ATA's Bill Graves Calls on Congress to Pass Omnibus in Lame-Duck Session
American Trucking Associations President Bill Graves sent a letter to every member of Congress asking them to pass a fiscal 2015 expansive omnibus funding bill during the post-election lame-duck session.
“There is no good reason to avoid passage of an omnibus spending bill this year,” Graves wrote Nov. 6. “Passage of an omnibus appropriations bill this year will allow Congress to focus its time and energies on the critical domestic and foreign policy issues that will have to be addressed” in the next Congress that starts in January.
ATA also is asking the federation’s members to urge their members of Congress to pass an omnibus funding bill that would keep federal agencies operating through the remainder of the fiscal year.
The omnibus bill represents an opportunity for key lawmakers to advance an ATA-backed proposal that would suspend for a year the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s hours-of-service rule.
Current funding for federal agencies expires Dec. 11, under a continuing resolution Congress passed before the midterm elections. Since leaders from both parties say they reject shutting down the federal government, lawmakers can either pass another temporary continuing funding resolution or a fiscal 2015 omnibus bill during the lame-duck session.
