Betrayal at MPO: McNeil, Leonhardt stab citizens in the back

Posted on July 24, 2007 by Terri Hall

Newbie walks in and wants to be Chair
Imagine a brand new State Rep walking into the Texas House of Representatives and demanding to be the Speaker his/her first day on the job. Well, that’s what Councilwoman Sheila McNeil did last month and she got her way this afternoon. A new appointee to the MPO walked in at her first meeting and demanded to be Chair…and challenged her own County Commissioner with 9 years experience for the position. What we witnessed was nothing short of STUNNING!

Cortez shows up
I knew we had lost the vote when I walked in and saw Councilman Phil Cortez (who ran as anti-toll) present when he was supposed to be absent (in order to not have to vote against Tommy and also not to get in trouble for voting against the City, but all bets were off). We knew a coup was about to take place and the other side had already lined-up their votes while ours flaked, abstained, or pontificated since our side requires a spine and to go up against the most powerful lobby in San Antonio. As always, the deck was stacked against us since the City has 6 appointees and the County only has 4 with other appointed members following the money, like Windcrest Mayor Jack Leonhardt. He apparently spent the weekend at the Texas Transportation Forum cozying up to the highway lobby not to mention how the City called him on his quid pro quo on the Windcrest Mall de-annexation.

Leonhardt’s betrayal
Mayor Leonhardt, who chaired the meeting, stepped right into where Richard Perez left off and played political chicanery with the agenda and voting procedures. Out the gate he said some members may have to leave early so he threatened to call a vote for the Chair even without Commissioner Larson there (as he promised he wouldn’t, but a politician’s promise isn’t worth the paper it’s written on). But Larson did arrive in time for the vote. However, the chicanery resumed when Adkisson asked for a vote on having ONLY elected members vote for Chair. When Perez wanted to change the bylaws to illegally appoint himself an alternate to the MPO, they refused to use Robert Rules of Order as Adkisson requested back in May, but when Adkisson asked for accountability and to have ELECTED officials WHO ANSWER to the PEOPLE be the only voters, Leonhardt then called a vote to use Robert’s Rules which required a higher vote threshold, a two-thirds majority rather than a simple majority to pass. Leonhardt may as well have been Richard Perez at that point.

Then the City’s voting block lined-up and locked elbows to vote AGAINST ACCOUNTABILITY and to allow the UN-ELECTED members to vote! Five of the 10 who voted against the PEOPLE were appointees and NOT elected officials. The City couldn’t win without their appointees. Then came the vote for Chair. Leonhardt began his usual pontificating and gave a speech AGAINST Adkisson (showing an appalling bias from one who should have been an impartial parliamentarian overseeing the vote for a new Chair without taking sides), and then tried to call for an immediate vote just like Perez used to do (he wasn’t going to give anyone else a chance to chime in).

He had the audacity to actually state he feared our MPO would be labeled “anti-toll” if Adkisson were the Chair. What??? As if that’s a reason to vote against the most experienced candidate or YOUR OWN county commissioner who endorsed you. WE ARE ANTI-TOLL! At how many meetings and how many times and how many ways do the people need to say “NO!” When over 2,000 people have turned out against tolls on 281/1604 alone in the past two years and when another 900 people turned out to oppose the Trans Texas Corridor, and when another 450 people turned out to oppose tolls on Bandera Rd, and when Senator Jeff Wentworth admits he got calls 100 to 1 against the tolls during the session, there is NO doubt about where San Antonians stand on tolls!

If ever there was a great candidate for a Mayoral recall, it’s Jack Leonhardt. He was just re-elected and this is when they get to feeling rather untouchable. It’s time for him to go!

TxDOT, which is a STATE agency, voted against the MPO’s State Representative and State Senator, both of whom endorsed Commissioner Adkisson. They sure haven’t learned that it’s the Legislature who funds their budget and who will decide whether to gut that agency and whose heads will roll come 2009 when they’re up for Sunset Review (top to bottom review of their books).

THE CITY A FRONT FOR ZACHRY
So we lost all three votes 10-7 with Ariaga abstaining and Uresti ABSENT! Why? Because this City isn’t run by our elected officials but the highway lobby behind them. These politicians are puppets and those who dare to stand-up for the PEOPLE get a public flogging. Bartel Zachry stood next to Phil Hardberger when he announced he was running for Mayor. We busted Zachry’s multi-billion PRIVATE toll deal on 281/1604 and he ain’t happy. He wanted ready access to your wallet on roads you’ve already paid for in a 50 year monopoly with GUARANTEED returns. Wonder why even the PUBLIC toll deal that the tolling authority (the RMA) is now doing on 281/1604 went from $1.4 billion last year to $2.2 billion after the private toll moratorium passed? So that Zachry can make an extra BILLION on the construction contract for the toll roads.

