As avid readers of PT’s Parking Blog already know, Mayor Rahm Emanuel has proposed a “congestion” tax which is basically an additional tax on parking in Chicago. The Local Parking Industry Labor Management Committee has begun a campaign to explain the new tax to drivers and let them know just how much its going to cost them.From the local rag:
…members of the Parking Industry Labor Management Committee have posted placards in their facilities showing the current taxes and how the top tax would increase 67 percent, from $3 to $5, under Emanuel’s plan. The companies are also distributing fliers to their customers encouraging city residents to tell their aldermen to vote against the proposed new fee.
The Parking Group has said that the rapid transit is not able to handle additional riders that would be generated by the increased parking costs. Hizzonner and his staff have said that they can, that the trains are really only full at rush hours. HUH isn’t that when the streets and freeways are full, too. You know full of people trying to get to work.
The parking group in San Francisco has successfully beaten back increased parking taxes in the bay city, and here’s hoping Interparking’s Marshall Peck and his group can hold the line in Chicago.
I know cities need funding, and the $28 mil that Mayor Rahm is expecting from this new tax will come in handy when budget balancing time comes around. But sorry, I just can’t see solving the funding problems in cities by raising taxes.
I rail about this all the time. Government workers are the best paid workers on the planet. They have the best benefit packages by far. They are able to ‘double dip’ and literally double their salaries. All of this costs money. Chicago is trying to figure out how to pay benefits to workers hired 30 years ago and promised fantastic retirement and medical packages. These people are sitting in Florida, and the folks up to their kiesters in snow in Chicago are being asked to pay the bills.
Its time for the government to do more with less, not simply look for new sources of revenue.
JVH
