Shuster Rejects Higher Fuel Taxes
WASHINGTON — House Transportation Committee Chairman Bill Shuster (R-Pa.) said he wants a five- to six-year highway bill but is not backing higher fuel taxes to pay for improvements and new capacity for the nation’s roads and bridges.
The chairman’s rejection of higher fuel taxes came a year after he assumed the committee chairmanship, saying at the time that he would consider all funding options for transportation.
“I just don’t think that there’s the will out there with the American public or the Congress. Even our president has said that we’re not going to do that,” Shuster said of a fuel tax increase. “So we’re going to have to find different ways at this time.”
Shuster made the comments during a transportation and infrastructure event held by Bloomberg Government on Feb. 4.
Asked to name alternatives for generating infrastructure investment, Shuster said a tax on vehicle miles traveled is one alternative.
Shuster also said he recently talked with Rep. David Camp (R-Mich.), chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, and that Camp told him there are areas where the government can find savings to direct to transportation.
The Highway Trust Fund is expected to become insolvent as early as August, a month before the current transportation funding law, MAP-21, is due to expire. Congress has been propping up the trust fund for years with general fund transfers.
A CBO report the same day as Shuster’s speech said the trust fund would be insolvent by Oct. 1.
Two other speakers, former Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell and former U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, called for higher fuel taxes, saying the nation is in the midst of an infrastructure disaster.
