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Regional Transit Authority rejects lobbying, PR contract

The adage you have to spend money to make money didn’t prosper Wednesday among Regional Transit Authority board directors.

Although a proposal to hire influential lobbyist ASGK Public Strategies to secure federal transit dollars passed a finance committee, the full RTA board rejected it.

The firm would have been paid up to $425,000 a year for a two-year contract.

ASGK was founded by power broker David Axelrod, a political adviser to President Obama who now operates a separate consulting firm.

RTA staff planners told directors that the region faces a $26 billion shortfall to keep its transit systems in good repair, including buying new equipment, repairing tracks and stations.

The RTA is responsible for the Chicago Transit Authority, Metra and Pace.

ASGK would have developed a public-relations campaign to educate the public about transit capital needs and pressured members of Congress to fund transit. Nationwide the transit maintenance bill is about $80 billion, RTA officials said.

That didn’t convince board directors, including William Coulson of Glenview.

“I thought it was too speculative and too expensive,” Coulson said. “It was bad timing in an election year when nothing happens traditionally — it’s a big gamble.”

The proposed contract with ASGK also included two one-year extensions, which could have brought the cost to $1.7 million over four years.

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