Boston leaflet against MBTA fare hike and service cuts

In January 2012, the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) which serves Boston and the surrounding area proposed two possible plans to eliminate the estimated $185 million deficit it will face this coming year. Both proposals involved 30-40% fare increases, with one proposal including more service cuts than the other.  The unelected MBTA board presented these proposals, and said, "there is no other option." Yet the MBTA pays twice its deficit in debt servicing. This has stirred up anger in working class communities, among youth, and among senior citizens. 

The cuts in public transportation are the main attack on the working class in eastern Massachusetts right now and the Occupy movement is in the process of organizing a fightback.  Socialist Alternative is using this leaflet to argue for coordinated actions across the area, including tactics of mass non-payment to build a movement involving unions as a strategy that could win this fight.
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The MBTA board states that 30% of its yearly budget goes to debt servicing. This debt was created by the Massachusetts legislature, dominated by Democratic Party politicians, during the Big Dig when the MBTA was legally mandated to upgrade stations and was given no Big Dig money to do it, instead being forced into massive debt.

In 2000, the State Legislature stopped funding the MBTA directly from the State budget, instead relying on fare increases and a portion of the sales tax - both are taxes on the working people who use public transit! Somehow they called this “Forward Funding.”

Now the MBTA board wants to eliminate bus routes, eliminate weekend service for the commuter rail, Mattapan line and E-line, eliminate The Ride (a service that many elderly and disabled people need to go about their daily routine), make the subway more dangerous by going to one conductor per train instead of two, and, in this terrible economy, eliminate over 500 good union jobs!

These cuts will hurt all working people. We should not be made to pay for the greed and short-sightedness of the corporate-dominated MBTA Board and State Legislature. Corporations and private universities could not exist without public transportation bringing their workforces to and from work on time every day, including weekends. Many corporations already pay nothing in taxes. The big universities, including Harvard, the richest university in the world, are "non-profits" and pay no taxes. The universities, who could not operate without T service, should drastically increase "in kind" payments in lieu of taxes. This would create added revenue that could expand T service and lower fares.

In order to defeat the fare hikes and service cuts, we will need to build a movement that reaches out into all affected communities. We need to do "Mic Checks" on morning and evening commutes - on the subway, commuter rail, and buses. All unions should join to fight this attack on working people, especially the MBTA unions. We should reach out to elderly communities who would have to pay the largest percentage fare increases.

Socialist Alternative calls for the building of an organized mass day of non-payment as one part of a movement which should target the State Capitol and its appointed MBTA board. A coordinated movement of rallies and non-payment actions should consider running independent candidates against the democrats who have created, and refuse to fix this mess. We need to put massive pressure on Beacon Hill to consider other options such as use of the State’s “Rainy Day Fund,” taxing the corporations and private universities, bringing T funding back into the State budget and other alternatives that would not further erode the T and our living standards.

We Say:

• No Fare Hike, No Service Cuts, No MBTA Layoffs!
• Organize mass demonstrations that include mass civil disobedience by non-payment. Politicians on Beacon Hill are to blame for the debt, we should hold them accountable.
• Repeal the “Forward Funding” law! Bring the MBTA back into the regular State budget as it was before 2000.
• Fund public transportation by taxing the big corporations and rich private universities.
Fund the contracts of the union MBTA workers, our communities need more jobs, not less.
• Set elections for the MBTA board within a month. All positions should be elected and subject to recall.
• For an extension of MBTA hours and services to create more union, living-wage jobs!