LOCAL News :: Protest Activity
BRING IT TO THEIR DOORSTEP! CTA PROTEST!
SERVICE CUTS? FARE INCREASES? JOB TERMINATIONS? FIGHT BACK!
****Thursday December 16th 2004
****12 noon
****CTA headquarters: 567 W. Lake Street
The CTA has already passed a 100% fare increase for paratransit riders. This
coming Thursday, at their monthly board meeting, they are expected to pass
their "Doomsday" budget, including a 20% cut to services and the termination
of over 1000 jobs, effective January 2nd 2005. While CTA officials have
claimed this crisis could only be avoided with extra money coming in from the
state legislator, we have been holding CTA president Frank Kruesi and his
board responsible. It is the CTA who has known this crisis was coming and has
made the decision to dump it on the backs of workers and riders. They are the
ones who ignored it as they built their new $119 million Lake Street office.
It is also Kruesi and his buddy mayor Daley who are still talking about
spending almost 2 billion dollars on a new Circle line, just so rich folks can
get from their neighborhoods to the airport a little bit quicker. If there is
money for such luxury, there is no excuse for cutting our service, terminating
our jobs and raising our fares!
In response, Midwest Unrest has called for a fare strike starting December
15th. And December 16th, we are inviting angry riders and workers to a rally
outside the the CTA's fancy new headquarters, one hour before heading into the
1 p.m. board meeting. So catch a bus on the 16th, politely state that you're
on fare strike and refusing to pay, and come on down to let the CTA hear loud
and clear that we will not be the ones paying for their crisis!
See also:
http://www.midwestunrest.net/farestrike