According to the Boston Globe, legislative leaders have agreed to create an independent commission to recover millions of dollars lost to Big Dig overruns. However, when this commission will be formed, who will be appointed and what powers the panel will possess.
The bipartisan consensus emerged despite lobbying by the Big Dig's management company, Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff, and other firms that could pay millions of dollars for mistakes and poor decisions if such a commission was successful.
"There is the consensus and the will to have a commission," Sen. Steven Baddour, who cochairs the Massachusetts Legislature's Joint Transportation Committee, told the Globe.
Lawmakers recently held a hearing that would take away cost-recovery responsibility from the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority and hand it to the commission. The panel would rely on a team of Turnpike Authority lawyers working under retired judge Edward Ginsburg, but would have the power to fire the Ginsburg team if it failed to show results.
