Half-penny transportation tax may be on November ballot (Miami: sales, 2015)

[Bobdreamz]

Another half-penny transportation tax may be on the November ballot as Miami-Dade county scrambles to add transit.

At last week’s Chairman’s Policy Council, Commissioner Jean Monestime said he’ll ask attorneys to draft legislation to add the surtax, 15 years after voters approved the People’s Transportation Plan [PTP] half-penny surtax.

“Time is running out for our board and our legacy and I think it’s time that we stop being afraid to fail,” he said. “If I’m going to fail, I’m going to fail big.”

Voters OK’d the PTP in 2002 for key projects, but most money has funded operations instead. Of $251.6 million collected in 2015-16, only $75.8 million went to capital work.

Mr. Monestime suggested a new surtax may be larger than the first: “We need to put it in [voters’] hands, not ours, when determining whether we should move forward with another half-penny, if not more.”

Dennis Moss said he couldn’t support an extra surtax when residents have been promised solutions they haven’t seen. “I’m just telling you straight up: South Dade is not going to support it.”

He said commissioners should first start SMART plan building to show progress. “Then we can go back out there, because people are not going to fall for the promises.”

Audrey Edmonson supported rapid action, saying three commissioners leading transit talks – Bruno Barreiro, Mr. Moss and Esteban Bovo Jr. – will be gone in 2020.

Mr. Monestime said impending term limits and an outcry from millennials are driving him to put the tax on the ballot quickly. “Our millennials are screaming and crying for this,” he said. The first half-penny passed before millennials were eligible to vote, he said, making them too young to feel betrayed. “Maybe this issue can mobilize them.”

“This isn’t something I can do by myself without the support of the board,” Mr. Monestime said. “But we need to have a longer conversation about giving the voters the option.”

Half-penny transportation tax may be on November ballot - Miami Today

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

*The half penny sales tax for transit that passed in 2002 ( I voted for it ) has raised well over $3 Billion dollars since its passage for mass transit yet county commissioners diverted the funds for Metrorail expansion to cover regular operating transit costs instead.
The most significant expansion so far of Metrorail was to the airport which cost a half billion dollars.
Should voters approve another half penny to expand ?

Thoughts ?

[boxus]

No, no, and no.

Please refer to the 2002 as the reason.

They do not need any more money because in my opinion, they are not efficiently spending what they have.

[bale002]

Originally Posted by Bobdreamz

Another half-penny transportation tax may be on the November ballot as Miami-Dade county scrambles to add transit.

Should voters approve another half penny to expand ?

Thoughts ?

No. Simply no.

As mentioned, these people are not to be trusted. Period.

In any case, none of the proposed solutions in the so-called SMART plan are really that smart.

Until high-tech solutions are truly viable, the best route to ameliorate the situation is simple low-tech, low-cost, and certainly not more very expensive and underutilized 1950s technology that we would be stuck with for the next 50 years.

No.

[Bobdreamz]

^ What hi-tech solutions are you speaking about?

[transitfan]

No way another 1/2 cent tax passes in Dade County. In fact, the farce that was the 2002 tax may have even affected a transit tax proposal in Broward County a few years ago. As you can tell from my handle, I am pro-transit (although where I live and work precludes me from using it on a regular basis), but I even voted against the Broward proposal, because I didn't trust them to do any better than Dade did with theirs.