Ghiz on Streetcars

Concerns about the City looking into having streetcars are legitimate. However, I agree with other candidates and members of council when I say that we should not react to the price. Everyone out there needs to realize that the options of how to fund streetcars are open. An example of how we could do it was presented by the administration. Its proposal in no way is written in stone. The Economic Development Committee simply gave the administration the go ahead to continue exploring and figuring out how to best manage the price tag for it. As of October 2007, that price tag is $102 million. However, it will go up as we wait to start the project.

My first question is always "how much will this cost?" In this instance, I have seen the type of economic development a streetcar system can generate, and I am in support of doing this. However, we must be cautious of where we get the money to do it. We need to lobby our State officials to get more than $10 million from them. We need to work with the private sector to get them to help us fund it. We need to work to see that the city's $25 million capital investment can be lowered. If we realize that this will be too costly to the city in the sense of loss of services to our citizens, we have put the project on the back burner. I do not think that is the case. I am certain if we work diligently (now, not in a few weeks or years), we can find a way to make this happen with little to no impact on our City coffers. But, every day council waits to act is a day that the overall cost goes up.

The committee on Tuesday was trying not to slow the process. Just because we passed a concept does not mean tracks will be laid tomorrow. We have a long way to go, but if we drag our feet on this, we will be doing a disservice to everyone.