Tonight (October 29, 2019), I traveled to the Carpenter Branch Library in South St. Louis to attend an event known as the “Airport Outreach Meeting by Fly314 Privatization Consultants.” I prefer to think of this group as the “Acolytes of Ayn Rand,” people who think that private for-profit is always superior to government. I spoke up several times tonight. Some of my comments can be heard on the attached video and other comments will be on KWMU Radio tomorrow.

My overriding fear is that when the “Working Group” actually comes up with a detailed proposal, its allies in the Board of Aldermen will declare an emergency session and force a vote before anyone has a chance to read and absorb the legislation. This is standard operating procedure in many publicly unpopular cases like this, where the citizens have nothing to gain. Hence, my cross-examination of the consultants, which you can hear on the attached two-minute recording, along with the non-answers. When I pressed them for assurances that the Board Members would have ample time to discuss the ultimate detailed piece of legislation with their constituents before any vote, one presenter stated that my question was “unfair.”

On this recording (which I made on my iPhone) you’ll first hear the claim that the group has been “transparent.” We heard that claim a lot tonight. Next, you’ll hear another presenter telling the citizens that they should RIGHT NOW be speaking to their representative on the Board of Aldermen about the airport deal. Never mind that there isn’t yet any deal and never mind that members of the Board of Aldermen do not have any meaningful information to discuss with their constituents.

The presenters showed vague “Objectives” and “Guiding Principles” on power point slides (see bottom of this post). Curiously, these aspirational points completely fit the mission of the CURRENT public airport Board. So why privatize? Why add a layer of profit to a highly functional public airport? These are truly good questions, especially where airport privatization has failed massively, most recently in Colorado. Does anyone hear the sound of a Great Vampire Squid licking its chops while waiting for this deal to be crammed through the Board of Aldermen?

We heard a lot of amazing things tonight. One of the four presenters indicated that this proposal might even bring a “billion” dollars of revenue to the city. Wow. She also said that that the lease would not be a 99-year lease. Why not? Apparently, no reason necessary. Then she indicated that there is no worry about the successful bidder failing to perform, because this is “only a lease.” That caused me to speak up, of course. I told her that what she said is incorrect. In my lawsuit against the St. Louis Blues two years ago, it was clearly established that the City’s lease with the Blues gave away complete control Scottrade Center. In that case, the City retained only bare legal title and had no right to control the premises at all. Therefore, the fact that the airport deal will involve “only a lease,” was misleading. It would depend upon the specific terms of the lease. When I finished, she said, “That’s what I was saying.” No. Sorry. That wasn’t true either.

The presenters had answers where it was convenient to have answers. Many of the most important questions, however, were answered with “to be determined” or “hasn’t yet been decided.” Vaporware on tour!

One interested citizen in the audience was concerned that considerable information was not available to the public. One of the presenters explained: Well, I assume you are talking about information from closed sessions and we can’t disclose those because it then they wouldn’t have been closed sessions. Something very much like that . . .

At the end of this session, the concerned citizens were invited to continue this conversation at the next public meeting.