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TIBERI DISAPPOINTED CHERRY VALLEY ROAD INTERCHANGE NOT STIMULUS RECIPIENT
Strickland Releases List of Transportation Projects To Receive Federal Stimulus Funding
Washington,
Mar 26, 2009 -
U.S. Congressman Pat Tiberi (R-OH) today expressed his disappointment that the Cherry Valley Road Interchange Improvement Project was not listed as one of the Governor’s selections to receive federal economic stimulus funding. Ohio was awarded federal transportation funds totaling $774 million from H.R.1, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
“I am sorely disappointed that the Cherry Valley Road Interchange will not receive stimulus funding,” said Congressman Tiberi, a long-time advocate of the project. “I did everything I could to let the Strickland Administration know improvements at the Cherry Valley Road Interchange should be a high priority. Licking County has a community-wide, non-political process for determining the county’s priorities, and Cherry Valley Road was at the top of their list. It’s extremely disappointing that this system and the priority-setting done at the local level was not recognized by Governor Strickland and the Ohio Department of Transportation.”
In 2005, Congressman Tiberi secured a $1.8 million in federal funding to complete an environmental study and preliminary engineering work to improve the interchange. Unfortunately, the Ohio Department of Transportation has refused to allocate the funding for this project.
“A lot of people have been working hard to see the interchange improvement becomes a reality. They know it’s not just a major bottleneck in Licking County, but improvement is necessary to insure the safety of Ohio drivers. The improvements would help ease traffic flow between Columbus and Pittsburgh spurring economic growth all along Route 16. I did all I could as a representative to the U.S. Congress to encourage Governor Strickland to use stimulus money to continue the improvements at the Cherry Valley Road Interchange, unfortunately that didn’t happen. I am told there were factors that went in to making these decisions, but we ultimately don’t know how these decisions were made and I’m concerned about the lack of transparency in the entire process. I will continue to work with local leaders and do what I can to keep this project moving forward,” Congressman Tiberi added.
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