Authority learns port’s value, but won’t tell

For more than a year, some have wondered how much the port of Hampton Roads is worth. The Virginia Port Authority now has an answer. But it says it can't tell anybody.

A seven-page "Indicative Range of Values Summary" completed by KPMG Corporate Finance LLC was presented to the Port Authority's Board of Commissioners in a closed session at its July 27 meeting.

When The Virginian-Pilot asked the authority for a copy of the study under the Virginia Freedom of Information Act, it was denied.

The exemption on which the denial was based protects papers prepared by, among others, "outside advisors, or consultants exclusively for the evaluation and negotiation of proposals filed under the Public-Private Transportation Act of 1995," or PPTA.

The idea is that going public with such information could undercut the authority's bargaining position in any negotiations resulting from proposals made under the PPTA, said Joe Harris, a Port Authority spokesman.

"We needed to know what we were worth," Harris said. "We had to have a baseline number from which we could negotiate," much like a homeowner getting an appraisal on a house.

Since late July 2009, the three proposals submitted under the PPTA to take over the operations of the port routinely have been characterized by state and local officials as low ball offers.

Yet few people knew how far they were off, and it looks like that may not change anytime soon.

An announcement by state officials about the port proposals submitted last year is pending.