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Young Coconut Road Supporters Aren't Giving Up $10 Million
Despite a reported FBI investigation and the surrounding controversy, developers in Florida really want to hang on to their hard-earned $10 million Coconut Road earmark from Rep. Don Young (R-AK). And yet everything seems to come back to Young one way or the other.
Real estate developers, led by Daniel Aronoff, who raised $40,000 in campaign contributions for Young are pushing the Metropolitan Planning Organization in Lee County to overturn a recent vote to send the money back to Congress in hopes of having it reallocated for a more popular project. The MPO vote came after it learned that the earmark had been changed after Congress voted on the bill. A new vote could take place at an MPO meeting today.
Florida consultant Joe Mazurkiewicz, a Young campaign contributor and outspoken proponent of the Coconut Road project, emailed the MPO yesterday a memo drafted by a Washington lawyer named Jack Schenendorf. The memo plays down the significance of the Coconut Road earmark change, pointing to another section of the 1,200 page bill where "Jacksonville" was changed to "Jacksonville, FL." (As we've already reported, there were no edits of any of the other 6,000 earmarks in the bill that would have changed where money was directed, aside from Coconut Road.)
The email and memo leave the impression that Schenendorf is a disinterested observer:
Attached you will find a Bio and Statement by Jack Schenehdorf, an attorney with Covington and Burling covering the I 75 Coconut Road Interchange Project. This man’s experience and reputation is without equal regarding Federal transportation issues and funding.
It turns out that Agripartners, a company owned by the same Daniel Aronoff, hired Schenendorf to write the memo, which Agripartners acknowledged in a statement issued last night. Schenendorf is a former chief of staff of the House Transportation Committee which Young is now a member and once chaired and has contributed to Young's campaign fun (albeit only $1,500).
Update: The MPO just voted to reject the Young earmark again.
Comments (7)
moondancerr wrote on September 28, 2007 12:30 PM:The sheer audacity of this is mind boggling. I guess if your a republican, shame is no longer an issue. Just stop pretending that you give a rats ass what citizens think, and go for the gold.
footsore wrote on September 28, 2007 1:20 PM:Better watch out or the weasel will getcha.
parrot wrote on September 28, 2007 3:09 PM:footsore
And, um, so when is someone in Congress going to actually complain about this? It would seem that someone, somewhere decided that they were BETTER THAN CONGRESS...had more right to decide where the money was going, etc, than Congress itself. Again, when is Congress going to investigate what happened and stop it from happening again? Or do they really care at all?
Velmas Twin wrote on September 28, 2007 8:23 PM:At the MPO meeting today, Joe Mazurkiewicz identified himself as representing both Agripartners and the City of Bonita Springs. That was interesting, as Bonita Springs city councilman Ben Nelson has stated, in official correspondence, that if the money can't go to a Coconut Road study, he'd like it to go to improving the next southern-most interchange, Bonita Beach Road.
I'm not sure how Mr. Mazurkiewicz is representing two clients who want the interchange in separate places? It's tempting to speculate that perhaps he or someone he represents would benefit from the interchange ultimately being located at a third, as yet unnamed location.
If you look at the original specifications for the ideal interchange, as specified by the MPO in 2006, it would be north of Bonita Beach Road and would be able to be easily extended to County Road 951. One piece of property fits that description like a glove--it's a 156-acre parcel nominally owned by a nonprofit children's agency. In reality, the approval to serve children through the agency won't be granted by Florida's Department of Children and Families until well into 2008 or beyond. And in reality, the parcel is not owned by that charity but by a private Real Estate Investment Trust established to hold the parcel.
(Those public-private partnerships are all the rage here in Southwest Florida. The most outspoken advocate of those deals, though, a local real estate magnate, was just found dead under mysterious circumstances in New Jersey, so perhaps that sort of wheeling and dealing will lose its luster. The man's legacy includes a questionable, multimillion dollar deal that funded the renovation of our local mental health crisis stabilization unit. Who would be the chairman of that capital campaign? Oh, that would be Joe Mazurkiewicz.
dweb wrote on September 28, 2007 9:30 PM:If I were a resident of Lee County, I'd be filing a suit against the awarding of these funds on grounds that they were illegally obtained. Congressman Young's actions - changing a bill's language AFTER it has been approved by both houses of Congress and gone through any reconciliation process -- is plain and simple..illegal. The funds were NOT assigned to the Cocoanut Road project via legal means. Congressman Young's actions violated the law. The bill is illegal. Case closed!!!!
CalD wrote on September 30, 2007 1:56 PM:Amazing how much he looks like Ted Stevens in that photo.
Linda Buzzetti wrote on January 16, 2008 9:32 AM:Today Schenendorf is on C-Span touting his ideas regarding raising gas taxes and other fees to save our roads. Hmmm.