NIAGARA FALLS —  Residents of Niagara County, Buffalo and beyond filled the Niagara Falls City Council chamber Tuesday night to lend their voice against proposed area bus route elimination and service reductions by the Niagara Frontier Transportation Authority.

Whether it was to save their mode of daily transport, or to keep the route delivering them to school, a number of reasons were provided during the public comment session. But one sentiment was expressed by nearly all 35 speakers and those gathered in silence.

They want their service to continue.

“Without paratransit services, I have no way of getting to my doctors,” Grace Chambers of Niagara Falls said. “I’m a veteran. I can’t get to the (Veteran’s Administration Hospital). We need to keep transportation going and moving.”

Before they opened the hearing for public comment, Director of Surface Transportation Tom George provided attendees with the results of a recent rider survey. He said about 81 percent of responders used the bus to get to work, while 42 percent declared an income less than $25,000 per year.

The proposed cuts to service come as the NFTA faces a reported $14.7 million deficit set to become reality in April. But Kim Minkel, executive director of the NFTA, said only $7.7 million was able to be recovered through cost-cutting measures, including the elimination of 20 police officers and 50 employees total.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s executive budget proposal would restore approximately $2.9 million in funding, but the figure isn’t enough, if it’s approved by the state legislature, to cover the deficit.

Earlier this year, the NFTA board of commissioners approved the end of 81 bus routes and a reduction at 14 others, including several in the Tonawandas, Niagara Falls and Lockport, to make up for the rest of the money. But before it is set in stone, the board is listening to public comment to determine the best course of action.

Several alternatives do exist, which approximately half of the speakers suggested Tuesday. They all felt a fare hike would be easier to handle, despite some being on fixed income, than losing service altogether.

“Many, many people here are dependent on the bus to go to work, said Niagara Falls resident Carl Slenk. “Cutting bus routes would be creating a disaster in the city. A higher cost is sometimes preferable. Revising the fare structure would be better than cutting services.”

But not everyone was happy with an either-or approach. Some questioned the validity of raising rates or cutting services. Some felt the idea of one or the other was a way to force an undesired action on the users no matter what.

“This is a boneheaded scheme,” Michael Postuka of Niagara Falls said. “It’s a scheme to scare the public into accepting these cuts or take a rate hike. They need to be more creative.”

Others brought up possibly decreasing the size of the buses to smaller capacity ones or investigating Rochester’s transportation system for answers. The Rochester Genesee Regional Transportation Authority’s system allows fares to remain at $1 while operating smoothly despite a decrease in state funding and suffering services in other major cities around the country.

But acting NFTA board Chairman Henry Sloma said operating like Rochester simply isn’t possible. For starters, he said, the RGRTA only services one county, while the NFTA services two.

“We’ve met with Rochester,” Sloma said. “Six years ago, they gutted their services to bare-bone. They only run services in downtown. They don’t go to the suburbs. If we ran buses in downtown Buffalo only, we’d fill the buses and be able to charge $1 as well.”

Sloma also pointed out standards in measuring route effectiveness are different in Erie and Niagara counties. The NFTA uses a 25 percent figure to determine if a particular route is feasible in Erie County, while a similar route in Niagara County would require just 10 percent capacity, he said.

“If we measured Niagara County like we do Erie County, there would be no buses,” he said.

Sloma added a rate fare hike was originally the least preferred option among many riders and officials, which led the board to make the reductions.