FINAL VOTE COUNT

Those who voted AGAINST Tommy Adkisson –

Sheila McNeil – Councilwoman District 2
Phil Cortez – Councilman District 4
Justin Rodriguez – Councilman District 7
Diane Cibrian – Councilwoman District 8
Emil Moncivias – City Planning appointee
Tom Wendorf – City Public Works appointee
Jack Leonhardt – Mayor of Windcrest
Ruby Perez – City Via appointee
David Casteel – TxDOT
Clay Smith – TxDOT
Those who voted FOR Tommy Adkisson –

County Commissioner Tommy Adkisson
County Commissioner Lyle Larson
County Commissioner Chico Rodriguez
State Representative David Leibowitz
Bill Weeper – Selma Councilman
Joe Acevas – County Infrastructure appointee
Melissa Castro-Killen – County Via appointee

Toll Party weighs in on MPO Chair vote

Posted on July 24, 2007 by Terri Hall

Toll Party Statement to MPO
Transportation Policy Board
Regarding election of new Chair
July 23, 2007

Let’s make an honest appraisal of the City’s reasons for challenging Commissioner Adkisson for Chair of the MPO.

1) They say Commissioner Larson held the Chair position for (2) two-year terms.
If the City had a problem with that, the time to challenge it was when he sought the second term, not now after the fact and when it’s time for the County to Chair the Board. In fact, it’s the County that’s owed two more years.
2) They say it’s about leadership and the City getting its fair share of the representation on the Board.
The City, in fact, has more representation on the MPO Board than the County. If anyone is due for more fair and equitable representation, it’s the County.
3) They say it’s not about toll roads.
Well, one of the City’s appointees has already stated they want the tolling authority to be a voting member of the Board thereby INCREASING the number of UN-ELECTED members of the Board rather than ELECTED members. When this Board can now, in effect, vote for virtually unlimited new toll taxes, the taxpayers deserve to have only those DIRECTLY accountable to them be vested with voting powers. So the City wishes to take this Board in the opposite direction advocating less accountability to the taxpaying public.

Now, let’s look at how the City handled the past two years as Chair. A vote for a top to bottom independent review of the toll plans was blocked from even being placed on the agenda. Meeting times and days were manipulated to accommodate the Greater Chamber and highway lobby versus ELECTED officials. Citizens to be Heard was placed dead last on each meeting’s agenda versus first as it was under Commissioner Larson. Debate on ANYTHING the public asked for was routinely cut short and votes rushed through. The City along with TxDOT blocked the citizens’ request to restore the gas tax funded plan for 281. And perhaps most shocking, changing the bylaws in the eleventh hour at his last meeting to attempt to serve on this Board as an un-elected alternate with full voting powers which is AGAINST THE LAW! The list goes on and on…

Now let’s look at Commissioner Adkisson’s qualifications. He’s served on this Board for 9 years, his opponent, not one. He’s been a stalwart advocate for the citizens who have repeatedly come before this Board with concerns about the region’s transportation plans, particularly the rush to toll roads. He understands the many issues at play, knows the history of what’s transpired and the legislation involved, and he’s known for working for fair and equitable solutions.

Given all of this, Commissioner Tommy Adkisson is by far the most qualified choice to serve as Chair. Any other excuses NOT to appoint him don’t hold water. The citizens want and demand accountability to not just have their voices heard and then repeatedly ignored, they want to be heard and HEEDED. And frankly, when all but one of the City’s appointees won’t even return our phone calls, we’re convinced they have no interest in listening to or heeding the will the of the people on the direction transportation is going. I’ve had more responsiveness form our U.S. senators and congressmen than the majority of the City Council.

It’s no secret that the toll plans are nearly universally opposed. Just on the 281 & 1604 hearings alone over the past two years, more than 2,000 people turned out opposing tolls 10 to 1. For the Trans Texas Corridor hearings, 900 showed up and 300 people had to be turned away! During the legislative session, Sen. Wentworth admitted he received calls 100 to 1 against the tolls.

We’re supposed to live in a Constitutional Republic that many have fought and died to secure and still fighting even today to secure. By law we’re entitled to representation and we’re clearly not being represented at ANY level of government, including this Board. We’re at a critical crossroads. We need leadership that has already proven to be responsive to the PEOPLE and who considers solutions aside from toll proliferation and charging the highest possible toll rates. We unequivocally want Commissioner Tommy Adkisson be elected Chair of the MPO.

Schlafly, Hunter address Freedom 21 National Conference in Texas

Posted on July 24, 2007 by Terri Hall

Link to article here.

SELLING AMERICA TO COMMUNIST CHINA

By Cliff Kincaid

July 24, 2007
NewsWithViews.com

In remarks on July 20 to a Freedom 21 conference in Dallas, Texas, conservative leader Phyllis Schlafly declared that the Chinese communists intend to exploit development of a North American Union in order to bring more cheap goods into the U.S. and destroy more American jobs.

The Freedom 21 conference, organized by Tom DeWeese of the American Policy Center and Cathie Adams of Eagle Forum of Texas, was devoted to highlighting the erosion of American sovereignty through an ongoing process that aims to economically and politically integrate the U.S., Canada and Mexico.

Schlafly, president of Eagle Forum, highlighted the role of Democratic Party foreign policy specialist Robert Pastor in the unfolding plan. Pastor helped lead the campaign to surrender U.S. control of the Panama Canal through the Panama Canal Treaty, a development that has taken on added significance in view of the fact that a Chinese firm, Hutchison Whampoa, now controls not only the ports at both ends of the Panama Canal but ports and terminals in Mexico. The company has close ties to the Chinese regime.

