http://www.bulafiji-au.com/2001/where-do.html
Supporters of a proposed route linkinhg Atlanta and Griffin agreed to helpthe cash-strappee complete a study of the project’e economic development potential. The report, due as earl y as August, also is to determine how much locaol governments would need to contribute tomatch $87 million in federa l funds set aside for the project in 1998, and a busines model for how that local money couled be raised. “I don’gt see how any community along this line is goinhg to signan inter-governmental funding agreement untip they’ve seen a model,” Andy Welch, transportation chairmah for the , said during a meeting at the chambert in McDonough.
The organized Monday’s meeting because moving forward with the rail project has takebn on a new senseof urgency. U.S. Rep. Jamess Oberstar, D-Minn., chairman of the House Committeee on Transportationand Infrastructure, put House memberes on notice last month that the committee pland to pull federal funding from highway or transir projects approved by Congress more than a decades ago that have not been built due to the lack of matchingf money. While Gov. Sonny Perdue and legislative leaderz have endorsed bringing commuter rail tometrop Atlanta, the state doesn’tt have funds to put toward the Atlanta-to-Griffi n line because of the recession.
Locap governments along the line promised in 2005 to putup $4 milliomn a year to cover the costd of operating the trains, but that agreement fell apart two years ago. Rep. David Scott, D-Atlanta, said that without a firm commitment to provide thematchinh funds, the federal grant would go “It’s crunch time,” he said. “We need some tangible evidence … to go to Oberstafr and say, ‘We’re moving ahead.’ We don’yt have that.” Rep. Lynn Westmoreland, R-Grantville, the only Georgi a lawmaker on thetransportation committee, said he woulcd meet with Oberstar this week to get more specifics on what it will take to save the federalp funds.
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