In some ways, this question is similar to the question of what should happen when annual appropriations for federal programs expire and Congress has not enacted new appropriations on time. That happens regularly, and Congress either has to step in with short term “continuing resolutions”, or much of the government would shut down. For programs funded with “contract authority” from the Highway Trust Fund, short-term extensions are akin to “continuing resolutions” of appropriations.

Starting in 2001, President Bush regularly called for a fiscal reform called “government shutdown prevention” in his annual budget proposals to Congress. This basic proposal was set out in the President’s Budget:

"There should be a back-up plan to avoid the threat of a Government shutdown, although the expectation is that appropriations bills still would pass on time as the law requires. Under the Administration’s proposal, if an appropriations bill is not signed by October 1 of the new fiscal year, funding would be automatically provided at the lower of the President’s Budget or the prior year’s level."

This was first set out in “A Blueprint for New Beginnings,” Feb. 28, 2001, and was regularly repeated right through President Bush’s last budget submission for FY2009. http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy09/pdf/spec.pdf

However, President Obama has not supported this proposal among the reforms included in his own budget proposals to Congress for FY2010 and FY2011.

While Congress will not have to act again to extend SAFETEA-LU, until the end of this calendar year, it does not appear that the enactment of a new multi-year surface transportation bill is likely to happen anytime soon. Certainly, Congress should not again allow these programs to expire, as with the filibuster by Senator Bunning. However, it seems likely that we will face additional extensions into 2011 and perhaps beyond. As Jack Schenendorf and others have pointed out, what has seemingly delayed enactment of new legislation is the unwillingness or inability of the Administration and Congress to identify sources of funding to support necessary investment in the preservation, restoration, and enhanced operations of the Nation’s transportation infrastructure.

Perhaps America’s continuing economic and financial challenges and the growing urgency of addressing budget deficits and a ballooning national debt will provide the impetus to deal with national transportation policy and investment in transportation on some longer-term basis. In this context, our goals should include both adequate investment in transportation infrastructure and significant reform of transportation programs.

Federal investment resources for transportation are likely to be scarce in the immediate future. These circumstances will put a premium on investing wisely and on maximizing the efficiency and productivity of transportation systems and facilities. Even in a series of interim transportation measures and short-term extensions, we can and should take initial, but meaningful, steps toward a national transportation policy shaped around clearly articulated goals and purposes, outcomes and performance, and accountability. A commitment by the Administration and Congress to enact and implement such programmatic reforms can make a surface transportation authorization bill the “must-pass” legislation for which Mort Downey has called, even in the context of severe budgetary constraints.

The construction industry shed 43,000 in March and has consistently clocked in at higher-than-average unemployment numbers. Transit agencies are letting go of bus drivers, station agents and engineers as state budgets bleed. Roads and highways are in a state of disrepair.

While many of these trends are out of Congress’ hands, there is no question that several months of stop-gap measures and mixed signals has taken its toll on our nation’s transportation infrastructure. The collapse of a bipartisan extension last October, for instance, forced states to put projects on hold when $8.7 billion evaporated. Obstructionism from Kentucky Senator Jim Bunning in early 2010 forced the Department of Transportation to send its employees on unpaid furloughs. What if something had gone seriously wrong and no one was at the switchboard to help?

Nobody wants to see history repeat itself in six or seven years when the transportation law is again up for renewal, but including automatic extensions seems like an easy way out. We need to focus our full attention on getting real reform in this bill so Congress can move forward with confidence the next time it expires. The reauthorization presents a number of challenges. How can we increase transportation options and offer Americans real choice? What can be done to keep close tabs on taxpayer dollars and promote projects that make sense? How do we empower local agencies to take charge of the process and get results?

It is past time we ask the hard questions rather than the easy ones. Allowing programs to renew automatically when the law has expired just makes it easier to put those tough questions and answers off longer than we can afford.

Including automatic extensions in the next highway and transit bill will help stabilize state governments, families and paychecks – provided, of course, that Congress doesn’t use them as an excuse to delay comprehensive action. But overall, they’re a good idea for a number of reasons, not the least of which is the positive impact such a policy would have on the workers who build our roads, bridges and railways.

The economic downturn has hit construction workers particularly hard – 27 percent are unemployed. By automatically extending transportation projects, many of these men and women would be able to not only get back to work, but also do so without worrying that their work assignment might come to an abrupt halt because of indecisive lawmakers or, worse, a filibustering senator.

With a regular paycheck, construction workers are able to provide for themselves and their families, and much of the money they earn is immediately reinvested in the local economy via spending at nearby businesses. These workers will also no longer be forced to rely on public unemployment or health care benefits, reducing the overall burden on taxpayers.

