U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE

WASHINGTON : 

For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Publishing Office

Internet: bookstore.gpo.gov Phone: toll free (866) 512–1800; DC area (202) 512–1800

Fax: (202) 512–2104 Mail: Stop IDCC, Washington, DC 20402–0001

23–822 PDF 2017

S. HRG. 112–956 

LEGISLATIVE ISSUES FOR 

TRANSPORTATION REAUTHORIZATION 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON 

ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS 

UNITED STATES SENATE 

ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

JULY 21, 2011 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Environment and Public Works 

( 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.fdsys.gov 

(II) 

COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS 

ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

BARBARA BOXER, California, Chairman 

MAX BAUCUS, Montana 

THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware 

FRANK R. LAUTENBERG, New Jersey 

BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland 

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont 

SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island 

TOM UDALL, New Mexico 

JEFF MERKLEY, Oregon 

KIRSTEN GILLIBRAND, New York 

JAMES M. INHOFE, Oklahoma 

DAVID VITTER, Louisiana 

JOHN BARRASSO, Wyoming 

JEFF SESSIONS, Alabama 

MIKE CRAPO, Idaho 

LAMAR ALEXANDER, Tennessee 

MIKE JOHANNS, Nebraska 

JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas 

BETTINA POIRIER, Majority Staff Director and Chief Counsel 

RUTH VAN MARK, Minority Staff Director 

(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

Page 

JULY 21, 2011 

OPENING STATEMENTS 

Boxer, Hon. Barbara, U.S. Senator from the State of California ........................ 1 

Inhofe, James M., U.S. Senator from the State of Oklahoma .............................. 3 

Baucus, Hon. Max, U.S. Senator from the State of Montana .............................. 6 

Sessions, Hon. Jeff, U.S. Senator from the State of Alabama ............................. 7 

Sanders, Hon. Bernard, U.S. Senator from the State of Vermont ....................... 8 

Lautenberg, Hon. Frank, U.S. Senator from the State of New Jersey ............... 9 

Boozman, Hon. John, U.S. Senator from the State of Arkansas ......................... 11 

WITNESSES 

Antonio, Hon. Mayor R., Villaraigosa, Mayor, City of Los Angeles ..................... 12 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 15 

O’sullivan, Terence M., General President, Laborers’ International Union of 

North America ...................................................................................................... 21 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 23 

James, Donald M., Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Vulcan Materials .. 27 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 29 

Martinovich, Susan, P.E., Director, Nevada Department of Transportation, 

on Behalf of the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials ...................................................................................................... 33 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 35 

Ridley, Hon. Gary, Secretary, Oklahoma Department of Transportation ........... 44 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 46 

Lovaas, Deron, Transportation Policy Director, Natural Resources Defense 

Council .................................................................................................................. 52 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 54 

Cohen, Greg, President, American Highway Users Alliance ............................... 72 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 75 

(1) 

LEGISLATIVE ISSUES FOR TRANSPORTATION 

REAUTHORIZATION 

THURSDAY, JULY 21, 2011 

U.S. SENATE, COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS, Washington, DC. 

The full committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m. in room 

406, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Barbara Boxer (chairman of the full committee) presiding. 

Present: Senators Boxer, Inhofe, Baucus, Carper, Lautenberg, 

Sanders, Whitehouse, Merkley, Sessions, Boozman. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. BARBARA BOXER, 

U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA 

Senator BOXER. The committee will come to order. 

This is a very big day for us. I believe it is a milestone. And 

every one of the panelists here played a role. Before I begin my 

statement, I want to thank a host of organizations who have been 

transportation advocacy organizations. And this is not complete, 

but I just feel this moment belongs to you as well as to all of us. 

I am going to name them. 

The National Conference of Mayors; The American Public Transportation Association; The American Council of Engineering Companies; The American Road and Transportation Builders; National 

Stone, Sand and Gravel Association; The AFL–CIO; a host of environmental organizations; the American Bus Association; AASHTO; 

AAA, International Union of Operating Engineers; American Traffic Safety Services Association; American Society of Civil Engineers; The Associated General Contractors; the American Trucking 

Association; The Association of Metropolitan Planning Organizations; The American Concrete Pavement Association; Associated 

Equipment Distributors; Portland Cement Association; National 

Ready-Mix Concrete Association; National Auto Dealers; National 

Asphalt Pavement Association; Laborers’ International Union of 

North America; Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association; 

American Iron and Steel Institute; U.S. Chamber of Commerce; 

National Association of Development Associations; National Association of Truck Stop Operators; American Highway Users Alliance; 

and many more. 

I had to do that, because this day has been hard to reach. And 

it is because of your advocacy, working with all of us, that we have 

gotten to this point. 

So now I will begin my statement, my 5-minute statement. I 

want to thank so much my friend and colleague, Senator Jim 

2 

Inhofe, for ensuring that our differences on many other issues 

never got in the way of our working toward a bipartisan Transportation Bill. We admit that we see life differently in many areas. 

But where we can come together, we do. And this is one area we 

believe it is absolutely necessary for our States and the United 

States to be strong and competitive. 

And we share a deep commitment to the safety of our bridges 

and our infrastructure. And one of the most, I think, compassionate 

moments I have seen on this committee is when Senator Inhofe 

talks about what happened when there was a piece of infrastructure that started to fall apart in Oklahoma and the consequences 

of that. 

All of the Senators on this committee have been instrumental in 

getting this bill ready for action. I must say, Senator Baucus and 

Senator Vitter, who are the Chairman and Ranking Member of the 

Transportation and Infrastructure Subcommittee, were extraordinarily helpful and we had many, many meetings for more than 

a year now. I want to thank the committee staff, who have been 

working so diligently on this bill. 

And thanking everybody doesn’t mean this bill is done. But I 

want to make the point that it is an unusual situation where we 

have to work so hard to get to this place. So I want to thank 

Bettina Poirier, Ruth Van Mark, David Napoliello and James 

O’Keeffe. These are the bipartisan staff, I think I have spoken to 

them at 9, 10, 11 o’clock at night for nights on end. 

I want to thank the staff of all of our colleagues on both sides 

of the aisle for working so closely on this bill. And I want to welcome everyone to this very important moment, this critical moment 

in our Nation’s infrastructure. Because the current Surface Transportation bill expires on September 30th, and if we don’t act, this 

is the fact, we will see a cut of one-third, actually 36 percent. And 

we will see a loss of 620,000 jobs between highway and transit, 

500,000 of those on the highway side. 

So it is clear that we have to act. Because if we don’t step up 

to the plate, we will see all these hundreds of thousands of jobs 

lost, and we will see our infrastructure continue to crumble. 

This hearing is a milestone. This bill, Moving Ahead for Progress 

in the 21st Century, MAP–21, will maintain current funding levels, 

protect existing jobs, help spur economic recovery. Now, we made 

a lot of reforms in this bill. It is remarkable how many reforms we 

have made. We have taken an array of programs, we have consolidated them. We have made this bill much more streamlined than 

any other bill that we have seen before. But we keep funding at 

current levels, and that is crucial. 

We also have a new section called America Fast Forward. That 

name was after a name that a bipartisan group of leaders in Los 

Angeles came up with to describe one particular part of this bill, 

the part that funds TIFIA at a billion dollars. And the mayor will 

speak to that, Mayor Villaraigosa will speak to that. I thank him 

and his bipartisan team for that. 

According to the Federal Highway Administration, every Federal 

dollar made available through TIFIA historically has mobilized up 

to $30 in transportation investments. I am pleased to say that although Chairman Mica’s bill is quite different from this bill, and 

3 

it totally reflects a huge cut, he does step up to the plate on TIFIA. 

And I am very grateful to him for that. 

I joined him in Los Angeles where he heard about TIFIA. He 

stepped up with his, and he has a billion dollars for TIFIA, and I 

am very pleased about that. 

Let me say again, we have many differences on this committee 

when it comes to the environment. That is no secret, and we are 

very open about it. We sometimes have a sense of humor about it, 

although sometimes neither side is laughing much. But on this, we 

really do believe this is a basic function of the national government, to address our infrastructure needs. Because if you can’t 

move people and you can’t move goods, you are just not going to 

grow. We are not going to have the jobs, we are not going to be 

the great power that we are and we want to continue to be. 

I would say in closing that the coalition I mentioned at the beginning, I think, was really represented in a magnificent way earlier 

in the year when we heard from Tom Donahue, President of the 

U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and Richard Trumka, President of the 

AFL–CIO. They practically held hands during their testimony. 

They were so close together on the way we need to take immediate 

action to reauthorize this Nation’s transportation system. 

So I look forward to this hearing. I look forward to our markup. 

We are working together on a date, that it may be before we get 

out of town here on this summer recess. Pray God all the other 

things fall into place that we know we have hanging over us. 

But again, my deepest thanks, and I will call on Senator Inhofe. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES M. INHOFE, 

U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF OKLAHOMA 

Senator INHOFE. Thank you, Madam Chairman. 

I want to put an editorial from the Oklahoman in the record. I 

think it is very, very good. 

[The referenced information was not received at time of print.] 

Senator INHOFE. Let me start by commending Chairman Boxer. 

As she says, we have had a lot of differences in the past, but this 

one area, we really don’t have differences. We recognize that this 

is what we are supposed to be doing up here. For her leadership 

and dedication and willingness to work together has made this possible. I say the same thing for Senator Baucus and the rest of the 

committee. I know that Senator Sessions has had real concerns 

about what is happening in his State of Alabama. 

And we have put together, I think, a really good highway bill, 

under the circumstances, one that we could not have anticipated 

we could have done even two or 3 months ago. It is very appropriate that we have my favorite Secretary of Transportation, Gary 

Ridley back with us. I have often said he is the best in the Nation. 

And one of the reasons for that is that he has been there as long 

as I have. 

Didn’t we figure out that we came about, he came as a laborer 

to the Department of Transportation the same time I came as a laborer to the State legislature? I think it was the same year. We 

won’t tell them how long ago that was. But we go back a long way. 

And I don’t think, I say this, you can’t find too many of the members that have the close relationship that we have. There is not a 

4 

week that goes by that we don’t talk about this problem that we 

are facing. We acknowledge that the proposal that we have has a $12 billion 

shortfall. I know that the Finance Committee is working on that. 

It is something that we are not going to be able, yes, we are going 

to come out with a bill, but it is not going to reach where we need 

to have it to get it passed until such time as we fill that hole. We 

can do that. But I can tell you right now, it will be virtually impossible to pass unless we are able to do that. 

Now, I think we are facing that. We know that it is going to happen. We are fortunate to have the Chairman of the Finance Committee on our committee, Senator Baucus. And we work very, very 

closely with him. So I support the efforts that have been working 

behind the scenes with him and with the Republicans, I have been 

talking with the Republicans on the Finance Committee, talking 

about what really we should be doing as we address the spending 

problems. 

