West Lake Hills City Council members discussed a plan of action last week that could decrease the cost of transit services for two disabled residents currently being served by Capital Metro.

When the city opted out of the Capital Metro taxing district, any disabled residents participating in the transportation authority’s free transit program were grandfathered in and must continue to receive the service.

Currently, only two residents take advantage of the program, which costs the city approximately $18,000 annually. The state requires the city to pay for the program out of its sales tax revenues. Recently, Capital Metro proposed a fee increase that would charge the city for the full cost of the ride, not the shared cost, per trip, hiking the annual total up to nearly $51,000.

City staff and council members have been discussing replacing the service with a Capital Metro-trained taxicab, which would only cost about $8,600 annually. At last week’s council meeting, members heard concerns from the father of a resident who depends on it to get to work each day.

“The taxi alternative is really not an option for my child, and I call her a child because she’s my child,” said Paul Lindsey of his 44-year-old daughter, Jill, who works in the state comptroller’s office. “There is not a performance contract between CapMetro and the companies and more data on how accurately they’ll meet pick up times.”

The younger Lindsey suffers from Asperger syndrome, an autism-related disorder that prevents her from being able to evaluate risk, form casual relationships, or handle change well. She is also deaf, which inhibits communication even further.

Capital Metro representative Inez Evans appeared at the council meeting to answer questions on both sides. She acknowledged Lindsey’s worry that Capital Metro did not have a performance contract with the state entity but also said that the taxi drivers were trained by Capital Metro, just not as thoroughly as their hired drivers.

“These taxi drivers, to a great extent, self-select,” Evans said. “There is a random drug-screen program and background check. They can work with us to get an established driver, and we have done this. The cab company puts it up on the board that we’re looking for a permanent driver. We have some cab drivers that do nothing but Metro access pickups.”

Council members, minus an absent Stan Graham and Andrew Schwartz, voted unanimously to postpone the item in hopes of renegotiating the terms of the cost with Capital Metro.

“I would be willing to continue to pay essentially almost double to maintain the service, but I really can’t stand here and support a 270-percent increase in the cost,” Councilman Spencer Stevens said of the difference between the cost of a cab and the current cost. “I’d say we postpone this item, and see if we can work with CapMetro to reorganize cost.”