L.A. County Urged to Pay Metrolink Shortfall

A Los Angeles County transportation panel recommended Wednesday that the county make up almost $2 million for Metrolink service that Ventura County officials, contending that their share is too high, have refused to pay.

Ventura County’s share for operating Metrolink trains from downtown Los Angeles to Moorpark is $3.42 million through 1994 under a formula approved by the five-county Southern California Regional Rail Authority.

But Ventura County officials have said the formula puts an unfair burden on the county and have offered to pay no more than $750,000 annually until costs are more equitably calculated.

To make up the shortfall, the Finance and Programming Committee of the Los Angeles County Transportation Commission unanimously recommended paying $943,000 both this year and in 1994, in addition to the county’s present $3.8-million annual share of expenses for the Ventura County line.

The entire commission is scheduled to consider the recommendation next Wednesday.

Ventura County officials hope a new formula is calculated that reduces their share by taking into consideration the fact that 47% of the ridership on the line is generated within Ventura County. The present formula is based on miles of track in each county. The 47-mile line runs about 12 miles into Ventura County, stopping in Simi Valley and Moorpark.

When a new cost-allocation formula is drafted in 1994, Ventura County officials say they will recalculate their share. If Ventura County owes more than $750,000 each for this year and 1994, they have offered to reimburse Los Angeles County for the difference.

Susan Rosales, a technical adviser to the Finance and Programming Committee, said the conflict over Metrolink costs has put both Ventura and Los Angeles counties in a difficult situation.

“The issue is how to split up the costs between the counties,” she told the committee. “Under any formula you look at, you will have winners and losers.”

She said Ventura County officials may consider seeking reduced service to Simi Valley and Moorpark if their future share of Metrolink costs is more than the $750,000 a year they are willing to pay.

Ventura County’s transportation funds are limited because, unlike the other counties involved with Metrolink, Ventura County does not collect an extra half-cent sales tax for public transit programs. Ventura County voters rejected a proposed sales tax increase in 1990.

Cutting service to Ventura County would substantially weaken Metrolink because the Ventura County route is the busiest of the system’s three lines with 35,622 passengers in February. The San Bernardino line from downtown Los Angeles to Montclair served 32,460 people in the same period, while the line to Santa Clarita carried 11,925.

In her report to the committee, Rosales said Los Angeles County is the only other county served by the Ventura County line, and so “the onus was left on Los Angeles County to make the operating budget whole.”

But James Tolbert, a member of the Finance and Programming Committee, said he worries that Ventura County might continue to balk at paying its share in the future. “Suppose they don’t agree with the next formula?” he asked.

Simi Valley City Councilman Bill Davis, a member of the Ventura County Transportation Commission, said in an interview that he could not predict what the Ventura County commission would do in the future if it is unable to pay its share of Metrolink costs.

“Who knows?” said Davis, who also serves on the board of the Southern California Regional Rail Authority, which owns and operates Metrolink. “There are a number of things that could happen in the next year and a half.”

One option for raising additional transportation funds would be to put another half-cent sales tax increase on the ballot, he said.

Davis said there is a possibility that voters will approve such an increase now that the Metrolink trains are operating and voters can see how the funds are spent.