I have to say that there are a lot of things in this bill that were 

compromises between Barbara and myself, between the Chairman 

and myself. And there is a lot more in the way of project delivery 

that I would have preferred, a lot more of the livability stuff that 

she would have preferred. But most of all, we want a bill. And this 

includes many of the essential policy reforms that my colleagues 

and stakeholders have recommended, consolidates the number of 

programs from SAFETEA from 87 down to 30, a major, major 

change. 

And I also want to say that putting this thing off is not an option. We have been putting it off and putting it off. The Chairman 

mentioned an incident, and we were talking about it when we had 

dinner last night with Secretary Ridley, about the lady in my State 

of Oklahoma who drove under a bridge, a chunk of concrete this 

size fell off, hit her, killed her. She’s a mother of two small children. We can tell stories about this. 

So this is not just, is this something that should enjoy a high priority. This is life-threatening, it is something we are going to have 

to do. 

So I don’t think that putting it off is an option. I don’t think that 

settling for the lower figure that would be a 34 percent cut, and 

I am going to be asking Secretary Ridley to talk about the specifics 

in our State of Oklahoma, as to what this would mean, what this 

would cost. It would be very, very expensive. 

And I want to get one thing across to my colleagues. I have been 

ranked more often than not the most conservative member of the 

U.S. Senate. And yet, I have often said there are two areas where 

I am a big spender. And I admit that. One is national defense, and 

the other is infrastructure. Because this is where it has to happen. 

We don’t do it here, it is not going to happen any other way. 

So I have personally been on this since I have been in this Senate, and then 8 years prior to that on the same committee in the 

House. So I think that we know what we have to do, and I think 

we are prepared now to get something done. So we will be looking 

forward to it. I agree with you, Madam Chairman, this is a very, 

very significant day. 

[The prepared statement of Senator Inhofe follows:] 

5 

STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES M. INHOFE, U.S. SENATOR

FROM THE STATE OF OKLAHOMA

I’d like to start by commending Chairman Boxer. With her leadership and dedication, and the great work of Senators Baucus and Vitter, we have put together a 

really good highway bill. Anytime you are working on a bill this important, it is 

hard to reach a bipartisan compromise, and this is especially true in our current 

political environment. What we have achieved here is important for the Nation. 

It is so appropriate to have Secretary Ridley here with us today. I’ve often said 

that he is the best DOT Secretary in the Nation. There is no person whose judgment 

I value more on these issues. I speak with him many times each month and I could 

not have negotiated this bill without him. 

We must acknowledge that our proposal to fund the highway program at current levels would result in a $12 billion shortfall in the Highway Trust Fund. Before we 

proceed to mark up, I must insist that the Finance Committee has identified a bipartisan way of filling this hole. It is unwise to push an unfunded proposal to spend 

over $100 billion at the same time the Nation is singularly focused on cutting trillions of dollars in spending. If we proceed before we have identified funding, we will 

lose Republican support and kill the bill for this Congress, doing irreparable harm 

in the process. 

We are very fortunate to have the Chairman of the Finance Committee, Senator 

Baucus, working so closely with us toward a bipartisan solution. I support his efforts and have been working behind the scenes to help him with Republicans. 

As is the case with all compromises, nobody gets everything they want. Most notably, this bill does not go as far as I would like on project delivery and it doesn’t 

have the so-called ‘‘livability’’ mandates the other side would have liked. What we 

do have, is a bill that can pass the Senate. 

This bill includes many of the essential policy reforms that my colleagues and 

stakeholders have recommended. It consolidates the number of programs in 

SAFETEA from 87 to under 30. It gives states more flexibility, while focusing Federal dollars on key outcomes. These changes will ensure that Americans get the 

most for their gas tax dollars. We have also made good progress expediting project 

delivery, including expanding categorical exclusions and imposing meaningful deadlines on Federal resource agencies. Finally, the bill will include no earmarks or programs that only benefit a limited number of states. 

I want to make it very clear that putting this off is not an option. We need to 

do a highway bill. A short term extension does not give states needed certainty and 

will either mean a cut of at least 34 percent Federal highway funding or a bailout 

of the Trust Fund in fiscal year 2013. Of equal importance, an extension will not 

include any of the important policy reforms in our bill. 

I’d like to take a moment to point out to my colleagues that I have been calling 

for massive cuts to government spending for years now. I introduced the first bill 

to lower spending to 2008 levels. This call has been echoed by most proposals to 

rein in our out of control spending since then. But it is important to note that taking the highway program down to $27 billion would mean going below 2000 funding 

levels—a point far beyond what is being talked about for other, less critical programs. This 34 percent cut would mean $200 million each year less for my State of Oklahoma than they currently receive. A recent editorial in the Oklahoman entitled 

‘‘Cuts in highway funds would really hurt Oklahoma’’ discussed possible delays in 

critical projects if we go with the House number. This is going to be repeated in 

every State in the Nation. The impact of that on jobs and the economy will be staggering. 

Senator BOXER. Thank you so much. 

I am going to call on Senator Baucus. I just want to say something I said to him privately and said to Senator Inhofe privately, 

that in the Gang of Six proposal, which as you know everybody is 

looking at, one of the things they do there is fully fund the Highway Trust Fund for 10 years out, based on current levels of spending. And I think the reason it is just important to mention it is because I think it does show that among Democrats and Republicans, 

this is a strong priority. They don’t mention any other specifics. 

Senator INHOFE. And confession is good for the soul. I have to 

admit, I didn’t know that until Barbara told me on the floor yesterday. 

6 

Senator BOXER. I just think it is something that says other people feel the way we do about it. 

Senator Baucus. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. MAX BAUCUS, 

U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF MONTANA 

Senator BAUCUS. Thank you, Madam Chairman. 

And I thank you for scheduling this hearing to finalize our bill. 

I want to read a quote, and I want everyone to see if you can 

guess who said it and when it was said. ‘‘American today lacks a 

coordinated transportation system that permits travelers and goods 

to move conveniently and efficiently from one means of transportation to another, using the best characteristics of each. The result 

is waste of human and economic resources and each of the taxpayers’ dollar. Modern transportation can be the rapid conduit of 

economic growth or a bottleneck. It can bring jobs and loved ones 

and recreation closer to every family, or it can bring instead a sudden and purposeless death. It can improve every man’s standard of 

living, or multiply the cost of all he buys. It can be a convenience 

or it can frustrate and impede and delay. The choice is ours to 

make.’ 

That was President Lyndon Johnson, March 2d, 1966, calling for 

establishing a United States Department of Transportation. What 

he said more than 45 years ago is as relevant today as it was then. 

The choice is ours to make. We need to plan for America’s future. 

That is why with your able leadership, Madam Chairman, this 

Senate will proceed with a bipartisan 2-year bill. Let’s be clear: 2 

years is not ideal, not in a transportation bill. I know Chairman 

Boxer held out for a 6-year bill as long as possible. But the issue 

is funding. 

The Congressional Budget Office says the Highway Trust Fund needs $12 billion just to maintain funding and still have a prudent 

balance at the end of 2 years. I want to say publicly that I am 

working very hard on the Finance Committee to find that money. 

We are having constructive conversations. Nothing is certain 

around here, but I feel fairly confident with some of the ideas we 

are working on that we will, on a bipartisan basis, find that $12 

billion. 

But there is also a sequence to things. Senators want to see Congress resolve the debt limit before they will commit to anything 

with respect to how we fund and find that $12 billion. I am, however, optimistic we will find the money and avoid the severe cuts 

the House proposes. And I am optimistic about the bill we are discussing today. 

This is one of our most important national programs. And I underline the word national. We need a little more of that around 

here. As with defense, space, agriculture, security, we are all in 

this together. Chairman Boxer, Ranking Member Inhofe, Senator 

Vitter, and I have stayed focused on the main national goals. I 

want to note the contributions of Senator Isakson and our former 

colleague, Senator Voinovich, as previous Ranking Member on the 

committee. 

Some people won’t like it. They will say it doesn’t do enough of 

this, or does too much of that. But that is of course the nature of 

7 

compromise. We have made compromises in the national interest. 

In America, people need a 21st century National network. Our bill 

focuses on national pursuits, such as asset management, safety, 

mobility, freight and planning. We seek to prioritize needs and to 

foster smart investment for the future. 

States need funding certainty to uphold the national network. 

And America needs jobs. Nationally, unemployment is at 9 percent, 

unemployment in the construction sector 16 percent. 

So the urban and the rural, the donor and the donee States must 

now all pull together for our shared national benefit. We are in this 

together. It reminds me of what Benjamin Franklin said, either we 

hang together or most assuredly we are going to hang separately. 

That is true of the Highway Bill, too. We have to hang together to 

get a good national bill. 

Meanwhile, over the next 2 years, we should contemplate what 

we want this program to be for the 21st century. And we need to 

think about how we are going to pay for it. 

We should use our time wisely. And as President Johnson said, 

the choice is ours to make. Thank you, Madam Chairman. 

Senator BOXER. Thank you so much. 

I thought it was Eisenhower, so you surprised me on that. 

Senator BAUCUS. Eisenhower was the Highway Bill, he was the 

interState system. 

Senator BOXER. We all would have failed the exam. This is embarrassing. 

But actually, it is fascinating to think about how long ago that 

was said, and think how much we have grown since then, and what 

worse problems we now face. Thank you so much. 

Senator Sessions. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JEFF SESSIONS, 

U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF ALABAMA 

Senator SESSIONS. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

I will offer my statement for the record, and just congratulate 

you and Senator Inhofe for working, putting together MAP–21. It 

is a framework that really answers some of the questions our State 

highway director raised when he testified here. So you made some 

progress in a lot of different areas. 

As the ranking Republican on the Budget Committee, I do know 

how significant our financial situation is. And if we can maintain 

the funding level that you have recommended, I think it would be 

something I can support. And I say that very seriously, because a 

lot of programs will not be able to maintain the level we would like 

them to be maintained at. 

I remain disappointed that the Stimulus Bill only produced about 

4 percent of that money to roads and bridges. So we have missed 

an opportunity there to jump start some of our infrastructure 

needs. And we will wrestle with this. Secretary LaHood testified at 

the Budget Committee and said we needed more revenue. But it 

was not a gas tax. So I teased him a little and talked about the 

not-gas tax. So Senator Baucus, I don’t know, you will have a notgas tax revenue enhancement somehow, I guess, or offsetting expenditure somewhere. 

Senator BAUCUS. The leading contender is the non-gas tax. 

8 

[Laughter.] 

Senator SESSIONS. The not-gas tax tax. 

Senator BAUCUS. No, the not-gas tax measure. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator SESSIONS. OK. 

May I take this opportunity to introduce one of the witnesses 

from Alabama? 

Senator BOXER. Yes, of course. 

Senator SESSIONS. I do have two other hearings at this very moment, so I will be in and out. 

