To the Editor:
The Gazette Packet article about Alexandria’s money-losing bike share program is emblematic of our anti-entrepreneurial, tax-and-spend City Council. Why in the world did these people decide they should use our tax dollars to create and operate an unprofitable-by-design government-owned bike share company? Why didn’t they challenge the private sector to develop one or more bike share programs, perhaps using electric bikes?
And their excuse? Our Dear Leaders say public transport must be government owned. How foolish. If that were the case, then there would be no taxi companies in America, no shipping companies, no water taxis, no Greyhound buses, no Uber and no airlines, all of which are private sector companies providing transportation services to the public.
Surely our City Council knows the private sector is where wealth is created from which tax revenues flow? On the other hand, maybe they don’t.
Worse: No privately owned company will offer a bike share program if it has to compete with a city-owned enterprise. It’s an unfair competition. It’s impossible for a tax-paying, private company to compete with a tax-subsidized government-owned enterprise.
The money-losing, city-owned bike rental program is an example of how our City Council discourages private sector business formation in Alexandria. This, along with their plans to acquire evermore of your income to fund their far more extravagant visions, not a single one of which has ever been put to a public vote, makes Alexandria a needlessly expensive city in which to live, especially for those entering the workforce, the elderly, our teachers and police.
Jimm Roberts
Alexandria