The American Public Transportation Association (APTA), a group of more than 1,500 organizations, opposes the House Appropriations Committee’s Budget Resolution for fiscal year 2018 which would cut funding for public transportation programs.
APTA is confused by the resolution as funding for the Capital Investment Grant (CIG) program already had been approved.
Earlier this year, Congress approved $2.3 billion annually through 2020 for CIG under the Fixing America’s Surface Transportation (FAST) Act.
The Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery grant program also would be at risk for budget cuts as would Amtrak and federal funding for high-speed rail.
“The proposal to halt the robust pipeline of these worthy and vetted projects would put 800,000 jobs at risk, including 502,000 construction and related jobs and an additional 300,000 longer- term jobs associated with economic productivity, and would result in a possible loss of $90 billion in economic output,” APTA Acting President and CEO Richard A. White said, citing analysis from the Economic Development Research Group.
The Trump Administration has offered contradictory infrastructure plans.
One plan would slash infrastructure spending by $206 billion over 10 years while a second plan would increase government funding by $200 billion over 10 years to reach a goal of $1 trillion in infrastructure spending.