It is really my pleasure to introduce Don James. He will be testifying today. He is Chairman and CEO of Vulcan Materials Company, based in Birmingham. Vulcan is the Nation’s largest producer of materials that go into highways and roadways. He joined 

Vulcan in 1992, after a long and successful career with Bradley, 

Ahrent, Rose and White, Alabama’s largest law firm. And I am 

sure Don thought it was the best and it is still a great law firm. 

He has a bachelor’s degree, an MBA from the University of Alabama and his law degree from the University of Virginia. He 

served in the Army as a first lieutenant. He is active in a number 

of business, civic and industry organizations. He is one of Alabama’s most respected and important leaders. 

He is past chairman of the National Stone, Sand and Gravel Association, a director of the Boy Scouts, of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, University of Alabama-Birmingham Medical Health System, 

Economic Development Partnership of Alabama and University of 

Alabama Health Services Foundation, a trustee of Birmingham 

Southern College, a fabulous liberal arts college, I guess one of the 

highest ranked academically in the State, and Children’s Hospital, 

which is a fabulous hospital in Birmingham. 

So Mr. James is a fine citizen and knowledgeable person who is 

deeply involved in these issues. From my experience in talking 

with him, you can be sure that the comments he offers will be wise 

and beneficial. Thank you, Madam Chairman. 

Senator BOXER. Senator Sessions, I know you have to go in and 

out. I just want to thank you for your comments. Your support for 

this bipartisan bill that you expressed today goes a long way with 

me. I am just very grateful to you. 

Senator Sanders. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. BERNARD SANDERS, 

U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF VERMONT 

Senator SANDERS. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

I find myself in agreement with much of what has already been 

said. What I can say is, I was a mayor for 8 years. One of the 

things you learn about infrastructure as a mayor is if you don’t invest in it, if you don’t maintain it, if you don’t rebuild it, you know 

what? It doesn’t get any better. 

So one of the stupid elements that we do about delaying infrastructure ends up costing us more, because we allow it to deteriorate. That does not make any sense at all. 

Madam Chair, I had hoped, as you know, that we would be discussing a 6-year bill. I know that was your desire as well, rather 

than a 2-year bill. That said, I hope that this committee and the 

9 

Senate can come together to pass meaningful legislation that will 

address our significant transportation infrastructure needs. And it 

has already been stated, not only do we deal with infrastructure, 

and the need to rebuild our infrastructure is apparent to everybody 

in this Country, but in the process, we can create over a period of 

years millions of good-paying jobs. So this is not only an infrastructure issue, it is a job-creating moment, and it is one that we must 

take advantage of. 

Even with this very meaningful investment being made as a result of the Recovery Act, we put some money into infrastructure, 

not enough, our transportation system clearly is in worse and 

worse shape every year. We have heard in previous hearings that 

the American Society of Civil Engineers has graded America’s 

roads, public transit and aviation with a D, a D. They say that we 

must spend $2.2 trillion over the next 5 years, simply to get to a 

passable condition, a passable condition, not $109 billion over 2 

years, but more than eight times that amount each year for the 

next 5 years. 

So what we are doing here is trying to move forward. But I think 

we can all acknowledge that it is simply not enough. 

Madam Chair, let me just simply conclude that not only is this 

important to infrastructure, not only is it important for job creation, it is also important in terms of our position in the global 

economy. Today the United States invests just 2.4 percent of GDP 

on infrastructure. Europe invests twice that amount. China invests 

almost four times our rate, roughly 9 percent. 

I will conclude with a short story. Good friend of mine returned 

from China, leaving a state-of-the-art airport in China, having ridden on state-of-the-art rail, getting cell phone service all over that 

so-called Third World country. Came back to an overcrowded airport in New York City, where he had to wait for hours to catch his 

plane. Couldn’t find a seat. And when he returned, he was wondering which is the Third World country. 

The rest of the world is moving forward aggressively in public 

Transportation and sustainable energy and so forth. We are not. So 

this is an enormously important bill for a number of reasons. And 

I look forward to working with you to make it happen. 

Senator BOXER. Senator Sanders, I so appreciate this. Great disappointment that we couldn’t do a 6-year bill. It has to do with 

funding and locking funding in for 6 years and the kind of job that 

our good Senator Baucus has to do in his committee, getting support. 

But I do know how you feel, and I want to note that you have 

been nothing but helpful and your staff as well. 

And Senator Lautenberg, a long-time champion of transportation, 

I am so glad you are here. Please have the floor. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. FRANK LAUTENBERG, 

U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF NEW JERSEY 

Senator LAUTENBERG. Thank you very much, Madam Chairman. 

I won’t be long. But I start by looking at what our mission is. 

And if our mission is to move our economy forward and create jobs, 

then we can do it very rapidly, very effectively if we look at the 

infrastructure side of things. I saw it in my own State, that the 

10 

Governor made a decision not to accept $6 billion worth of assistance from the DOT and from the Port Authority in New York and 

New Jersey, because of concerns that there might be overruns in 

building this tunnel. So critical for us to continue to get cars off 

the road. 

This by the estimates that were available would have taken 

22,000 cars a day off the road. It would have created 44,000 jobs 

immediately in the construction area, where there are plenty of 

people shovel-ready, ready to get going, they can’t wait. 

And last, to create a better avenue for those who want to work 

in the city of New York, or vice versa, or those who want to live 

in New Jersey and move things along more efficiently. And it was 

mind-boggling, to say the least, to hear that decision by the Governor was being made. 

And I look back in history and it may be a surprise, but I’m old 

enough to remember WPA and some of the other things. I even remember when the George Washington Bridge was being built. They 

said it wouldn’t last, but there it is. In any event, what happened? 

It was the Washington Bridge between New York, the largest 

crossing facility between New York and New Jersey. George Washington Bridge was built during the Great Depression. The interState highways built over a 40-year span, even when the Country 

was in recession. 

The fact is, that if we short transportation now, we will be selling the Country short in the future. And that is not why we are 

here. But we do need to make the smart investments. Simply building more highways won’t solve our transportation problem, make 

us more competitive. We need a national, strategic transportation 

policy that establishes clear, measurable goals for the future and 

ends the checkerboard approach that has plagued our transportation system far too long. 

And while we shouldn’t, in my view, be adding more lanes on our 

highways, we ought to be repairing the infrastructure that we now 

have in place and keeping dangerously large and heavy trucks and 

their wear and tear off our bridges and highways. After all, a 21st 

century economy cannot be built on collapsing bridges and crumbling infrastructure. 

So we ought to be making substantial investments in mass transit, passenger rail, high speed rail. We are now planning to build 

a gateway tunnel, it is called, which will allow us to run more 

trains, faster trains, through the vital Northeast Corridor, create 

tens of thousands of construction jobs and permanent jobs. We 

ought to be putting more cargo on trains and ships, a move that 

will help get more trucks off the road and help us save fuel, boost 

productivity, improve the environment, reduce traffic. And we 

ought to make transportation safer by investing in systems that reduce things like drunk driving, more uses of all transportation networks, including bicycles if necessary and other things to encourage 

people to get out, not to jump in their cars. 

So if we don’t prioritize smart transportation investments today, 

we will fall behind tomorrow. And I remind everybody that there 

were 100 million new Americans in a 30-year period. And it is predicted that the next 100 million is going to come at a much faster 

rate. And we have an infrastructure that isn’t built for that kind 

11 

of use. And we ought to wake up to the needs of not only tomorrow, 

but the days well after tomorrow. 

So thank you, Madam Chairman, for holding this hearing. It is 

important and I hope that we won’t be the only ones listening to 

ourselves. Thank you. 

Senator BOXER. Well, I can assure you we are not. Because 

frankly, the work that went into this bill really came from stakeholders all over the Nation. And I think it is a good moment today. 

I am optimistic hearing what Senator Inhofe has said and Senator 

Sessions, Senator Baucus. I just feel good about the way we are 

going. 

Senator Boozman, keep up that spirit, sir. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JOHN BOOZMAN, 

U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF ARKANSAS 

Senator BOOZMAN. Well, thank you very much. I will keep up 

that spirit. I want to thank you, Chairman Boxer, and Ranking 

Member Inhofe, for your commitment to the bill, along with Senators Baucus and Vitter. The fact that the committee was able to 

reach an agreement on a bipartisan bill I think is nothing short of 

miraculous. And for this, I would like to thank all of you for your 

leadership. 

I would also like to thank our witnesses for appearing today and 

sharing their thoughts on the 2-year bill. While we still have work 

ahead of us as far as funding is concerned, I do believe this bill is 

an extremely important step in the right direction. We cannot afford to let current projects go unfinished. And that is a very real 

concern, without proper funding. In the State of Arkansas, we have 

a number of unfinished projects that are important to the State, 

but more importantly, of national significance that would greatly 

help the flow of commerce throughout the Country. 

Without appropriate investment in our Nation’s infrastructure, 

thousands of jobs are directly and indirectly on the line. And the 

ability of our people to travel hangs in the balance. I am pleased 

the committee recognizes the problem such as this, and have 

worked hard to put forth a proposal that will hopefully address 

much of our needed infrastructure investments. 

Again, I am excited to discuss the details of this highway funding 

proposal. Without the dedication of the members here today, this 

would not be possible. With that, I yield back. 

Senator BOXER. I thank you so much for that. 

And we are going to get right to our panel. We are going to start 

with Hon. Antonio Villaraigosa, Mayor of the city of Los Angeles. 

I think everybody knows, well, right now, you are the head of the 

what do you call it, the President of the Conference of Mayors. 

Mayor Villaraigosa has done wonders in Los Angeles and continues 

to. This is an area that just has all the congestion and needs a 

leader like this. We are so proud. You have worked with all of us, 

and you have worked with Chairman Mica. So I just want to praise 

you for working across the aisle on this. 

We welcome you. I know you got in at 4 this morning and you 

are leaving at 1 today. So you just go, and if you need to leave, 

please, we understand. We are thrilled that you are here, Mayor. 

12 

STATEMENT OF HON. MAYOR ANTONIO R. VILLARAIGOSA, 

MAYOR, CITY OF LOS ANGELES 

Mayor Villaraigosa. Actually, I have to welcome about 50 mayors 

from around the Country to my city at 5:30. So I may take you up 

on that. 

Madam Chair, Ranking Member Inhofe, and Senators Baucus 

and Boozman, and all of the members who I have had an opportunity to hear from, I dare say that those of us listening and 

watching and working with you marvel at the bipartisanship, the 

ability to work together. If we could just do that on many of the 

other issue facing the Nation, I think America would move forward 

even during these tough times. 

I know I speak for my fellow mayors around the Country, both 

Democrat and Republicans, when I say that this is a critical moment in our Nation. Hearing Senator Sanders a few minutes ago 

speak to the $2.2 trillion need just to get us to a passable grade, 

it boggles the mind, the challenges before us. With the future of 

Federal infrastructure investment in question, we are standing at 

a generational crossroads. I believe we need to think very carefully 

about how we choose the path ahead. 

