Sniping helps stall South Shore funding bill

BY PATRICK GUINANE, Times of Northwest Indiana 
pguinane@nwitimes.com

INDIANAPOLIS | The no-tax plan for South Shore expansion landed on the path to a potential legislative buzz saw Tuesday morning.

Senate Tax Chairman Luke Kenley, R-Noblesville, gave the funding bill the strongest heave, saying he couldn't support the plan to divert $350 million in state sales tax money toward construction of commuter rail lines to Lowell and Valparaiso. The measure also stumbled amidst a bout of regional factionalism.

The Senate Tax and Fiscal Policy Committee took more than two hours of testimony, hearing from five region legislators, three mayors, U.S. Rep. Pete Visclosky, D-Ind., a lobbyist for East Chicago and representatives of the Northern Indiana Commuter Transportation District, the Northwest Indiana Regional Development Authority and the Northwestern Indiana Regional Planning Commission.

The cavalcade couldn't deliver a unified message. East Chicago became the latest detractor, complaining that the $1 billion rail expansion could sap funding for other RDA projects . Meanwhile, Gary Mayor Rudy Clay and state Sen. Earline Rogers, D-Gary, continued to press for a $130 million rail link to Gary/Chicago International Airport.

And at least one member of the Senate panel was noticeably irritated by the lengthy, sometimes divisive display put on the by the Northwest Indiana contingent.

"It seems to me that we have a disagreement between the whole region," said state Sen. Connie Sipes, D-New Albany. "Is this the proper place to discuss this?"

Sipes posed the same question at least two more times.

After the hearing, Hammond Mayor Thomas McDermott Jr. said he was embarrassed that the region had "aired it's dirty laundry in front of the Senate." McDermott worked behind the scenes in recent weeks to secure a commitment for a Hammond gateway station linking current and future South Shore lines if the expansion plan moves forward.

Kenley on several occasions raised the prospect of imposing a 1 percent food and beverage sales tax in the four counties served by the South Bend-to-Chicago commuter railroad. He held off voting on the South Shore legislation, House Bill 1220, until at least next week.

Kenley said he wants to talk with state Rep. Chet Dobis, the Merrillville Democrat who authored the South Shore bill. But Dobis said any sort of regional tax hike is a off the table, so it's unclear what the two could discuss that might save the rail funding bill.