oocea

2013-04-02: Orlando Sentinel readers were told this morning that local toll authority officials were "fretting" over possible train wrecks on the FL528 Beachline Expressway. "Expressway frets over wrecks with proposed Miami-to-Orlando train" reads the headline in the major area newspaper.

The Orlando FL area toller OOCEA has a major refinancing in the works - to take advantage of low interest rates and reduce its exposure to an increase in rates.  Some $463m of debt is being refinanced and some swaps are being terminated.  Total debt of OOCEA is some $2.6 billion.

Fitch and S&P rated the new bonds A, Moody's A2. Moody's has a 'negative' outlook for OOCEA because of the state of the economy and the area's dependence on discretionary entertainment and tourist travel. Fitch and S&P have the toller's outlook 'stable.'

The Orlando Orange County Expressway Authority (OOCEA) has shortlisted five candidates for executive director to succeed Max Crumit, who has had the job since December but declined to accept it as a permanent position.

The five shortlisted are:

- Jeffrey Dailey of HNTB

- Tim Jackson director of transportation planning at AECOM

- Alfred Lurigados, chief engineer of Miami-Dade Expressway Authority.

- John Davis, chief engineer of the Jacksonville Transportation Authority

- Larry Mau of K2M Commercial

Max Crummit the temporary CEO at Orlando's toll authority (OOCEA) Orange County will go back to the private sector in the fall, local reports say.

Expressway authority chairman Walter Ketcham and other board members tried to induce him to stay offering him a raise from his $180k to $230k.

The Orlando Sentinel reports that interim chief executive of the Orlando Orange County Expressway Authority (OOCEA) Max Crumit has been offered the job as a permanent position. But he's said "No thanks" because he doesn't like being in the public limelight.

Board chairmanWalter Ketcham says Crumit has been doing a "fabulous job."

Who is least corruptible - appointees of elected officials, or elected officials themselves? That's the issue being discussed in Florida in the context of a tussle at the Orlando Orange County Expressway Authority (OOCEA).

Before the end of March the Orlando area Expressway Authority (OOCEA) will be opening a new toll plaza on its very first expressway, known now as the Beachline, but back then as the Beeline Expressway. It was so named because it made a "bee line" from Orlando airport to the Atlantic coast at Cocoa Beach and Cape Canaveral. The 15 miles stretch between SR417 and FL520 runs the whole distance across flat scrub and swampland in a perfectly straight line.

Two board members of the Orlando Orange County Expressway Authority's board are demand from staff details of contributions to a business group, plus justification. One is Theresa Jacobs county mayor. The group in question is the Central Florida Partnership. The other is an attorney Frank Kruppenbacher.

TOLLROADSnews 2012-02-29

There may be lack of agreement in central Florida on construction of the Wekiva Parkway but there's no lack of agreements. Or of 'aggressive timelines.' Agreement after agreement, year after year. And they each stress their aggressive timelines.

The going rate for a chief executive at a medium to large toll agency in the US is presently in the range $180k to $190k/year salary. That's the conclusion of a study done for Orlando Orange County Expressway Authority by Cody & Associates, a Cocoa Beach Florida management consultancy specializing in pay issues.