CALEDONIA - Residents told Village Board members Tuesday their decision to cut buses in the community was "unbelievable," "irresponsible" and "shortsighted" and urged them to reconsider.

"My son will never be able to drive," said resident Paula Bruening, about her 19-year-old son who has a mild learning disability and vision problems.

He took the bus a couple of days a week this summer for a job at the Racine Zoo, she said, and now he's looking for a job after graduating from high school. But it would be really difficult, she said, for him to get and keep a job without a reliable means of transportation.

Bruening was one of about 50 residents who attended the Board meeting Tuesday night at East Side Community Center, 6156 Douglas Ave.

The board, facing a $440,000 deficit, slashed transit funding from $36,000 to $0 Oct. 26 in a 4-3 vote in favor of funding parks, which previously had a $0 budget after paying utilities. Trustees Bob Bradley, Gale Morgan, Wendy McCalvy and Lee Wishau approved the cut, with Trustees Kathy Burton and Kevin Wanggaard and President Ron Coutts dissenting. Morgan and Wishau said Tuesday after the meeting they will reconsider the issue.

That would mean there will be no buses going to Caledonia beginning January, according to Curtis Garner, the executive director of the Belle Urban System management company. Buses would probably not venture north of 3 Mile Road on Douglas Avenue, he said, and definitely stop going to the Greentree Shopping Center, 5101 Douglas Ave. About 20,000 trips per year were made to and from the Greentree stop out of about 1.4 million total trips in 2009, according to Garner.

Cutting buses would hurt businesses at Greentree center and the community, according to an e-mail Coutts read Tuesday from a senior property manager of the center urging the board to reconsider their decision.

"I am astonished that you would take this action so precipitously," said resident Melissa Warner.

That would be, according to her, telling businesses we don't care how your employees get to work or telling young families to not bother looking to move into the village unless they have two cars.

Warner argued parks are important, yes, but they can be funded as money is available and helped on a volunteer basis, whereas buses require a steady funding source.

It was a "shame" for two quality of life issues to be "pitted" against each other, said Marla Wishau, president of the Caledonia Parks and Recreation Commission.

"Cutting buses isn't the ideal answer," she said. "But getting rid of parks isn't either."

Members of the Caledonia Baseball/Softball League expressed their support for parks at the meeting.

Wanggaard said he knew a couple of businesses that would sponsor a park and said that might be a possible solution.

"I'm a parks person too - that's a quality of life," he said. "But I'm also for maintaining essential services first."

Morgan, who voted to cut buses, said the decision was not made lightly.

"But I'm willing to go back and see if we can find a better solution," he said after the meeting.

Lee Wishau said the issue will be reconsidered at the November budget meeting and he was open to discussion. He added that a partial reduction in bus services - cutting the bus service frequency from every half hour to every hour, as one resident suggested during the meeting - might be a way to save some costs.

The board is waiting on more accurate numbers, including labor union negotiations and health insurance costs, before making any decisions about layoffs or service cuts. The budget is expected to be finalized Dec. 28.