The funds will be used to support SEPTA’s daily operations.
This week, Governor Josh Shapiro approved a request from SEPTA to use up to $394 million in capital assistance funds for dairy operations.
The governor directed PennDOT Secretary Mike Carroll to give SEPTA permission to use the funds in the absence of a state budget.
“We have seen how critically important SEPTA is for years and years and years, but particularly over the last couple of weeks, after some of their cuts went into effect, folks were struggling to get to work and wondering how they were going to get to their destination, get their families where they needed to go. Sixty-three percent of Philadelphia schools saw increased late arrivals, and 50% saw higher absenteeism. I must tell you that that really tugged at me, and in my conversations with Superintendent [Tony] Watlington, it was just clear to me that is not something we can allow to continue,” said Shapiro in Philadelphia.
With public transportation funding facing uncertainty in Harrisburg, SEPTA has made significant service cuts. The agency is facing a $213 million budget deficit.
These cuts included the closure of 66 stations, the elimination of 50 bus routes and five regional rail lines, and a 20% reduction in service on all remaining routes.
As a condition of approval of SEPTA’s request to utilize the capital assistance funding, Shapiro instructed SEPTA to continue addressing its structural challenges and to report to PennDOT every 120 days on the steps taken to address inefficiencies.
Senate Republicans attempted to use the funding source, which has been largely unused for years, to assist SEPTA. Democrats were opposed to the legislative proposal.
“Had our Democrat colleagues joined us in putting people over politics by supporting and advancing House Bill 257, as passed by the Senate on August 12, this money could have been utilized three weeks sooner – and there would have been no negative impacts to school children, seniors, and everyone who relies on transit services as part of their daily commutes,” said Senate Majority Leader Joe Pittman in a statement expressing support for the plan.
The approved use of capital assistance funding will support SEPTA for the next two years.
“These next two years will allow the new leadership of SEPTA – both the new board leadership and the new professional leadership – to put in place the reforms that they want to put in place, to be able to create the efficiencies that they need to create, to remove the duplications and other things that I think have slowed SEPTA down in recent years. So by giving SEPTA these two years, I think we also usher in an opportunity for real reform and real change,” said Shapiro.
With the new source of funding, SEPTA should be able to restore all impacted service by September 14th.
In a recent interview, SEPTA spokesperson Andrew Busch said, “It’s been a rough couple of weeks for our customers. We’ve had significant delays. We’ve had several thousand people passed up by buses that were too crowded to take them on. We’re getting into peak fall travel season here where people are fully back on their work schedules, school is in session, and we really need all that capacity out on the system. So, we’re looking forward to getting full service back next week.”
