I've found a new ally in my battle against the Area Transportation Authority's request for a $375 million sales tax for buses in April.

    Thank you, Mark Funkhouser.

    The mayor said at a recent light-rail forum that suburbanites are "not going to invest in regional transit led by the ATA." That prompted ATA leader Mark Huffer to say he's disappointed by that comment.

    Sure, I know Funkhouser technically was saying many suburban residents won't trust the ATA to correctly spend hundreds of millions of dollars for light rail.

     But in evaluating the mayor's comments, I think it's fair to question whether Kansas City residents at this point should trust the ATA to correctly spend hundreds of millions for buses, either.

     The ATA plan on the April ballot asks voters to renew the current three-eighths-cent transit tax for 15 more years. (It was endorsed in 2003 for only five years first time around.)

    But the 15-year length is far too long, given the fact that absolutely no one knows now what the ATA's light-rail plan will look like.

    Yes, light rail is an important part of the bus-tax vote.

    That's because the ATA and City Council say they hope to place a light-rail starter line before voters in November. And that's going to take a tax increase of either one-quarter or  three-eighths-cent.

    However, Funkhouser has now raised questions about just how involved the ATA will be in making sure light-rail is done on a regional basis.

    Bottom line: Voters at this time do not have good reasons to approve a 15-year renewal of the bus-tax. Fear not. That would not be the end of  good bus service in Kansas City.

    Instead, the defeat would force the ATA to come back to voters in November with a more comprehensive proposal. It should show Kansas Citians exactly what  they would be spending to build high-quality bus service plus a new light-rail system.

    That kind of approach is far better than voters plunging ahead with the ATA's $375 million tax and then hoping that a reasonable light-rail proposal emerges later in 2008.