As bus riders get used to the Spokane Transit Authority’s new routes, schedules and park-and-ride arrangements, it’s easy to forget that fundamental bus service was in doubt less than two years ago.

After a major funding hemorrhage – courtesy of the voter-approved repeal of state motor vehicle excise taxes – STA officials found themselves in a pinch. The pinch became a pulverization through an embarrassing series of management miscues. Ridership was too low, public trust was sinking and the Spokane area was hearing about a financial crisis that would leave it with no viable mass transit system.

In a near desperation move, STA leadership reluctantly put a sales tax request on the ballot. It wasn’t a comfortable move. After all, the community had rejected a 2002 revenue plan, only to find out the transit system had overstated the urgency of its needs.

Significantly, among the steps STA took to salvage public support during that low point was to bring Avista Corp. executive Kim Zentz in as executive director. Credit Zentz and her hard-nosed business sense for bringing orderliness and fiscal responsibility to the endangered agency.

Voters overcame their skepticism enough to give STA a vote of confidence, approving the sales tax that kept the buses running. As a consequence, hundreds of modestly paid workers still have transportation to their jobs and are able to remain self-supporting taxpayers rather than lose jobs they can’t get to. Non-driving seniors and students still have affordable mobility resources. Commuters are able to leave hundreds of cars at home where they aren’t adding to air pollution. And Spokane County escapes the embarrassment of being the community of 400,000 with no public transit system.

But a deep breath of relief may be premature. A fundamental deficiency continues in place, and STA leadership ought to be addressing it.

By state law, the board of directors of public transportation benefit districts such as STA must consist of elected municipal officials within the service area. The policy-making, governance and oversight provided by the board are limited to what can be supplied by the citizen politicians who have the political skills to get elected to city and town councils and the board of county commissioners.

Nothing against those people, or their talents, but it’s unrealistic to think that within that relatively small pool of candidates, this region is going to find the most astute leadership of the type needed to guide a sophisticated transit system. Consider other entities such as the state Transportation Commission and the boards of regents and trustees that run Washington’s colleges and universities. Those people are picked not just for political connections, but also for their demonstrated organizational and business skills.

The town, city and county officials who now choose some of their own members to make up the STA board should have broader options, but that would require legislative intervention. The 30-year-old requirement that transit boards be comprised solely of elected officials is due for modernization. Private-sector expertise would be as valuable for Spokane-area transit governance as it is for the state’s road system and institutions of higher education.

The Legislature will be more likely to move in that direction if it gets some encouragement from transit systems themselves. If STA’s board meant its 2004 promises to improve management, it should demonstrate its sincerity by lobbying for legal authority to turn the reins over to private-sector board members.