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Originally Posted by the urban politician
Great news.
Can any of you kindly post what the nature of the plan is? (sorry guys, too lazy to do the research)
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Can any of you kindly post what the nature of the plan is? (sorry guys, too lazy to do the research)
End of Quote
The house bill that created DARTA was explicate and to the point. It meant the end of over $100 Million per in operating subsidies to SMART and DDOT from the state fuel tax. The new bill is the same and the preferred funding is one half percent for transit operation and one half percent for the county road commission. This is kept a secret to deceive the public into believing that we will get more from our limited transportation tax dollars, more federal funds and job growth.
The city of Livonia never paid for the large SMART buses ever. The money came from the Michigan Department of Transportation. The November 2005 opt. out was a hoax to disguise over $32 Million dollars per year in operating cuts that were once used for revenue sharing among communities.
The August 2010 SMART property tax renewal is a cover up, masquerade and a deception to get the public to believe that the state tax on fuel from the Michigan Department of Transportation is now defunct and must be replaced.
A vote of NO will only defeat the increase of this tax.
The savethefueltax.org website is designed to defeat this tax unless SMART officials respond appropriately to serve the best interests of all taxpayers. This will restore the dignity and respect of southeast Michigan’s taxpayers by allowing competition and the end of scare tactics designed to increase taxes by telling the public that the elderly, handicapped and the low income will lose their transportation options without your YES vote. This is illegal because of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Americans with Disabilities Act. It is time to publicly disqualify SMART officials from denying the public a voice in how we use our tax dollars by mailing them the letter in the website to protect Act 51 which mandates state funds for all.
The NEW regional agreement rejects protecting existing federal and state funding by allowing a county take over of mast transit. This affords the taxpayers no accountable as it is essentially a bailout of over $70 Million in debts from the city of Detroit which is very explicit if you take the time to understand how mass transit is funded as specific to the state of Michigan. The only way a regional transit authority can be of any benefit is by reducing the per passenger costs of our existing public bus systems. The promoters of this agreement claim just that but they are wrong. Our county and local governments are not equipped to manage, build and maintain the transit system that is proposed by our leaders. This is best left to our industries without the county government.
The SMART property tax and NEW regional agreement are both regressive in the sense that it will be the low income and not state, federal or industry that will pay. There is just simply no reason why an average worker would want to support such an agreement or the SMART property tax unless they want to pay more taxes for no reason. Our existing laws protect our mass transit systems as we know them today. But, lawmakers in Lansing will take away all funding and move our state backwards unless directly challenged to make SMART and DDOT accountable by protecting all existing funds. That is not the case.
Remember Livonia in November 2006? That is the future of southeast Michigan unless the public demands the restoration of public bus service first in writing. Our leaders are not interested in supporting or improving our existing public bus systems. That is not the purpose of the new regional mass transit agreement.
Without Support, savethefueltax.org will expire and there just simply will not be any state money or a decent amount of fare box money or any industry support to speak of. It will be survival of the fittest and the rich will win every single time. Of course, unless our industries including Wal-Mart decide to pay a decent wage out of the kindness and generosity of their big hearts.