No voice on RTA
Mayor casts vote for Calallen rep
BY PHIL REYNOLDS SOUTH JETTY REPORTER

For the first time since it was 1 ½ years old, the Corpus Christi Regional Transportation Authority (RTA) is without a Port Aransas representative on its board of directors.

Members of the RTA's small cities committee, including Port Aransas Mayor Claude Brown, voted on Thursday, Sept. 13, to rename Sara Salzide of Corpus Christi to the board and to replace board member Glenn Martin of Port Aransas with Ricardo Ramon, a Robstown businessman who lives in Calallen.

Four of the seven members of the committee were present and voting at the meeting, RTA minutes show. Besides Brown, they were Robstown Mayor Rodrigo Ramon Jr., Bishop Mayor Geraldine Rypple and Gregory Mayor Fernando Gomez.

Mayors from Agua Dulce, Driscoll and San Patricio, who are also on the committee, were not at the meeting.

Brown said he voted with the majority for Ramon and Salzide because "it was a done deal when I walked in. My vote wouldn't have made any difference."

Port Aransas has long sought a voice on the RTA board, no matter how much of a minority, because of the amount of money the city contributes to the authority's budget. Port Aransas, as does each other municipal member of RTA, kicks in ½ cent of its sales tax to the transportation authority.

In Port Aransas' case, that totaled $351,668.01 in 2006 and $371,369.44 through Aug. 31 of this year, according to figures at Port Aransas City Hall. The RTA did not have sales tax contribution figures from other small cities in the area.

In return for that, the city gets the shuttle trolley that makes a circuit of town; the Flexi-B, which carries people to the RTA's south-side transfer point at Padre Staples Mall; a seasonal bus route designed to carry workers from Corpus Christi up State Hwy. 361 to Port Aransas; and the experimental ferry shuttle, aimed at taking workers from the ferry landing to their work places in the morning and returning them to the ferry in the afternoon.

The ferry shuttle is due to end Oct. 31, and RTA board members are to decide over the winter whether to reinstate it as a permanent route for Spring Break and the summer tourist season.

Both Ramon and Salzide were at the meeting when the appointments were made in executive session. Martin said he was not present because he had not been invited to attend.

The meeting was a public one and was posted ahead of time, an RTA spokeswoman said.