News and Blog - Page 58 of 78 - Transportation For America

Wyoming voters reward elected leaders for raising transportation revenue

https://www.flickr.com/photos/drdad/5107307120/in/photolist-8Mjhtj-djKJmK-djKJCZ-frRDBW-2gqWbk-dKq93k-2dTd-2nPrc-94dgY4-94gmF5-afwTLe-94gkxQ-as5kRp-as7uQN-6Vczp8-dxzjRd-2q6k3u-6yPwoC-94dfYr-bFffEk-4gF27-AgxzE-fWRoFa-as4Swc-22X5LK-SAmcE-ftd8Gq-fsXrJp-mhzNh-232KYE-2Yc8Jb-o8eomT-gMLys-2Y7wu2-a1zsHi-5Basgj-feQk2k-dxHED-fLSPfm-85iraX-8F9XiL-7G3DmM-7G3DoB-7G7zV1-o6mepJ-o8h9zP-nP2Fsy-2QJ3vc-85myTb-cKvdW1

In February of 2013, Wyoming’s state legislature decided to stabilize their state’s transportation fund by passing a ten-cent increase to their gas tax, which is expected to raise an additional $72 million per year for state and local roads. On Tuesday, those elected leaders faced their first primary election since their vote to raise the gas tax by ten cents, which went into effect a few weeks ago on July 1st.

HB 69 passed the House by a vote of 35-24, with 30 Republicans and 5 Democrats voting in favor. In the Senate, the bill passed by a vote of 18-12, with 14 Republicans and 4 Democrats supporting the measure. (Wyoming has a relatively small state legislature with only ninety total members in the Senate and the House — compared to a state like New Hampshire, which has 409.)

Wyoming highway Flickr photo by remster_9

Of the 30 total House and Senate Republicans running for re-election this week that voted yes on the gas tax increase, just 15 were challenged by a primary contender. This may indicate that Wyomans by and large support the position and leadership that these leaders took on the state’s transportation funding. Only two of the 15 supportive Republicans facing a primary opponent lost their races: Dave Blevins (R-Park County) and Kathy Coleman (R-Sheridan County). All six supportive House and Senate Democrats running for re-election won their uncontested primaries.

Based on the primary results, 94.4% of all Wyoming legislators who supported the measure and are running for re-election have won support from their constituents in their primary elections.

It certainly didn’t hurt that the legislation also had Republican Governor Matt Mead’s full support and endorsement:

“Every part of Wyoming’s economy relies on an effective, well-maintained and continually improved highway system. Wyoming Department of Transportation’s projects are planned years into the future – good planning, reasonable costs and effective management can only be achieved through reliable, long term funding.”

Considering that long-term funding certainty is the last thing coming from Washington, D.C right now, this type of teamwork between the Governor and the state legislature helped provide Wyoming certainty for planning and investing in priority projects, including $35.5 million of much needed highway and bridge maintenance and repair throughout the state.

In an environment where Congress is unable to find a stable long-term funding solution for the nation’s Highway Trust Fund, more and more states are taking it upon themselves to fill the gaps and raise additional revenue to provide some stability and invest in much needed capital construction and maintenance projects.

Even though several recent polls seem to suggest that the American public is opposed to raising transportation related taxes, recent state primary election returns from Maryland, Virginia, Pennsylvania and now Wyoming tell a different story. In those states that approved a gas tax increase, at least 93% of the representatives backing a tax increase won their primary or kept their seat.

You can read our recent analyses on Maryland, Virginia, and Pennsylvania, here. Stay tuned for Massachusetts, Vermont and New Hampshire in the coming weeks.

Congress postpones insolvency, but uncertainty still plagues the Highway Trust Fund’s future

The last-minute patch to the Highway Trust Fund that Congress enacted on the way out the door last week delayed immediate insolvency, but it hardly ends the uncertainty for states or addresses our nation’s long-term prospects.

The House ultimately won the debate with the Senate over the length and funding source for the patch, using the controversial gimmick known as “pension smoothing” and temporarily postponing insolvency until next May. The Senate had passed a patch earlier in the week with enough money (but no pension smoothing) to carry the fund to the end of the year, which could have set the stage for a long-term solution in the lame-duck session.

“Congress is rapidly running out of last-minute budget gimmicks to patch holes in America’s key infrastructure fund, and must immediately begin the task of replacing pretend dollars with the real money necessary to continue to call ourselves a first-world nation,” said James Corless, T4America’s director, in our full statement released after final passage in the Senate. “In truth, they have bought themselves only a few short months to grapple with an issue they have delayed for years.”

Without this patch, the U.S. Department of Transportation was just days away from beginning to slash reimbursements to states for their current projects. However, with only ten months of full funding promised — if it stretches that far — some states are still shelving projects. Take, Tennessee, for example:

“Because of the uncertainty concerning the future of the Highway Trust Fund, the department took a conservative approach with the projects in this year’s three year transportation improvement program,” said Tennessee Department of Transportation’s Jennifer Flynn in a story yesterday about projects still being delayed there, despite last week’s action. “The most recent program included no new construction starts, and there were many projects throughout the state that did not move forward based on available funding.”

Department of Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx has been pushing Congress for a long-term funding solution almost since his tenure began as Secretary.

“The good news is that Congress has avoided bankrupting the Highway Trust Fund,” Secretary Foxx said in his news release following the vote. “The bad news is that there is still no long-term certainty, and this latest Band-Aid expires right as the next construction season begins.”

So what happens next? Assuming Congress punts on the issue during the lame-duck period, a lot could be determined by the political makeup of the next Congress May, as well as other big issues early in the next Congress, including raising the debt ceiling again.

Last week, Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) found 28 fellow Republicans who would vote to defund the nation’s transportation system except for a small Interstate maintenance fund, and leave it to states to make up for the lost funding.

It would be a massive hole to fill for states and localities. Many already are struggling to raise additional revenue to make ends meet while Congress continues kicking the can down the road. Would they have the ability or political will to raise the equivalent of millions (or billions) in lost federal revenue? And what would happen to our country if the feds walked away from the national interest in our transportation system that spans multiple modes, state borders and moves goods and people across jurisdictional boundaries every day?

Other GOP members appeared to have grave doubts about such a strategy, and instead argued forcefully for shoring up the program for the long haul.

We believe most Americans would prefer to see our nation continue to make first-world levels of investment in our infrastructure – particularly if more of it comes to their communities to solve their local issues and address their priorities. That’s why we’re fighting for a long-term funding solution that gives local communities more resources and latitude, while ensuring that our bridges, roads and transit networks remain strong and safe across the nation.

