Streetsblog Capitol Hill

Congress has five days in which to pass an extension of transportation funding. That means there will be a flurry of activity on the Hill this week to avoid a shutdown of federal transportation programs on April 1. (It also means there will be a flurry of “April Fools” references directed by and at opposing political parties on the House and Senate floors.)

Just to remind everyone where things stand, the Senate has passed, in a 74-22 vote, a two-year transportation bill that the House GOP doesn’t like. Meanwhile, the House has offered up a 90-day extension of current funding that Senate Democrats don’t like. House Republicans are expected to use their extension to buy time for their five-year bill that almost nobody likes.

The House leadership will make its first attempt to pass the 90-day extension today. Technically, since the bill isn’t on the schedule yet, the vote would be “under suspension of the rules,” and require a two-thirds majority to pass, or 290 votes. The Republicans only control 244 seats, so for the bill to pass today, at least 46 Democrats would have to support it.

Why wouldn’t the Democrats support it? Because they don’t want to be seen as withdrawing their support for the Senate bill. But if the extension doesn’t pass today, House Republicans will try to paint the Democrats as supporting a government shutdown, and the House would still bring the bill up later in the week.

But that creates a new wrinkle, because, according to Politico, the Senate is working on a shorter extension, maybe as short as 45 days, to protect its larger bill. If the House’s extension doesn’t pass today, that means there would be very little time to reconcile two extensions of different lengths, after all the Senate’s procedural votes are done with.

Why the desire for a shorter extension? Because every extension eats away at the Senate bill’s value as a long-term reauthorization measure. The Senate’s two-year bill would go into effect retroactively to September 30, 2011, meaning that even if it were to be signed into law tomorrow, it will only be in effect for 18 months. Tack on a 90-day extension, and what is nominally a two-year bill would in reality be a 15-month bill. Another 90 day extension to the August recess would reduce the Senate bill to little more than a one-year deal, and any extensions beyond that would effectively kill the Senate bill altogether.

So, to recap: The fight between the House and Senate right now has likely boiled down to a fight between a 90-day extension and a 45-or-60-day extension. Five days remain on the clock and anything can change on a dime, minute to minute. Stay tuned.

So much for bipartisanship.

Even though his efforts to whip his party into passing a five-year transportation bill that attacks transit, biking, and walking have been fruitless, House Speaker John Boehner isn’t about to follow through on his threat to take up the Senate’s two-year bill. That bill passed with 22 GOP ayes (and 22 nays) in the Senate earlier this week.

Politico reported this morning that the House Transportation Committee still plans to take up something resembling Boehner’s disastrous HR 7, but not before the eighth extension of SAFETEA-LU expires at the end of this month. The earliest the House plans to take up their bill is April 16, after the Easter recess – and it could be long after that.

While a Boehner spokesperson said no final decision had been reached, Joshua Schank of the Eno Center for Transportation said the speaker’s threat to take up the Senate bill was always an empty one. “The Republican caucus would have revolted against it and Boehner would have lost this job,” Schank said. “If [the Senate bill] passed [in the House], it would have passed because Democrats had voted for it. [House Majority Leader Eric] Cantor is breathing down his neck. If that happens, he’ll just say, ‘Look, you passed a bill that was a Democratic bill; it wasn’t a Republican bill. So he should be out; what kind of Republican leader is that?’”

Politico says the House will introduce a measure to extend SAFETEA-LU yet again the week of March 26, to give them time to pass their own bill. But there are several ways this plan could fail.

First, the Senate could very well obstruct the extension. Everyone involved has been pledging for many months now that there would be no more extensions. The Senate has done its job. Rather than enable the House to take up more and more time pushing its unpopular five-year bill, the Senate could play hardball and force the House’s hand. At that point, the House would either have to take up the Senate bill or let the nation’s transportation program lapse – at the cost of an estimated 847,294 jobs.

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Now that the Senate has passed a transportation bill and everyone’s waiting to see what the House will do next, Transportation for America has done us all a great service and compared the Senate’s bill to the House’s — well, to the last thing the House showed us before things fell apart for John Boehner’s extreme attack on transit, biking, and walking.

The T4A analysis breaks down each bill, policy by policy, and lays out any pending amendments to the House bill that could potentially change it for the better.

Here’s an excerpt from their detailed comparison:

Public transportation & transit-oriented development

Senate: Continues dedicated funding for public transportation at traditional 20 percent share. Creates some new flexibility to spend federal funds on operations, i.e., keeping buses and trains running, not just buying new equipment. A new transit-oriented development planning program was incorporated into the bill via the Banking title.

