DALLAS — The House is expected to vote Tuesday on a two-month extension of the Transportation Department's highway and transit spending authority past May 31 that could pave the way for a multiyear transportation funding measure this summer.
The extension bill, HR 2353, was filed May 15 by Rep. Bill Shuster, chairman of the House Transportation & Infrastructure Committee, and Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wisc., chairman of the House Ways & Means Committee.
The Senate will consider the extension bill if it is adopted in the House on Tuesday morning or may vote on a separate but similar extension proposal from Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., and Sen. Tom Carper, D-Del. Congress will break later this week for the Memorial Day recess.
The Transportation Department's highway and transit spending authority is scheduled to expire at the end of the month without the extension, which could force a cutoff of federal reimbursements during the busy summer construction season.
Cash balances and fuels tax revenues dedicated to the Highway Trust Fund should be sufficient to continue the reimbursements through July. However, Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx said last week that highway aid would stop when the spending authority ends on May 31 despite the remaining balances.
While a two-month extension could be accomplished with no additional revenue, keeping the HTF solvent through the end of calendar 2015 would require $11 billion of additional revenue or a transfer from the general fund. Congress has transferred more than $63 billion to the HTF from the general fund since 2008 to cover shortfalls from federal gasoline and diesel fuel taxes.
Keeping the HTF solvent through a six-year transportation measure would require an additional $100 billion, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, who has been seeking an extension through calendar 2015 to develop the funding for a long-term bill, said he would support Shuster and Ryan's proposal for a two-month patch.
Hatch endorsed the two-month extension during a Senate speech on Monday.
"Despite this most recent shift on highway funding, I'm confident we can work together to find a workable path forward," he said. "Though I am frustrated, I am undeterred. I am committed to finding a long-term solution on highways."
The preference for a two-month extension shows that Hatch and others have failed to come up with the $11 billion to offset the transfer needed for the longer fix, said Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., the ranking Democrat on the T&I Committee.
"Congress needs to get serious about a long-term bill," DeFazio said. "No more promises, no more delays."
A bipartisan group in the House may oppose a short-term extension in an effort instead to pass a six-year surface transportation bill, said Rep. Peter Welch, D-Vt.
"What you're seeing is people reaching a boiling point about the irresponsibility of not having a long-term transportation fund with a long-term funding source," Welch said in the letter to House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, and Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.
States have had to delay or cancel projects every year since 2005 because of the 32 short-term funding extensions without a long-term bill, said Peter Ruane, president of the American Road & Transportation Builders Association.
"It's time for Congress and the president to honestly explain the federal transportation investment situation to the American people and ask for their help in solving the nation's mobility problems," Ruane said.
Ryan and Shuster's two-month extension will be worthwhile only if it results in a multiyear transportation bill by August, said Nick Yaksich, vice president of the Association of Equipment Manufacturers.
"Congress must use the next two months to develop a viable way to fund a multi-year extension of the HTF," Yaksich said. "It would be a squandered opportunity if this patch only yielded another short-term extension at the end of July."
