Ohio Spending Panel OKs $200K More for Slow Train to the Past Project
Outsourced California Rail Study Firm Outsources Work to $300/hour Consultant
State Spending Priorities Called into Question as Initial 3C Rail Study Reaches $650,000
August 27, 2009
COLUMBUS, OHIO: The split vote last Monday by a bi-partisan legislative spending panel, over whether Ohio rail chiefs should be given another $200,000 on top of the $450,000 they received in late March to fund a California firm's assessment of the capacity and capital costs associated with Gov. Ted Strickland's idea to start running passenger rail trains between Cincinnati and Cleveland, raises questions of whether this project has merit at a time when Ohio's budget is under terrible pressure and if the Controlling Board will become a back-door to increased agency funding reduced during the regular budget cycle?
The Controlling Board, housed in the Ohio Department of Budget and Management and controlled by the administration of Democratic Gov. Strickland, is an insider's agency that rarely gains coverage by the media other than when spending on hot topics like casino gambling, slot machines or special counsel for special projects comes before its bi-weekly schedule. Ohio news media did take note that state agencies whose funding was reduced in the recently completed budget cycle, that ended on July 17 when Strickland signed a budget some say will lead to thousands fewer state workers and job losses by agencies whose state funding was cut sharply, are using the sleepy spending panel as a back-door method to add to their budgets.
In the case of the request by the Ohio Department of Development (ODOT) and its captive rail agency, The Ohio Rail Development Commission (ORDC) that asked for and received another $200,000 for critical work its needs before it can apply for high-speed rail (HSR) funds from Washington on October 2, the Controlling Board may find itself in the news more often as it becomes a new battleground to tussle over projects that really do need more funding or whether projects like the 3C railroad project, that Republicans in general and Republicans on this panel in particular say is not only not in demand but will spend precious dollars that could be spent on more pressing priorities, like funding food banks, children's health programs, libraries, services for the elderly and the sick, should slow down and wait for better times or better train technology.
Public information submitted (#90) to the Controlling Board by ODOT/ORDC to add another $200,000 to the $450,000 the panel approved in late March, shows the small, four-person California firm, Woodside Consulting, that state officials said they had chosen to perform analysis of the "capacity and capital costs" associated with the re-establishment of passenger rail trains along a 250-mile route connecting Cincinnati with Cleveland with stops in Columbus and Dayton along the way because only they could do it, will now outsource the state's outsourced work to other consultants, one of whom will charge $300/hour, a rate that even high-priced lawyers doing special counsel work for the Ohio Attorney General would envy.
Calls for comments to the three Republicans who voted against the rail consulting funding request Monday, State Senators John Carey (17th Dist), Mark Wagoner (2nd District) and House Representative Jay Hottinger (71st District), were not returned to Spinelli on Assignment in time for this column. However, a staffer for Hottinger who said he was familiar with his boss's general thoughts on the issue of high speed rail, said his boss believes their is little real demand for this project and that a train system like the one that runs in the nation's capital would be better suited for Ohio, as it would help move people from suburbs to city centers, a decision that might actually lure some drivers to abandon their cars for a commuter train.
In ORDC's pre-application to the Federal Rail Administration (FRA) that asks for more than $5 billion of the $8 billion being offered nationally for such projects, Ohio said its 3C plan would conservatively cost $1.53 billion. This figure, some rail observes say, will rise much higher if and when real bids are ever received. Bids to build HSR in Florida -- recall that the International standard for HSR is 167-mph or more-- were nearly double what proponents said they would be when they convinced Floridians in 2000 to have the state make a commitment toward Euro-style trains. In 2004, when the jaw-dropping bids came in from foreign companies that control the fast train technology, Floridians reversed their commitment in another statewide vote. The lesson from Florida, and now from California, where a slim margin of voters last November authorized the sale of $10-billion in bonds to pay one-third the total cost of the state's $45 billion HSR package and where a lawsuit filed recently by opponents of one part of the plan to adjust the route has been upheld by a county judge, should not be lost on regular Ohioans or their leaders.
Amid the fanfare and fever surrounding the prospect of HSR coming to a state near you, a vision that has every township official thinking their location will be a HSR stop and the riches brought in from the talking point that economic development will occur from it, more and more national voices are making clear arguments that are popping the myth bubble expanding around HSR. It may rub some rail proponents the wrong way, but its a message more people need to hear before they are lead to far down the primrose path.
