With John Lehman's recent betrayal of the citizens of Racine via his role in changing the Governor's proposal for RTA/KRM it has become apparent that John Lehman is no longer fit to represent Racine. His offenses include:
1. Deception. Insulting the intelligence of the citizens of Racine by adopting a rental car tax that is not only unsustainable, but stupid. Lehman believes that the citizens of Racine do not have the mental capacity to understand that Federal dollars are contingent upon a dedicated funding source from us (sales tax or gas tax). Given that knowledge, he still insisted on the rental car tax, knowing that it would disqualify the KRM project from federal money, thus effectively ending the project or assigning it to permanent limbo. He wants to make it look like he tried, when in fact he knew full well his proposal would fail due to lack of Federal funding. He was counting on the stupidity of the citizens to accept his non-solution and re-elect him.
2. Coward. He put politics above policy and the economic prosperity of Racine. He was more concerned about his job than the citizens he represents.
3. Pandering. John pandered to conservatives that did not vote for him in the first place and will not vote for him in the future. The same conservatives who advocate doing and paying for nothing under any circumstances......ever.
4. Inept. Any third grader could have sold this project to the people with an effective message. A minimal sales tax increase, offset by lowering property tax. Shift the tax burden from property owners as the sole funding and share the load with visitors via a sales tax. A typical person would pay less than $2/month in additional sales tax ($24/year) and save $100 in property tax.
5. Contempt. By rejecting RTA, Lehman also killed the bus system in Racine, which is in dire need of help. The bus had been funded by property taxes. Those taxes are not indexed to inflation so while the costs of the bus have gone up, revenue has not. The result is less routes/service and increased fares which led to a dramatic decrease in passengers. RTA would have supplied a more reliable funding source for the bus, by using the sales tax money (thus saving the Racine bus system). Lehman apparently doesn't care about the working poor or anyone else that needs public transportation to survive. In not supporting RTA, he is advocating for the demise of the bus system while throwing all of us under it.
