GOP lawmakers want to take money from several different sources and spend it on road, highway, bridge and port projects. What they don’t want to spend it on is high-speed rail.
“We’re done with that. We’re over that,” says Assembly Republican Leader Connie Conway (R-Tulare), whose proposal would ask voters to scrap high-speed rail and put the money towards infrastructure instead.
“The taxpayers are now stuck with a huge bill, the governor’s folks even keep raising up the estimation of what that’s gonna cost, and here we are today and nothing’s been done," Conway says.
The proposal would set aside $11 billion in one-time funds – mostly from voter-approved high-speed rail bonds – and $2.4 billion each year in Proposition 42 gas tax revenues. Republicans say their plan would create more than 100,000 jobs.
Governor Jerry Brown's administration says canceling the high-speed rail project would cost the state $3 billion in federal funds – and cost the Central Valley thousands of jobs.
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