The House of Representatives is currently debating the Fiscal Year 2011 funding bill for the Department of Transportation. The bill is expected to pass and now includes an amendment that will restore $200 million to the Highway Trust Fund due to AGC's lobbying efforts. Because several of the amendments would cut various transportation investment programs, AGC and our colleagues in the transportation construction industry sent a letter opposing any effort to scale back the transportation funding levels in the bill.
An amendment offered by the Chairman of the Transportation and Infrastructure Subcommittee on Highways and Transit, Congressman Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.), drew the most attention. The amendment restored $200 million that was taken from federal highway formula funds to fund DOTs "livable communities" initiative. The "livable communities" initiative is an unauthorized, yet to be defined grant program that DOT hopes to create to provide certain planning grants to communities. The amendment was opposed by the Chairman of the Transportation Appropriations Subcommittee, John Olver (D-Mass.), as well as several House Democrats who wanted to ensure that federal transportation dollars were not spent on particular modes or types of projects.
AGC along with its transportation construction stakeholder partners led the lobbying efforts for the DeFazio amendment. These efforts ultimately led to Chairman Olver accepting the amendment, ensuring that the $200 million will remain in the Highway Trust Fund.
The bill provides $45.2 billion for the highway program, $11.3 billion for transit program funding, $3.5 billion for the Airport Improvement Program (the same amount as appropriated in previous years), $1.4 billion for high-speed passenger rail, and $400 million for TIGER Grant programs, while failing to provide the $4 billion requested by the president for a National Infrastructure Innovation and Finance Fund.
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