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VRE to shuffle board?
Stafford, Fredericksburg could each pick up seat on VRE Operations Board
Date published: 12/6/2006
By KELLY HANNON Stafford and Fredericksburg could get a larger say in Virginia Railway Express operations. A VRE committee has proposed new membership for the VRE Operations Board. Voting would become proportionate to ridership, and so would the cost of belonging to VRE. Since ridership is growing south and west of Northern Virginia, this could mean a shift in power, and bearing of expenses of commuter rail, from Washington's inner suburbs to outer suburbs. "It's a big change," VRE CEO Dale Zehner said. "What we're doing is looking at ourselves and saying, 'Are we going to expand? Are we going to expand south and west?' I think if we want to do that, we have to change our agreement and open it up a little bit," he said yesterday in an interview. Today, Stafford and Fredericksburg share a single representative on the seven-member VRE Operations Board. Yet 20 percent of VRE's passengers live in Stafford and Fredericksburg. Another 11.2 percent of riders from Spotsylvania board the trains at Stafford and Fredericksburg stations. Subsidies are a little unbalanced, too. VRE calculates each locality's subsidy based on a formula of 90 percent ridership and 10 percent population. Twenty percent of VRE riders live in Fairfax, but because the county has a total population of more than 1 million people, it pays an annual subsidy of nearly $4 million. By comparison, Stafford, with 16.7 percent of ridership and a population of about 117,000, is paying $917,147. The proposal would phase out the population component. Stafford's subsidy would rise to $1,293,752 over four years. Fredericksburg would go from paying $111,115 to $174,099. VRE member localities levy a 2 percent gas tax at the pumps to pay for this subsidy. Stafford and Fredericksburg earned enough from gas taxes between July 2005 and June 2006--the most recent fiscal year--to accommodate a higher subsidy.
2% Gas Tax errr...surcharge.
(posted by
wsloftus
, Sep. 25, 2007 2:41 pm)
What I find interesting is that last year Stafford took in over $376,000 more from the gas surcharge than it paid out to VRE. Where is that money going now?
VRE Analogy
(posted by
therestofthestory
, Sep. 25, 2007 2:41 pm)
Maybe here is an analogy that Mr. Zehner of VRE can understand...Would he hire an employee that said to him at their interview that they would be late at least one day a week and in the summer maybe two days a week. That is exacly the type of on time performance VRE has. You either don't hire the employee or you fire them! In VRE's case Spotsylvania is very wise not to hire junp on a failing system.
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