Planning a route for transit's future in Everett
By The Herald Editorial Board
The City of Everett is looking to off-load some services and their costs — services that it and other cities have traditionally offered — to resolve a nagging budget deficit that could reach $22.5 million by 2024.
In making future decisions regarding its public library, parks and even fire and emergency aid services, issues of tradition and civic pride are taking a back seat on the bus to questions of cost and continued delivery of service; that’s especially true for Everett Transit, which this year celebrated its 50th anniversary.
An idea kicked around for years — handing over Everett Transit’s fixed route and paratransit services to the countywide Community Transit — got its first official pitch in front of the Everett City Council earlier this month, as The Herald’s Lizz Giordano reported.
“Everett Transit provides a quality service; they just don’t provide enough of it, and it’s not cost-effective,” Emmett Heath, CEO of Community Transit, said after his presentation to the council. “There is an inefficiency in operating two systems.”
Unifying the transit agencies, Heath told the council, would be more efficient, resilient and financially sustainable.
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