One of the central components of all future transportation planning for Georgetown was the construction of a streetcar line that would travel from Georgetown through downtown to Union Station. With its budget action yesterday, however, the Council has put that component at serious risk.
As reported several places, the Council approved a preliminary budget yesterday that took $165 million from the streetcar project and moved it to tax cuts. The primary actor behind the move, Chairman Phil Mendelson, tried to paint the move as not endangering the ambitious plans for streetcar across the city. He claimed money could be returned to the project in the future. But seeing as the slashed budget is being directed towards tax cuts, GM’s skeptical such a decision could be reversed.
There are various arcane budgetary tricks at play (well described by the Post) but suffice it to say, whereas the mayor’s proposed budget continues the plan of setting aside significant money to fund future expansions of the program, Mendelson’s budget only funds initial plans.
While the line from Union Station to Georgetown is the first to be constructed, these shenanigans make long-term planning more difficult and could endanger the creation of a dedicated transitway on K St. through downtown. Given Mendelson’s (and the Council’s) preference for reducing millionaire’s estate taxes to maintaining a steady stream of revenue for the streetcar, GM doesn’t think it’s beyond question at this point that the full line will even be built.
Not for nothing, but multi-million dollar homes in Georgetown get snapped up in days. The idea–pushed forever by politicians like Jack Evans–that DC’s taxes are scaring away wealthy residents is obviously baseless. Yet we’re slashing taxes paid by rich people based on this faulty (and self-serving) premise and paying for that fool’s errand by mortgaging our future transit system.
The Georgetown Metropolitan 