BY KEITH BENMAN, Times of Northwest Indiana
kbenman@nwitimes.com
Why the South Shore extension bill went off the tracks in the General Assembly is a question still being grappled with by friends and foes of the $1 billion project.
"I kept waiting for Chet (State Rep. Chet Dobis) to pull a rabbit out of his hat," said State Sen. Earline Rogers, D-Gary. "But it never happened."
House Bill 1220, introduced by Dobis at the beginning of the session, would have diverted $30 million annually in state sales tax to the project to make up a $350 million funding shortfall.
Dobis, a Merrillville Democrat, proposed using state sales tax after it became obvious voters would not stomach a new tax while the state's property tax revolt was in full swing.
"I said I have to find a way to do this without a tax increase," Dobis said this week. "And I did that. But there were a couple of people that stood in my way: the governor and Sen. Kenley (Luke Kenley, R-Noblesville)."
Others said it didn't help that at a Feb. 12 hearing before Kenley's Senate Tax and Fiscal Policy Committee, region representatives sparred over where stations should be built and whether the South Shore would sap resources from other projects.
"Until we decide we are a region, and until we decide we need to set aside our parochial instincts, we will never, and I emphasize never, come together for the long-term benefit of Northwest Indiana," said Harley Snyder, the governor's appointee to the Northwest Indiana Regional Development Authority.
But others point out Kenley already had made it known, and made it known again on Feb. 12, that he would not support using state sales tax to fund the entire $350 million.
Kenley then stripped the bill of funding for the South Shore and remanded it to a summer study committee. House Transportation Chairwoman Terri Austin, D-Anderson, also will conduct hearings on mass transit in Indiana this summer.
At the annual meeting of the Indiana Transportation Association in September, in Hammond, Hamilton County Commissioner Christine Altman issued a call for a statewide funding source for mass transit.
Express buses linking affluent suburbs with downtown Indianapolis have proved a success, and Altman and others now are promoting the idea of light rail for their region.
That gives Dobis and others hope that the South Shore extension still could go forward, this time as part of a statewide push for more mass transit.
"It's not dead," Dobis said.
Opinion is divided on whether Northwest Indiana residents again will be deluged by mailings extolling the virtues of the South Shore expansion. Some blame those mailings for stoking controversy. Others say the effort was well worth it.
RDA member Gus Olympidis said despite questions about using public money for the purpose, the RDA was right in putting up $130,000 for the effort.
With a funding goal of $870,000, the campaign mainly was funded by donations from private business and coordinated by the Northwest Indiana Forum.
"The better question is whether or not it was effective, and clearly it was not," Olympidis said.
But Forum CEO Vince Galbiati said the Forum still has funds left over from the campaign and will restart it -- if it will help the rail project to roll.
"From the Northwest Indiana Forum's perspective, we see this project as critical to the future of Northwest Indiana, so our support for this has not wavered," Galbiati said.