Thursday, March 15, 2012

Conservatives Win One!

Actual Conservatives--not the jello-folk--won one yesterday.

.,..a key legislative committee voted Wednesday against building a new train maintenance base - a decision that officials warned could mean mothballing two brand-new trains and walking away from the $71.8 million already invested in them.

Gov. Walker, for some reason, does not agree with this move.

...Under the terms of the company's no-bid contract with the state, Talgo was to maintain its trains at a base provided by the state.

"No-bid" means that Diamond Jim handed the contract to Talgo, no questions asked.

...Republican lawmakers attacked the deal Wednesday, pointing to state Department of Transportation calculations that the state could save $10 million a year by mothballing the new state-owned trains and continuing to use 20- to 30-year-old Amtrak-owned equipment. The state would save money even though it would be paying $739,347 a year to store the Talgo trains, which probably couldn't be sold to another state, Gottlieb said.

Good.  That $10 million should be offset by a TAX REDUCTION.

2 comments:

jimspice said...

Tax reduction? You haven't been following the plot. The money will be used to offer tax breaks for companies to relocate here so the state can then break their contract. Duh.

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