Why is TriMet buying new furniture amid budget cuts?
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PORTLAND, Ore. - Two weeks after TriMet cut spending on bus routes by more than $1 million the agency's board voted Wednesday to spend $1.4 million on new furniture.
Why buy new furniture when TriMet leaders say the transit agency’s budget is unsustainable? It turns out the agency is downsizing its office space in order to save money.
TriMet has been swinging a big budget ax to close a $12 million budget hole and more cuts could be coming.
But with the Portland-Milwaukie light rail line three years away from opening, TriMet officials say its operations command center in Gresham is too small. And rather than spending $11 million to build a new building, TriMet is shuffling employees around.
"We're consolidating our footprint – going from four facilities to two," said TriMet spokeswoman Mary Fetsch.
By consolidating space, you'd think you wouldn't need to buy new furniture and spend $1.4 million to save money.
Fetsch explained: "If you use this (an office chair) you have to disassemble it, you have to store it, you have to reassemble it and for some furniture you have to rehab it."
Keeping and moving the old furniture would cost more than $1 million, according to TriMet estimates. But Fetsch said the real savings come from TriMet's plan to downsize work stations.
"All of these (offices) will become 6 x 8 cubicles," she said. "Even the general manager will not have an office."
By ditching furniture that won't fit in smaller cubicles, TriMet won't need to rent as much office space.
"If we moved all of this furniture into the space, we would have to have up to 15,000 more square footage that we would have to lease," Fetsch said.
TriMet expects to save more than $2 million in rent over 10 years, more than the cost of the new furniture.
Fetsch said they are looking into keeping some chairs and other "things like that."
She said TriMet is auctioning off old furniture with the money lowering the new furniture bill, which TriMet is getting help on from the federal government and other sources. So the most TriMet will actually pay for the furniture is $735,000.
Thanks for this .. Merry Christmas guys!
Because TriMet does what it wants to do, to hell with what the people say. Perfect case in point - TriMet is going to ram light rail down the throat of Milwaukee whether they like it or not.Â
It's still an abuse of public money...
YOU MEAN SHE SAID THAT WITH A STRAIGHT FACE? omg...wtf...over
It's a government entity, that's why. They don't care how they spend our money.
Outrageous. Besides, if they need $1.4M to refurnish the office, they have way to much staff. Half of it, or $700K, would still buy lots of top grade rosewood furniture. Time to cut staff by some 50%!
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It surely is easy to spend money that isn't yours.
 @Altazi Are you talking about Obamacare?
The current furniture looks pretty nice to me. The employees are probably going to take the old stuff and call it recycling.
 Been done before; I'd like to see them donate it to another tax payer supported organization like PPS.
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tried yesterday to load megacity + Megaquake to comment and it just keep spinning and never loaded. just checked it today and it is still not loading comments there.
livefyre has trouble loading and now we can't go somewhere to see our comments. maybe it's time to boycott the comment sections to get the intense debate back.
like all companies money is spent on the top down. you have a bunch of management making decisions and they spend the money their way. you the customer are the last one to benefit. that is why they have big PR departments to spread the lie that "you are important to us". the only thing we are important to them for is keeping their jobs in those over paid position. management salaries are adjusted by what the drivers are paid and then all the higher ups get paid more.
They are out of control and nobody and do a thing about it....
Trimet loves to waste money on things like furniture and the crime train to Milwaukie.
Following that logic, I should just throw my dishes out as it would cost more in water/sewer & Â heating of the water than what it would to just buy new dishes.
They are going to auction off the stuff that is not good enough for them to keep? Why don't they donate it to companies who actually can use it? I work for a non profit who actually does what it says without asking for more tax payers money! Our office and programs could use this furniture! We can't afford to buy 1.2 million is furniture to downsize! Give me a break!
Government has an answer for every dime they waste.
I'm sure if they checked out the "Free" section on Craigslist, they could have saved even more money.
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Typical, they cut services to meet budget (including buying new furniture) and the public suffer. Â Thing is, when they meet budget, as a reward, management will give themselves pay raises for meeting their goals and then next year, the pay raises will affect their budget and they'll have to make more cuts. Â I think Trimet needs to clean house at the upper levels.
spending money to save us money is like going shopping then returning with the statement I went shopping and saved X amount .! I think one would save more by just staying home...''DUH''
Just raise the Tri Met Self Employment Tax and they will pay for the furniture and some more Juju's and Wham Wham's for their executives.
Let me see....We are cutting services and jobs to save money so that we can buy new furniture, and the niffty new furniture will save us money in the long run because we downsized and moved to a niffty new office down town. WOW are we really supposed to buy this latest piece of garbage?
@Luckylucy  Yes, we are. That's how they are going to pay for the new furniture . . .
Mary, whatever TriMet is paying you should be doubled. I've heard you speak numerous times and if anyone can make the public drink the Kool Aid, you can. You're a very intelligent and seemingly nice person; I wish you worked for a better organization.
Tri-Met has more goddamn excuses to raises fares, cut services and spend money frivolously. Their justification doesn't even hold water. Someone ought to shot those retards?
On a side note, they're also building a 1.495 billion dollar MAX line. With its own bridge.
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Just...throwing that out there.
Sooo, they will save money overall but lets be mad anyway.Â
 @Robert G *They're* saying they will save money. I can't see how it would cost that much money for what they're saying. Especially since there won't be much storage needed - they're moving from one location to another. It's not like we're talking about months of not having an office anywhere and you need storage. They're taking several offices and moving them into an expensive new location downtown. That means you pack up your stuff and you move it to downtown. No need to buy anything new.
 @Robert G KATU, slow news day? Didn't any kids fall out any windows?Â
 @I_Miss At a time where they're cutting lines and raising fares, spending more than a million on new furniture is news.
1.4 million on new furniture while "ghetto" people are harassing and attacking passengers and operators.