I do think that building a publicly controlled rail corridor, high speed or other, linking Tampa, Orlando, and ultimately, Miami, will carry important long-term benefits for the state. And of all the rail routes discussed for Florida, the Tampa-to-Orlando stretch has greatest potential ridership. So, I'm happy to see everyone moving forward on it. (Everyone, that is, except JD Alexander and the Winter Haven folks.) But, in the interest of intellectual honesty, and embracing the uncertainties and potential consequences of what I support, I want to make a few points.
In this economy, CSX will not lightly walk away from more than $600 million in cash and system improvements, liability or no. FDOT probably still wants to hand that money over to the company. In fact, it's already done so to some degree in the form of ongoing overpass improvements in north central Florida. Buddy Dyer is out begging for $20,000 in legal expense money so lawyers can try to figure out a way around the senate. Democracy in action. (Funny that with all the money spent on John Thrasher and other uber lobbyists during the session, Dyer is reduced to panhandling for this. You would think GrayRobinson would just pick it up for him.) Anyway, this isn't over. But it's worth taking a moment for some post mortem thoughts before this deal reveals itself as the undead zombie vampire that we fear it might be...
Update: (4/14) It seems that Meek and Brown may pass on the chance to goose fellow Democrats after all. From the Sentinel: Last week, Senate Democratic leader Al Lawson said that U.S. Reps. Kendrick Meek, D-Miami, and Corrine Brown, D-Jacksonville, would be visiting the caucus to talk up commuter rail along with other backers such as Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer. But over the weekend, Meek's office said he wasn't likely to be there and Brown would be out of the country. No word from Dyer despite our inquiries, but the Senate Democratic Office now says only Sen. Lee Constantine, R-Altamonte Springs, is confirmed to attend the meeting, where he'll no doubt face a tough crowd of SunRail opponents, including fellow Orange County Sen. Gary Siplin. Hmmmmm. Why are U.S. Reps. Kendrick Meek, Corrine Brown planning to stick their noses into the state legislative battle over the CSX deal? And why are they taking the side of a deal that guts union jobs, hands over up to $600 million in cash and product to a highly profitable private company, and harms several communities for the benefit of another? Haven't Democrats backed quite enough corporate bailouts of the powerful lately?
In case you missed it, the Orlando Sentinel has a new series on the commuter rail project. Read the full article for the pertinent links...
Memo to hungry political operatives: I have an ad to suggest for the next election cycle. You can probably run some version of this for lots of Republican legislators. (Yes, many Democrats are just as beholden to CSX as Republicans are, but very few Democrats are both anti-stimulus and pro-CSX, which seems to be the mainstream Republican position.) I'll single out Rich Glorioso, R-Plant City here because this is fresh: Fade in with ominous music to an image of Plant City's Smithfield Foods Packing Plant:
Four major freight rail companies control 95 percent of traffic in the US. They are CSX, Union Pacific, Burlington Northern Santa Fe, and Norfolk Southern. It should surprise no one that these Four Horsemen of the Rail Apocalypse love Rep. John Mica, R-Corporate Welfare, the Orlando-area congressman behind the CSX freight dump deal.
As you may have noticed, two of the possible freight realignment routes – seemingly the only available routes – for downtown Lakeland involved reactivating the track that became the Van Fleet Trail between Wildwood and Auburndale. At least one of them would then reactivate closed tracks that run through the very heart of downtown Winter [...]
The Ocala Star-Banner took a hatchet recently to the state's $1.2 billion CSX/Orlando freight expansion and dump deal, both in a straight news story and in an editorial. Veteran reporter Billy Townsend takes a look at the Ocala editorial and compares it to the work by The Orlando Sentinel editorial staff
This morning The Ledger, a Polk County daily, wrote an editorial that should be read by every taxpayer in Orange County. In every editorial the Sentinel has pushed hard to give CSX $795 million dollars. At least the Ledger editorial board realizes this isn't a plan to build a commuter railroad, it's a plan to railroad the commuters.
