By BRYAN CORBIN, Evansville Courier & Press Statehouse bureau
corbinb@courierpress.com
INDIANAPOLIS - Progress toward securing funding for construction of Interstate 69 from Evansville to Indianapolis took a big step forward Thursday when a state Senate committee approved $1.13 billion in funding for it and other highway projects.
Hours later, spirited debate erupted in the Indiana House over amending another bill to set aside $119 million just for the I-69 project.
No vote was taken in the House, though, because the amendment was ruled improper on procedural grounds.
Yet the fact that Republicans and Democrats on both sides of the Legislature came out strongly in favor of building I-69 from Evansville to Indianapolis came as welcome news to a Southwest Indiana Chamber of Commerce official who is lobbying in favor of the project.
"We'll never turn down funding for I-69, that's for sure," said Steve Schaefer, chamber vice president and executive director of Hoosier Voices for I-69.
Thursday morning, the Senate Appropriations Committee approved a $26 billion state budget. It includes a $1.13 billion appropriation out of the Major Moves Construction Fund to be used by the Indiana Department of Transportation for major highway projects.
Appropriations chairman Sen. Robert Meeks said that amount includes about $700 million for I-69 construction, although Meeks said he has more questions for INDOT about which other projects are on the list.
"I want to know where that billion dollars is going, because I want it in assets, I want it in concrete and asphalt," said Meeks, R-LaGrange. "I don't want it to go anywhere else except infrastructure for the state of Indiana - to supply jobs so that the traffic can move."
The four Democrats on the Senate Appropriations Committee, including Sen. Bob Deig, D-Mount Vernon, and Sen. Lindel Hume, D-Princeton, voted against the budget bill Thursday, citing the school funding formula that would cause some schools to see a net loss of income.
The I-69 funding was not in dispute and was barely mentioned during Thursday's appropriations hearing and vote, however. The budget bill goes next to the full Senate and then back to the House.
Thursday afternoon, Rep. Russ Stilwell, D-Boonville, tried to add funding just for the I-69 project into another bill the House was hearing, Senate Bill 105, which deals with studies of mass transit and commuter rail systems.
The amendment would have appropriated $44 million in 2008 and $75 million in 2009 out of the Major Moves fund, to begin construction of the first leg of the I-69 project through Southwest Indiana.
Stilwell's amendment also would have required that I-69 be toll-free its entire distance from I-64 near Evansville to I-465 in Indianapolis.
During floor debate on the amendment, Rep. Randy Borror, R-Fort Wayne, questioned whether it is constitutional to itemize spending for I-69 only, while not funding other projects that way.
Rep. Suzanne Crouch, R-Evansville, had similar questions: "I intend to vote for this amendment, because it will provide funding for I-69. I wish it had funding for all state road projects," Crouch said.
Rep. Trent Van Haaften, D-Mount Vernon, asked House members to vote for Stilwell's amendment "as a reflection that this type of development is important for the entire state of Indiana," he said.
An I-69 opponent, Rep. Matt Pierce, D-Bloomington, argued that support for the interstate project is not universal.
While Stilwell's amendment would prevent I-69 from being a toll road, "it would appropriate hundreds of millions of dollars to a project that many of my constituents think is a boondoggle," Pierce said.
House Republican Minority Leader Brian Bosma said that he, too, supports building I-69.
But Bosma, R-Indianapolis, protested that under House rules, an appropriation cannot be amended into legislation that is not already an appropriations bill. And Senate Bill 105 is not, he said.
House leaders conferred for several minutes before Democratic House Speaker Patrick Bauer ruled that Bosma's procedural interpretation was correct, that Stilwell's amendment could not be allowed under House rules. No vote was taken on the amendment and the House moved on to other business.
Stilwell said later that Bauer was "consistent and fair" in ruling against his amendment. "We highlighted the necessity of I-69, hopefully on a clear bipartisan basis," Stilwell said.
Schaefer, of Hoosier Voices for I-69, was pleased that funding is moving forward in the Senate for I-69 and other Major Moves projects. "Even though it was supposedly out of order (in the House), it's always good to hear legislators talk in support of that project and fight for that money," Schaefer said.
If the Legislature appropriates money out of the Major Moves construction fund, groundbreaking on I-69 from Evansville to the Crane Warfare Center could take place in summer 2008, officials have said.