Speaking at the same conference, Rep. Duncan Hunter, a Republican presidential candidate, said unfair Chinese trade was decimating America’s industrial base and that the communist regime was using ‘crisp new American trade dollars’ to build up its war machine.

Schlafly came close to endorsing Hunter for president, declaring, ‘Wouldn’t it be wonderful to have him in the White House?’ She said he was ‘right on every issue’ and ‘he’s the only one of all the candidates who talks about the jobs issue, and I think that is the coming big issue in the next election.’ Her remarks followed Hunter’s speech.

New Book Highlights Threat

She strongly recommended Jerome Corsi’s new book, The Late Great USA, which argues that a North American Union would provide China another ‘economic advantage’ over the U.S., with ominous national security implications.

Indeed, Corsi comes close to arguing that China is the ultimate power broker behind the scheme, saying that ‘In order to solidify its economic superiority over North America, Red China is working to restructure the North American transportation infrastructure.’

It also turns out, according to information presented at the conference by Oklahoma activist Amanda Teegarden, as well as Corsi’s book, that a Hutchison Whampoa subsidiary is a major investor in a firm, Savi Networks, that has developed a radio technology to track and manage cargo shipments. Hutchison Whampoa owns 49 percent of the firm, with 51 percent owned by U.S. defense contractor Lockheed Martin. In 2006, Lockheed Martin was the top contributor among military contractors to candidates for federal office and national political parties. Fifty-eight percent of its money went to Republicans.

Schlafly also attacked so-called ‘patent reform,’ now moving through Congress, which she said would benefit China by forcing Americans to put information about their inventions on the Internet where it could be stolen. And she warned against President Bush’s plan to ‘to put all the illegal aliens in Social Security,’ a scheme called ‘totalization,’ which would ‘break the bank.’

Several speakers at the Freedom 21 conference were activists from Texas and Oklahoma opposed to the building of corridors or ‘NAFTA highways’ through their states to bring goods from Mexico to the U.S. Organizations represented at the conference included Oklahomans for Sovereignty and Free Enterprise, Corridor Watch, and Texans Uniting for Reform & Freedom.

‘The purpose is to bring in cheap goods from China,’ Schlafly declared. ‘The plan is to bring the cheap Chinese goods and the containers across the Pacific and then dock at the Mexican Pacific port Lazaro Cardenas and then bring them up on the railroad that’s already in place, put them in the Mexican trucks and bring them up the NAFTA highway. And they will never be inspected until they get to Kansas City.’

Schlafly said that we are witnessing the unfolding of a plan that is based on a series of steps, including passage of ‘free trade’ agreements, creation of a common market and a monetary and economic union, the establishment of international trade tribunals to govern trade and other disputes between the U.S., Canada and Mexico, and the use of a single currency for North America.

‘Their model is the European Union,’ she said.

North American Institutions

Accuracy in Media has confirmed this, having reported on a Washington conference on development of a North American legal system where participants were told of proposals to create North American institutions, including a ‘North American Court of Justice’ with the power to overrule the U.S. Supreme Court. Robert Pastor, who claims to be in favor of a North American ‘community,’ not a union, presided over the conference.

Robert Pastor, who also runs the Center for North American Studies at American University, helps facilitate model ‘North American Parliament’ meetings where students play the role of delegates to a trilateral legislature. One of his students, Marlon Brown, has written about Pastor’s personal vision and plans for a ‘North American Parliament.’

The White House, which claims the North American Union is a myth, has announced that Bush will travel to Montebello, Quebec, Canada to meet with Prime Minister Stephen Harper of Canada and President Felipe Calderon of Mexico at the ‘North American Leaders’ Summit’ on August 20-21. ‘The leaders will review progress and continued cooperation under the Security and Prosperity Partnership, as well as discuss hemispheric and global issues,’ the White House says.

The Security and Prosperity Partnership is seen by critics as a key part of the North American Union (NAU) plan. The SPP, an executive branch initiative, has never been approved by Congress but has nevertheless resulted in the creation of dozens of working groups involving officials from the U.S., Canada and Mexico meeting to ‘harmonize’ the laws and regulations of the three countries. The public interest law firm Judicial Watch has been forced to go through the Freedom of Information Act to get information about the activities of these groups.

Opposition Developing

In the House, Rep. Virgil Goode (R-Va.) has introduced House Concurrent Resolution 40 opposing the NAU. No formal opposition has yet surfaced in the U.S. Senate. Conservative Caucus chairman Howard Phillips has announced that opponents of the NAU will hold a press conference on August 20 in Ottawa, Canada, on the occasion of the upcoming SPP meeting. The press conference will be held at the Marriott Ottawa from 10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.

Schlafly was the first national commentator to write about the prospect of a North American Union, noting in a July 13, 2005 column that the influential Council on Foreign Relations had just issued a report urging an ‘integrated North American Community.’

Schlafly, who almost single-handedly stopped passage of the so-called Equal Rights Amendment to the Constitution, urged participants in the Freedom 21 conference to vigorously oppose the North American Union, which she noted has received little media coverage, save for Lou Dobbs of CNN. She also noted that some members of Congress claim not to know anything about it or dismiss it as a conspiracy theory.

However, Schlafly said, there are certain facts that ‘cannot be disputed,’ and that when you ‘connect the dots,’ people will get the big picture.

