Feeling depressed about railways? Or, more specifically, that couple-mile-long ditch that would accommodate Union Pacific trains so as to facilitate the flow of traffic through downtown Reno?
Well, the trench critics are depressed. Or at least disappointed in Judge James Hardesty’s decision Tuesday to approve the city of Reno’s $115 million bond sale to fund the ReTRAC depressed railway corridor.
The Citizens for a Public Train Trench Vote, after gathering thousands of signatures in order to put the project to a vote of the people, had filed a lawsuit against the city in order to halt the sale of the bonds. The Reno City Council voted in April to go ahead and sell bonds ASAP in order to take advantage of low interest rates. The CPTTV tried to make a case that the city was interfering with the citizens’ constitutional right to vote by making decisions on a project before the people had a chance to have their say.
Hardesty said that the issue was more of a political issue than a legal one. He allowed the city to go forth and issue bonds, saying that “there is simply no First Amendment violation in this case.”
Also in the past week, the city was approved for a $50.5 million federal loan for the ReTRAC project. The city’s sitting on the three bids that have come in for the project. But nobody’s telling citizens the big secret—how much this is all going to cost.
Mike Tracy, lead dog for the CPTTV, says the group has also asked for a legal decision on this. Can the city really keep this information from the people? Judge Hardesty has not yet responded to this question.
“Obviously that’s a process that’s suspect when you consider that they’re hiding from us the information that really should be in the public domain,” Tracy says. “I think it’s a smoke screen. … I think the public is fully entitled to those details.”
The secret bid info will be revealed, finally, during a presentation to the Reno City Council July 16. Hardesty has not yet ruled on the public trench vote itself.