A couple of news items that are near and dear to Lakelanders. (And a bonus headline.) [ONE QUESTION WASTED] Townsend interviewed in Ledger's "Five Questions" Last night the Ledger posted an article where Lakeland's paper of record asked the Downtown Lakeland Partnership's Julie Townsend* five questions about her organization's continuing fight against Florida wasting taxpayer dollars to give CSX corporate welfare. Yes, the project that used to be called Central Florida Commuter Rail. The project that used to be responsible for forcing CSX to build a new ILC in Winter Haven and running many more longer trains through downtown Lakeland. You remember that don't you? But I guess the Ledger believes we have always been at war with Oceana. Back to the Townsend questions. I finished the article and wondered why 20% of the questions ere wasted on: CSX officials have said that if the purchase of the 61 miles of track goes through, there will be money available to help to install quiet zones along the rail corridor indowntown Lakeland, but if the deal falls through, the quiet zones are probably off the table. Which is a bigger issue for the DLP: quiet zones or the increased number of trains the Orlando deal will bring? Townsend gave a courteous answer "To my knowledge, CSX has never offered to pay for quiet zones...." I wish she had said, "Stop misleading with talk about quiet zones. It's the wasted tax money and traffic stupid. It always has been" (To paraphrase a Bush.) • File Storms Under Aquatic Birds (genus Gavia) Part of our reading area has a state Senator, Rhona Storms. She was in the news recently: The economy is a shambles. State revenue is in a free-fall. House leaders in both parties stand accused of misusing their political powers. This week, state Sen. Ronda Storms identified another menace: The Dewey Decimal System -- Libraries Offer Plenty For Storms To Stew Over Some might give Storms credit. The Dewey Decimal system is a proprietary product of OCLC. Libraries use the company to catalog books and must pay a small price per item placed in their catalog. (Assuming they want to use OCLC's common cataloging info. They could save the money and not join with OCLC, but it would cost them more to do all their own original cataloging. Trust me on this one. I spent seven years dealing with OCLC and catalogers on a daily basis. There is a system that is owned by the American people: the Library of Congress system, but cataloging under that system also has costs. Storms proposes libraries use the BAM method. You know where bookstores place items under big signs in some odd sort of order. You know how easy it is to find the book you need at Borders or Books-a-Million? (I'll wait for my sarcasm challenged daughter to catch that last sentence.) OK, it is simply silly that Storms believes only "little old librarians" will be upset to lose proper shelving of books. So will every single library patron. It's not a miracle that you can look up a book and go to a shelf and find it properly placed. It is the result of a lot of hard work and a precise system of cataloging. It may save a few dollars to not use Dewey, but I promise that when your child needs that book on loons the night before the paper is due...you will be glad you don't instead find a biography on Rhonda Storms. • And as a bonus, this headline from today's Ledger: Woman Accused of Biting Hubby's Thingy Seriously? "Thingy"?! It's a penis people. The Orlando Sentinel, where the Ledger got the story, wasn't much better: Angry wife jailed after biting husband's you-know-what Note that the Sentinel's URL does reference "penis." • * - Townsend is the wife of Lakeland Local writer Billy Townsend, but that makes no difference to me. photo 1 credit: Cat Carter for ylakeland photo 2 credit: becflies2001 (Cross-posted at LakelandLocal.com)
The Tribune had quite a local front in Sunday. First, and most remarkably, Executive Editor Janet Coats and Publisher Denise Palmer co-wrote (one wonders how much co-writing was really involved) a top of the page declaration that the paper would not cease to exist after the Super Bowl, as various rumors have suggested in recent weeks.
The Orlando Sentinel tells me that the Orlando cabal held a pep rally with some of the Sentinel's editors and reporters yesterday to talk about their plans for winning approval of state funding for CSX's Florida business plan, errr, commuter rail. They seem to have momentum on their side, but it seemed that way last year, too. So we'll see. But no matter what happens, this is great: "Central Florida rail backers through MetroPlan Orlando have met privately with their counterparts in Jacksonville, Tampa Bay and South Florida over the last six months to get all four regions on the same page behind Central Florida's plan. For starters, expect backers to launch a new marketing campaign for the project dropping the "Central" from Central Florida Commuter Rail and calling it something other than commuter rail."
Bio: Billy Townsend was a longtime government, political and general assignment reporter in Polk County and the wider I-4 corridor. He wrote extensively about Polk's unique regional identity and the issues shaping it, including USF Polytechnic, the Heartland Parkway and the CSX rail deal. Billy recently left professional reporting to take a corporate writing job, but he keeps close tabs on news of all stripes (especially political news) and the changes in modern journalism. Billy's wife is Julie Townsend, executive director of the Downtown Lakeland Partnership.They live with their three children in the Lake Morton area. His work at Lakeland Local is his first as an amateur hyperlocal writer.