She said some of the key dates in this process were:

April 2001. President Bush endorses the ‘Declaration of Quebec City,’ featuring a commitment to ‘hemispheric integration.’
March, 2005. Bush and the leaders of Canada and Mexico announce the Security and Prosperity Partnership.
May 2005. The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) issues its report endorsing creation by 2010 of a North American economic and security ‘community’ with a common security ‘perimeter,’ open borders to facilitate the movement of trade, capital and people, and a North American ‘tribunal’ to resolve trade disputes.
June 2005. Former Carter Administration official Robert Pastor presents the plan to a sympathetic session of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, then-headed by Senator Richard Lugar.
March 2006. Bush and the leaders of Mexico and Canada hold another meeting, calling it the ‘first anniversary‘ of the SPP.
May 2006. Bush gives speech calling for ‘comprehensive immigration reform.’
2007. The Senate immigration bill is introduced, with a provision calling for the acceleration of the SPP.

Schlafly said the only explanation for the determination by the White House and congressional liberals to pass immigration ‘reform’ is that the ‘powers that be’ want the economic integration of North America. She identified them as belonging to powerful organizations such as the Council on Foreign Relations, whose membership once included top State Department official and communist spy Alger Hiss.

Speaking to the assembled activists and concerned citizens, Schlafly said, ‘Something terrible is happening to our country and it’s up to people like you to stop it before it’s too late.’

Trans Texas Corridor topic of Freedom 21 Conference

Posted on July 23, 2007 by Terri Hall

What do Joseph Farrah, Phyllis Schlafly, and Duncan Hunter all have in common? A concern about the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP) and moving toward a North American Union (NAU) and all that comes with it, like the Trans Texas Corridor (TTC). And it’s not just conservatives, but those across the political spectrum…Republicans and Democrats and everyone in between. This past week in Dallas, Farrah, Schlafly, and Hunter all addressed the attendees of the Freedom 21 Conference, the patriot’s answer to the United Nations’ Agenda 21 for global governance. This year’s topic addressed the NAU and TTC.

{mosimage} There’s no better place to discuss the formation of the NAU than Texas. We’re ground zero for the global push for the free flow of people and goods through Mexico via the TTC. The best resource for someone wishing to “connect all the dots,” examine the evidence, and get beyond the accusation of “conspiracy theory” should read Dr. Jerry Corsi’s just released New York Times bestseller, The Late Great USA, The Coming Merger with Mexico and Canada.

Presidential candidate Congressman Duncan Hunter gave a surprisingly substantive speech (not the usual soundbite fluff we get from the top tier), which noted the military threat from China, not just its economic one. He railed against our failed trade agreements and other policies like the Value Added Tax (VAT) and China’s manipulation of currency that have contributed to the dollar’s race to the bottom making way for a North American currency like the Amero to emerge.

{mosimage}Ms. Schlafly’s address connected the dots and named names of how we’ve arrived at this threat to our sovereignty and charged the crowd with how to defeat it! To the naysayers: government documents and Corsi’s book document it, and 13 state legislatures have now passed resolutions against the SPP, NAU, and NAFTA superhighways.

The fact that Corsi’s book has shot to the top with NO publicity in the mainstream media and the fact that World Net Daily didn’t even print enough books in the first printing for it to sell enough copies to become a New York Times bestseller speaks to the grassroots hunger to get this issue front and center before the American people before its too late.

{mosimage}Mr. Farrah shared that this couldn’t have happened without the new media, like World Net Daily. He also noted how members of BOTH parties began a more fervent push to renew the Fairness Doctrine AFTER they suffered a MAJOR grassroots defeat on the immigration bill. It’s certainly no coincidence! They don’t want talk radio to sound the battle cry or to hear from YOU; they simply want to ram their agenda through without accountability and laugh all the way to the bank!

Many of the speakers at the Freedom 21 conference not only educated attendees about the NAU and TTC, they equipped them with the tools they’ll need to keep the grassroots drum beat going to defeat EVERY SINGLE SHRED of NAU initiatives from free trade agreements, eroding private property rights, outsourcing jobs, importing labor, and open borders, to the push to sell off our public infrastructure through privatized toll roads using Public Private Partnerships (PPPs).

Mark my words, using the tools they gave the grassroots, the phones of the elites (not just in government but those who will profit from this scheme) are going to start ringing throwing these guys into abject panic!

There’s no sugar coating it nor denying it; our sovereignty WILL BE erased, incrementally, like the European Union, or through the next national crisis if the people living in the last beacon of freedom, the United States of America, don’t rise up to defeat it!

What started as a fight against toll roads has led to our stumbling across a HUGE can of worms none of us could fathom at the outset. But millions of ordinary Americans are also beginning to connect the dots and the uprising has already begun through the defeat of the immigration bill.

There are many battles yet on the horizon, but suffice it to say…it all leads back to Texas and our gigantic job ahead of us, to defeat the Trans Texas Corridor and stop the free flow of people and goods across our border.

Jaime Castillo: Toll road proponents say motorists can and should pay more

Posted on July 22, 2007 by Terri Hall

Link to article here.

WARNING: Reading this article may cause you to throw things and kick the dog…or worse! Solution: VOTE THE BUMS OUT!