Along with automatic extensions, the next transportation bill should also allow for some funding flexibility in the absence of a new authorization – an underfunded project is in some ways even worse than one that’s been temporarily halted. Taxpayer money is spent inefficiently in such projects, all while limiting the number of people who can benefit from working on them. The next transportation bill should, in the event it expires, give the Transportation Department the power to alter funding levels as needed – this would go a long way toward making sure projects finish on time and on budget.

Updated at 12:13 p.m. on March 30.

The case for multi-year surface transportation authorizations has rested on the need for states to manage costly multi-year construction projects. Multi-year transportation bills and contract authority have helped state DOTs to avoid fluctuating year-to-year transportation program levels and have minimized the attendant uncertainty when planning for large construction projects. That justification was indeed valid when we were building the Interstate Highway system and planning other capacity expansion mega projects such as Boston’s “Big Dig” or Northern Virginia’s Springfield Interchange. But that age, if we correctly read the tea leaves, is over. Implementing walking and bicycling networks and other “non-motorized” and “livability” projects will not require much advance budgeting or a long planning-design-construction cycle. Routine road maintenance and preservation activities to keep the system in a state of good repair, likewise do not need multi-year planning and budgeting.



With “the end of favoring motorized transportation at the expense of non-motorized,” and with state transportation agencies urged to give “the same priority to walking and bicycling as is given to other transportation modes” as Transportation Secretary LaHood announced, perhaps the time also has come to end multi-year transportation bills and embrace an annual appropriation cycle like the vast majority of other federal programs.



Reactions any one?

I understand and share the frustration that everyone feels with the stop-and-start uncertainty about surface transportation--and aviation--legislation, but I don't think the automatic continuing resolution is the right answer. What the industry needs, and has benefitted from, is long-term certainty in order to move forward on an overall program of investment, balanced among system preservation and new capacity.

If there were an automatic continuing resolution, I think it would become the default option, assuring that nothing would be done on schedule. If it kicked in with every expiration, it's possible that there never would be pressure to enact long-term legislation. This means no realignment of programs with emerging priorities, and eventually a total lack of alignment with the revenues that drive the program.

The need to take action is necessary to remind the Administration and the Congress of their responsibilities. Perhaps there should be provision to assure that staffing for oversight and management of existing committments should not be allowed to lapse, as happened with the Bunning filibuster, but at some point the urgency of program furnding for new commitments needs to be felt in order to overcome inertia. Dealing with transportation legislation needs to become a "must-pass" bill in order to get attention.

This is a fascinating question. Stated another way, “Should we let Congress off the hook for the consequences of its failure to decide what the federal-aid highway system should look like and how to fund it?” I think the answer must be “no.”

Five years ago, IBTTA organized a forum on the future of highway transportation in America. During the forum, one of the participants famously remarked that a successful reauthorization might be, in fact, a hindrance to innovation because it’s the strangling of the system that’s causing people to think outside the box. I love it when we see words like strangling and innovation in the same sentence.

The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee has produced a bill that envisions a six-year highway program worth $500 billion. The problem is that the committee can come up with only about $300 billion to fund the bill. Where does the remaining $200 billion come from? If you’re looking for a prime example of self-strangulation, this is it.

The systemic gap between desired expenditures and available revenues from the fuel tax is the elephant in the room. This elephant suggests that we need to take a very hard look at how we fund transportation and where we spend our dollars.

Last July, President Bill Clinton gave an important speech before the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s inaugural conference on obesity. A highlight of the conference was the release of a report stating that obesity costs the US $147 billion a year in direct health care costs.

Less reported but equally important was the miniature sermon Mr. Clinton dropped into the very middle of his speech. He said, “Most of the debates in Washington debate two questions. What are you going to do and how much money are you going to spend on it? There is relatively little time spent on the third question: however much money you’ve got to spend on whatever it is you’re going to do, how do you propose to turn your good intentions into positive changes? The how question, in the end, matters more than the how much question. Not because money doesn’t matter but because if you answer the how question you can get more money for what you’re trying to do.”

Last year the Bipartisan Policy Center issued a report called “Performance Driven: A New Vision for U.S. Transportation Policy.” This report tries to address all three of the questions President Clinton mentioned. But, refreshingly, it takes special aim at the question of how.

The Bipartisan Policy Center report raises the fundamental concern that “existing revenue mechanisms fail to take advantage of the fact that the performance of the transportation system can be directly influenced by how users pay for it.” That’s a fancy way of saying what many experts and editorial writers have stated so clearly: our system of paying for and maintaining roads has collapsed because it relies on a funding mechanism – taxes on the sale of cars and gasoline – that is unsustainable.

