Dogged by protests, Florida's transit boss Tuesday toured the four-county Central Florida region that would be served by the planned SunRail commuter train.
Just days before Gov. Rick Scott is scheduled to make a final decision on the controversial rail project, FDOT Secretary Ananth Prasad met with local officials to discuss financing and logistics of the 61-mile route running through portions of Orange, Seminole, Volusia and Osceola counties.
Prasad's message to locals was a tough one: Don't expect any state bailouts after the first seven years of operation. FDOT forecasts a shortfall of some $2 million a year.
But critics say lowball cost estimates and inflated ridership projections will stick Central Floridians with a far bigger bill -- perhaps as much as $60 million annually.
About 50 protesters from local tea party groups and the anti-rail Ax the Tax organization turned out in Orlando Tuesday to denounce the project as an "end-run around the taxpayers and the Constitution."
"No one is looking at the details," said Beth Dillaha, head of Veto SunRail. "The scary part is that elected officials are making decades-long commitments without the right information, or even caring."
"SunRail is being presented as a panacea to everything that ails Central Florida. Fact is, we're talking about 2,150 riders. The Federal Transit Authority said this project will not serve the I-4 corridor," said Dillaha, a former city commissioner in Winter Park.
State Sen. Paula Dockery, R-Lakeland, says SunRail's price tag has already ballooned, pointing to an FDOT document that pegs the 30-year costs at $2.66 billion. That document, which was nowhere to be seen Tuesday, doubles the advertised figure of $1.3 billion, of which the federal government agreed to pay half.
At minimum, FDOT warned that SunRail's added costs would scupper dozens of road-building projects in the Orlando region.
Opponents say participating cities and counties are already upside down, having drawn loans to kickstart the rail line. Without a financial cushion from the state, local tax increases are inevitable, SunRail skeptics predict.
SunRail's corporate sponsors -- ranging from Florida Hospital to Disney -- tried to rev up enthusiasm for rail on Tuesday.
Tuesday's meetings were replete with business-suited attendees, including developers and Realtors who said SunRail would kickstart transit-oriented real-estate projects.
A nurse also testified she could use the train to commute to her downtown hospital job.
Yet the line is limited to weekday operations only. Though SunRail is paying $432 million for right of way on CSX tracks, CSX reserves nights and weekends to run its freight trains.
"Proponents have no cogent arguments for SunRail. I just heard how great it will be to go to Magic games. But it does not run on weekends," Dillaha said.
Since SunRail will not serve the region's two biggest destinations -- Disney and the Orlando airport -- skeptics predict the train will be an even bigger fiscal suck than South Florida's Tri-Rail. Though Tri-Rail carries more than three times the riders envisioned for SunRail, the South Florida line still depends on annual, multimillion-dollar infusions of government cash to keep running.
Further raising the stakes, if SunRail were to default or fail to complete its federal Full Funding Grant Agreement, Florida would be liable to refund all money to Washington.
Mile for mile, Dillaha's group calls SunRail "the most costly rail deal in the history of the United States."
CSX, in defense of the project, says it will reinvest all $432 million in right-of-way proceeds back into Florida's rail network, including access to ports.
Scott, who previously rejected $2.4 billion in federal stimulus funds for a Tampa-Orlando high-speed rail venture, has made port development a top priority. In a position to steer future federal port funding, U.S. House Transportation Committee Chairman John Mica, R-Orlando, has urged Scott to green-light SunRail -- notwithstanding pro-forma financials that look every bit as shaky as the high-speed project.
Countering those numbers, Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer cited a recent poll showing 77 percent of local residents favor SunRail.
U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown, D-Jacksonville, also banged the drum for SunRail on Tuesday. Brown, whose district includes CSX's headquarters, almost yelled, "We have to have this."
Dillaha responded that if voters truly support SunRail, Dyer & Co. should have no qualms about putting the project and its funding to a vote. Orlando's last public-transit referendum, proposing to build a light-rail system, was rejected.
Matthew Falconer, an Orlando area businessman and SunRail opponent, called Tuesday's FDOT tour "a dog and pony show" that sets the stage for Scott to approve the project.
"When the FDOT secretary talks about holding people accountable for the number of jobs created [by SunRail] it appears that the governor is playing Pontius Pilate," Falconer said.
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Contact Kenric Ward at kward@sunshinestatenews.com or at (772) 801-5341.