Across the Country, from Portland, Oregon to Portland, Maine, 

one thing is clear: Americans need jobs now. I like to say with all 

of the debate around the deficit and the debt that when people 

walk up to me on the streets of Los Angeles, in fact, when they 

walk up to mayors all across the Country, they don’t ask us about 

the debt and the deficit. I am not suggesting that those aren’t important issues. 

But invariably they will say, Mayor, can you get me a job, I want 

to work. And we have a solution for them, you all have a solution 

for them. And that is to pass a transportation bill now. A bill like 

the one outlined by Chair Boxer and Ranking Member Inhofe 

would not only invest in our crumbling roads, our bridges, our tunnels, and our aging ports, airports, water treatment and power facilities, it would create a half a million jobs just right now. I want 

to applaud your leadership in developing the outline for MAP–21. 

It is a forward-looking proposal that would help create the world 

class infrastructure this Country needs. 

Obviously I come from Los Angeles, and for some of you, it is on 

the other side of the Country. And sometimes it seems like the 

other side of the world. But what people don’t realize is that we 

move 44 percent of all the seaborne goods that enter the United 

States. Every single congressional district generates jobs because of 

the trade activity that occurs at our port. Our airport is the No. 

1 destination airport in the United States. 

So we know first-hand that worldwide competition is demanding 

more of us than ever from our infrastructure system, just to remain 

competitive. I am very pleased to see that this committee’s framework would include a national freight program. We also continue 

to grapple with growing congestion. You may have seen on the 

news last week Carmageddon. A day without a car in Los Angeles 

is a day that we don’t enjoy very often. We were able to enjoy the 

other day. 

But what I tried to explain to everyone, we weren’t just demolishing a bridge. We were connecting a system of HOV lanes from 

13 

Orange County all the way to the San Fernando Valley, with the 

goal of reducing, moving traffic and reducing congestion 1 minute 

a mile as a result of that HOV lane. Creating 18,000 jobs just with 

that alone. 

So we continue to grapple with congestion and the impact on mobility and jobs. And take it from a native Angeleno, congestion can 

be a job killer. It is pretty simple: when our infrastructure functions efficiently, employers expand their businesses. When congestion and other constraints choke movement of people and goods, 

companies pull up stakes and the jobs leave with them. 

Now, L.A. is no different from other major metropolitan areas. 

Our cities are the heart, lungs and muscle of the Nation’s economy. 

Let me give you an example. If you took New York, L.A. and Chicago, our economic output is roughly the equivalent of France. If 

you took the 10 largest cities in the United States of America, they 

would be the third largest nation in the world, roughly $5 trillion 

economy after the $5.9 trillion economy of China and the $14.9 trillion economy of the United States. 

The key to those economies is investing in infrastructure, investing in the movement of people and goods. The current extension of 

the Surface Transportation bill expires on September 30th. The 

clock is ticking. And we are at a critical fork. We can put people 

back to work and invest in the infrastructure our Nation and our 

cities desperately need, or we can lose ground against our competitors in the way that Senator Sanders just said. 

Put simply, we cannot afford any cuts to infrastructure spending, 

and at the very least we must maintain current levels. According 

to the DOT, a 30 percent reduction in transportation funding would 

equate to a loss of 630,000 highway and transportation jobs. 

So I stand with you, and I know that the mayors across the 

Country have come out unanimously in support of this effort. A 2- 

year bill, which would invest about a $109 billion, my recollection 

is, as Senator Sanders said, when China is investing four times the 

rate of what the United States is, and what he didn’t say is, they 

are also footing most of the bill for Europe. So Europe is ahead of 

us, China four and a half times ahead of us, but also funding. What 

he didn’t say is, we are not even competing with the rest of the developing world. Latin America is investing more in infrastructure 

than we are. 

We believe, and the U.S. Conference of Mayors has come out in 

support, we have said that we can’t keep building bridges in Baghdad and Kandahar and not Baltimore and Kansas City. The American people need and deserve a world class infrastructure, which is 

why we are pleased that our bipartisan America Fast Forward proposal has been included in both the House and Senate bills. 

And I too want to acknowledge Chair Mica for his support. It was 

a great thing to see Senator Boxer, Senator Inhofe, in support, 

Congress member Mica, Tom Donahue, Richard Trumpka, all in 

support of the idea that we need to invest in infrastructure and 

jobs that come with it. 

According to the L.A. County Economic Development Corporation, your committee’s proposal to increase TIFIA budget authority 

to a billion dollars has the power to create, just with that alone, 

500,000 jobs in just 2 years, and over a million jobs over a 6-year 

14 

period of time. Why? Because it is a 30 to one leverage with that 

money. At a time of high deficits and debt, this is the right time 

to make those kinds of investments. I hope that the Senate and the 

House will also look, at some point, at a transportation bond program that will help us expand on that effort as well. 

There are now 113 bipartisan mayors who have gotten behind 

this effort. I want to thank all of you for your work. I look forward 

to working with you to pass this. I hope that this support on a bipartisan basis will bleed through on the many other issues facing 

the Nation today. America’s cities deserve no less. 

Thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Mayor Villaraigosa follows:] 

15 


23822.001
16 


23822.002
17 


23822.003
18 


23822.004
19 


23822.005
20 


23822.006
21 

Senator BOXER. Thank you, Mayor. And we know that you have 

to rush off to the airport. Have a safe, good flight. 

Our next witness is Mr. Terence M. O’Sullivan, President of the 

Laborers’ International Union of North America. Welcome, sir. 

STATEMENT OF TERENCE M. O’SULLIVAN, GENERAL PRESIDENT, LABORERS’ INTERNATIONAL UNION OF NORTH AMERICA 

Mr. O’Sullivan. Thank you. 

On behalf of the working men and women of LIUNA, the Laborers’ International Union of North America, I would like to thank 

you, Chairman Boxer, Ranking Member Inhofe, and all the members of the committee for the opportunity to testify today. Our perspective on critical infrastructure investment is grounded in 

LIUNA as an organization of a half million men and women who 

predominantly do the work of building America, our roads, bridges, 

transit systems and other fundamental pieces of the backbone of 

our Nation’s economy. 

Like all Americans, we are concerned about falling behind in the 

world. We are concerned about China, for example, who investments almost 9 percent of its GDP, or almost $680 billion in infrastructure this year, while we are struggling to patch potholes. 

Meanwhile, there are 1.3 men and women who are read, willing 

and trained to rebuild America’s crumbling transportation systems, 

but through no fault of their own are jobless. 

The nearly 2 years of delay in passing a robust highway bill is 

not a recipe for economic growth or competitiveness. It is a recipe 

for disaster. That is one reason LIUNA is gratified and thankful 

to testify today and contrast, the outline of your highway bill with 

the outline put forth by the U.S. House of Representatives. 

We join with partners in the environmental community, like the 

blue Green Alliance, and with the business community, including 

the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, in pointing out that the House 

proposal locks in failure for 6 years. In effect, it gives up on America. Likewise, we join with others in praising your political courage 

and focus on maintaining a foundation for the future which is illustrated by your bipartisan proposal. 

I want to emphasize that to have the necessary economic impact, 

investments must be made through the existing core program and 

highway trust fund, and that there must be a commitment that 

any shortfalls do not result in less investment than is currently 

made. 

LIUNA welcomes proposals to leverage more private investments 

and believes that properly structured, innovative financing mechanisms, such as the Infrastructure Bank, could provide a valuable 

supplement. But we believe some of these proposals are years away 

from creating a significant number of jobs. 

Like many others, we also believe there must be greater transparency. We have all heard about the bridge to nowhere. But we 

must remember that there are plenty of bridges to somewhere that 

are deficient or obsolete. In fact, 4 years after the I–35 bridge collapse in Minneapolis, 27 percent of our bridges still are structurally 

deficient or functionally obsolete. 

22 

In stark contrast to this committee’s proposal, the House outline 

would result in massive job losses, as many as 490,000 lost jobs, 

related just to highway work in the first year alone. And it would 

result in a dramatic acceleration of the decline of our Nation’s 

transportation infrastructure. One could argue that those who 

crafted the House proposal have found the will to justify billions of 

dollars in tax breaks and loopholes for corporations and the 

wealthy while cutting investment that all Americans and our economy depends on. 

This may be the summer of the blockbuster Harry Potter movie, 

but a magic wand won’t prevent what for so many Americans and 

for our Nation will be the real deathly hallows, as more jobs disappear, more families suffer and the U.S. falls further behind. Like 

many Americans, we are frustrated by the inability of some in 

Washington, DC. to put one and one together and match those who 

desperately need work with our critical infrastructure needs. 

Just last night, I held a conference call with thousands of our 

members’ activists about mobilizing for a highway bill that builds 

America. We will make sure their voices, their dreams and their 

hardships are heard loud and clear. LIUNA’s perspective is that 

this is a no-brainer. We can put people back to work, spur economic 

growth and create real assets for taxpayers and future generations. 

We can again be the Nation that does big things, even in trying 

times. We can fulfill our obligation to make sure what we do leaves 

our Nation better off than the way that we found it. 

Chairman Boxer, Ranking Member Inhofe, members of the committee, we can build America so America works. Thank you for the 

privilege of addressing you today. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. O’Sullivan follows:] 

23 


23822.007
24 


23822.008
25 


23822.009
26 


23822.010
27 

Senator BOXER. Thank you, President O’Sullivan. I just hope 

that this phone call that you had with all those workers will continue, because we need the people to communicate with those on 

the Finance Committee on both sides of the aisle and this committee that you really need us to do this. A lot of you said it took 

courage for us to come together. We need to have you in the background with a loud voice. So thank you for that. 

Mr. O’Sullivan. Thank you. 

Senator BOXER. And our next speaker, Donald James, Chairman 

and Chief Executive Officer of Vulcan Materials. You had a fabulous introduction from Senator Sessions. We welcome you. 

STATEMENT OF DONALD M. JAMES, CHAIRMAN AND CHIEF 

EXECUTIVE OFFICER, VULCAN MATERIALS 

Mr. JAMES. Thank you, Chairman Boxer and Ranking Member 

Inhofe, for the invitation to testify today. 

As Senator Sessions said in his gracious introduction, Vulcan 

Materials is the largest producer of construction aggregates in the 

United States. We are here today to address the critical situation 

with respect to the Federal aid highway and transit programs that 

exist in this Country, specifically with respect to the next 2 years, 

fiscal years 2012 and 2013. 

At the outset, let me say that it is our view that highway and 

transit programs were not created by Congress for the purpose of 

providing jobs. Although they do in fact do a really great job of providing jobs, the real purpose of the program is bigger and much 

more important than that. It is to provide the Nation with Transportation infrastructure that is essential to the efficient functioning 

of the U.S. economy. Transportation infrastructure is a basic and 

fundamental good. Every man, woman and child in this Country is 

a direct beneficiary of Federal investment in infrastructure, as is 

every business in this Country. 

