For me, the pivotal issue is whether the monorail has sufficient revenue to support the project. To that end, I asked four questions to be answered before a spade of dirt is turned.

• Can the monorail finish building what it starts?
• Is the project financially viable now and in the future?
• Is the estimated $7 billion financing cost an acceptable price to pay?
• And does this protect the tax payers of Seattle from undue risk?

I appreciate the efforts the agency has made in recent weeks to meet my request. Unfortunately, the recommendation approved by the Monorail Board on Wednesday, and presented to me yesterday, does not meet those tests.

My staff, including Chief Financial Officer Dwight Dively, sat down with agency representatives yesterday to go over the financial plan in detail. Put simply: the monorail does not have enough money to pay for the project. The financing plan presented to me is not prudent. It relies on a risky assumption that money from car tabs will grow faster than expert economists consider reasonable or prudent. You can't solve a real revenue problem with rosy projections.

I hope that the Council will consider going just a bit farther than the mayor asked and pass a resolution to continue to withhold the permits until SMP can demonstrate that it meets a stringent set of conditions.

Those conditions should include a vote and a financing plan approved by several outside sources including the state treasurer, along with a showing by SMP -- if they somehow manage to go ahead with their project -- that its overall effect contributes to the city's and the region's growth plans.

That third issue is an important one because the still-vague revised plan that SMP is considering seems, at first blush, to violate several of Seattle's growth plans. For the few neighborhoods that it would serve, SMP's mini-mass transit system might contribute the the city's expressed goal of decreasing auto dependence. But the overall system's new financing -- as it was presented to the board last week by its consultant Kevin Phelps -- would depend on an significant increase in car ownership within Seattle.

The agency seems to be working at cross-purposes here. To stave off bankruptcy under their still-mysterious new plan-for-a-plan, SMP seems to be heading for a situation where they would have to avoid doing anything that would decrease overall car ownership. Furthermore, if they were to ask for federal funds for their system, as their interim director suggested they might, the agency would be competing with other Seattle transportation projects for limited funds.

Edit: Added quotation from Nickels email.

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