THIS COMES FROM TURF:

ACTION ALERT:
KILL HB 2268!

This bill actually gives TxDOT MORE power. Bad idea...

The bill allows TxDOT to condemn/buy private property FIRST and assess the impact of a potential project SECOND. It's backwards...TxDOT wants it so they can force a specific route without the public input FIRST.

Call your senators, especially Wentworth who sits on the Senate Transportation Committee, to make sure they kill this bill. Remember that Senator Kevin Eltife thinks the Legislature "has created a monster" in TxDOT. Rep. Joe Pickett says "we gave them too much power." Sen. Steve Ogden is trying to "right his past sins" by attempting to rein-in TxDOT. Rep. Warren Chisum says TxDOT is "an agency run amok." We CANNOT let this bill become law!

CONTACT SENATORS, ESPECIALLY CARONA & WENTWORTH:
To find out your senator, go here

You may contact them by calling the Capitol switchboard: (512) 463-4630 and/or via email below:

Contact Chairman John Carona: john.carona@senate.state.tx.us
Contact Jeff Wentworth: jeff.wentworth@house.state.tx.us

Ask them to:
"Kill HB 2268 in committee. WE DO NOT WANT TO GIVE TXDOT MORE POWER!"

More on the bill...
It passed in the House yesterday and now should be moving to the Senate Transportation Committee unless it finds its way to another committee. It's a bad bill. It relates to the Trans Texas Corridor as well as other transportation projects. Here's the meat of it.

The bill allows TXDOT to purchase an option on land for a transportation project before the environmental review process is completed.

Here's the basic reason it is bad: it puts the cart before the horse. If TXDOT is allowed to purchase an option on land for a transportation project, in reality it is declaring its intent to build the transit facility where the land option was purchased. What if the completed environmental review process reveals the route to be so harmful to the environment and human health, the Department should reconsider? How likely is the Department to reconsider when it has already put out money and time?

It also deflates the worth of public input.

The bill says the Department's environmental review will be be acquired before the completion of the federal environmental review. It does not say the Department's environmental review will be completed BEFORE the purchase of the option.

Moreover, the Department's environmental review has no statutory authority--it has no teeth, it has no right for citizens to challenge it.

In reality, this bill locks the Department into a final plan no matter what the impacts on the environment or what the public has to say.

Use your power to defeat this-----because with this bill, TXDOT has the power to move along on every one of its projects, TTC, included.


--Terri
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