This morning, Gov. Blagojevich offered the CTA and Pace $27 million in grants to keep both agencies running through the end of the year and delay fare hikes and service cuts set to take effect on Sunday.
The CTA and RTA have tentatively agreed to accept the bailout, as long as the Federal Transit Administration approves the infusion of capital dollars.
Unlike the first one, this bailout is a grant, not a loan, the governor says.
My question to you is, should the CTA and Pace go ahead with the cuts anyway, to force the General Assembly to finally make a decision on long-term transit funding? Or should they just take the money and save millions of transit riders the headache?
Thoughts?
Since when did the Illinois governorship become the regional loan-sharking syndicate? What's he going to do if we don't repay the $24m we still owe, break all of our legs so that we can't climb onto the buses? (That won't work. The buses are handicap-accessible.)
Wait a second. The loan from August was for $24 million and the grant is $27 million. Those two offset, leaving only 3 million in actual gain.