May 23, 2012

Headlines
Where is the water?
Mica claiming progress in privatizing airport screeners
IN: As Indiana Toll Road funds wind down, state looks to more transportation P3s
CO: Bill Koch’s 5000 acre Bear Ranch may see more drive-by visitors
TX: Are you paying for toll roads already paid off?
PA: Are critics justified in accusing Philadelphia schools of privatization?
MI: CMU event honors former Gov. Engler for boosting charter schools
MI: Allen Park Council votes to outsource police and fire

Where is the water?
Bottling companies come into communities and drain their water sources and take the water elsewhere. Citizens fearing a collapse of local water systems like the Michigan Citizens for Water Conservation are fighting to oust bottlers like Nestlé from their communities. “It has been seven years since the residents of Mecosta County, Michigan were made aware of Nestlé’s plans to pump over 210 million gallons of spring water per year from a private hunting preserve, divert it through a 12 mile pipeline that crosses streams and wetlands to its plant, bottle it, and then truck it outside the Muskegon River Watershed and Great Lakes Basin under the brand name Ice Mountain. As Nestlé moved into Michigan to privatize our water for its own profit, it announced there would be no adverse resource impact to the natural resources,” Terrill Sweir said in a public testimony against Nestle’s bottling operations in Mecosta County the United States Congress’s Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. Sweir went on to claim that Nestle’s bottling operations have led to severe lake and stream drainage of waters that used to provide recreational opportunities for locals and habitats for native wildlife. Huffington Post

Mica claiming progress in privatizing airport screeners

In the decade since U.S. Rep. John Mica helped create the Transportation Security Administration, the veteran Republican has gone from reluctant father to outright critic — once describing the airport security agency as his “little bastard child.” Few areas of TSA have dodged Mica’s scorn; he’s attacked the $7.8-billion agency on issues ranging from wasteful spending to the intrusive pat-downs of passengers by airport security workers. But only recently has the Winter Park legislator made progress on his top goal: eliminating the roughly 52,000 TSA screeners nationwide in favor of those hired by private security companies. An airline law passed earlier this year included language — inserted by Mica — that makes it easier for airports to make the switch by removing barriers that give TSA broad power to deny privatization efforts. Orlando Sentinel

IN: As Indiana Toll Road funds wind down, state looks to more transportation P3s
As Indiana spends down $3.8 billion generated by its 2006 lease of the Indiana Toll Road, the state has a series of new public-private partnerships in the pipeline that underscore its continued reliance on the technique to provide financing for transportation infrastructure projects.The Hoosier State has three major privatization deals in the works under a P3 program launched by Indiana Department of Transportation for the state’s largest infrastructure projects. The transactions include the state’s participation in a bi-state effort with Kentucky  to build a new $2.4 billion bridge spanning the Ohio River, a planned 47-mile expressway that connects to Illinois, and a major revamp of a highway that runs north of Indianapolis. Bond Buyer

CO: Bill Koch’s 5000 acre Bear Ranch may see more drive-by visitors
Hikers are being encouraged to check out a trail head into the Ragged Mountain Basin that some believe has been intentionally kept secret.  A brochure specially dedicated to the Deep Creek Trail and Ragged Mountain Basin was released this week by a group opposing a Federal land swap involving billionaire Bill Koch’s property in Gunnison County.  Koch, a part-time Aspenite, is a proponent of the Central Rockies Land Exchange Bill that would trade a public road on the periphery of his Bear Ranch that provides the preferred access into the Ragged Mountain wilderness area…Critics of the land swap, who this year have grown more organized, want to raise awareness about the trail and gold medal hunting grounds they say would be lost through a formal land exchange. The brochure is one way they are spreading the word about the Deep Creek Trail. Aspen Business Journal

TX: Are you paying for toll roads already paid off?
Do you use the toll roads? Half a million of you do every day and tonight we have some bad news for you: you may be paying forever, even if the roads were paid off a long time ago….I didn’t see that in the fine print. Did you? But leave it to politicians to welch on a deal. It happened in September 2001 at a Harris County Commissioners Court meeting, way down on the agenda. Look at H, a bunch of gobbygloop about bond stuff and then “a resolution for pooling of a list of toll road projects as component facilities.” Translation: you’re going to pay tolls forever.  abc13.com

PA: Are critics justified in accusing Philadelphia schools of privatization?
Among the hot topics will be a dramatic reorganization proposal that critics call privatization. District officials don’t like that word, but the details of their long term plans are far from clear. Newsworks.org

MI: CMU event honors former Gov. Engler for boosting charter schools
As the state prepares to lift the 255 cap on public charter schools, some advocates urged a closer focus on making existing charters academically superior to traditional public schools. The quality of public charter school education has been mixed in Michigan. In July 2011, a Detroit News analysis of 2011 test score data found just six of 25 charter schools in or near Detroit had math or science proficiency scores higher than the Detroit Public Schools average. The Detroit News

MI: Allen Park Council votes to outsource police and fire
In a desperate move to balance the budget, the council voted to eliminate the city’s fire and police departments and outsource emergency services. The city is drowning in debt after the failed investment into Unity Movie Studios. Now its millage didn’t pass. With a $4-million budget shortfall, city officials don’t have enough to pay its bills and even into the pension fund, let alone police and fire. MyFox Detroit