Annual Charade by Transit Panel

* Once again, our feckless Ventura County Transportation Commission, comprising members of several city councils and the Board of Supervisors, and its staff have engaged in an annual charade by dictating that no further development of a comprehensive, responsive, cost-effective multi-modal transit system will occur in Ventura County now, or in the immediate future.

This annual ritual of denial--finding that there are “no unmet transit needs”--allows the public works directors of the cities and county to divert nearly two-thirds of the state Transportation Development Act funds intended for transit development to their roads and street maintenance budgets.

This year, the Transportation Commission also decided to not follow its own Comprehensive Rail Plan by failing to fund development of a MetroLink station and service to Montalvo, in the middle of the city of Ventura, next to Highway 101. Even though the two early morning MetroLink trains that “originate” in Oxnard are actually sequestered overnight in Montalvo, the Transportation Commission would not even approve the pittance in operating funds needed to start the trains from the pathetic little Amtrak platform next to the fairgrounds in downtown Ventura.

Ventura County, the 12th most populous county in the state, now ranks 45th in transit service coverage. Of the top 20 largest counties in the state, no county diverts more state transit dollars to roads than does this county.

NEIL A. MOYER

President, Environmental Coalition of Ventura County

Ventura