ATLANTA — MARTA is dealing with a budget deficit stemming from factors that organization officials said were due to overtime payments, lower passenger revenue, and complications from the switch to new faregates with the upgrade to Breeze 2.0.
The budget under review was for the 2026 fiscal year, which ended June 30.
The Better Breeze faregates, which remained open as the new system was installed, also had a large impact on budgeting.
MARTA Deputy Chief Financial Officer Greg Patterson told members of the MARTA Board of Directors that while the agency had expected an approximate $14 million loss of revenue during the transition to the new Breeze fare system, “the actual revenue loss exceeded the assumptions in the forecast.”
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The agency discussed the latest financial reports at a recent board meeting, saying a majority of the deficit was due to overtime payments to staff.
As far as overtime, Patterson said it was “unfavorable to budget by $18.2 million.”
Adding to that personnel payment deficit was a payment error reported by Channel 2’s Tom Jones in July.
MARTA told Jones a clerical error had led to a janitor receiving $620,000 in overtime pay that they were not actually owed. While the janitor and the staff member who had made the error are both no longer employed by MARTA, the agency is still working to get that money back.
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A MARTA spokesman confirmed to Channel 2 Action News that it had filed a lawsuit against the former employee in an effort to recoup the more than $600,000 paid in error.
The main driver of budget issues for overtime payments, though, was “primarily mechanical operations, bus operations, rail operations and MARTA police,” Patterson told the board in September. “While World Cup certainly contributed to this figure, it was not necessarily the main driver.”
Instead, Patterson said the need for additional police presence and deployments outside of the World Cup drove up the use of overtime, in addition to what he said was coordinating use of mechanics to maintain MARTA’s fleet, which “consumed overtime well beyond the budget.”
The agency said it was taking steps to perform monthly reviews of overtime in order to stay within its budget limits.
“We previously did not have this level of monthly oversight regularly implemented,” Patterson said. “But we’re looking forward to the benefits of that new process” in the 2027 fiscal year.
Capital costs, or payment for construction or development projects, were also unfavorable, to the tune of $42 million, Patterson said.
An accompanying presentation on the budget from Patterson showed overall, MARTA had to spend about 17% more than planned, a net deficit of $92.9 million compared to the balanced budget for the year.
Board member Jacob Tzegaegbe said the update from Patterson was “sobering,” but thanked him for providing a walkthrough of the current state of affairs and how the agency got there.
While asking about some of the financial specifics from the budget through the end of June, which ended the 2026 fiscal year, Tzegaegbe said “it’s a sobering number” when looking at the deficit, particularly as compared year-over-year.
Channel 2 Action News requested additional information about how they may be adjusting their budgeting to account for the costs and is waiting for a response.
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