…. said Rick Jensen as Liz Allen finished and hung up the phone before Rick could answer….
I usually drive in silence but I laughed out loud when I heard that. Seriously glad I was not drinking coffee that very second…
To set the background, Rick was trying to pin the blame on unions like would a normal corporate shill and Liz called in and was objecting…
Basically her argument was that there were a lot of things wrong with this Kinder Morgan Deal. Most of you know, I’ve outlined many. Al Mascitti has outlined some. Nancy Willing outlined some. Norinda outlined some. Bobby Marshall has outlined some. John Kowalko has outlined some. The News Journal writers and editorialists have outlined some. Even Alan Levin truthfully outlined some…. And of course, Liz Allen was Delaware’s voice. She outlined many…. And don’t even mention that the entire House of the General Assembly, both Democrats and Republicans unanimously voted for General Assembly oversight on this strange thing happening, despite the Governor and Alan Lavin saying…”shouldn’t do that!!!”
THE ENTIRE HOUSE OF THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY VOTED FOR SENATE BILL 3 YET KINDER MORGAN IS SINGLING OUT A LABOR LEADER, JULIUS CEPHAS? ? ?
All of these people are more to blame for swaying public opinion than Julius Cephas. However, truth be told, without Julius, none of these people would be swaying public opinion…. He didn’t harangue, he didn’t bash, he’d didn’t twist arms…
All Julius did to persuade this wave against Kinder Morgan, was speak the “truth”. The letter paints Julius as a feisty uncooperative fiery personality… Anyone who’s sat on a panel with Julius finds that hard to believe. That is not how Julius handles adversity. He digs down and works.
Of course as we all age we come to realize that anything is possible. But if we are going to allow ourselves to consider even the most outrageous items, what I find far more possible, and far more probable, was that Kinder Morgan was seriously planning on cutting jobs. Furthermore, it probably had it’s eye on the DRBA portion of the state pension fund… Speaking strictly as a vulture capitalist here… who wouldn’t?
Apparently Julius Cephas was in the way… We all owe him a thank you.
I know Texas gas firms. This deal is not off. What we have here is a lighter being held up to Delaware’s foot. To scare us a little, try to get us to move things up, to get us to concede… They sharply deduced that to have a successful operation here, they need to do away with the union. Hence, instead of excoriating Bob Marshall’s leadership, which they would have done if they truly were to pick up and go, …knowing they might need him later instead they chose to focus on Julius Cephas…
Can they turn the state into an out-roar against Julius and the Longshoreman’s union, so much so that we offer them a counter-offer with “the union” completely eclipsed out of it?
In their minds they think they can. They’re Texans… Look at Governor Perry. (Hope you weren’t drinking hot coffee right there… )
What they don’t realize is that to convince Delaware to come aboard, they have to accomplish all these four things…
A. Convince us first on the concept of privatization; Trust us, our state is completely against it.
B. Give us $5 billion for 50 years.
C. Promise us the Longshoreman’s Union will be around forever .
D. Expand business so the outside businesses will grow…..
I think this is more money than they want to bear right now…. But if they are willing to agree to these propositions, send us an offer….
Us Delawareans are a little stronger negotiators, with a little more backbone, than is Alan Levin…. I’m sorry from a honesty point of view, if his actions sort of misled you.
There are two ways to do business. One is do what is best for the business by being selfish.. The second is to do what is best for the customer and community, which in our view, turns out to be what is best for the business.
Delawareans (minus Rich Heffron) subscribe to the latter…..
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kavips 
6 comments
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March 9, 2013 at 7:35 am
Nancy Willing
All points right on target, Kavips. As I have mentioned recently, one of the weirdest things KM reps. said at the public DSPC meeting in Feb. was that they were excited to move forward with this deal as an example of good public private partnerships for DE implying that there were other deals afoot in our state.
It isn’t a secret that Ruth Ann Minner took a bunch of legis and staffers on a junket to Australia late in her tenure to get a fix on what they’d offer for privatization of one of our roadways. Coming in at 3 billion, not much more about the estimate was proffered but many of us got active to make sure that the public wouldn’t stand for any deal done in back rooms.
The Civic League for New Castle County produced a Resolution to that effect. No deal without a great amount of public scrutiny.
The privatization (sale of lease) of a highway or toll road was an active notion even into Markell’s term when his then Secretary Carolann Wicks admitted in early 2009 that it was still on the table. A boost of 3 billion would have solved the DelDOT deficit – if terribly falsely depending on the terms of the deal.