The average motorist has little idea how she pays for roads. She’s upset that urban congestion is growing worse with each passing day. She’s frustrated because the Congress and state legislatures keep getting wrapped up in endless, futile debates on whether to raise the gas tax or where to spend the scarce transportation dollars. She doesn’t understand why we can’t seem to solve this problem.

Money from the federal gas tax has been declining in recent years because fuel economy standards are rising and inflation is stripping away the purchasing power of the tax, which hasn’t been increased since 1993 (when Bill Clinton was president). Many experts believe the gas tax is an ineffective way to pay for transportation. Two congressionally chartered commissions issued reports in 2008 and 2009 that focus on transportation funding. Both commissions urge Congress to move away from the gas tax and towards a mileage based user fee that more accurately reflects the miles people actually drive on the highway. Road tolls are one example of these types of fees and they are currently used successfully in 35 states.

Congestion charging is another mechanism that allows motorists to gain access to uncongested highways by paying a fee. The fee goes up or down depending on the level of congestion and is set to achieve a specific performance level, such as the ability to drive 55 mph without delays. The high occupancy toll or HOT lanes that will soon be operating on Washington’s Capital Beltway (I-495) in Virginia are one example of this type of mileage-based user fee that both raises money for transportation and fights congestion.

Tolls and congestion charges are very effective ways to pay for transportation. These fees address the very important question President Bill Clinton raised in his speech on obesity: how do you propose to turn your good intentions into positive changes? Tolling and congestion charging are already bringing about positive changes in transportation. Experience around the world suggests that tolling and pricing benefit all income groups. Tolls are helping Americans make more conscious choices about how and when to travel and what they expect to receive in return for the payments they make to support our transportation system.

So, before we let Congress off the hook, let’s ask them to decide what the federal-aid highway system should look like, how it will be funded, and how they propose to turn their good intentions into positive changes. Relaxing the restrictions on tolling federal-aid highways – permitting tolls to be used to fund some of the most heavily traveled highways in our country, as most developed and developing nations now do – would be a good first step.

The Feb. 28 expiration of the SAFETEA-LU extension was particularly concerning for the trucking industry because it suspended funding for critical federal highway and highway safety programs, like the Motor Carrier Safety Assistance Program (MCSAP). MCSAP provides state grants for roadside inspection of commercial trucks and buses. Withholding funds for that program hinders states' ability to provide sufficient enforcement efforts necessary to ensure commercial vehicles are in a safe operating condition, and that truck and bus drivers are properly licensed and in compliance with federal safety regulations such as the federal Hours-of-Service regulations. I trust that our nation's lawmakers can devise a way to protect against future expiration of vital highway programs, like MCSAP, that help protect the safety of all drivers sharing the road.

The real issue at hand is the lack of a long-term highway bill. We cannot continue relying on extensions. The trucking industry has continuously voiced support for a long-term national transportation policy that repairs and expands our highway system. Signing a multi-year bill that facilitates capacity expansion at our nation's worst highway bottlenecks will greatly benefit our economy by putting people to work and improving the efficiency of our nation's transportation system.

The ability to pass legislation in a timely manner has never been a hallmark of Congress past and present. This is evident from Congress’s decision to move the end of the Federal fiscal year from June to September in 1976 to allow itself more time to pass the budget (and its result since), and the never-ending calls by advocacy groups for creation of independent commissions that essentially bring difficult policy decisions to Congress for an up or down vote (including the NASTRAC proposal from the Policy and Revenue Commission).

Whether it is a twelve-Continuing Resolution marathon prior to SAFETEA-LU enactment or the Highway Trust Fund program shutdown on March 1, the enormous amount of time and energy expended just to maintain a hand-to-mouth existence is simply bad public policy. The latest episode also helped to negate the purpose of the Recovery Act to stimulate investments beyond regular highway and transit spending.

As Jack Schenendorf mentioned, the automatic six-month extension provision is not without its drawbacks, including the reduction of pressure on Congress to act without the threat of a shutdown. But unfortunately, it is now clear that having gone through such a manufactured crisis (as Pete Rahn aptly put it) still has brought us nowhere close to reauthorizing a six-year bill called for by a vast majority of the transportation community.

There is no question that Congress will be quick to reject suggestions to outsource its decision-making authority. But it is also painfully clear that we need to identify politically palatable measures to bring end to the chaos that now regularly follows expiration of authorizations, as the cost of inaction is too great.

There is no question that the myriad of extensions that preceded enactment of SAFETEA-LU, as well as the five extensions so far in the current reauthorization effort, are frustrating. They have hurt the surface transportation programs and have led to considerable uncertainty, which makes it hard for states and local governments to commit the major resources necessary to repair and upgrade our highway and transit systems.

