Annapolis Capital Punishment

Nuts.

I don't mean to suggest that mayor Moyer has Annapolis surrounded and has asked for our surrender. No. Certainly not, but she is the one who said "nuts" regarding the loss of the 921 bus route that has been so extensively covered here. Nuts. Why do I say nuts to the mayor? First, read my Dec. 30 post about this 921-bus-doomed after the local newspaper reported that she asked our own transit system's boss to pick up the ball--and, well she was away--for two weeks--and the mayor seemed not to know it.

Now a second newspaper has weighed in at Nuts . Both reporters at these two papers have missed the bus on this story. The Maryland Transit Administration (MTA) is cutting a route that runs almost from Washington, DC (New Carrolton Metro) for about twenty miles through parts of Prince Georges County and Anne Arundel County and then comes into Annapolis for a mile or two. Why should Annapolis, with its own bus challenges pick up the slack? And related to all this is the mayor thinks our city's finances are fine! Well I got my assessment the other day and guess what--it dropped!

Yes Mayor Moyer, the 921 is important to Annapolis. Yes it is admirable that you are concerned but where have you been while our own bus service cut the route into south Anne Arundel County? Where were you when we cut the once a day over and back commuter route to Kent Island? Where were you when Governor Ehrlich cut the 210 commuter bus to and from Baltimore? Why do we not have bus service on Edgewood Road? Why does the bus to BWI only go every two hours? Where were you when census reapportionment resulted in a major loss of federal funding? And most easily corrected of all, where have you been every August for the past seven years when the air conditioning systems failed and failed on our buses? How come you have not filled the vacant transportation board? That's right--empty, as in MTA.


Therefore I say nuts! Yes the 921 is important to Annapolis. Yes it is admirable that the mayor is concerned but where was she when the city's bus driver of the year was awarded the watch presented to him or her by local jeweler and now State Delegate Ron George? The mayor could not present the watch because George is a Republican! I started that annual program with Mr. George and while former Mayor Johnson showed up every year, Ellen O. could not be bothered. She could not walk two blocks to honor the city's driver of the year because the watch was coming from a Republican!

The mayor could never ride on our city buses because it made her sick. Yet that did not stop her from sailing a racing yacht down the Bay, or from going to Europe for six weeks. But riding a city bus? Too much for the mayor who prefers her own SUV.

The mayor is not interested in our transit system. She allows its director, yes the one who is nearly always on a long vacation somewhere, as she learned this time again, to run it as a fiefdom, out of sight and out of mind on Chinquapin Round Rd. Mayor Moyer--get on a bus. Please take a bus ride, or two, or three. Ask for an audit of the finances and management of our bus system. Ask the director to publish an annual report of performance. I did that every year when I was the marketing specialist. It's stopped since. Ask the department to publish a customer's bill of rights. I did and was told I was crazy. Ask the director to set performance goals, develop a mission statement and a vision. I did and was told I was crazy. Ask the director what happened to all the lovely Maryland native species gardens and landscaping I created at the department. They've been plowed over and abandoned--despite a small army of environmentalists, sustainability coordinators and horticulturalists in the DNEP that you created at such expense to we the taxpayers. Ask why many of the buses do not even display the logo-decals that identify the vehicles as Annapolis City buses!

Take care of our own bus system within the city in which we live and then we might take you seriously when you grandstand to save a bus route that goes out of the city and through two other counties.

I say nuts. Let's see what the transportation director says after her two weeks away, probably to her vacation home in Pennsylvania. That 100k plus annual salary can take you far in the world....far away from Annapolis, even further than Pennsylvania, as it has many times.

Does anybody else think that a city manager might have handled things differently? Might have known if we have the resources to take up this route? Might have known if one of her department heads was away for two weeks? Might have known enough about the budget to have an answer herself?

To learn more about the 921 route, search for "921" on the search bar to the right and watch the video on the upper right where I recently addressed the Parole Rotary Club about our local transportation issues. And thanks for reading!


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