(The following story by Patrick McGreevy appeared on the Los Angeles Times website on September 18.)
LOS ANGELES — In the same category as “man bites dog,” a major corporation has told California that it can’t accept its offer of $43 million in public subsidies.
The chairman of Union Pacific Railroad dropped a line to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger that his company has to turn down the state’s offer to cover half the cost of building extra tracks and improved tunnels for Union Pacific trains traveling over Donner Pass.
But Chairman Jim Young’s rejection of the money is not an act of conscience — he’s miffed that the state is now demanding that, in return for the money, Union Pacific would share some of the tracks with passenger trains.
“Union Pacific has consistently maintained (that) the Donner Project must be exclusively a ‘freight’ project,” Young wrote. “Therefore Union Pacific hereby withdraws the Donner Project from any further consideration for (state) funding and will develop and construct the project over time with its own resources.”
Still, the Dear John — or is it Dear Arnold? — letter is a rare act considering that another company, insurance giant AIG, is welcoming an $85 billion federal bailout offer with open arms.