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WARREN -- The county's transit contractor is hoping a bill next year will settle both a money issue and a rider issue.
"I need to feel comfortable. I do not feel comfortable right now," said Terry Thomas, CEO of Community Bus Services, the Trumbull County Transit Board's contractor.
Trumbull County and transit officials are awaiting word from the Ohio Attorney General on whether he believes state law permits county transit systems to use funding from senior levies to pool money to gain matching dollars and offer rides to people who are not seniors with the money.
Thomas must front millions of dollars to operate the transit system. The transit board owes Thomas' company $1.7 million right now, he said.
Ohio Sen. Sean O'Brien, D-Bazetta, just elected minority whip by his colleagues in the next General Assembly, said an amendment to the state's transportation bill should solve any uncertainty about the use of the senior levy money for the rides, a practice the county and the transit board have been using for years. The transportation bill is likely to be signed in March and take effect 90 days later, O'Brien said.
The Trumbull County commissioners, after the recommendation from the Trumbull County Senior Levy Advisory Committee, asked the Ohio Attorney General's office if it was appropriate to use money from the senior levy funds to pay for rides for people who aren't seniors.
Thomas said not knowing if the money is guaranteed makes him uncomfortable entering into a new contract for Jan. 1.
"If the attorney general returns a convoluted or negative opinion, I'm out hundreds of thousands of dollars a month," Thomas said.
Robert Faulkner, chairman of the transit board, said there are plans to sign the contract any day and that commissioners said they will guarantee the money for the 6-month contract should the attorney general rule levy money cannot be used to leverage transit dollars.
The uncertainty is bad for business, Thomas said. About 30 other counties do fund transit systems in a similar way.
The commissioners dedicated $425,000 to the system, as they have in most other years, and the money brings in an additional $240,000 in grant money. The funding is about a third of what Thomas is paid to operate the system.
The issue is further complicated by transitions in the administration of the transit system that led to late submissions for grant applications, said Mark Hess, the former transit administrator.
The grant money would be available to fund everything if the grant applications had been submitted in the spring, Hess said.
The contract with Thomas expires at the end of the year. A request for proposals should have went out earlier this year, but the administrative changes delayed that process, too.
Thomas, the transit board and the new administrator, Mike Salamone, worked out a temporary contract until the RFP process can be finished.
The plan is to extend the contract until June, with the option to cancel with 30-days' notice. The contract can also be extended month-to-month. Salamone said the contract will limit billable service hours to 90, cutting back from 100.
"The bottom line is we have to stay within our budget," Salamone said.
In March, the RFP package should be ready to distribute, and proposals will be accepted for about four weeks after, Salamone said. A committee will convene to go through the proposals to select a vendor to whom to award the contract, Salamone said. Though the committee hasn't been selected, Salamone said potential members include representatives from the Ohio Department of Transportation and the Eastgate Regional Council of Governments. Transit board members and commissioners won't be selected.