A Citizen's Guide to Indiana

The Indy Star mainly has an article entitled Daniels: Toll road would offer vitality beyond Indy. The article has to do with Daniels’ response to the criticism of former Indianapolis mayor William Hudnut and developers and land-use experts who think that the Daniels’ Toll Road might “perpetuate the migration by businesses and residents out of the city to the suburbs and beyond.” Daniels responds that this smacks of provincialism and that we can’t be concerned about the welfare of Indianapolis above all else. “Even so, Daniels could not point to any studies or data showing the potential economic benefits of the road, or how it might reduce or influence traffic congestion.”

Mainly, however, I wanted to cite the article in order to puzzle over this sentence: The 75-mile project would run in a clockwise arc from Pendleton to Indianapolis International Airport. Can a highway’s arc really be said to run clockwise or counter-clockwise? Assuming, of course, that traffic will be permitted to run in both directions. Traffic will also flow in a counter-clockwise arc from the airport to Pendleton I presume.

Niki Kelly has an article in the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette taking a look at what the Democratic House may mean for the upcoming session. First, there will be a budget battle with school funding likely being a main bone of contention. The Republicans last budget favored a “follow the student” formula which tends to disregard fixed costs and the fact that some students are more difficult to educate than others. Democrats tend to favor a certain minimum guarantee per school for school funding.

(Note: Pat Bauer has said that the Democrats will find common ground with the Governor because the constitution requires it. Just thought I’d mention that, although legislators frequently cite their constitutional duty to pass a budget, the Indiana Law Blog has spent some time searching for and not finding this supposed Constitutional obligation. That notwithstanding, it’s still a really, really good idea to have a budget.)

Brian Bosma’s prayer lawsuit may or may not be dropped. Bauer is religious and apparently wants to pray in the chamber, but doesn’t necessarily see the lawsuit as a priority.

The anti-gay marriage amendment to the Constitution will come up again this year. Bauer has promised a vote on the issue, but may have some tricks up his sleeve to throw some sand in the gears of the amendment’s progress (if I may mix a couple of metaphors.)

There is also some discussion of property taxes, ISTEP & all day kindergarten.

Well worth a read.

The South Bend Tribune has an editorial asking for some transparency in the Medicaid eligibility privatization process, the contract for which is estimated to be worth about a billion dollars. Mitch Roob originally had FSSA on track to let the contract this summer, but Gov. Daniels stepped in, apparently because of appearances of impropriety. The two competing vendors are ACS and IBM. My recollection is that IBM has had some significant problems in satisfying its obligations under a similar contract in Texas. And ACS was Roob’s former employer, and with a contract this large, that creates at least the appearance of a significant conflict of interest.

Gov. Daniels put the brakes on this summer and appointed a panel to take a look at the process. Also, the Department of Agriculture which handles the food stamp program, decided to take a look. If all goes smoothly these groups will be done and could greenlight the contract as early as December — before the next session of the General Assembly convenes in January. The South Bend Tribune opines that this would do a disservice to the state, and says that the General Assembly ought to be taking a look at the privatization contract and that all decisions pertaining to the billion dollar contract ought to take place under the full glare of public scrutiny. If this plan is so good, what does Gov. Daniels have to fear from the involvement of the legislature?

Well, for starters, that they might say “no.” And, of course, there are different metrics as to what constitutes a “good.” Are we talking “good” for Medicaid recipients? “Good” for taxpayers? Good for ACS? “Good” for particular individuals?

I agree that the legislature ought to be involve with this significant allocation of taxpayer dollars. But, Gov. Daniels has plenty to fear if the legislature gets involved.

I’ll keep an open mind about it, but at the moment, I don’t “get” the “Indiana Commerce Connector” idea floated by Governor Daniels. As I understand it, it will be sort of an extended outer belt way around southern Indianapolis run by a private operator with tolls high enough to pay for its own construction as well as the construction of I-69 southeast from Indianapolis to Evansville.

The route will run from Pendleton on I-70 east of Indianapolis, south to Shelbyville on I-74 then east past Franklin on I-65 to Martinsville on what is projected to be I-69 then northwest to terminate at I-70 west of Indianapolis at about Mooresville.

So, I have a few questions:
1) How great is the need? At the moment traffic on I-70 and I-465 on the south side doesn’t seem particularly severe. Perhaps we’re just projecting into the future. But as far as local needs go, the north, particularly the northeast. But, presumably this isn’t primarily for local consumption — since we want outsiders to pay for our roads as much as possible.

2) What is or will be the demand for this service? This route seems ideal for commerce heading southwest from Ohio (or northeast to Ohio) and southeast from Illinois (or nortwest to Illinois). Seems like the straight east/west traffic will take the time hit from congestion in exchange for fewer miles and free miles. Is this a need with a current or future demand strong enough to make travelers willing to pay a toll that is high enough to pay, not only for the Commerce Connector bonds, but also for the construction of I-69 and give the private operator enough profit to induce it to undertake the risk?

3) How much will legislators have to sacrifice their purported commitment to property rights and antipathy to the use of eminent domain to get this thing built? Eminent domain will have to be used to build this thing. If nothing else there will be a temptation for free riders with land in the way to simply demand prices which are orders of magnitude higher than the value of their land simply because they know their neighbors have sold and the route has been fixed. In the wake of the Kelo decision, we heard a lot of rhetoric about the sanctity of property rights. This land will be seized by the government and turned over to a private operator. Is that acceptable to our policy makers? Personally, I think eminent domain is a necessary tool for governments which should be used cautiously. But what I heard from politicians in the wake of Kelo seemed to indicate a belief that there was no real place for eminent domain, particularly where the land was going to be turned over to a private operator.