Anti-French crusaders step up pitch to RTC

Friday, April 11, 2003 | 11:16 a.m.

Anti-French protesters continued their attack on the Regional Transportation Commission's purchase of buses from Europe on Thursday, with one promising to seek a court injunction barring the agency from fulfilling the contract.

The RTC, the region's road-planning and mass transit agency, is contracted to buy 10 buses from Iris Bus, a multinational company that assembles the vehicles in France. Members of the RTC's Older Americans with Disabilities Advisory Committee last month asked the agency to abandon the contract for the buses.

The French government's opposition to the U.S.-led war in Iraq is the basis for their concern, a sentiment shared by others throughout the country in an increasingly angry mood toward French people, products and government.

Some of the committee members also questioned the basic need for the high-tech buses, which RTC staff members have characterized as a new technology combining features of traditional buses and commuter light-rail systems.

"To consider purchase of an unneeded and unproven system from a nation that is actively engaged in our defeat is in my view criminal," said Gerald Ernst, a retired building contractor and committee member. "I would hate to think I was riding on a bus that was manufactured by an enemy."

"It should also be the responsibility of the RTC to protect American jobs since it is American taxpayers paying for the buses," agreed Leonard Bukofsky, a retired steel industry executive and committee member. Bukofsky said a trade boycott should also extend to French-speaking Canada because of Canada's diplomatic opposition to the war.

"Don't give 'em one penny of United States' taxpayer money," argued Joseph Bifano, also a committee member. "We got to unite behind our president. We got to unite behind our leaders in Washington, D.C. ... We can't give them one penny."

The committee members said the French government has ignored the desecration of American military graves from World War II and encouraged the burning of American flags in anti-war demonstrations. They demanded that the RTC dump the existing contract and use U.S. bus manufacturers or at least companies that support the war.

Bifano said he will file a lawsuit arguing that the contract with Iris Bus was improperly granted and should be frozen.

RTC General Manager Jacob Snow said dumping the contract, which was negotiated over five years, would cost the agency more than $17 million and lead directly to the cancellation of eight to 12 bus routes.

"We would be left with a sizable deficit in the transit account," he said. Among the costs for the agency would be more than $7 million already spent acquiring the buses and $10 million that would have to be paid back to the federal government, which is funding the experimental bus purchase.

"The last thing I want to do is take away more service for the people in the community who desperately need it," Snow said. "We will have to agree to disagree with our advisory committee."

Snow also argued that targeting Iris Bus would not be the best way to punish the French. The company itself is a subsidiary of Fiat, an Italy-based multinational company, he said.

Parts of the engine, body, seating and electronic systems are made in America, he said. And much of the rest of the bus is made in Germany.

Snow said the technology, which was tested last year, will provide "the cleanest transit vehicle in the country" in terms of air emissions.

RTC board member and Clark County Commissioner Bruce Woodbury agreed.

He said the buses "are really multinational buses," with components manufactured in many countries.

"There are many, many employees here in the United States whose jobs are kind of on the line as well," Woodbury said.

June Devoll, RTC transit administrator, said the purchasing procedure was appropriate and fully vetted by the U.S. Federal Transit Administration, which is funding the project.

The buses are destined for the link between downtown Las Vegas and Nellis Boulevard, one of the Citizens Area Transit bus system's busiest routes. Snow said buses on the routes frequently are too full to accept passengers waiting for service.

Absent a successful legal challenge or a request from a board member to reconsider the contract, the agency will go ahead with the purchase, RTC staff members said. None of the seven RTC board members spoke against the purchase of the new buses.

Not everyone at Wednesday RTC board meeting opposed the contract for the buses. Walter Barbuck, a Sierra Club member, said the buses would be an important asset in a town looking for clean mass transit.

Canceling the contract would lead to "greatly diminished public transit service," Barbuck said.