{"id":850,"date":"2017-09-10T19:49:10","date_gmt":"2017-09-10T19:49:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/michaelcrane.net\/wp\/?p=850"},"modified":"2017-09-10T19:49:10","modified_gmt":"2017-09-10T19:49:10","slug":"patransit-tuesday-weekend-voodoo-math-edition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/michaelcrane.net\/wp\/patransit-tuesday-weekend-voodoo-math-edition\/","title":{"rendered":"PATransit Tuesday: Weekend Voodoo Math Edition"},"content":{"rendered":"

I was going to save this post for Tuesday, but I figured better to get it out there and maybe someone can show me the error of my ways.\u00a0 I really hope there is something that I am just not understanding or seeing.\u00a0 Please correct me!\u00a0 Settle in folks, this is a long one:
<\/span><\/p>\n

First, raise your hand if you thought the drink tax was going to be used for the Port Authority?\u00a0 [Raises hand].\u00a0 So were we duped?\u00a0 Here’s what we were greeted by yesterday<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

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Since their enactment in 2008, Allegheny County’s taxes on alcoholic drinks and car rentals have done virtually nothing to ease the Port Authority’s chronic financial problems.<\/span><\/p>\n

Here’s why: The new taxes were intended to help the county’s budget, not the Port Authority’s.<\/span><\/p>\n

The taxes are generating less than $2 million per year in extra revenue for the authority while producing $30 million to $40 million windfalls that county government has used to avoid raising property taxes.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Well now.\u00a0 Then what about all of these:<\/span><\/p>\n

Example one<\/a>:<\/span><\/p>\n

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The Republican from Upper St. Clair said today the current levy is bringing in more revenue than the county needs to provide local matching funds to help support Port Authority buses and light-rail trains.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Example two<\/a>:<\/span><\/div>\n
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The tax has brought in $80 million for Port Authority operations.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote><\/div>\n
Example three<\/a>:<\/span><\/div>\n
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He proposed the drink tax and a $2-a-day tax on car rentals last year to fund the county’s $30 million subsidy of the Port Authority
<\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
Example four<\/a>:<\/span><\/div>\n
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Given a choice between Allegheny County’s 10 percent drink tax or higher property taxes to fund Port Authority, Chris Pfefferman will choose the former. “Keep the drink tax,” said Pfefferman, 43, a Baldwin Borough homeowner who runs a Downtown newsstand.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Example five<\/a>:<\/span><\/div>\n
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This morning Common Pleas Judge Judith F. Olson set the date for arguments over an injunction that would prevent the county from spending its drink and car rental tax receipts on anything other than transit.
<\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
Example six<\/a>:<\/span><\/div>\n
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In what Allegheny County officials said was a massive blow to this year’s budget, a judge ruled yesterday that excess receipts from the county’s drink and car rental taxes can only be spent on the Port Authority.
<\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
Example seven<\/a>:<\/span><\/div>\n
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County Chief Executive Dan Onorato, in the meantime, pledged to oppose efforts to defeat the tax, which was enacted along with a $2-per-day rental car tax Jan. 1 to raise about $30 million for the Port Authority.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Example eight<\/a>:<\/span><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/div>\n
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In Act 44, they said you can have a drink tax and a car rental tax,” Onorato said. He said he faced the prospect of raising $30 million to $40 million more in property taxes for transit, and “I campaigned on not raising property taxes.” <\/span><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/div>\n
Said Wagner, whose family owns a tavern: “There is no correlation between getting a drink and paying for the Port Authority.”<\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/div>\n
That is just what I quickly found.\u00a0 Were we all confused?\u00a0 Was the entire county lied to?\u00a0 Was there some kind of crazy math going on?\u00a0 Are we all suckers?<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
I was thinking it might have been the wording that the tax was used to fund the county’s contribution, but then there are quotes from judges saying excess money had to be given to the Port Authority, so that kind of cancels that out.
<\/span><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/div>\n
Well, maybe we are all suckers.\u00a0 We know that the math was all kinds of messed up.\u00a0 After all, it brought in so much money to begin with, they apparently didn’t know what to do with it all, hence the court battles saying that the money had to go to the Port Authority.\u00a0 The difference between 10% and 6% is a lot more than even the accountants thought it was!\u00a0 Imagine that!<\/span><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/div>\n
Now, believe it or not, that is actually not the main focus of the article, just a quick aside into the crazy math that has been plaguing us, and continues to haunt us.<\/span><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/div>\n
Yesterday, we were greeted with the news (which also apparently surprised even Steve Bland), that the Governor found $45 million that he wants to give to the Port Authority<\/a>.\u00a0 Awesome!\u00a0 PAT has a $47 million hole to fill, so only having to find an additional $2 million really should not be too bad, or could at least be manageable.<\/span><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/div>\n
Wrong! See, $47 million fixes everything for the year.\u00a0 $45 million, on the other hand, only fixes everything until June<\/a>.<\/span><\/div>\n
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“This only takes the Port Authority through to July 1,” Mr. Rendell said. “Then we’re back to square one.<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
Wait…what?<\/span><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/div>\n
Yes, there is overhead, and I’m sure running a huge transit agency is tough work, much beyond my brain to be able to do it.\u00a0 But really?\u00a0 Something seems way off about this.\u00a0 I’m calling it Voodoo Math.<\/span><\/div>\n

<\/span><\/div>\n
And I think we’re all being suckered again.
<\/span><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I was going to save this post for Tuesday, but I figured better to get it out there and maybe someone can show me the error of my ways.\u00a0 I really hope there is something that I am just not understanding or seeing.\u00a0 Please correct me!\u00a0 Settle in folks, this is a long one: First, raise your […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-850","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-pittsburgh-metblogs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelcrane.net\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/850","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelcrane.net\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelcrane.net\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelcrane.net\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelcrane.net\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=850"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/michaelcrane.net\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/850\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2332,"href":"https:\/\/michaelcrane.net\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/850\/revisions\/2332"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelcrane.net\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=850"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelcrane.net\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=850"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelcrane.net\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=850"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}