T4America statement in response to Senate adoption of stopgap to avoid Highway Trust Fund insolvency

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Senate today approved a House-passed measure to transfer $10.8 billion from the general fund to cover the looming shortfall in the Highway Trust Fund until next spring. The stopgap bill, which now heads to President Obama’s desk, comes one day before a deadline to avoid significant funding cuts during the height of construction season.

James Corless, director of Transportation for America, issued this statement in response:

“We are relieved that thousands of communities, more than a half-million workers and their families, and millions of commuters will be spared the pain of drastic cuts in promised federal funding to build and repair our bridges, roads and transit systems.

That said, Congress is rapidly running out of last-minute budget gimmicks to patch holes in America’s key infrastructure fund, and must immediately begin the task of replacing pretend dollars with the real money necessary to continue to call ourselves a first-world nation. Perhaps the most important outcome of this go-round is that members of both parties, in both chambers, have voiced a growing discomfort with hastily crafted, short-term fixes along with a desire to find a long-term funding solution.

In truth, they have bought themselves only a few short months to grapple with an issue they have delayed for years. We look forward to working with leaders in both houses as they make good on their promise to work in earnest on a long-term solution to fund the infrastructure our economy and daily lives depend on.”

Massachusetts is attempting to lead the way on a performance-based system for selecting transportation projects.

Last year, The Commonwealth of Massachusetts passed a landmark bill to fund urgently needed statewide transportation investments over the coming years. But how will the state ensure that those dollars go where they’re needed most and can have the greatest impact? Advocates, state officials and other stakeholders in Massachusetts are in the midst of figuring that out.

To support and encourage them in pioneering a more inclusive, sophisticated approach to picking projects, we partnered with Transportation for Massachusetts this month on a conference in Boston called “Measuring Up: Getting More Bang for the Buck in Transportation Project Selection.” More on the event in a moment, but first a bit more context.

Why institute a process for picking better transportation projects in the first place? With public confidence in the process at alarmingly low levels, it’s more important than ever to quantify the public benefits and let voters know what their money is going to buy — especially when attempts are being made to raise new money for transportation to fill the gap.

Massachusetts’ 2013 funding bill established a new council to develop criteria for selecting projects, with the purpose of ensuring that new state funding will go to the most deserving projects across the commonwealth, not the ones that have simply been in the pipeline the longest.

That panel, the Massachusetts Project Selection Advisory Council (PSAC), has been hard at work gathering public input for their report of recommendations to the legislature. The Measuring Up event brought together members of the PSAC, transportation planners, local leaders and advocates to discuss criteria for evaluating the priorities the PSAC has identified: improving safety, lowering congestion, and helping connect workers to their jobs. Their report of recommendations is due by December 31st.

The keynote speaker, Massachusetts’s Secretary of Transportation, Richard Davey, noted his department had set a goal — known as Mode Shift — to increase walking, transit and biking trips by one-third by 2030. Realizing that goal “will require a strategic approach to project selection,” said Davey. “We just can’t do what we’ve always done.”

“We are honored to convene a group that will tackle this challenge and help balance regional priorities with transportation, environmental, economic, and social concerns,” said Kristina Egan, director of Transportation for Massachusetts. “With limited resources but knowing that transportation investments must last for generations, we have to make smart choices.”

Transportation for America is proud to support this kind of work at the state level that will improve accountability for our transportation dollars and help drive and fund transportation and infrastructure projects based on performance and data.

If you would like to know more about what PSAC has accomplished since they have started working, we have listed some resources below including a handout (pdf) and powerpoint presentation (pdf).

Senate passes plan to postpone transportation insolvency to the end of the year, sends it to House

Late Tuesday evening, the Senate modified and approved a measure transferring about $8 billion from the general fund to keep the Highway Trust Fund solvent until the end of the year. But because two amendments were made, it’ll return to the House for further action before any final deal can be approved on postponing insolvency of the nation’s transportation program. The House will have to act fast: the long August recess is scheduled to begin in just three days.

Conventional wisdom had held that the Senate would adopt the House-passed bill as-is so they could finish up well before recess begins later this week. However, a strong bipartisan group supported amendments to eliminate the most controversial accounting gimmick and cut the length of the patch in half to keep the pressure on to find a long-term fix as soon as possible.

“Today’s votes held some positive signs for the future of our nation’s transportation system,” said James Corless in T4Amercia’s full statement after the vote tonight. “The Senate overwhelmingly rejected a move to dismantle our key infrastructure fund, and instead challenged themselves to take up a long-term funding solution this year.”

Two of the four amendments considered were approved before the final bill was passed. The first, from Senators Wyden and Hatch and approved 71-26, replaced the House revenue sources with the bipartisan ones agreed to by the Senate Finance Committee several weeks ago.

Once this first amendment passed, guaranteeing that the bill would return to the House, it might have made it easier for Senators on the fence to support the second amendment. That second amendment, from Senators Carper, Corker and Boxer, entirely eliminated the controversial “pension smoothing” provisions from the House bill, cutting about $2.9 billion from the patch and keeping up the urgency on finding a long-term funding solution.

The most passionate speech of the day came from Senator Bob Corker on that very topic. Senator Corker, who is also pushing an actual long-term funding plan with Senator Murphy to raise the gas tax — was incredulous at the idea that the Senate and specifically his Republican colleagues would support a plan to take ten years of funds from an accounting maneuver like pension smoothing to pay for ten months of an extension, calling it “generational theft.”

“We’re taking a finance gimmick out of this bill. … It forces us to deal with a long-term solution, which we should have done a long time ago,” he said.

An amendment from Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) to dramatically defund the federal program by cutting the gas tax from 18.4 to 3.7 cents failed overwhelmingly, drawing only 28 votes. Lee argued, correctly, that the existing program is out-moded and fails to give local communities the resources and latitude to meet their needs, but we — and a large majority of the Senate, clearly— strongly disagree that the solution is to take the resources away altogether.

The solution — one that we would hope to see as part of any long-term funding discussion — is forward-looking policy reform that gives local leaders more of a say in how the money gets spent. Local results and accountability are what will win and keep support for the program among the American people.

We are pleased to see so many Senators take a principled stand in support of the highway trust fund and an ongoing federal role in supporting our communities and their economic future. We especially recognize the leadership of Senators Wyden, Hatch, Carper, Corker and Boxer in forging their plan and rallying support. We hope this can spur the conversation to find a long-term solution as soon as possible, and we look forward to working with the leaders in both chambers.

Action will move back to the House tomorrow in these last few days before recess begins, so stay tuned.

Senate poised to take up House plan to patch Highway Trust Fund until Spring 2015

Sometime in the coming days the Senate is expected to take up and vote on the House’s bill to postpone the insolvency of the Highway Trust Fund until May of 2015 via an array of accounting maneuvers to cover ten months of transportation funding.

