Council Committee Members Utterly Fail To Ask Tough Questions About BRT

If the first meeting of the Metropolitan and Development Committee on the proposed permanent quarter percent income tax increase to fund bus rapid transit is any indication, you are going to be in for a year of nothing but disinformation by the proponents and a complete abandonment of any serious inquiry of the proposal before them by those we've elected to represent us on the Indianapolis City-County Council.

The one point that came through loud and clear that everyone must understand is that proposed income tax increase is a permanent income tax increase to support IndyGo, and the additional income tax revenues are needed both for the additional construction costs of up to three bus rapid transit lines planned for construction over a 5-year period and for the permanent ongoing operating costs of the expanded IndyGo. There will be no property tax relief from the nearly $50 million you already fork over annually in property taxes to support IndyGo.

What the income tax increase guarantees is an immediate 54% increase in the annual operating budget of IndyGo from $70 million to $108 million. Contrary to the state law which allows IndyGo to seek approval of voters to levy a quarter percent income tax for mass transit expansion, IndyGo will continue to rely on the fare box for just 17% of the costs required to operate the bus system. The law passed by the state legislature specifically required the fare box receipts cover 25% of the operating costs of the expanded transportation system. IndyGo's BRT plan to tap $75 million in FTA grant money for the project assumes a fare box return of just 17% of the system's operating costs.

Incredibly, IndyGo planners claim they can construct the Red Line in 2017, a Purple Line in 2019 and a Blue Line in 2020 for just $390 million. The costs for all three lines is much closer to $1 billion than it is to $390 million. IndyGo expects to rely on federal grant money for 60% of those costs. Clearly, the additional income tax increase is needed for both construction and operating costs. Yet officials told non-discerning members of the Metropolitan and Development Committee that no income tax revenues would be used to pay for construction costs. The numbers simply don't add up.

As Advance Indiana reported earlier this week, IndyGo is telling council members it can build BRT lines for a little more than $7 million a mile. That's less than 50% of the cost BRT lines have cost in other cities where the costs run anywhere in the range of $15 to $25 million per mile. Even if IndyGo plans to rely on just the fare box to recover just 17% of the cost of operating the BRTs, it's relying on extremely rosy projections that ridership of the city's bus lines will increase by at least 178% once BRTs are brought on line.

The $96 million initially being budgeted for the Red Line covers just a 13.6 mile stretch from 66th Street south to the University of Indianapolis. IndyGo plans to rely on the City's TIF fund to help make up the $21 million in additional dollars it will need to construct Phase 1 of the Red Line, which would prove to be the least costly BRT ever constructed in the United States if it can actually be built for that cost. IndyGo officials acknowledged there are other complimentary infrastructure costs that will have to be paid out of the Department of Public Works budget that are not included in the $96 million budget. Nobody presented any figures on what those added construction costs in DPW's budget will be.

You had to watch in disbelief as none of the council members who serve on this committee asked a single probing question of the presenters of this ambitious and costly public works project. It's quite obvious they're more concerned about padding the wallets of their campaign contributors who are lining up to cash in when the contracts for this boondoggle are let than what the long-term cost implications are to the taxpayers they pretend to represent, who will be left holding the bag when the bills come due. Unfortunately, only a handful of people bothered to show up to testify at the public hearing and those were mostly business and special interest lobbyists whose opinions are useless to thoughtful deliberations. When a concerned citizen would step to the microphone to raise valid questions, they were quickly cut off due to tight restrictions placed on speaking time.

These committee members have already made up their minds. Don't confuse them with the facts. Then people wonder how we wind up with financial debacles like Blue Indy, Vision Fleet and the Regional Operations Center. There's no point in having an elected council if the only role they see for themselves is being wined and dined by the business and special interest groups they rely upon to finance their campaigns and seeing how much they can fatten their wallets while pretending to represent their constituents.