By Chavez                                            H.C.R. No. 137

                             HOUSE CONCURRENT RESOLUTION

 1-1           WHEREAS, With the advent of the North American Free Trade

 1-2     Agreement (NAFTA), Texas roadways have borne the brunt of the 5,000

 1-3     to 7,000 trucks that cross between Mexico and Texas daily, carrying

 1-4     80 percent of all U.S.  trade with Mexico; and

 1-5           WHEREAS, With the total number of border crossings estimated

 1-6     at 1.8 million for Texas in 1994 alone, and  expectations of an

 1-7     increase to eight million crossings by the year 2000, this

 1-8     ever-increasing free trade is imposing an unfair burden not only on

 1-9     Texas taxpayers, but on those in the border states of New Mexico,

1-10     Arizona, and California; and

1-11           WHEREAS, Overland trade traffic has not been effectively

1-12     limited to designated NAFTA corridors, and the illegal use of

1-13     county, farm-to-market, and other peripheral roads by overweight

1-14     trade vehicles has caused untold damage to roadways and created

1-15     financial hardships for county and local governments; and

1-16           WHEREAS, The Texas Department of Transportation (TXDoT)

1-17     estimates that damage to the Texas highway system from overweight

1-18     trucks costs $450 million annually and a 1994 study by the Texas

1-19     Transportation Institute found that a truck that weighs 4,000

1-20     pounds over the 80,000 pound limit could effectively shorten the

1-21     40-year lifespan of a highway to eight years; and

1-22           WHEREAS, Of the 4,800 Texas bridges on the NAFTA trade route,

1-23     28 percent currently fail to meet structural standards and if

1-24     Canadian and Mexican weight limits are imposed on the United

 2-1     States, the percentage of structurally deficient bridges jumps to

 2-2     64 percent; and

 2-3           WHEREAS, A recent report by Shiner, Mosely, and Associates on

 2-4     infrastructure requirements in the Texas border region estimated

 2-5     the cost for all transportation infrastructure needed over the next

 2-6     decade to be approximately $3.25 billion; and

 2-7           WHEREAS, The Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act

 2-8     (ISTEA), authorized by Congress in 1991, provides innovative

 2-9     financing options for the construction and improvement of highways,

2-10     but the funds allocated to Texas since the Act's inception have

2-11     only met 33 percent of the state's highway needs; now, therefore,

2-12     be it

2-13           RESOLVED, That the 75th Legislature of the State of Texas

2-14     hereby urge the United States Congress to create a NAFTA Trade

2-15     Impact Fund under the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency

2-16     Act to provide border states and communities with funding for

2-17     transportation infrastructure for the facilitation of free trade

2-18     and NAFTA-generated passenger and commercial traffic; and, be it

2-19     further

2-20           RESOLVED, That the Texas secretary of state forward official

2-21     copies of this resolution to the president of the United States, to

2-22     the speaker of the house of representatives and the president of

2-23     the senate of the United States Congress, and to all members of the

2-24     Texas delegation to the congress with the request that this

2-25     resolution be officially entered in the Congressional Record as a

2-26     memorial to the Congress of the United States of America.