COUNTY BUDGET CUTS

TARGET SENIORS,

UPCOUNTY RESIDENTS

"There you go again." After failing - for the moment - to ram through an ambulance fee that would cause seniors to avoid dialing 911 for financial reasons, our county Democrat officials are now going after retirees again.

Not only is the county cutting in-home help currently provided to some senior citizens, but it is also cutting off their transit priviledges.

Note the careful wording of the proposed reduction in Ride-On bus service. Many routes are losing midday service - the time when most senior citizens use public transportation. Younger, working people are primarily onboard during the rush hours. Midday service elimination affects routes such as those in the Grosvenor-Parkside-Montgomery Mall corridor, where large numbers of seniors live. Taken along with Montgomery's draconian property taxes, is there no end to the punishment our Democrat leaders can dish out toward our senior citizen population?

It's outrageous.

Also outrageous is the fact that the majority of bus routes being cut are in the upcounty area, affecting Clarksburg and Damascus. To quote Mike Knapp on another slap to Clarksburg...

"to the residents of Clarksburg, your government has basically turned its back on you."

Once again, the peculiar dynamic in government-upcounty relations is strengthened: upcounty residents pay taxes for Metro and Ride-On, but receive no Metrorail service and continual reductions in bus service. With the automobile as the only realistic commuting method for upcounty residents, the failure to serve that area with mass transit is one of the most stinging indictments of our elected officials' environmental hypocrisy.

A government passing expensive measures that hurt residents, builders, and businesses, for the sake of the global warming hoax, turns around and slashes mass transit. That's not green. It's just hypocrisy.

It's outrageous.