Audit of the Greater Attleboro Taunton Regional Transit Authority (December 24, 2024)

This is a Massachusetts State Auditor performance audit of the Greater Attleboro Taunton Regional Transit Authority, covering July 1, 2021 through June 30, 2023.

“In accordance with Section 12 of Chapter 11 of the Massachusetts General Laws, the Office of the State Auditor has conducted a performance audit of the Greater Attleboro Taunton Regional Transit Authority (GATRA) for the period July 1, 2021 through June 30, 2023.”

The auditor checked whether GATRA followed requirements for buying electric buses and chargers, maintaining them, managing safety risks, training staff, reporting performance data, and handling farebox revenue data.

“The purpose of our audit was to determine whether GATRA did the following:”

The issues matter because poor training or maintenance can create safety risks for workers and riders, and weak cash reconciliation can create a risk that fare money is underreported or misused.

“If GATRA does not ensure that its contracted transit provider reconciles farebox revenue, then there is a higher-than-acceptable risk that the provider may underreport the farebox revenue and misappropriate the cash revenue that was not captured in the transit fare collection system.”

GATRA met some requirements, including putting the electric buses and chargers into service and submitting required reports, but the auditor found problems with training, maintenance documentation, farebox reconciliation, and electric-bus fire planning.

“Based on the results of our testing, we determined that GATRA’s safety plan was compliant with the Safety Risk Management Requirements outlined in 49 CFR 673.25.”

The auditor recommended that GATRA get required training in place, document electric-bus maintenance better, monitor its contractor more closely, reconcile farebox cash, and improve electric-bus emergency planning.

“GATRA should develop policies and procedures, including a monitoring component, to verify the accuracy of the total farebox revenue reported by its contracted transit provider.”

This is significant because GATRA serves many communities, operates a large fleet, and received a major grant to add electric buses and charging stations.

“On November 25, 2020, GATRA was awarded a $5,513,500 grant as part of the Volkswagen Clean Air Act Settlement allocation: $4,973,148 was to purchase six 30-foot-long BEBs, and $540,352 was to purchase and install six charging stations.”

A BEB is simply a battery electric bus: a bus powered by batteries instead of diesel fuel for driving.

“Since the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law was enacted on November 15, 2021, states and municipalities have invested in projects related to battery electric buses (BEBs), which are buses that use battery power to drive instead of diesel fuel.”