Twin Transit General Manager Rob LaFontaine said his organization never misinformed anyone when it provided the city of Chehalis with a list of organizations that receive passes from the transit organization.
Earlier this year, Twin Transit’s board voted to remove lifetime passes for seniors, a longstanding service, because it was financially too difficult to do in light of rising costs associated with paratransit services. When the Chehalis City Council considered subsidizing the fares for the city’s residents, LaFontaine said he emailed Chehalis a list of organizations that receive passes from Twin Transit and said some of them might provide passes for seniors. But, he said, he never specified they did provide passes, and added that his involvement ended there.
On two separate occasions, once in March and again earlier this month, the Chehalis City Council followed the recommendation of City Manager Merlin MacReynold and declined to subsidize passes for Chehalis residents, believing 16 community groups already provide them.
MacReynold said based on the emailed list and his conversation with LaFontaine he thought Twin Transit did provide passes to organizations that in turn provided them to seniors. He said he was only made fully aware that they didn’t after Janet Rowley, a Chehalis resident and Twin Transit rider, checked with the 16 listed organizations and found that none of them provided passes.
