Michigan may cut subsidies that keep Amtrak running along two of its three passenger rail lines in the state, a move critics say sends the wrong message as President Barack Obama is promoting high-speed rail.
The state is paying Amtrak $7.3 million a year to offer roundtrip daily service linking Grand Rapids to Chicago and Port Huron to Chicago.
Funding would drop by half to about $3.7 million starting in October under a budget passed by Senate Republicans. Democratic Gov. Jennifer Granholm and House Democrats want to reduce the subsidy to about $5.7 million, a 22 percent cut.
State officials aren't saying how drastically service along the Pere Marquette and Blue Water lines could be affected. The Wolverine line from Pontiac to Chicago isn't subsidized by the state and wouldn't be affected by the cuts.
"People have grown very attached to both of these lines. We hear from passengers," Michigan Department of Transportation spokeswoman Janet Foran said. "People like having these lines intact, in place and in their cities. We're going to do everything we can to preserve this service."
Amtrak has been targeted for cuts by lawmakers in the past, "but the communities affected always rally to the cause," Foran said.
The Pere Marquette and Blue Water trains wouldn't run without a state contract, Amtrak spokesman Marc Magliari said. He indicated it's unclear how service would be affected, however, as legislators aren't finished drawing up the budget for the fiscal year that starts Oct. 1.
Mass transit advocates are worried enough, though, that they staged bake sales in four cities Wednesday to bring attention to the proposed cuts to Amtrak and local bus operations.
"We need to have state and federal support," said Todd Tennis of the Let's Get Moving Coalition, a group of public transportation supporters. "We can't support public transportation funding with bake sales."
Tennis said it's time for Michigan to start "looking like a 21st century state" and be less reliant on individual cars and trucks for getting around. The state should be spending more of its own money on mass transit so it can get more federal dollars for passenger rail projects, he said.
Yet with tax revenues dropping because of the recession and the auto industry's woes, money is hard to come by. Lawmakers also don't seem interested in asking people to pay higher gasoline taxes or vehicle registration fees to increase funding for road repairs and public transportation.
Senate Republicans say the size of the state's deficit has left them with few ways to balance the books other than making deep cuts.
"In this time of economic struggle, now more than ever, state government must learn to live with less," said Senate Majority Leader Mike Bishop, R-Rochester.
While House Democrats opposed the level of Amtrak cuts proposed by Republicans, they recently passed a budget that still includes Granholm's proposed reduction. Negotiators will try to hammer out a compromise before October.
Amtrak ridership hit all-time highs last year as gas prices jumped above $4 a gallon. When gas prices declined, ridership stayed relatively steady considering the poor economy, Amtrak officials said.
Riders boarding the Grand Rapids-Holland-Bangor-Benton Harbor-Chicago route are on pace to be down 7 percent from last year's 111,000 riders. But ridership still is up about 0.5 percent on the route linking Chicago, Niles, Dowagiac, Kalamazoo, Battle Creek, East Lansing, Durand, Flint, Lapeer and Port Huron. More than 136,000 people rode that route in the last budget year.
Michigan is among 15 states that pay Amtrak for service, including the Midwestern states of Illinois, Missouri and Wisconsin.
The Mackinac Center for Public Policy, a free-market think tank in Midland that opposes Amtrak subsidies, said the fact that both the governor and lawmakers support some cuts is a good sign.
"State government has a number of constitutional responsibilities. Providing passenger rail subsidies is not one of them," policy analyst Ken Braun said. "It is one of the luxuries we should have gotten rid of a long time ago."
The Michigan Environmental Council said if the Amtrak contract is cut, the two rail lines likely would run fewer than seven days a week.
"We'll have to see if cutting Amtrak sends a negative message to the U.S. Department of Transportation ... 'We'll take your free money but we're not going to invest in anything of our own,"' deputy policy director Tim Fischer said.