Down-to-the-wire negotiations late last night between President Obama, House Speaker John Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid resulted in a budget deal containing about $38 billion in reductions from current spending levels and the prevention of a government shutdown. The High Speed and Intercity Passenger Rail program will receive $1 billion, a reduction of $1.5 billion from the previous year, and the New Starts program — a key revenue source for transit projects throughout the country — loses $280 million, though the figure is reportedly sufficient to fund projects that have already received grants from USDOT.

The federal government will keep the lights on next week after the U.S. Senate easily approved a two-week stopgap measure containing $4 billion in spending cuts. The vote was 91-9. Only two budget items – $650 million from a one-time Federal Highway Administration program – and a handful of legislative earmarks are transportation related.

UPDATE, 2/19/11, 9am: The House voted 235-189 in favor of an FY2011 budget containing $60 billion in spending cuts, including $430 million in cuts to the New Starts program that funds new transit construction, $152 million in cuts to Amtrak and a zeroing out of both high-speed rail and the innovative TIGER program. No Democrats supported the continuing resolution and three Republicans opposed it.

On the Friday before the President releases his budget for 2012 (forthcoming sometime this morning), the House Appropriations Committee, led by Chairman Hal Rogers (R-Ky.) released their funding proposal to carry the government through the rest of 2011. Quick refresher: The government is currently operating under what’s known as a Continuing Resolution (CR) that expires [...]

CONTACT: Cosabeth Bullock 202-478-6128 cbullock@mrss.com Paula Chrin 202-478-6138 pchrin@mrss.com WASHINGTON, D.C. — Congress this week again postponed action on the overdue rewrite of the federal transportation law, passing a continuing resolution set to expire on December 18. In response to this action, Transportation for America Director James Corless released the following statement: “Congress has once [...]