After a gusher of federal COVID money, the transit agency now faces a looming deficit next year. And it’s unclear where the money will come from to pay for an ambitious improvement plan — or even the continuation of free fares on RIPTA’s busiest bus line. The person responsible for addressing all this is RIPTA CEO Scott Avedisian, the longtime former mayor of Warwick. He says RIPTA is doing a good job with available resources. But Avedisian has been under fire from Senate President Dominick Ruggerio and state DOT Director Peter Alviti, who now chairs RIPTA’s board. So what will it take to improve public transit in Rhode Island? I’m Ian Donnis and this week I’m going in depth with RIPTA CEO Scott Avedisian.
Ian Donnis: Welcome back to the public’s Radio. Thank you RIPTA has faced a perpetual struggle for adequate financial support and things have gotten more challenging due to declining gas tax revenue, is there a way to put RIPTA on track for a better future and a more reliable source of funding?
Scott Avedisian: So the governor’s office, the Office of Management and Budget, the State Department of Transportation and RIPTA have been meeting to talk about what are the alternatives to the gas tax and as more people electrify, we’re going to see a smaller and smaller, smaller yield on the gas tax each year. And so those discussions are ongoing. There are lots of models that are out there that other communities have thought about, maybe it’s vehicle miles traveled in an electric vehicle, maybe there’s an alternative. And all those things are still on the table and we’re working toward a good solution. You know, we were fortunate to get an awful lot of CARES Act money to really sustain us during the pandemic, that will run out with fiscal 2025. And so there’s some urgency to us all sitting down and figuring this out.
Ian Donnis: As you say, RIPTA, faces an expected budget hole in the next year or so of $30 million or more, has any way of resolving that been identified.
Scott Avedisian: No, that’s also part of the discussion. So whatever we do, we need to make sure that it takes care of DOT’s funding issues, because there’s three agencies that are funded with gas tax, there’s the Department of Transportation, Rhode Island Public Transit Authority, and the Turnpike and Bridge Authority. So we need to have a solution that helps all three. And so that we’re not tripping all over one another.
Ian Donnis: Has Governor McKee offered any assurance that more state money might be available?
Scott Avedisian: Well, let’s just put it this way. We have a lot of projects that are ongoing, that have been ongoing for a long time, because the state match wasn’t there. And this governor has really put in a commitment to the state match. So we just opened a new bus hub on the Knight Campus of CCRI. In Warwick. We are working on a new bus hub at the University of Rhode Island in Kingston. We are creating a passenger building at the Pawtucket/Central Falls train station and bus hub. We’re doing the East Side tunnel project that has been ongoing for years because we never had the match, we finally do have all the match. So we’re going to renovate the entire bus tunnel. So the governor has not said this is exactly how much you’re getting. But he certainly has been very willing to have discussions with us and talk about what we need and how we can best answer those questions.
Ian Donnis: RIPTA also has a transit master plan that proposes a series of improvements across the state. As usual, the big question is money, this would take at least $200 million to implement, possibly much more. Are there are funding sources identified for implementing the transit master plan?
Scott Avedisian: That’s also part of this discussion, because that’s a 20 year commitment. It won’t be all done in one year. And so what we have been looking at what is a low hanging fruit that we can do on our own through our existing budget, to make that work. But I think each piece falls into place, allowing the next event to happen. So I think the funding cycle needs to be fixed, then we need to work on what are the the federal grants that are available, and we’ve been very successful and competing for the competitive the competitive grant cycles that are out there. Hence the reason for the stockpiling of federal grants that once we got the state match, we can now do all these projects.
Ian Donnis: RIPTA is in the process of phasing out a pilot program of free fares on your busiest bus line, the R-line from Pawtucket to South Providence, it seemed like that really boosted ridership. Is there a way of sustaining free fares into the future?
Scott Avedisian: Well, we would need funding for that. So we have been looking at what kind of pilots can we do and what kinds of private entities can we bring in. So Discover Newport, which is the Aquidneck Island-based Tourism Council pays for a hop on hop off service on their busiest route all summer long. So they pay us for that service. The Episcopal Diocese of Rhode Island and the three Episcopal churches in Newport took some creation of care money that they had to fund a beach pilot program so people in the North End get to go to the beach for free. So we’re trying to build those relationships with other funders so that we can expand service. We have yet to find someone who’s going to fund the R-Line extension.
Ian Donnis: Rhode Island voters have usually been pretty generous in supporting bond proposals to pay and borrow money for various needs is there any thought being given to asking the voters to support bonding, to address some of these transit related issues involving RIPTA?
Scott Avedisian: That’s in the conversation as well. And in the mix, you know, you’re right, Rhode Islanders tend to be very supportive of bond issues. And they also seem to be very supportive of enhancements. And I think when we can show the connectivity with the Pawtucket/Central Falls, train station bus hub, and being able to go from there to TF green, and the way that that all fits in together, I think they will respond well, to those types of messages.
Ian Donnis: We’re talking here with Scott Avedisian, CEO of RIPTA, and a consortium of five firms was the only bidder recently to work with RIPTA on creating a new transit center that would move the focus for bus service away from Kennedy Plaza. Critics really questioned whether this is the right approach for the people who rely on RIPTA. What do you say to those concerns?
