Senators Urge Transportation Secretary to Endorse Infrastructure Grants
A bipartisan group of senators called on the country’s top transportation officer to endorse funding for a popular infrastructure grants program the Trump administration is seeking to undo in fiscal 2018.
Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Jack Reed (D-R.I.), leaders of the chamber’s transportation funding subcommittee, argued that Obama-era infrastructure grants have helped states and cities with advancing large freight and transit projects over the years.
“The elimination of the highly effective and popular TIGER program, for which I have consistently advocated since its creation nearly a decade ago, is a mistake. TIGER provides the flexibility to fund a wide range of transportation projects that promote economic development and job growth on a regional basis,” Collins said at a hearing with Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao on July 13. “This program offers an otherwise unavailable resource for vital infrastructure needs.”
“The administration talks about more money for infrastructure but irresponsibly cuts successful and popular programs like TIGER,” Reed added before five senators echoed his sentiment during the hearing.
TIGER is the Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery program, which has helped in hundreds of state projects.
In a fiscal 2018 budget request, the administration did not propose funding for the grants program. On July 11, a House transportation appropriations subcommittee honored the administration’s request in a fiscal 2018 funding bill. A fiscal 2017 funding law provided $500 million for the TIGER program. The U.S. Department of Transportation is expected to announce a notice of funding availability shortly.
The administration acknowledged the program’s popularity among senators, and it intends to propose a similar program as part of an infrastructure funding plan this fall, Chao told the senators.
“We understand the eagerness of everybody,” she said. “We understand the tremendous concern of Congress on this.”
The TIGER program has assisted agencies with more than 400 projects. The additional funds have targeted freight connectivity projects. Recipients have included the Little Rock Port Authority in Arkansas, a freight rail project in South Carolina and Mississippi’s Port of Pascagoula.
As the administration finalizes its infrastructure funding proposal, the top Democrat on the tax-writing Senate Finance Committee promoted repatriating overseas profits as a way to fund big-ticket projects.
“My own judgment, I think, there is more Republican interest in repatriation,” Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) told reporters on July 13 after speaking to the American Road and Transportation Builders Association in Washington. “I think this idea has some potential.”
Repatriating overseas profits with a low one-time tax to help fund infrastructure projects has been endorsed in recent years by Republican leaders and prominent Democrats on Capitol Hill. The Trump administration has not promoted it as part of its 10-year, $1 trillion infrastructure funding outline.
Wyden expressed hope the Senate would compromise soon on health care policy so it could move on to legislation aimed at overhauling the U.S. tax code and ensuring funding for infrastructure. So far, the only meaningful work the chamber has accomplished was to confirmed a justice to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Asked if he thought a GOP-led tax reform measure would address the Highway Trust Fund’s looming shortfall, the Oregon Democrat noted the Republican leadership in the House and Senate will “tell you they’re not going to raise the gas tax.”
Earlier this year, ARTBA led a coalition of stakeholders who called on members of Congress to restore the trust fund’s long-term funding. That resulted in nearly 260 House members urging the leaders of the tax-writing Ways and Means panel to include a fix for the trust fund in a tax reform bill.
The freight industry champions increasing fuel taxes to assist states with maintenance and upgrades of critical corridors. The fund relies on revenue from taxes on gasoline and diesel and is projected to be insolvent in a few years. Federal inaction on fuel taxes since 1993 has prompted nearly two dozen states to increase diesel and gasoline taxes to pay for road projects. The current federal diesel tax is 24.4 cents per gallon and the gasoline tax is 18.4 cents per gallon.
