Voice of the People

Another week of depressing economic news in the NWI Times, Post Tribune and Chesterton Tribune gives more doubt to the viability of the South Shore expansion.

How are the taxpayers of Northwest Indiana going to fund our part of this ever changing plan? State Revenues down, Gambling revenues down, Property values down, Home sales down, Auto sales down, Sales tax down. Meanwhile bankruptcies and foreclosures are up. It doesn’t take a genius to see that this is no time for the N.W. Indiana taxpayers to take on more debt. We will be hard pressed to fund the projects we have now and keep our local governments afloat.

The benefits this project is supposed to create is bogus. It is figured on a formula that if you spend x amount on a transit system it will create x number of jobs and return x amount of money to the local economy. This type of hypothetical job and revenue projection is based on an urban transit system. Not one going to a bean field in Lowell, Indiana.

Thankfully the politicians from North Lake county have stirred from their slumber and asked “What about us?” They want, and rightfully so, rail hubs at the Gary airport and in Hammond. Great ideas. How are we going to fund them?

What we need in place first is a comprehensive tax plan for the state if Indiana. One that will include revenue for a transit system. Then we can look at an overall mass transit plan for the region. Not one that is patched together by special interest groups and uninformed politicians. To think that taxpayers overwhelmingly support this plan is ridiculous and shows our elected officials are out of touch with the rest of us.

Contact your representatives, Tell them to stop this project until we have a better plan for the residents of N.W. Indiana. You can sign an online petition at www.petitiononline.com/mod_perl/signed.cgi?nossre&1 or contact me at nwiposse@yahoo.com

Kevin Cornett

Posted2/13/2008