Last week, the House passed Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp’s bill transferring $10.9 billion to the trust fund from various sources, with a large portion coming from an accounting method called “pension smoothing.” This allows employers to defer payments to their employee pension plans; resulting in higher revenues for companies and therefore increasing overall federal tax revenue. It’s a controversial idea, lambasted by conservative political groups and the New York Times alike in advance of last week’s vote.

The Senate will likely be taking up the House’s version of the bill this week and voting on it, though several amendments could also be considered.

Finance Committee Chairman Wyden is expected to offer the alternative version approved by a bipartisan vote of the Senate Finance Committee earlier this month as an amendment. This would improve upon the House-passed bill by providing better revenue options, primarily tighter enforcement of tax laws and extension of certain fees.

Another amendment likely to be introduced by Senators Boxer (D-CA), Carper (D-DE), Corker (R-TN) would reduce the amount generated by some of the accounting maneuvers, essentially cutting the length of the patch and forcing Congress to act on a long-term funding solution before the end of the year.

This amendment would have the positive effect of keeping the pressure on lawmakers, as well as avoiding the potentially disastrous effects of pushing this debate to the months and weeks just before the 2015 construction season begins. (NPR took a look at this perpetual habit of “kicking the can” further down the road in a great piece earlier this week.)

While we commend Congress for reaching a short-term agreement to keep important projects from coming to a complete standstill, all this really accomplishes is postponing the inevitable insolvency for a later day. In the words of the letter sent to Congress this week by U.S. Secretary of Transportation Anthony Foxx and the last 11! USDOT Secretaries:

We are hopeful that Congress appears willing to avert the immediate crisis. But we want to be clear: This bill will not “fix” America’s transportation system. For that, we need a much larger and longer-term investment. On this, all twelve of us agree. Congress’ work will not be over with passage of this bill; they must continue moving forward and develop a long-term solution for our nation’s transportation funding.

We will continue to update as the Senate moves forward this week.

Follow-Up: Maryland pols raise their gas tax, voters respond supportively

While the conventional wisdom is that voting for a tax increase spells doom for a politician, recent evidence from Maryland continues to show that state politicians rarely lose their seats when they vote for a gas tax hike.

Maryland is one of five states that recently raised or modified their gas tax to raise more money to fund transportation and infrastructure projects. (Be sure to read our first post focusing on election returns in Pennsylvania and Virginia following gas tax hikes/changes.) While zero Maryland Republicans voted “yes” for the increase, we found that out of the 80 Democrats who voted yes and ran for re-election, 94% kept their seat in the June 24th primary.

On the other side of the aisle, 12.5% of Republicans lost their seat in the primaries.

Maryland follows the pattern set by Virginia and Pennsylvania that state legislators who vote for a tax increase – especially one specifically to raise money to invest in transportation – don’t face penalties at the polls from voters.

The five incumbents who lost primaries were all Democrats: Shawn Tarrant (D-Baltimore City), Darren Swain (D-Prince George’s County), Keiffer Mitchell Jr. (D-Woodlawn, Catonsville), Melvin Stukes (D-Woodlawn, Catonsville), and Michael Summers (D-Prince George’s County).

While a majority of those losses were theorized to be due to Maryland’s law of redistricting every ten years, some were also due to misconduct allegations, according to news articles about the races. A quick scan of the postmortems on each race doesn’t include any mentions about voting for the gas tax increase.

The Republicans had their own problems of redistricting and misconduct as well; in fact, the gas tax seemed to be a complete non-issue for this primary.

As primaries unfold in states taking up transportation funding, we will continue to update this story with more primary and general election results as they become available. As it stands right now, three states have proven that a state legislator can vote for a gas tax increase for transportation funding without fear of losing his or her job.

Senate, House committees approve short-term rescue of trust fund; long-term solution still needed

The Senate Finance and House Ways and Means committees today each passed similar short-term patches to keep the Highway Trust Fund in the black at least through early 2015. If adopted by the full House and Senate, the move to transfer $10.8 billion to the trust fund will avert immediate disaster, but there’s still heavy work needed to find a long-term funding solution.

Wyden Finance markup

Without this stopgap — if approved — worked out by Chairman Wyden and Chairman Camp and their respective committees, reimbursements to states would have been cut as much as 28 percent starting in just a few weeks, according to the U.S. DOT. But Congress has bought itself only a few months to address the larger problem of long-term solvency.

The House Ways and Means Committee was first to act this morning, marking up their funding patch to keep the trust fund solvent through May 2015 — five months longer than the Senate’s original plan. Senate Finance resumed discussion of its trust fund bail-out this afternoon after making key changes to match the $10.8 billion in the House provision while striking the language specifying an expiration date.

The upshot is that both measures have enough revenue to carry the trust fund into 2015, although Democrats have been pushing to consider a long-term transportation measure before the end of the year. Sen. Tom Carper offered an amendment to reduce the amount of the patch so that it would expire at the end of December, but it was not approved. Overall, the bill passed with just one “no” vote from Senator Carper.

As passed today, the Senate proposal would transfer $9.824 billion in general funds to the Highway Trust Fund, and $1 billion from fund for leaking underground storage tanks. The Senate bill modified some of the many mechanisms of paying this money back from their original proposal, most notably by including the House’s plan for “pension smoothing.”

The real question is how long this revenue cobbled from multiple accounting gimmicks will hold out. May 15 seems optimistic, given how the insolvency point moved sooner and sooner over the course of this year. Last month, the Congressional Budget Office projected we’d need $8 billion just to make it through this year.

Senator Bob Corker (R-TN), who co-introduced a plan to raise the federal gas tax 12 cents over two years, didn’t hide his disappointment in this plan and how Congress is paying for it. “This disgraceful practice of borrowing money to cover a few months of spending and paying for it over a decade is nothing more than generational theft,” he said in this Transport Topics story.

His comments as well as others made today by members of the House and Senate committees could represent a groundswell to find a real long-term funding fix and end the practice of lurching from crisis to crisis. After all, providing funding just for ten months instead of five months doesn’t actually give States the reliability and predictability they need for multi-year contracts and bigger projects — it just ensures that many projects underway or getting started this summer won’t hit the brakes. Think of it this way: States could resurface a road with some confidence, but that multi-year project to replace the deficient old bridge on the same road? Tough to do when you only have funding through May with any certainty.

Even House Transportation Committee Chairman Bill Shuster, who also supports the fix through May, said today, “This bill in no way precludes Congress from continuing to work on addressing a long-term funding solution, and a long-term reauthorization bill remains a top priority for the Transportation Committee.”

