The need for a law to allow Texans to recall a governor

Posted on June 28, 2007 by Terri Hall

The Need For Gubernatorial Impeachment Legislation
posted on Thursday, June 28, 2007 @ Texas Monthly blog

The Need For Gubernatorial Impeachment Legislation In Texas. Why Gov. Rick “39-percent of the votes” Perry Should Teach Political Science 104: “How to Lie to Texas Voters.”

From the “git-go” Gov. Rick Perry has lied to Texas voters and has pushed the legislature to approve special interest bills and actions.

Never in the history of Texas politics has a smooth-talking governor “pulled the wool over the eyes” of taxpayers and voters the way Perry has. In the last election Perry was reelected by 39 percent of the votes cast for governor and won simply because Texas law doesn’t require a run-off.

Some of Perry’s sleight of hand:

Perry provided a sample state budget filled with zero’s to help guide legislators; it took 3 tries for the lege to get the budget approved by the Comptroller

He campaigned hard state-wide to eliminate “frivolous” medical liability lawsuits

Perry “turned the other cheek” when the home insurance industry doubled premiums overnight; months later he and the Tx Dept. of Insurance promised to return a piddly 10 percent back to customers — that never happened and the premiums remain doubled and the highest in the nation

He wanted to finance public education by charging taxes at Gentlemen Clubs — that didn’t catch on even with his party

Perry cut various vital social services including children’s health care and one year later returned some of those dollars, all the while crusading that he had championed and financed those needed programs and services

Perry stepped away from the limelight to let D.C. Congressman Tom “the Hammer” DeLay into the state capitol to brandish the sword for redistricting

Perry promised to provide relief to homeowners for 6 years of astronomical property taxes, crusaded for a 13-percent reduction after three years — after which property taxes rose again and canceled out the relief promised

The governor crusaded to deregulate higher education tuition after which UT and other institutions raised costs 3 different times

Perry pushed to deregulate electric companies after which many increased their rates to customers

Perry accepted special interest money and perks, e.g., trips to the Caribbean, which influenced his decision-making

Perry touts he created thousands of new jobs, but the truth remains that millions of Texans are without work

The governor used his Executive Authority to force sixth grade girls to receive vaccinations against cervical cancer even though doing so won’t necessarily prevent the disease — the serum manufacturer is Merck, a large contributor to Perry’s campaign.

All in all Gov. Perry has been pro his special interest campaign contributors and against Texans and their families. Seldom are the actions of the governor in the best interests of the Texas community at-large.

Currently Texas law does NOT permit voters to impeach the governor. The people must pressure the legislature to provide the legislative means to do so to ensure that the interests of the Texas community prevails against special interest unethical gubernatorial behavior and actions. The legislation is needed to protect Texans from scoundrels like Rick Perry.

Dallas toll agency grabs 121 toll road from Cintra!

Posted on June 28, 2007 by Terri Hall

Link to article here.

Another multi-billion dollar deal dies for Cintra. They’re not faring too well in Texas…let’s keep it that way!

Dallas agency wins toll road
By Pat Driscoll
Express-News
June 28, 2007

The Texas Transportation Commission voted 4-1 today to let a local agency develop the Texas 121 tollway in North Texas rather than give it to Cintra of Spain for 50 years

Chairman Ric Williamson said it was the board’s first split vote.

But board member Ted Hougton didn’t cast the dissenting vote because he was opposed to letting the North Texas Tollway Authority finance and operate Texas 121.

He’s not happy because the order as written excludes the Texas Department of Transportation from helping the Dallas-Fort Worth Regional Transportation Council negotiate a contract with NTTA.

“This is part of the state highway system and I don’t think we can abdicate our responsibility,” Houghton said. “We have a role in that negotiation.”

Williamson said TxDOT’s reputation has been dragged through the mud enough over the issue in the past couple of years. State officials can watch negotiations, he said, and steer locals away from illegal rabbit holes, but that’s it.

“There is absolutely no benefit to our inserting our staff in this process to be once again blamed,” he said. “If we are in the negotiations it will inevitably fail.”

Williamson and Houghton did agree on something, and that was grousing about having to go through another dog and pony show over who develops Texas 121. Williamson said this is the third time around, and a contract with Cintra has been sitting for months ready to be signed.

“Talk is cheap,” the chairman said.