We warned the Texas Legislature this would happen if they passed that “compromise” bill, SB 792, that Rick Perry rammed through in the last weeks of the 80th session. TxDOT would use these new market-based tolls to rob us blind and them come back for more…without accountability, without representation. Toll taxes, especially market-based tolls, are runaway taxation without representation, and it’s the POLITICIANS WHO ALLOWED THIS TO HAPPEN that will pay dearly!

When people can scarcely fill their tank with gas at $3/gallon, it boggles the mind to think there’s a stitch of validity to this argument that motorists can and should pay the highest possible tolls. The bond buyers in an investment grade toll viability study for 183A in Austin said toll roads are no longer viable at $3 a gallon for gas. So from whence shall the toll money come? Short of taking food off the table and shoes off our children’s feet, there’s only so much the family budget can pay toward transportation before other necessities suffer. These are the same politicians who fail to fix runaway annual appraisals that lead to out of control property tax rates that, in turn, have caused every major Texas city to be in the top 10 for foreclosures in the country! Mad yet? Read on and then VOTE THE BUMS OUT!

Jaime Castillo: Toll road proponents: Motorists can — and should — pay more
San Antonio Express-News
07/22/2007

They say you don’t kill the messenger, but can you at least throttle him?

The “him” in this instance is Dye Management Group Inc., which recently completed a draft audit on toll roads for the Texas Transportation Commission.

After taking a look at existing toll rates of 10 to 15 cents a mile in Dallas, Houston and Austin, the firm determined that local toll authorities aren’t charging drivers enough.

The logic — a term that should be used loosely — is that motorists can and will pay more, which would bring in more cash for the state’s yawning road needs.

“Tolls charged by local authorities are lower than studies indicate that their customers would be willing to pay,” the audit reads. “As a result, congestion goals will not be met.”

Translation: “If you want to raise funds for other projects, keep jacking up the toll price until drivers cry ‘uncle,’ and then back it off a penny or two.”

As reported by Express-News transportation writer Patrick Driscoll, the audit “mirrors much of what officials have been saying for years.”

Hope Andrade, a transportation commission member from San Antonio, told Driscoll:

“It just confirms the emergency situation that we’re in. We can no longer support toll rates that are not market value.”

If this were part of a political handbook on winning support for toll roads from a skeptical public, charging “market value” — or as much as you can get — on tollways would be relegated to the section titled: “How to lose even more support in 30 seconds or less.”

And this isn’t the fault of people like Andrade, either. State and federal lawmakers continually saddle transportation officials with a losing poker hand.

In the last 16 years, the state’s population — and construction costs — have grown exponentially. Yet, the gas tax — the primary source of highway funding — has been frozen since 1991.

And not only has it remained static in an ever-changing world, state lawmakers can’t keep their hands off of it either.

Continuing its long-running budgetary shell game, the Legislature’s latest two-year budget will see one-tenth, or $1.6 billion, of the highway fund diverted from building and maintaining roads.

With fiscal constraint apparently off the table, raising the gas tax must be looked at seriously. While difficult with gasoline prices hovering around $3 a gallon, it could be done if the entire state leadership — the governor, lieutenant governor and House speaker — supported the change.

That way, lawmakers, who already quietly concede that the gas tax is too low, could stick their necks out and not fear being singled out as the pigeons that supported higher taxes.

The alternative is to unnecessarily gouge those who will use toll roads. If the recommendations by Dye Management Group are the guide, toll riders will soon have the privilege of paying the highest tolls possible and paying the 20-cent-a-gallon gas tax.

A recent trip to the car dealer landed me in a shuttle van with several other car-less souls.

The shuttle van driver, exasperated by a 15-minute wait to go a couple of miles on U.S. 281 North, said to no one in particular:

“This almost makes you want to see toll roads.”

To which, a homeowner who lives near the intersection of 281 and Bulverde Road blurted out:

“I don’t care what they do as long as they do something soon.”

With that kind of captive — and infuriated — audience, state and local transportation officials are banking that they will get their way eventually.

But it still doesn’t make it right.

TxDOT promotes charge by mile scheme…and HIGHEST POSSIBLE TOLLS!

Posted on July 21, 2007 by Terri Hall

Link to article here.

Well, here ya have it black and white, folks. This shift to tolls is all about MONEY, a whole new tax on driving to generate REVENUE. It’s not about anything else. What they’ve been telling us about (it being a tool to speed up road projects) for more than 2 years has all been DOUBLE TALK and smoke and mirrors to bide time until they got some private firm to cook-up a study that says they HAVE TO TOLL, and that it has to be the HIGHEST POSSIBLE TOLL, and that it’s NECESSARY to rob from Peter to pay for Paul’s roads.

It hasn’t even been a year since the Texas A&M Study was released that blasts a GIGANTIC HOLE into these claims. Let’s review, for those with short-term memory loss at TxDOT and in the Legislature. The Texas Transportation Institute report stated it is NOT necessary to toll a SINGLE ROAD to meet our future transportation needs in Texas. NOT ONE! They gave 4 different options for indexing the gas tax. As we’ve said from DAY ONE, the gas tax system is FAR more affordable than UNBRIDLED NEW TOLL TAXES in the hands of an UN-ELECTED Transportation Department or tolling authority. With toll rates as high as $1.50 a mile in Austin, you better be prepared to leave your wallet at the toll booth, because you’re not going to have much left in it when they’re through.

