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| Mon, Nov. 30 - - Mobile - RSS | |
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Kaine boosts his roads proposal
Kaine talks up transportation planDate published: 5/29/2008
RICHMOND-- Gov. Tim Kaine yesterday urged business leaders to push legislators for a transportation solution.Speaking to a meeting of the Greater Richmond Chamber of Commerce, Kaine laid out his own proposal to raise about $1 billion for transportation needs by increasing the sales tax on vehicles, the grantor's tax and other fees, and said businesspeople should tell their representatives to work with him, and not just reject his ideas. "Tell the people to get on the problem-solvers side of this thing," Kaine said. "We will get a solution or make very plain to Virginians who does not want a solution." Kaine was talking about House Republicans, who rejected his proposals in a news conference soon after he announced his own plan. "What I've heard for the last three weeks is basically 'no, never, we're not going to do it'" Kaine said. "The only excuse for inaction in the special session is this: We don't want to solve the problem." Kaine, who has called a special session on transportation to start June 23, is insistent that a transportation plan should include new revenue for road maintenance. House and Senate Democrats differ on how such revenue should be raised, while House Republicans want to focus solely on reviving two regional transportation authorities. Kaine told reporters that if lawmakers send him a bill that contains no provision for maintenance, "it would be very difficult to approve it." He also wondered whether House Republicans have a proposal of their own, and said he's hearing from individual Republicans that they're not sure what their own leadership has planned. In a meeting of a legislative transportation accountability commission later yesterday, it seemed Republican delegates' plan is leaning toward the use of tolls and public-private partnerships to finance future transportation infrastructure. The commission heard presentations on the viability of tolls and congestion-pricing, which aims to reduce congestion by making it cost more for people to take their cars into congested areas at peak times. Several Republican delegates took the lead in questioning Secretary of Transportation Pierce Homer about those issues, about Kaine's transportation proposal, and about how elements of last year's transportation bill have been implemented so far.
Date published: 5/29/2008
Don't get me wrong here...
(posted by
bhaas
, May 30, 2008 6:12 am)
I am NOT pushing socialism nor any other far left liberal concept. What I am pushing is for our elected representatives to DO THE JOB they were elected to do. Stop taking the easy way out of every problem that comes up.
Free-market Republicans...
(posted by
biosco
, May 29, 2008 12:50 pm)
always want to set-up public/private partnerships. Before you know it we will be selling off govt assets such as the Washington Monument & the Lincoln Memorial. Then we can lease them back from some foreign owner. Makes a lot of sense huh? How stupid is that? We should not sell control of our roads or any other state or federal assets just to fund tax cuts for the wealthy. Remember, the progressive taxation "ability to pay" principle? It was destroyed by Reagan & Bush et al to help their "friends"...
I am very concerned about...
(posted by
bhaas
, May 29, 2008 8:34 am)
the republican plan pushing "tolls and public-private partnerships" when speaking about the solution to the current transportation crisis in Virginia. These legislators created this problem and now they want to place the roads, that were paid for by the tax payers, in the hands of some public-private entity and let the tax payers pay tolls to use the roads. Then they can throw up their hands and brag about how they "solved" the problem. We need a voter revolt here and get rid of these BUMS
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