Let me stick with the facts. I would suggest that we review the facts carefully. This would be the second cut to occur under Tim Pawlenty, I believe the fourth in five years. The real problem is not LRT, but how we changed out transit funding scheme a few years ago.
Let me first dissuade anyone that LRT has anything to do do with this. Like so much else, transit funding comes in two varieties: operations and capital/infrastructure construction costs, and the same is true for Hiawatha.
CAPITAL/INFRASTRUCTURE CONSTRUCTION COSTS
LRT construction costs are TOTALLY IRRELEVANT. A majority of the construction cost for LRT was federal money that Hiawatha was uniquely qualified for. The state and local portions was generally bonding dollars. LRT was built with bonding money, and legally bonding money is a loan that is used to pay for a permanent improvement. Bonding money could NEVER be used for operations, as some LRT opponents seem fond of suggesting.
So, while it makes nice rhetoric for David Strom and the Taxpayers League, LRT construction costs have basically nothing to do with cuts in transit operations.
OPERATIONS COSTS
LRT's operating budget is seven times smaller than the current funding deficit. State LRT operating costs this year are budgeted to be a whopping $3.9 million. (http://www.dot.state.mn.us/transit/treport/Program_Mgmt.pdf). The total round of CURRENT cuts is $30 million. If that's not enough, let me elaborate. Today's Pioneer Press did justice to this question:
[Metro Transit Operations Manager] Lamb said light rail receives its funding from the general fund and is responsible for less than $1 million of the shortfall.
[MetroTransit's] Lamb, [Transit for Livable Communities'] Thoman and [the Pawlenty appointee-controlled] Metropolitan Council members blamed the Gov. Jesse Ventura-initiated switch from financing the bus system through the relatively stable property tax to the more volatile motor vehicle sales tax. That tax is projected to bring in nearly $30 million less in the next two years than originally expected, or about half of the hole the council is trying to plug.
However, David Strom, president of the conservative Taxpayers League, blames the Hiawatha light-rail line for the budget problems and said it is time to consider rethinking the entire idea of mass transit.
So, a transit advocacy group, transit official, and Pawlenty appointees all agree it was not about Hiawatha, but past changes in the way transit was funded. The ever-dogmatic David Strom predictably blames it on LRT, but every time he is contradicted by the Pawlenty administration and agency heads, he marginalizes himself and reduces his credibility still further.
Now, unless you skim over the reality of how the project was funded - as the Taxpayers League is fond of doing - you simply cannot allege that the current cuts are in any meaningful way a result of Hiawatha LRT.
THE REAL PROBLEM: HOW WE FUND TRANSIT
The underlying problem is using MVST for transit funding, the estimates happened to not work out as they hoped. (second page of above document outlines MVST amounts, I'm not sure if this includes opt-out costs needed, but I'm guessing they do). (http://www.budget.state.mn.us/budget/operating/200607/revision1/ metrocouncil_transit.pdf)
Looking at the first page there, they said the MVST income will be $255.7 for the two years. (http://www.dot.state.mn.us/information/funding2005/ highwayfinances.html)
In 2004 it came out to 104.49 million instead of 127.67 million. (21.5% of mvst goes to transit) (http://www.finance.state.mn.us/ffeu/forecasts/2005feb/2005feb_sum.pdf)
In 2005 its likely to come to 115.455 million rather than 134.719 million.
In 2006 its projected to be 114.165 million.
The real problem was a shift the Ventura administration made to the motor vehicle sales tax, and away from property taxes in funding the system. A broad coalition of transit groups would help fix that (see http://www.tlcminnesota.org) with the Transportation Choices 2020 legislation.
Thanks to Scott Dier of the Metro Issues forum, from whom I borrowed the specific statistical research found in much of the last section.
Respectfully,
Bob Spaulding
Downtown Saint Paul Resident
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