SEPTA funding crisis: How other major cities are tackling transit budget problems

We are back now with a looming SEPTA commuter crisis as we help you navigate whatever comes next. We have been getting a lot of questions from our viewers. Matt Fairley asked us what are other large metropolitan areas doing to make it work and we went looking for answers. As it turns out, we are not alone here. Our Tamila Edwards now live in studio with a look at how other major cities are tackling their own transit issues. Tam, you know guys, that's a really great question and we're in an interesting situation. There really isn't a good comparative city in fix. In many ways, we're the first to hit crisis with everybody else behind us, but other cities don't feel sorry for us, especially in places like Chicago. They're too busy being scared for themselves. I would say that every single uh, you know, large transportation agency in the United States um is facing or has faced in the last 12 months a similar fiscal cliff situation. This is true. From the recent troubles for the MTA in New York City to the crisis facing BART in MUN and San Francisco right now. But no city twins Philadelphia more than Chicago. They too have pandemic writership disruption and the loss of CO funds. They too are waiting on state house intervention in their case to deal with a $700 million hold. And they too are facing a slash in service perhaps by as much as 40% come January. So that means that right now our transit agencies are planning for all the cuts and fair increases that Philadelphia is about to roll out and they would be devastating. Chicago doesn't have our partisan drama. All its top lawmakers are Democrats. But no one wants to be blamed for hiking already high sales taxes and fairs. Advocates in both cities say the answer is a new dedicated funding source that taxes modern living like package deliveries, ride shares, and car leases. Kentucky, they have a statewide fee on Uber and Lyft. Pennsylvania does not. So, these are common sense measures uh that we can see that will raise a lot of money. What do we want? When do we want it? We have been talking to the advocates in Philadelphia who are working so hard on this and I feel like we're sister cities in this and the hope of course is that it's not disaster here that gets them to solutions elsewhere. So many things to dissect here. Okay, Tam, was there anything that Chicago has that we don't have in getting to their solution? Attitude, which is a little bit shocking downstate in Illinois. The attitude is not, well, you guys are on your own, figure it out. They seem to get, "If Chicago fails, they all suffer." Very different from here. Or some lawmakers in Harrisburg seem to relish being against Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. It's really u an intractable issue in so many ways. And so maybe this is an existential question, but how do you make any headway to turn that tide? You know, this one was kind of surprising to me. Transit advocates say we're not just the first in the nation, we're the first in the state. They say every Pennsylvania county is facing a coming transit crisis. Even though 30% of residents in rural counties, they need their public transit. So when lawmakers elsewhere say this is not my problem, they've been busy. They've been getting statements on video. They can pull up things on their iPads, their phones, or they have statements from people in their county saying fix SEPTA and fix it here. Yeah. Some of the ideas you laid out just make sense. Sure do. So hopefully someone's listening. Tam, thanks. New saints.