SB 792 from the last legislative session opened the latest round by invalidating a year-old protocol in which NTTA agreed not to bid on the project. Now the agency has made a bid, and the region’s transportation council recently voted 27-10 to accept the offer.

On Tuesday, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst sent a letter to Williamson to make sure he got the message.

“Local control was the legislative directive embedded in SB 792, and I feel this is the proper way to proceed with current and future transportation projects,” the letter says.

NTTA proposed paying more than Cintra in up-front cash, to be used for other area projects. But the agency also takes on the risk of traffic being lower than expected, which could mean higher tolls on its other roads.

Now NTTA has 60 days to hammer out an agreement with the transportation council and 45 days after that to come up with the money. If officials can’t do that, then TxDOT can sign with Cintra.

Look for links below as reports come in.

• Cintra statement
• TxDOT statement
• State Sen. John Carona’s statement
• State Sen. Robert Nichols’ statement
• Toll Roads News assessment
• Reuters report
• Fort Worth Star Telegram report

Tollers at final 1604 hearing trample on Martin Luther King's legacy

Posted on June 27, 2007 by Terri Hall

NOT TOO LATE TO SUBMIT COMMENTS!

You know the highway lobby WHO IS PAID TO OPPOSE US is getting their pro-toll comments in, continue to flood these guys with all the evidence of the public uprising against the highest possible tolls using “market valuation” by sending your comments in to: Loop1604@hntb.com or by fax (210) 349-2101 by July 10!

Since HNTB also engineers many of these toll projects, ask for confirmation of your comments submitted to this biased contractor to ensure your feedback actually makes it into the official record.

Some major points to make since their environmental assessment claims there are NO significant environmental, economic, social, or health impacts to the 1604 toll project:

• There are MAJOR economic impacts to motorists who will have to pay the highest possible tolls through market-based tolling or be stuck in gridlock on the non-toll lanes. Initial TxDOT surveys show 29 cents a mile on 1604 and some toll rates are as high as $1.50 a mile in Austin, which means $2,000-3,000 a year in NEW toll taxes per commuter versus 1-3 cents a mile in gas taxes which is only $200 a year on average.
• TxDOT and the RMA are choosing the most expensive, most environmentally damaging, and most invasive option which is NOT in the public’s overall best interest DESPITE MASSIVE PUBLIC OPPOSITION asking them to do otherwise.

• Destroying our existing 4 lane freeway and rebuilding it into a 4 lane tollway with cement barriers and complex entrances and exits and with 4 lane freeway to the outside is a WASTE of taxpayer money compared to the less invasive, more affordable option of simply adding the two originally planned non-toll lanes down the existing median using gas taxes or bonds (TxDOT’s bonding capacity was just DOUBLED under SB 792).

• Making 1604 a toll corridor causes people to avoid the tollway and increases traffic on surrounding neighborhood streets and puts throughway users in competition with local street users clogging our neighborhood streets and making them less safe.

Highway lobby slithers in

The Krier/McCombs Texans for Safe Reliable Transportation group sent out their highway lobby minions once again to attend last night’s 1604 hearing. We know an email went out promoting it and asking their membership to stack the deck and come in casual (versus business) attire to say they were FOR tolls based on our conversations with some of them. Krier’s outfit had their own buttons (to counter ours) and we saw guys show up in Hawaiian shirts who were supposedly incognito go over and greet the SAMCo types slapping backs and laughing all the way to the microphone, trying to have their applause for the pro-toll crowd outweigh ours, etc. It was the biggest orchestrated circus yet and so low, even for Krier.

However, it couldn’t squelch the TRUTH that there remains OVERWHELMING public opposition from ORDINARY CITIZENS who are about to get fleeced to benefit these highway lobbyists. By a more than 3 to 1 margin, the testimony from the near packed house continued to demonstrate that TxDOT, the RMA and the politicians enabling them continue their toll plans at their own peril. The public WILL NOT tolerate this unnecessary tax grab!

Tempers flared as TxDOT’s insulting presentation spoke to citizens as if they were kindergarteners while they claimed there were NO environmental, social, or economic impacts to tolling 1604. Many couldn’t choke it down and gave stenographers their comments and left, others stepped outside until the dog and pony show was over and the public comments began.

