With the loss of bus service throughout east Pierce County, many of the small cities that are still paying sales taxes for buses have been wondering exactly what they are getting for their money.

Several have even discussed the possibility of leaving the Pierce Transit taxing district altogether.

On Monday, the Pierce Transit Board of Commissioners took the first step toward reviewing the district’s boundaries, giving direction staff to bring forward a  resolution to convene a public transit improvement conference that would bring together the district’s entire membership to discuss the future of the transit authority.

Bonney Lake Mayor Neil Johnson, who sits on the board as the small cities representative, said staff presented the board with the “first blush” of a map showing possible new boundaries that would eliminate from the taxing district most of the cities that turned down this year’s requested tax increase.

“It basically mirrored what the vote was,” Johnson said of the draft map.

Any final district map will probably be different and will have to be approved by members and the board.

Pierce Transit on Oct. 2 reduced services throughout the county following the February defeat of a tax measure they said was needed to keep the system afloat.

The ballot measure would have increased the transit’s sales tax collections by 0.3 percent, or 3 cents per $10. However, even with the additional taxes, much of the eastern part of the county was set to see reductions in service, prompting voters to shoot down the measure.

The changes eliminated all routes east of Puyallup, except for the 496, which runs from the Bonney Lake Park and Ride lot to the Sumner Sounder Station.

These reductions were made due to a $51 million budget shortfall brought on by the economic recession and loss of Proposition 1 at the February 2011 election.

More than 64 percent of voters in the 31st Legislative District, which includes Bonney Lake, Sumner and Buckley, rejected Proposition 1.

Bonney Lake contributes more than $2 million dollars in sales tax revenues each year to Pierce Transit. Combined, the cities that lost service contribute an estimated $4.8 million.

The full Pierce Transit Board must approve the full member meeting at its next meeting in two weeks. The Public Transit Improvement Conference will take place after that.

Johnson said it will be nice to get the member cities together to get a sense of what each city wants and needs in terms of service.

“There’s going to be a lot of discussion about what transit means to each city,” Johnson said.