House: Original bill ends 30 years of dedicated funding for public transit (read the letter we organized by more than 600 groups and individuals opposing this). Allows loans for transit-oriented development as an eligible expense under the TIFIA loan program. It doesn’t provide large transit operators with any flexibility to spend federal money on operating their transit systems.

Possible House amendment fix:  LaTourette/Carnahan 16 would allow all transit agencies to use a portion of their federal transit funding for operating expenses during times of economic crisis. (This amendment is similar to this bill the two representatives offered back in 2011.)

Walking and bicycling, local control of funds

Senate: Due in part to this amendment offered by Senators Cardin and Cochran and incorporated into the bill, MAP-21 consolidates programs for making biking and walking safer (as well as for other small local projects) and gives 50 percent of this consolidated program directly to metro areas. States and metro areas must create a competitive grant process to distribute that funding to local communities that apply. The Commerce Committee title also includes a new Complete Streets provision.

House: Eliminates most dedicated funding for bicycling & walking. Those uses remain “eligible” but without any dedicated funding for them. The bill also deletes numerous references throughout the bill that encourage multimodal projects. The bill retains the Recreational Trails program.

Possible House amendment fix: Petri-Blumenauer 103 creates consolidated program for bike/ped and other local projects and provides local governments access to new consolidated pot of funding.

Read the rest here.

Praise for the Senate transportation bill and its bipartisan passage is pouring in to the inboxes of Congressional transportation reporters this afternoon.

Here’s the statement from the traditionally pro-highway U.S. Chamber of Commerce…

Passage of MAP-21 is a long-awaited victory for the business community and the American people… The Chamber commends the chairs and ranking members of the committees of jurisdiction for striving for a bipartisan bill.

…and from AASHTO, the association of state DOTs:

Their bipartisan approach helped set a path forward for this bill that not only provides a greater degree of funding certainty for states, it also establishes reforms that will streamline project delivery, consolidate programs, and improve performance reporting and accountability.

The bill also drew (somewhat more tentative) praise from advocacy organizations like T4America…

The Senate today has done the nation a great service in overcoming partisan gridlock to help Americans avoid literal gridlock… While there are still additional reforms that could improve the overall program, we have to commend the Senate for doing its part, and in so doing has created a road map for transportation policy that can win bipartisan support.

…and environmentalists:

The Sierra Club applauds the bipartisan coalition that fended off the desperate attempts of big polluters to derail a bill that will put Americans to work rebuilding and improving our transportation system and will begin to reduce our dependence on oil. Although there is room for improvement, this bill takes important steps forward in repairing our existing infrastructure and investing in clean, convenient transportation options such as transit, biking and walking.

The bill’s applauders all urged the House to pass a transportation bill — current policy runs out on March 31 — while recognizing the abundant superiority of the Senate bill over what the House most recently proposed.

The Senate transportation bill has finally passed by a vote of 74 to 22. In a show of bipartisan support, which this bill has largely enjoyed from start to finish, 22 Republicans voted for its passage.

The bill, which would support $109 billion worth of federal transportation programs over two years if enacted — a much shorter time-frame than the usual five or six years — contains few sweeping changes to existing policy. Measures that initially weakened federal support for bicycle and pedestrian projects were mitigated by the Cardin-Cochran amendment, which was incorporated into the bill without a vote. The bill also gives transit agencies more flexibility to spend federal funding to maintain service during economic downturns, and equalizes the commuter tax benefits for transit riders and drivers. (We’ll have more policy details later today.)

“Some really good reforms have taken place here,” said Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) from the floor immediately following the vote. He expressed his hope that the vote will lay the foundation for a “much longer, better, more robust highway authorization bill, but the first thing is to get into conference with the House and see what we can accomplish.”

“It was a great vote,” added Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA). “If Senator Lautenberg were here, it would be 75.” Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey was one of only four Senators, and the only Democrat, not to vote. (Update: Lautenberg was attending the funeral of New Jersey Rep. Donald Payne, who passed away last week.)

Boxer and Inhofe, respectively the chairman and ranking member of the Senate Environment & Public Works Committee, received a great deal of praise from their colleagues for assembling so much bipartisan support. “That’s hard work, and that’s the way the Senate should work,” Mary Landrieu of Louisiana said of their efforts. “I hope the House will take this bill, and I know they have their own opinions of how things should be, but it’s important to get this $110 billion out to America.”

