[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 67 (Friday, May 22, 1998)]
[Senate]
[Page S5403]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                                 ISTEA

  Mr. WARNER. Equity for the donor States. ``Donor States'' is a 
category created by ISTEA I. We never actually heard that term prior to 
ISTEA I. But generally speaking, what it represented was as a 
consequence of ISTEA I, a group of States, about 18 to 20 in number. 
Some were right on the borderline. Those States, when their citizens or 
visitors in those States went to the gas pump and paid this very 
significant Federal gas tax, those 19 States got back a very small 
amount in comparison to other States whose return, as a consequence of 
ISTEA, was far higher.

  My State got 79 cents on what we called the apportion dollar that 
comes back from the highway trust fund; other States had equally. 
Several had less than my State. And that was basically an unfairness to 
the citizens of that State, that those moneys that they expended in a 
Federal tax, and which was represented as to be for the purpose of 
highways, did not come back in what I believe was a fair formula.
  So the foundation in this bill was to change that inequity such that 
that class of donor States received no less than 90.5 percent.
  Mr. REID. Would my friend yield for a unanimous consent request?
  Mr. WARNER. Yes.
  Mr. REID. I appreciate it very much. I am sorry to interrupt.

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