The lesson may play out in Cincinnati, one big C in the 3C rail route. Residents of the Queen City opposed to a trolley project, that has already escalated in estimated cost from $123 million to $185 million, are pushing a charter amendment that if passed this fall would prevent any rail projects going forward without a vote of the public. The hometown newspaper, Gannet's conservative Cincinnati Enquirer, wrote a no-holds editorial calling for a halt to the trolley project. Proponents of trolleys running in a mostly Downtown loop argue not doing it will show how opposed to progress Cincinnati will be. Advocates to stop the trolleys in their tracks say its another boondoggle waiting to happen. Their argument is mostly centered on the health of city finances. Until Cincinnati city finances are flush again, such that it doesn't have to lay off workers or reduce funding for important programs, only then should such a project be discussed.
The implication for ODOT/ORDC is that passage of the charter amendment will help derail their hell-bent push to start the 3C because voters will have to vote again to authorize the building or updating of rail lines into the city.
Critics of the 3C plan, which if it ever gets started -- rail officials say with great uncertainty that their "quick start" train may not run until the fall of 2010 or even 2011 and that the train won't be in full bloom until 2015 -- say the speed will be so slow -- averaging only 57-mph because this train, by necessity, will be forced to share freight rail tracks with freight rail trains. Ohio rail officials are caught on the horns of a dilemma -- they want to encourage support for the plan but at the same time they must tell some officials they won't be a stop on the route. By themselves, freight trains had over 100 accidents in one year in Ohio, according to the FRA. It follows that collisions between passengers and freight will happen.
One key question state rail chiefs or even lawmakers are not asking, is who will be liable for such crashes? Indemnification, the technical name for who pays for accidents when they happen, is an issue, that like the capacity and capital costs Woodside is to produce, state rail chiefs don't want to talk about. State supporters of the costly train to the past would rather oversell its benefits -- one favorite talking point is that rail nodes will foster economic development, but it's a talking point any mode of transportation can make, so its not unique to the 3C -- and undersell the cost to build it, the cost to operate it, the ridership numbers who will use it and how much Ohio will need to subsidize it because it won't be a money maker.
Another critical aspect of the 3C is who should really pay for it, as this article about the debate over the cost of transportation in Virginia demonstrates. Should everyone or just users be stuck with the bill? State rail proponents would like everyone to pay for it even though only a few will actually pay the ticket price to ride nearly seven hours from one corner of the state to another. They are having a hard time making their slow train appear competitive with traveling the same distance by car. Those in the know in Ohio know that even when a rider gets from point A to point B, the public transportation infrastructure that awaits them in any Ohio city has a lot to be desired. State lawmakers have reduced state funding for public transportation by more than 60 percent since 2000, so who's fooling who here?
One funding options state rail officials would rather not discuss is asking those cities who want to be a part of the route -- Cincinnati, Dayton, Columbus and Cleveland -- and those riders who want to ride it to pay for it. Most of Ohio will not be close to it and few Ohioans will not ride it. So why should they pay for it? Tolls and user fees are popular forms of paying for infrastructure, as those of us who follow infrastructure bills in Congress know. James Oberstar (D-Minnesota), the reigning wonk on transportation infrastructure, knows everything about how transportation modes can operate seamlessly but he falls short on how to pay for it all. With the nation all lathered up over growing deficits made real by spending on tax cuts, war and now maybe health insurance reform, the appetite to have Washington dole out trillions more for roads, bridges, airports or trains and train stations is surely souring. States like Ohio will be left to their own devices and political wills to fund their own infrastructure.
As the races for various public offices in 2010 come closer, the wisdom or folly of pushing the 3C slow train to the past will gain more speed. Gov. Strickland will have to defend it while his opponent, possibly John Kasich , a former Ohio Congressman know for his attention to balanced budgets, low-taxes and deficit hawk sentinel, could use it to show what a waste of funds it will be and ask where, exactly, Strickland expects to come up with Ohio's share of hundreds of millions, maybe billions, for a project that would necessarily have to usurp money from more important state priorities.
But until the un-electeds like the leaders of ODOT and ORDC are reigned in by their boss, they will continue to make unsubstantiated arguments for their slow train to the past and spend money as if it was delivered in a box car from CSX, all because they have control over it. Voters will be left at the train station (most communities don't have and can't afford to build) as they watch slow trains that won't go any faster than Civil War era trains chug away from them on routes to yesteryear.
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