Highway and Transportation Funding Act of 2014

Floor Speech

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Ms. NORTON. Madam Speaker, I thank my good friend, the ranking member of the full committee, for his work to try to get us a fully funded bill, that I am sure the chairman desired as well.

But I must say, Madam Speaker, we have shored up the highway trust fund four times since 2008--four patches, this would be the fifth--until May. Everyone knows what we are doing. We are setting ourselves up for another series of short-term extensions. We don't dare leave the trust fund insolvent--not us. But we don't have the guts to help our own States get on with urgently needed projects.

Short-term funding is like no funding. Where is the dissent on this traditionally bipartisan bill, the highway bill. It is certainly not in the States. It is in the Republican Conference, where they have a crisis among some of their members who believe that spending money on anything is an original sin, even at the demand of their own constituents.

Madam Speaker, I don't have the figures from my own district, so I give you some figures from the State of Arkansas, which I chose at random, to indicate what this bill means for the States. Arkansas relies for about 70 percent of its transportation funding on this bill. However, it has put off 15 projects, even with this bill coming. I am quoting from its Highway and Transportation Department:

We don't feel comfortable going forward with these projects because we are not sure if the highway trust fund will be resolved in time to fully see these projects to completion.

That is the position you are leaving the States in.

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Ms. NORTON. An official from the American Road and Transportation Builders Association spoke about what this funding does. He said:

If you have your money coming in on an almost annual or every other year basis, subject to being shut down by Congress, you cannot make long-term investments and hire people.

The tragedy of these patches is they have a human face: millions of construction workers now working on a piecework basis. The differences between the House and the Senate are easily reconcilable. The Senate passed their bill 79-18. What is wrong with this House? In the past, we would have gotten these differences resolved. There has been plenty of time since MAP-21. If 2 years has not been enough, what in the world do we think the next 8 or 9 months will mean? Time is not the problem; will is. Let's spend this time in the recess getting a long-term bill, as our States are demanding.

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