Like that famous scene from Casablanca, a comical denial was issued Monday from the Democrat governor of Minnesota, Mark Dayton:
I was shocked and appalled to learn last Friday that the staff at the Metropolitan Council [an appointed regional authority] had increased its estimate of the cost of the Southwest Line Rail Transit line by $341 million to $1.994 billion…
The continuing escalation of the costs to design and build this line raise[s] serious questions about its viability and affordability…
Apparently, the previous estimate of $1.653 million was totally acceptable. The Minneapolis Star Tribune reports that $59 million has already been spent on the project which the governor and other officials now say may never manifest. All of that money, essentially squandered, came from hard-working taxpayers.
Adding insult to injury, Dayton’s statement coincides with news that the Democrat-controlled state senate just passed a 16 cent per gallon gas tax hike to fund roads and bridges. This in the midst of a $2 billion budget surplus which Democrats in the state refuse to apply to essential infrastructure.
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