Frasure Denies Influence On Road Project Solution

The one-session chairman of the state Senate Transportation Committee is defending himself against charges he engineered local endorsement of a Pocatello area road project to benefit the area where he lives and not the entire community.

“That’s a cheap shot,” Pocatello Republican Evan Frasure said.

Frasure denies exerting any undue influence on the local elected and appointed officials who backed his proposal for a new interchange connecting Interstate 15 and Chubbuck Road even though three advisory groups rated two other approaches as better ways to ease local traffic congestion.

But the third-term lawmaker, who took over the Senate committee when its former chairman joined the Batt administration a month into the session, does not deny he wields some influence in his new position.

That was exactly the view that citizens advisory committee member Ray Wright resigned last week after the Bannock Planning Organization policy board backed Frasure’s multimillion-dollar solution over those recommended by his panel, a technical advisory panel and a transportation study team.

Congress provided $10 million in the late 1980s to solve traffic problems in the area, but there has never been a decision on how to do it until now. And the preferred approach by the policy board made up primarily of mayors and council members is the $21 million Chubbuck interchange favored by Frasure.

One of the alternatives rated more favorably by the advisory groups was a $12.8 million improvement of the existing Pocatello Creek interchange.

Frasure’s critics have complained he has backed the new interchange because it would provide the biggest benefit to the area where he lives.