So what’s a politician to do when his pesky constituents get in the way of him doing what he wants to do? If you’re Durham Mayor Bill Bell, when it comes to transit, you advocate cutting them out of the process.
From the Herald-Sun (emphasis is mine):
Mayor Bill Bell surprised fellow Triangle leaders this week by suggesting that if they ask the state for permission to levy a sales tax to support transit, they also ask for the authority to impose it without a referendum.
Bell made the proposal Wednesday during a rare joint meeting of the inter-government advisory committees that coordinate transportation planning in the western and eastern halves of the Triangle.
The move clearly got his colleagues’ attention, if not necessarily their support. “I thought, ‘Bill Bell, radical — should listen,'” Chapel Hill Town Councilman Ed Harrison said after the meeting.
Bell on Thursday said he spoke up because it’s clear the Triangle’s long-term transportation problems are so serious local governments have to find a way to avoid political gridlock.
So in Mayor Bell’s mind, if you oppose a transit tax, your view is nothing more than “political gridlock.”
