Public transportation in Horry County rests in the hands of the voters, and it will be CoastRTA's job to make sure the public is educated about mass transit.
On Wednesday, the board of directors for Coast RTA met to begin developing ways to sell the message. The board of directors will be able to "educate" the public, but they are not allowed to encourage people to vote yes or no while using public resources.
A November referendum will ask if voters support a tax increase to fund mass transportation beyond July 2011.
The Coast RTA general manager says they support a referendum, but he doesn't think the tax increase is large enough to support future growth. Additionally, they will be losing money if a new tax is implemented.
"Because once the referendum is passed, those local governments are going to pull their funds. City of mb isn't going to participate in mileage and then give us a reward. They would look at that as double payment," said Myers Rollins Jr., the general manager of CoastRTA.
The referendum will ask voters if they support a 0.6 millage increase, annually.
That equates to roughly $2.40 per $100,000 of property.
