Town of Chevy Chase Spending Tops Million Dollars to Fight Purple Line
Press release issued February 18, 2015
At its monthly council meeting last week the Town of Chevy Chase committed an additional $116,000 to its fight against the Purple Line, raising its total spending against the transit and trail improvements project to over one million dollars in the last six years.
The supplemental appropriation funds a four-month extension of a contract with the lobbying and law firm Buchanan, Ingersoll, and Rooney one of whose partners is Robert Shuster, brother of U.S. House Transportation Committee Chairman Bill Shuster (R, Pa.).
The town's outlays to fight the Purple Line are now larger than its residents' share of the cost of actually building the light rail line. With a population of approximately 2,900 in 2013, its share of the construction cost proportional to population comes to $930,000.
“It seems a shame that so much has been spent on lobbyists, consultants, public relations, and fruitless searching for endangered shrimp-like creatures, when it could have contributed to large employment and economic benefits for all of us who live, work, or play in Montgomery and Prince George’s counties,” commented Action Committee for Transit president Nick Brand.
Town expenditures against the Purple Line break down as follows:
- Sam Schwartz Engineering - $434,000
- Friends of the Capital Crescent Trail - $40,388
- Buchanan Ingersoll & Rooney, to date - $410,000
- Buchanan Ingersoll & Rooney, newly approved contract - $116,000