MEMPHIS, Tenn. -- A consultant firm from Florida is expected to soon give its first report on the city's bus system and its current financial situation. According to a city contract WREG Investigators uncovered, the city hired a third party to help figure out operations at MATA that put it in a $60-million deficit. MATA leadership broke the news this summer and blamed increased costs, decreased ridership, and flat funding. Soon after, the trolleys stopped, jobs were cut and routes were eliminated. In August, the mayor's administration told council members a transit consultant is stepping in to look at "the organization, structure and design." TransPro Consulting firm reiterated on its website that it has "a national reputation for success in transforming sector agencies with private sector business principles." According to the contract with the city, the firm will get $336,071 to help figure out MATA's best options. At first, they will do an assessment and compare MATA to similar cities. They will present the best options with cost savings estimates and then develop and help implement a recovery plan. WREG Investigators reached out to TransPro to find out more. The CEO said he's happy to connect, but city officials asked us to wait until after the initial report is presented. In the meantime, we did some digging and found out this isn't the first time TransPro worked with MATA. Minutes from a 2021 MATA board meeting show a contract with the company that employs all employees of MATA went out for bid. MATA's former president later explained in a memo that he "convened a group of local business and government leaders to review the best options." He stated those meetings were led by discussion and discovery with the assistance of Transpro Consulting. "So they presented four different options. Notably, three of which were some sort of privatization, that is, contracting some of the services or all of the services for MATA," Alex Hensley said. Hensley said she sat in on the meetings as a representative of Shelby County Mayor Lee Harris' office. She said she was concerned about privatization. "Because they had particularly mentioned breaking up organized labor so that they could pay the workers less and lessen that cost," Hensley said. "Of course, they presented this neutrally. But yeah, I think that is the direction they wanted to go." She said the commission ultimately picked the fully public governance option with the goal of getting local leaders to invest more. She said she was concerned seeing TransPro helping again because she's afraid privatization would be pitched again. "If we do if we do that, we have no accountability over MATA, which serves thousands of residents," Hensley said. MATA leader says she didn’t know about agency’s shaky finances Mayor Paul Young was also a part of those 2021 meetings as the former Downtown Memphis Commission president. He said he never saw the final recommendations. "I didn't fully remember TransPro was a part of it. I realized it after we started this work," he told us. We asked if privatization would be an option this time. "Certainly, I have heard discussions whether it should be private or public. I don't think we have any intentions of having a privatized system," Young said. "My intent is to remain a public system that is assessable to all parts of the community." He said he called on TransPro for their national reputation with the goal of figuring out operational challenges and finding out what worked for other cities that have had public transit issues. City sends letter to MATA, notes it hasn’t seen proof federal funds returned Young stressed conversations have been productive, MATA has cooperated and any day now, TransPro should have some preliminary recommendations and a series of actions MATA takes in the short term. He said it will all be shared with the city council. WREG Investigators requested records from MATA regarding the commission's recommendations made in 2021 as we continue to dig deeper into MATA and its deficit. MATA said we'd get a response in "due course."