Action Committee for Transit

www.actfortransit.org P.O. Box 7074, Silver Spring, MD 20907

OFFSHORE TAX HAVEN HARBORS

ANONYMOUS ANTI-PURPLE LINE WEBSITE

Purple Line opponents are going global to hide who's paying the bills, the Action Committee for Transit revealed today. The transit foes' new website, a4stmd.com, is registered in the Madeira Islands, a tax haven located off the coast of Africa, through a service called “Domain Discreet” that conceals the name of the true owner.

This maneuver follows the revelation that Columbia Country Club is orchestrating a heavily-funded “grassroots” campaign against the Purple Line. The planned light rail line from Bethesda to New Carrollton would run on an old railroad right of way that adjoins the country club's golf course. The club's effort was unmasked in April when a letter from its president, J. Paul McNamara, was leaked to transit supporters.

Also failing to disclose his membership in Columbia was Geoff Gonella, whose anti-light rail letter was printed by the Washington Post on June 23. Gonella, a lobbyist who specializes in creating “grassroots” backing for paying clients, is rated by Golf Digest magazine among the best golfers in the Washington lobbying corps.

Action Committee for Transit president Ben Ross observed that Columbia's lobbyist members, distracted by the anti-Purple Line campaign, may not be concentrating on their swing. In Golf Digest's 2005 ranking, the club boasted three of the four lowest handicaps on K Street, while this year it could claim only 5th, 12th, and 14th places.

“The folks at Columbia Country Club need to get back on the fairway instead of wasting time pretending they're the grass roots,” Ross said. “Nobody believes them anyway, and meanwhile their game is going downhill.”

- released July 7, 2008