The slick simulated “movie” showing the potential toll lanes and all their schematic drawings (that were not given to the public) all stated “subject to change.” We know what that means…it’s code for we’re changing this to maximize the number of people who take the toll lanes, we can change and minimize the exits from the toll lanes to keep our captive audience, and we can take away the number of free lanes just like they did in Austin. The State Auditor (read more here and here) and history shows TxDOT and the others pushing these detested toll plans LIE and say ANYTHING to push their toll agenda!

Tollers defile “I have a dream speech”

Case in point, Vic Boyer of Joe Krier’s San Antonio Mobility Coalition or SAMCo, invoked Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I have a dream” speech where SAMCo and the Toll Party all live in harmony on toll roads and mobility is had by all (except those stuck in gridlock on the free lanes, of course). Talk about low, invoking one of America’s cherished civil rights leaders in an effort to promote economic segregation by tolling economically disadvantaged families, many of whom are people of color, off our freeways? What an OUTRAGE! Will the Hispanic Chamber continue to support this exploitation and treading on the legacy of one of America’s greats? What about civil rights groups and those representing the economically disadvantaged?

As usual, they put the Greater Chamber & SAMCo people up first and waited to call me up to speak when only a few people were left.

Toll Party testimony

To say that there are NO economic, social, or environmental impacts to tolling 1604 is an insult and your failure to consider viable alternatives to tolling violates your fiduciary duty to the public who PAYS YOUR BILLS! We believe there are other more affordable ways to accelerate 1604 improvements than tolling. The original plan for 1604 was only to add two additional free lanes. Now the project calls for 4 additional TOLL lanes, not free lanes, which requires them to bulldoze our EXISTING freeway and rebuild it. With waste like that, no wonder we have no money for roads!

The toll plan, though being billed as speeding up the improvements, will actually be more costly, will take longer, be more invasive to build, less safe, more damaging to the environment, and increase the cost to motorists for using the highway from 1-3 cents on average per mile in gas tax to a minimum toll start rate of 29 cents per mile UP TO the tax grabbing sum of “whatever the market will bear” for a minimum net increase of over $2,500 per year per motorist for a 20 mile ONE WAY daily commute.

We put forward other options to solve congestion without tolls like using our gas taxes, bonds, tidal flow, dynamic lanes, and accelerated projects like in WA, CA, & Austin– taking a 10 month project and shortening it to 9 days and saving 25% of the construction cost, and yet there’s no consideration of such alternatives in your assessment! Toll roads don’t solve congestion; they manipulate it for profit. Toll roads DON’T work if the lanes next to it are congestion free.

Houston has 83 miles of toll roads, have toll roads solved Houston’s congestion problems? No, in fact, they’re pushing miles of new toll roads and their politicians voted to DOUBLE their toll rates! From now on, you aren’t going to get freeway improvements or congestion relief unless you have an extra $2,000-4,000 a year for tolls. You can’t possibly claim there is NO significant economic impact from this toll project! We are not gullible ignoramouses, rather we’re well-informed citizens who know a rip off when we see one. An anti-incumbent tax revolt is in order!

This new tax on driving will have a devastating economic effect on businesses and consumers alike reaping both direct and indirect cost increases (higher cost of goods), particularly retail businesses along the corridor and businesses with fleets that use our highways multiple times per day for deliveries not to mention home values in the affected corridor. It is a known fact that people change their behavior to avoid toll roads. This increases traffic on surrounding neighborhood streets and puts throughway users in competition with local street users clogging our neighborhood streets and making them less safe. Tolls on 1604 are a totally unnecessary new tax with damaging economic, social, and health impacts.

TxDOT and MPO documents show that 1604 is NOT a self-sustaining toll road. They already know not enough people can pay the toll to pay for the project entirely, so they have to use over $300 million in YOUR gas taxes to build this project yet you wont’ be able to drive on it without paying tolls, too. So it’s a massive TRIPLE TAX scheme to charge us THREE times to drive on a highway already built and paid for. We’ve already paid for what we on drive today and our gas taxes will help build the tollway, but you’ll have to pay a THIRD tax to use it! TxDOT is saying the options to the public are toll it or NO IMPROVEMENTS. They are not considering the less invasive, more affordable, and less damaging options.

Go to our table outside, get this flyer showing you what happens when they toll existing corridors like they did in CA where these folks now pay over $9 to drive 10 miles or get stuck in horrific gridlock! Sign our petition, get informed and get involved! Donate today to help fund the CITIZENS’ lawsuit that will put a stop to this highway robbery!

Express News coverage of 1604 hearing: The public's "hot" over tolls!

