More toll trouble tonight, this time the tough talk is coming from Grand Island residents. They want to see the tolls removed entirely from the Grand Island bridges. This comes amid the debate over if, and how much, the tolls on the NYS Thruway will go up.

Some of the people who live on Grand Island characterize the toll as an "indirect tax" on commuters, something that was supposed to have been eliminated years ago. Mark Kolpenski and his wife drive across the bridge every day for work, but today they decided to walk across it with others in protest of the toll. "As far as I know, these have been paid for, for years. Why should we have to keep paying? Its an unfair tax to commuters."

That's the same question toll activist Rus Thompson has been asking of New York state leaders since the funding for the initial construction of the NYS Thruway was paid off 10 years ago. "I've personally been fighting to get rid of the tolls since 1995. In 1996, when the bonds were paid off, all the tolls were supposed to be removed from the Thruway. The legislation passed, all the tolls are still here."

But the toll barriers were shut down at I-190 at South Ogden in Buffalo last year. That's something advocate Carl Paladino says could happen for Grand Island. "We're here to encourage the people of Western New York that they can get up and they can be heard and they can encourage their elected officials to do something about the inequities that we suffer at the hands of Albany."

State Senator Antoine Thompson said, "There's a bill that's in the assembly and there's a bill that's in the senate that I co-sponsored, and we just gotta keep pushing along."

Part of that push involves a petition handed to Senator Thompson today by the protestors. Over 7,000 signatures signed by people who want to get rid of the Grand Island bridge toll. Kolpenski said, "Its money out of my pocket to go anywhere off of Grand Island."

The protestors today sent a letter to Governor Spitzer, asking him to come to Niagara Falls to hold a meeting on the toll issue. They will continue to hold protest events and meeting, like the one today, and they are looking into possible legal action.