Foxx Expects Highway Bill for Christmas

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DALLAS -- Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx said Tuesday that he is optimistic that a multiyear federal highway bill can be signed into law before Christmas and still holds out hope that annual funding levels will be increased by the conference report expected to be released Nov. 30.

"It looks like we may be on the cusp of getting a long-term surface transportation bill done," Foxx told reporters during his regular weekly briefing. "My only admonition is that it be big enough to make a difference in the lives of the American people."

However, Foxx said he would not "declare victory before victory."

"I say 'looks like' because there's still ongoing work by the conferees, and nothing is done until it's done," he said. "There's still a lot of time to screw this up."

The House and Senate conference committee is meeting over the holiday to resolve the differences between the Senate's six-year DRIVE Act (H.R. 22) and the House's amendments to the funding bill.

Conference committee chair Rep. Bill Shuster, R-Pa., said Nov. 18 that the conference report would be ready when lawmakers return Nov. 30 from the Thanksgiving recess. Shuster, who is also chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure, is the main sponsor of the House proposal.

The latest 14-day reauthorization of federal funding signed into law by President Obama on Nov. 20 will expire Dec. 4. A 60-day funding reauthorization in late May transferred $8.1 billion of general revenue into the Highway Trust Fund, which is expected to keep it solvent through at least through the end of 2015.

The House proposal would provide $261 billion of federal highway funding and $55 billion for public transit. The Senate bill would allocate $273.4 billion for highways and $59.3 billion for transit through fiscal 2021.

Foxx said at least $400 billion over six years is the minimum level of federal funding needed to expand and maintain the surface transportation network.

"We've got to get away from 'Pothole Nation,'" he said. "We've got to get away from having longer travel times and having the folks that really pay the bills getting less bang for the buck."

Both of the proposed highway bills are fully funded only for the first three years.

The Senate measure includes a variety of revenue offsets to supplement the taxes dedicated to HTF for three years while the House version would dedicate to transportation the Federal Reserve System's current $29 billion reserve fund, along with any future surplus funds.

Foxx said he remains concerned about the length as well as the annual funding levels in the compromise bill that comes out of the conference committee. Some on the panel said they would prefer a five- or even a three-year bill over the lack of full funding for all six years.

"If you're going to go through the brain damage of a long-term bill, you might as well make it worthwhile," he said. "I think it's a false choice to choose between time and resources."

Meanwhile, Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe on Tuesday announced the second expansion of the state's public-private partnership high-occupancy toll lane system in a week.

Transurban, the state's partner in the Interstate-95 HOT system that opened in late 2014 as well as the eight-mile extension along I-395 announced on Nov. 20, will also oversee funding and construction of two additional miles on tolled lanes on I-95, McAuliffe said.

The new HOT lanes on the southern end of the I-95 current system and the eight-mile extension on a northern segment of I-395 will help unplug traffic bottlenecks near Washington, D.C., said Virginia Transportation Secretary Aubrey Layne.

"There is no one magic fix that resolves all problems," Layne said. "It takes a combination of additional capacity, express lanes, and multimodal improvements to move more people efficiently and safely."

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