Thread: FOR ALL YOU TEXANS OUT THERE!

Obviously your Gov. is NOT for the people of Texas!
He is just as two faced as the rest of them!

Toll-road issue growing heated

By JOHN MORITZ
STAR-TELEGRAM AUSTIN BUREAU

AUSTIN - Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn, running for governor as an independent, was teed off Wednesday over Republican Gov. Rick Perry's state transportation commission chairman's remarks that a foreign-owned company could supersede local officials in deciding where new toll roads are built.

Commission Chairman Ric Williamson, a Perry appointee and longtime friend, rejected pleas by North Texas leaders last week that a road-building consortium partly owned by a Spanish firm be forced to locate a new tollway system closer to the population centers in Fort Worth and Dallas. When courting private companies to construct highway projects, Williamson told about 100 officials, "you can't tell them where to build the road."

Strayhorn emphatically disagreed.

"To me, that is absolutely shocking," Strayhorn said during a news conference at her campaign headquarters. "Texas property belongs to Texans, not foreign companies. Texas freeways belong to Texas companies.

"Apparently, the governor and his transportation chairman believe that what a foreign company wants, a foreign company gets," she added. "And Texans have no say over our freeways and critical infrastructure."

Williamson said Wednesday that his remarks, which were first reported Friday in the Star-Telegram, were intended to make clear that private companies in the toll-road business must have the latitude to ensure that their ventures with the state are profitable.

Perry's campaign spokesman Robert Black said that a private contractor working with federal environmental regulators would narrow down proposed routes for any new tollways, but that state officials will determine where the roads are built.

"Ultimately, the state of Texas will have the final call," Black said.

The North Texas officials, including Fort Worth Mayor Mike Moncrief and state Sen. Kim Brimer, want Cintra Zachry to rethink its plans to route new toll roads well east of Dallas. Such a move would encourage so-called leapfrog development away from the urban centers and into rural prairie, officials told the commission.

Cintra is a Spanish-owned company; Zachry is based in San Antonio.

Strayhorn used her news conference not only to chide Williamson's response, but also to demand that Perry instruct the transportation commission to release all portions of its contract to build toll roads connecting San Antonio to North Texas over the next decade. The projects would be built with private funds and would be worth an estimated $6 billion to the consortium, which would pay the state $1.2 billion to collect tolls for 50 years.

A year ago, Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott ruled that the contract must be made public. But the consortium and the transportation commission have filed suit to overturn that ruling on grounds that it contains sensitive proprietary information.

Black said that the bulk of the contract is accessible on a state-operated Web site. But like any state deal with a private concern, information that could compromise a company's profitability is protected, he said.

"Carole Strayhorn is angry and wants attention so she launches a shrill, trumped-up attack," Black said.

Black also resurrected Strayhorn's archived news releases from the late 1990s and early 2000s that show Strayhorn -- then a Republican -- had been an early champion of toll roads to ease urban congestion and an advocate of increased foreign investment to boost the Texas economy.

In January 2001, her office urged the transportation commission to "adopt innovative financing tools, such as Grant Anticipation Revenue Vehicle (or GARVEE bonds), build more toll roads and tap into a new line of credit through the Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act," according to one document distributed by Black.

Strayhorn said that Perry's toll-road plan, the Trans-Texas Corridor, is far more aggressive than anything she has proposed.

"Perry's ... Trans-Texas Corridor, which I call a Trans-Texas catastrophe, is going to be 4,000 miles long," she said. "More mileage than Texas' 3,200-mile share of the interstate system."

Perry has touted the proposal as a visionary strategy involving highway and rail construction projects designed to ease Texas' burgeoning traffic congestion.

John Moritz, 512-476-4294 jmoritz@star-telegram.com

This is just another step in Bush's plan to slowly strip away the rights of Americans and eliminate our sovereignty as he merges Canada and the U.S. with the sewer to our south. The NAFTA Superhighway is just another cog in the Globalist machine. Funny how the administration fails to mention the proposed Mexican Customs Office in Kansas City. I guess he wouldn't want to tee off his "loyal American subjects" if they found out the absurdity of the situation.


An aide quoted the president saying the Constitution "Is just a g-d damn piece of paper."

Texans, Here is the in-state toll free number. Call Perry up and give him an ear full. He is up for election in November so scar the election right out of him.

1-800-252-9600 Governor's Opinion Line
Answered 24 hours a day. Leave a message!

e-mail form http://www.governor.state.tx.us/contact

Look in your phone book and call your TX Senators and House members today!

Do not let them do this to us.

Dixie

http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/news/opinion/14842146.htm

I wondered why they were going around Dallas and Fort Worth. Now I know. This is an express way for Mexico and not intended to relieve traffic congestion in DFW. More dishonest information form NASCO.
Fort Worth is in Tarrant County and I saw one of the county commissioners was on the NASCO or SPP list. If they are going to spend this much money and effort, they should relieve the problems in major cities first!

This massive proposal should be sent to the voters!

Perry better come clean, or I'm not voting for him. I'll elect crazy Kikky Freeman before I will vote for him.

Dixie

This whole country has been outsourced. And all that is not able to be outsourced is being taken over by foreigers in our own country through work visas and illegals. Slowly we are being destroyed culturally and economically. The illegals are just the first step in the larger fight to get our country back.

Dixie, I grew up in Plano and lived there up until 3 yrs ago, my mom and some family is still there. There isn't room to build the 4 football length highway thru there; it would cause too many questions which they are not willing to answer right now. I spoke with my mom about this highway and she had not heard of it. Needless to say I sent her the map and some articles concerning the situation. Trying to open her eyes, even if just a little bit!!!

This highway needs to be stopped!!!

Question for Texans:

Doesn't your state retain the right to secede from the United States if at any time it wishes to do so? Or am I mistaken?