Let's cut the red tape

The feds are apparently abandoning the Gulf Coast yet again. Gulf Coast transportation officials have complained that restoration of hurricane-damaged highways and bridges will come to a halt before the end of the year unless Congress provides 100 million dollars to replenish an emergency federal highway fund. Louisiana Transportation Secretary Johnny Bradberry told a House transportation panel that his state is spending almost one million dollars a day, but so far has received only five million in federal reimbursements. Meanwhile, in Mississippi, Wayne H. Brown, the southern district commissioner for the Mississippi Department of Transportation, told a congressional committee that if federal aid does not come quickly, the state would have to choose between stopping work on regular highway maintenance projects and delaying critical repairs to U.S. 90. It's time to cut the red tape and come to the aid of infrastructure projects in the battered Gulf Coast. Your comment?