Posted on June 27, 2007 by Terri Hall

Link to article here.

Public sounds off on Loop 1604 tolls
Patrick Driscoll
Express-News
06/27/2007

Hundreds of people, many buzzing with anger, packed a hearing Tuesday to listen to the state’s latest pitch on why toll lanes should be added to Loop 1604.

The Texas Department of Transportation said rebuilding North Loop 1604 to add four to six toll lanes from Texas 151 to Interstate 10 near Randolph AFB would not significantly hurt people or nature.

But many of the nearly 400 people at the hearing, at the Alzafar Shrine Temple on the loop, didn’t buy that.

Michael Wikman, one of almost 50 speakers, stepped to a microphone and said he’s the maddest of the bunch.

“I am hot,” he said. “I’m fed up with you people. I’m fed up with this government telling me how I’m going to live, how my money’s going to be spent.”

Wikman and other critics, including environmentalists, said the $1.8 billion, 36-mile tollway would have big impacts on wallets and water quality.

Families could pay hundreds or thousands of dollars a year to avoid increasingly congested non-toll lanes, and another 247 acres of recharge areas of the Edwards Aquifer would be paved over.

“The cost of a toll road is always, always more, and history shows it does not eliminate congestion,” Mel Borel said.

Toll advocates say planned growth is already strangling North Side roadways and causing more traffic accidents, and state and federal lawmakers have refused to raise gas taxes.

“Please act now,” Richard Sabinson pleaded. “We simply cannot wait. The traffic is here and it is only going to get worse.”

Some critics demanded a vote, and one speaker sought to prove a point by asking for a show of hands. A dozen or more people supported tolls; at least three-fourths of the crowd rejected the idea.

With traffic expected to double on Loop 1604 by 2035, the toll lanes would give motorists a choice of paying their way out of congestion or suffering longer commutes. Past studies suggest rates starting at 14 to 16 cents a mile on lanes and 50 cents on ramps.

TxDOT will ask the Federal Highway Administration to sign off on its environmental assessment, which shows no significant impacts, to avoid a more detailed study that could take another two to three years. The state hopes to get clearance this summer and start construction next year.

Williamson's spin on SB 792: "The moratorium doesn't affect TTC-35"

Posted on June 27, 2007 by Terri Hall

Link to article here.

Get the impression TxDOT is just begging for a lawsuit or for the Legislature to stop them from continuing work on the Trans Texas Corridor TTC-35? The legislative intent was clear…it was to halt the TTC pending further study. The people of Texas are in an ALL OUT WAR against this Governor and his minions at TxDOT who are really a front for Cintra.

Toll boss clarifies moratorium
By Pat Driscoll
Express-News
June 27, 2007
A construction contract for a Trans-Texas Corridor toll road from Austin to Dallas could be ready within two years, and a new moratorium law wouldn’t stop it, state officials said today.

SB 792 bans leasing of many new toll projects for two years, the state’s preferred way to finance its border-to-border TTC network, but the restriction does not apply to TCC plans along Interstate 35, said Texas Transportation Commission Chairman Ric Williamson.

Ric Williamson

That’s because a TTC-35 development contract signed in 2005 covers upcoming construction contracts, he said. And that means those projects can be built using otherwise prohibited concession agreements, which raise upfront cash in return for letting companies collect tolls for up to 50 years.

“The moratorium doesn’t affect TTC-35,” Williamson said. “I don’t know what else to say.”

State Rep. Lois Kolkhorst, R-Brenham, got an assurance read into the House record for SB 792 last month that says no construction of TTC-35 projects, except for Loop 9 around Dallas-Fort Worth, would start over the next two years.

Gov. Rick Perry’s office told her that work couldn’t start within two years anyway because environmental studies won’t be finished.

But today, in a conference call Williamson and other officials held with reporters, Texas Department of Transportation Assistant Director Amadeo Saenz said otherwise.

A big-picture environmental study for TTC-35 could get federal clearance this summer and the first second-phase studies to determine specific alignments could be finished in a year or year and a half, Saenz said.

TxDOT announced two weeks ago that they’re ready to pursue 87 toll projects statewide, including three four-lane TTC-35 tollways — one from I-35 south of San Antonio to I-10 near Seguin, a segment from Austin to Dallas and another from Dallas to Oklahoma.

Williamson said today that a construction contract could be ready within two years for the toll-road from Austin to Dallas.

