Author Archive
Transportation Referenda On Next Week’s Ballot in Georgia
July 25th, 2012 | By: America's Infrastructure Report Card
On July 31st, voters in Georgia will head to the polls to vote on a referendum important to both the people of Georgia and the Civil Engineering Profession.
Georgia’s 12 Economic Development Regions. Click on the map to go to the T-SPLOST website.
Obama Announces Major Port Projects to Be Expedited
July 23rd, 2012 | By: America's Infrastructure Report Card
The Obama Administration has announced that as part of its “We Can’t Wait” initiative, seven nationally and regionally significant infrastructure projects will be expedited to help modernize and expand five major ports in the United States, including the Port of Jacksonville, the Port of Miami, the Port of Savannah, the Port of New York and New Jersey, and the Port of Charleston. “I am excited to hear the Administration is taking steps to speed up improvements of some of America’s most important infrastructure and our lifeline to international trade – our ports,” said ASCE President Andrew W. Herrmann, P.E. In March, President Obama signed an Executive Order to charge the Office of Management and Budget with making the permitting and review process for infrastructure projects more efficient and effective. These are the first seven of the initial 43 projects that will be expedited by the Executive Order – additional expedited infrastructure projects will be announced in the coming weeks. The Obama Administration also announced the establishment of a White House-led Task Force that will consist of senior officials from various White House offices, the Army Corps of Engineers, and the Departments of Transportation, Commerce, Homeland Security, and the Treasury. The Task Force will develop a Federal strategy and coordinated decision-making principles that focus on the economic return of investments into coastal ports and related infrastructure to support the movement of commerce throughout the Nation. For more information on the port projects selected check out the White House site To read President Herrmann’s full statement, go to ASCE’s website
Dam Safety Bill Introduced in Senate
July 19th, 2012 | By: America's Infrastructure Report Card
Senators Daniel K. Akaka (D-HI), John Boozman (R-AR), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), and Mike Crapo (R-ID) introduced the Dam Safety Act of 2012 on June 29. The last bill authorizing spending for the national dam safety program expired on September 30, 2011. The National Dam Safety Program is administered by the Department of Homeland Security’s Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Under FEMA’s leadership, the National Dam Safety Program is dedic
ated to protecting the lives of American citizens and their property from the risks associated with the development, operation, and maintenance of America’s dams.
The new Senate bill will reauthorize the National Dam Safety Program for Fiscal Years 2012 through 2016 at $13.9 million per year including:
- $9.2 million per year split among the states, based on the relative number of dams per state, to make improvements in programs identified in the National Dam Safety Program Act;
- $1.45 million per year in research funds to identify more effective techniques to assess, construct, and monitor dams;
- $1 million per year for a nationwide public awareness and outreach program;
- $750,000 per year in training assistance to state engineers; and
- $500,000 per year for the National Inventory of Dams.
Congressional Budget Office Examines the Proposed National Infrastructure Bank
July 16th, 2012 | By: America's Infrastructure Report Card
Senator John Kerry, author of the BUILD Act and Infrastructure Bank proponent. Courtesy Flickr/Talk Radio News Service
ASCE Needs Your Help — Give Us Your “Success Stories”!
July 13th, 2012 | By: America's Infrastructure Report Card
ASCE is currently developing the 2013 Report Card for America’s Infrastructure and we need your help in identifying “Success Stories” – examples of how public and private organizations have addressed specific infrastructure problems with some creativity and determination. While the 2009 Report Card showed there is much work to be done to raise the grades, we know there are countless examples of projects and programs from across the country that demonstrate progress is being made. It is
Success!
- Increased federal leadership
- Promotion of sustainability and resilience
- Develop federal, regional, and state infrastructure plans
- Address life-cycle costs and ongoing maintenance
- Increase and improve infrastructure investment from all stakeholders
Transportation Bill Signed Into Law
July 9th, 2012 | By: America's Infrastructure Report Card
President Obama signed the surface transportation bill, MAP-21 (HR 4348), last Friday at the White House. The President’s signature comes 1,010 days after the last surface transportation bill, SAFETEA-LU, expired. The new $118 billion, 27 month piece of legislation will fund programs until September 2014. ASCE President Andrew Herrmann, P.E., SECB, F.ASCE, was in attendance for this afternoon’s signing ceremony. Hundreds of ASCE Key Contacts assisted in this effort by responding to Key Alerts asking them to call, email or make visits with their elected officials to let them know how vital this legislation is to the nation’s infrastructure, and to the livelihoods of all Americans. Thanks to all those who helped! For more information on the legislation and to see how your Senators and Representative voted on the final surface transportation bill please visit our “Transportation in Action” page.
