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Financial Train Wreck
Activists are gathering in Washington County in vocal opposition to possible construction of unnecessary light rail routes. The controversial and unjustifiably expensive light rail line that was proposed to carve its way across Clackamas County looks set to duplicate itself in Washington County. As you’d imagine, locals are as enthusiastic about the possibility as the Clackistanis are.
Pre-Emptive Action
Petitions were filed in the Washington County cities of Tigard, King City, Tualitin and Sherwood as countermeasures against possible proposals. If the petitions are successful it will mean that any announcements for new rail systems must first pass a public vote on the financing of the projects.
The hope is that the issues can be put before the special election ballot on September 13. To qualify for admission, the petitions must first gather a certain number of signatures, though the chief petitioners in each city, Doug Davina in Sherwood, Aaron Crowley in Tualatin and Billie Reynolds in King City, and Art Crino in Tigard, are all confident that volunteers will gather a sufficient quantity. The actual tally required varies from city to city due to their varying size – ranging from 4,277 signatures in Tigard to a mere 273 in King City – but compared to the percentage of each city’s population such totals relate to, only a small voice of the city is required in order for those who run it to sit up and take notice.
Councilors in Tigard confirmed that Crino had filed the petition and that they were still reviewing it. It first needs to be approved and then if it is not subsequently challenged, the ballot title will be confirmed within 17 days. Crino and his volunteers would then have until June 20 to collect the required number of signatures from the townspeople.
When asked to clarify his position, Crino stated that “We believe the public should have a voice. It’s not that we’re saying no light rail,” and that “We just want to make sure that light rail only comes through our towns if the citizens approve of it."
Although no actual projects for the construction of light rail routes have yet been officially proposed for Washington County, local government officials have initiated a study, to be carried out with Metro and Tri-Met, to investigate all the “high capacity transit” options to run along the Southwest Corridor, running along Southwest Barbur Boulevard and Highway 99.
Opposing Opposition
It will come as no surprise that those who actually support the light rail initiatives are voicing their concerns about the possibly detrimental effect that any such enforced vote will have on local council processes, claiming it will set a dangerous precedent.
Legislative candidate Carl Hosticka pointed out that while showing you are giving the locals a say in the matter might give a good appearance, he also declared that it was “undemocratic” to allow them to potentially overturn regional legislation and that any project “could be held hostage by a small group.” But then, he is the councilor for Metro that represents the area of Washington County in question, so he is somewhat obliged to make those kinds of statements.
The other issue raised was that any races for office would be slowed down by candidates having to take a stance on the issue, with former Metro Council candidate Steve Schopp referring to it as an “opportunity for activists to rally behind interrupting the regional policy making.” Because heaven forbid that local councilors be forced to voice an actual opinion.
Clackistani Uprising
The first example of the general population making their opinions known in such a manner was in Clackamas County only a few weeks ago.
When the $1.49 billion light rail route to run through Clackamas County was announced it was met with a great deal of hostility from locals. Many felt that the idea of local legislators diverting such a vast sum of taxpayer’s money to a project without requiring general approval was utterly unjustifiable.
Almost 12,000 signatures were submitted to the County Elections Office, and although only 9,728 of them were validated by a statistical sampling method, it was still 350 more than the minimum required to qualify for the September special election.
Some 1,500 volunteers collected 8,000 of the signatures in only six days through gathering them by any means necessary, be it by going door-to-door, or grabbing people when they were on the street or out shopping for upholstery. The swiftly accumulated tally indicates how strongly opposed to the project the population truly is. If this level of opposition is anything to go by, the cities and people of Washington County will have no trouble making their voices heard.
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Additional notes: Although voters approved construction of the initial Portland/Gresham light rail, they voted down additional lines, which government agencies built anyway. The agencies then decided not to bother with the formality of gaining voter approval, and have planned and constructed additional lines. Activists recognize that the only way to bring them under control involves severing the agencies' access to the public purse. At this writing, Metro and Tri-Met are well on the way to burning through $10 million in tax dollars on "studies" of "high capacity transit" in the southwest area. In planner lingo, that means two-car light rail "trains" - because that's all that fits into a downtown Portland city block. And in the Metro/Tri-Met mindset, everybody needs to go to downtown Portland.
In Portland and the surrounding area, "high-capacity transit" means two light-rail cars. If you want to see real high capacity transit, you might look at the El in Chicago, the Metro in D.C., or the New York City transit system - none of which run two-car "trains".
Further note: the guest writer has been permitted one plug for nonoffensive content in exchange.
