Fellow Cincinnatian,
As you may know, a coalition of naysayers has recently announced they have collected enough signatures to place a charter amendment on the fall ballot that would prevent the City from making any investments in all forms of passenger rail without a popular vote. This ballot initiative threatens Cincinnati’s ability to receive federal rail funding and may result in Cincinnati being bypassed by President Obama’s High Speed Rail Plan and Governor Strickland’s Cincinnati-Columbus-Cleveland rail corridor.
I am writing to you today to ask you to contact the Cincinnati Enquirer and tell them to accurately report on the Anti-Passenger Rail Amendment. In recent articles the Enquirer has been calling this Amendment the “Streetcar Measure” or the “Streetcar Issue” when the reality is that is will affect all passenger rail—not just the streetcar.
It is inaccurate and misleading for the Enquirer to call the ballot initiative the “Streetcar Issue” when it would permanently affect all passenger rail. A ballot initiative that affected all highways would not be called the “Norwood Lateral Issue,” nor would an initiative that affected all parks be called the “Eden Park Issue.”
Please contact the Enquirer and tell them to accurately report on this issue. Write a letter to the editor [email: letters@enquirer.com] , write an email to the reporters who use the term “Streetcar Issue” and carbon copy (cc) their editor, comment on the Enquirer’s website, or write a blog post about this inaccurate reporting. Don’t have a blog? Pass this on to someone who does.
Here is a list of who to contact at the Enquirer:
Julie Engebrecht: Deputy Managing Editor
E-mail: jengebrecht@enquirer.com
Barry Horstman: Reporter – Transportation
E-mail: bhorstman@enquirer.com
Jane Prendergast: Cincinnati City Politics Reporter
E-mail: jprendergast@enquirer.com
David Holthaus: Reporter
E-mail: dholthaus@enquirer.com.
Thank you for your time and effort on this critical issue that could affect generations of Cincinnatians to come.
July 3, 2009 at 10:16 am
aren’t newspapers SUPPOSED to be unbiased?
tisk tisk – enquirer
July 3, 2009 at 10:21 am
Firstly, I think most Cincinnatians realize that the Enquirer has devolved into a joke. I think I’ve seen high school papers that are better written and are less biased.
Secondly, why not a popular vote as long as the information presented is accurate? If the Enquirer and news outlets were to give us accurate information, why shouldn’t the citizenry have a say in an expenditure of this magnitude?
July 3, 2009 at 10:26 am
The Streetcar represents $36 million in on-budget city spending out of a total budget of $2.54 billion. That same budget had over $100 million in roadways spending.
http://cincystreetcar.wordpress.com/2009/03/26/the-streetcar%E2%80%99s-impact-on-the-city-budget/
July 4, 2009 at 9:48 am
Its a slippery slope if you keep allowing the people to vote on every spending issue. The reason that we have a representative democracy is so decisions can be made efficiently. People forget that we already voted for people that we trust to make the right decisions.
In my mind this argument is not just about rail transit…its about how Cincinnati is governed.
Do we want a direct democracy in our city?
July 5, 2009 at 1:33 pm
Two incredibly excellent points, Andy and cincystreetcar.
It still boggles my mind how people can be so opposed to setting up a range of transportation options, not to mention how good this particular option would be for the city in so many different ways. People also just don’t seem to understand that this is just the initial leg of a larger rail initiative which could eventually reach the outer suburbs, the airport, and other large cities. What the hell is wrong with that?
July 5, 2009 at 1:47 pm
“Do we want a direct democracy in our city?”
That leads to the “tyranny of the majority”.
July 5, 2009 at 4:45 pm
Andy,
The “slippery slope” is a logical fallacy, and no way to win an argument.
Having said that, readers may be interested in my series of letters to the Enquirer on just this issue from earlier in the week:
http://www.cincinnatibeacon.com/index.php/contents/comments/letters_with_barry_horstman_on_the_streetcar_coverage/
July 6, 2009 at 11:09 am
The Beacon website doesn’t seem to be working.
Its true that “slippery slope” can be a dangerous thing to say because it assumes that things are inevitable. But I think that it is reasonable to argue that referendums will continue to occur considering that they are allowed by the charter and they have occurred in many local elections.