The MTA Can’t Steer and Row, Too : Transportation: The agency should provide the framework for an efficient system and let the private sector implement it.

The public is rapidly losing what confidence it had in its governmental institutions--the MTA is no exception. A new vision is needed for transportation in Los Angeles County. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority needs to focus its attention on providing the framework for making it easier for citizens to get around the metropolitan area, and stop the political bickering and wrangling. Government should steer the boat, not row it.

The MTA is bickering over bus versus rail service. It is in the courts arguing over whether its fare structure hurts the poor disproportionately. It is asking riders to give up the convenient monthly pass, introducing a token and a complicated transfer charge.

The MTA recently settled a strike, but did so without significantly changing the economic facts of life that lead to this year’s $125-million shortfall. Management’s relations with its unions and staff are at an all-time low, with employees lacking any sense of empowerment and motivation to improve the situation.

The MTA has become focused on trying to find scapegoats for the problems besetting the construction of the Hollywood segment of the Red Line subway. The solution will probably be to fire the most competent construction manager they’ve got, and abolish the Rail Construction Corp.’s board of directors--a group of individuals who are very knowledgeable and experienced in construction projects and who must spend their time trying to keep politics out of the project. It would replace them with a board of politicians.

The real issue the MTA should be wrestling with is how to set up the framework that unleashes the entrepreneurial spirit and drive of Southern California to achieve MTA’s mission--to improve mobility in L.A. County.

The MTA needs to take a page from what many families and businesses have had to do--namely, live within their means, drastically cut back to fit the available budget, downsize and rethink the traditional way of doing business.

Four steps should be taken.

* Operations should be cut back to the level required to match the revenues available.

* New sources of revenue or income should be identified. The public is not in the mood to impose more taxes on themselves. The only option is to charge more for the service you are providing. With the quality of the service being delivered, it remains to be seen whether people will pay more. Even if the courts allow the proposed fare increase to go into effect, it will only raise one-third of the monies needed to bridge the operating shortfall.

* New ways of doing business--ways that provide needed service at lower cost--should be sought.

* The private sector, the nonprofit sector and individuals should be asked for help to provide transportation services to people who would suffer as a result of service cutbacks.

Although Southern California has been in a recession for several years, the entrepreneurial spirit is alive and well. For example, private bus companies are eager to provide quality service at lower costs and cheaper fares. The taxi and shuttle-van industry wants to increase its market share. Many individuals would jump at the chance to own and operate 10- to 20-passenger jitneys, which would be cheaper to operate, less costly to the riders, have more frequent service and be safer.

This applies to rail construction too. The answer to the rail construction “problems” identified in The Times is not to have the 13-member MTA board try to directly manage the very complicated $2-billion project. The 13 elected officials are not expert in the management of large capital projects. Their agendas and interests and time are divided among competing priorities. They cannot focus on getting the job done that the voters have twice voted to have happen--namely, to bring a rail system to Los Angeles County.

Rather, the board should be asking the private sector to take on a greater role and responsibility to complete these large capital projects on schedule and within budget. Most other countries have long recognized that the private sector is much more capable of building these complicated projects.

Mayor Riordan and others on the MTA board have spoken of the need to move in this direction. The time is now.