Talking Points County Transportation Surtax
County Transportation Surtax Talking Points
(For City Commission Emails and Meeting on 19 Sep., 1 pm)
Email Commission at citycomm@cityofgainesville.org
For questions contact James Thompson at jtexconsult@gmail.com
Your Task:
First read the background, talking points, and advice for letter writing.
Then, Write an email to citycomm@cityofgainesville.org and CC: bocc@alachuacounty.us (the county commission). All your emails are public property and are read by the press. Expect to end up in the newspaper.
Or, write a more brief letter to the editor of the Gainesville Sun. You have to use their form at www.gainesville.com under “Opinion” and “Letters to the Editor.”
Some Background:
The County will likely ask voters to consider a 1 cent sales tax for anywhere from five to ten years. This will mostly go to fixing our damaged roads infrastructure, but a generous portion of up to 5% may be allocated purely to multi-modal transit (busses, walking, bikes, park and ride).
A similar measure was defeated last year because it did not grant home rule to Gainesville’s portion of the pot (other cities got it), and because it included no bike-ped provisions. The County refused home rule because of opposition to the poorly named “Bus Rapid Transit” routes required by the City’s growing infrastructure.
The Sep. 19th meeting will hopefully reconcile the differences in the City Commission over BRT, hopefully by explaining to worried voters and Commissioners that this isn’t BRT like you see in major metro areas, it is more of an express park and ride, which is exactly the kind of muscular addition to existing robust transit that Mayor Braddy and Commissioner Todd Chase say they support.
Talking Points (Include Only Two or Three and share your personal experience. I always trust people to add or come up with their own, but this gets you started thinking--JT)
1. The transportation tax is badly needed to expand our multi-modal infrastructure so that cars, busses, bikes, walkers, and the disabled can commute efficiently.
2. The transportation tax should include park and ride express projects like the scaled down bus rapid transit system proposed in the current City plan.
3. “BRT” is not some overblown public works project. It is actually a park and ride system that Gainesville is long overdue for. It has been well tested in cities our size for at least two decades.
4. In the proposed Gainesville budget the BRT portion is equal to the sums of a handful of bus route expansions. It is really not that expensive, and it will benefit the working poor and middle class who most need this kind of transportation.
5. Gainesville requires home rule, just like all the other cities, for its portion of the surtax. To yield any control over our portion is not in keeping with the duty of elected City Commissioners.
6. The proposed County tax should include a multi-modal dedicated funds proportion of at least 5% if it is to be attractive to the growing support for bike-ped not just in Gainesville, but in outlying cities like Archer, High Springs, Hawthorne, and Waldo.
6.5 Multi-modal studies across the globe show that it mitigates and calms traffic. It leaves more parking spaces and car lanes for people than can only go by car. It clears up space at the gas pump, and it makes road maintenance cheaper, saving the taxpayers money.
7. This issue is important to me and will help determine how I campaign and vote in the next elections.
Advice for Writing Letters
1. Always begin by stating where you live, that you are a motorist (if you are), and that you pay taxes on gas, a home, etc . . . That disarms many of our critics.
1.5 Be sure to share what you wrote on social media, especially FB. If a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it, then the tree doesn’t get what it wants, or what the forest needs.
2. Avoid using superlatives like “never” or “always” unless you have done research on whether it is true. These deny others’ lived experience and suggest an appeal to ideology and emotion.
3. Always mention if you have a family, what is your profession, and whether you own a business or are a supervisor. The most respected positions (in no order) are clergy, doctors, teachers, responders, and mail carriers, also soldiers and scientists.
4. Be brief in letters to the editor. Letters to government can be slightly longer and more research based, but they still should read smoothly.
5. Always let your letter rest, then edit, then have someone read it. Trust their edits. Never “fire anything off.”