“We are pleased that Congress has begun to take the situation seriously and will avoid the economic pain of an insolvent trust fund, at least for the very near term,” said T4America Director James Corless.

“Perhaps the most important outcome is that the debate in both chambers showed a growing discomfort with short-term accounting tricks and a bipartisan desire for a long-term solution. In truth they have only bought themselves a few short months to grapple with an issue they have delayed for years. We look forward to working with Chairman Wyden, Chairman Camp and other leaders as they make good on their promise to work in earnest on a long-term solution to fund the infrastructure our economy and daily lives depend on.”

House proposes a trust fund Band-aid through May, 2015, with key differences from Senate

House Ways and Means Committee Dave Camp (R-MI)

A House proposal to shore up the transportation trust fund through May, 2015, is a good news, not-so-good news proposition.

Late yesterday, House Ways and Means Chairman Dave Camp (R-MI) proposed a $10.8 billion infusion to cover a looming deficit in the Highway Trust Fund. The money for the next few months would come mostly from an accounting maneuver called “pension smoothing” over the next 10 years. The remainder comes from extending some customs fees and transferring $1 billion from the fund for leaking underground storage tanks.

The good news is that both Houses are now moving to take seriously the increasingly urgent warnings of insolvency coming from the Congressional Budget Office and the U.S. Department of Transportation. Absent action to transfer money to the trust fund, the flow of dollars to the states will be curtailed as much as 28 percent after Aug. 1.

The not-so-good news is that the recent hope for a speedy, bicameral solution seems lost for the moment. The House is taking a different tack from the Senate, whose Finance Committee had delayed its own proposal in hopes of negotiation a bipartisan compromise within both chambers. The Camp proposal covers a different time period – through May 31 versus Dec. 31 in the Senate – and uses different “pay-fors”. The differences mean it will be that much harder to reach a solution before the long August recess.

The other less-than-good news is that the proposal to extend into May of next year would reduce the urgency to address a long-term solution, such as the bipartisan Murphy-Corker proposal to raise the gas tax and index it to inflation. By extending only through the end of this year, the Senate deadline raised the possibility that Congress might move immediately after the election, in a lame-duck session where members feel less political pressure.

“While it doesn’t provide as much funding as I would like – enough to get through the end of next year – it does give Congress and the tax-writing Committees ample time to consider a more long-term solution to the Highway Trust Fund,” Camp said in a statement. However, Camp also indicated he is opposed to tapping the most readily available revenue source, the federal gas tax, calling it “just about the worst tax increase Congress could hit hardworking Americans with.”

The House Ways and Means Committee is scheduled to consider the legislation Thursday at 10:00 a.m.

Representative Dina Titus announces bill promoting greater local control at Las Vegas event

At a press conference Monday in Las Vegas, Rep. Dina Titus introduced her constituents to her bipartisan bill to give local communities across the country greater access to federal transportation funds.

The Innovation in Surface Transportation Act (HR 4726) would set aside a share of each state’s federal dollars for competitive grants that will provide local communities greater access to federal transportation funds that they can invest in innovative projects to help boost local economies.

“It’s about local governments, local entities, business, bicycle groups – everybody coming to the table to decide where the dollars should go,” Representative Titus said at the press conference.

At yesterday’s event, Titus stressed that this bill doesn’t require new money — rather, it just helps existing funds get down to the cities, towns and suburbs where most people live and where constituents can hold local officials accountable for how it is spent to ensure their economies thrive.

“It’s intended to empower state stakeholders who are impacted by state transportation investment decisions, but who aren’t at the table right now,” Rep. Titus said.

The legislation is also sponsored by Rep. Rodney Davis (R-IL), who held a similar event last month in Normal, IL.

Local officials Kristin McMillan, president and CEO of the Las Vegas Metro Chamber of Commerce, Clark County Commissioner Chris Giunchigliani, and Las Vegas Councilman Steve Ross all endorsed the proposal and attended the event.

As we’ve said before, competition is one way to ensure that money gets spent on the best projects possible — an appealing prospect for many local leaders.

“Another feature I like of competitive grants is that it levels the playing field for midsized urban areas who often lose funding opportunities to their bigger siblings in a state because DOTs just look at population as a starting point to allocated funds and not project innovation and worthiness,” said Lee Gibson, CEO of the Regional Transportation Commission of Washoe County, which is the metropolitan planning organization (MPO) for Reno, NV.

Reps. Davis and Titus have crafted a bill to help the local leaders and organizations who know the most about their communities decide where a small portion of transportation money should be spent — answering one of the most consistent requests we hear from our coalition of local elected leaders, businesses, and chambers of commerce across the country.

“As a former mayor who speaks frequently with local leaders around the country, I can say with confidence that they are more than willing to compete and be held accountable for results, but they need access to resources to meet their communities’ needs,” said Mayor John Robert Smith, chair of Transportation for America and former Mayor of Meridian, Mississippi. “This bill would take a major step toward restoring funding for local needs that was greatly restricted in the 2012 transportation bill, MAP-21,” Mayor Smith said. “Rep. Davis’s and Rep. Titus’s measure will ensure that those closest to the heart-beat of a community have access and opportunity to make decisions on how transportation dollars should be spent, while promoting innovation and efficiency.”

Members of Congress are hearing from their constituents about this bill, and we expect legislators from both parties to jump on board soon and co-sponsor this important piece of legislation.

Send a letter to your Congressman and join our call for action.

On C-SPAN, T4A’s Beth Osborne finds agreement with Heritage on HTF, walkability

Beth Osborne appearing on C-SPAN July 3, 2014. Click the image or here to watch the full video

Our compatriot Beth Osborne engaged in a spirited discussion on gas taxes and the crashing highway trust fund this morning on C-Span’s Washington Journal. Her co-panelist was Curtis Dubay, taxes and economic policy research fellow at the Heritage Foundation.

Dubay took less of a hard line than have some of his colleagues, who have suggested we could wind down the federal program and make the states take on everything themselves. (As an aside, can you imagine the gory fights in 50 legislatures as they try to raise gas taxes as much as 20 cents a gallon to replace the federal tax, on top of state gas taxes, which some have recently raised? How many legislative sessions would it take, and how many would just punt and let the highways, bridges and transit go to hell?)

As taxes go, Dubay said, the gas tax is a “good one”, because the people who use the resulting system are paying for it. Most people agree that infrastructure in a primary government responsibility. He even agreed a higher tax might be warranted, but only if it is restricted to highway construction.

Dubay complained that the gas tax has been diverted to “non-infrastructure purposes” like subways, ferries and road safety projects that save the lives of pedestrians and bicyclists (and motorists). To which Osborne responded:

Transit is a form of infrastructure. The purpose of the federal program is to move people and goods efficiently, not to require that people move a particular way. From the driver’s perspective it’s just as helpful to get somebody out of their way, particularly [those traveling] short distances. And it can be cheaper to move them outside their cars. … We’re looking for efficiencies and good outcomes in the program. These taxes are being used to move people the way they want to move.

