WYLIE — As a disabled veteran, Jeff Gudgeon feels he has paid enough. He says spending money on highway tolls is a cost he shouldn’t have to pay.
“It kind of gets to you,” Gudgeon said.
Thousands of disabled veterans in Texas get to drive toll roads for free — but not in North Texas.
In September, the Texas Legislature passed a law giving toll road operators the choice to waive fees to disabled vets.
Three months later, Houston’s major toll road operator, Harris County Toll Road Authority, adopted the idea.
Any driver with a specialty license plate showing they’re a disabled veteran, Purple Heart or Congressional Medal of Honor recipient will not be charged on its 119 miles of highway.
The North Texas Tollway Authority hasn’t yet embraced the idea.
“Why in North Texas we're getting dinged and charged tolls, but in South Texas we're not?” Gudgeon asked. “It’s just not fair.”
The Wylie father was badly injured in an industrial accident while serving in the Coast Guard in 1999.
The NTTA says it can’t waive tolls because of contractual agreements with its bondholders who helped pay for the highways.
The agency estimates there are nearly 21,000 disabled veterans in North Texas; giving them a free ride would cost the agency nearly $3 million a year, officials say.
“We would have to get that reimbursed by either the Texas Legislature or some other source,” said NTTA spokeswoman Sherita Coffelt. “We have a certain fiduciary responsibility to our bondholders; we can't break that. However, if we’re able to locate a funding source, we'll definitely, we'll definitely be recommending this to our board.”
Houston’s toll operator says waiving the fees was an easy decision for its leaders.
“It was a way of doing something to give back to them (veterans),” said Harris County Toll Road Authority spokesman Eric Hanson. “It’s to say 'thank you' to our veterans.”
Houston's toll authority estimates it is losing about $80,000 a month on the program, assuming those veterans would have used its highways if they had to pay the tolls.
In North Texas, Jeff Gudgeon spends nearly $40 month on tolls. Waiving that cost is not only appropriate, he says, but deserved.
“It just comes down to what’s right — simple as that.”
E-mail jbetz@wfaa.com
