Toll Roadblock
September 13th, 2007 at 9:36 am
Texas senators Kay Bailey Hutchison and John Cornyn successfully tacked an amendment onto the transportation and housing funding bill Wednesday. The senators, both Republicans, say the amendment would place a one-year moratorium on tolling current federal highways in Texas.
It must survive a reconciliation with the house version and a threatened veto by President Bush, but the bill passed the senate 88-7. So, there’s a chance that anti-toll activists might win one for change. There’s also a chance that this bill might be the first successful override of President Bush’s scarcely-used veto.
But what does the amendment say? I read it and I’m not so sure. It seems to allow exactly what it promises to prohibit, and it is written in the deliberately confusing, dependent-clause-rich prose of lawmaking. But, hey, we’ll have to trust our senators on this one.
The move comes in the wake of a mini-scandal over the Texas Department of Transportation hiring its own federal lobbyists to push legislation enabling the Trans-Texas Corridor — along with lobbying to allow tolling existing interstates.
Hutchison says she is firmly against tolling interstates, and she has filed legislation that would prohibit it. Cornyn is certainly interested in the anti-toll vote, but his office seemed a little late in trumpeting his involvement in the amendment (so Hutchison had the lead to herself).
Perhaps Cornyn is hesitant to embrace the anti-toll constituency because of its distrust of government and its dislike of the current GOP leadership in Texas, which seems bent on privatizing public roads willy-nilly. Or maybe it’s because the big money in GOP politics in Texas favors toll roads (and the TTC). A cursory search of the Federal Election Commission website found contributions for Cornyn in the last year of more than $10,000 from Williams Brothers Construction, $7,000 from Dannebaum Engineering, and $15,000 from people associated with Zachry Construction. We are sure that’s just a drop in the bucket.
September 13th, 2007 at 10:47 am
Gaping loopholes in Hutchison’s bill allows TxDOT to go out and build new toll lanes TODAY, all day long on our interstates - and they can build them with 100% of our tax dollars.
That’s exactly what TxDOT is doing all over Texas with our state highways today. The double taxation scheme here in Central Texas (CAMPO) includes a plan to spend $700 million of our tax dollars - intended for freeways - to shift our freeways to toll ways.
Sal “The Muckraker” Costello
http://salcostello.blogspot.com/
September 14th, 2007 at 6:24 am
I am curious as to why no-one has started a re-call petition against Governor Rick Perry.
September 14th, 2007 at 2:04 pm
Good blog. However, I like the 130 toll road in Travis and Williamson counties. I do not mind paying a few bucks to be able to go 85 with only 5 cars in sight.
Regards,
Ames