There are lots of good reasons why federal gas tax dollars should be used to build and maintain a truly complete network. Transit projects in major cities make the morning commute possible for drivers, plain and simple, because without it gridlock would be absolute. Federal dollars were used to build roads that cut through neighborhoods without providing for the safety of people walking along or across them, and need to be fixed. Ferries, in states such as Washington, are part of the highway system, connecting roadways across bodies of water. These are not “diversions” from our surface transportation infrastructure; they are key components that must be part of a complete system that offers fair access for all.

In terms of who’s paying the federal gas-tax “user fee”— it’s everybody. You’re not exempt if you only use local roads and no federal highways in your commute. The cost of transporting goods, including gas and diesel taxes, is in the price of everything you buy. In the name of fairness, our taxes should be buying the safest, most efficient, most accessible system possible for all Americans – well-off or poor, young or old, whether living in cities, suburbs or small towns.

Today, market and demographic changes are demanding a new focus for our transportation investments, and that’s because … well, lets give Mr. Dubay the floor:

The market is solving the livability and walkability issue. People are moving in closer to cities. It’s a generational shift… . They are not living in the suburbs as much as they used to, largely because people don’t want to drive like they used to. Having a car and driving isn’t as romantic as it once was, that’s for sure.

If, indeed, people are going to be living in higher concentrations – and they are doing so in both cities and older suburbs – they will still need to get around. What they will need is a seamless, fully integrated network. Many will still own cars and drive them when it makes sense for them, paying gas taxes when they do. They will hope that when they need to use the highway, enough of their fellow residents will be using transit that there is actually room for them on the road.

The local leaders we work with know this, and that’s why they are trying to save the nation’s infrastructure fund from insolvency and win reforms that give them the latitude to do what they need to do. We’re glad to see folks at Heritage acknowledge the changes, and we hope that soon they will join us in declaring an end to the days of the government mandating a top-down, single-mode approach.

A broke Highway Trust Fund means job losses equal to Denver’s population, President Obama warns

Speaking today at the Key Bridge in Washington, DC, President Obama called on Congress to save the Highway Trust Fund from its pending insolvency, and to adopt a long-term transportation bill on the scale of his proposed four-year, $302 billion program. [Full text here.]

In doing so, he retraced the bipartisan history of transportation funding in the U.S.:

Soon, construction workers will be on the job making the Key Bridge safer for commuters and for families, and even for members of Congress to cross. (Laughter.) This is made possible by something called the Highway Trust Fund, which Congress established back in the 1950s, and which helps states repair and rebuild our infrastructure all across the country. It’s an example of what can happen when Washington just functions the way it was supposed to.

Back then, you had Eisenhower, a Republican President; over time you would have Democratic Presidents, Democratic and Republican members of Congress all recognizing building bridges and roads and levees and ports and airports — that none of that is a partisan issue. That’s making sure that America continues to progress.

Now, here is the problem. Here is the reason we’re here in the heat. If this Congress does not act by the end of the summer, the Highway Trust Fund will run out. There won’t be any money there. All told, nearly 700,000 jobs could be at risk next year. That would be like Congress threatening to lay off the entire population of Denver, or Seattle, or Boston.

That’s a lot of people. It would be a bad idea. Right now, there are more than 100,000 active projects across the country where workers are paving roads, and rebuilding bridges, and modernizing our transit systems. And soon, states may have to choose which projects to continue and which ones to put the brakes on because they’re running out of money. Some have already done just that, just because they’re worried that Congress will not get its act together in time.

We spend significantly less as a portion of our economy than China does, than Germany does, than just about every other advanced country. They know something that I guess we don’t, which is that’s the path to growth, that’s the path to competitiveness.

We share the President’s frustration at the lack of progress, but we are encouraged by recent glimmers of bipartisan interest in a solution. Just last week we saw a bipartisan proposal for a long-term solution in the form of a 12-cent gas tax increase over two years. To us, that is far preferable to a last-minute accounting trick to get us through the election, which seems to be the betting of conventional wisdom at the moment. And it strikes us more sustainable than the one-time infusion from a tax holiday for offshore profits the Administration has proposed.

Still, we are glad to see the President use his bully pulpit to call attention to an issue that remains something of a sleeper for a public largely unaware that the trust fund that their safety, convenience and economy depend on is seriously threatened.

“They’re gonna need to see this upstairs.”

“They’re gonna need to see this upstairs.” That’s what staff at the U.S. Department of Transportation told Smart Growth America president Geoff Anderson yesterday when he showed up with 1,500 letters from T4America and Smart Growth America supporters urging USDOT to improve their targets for reducing the number of deaths and serious injuries on our streets and to better hold states accountable for reaching those goals.

Smart Growth America President Geoff Anderson personally delivered the safety rule comments to USDOT.

It’s important that we get this first of 12 “performance measures” right, and that’s why we joined with SGA in asking our supporters to send a letter to USDOT urging them to improve this first one and take a positive step forward into this new system of accountability. More than 1,500 people responded with letters to USDOT that Geoff Anderson delivered DOT Secretary Anthohny Foxx the old fashioned way, via hard copy,

As a refresher, the 2012 federal transportation law, MAP-21, created a first-ever accountability framework for measuring the payoff from the billions given to states and MPOs each year. It was left to the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) to put flesh on the bones by adopting rules for how to apply those performance measures.

But we were discouraged by DOT’s first attempt at proposing a set of requirements for judging progress on safety on our roads, deeming it “too weak to be effective.”

This rule for the first measure, if finalized as it was proposed, would allow the states that fail to meet the targets they set for themselves to avoid taking action to improve their outcomes. Further, the USDOT decision to require states to meet only two requirements gives short shrift to the idea of accountability. (Much more detail on the shortcomings in this first draft measure can be found in our original post.)

Getting this one right is critical not just for safety, but also in setting the tone for the 11 other performance standards to come.

After going to all the trouble two years ago to create this new system of accountability to ensure that taxpayer dollars are better spent — which helps build the support and confidence needed to raise new revenue, by the way — it makes no sense to do them halfway. They need teeth, they need to result in money better spent, and they need to help build the confidence of the taxpayers who are asked to pay for improving the country’s infrastructure.

It’s imperative that we put our best foot forward and show that this new system of measuring performance is a strong step toward a better, safer, more complete transportation network.

We thank those of you who took the time to send in a letter, and we’re honored to help deliver them.

