scholar at the Northwestern University Law School. Koppelman said the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that laws that have uneven impacts on blacks and whites are not unconstitutional as long as they don't make clear distinctions on the basis of race.

"Politically, it is quite powerful," Koppelman said of the racism argument laid out in the lawsuit. "But as a legal argument, it's a loser."

At a minimum, the lawsuit may serve to focus fresh attention on the delicate geographic and political balancing act that has tied the financial fortunes of the three transit agencies together for decades under the umbrella of the Regional Transportation Authority.

There it is again. A revision of the current funding formula of the Chicagoland transit agencies. Instead of fare freezes and doomsday scenarios perhaps we have to seriously revise the funding formulas.