(The Post-Gazette published the following story by Ann McFeatters on its website on August 17.)
WASHINGTON, D.C. — When Congress comes back from its August recess, one of its priorities, according to President Bush, should be derailing Amtrak.
The financially troubled national passenger rail service, which has lost taxpayer dollars since 1970, has been a target of many legislators for years on grounds that it is costly, outmoded and accounts for less than 1 percent of intercity passenger travel. With both houses of Congress and the White House under Republican control, some think Amtrak’s days finally could be numbered.
Amtrak now carries about 23 million passengers a year in 46 states over 23,000 miles of track and usually gets about $1.2 billion from the federal government each year.
What is most likely to happen early this autumn is a budget cutback that would put Amtrak in such financial straits that legislation to restructure and privatize part of it would get serious consideration on Capitol Hill.
The administration plan is to split up Amtrak, end operating subsidies and let the states operate those parts of the service they are willing pay for. In the meantime, Amtrak says it may soon run out of money and have to shut down.
With the federal government facing a $400 billion deficit this year, Amtrak is one of the services most often mentioned for cuts. Not only is the White House determined to cut Amtrak loose, but some chairmen of key congressional committees that have jurisdiction over the train system agree that a major overhaul is needed.
Among the loudest voices in defense of Amtrak is the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. NAACP President and CEO Kweisi Mfume points out that many black Americans travel up and down the East Coast, often from the South to New York City, and need Amtrak because they cannot afford air fares.
“Amtrak is the lifeblood transportation system for inter-city rail commuters along the Northeast Corridor,” he says. “Full federal funding is the only acceptable solution for preserving and maintaining the pivotal service Amtrak provides. Placing the burden of paying for the railroad on the states, many of which are already financially strapped, is the wrong course to take.”
The Bush plan calls for cutting Amtrak’s budget request for fiscal 2004, which begins Oct. 1, from $1.8 billion to $900 million. Amtrak would be reorganized, so that the states most needing passenger rail service would have to pay for it, probably through regional compacts. The federal government would help pay for capital improvements, primarily to improve the badly deteriorating rails in the Northeast. States would decide what service would be offered.
The Bush plan is not without critics on both sides of the aisle.
Republican Sens. Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas, Trent Lott of Mississippi, Conrad Burns of Montana and Olympia Snowe of Maine have introduced a bill to provide Amtrak $12 billion in operating funds over a six-year period and $48 billion in federally backed bonds to pay for capital improvements.
In a sharp split with the White House, Lott, who was Senate Republican leader until forced to step aside amid public backlash over a racially tinged comment he made, startled reporters at a recent news conference with his vehemence about the Bush plan for the rail system.
“I am extremely disappointed with what the administration came up with,” he said. “What they have proposed on Amtrak is a total non-starter. It will get the amount of consideration it deserves, which is nothing.”
Allan Rutter, head of the Federal Railroad Administration, is undaunted, blitzing newspapers with letters-to-the-editor to try to convince taxpayers and legislators that the administration won’t countenance putting a penny more than $900 million into Amtrak next year. The House Appropriations Committee approved just that amount last month.
“The Bush administration is proposing the first substantive inter-city rail passenger service policy in decades,” Rutter wrote. “The major features of its proposal: more private-sector involvement, more state participation and a more effective rail network.”
States should have more say in rail service, he insisted. If they want more than the basics, they should pay for it, he said, as California, North Carolina and Washington state have done.
Many who work for and depend on Amtrak are braced to be taken to the brink once again. Faced with a cutback in its operating subsidy from Congress, Amtrak prepared to shut down last summer, saying it was out of money. Members of Congress blinked at the last minute and averted the shutdown.
But this year an 11th-hour bailout may not happen. A key member of the House Appropriations Committee, Rep. Ernest Istook, R-Ok., is a staunch foe of Amtrak. At a hearing this spring, he said, “There is a grave question whether Amtrak can continue to operate without dragging down the transportation system of the rest of the country”
There is almost total agreement that Congress will not come through with the $1.8 billion Amtrak says it needs and that even $1.4 billion is in doubt. Amtrak President David Gunn said that if Congress provides only $900 million, passenger service will have to be shut down.
With reports that recent derailments were caused by improperly maintained track, Gunn says capital improvements are essential. Amtrak is now spending at an annual rate of $1.8 billion, putting it on a collision course with the administration.
One federal transportation official stressed that Amtrak was never supposed to be a federally subsidized national rail service, but instead an independent service that was self-sufficient. If the states can’t afford or don’t want to maintain inter-city train service, the official said, then the country simply won’t have a national passenger rail service. The United States is not Europe, he said, adding that Amtrak is an antiquated system because it runs trains and schedules that are demanded by politicians but don’t make economic sense.
If the Bush plan is enacted, transportation experts think it unlikely that all states would agree to continue long-distance service or that they could afford to pay for it.
Texas’ Hutchison, who chairs the Senate Transportation subcommittee and wants Amtrak high-speed rail in the Dallas-Texarkana corridor, said in a statement, “If you turn Amtrak over to the states, it’s gone.”
The National Association of Rail Passengers, or NARP, a consumer lobbying group, this month is urging its members to contact members of Congress to argue that Amtrak trains are more energy-efficient than airlines, that they reduce America’s dependence on foreign oil, that they are safe in bad weather, that they are needed for national security and that they don’t pollute or contribute to urban sprawl.
The group has dubbed the $900 million proposed by Bush a “kill Amtrak” figure. If enough members of Congress complain to House Appropriations Committee Chairman C.W. Bill Young, R-Fla., there still might be a chance to increase funding on the floor, the group insists.
NARP expects Amtrak funding to come up in the Senate during the first or second week in September. It says that since 1971, the government has spent nearly 25 times more on highways and aviation than it has on passenger rails.