Thankfully, WE THE PEOPLE aren’t through, and we’re not going to let them DOUBLE TAX TOLL our existing roads or gouging citizens so politicians can amass a slush fund! Note how the report claims even charging the highest possible market rate tolls won’t be enough. Of course not, no matter what we’re forcibly taxed and have to fork over to BIG GOVERNMENT, it’ll never be enough. That’s why it’s up to us to restrain THEM!

A desire to keep the rates low could torpedo toll road goals
By Patrick Driscoll
Express-News
07/20/2007

Motorists should pay higher fees on Texas toll roads, including those planned for San Antonio, but even that won’t be enough to fix growing traffic problems, a new report says.

The trouble is local toll agencies don’t want to set rates any higher than needed to cover financing of their own roads, says the draft audit by Dye Management Group Inc., which was presented this week to the Texas Transportation Commission.

So not enough profit is being raised to fund other projects, the executive summary says. Drivers pay about 10 to 15 cents a mile on tollways in Dallas, Houston and Austin.

“Tolls charged by local authorities are lower than studies indicate that their customers would be willing to pay,” it states. “As a result, congestion goals will not be met.”

The audit, commissioned by the Texas Department of Transportation, which the Transportation Commission oversees, mirrors much of what officials have been saying for years.

“It just confirms the emergency situation that we’re in,” said Hope Andrade, a commissioner from San Antonio. “We can no longer support toll rates that are not market value.”

Keeping rates “reasonable” is one reason why the Alamo Regional Mobility Authority last month took over planned toll lanes on 47 miles of U.S. 281 and Loop 1604 on the North Side.

But forcing such local agencies to maximize profits, or at least get healthy returns, is why a provision was slipped into a law last spring that requires state and local officials to agree on toll rates for new projects.

Reasonable rates and market rates are not necessarily at odds, since some surplus is good if used on other needed projects, said Bill Thornton, chairman of the Mobility Authority.

But that still leaves room for debate on how high toll fees should be.

“I do not see conflict in the debate,” he said. “I see it as a healthy discussion.”

Those differing views could gel, or not, later this summer when a market valuation is finished for the U.S. 281 and Loop 1604 toll system.

Toll critics see the valuation as a way for government to use its monopoly on roads to squeeze money out of motorists trapped in congestion.

“Anybody can make money off of that,” said Terri Hall of San Antonio Toll Party. “It’s really for unlimited runaway taxation of the likes we’ve never seen before.”

Nevertheless, charging at or near market rates for tolls won’t be enough, the report says.

For one thing, toll roads are mainly solutions for big cities, since that’s where the congestion is. And erosion of gas taxes will escalate because of rising construction inflation and more cars getting better mileage or using alternate fuels.

A long-term answer is to switch from a tax on gas to a tax on how much people drive, called a vehicle miles traveled charge or VMT charge. Oregon finished testing such a system in March and a report is due this summer.

“Texas needs to lay the groundwork to move to a VMT charge over the next 20 years,” the report says.

Andrade agreed that a VMT charge should be looked at.

“We’re at a point when we must explore everything,” she said. “That would be difficult but not impossible.”

Hall said that would hand government yet another unbridled tax as well as another tool to intrude on privacy by tracking the movements of vehicles.

“We knew that was coming all along,” she said.

Texas still needs to build more toll roads and lease what they can to private operators, the report says. The Dye Management report is one of five audits that will be a starting point for a sunset review of TxDOT, which the Legislature is scheduled to wrap up in its 2009 session.

WND: Controversy erupts over Macquarie, compared to Enron!

Posted on July 20, 2007 by Terri Hall

Link to article here.

Controversy erupts over leaser of U.S. toll roads
Foreign firm part of public-private partnerships funding highway network
By Dr. Jerome Corsi
World Net Daily
July 20, 2007

Chicago Skyway

Investment analysts in New York and Australia charge that Macquarie, the Australian conglomerate leasing U.S. toll roads, is a “house of cards” that has made billions by spinning off the highway assets into over-valuated investment trusts controlled by the bank.

Macquarie has been an active participant in the “public-private partnerships” sponsored by Mary Peters when she was head of the Federal Highway Administration.

As documented on the FHWA website, Macquarie recently concluded long-term leasing deals on the Chicago Skyway and the Indiana Toll Road.

In both projects, Macquarie has partnered with Cintra Concesiones de Infraestructuras de Transporte, S.A., the Spanish investment consortium also involved in financing and leasing the Trans-Texas Corridor.

The criticism of Macquarie can be traced to a paper published last year by John L. Goldberg, an honorary associate at the School of Architecture, Design Science, and Planning at the University of Sydney in Australia.

Titled “The Fatal Flaw in the Financing of Private Road Infrastructure in Australia,” the paper argued equity investors in Macquarie investment trusts are likely to suffer heavy losses by excessive valuations Macquarie makes of financed toll roads that are packaged together to be sold to pension funds and other institutional investors.

Goldberg also argued that government guarantees on Macquarie projects are often buried in the confidential part of toll road “comprehensive development agreements,” such that the public taxpayer liability only comes to light when a toll road project fails.

