Bacon's Rebellion

Democracy Thrives in Sunlight

Quote of the Day: Doug Koelemay

—

by

James A. Bacon
in

koelemay

As it appears increasingly likely that Congress will throttle the flow of federal transportation dollars to the states, state officials are looking at alternative financing mechanisms such as Public Private Partnerships (P3s). As it happens, Virginia is one of only four states with extensive experience with P3s — the others are California, Texas and Florida — so it’s no surprise that Governing magazine touched base with Doug Koelemay, the McAuliffe administration’s P3 chief, for comments in a recent article.

Koelemay, who heads the state’s Office of Transportation Public-Private Partnerships, … stresses the need for an open process in developing the agreements. Public notice and comment periods are often “sterile” and yield little useful information. But more public involvement can help planners develop better projects, Koelemay says, because they can understand the public’s concerns as consumers of transportation services.

P3s are an invaluable tool for building transportation mega-projects. But as experience in Virginia has shown, there is a built-in tension between protecting the confidentiality of P3 contract negotiations and maintaining openness and transparency. The public is not well-served by a process in which a negotiated contract is presented with a take-it-or-leave-it option. Of course, the public is not well served either by an open-ended process that allows for continual modifications and revisions leading to mission creep and cost overrruns.

I’m not sure how to balance the conflicting considerations. There are no easy answers. Koelemay is clearly signaling that the McAuliffe administration is leaning toward greater openness and transparency.

— JAB

Share this article

ADVERTISEMENT

(comments below)

ADVERTISEMENT

(comments below)

Comments

3 responses to “Quote of the Day: Doug Koelemay”

  1. larryg Avatar
    larryg

    well first off.. we should stop calling them P3s and honestly call them public-private toll roads because there are no other “finance” mechanisms other than tolls.

    second – you can have a full and open public process about the location and purpose of any road – even a toll road – without getting into the proprietary aspects of the private companies.

    VDOT has CHOSEN to EMBED – virtually ALL of it – when they do not have to – there is no compelling reason to do it – and it harms the public’s right to know and participate.

    Can you imagine Henrico entering into a PPP with a company to build a road and telling it’s citizens that it’s a private process.. and they will be “informed” at some point as to what has been “decided”.

    this is essentially what VDOT is doing – and the most recent example is US 460 where the concerns of the COE were essentially hidden from public view – until it became clear that the COE was holding firm – and it was “suddenly discovered” that the COE was not going to issue a permit.

    there was no “sudden” about it – it was the problem from the getgo but it was effectively hidden from public view by configuring the process as a “proprietary” effort.

    If we don’t fix this – from now on most new roads, in the absence of Federal Funds will be a PPP – and the process will be essentially hidden from the public – EVEN for roads that will be subsidized with taxpayer dollars AND tolled also.

    VDOT needs to be reined in on this.. not quietly or softly but in a major way – to pitch a major hitch in their giddy-up.

  2. billsblots Avatar
    billsblots

    “VDOT needs to be reined in on this.. not quietly or softly but in a major way – to pitch a major hitch in their giddy-up.”

    should there be some sort of scolding, or even more forceful, official procedure, against current high ranking VDOT officials who were central to this process and now sit at the highest chairs in the organization?

    1. larryg Avatar
      larryg

      The legislature needs to act to rein in VDOT. I don’t blame the VDOT execs.

      I don’t like what they did in their disreputable use of PPP to cut out the public but it was inevitable if it was an option/loophole that could be exploited in the legislation.

      You just don’t let them do it – by law.

      the same thing, by the way , is now going on with the FOIA law in Va where more and more officials are seeking more and more “carve out” exemptions based on the most flimsy and bogus of reasons – the Va GA seems okay with it.

      It’s things like this – that frustrate the hell out of Conservative (and other) groups who see it as an increasingly unresponsive imperial govt that needs to be toppled from the top – no more nibbling around the edges with “Rules”.

      I support tolls – but VDOT has taken this to a whole new outrage. They want tolls on top of taxpayer subsidies for roads operated by 3rd party for-profit companies.

      the VA GA is responsible for this.. they enabled it … and now VDOT is using it.

Leave a Reply

Read More