What exactly does Mr. Moroun have in mind?

News report: U.S. Moroun family says it wants to co-operate as Ottawa goes ahead with plans for new bridge

This “news” is as much a surprise as the winner of last weekend’s NBA 3 point competition being a member of the Golden State Warriors squad.

As business folks, the team around the Ambassador Bridge Co. are fabulous. In person, I’m sure that you’d find them to be engaging and friendly. Manny Moroun’s commercial and financial success is worthy of admiration, particularly given the fascinating backstory. And, if you haven’t paid attention to the cut-and-thrust of the goings-on in the Windsor area over the last 25 years — with particular attention to their Detroit-area PR effort over the past 12 months — you’d take the media report about the Morouns offering the Federal government “an olive branch” at face value.

There’s no doubt in my mind that the owners of the Ambassador Bridge would like to make “the Windsor-Detroit border…a shining example of efficiency and co-operation,” as The Toronto Star breathlessly reports. Efficiency has always been part of the family’s public pitch to build a twin version of their privately-held Ambassador Bridge, after all. A Toronto-based journalist might find that newsworthy, but the staff at The Windsor Star wouldn’t have given this exclusive scoop a column inch of space.

That’s likely why the Moroun’s didn’t email their statement to the Windsor-based version of The Star. It would have fallen on deaf ears.

According to The Toronto Star, Matt Moroun, Manny’s cheerful son, says his side is “inspired by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s desire to take a new look and a fresh approach to fix old problems. This situation is just such a problem. I’m ready to do the same.”

Here’s the thing: discussions have no doubt been held by various government and business folks, on and off, for the past 10 years. Although it wouldn’t be appropriate to disclose anything about the content or who was involved, one could likely characterize them as constructive, even urgent. Yet, here we are. Square one. Ten plus years later. You have to recognize that the simple fact that nothing has ever been resolved between the parties isn’t for a lack of trying. Importantly, one should never forget that it’s the Morouns who are always suing Canada, and/or the Michigan Governor; not the other way around.

When I was appointed inaugural Chairman of the Windsor-Detroit Bridge Authority in June 2014, it quickly became obvious that the easiest way to speed-up the ultimate opening of the Gordie Howe International Bridge was to find a way to resolve the “Moroun issue”. As someone who has invested hundreds of millions of dollars in dozens of U.S.-based companies over the years, I feel like I know how to get a deal done on the southern side of the 49th parallel. It just takes a willing dance partner and some intestinal fortitude.

Even without a willing dance partner, as was proven with the successful Billy Bishop Pedestrian tunnel project.

A simple Google search would turn up plenty of evidence that the Moroun litigation strategy continues to this day in at least three different legal jurisdictions: Washington, D.C., Ontario and Detroit, Michigan. To date, the Moroun’s have brought something like 27 or 29 different legal actions against the DRIC project. The governments of Paul Martin and Stephen Harper have had their hands full as countless Moroun lawyers did their thing on behalf of the Ambassador Bridge team over the years. Those tactics were business decisions that were made by the Ambassador Bridge team, and one can understand why they have tried so hard to protect their unique perch.

But you can’t lay equal blame for that on the Feds (despite the fact that Star journo Linda Diebel did).

Moroun’s legal machinations continued in 2015, and not for a lack of interest in resolving every conceivable matter once and for all on this side of the border. Matt Moroun might be now “ready to fix the problem”. Although that “problem” remains carefully undefined in the article (other than a inside baseball reference to traffic studies), I would hope that there was no doubt in his mind that he had an open-minded crowd to work with long before the last election.

Based upon the current state of play, as evidenced by the ongoing Moroun lawsuits, you can draw your own conclusions about why barriers remain and settlement was never reached.

For the Moroun email (sent to The Toronto Star, the Liberal Party house organ let’s not forget) to truly be “a significant development” as per Interim WDBA Chair Dwight Duncan, the family needs to make it clear exactly what they have in mind. And what is different this time. Otherwise, the message isn’t worth the cost of its transmission:

– Are they unilaterally dropping their lawsuits against Canada? If not, why not?

– Are they going to allow construction of the Howe Bridge to proceed on the U.S. side of the border in 2017? It has been reported that the Moroun family owns dozens of properties that are directly in the path of the Gordie Howe’s planned U.S. Customs Plaza. Are they going to immediately sell the dozens of properties they have acquired to the Michigan Land Bank so that the P3 project can proceed unimpeded?

