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CAF USA needs to win support from the FTA and the City of Houston over the next few days in order to turn this very strong tide against you, in your favor or at least to neutral to buy you more time. The story has been too publicly wrong for too long. Misconceptions have now set in as conventional knowledge. Our recommendation is that you employ a full scale approach to "re-start" the dialog. And we are doing just that.

This includes help from the White House to buy more time with the FTA in order to revise their decision; lobbying from the NY delegation and the rest of the political leadership; more engagement with the opinion leaders and the media; and legal support.

And it means making your case more directly and publicly than you might have to do if you had more time. But you don't. You have only a few days. That is why we also recommend that you take out full page ads in the Houston Chronicle for Tuesday and Wednesday supplemened by a similar ad online. You have been attacked for violating the law and for promoting an unfair bidding process. You must fight back - in our opinion.


Ad Copy:

AN OPEN LETTER TO THE CITIZENS OF HOUSTON
From CAF-USA, an American Company

When Houston citizens voted to expand the City's transportation with a new light rail project, METRO heard you loud and clear. The last and current City mayors heard you. And we at CAF-USA heard you too.

That's why we've been working hard to bring the City and you its citizens the transportation you need - a state of the art light rail line on the Purple Line and Red Line Extension.

After an extensive, competitive bid process, we won the contract to build the rail system. Our contract with METRO will deliver Houston's rail system on tme, at the best price of all those bidding and in the process, we will employ only Americans.

Finally, to dispel any confusion, we will adhere to the "buy American" requirements of the contract. The current misunderstanding is because two rail cars used as "pilots" were shipped from abroad. The reality is we have a plant in America, with American workers ready to build the cars needed for Houston's light rail system.

A confusion over two test cars should not lead to scuttling the entire project - that would simply undermine the will of the voters as expressed in the referendum that approved the light rail extension, it would waste the tens of millions of taxpayer money already spent, it would cost as much as $100 million more of taxpayer money to re-bid the contract and would lead to as much as two years of delay. It would also lead to job losses at our US factory which is staffed up and ready to roll.

We understand some of the companies that lost the competitive bid are unhappy and want federal authorities and local officials to derail the process. It's just sour grapes. The bid process was open, fair and competitive; they lost, and the people of Houston won. We are providing all interested parties with the facts so that there can be no confusion: we will adhere to buy American, we will build the rail cars with US workers, we will do it quickly, we will deliver our work on time and we will provide Houston with what you voted for and what you deserve.

In other words, we're ready to get rolling.


Sincerely,
CAF USA


Hilary Rosen | SKDKnickerbocker
202.464.6900 (O) | 202.320.2711 (C) | HRosen@SKDKnick.com
1818 N Street NW, Suite 450, Washington DC 20036