Providing that transportation infrastructure, properly maintaining and sustaining it, is a core Federal responsibility. The lifeblood 

of the U.S. economy flows through our transportation system. In 

funding it, Congress provides a critical public benefit that extends 

decades beyond the construction project. Our Nation’s economic 

competitiveness, our economy’s growth and the creation of jobs year 

after year are directly correlated to the health and quality of our 

infrastructure. 

For example, our Nation’s roads and bridges move close to $40 

billion worth of goods every day, but could move significantly more 

were it not for traffic congestion, which costs our Nation $87 billion 

annually. The construction sector of our economy that implements 

this core responsibility will be severely tested in fiscal years 2012 

and 2013. The downturn in the economy has placed historic economic stress on the businesses that build and maintain our transportation system. Commercial and residential construction in the 

U.S. has dropped 75 percent to historic lows. Short and medium 

term prospects for improvement remain bleak. 

Aggregate volumes at Vulcan are down 50 percent. Our employment has dropped by 30 percent. Transportation infrastructure construction is the one somewhat stable construction sector in the U.S. 

economy today. The annual Federal funding for infrastructure has 

28 

been vitally important, while at the same time enhancing economic 

efficiency nationwide. 

Congress wisely chose to maintain the Fiscal Year 2010 baseline 

for Fiscal Year 2011 Federal highway programs, even while reducing spending in other areas. As a result, many U.S. companies did 

not have to lay off even more employees as a direct result of these 

cuts. Instead, they have been able to continue providing the public 

and economic benefits that the transportation and construction industry produces. 

Throughout the recession, we have of necessity had to reduce our 

work force and have taken additional measures to size our company to meet the current economy. You face similar challenges in 

reducing the size of government. When we reduced our company’s 

size and the number of our employees, we had an obligation to do 

it in a way to preserve our company and to position it for future 

growth. The cuts and layoffs were painful but strategic, designed 

to ultimately make us stronger and better. If we had ignored this 

core responsibility and cut arbitrarily across the board, we would 

have damaged our ability to grow, to rehire our employees, to survive and flourish again as a leading U.S. company. 

In roughly 10 weeks, the current authorization will expire. It is 

critical to determine now what size Federal program is required to 

maintain the Nation’s transportation infrastructure in order to 

grow the economy. We strongly support the funding on a bipartisan 

level at the current baseline to continue Congress’ long commitment to this core responsibility. 

Our Nation is at a critical crossroads economically. I ask you to 

consider the great importance of prioritizing spending cuts in a 

way that preserves the Nation’s potential for economic growth. 

Your bipartisan decision on the baseline determine whether we can 

begin to climb out of this recession and rebuild our work forces or 

experience further decline and lose more employees during fiscal 

years 2012 and 2013. Our Nation’s ability to grow economically, to 

continue to create additional taxpayers, will be subverted if we do 

not maintain the baseline. 

We have all heard that the job loss, if we do nothing more than 

fund construction at the current gas tax receipts, we will lose hundreds of thousands of jobs all across this Country. As bad as this 

is, the true calamity will occur in the ongoing national economic 

impairment, of which there are few if any existing and accepted 

metrics. 

Our ability to produce and export U.S. products efficiently is directly tied to the quality of our highway infrastructure. Absent adequate funding, we will experience the corrosive consequences of 

competitive losses. As we have all heard today from other witnesses and from members of this committee, the infrastructure investments that China, India, the European Union, Brazil, Canada 

are making in their infrastructure. It will be prudent to avoid these 

consequences of loss of competitiveness before they occur. 

Bipartisan congressional support will ensure the public good 

transportation infrastructure that enabled us to become the greatest economy in the world and which can preserve that status for 

future generations. Thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. James follows:] 

29 


23822.011
30 


23822.012
31 


23822.013
32 


23822.014
33 

Senator BOXER. Thank you for your eloquent statement. 

We are happy to welcome back Susan Martinovich, Director, Nevada Department of Transportation, on behalf of the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials. And I 

want to thank again your organization for being part of this great 

coalition that is behind our bipartisan approach. 

STATEMENT OF SUSAN MARTINOVICH, P.E., DIRECTOR, NEVADA DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION, ON BEHALF OF 

THE AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF STATE HIGHWAY AND 

TRANSPORTATION OFFICIALS 

Ms. MARTINOVICH. Thank you, Senator. 

Good morning. I thank you for the opportunity on behalf of State 

DOTs to share our views on surface transportation reauthorization 

and the bill summary that you recently released. On behalf of 

AASHTO, I would like to express gratitude to you, Madam Chair, 

Senators Baucus, Inhofe and Vitter, for your leadership in advancing a bipartisan reauthorization measure. We do recognize that in 

this time of economic and fiscal distress, producing a bipartisan bill 

required tremendous compromise on all sides. And we truly applaud your efforts. 

Your proposal merits our strong support. If it succeeds, over 

500,000 jobs will be saved and hundreds of projects vital to America’s competitiveness will be made possible. 

Let me make three brief points on your proposal. First, the Fiscal 

Year 2012 budget resolution approved by the House in the past 

spring would lead to an almost 35 percent cut in Federal and highway transit funding. This has been mentioned, that it would have 

a devastating effect on many State transportation programs. In Nevada, this would result in a $122 million cut in funding 

next year, with a major impact, one of those impacts being our 

Project Neon, which is scheduled to begin construction in 2013. 

This is a $1.7 billion reconstruction project on InterState 15 in 

downtown Las Vegas. The I–15 is a major corridor, multi-State corridor for east-west goods movement for the Country. And a $122 

million cut to our program would delay that start date. 

But it is not about the start date. That is important. But it is 

also about people. There are developers, there are businesses, there 

are individual homeowners whose lives are on hold and in limbo, 

waiting to see if we have the funding to acquire their property or 

to even start the project. 

We understand that in order to maintain the current funding levels, a revenue gap of approximately $6 per year is most likely needed to be filled. And we urge the Senate Finance Committee, working with your committee, to find that offset in revenues to fill the 

gap. And we recognize the current Highway Trust Fund revenue 

limitations, but advise that it is absolutely essential to maintain 

current funding levels. We need this not only to sustain hundreds 

and thousands of jobs and to keep essential transportation projects 

moving, but what has also been said, it is for the economy of this 

Country. 

Second, States have a critical need for program stability and the 

certainty to plan, develop and construct transportation projects. 

Without this, the States could have to avoid risk by deferring inVerDate Aug 31 2005 13:57 Apr 24, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00037 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\23822.TXT VERNE
34 

vestments in major multi-year projects. Simply put, States will not 

advance the first phase of a project if funding required to complete 

the project is not available in subsequent years. 

So with major projects deferred, construction companies will not 

make the material and equipment investments, they will be forced 

to further cut their work force. And this trickles down to even more 

jobs and businesses that indirectly support the construction industry. 

So while States would prefer a 6-year reauthorization bill, a 2- 

year bill provides the opportunity to advance toward that long-term 

goal. And it is a vast improvement over the uncertainty of the 

month to month extensions that we have had over the past 2 years. 

Third, the State DOTs have been advocating many of the policy 

reforms similar to those proposed in your legislation. We recognize 

that the provisions in your bill reflect many of the compromises 

from all viewpoints. And we thank you for that spirit of cooperation. 

It appears from our review that we are in agreement where some 

of the key policy reforms are needed: program consolidation and 

flexibility, the use of performance measures, expansion of innovative finance and further streamlining to accelerate project delivery. 

There are two policy reforms we are especially supportive of, and 

that is the enhancement and expansion of the TIFIA loan and loan 

guarantee program. However, I do want to caution that innovative 

financing mechanisms, including infrastructure banks, are valuable 

financing supplements. But they cannot replace the need for funding of the base program. 

We are also supportive of provisions to reduce bureaucratic hurdles for projects with no significant environmental impacts and provisions to accelerate projects approved within specified deadlines. 

We hope your bill will also encourage increased cooperation with 

the regulatory agencies. And I want to emphasize here that we 

strongly believe that at constant or reduced funding levels, Congress should be even more aggressive in removing regulatory burdens and providing States with greater flexibility to deliver 

projects. 

Finally, I would like to reiterate what I said at the beginning, 

that we believe a bipartisan measure, which has been a cooperative 

effort between you, Madam Chairman, and Senators Baucus, 

Inhofe and Vitter, merits our support. Investment in transportation 

truly is an investment that is immediate and has long-term benefits to this Country. We respectfully urge you to continue this bipartisan effort and thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Martinovich follows:] 

35 


23822.015
36 


23822.016
37 


23822.017
38 


23822.018
39 


23822.019
40 


23822.020
41 


23822.021
42 


23822.022
43 


23822.023
44 

Senator BOXER. Thank you. 

And now we call upon Hon. Gary Ridley, Secretary of the Oklahoma Department of Transportation. Senator Inhofe has given you 

a very warm introduction. We welcome you. 

STATEMENT OF HON. GARY RIDLEY, SECRETARY, OKLAHOMA 

DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION 

Mr. RIDLEY. Madam Chair, members of the committee, my name 

is Gary Ridley. I am Secretary of Transportation in Oklahoma. And 

I am here today to testify on behalf of the Oklahoma Department 

of Transportation. 

First, we want to thank you, Madam Chair, along with Ranking 

Member Senator Inhofe and the other members of the committee 

for your leadership and efforts to sustain funding levels and increase the efficiency of delivering the transportation projects in the 

reauthorization. 

As we consider the deficiencies of our national transportation 

system in the next highway bill, we recognize the challenges faced 

by Congress are significant. Transportation departments across the 

Country are hopeful that Congress can make every effort to at least 

fund the transportation at historic levels. 

However, we are acutely aware of the difficulties that are presented by the limitations of the projected highway trust fund revenue. Your work to find ways to benchmark investments and direct 

more transportation dollars to the core infrastructure is appreciated. 

When considering a reduced Federal funding projection, none of 

the critical needed Transportation projects currently being prepared for delivery in Oklahoma can be held harmless in the rebalancing of our fiscally constrained construction work plan. In addition, your renewed focus on core transportation infrastructure and 

your review and consolidation of programs that mandate the commitment of the highway trust fund dollars to fringe activities is 

welcome. 

If eligibilities are retained, the decision to commit transportation 

resources to these activities should be left to the States alone. Even 

more so when our State and Federal budgets are under extreme 

pressure and our performance is proposed to be measured by key 

outcomes, such as reducing fatalities, improving bridges and fixing 

roads and reducing congestion. 

The utilization of Garvey, TIFIA, public-private partnerships, 

Build America bonds, infrastructure banks and other such methodologies that have proven effective in financing certain and welldefined transportation systems. However, we should be mindful 

that none of these financing opportunities provide new revenues or 

sustainable long-term funding. It is important to ensure that financing options are not held as the Federal Government’s best or 

only solution to stem the further decline of our national transportation system. 

The Nation requires new and effective transportation revenue 

streams, but does not need new encouragement to incur additional 

debt. Extreme care must be exercised when considering such programs in order to avoid over-projecting and over-extending our limited resources. 

