Speaking of the transit tax repeal, we’ve hit a new low in the gloom-and-doom campaign from Official Charlotte.
Nevermind what the $70 million per year, $60 per head, tax does or does not do for Mecklenburg’s transportation needs, repeal the tax and you send the wrong message to the rest of the world.
I kid you not. Repealing the tax would be bad marketing for Charlotte. Check it out from News14:
“The repeal of this, I think, will be catastrophic to the future of this community for decades to come,” said city council member Pat Mumford. “It sends a message to the outside world that we’re not ready to prepare our infrastructure for the growth that’s coming.
But Pat, CATS $9 billion transit plan does almost nothing to prepare for that growth. Deep down, you know that is true. CATS own pitch for the North line up I-77 confirmed this just a couple weeks ago. Traffic on 77 will go from 77,000 a day now to 177,000 in 2030 with the $373 million North line — if it is built — taking all of 5000 commuters off that road. That is what CATS says.
Maybe you missed it, so here it is in detail:
WBT Radio’s Pete Kaliner captured CATS on tape pitching the North line as a great way to save home improvement giant Lowe’s some money.
“Every person we can get on the train is someone who they don’t have to spend $12,000 for a parking deck space for,” David Carol, CATS North corridor project manager, explained.
Carol made clear that CATS dreams of running a train directly to Lowe’s headquarters in order to get at the 15,000 workers who work there. Cost-benefit for the entire region does not enter into it, as Carol likewise made clear.
“There are 77,000 people a day riding on I-77 in the North towns, that will grow – whether or not it is widened – to 177,000, which is what the 2030 plan is. It is a massive increase,” another Kaliner report quotes Carol.
Ridership for the North corridor train is only expected to be 4,000 to 5,000 per day – at most. Spending $250 million on a train that will reduce future, 20-year hence traffic on I-77 by only 2 percent is utterly nuts. Worse, as the project will almost certainly not get federal funding, local governments will have to crater their tax bases with at least $63 million in tax-increment financing schemes to get the North line off the ground.
This means that instead of having property tax revenue for schools or public safety, the money will be sunk in a train that – by CATS’ own admission – will not impact traffic congestion even 20 years in the future. But it will save Lowe’s that vital $12,000 per employee.
Same deal with the South Blvd. line — the 6000 or so riders (remember, many of those will be former bus users, so no net gain in transit use) will not even make a dent in South Blvd.’s traffic load. Is that a good use of $500 million? What message does that send to outside world? That we are flaming idiots?
Also note that Mumford made his Outside World argument to a meeting of the Lake Norman Chamber of Commerce, meaning that Mumford is sliding into the role of ad hoc CATS apologist we predicted for him some months ago.
At that same meeting, Huntersville Mayor Kim Phillips also offered up these pearls of wisdom:
“We are bringing people in that want to look, want to know what’s going on with transit,” she said. “They want to know, if they’re investing their dollars, if the potential for future development will be there.
“I think people forget that that half-cent sales tax is paid for by many people who are not only commuting through on the way to Florida or wherever they are going, but also people who are from our neighboring counties who are coming into Mecklenburg County to shop,” Phillips said.
Sounds like the Mayor’s investors are looking for development subsidies. We already know CATS and the city of Charlotte love subsidies for transit oriented development — despite promising that development subsidies around the light rail lines would never, ever be needed.
And no, Mayor Kim, absolutely no one with half a brain forgets that some of the half-cent sales tax comes from outside the county. That is why the Meck Deck’s official half-cent tax burden calculation uses Mayor Pat’s — know him? — 30 percent outside-the-county figure.
As a result, when you figure that roughly 70 percent of the half-cent revenue come from Mecklenburg residents you come up with $60 per person, per year or $240 for a family of four.
For marketing. To send messages. To the outside world.
What a steaming load. To send. To the outside world.
