Here's what's crazy: By my best reckoning Idaho is getting over $15
million it could have spent on public transportation statewide. It can
only buy infrastructure with this money, nothing but buses, bus stops,
material stuff like that. No drivers, no gas, no operating costs to pay
drivers to make the buses go anywhere if we buy them.
At the same
time the Speaker of the House (I'm sure with a bit of strategic help
from Mike Moyle and his leadership team because Lawence Denny is the
man, but he is not the arm twisting type) the Speaker has said no
hearing on any local option authority legislation. No hearing to let
voters in local communities around the state decide if they would like
to tax themselves to fund something urgent that we as a state
legislature just won't give them money for.
The most glaring
example would be public transportation. No state dollars go there. No
local funding source exists because local governments are not allowed
to ask voters what they want to fund and how they want to fund it. The
state dictates that. So since Mike Moyle, a single man from Star,
elected to a powerful position by an increasingly conservative
Republican caucus, since he is still not a fan of public
transportation, the entire state has no way of funding public
transportation operations.
So, no matter how long the people of
Nampa wait in traffic, no matter how long it takes some days to get
from Boise to Star or Eagle, if we have no money to operate a bus with
fuel and a driver, we can not use the stimulus to solve the problem of
Nampa to Boise buses running at capacity, or a bus system so poor it
does not even run after dark, in early mornings or on weekends. Who can
depend on a system like that? Who can afford to miss the bus to work or
a job interview when the next one does not come for an hour or so?
So,
instead of using the stimulus to allow little cities around Idaho to
fund new van pools or real bus systems; instead of putting more buses
on that corridor between Ada and Canyon counties we will instead replace
old buses and then go on as we were, infinitely widening freeways and
overpasses between Nampa and Boise. We will spend billions on that
stretch of highway because a few powerful people don't personally like
or believe in public transit. We will waste millions infinitely and
futally trying to unclogg a clogged stretch of freeway, money that
could be spent to fix rural roads from Soda Springs to Sandpoint.
I would think my rural colleagues would be more annoyed about that.