Jim Chanos, a founding principal in the New York investment firm Kynikos Associates, has been equally critical of Macquarie.

Kynikos, founded in 1985, specializes in short-selling the stock of companies the firm believes are overvalued by the financial markets and likely to fall in price. Chanos distinguished himself as one of the most active critics of Enron prior to the company’s fall.

In a May 30 radio interview with Australian talk-show host Mark Colvin, Chanos charged that the “Macquarie model” was seriously flawed.

“The bank scours the world buying assets,” Chanos told the radio audience, “buying assets, everything from toll roads to bowling alleys and selling them into separate trusts that the bank controls. This generates triple fees for Macquarie Bank: one for the up-front purchase; a second for selling the assets into the trust; then ongoing management and performance fees from the funds.”

Chanos charged that the loser in the scheme was the investor.

“If you look at the financial accounts of the trusts,” Chanos explained to the Australian talk show, “you’ll see that in almost all the cases the companies are using Australian re-valuation accounting which is legal under [Generally Accepted Accounting Practices] in your country to write up the value of the asset annually and put that through operating income and into equity.”

Chanos argued that the practice only works in a financial environment in which cheap credit is readily available and valuations for infrastructure projects are generally rising.

“You need a credit environment that looks the other way, or you need a credit environment where the people lending are just lending on reputation or not numbers,” Chanos said.

Eventually, he contended, the self-dealing between Macquarie and the Macquarie-controlled funds into which the infrastructure assets are sold is likely to crash.

“All I would tell your listeners,” Chanos said in the radio interview, “is simply just go to the trusts, the financial statements, and simply extract out the asset re-valuation number, which is basically management’s guess as to how much, what the asset’s worth and just see what the cash flow looks like. In many cases, the cash flows are diminished or actually go negative. That’s the simple litmus test to the Macquarie model.”

Still, Chanos argued that despite the problem in the underlying cash flows, Macquarie makes hefty profits.

“Capital gains alone in the fiscal year 2007, just for flipping these types of assets into the trusts, accounted for half of the pre-tax income of Macquarie Bank,” Chanos asserted.

Macquarie Bank has hit back strongly against both critics.

According to newspaper reports in Australia, Macquarie Bank executive Warwick Smith complained to University of Sidney Vice Chancellor Gavin Brown, demanding that the university dissociate itself from Goldberg over his critical research.

In response, Brown issued a statement clarifying that Goldberg is not an employee of the University of Sydney, though he has been given the title of honorary associate by the Faculty of Architecture. In his statement, Brown claimed Goldberg “speaks as an individual and the university accepts no responsibility for his comments which it does not endorse.”

In the subsequent controversy that erupted in Australia, Goldberg was featured as a case study in “Silencing Dissent,” a book critical of the administration of Prime Minister John Howard, published in Australia by Clive Hamilton, the executive director of a prominent Australian think-tank, and his co-editor Sarah Maddison.

In the book, Hamilton and Maddison charged that the Howard government used strong-arm tactics to challenge the tax status of non-government organizations and ruin the reputations of academics who were critical of governmental policies, including the sale of highway infrastructure leasing rights to private investment concerns in Australia.

Macquarie used a similar personal attack to discredit Chanos following the interview on Australian radio.

In a May 31 statement posted on the Macquarie website, the investment group charged that Chanos, “a hedge fund short-seller of equities,” had an economic self-interest in advancing “incorrect claims” that could cause the stock price of Macquarie to fall.

When contacted for comment, Macquarie’s New York representative referred WND to the company’s online statement, in which Macquarie asserts that all assets acquired by funds controlled by Macquarie are valued directly from the market and subject to the approval of independent directors of the funds.

The published Macquarie response to Chanos also cited a May 25 Bloomberg report which quoted Chanos as saying Kynikos maintains a short position on Macquarie.

Short-selling is a Wall Street practice in which an investor borrows and sells stock the investor does not own, anticipating the stock will go down in value. The short-seller profits by buying shares at a lower price to replace the shares that originally were borrowed and sold at the higher price.

Short-sellers lose money if the price of the stock increases and the cost to purchase shares to replace those borrowed is greater than the price for which the borrowed shares were sold.

Macquarie Infrastructure Group is a separate subsidiary from Macquarie Bank.

The website of Macquarie Infrastructure Group bills the company as “one of the largest private developers of toll roads in the world.”

High gas prices causing biofuel demand and food price crisis

Posted on July 15, 2007 by Terri Hall

Clearly a global economy isn’t serving the best interest of the United States much less the world’s poor. Due to rising demand for gas and now food in China, it demonstrates how China is becoming the world’s superpower while the U.S. buries its head in the sand and continues to sell 2-3% of our national wealth to foreign investors every year. Our enemies have figured out how to win the West, bring your checkbook, buy up controlling interest, and squeeze consumers with the rising domination of the East. Here’s a sampling of the total failure of leadership in this country that’s bringing the world’s wealthiest Nation to her knees (with poverty and hunger).

Link to article #1 here. Link to article #2 here.