What happens next is still a mystery.

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The Senate is voting right now on the final amendments to the transportation bill and will consider the full bill later today. Transportation for America has put out a handy amendment tracker, reproduced below, with descriptions of each one and the final outcomes of the votes that happened yesterday. Senate leaders had already tossed out many amendments that had been introduced and agreed to consider the 30 below.

The first table is transportation-related amendments; the second one is non-transportation-related amendments.

Senator and #	Description	Outcome or Notes
Cardin-Cochran 1549	Local Access and Control This provides local communities and metropolitan regions with access to the “Additional Activities” pot of funding through a competitive grant program — funding that they can use for main street revitalizations, boulevard conversions, new bike facilities, or safety improvements to make streets safer for everyone. Large metro areas will receive some funds directly. Read our explainer on the amendment here	Adopted into Senate manager’s amendment package on 3/1/12. Amendment text (pdf)
Franken-Blunt 1543	Bridge Repair This would help provide adequate funding and flexibility to states to repair and rehabilitate the 180,000 federal-aid bridges that are not on the National Highway System (NHS). These bridges would become eligible for a 40% share of the main highway program funds (National Highway Performance Program) that aren’t currently required for repairing the National Highway System.	Adopted into Senate manager’s amendment package on 3/1/12. One-pager on federal-aid bridges (pdf) Amendment text (pdf)
Landrieu 1630	Protecting MPOs from State Penalties This ensures that metropolitan areas (MPOs) aren’t left on the hook for financial penalties if states do not meet their state requirements for fixing roads and bridges or develop a state highway safety plan.	Adopted into Senate manager’s amendment package on 3/1/12. Amendment text (pdf)
Blunt-Casey 1540	Repairing Non-Federal-aid Bridges This would require states to dedicate a specific percentage of their highway funds to repairing bridges that are not on the National Highway System and also not located on a Federal-aid highway.	The amendment passed by an unrecorded voice vote.
DeMint 1756	Turning federal program over to states This would transfer most responsibility for surface transportation to states and remove many regulatory requirements. The Federal government would continue to fund Interstate maintenance, transportation research, and safety. Finally, this amendment would end all dedicated funding for transit programs.	The amendment failed, by a count of 30-67.
Bingaman 1759	Privatized highways This would reduce the amount of Federal highway money states receive each year to account for roads that have been privatized, The majority of Federal highway dollars are sent to states based on the total number of lane miles, this ensures that states don’t get federal money based on including lane-miles that they’re not actually responsible for maintaining.	The amendment passed by a count of 50-47.
Coats 1517	State spending caps Under this amendment, states would get back only what they put into the Highway Trust Fund in a given fiscal year, defeating the ability of a federal program to shift revenues based on important regional or national purposes.	The amendment failed, by a count of 28-70.
Brown (OH) 1819	Buy America This would apply “Buy American” requirements to all highway and transit projects. This would ensure that a higher percentage of manufactured goods and commodities (e.g. steel, concrete, etc.) are produced within the United States.	The amendment passed by an unrecorded voice vote.
Merkley 1653	Farm vehicle exemptions This would exempt certain farm vehicles, including the individual operating that vehicle, from certain requirements, including commercial drivers’ licenses, drug testing, and certifications	The amendment passed by an unrecorded voice vote.
Portman 1736	Gas tax flexibility States would keep their gas taxes and be able to essentially “opt-out” of the federal surface transportation program entirely. Transportation projects developed by states that “opt-out” would not be subject to any Federal highway, transit, and related environmental regulations.	The amendment failed, by a count of 30-68.
Klobuchar 1617	Ag transportation This amendment would exempt drivers from maximum driving and on-duty regulations for drivers of agricultural farm supplies and agricultural products during planting and harvesting periods.	The amendment passed by an unrecorded voice vote.
Corker 1785	Discretionary spending cap adjustment This amendment would cut discretionary spending by $20 billion on top of the cuts Congress already has agreed to.	The amendment failed, by a count of 40-58.
Shaheen 1678	Small bus systems Public transportation providers that operate between 50 and 75 buses would be allowed the flexibility to use a portion of their federal funds to cover the cost of operations. Systems operating fewer than 50 buses would be permitted to use a larger share of their federal funds to cover the cost of operations.	This amendment was withdrawn by the sponsor.
Portman 1742	Rest areas This amendment would allow states to permit any non-highway use in any rest area along any highway, including any commercial activity that does not impair the highway or interfere with the full use and safety of the highway.	The amendment failed, by a count of 12-86.
Corker 1810	Limitation on expenditures Beginning in 2005, Congress authorized spending more money each year from the Highway Trust Fund than it took in, resulting in declining balances. This amendment would eliminate this practice and ensure that expenditures from the Fund were equal to amounts deposited for a given fiscal year.	This amendment was withdrawn by the sponsor.
Carper 1670	Tolling This amendment would expand the ability of states to apply for authority to toll certain Federal-aid highways, with proceeds available for investments in the corridor, helping to create alternatives in that tolled corridor.	This amendment was withdrawn by the sponsor.
Hutchison 1568	Tolls This would reduce the ability of states to apply to USDOT for authority to toll certain Federal-aid highways	This amendment was withdrawn by the sponsor.
McCain 1669	Grand Canyon – noise abatement This would exempt certain commercial air tour aircraft from noise restrictions, air traffic control restrictions (minimum altitude requirements) and environmental restrictions. In addition, it would set a 15 year deadline for conversion of air tour aircrafts operating in the Grand Canyon National Park to certain quiet technologies.	This amendment was superseded by provisions in the manager’s package and withdrawn by the sponsor.
Alexander 1779	Over-flights of national parks	The amendment passed by an unrecorded voice vote.
Boxer 1816	Emergency exemptions This “Sense of the Senate” resolution urges agencies to take advantage of procedures in current law to move expeditiously when rebuilding after a disaster.	The amendment passed by a 76-20 count.
Paul 1556	Emergency exemptions for projects When rebuilding any project closed due to safety reasons, this would exempt those projects from environmental reviews, approvals, licensing and permit requirements for rebuilding a project that was closed due to safety reasons.	The amendment failed by a count of 42-54. (Technically, a vote on the amendment was not permitted because a point of order against it was sustained. The motion to waive the point of order failed to reach the required 60 votes.)

