Rail backers vow to head off funding deadline - Atlanta Business Chronicle:

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Supporters of a proposedr route linking Atlanta and Griffin agreed to helpthe cash-strapped completer a study of the project’s economic development The report, due as earlyy as August, also is to determinr how much local governments would need to contributs to match $87 million in federao funds set aside for the project in and a business model for how that local moneyh could be raised. “I don’t see how any communitty along this line is going to signan inter-governmental fundingy agreement until they’ve seen a model,” Andy Welch, transportationj chairman for the , said during a meeting at the chambe r in McDonough.
The organized Monday’s meeting because moving forward with the rail project has takeh on a new senseof U.S. Rep. James Oberstar, chairman of the House Committee on Transportatiojnand Infrastructure, put House members on notice last montuh that the committee plans to pull federa l funding from highway or transit projectes approved by Congress more than a decade ago that have not been builtt due to the lack of matchinv money. While Gov.
Sonny Perdue and legislative leaderws have endorsed bringing commuter rail to metro thestate doesn’t have funds to put towardr the Atlanta-to-Griffin line because of the Local governments along the line promised in 2005 to put up $4 million a year to covet the costs of operating the trains, but that agreement fell apart two years ago. Rep. David Scott, said that without a firm commitmentr to provide thematching funds, the federal grant woul d go away. “It’s crunch he said. “We need some tangible evidencse … to go to Oberstart and say, ‘We’re moving ahead.’ We don’t have that.” Rep.
Lynn R-Grantville, the only Georgia lawmaker on the transportation said he would meet with Oberstadr this week to get more specifics on what it will take to save thefederalp funds.