Leaders and ranking members of several House committees encouraged House Leadership to further infrastructure legislation under any future budget agreements through correspondence sent last week.
House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure Chair Peter DeFazio (D-OR) and Ranking Member Sam Graves (R-MO); Subcommittee on Highways and Transit Chair Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) and Ranking Member Rodney Davis (R-IL); and Subcommittee on Water Resources and Environment Chair Grace F. Napolitano (D-CA) and Ranking Member Bruce Westerman (R-AR) signed the letter. In the correspondence, the legislators pressed for two committee-related priorities to be considered in any future agreement.
The first called for a repeal of a $7.6 billion rescission established under the Fixing America’s Surface Transportation Act. That rescission aims to yank back highway funding from all 50 states and the District of Columbia — funding which was already provided to them by Congress. The amounts would vary, but all states would be affected.
“The rescission will significantly limit the flexibility of all states and impact the ability to plan and execute highway and bridge projects,” the members wrote. “These projects are necessary in order to grow the U.S. economy, create jobs, and ensure the Nation’s global competitiveness.”
Additionally, the legislators want to see Harbor Maintenance Tax collections are fully utilized annually for harbor maintenance and access. Without a proper mechanism in place, they fear U.S. ports and harbors would not be fully maintained.
“Enactment of such a provision would immediately improve the infrastructure of our nation’s harbors while honoring our Nation’s long-term commitment to U.S. shippers and taxpayers, maintaining and improving the competitiveness of U.S. businesses, and creating thousands of additional jobs,” the members wrote.
This would be in contrast, they said, to past decades, which have seen Congress appropriate far less to such efforts than has been collected from shippers. They noted $9.3 billion in already-collected revenue sitting unused for that very reason.