05/18/2007

Brandi Grissom / Austin Bureau / EL PASO TIMES

AUSTIN -- Legislators might avoid a special session and El Pasoans could get to vote on toll-road projects after the House approved a major transportation bill Thursday.

"We're not across the finish line É but it's now out of our hands," said state Rep. Wayne Smith, R-Baytown, who sponsored the bill that passed on a 143-2 vote.

The House quickly approved the transportation bill as legislators try to dodge a veto of a similar bill on Gov. Rick Perry's desk and a special session he has threatened to call if legislators don't make a deal on roads.

The bill would put a two-year moratorium on agreements that allow private companies to build and operate toll roads, but many large urban areas with projects already under way, including El Paso, would be exempted from the ban.

Lawmakers, responding to outrage last year from voters worried about toll roads proliferating statewide, have been working all session to limit toll roads and private contracts to build them.

State Rep. Joe Pickett, D-El Paso, said that the bill passed Thursday would not stop toll roads but that it would send the Texas Department of Transportation a message that lawmakers want more control over state road-building policy.

"This is a venting of the Legislature," Pickett said.

Pickett added to the bill several amendments that pertain specifically to El Paso. One of the changes he made would require an election on toll projects worth more than $200 million.

State Sen. Eliot Shapleigh, D-El Paso, said the election requirement could cause problems because the city needed to build roads quickly to accommodate new soldiers at Fort Bliss. "I know of no county where road projects go to the voters like that," he said.

Another change Pickett made to the bill would exclude from the moratorium only El Paso road projects the local municipal planning organization had approved by May 1. Another measure he added would allow the newly created Camino Real Regional Mobility Authority to appoint members from the same region the El Paso Metropolitan Planning Organization encompasses.

Earlier this month, the House and Senate overwhelmingly approved and sent Perry a bill that included the moratorium and other measures that would have affected toll authorities in Houston and North Texas.

Perry threatened to veto the bill and to call lawmakers back for a special session to deal with transportation issues in the legislation, which he said would cost Texans jobs and jeopardize federal dollars.

Senators and representatives met with Perry and his staffers and came up with a deal to pass another bill in its place that would respond to concerns of lawmakers and the governor.

If Perry accepts the bill, they could avoid a gubernatorial veto and the specter of returning to Austin this summer.

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