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CARTS Information Is Somewhat Misleading

To The Reader’s Forum:

In the article that appeared in this paper titled “CARTS Announces Plan To Acquire Downtown Hub” I believe there is some misleading information.

Let’s not rewrite history. Brad Bentley is quoted “CARTS has never had a place to call it’s own in downtown Jamestown.” This is just not true. The train station was given several million dollars in Department of Transportation taxpayer money when it was restored. The grant specifically designated the newly refurbished train station was to be used as the hub for transportation downtown. That included CARTS. It was also stipulated the main waiting room be open to the public. CARTS’ downtown home was the renovated train station. It stayed that way for a few years before the train station was given, for free, to the National Comedy Center with no public discussion. After the NCC took the train station over, CARTS was told they had to leave. In essence they were kicked out. For a while, the city wasn’t sure if they would be on the hook to the Department of Transportation for breaking the terms of the funding.

The article also states there would be “no local share cost to the county residents.” This is also not exactly true.

We, the taxpaying public of New York state, are asked again to pay for a new hub for CARTS. It’s not free money. We all pay NYS taxes. And for what? To appease the NCC because they didn’t want CARTS using their facility? A facility that was never intended to be used by the NCC. Or was giving the train station to the NCC the plan from the beginning?

Tom Andolora

Jamestown

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