The Platte Institute for Economic Research, a fiscally conservative thinktank based in Omaha, released a study last week calling for Nebraska officials to look at public-private partnerships  (read: toll roads) to help the state get through its funding crunch for roads.

In a public-private roads partnership, private risk capital is typically invested to design, build or maintain a road for a specific time period, and the private entity charges tolls on the road to recoup the cost, according to the study. After the contract expires, the state government can usually get the road back at no cost.

The study is authored by Shirley Ibarra and Leonard Gilroy, two analysts at the Reason Foundation, another California-based thinktank that advocates free markets. It goes into lots more detail about how these partnerships might work, but essentially it argues that these partnerships could jump-start several state roads projects that are stalled because of a lack of funding, like the $175 million Lincoln South Beltway project and the Highway 34/75 Missouri River crossing.

So will the Legislature give the idea a look?

The Legislature’s Transportation and Telecommunications Committee has its own report on highway funding due out this week. State Sen. Deb Fischer of Valentine, the committee’s chair, told the Lincoln Journal Star the report won’t include much on public-private partnerships, but she’d be interested to see if any private groups are keen on building roads in the state.

Another senator, Tim Gay of Papillion, told the Omaha World-Herald he’s skeptical about toll roads in a low-population state like Nebraska, but he’s interested in some of the study’s other ideas, like privatizing maintenance work.

In a blog post today, state Sen. Colby Coash of Lincoln called the partnerships “an interesting alternative” and asked his constituents what they thought.

This issue has a lot of hurdles to clear — logistical, procedural and attitudinal — in order to become a reality in this state. But with roads funding in a critical shortage, state senators sound open to anything. This could be an issue to watch long-term.

*District 34 consists of Hamilton, Merrick, Nance and parts of Polk and Hall counties, including the cities of Aurora, Central City and Fullerton.

The plan sounds for now like it makes sense: Dubas, a registered Democrat in the formally nonpartisan Legislature, doesn’t have an opponent, and I haven’t heard any opposition to her within the 34th District (although I haven’t solicited any opposition, either). But that may change, if the Nebraska Republican Party has anything to say about it.

The week after Dubas’ announcement, state party chair Mark Fahleson held a listening session in Aurora, with Dist. 34 one of two districts in which the party has already targeted a Democratic incumbent (the other is Dist. 16, home of Sen. Kent Rogert of Tekamah). The party is actively recruiting candidates to run against Dubas and Rogert, and in a post on his blog at the state GOP website, Fahleson had some fighting words for Dubas:

“Senator Dubas is a likable person, but the reality is she votes against her district and sides with the liberal special interests in Lincoln. There are a lot of nice people that I wouldn’t want representing me in the Nebraska Legislature.”

Fahleson went on to compare Dubas’ voting record with the state Chamber of Commerce to former state Sen. Ernie Chambers. (He didn’t specify which special interests Dubas was beholden to, other than to briefly mention the state’s trial lawyers.) He seemed quite exuberant based on the meeting’s turnout, saying, “I’m confident that a Republican will be elected to represent District 34 in November 2010.”

That may seem like crazy talk in a district in which the incumbent senator has drawn little, if any, public opposition. But let’s remember that Dubas nipped her Republican opponent in 2006, Greg Senkbile of Central City, by only about 230 votes, or about 1.7 percent of the vote. On the other hand, the heads of both the state’s political parties are no strangers to rose-colored hyperbole — see their wildly differing takes on Nebraska’s opinion of Obama in this Lincoln Journal Star piece — so talk may be a long ways from action.

At the very least, though, this may be a more interesting campaign than we initially expected.