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Pullman Developers Pitch Project to State Officials
By Art Harvath, HNN
Correspondent
Shaffer's Answers Appear Inconsistent
The public and private developers for the Pullman Square project were
in Charleston Friday to make their pitch for another $10.6 million in
public funds.
The Transit Authority general manager Vickie Shaffer and Metropolitan
Partners’s Tim Rollins and Bill Dargusch made their proposal for
the money before the West Virginia Economic Development Grant Committee.
Shaffer told the board that “in April and May” of this year
HURA (Huntington Urban Renewal Authority) reached an agreement with Chi
Chi’s Restaurant. Rollins told the board that the agreed upon price
with Chi Chi’s was $1.75 million, and that $600,000 of the grant
money they were applying for would go towards paying that price.
On Monday HNN contacted Rob Carl, vice president of investor and media
relations for Chi Chi’s parent company Prandium. Carl said they were
“continuing to discuss a fair and equitable agreement price.”
“There is no agreement in place,” said Carl.
Concerning the shuttle bus purchases Shaffer said that “TTA has piggybacked
with Santa Clara County Transit Authority in California for the purchase
of the shuttle buses. All six will be delivered next year.”
Piggy backing is when bigger transit authorities buy buses with an option
to buy more at a later date. If the buses aren’t needed, they contract
with smaller transit companies to enable the smaller company to buy at
a reduced rate.
Maureen Raine, of the Santa Clara County Transit System, was in the dark
when asked Monday about Shaffer’s remarks concerning the buses. Raine
is in charge of the purchasing and selling of the buses for Santa Clara.
“I’m not aware of any options that are available on new buses,”
said Raine. “We do have some buses going out for bid soon, but as
far as new buses I just don’t know of any options I have available.
I’m not familiar with TTA or Huntington, West Virginia, so I just
don’t know how to respond,” she said.
The Federal Transit Administration grant was over $26 million. In their
application for the $10.6 million grant from the state, the developers
said the FTA grant was $17 million.
Rollins explained this discrepancy to the board. “There were the
purchase of buses…and related equipment for those buses,” said
Rollins. “There is some funds available for grant administration
and for an FTA consultant…some of the dollars have been spent on
predevelopment activities to date on some of the market analysis and early
design work.”
“So netting those cost categories out, you end up with about $17.6
million,” said Rollins.
Board chairman Brian Kastic asked Rollins and Shaffer to specifically
name what money sources they had actually dedicated to the project.
“You absolutely, positively have the FTA grant?” asked Kastic.
“Oh, yea,” replied Shaffer.
“You absolutely, positively have $650,000 from HURA?” asked
Kastic.
“Yes,” said Shaffer.
“You have the $500,000 from the Empowerment Zone,?” Kastic asked.
“Yes.”
“The city of Huntington has the $500,000 in account. It’s not
promised, because the city has actually no fiscal standing, so they actually
have $500,000 set aside for the project?” asked Kastic.
Shaffer replied, “yes.”
“In a separate account?” asked Kastic. “It’s not promised
in next year’s budget?”
“Yes, it’s Community Development Block Grant money,” replied
Shaffer.
Richard Dixon, director of Development and Planning for Huntington, said
Monday that there is no money set aside in the Community Development Block
Grant for the Pullman Project.
“We do have $200,000 set aside for street improvements in Huntington,
but there is no specific grant set aside (for the Pullman Project),”
said Dixon.
HNN also contacted the Empowerment Zone office to ask about the $500,000
grant Shaffer told the committee the EZ has committed.
EZ director Cathy Burns was unavailable for comment. Empowerment Zone
employee Jennifer Evans said to her knowledge no grant has been awarded
to the Pullman Project.
“I can’t imagine not knowing about a grant of that size,”
said Evans.
Neither Shaffer nor Rollins returned phone calls.