As SGA said to their supporters this morning, “Rest assured: they’re going to see this upstairs.”

Attempts for bipartisanship slow down Senate Finance plan for short-term trust fund fix

The Senate Finance Committee plan to rescue the nation’s transportation fund through the end of the year took a slight detour today as Chairman Wyden (D-OR) made some key changes and deferred debate on potentially contentious amendments in the name of trying to reach bipartisan agreement.

Between yesterday and today, Chairman Wyden amended his Preserving American’s Transit and Highways (PATH) Act, which would provide a short-term extension of the federal transportation program and come up with the necessary funds (about $9 billion) to the keep the Highway Trust Fund (HTF) solvent through the end of the year. (The HTF is expected to become insolvent before the end of August.)

The amendments came in the form of a Chairman’s mark – a single package of amendments or legislative language put forth by the Chairman of a committee — which was agreed to by (bipartisan) unanimous consent today in committee, but final consideration was postponed until after the July recess.

“On the Finance Committee, all the Democrats and all the Republicans do not want to slam the brakes on 6,000 road projects, putting thousands of Americans out of work,” said Chairman Wyden this morning. “These modifications move the committee closer to bipartisan agreement.”

But it may yet be difficult to find agreement between the two sides and move a truly bipartisan package out of the committee that staves off insolvency of the trust fund. In the House, Ways and Means Chairman Dave Camp (R-MI) has said, “There is no way tax hikes to pay for more spending will fly in the House.”

All along, Republicans especially, but also Democrats, have asserted that it’s important to protect the historic principle of “user pays” for the trust fund — ensuring that the people using the transportation system are the ones paying for its upkeep or expansion. Yet, the most significant change made to the Chairman’s mark today was removing the increase in heavy truck fees — the only “user fee” in the handful of revenue increases included in the PATH Act that was introduced by Chairman Wyden two days ago. The other four methods of raising money are changes to tax code or accounting maneuvers, which were all largely modified as well.

The Republican ranking member Orrin Hatch (R-UT) made it clear that his party understands the urgency to do something, but are still unlikely to support a plan that won’t pass the House. “It’s important for the committee to get something done, but it’s even more important that we get it done right,” he said.

And, “The last thing we want is for state departments of transportation to be left holding the bag in August,” said Sen. Thune (R-SD).

The Senate Finance Committee is planning to resume discussions on this package again after the congressional recess for Independence Day. Amendments that may be considered at that point include plans for a gas tax increase and indexing it to inflation, creating a new multimodal account, ending the federal program as we know it, and an amendment to defund the extremely popular program that helps get money down to the local level for safer streets (TAP).

We’ll continue to track the developments.

Senate Finance Committee considers a trust fund stopgap, with long-term funding unclear

The Senate Finance Committee Thursday will take up a proposal from Chairman Ron Wyden (D-OR) to keep the Highway Trust Fund solvent through Dec. 31 with a $9 billion transfer from the general budget. The needed revenue would be raised by increasing the allowable tax on heavy trucks and four accounting maneuvers unrelated to transportation.

Chairman Wyden’s stopgap proposal would prevent the projected August insolvency of the nation’s key infrastructure fund and buy time until after the November elections, when Congress could consider a longer-term fix to the beleaguered trust fund.

Unfortunately, the proposal does not have bipartisan support. The top Republican on Senate Finance, Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT), has indicated he would like the trust fund fix to rely more on spending cuts. Senator Bob Corker (R-TN), who is co-sponsoring a proposal to raise the gas tax with Senator Chris Murphy (D-CT), called the proposal “a complete sham” .

However, with the clock ticking toward an end of promised federal payments to states for their transportation spending, it is the only proposed stopgap on the table that would avoid idling thousands of workers and stalling key projects throughout the country. Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA), chair of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, urged her colleagues on the Finance Committee to pass Wyden’s proposal. “I’m here to send an SOS to Congress because we are facing a transportation government shutdown,” Boxer today said at a press event.

Wyden’s proposal relies on accounting changes over ten years to amass the “savings” that would be transferred immediately from the general fund to cover the next several months of the trust fund outlays. The largest change ($3.7 billion) would require faster disbursement – and collection of taxes owed – on retirement savings of deceased account holders.

The only transportation-related source comes from raising the cap on the surcharge placed on especially heavy trucks, from $550 a year to $1,100. Set to take effect June 30, 2015, it would be the first change to the so-called heavy vehicle use tax since 1984 and is expected to raise up to $1.4 billion over the next 10 years.

Wyden told Transport Topics that he expects Republicans to offer several amendments at the committee hearing, set for 10 a.m. Thursday. “They indicated informally some rough ideas but that’s why we have opened the process,” Wyden said.

In the House, Chairman Dave Camp (R-MI) of the Ways and Means Committee, with jurisdiction over the Highway Trust Fund, has said, “There is no way tax hikes to pay for more spending will fly in the House.” Camp plans to mark up an extension of the transportation program and Highway Trust Fund after the July 4 Congressional recess.

In an encouraging bipartisan move, Senators Corker and Murphy last week proposed raising the gas tax 12 cents over two years, and offsetting that increase by making some current tax breaks permanent. Corker has said the offsets could allow other Republicans to support the proposal because it would not violate Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform pledge.

Any such long-term solution for transportation funding – which we at Transportation for America certainly support – would have to come through Wyden’s Finance Committee, presumably after a stopgap such as that on the table for tomorrow’s hearing.

Raising the gas tax also would have to pass muster with the White House. In comments Monday, Administration officials did not rule out a gas tax hike but reiterated that corporate tax reform is their preferred pay-for.

“The Administration has not proposed and has no plans to propose an increase in the gas tax,” said White House spokesman Matt Lehrich. “It is critical that we pass a [transportation] bill that not only avoids a short-term funding crisis but provides certainty and lays the groundwork for sustained economic growth. So we appreciate that members on both sides of the aisle continue to recognize the need for a long-term infrastructure bill, and we look forward to continuing to [work] with Congress to get this done.”

Here, you can read a Description of the Chairman’s Mark, and the Joint Commission on Taxation’s Score (JCT Score) of the proposal.

Support the Senate’s bipartisan plan to raise the gas tax

A bipartisan pair of Senators says it’s time to raise the gas tax. Let the rest of the Senate know if you agree.
Take action.

After months of hearing from mayors and business leaders and citizens and people of all stripes who are worried about the looming bankruptcy of our transportation fund, a key Senate committee this week at last is taking up a temporary fix to the trust fund for the next six months. But Congress still must find a long-term solution to save our nation’s transportation fund.

