Executive

Waste of the Day: D.C.’s Metro Faces $750 Million Shortfall, Asks States For More Money

The Washington, D.C. Metro will be short $750 million and will likely ask the city government, and Virginia and Maryland, for support.

Published

6 months ago

November 14, 2023

Adam Andrzejewski

Washington DC Metro service area, aerial

Washington D.C.’s Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, or Metro, has received $2.4 billion in federal aid since the beginning of the pandemic but its finances are such a mess, that it still needs $750 million to break even next year, The Washington Post reported.

Ridership had fallen, bringing in less revenue than needed to run the train system. Although ridership has come back recently, the budget shortfall is still a problem, which could mean service cuts for the now-busy system.

Waste of the Day: D.C.’s Metro Faces $750 Million Shortfall, Asks States For More Money — Waste of the Day 11.14.2023 by Open the Books

Metro said in a recent report that it found $95 million in new, one-time savings in the current budget year and another $50 million in ongoing savings beginning next year, The Post reported. The savings come partly from using fewer consultants, consolidating call centers and having Metro conduct its own police training.

But the transit authority needs a lot more cash. It is considering taking between $60 million and $345 million from its capital program. Filling the gap is needed but that would skim funds off the top of the funds used for things like modernizing the system, upgrading signaling systems, and buying new rail cars and zero-emission buses.

No matter what, Metro will ask D.C., Virginia and Maryland to contribute more money.

Metro’s new report “paints a dire picture of Metro’s future if the agency fails to garner enough local support,” including having to service by about two-thirds, The Post reported.

Service cuts “would likely trigger a death spiral of a loss of ridership, detrimentally impact the region through worse traffic, reduce access to jobs and opportunity, and more pollution,” the report said.

While the newspaper reported that those “worse-case scenarios are unlikely” because regional leaders expressed support for paying for the train system, having been subsidized with $2.4 billion of taxpayer funds, Metro has a lot to answer for.

The #WasteOfTheDay is brought to you by the forensic auditors at OpenTheBooks.com

This article was originally published by RealClearInvestigations and made available via RealClearWire.

Adam Andrzejewski

CEO at OpenTheBooks.com | Website | + posts

Adam Andrzejewski (say: Angie-eff-ski) is the CEO/founder of OpenTheBooks.com. Before dedicating his life to public service, Adam co-founded HomePages Directories, a $20 million publishing company (1997-2007). His works have been featured on the BBC, Good Morning America, ABC World News Tonight, C-SPAN, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, USA Today, FOX News, CNN, National Public Radio (NPR), Forbes, Newsweek, and many other national media.

Today, OpenTheBooks.com is the largest private repository of U.S. public-sector spending. Mission: post "every dime, online, in real time." In 2022, OpenTheBooks.com captured nearly all public expenditures in the country, including nearly all disclosed federal government spending; 50 of 50 state checkbooks; and 25 million public employee salary and pension records from 50,000 public bodies across America.

The group's aggressive transparency and forensic auditing of government spending has led to the assembly of grand juries, indictments, and successful prosecutions; congressional briefings, hearings, and subpoenas; Government Accountability Office (GAO) audits; Congressional Research Service (CRS) reports; federal legislation; and much more.

Our Honorary Chairman - In Memoriam is U.S. Senator Tom Coburn, MD.

Andrzejewski's federal oversight work was included in the President's Budget To Congress FY2021. The budget cited his organization by name, bullet-pointed their findings, and footnoted/hyperlinked to their report.

Posted on YouTube, Andrzejewski's presentation, The Depth of the Swamp, at the Hillsdale College National Leadership Seminar 2020 in Naples, Florida received 3.8 million views.

Andrzejewski has spoken at the Columbia School of Journalism, Harvard Law School and the law schools at Georgetown and George Washington regarding big data journalism. As a senior policy contributor at Forbes, Adam had nearly 20 million pageviews on 206 published investigations. In 2022, investigative fact-finding on Dr. Fauci's finances led to his cancellation at Forbes.

In 2022, Andrzejewski did 473 live television and radio interviews across broadcast, major cable platforms, and radio shows. Andrzejewski is the author of The Waste of the Day column at Real Clear Policy. The column is syndicated by Sinclair Broadcast Group, owners of nearly 200 ABC, NBC, CBS, and FOX affiliates across USA.

Andrzejewski lives in Hinsdale, Illinois with his wife Kerry and three daughters. He is a lector at St. Isaac Jogues Catholic Church and has finished the Chicago Marathon eight times (PR 3:58.49 in 2022).