Kenosha County Board Chairman Joe Clark wants to make this clear: “His” regional transit authority is not looking to raise a rental car fee by 900 percent.

And Mayor Keith Bosman says he’s not behind a transit “slush fund” that officials are looking to create.

Clark and Bosman have found themselves the subjects of automated telephone calls that an advocacy group began placing in the Kenosha area this week, against a fee increase to support the new Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Transit Authority.

The calls, paid for by Club for Growth Wisconsin Inc., refer to “Mayor Bosman’s new transit authority” and “Chairman Clark’s new transit authority,” though the authority was created by the Legislature and Bosman and Clark merely appointed delegates as required by the state.

“It’s a week before Christmas and the unemployment rate is over 10 percent,” the recorded calls state. “But that’s not stopping Mayor Bosman’s new transit authority from raising the rental car tax by 900 percent and — get this — they don’t even know how they’re going to use the money.

“So while we’re trying to get people to visit and spend money here in our stores, hotels and restaurants, Bosman’s board wants to increase the car rental tax nine times over to create a slush fund.”

The calls go on to instruct residents to call Bosman or Clark and tell them to stop the rental car tax.

Clark said the statement that he controls the authority is far from the truth.

“I have no horse in that race,” he said in an interview. “I have no say whether they pass that fee or not.”

Bosman said he has directed his authority appointee, former Mayor John Antaramian, not to support any change from the current fee of $2 per rental car transaction.

The transit authority board is scheduled to meet at 8 a.m. today at General Mitchell International Airport in Milwaukee. One of its agenda items is to consider enactment of a vehicle rental fee, which Antaramian said he believed would likely be a continuation of the $2 charge.

The Legislature, in creating the new transit authority as part of the 2009-11 state budget, enabled the board to raise the fee to up to $18 to fund preliminary engineering for the Kenosha-Racine-Milwaukee commuter rail proposal, authority staff, communications and incentives to local bus systems to increase service and implement dedicated funding sources.

An exhibit in the meeting packet indicates it may be necessary to implement the full $18 fee to build up a bank of surplus funds to demonstrate financial viability to the Federal Transit Administration.

But Antaramian said he does not know of board support for the fee hike.

“I’m not looking to increase that in any way,” Antaramian said Thursday. “And, to my knowledge, no one else has talked about increasing that any more, either.”

Club for Growth Wisconsin, an affiliate of a national, conservative political advocacy network led by former U.S. Rep. Chris Chocula of Indiana, did not return requests for comment about the calls.

Bosman, who favors a sales tax over rental car fees to pay for transit, said he did not understand the basis of the group’s claims.

“I don’t know where these folks are coming from,” Bosman said. “I don’t think I’ve ever suggested that increasing the car rental fee was of any value to anyone.”