06.04.07

It’s A Moratorium On Nothing

Posted in 80th Legislature, Around The State, Privatization, Road Issues at 9:30 am by wcnews

Who’s to blame? Is it us for trusting legislators or the legislators for trusting Perry. Ultimately it’s the legislature for not getting something done that reflects the will of the people. It appears that the legislature got what it wanted, a free hand to build roads in the major metropolitan areas and everyone else be damned.

There was tremendous financial pressure brought to bear on all legislators this session over tolls for corporate profit and the selling off of our transportation infrastructure. It was evident in how fast Sen. Carona changed his tune – first being strongly opposed then taking a more measured tone- after hearing overwhelming public and expert testimony on what a bad idea corporate toll roads are. It seemed that hearing would have steeled his resolve but instead the exact opposite happened. We’ve found out that not only are corporate toll roads a bad idea but they’re a bad investment and rip-off for taxpayers too. With all this and a veto proof majority it only makes sense that the legislature would give in to the governor’s demands.

It’s hard to fathom any sane/rational reason why this occurred. In the end it was a deal by a bunch of people who, for whatever reason, don’t see the issues the taxpayers of this state have with toll roads. They believe that their selling off of our infrastructure, for short term gain, roads now, will be hailed as the public policy coup by generations to come. They believe they will be long remembered for their farsighted thinking when exactly the opposite will be the case.

Not only did Perry not sign the supposed “moratorium” his office is now rubbing it in legislators faces that this is a moratorium on nothing, and certainly not the TTC:

Now that legislators have gone home and trumpeted how they passed a bill to freeze private financing of toll roads, the governor’s office has some bubble-busting news.

There isn’t much of a moratorium in Senate Bill 792.

“Of any kind, that we can tell,” said Robert Black, spokesman for Gov. Rick Perry. “Unless there was something screwy that happened.”

[...]

Worried that the construction contracts might slip through the moratorium on new concessions, Rep. Lois Kolkhorst, R-Brenham, added an amendment to plug the potential loophole. But Perry balked, threatening to veto the bill.

The House-Senate compromise committee agreed to take the amendment out.

After talking to lawyers and Perry’s office, Kolkhorst said she believes in her heart that there is a moratorium on the corridor contracts, according to reports. If TxDOT wants to play with words, she said, the matter could be settled in court.

“It’s a strong bill with or without the amendment,” she said.

Black said Kolkhorst was told that work couldn’t start on corridor projects within two years anyway because environmental studies won’t be finished.

But Kolkhorst may not have known that SB 792 would still allow construction contracts to be signed, though work wouldn’t begin until after the studies are completed, he said.

“She kind of got her hat handed to her,” Black said.

Ben Wear has more on the lack of will the legislature had for this fight and how Ric Williamson has got his “saunter” back:

The obvious question, given all the public pressure and the periodic displays of legislative umbrage this session at a Texas Department of Transportation “run amok”: How can this be? Everyone said they wanted to vote for a moratorium, but we didn’t really get one?

It’s all about commitment. In politics, all other things being equal, the side that wants it the most and is willing to do whatever it takes is going to win most of the time. In this case, that side was Perry and the Department of Transportation.

Legislators were conflicted. They wanted to please constituents, particularly rural ones, who don’t want a bunch of new tollways “owned” by foreign companies cutting through farms. They were nervous about 50-year toll road leases that might outlive their children, and about corporations toting away profits that might otherwise go to building other roads.

But lawmakers also wanted urban highways, as many as possible and as soon as possible, and the Houston and Dallas delegations in particular wanted to build and run most tollways in their areas. And legislators also didn’t intend to raise the gas tax, no matter how much the fiscal logic of the situation tells them they should. Those are, taken together, competing imperatives.

[...]

The Wednesday before lawmakers adjourned for good May 28, Williamson hosted his monthly briefing with reporters at Transportation Department World Headquarters, across 11th Street from the Capitol. By then it was looking like SB 792, which emerged as the toll road bill of choice after several pretenders had skidded into the ditch, would pass and would be acceptable to Perry.

Williamson, spotted several weeks earlier huddling with confederates at the Capitol after the Legislature passed a much tougher toll road bill, had looked grim. (Perry vetoed that earlier bill.) This day, though, Williamson sauntered into the room seeming pretty pleased with life. As he swung into his chair, he tossed some party favors onto the table, royal-blue plastic wristbands with white writing on them. The words succinctly captured why SB 792 turned out the way it did.

The Churchillian message: “Never ever give up.”

The worst part is, is that the governor’s office is even robbing legislators of the ability to go back to their districts and say they did something to stop toll roads.

This all reminds me of a question EOW posed a few weeks back, when do those opposed to corporate tolls in the Lege figure out that they’ve given all the power back to the governor on this issue? Well if they didn’t know it by now they damn sure know it now. Check this post out as well, Deal Or…No Deal, Does It Matter?, it pretty much sums up what happened.

Many of us saw this coming, some didn’t want to believe this, but now that we all know what’s happened, despite the “legislative intent” we now have to get to work electing people that will never give up.

Permalink