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Re: SMART sales tax extension...Poor accountability, but how does taxpayers, paying millions more in interest fix that?
Author: ron
Date: 03-07-2020 - 10:02
BOB2 Wrote:
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> The problems with the "theory" of "holding SMART
> accountable" by voting down the reauthorization
> are first that it doesn't fix that, the Board has
> to make that management change. I agree with
> Bob's critique, but this also wasn't an election,
> which would somehow allow us to hook up Doc's
> DeLorean, to go back and fix any of that.....
>
> The second problem with this "vote down the
> extension" to "hold SMART accountable" is the
> tremendous cost to taxpayers for such foolish
> reasoning.
>
Your take on the tax extension make good sense from an analytical point of view. In fact your reasoning on many projects where you analyze costs and benefits are always worth reading.What you don't seem to grasp is emotion. Voters are ANGRY that SMART has misled them about costs ,ridership, and a rail line that was supposed to be rebuild to Cloverdale with a parallel bike path years ago.Please read Willie Browns quote "dig a hole and fill it up with money" SMART is now forced to make changes including it's salary structure 395,000 dollars a year for the GM as an example. It's true costs to build something like the Larkspur extension that cost some where between 37 million and about 100 million. Many people think a 30 year extension is too long 2059. With self driving cars coming a lot will change by then. SMART is being spanked by the voters for past misdeeds. They have almost ten years to change their culture and many more election cycles to extend the tax.
-------------------------------------------------------
> The problems with the "theory" of "holding SMART
> accountable" by voting down the reauthorization
> are first that it doesn't fix that, the Board has
> to make that management change. I agree with
> Bob's critique, but this also wasn't an election,
> which would somehow allow us to hook up Doc's
> DeLorean, to go back and fix any of that.....
>
> The second problem with this "vote down the
> extension" to "hold SMART accountable" is the
> tremendous cost to taxpayers for such foolish
> reasoning.
>
Your take on the tax extension make good sense from an analytical point of view. In fact your reasoning on many projects where you analyze costs and benefits are always worth reading.What you don't seem to grasp is emotion. Voters are ANGRY that SMART has misled them about costs ,ridership, and a rail line that was supposed to be rebuild to Cloverdale with a parallel bike path years ago.Please read Willie Browns quote "dig a hole and fill it up with money" SMART is now forced to make changes including it's salary structure 395,000 dollars a year for the GM as an example. It's true costs to build something like the Larkspur extension that cost some where between 37 million and about 100 million. Many people think a 30 year extension is too long 2059. With self driving cars coming a lot will change by then. SMART is being spanked by the voters for past misdeeds. They have almost ten years to change their culture and many more election cycles to extend the tax.
