The Honorable Stanley A. Owens, Chairman of the House of Delegates Finance Committee, established the House Finance Subcommittee on Financing Mass Transit in 1973 to study and provide recommendations for the financing of public mass transportation (hereinafter frequently referred to as mass transit) in the Commonwealth. C. Richard Cranwell and Joseph A. Leafe were appointed members of the Subcommittee with Carrington Williams to serve as Chairman. The Division of Legislative. Services, represented by E. M. Miller, Jr. and Jill M. Pope, made staff and facilities available for the study. Spencer H. Elmore served as Ex Officio Consultant to the subcommittee.

The Subcommittee met numerous times in locations throughout the Commonwealth receiving information from the governing bodies of localities, planning and transportation districts, State agencies and officials, owners of buslines and taxicab companies, and other individuals interested in mass transit. In June of 1973, the Subcommittee requested from each of the State's twenty-two regional planning districts their best estimates of their present and future revenue needs for capital and operating funds for mass transit. Replies came from eighteen districts; five were able to provide supportive documentation of their needs, five were able to provide their best estimates of needs without supportive documentation, seven were unable to provide any estimate, and one indicated no present or future revenue needs.

As the enclosures demonstrate, the financial needs for mass transit are large and growing; but, so is the public need, particularly as the fuel supply for automobiles drops. We think the Commonwealth should face this problem now, and get about solving it. After considerable study and many hours of deliberation the Subcommittee made its recommendations to the Committee.