The rag babbled:
What in the world was County Commissioner Tom Mielke thinking when he voted against the grant? The trail is in his district! Logic dictates that Mielke should be one of its strongest proponents.Well, now that the bill for less then a mile of the wonderful trail these scumbags wanted so badly has come in at a million dollars.
A fricking million dollars.
A million dollars these morons apparently believed grew on trees.
Million-dollar mile: Expensive section of trail provokes varied reactions
Price tag for first section of planned 33-mile Chelatchie Prairie Railroad Trail unexpectedly highMore:
Ray Holbrook walks his dog, Pearl, on the new Chelatchie Prairie Railroad Trail near Battle Ground Lake State Park last week. The project has cost $1,030,133 to date.
By Stephanie Rice
Columbian Staff Reporter
Sunday, January 29, 2012
The first mile of the Chelatchie Prairie Railroad Trail comes to an end on property owned by the state. There’s no timeline for building the rest of the trail.
By the numbers
Costs and funding sources for Chelatchie Prairie Railroad Trail:
Master plan: $228,304 (federal transportation enhancement grant)
Design/engineering/permitting: $210,987 (federal transportation grant, state recreation grant)
Right-of-way: $39,650 (local real estate excise tax revenue)
Construction contract: $480,000* (state, local)
Construction management/inspection: $71,192 (state, local)
TOTAL: $1,030,133
Estimate; final amount still being negotiated.
The sign at the Chelatchie Prairie Railroad Trail declares it to be nine-tenths of a mile. County officials later clarified it to be slightly longer -- 5,257 feet, just 23 feet short of a mile -- but let’s just round up and call it a mile.
Then add up what Clark County has spent so far on the railroad trail project, and call it a million-dollar mile.
The $1 million includes a $228,304 federal grant which paid for a study that launched the entire 33-mile project. The first paved mile, from design to final inspection, cost $801,829, for a total of $1,030,133.
The county acknowledges the first segment was more expensive than anticipated, but the price tag hasn’t provoked uniform reactions.
County Commissioner Tom Mielke, who never wanted to accept a state grant that paid for part of the project, said it’s too expensive.
When Commissioners Marc Boldt and Steve Stuart voted in 2009 to accept the grant, which required matching local funds, Mielke said he’d heard from homeowners along the rail line who didn’t want the public near their property.
Mielke said last week he would have rather seen the money go toward extending an existing trail as opposed to one that starts across the street from Battle Ground Lake State Park and dead-ends on land owned by the state Department of Natural Resources.
Clearly, Stuart and Boldt didn't give a rat's ass about this stuff and Mielke did.
Those running the newspaper beat the hell out of Mielke for doing the right thing, begging the question:
Do you morons at the paper get why he voted against this garbage NOW?
Back then or even now, the idea of crap like this in this economy when other public services go begging is insane.
It also serves as an abject lesson in government regulation gone out of control, but that was neither here nor there. It was a stupid idea, a massive waste of money; Stuart, Boldt and the idiotic newspaper were all wrong, and this despicable rag needs to do an editorial apologizing first, to Commissioner Mielke and second, to the people of Southwest Washington.
because I've got to ask:
What are you going to babble about when it comes to the cost overruns on the massive waste of billions you scum are so blitheringly happy about? What are going to say THEN? Where will THAT money come from?
if ever we needed any additional evidence that we'd all be better off without this cancer on our community, I can't think of what it might be.
Despicable.
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