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IDOT: Stimulus Bill "Not Our Salvation"
The short story from the Illinois Department of Transportation is don't get too excited about state road projects under the federal government’s stimulus package.

The nearly 700 (m) million dollars worth of projects will begin earlier than without the stimulus bill, but the state's new transportation secretary says the bill is "really not our salvation" - much less than a normal year's worth of projects.

"It's going to do some good, but probably the expectations we had from Washington are much higher than we're really going to see," says newly-installed IDOT Secretary Gary Hannig, a longtime state representative from Litchfield. "We're seeing more frustration than we are people who are excited about it."

Hannig made a familiar pitch: that lawmakers and the Governor must work out a roads-and-buildings construction plan.

"Sometime about mid-March we will post a bulletin advertising the contracts, and on April 3rd we will open those bids," says Christine Reed, IDOT's director of highways.

Hannig and other IDOT leaders spoke Wednesday to the House Appropriations for Public Safety Committee.

www.dot.state.il.us/stimulus/April_Letting_List_With_Letter.pdf

(Illinois Radio Network)
03 05 09 by Newsroom
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