A food and beverage tax to support local bus service is looming ahead on the Lake County Council's agenda, and there is a tendency by some to treat the 1 percent levy as a nominal fee.

Which it is, I guess, even if you take the whole 3.19 people in your average Lake County family out and run up a $200 tab.

It's an extra $2. On a White Castle run, you're not going to notice the extra pennies.

But if you think I'm in favor of the tax, I'm not. Because once you get used to the idea that a percent here and a percent there are "nominal," one day you wake up and wonder why you are giving half of what you make to the government.

While I haven't always agreed with Speros Batistatos, the executive director of the South Shore Convention and Visitors Authority, I agree to tax the food industry to fund local bus transportation is wrong-headed.

What it does is to potentially punish profitable businesses, which are in short supply just now if you haven't noticed, and use the money to prop up a nonprofitable and (some would argue) nonessential entity.

Nonessential? Yes. And I am not ignorant of the fact a fraction of our population uses the buses to get to jobs or the doctor.

But to listen to the tax proponents, you would think there is no taxi service in Northwest Indiana. I opened the Highland Yellow Pages and found nine based in Merrillville, Gary, Hammond, Schererville, Lansing, Calumet City and Highland.

And why only the food industry? What did it do to deserve this?

In Northwest Indiana, Batistatos said about 1 percent of the population will ever use a bus, and I think he's being generous.

For the $7 million the Regional Bus Authority wants from the tax, you could buy a small fleet of fuel-efficient cars or vans and give rides on demand to qualified low-income or elderly riders, or give them vouchers to pay for private cab services. You could do both.

But to continue running the bus services the way it is now is just throwing good money after bad. East Chicago does not even charge for bus service, much like its sidewalks.

"This is not a referendum on compassion," Batistatos said at a recent Lakeshore Chamber of Commerce lunch. "This is a referendum on incompetence."

Show us a competent way to run effective public transit (I did not say bus), then ask for more money. We are tired of people holding out their hands and saying, "Trust us."

Because we have found out the hard way that does not work.

The opinions are solely those of the writer. He can be reached at markk@nwitimes.com or (219) 933-4170.