Eyeing a narrow window of opportunity for collaboration with partners in the White House, the VIA Metropolitan Transit is leaving nothing to chance when it comes to seeking federal funding for the city’s planned bus-to-airport service.
San Antonio’s Advanced Rapid Transit (ART) plan relies heavily on the prospect of federal money and received a nod from the Biden administration earlier this year when it was included in the president’s fiscal year 2023 budget.
The actual funding wouldn’t come until 2024, however, and VIA is still trying to rule out any question as to whether San Antonio will have the required local funding in place.
VIA President and CEO Jeff Arndt said Monday that the organization is paying a former acting administrator of the Federal Transit Administration, Carolyn Flowers, to help advise with the grant process. At her recommendation, VIA is asking both the city and county to reaffirm their financial commitments to the project in order to improve its prospects of being funded.
“Believe me, it’s a tough process to get $160 million, and we don’t want to leave any reason for someone to say, ‘No, we can’t fund you,'” Arndt told members of the San Antonio City Council’s Transportation and Mobility Committee on Monday.
The North-South portion of the ART would begin at the San Antonio International Airport and travel in dedicated lanes along San Pedro Avenue through downtown, extending past the Blue Star arts complex in Southtown.
It’s expected to cost about $320 million, of which local authorities are expected to cover half.
Some of the local funds are expected to come from money the city was able to put aside thanks to federal pandemic relief. The rest is supposed to come from a one-eighth of a cent of sales tax revenue that voters in 2020 approved taking from an Edwards Aquifer protection program and linear greenway trails to fund transit. VIA will be able to collect the additional tax revenue starting in 2026.
As the regional metropolitan transit authority, VIA also collects a half-cent sales tax in most of Bexar County.
Though the tax revenue reallocation approved in 2020 was directly intended to allow VIA to compete for federal dollars, the eighth-cent sales tax technically goes to the organization, the city and the county. Arndt said Monday that VIA needs formal resolutions confirming that the city and county’s shares would go toward the plan.
“Lacking that resolution, the federal government would look at the city’s piece and … they would say we can’t count that toward your economic analysis because [that piece of the funding] does not come to you,” Arndt said.
Councilman Clayton Perry (D10) said he didn’t believe a resolution was necessary and that any changes to the wording of the ballot initiative should be put back out to voters.
Councilwoman Melissa Cabello Havrda (D6), who chairs the committee, said she would work to provide VIA with whatever support it needed to secure the money.
If VIA receives the federal match, construction on the North-South line is expected to begin in 2025 and be completed by 2027.
Arndt said VIA has yet to secure a local funding match for a second segment of the project, which would run from General McMullen Drive on the West Side to near the AT&T Center on the East Side along parts of Houston and Commerce streets.
In an interview after the meeting Arndt stressed that VIA was still working closely with the Biden administration, which supports the project.
“We have an administration right now that is favorable,” Arndt said. “We are wanting to make sure that we can have that administration making [the decision whether to fund this project].”
