It has long been shown that the Columbian, the so-called newspaper of record for Southwest Washington, is solidly in the tank for the effort to force Clark County to accept Portland, Oregon’s financially ailing light rail system by supporting the Columbia River Crossing project, falsely being sold as a “bridge replacement project.”
Replacing the aging spans is secondary to forcing light rail across state lines a short distance into our community, as was revealed early in 2012 by an Oregon State Supreme Court ruling in an unrelated case. To date, the Columbian has not acknowledged that revelation first made known in the Willamette Week article, The $2.5 Billion Bribe.
Far from being just an “ugly baby” we are somehow beholden to, as described in editor Lou Brancaccio’s Saturday Press Talk column, It’s an ugly baby, but it’s ours, it is in reality the epitome of the war on the middle class as expenses of this boondoggle fall directly on the backs of a still struggling middle class in Clark County trying to recover from 4 straight years of double digit unemployment.
CREDC, The Columbia River Economic Development Council and staunch supporters of the project, unwittingly admit to just that in their 2013 Legislative Agenda paper where you read,
“As we move into 2013, Southwest Washington has largely been bypassed by economic recovery. As the Legislature continues to wrestle with the budgetary challenges it faces on a statewide level, the need remains to minimize economic harm to municipalities, schools, and our other local economic entities. When cuts are made in the State budget that affect local communities, the legislature should review mandated policies under State law that remain unfunded and if possible allow latitude on implementation to our local governments, schools and other impacted agencies.”
Ignoring that CREDC does not advocate paying higher taxes themselves on their individual businesses or increased license and fees, often seeking and gaining actual tax cuts to remain in business, they end the paper saying,
“The business community of Clark County has provided a united voice and Southwest Washington Legislators have been receptive and supportive. Southwest Washington has enjoyed successes because of the teamwork this region demonstrates in both the public and private sectors. We thank you for your continued support.”
What successes? Did they not begin saying “Southwest Washington has largely been bypassed by economic recovery?”
The only success I see is CREDC fighting to receive more funding confiscated from the struggling middle class who has “largely been bypassed by economic recovery.”
Jim Moeller
We also see this week in the Columbian online, a series of short videos featuring 49th Legislative District Representative, Jim Moeller, a far left Democrat justifying his efforts to sue constituents to invalidate their votes, cramming Portland’s ill fated light rail down our throats against our wishes and his opposition to many positions his constituents take.
He laughingly calls that “leadership” when it more rightly would be labeled “dictating” elsewhere.
Annette Cleveland
But shining light on the left’s war on the middle class, who will bear the burden of generations to pay for this boondoggle, who will see tax increases, high tolls, fewer long term jobs, gasoline tax increases, possibly an increase in their license tab fees and if rookie 49th District State Senator Annette Cleveland gets her way, a toll on top of the tolls, does not set well with the left, even those who have expressed opposition to the light rail prospects.
Fortunately, the middle class in Clark County has allies in the State Legislature who are standing up for us and against this heavy burden the left wishes to place on us to pay for a massive light rail carrier we have repeatedly said we do not want.
Again, we end up turning to the Willamette Week as they did an article recently on 18th District State Senator Ann Rivers. Allied with 17th District State Senator Don Benton, both Republicans we read from the Willamette Week, “Oregon backers of the CRC think they’ve won the day. They haven’t met Ann Rivers.”
Ann Rivers
Together, Rivers and Benton have sponsored legislation to halt the massive spending, some $170 Million to date and cannot even draw a design to adequately clear river commerce traffic and redraw plans to a workable, more affordable project.
As Sen. Rivers puts it,
“It’s almost been like a timeshare sales pitch: ‘If you don’t buy now, by God, you’ll never be able to get it at this price!’ We need some sanity on this.”
Yes, it is well passed time some sanity was brought into this discussion and the hard sell pushed by supporters and the Columbian ceased.
Even though Brancaccio claims to “respect” Ann Rivers and her views, he too engages in an obfuscation tactic with,
“there is a sense from many in this community that the conversation about the CRC has to shift. It has to shift from talking about all the problematic details mentioned above to a much broader topic. And that broader topic is what a new bridge would mean to this community.”
In other words, very similar to what Sen. Rivers said.
Brancaccio would have us ignore the multitude of problems associated with the project as well as the ever increasing call of raising revenues throughout Clark County to pay for what we say we do not want.
Barely batting an eyelid to acknowledge the forensic auditing work of Acuity Group LLC and the diligence of Tiffany Couch, the so called NEWS paper seems to take no position on the revelation of irregularities asked by 3rd Congressional District Congresswoman Jaime Herrera Beutler as she questions CRC expenses, some as far as 60 miles outside of the so-called benefit district of the project and that also stand to be placed squarely on the backs of the still struggling middle class in Clark County.
Whether or not she will follow through on her questions remains to be seen, though.
We hear a lot of lip service from Democrats on how they support and stand up for the middle class. But we then see them raising taxes, fees, charges or any multitude of burdens they place squarely on the backs of the middle class.
Although you wouldn’t think such a project is a partisan issue, the CRC in its current form is just that as Democrats line up to force the middle class to accept it.
Or, as Democrat Jim Moeller once put it,
“I’m just going to spend my political capital dragging you and the rest of the CRC naysayers into the 21st century so we can join in the future of the economic powerhouse to the south called Portland.”
Doing something to the benefit of his own district he is elected to represent, like give the struggling middle class a break, is out of the question as Moeller and others drive their war on the middle class ahead.
