* Crain's Cleveland Business is stating this morning that Gov. John Kasich's plan to sell off the Ohio Turnpike might not work out as he had hoped:
“It was the best deal since Manhattan was sold for beads,” Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels told Barron's business weekly in 2009. A multinational joint venture paid $3.8 billion for the 157-mile stretch of road between Ohio and Illinois.
But Gov. John Kasich won't do as well, it appears, if he tries to peddle the Ohio Turnpike. As it is, he only hopes for around $3 billion for the 241-mile road...
....The Indiana road has suffered from a decline in traffic and revenue during the recession. According to a 2010 Macquarie prospectus, toll road revenues “are expected to remain insufficient to cover debt service obligations over the medium term.”
>>>>> An opinion piece in the Zanesville Times Recorder finds problems with Kasich's goals to sell off Ohio's assets to private companies, a plan to lease the turnpike for 99 years, and thereby forsaking the reported $236 million/year toll income for a one-shot deal. Zanesville Times Recorder:
....We do not know the terms of the prospective lease, but it is a certainty that the company will be raising the toll fees many times during the life of the lease. The road proceeds will be going to a private company, probably a foreign company, such as Spanish or Australian.
A typical lease prohibits the government from building new roads or improving old roads adjacent to the leased road, with the intention of forcing more motorists to use the private toll road. According to LandLinemag.com, Orange County, Calif., leased state Route 91 to investors. The website quoted an Oklahoman State Representative as saying, "Seven years later, they were having gridlock and they were prohibited from building new roads. ... The citizens had to buy back that road."
A moral issue also is involved. These roads, prisons and other government property that are being sold or leased to private companies, are actually owned by the residents of the state, who built them with their hard-earned tax dollars. The politicians should not have the right to let private companies earn profits on our property....
Kasich, who famously worked as a vice president at Lehman Brothers (the firm that started the 2008 financial crisis), was accustomed to taking risks with other people's money. The retirement systems for Ohio's public employees know that the investment funds sold to them by Kasich and Lehman lost them hundreds of millions of dollars. Now Kasich is willing to risk our citizen-owned state assets and those profits in favor of some "deal."
Just like the Kasich/Republican sponsored SB 5, middle class families, tax-paying citizens, teachers/firefighters/police offiecers, and all Ohioans should regard any "deal" sponsored by Kasich with suspicion. Kasich is helping his rich business supporters thrive while we lose income, rights, and protections.
Anything coming out of the Kasich administration should be viewed by Ohio citizens with this in mind-----
(image from Business Ethics)
*** Leave it to Republican Rep. Steve Stivers (OH-15th) to support a bill which slowly destroys the effectiveness of the Dodd-Frank bill, which protects consumers. The Dodd-Frank bill was passed after the 2008-2009 financial losses consumers experienced by over leveraged firms on Wall Street.
Jimhamiltonblog:
The subcommittee will also mark up the Asset-Backed Market Stabilization Act, HR 1539, which would provide certainty to the issuers of asset-backed securities by repealing Section 939G of Dodd-Frank, which nullified SEC Rule 436(g), thereby imposing Section 11 liability on rating agencies if their ratings were determined to be inaccurate. In the week preceding the effective date of Section 939G, the major rating agencies issued public statements refusing to allow their ratings to be included in registration statements. SEC Regulation AB, however, requires that a prospectus for an asset-backed offering disclose ratings whenever an issuance or sale is conditioned on the assignment of a rating. Thus, the public asset-backed securitization markets froze on July 22, 2010, forcing the SEC to step in and issue a temporary no-action letter on July 22, 2010. On November 23, 2010, the SEC issued a permanent no-action letter. The Act is sponsored by Rep. Steve Stivers (R-OH).
Gee. Why does Stivers want to repeal something that would force companies to actually be liable if the information they provided to the public wasn't correct?
Constituents in Ohio's 15th district must keep in mind several things:
(1) he was a former bank lobbyist
(2) while in the Ohio Senate, Stivers continued to push bills that protected banks and tore away at consumer protection rules/laws
(3) Stivers voted for the Paul Ryan plan which kills Medicare
(4) Stivers refused to sign a pledge that he would protect and support Social Security
(5) Stivers continues to work to protect bank profits, while he continues to receive huge campaign contributions from bankers, financial concerns, etc.