McConnell Pushes for House Action on Multi-Year Transportation Funding
House and Senate lawmakers will reconvene in September with the aim of striking a compromise on a multi-year highway and infrastructure funding bill, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., told reporters on Aug. 6. McConnell and Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., struck a compromise to move forward with the Senate’s six-year legislation, and lawmakers in that chamber passed the bill on July 30 (see 1507300052). House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, and Transportation Chairman Bill Shuster, R-Pa., must now collaborate to pass a similar bill, McConnell said.
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“Senator Boxer and I put together a multi-year highway bill with credible pay-fors and passed it,” he said. “The Speaker has asked Chairman Shuster to come up with a multi-year highway bill and pay for it and pass it in September and go to conference with us.” The Senate bill (here) puts in place pay-fors, congressional parlance for funding offsets, through changes to property tax and other means. Conference is a method of resolving differences between different bills produced between the two chambers.
President Barack Obama signed a three-month stopgap transportation funding measure into law on July 31, after House lawmakers refused to consider the Senate long-term legislation (see 1508030010). Shuster applauded the stopgap at the time, but said a long-term bill remains the ultimate objective. “My goal remains the completion of a long-term bill to improve our Nation’s roads, bridges, and other infrastructure as soon as possible, and the House continues to make progress on that bill,” said Shuster (here). “The Senate’s work on their transportation bill is a positive step, but the House also needs to make its voice heard and put forth its own priorities for such a significant piece of legislation.”