(The following article by Stewart M. Powell was circulated by Hearst Newspapers on December 10.)
WASHINGTON — Transportation Secretary Norm Mineta, named Thursday to serve in President Bush’s second-term Cabinet, vowed to press a controversial plan to overhaul Amtrak financing in order to end “a drain on the budget.”
Mineta, 73, the former Democratic mayor and House member from San Jose, said in an interview that he would work to win congressional approval for the pending plan to reduce federal spending on the government-subsidized rail system by shifting a greater burden to states served by Amtrak on the East and West coasts.
Federal assistance for Amtrak ought to be on the same basis as federal assistance for highways and metropolitan transit systems, with the federal government paying a smaller share of the costs, Mineta said.
“There ought to be a local-share component in the financial support of those railroad services,” Mineta said.
Mineta said Bush backs the hard-nosed plan requiring states to pay up — or lose service.
“If a train goes through a state and that state is not willing to pony up the state’s share, then we would run the train through that state, not stopping and keeping the doors closed,” Mineta said.
The transportation chief said he intends to “deal with the long-term longevity of Amtrak,” which receives $1.2 billion under Bush’s latest annual budget — about $600 million less than Amtrak requested.
Mineta conceded that he was “quite sure we’ll find resistance” in Congress to the plan. But he added: “We have spent something like $37 billion on Amtrak (since its inception in 1970). It has been a drain on the budget, and we haven’t really improved services in a major way. I want to make sure that we keep this system safe and provide a good service.”
Ross Capon, executive director of the National Association of Railroad Passengers, said states already shoulder a significant portion of Amtrak’s capital expenditures. Mineta’s plan would merely “take the bill for existing railroad service and dump a greater share on the states” when states need more generous federal support “to take railroad service to the next level,” Capon said.
Of the $417 million Amtrak invested in capital improvements in fiscal 2003, the federal government provided $268 million, leaving the remaining $149 million to be financed by states, localities and borrowing.
“The rhetoric the administration is using just doesn’t match up to the reality,” Capon said. “This plan would be the death knell for expansion of railroad service.”
Amtrak enjoys wide support in Congress, which created the federally subsidized network after the demise of private passenger rail service in the 1960s. Lawmakers with Amtrak trains running through their states or districts represent a formidable lobby against any attempt to reduce service.
Amtrak operates as many as 265 trains each weekday, serving nearly 66,000 passengers at more than 500 stations in 46 states along more than 22,000 miles of track.
Mineta’s plan calls for gradually handing over control of Northeast Corridor tracks between Washington and Boston to a coalition of states.
Mineta also said his department would coordinate with the Department of Homeland Security on a variety of aviation safety assignments outlined in the sweeping overhaul of the U.S. intelligence system approved by the House and Senate and awaiting Bush’s signature. Mineta has responsibility for 60,000 employees and a $57 billion budget, including the Federal Aviation Administration.
“We will be working from an operational safety perspective with (the Department of Homeland Security) on this,” Mineta said, without going into detail.
The assignments include screening all individuals with access to secure areas of airports against the governmentwide terrorist watch list and having the FAA conduct “airworthiness and safety certification” of any anti-missile defense systems adapted for use on the nation’s more than 6,800 commercial aircraft.
White House spokesman Scott McClellan on Thursday announced Bush’s decision to keep Mineta and three other Cabinet secretaries for the second- term Cabinet, including Interior Secretary Gale Norton, Labor Secretary Elaine Chao and Housing and Urban Development Secretary Alphonso Jackson.
Bush also announced his selection of former GOP Chairman Jim Nicholson to replace Veterans Affairs Secretary Anthony Principi, who resigned Wednesday.
The latest Cabinet announcements showed Bush had carried out one of the most sweeping Cabinet overhauls of a second-term president in generations, replacing nine of the 15 members of his first-term Cabinet.
Bush has announced replacements for most of the posts, all of whom are expected to win easy confirmation by the Republican-led Senate in January. Mineta, so far, remains the only Democrat in the Cabinet. He served as commerce secretary in the Cabinet of President Bill Clinton.