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Rail News Home Passenger Rail

8/1/2012



Rail News: Passenger Rail

Atlanta-area voters reject transportation tax


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A ballot measure that asked Atlanta-area voters to approve a 1 percent sales tax to pay for transportation infrastructure projects was defeated yesterday.

The proposed 10-year tax was shot down in a majority of the regions that voted on the referendum, according to local news reports.

Tax proceeds would have been used to fund $7.2 billion in transportation projects to help alleviate heavy traffic congestion in the metro Atlanta region.

Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed, several environmental groups and segments of the business community had supported the referendum. Opponents, who identified themselves as being part of a local “tea party” organization, fought it as part of an anti-tax agenda, local news organizations reported.

The vote would have helped fund new commuter alternatives, including more than 10 miles on the Atlanta BeltLine and an extension of the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority system with the Clifton Corridor rail line, according to a prepared statement released last week by the mayor’s office.