Author: Jeffrey M. Barker

It sounds like Charles Crumpley of the Los Angeles Business Journal understands some of the advantages of high-speed rail in California, and all he needs is a little help to dig through the numbers, which can too easily be skewed. So, let me outline a few numbers that a businessman, if not an editor of a business newspaper, might appreciate.

First, 25 percent. That’s the portion of the cost of the high-speed rail system that will be borne by the state. A little less actually – $9 billion from $42.6 billion. The balance will come from the federal government, private entities, or cost-sharing agreements with local governments. What other public infrastructure project can boast that percentage? A private entity would leap at the chance to make such a capital investment only putting down a quarter of its own money for each dollar expended, and so shouldn’t the state.

While we at the California High-Speed Rail Authority don’t second-guess the
will of the voters the way Jon Coupal seems to – instead we make it our
mission to carry out the will of the voters – we actually agree with the
position of the taxpayer advocate who doesn’t want a single cent of the
taxpayers’ dollars wasted. We want to ensure that the $9 billion voters
decided to put toward the construction of a high-speed rail system is not
wasted and is used to its fullest effect. And in fact we have a plan to grow
that $9 billion into the $42.6 billion needed to construct the project.

So, in that light, let us run through a number of reasons we think taxpayers
would be pleased at the approach taken by the High-Speed Rail Authority.

First, investment in infrastructure is good for our economy. Without a
doubt, putting money into brick-and-mortar construction creates jobs and
spurs economic stimulus. In the case the of the high-speed train project, a
conservative estimate shows we’d create 600,000 construction related
job-years over the life of the project’s construction and 450,000 permanent
jobs thereafter. The benefits of $43 billion pumped into our economy cannot
be overstated.