But that doesn’t mean the state will sign the contract right away, he said, not without giving lawmakers a chance to weigh in at the 2009 legislative session, when TxDOT itself and the ability to enter into concessions come up for sunset reviews.

“We’ll be very judicious about that kind of stuff,” he said.

Businessweek: Peak oil looming, means catastrophe for U.S. economy

Posted on June 25, 2007 by Terri Hall

JUNE 25, 2007

IDEAS — OUTSIDE SHOT
By Eugene Linden
Businessweek
From Peak Oil To Dark Age?
Oil output has stalled, and it’s not clear the capacity exists to raise production

With global oil production virtually stalled in recent years, controversial predictions that the world is fast approaching maximum petroleum output are looking a bit less controversial. At first blush, those concerned about global warming should be delighted. After all, what better way to prod the move toward carbon-free, climate-friendly alternative energy?

But climate change activists have nothing to cheer about. The U.S. is completely unprepared for peak oil, as it’s called, and the wrenching adjustments it would entail could easily accelerate global warming as nations turn to coal (see BusinessWeek.com, 4/19/07, “Rx for Earth: Sooner Not Later”). Moreover, regardless of the implications for climate change, peak oil represents a mortal threat to the U.S. economy.

Peak oil refers to the point at which world oil production plateaus before beginning to decline as depletion of the world’s remaining reserves offsets ever-increased drilling. Some experts argue that we’re already there, and that we won’t exceed by much the daily production high of 84.5 million barrels first reached in 2005. If so, global production will bump along near these levels for years before beginning an inexorable decline.

What would that mean? Alternatives are still a decade away from meeting incremental demand for oil. With nothing to fill the gap, global economic growth would slow, stop, and then reverse; international tensions would soar as nations seek access to diminishing supplies, enriching autocratic rulers in unstable oil states; and, unless other sources of energy could be ramped up with extreme haste, the world could plunge into a new Dark Age. Even as faltering economies burned less oil, carbon loading of the atmosphere might accelerate as countries turn to vastly dirtier coal.

GIVEN SUCH UNPLEASANT possibilities, you’d think peak oil would be a national obsession. But policymakers can hide behind the possibility that vast troves will be available from unconventional sources, or that secretive oil-exporting nations really have the huge reserves they claim. Yet even if those who say that the peak has arrived are wrong, enough disturbing omens—for example, declining production in most of the world’s great oil fields and no new superfields to take up the slack—exist for the issue to merit an intense international focus.

The reality is that it will be here much sooner for the U.S.—in the form of peak oil exports. Since we import nearly two-thirds of the oil we consume, global oil available for export should be our bigger concern. Fast-growing domestic consumption in oil-exporting nations and increasing appetites by big importers such as China portend tighter supplies available to the U.S., unless world production rises rapidly. But output has stalled. Call it de facto peak oil or peak oil lite. It means the U.S. is entering an age when it will have to scramble to maintain existing import levels.

We will know soon enough whether the capacity to raise production really exists. If not, basic math and the clock tell the story. All alternatives—geothermal, solar, wind, etc.—produce only 3% of the energy supplied by oil. If oil demand rises by 2% while output remains flat, generation of alternative energy would have to expand 60% a year. That’s more than twice the rate of wind power, the fastest-growing alternative energy. And all this incremental energy would somehow have to be delivered to transportation (which consumes most of the oil produced each year) just to stay even with the growth in demand.

Nuclear and hydropower together produce 10 times the power of wind, geothermal, and solar power. But even if nations ignore environmental concerns, it takes years to build nuclear plants or even identify suitable undammed rivers.

There are many things we in the U.S. can do (and should have been doing) other than the present policy of crossing our fingers. If an oil tax makes sense from a climate change perspective, it seems doubly worthy if it extends supplies. Boosting efficiency and scaling up alternatives must also be a priority. And, recognizing that nations will turn to cheap coal (recently, 80% of growth in coal use has come from China), more work is needed to defang this fuel, which produces more carbon dioxide per ton than any other energy source.

Even if the peakists are wrong, we would still be better off taking these actions. And if they’re right, major efforts right now may be the only way to avert a new Dark Age in an overheated world.

Views expressed in Outside Shot are solely those of contributors.