As we wrote about last week, two courageous senators have introduced a bipartisan – yes, bipartisan – proposal to save the trust fund for the long haul. Senators Chris Murphy (D-CT) and Bob Corker (R-TN) proposed raising the gas tax 12 cents per gallon over two years. It would be the first increase since Bill Clinton was in office and gas cost around a buck a gallon.

Can you send a message to your Senators asking them to throw their support behind this proposal? (Supporters in CT and TN: You can send a message of support to your Senators as well.)

Without new money to save the highway trust fund from insolvency, federal contributions for important transportation projects in your community would stop as soon as August and could shut down completely for the next year.

Some in the Senate are still talking about settling for a temporary bailout, rather than face our crumbling transportation program head-on.

Over the last five years, Congress has scoured the couch cushions to find $50 billion from general revenues to plug holes in the transportation trust fund. Meanwhile, the need for investment is growing as our population grows and infrastructure ages. Not only has inflation eaten away a third of their value, but gas tax receipts also have dropped with gains in fuel efficiency and a decline in the miles driven per person.

Most members of Congress have been afraid even to mention the possibility of tax increases, but as Senator Corker said, “If it’s something worth having, then it’s something worth paying for.” We couldn’t agree more. As our recent post on support for gas tax increases at the state level shows, voters may be more accepting of higher transportation taxes than conventional wisdom suggests.

Senators Murphy and Corker deserve great credit for their leadership and courage to propose a real fix to the transportation funding crisis.

Let’s let the rest of the Senate know that safe roads and bridges, better transit, and speedier commutes are things worth paying for.

In the meantime, T4America will keep fighting for more reforms to the system to ensure that states are held accountable for their spending and that more money flows to the local level where it’s needed most. But without any new revenue, there’s no need for accountability: Projects and plans will sit on the shelf.

—

What do you think about raising the gas tax? Feel free to let us know in the comments.

Favorable responses and coverage for the bipartisan Senate plan to raise the gas tax

As soon as Senators Murphy and Corker introduced their bipartisan plan yesterday to raise the gas tax by 12 cents, supportive statements starting flowing in and media outlets quickly picked up the news.

The day before the news broke, USA Today’s full editorial board weighed in on the issue and offered their preferred solution for rescuing the nation’s transportation fund: “Raise the gas tax.” They couldn’t have thought they’d see action quite so soon, but the very next day, as we reported, Senator Murphy (D-CT) and Senator Corker (R-TN) responded with a proposal that would do exactly that, raising the gas tax 12 cents to help provide “the trust fund with the stable source of income it so desperately needs.” More from the editorial:

The best way to deal with declining gas tax revenue happens to be the simplest way: Raise the gas tax. … The days of higher fuel taxes being a “third rail” of politics (touch it and you die) are long gone. In recent years, seven states have either raised their own gas taxes or imposed other fees that raise revenue. The political fallout has been minimal.

The proposal quickly made headlines around the country, from the biggest papers down to local blogs. Here’s a quick look at just a few of the responses to the Senators’ leadership.

RollCall
Gas Tax Is Imperative to a Robust Highway Bill | Commentary
With federal highway funding about to run dry this summer, will Congress vote to increase the gasoline tax to refill the Highway Trust Fund? It seems a long shot, but a bipartisan agreement begins with two – and two senators have stepped forward.

The Business Journal
Ready for higher gasoline taxes? Road projects may come to a halt without it
The gasoline tax hasn’t been raised since 1993, so maybe it’s time for an update. Plus, it seems fair to make users of the nation’s road pay for improvements. Congress has violated this principle for the past couple of years, taking $50 billion from the federal government’s general fund — thereby raising deficits — to make up for shortfalls in the Highway Trust Fund.

Washington Post
Bump at the pump? Senators propose a 12-cent hike in federal gas tax
A bipartisan Senate proposal emerged Wednesday to rescue beleaguered federal transportation funding by raising the tax on gasoline by 12 cents a gallon.

Streetsblog USA
Senators Murphy (D) and Corker (R) Propose 12-Cent Gas Tax Increase
There are several proposals on the table to stave off the impending insolvency of the Highway Trust Fund (which pays for transit, biking, and walking projects too) in two months. Just now, two senators teamed up to announce one that might actually have a chance.

Associated Press
SENATORS PROPOSE 12-CENT GAS TAX INCREASE
Two senators unveiled a bipartisan plan Wednesday to raise federal gasoline and diesel taxes for the first time in more than two decades, pitching the proposal as a solution to Congress’ struggle to pay for highway and transit programs.

CBS News
A bipartisan push for higher gasoline taxes
The timing might seem a bit dubious, considering it’s the height of the U.S. driving season, and Americans are dealing with both geopolitical turmoil and the upcoming midterm elections.

MSNBC
A Republican who’s willing to raise the gas tax
To fix America’s crumbling roads and bridges, Tennessee GOP Sen. Bob Corker says he’s willing to do what’s become unthinkable for most congressional Republicans: raise taxes.

WBBJ Eyewitness News Channel 7 (Jackson, TN)
Corker proposes increase to gas tax
For the first time in more than two decades, federal taxes on gasoline and diesel could be raised.

Johnson City Press/Kingsport Time News (TN)
Corker proposes higher fuel tax to pay for repairs to highway infrastructure
U.S. Sen. Bob Corker pitched his legislation Wednesday to fix up the nation’s highway infrastructure by raising federal fuel taxes by six cents twice in the next two years and paying for the hike with provisions in the so-called “tax extenders” bill.

Chattanooga Times Free Press (TN)
Bob Corker eyes 12 cent gas tax to help shore up federal road funds
U.S. Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., on Thursday proposed a bipartisan plan to raise federal gas and diesel taxes for the first time in more than two decades as an answer to long-standing funding woes threatening to stall the nation’s highway, bridge and transit programs.

The Daily Times (Blount County, TN)
Sen. Bob Corker pitches gas tax hike
Tennessee Sen. Bob Corker is part of a bipartisan plan to raise the federal gas tax by 12 cents over the next two years.

Laborers’ International Union of North America
“It’s Time to End the Pothole Penalty”
LIUNA applauds Sens. Murphy and Corker for their continued bi-partisan progress in the U.S. Senate to make our roads and bridges safer and strengthen our economy by addressing the failing Highway Trust Fund with a long-term, full-investment solution.

Senators unveil bipartisan plan to rescue the federal transportation program by raising the gas tax

Senators Chris Murphy (D-CT) and Bob Corker (R-TN) today announced their bipartisan plan to raise the nation’s gas tax by 12 cents over two years to rescue the nation’s Highway Trust Fund, which is headed for insolvency before the end of the summer.

Senators Murphy and Corker introduce their proposal to raise the gas tax by 12 cents and index it to inflation on Wednesday, June 18, 2014. Photo courtesy of Sen. Murphy’s office.