Scott Avedisian: Well, first and foremost, I think that we can have a better transit center, if we are able to build it from the ground up, and from the very beginning, make it passenger oriented and other amenities that could be added to that. So we’ve been looking at transit centers across the nation. We have some really positive work that we’ve done with some of our peer agencies. And so we’d like the consortium to look at what we think could be a real win for passengers, and then tell us what’s doable, what’s not doable? What works, what doesn’t work? And what other things that we didn’t add into that next.
Ian Donnis: No one has confirmed this, but there’s a lot of suspicion that this transit center may wind up in the I-195 District. Is that something that’s going to happen?
Scott Avedisian: Well, I don’t think anything is in or out at the moment, I think we’ve looked at a bunch of options. We’re in negotiations now with this consortium. So I don’t think we’ll have answers for another month or so. But I wouldn’t rule anything out.
Ian Donnis: You face criticism over recent years from DOT director, Peter Alviti. He is now the chair of your board. And there’s kind of a Rhode Island Senate flavor to the membership of your board with Robert Kells and Patrick Crowley, the secretary treasurer or the Rhode Island AFL-CIO. How does that affect your ability to execute your vision at RIPTA?
Scott Avedisian: Well, I’ve talked to Director Alviti all the time and have for years. So I think we have a shared vision as to where we need to go, and how we need to solve our problems and what enhancements we need to bring forward that will be of benefit to the people who are riders. You know, we’re back to a million passengers a month, which is really good. You know, we lost a lot during COVID. And it has been a slow recovery to get people back on the bus. But we’re back to almost pre-COVID levels. And I think that really bodes well for our future.
Ian Donnis: There was a controversy a while back when RIPTA tried hiring former Cranston Mayor Allan Fung as its lobbyist, and that did not go forward. But RIPTA has not traditionally had a lobbyist in contrast to even some more obscure quasi-public agencies and you know, that might be related to the funding struggles that RIPTA has faced. So why is RIPTA traditionally not had a lobbyist?
Scott Avedisian: I think that RIPTA always believed that they could do it on their own. And that’s not always the best path to take. Our former Board Chair, Norm Benoit, who has been involved for many, many years in a number of philanthropic groups really saw that a lobbyist who was needed and really pushed us to take that step. We interviewed a bunch of firms. And we chose Matty Lopes and his firm and they represented us well in this last session.
Ian Donnis: In your former life before RIPTA you were a popular and durable Republican as the mayor of Warwick for about 18 years. There’s been a lot of questions about the direction of the Republican Party nationally in recent years. I wonder, do still identify as a Republican?
Scott Avedisian: I’m still a registered Republican, but I haven’t really been involved since I left office. The most I’ve done is to be helpful to my successor, Frank Picozzi. I find it really interesting that Warwick is a reliably Democratic city but in the last 40 years, they’ve had two Democratic mayors each for one term. And that was Charlie Donovan in the late Joe Solomon. And now we have an independent so I think that people really do assess candidates. I think we’ve seen that time and again, where people that you weren’t necessarily think you were going to win elections come out of nowhere and steal the show.
Ian Donnis: In terms of assessing candidates, why do you think such a large swath of Republicans support Donald Trump?
Scott Avedisian: Well, I think, you know, the party has been solidly going to the right for many years. And I think he has a message that resonates with them. You know, I always came from the John Chafee wing of the party and felt very comfortable there. You know, I look back at the heyday of Rhode Island Republicans is when John Chafee was in the Senate, Claudine Schneider was in the house and Ron Machtley joined the house and Susie Farmer and Lila Sappinsley, those were the type of Republicans that I always identified with.
Ian Donnis: I’ve got to throw you a bone on your being a longtime Baltimore Orioles fan. I remember when you were mayor you used to have a Cal Ripken, Jr. Jersey in your office at City Hall. The Orioles have been in the wilderness for a long time, but they’re having a great season this year. Your thoughts?
Scott Avedisian: Well, I’ll tell you. One of the best things that we used to do when I was a page for John Chafee is we would jump on the train in Union Station and go out to Baltimore to watch Orioles games, and they were a great team then and they are proving to be a great team again this season.
Ian Donnis: Any prediction on how far they will go in the postseason?
Scott Avedisian: I never make predictions now.
Ian Donnis: All right. Probably a smart move. RIPTA CEO Scott Avedisian. Thank you so much for joining us.
Scott Avedisian: My pleasure.
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Jonathan Acosta had a good laugh this week. The state senator from Central Falls ruffled feathers at the Statehouse by wearing hoodies and other casual clothes after he won election in 2020. That was a challenge to the traditional business attire typical of Smith Hill. But now the U.S. Senate has ditched the dress code for senators. The change comes after Pennsylvania Democrat John Fetterman has been wearing shorts in the Capitol. Does clothing make the man — or the woman? Mark Twain — known for his famous white suits — wrote this about that centuries-old question, speaking in the voice of the czar of Russia, “clothes do not merely make the man, the clothes are the man; that without them he is a cipher, a vacancy, a nobody, a nothing .”You can read more about this in my weekly TGIF column, posting around 4 this afternoon on what used to be known as Twitter and at The Public’s Radio dot org.
That’s our show for this week. Our producer is James Baumgartner.
I’m Ian Donnis and I’ll see you on the radio.