45 

States should not be left to bear the financial burden of a national Transportation system alone. We recognize that a consistent 

authorization with reasonable funding commitment and a term 

that extends beyond the reach of the endless extension acts, while 

the complete fiscal resolution of our national Transportation funding crisis may not yet be at hand, the value of the legislation provisions proposed to facilitate a more effective project and program delivery system should not be discounted. 

Reducing environmental hurdles for projects that have no significant environmental impacts will be extremely beneficial. For example, the last 3 years, we let the contract almost 200 routine projects 

that were less than $5 million cost. All these projects required 

NEPA documents that typically took 30 to 180 days to complete. 

Assuming that such projects would meet the criteria for expedited 

process or a complete NEPA exemption, then Oklahoma would 

have had the opportunity in many cases to reduce the process cost 

and shorten the project delivery time on each by a like amount. 

The introduction of these ideas is a giant step in the right direction. The preparation efforts and time saved to deliver projects that 

meet defined criteria will not only translate as a cost and time saving to the agency, but will accelerate a direct user benefit to commerce and the traveling public. Also, the State and Federal regulatory resources and lead agencies will have the opportunity to 

focus more of their internal resources on progressing other, large 

scale proposed Transportation improvements in a more timely and 

effective manner. 

However, even as some progress is evident, we have recently become aware that the EPA and the Corps of Engineers are seeking 

to expand their jurisdictional authority over new waters through 

issuance of clarification guidelines. Such guidelines are greatly concerning, as more and more regulation creeps into the simple drainage ditches and minor tributaries that were long considered nonjurisdictional. 

In Oklahoma, Corps of Engineers-issued permits and mitigation 

members approval is becoming more and more difficult to obtain in 

a timely manner, due to the resources strain on the existing broad 

jurisdictional assertion. This situation can only be exacerbated by 

the expanded jurisdictional authority under the proposed guidelines. Regulatory guidelines should not overState the law, should 

be easily manageable by the responsible agency with the resources 

anticipated to be available, and above all, should be determined 

reasonable by State governments and by the private sector. 

It is critical that a balance is maintained that a project’s environment does not restrict the delivery of critical needed safety and 

condition-related improvements or the economic growth and competitiveness and development of our Nation. 

Thank you, Madam Chair, Ranking Member Inhofe, for the opportunity to testify. We are grateful to the efforts of the committee 

and Congress to craft and fund a transportation compromise that 

will carry us to a multi-year authorization. I will be glad to answer 

any questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Ridley follows:] 

46 


23822.024
47 


23822.025
48 


23822.026
49 


23822.027
50 


23822.028
51 


23822.029
52 

Senator BOXER. Thank you so much, Mr. Ridley. 

Our next witness is Mr. Deron Lovaas, Transportation Policy Director of the National Resources Defense Council. Welcome. 

STATEMENT OF DERON LOVAAS, TRANSPORTATION POLICY 

DIRECTOR, NATURAL RESOURCES DEFENSE COUNCIL 

Mr. LOVAAS. Thank you, Chairman Boxer, Ranking Member 

Inhofe, members of the committee, for inviting me to testify today. 

I want you to imagine a world devoid of a national Transportation system. In that world, we would face gridlock and paralysis. 

Ranchers and farmers would be unable to get products to markets. 

Manufacturers of vehicles and parts would be unable to ship in the 

U.S. or overseas. Transportation is clearly a key means to a variety 

of ends that boost the economy. 

Current policy, unfortunately, undermines America’s safety, energy and climate security and economy. Now is the time to rectify 

that by, first, investing wisely by setting national mobility and access, safety, economic impact, energy use and environmental quality objectives. Public investments in infrastructure can yield large 

economic productivity gains. 

A billion dollars of investment in public Transportation, for ex- ample, yields about $3.5 billion of GDP. Annual investments of $30 

billion in America’s public transit systems and $10 billion in intracity and high-speed rail would create 3.7 million jobs overall and 

more than 600,000 jobs in manufacturing over 6 years. In addition, these investment would generate $60 billion in net annual gross domestic product, GDP, nearly $45 billion in annual 

worker income and $14 billion in annual tax revenue, spurring additional growth throughout the economy. 

Current fiscal constraints warrant collection and use of cost and 

benefit data during planning and project selection and design. We 

need to make sure to invest carefully. Government should turn to 

a tool in the kit of successful companies: strategic planning, including the use of scenario building. One recent study pegs the cost differential between strategic and business as usual investment at 12 

percent savings for Sacramento, 24 percent for Albuquerque and a 

whopping 51 percent for Nashville. There are big potential savings 

if we look seriously at the future by building scenarios. 

Two, we need to fix it first with clearer, more aggressive repair 

and maintenance policy. Deferred maintenance, let’s be clear, is a 

national crisis. Five hundred bridges in America failed between 

1989 and 2003. And today, nearly 70,000 bridges across the Country are in disrepair. As former White House economic advisor Larry 

Summers put it, ‘‘You run a deficit both when you borrow money 

and when you need it for maintenance that needs to be done. Either way, you are imposing a cost on future generations.’ 

No. 3, we need to break our oil habit by delivering mobility 

choice driven by a national oil savings objective for our transportation policy and similar objectives for States and regions. Transportation drives America’s dependence on foreign oil. We have 

nearly weaned our electricity sector off of oil, thankfully, but 

Transportation remains almost entirely dependent. Nearly 70 percent of U.S. oil use is for transportation. Overall, this translates to 

a 9,000 gallon per second habit. 

53 

How do we reduce that dependence? Well, raising the bar on fuel 

economy performance for our vehicles, which we are making good 

progress on, is the first step. Second, providing consumers with 

more fuel choices by making cars pluggable. And a third prong we 

need to attack oil dependence is greater mobility choice. Consumers 

deserve more options for travel, including virtual travel, high occupancy toll lanes, bus rapid transit, telecommuting, technology that 

improves road and transit traffic flow, as well as convenient and 

safe opportunities to walk and bike. 

Four, we need to secure funding and financing with new tools. 

And I think we are all in agreement on some of those tools. We 

favor looking at tools like an oil security fee, an increase in the gas 

tax, or a VMT fee over the long run, as well as innovative financing. Expansion of TIFIA and other tools involving public-private 

partnerships, such as infrastructure banks, should award assistance on a competitive basis, a focus on maximizing returns based 

on measurable outcomes and fuel savings and pollution cuts. It is 

important that performance measurement and accountability be a 

rigorous component of any expanded program to make sure we leverage taxpayer dollars. 

Five, we do need to improve project delivery by tackling real 

causes and not compromising environmental reviews. Let’s be 

clear: environmental reviews account for only a small share of 

transportation project delays. Lack of adequate financing is a bigger factor. And few projects actually need an environmental impact 

statement with even fewer subject to controversy. Congress 

shouldn’t legislate by anecdote based on horror stories, but evaluate project delays and tackle then with planning improvements and 

adequate resources for reviewers. 

Six, we need to move good faster, cleaner and cheaper with a 

freight program to facilitate affordable goods movement while reducing environmental harms. We can meet growing demand for 

goods while saving oil as well as reducing air pollution, water pollution and noise through targeted provisions. Specifically, we favor 

a competitive grant program to fund innovative projects based on 

energy and environmental performance criteria developed in coordination with environmental stakeholders. 

Last but not least, we need to protect our natural resources by 

setting a stormwater runoff performance standard for new and rehabilitated highways and roads. Smart pollution mitigation strategies, such as green roads and highways, are a cost-effective way to 

reduce stormwater runoff, flooding and help meet clean water requirements. 

Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today. We need 

to press forward with wise investments in a smarter and greener 

Transportation program. I look forward to working with you on 

that. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Lovaas follows:] 

54 


23822.030
55 


23822.031
56 


23822.032
57 


23822.033
58 


23822.034
59 


23822.035
60 


23822.036
61 


23822.037
62 


23822.038
63 


23822.039
64 


23822.040
65 


23822.041
66 


23822.042
67 


23822.043
68 


23822.044
69 


23822.045
70 


23822.046
71 


23822.047
72 

Senator BOXER. Thank you so much. 

And last but not least, we are very happy to welcome back Mr. 

Greg Cohen, President and CEO of the American Highway Users 

Alliance. Welcome. 

STATEMENT OF GREG COHEN, PRESIDENT, AMERICAN 

HIGHWAY USERS ALLIANCE 

Mr. COHEN. Thank you, Madam Chairman, Ranking Member 

Inhofe, members of the committee. I am honored to appear before 

you here today to present testimony indicating our strong support 

of your plan to enact the bipartisan MAP–21 bill this year. 

Highway Users is the only organized national non-profit coalition 

that represents the interests of the motoring public across all the 

highway modes. We promote Federal, State and local policies that 

improve safety and mobility, and our members include AAA clubs, 

trucking and bus companies, motorcyclists, RVers and others that 

contribute user fees to the trust fund. These members and several 

hundred other member businesses and associations represent millions of highway users from coast to coast. 

We have worked closely with members of this committee and 

your excellent, professional staff to advocate for a new vision of the 

Federal Aid Highway program that is reformed, robust, streamlined, and reflects the core priorities that serve the national interests. We congratulate the committee on this week’s release of your 

policy outline, which largely reflects priorities that we share with 

you. 

Our goal is not to please traditional transportation trade associations in Washington, but more importantly, to serve the interests 

of the public at large, particularly those who pay the highway user 

fees. Unfortunately, the unwieldy and complex authorization bills 

of the recent past generation, lacking in direction and full of earmarks, put this committee at a public relations disadvantage before 

you even began working 2 years ago on this. That is why it is 

worth emphasizing again how delighted we are that this is a Big 

Four bill that sets a new course focused on reform. 

We are thrilled that despite the current divisive political environment, MAP–21 is being negotiated to receive the support from 

some of the most progressive and some of the most conservative 

members of the U.S. Senate. Bipartisan cooperation on the surface 

transportation bill is a tradition worth keeping. 

We strongly support passage both of this bill and the House bill 

so that a conference committee can be convened quickly, and so 

that you can complete your work. The worst possible outcome 

would be if Congress fails to make progress and we end up with 

a long-term extension bill that cuts funding and fails to reform the 

program. 

The Federal highway program is of much more value than simply 

being a jobs bill. Mobility and safety investments create broad economic growth, improve our quality of life, and give America competitive advantage in international trade. For example, SAIC has 

fond that safety investments under the HSIP program have saved 

$43 in societal costs for every $1 spent. According to U.S. DOT, investing as much as $175 billion per year on highway projects would 

have a positive benefit to cost ratio. And at the current funding levVerDate Aug 31 2005 13:57 Apr 24, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00076 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\23822.TXT VERNE
73 

els, a performance-based highway program would deliver hundreds 

of billions of dollars of economic benefits each year to Americans 

in every State in the Country for only $40 billion in annual user 

costs. 