Unveiled at an event at the U.S. Capitol this morning, The Highway Funding and Tax Reduction Proposal would increase the federal gasoline and diesel taxes by 6 cents in each of the next two years for a total of a 12-cent increase. The taxes would then be indexed to inflation, so that transportation funding keeps in step with construction costs. (The federal gas tax has lost about a third of its purchasing power since it was last raised in1993.)

These two simple changes would provide funding to sustain current spending levels, plus inflation, over the next 10 years. The Murphy-Corker plan proposes to offset some of the increased costs to individuals by permanently extending a handful of tax breaks that benefit ordinary households.

Since 2008, Congress has transferred more than $50 billion in general funds into the Highway Trust Fund to maintain investment levels, and the fund’s spending is currently projected to outpace revenues by over $160 billion in the next decade. Just to have enough money to continue the program for next year would require finding an additional $18 billion before Oct. 1.

But now, for the first time in this Congress, a legitimate, bipartisan plan has been offered to solve the shortfall of the nation’s transportation trust fund. No temporary patches, no swapping funding between programs, no general fund transfer or accounting sleight-of-hand.

“Proposed short-term patches using accounting gimmicks have been all but shot down in both houses,” said T4America Director James Corless in our full statement released this morning. “Senators Murphy and Corker are showing real leadership – as well as concern for their constituents’ jobs and safety – by championing a long-term solution that recognizes the gravity of the situation and addresses it head-on. … The alternative is to allow our transportation system to crumble along with an economy hobbled by crapshoot commutes and clogged freight corridors.”

“By modestly raising the federal gas tax, we can address a crippling economic liability for this country—the inability to finance long-term improvements to our crumbling national infrastructure,” said Senator Murphy in the Senators’ joint statement this morning.

“I know raising the gas tax isn’t an easy choice, but we’re not elected to make easy decisions – we’re elected to make the hard ones. This modest increase will pay dividends in the long run and I encourage my colleagues to get behind this bipartisan proposal,” he said.

Senator Bob Corker, who certainly understands how important transportation investments are down at the local level as the former mayor of Chattanooga, TN, stated emphatically at the event that “if something is important enough to have, it’s important enough to pay for.”

“Congress should be embarrassed that it has played chicken with the Highway Trust Fund and allowed it to become one of the largest budgeting failures in the federal government,” he added in his official statement. “If Americans feel that having modern roads and bridges is important then Congress should have the courage to pay for it.”

As our recent post on support for gas tax increases at the state level shows, voters may be more accepting of higher transportation taxes than conventional wisdom suggests. And any move to stave off crisis and stabilize the federal program for the long term brings cheers from the local officials who represent home-state constituents.

“We certainly support Senator Murphy’s efforts to put our transportation trust fund on a sound footing,” said Lyle Wray, executive director of the Capitol Region (Hartford) Council of Governments in Murphy’s state of Connecticut. “We have seen two bridge closures in just the last two weeks on the Metro-North line, the busiest commuter line in the country. Repairing and replacing bridges is just the start of our communities’ needs. We have been doing all we can to stretch dollars and use debt financing, but we have gone as far as we can go without additional funding. Raising the gas tax is the best solution we see for stable funding for critical infrastructure in the near term.”

And in Franklin, TN, a southern suburb of Nashville, Mayor Ken Moore offered Sen. Corker — a prior mayor of Chattanooga — his support for the proposal.

As mayor of Franklin and chair of the mayors’ caucus of Middle Tennessee, I can say we have been supportive of raising the gas tax because we recognize this is what funds our highways and our transit, and we can’t allow our infrastructure to deteriorate. We have to stabilize the trust fund and provide consistent funding.

Middle Tennessee is the economic generator now for Tennessee, one of the fastest growing regions in terms of creating jobs. While that is a good problem, it creates a burden on our infrastructure. It’s important to make sure we have the certainty of funding so we can continue to support this economic development

As a mayor I can see the handwriting on the wall. Without this we will be tremendously challenged to avoid congestion and gridlock. The number one calls and emails I get are about traffic and congestion. I think voters will support it if they know it will go towards relief and supporting that economic growth.

So there you have it. The first legitimate, bipartisan transportation revenue proposal is on the table. Senators Murphy and Corker deserve great credit for their leadership and courage to propose a real fix to the transportation funding crisis.

We will have more on this proposal as we track its progress closely over the next few weeks and months, so stay tuned.

T4America statement in support of Senate proposal to rescue the federal transportation program with a 12-cent gas tax increase

James Corless, director of Transportation for America, issued this statement in response to the proposal from Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) and Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) to save the highway trust fund from insolvency and restore stable funding through a 12-cent gas tax increase over two years:

“Our nation’s key infrastructure fund is rushing toward insolvency. Proposed short-term patches using accounting gimmicks have been all but shot down in both houses. Senators Murphy and Corker are showing real leadership – as well as concern for their constituents’ jobs and safety – by championing a long-term solution that recognizes the gravity of the situation and addresses it head-on.

A return to stable funding will ensure that our states and communities can repair aging roads, bridges and transit systems and build the infrastructure we need for a growing economy. The alternative is to allow our transportation system to crumble along with an economy hobbled by crapshoot commutes and clogged freight corridors.

Phasing in the gas tax increase over two years along with extended tax breaks will ease the transition for consumers, just as the ensuing investment in a sound, working transportation network will ease travel for workers and businesses alike.”

Governing Mag on the compelling case for more local access to transportation dollars

As the impending insolvency of the Highway Trust Fund looms over the nation’s transportation projects, more and more local leaders are asking for the chance to be heard when it comes to doling out federal transportation money.

In this superb recent article by Governing, they reported on this growing chorus of local leaders asking Congress to give them more access to transportation dollars and give them a seat at the table as decisions are made.

Governing writes:

The 2012 federal law put more money toward big highways and less toward local roads. It cut money for bridges and roads that are not part of the National Highway System by 30 percent. Local governments own more than half of those smaller roads. The law also gives states a greater role in determining how to spend federal money on everything from run-down bridges to bike lanes and sidewalks.

Chris Abele, the county executive of Wisconsin’s Milwaukee County, said this week that the current funding system is like federal and state officials passing an envelope full of taxpayer money for transportation along a line, with localities at the end.

“Sometimes, by the time the envelope gets to us, there’s nothing left,” he said. Local officials, especially those from urban areas, worry that their top priorities could be lost or ignored at the statewide level.

Click through to read the full article.

Local officials know best what their communities need, and the Innovation in Surface Transportation Act would give those local leaders — the ones usually held accountable by their residents when roads are potholed or bridges crumbling — a seat at the table to ensure that they’re part of the decision-making process when it comes to investing those federal transportation dollars.