I see you guys still need the opinions of Joe Thompson (Gilroy Dispatch, Dec. 2). Why, I ask? He is the one that wanted people to get a new car! That’s the sort of person I thought you guys didn’t like. I guess I was wrong. So be it.
I use public transit all the time. I’m an access user and proud of it. It’s cheap, affordable and smart. Mr. Thompson is wrong, of course. He doesn’t like anybody, anyway.
Radicals are everywhere, and it’s getting worse. They failed to bring me down. I’m lucky, But not for long, nobody lives forever, and I’m still not well. I’ve had two heart attacks and two strokes, and I’m still able to rock. I’m blessed.
Daniel Garcia
Gilroy
Ah Mon Ami,
I hope that you are well, enjoying the New Year. We expect that subsidy recipients will support more transit services paid for by others. What we don’t expect is that our government will conceal the truth in transportation from the taxpayers, who pay the taxes that make it possible for them to operate transit boondoggles. In our Public Utilities Code we find the Transit Development Act, where the requirements for farebox recovery rates are prescribed. The truth is in the details. Bernie Madoff and Enron used “off-book accounting” methods to conceal the full extent of the losses they sustained. How would it be if our own government did that to us?
FTX Bitcoin scam is, according to some reports, the “scam of the century.” Maybe. But do our leaders (appointed “directors” of the transit agencies) conceal the losses that they sustain by means of false financials?
If they are required to net 10% of their operating costs from their patrons (riders), do they include taxpayers’ subsidies from sales taxes in calculating their income from operations? Wouldn’t such a practice undermine the integrity of their financial
reports to the voters? What creative accounting is going on at the transit agencies at the expense of motorists paying gas taxes to fund the transit agencies’ operations? Are there any elected officials who would dare to ask the question? What about a Public Records Act request by the City Council to the VTA? Or by SBC BOS to SBC COG? Would that get to the bottom of the cover-up? Don’t know because they never seek to know why the taxpayers are being shafted by the “directors” unelected appointees to the transit agencies.
We continue the quest for truth in transportation, and I am very happy to have you join me in the discussion.
Joe Thompson
(408) 848-5506
Past-President (1999-2001, 2006), Gilroy-Morgan Hill Bar Assn.
E-Mail: [email protected]