Fiona Ma is a high-powered pro-HSR Assemblywoman from San Francisco. Here is a letter from her about the Fresno Congressional Hearing by CongressmanJohn Mica which we talked about in this blog already. It's already highly rigged by the CEO of the CHSRA to favor responses in support of the HSR and pulling funds from Florida into California.
Remember, Ma is an elected official of the state. The CHSRA is a government agency of the state. They are making this information seeking hearing for John Mica into a self-styled political rally. This is the same thing as rigging an election. It's the same thing that the court chastized the Legislature for when they wrote the Proposition 1A ballot measure full of marketing verbiage.
Facts are totally irrelevant here. Noise is what matters. The hard, empirical data that has been circulating will not be offered by Ma, the construction unions, or the HSR supporters, most of whom stand to benefit immensely from these federal funds. This bears out my argument that the conflict issues with this HSR are not about the train, but about politics and money! And we, the citizens and voters of California, are being screwed by our government officials.
Pleas note that Assemblywoman Fiona Ma does not identify herself in her elected official position. She sees herself as a private citizen speaking for "Highspeedrailcalifornia" an advocacy PAC. Sorry, that doesn't wash!
Let me just say, here and now, contrary to what Ms. Ma states, this project is not worthy of a dime of state or federal dollars. It's a corrupt effort; an insult to all the voters and taxpayers of California.
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From: Fiona Ma
Date: Mon, Feb 21, 2011 at 10:42 PM
Subject: Action Alert: Rally in Fresno tomorrow
Last week, Florida's new Republican governor, Rick Scott, joined Ohio Governor John Kasich and Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker in rejecting federal high-speed rail (HSR) funds -- an additional $2.4 billion to add to the $1.2 billion already rejected by Kasich and Walker.
Immediately, Governor Jerry Brown, Senators Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer, and a bipartisan group of government officials from across California launched an effort to bring the additional funds here to drive our well-developed project even further down the track.
But we’re facing stiff competition. Senators Kirsten Gillibrand and Chuck Schumer of New York also launched their own campaign to bring that money to the northeastern corridor. And House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chair John Mica has expressed skepticism for high-speed rail outside of the northeast, so we need a ground-swell of support here in California to show them that our plan, and our system, is a worthy investment of federal funding.
Thankfully, we have a perfect opportunity to get Chairman Mica's attention: He'll be holding a listening session in Fresno tomorrow morning to discuss our high-speed rail system, and Fresno Works -- a coalition of officials and groups from Fresno -- is holding a rally before the meeting to show support for HSR in the Central Valley. With the challenges we face in the current Congress, we need HSR supporters to attend and make clear why California deserves federal funding for our system.
Here are the details on tomorrow's rally and hearing -- I hope you can attend:
Pro-HSR Rally hosted by Fresno Works
Tuesday, February 22, 8:00 a.m. -- followed by 9:00 a.m. listening session Outside Inyo/Kern Conference Room of the California State University Fresno
550 East Shaw Ave., Fresno, CA 93710 If you have any questions, contact Fresno Works at (559) 600-3000. Thanks for supporting high-speed rail for California.
Sincerely, Fiona Ma
California Assembly Speaker pro Tempore
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