passing parameter from one autocomplete-jquery to another

Rails 3.1.3

My app has two consecutive rails3-autocomplete-jquery form_tags

I want to pass a parameter, which depends on the first autocomplete_field_tag choice, to the second. The second form should search based on the parameter.

<%= autocomplete_field_tag :departure_id, '', autocomplete_city_name_plans_path, :size => 75,               'data-delimiter' => ' ' %>

<%= autocomplete_field_tag :destination_id, '', autocomplete_destination_name_plans_path,               :size => 75, 'data-delimiter' => ' ' %>

They are defined in routes.rb

        resources :plans do             get :autocomplete_city_name, :on => :collection             get :autocomplete_destination_name, :on => :collection         end

I tried using jquery

    $('#departure_id').bind('railsAutocomplete.select', function(event, data){   departure = data.item.id;       if(departure == "") departure="0";       jQuery.get('/plans/update_destination_select/' + departure, function(data2){         ...      });

can pass a value to an action in plans_controller.rb

    def update_destination_select         departure = City.find_by_id(params[:id]) unless params[:id].blank?         @temp_departure_id = departure.id         ...     end

But the class variable @temp_departure_id does not work.

Is there anyway to pass a value from the first autocomplete-jquery to another?

soichi