If both of the above steps are taken next week, then this email would definitely qualify as being a “stunning” and “significant development”.

Or, some might surmise, this media entreaty is just a gambit. One that would see the Morouns dropping their proposal to build an Ambassador Twin in exchange for being given the right to build and operate the Gordie Howe as a private business (rather than a publicly-owned project) — just as they have done with the Ambassador. Obviously, the new Federal government would have to be comfortable perpetuating the private ownership of Canada’s most important economic gateway.

Now that would certainly qualify as a stunning development!

It is truly simple for the Moroun’s to turn the page with Ottawa (not to mention the 10,000 Canadian exporters who remain in limbo) if they mean what they say when Ms. Diebel reports that the family “‘severely underestimated’ the importance of the Windsor-Detroit border crossing to Canada”. I’ll repeat myself:

– withdraw the lawsuits

– sell (at fair market value) the WDBA the Moroun-controlled Delray properties it needs to build the bridge, rather than force the Michigan Attorney General to go through an expensive Condemnation process via the County Court on behalf of the WDBA (a process which will ultimately result in the Moroun properties being delivered to the project proponents for bridge use at fair market value)

Seems like child’s play, doesn’t it?!

What is holding the Morouns back is unclear. Some might think that this impetus for peace flows from the dramatic progress that has been made on the Gordie Howe over the past 24 months.

A year ago, our WDBA Board pulled the Canadian Customs Plaza Port of Entry component out of the originally-envisaged P3 Procurement process. “Dust is flying” as a result. Federal Infrastructure Minister Amarjeet Sohi did a photo op on this very site 8 weeks ago. It took a great deal of effort on our part to convince Treasury Board bureaucrats that this “Early Works” piece should and could proceed. In my mind, this is a tangible example of the urgency and initiative the Gordie Howe project requires.

That there would even be a live construction site for the new Minister to visit wasn’t a foregone conclusion last April.

Thanks to a lot of hard work, the Windsor-Detroit Bridge Authority launched the P3 procurement process last summer. Construction began in August. The initial phase of building the Gordie Howe International Bridge has started, despite all of the Moroun efforts to prevent that from ever happening. The short list is out, and all that’s left is for the Feds to allow the WDBA to issue the RFP for the P3 Project (see prior post “Media confuse “construction cost” with “taxpayer cost” on Gordie Howe project” Jan. 8-16). With that step being two month late, there’s no doubt the Moroun’s professional advisors might think it a window exists to “do a deal”. I’m proud of what was accomplished under very difficult circumstances (see prior post “On the launch pad: The Gordie Howe International Bridge” Dec. 16-15), and delighted that the new Board Chair is well positioned to finish the job (“on schedule“) that the Inaugural Board of Directors started.

By 2020 — on time.

Which puts pressure on the Morouns, if they want to maintain their exclusive bridge business, as their anti-Howe litigation windows continue to evaporate (25 Court losses to date, I believe). All of which makes this “olive branch” a natural next tactical move. That’s not to say it isn’t genuine. But it makes all the business / common sense in the world.

There may well be lots of reasons to still talk. There always were. But public and business stakeholders need to understand what the agenda is.

Despite what you might have read in The Star, President Obama can’t do anything to help move the Gordie Howe project along. He issued the Presidential permit long ago. Even if the President has finally decided to pay for the U.S. Customs plaza, he doesn’t appear to have the votes in the Republican-controlled Congress to get it passed. One can’t forget that it was a Republican-controlled State House in Michigan that tied up the DRIC (now called the Gordie Howe) for two years (allegedly on behalf of the politically generous and well-connected Morouns).

All of which reminds us there is no free lunch. Every inch of ground that has been gained for the Gordie Howe has been hard fought. There’s no other way to describe it.

The Moroun’s need to be clear what they have in mind. Assuming they don’t intend to drop their lawsuits, what’s the point of the “olive branch”? If the Moroun goal is to build the Gordie Howe themselves, what does the Canadian government tell the three recently-announced short-listed P3 construction bidders?

If that’s not the goal, and the family plans to continue to be in the bridge business, there’s not much to talk about. Unless, of course, the Feds have decided they don’t want to proceed with the Gordie Howe project; which would be in direct opposition of the Interim Chair’s recent statements on behalf of the Prime Minister.

All of which takes us back to the beginning. What do you specifically have in mind, Mr. Moroun?

MRM
(disclosure: this blog, like all posts, is an Opinion Piece and reflects a personal view based upon publicly-available information)