Advocacy Alerts

Send an email message in support of these issues in as little as two minutes:

Advocacy:

Paseo Bridge Bike/Ped Access: MoDOT is building a new quarter billion dollar bridge in the heart of Kansas City. It could provide the first safe bicycle/pedestrian crossing of the Missouri River near downtown Kansas City. We've been working on this for years and now it's going to move or die forever in the next month or so.

Advocacy:

Hwy 45 Bike/Ped Access: MoDOT is building a new highway through Parkville, Missouri. Guess what--their plans for accommodating bicycling and walking are inadequate, plus they forgot to include any funding for them.

Advocacy:

Bicycling License Plate: Many other states have 'Share the Road with Bicycles' license plates. Why not Missouri, too? In 1 minute you can show your support.

An article in today's St. Joseph News-Press reports on the progress on TEA-21 re-authorization. TEA-21 and its predecessor, ISTEA, have been the main federal funding vehicle for bicycle- and pedestrian-related transportation improvements over the past 10 years or so. Projects include such things as bike/hike trails and comprehensive bicycle transportation plans such as BikeKC, recently passed by Kansas City, MO.

Last year, Missourians paid $757 million in federal fuel taxes and Missouri received only $592 million back. The article explains the reasoning behind the funding formula that makes some states "donor states" and others "recipient states".

According to the article, Missouri Senator Kit Bond "with his 16 years of seniority, serves on the Committee on Environment and Public Works, along with the Transportation and Infrastructure Subcommittee, with a chance to play a prominent role in drafting the legislation". (However, with the recent changes in the senate, Mr. Bond may be pegged to chair a different committee.)

Missouri Congressman Sam Graves (6th district, St. Joseph area, Republican) is on the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.

Both would be key players in the TEA-21 re-authorization, and need to hear regularly from Missourians who support bicycle, pedestrian, and mass transit initiatives (click on legislators' names, above, to visit a page with info about how to contact them).

Bob Foster of the Missouri Bicycle Federation is particularly interested in finding any cyclists or cycle-related businesses who have worked with Senator Bond in the past. Read Bob's article to the STLBikeFed email list.

Read the complete St. Joseph News-Press article here.

Related:

News: Federal Complete Streets Amendment offered--your support needed

AdvocacyAlerts-Senator Kit Bond to tour Missouri discussing transportation issues

permanent link to article: "Missouri senator & congressman poised to influence TEA-21 re-authorization"
posted by Brent Hugh at 11/16/2002 10:34:00 AM |comment on this article