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Esther Contreras spends two hours a day on the Metro commuting to her job in Bethesda from her Fort Washington home. Now, as the county considers cuts to help balance a $100 million deficit for fiscal 2010, Contreras and thousands of others could see their monthly transportation costs increase.

Contreras, an administrative assistant at DCP Retirement Services, participates in the county's Super Fare Share program, which allows employers to share the cost of mass transit benefits for their employees with the county. The program, which the county budgeted is among the cuts recommended by County Executive Isiah Leggett over the past few months. Eliminating the Super Fare Share program would save $463,000 this fiscal year, officials said.

If the County Council approves the cuts, about 2,400 employees in downtown Bethesda, North Bethesda and Friendship Heights could be affected if businesses don't pick up the tab, said Andy Shulman, vice president of economic development and government affairs for the Bethesda-Chevy Chase Chamber of Commerce.

"Our concern is however many Silver Spring and Rockville and Gaithersburg residents who work in Bethesda and take Ride On, take Metro, are left worried about how they are going to afford getting to work," he said.

The Super Fare Share program operates on a sliding scale, with the county contributing more than $100 a month to each participant the first year a business signs up for the program. In subsequent years, the county scales back its contribution while businesses pay more. By the tenth year, if they continue with the program, employers are expected to pay the entire subsidy. The program is offered in the downtown Bethesda, North Bethesda, Friendship Heights and Silver Spring transportation management districts, areas the county has targeted to promote alternative transportation and reduce pollution.

Even though the County Council has yet to approve Leggett's recommendations, Super Fare Share was suspended in January for downtown Bethesda, North Bethesda and Friendship Heights.

For Contreras, whose employer has participated in the program for several years, the county subsidized about 20 percent of her commuting costs. Before the suspension, she was paying about $50 a month to commute; now, that will jump to about $75.

"It's going to affect me financially," Contreras said.

After the suspension, about 150 employers in downtown Bethesda, North Bethesda and Friendship Heights who use the program were left in the lurch, Shulman said.

"It left employers who made this commitment to their employees and their community scrambling" to figure out how to afford the subsidies, he said.

County officials said the deficit forced painful cuts.

"I think the point here is that we are in a fiscal crisis and this is one of the areas we feel we have to cut, but we would ask the business community to step up to the plate," Brecher said.

County spokeswoman Esther Bowring said the program was always intended to demonstrate to employers the benefits of providing mass transit subsidies. Both Brecher and Bowring said they hoped businesses would continue funding alternative transportation costs and take advantage of state tax incentives.

"Sometimes you need to give people an incentive to try something new, and once they starts see that there are benefits to this, we hope they'll see the value of the program and they'll want to continue it once the subsidy goes away, " Bowring said.