Transcript of CNN Lou Dobbs Report on VA HOT Lanes

DOBBS: Coming up next here, outrage over state and local government efforts to turn over vital U.S. infrastructure assets paid for by taxpayer dollars, of course, to foreign companies.

DOBBS: Lisa Sylvester will have the report -- Lisa.

LISA SYLVESTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Lou, state governments have found something new to outsource, the very roads that we all drive on. These public and private partnerships are gaining in popularity, but critics say these deals a dead end for taxpayers -- Lou.

DOBBS: Lisa will have that report coming up here tonight.(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DOBBS: Our federal government and many state governments have absolutely no apparent respect for the American taxpayers or the citizens that those institutions represent.

DOBBS: A foreign company is about now to acquire toll rights to another major highway in this country.

DOBBS: And as Lisa Sylvester reports, the outsourcing of our roads, highways, our infrastructure, will cost American taxpayers a great deal in the long run.

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SYLVESTER (voice-over): Private companies are hitting the roads, snatching up highways with long-term leases, the latest venture, the Washington, D.C.-area beltway.

SYLVESTER: An Australia/U.S. consortium would expand the beltway in Virginia. In exchange, it would control this new section of the highway for the next 75 years, pocketing future toll revenue.

SYLVESTER: Critics say this public-private partnership negotiated by the State Department of Transportation benefits investors, but not taxpayers.

STEWART SCHWARTZ, COALITION FOR SMARTER GROWTH: I think the DOTs are heading too quickly into this for short-term gain, but giving away a lot over the long term, effectively mortgaging our future.

SYLVESTER: The Coalition for Smarter Growth, an environmental group, says turning over highways to a private concern means less oversight over setting of tolls, less flexibility in other transportation projects and less money for future highway improvements.

SYLVESTER: Virginia is among the states that has either completed or is in the final stages of a private-public partnership. At least five more states are considering similar arrangements. These partnerships have hit roadblocks in three other states, Texas, Pennsylvania and New Jersey. But supporters of these deals say they're necessary because states can't afford to update crumbling infrastructure.

LEONARD GILROY, REASON FOUNDATION: Well, governments can't even balance their budgets, and now we're supposed to believe that they can find the billions and billions of dollars to invest in the roads and bridges we desperately need?

SYLVESTER: Yet, the toll projects are considered to be financial bonanzas. In Indiana, Spanish and Australian investors are expected to break even within the first 20 years, and reap in pure profits for the next 55 years.

SYLVESTER: Representative Pete DeFazio worries about the precedent that is being set.

REP. PETER DEFAZIO (D), OREGON: Thus far, it's fairly benign, but what happens when China wants to get a choke point to some critical points, let's say, one of our ports or something else and they want to invest? I think it's a very bad precedent.
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SYLVESTER: Representative Pete DeFazio also takes issues because so many of these deals are negotiated in secret with very little input from voters.

SYLVESTER: And (DeFazio) has sent a letter to the governors warning them about some of the pitfalls...

SYLVESTER: and (DeFazio) is considering introducing federal legislation that would place more conditions on future partnerships -- Lou.

DOBBS: Thanks to Congressman DeFazio and others who are starting to pay attention to this and taking some action.

DOBBS: This is not a question of local taxpayers and a case of state and local government infrastructure being sold off and the federal government not receiving word or being offered a voice in this. They're simply being ignored and their interests have been completely misrepresented altogether. It is an outright ripoff of our infrastructure and assets that are paid for by the American taxpayer. It's shameless.

SYLVESTER: Lou, in so many cases, too, the voters, the taxpayers, they don't find about these deals until after it's signed, sealed and delivered.

DOBBS: Well, we're going to do our very best, thanks to you, Lisa, and our other colleagues to make certain people do find out about it. Thank you very much, Lisa Sylvester from Washington.


Original CNN transcript contained here http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0710/08/ldt.01.html