The embattled chief of California’s likely doomed and certainly overpriced high-speed rail project resigned on Wednesday, his stint “marred by scandal,” as the New York Post put it.
“This has not been an easy decision, as leading the Authority has been one of the most meaningful and rewarding chapters of my professional life,” Ian Choudri wrote in his resignation email (not even proper stationery?) to High-Speed Rail Authority board chair Steve Kawa.
“Currently, the project is set to run out of money in 2027 without ever having laid a single piece of track,” the Post also reported. “The authority hopes to find enough private investment funds to fill the gap left by the lack of federal funding.”
Oh, that’s a good one. People with the kind of money this project requires don’t get suckered in by strangers offering to sell them the Brooklyn Bridge.
Earlier this month, the board voted to strip Choudri of his authority to sign or manage contracts under $25 million, and also required in-house legal review of contracts, which must have taken most of the fun out of the job — but more on that below.
What do you think the final straw might have been?
Was it:
- The multibillion-dollar shortfall for completing the so-called Early Operating Segment?
- Repeatedly missing the deadline to purchase the actual freaking trains (not that they have any rail to travel on) required by federal funding agreements?
- An Inspector General report finding incomplete disclosures of schedule risks, cost increases, and funding shortfalls in the business plan?
- The Trump administration finding no viable path forward for the effort and withdrawing $4 billion in federal money?
- Choudri’s mythical cost-saving effort?
- Embarrassing public scrutiny of Choudri’s personal life following a February domestic violence report?
And those are just the problems I found during his relatively brief two-year tenure overseeing the project first approved by voters in 2008, and currently expected to be completed basically never, yet at great expense. Originally pegged at $35, maybe $40 billion with a 2020 completion date, the L.A.-to-S.F. high-speed rail (that won’t actually connect L.A. to S.F with high-speed rail) could now cost anywhere from $126 billion to $231 billion. And the completion date was officially changed in 2022 to a shrug emoji.
As it turns out, however, Choudri quit for none of those reasons.
While he claimed he wants to focus on “important personal and family priorities,” which is the most boilerplate/least believable justification ever, Choudri leaves in the midst of a scandal involving “nearly $600,000 in taxpayer money for questionable trips by rail authority consultants,” as CalMatters put it.
“State investigators last month found the rail agency’s consultants flew first class, hailed premium rides and traveled to a nightclub, cigar lounge and restaurants on taxpayers’ dime,” the report continued, “sometimes at Choudri’s request.”
Those are the goodies the board took away from Choudri three weeks ago.
Then there’s this: “Many of the trips involved traveling to Folsom, the Sacramento suburb where Choudri has a home, sometimes after hours,” to which I can only add, “Oh really?”
The whole thing stinks, and Choudri’s sudden resignation barely even registers on the project’s 9.6 Richter scale of fail.
Recommended: Another Day, Another World-Changing Milestone From SpaceX
Mock blue states. Get cool stuff.
PJ Media VIP members get tons of exclusive goodies, including podcasts and video live chats with your favorite writers, almost none of which are Russian or Pakistani bots — guaranteed! You can support alternative conservative news and save 60% with promo code FIGHT.