UN warns it cannot afford to feed the world

By Javier Blas and Jenny Wiggins in London

Financial Times

Published: July 15, 2007

Rising prices for food have led the United Nations programme fighting famine in Africa and other regions to warn that it can no longer afford to feed the 90m people it has helped for each of the past five years on its budget.The World Food Programme feeds people in countries including Chad, Uganda and Ethiopia, but reaches a fraction of the 850m people it estimates suffers from hunger. It spent about $600m buying food in 2006. So far, the WFP has not cut its reach because of high commodities prices, but now says it could be forced to do so unless donor countries provide extra funds.

Josette Sheeran, WFP executive director, said in an interview with the Financial Times: “In a world where our contributions are holding fairly steady, this [cost increase] means we are able to reach far less people.”

She said policymakers were becoming more concerned about the impact of biofuel demand on food prices and how the world would continue to feed its expanding population.

The warning could re-ignite the debate on food versus fuel amid concerns biofuel production will sustain food inflation and hit the world’s poorest people.

The WFP said its purchasing costs had risen “almost 50 per cent in the last five years”. The UN organisation said the price it pays for maize had risen up to 120 per cent in the past sixth months in some countries.

Biofuel demand is soaking up grain production as is rising consumption in emerging countries for animal feed.

“We face the tightest agriculture markets in decades and, in same cases, on record,” Ms Sheeran said. Global wheat stocks have fallen to the lowest level in 25 years, according to the US Department of Agriculture.

Ms Sheeran added: “We are no longer in a surplus world.”

_________________________________________

July 16, 2007

Ice-cream makers frozen out as corn price rises

Suzy Jagger and Carl Mortished

The Times, London

What’s the connection between ethanol, the biofuel produced from corn, and a cherry vanilla ice-cream?

Answer: the first is responsible for pushing up the price of the other.

This month, the price of milk in the United States surged to a near-record in part because of the increasing costs of feeding a dairy herd. The corn feed used to feed cattle has almost doubled in price in a year as demand has grown for the grain to produce ethanol.

Christina Seid, whose family have been making ice-cream at the Chinatown Ice Cream Factory for 28 years, said yesterday that she expected to have to raise her prices, along with all competitors in the short term. “We are holding out as long as we can, but prices will rise,” Ms Seid said.

Amy Green’s Ivanna Cone ice-cream emporium in Lincoln, Nebraska, has already raised its prices for a small cone to $3.50 before tax, up from $2.95 a few months ago. She also estimates that she is paying $150 more a week for the butterfat that she uses in her ice-cream.

The squeeze on ice-cream makers, chocolate manufacturers and pizza companies – all of whom use dairy produce as a raw material – is set to tighten as the price of a gallon of milk in the US – up 55 per cent in the past 12 months in some American states – is now the same as a gallon of petrol, with dairy prices accelerating faster than the cost of fuel.

Prices for dairy products have also risen because of increasing demand from China and the Middle East along with the drought in Australia, reduced subsidies in the European Union and the rocketing cost of corn.

SA Biz Journal: 281/1604 toll projects to cost $2.2 Billion & can still use "private partner"

Posted on July 13, 2007 by Terri Hall

In an article in today’s San Antonio Business Journal entitled Toll road projects set to get off the ground in San Antonio, the Alamo Regional Mobility Authority (ARMA or tolling authority) gets giddy over the prospect of raiding motorists’ wallets by tolling existing corridors already built and paid for with YOUR gas taxes. The most shocking detail is the 281 & 1604 project cost. It went from $1.3 billion in July 2005 to an astronomical $2.2 billion in July of 2007! What do they plan to do? Pave them with GOLD?! That’s $50 million a mile (for 48 mile project) or $5 million per lane mile (according to the Government Accountability Office, the national average per lane mile is $1.6 million). For further context, the original plan for 281 improvements as a non-toll freeway was $100 million in 2004, and now in 2007 as a tollway it’s up to $400 million for 8 miles!

Considering TxDOT has already been found guilty of defrauding the public and betraying the public trust by LYING about their figures, we obviously cannot trust what should be simple projects to add some lanes down the middle of two freeways which has now turned into a feeding frenzy at the expense of battered motorists already facing $3 a gallon at the pump! And this is BEFORE the NEW TOLL TAX kicks in! Someone’s gettin’ rich off this scheme and it ain’t the taxpayers!

Of course, the Biz Journal blocked public access to the article (only paid subscribers can access the article, yet an article on TxDOT losing another $72 million in gas taxes to the feds is there to scare the public into thinking tolls are the ONLY solution). I have the print copy…

RED FLAG #2 –

They must be planning to continue at least 1604 as a private toll deal using a CDA (Public Private Partnership or PPP) or some other loophole in SB 792 since ARMA Executive Director, Terry Brechtel, states: “private toll firms will still be allowed to participate in the toll projects…”

The purpose of the private toll moratorium was to STOP any private toll contracts from moving forward for the next two years, yet this veiled language seems to indicate they will anyway. Get out your legal pads, I feel a lawsuit coming.

Fix290 citizens group encounters TxDOT steamroll to put elevated toll road over Oak Hill

Posted on July 13, 2007 by Terri Hall

The citizens standing up to TxDOT on the elevated tollway planned over Oak Hill (near Austin) on Hwy 290 is remarkably similar to the battle brewing in the Leon Valley/Bandera Rd. area in Bexar County.

Watch some terrific news coverage about the citizens’ concerns about the impact an elevated tollway would have on their community here.

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