We support your efforts to prevent cuts to the funding of the 

highway program. Due to the shortfall in the highway trust fund 

and the seemingly impossible task of raising highway user fees on 

fuel, we encourage all the committees that are involved to consider 

supplementing highway programs with general funds over the next 

few years. However, it is important to note that we have always 

supported highway users paying their full share for the highway 

program. And we agree with the committee that growing the TIFIA 

program is a better plan than the National Infrastructure Fund. 

We also encourage Senate consideration of Senator Wyden’s TRIP 

bond bill, which would supplement funding for all States. 

We applaud this committee for taking a strong position on reducing bureaucracy and improving project delivery. We understand 

that the committee’s plan is to keep all substantive environmental 

protections in place. At the same time, we can improve interagency 

procedures and establish deadlines for NEPA comments and permit 

reviews. According to U.S. DOT, a major highway project can take 

9 to 19 years to complete. And every 10 years that a project is delayed, the costs double. 

The Highway Users Alliance also supports streamlined transportation planning processes that include consultation with a wide 

range of interested parties and ensures that representatives of motorists, private bus companies, truckers and other highway user 

fee-paying groups are at the table. However, with money in short 

supply and time of the essence, Congress should avoid the addition 

of new planning, additional planning layers or mandates that force 

cooperation or coordination with new groups of reviewers. Transportation planning is already extremely complex. I know, I have 

done it. Federal mandates that slow the process give new actors 

veto power, reduce the primacy of transportation considerations 

and transportation planning, mandate experimental planning techniques or create additional hurdles for U.S. DOT to approve plans. 

These have to be avoided. 

Most of the core programs proposed by the committee are similar 

to those that we have proposed in our authorization briefs and in 

our previous testimony. In particular, we congratulate you and 

strongly support your core programs for safety, freight and the National highway system program. Safety is our top priority and we 

urge the committee to even consider additional safety proposals, 

such as the Baucus safety bill and others that we endorsed in our 

committee testimony back in April 2010. 

The new freight program is critical to improve our commerce corridors. The new national highway system program will improve 

just 4 percent of the roads, but those are the roads that are these 

most used, and serve as our Nation’s economic arteries. 

In conclusion, this committee has an extraordinarily opportunity 

to help improve the economy, reduce congestion, save tens of thousands of lives by expediting the authorization of MAP–21 with a reformed, streamlined and robust highway and transportation proVerDate Aug 31 2005 13:57 Apr 24, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00077 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\23822.TXT VERNE
74 

gram. We greatly appreciate being your partner in this effort and 

would be happy to answer any questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Cohen follows:] 

75 


23822.048
76 


23822.049
77 


23822.050
78 


23822.051
79 


23822.052
80 

Senator BOXER. Well, thank you very much to all of our panelists. 

Mayor, I do have some questions for you, so don’t go just yet. 

I want to just say that I thought, Mr. Cohen, you really brought 

it home to me, that a lot of the reforms that are in this bill, probably all of them, and there are many, really came from the people 

out there who have been working on various commissions and committees, and have worked with us on both sides of the aisle. And 

we really appreciate it. And what we were able to do was look at 

all these proposals and finally do something about this program 

which, let’s just say it was sprawling. It was just too many little 

things. And we managed to consolidate and save the things that we 

worked hard together on. 

There were some differences here. We gave and we took. It was 

hard. But I think at the end of the day we managed to get this together. 

Mayor, I want to make a point here which I know you agree 

with. The basic Highway Trust Fund, that is how we fund, that is 

the bread and butter. It is what Mr. James referred to, it is what 

Mr. Ridley referred to, all of you have referred to it, most of you 

have referred to it. That is the bread and butter program that we 

are talking about. 

And that is why I appreciate all the new ideas that are coming 

forward, and by the way, support them, I think, whatever they are. 

But we can’t allow those ideas, whether it is an infrastructure bank 

or anything else, to replace the basic funding mechanism we have 

here. And I know that Senator Baucus has on his plate, as soon 

as we act, he is going to do everything in his power. 

But you need to help him, support him, and I say this as someone who has been around here and on this committee since the day 

I came to the Senate, so that he and his members feel, and Senator 

Carper is on that committee, I don’t know who else here is, but the 

bottom line is, they have to feel that this is a priority. 

I already feel that, because working for a year doing the conference calls with you, you must have been sick of me already 

every other week on the phone talking about where are we and 

how can we move and all the rest. Well, I felt the support. 

But the support now has to continue with this committee, but 

also with the Finance Committee. Because if they don’t sense that 

America wants this, it is going to be very difficult. 

So I want to make that case. As of today, I think you have seen 

this bipartisan support here. So Mayor, I want to thank you personally, but also your organization now that you head, the Conference of Mayors. Because you are bipartisan mayors and you 

have worked with us, very clearly. And you have worked with us 

on the need to have a strong core bill, which is maintaining the levels that we have now. And you have worked with us also on Safe 

Routes to Schools, because that is so crucial, and bike paths, and 

we kept it, and recreational trails, and we kept it. 

Tough, tough debates, giving here, taking there. But that has remained in the bill. 

I want to ask you a question about TIFIA. For the information 

of all Senators, because this is so, to me, so exciting. When you 

came to me 2 years ago with your bipartisan group, you had labor, 

81 

you had management, you had chamber of commerce, everybody. 

And you said, Los Angeles has passed a half cent sales tax, and 

we have a list of programs, I think you said nine that the people 

said they want to do. But it is going to take us 30 years to get all 

the funding. 

And you, Federal Government, if you could come up front and 

help us at the beginning and move these projects forward. You 

know you have a steady stream of income coming behind it. Would 

you be willing to come out. 

And then we talked about it, and I went to Senator Inhofe and 

I said, here is an idea whose time has come. The cities and the 

counties all over this Nation are stepping forward. But it takes 

time to get the dollars in. So through the existing TIFIA program, 

and I give credit to my chief of staff and chief counsel, Bettina 

Poirier, for saying, you know, I think there is already a program 

here. It is small, but it could meet the needs here. We were able 

to help already with one project. 

And I wonder if you could just explain to my colleagues now, because they support this robust, and so does Chairman Mica, robust 

increase, how TIFIA works and what it is enabling your city to do, 

and of course other projects were funded also through TIFIA. And 

also if you could speak to some of the reforms, if you are familiar 

with them. If not, we will put those in the record. Go ahead. 

Mayor Villaraigosa. Yes, thank you, Madam Chair. And again, I 

want to thank you and the committee for the work that you did on 

this issue. 

L.A., in the middle of a recession, with a two-thirds vote with bipartisan support passed a half penny sales tax that generated, as 

you said, $40 billion, to double the size of the rail system, 12 rail 

projects. But also to invest in highway repair, bridge repair, expansion of HOV lanes, HOT lanes throughout the region. It became 

crystal clear when almost days, weeks after the passage of that 

bill, when people would walk up to me and say, Mayor, where is 

the subway you promised? I would have to explain to people that 

it was a half penny sales tax, not a ten cent sales tax and that 

money would generate over a 30-year period of time. 

And as you said, working with you and your office, we began to 

look at innovative financing tools. Because we knew that this day 

was coming, that the conversation around the deficit and the debt 

was such that people here in the Congress didn’t just want to rely 

on programs that provide grants. And what is great about this specific program is that there is a 30 to one leverage. 

In our case, and in the case of cities and counties across the 

Country, and States, if you have a revenue pool from which to invest in, a stream here, you can leverage that, get a loan and pay 

it back. As you know, we already have done that with you, a $546 

million loan for the Crenshaw Line. We are now in the pipeline, a 

finalist for a $646 million loan for a subway. 

And the reason why we are qualifying in the way that we are 

is we are putting up our own money. So at a time of high deficits 

and debt, what it encourages is that the responsibility not just be 

on the Federal Government. 

Now, I associate my remarks or support for Ms. Martinovich, 

who said, we don’t want this to be in lieu of a Federal commitment. 

82 

We understand how important that is. But at a time when we are 

all debating deficits and debt, this is a creative way to incentives 

localities. And by the way, if you ask someone in L.A. and Detroit, 

in a small town, wherever it is, if they would rather support a local 

tax or bond or a State or Federal one, they are almost unanimous 

in their support for a local one, because they want to see their dollars come back to their neighborhood. 

So that was the idea around TIFIA. In addition to that, you have 

responded to a number of other changes. Instead of just going for 

33 percent of a project, this could go up for 50 percent. Also we 

could do multiple projects here. You could get advance notice, or 

advance, I forget the exact term, but an opportunity to get up-front 

credit going forward on multiple projects, which would help us as 

well. And that is the thinking behind it. 

And I do want to say one last thing, and I know Senator Baucus 

just walked out, to really make this work, getting a transportation 

bond program could really enhance all of this as well. Also have a 

great deal of leverage, also promote public-private partnerships and 

the like, to really help us, particularly during these tough economic 

times. 

Senator BOXER. Thank you, Mayor. 

I am going to turn it over to Senator Inhofe for 8 minutes. I just 

want to say here to my colleagues, when we were able, when the 

Department of Transportation made that TIFIA loan to Los Angeles, $500 million, the score was $20 million. It was barely anything. 

The reason is, it is a dedicated stream of funding, the people vote 

for it, it is going to be, it is hardly any risk at all. That is the exciting part of TIFIA, and why I am so grateful. It doesn’t replace the 

core programs, but in these times when you hear Mr. James talk 

about layoffs and worries and the rest, and we know construction 

is still down, this will give us a chance to even do more than we 

can do with the basics. 

The last thing is, we did reform TIFIA also to allow rural areas 

to be able to move forward here with practically no interest rate. 

So I think it is terrific. 

Anyway, I give you 8 minutes. 

Senator INHOFE. Thank you, Madam Chairman. 

We went through this back in 2005. At that time, we were majority and I was the Chairman. We had a successful effort then. But 

that was $286.4 billion, I believe. Initially it was going to be a 6- 

year bill and then a 5-year bill, I guess. 

And yet, at that time, we had really good testimony. I remember 

some of you, maybe some of the same ones, I think, Gary, you were 

here at that time, saying, that amount of money really just maintains what we have now. It is just, and so what we are talking 

about here, it is not as if we are saying that to drop $12 billion 

over a 2-year period is going to inflict some kind of hardship. We 

are saying, even at the full funding, it is not adequate. And that 

is coming from a conservative. And I feel strongly about that. I remember so well when they had the $800 billion stimulus bill. 

And we were down on the floor, and I couldn’t believe that only, 

as was mentioned by Senator Sessions, only 3 and a half percent 

of that actually went to what we are talking about today. And so 

we had an amendment, you talk about being bipartisan, the ChairVerDate Aug 31 2005 13:57 Apr 24, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00086 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\23822.TXT VERNE
83 

man and I had an amendment, and I am going from memory now, 

it was $29 billion, up to $79 billion. I was going to ask, where do 

you think we would be today if we had been successful in that effort. 

