The Tacoma News Tribune reports that Pierce Transit will make permanent the 20 percent reduction in service the agency instituted after an explosion that destroyed a refueling station in Lakewood last month. On top of that reduction, Pierce Transit will cut service another 15 percent in October. Last month, voters defeated a sales-tax measure that would have enabled Pierce Transit to keep transit service at existing levels, forcing the agency to make massive cuts to service and lay off one in five employees.

TNT reports:

The cuts will include:

• Permanent elimination of Route 207 to Joint Base Lewis-McChord and Route 60 to the Port of Tacoma. Neither is operating now.

• Less midday service, with many routes running hourly instead of more frequently.

• Major cuts in weekend and evening service.

There will be an emphasis on core service that gets people to work and school, CEO Lynne Griffith wrote in a memo to employees Monday.

The cuts are necessary because the agency’s recession-battered revenues can’t keep up with expenses, transit leaders say.

Pierce County will hold a series of meetings starting next month to determine how and where to make service cuts.