We are making a difference! Memo from CARE FL reiterates All Aboard Florida is NOT a Done Deal! AAF: Not a Done Deal As you might have read by now, press reports indicate All Aboard Florida (AAF) has won tentative federal approval to issue Pubic Activity Bonds (PABs) for $1.75 billion. According to the press report, the US Department of Transportation (DOT) last week gave AAF approval. However, DOT has declined, at this point, to confirm the action by its own Credit Council, which administers funding actions. Nor has DOT said under what (federal/DOT) legal authority the funding is being granted. What we do know is this: If funding is ultimately granted, it will be a subsidy for AAF and an expense for taxpayers in the amount of foregone taxation, even if no one is telling taxpayers about that. While this is not a headline we were hoping to see, nothing has fundamentally changed with respect to the core question of whether AAF actually goes forward. The simple fact of the matter is that AAF still faces many significant hurdles. These include: 1. AAF still has to get DEIS approval. The AAF and DOT put out a very flawed Draft Environmental Impact Study (DEIS). That study elicited 8,000 comments, some serious and factually and legally based. Issuance of a final EIS is still required as a non-negotiable requirement of federal funding, and we believe DEIS approval is far from certain. Federal authorities recently conducted a series of public hearings and received another 12,000 comments -- the overwhelming majority of those are negative. CARE also filed comments, and has asked that a second DEIS be issued because the first one was so fundamentally flawed. We expect a final decision on the DEIS sometime in 2015-probably in the spring – until then, AAF has its hands tied: it can’t spend the funds it may raise, it can’t lay down a single track; it can’t do any construction. 2. AAF will face major legal obstacles. Even if federal PAB funding goes forward and investors step up, AAF will clearly face a long and winding road in court as a result of the many lawsuits that would likely get filed should the current DEIS go forward without being fixed. CARE will file such a suit among others if the flawed DEIS goes final. 3. AAF still has to convince private investors to provide the $1.75 B. Getting federal PAB approval is just one leg of the financial stool. If federal support actually materializes -- and again, this is far from certain -- AAF still has to go out to the public and raise the money. This entails convincing investors to step up and assume the financial risk of associating with a project that has clear and convincing community issues, as well as clear prospects for years of high-profile litigation that would be filed by AAF’s many opponents. 4. Once DOT makes clear its authority for AAF PABs we will examine it -- closely. DOT has not cited which funding program it is using to support AAF. There are many such programs but each has limits, regulations, guidelines and legal requirements. Once the program is revealed – and DOT will have to cite the actual program at a point – CARE and other opponents will have an opportunity to review and unravel the proposed legal rationale. The fact that the source of authority is not being cited, in combination with its decision to release the news on the Friday afternoon before Christmas -- ensuring less press and public attention – may indicate issues exist in this respect. 5. Public and local community opposition to AAF is skyrocketing. Funding and regulatory approvals aside, the fact remains that AAF is a politically charged and unpopular program, with fabricated economics. The shadow boxing of the sort we are now seeing around federal funding supports our basic contention that AAF stands in direct opposition to the fundamental needs and interests of the very communities it seeks to serve. This growing political headache will not go away for Florida’s elected congressional and state leaders. It has the potential to burst onto the national scene, causing more problems for AAF’s well-heeled – and politically connected -- backers.
Posted on: Sun, 28 Dec 2014 22:33:01 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015