Massachusetts Senate Minority Leader Bruce Tarr gathered his fellow Republican Senators to push their MBTA reforms, a plan that looks a lot like the plan Governor Charlie Baker is pushing including a move away from the anti-privatization law and the creation of a Fiscal Control Board.
Senate Republicans feel emboldened following the release of a new automated poll that shows 84 percent are behind Bakers plan, a fiscal control board is a key element of both the Senate Republicans and the Governor's proposals, but it's going to be a hard sell given that both the House and Senate Transportation Committee chairs and the Senate President have said they are not behind it.
They say Baker's fiscal control board would add to the state's transportation bureaucracy, though Tarr points out the Senate's plan increases the MassDOT Board.
"It creates an irony in folks that are suggesting we don't need a new bureaucracy, that they're trying to increase the existing bureaucracy," Tarr said.
Republican Senators hope to convince their Democratic colleagues of the merits of a Fiscal Control board, a 22-year Senate veteran Robert Hedlund says he has more hope this year than he has under previous, more controlling senate leadership.
"One of the great things about the current Senate President is he has viewed himself more as the presiding officer and not someone who is directing his members to vote in a particular way," he said.
Earlier in the day, Baker met with three MBTA commuters who shared their experience on the T this past winter and what they would like to see going forward.
