Not quite sold on this quest to get Beacon Hill to stop wasting tax dollars on corporate welfare to Hollywood, when millions of lives are at stake with the MBTA?
Well, how’s this one?
Since the Film Tax Credit legally mandates the state to pay for 25% of the costs of filming in Massachusetts, we have to pay 25% of the millionaire salaries of A-List Hollywood.
With A-Listers making $20 million or more, that means all it takes is one Tom Cruise to cost this state $5 million bucks… or more.
Well, what else costs $5 million bucks? In the MBTA’s Plan 1, services would be cut on the commuter rail for all trains after 10pm and throughout all weekends, all to save a measely $5.7 million (pg 15).
That means we’re one Angelina Jolie or Adam Sandler away from being able to afford to keep weekend services on the commuter rail.
Sign the petition to tell Beacon Hill this is wrong, that our public transportation, serving more than a million people every day, is more important than giving corporate welfare to Hollywood.
And, certainly, weekend trains, affecting millions of people a year, are more important than paying for a quarter of Johnny Depp’s salary, should he decide to do his next movie here.
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There’s no money to hire a field staff, or create a commercial, or to start a PAC, so if you think we should keep the MBTA, consider yourself drafted.
You are the PR team. You are the field staff. You are the boss.
You are ultimately the people who will benefit if we can get this to be seriously considered on Beacon Hill, as well as your friends, neighbors and anyone you know who relies on or even cares about public transportation. That means you have to draft them, too.
Even if you’re from outside the Metro region, this is important, because if the MBTA dies, who thinks public transportation in other parts of the state will be able to survive it?
That means we need more BMG’ers to sign — and, most especially, to pass it forward to your friends, co-workers and people you know who ride the T.
What everyone should do now is get out a piece of paper and write the numbers 1 through 10 down, row-by-row.
Now, think of names to put in each of those slots: people who ride the T, people you know, people who serve on the same local board or committee, people who’ll just sign the darn thing for you because you asked.
If that list was hard to create, you’re done. If it was easy, write down 10 more numbers and keep writing 10 more until it gets hard.
Now, email each of those people directly and ask them to sign. If they don’t do it right away, send them a text or plop a link to the petition on their facebook wall and remind them.
Let them know if they still don’t do it, you’ll be calling them next, and if that doesn’t work, you’ll be knocking on their door.
Now, you won’t actually have to do any of those things… because signing becomes the much easier thing for them to do, so they’ll get off their butts and do it. This is just how to get them to act.
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Remember, no one thought that Bank of America would walk back on its monthly fee to use debit cards, or that Komen would so quickly be disgraced and forced to apologize, or that Obama would actually block the Keystone Pipeline.
None of that would have happened without a few crazy people stepping out there and getting the ball rolling.
But none of that can happen without that second group of slightly-less-crazy people who see that the idea isn’t half bad and get their friends and acquaintances on board. These are the most important people.
That means it’s up to you.
That’s what this is all about, after all… you. Your ability to get from Point A to Point B in a civilized society. Your ability to go to work and then back home again, or to go into the city some Saturday night and catch up with old friends.
It’s being reported today that a compromise plan was put forward by the board. It would jack prices up 25% and dump the silver line and the ferries on Massport and policing the MBTA on the state police. It freezes salaries and adds a sport/concert surcharge on top of the 25% fare hike, and mystically expects museums and colleges to start giving it millions of dollars.
The globe has more (on my phone so I can’t link), but needless to say I think this is pure fantasy, at best. I’m glad to see their thinking caps are on, but this does nothing about the big dig debt and is just shuttling expenses around as if doing that will stop making them expenses.
Lets not forget pushing expenses onto state agencies that didn’t want them is how these problems started in the first place, when the mbta was dumped with two billion in big dig debt.
Beacon Hill needs to grow up and take responsibility for that debt, not dump the MBTA’s deficit on the state police and MassPort.
So, until I see signs of grown up action on Beacon Hill… I’m still going to push for our state to choose the millions who depend on a safe and reliable T instead of corporate welfare for Hollywood.
And remember, BOA bought a bunch of film tax credits to lower its taxes – so it is a kind of revenue- loss double dip – first Beacon Hill gives away money as film tax credits (expensive, VERY expensive photo-ops for politicians) THEN loses tax money from BOA.
A REAL Lose/lose for the public.