Rep. Connie Mack (R-Fla.) sent a letter to a Florida university expressing his support for an interchange at Coconut Road, a $10 million earmark that has raised red flags and stirred controversy since its belated insertion into the 2005 highway bill.

For months, Mack said he was not involved and knew nothing about the earmark’s inclusion in the massive highway bill — even though it was a high priority for the university in his district and he was a member of the House Transportation panel when the earmark was placed in the bill.

“The Coconut Road Interchange, built in conjunction with the [Florida Gulf Coast University] Transportation Management Center, stands to be the cutting-edge demonstration project in America to study and improve hurricane and crisis evacuation transportation safety programs,” Mack wrote in the letter, which was addressed to Florida Gulf Coast University (FGCU) President William Merwin. A copy was obtained by The Hill.

Citing southwest Florida’s “phenomenal growth” and the critical role that I-75 plays as an evacuation route and in the region’s economy, “there is not a more appropriate place in the country to locate this demonstration program,” Mack wrote.

Watchdog groups have accused then-House Transportation Committee Chairman Don Young (R-Alaska) of changing the earmark language in the 2005 highway bill to benefit a contributor and real estate developer after both chambers passed the legislation but before it reached the president’s desk. The altered language designated the money for “Coconut Road Interchange” on Interstate 75, whereas the original language authorized the money only for “widening and improvements” for I-75.

The watchdog group Taxpayers for Common Sense has called for an ethics investigation and has accused Young of abusing the legislative process to make an unorthodox change that benefited real estate developers who want the interchange. Those developers include Daniel Aronoff, who helped Young raise $40,000 at a February 2005 fundraiser.

The local transit authority has twice voted to send the money back to Congress in hopes that it can be channeled to the road-widening project, a top area priority that won $81 million in separate language in the 2005 highway bill.
Ever since the controversy erupted in the press, Mack has maintained that he did not request the $10 million earmark for the interchange in his district. He also says he did not know about efforts to insert it into the massive transportation bill.

Young, who is under FBI investigation for his ties to an oil company in Alaska, indirectly acknowledges that he requested the earmark. But he has declined to comment about his alleged role in making the change to the language after the bill passed the House and Senate. Young also will not say whether he and Mack discussed the interchange earmark at any time before or after the 2005 highway bill passed the Senate and was signed into law.

Through a spokeswoman, Young has said the earmark was inserted because FGCU and area residents had expressed a need for a hurricane evacuation route. If they have since changed their minds, they were within their rights to do so, the spokeswoman said.                 

Mack spokesman Jeff Cohen said no conversations about the interchange ever took place between Mack and Young, and that Mack was completely unaware of any efforts by Young to allocate the money for the Coconut Road interchange.

“We never had any indication that money was going to be taken away from I-75 to build this interchange,” he added.

Mack has pledged to work to reverse the language in the bill so the $10 million for the interchange can be re-designated for road-widening. And fellow Florida Republican John Mica, the ranking member of the House Transportation panel, has recently vowed to help him.

Such a change would normally be made in a technical corrections bill, which is wending its way through Congress right now. But that measure has become bogged down in the Senate, and GOP lawmakers have said they may address the issue in an upcoming spending bill, according to GOP sources.

“We are looking at every available avenue” to make the change, said Mack spokesman Cohen.

Cohen argues that the March 2006 letter shows only that Mack was trying to support the needs of his constituents.

He emphasized that FGCU has long wanted the interchange as part of its efforts to develop a transportation management center as a resource for students to study transportation, traffic and homeland security emergency and evacuation management issues associated with busy freeways. Cohen also noted that Mack’s letter was sent in response to a university request regarding funds for the interchange and center.

“As Connie has said all along, the decision on whether or not to build the Coconut Road interchange was the decision of our local leaders,” he said.

In fact, in the March 2006 letter, Mack notes that the Lee County Metropolitan Organization must approve the interchange project for it “to reach its full potential.”

The connection between the interchange and the transportation management center, and the reasons why the university supports the interchange, are unclear. Cohen referred those questions to FGCU. Calls to the university were not returned.

Rick Alcalde, a lobbyist at Potomac Partners whose clients include both FGCU and Aronoff’s Landon Companies, also did not return a call seeking comment. Landon Companies has paid Alcalde’s lobbying firm (first Ogilvy Government Relations, then Potomac Partners) a combined $580,000 since 2003. FGCU has paid Potomac Partners $140,000 since 2005.

Aronoff helped organize the fundraising event honoring Young, but Mack also was involved in hosting it. An invitation for the event, held at the Hyatt Regency Coconut Point Resort & Spa, asks attendees to “please join Congressman Connie Mack” as well as “members of the Southwest Florida Transportation Initiative (SWFTI) in honoring Chairman Don Young.”

Young and Mack both attended a town hall meeting on the FGCU campus earlier that day.

According to a notice about the event, topics included a study commissioned by FGCU that recommends the construction of an interchange at Coconut Road and I-75 as well as a high-tech command and control center to be located on the FGCU campus.

Minutes from the meeting indicate that Mack invited Young, and that Young made a commitment during the meeting to help FGCU obtain funds for the transportation center.

“Chairman Don Young of the House of Representatives Transportation Committee was invited to FGCU by Congressman Connie Mack,” the minutes state. “Dr. Sheppard [the author of the study] made a presentation that day and convinced the Chairman that FGCU should become a transportation information hub.”