Sixteen years ago this month, our organization, CARR, began
presenting reasonable, practical alternatives to INDOT’s highly
destructive and wasteful proposal for a new terrain I-69. Since then,
for 16 years, we have experienced firsthand how INDOT has ignored
virtually all citizen input and has violated the spirit and the letter
of the law. After nearly 140,000 petition signatures in opposition,
numerous proposals for alternative routes, stern rebukes by state and
federal agencies, resolutions in opposition and tens of thousands of
negative comments by concerned citizens we have the same basic proposal
today as we did in 1990, only made worse by the Governor’s edict that
it be a toll road.
In a democracy, the voice of the people is supposed to matter,
their ideas are welcomed in deciding public policy. There has never
been an outcry against an INDOT project as loud, as reasoned and as
passionate as that heard against the proposed new-terrain I-69. Turning
the project into a hated toll road has raised the protests to a
deafening roar. Yet, INDOT continues to acts as if there is no one out
here, that we don’t matter. Our pleas for a democratic process are met
with contempt, scorn and sham studies.
This arrogant, out of control agency, drunk on its own power,
is running amok over citizen’s rights. Their studies, built of shoddy
science, are of less of value than what comes out of the back end of
the cows that pasture on the land it wants to destroy with I-69.
At least what the cows leave will fertilize a field; INDOT’s studies
are little more than embarrassing stink bombs. Nothing that comes out
of that agency can be trusted. Gov Daniels himself said when he came
into office that INDOT was the worst run agency in the state. Under his
administration it has only gotten worse. With I-69 NAFTA superhighway
toll road banners stuck in their ears, INDOT and the Governor march
sternly forward, ignoring the thoughtful warnings of concerned citizens
and independent analyses.
Policy makers and citizens need objective, unbiased studies to
help them determine if a proposed project is worthwhile. INDOT has
failed miserable to fulfill its obligation to provide those studies.
With blatant abuse of its power it decides what it wants to do, usually
based on political agendas, then it cherry picks and misrepresents data
to justify its predetermined conclusions. With disregard for citizens’
rights to know the truth it has violated every principal of independent
analysis and federal law.
The FHWA, which is supposed to provide oversight of INDOT to
insure they are doing things right, is nothing more than a rubber stamp
for whatever ill-conceived plan INDOT comes up with.
Enough is enough. The citizens of this state deserve better
treatment. We are asking the courts to require that INDOT perform
honest studies and unbiased analysis, studies which we can trust and
use to make good decisions. That is why our organization, CARR, has
joined this lawsuit. We ask that INDOT be made to perform their job
correctly, to follow proper procedures. We are simply asking that the
truth be told. INDOT and FHWA are properly the servants of the citizens
of this state not henchmen who enforce politically dictated orders that
waste our precious farmland, condemn our homes and properties, destroy
established businesses, waste our tax dollars and deny our democratic
rights.
We are asking the courts for relief from INDOT’s illegal,
irrational behavior; we are asking the citizens of this state for help
in rescuing our democracy from this contemptuously dictatorial process.
Whatever the outcome of this review, we are in this for the long haul.
We will not rest until the politically puffed-up bag of hot air that is
I-69 is tested against the scalpel of intellectual honesty.
Thomas Tokarski
CARR President
