Cuyahoga County residents are already paying the highest sales tax in Ohio. Now the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority wants more — and the timing could hardly be worse.

The hosts of Today in Ohio blasted the RTA as tone-deaf in even suggesting a tax increase that is all but guaranteed to be rejected by tax-weary voters. RTA already gets a full 1 percent sales tax on goods sold in Cuyahoga County. It wants to increase that to 1.5 percent.

“The Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority gets the tone deaf award of the decade with what is guaranteed to be an unpopular and likely futile decision,” podcast host Chris Quinn said on Monday’s episode.

RTA says that without new revenue, it will have to cut about $30 million in service next year. With the additional half-cent tax — which would bring in roughly $135 million annually — it promises more frequent buses, expanded weekend service, better suburban routes, and long-term financial stability. Pay more now, or watch transit shrink.

The problem, as Leila Atassi explained on the podcast, is the context in which this ask is being made:

“At a moment when voters are already furious about taxes and local governments are talking about raising the sales tax again to help fund stadium repairs and things, RTA wants to pile on with another half cent,” she said.

Cuyahoga County’s overall sales tax already sits at 8 percent — the highest in the state. Approving RTA’s request would push that to 8.5 percent. Even some RTA board members think going to voters this fall is too soon, arguing that nowhere near enough has been done to build public support for the increase.

And voters agree — loudly. When cleveland.com asked readers about this idea back in December, the response was overwhelming. Atassi summarized: they “overwhelmingly said RTA hasn’t earned the public’s trust to ask for more money.” But the opposition wasn’t anti-transit. In fact, many readers acknowledged that public transportation is a genuine public good. The frustration runs deeper than that.

“People want a system that reflects the way people actually live today,” Atassi said, describing the reader response. They talked about empty buses, routes that still assume everyone is commuting downtown, unreliable service, safety concerns, and a lack of creative problem-solving. The most common refrain? Redesign the system first. Then ask for more money.

Quinn pointed to what he sees as the fundamental failure at the heart of RTA’s approach: the agency has never done the hard work of reinventing itself. In the private sector, when organizations face financial pressure, they bring in change agents who rethink everything from the ground up. RTA, Quinn argued, has instead cycled through political appointees and transportation insiders who maintain the status quo.

And here’s a detail that Quinn criticized: RTA noting that it hasn’t asked for a sales tax increase in decades. In that time, inflation has dramatically increased the value of every sales transaction — meaning the agency has been collecting more money in real terms year over year without improving service. Quinn mentioned a note from a reader pointing out that cars cost $6,000 when the RTA sales tax began, and today they routinely cost $50,000. That means a much greater value to the sales tax.

As Atassi put it on the podcast: “That reader was completely right. The revenue they collect is tied to inflation and RTA has been contracting over the years. How is it that they can’t make ends meet and deliver quality service with the money that they get from a 1 percent dedicated tax? That just boggles the mind.”

Readers suggested practical alternatives: smaller buses, more flexible routes, partnerships with rideshare services, more connections between neighborhoods rather than everything funneling downtown. These aren’t radical ideas.

Quinn’s prediction? The measure goes down hard — 70-30 or worse. And he argues it should, not because transit doesn’t matter, but because rewarding institutional failure with more taxpayer money is no way to fix a broken system.

Listen to full “Today in Ohio” episodes where Chris Quinn hosts our daily half-hour news podcast, with Editorial Board member Lisa Garvin, Impact Editor Leila Atassi and Content Director Laura Johnston.

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