Proposed railroad sale at risk due to lack of education (Cincinnati Enquirer 9.15.23) Zinser Op-Ed 001

When it came out that the mayor wanted to sell the Cincinnati Southern Railway and that the entire city council and the Trustees of the railway were all in agreement, it did not sit well with many of us.

These politicians, who are here one day and gone the next, wanted us to give up an asset that the city had built and owned for 130 years to make up for the mis-management of previous city councils who ignored the maintainence needs of the city’s infrastructure.

On top of that, both the city and the Board of Trustees were suggesting that the municpal code prohibted any involvement of the city in the referendum. The citizens were on their own to figure out what was going on. The Railway Board took the same position.

That was such a blatant misinterpretation of the rules that I wanted to call them out about it. I thought we needed a public debate about the issue and that the city and the Railway Board needed to be part of that debate.

In the end, the sale did wind up to be hotly debated, including a public debate hosted by the Enquirer at Union Terminal.  The sale was narrowly approved by the voters 51.5% to 48.4% with 83,732 votes cast.

The public debate must have made Norfolk Southern nervous. Unbeknownst to us, until after the election, Norfolk Southern wound up spending $6 million on their campaign to convince voters to approve the sale.  That amount is reportedly 3 x the previous record of campaign spending in a Cincinnati election. Remarkably, not a sole on the city council raised any concrerns about all the money spent by Norfolk Southern. All for one and one for all.

Episode 18 of “Citizen Watchdog with Todd Zinser,” discusses the $6 million at greater length. It’s called “The Great Cincinnati Train Robbery.”

 

Railroad sale at risk due to lack of voter education _ Zinser Op-Ed (9.15.24)