State Legislators Ready to Tackle Transportation
July 4th, 2012 | By: America's Infrastructure Report Card
We can take heart that there are policymakers working hard out in the states to help find solutions to restoring and improving the nation’s infrastructure. Last week ASCE staff had the opportunity to interact with a small group of state legislators from around the country who have distinguished themselves as leaders on transportation issues. Through a partnership with the Council of State Governments (CSG), ASCE helped to host a Transportation Policy Academy in Washington, DC to talk about the challenges and possible solutions to funding infrastructure at the state level. What we learned is that these state legislators need our help. Most of the legislators participating in the three-day long meeting serve as the chairman of one of the Transportation Committees in their legislature, so they are on the front lines in facing the challenge of funding the improvements needed in their state. They are fully aware of the problems ASCE has been highlighting in our recent Failure to Act series, but what they expressed to us is how helpful these reports are in demonstrating to their own constituents the need for infrastructure investment. A prominent legislator from Connecticut said, “We need to convince our constituents that there is a need for our state government to increase its investment in infrastructure. These reports can help us do that.” A legislator from Georgia who has been a leader on the effort there to put a 1% sales tax on the ballot this summer to fund transportation projects said, “In my district, we need to realize that revenue is necessary to pay for new projects and maintenance of our current system.” During the meeting, lawmakers shared information about what they’ve been doing in their respective states on transportation issues, but they also heard from policy experts and advocates from several groups including ASCE. Their agenda also included a visit to several ongoing projects in Northern Virginia hosted by the Virginia Department of Transportation, and meetings with Members of Congress from their respective states. Legislators attended the meeting from Arkansas, Connecticut, Georgia, Louisiana, Maine, Ohio, and Washington.
House and Senate Pass Transportation Bill
July 2nd, 2012 | By: America's Infrastructure Report Card
UPDATE: The House of Representatives passed the transportation conference report by a vote of 373-52 Friday afternoon. The Senate passed the bill 74-19. The House and Senate worked vigorously all week to come to a compromise surface transportation conference report on Wednesday night. The announcement of a deal came over 1,000 days after the last surface transportation bill, SAFETEA-LU, expired in September 2009. The conference deal, which runs through the end of September 2014, will keep transportation spending at current levels and extend the authority to collect gasoline taxes through September 2016. The deal will be voted on today, first by the Senate, with the House following shortly thereafter. The bill is expected to pass through both chambers and be signed by the President before the 9th extension to surface transportation programs expires on Saturday. The House and Senate agreement on Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century (MAP-21), will set highway spending at $39.7 billion in fiscal 2013 and $40.3 billion in fiscal 2014. Mass transit formula grants would be set at $8.5 billion in fiscal 2013 and $8.6 billion in fiscal 2014. Additional revenues will mostly come from collecting revenues from changes to federal pensions and moving money from the Leaking Underground Storage Tank trust fund into the Highway Trust Fund. The new bill makes significant programmatic reforms, many of which ASCE has been long supported. The deal consolidates federal programs in an attempt to make them more competitive and streamlines the environmental review process to speed project delivery. The bill also has a focus on performance standards for highway and bridge maintenance, and ties some funding to whether states meet performance goals laid out in the bill. The TIFIA grant program will see a substantial increase to $750 million in 2013 and $1 billion in 2014, a move which ASCE strongly advocated for over the past few months. The TIFIA program will also now operate on a first-come, first served basis, removing evaluation criteria. Next, the Transportation Enhancements program will also see some changes. First, the program will now be called the Transportation Alternative program and each state will set-aside 2 percent of the amount apportioned for their enhancement activities. However, if these funds are not allocated within the state, the state may transfer up to 50% of those funds to other programs. MAP-21 also includes the RESTORE Act language, which would establish the Gulf Coast Restoration Trust Fund. The trust fund would contain 80% of all penalties paid from parties responsible for the gulf coast oil spill in order to pay for the extensive clean-up efforts. ASCE, through the Water Resources Coalition has been supportive of the inclusion of the RESTORE Act language. Additionally, MAP-21 expands the ability of states to place tolls on any Federal-aid facility for any new capacity and removes the Bingaman amendment, which ASCE opposed, that would have reduced highway formula funds for states that sell or lease toll facilities to private companies. Finally, turning to research, the bill provides $400 million for transportation research and authorizes 35 competitive grants to be provided annually for University Transportation Centers, a move which ASCE supported. We’re happy to see that Congress came to a bipartisan agreement on surface transportation programs and worked to get a bill done by June 30th. However, it must be noted that this is just a critical first step to raising the grades for our nation’s surface transportation system. As ASCE has documented, we are not investing nearly enough to bring our roads, bridges, and transit systems to an acceptable condition that will serve our economy in the long-run. Therefore, ASCE will continue to work with Congress on a long-term, reliable funding source to meet these goals.