This is why I have a lot of sympathy for the idea of automatic, six-month extensions until the multi-year reauthorization bill passes. But, unfortunately, I do not think this approach will work. It would give those who want to maintain the status quo, or who do NOT want to see the multi-year bill pass for whatever reasons, the incentive to slow down or block the bill, without having to face the consequences of the programs shutting down. This approach could, therefore, actually make it harder rather than easier to enact the multi-year bill.

There may, however, be a way to address the problem related to discretionary programs that most recently led to the shutdown of the Highway Trust Fund. The next multi-year bill could spell out how to handle the funding associated with discretionary programs in extensions until a subsequent authorization bill is enacted. For example, it could reserve the discretionary funding and the associated obligational authority until the multi-year reauthorization bill is enacted, regardless of how long it takes. And it could ensure that this reservation would not have an impact on the CBO or OMB baselines. Of course, nothing would prevent the House and Senate from agreeing in one of the extensions on how to distribute the funds, but they wouldn’t have to address this issue until the multi-year bill if they could not reach agreement before then. This would be one approach to solving at least part of the problem.

But the real solution to the problem is for Congress to do its job and pass the multi-year authorization bill without numerous extensions. What has kept this from happening in recent years has been the inability to come up with the necessary revenues. There is little, if any, dispute over the need to invest more in our surface transportation systems. What has been missing is a politically acceptable way to do it.

Congress recognized this dilemma in SAFETEA-LU and created two independent commissions to look at this very issue. Both commissions recommended increasing the motor fuel user tax as the best way to raise revenues in the near term. And the users of the system—from business to the trucking industry to manufacturers and to the driving public—have indicated a willingness to pay if Congress reforms the program and produces a bill that preserves, upgrades and modernizes our surface transportation systems to meet the challenges of the 21st Century.

Republicans should be supportive. From Abraham Lincoln and transcontinental railroads, to Teddy Roosevelt and the Panama Canal, to Dwight Eisenhower and the Interstate System, Republicans have a long tradition of supporting investments in America’s transportation infrastructure. And President Eisenhower supported what was almost a tripling of the motor fuel tax. President Reagan supported a 5-cent increase in the motor fuel tax, recognizing that it was more a “user fee” than a “tax.” If they could support an increase in the motor fuels tax, shouldn’t today’s Republicans be able to support one?

Democrats should also be supportive. Like Republicans, Democrats have a long tradition of supporting investments in America’s transportation infrastructure. President Clinton supported increasing the motor fuels tax for deficit reduction and then supported shifting the revenues to the Highway Trust Fund. Today, President Obama and most Democrats in Congress support “cap and trade” which will increase the price of motor fuel, just as an increase in the motor fuels tax would do. If President Obama and Democrats can support an increase in the cost of motor fuel by imposing “cap and trade,” shouldn’t they be able to support the same increase by raising the motor fuels tax?

The benefits of modernizing our surface transportation infrastructure would be enormous. It would make America more competitive in the global marketplace; help drive economic growth; create short-term and long-term jobs; reduce our dependency on foreign oil; reduce greenhouse gas emissions; save lives; and improve the quality of life for all Americans. And because it would be paid for by users, it would not increase the deficit.

This is an investment worth making. It is a necessary investment if we are to remain competitive in today’s global marketplace. It should have bipartisan support in Congress.

Until Congress comes together and agrees on a way to raise the necessary revenues I fear that multiple extensions will be the norm. But if Congress and the Administration, and both political parties, are able to put the national interest over partisan politics, then it will become much easier to pass the multi-year authorization bill. Extensions will become the exception rather than the rule. In today’s political climate I know it’s a long shot, but one can always hope.

Updated at 9:41 a.m. on March 29.

Including automatic and continuing 6 month extensions to all programs that will exist in the next highway and transit authorization is an excellent idea. These extensions should continue until Congress formally adopts a new authorization. Nothing expires until Congress acts affirmatively.

The current process of numerous 30 and 60 day extensions is disruptive to state construction programs and creates uncertainty in managing increasingly critical cash flow. Additionally, contractors cannot make long term capital investments based on fluctuating transportation program levels. Combined, these result in unnecessarily erratic employment in the heavy construction industry.

This would also remove the single largest risk that credit rating agencies have viewed exists with the issuance of GARVEE bonds—that is the risk of a lapse in the Federal program. It is conceivable that the provision of automatic extensions could actually increase the rating of these bonds and reduce the cost of borrowing for states. Obviously, a good thing.

The biggest question is: Will the Congressional authorizing committees voluntarily give up the ability to manufacture a series of crises every four to six years? An automatic extension would avert the manufactured crisis (like the shutdown of FHWA) that can serve as the grease to compromise in legislative progression.