In addition to a whopping price tag of over 100 million (based on 3-years-old estimates), the Summit Avenue Rail Trail project and avenue rebuild will levy an $30,000 average assessment on each Summit Avenue household. Collateral environmental damage, due to loss of trees, will impact storm water filtration, natural heating and cooling, CO2 storage and oxygen emissions, and real estate values. These costs won’t show up in the project budget.

Federal and state funds are drying up. This places a greater demand for local tax dollars to repair streets and maintain parks. Taking 1% tax revenues to pay for this new bike trail leaves other needed projects unfunded.

The maintenance backlog for Parks has grown to over $235M. The 1% sales tax was supposed to address this backlog. No 1% tax revenues should be spent on anything other than clearing this backlog and repairing streets. The City must demonstrate that they can maintain our existing facilities.