House Dems Seek BABs, Infrastructure Bank, and Rail

A coalition of House Democrats is calling for Build America Bonds, a national infrastructure bank, and high-speed rail as part of a plan to improve transportation and stimulate job growth.

The plan, which was recently unveiled by the 42-member New Democrat Coalition, comes as the Obama administration may be taking a new look at transportation spending to help push down the rising unemployment rate, sources said.

Coalition members met late last month with Jeffrey Immelt, chief executive officer of General Electric Co. and chairman of the President’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness, to push their agenda. The jobs council, formed in February 2009, is a 26-member group of business and labor executives as well as economists. Immelt took over as chairman of the council in January from Paul Volcker.

The council held a conference call on infrastructure financing options last week, a source familiar with the meeting said. The call included a presentation on the financing options that are expected to be included in the House and Senate transportation reauthorization bills. Council members “seemed to be receptive ears” to the financing ideas, the source said.

It remains unclear if a revival of the BAB program will be included in the six-year transportation reauthorization bills being written in the House and Senate. The coalition agenda does not elaborate on details of its BAB proposal. It is a “starting place” for infrastructure development and does not include a subsidy rate, a coalition spokeswoman said Monday.

The group has yet to consider the proposal of Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., to create transportation-specific tax-credit bonds, the spokeswoman said. Wyden’s Transportation and Regional Infrastructure Project bond proposal, which the senator is expected to introduce in legislation, “is something the members will be interested in looking into,” she said.

The coalition is chaired by Rep. Joseph Crowley of New York. Its infrastructure task force is led by Reps. Jason Altmire of Pennsylvania, Rick Larsen of Washington. and Laura Richardson of ­California.

Both the House and Senate transportation committees are working on a six-year reauthorization bill that could be introduced later this month. Increased funding has bipartisan support but no one has been able to find a way to pay for it that is acceptable to most of its proponents.

Both Thomas Donohue, president and CEO of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and Richard Trumka, president of the AFL-CIO, have supported greater infrastructure investment and have called for a gas tax increase to pay for it. However, most members of Congress are opposed to a gas tax increase.

Donohue has said transportation projects may generate jobs that were lost after the housing bubble burst. With scant new-home construction nationwide, an emphasis on transportation projects could bring those construction workers back into the labor force, he has argued.

One financing provision likely to get a boost in the reauthorization bill is the Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act program, which was funded at $110 million for 2010 but was oversubscribed by $1 billion. Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., who chairs the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said last month that panel members have agreed to fund the program at $1 billion a year, and to increase the maximum amount of assistance that could be used for a project to 49% from 33%.

In the House version, funding for TIFIA could go as high as $1.5 billion, a source said.

For reprint and licensing requests for this article, click here.
Transportation industry Washington
MORE FROM BOND BUYER