Yesterday, almost two-thirds of voters in Fulton County approved the renewal of its educational sales tax. I've stated my case against it, and despite the apparent uncritical nature of our local electorate whenever our children's future (or some such thing) is mentioned, I'm not all that bitter today.
What troubles me, though, is that I've seen a few people people link the education tax to next year's transportation tax vote. This usually occurs as a means to apply an aura of excess and futility to the latter tax. A warning is also presented to fearful voters that, should the tax be approved, Atlanta will have a 9% overall sales tax rate. For comparison, the current tax rate in Chicago is 9.75%; in New York City, 8.875%; in Los Angeles, 8.75%; and in Houston, 8.25%.
Although I certainly don't like the idea of paying such a high sales tax, I know what the alternative is. As I've said in the very second blog post I made, if Atlanta shows that it is unwilling to make difficult decisions to fix its already expensive and sometimes lethal traffic congestion, she stands to be written off as one of the powerful American cities for quite some time. If you vote 'no,' be prepared to lose neighbors and job opportunities, and expect local government to somehow come collecting for its lost revenue.
Also, let's not forget the Clifton Corridor MARTA line, which could be (crossing my fingers) heavy rail. MARTA also stands to earn money for general upkeep, which is soon to become a much more urgent need in the 32-year-old rail network.
We, transit advocates, have a long struggle ahead of us if we truly want this to pass. A cursory Google search shows that our favorite defenders of the common welfare are already hard at work, trying to derail, if you will, this vote.
In fact, they'll be right down the street from my apartment on Saturday protesting it. I encourage anybody willing to join me in a civil, reasoned counter-protest.
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