House Tax Panel Advances Trust-Fund Fix; Floor Action Next Week
The House Ways and Means Committee on July 10 gave voice vote approval to legislation that would provide about $10 billion to keep a cash-strapped Highway Trust Fund solvent for nearly a year.
Despite strong objections raised by Democrats, the GOP-controlled panel easily reported the bill to the floor. The full House is expected to take it up next week.
To find offsets needed to cover the cost under congressional budget rules, the legislation would rely on the accounting practice known as pension smoothing. That allows companies with defined benefit retirement plans assume higher interest rates when calculating the amount of money needed to contribute for employees’ retirements.
The bill also would extend customs fees until 2024. And it would transfer $1 billion from the Leaking Underground Storage Tank Trust Fund to keep the highway account solvent through May.
Ways and Means Chairman Dave Camp (R-Mich.) said the bill “is a much better approach than any proposal to just get us through the end of this year.”
Before approving the bill, the committee rejected 23-16, along party lines, an amendment offered by Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.) that would have extended funding for the trust fund through the end of the year to give lawmakers time to approve a long-term surface transportation funding plan. The amendment also would have noted that it is the sense of Congress that long-term transportation authorization should be enacted.
Blumenauer’s amendment drew strong support from Democrats on the panel, and the Oregon Democrat insisted his proposal would ensure the committee stop “missing in action” on transportation matters.
The Senate Finance Committee, the panel with jurisdiction over tax policy, announced it would consider its legislative version July 10. Senate Democratic leaders have opposed the House bill, limiting its chances of passing the Senate.
Two key Democratic transportation leaders, Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chairwoman Barbara Boxer of California and Sen. Tom Carper of Delaware, have come out against the House bill.
"The House's plan to kick the can down the road and pass a temporary patch for the Highway Trust Fund until next May derails the effort to pass a long-term transportation bill this year,” Boxer said in a news release.
Many states and infrastructure advocates have called on Congress to shore up the fund. DOT has indicated the trust fund will run out of money at the beginning of August. If the House and Senate fail to boost the trust fund before leaving Washington for the August recess, a slowdown of highway project payments is expected to commence.
Congress has not raised the tax on gas and the diesel tax since 1993.