Feature: Giuliani's Trans Texas Corridor ties explored

Posted on June 19, 2007 by Terri Hall

An article in this month’s issue of Manufacturing News tells of Giuliani’s ties to Cintra and Macquarie (partners and two of the largest, most expensive toll companies in the world), and, hence, his connection to the Trans Texas Corridor. We’ve been shouting this from the rooftops and now it’s starting to get traction.

Link to view the PDF of the front page story here.

Seven in 10 Americans say economy getting worse, site high gas prices

Posted on June 19, 2007 by Terri Hall

Link to article here.

We’ve been connecting these dots since the gas price hike after Katrina. We’ve also noted the negative savings rate gripping our Nation for over a year (not seen since the Great Depression and even then the negative savings rate didn’t last this long). Lastly, we’ve also noted the growing backlash to our country’s failed trade & immigration policies that have led to depressed American wages and loss of quality jobs. TxDOT’s own toll viability studies show many of these toll projects will go belly up (will no longer be financially viable since there will not be enough people with the discretionary income high enough to pay the tolls) if gas is above $3 a gallon, and yet here we are at $3 a gallon and on they march in defiance of the public interest and in violation of their fiduciary duty.

GALLUP: 7 in 10 Americans Say Economy Is ‘Getting Worse’

By E&P Staff

Published: June 19, 2007 11:40 AM ET

NEW YORK A new Gallup Poll will only reinforce those who claim that while the rich get richer most Americans don’t feel they are sharing in the growth in our economy. The stock market may be climbing and the unemployment remains relatively low, but 7 in 10 Americans believe the economy is getting worse — the most negative reading in nearly six years.

Only one in three Americans rate the economy today as either excellent or good, while the percentage saying the economy is getting better fell from 28% to 23% in one month.

Gallup adds: “For the first time this year, a majority of Americans are negative about the employment market, saying it is a bad time to find a quality job.”

The 70% negative rating is up 10 points since April. Also, just in the past month, there has been a significant five-point drop, from 28% to 23%, in the percentage saying conditions are getting better.

“When asked about the most pressing financial problems their family faces today, Americans mention healthcare costs, lack of money or low wages, and oil and gas prices,” Gallup reports. “Healthcare costs are mentioned by 16% of Americans while 13% say low wages and 11% say oil and gas prices. These percentages are virtually unchanged from last month.”

The survey of 1,007 adults was taken June 11 to 14.

Public toll entity knocks out Cintra on 121 deal in Dallas!

Posted on June 19, 2007 by Terri Hall

Link to article here.

I wouldn’t exactly get giddy over this, but it’s a MAJOR step in the right direction. Senator Florence Shapiro fought to give public tolling entities (versus private, foreign companies like Cintra) the first dibs on toll projects, but the problem is, now they’re using up front concession fees (as was added last minute without public debate to the Governor’s private toll moratorium compromise bill, SB 792, allowing public agencies to use this sort of market based tolling on PUBLIC projects, just like the private companies would) which translates into the HIGHEST POSSIBLE TOLLS.

Market based tolls mean the poor chaps using the toll road will be funding the rest of the region’s roads since now the users will be paying tolls high enough to cover the concession fees (a sum of money determined by a “third party” appraiser who decides how much the road is worth on Wall Street and how much money they can get away with charging) and not just the actual cost of building the road and retiring the debt. The concession fees, the money over and above the cost of building the road, will then go to fund the rest of the region’s road projects at the expense of the users of a single highway while everyone also continues to pay the gas tax for roads!

What NO ONE is reporting or talking about is the fact that 16 miles of this 26 miles project is already BUILT AND PAID FOR with GAS TAXES and DOESN’T NEED TO BE TOLLED! This is why they’re calling 121 the “crown jewel” of toll projects. It’s so lucrative because all but 10 miles is PAID FOR. They’re going to reap about $100 billion in new toll taxes over the next 40-50 years simply to build one 10 mile stretch of road!

NTTA gets OK for 121 toll project
State board must still approve deal

11:01 AM CDT on Tuesday, June 19, 2007

By MICHAEL A. LINDENBERGER and JAKE BATSELL / The Dallas Morning News

The North Texas Tollway Authority won the strong support Monday of local officials charged with deciding who will build the lucrative but controversial State Highway 121 project.

The Regional Transportation Council voted 27-10 to recommend that the state reverse course and award the contract to the tollway authority – and not to the Spanish construction firm Cintra.

