Gary mayor: Airport belongs on South Shore ride

Clay does not take kindly to legislative efforts to force Gary to kick in at least $35 million for a South Shore commuter rail extension he believes would chiefly benefit other parts of the region.

Appearing with Sen. Earline Rogers, D-Gary, the mayor said Tuesday he wants plans for a rail spur from the South Shore line to the Gary/Chicago International Airport to be part of the $1 billion construction package pending in the state Senate.

"If there's going to be a $1 billion train ride, Gary wants to go for that train ride," Clay said.

Otherwise, Clay wants Gary to have the power to opt out of paying $3.5 million annually to the Northwest Indiana Regional Development Authority, the public board slated to contribute $150 million to building the South Shore extension south to Lowell and east to Valparaiso.

Rogers will propose an amendment to House Bill 1220 to allow Gary and other current paying members of the RDA to pull out of the group immediately.

The senator is responding to a clause now in the bill locking the contributors -- Gary, Hammond, East Chicago, Lake County and Porter County -- into 10-year commitments at $3.5 million each per year.

Rep. Chet Dobis, D-Merrillville, said bonding agencies need a secure funding source before they will agree to loan the money for the project.

But Rogers worries the rest of the RDA's agenda, like the airport or regional bus service, is getting shunted aside in favor of the massive rail expansion Dobis and U.S. Rep. Pete Visclosky are pushing.

"This is really changing the rules in the middle of the game," Rogers, who helped craft the RDA's enabling legislation in 2005, said.

"Certainly we might be more enthusiastic about the (South Shore) plan if it included an opportunity for a spur to be built to the Gary/Chicago airport ..." she added.

Visclosky has urged legislators to act quickly on the South Shore extension, pledging $500 million in federal matching funds if the same amount can be found locally.

He will testify Tuesday about the plan in front of the Senate Tax Committee in hopes of securing the money this year.

Visclosky pledged to push for money to pay for an engineering study of the airport spur in 2009.

"That's the first step, so the airport spur project can catch up to the rest of the South Shore project," Visclosky said. "There's nothing here that can't be worked out."

But Clay remains leery about the airport spur proposal coming uncoupled from the larger South Shore construction plan.

"We want to ride with the money," he said.