DALLAS (AP) _ At least $46 million in revenue from red-light camera tickets, intended to help fund trauma centers across Texas, instead sits in Austin as lawmakers use it to back certification of a balanced state budget.
The Texas Constitution requires a balanced budget of the biennial Legislature, and Texas lawmakers withheld a record $4.1 billion generated by earmarked taxes and fees in their 2010 session.
The Dallas Morning News reports that has interrupted the steady stream of state funding for trauma systems that the American College of Surgeons said in a 2010 analysis is necessary to meet growing needs.
That’s not the end of the worries John McWhorter foresees. The president of Baylor University Medical Center at Dallas says there is the fear that proceeds won’t ever reach the trauma rooms.
(Copyright 2012 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)