MARTINSVILLE, Ind. - In the town where the future Interstate 69 and the proposed Indiana Commerce Connector would intersect, hundreds of Morgan County residents gave state legislators an earful about the privatized toll road bill.
During a field hearing of the House Roads and Transportation Committee, crowd sentiment appeared to be largely against the Indiana Commerce Connector - the proposal to let a private vendor pay the state for the rights to build a 75-mile toll road and collect the tolls. Proceeds could then pay for Interstate 69 construction through Southwestern Indiana, Gov. Mitch Daniels has said.
At the two-hour public hearing at the Morgan County 4-H Center, Stephanie Parks of Mooresville, Ind., asked the standing-room-only crowd to indicate, by show of hands, who supported the Commerce Connector and who opposed it. No formal count was made, but opponents appeared to outnumber supporters four or five to one.
Committee chairwoman Rep. Terri Austin had supporters and opponents take turns at the microphone as the House panel listened.
Opponents cited similar themes: A privatized toll road would jeopardize Morgan County's rural way of life through loss of homes and farms to eminent domain, and would bring unwanted truck-traffic congestion.
"The last thing I want to see is another freeway come through here. All this thing's going to do is give thieves a little easier access to your wallet," Eugene Robertson said. "It's going to steal your farmland; it's going to steal your children's chances at having farmland that's been passed down through generations. ...They're not building it in their backyard; they're building it in ours."
Supporters pointed to the potential for economic development at the interchanges created by the Commerce Connector and other interstates, including the planned I-69 extension from Evansville to Indianapolis. Through Morgan County, I-69 is to follow the Indiana 37 corridor, and the interstate would intersect with the Commerce Connector tollway somewhere in the Martinsville vicinity.
Proponents said jobs brought by such economic development would reduce the exodus of college graduates out of Indiana.
"This road will not create any jobs, it will create the opportunity for communities to create jobs," said Harold Gutzwiller, executive director of the Hendricks County Economic Development Partnership.
Some of the loudest applause went to opponents of the two road projects.
Charles Ramsden Jr., who traveled to Martinsville from Springville in Greene County, said the planned I-69 extension from Evansville would cut through his property.
"We are left in life limbo related to our future. Our property is publicly marked as I-69 right of way, our ability to sell (is) ruined, our hope of any certain future or personal value in further improving our homes and property (is) not realistic."
Ramsden said he and his wife, both elderly, had hoped their adult son would establish a home on their property and assist them as they age, but the planned I-69 makes that impossible.
Some of the frustration in the crowd stemmed from not knowing exactly what route the Commerce Connector would take through Morgan County as it sweeps from Pendleton, Ind., around the east and south sides of Indianapolis, linking eventually to Interstate 70 west of the Indianapolis International Airport.
The House Roads and Transportation Committee plans more public hearings in central Indiana communities - Thursday night in Shelbyville and next week in Franklin and Greenfield.
Although funding for Interstate 69 from Evansville through at least Crane was generated through last year's Major Moves lease of the northern Indiana toll road, Daniels has proposed the Commerce Connector tollway as a means of generating $1 billion to $1.5 billion to fund the rest of I-69 from Crane to Indianapolis.
Daniels also has indicated recently he would back off the Commerce Connector project if there was not public support for it.
Tuesday night's hearing in Martinsville happened the same day as members of the Southwest Indiana Chamber of Commerce were at the Statehouse in Indianapolis to lobby their legislators to move the I-69 project forward. Among those Evansville-area business people was Jeff Mulzer, vice president of Mulzer Crushed Stone, whose firm sees expanded opportunities with a wave of new road construction.