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The Senate is finally making progress towards passing their two-year transportation bill, but the big question seems to be what’s to come in the House — and not even the House knows.

The uncertainty surrounding the House bill, and the threat it poses to the entire reauthorization process, has elicited an impassioned response from representatives of “different levels of governance in three states, across three geographic regions, and from both parties” in defense of bipartisanship.

Writing for The Hill, these experts — Mick Cornett, the mayor of Oklahoma City, Eugene Conti, the Secretary of Transportation for North Carolina, and Steve Heminger, Executive Director of the Bay Area Metropolitan Transportation Commission – are urging the House not to come back from recess with the same, bitterly partisan bill as before:

With just a handful of legislative days left before the March 31 expiration, the Senate now seems on the verge of voting on a bipartisan bill. The road has been rougher in the House, but Wed. Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) urged his troops to make one last run at crafting their own measure.

We were heartened to hear that House leaders intend to back away from ending the dedicated funding for public transportation begun under President Reagan. But we hope the changes to the earlier draft will go well beyond that.

Read the whole op-ed here.

After two consecutive failed attempts, floor votes are finally proceeding on the Senate’s two-year, $109 billion transportation bill. The votes come on the heels of an agreement between party leaders Harry Reid and Mitch McConnell, which will allow certain non-transportation-related amendments to be voted on. As part of the deal, those amendments will require 60 votes for passage instead of the customary simple majority.

Yesterday, the Senate voted on seven amendments (out of 30) and one motion to waive certain provisions of the Budget Control Act. They passed two amendments, and the motion carried, setting up more votes on Tuesday, and a possible final vote on the bill later next week.

The budget controls waiver was important enough that majority leader Harry Reid made sure it would see a vote on the first day. If that motion were to fail, the Senate would essentially have to start over with its bill.

The two amendments that passed each did so with considerable bipartisan support. One committed extra funding to rural schools in areas where federal lands cut into the property tax base, and another directed 80 percent of BP’s Deepwater Horizon spill settlement to Gulf Coast states to aid in environmental cleanup.

Of the five rejected amendments, three received a majority of votes but fell shy of the 60-vote threshold necessary for adoption. Two rejected amendments — one sponsored by a Democrat, Ron Wyden, and one by a Republican, John Hoeven — dealt with the Keystone XL pipeline, which President Obama has repeatedly come out against, at least as currently proposed.

The national media have taken note of the close call on Hoeven’s amendment. Eleven Democrats voted in favor of authorizing the pipeline, giving it an easy majority at 56 votes, but not quite the 60 votes they needed to pass it. Add in the two Republicans who couldn’t vote, Mark Kirk (recovering from a stroke) and John Thune (death in the family), and they cut it even closer.

