1-1     By:  Chavez (Senate Sponsor - Shapleigh)             H.C.R. No. 137

 1-2           (In the Senate - Received from the House May 16, 1997;

 1-3     May 16, 1997, read first time and referred to Committee on

 1-4     International Relations, Trade, and Technology; May 17, 1997,

 1-5     reported favorably by the following vote:  Yeas 7, Nays 0;

 1-6     May 17, 1997, sent to printer.)

 1-7                         HOUSE CONCURRENT RESOLUTION

 1-8           WHEREAS, With the advent of the North American Free Trade

 1-9     Agreement (NAFTA), Texas roadways have borne the brunt of the 5,000

1-10     to 7,000 trucks that cross between Mexico and Texas daily, carrying

1-11     80 percent of all U.S.  trade with Mexico; and

1-12           WHEREAS, With the total number of border crossings estimated

1-13     at 1.8 million for Texas in 1994 alone, and  expectations of an

1-14     increase to eight million crossings by the year 2000, this

1-15     ever-increasing free trade is imposing an unfair burden not only on

1-16     Texas taxpayers, but on those in the border states of New Mexico,

1-17     Arizona, and California; and

1-18           WHEREAS, Overland trade traffic has not been effectively

1-19     limited to designated NAFTA corridors, and the illegal use of

1-20     county, farm-to-market, and other peripheral roads by overweight

1-21     trade vehicles has caused untold damage to roadways and created

1-22     financial hardships for county and local governments; and

1-23           WHEREAS, The Texas Department of Transportation (TXDoT)

1-24     estimates that damage to the Texas highway system from overweight

1-25     trucks costs $450 million annually and a 1994 study by the Texas

1-26     Transportation Institute found that a truck that weighs 4,000

1-27     pounds over the 80,000 pound limit could effectively shorten the

1-28     40-year lifespan of a highway to eight years; and

1-29           WHEREAS, Of the 4,800 Texas bridges on the NAFTA trade route,

1-30     28 percent currently fail to meet structural standards and if

1-31     Canadian and Mexican weight limits are imposed on the United

1-32     States, the percentage of structurally deficient bridges jumps to

1-33     64 percent; and

1-34           WHEREAS, A recent report by Shiner, Mosely, and Associates on

1-35     infrastructure requirements in the Texas border region estimated

1-36     the cost for all transportation infrastructure needed over the next

1-37     decade to be approximately $3.25 billion; and

1-38           WHEREAS, The Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act

1-39     (ISTEA), authorized by Congress in 1991, provides innovative

1-40     financing options for the construction and improvement of highways,

1-41     but the funds allocated to Texas since the Act's inception have

1-42     only met 33 percent of the state's highway needs; now, therefore,

1-43     be it

1-44           RESOLVED, That the 75th Legislature of the State of Texas

1-45     hereby urge the United States Congress to create a NAFTA Trade

1-46     Impact Fund under the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency

1-47     Act to provide border states and communities with funding for

1-48     transportation infrastructure for the facilitation of free trade

1-49     and NAFTA-generated passenger and commercial traffic; and, be it

1-50     further

1-51           RESOLVED, That the Texas secretary of state forward official

1-52     copies of this resolution to the president of the United States, to

1-53     the speaker of the house of representatives and the president of

1-54     the senate of the United States Congress, and to all members of the

1-55     Texas delegation to the congress with the request that this

1-56     resolution be officially entered in the Congressional Record as a

1-57     memorial to the Congress of the United States of America.

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