The decision marks a reversal from last winter when the Texas Department of Transportation had tentatively awarded the contract to Cintra, which had beat two other private bidders with a promise to pay the state government nearly $3 billion for the right to collect tolls on the 26-mile road for the next 50 years.

“It’s probably been the toughest decision that I’ve had to make in the 10 years I have been on this committee,” Tarrant County Judge Glen Whitley said just before casting his vote for NTTA.

Mr. Whitley said the authority’s bid promised even more up-front money to the state than Cintra.

“If we go with Cintra, we do leave money on the table,” he said. “We leave money on the table up front, we leave it on the table in the payments over the 50 years. … So, sure it is a risk, but this the crown jewel of toll projects in the state, and maybe even in the country.”

The Texas Transportation Commission is expected to render a final decision on the project at its June 28 meeting in Austin.

Over the last two weeks, Cintra had tried again and again to underscore the risks it said were inherent in the NTTA bid. The authority offered more money up front, Cintra said, but it did so at a risk of increased toll rates in the future if traffic volume forecasts are not met.

Many of those casting the 10 votes in favor of Cintra seized on those arguments, and on analyses by the Texas Department of Transportation and global accounting firm Price Waterhouse Coopers that reached similar conclusions.

“We cannot gamble on this,” Denton County Commissioner Cynthia White said. “We have to go with what is a for-sure deal. Cintra comes out ahead against NTTA, and that is the cold hard facts. Theirs is the only proposal that guarantees a [financial] return to the region at the end of the contract.”

NTTA chairman Paul Wageman had countered earlier in the day, however, that council members should go with the bid by the entity they know best, and with the project that paid the biggest amount of money up front.

“In the end, I think it was that our proposal was a superior financial deal, and because of our track record in this region,” a smiling Mr. Wageman said after the vote.

Jose Lopez, the president of Cintra’s North American operations, said the bidding process was fair. But he said his company’s proposal was clearly better.

“We will just have to wait and see what the TxDOT commissioners have to say, since they are the ones that have the final say,” Mr. Lopez said. “We respect the decision by the RTC, but we still are certain that our proposal was better, way better, for the region.”

The Texas Transportation Commission’s five members, all appointed by Gov. Rick Perry, are not bound by Monday’s vote.

That worries state Sen. Florence Shapiro, R-Plano, who attended Monday’s vote.

Ms. Shapiro noted that the two Transportation Department’s representatives on the Regional Transportation Council voted in favor of Cintra’s bid. Last week, TxDOT’s chief financial officer said his department would recommend Cintra for the contract – if commission members asked for an opinion.

“That’s probably pretty indicative of what they’re going to do on the 28th,” Ms. Shapiro said. “I am very concerned about it and intend to be there to listen and to watch and to see how it’s handled.

“The commitment that … [Texas Transportation Commission members] made – and I heard it with my own ears – was that whatever the region decided was what they would move forward with. This was overwhelming, 27-10, and I think that is a very strong message to take to TxDOT.”

Bill Hale, one of two TxDOT employees on the council, said he expects Texas Transportation Commission Chairman Ric Williamson to give great weight to Monday’s vote.

“That’s what he has said in the past they intend to do,” said Mr. Hale, the top engineer on TxDOT’s Dallas-area staff.

Mr. Hale, who voted in favor of awarding the contract to Cintra, said he will now support NTTA’s involvement in the project.

Ms. Shapiro’s concern reflects the mood of many state lawmakers.

The transportation commission gave Cintra preliminary approval for the Highway 121 contract in February. Immediately, lawmakers reacted angrily to the prospect of signing a lease with a foreign company to operate toll roads that will span generations. And they quickly pressured the RTC to invite the NTTA to submit a bid, paving the way for a rival to Cintra.

“It is exactly what I had hoped would happen,” Ms. Shapiro said. “We gave them the opportunity today, but they had to perform and they had to produce. And they did.”

Fort Worth City Council member Wendy Davis said that if the contract ends up with NTTA, North Texas may lose out on private investment in the future.

“What we are going to do today is not just going to impact our decision on Highway 121, but I can assure you that it will impact our ability to attract private businesses in the future,” she said. “If I was Cintra, I would learn a valuable lesson. And that lesson is that no matter how many steps are put in place to make sure the process is fair, the deck is going to be dealt in such a way that favors” a public entity such as NTTA.

Still, Richardson City Council member John Murphy, who voted for NTTA, encouraged his colleagues to feel good about the vote, no matter which side they favored.

