Raise your hand if you were late to work last winter because of the T.
Raise your hand if you experienced increased traffic congestion because T riders
were driving to work.
You can put your hands down. You know what happened. The MBTA finally
crumbled under the weight of not only the snow and ice, but the weight of
deferred maintenance, uncollected fares, outrageous absenteeism, and years of
inefficiencies exacerbated by a law that was designed to protect inefficient
government-run programs, namely the Pacheco Law.
Hatched in 1993, the Pacheco Law quickly converted Massachusetts into the
most anti-privatization state in the country. With that came a steep cost that
taxpayers continue to pay today, both in terms of dollars spent — for example,
according to a 2013 Pioneer Institute report, the MBTA’s bus transit system
ranks fourth out of 379 US systems in highest maintenance costs per mile driven
— and the virtual handcuffing of government agencies seeking to improve
operations.
Road maintenance is another poster child for inefficient operations, and
you don’t have to go far to illustrate the point. According to a Reason
Foundation report released last year, the six New England states maintain
24,225 miles of roads, 3,662 miles of them in Massachusetts. The average annual
expenditures per road mile for the six states, including Massachusetts, is
$360,000. In Massachusetts, we pay $675,000. If we paid the average amount per
road mile, we would save $1.2 billion per year. Put another way, Massachusetts
could invest an additional $1.2 billion per year in its roads and bridges,
something everyone on Beacon Hill believes is necessary.
The Speaker of the House, Robert DeLeo, has joined hands with Governor
Charlie Baker by backing a five-year hiatus from the Pacheco Law for the
purpose of making necessary reforms at the MBTA. Senate President Stanley
Rosenberg has not supported this relief.
It is not a stretch to believe that the MBTA’s woes, and those of its
passengers, will continue if the Pacheco Law is not put aside for a while. If
it is, the next five years will prove that it is time for the Pacheco Law to
go.
