Warsh to leave Transit post in six months
Director raised fares,
purchased vehicles, and supported projects
Jeffrey Warsh
It is one valentine that NJ Transit Executive Director Jeffrey Warsh will not forget.
Gov. James McGreevey sent a Feb. 14 letter to the authority asking for Warsh’s resignation from the $185,000 a year post.
"There was a letter sent on Valentines Day to the NJ Transit board of directors asking for Mr. Warsh’s removal," McGreevey spokesperson Richard Lee said Tuesday.
The one sentence letter simply asked the board to terminate Warsh’s contract.
According to Lee, a variety of issues led to the governor’s request.
"It was a culmination of a lot of factors," Lee said.
Warsh will leave the job in six months due to a clause in his contract. Lee said that the governor currently does not have a candidate to replace Warsh.
Warsh was appointed to the position by former Gov. Christie Whitman in 1999, and revived the agency’s interest in the controversial Monmouth-Ocean-Middlesex rail line.
The $500 million proposal will use an existing Conrail freight line to carry passengers from either Lakehurst, or Lakewood in Ocean County north to Howell, Farmingdale, and Freehold, turning west through Manalapan, and Englishtown in Monmouth County.
The line will continue west through the Middlesex County towns of Monroe, Jamesburg, and South Brunswick, where it will connect with Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor line in the Monmouth Junction section of the township, where commuters will have access to points north and south such as New York, and Philadelphia.
While Ocean and Monmouth Counties approve of the line, Middlesex County and the three towns that the line would pass through there, vehemently oppose the line.
That project, now estimated at $500 million, is in the study phase, according to the agency.
A $4.5 million contract award for a Draft Environmental Impact Study on the line was given to Systra Consulting, Bloomfield, last summer.
That study will also look at other alternative routes including, a Freehold to Red Bank connection with the North Jersey Coast Line, and a route from Freehold to Matawan.
Warsh issued a statement reacting to the letter on Feb. 14.
"I understand Gov. McGreevey needs his own person at the helm of NJ Transit and respect his decision," Warsh’s statement said, "I want to thank the people of the state of New Jersey and staff here at NJ Transit for what has been a tremendous opportunity to lead the corporation and help shape the regional transportation system during the past two and one half years."
Warsh said in the statement that during his tenure, the agency has purchased a record 1,400 cruiser buses, 85 articulated buses, 200 rail coaches, 33 diesel and 29 electric locomotives for its fleet.
He also raised fares for the first time in 10 years after discovering that the agency was rolling in red ink, facing a major financial crisis, as noted in a Rutgers University report last fall.
"An impending crisis affecting the agency’s entire fiscal structure is just around the corner," states a November study by Martin E. Robins and Neal A. Denno of the Allan M. Voorhees Transportation Center, Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers University, New Brunswick.
According to the study, the agency has diverted some 70 percent of funds marked for preservation and maintenance of the system to operating expenses, causing an estimated $236 million shortfall this year.
"That money comes from preservation capital. Nobody is understanding the trade off," Robins said in a telephone interview last fall.
The study predicts that, unless changes are made, the expenses will exceed expected revenues by possibly $1.5 billion between 2001-2005. Warsh said following the study’s release, that the agency is aware of the diversion.
"That is a gap we are looking at," Warsh said, adding that diverting funds from the capital fund to the operating fund is done by budget officials to fill gaps.
"We must maintain a state of good repair," Warsh said.
This figure does not include about a dozen new projects being planned by the agency, including the controversial MOM line.