StarTran and Mike Krusee

Ben Wear has a great article in today's Statesman about StarTran. Never heard of StarTran? Well neither had I, Ignore that agency behind the Capital Metro curtain. They are a shell corporation that allows Capitol Metro not to have to bargain with unions:

StarTran is a convenient fiction. But not necessarily a harmless one.

Most of you probably have no idea what I'm talking about. After all, you've never ridden on a StarTran bus or paid your fare to a driver with a StarTran logo on her shirt.

...

StarTran Inc., you see, is the nonprofit public corporation created in 1991 by Capital Metro to thread the needle between state and federal law.

Nice, isn't it? The funny part is that Mr. Wear asks Rep. Mike Krusee to help with the solution:

All the blarney might at first glance seem harmless. But it introduces one more level of bloviation into a tense labor negotiation, a situation inherently prone to indirection. There is a solution available, however.

If state law says Capital Metro can't collectively bargain, all it would take would be a few words inserted into the statutes providing an exception for the agency. Inserted by, say, former Capital Metro antagonist state Rep. Mike Krusee, R-Williamson County, now a reliable friend to the agency.

Rep. Mike Krusee come to the aid of union worker's? That'll be the day!

Sal Costello has a post on some of the latest transportation scams that are proposed on the November constitutional amendment ballot, "Tax Wolves in sheep's clothing":

Proposition 1 is an open-ended corporate subsidy scheme --- a blank check. Taxpayers will pay unlimited tax dollars to move private corporation rail lines into Gov. Perry's Trans Texas Corridor, and this after the governor had promised Texans that no public funds would be used.

This is of significant importance to all of those who live in eastern Williamson County () and are concerned about the shifting rail lines in Gov. Perry's TTC scam.