Free Republic

AUSTIN — Rural landowners carrying protest signs and shouting angry slogans gathered at the Capitol to speak their minds. Their goal: Stopping Gov. Rick Perry’s Trans-Texas Corridor. Farmers and ranchers say the huge highway project will gobble thousands of acres of their property only to make money for private toll road companies. “The government is out of control. They’re trying to take our property rights away from us,” said Rep. Harvey Hilderbran, R-Kerrville, one of the legislators who spoke at the May 3 rally. Republican Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn —one of Perry’s potential GOP primary opponents in 2006 — joined...

WASHINGTON — A political spat erupted Tuesday between Texas Gov. Rick Perry and Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison when the senator filed an amendment to the $284 billion transportation bill that would ban tolls on existing federal highways. The amendment would repeal existing language in the highway bill that would allow states to erect toll booths on federal highways to pay for transportation projects. "Tolling existing roads to pay for new ones is double taxation," said Hutchison, R-Texas, a member of the Senate Commerce and Transportation Committee. But the amendment was seen as a shot at Perry's proposed $175 billion Trans...

CorridorWatch.org MEMBER BULLETIN - May 25, 2005 PLEASE TAKE 3-MINUTES TO SEND A MESSAGE The Austin Toll Party organization has put a quick and easy e-mail letter on their website. Using the fill-in-the-blank web page form will send the Governor, Chairman Krusee and over 200 other elected state officials your opposition to the Trans-Texas Corridor and support for HB-3363. Be sure to add your own objections and concerns in the box titled additional comments. CLICK ON THIS LINK: http://www.austintollparty.com DO NOT WAIT - DO IT RIGHT NOW ! ====== RALLY AT THE CAPITOL - TUESDAY, MAY 3, 2005 - 10:00AM...

HOUSTON – For four generations, Clarence Friedrich's family has farmed the land in Fayette County, Texas. Like many Germans who settled the area in the 1800s, the family has an attachment to the land that runs deeper than corn or cattle. It's part of Mr. Friedrich's heritage, his story. But Texas is looking to the future, not the past, in developing a new transportation system that could slice up his 350 acres and countless farms like it. The colossal $184-billion project would interlace the state with 4,000 miles of tolls roads - up to a quarter mile wide in some...