Oct 22, 2007 6:09 pm US/Central
CTA Reminds Commuters Of Impending 'Doomsday' Cuts
CHICAGO (CBS) ―
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CTA employees Oct. 22, 2007 distributed leaflets on approaching "doomsday" transport cuts and fare hikes.
CBS
With so little action coming out of Springfield the CTA Monday reminded commuters their "doomsday" is just two weeks away.
CBS 2 Political Editor Mike Flannery reports CTA employees were passing out leaflets warning of higher fares and service cuts.
The leaflets have on one side a symbol meaning no "Band-Aids," adding we need a long-term solution to mass transit funding.
But State Senate President Emil Jones told CBS 2 that CTA executives are being unrealistic in the money they want the state to provide.
"Carole Brown and Ron Huberman, they're out there in la-la land," Jones said. "To get legislators to vote for a tax increase is not the easiest thing to get them to vote for."
Even though he himself is from Chicago the state senate's budget chief, South Side Sen. Donne Trotter, suggested Mayor Richard M. Daley and Chicago taxpayers should be forced to pay much more to the CTA than they ever have previously.
"Can we look at some of those TIF dollars the mayor has put in his private piggy bank? Can we look at that $600 million that he put in his private piggy bank from the Skyway, from that $1.2 billion deal."
But House Speaker Michael J. Madigan's spokesperson rejected all that. House Democrats still favor the sales tax increase they proposed last summer for transit.
"That is the most rational, sort of regional solution to a regional problem, and we're hoping that it can pass before there are any real major cuts, major fare increases have to go into effect," said spokesperson Steve Brown.
Neither the House nor the Senate is scheduled to convene between now and the Nov. 4 date when the fare hikes and service cuts are scheduled to take effect.
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