HOW CAN YOU SELL WHAT YOU DO NOT OWN?

Looks like Charlie Crist is at it again. How in the WORLD can he think that he can lease State roads or bridges when they are OWNED by the taxpayers??? OK, so let me see if I get it. I rent the Skyway Bridge and then close it???? If I paid to lease it, why can't I lock it up? Maybe charge $50.00 per crossing? How about closing it and making it a BIG fishing pier. Charlie, get a grip!! You cannot lease that which you do not own. See Below...

Maybe we spend LESS, cut the government fat and SAVE some money.........a NEW concept in government.


TAMPA, Fla. (AP) -- Faced with a $2.5 billion budget shortfall over the next two years, Florida leaders are considering selling 50-year leases on some state toll roads and bridges in exchange for large sums of cash from private investors.
In a preliminary study, the Florida's Department of Transportation estimated a 50-year lease on Tampa's Sunshine Skyway Bridge could be worth $1.3 billion if investors were allowed to set tolls at "market rates." The study used the example of the SunPass toll, which would double in the first, fourth and 10th years of the deal, climbing from 75 cents to $5 within a decade on the Skyway.
Florida would follow the lead of other places including Indiana, Chicago and San Francisco, which have made billions from similar deals to sell road leases to private entities. Florida's $8 billion-a-year road construction budget faces challenges such as declining gasoline tax revenue and higher materials costs.
"We won't do it unless it is good for the state," Gov. Charlie Crist has said.
Opponents worry Florida drivers could get a raw deal over the long-term because private investors would make big profits from aggressive toll hikes. And they fear privatization could hurt the poor.
"Take Alligator Alley. For many people, that's the only way to go from east to west Florida and vice versa," said Sen. Mike Fasano, a New Port Richey Republican who is chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee. "It would be controlled by a private entity that could raise tolls ad nauseam. It could make it unaffordable for people to travel."
A law passed this year allows Florida to lease roads operated by the Transportation Department, but not by Florida Turnpike Enterprise. The turnpike's system's roads, including the Veterans Expressway and Suncoast Parkway, can't easily be leased because they're all part of a system that's tied together financially.
That leaves four roads: Alligator Alley, the Sunshine Skyway in Tampa Bay, the Pinellas Bayway and a state-owned stretch of the BeachLine Expressway (formerly the Bee Line) in central Florida.
But the upkeep costs of the Tampa Bay area's toll bridges would lower the price that investors would be willing to pay for them. Officials say Alligator Alley, the long, flat road through the Everglades, could be the most lucrative choice for privatization.
Leasing Alligator Alley, which runs between Naples and Fort Lauderdale, could bring in $500 million to $1.3 billion depending on how high the toll could rise - either to $6.75 or a $10 in the first decade.
For the Skyway, a more politically palatable deal would raise tolls by 50 percent starting in the first, fourth and 10th years, rather than doubling it. In a decade, Skyway drivers would be paying $3.50 in cash or $2.50 via SunPass. More price hikes would follow in the next 40 years.
Rep. Gary Aubuchon, R-Cape Coral, co-sponsored the legislation this year that allowed the leasing toll roads. It wouldn't make sense for companies to raise tolls so high that drivers would avoid the roads, he said.