The Mackinac Bridge Authority will postpone until July a decision regarding revisions to its commuter discount policy, it announced Thursday, March 12. The decision had been expected at its Friday, March 20, meeting in Sterling Heights.

The Authority will meet as planned March 20, but members say they want more time to gather information before recommending any changes to the commuter program.

Before a decision is reached, the public will have an opportunity to comment on the program at a committee meeting in St. Ignace this summer, said Executive Secretary Bob Sweeney in a news release. The Authority has tentatively scheduled a July 23 meeting, at which time it expects to finalize its revisions to the policy.

Its most recent decision about the commuter program, made in December 2008, was to allow drivers using commuter cards to refill the cards in increments of $50, rather than the $80 previously required.

Remaining in question after that meeting, however, were other ideas discussed by the Authority, including how long the cards will be valid before they expire, and whether the discount cards may some day be made available only to drivers in certain geographical areas or those crossing with a certain frequency. In December, the Authority pushed back those decisions until at least March, The St. Ignace News reported.

Until a new decision is reached, all bridge cards are currently set to expire at the end of 2009. The Authority has been researching how it would handle cards, and the unused balances, once they do expire. So far, no cards have reached their expiration date, and a new decision is expected before that happens. The state attorney general's office was asked by the Authority to review several aspects of the expiration date for the cards, The St. Ignace News reported in December.

The commuter rate is $1.70 per automobile crossing, compared to the regular rate of $3.