Save taxpayer money by consolidating transit agencies

Thanks for your thoughtful editorial on Everett’s budget (“Everett budget cuts will be felt but are necessary,” The Herald Sept. 18). We need more focus on consolidating transportation rather than reducing services, which was a suggestion.

Merge Community Transit and Everett Transit. Start with para transit. Everett Para Transit and Community Transit para transit (Dial a Ride) duplicate costs, such as scheduling, eligibility, human resources, purchasing, administrative overhead, contracting and many other elements in operating two smaller programs rather than a combined larger business.

Look inside the shaded windshields. Note how often they are running around empty. Then some of their runs overlap. The productivity must be two or three clients per hour. Many clients could get by with an Uber voucher.

We have great people in transportation. We just have been using old-fashioned thinking in managing them. With a new mayor, why not a new approach? In the long run, we will all be better off.

R. Frank Crerand

Tulalip