There are only 23 amendments left to go, including five more non-germane amendments (four require a 60-vote majority to pass). If the Senate can approve the entire bill in the next week or two, and the House’s week-long recess is not enough time to drum up support for its own five-year bill, Speaker John Boehner has indicated he will take up the Senate bill. If that happens, expect the House to throw its own amendment parade, too.

T4America’s amendment tracker has been updated to reflect yesterday’s results, but here is a handy summary of the day’s votes:

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The leaders of each political party in the Senate have reached a deal on their two-year, $109 billion transportation bill, clearing the way for as many as 10 votes on amendments to the bill later today.

With a deal struck, prospects for passage of the Senate bill have now improved dramatically. Majority leader Harry Reid had tried to bypass much of the amendment process with a cloture vote on Tuesday, but couldn’t assemble enough votes to move forward. Top Republican Mitch McConnell had indicated prior to that vote that he felt a deal was near, and urged his colleagues to vote “no” in order to give him more time to negotiate.

Reid and McConnell have agreed to bring 30 amendments up for a vote. Of those, 18 are “germane” amendments dealing with specific provisions already included in the bill, and 12 are “non-germane” and deal with oil drilling and the Keystone XL pipeline, among other things. The Hill is reporting that approximately 10 amendments will be voted on today, with the rest waiting until next week. T4America has also launched new amendment tracker that reflects the changes to the bill.

The germane amendments need only a simple majority to pass, while the non-germane amendments will require 60 votes, a tall order in the Democrat-controlled Senate. However, the Obama administration is already lobbying Democrats to oppose the Keystone XL amendment, perhaps an indication that it might have the votes to pass. Keystone XL has already passed the House as part of a domestic energy production bill.

The underlying bill for these amendments will be Reid’s 1500-page combination of the EPW, Banking, Commerce, and Finance titles. It is the same transportation bill that failed Tuesday’s cloture vote, but it has already been agreed to by “unanimous consent,” meaning that it doesn’t need a vote of its own to be the basis for today’s amendments.

Votes will be broadcast and webcast on C-SPAN2, and Streetsblog will be tweeting updates all day.

Majority Leader Harry Reid failed to win a key vote in the Senate today that would have forged significant progress toward passage of a two-year transportation bill. It is the second time a cloture vote on the bill has failed since it was first brought to the Senate floor.

Needing 60 votes to invoke cloture, only 52 Senators voted in favor of the measure and 44 voted against it. The vote means Reid and top Senate Republican Mitch McConnell must continue to negotiate a list of amendments that will be allowed for individual consideration on the floor. It also gives the House time to regroup — House Republicans are meeting privately today and tomorrow to decide what, if anything, they will try to pass before the current extension of the 2005 transportation law runs out on March 31. With Bill Schuster taking the lead on the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, the House seems to be doubling down on its highway-centric approach to transportation policy.

Prior to the Senate vote, Reid and Senator Barbara Boxer urged their colleagues to vote yes. “We have a chance today to vote to end this dithering,” said Boxer, before launching into a state-by-state enumeration of how many jobs depended on passage of a transportation bill.

But McConnell had other plans. Before the vote began, he proposed that the Reid bill be replaced with his own, one that included a different list of amendments, including several which Reid described as “inflammatory.” Under McConnell’s plan, the Senate would then wait until the House put forth a bill of their own to move forward.

With the House bill in shambles and the March 31 deadline fast approaching, Reid rejected McConnell’s proposal, setting the stage for his cloture vote. In the end, the vote gave McConnell at least part of the delay he initially sought: “I’d encourage a ‘No’ vote, but not to stop the bill,” McConnell said, explaining that he just needed more time to negotiate with Reid.

Two Republicans broke ranks with their party and voted for cloture: Scott Brown (MA) and Susan Collins (ME). There had been some speculation that Collins’s fellow Mainer, Olympia Snowe, who is retiring at the end of the current term, would vote yes as well, but she voted with McConnell — as did James Inhofe and all the ranking Republican committee members who helped their individual portions of the bill pass committee with bipartisan support.

Two Democrats did not cast a vote — Alaska’s Mark Begich and Vermont’s Patrick Leahy.

Reid himself cast the last vote against cloture for procedural reasons. Faced with inevitable defeat, Reid’s “no” vote will allow him to revisit the motion later.