Sacramento Regional Transit's board will be asked Monday to decide whether to adopt a larger fare increase than originally proposed last month in order to accept a smaller reduction in bus service. But that won't be the end of the discussion. The staff has asked the board to hold a hearing next month to plan for the service cuts that will be necessary in January if the district's budget picture doesn't improve. "Given the uncertainty and potential severity of January service changes, staff intends to notice all routes for elimination, so as to allow contingency planning with maximum flexibility," the staff report says. RT had originally proposed to raise $1.8 million through fare increas

"When are the Operators going to get a furlough day?" Hearing that question from one of Regional Transit's Admisistrative staffers who happens to be a close friend of mine, I had to pause and chuckle. The powers that  be at Regional Transit have taken on the arduous task of bridging a 9 Billion dollar budget defecit, and that ain't no easy fix.  Furloughs, hiring freezes, unfilled vacancies....the list goes on and on but makes nigh a dent......See, the problem lies with how Regional Transit recieves, and in turn allocates funds from the Fed's and the State. Why are we facing service cuts and possibly layoffs?  Simply put, our Operational bucket is almost empty while our Capital Bucket