Is The Purple Amoeba Real?

The Purple Amoeba

According to Ron Utt of the Heritage Foundation, Dulles Rail, when measured in results achieved, is “...one of the most expensive new transit projects ever conceived.

The cost to Loudoun being discussed are sketchy and written in pencil, and we know that rail project projections have a long and distinguished history of under-estimated costs and over-estimated revenues. The figures are not believable and the tax districts are worthless unless they are guaranteed to cover all the Loudoun County costs arising from Phase 2.

The centerpiece of the payment talk is a little wonder concocted by Supervisor Williams. It began as the 2-mile Tax District and included sizable residential communities and commercial and industrial properties.

The Tax District Fairy is on Staff at Loudoun County

In just a short time the 2-mile District shrunk in size, shedding the residential areas, while it’s supposed revenue potential grew. There are serious questions about whether it can be formed without notice to and approval by landowners, and in general it proposes imposing huge burdens which may well scatter current and potential new businesses and discourage others from choosing Loudoun as a home.

We have named this district “The Purple Amoeba.” This creature and its power presently seems to be the best our Supervisors can come up with to pay for the project which will most certainly make traffic worse, decrease mobility, and re-direct vast resources away from families, businesses, and worthwhile improvements. Only in the public sector do ideas this bad stay alive.

If Loudoun Opts In, we the taxpayers are the back stop because there is noassurance that taxpayers would not be landed with meeting the residual charges in the event that the special tax districts fail to deliver "enough revenue to cover the costs".

To summarize, the “The Purple Amoeba” is an idea that at best could pay some of the cost of rail; if it does not happen your property and business taxes will pay for Metro, forever. It is just that simple. The Purple Amoeba is a shifty, shaky, iffy, suspicious, maybe even phony proposition being used as an excuse to advance this bailout.

It is just a metter of time.

The Purple Amoeba will be voted on this Friday. It is a mirage. Another threat to the stability of this project is a toll-dependent financing method which may be revoked by court action and leave Loudoun with vast debt. This risk is barely acknowledged by most Supervisors. Instead, they are fixated on and fascinated by the Purple Amoeba.

There is a rainbow in all this, a $600 million winning Lottery ticket owned by LoCo payable for opting out, we pay $0, zero risk. It is clear as day if you just run a column of numbers from RCLCO. Buses can satisfy the current and future transit needs of Loudoun, but first we must toss out the idea that it is OK to trust our future to the dreaded Purple Amoeba.


David LaRock


Hanilton Virginia