Long-term lease agreements involve the lease of publicly financed facilities to a private sector concessionaire for a specified time period. Under the lease, the private sector concessionaire agrees to pay an upfront fee to the public agency in order to obtain the rights to collect the revenue generated by the facility for a defined period of time (usually from 25 to 99 years). In addition to the concession fee, the concessionaire agrees to operate and maintain the facility, which may include capital improvements in some instances. The potential benefits of long-term lease agreements include transferring responsibility for increases in user fees to the private sector; generating large up-front revenues for the public agency; transferring most project, financial, operational and other risks to the private concessionaire; and gaining private sector efficiencies in operations and maintenance activities.