Opponents of the planned downtown streetcar system said Tuesday that county officials broke a promise with voters when they agreed to use advanced transportation district funds to help fund the project.
The group contends that multiple pieces of campaign literature used to promote the ATD tax in 2004 explicitly stated the money would not go toward light rail or toll roads.
A streetcar, they said, is light rail by another name.
“I think the average person would say this is light rail,” said Jeff Judson, an Olmos Park city councilman, senior fellow with the Heartland Institute and former president of the Texas Public Policy Network, a conservative think tank that played a large role in the defeat of a 2000 tax increase that would have funded a 53-mile light rail system here.
The streetcar opponents — including Judson and San Antonio Tea Party President George Rodriguez — laid out their argument in a Tuesday meeting with the San Antonio Express-News Editorial Board.
The group said it could consider legal action if the county does not rescind its August vote to use its advanced transportation district bonding capacity for the streetcar system.
VIA Metropolitan Transit, Bexar County and the city of San Antonio agreed last fall to build a $190 million downtown streetcar system, part of a $239 public transit package funded by the three entities.