The Daily News reports on Tim Kearney's plan for permanently funding public mass transit using the profits from the soon-to-be slots halls.
My idea is to take the first $300 million of the $1.6 billion that will go into the pockets of private owners of the state's 14 slots parlors every year and dedicate it to funding mass transit in Pennsylvania.
According to Kearney, SEPTA is and has been run by Repugs throughout its history and it was Repugs who have accrued this deficit without appropriate safeguards in the past. And now, those same Repugs refuse to fund the ailing program.
Q: What's your beef with [state House Speaker John] Perzel (R-Phila) regarding mass transit?
A: Perzel is a powerful Republican. SEPTA is run by Republicans and has been throughout its history. The SEPTA board has always been controlled by Republicans and SEPTA is filled with Republican patronage jobs. If there's waste, it's Republican waste. If there's misuse of money, it has to be laid at Republican feet. So I find it particularly disturbing that Republican legislators in Harrisburg, like Perzel, won't properly fund the system that they've run for more than 30 years.
An interesting proposal for the use of private funding. Let's see how much backing this gets in the coming weeks and months.
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