Headlines
IL: Is Midway Airport privatization deal back in the works?
OH: Official: Public can fight school privatization
CA: Santa Monica College students fight privatization
NC: Ruling leaves toll road in doubt
LA: Privatizing Louisiana prisons
MI: Mayor calls for cutbacks, assistance to keep Detroit afloat
New schemes hold the public hostage to private finance
Privatization of the Commons
IL: Is Midway Airport privatization deal back in the works?
Chicago aldermen signed off Monday on Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s plan to refinance $1.5 billion in Midway Airport debt – and got a strong sign that the $2.5 billion Midway privatization that collapsed for lack of financing may yet be cleared for takeoff. Chicago Sun-Times
OH: Official: Public can fight school privatization
To stop privatization of public education, citizens need to become active. “Go to hearings, send 10 million emails to the governor and the legislators,” William L. Phillis, executive director of the Ohio Coalition for Equity and Adequacy of School Funding, told about 200 people at Boardman High School Monday…Chief topics were charter schools and vouchers, both of which take money from public school districts, presenters said. Nearly $780 million in state funding went to charter schools in fiscal year 2012 including $21 million from Youngstown, $696,000 from Austintown and $683,000 from Boardman school districts. Youngstown Vindicator
CA: Santa Monica College students fight privatization
Community colleges across California are facing the wrath of privatization efforts by reactionary forces, most notably for-profit colleges and their surrogates, the corporate media and coin-operated politicians. Both democrats and republicans have been and are continuing to use shock doctrine crisis management to privatize the community college campuses…Both corporate liberals and reactionaries have decided the best way to deal with austerity crisis and budget cuts are to capitulate to the forces of capital, not to mount an offensive. They have drafted and engineered another “access hierarchy” which, if ever successful, promises to form a class-based tollbooth for students who wish to attend community colleges. What this means is a two-tiered class system of fees for a two-tiered class society. Those students who can pay more at the ‘tollbooth’ will do so and those who cannot will be denied access to classes. Daily Censored
NC: Ruling leaves toll road in doubt
The planned $725 million Monroe Connector-Bypass – the Charlotte region’s first modern toll road – is in doubt after a federal appeals court ruled Thursday in favor of environmental groups that had sued to stop construction. Charlotte Observer
LA: Privatizing Louisiana prisons
The pitch went out in January 2012: a letter to 48 state governments, including that of Louisiana. It was signed by Harley Lappin, former director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons. Lappin retired from that job in March 2011, one month after he was arrested in Maryland on charges of drunk driving. In June of that year, he took a job with a $300,000-a-year salary, plus bonuses, as chief corrections officer for Nashville-based prison operator Corrections Corporation of America (CCA)….Six months after CCA hired Lappin, it offered to spend $250 million to privatize publicly owned prisons across the country. “I am writing to brief you in advance about a new program — the CCA Corrections Investment Initiative — that we plan to begin discussing with you and other key decision makers in the coming weeks,” the letter said. “In short, CCA is earmarking $250 million for purchasing and managing government-owned corrections facilities.” Two months later, Louisiana had a new prison privatization bill — with the full support of Gov. Bobby Jindal. BestofNewOrleans.com
MI: Mayor calls for cutbacks, assistance to keep Detroit afloat
Earlier this year, city officials agreed to an 11-month trial to privatize bus operations and save the city money. At the same time, late night service has been suspended on several routes and drivers have been put out of work. These changes are part of Bing’s efforts to forestall fiscal takeover by the state of Michigan, but the mayor acknowledges public service cutbacks are not enough to save the city. “There is so much that needs to be done. There is no doubt in my mind that we in this administration can’t do it by ourselves,” Bing said. “We’ve got to have help. Whether it’s at the state level or the federal level. I don’t think we can fix the problem here in the Detroit without some intervention, meaning resources. Not all the time money, but money will surely help.” PRI
New schemes hold the public hostage to private finance
Public-private partnerships (PPPs) have been around for decades in various forms and their track record is replete with delays, cost overruns and prolonged legal battles. What’s more, the beneficiaries of these investment mechanisms are the same rapacious Morgan Stanleys and Goldman Sachs that gave us the mortgage-backed securities scandal and the ensuing recession. Using the economic malaise they created as cause, they have ratcheted up their advocacy of PPPs as a means of helping cash-starved public entities finance capital-intensive projects. The upshot is that they are holding us hostage all over again. They are using infrastructure built over decades with public monies as collateral to extract profit off of the back of taxpayers. A cursory look at some past projects of this nature demonstrates that PPPs are often inefficient, overly costly and inherently unjust. AlterNet
Privatization of the Commons
For centuries the Open Field System was the dominant economic agriculture system of England (and most other places in Europe). Resources were shared in the community and the community regulated its uses….So what brought this system to an end? Contrary to what some would have you believe, it didn’t die on its own…it was knifed in the back. And the hundreds of thousands that depended on this system had their livelihoods destroyed…leaving a huge swath of the population homeless, penniless, and without means to feed their families. Democratic Underground