Tags: congress, economics, highway trust fund, house of representatives, infrastructure, senate, transportation
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House Guts EPA Spending on Infrastructure to Curtail Regulations
June 22nd, 2012 | By: America's Infrastructure Report Card
A House subcommittee has approved a spending bill for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for fiscal year 2013 that seeks to drastically cut back on new federal environmental rules through the simple expedient of imposing major budget cuts on the agency. In years past House Republicans used prohibitory language in appropriations acts to bar the EPA from spending money to write or carry out certain rules opposed by business interests.
Far easier now to simply eliminate funding for large parts of the agency’s programs. The $28 billion appropriations bill that was marked up in subcommittee on Wednesday provides only $7 billion for the EPA in FY 2013. This represents a 17 percent cut that would bring environmental funding to a level below the FY 1998 total. The bill caps the number of agency employees at their lowest level since 1992.
“The bill reins in funding and out-of-control regulation at the EPA and reduces overall spending for the third year in a row,” according to a press release from Rep. Mike Simpson (R-ID), chair of the Interior-Environment Appropriations Subcommittee.
The bill reduces the EPA’s Clean Water State Revolving Fund for wastewater infrastructure by $778 million, or more than half from FY 2012, to $689 million, and cuts the Drinking Water State Revolving Fund by $89 million to $829 million.
“Despite the hyperbole of some of my Republican friends, EPA programs and regulations did not cause this recession, and tying the hands of this important agency certainly won’t get us out — that idea is as fictional as recent reports of EPA
drones,” said Rep. Norm Dicks (D-WA), senior Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee.
The bill adopts a new tack by House Republicans, who added numerous amendments to the FY 2012 act that were designed to roll back or limit EPA regulation. The Republican leadership had to pull the FY 2012 bill last year amid a surge of amendments. Republicans were forced to put the EPA spending bill in an omnibus appropriations measure that largely spared the agency from deep cuts.
Transportation Appropriations Heading to House Floor
June 20th, 2012 | By: America's Infrastructure Report Card
The House Appropriations Committee marked up the Transportation and Housing & Urban Development appropriations bill, which passed by voice vote. The bill’s overall total of $51.6 billion in discretionary spending would be $3.9 billion less than fiscal 2012 and $1.9 billion less than the president’s request, however due to the current economic climate the cuts are not too bad. Overall, the House was kind to transportation programs, maintaining investment for highways and making minor increases for the FAA and Amtrak. One of the bigger cuts in the House bill is the zeroing out of the discretionary TIGER program, which provides grants for infrastructure projects that have national or regional significance. The full spending breakdown can be seen here:- Highways – Provides $39.1 billion from the Highway Trust Fund to be spent, the same level as last year and $2.7 billion below the President’s request.
- Air – The FAA would receive $12.6 billion, $91 million above last year’s level. The bill also provides nearly $1 billion for NextGen and rejects the Administration’s proposal for new aviation fees.
- Rail – The Federal Railroad Administration is funded with $2 billion, which is $384 million above last year’s level and $716 million below the President’s request. This funding includes $1.8 billion for Amtrak, to be primarily used for capital improvements.
- Transit – The Federal Transit Administration would receive $2 billion, which is $181 million below last year’s level and $546 million below the President’s request. The bill would also provide $1.8 billion for the “New Starts” program.
- Maritime – The bill includes $338 million for the Maritime Administration, a decline of $12 million from last year and $7 million below the President’s request.
- Safety – The bill includes $776 million for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, a decrease of $23.8 million from last year; $551 million for the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, a decrease of $2.6 million from last year; and $177 million for the Pipeline and Hazardous Safety Administration, an increase of $4 million from last year.
Tags: economics, infrastructure, legislation, roads, transportation
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