Trimet chicanery

The good old boys that run the Trimet system are bringing back even more of the service they cut just two years ago. 

So what happened to create all this new service? 

There has been no victory over the union so they can't say any money came from that. 

Sure the tax revenues have been up but they were never that down to begin with (click here for proof).

And when we look at a chart of Trimet tax revenues we see this huge spike in 2012. That spike in tax revenues has never been explained but something stinks about it.

So what happened? I'll tell you my theory.

Trimet executives were trying to paint the union and its members as 'evil greedy employees' and to do that it was necessary to 'create' an phony economic crisis.

Those same executives decided that Portland should have one of the highest bus fares in the country and to do that they needed to create a crisis.

I think it was all intentional and seems to go along with all the other dubious dealings this batch of executives have conspired on, like the secret raises back when they were cutting services and raising fares.

All the service cuts were not necessary at all.  We were all victimized by this ruthless greedy, self absorbed bunch of self appointed technocrats who treat the public transit system as their very own property which they can play with like its some kind of toy.

OPAL's Jonathan Oster in an interview with KOIN described how Trimet officials misstated revenues.