On cue, looks like the Charlotte Chamber of Commerce is rushing to the defense of CATS.
The Chamber is currently circulating to members an e-survey that, according to descriptions of it, points toward an anti-transit tax repeal outcome. I would reproduce the survey here, but each response is encrypted as it is received and respondents cannot retrieve it. If there is someone out there yet to take the survey and would like to cut-and-paste the questions as you take it — send it on.
For now here’s the Chamber survey set up:
Charlotte’s metro population today of 1.5 million people is projected to grow to 4.2 million in the next 20 years. Today, 146,000 people commute into Mecklenburg County daily. That number will grow to 450,000 by the year 2026.
To address the need to invest in transportation infrastructure to handle future growth, to address air quality issues and to help employers attract the workforce they need to remain competitive, in 1998 the Charlotte Chamber led the referendum to approve a half cent sales tax to fund a transit program for Charlotte/Mecklenburg. We have since supported the transit program by lobbying for state and federal dollars to leverage our local investment. We have also continued to support efforts to fully fund road needs for Charlotte and the region.
There is an effort underway to force another referendum on the half cent sales tax. Called “Stop the Train,” the express purpose is to eliminate the half cent sales tax as a funding source and, in effect, bring the transit program to a halt. The effort requires that approximately 50,000 registered voters sign a petition calling for a new referendum. There is a growing expectation by local officials that the effort will succeed.
As you can see, this is overall very loaded. In spots, it is flat-wrong.
Again, as UNCC transportation expert Dr. David Hartgen has repeatedly shown, the direction CATS has taken the half-cent revenue does nothing to relieve Charlotte’s traffic congestion or improve its air quality. And who knows what “help employers attract the workforce they need to remain competitive” means.
More to the point, the Chamber is absolutely wrong to assert that the “express purpose” of the repeal effort is to “bring the transit program to a halt.” Either the consultant/task force/hired gun who wrote that is purposely lying or is painfully unaware of reality.
Transit programs run everyday across North Carolina without a dedicated half-cent transit tax. Raleigh and Durham, for example, use federal transit dollars to run buses; CATS heaps federal money on train building. Charlotte had a bus system before 1998 and the half-cent sales tax and it could have one after the half-cent enabler of bad decisions goes away.
Would repeal force CATS to swerve away from the $9, 10, 11 billion transit path it is now on? The one that will throw off annual operating costs in the neighborhood of $350 million and quite possibly bankrupt Char-Meck in the process? Yes, absolutely. And the Chamber, the official business voice of Charlotte, thinks that is a bad idea.
So bad, in fact, that the Chamber is spreading the lie that all local mass transit would go poof. That voters should not even have a say on Charlotte’s future. Just sit back and let the Chamber handle that.
Couple more things — “We have also continued to support efforts to fully fund road needs for Charlotte and the region,” the Chamber says. Funny how that effort has failed miserably since 1998, huh? Let’s review.
Westin Hotel? Got it. Uptown arena? Got it. NASCAR Hall of Fame? Got it. Wachovia Arts Tower? Got it. Uptown baseball? Damn near got it.
Plus additional city and county property tax hikes, a business privilege license hike, a water and sewer rate hike. Got all those too. And CATS’ insane choo-choo plan got a chunk of those funds as well.
Money for roads? Bzzzt. Try again. Why, there is almost an outline of a pattern here.
To be blunt, some in Charlotte thought president Bob Morgan would bring a more proactive, independent stance to the Chamber. This survey and what one can only assume is the Chamber’s full-on opposition to the repeal even making it to the November ballot indicate otherwise.
Igniting success? Try insuring calamity.