It always comes down to transparency and the terms of the deal. That is what the public wanted from KM and DSPC and that was central to what Julius Cephas and Bobby Marshall demanded.
I say we need to stay on our toes and I agree with you, Kavips, that this company is lurking and planted this notion of Julius Cephas -as-angry-black-man-deal-killer as a likely twist in the long term goal of getting what they have been offered by a subset of Jack Markell’s administration.
March 9, 2013 at 7:38 am
Nancy Willing
I think the best outcome of this protracted fight is that it clearly shows Markell et al what we are expecting of our representation from any deal with DSPC – just as you outlined above. We won’t settle for less.
March 9, 2013 at 11:34 am
kavips
When it comes to down to answer privatization questions. such as should we or should we not, after much study, it all comes down to one equation….
Can” the people” do without it?
For if something is required by every person, or quite a few of every person, to have government ownership of that item in order to keep costs down and free money up for other investments, makes sense. Furthermore, if something is so important that is it required, privatizing it will put enormous power into the hand of that item’s controller…who then has a monopoly and is able to gouge anyone he wishes….. One must use his services….
That as you know is the argument for single payer health care. It is required and should be non profit, allowing us to spend more of our money on enjoying life, not working 45 years to pay for our retirement.
That also is the argument against roads being privatized. Indiana was the first to privatize interstate and that road is a disaster and a death trap now because loan payments of the private investors take precedence over repairs even despite massive toll hikes…. As we all learned watching Bain Capital and with the Fisker demise, big investors get their money first.
If something is needed by everyone, it should be in the hands of the cheapest and financially most secure provider, which always is government.
The port is not so clear cut. Most of us don’t use the port. It can function well in a private capacity, unlike interstates, there are many ports that do well, and even though this was Wilmington’s only port, competition up and down the river could prevent monopolistic control… It Wilmington’s private owner jacks prices 100%, we can just sent our ships to Philly and drive 16 miles extra… That should prevent inequities from occurring…..
Plus, after very much analysis, private and public ports both do very well in some places and poorly in other places. One cannot say with certainty, that Private is better than Public, or vice versa. It depends on the quality of the management of the port….
That said, when speaking of efficiencies, and I know this from business, someone who has experience in a certain business goes down a lot fewer dead ends. That would make privatization more appealing because having run several ports, those owners would know more than would people elected from labor, business, non-profits, as who do currently head up the Diamond State Coalition…
This Kinder Morgan deal was a cheap offer. Should a better one come along, let us look. It could do us well.to take it up, if the price is right…
March 9, 2013 at 12:27 pm
kavips
Seriously I would look at European owners who would readily see the value of our port in terms of cross Atlantic trade, and who have a long tradition of being community players….
I would shy away from the Chinese or Russians.
March 13, 2013 at 1:47 pm
Liz Allen
Senator Coons came back from Africa working on some trade deals. Why not get him on board to ship fruit etc from Africa that fits with the industry already at the Port? Why not a Limited Public Partnership? Those in legislature would have to have an “education” forum on the beauty of a Limited Public Partnership. Or, the State could do what Calfornia did and pass legislation applying for the funds the Harbor Trust Fund owes them. We spent $8 + million on expanding the Canal? The Congressional Budget office found the Army Corp of Engineers billed for $40M on a project they only spent $13 million! Continue to call for an independent audit. Title 29 which established the Port states the Auditor of Accounts is to do audits, when did Tom Wagner ever do one? WE must demand the JFC order an independent audit. BDO has not audited since 2010…its time for a new one, and its time for Wagner to do his job.
March 13, 2013 at 4:37 pm
kavips
I don’t think Coons has that much clout to influence Afrikaans to ship to us.. That more or less is a governor’s job, to be frank and honest. And from what I was able to gather, Coons did not meet with many produce companies…. so I don’t know if he’d have the connections to manipulate in more business…
And Africa is looking for investment into Africa, and not interested in investing outside Africa, We are primarily looking for an investor interested in capturing what?
The big boats still can’t come up the river even after the dredging is done…
Delaware’s prime selling point is where you can be 12 hours from unloading, because of our central located hub of Interstate systems. I’m sure you saw the map with circles on the ports website….
It takes 4 hours to simply get out of New York or Baltimore…… Our shipment could be in Pittsburgh by then,
Yea! Delaware!