Our view: Area bus operations on last lap?

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Updated: January 23, 2012 4:12AM

For more than a decade there has been a concentrated effort to bring a unified bus system to Lake County and beyond.

There have been countless studies completed. Each has shown a need for fixed-route, paratransit and demand-response service.

At the insistence of local officials, the General Assembly created the Regional Bus Authority, but didn’t give it a means of raising capital and operating funds.

The RBA did its best to unite the existing bus services within Lake County — a move that would have made it a more powerful organization when it came to establishing a fixed funding source.

To his credit, Hammond Mayor Thomas McDermott folded the city’s bus service into the RBA and gave the bus operation $900,000 a year for 2010 and 2011.

Sadly, Gary refused to become a part of the RBA. That must change if there is going to be a future for bus service across the region.

The Regional Development Authority gave the RBA $4 million. It will be gone at year’s end.

The RBA is now on death row. Its last funds will be gone in mid-2012.

The RBA and local elected officials need to be a voice for those who need the service. They must identify a permanent funding source.

Funding likely will involve imposition of a tax. It can be done with the least amount of pain.

A region as populated as Northwest Indiana needs bus service. The quality of life is lessened without it. Will our elected officials act or opt for lethal injection?