“This is about the future and the future has changed for us,” Mr. Murphy said. “Not long ago we were at a point where we were saying, ‘Oh my gosh, where are we going to get the money to build roads?’ Now, we’re saying instead, ‘Show us the money.’ “

Let the TTC land grab begin…Seguin residents brace for eminent domain abuse to benefit Cintra

Posted on June 17, 2007 by Terri Hall

Link to article here.

Highway 130 begins push for property

By Michael Cary
The Gazette-Enterprise

Published June 17, 2007

SEGUIN — The property acquisition process for the fifth and sixth segments of the State Highway 130 toll road is getting under way.

Seguin, Fentress, Luling and Lockhart area landowners, businesses and residents who live or work in the pathway are now being notified.

Frank P. Holzmann, the SH 130 project manager for the Texas Department of Transportation, Dennis L. Sedlachek, vice president for right of way for the SH 130 Concession Co., and Jessica Schenk of Tate/Austin public relations were in Seguin on Friday to announce the process that will eventually clear the way for construction of the final two phases of the roadway.

SH 130 Segments 5 and 6 will link IH-10 to the highway that will connect a point north of Lockhart to Georgetown. The final two segments will be about 40 miles long, and will connect to IH-10 east of Seguin, in the vicinity of the Department of Public Safety’s weigh station.

A partnership of the Zachry American Infrastructure and Cintra companies will be responsible for design, construction and operation of the toll road, which is expected to offer a low-traffic connection from the Seguin area to the northern central Texas sector, providing relief from traffic on a congested IH-35. The two companies established the SH 130 Concession Co. to design, build and operate the toll road in Travis, Caldwell and Guadalupe counties.

TxDOT will oversee all right of way acquisition and relocation procedures, and the state will be the record titleholder to all right of way acquired for segments 5 and 6 of SH 130.

“We’ve got agreements signed to begin the right of way acquisition process,” Holzmann said.

O.R. Colan Associates contracted to aid in acquiring all of the necessary property rights for the project in the name of the state.

Schenk said the firm has opened an office in Lockhart and communicated with property owners who will be affected by the toll road’s pathway. Out of 309 property owners who were notified by mail about the acquisition phase, 47 parcels are in the Luling area, and 29 parcels have been identified in the Guadalupe County/Seguin area.

Sedlachek said SH 130’s fourth segment should be complete by the end of the year.

Segments 5 and 6 will begin construction in 2009, and should be complete by summer or fall of 2012.

“My job is to see that property owners are treated fairly and equitably, and treated in a professional manner,” Sedlachek, who serves on the city of Pflugerville’s planning and zoning commission, explained.

“We are going to do our very best to keep the communication open. Every property owner will be treated individually to make the transition as comfortable as possible,” Schenk said.

O.R. Colan Associates is sending a right-of-way acquisition organizer kit to property owners that includes an introductory letter, an informational brochure, a “State Purchase of Right of Way” booklet, a “Relocation Assistance” booklet and a notice that they will soon be contacted personally by a representative who will discuss the acquisition and relocation processes and address any concerns a property owner or tenant may have.

Landowners and tenants then will be contacted by surveyors, appraisers, relocation agents and environmental experts.

Sedlachek said the SH 130 route was chosen to affect property owners as little as possible.

“We’ve received some feedback. Some say hurry up so we can move on, and others say we’ve been here for years and we don’t want to be affected. We try to speed up the process for the willing, and go into eminent domain proceedings if they do not want to talk to us,” Sedlachek said.

He said highly trained and certified state property appraisers will determine the fair market value for any property that is acquired for the toll road project.

The total length of SH 130 is 91 miles. Segment 5 begins north of Mustang Ridge and will drop 12 miles down to F.M. 1185 in Lockhart.

Segment 6 connects from F.M. 1185 to IH-10, a distance of about 28 miles. It will provide direct connections to State Highway 45, which is under construction and will be completed by 2010, and to U.S. 183 north of Lockhart.

The new roadway will not affect any existing roads. Current project cost is $1.35 billion, which Zachry/Cintra will bear and recover their costs through toll collections.

Allen A. Armstrong is the contact person at O.R. Colan Associates for affected property owners who want more information about the acquisition proceeding. His office is located at 1001 W. San Antonio St. in Lockhart, and the telephone number is 1-866-933-4672.

The general public can find information about the toll road by visiting www.mysh130.com.