Transit woes call for a lead-foot approach

The clock is running.

By July, the buses may not be.

Which is why Nassau County Executive Edward Mangano has doubled back to bidders for proposals to privatize operations of the 25 Long Island Bus routes slated for shutdown by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.

A county official said Wednesday that one of Nassau's goals is to demonstrate that a private company can manage the system for less than the millions of dollars the MTA has requested from Nassau, the only regional system that receives an agency subsidy.

But there's a better reason for Nassau to aggressively pursue other options: The county needs its public transportation system. More than 100,000 residents rely on the system to get them to work or to school. To run errands and get to doctors' appointments.

On Monday, a gaggle of politicians, along with a lone commuter, took to the microphone during a news conference, calling on Mangano to give the MTA enough money to keep all 48 lines running.

"What do they expect me to do, hitch hike?" asked one rider who took time enough only to identify himself as Ronnie before boarding a waiting bus Monday in Hempstead. "I'll do it if I have to, because I've got to get to work."

SEE PHOTOSLIRR trains and commuters through the years

So far, however, negotiations between the MTA and the county have produced no workable solution.

Nassau's problem is that revenue is tight, tighter than when former County Executive Thomas Suozzi began reducing payments to the MTA.

At one time, transportation experts advocated an MTA takeover of bus systems in Nassau, Suffolk and Westchester, a move that would tie together a regional transportation system.

But with a recession that's impacted the MTA -- along with everybody else -- it's an idea now slated, perhaps, for some distant future.

The issue in Nassau, however, needs a solution now.

Brian Nevin, Mangano's communications director, said that the county has offered the MTA an additional $6 million -- on top of its budgeted $9 million -- to keep all of the bus lines operating. But the county wants the MTA to drop its legal efforts to get Nassau to return $13.6 million that the agency had loaned it years ago. The MTA, which won the lawsuit, said no deal.

The county has given three bidders until March 21 to submit proposals on running just the lines slated to be cut by the MTA. That's in addition to proposals they have already given the county to operate the entire system.

The MTA, meanwhile, has scheduled a March 23 public hearing on the cuts, which the MTA said would take effect in July.

"We think that would give us enough time to get something going," Nevin said. The goal, Nevin said, is to make Nassau's system like Suffolk's -- where the county goes through a competitive process to award routes to private operators.

It's too early to talk about fares. Or about the potential of union and nonunion drivers -- or, for riders, what happens with transfers -- on a part-MTA, part-private operator system, should it come to that.

It's essential that Nassau keep working so that riders don't get hurt.