CollegeAvenueIndy.org just learned about a legal notice in last Friday’s Indianapolis Star that announces a public hearing that will be held at 5:00 PM this Thursday, August 11, 2016, at IndyGo’s 1501 W. Washington St. facility. The subject of the hearing will be IndyGo's 2017 budget. According to the public notice, IndyGo is seeking a "special" $16,300,000 property tax levy (this is in addition to the maximum levy set allowed under IC 6-1.1-18.5-1) to cover its annual budget shortfall. In its petition to the City County Council, IndyGo suggests that it could not “carry out its governmental functions for 2017 under the levy limitations imposed by IC 6-1.1-18.5-3 7” and that a need therefore “exists for the establishment of a special tax and an increase in the Maximum Levy." Upon learning of this hearing, CollegeAvenueIndy.org examined IndyGo's 2017 budget (http://www.indygo.net/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/2017-Budget-Book_General-Public.pdf) and on page 11 noted that revenue from rider fares was a paltry $11,260,215. This works out to 6.43mil trips annually based upon IndyGo's published rate of $1.75 per fare. CollegeAvenueIndy.org further noted that IndyGo collected an additional $57,170,064 in public subsidies from Property & Excise Tax, the Public Mass Transit Fund, and the Federal Transit Fund. When you include the fares and subsidies together, the actual cost for one IndyGo fare is $10.64 (the rider pays $1.75 and the tax payer pays $8.89 per fare whether they ride the bus or not). Despite the $8.89/fare public subsidy, IndyGo will inform the City County Council on Thursday that they are running an annual budget defecit that will require the City County Council to levy special property tax on local taxpayers in the amount of $16,300,000. CollegeAvenueIndy.org notes that by itself, the $16,300,000 special property tax levy exceeds IndyGo's total 2016 fare revenue by more than $5,000,000. Moreover, the special property tax levy would increase IndyGo's annual public subsidy to a whopping $73,470,064. It also increases the actual cost of one IndyGo fare to $13.17. At $13.17 actual cost per fare, CollegeAvenueIndy.org wonders if it wouldn't be cheaper to mail Uber vouchers to casual riders and BlueIndy vouchers for regular riders. Ultimately, if IndyGo and the City consider it a successful business model to collect $75mil per year in public subsidies to run a bus line that generates a little over $11mil in fares, then they must be smoking from a different kind of pipe. And if local voters and taxpayers are seriously considering allowing IndyGo to pour another $100mil into their failed transportation enterprise to build the Red Line (which will certainly balloon future budget shortfalls), then local voters and taxpayers must also be smoking from a different kind of pipe. Click the link below to have a look at IndyGo's 2017 budget.