WASHINGTON - Members of the Pennsylvania Congressional Delegation gathered on Capitol Hil today to discuss how the Federal Highway Administration plans to evaluate a new application to impose tolls on Interstate 80.

“I used the opportunity to make sure FHWA Administrator Victor Mendez is aware of my staunch opposition to this proposal,” said U.S. Representative Glenn Thompson, R-5 of Howard. Thompson also delivered to Mendez, a three-inch thick binder of press articles from the state on the differing opinions and the recent scandals surrounding the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission, who, if the application is approved, would manage and toll I-80.

Representatives Thompson, Kathy Dahlkemper, Paul Kanjorski and Chris Carney on November 3rd invited Administrator Mendez to meet with the delegation to explain the complicated process of evaluating the Turnpike’s application. The FHWA has turned down the state’s two previous applications.

Seven members of the 19-member delegation attended the meeting. They were Representatives Thompson, Dahlkemper, Kanjorski, Carney, Jim Gerlach, Bob Brady and Bill Shuster.

Mendez told the group: “We are not predisposed to one decision over another," according to a statement released by Thompson's office. "Our intent is to follow the law the U.S. Congress put in front of us.”

The Administrator was asked if he had a timetable for a decision, he responded: “We don’t have a projected time frame. We must meet the intent of the law and the details. I have instructed our teams to expedite but to be deliberate. Don’t push too quickly and get the wrong answer.”

One of Mendez’s policy advisors explained that the application must show that “the only way the state could reconstruct or rehabilitate was through tolling.”

Kanjorski told Mendez that he did not think the state had exhausted all other possibilities.

Thompson will be keeping an open dialogue with the FHWA as this process moves forward. “Today’s meeting has only cracked the surface of this debate,” said Thompson.