Bar none, the scariest sight in recent memory. Kerry Stemler and David Nicklies are the designated stewards of your transportation future, Kentuckiana. Are you feeling sick yet?
Coming two days after two governors and a mayor issued a largely meaningless press release, the order of the day was keeping the morale of Tolling Authority shock troops at a high level of self-congratulatoriness. Toward this end, Chairman Buddeke reminded the members that they are united as a team of unique ambassadors, selflessly undertaking sacrifice for the public good ... and we must be reminded of it at every opportunity.
No less than four times, executive director Steve Schultz (above, left) invoked the celestial intervention of Tuesday's "direct guidance from our leaders," leading me to question whether I was seated at Indiana University Southeast or Pyongyang Polytechnic.
Sounding more than ever exactly like his hero, George W. Bush, Kerry Stemler insisted to reporters that tolls are off the table for Spaghetti Junction, the Clark Memorial Bridge and the Sherman Minton, although he didn't mention whether future diversion coping measures might include the tolling of a few hundred yards of asphalt on either side of these key choke points.
Make no mistake about it: Tolls remain an integral part of the project. The new talking point to emerge today is that thanks to Tuesday's providential "guidance" from our dear celestial leaders, the Tolling Authority now can begin seeing to it that those tolls, which they denied considering for so very long, can be kept as low as possible -- just another example of the benevolence of St. Daniels, who's making all these asphaltgasms possible.
On the placard above, the Tolling Authority's freshly minted Job One is indicated right at the top: Global Developers, Global Contractors and Investors/Lenders. Political propaganda points are to be earned when St. Daniels informs voters that we are building (unnecessary; whatever) bridges with someone else's (read: China's) money, not our own.
Naturally, toll revenues will then flow outward and elsewhere for the remainder of the lifetimes of our grandchildren, but what the hey -- One Southern Indiana has its lifeline, and we have our 1950's transportation "solution" for 2050 realities.
Thirty solid minutes of these quasi-erotic buzzwords, like outsourcing, innovation, privatization, delivery models, design engineering, creativity and market options, produced a bizarre masturbatory fury -- although, like the good Puritans we'd expect St. Daniels' disciples to be, no one was much interested in prolonging the good feelings; rather, it was stressed that the element of time is crucial, and construction must begin in August 2012.
Just in time for the Republican convention in Tampa.
Bar none, the scariest sight in recent memory. Kerry Stemler and David Nicklies are the designated stewards of your transportation future, Kentuckiana. Are you feeling sick yet?
Coming two days after two governors and a mayor issued a largely meaningless press release, the order of the day was keeping the morale of Tolling Authority shock troops at a high level of self-congratulatoriness. Toward this end, Chairman Buddeke reminded the members that they are united as a team of unique ambassadors, selflessly undertaking sacrifice for the public good ... and we must be reminded of it at every opportunity.
5 comments:
I'd suggest keeping eyes peeled for foreign campaign contributions, but the "real American" wing of the Supreme Court has seen to it that we can't do that.
May I suggest that now is the time to raise objections to the next step in the financing plan required for a $4.3 billion dollar paving Godsend?
Sure, fight the tolls. Fight the unnecessary 2nd Kennedy bridge. Fight the diversion of resources from 21st Century solutions.
But what's sliding under the radar is the proposal to institute a massive multi-county tax increment financing district. Our international investors know that $1 tolls (or even $3 tolls) won't pay them back.
It is intended that all increases in property value from a chosen date will be taxed and diverted to paying off the bonds on the bridge project.
That means that no city or county will have any means to finance growth, and much less incentive to promote it as a revenue stream, because all the revenues will be going to pay off the bonds.
1si and their ilk consider the bridges project as THE economic development tool for the next 30 years.
A smart city would let them pick a date certain for their TIF and then lay a new TIF on top of it to take precedence. But I'm sure their lawyers and bond counsel have thought of that. Hell, they'll probably insist on a guarantee pledging the full faith and credit of every city, town, and county in the region to back the bonds...in exchange for .1% lower interest rates.
Seriously, tolls are just the visible "toll" on our economy. This project will wreck things in ways we haven't begun to imagine.
Agreed, Bookseller, and you're not the only one to have raised the issue.
As I mentioned elsewhere:
*Outside private firm brought in to build and manage bridges and tolls (lease agreements tend to run 50 - 90 years, tolls the whole time, even though they tend to pay off their debt and hit major profitability much sooner - it's not like we have transportation options so they'd be running a monopoly)
*May not hire any local workers
*Portion of public funding provided by TIF, meaning any development around bridges provides no boost to local property tax levies or ability to (re)develop on our own
The toll issue(elimination), from my perspective, was as much a tool as a goal. There are lot more people now aware of the faults of this project because of the issue of tolls. I agree with everyone else, now is not the time to stop educating and protesting.
It all goes back to the main point: This "solution" isn't actually a transportation solution, regardless of how they intend to pay for it. As I mentioned to Mark yesterday, I have no interest in making long-term stupid faster and cheaper in the near-term.
Along those lines, I'll reiterate that No Tolls folks need to get their language in order in such a way that it educates about better alternatives.
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