Reed Announces His Support for $340 Billion Federal Transportation Bill

The House is in the midst this week of hearing and voting on almost 300 amendments to its STRR bill.

The House Rules Committee has added an extra hearing to consider amendments to the highway bill.

Congressional efforts to re-fund the nation’s highway and transportation systems have been ongoing for months.

The bill has also become a veritable Christmas Tree with a few 250 amendments, many unrelated to highway funding, being floated.

But opponents argue that unfettered US crude exports would come at the expense of a few domestic refineries that can buy discounted American oil today.

“Equipment manufacturers applaud the House for passing The STRR Act, a long-term highway bill that will spur investments to rebuild America’s crumbling infrastructure”.

“I am very pleased, that after ten years of short-term band-aids and extensions, the House finally passed a bipartisan, six-year transportation bill”, said Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-OR).

The bill, which was approved by the committee October 22, would send $261 billion to highways, $55 billon to transit programs and another $9 billion on safety programs.

Avoiding a potential area of contention between the two versions of the bill, the House bill includes the reauthorization of the controversial Export-Import Bank’s charter. While the House bill originally would only have paid for the first half of the bill, the House also passed an amendment Thursday morning from Texas Republican Randy Neugebauer.

The bill passed 363-64 after days of debate that included consideration of more than 100 amendments.

And while the House did engage in far more open debate than it has been in recent years, Republican leaders blocked amendments that would have increased the gas tax – a move they oppose but many business groups support. “And we’re hopeful that the impending conference between the Senate and the House to reconcile the differences in that bill will provide an important opportunity for strengthening this critical piece of legislation”, White House press secretary Josh Earnest said. French said the legislation would “provide long-term stability to the nation’s surface transportation programs”. It authorizes the full six years of funding only if Congress can find a way to pay for the systems between 2019 and 2021 – the plan’s final three years. Speaker Ryan pledged to shake things up in the way the process works, and he has.

“Businesses, labor, states, and local communities are depending on us to pass a consensus-based, bipartisan bill which provides funding certainty that will enable them to modernize our nation’s highways, bridges, and transit systems”, the Senate duo continued.

One of the Ex-Im Bank’s chief backers, Republican Representative Stephen Fincher of Tennessee, teamed up with Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer of Maryland to force a House vote last week that demonstrated overwhelming support for reviving the bank.