One senator’s last-minute amendment saved I-10 expansion funding from advancing in the Legislature as a bill this session. The I-10 expansion is a project important to a handful of legislators, but every time it seems like the funding is secured, there’s a new bump in the road. || Photo courtesy of Arizona Department of Transportation
By Camryn Sanchez || The Arizona Capitol Times
One senator’s last-minute amendment saved I-10 expansion funding from making it through the Legislature as a bill this session.
The I-10 expansion is a project near and dear to a handful of legislators, but every time it seems like the funding is secured, there’s a new bump in the road.
Last session, the Legislature passed a bill to secure about half of the funding needed for the I-10 expansion, with the hope – and assumption – that the state could get the rest of the money through a federal grant.
However, in the interim between sessions, the federal government rejected Arizona’s grant application in favor of other projects. This session, Sen. T.J. Shope, R-Coolidge, and Rep. Theresa Martinez, R-Casa Grande, filed identical “mirror” bills that would require the state to pay the rest of the $360 million in funding if the federal government won’t.
Shope’s bill passed the Senate unanimously, but Martinez couldn’t get her bill passed in the House Transportation Committee by Chairman Rep. David Cook, R-Globe.
Cook had a bill important to his district dealing with health insurance claim denials, which was assigned to Sen. Jake Hoffman, R-Queen Creek’s Senate Government Committee, but Hoffman did not hear the bill.
Shope’s I-10 widening bill came to Cook’s House Transportation Committee and Cook tried to amend it to strike out the I-10 widening language and put the language for his health insurance bill on there, but that effort was blocked by Democrats and Martinez, who is the vice chair of Cook’s committee.
