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CEC ENVIRONMENTAL NEWS UPDATE – 12/27/02 LOCAL Citizens Force Public Comment Extension Thanks to citizen requests, the Houston-Galveston Area Council has extended the deadline for public comment on amendment 190 of the Transportation Improvement Plan. According to Pat Waskowiak, a spokesperson for the H-GAC Transportation Policy Council, the original Jan. 6 deadline was pushed back to Feb. 5 after citizens complained the amendment and a public hearing to discuss it were not sufficiently publicized. Passage of amendment 190 is needed for the Texas Department of Transportation to begin right-of-way acquisition for several projects including the expansion of the Katy Freeway, the Grand Parkway and the Bolivar bridge, which many environmentalists oppose. Polly Ledvina, an organizer with the Katy Corridor Coalition, a group opposed to the proposed I-10 expansion, said that few people knew about the meeting or the public-comment deadline and none of the residents or citizens' groups which represent affected neighborhoods were directly contacted. Waskowiak said that H-GAC employed the same methods it normally does for publicizing hearings. She said that advertisements were placed in the Houston Chronicle on the two Sundays prior to the meeting. The meeting was also announced on H-GAC's transportation web site. She said that, in response to the complaints, H-GAC would place new advertisements to announce the extension of the deadline and would mail notices to people who attended the meeting. She said that H-GAC denied citizens' request to hold another meeting. "We feel that what we are doing to re-publicize the amendment is sufficient," Waskowiak said. "Holding another meeting would just be going over the same issues again and again." Citizens were also denied their request to “unbundle” the amendment which, if passed, would grant approval for right-of-way acquisition of several major projects at once. H-GAC published the entire amendment on their web site - not a common practice according to Waskowiak. "Because there were so many questions about amendment 190, we've decided to publish the entire document on the website," she said. The amendment and notification of the deadline extension can be viewed at www.hgac.cog.tx.us/transporation/. To add your voice to the debate, send written comment to Pat Waskowiak at pwaskowiak@hgac.cog.tx.us or c/o H-GAC, P.O. Box 22777, Houston, TX 77227. ABOUT THIS PUBLICATION CEC Environmental News Update is a weekly publication by the Citizens' Environmental Coalition, a 501(c)3 dedicated to fostering dialogue, education and collaboration about environmental issues in the Houston-Gulf Coast Region. Visit the CEC online at www.cechouston.org. To subscribe or unsubscribe, or to suggest items for inclusion, send your request via e-mail to Sarah Doss at sarah@cechouston.org. |
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