But that still would have been only 10 percent of the $800 billion 

stimulus. It is just mind-boggling to me, it would have been such 

an easy thing at that time to do, that we didn’t do it. We just don’t 

want to make that mistake again. 

I am going to start with Secretary Ridley, because we talked 

about this before. I think that Ms. Martinovich would agree that 

how this affects Oklahoma would affect probably all the rest of her 

member States. In the event, Gary, that we had to do the 34 percent cut from current level, and that is what we are talking about, 

specifically what would that mean in Oklahoma? 

Mr. RIDLEY. Thank you, Senator. 

Certainly, the impact would be devastating to our 8-year construction work plan. We put together an 8-year plan that is fiscally 

constrained based on the moneys that we receive at the State level, 

as well as the anticipated revenues at the Federal level, considering current statutes, current law. 

So if you have a basically one-third reduction of the Federal 

funds and the Federal funds make up 60 percent of our 8-year construction work program, one would have to, if you do the math, you 

are looking at somewhere around $750 million to $800 million 

would come out of that 8-year construction work program. So you 

have about a 4.1 program would have to be reduced by $800 million. 

Certainly there are some projects that you could probably look to 

rescope and reduce the length of them. But in that program, we 

have 650 bridges that we will either replace or rehabilitate. I can’t 

reduce the length of those, as you might expect. They are what 

they are. And it would certainly put all projects within that 8-year 

program at risk of being either reduced in size or scope, or being 

pushed either out of the 8-year program or certainly being moved. 

Senator INHOFE. Would there be a specific program in our State 

of Oklahoma that you could just real quickly address as to what 

difference that would make in that project? We have, as you know, 

some huge ones in Oklahoma City and Tulsa and elsewhere. 

Mr. RIDLEY. And you are absolutely right, Senator. We have a 

project in Oklahoma City, it is the relocation of the I–40 crosstown 

bridge. And we are getting close to being able to take traffic off of 

that critical bridge and get them on a new mainline. But with that, 

it requires us to reconnect the downtown area of Oklahoma City 

back to InterState 40, InterState 235 and InterState 35. We are 

scheduled to have that completed by 2014. One would imagine that 

again, that project and those series of projects would have to be delayed. 

In Tulsa the same way. We have a section of interState commonly referred to as Skelly Bypass, Riverside and Yale, that is a 

$340 million project, that we have the last project that is scheduled 

for letting about this time next year. If we have this major reduction in Federal funds, one could imagine that could very well be a 

project that we would have to delay. 

84 

That is the oldest section of interState that we have in our system. In fact, it was in place before the interState system was established. So it was supplanted on top of an existing highway. High 

accident rate, high severity rate and high fatality rate in that area. 

And some of the worst in our interState system. Delaying completion of that project would not only cause additional costs, but certainly you could expect to have additional accidents, both personal 

injury and maybe even fatalities, any delays that we would have 

you could certain expect that. 

Senator INHOFE. And I would like to ask Mr. James or it could 

be just about anyone, the alternative, if we were to deal with just 

more extensions, and even if the money were the same amount, in 

addition to just the reforms that we have in there, what other problems, Ms. Martinovich, do you see that would be there? In other 

words, we spend the same amount of money but we do it with extensions. 

Ms. MARTINOVICH. Thank you, Senator. 

The biggest problem is not being able to plan. As a transportation official, I don’t know when the money exactly would come or 

even how much, because of what the unknown times are, or what 

the criteria is. And assuming it is all the same, I still will be hesitant to put out any projects that are past that, not knowing if I am 

going to be reimbursed on time. And then supplementing, paying 

those contractors with our State money. 

So it is a balancing act and a planning act. So if I can’t plan, how 

can our customers plan? How can the contractors know and set up 

their resources? How can the supplies even be available not knowing, do they make a lot or do they be reactive? 

So then that delay could impact time. 

Senator INHOFE. That is what I am trying to get at, because we 

have a lot of things, the predictability that is in here and how that 

translates into what we are going to be able to get from a bill. We 

have the flexibility in terms of the States’ activities and these 

things. So I guess what I am saying is, we have a lot of really good 

reforms. Some of them were easy. Some of them we didn’t agree on 

in the beginning. But that to me was almost just as important as 

the amount of money to be able to predictably see it. 

I am going to thank you, Mr. O’Sullivan, too. My time is expired, 

but I just want to tell you that I appreciate your being here and 

bringing to the table the fact that we have thousands and thousands of jobs out there. I often wonder, and maybe you put the pencil to this, I don’t know, but if we had been successful in changing 

that $29 billion to $79 billion, how many more jobs today would 

there be actively working on? 

Mr. O’Sullivan. If we used the statistics of 34,000 jobs created for 

every billion, there would be an awful lot more jobs. There would 

be less unemployment in the construction industry. And the question about what would happen as far as the State department of 

transportation, from the labor perspective, we already have a 15.6 

percent unemployment rate in the construction industry today, 

down from 20 percent, 1.3 million construction workers out of work. 

From the unionized sector, we have lost 30,000 members in the last 

2 years. And unfortunately, over half of those were construction laVerDate Aug 31 2005 13:57 Apr 24, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00088 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\23822.TXT VERNE
85 

borers working on heavy and highway projects that had eight or 

more years of service in the industry. 

So as the unemployment rate goes up, this has been a sustained 

depression or recession in the construction industry, one that we 

really haven’t witnessed in a real long time. And we are seeing an 

exodus of skilled craftsmen and women leaving the industry that 

makes it difficult when the money is there to revamp and to rebuild the crumbling infrastructure in this Country. 

So the skills drain in this Country because of the prolonged recession in the construction industry is a real problem. 

Senator INHOFE. I appreciate it. 

Senator BOXER. I so appreciate your asking that question. 

Senator INHOFE. Our witnesses here, this is really unusual. We 

have everybody covered here. So I express to you my appreciation 

for working on this input that we are getting. 

Senator BOXER. Well, it is extraordinary. I went, about a year 

ago, to a job retraining center in the Central Valley. One of the 

programs was learning how to chef. And I went around the room 

and at least in that room of about 25, 30 working people, were at 

least 10 who said they were construction people. Imagine. And they 

just plain had given up. 

So your point is poignant and it is accurate. I thank you for it. 

Senator Merkley? 

Senator MERKLEY. Thank you very much for your testimony and 

thank you, Madam Chair. 

I really want to make sure we understand fully the job implications. I have heard the estimates ranging from 700,000 jobs at the 

high end, 500,000 jobs. Can a couple of you who feel like you have 

a real handle on these numbers help us understand if we don’t get 

this reauthorization and we have this roughly 35 percent drop? 

Mr. JAMES. Certainly I can speak for my company, my customers’ 

companies and our suppliers’ companies. We are staffed at a level 

today that is in anticipation of maintaining the current level of 

funding. If for some reason that declines further, we unfortunately, 

and our customers and our suppliers will also have to take further 

reductions to remain economically viable. 

We have no other choice. That is our only option. So this is not 

a theoretical job loss issue. It is real, these are human beings. 

These are members of Mr. O’Sullivan’s union and others who we 

will not have work for if this Federal program is not maintained 

at current levels. 

Mayor Villaraigosa. Senator Merkley, the number that I mentioned earlier was with a 36 percent cut, about a 630,000 job loss. 

To our agency alone, the L.A. County Metropolitan Transit Authority, about $1.4 billion. So it is a very, very sizable impact on the 

job market, but also on our ability to fund important projects. 

Senator MERKLEY. Mr. Ridley? 

Mr. RIDLEY. Senator, a lot of talk and a lot of discussion has centered around, and rightly so, on the current job situation in America in all our States. And that is certainly an area that we look at 

in the short term, especially for creation or sustaining jobs in the 

construction market. 

But to me, the idea of investing in ourselves and investing in the 

infrastructure establishes much more than that. Exponentially 

86 

more than that. If we think about the investment that our Nation 

put into the interState system and where we are today with the 

economy and where we would be without it, I think that rebuilding 

our system, our national system, if you will, to get it back to where 

we were or better than where we were 20 years ago will create that 

investment along those corridors like we haven’t seen in a long 

time. 

So I think that the economic vitality of this Nation is totally dependent on how well we do our job as far as the infrastructure is 

concerned. 

Senator MERKLEY. Thank you. I certainly agree that investing in 

our infrastructure is absolutely critical, critical to our economy in 

terms of job creation and critical to our future economy in terms 

of our ability to transport goods and people. We recently had a bipartisan delegation that went to China, and it had been 14 years 

since I had been there. In those 14 years the amount of infrastructure that had been built was massive. The estimates I heard have 

ranged from 10 to 12 percent of GDP being invested in infrastructure. 

To ride a 200 mile per hour train out of Beijing to Tianjin was 

kind of a startling feeling. I have never had the chance to set foot 

on a 200 mile per hour train here in the United States. To see the 

amount of light rail transportation and the amount of road infrastructure that had been constructed in a decade and a half. I think 

the estimate is we are spending 2 percent of our GDP. And we are 

barely maintaining the infrastructure we have. 

And so I want to applaud all of you for bringing your testimony 

today. I want to applaud the Chair and Ranking Member for working together to try to figure out how we can sustain our investment. Because in my opinion, this is simply the minimal acceptable 

approach, that in fact we should be figuring out how we can spend, 

and someone referred to building bridges in Baghdad rather than 

building bridges here. That was a very poetic way of putting it. 

But we need to figure out how we can invest far more in our infrastructure here. Thank you all. 

Senator BOXER. Thank you so much. 

Senator Whitehouse? 

Senator WHITEHOUSE. Thank you, Chairman Boxer, for holding 

this important hearing and for the hard work that you have put 

in to create such a broad spectrum of consensus on this point that 

is reflected in today’s panel. 

We obviously are facing a very serious shortfall in transportation 

funding. In Rhode Island, one in five of our bridges are presently 

structurally deficient. That is the fourth highest ratio of any State. 

Sixty-eight percent of our roads are rated in poor or mediocre condition. And 37 percent of our major urban highways are congested. 

There is a lot of work that needs to be done. 

Estimates are that to bring Rhode Island’s highway system to a 

State of good repair, we would have to double our current spending 

levels for 10 years. But against that backdrop, the House of Representatives, the Republicans in the House of Representatives, 

have proposed a budget that would cut current transportation 

funding levels by more than a third. This obviously would have a 

devastating impact on the economy, a devastating impact on jobs. 

87 

Rhode Island’s unemployment rate is the fourth highest in the 

Country. And this cut would lead to the loss of 3,500 more jobs in 

Rhode Island. 

So it is totally unacceptable. And I applaud, again, the Chairman, the Ranking Member and Senators Baucus and Vitter for 

their work to bring us to this point. 

The question that I would love to ask, let me ask Mr. O’Sullivan, 

representing one of our strongest labor organizations, and Mr. 

James, representing a very strong and successful private sector corporation with interest in this area. Have we done a good job in 

Congress at distinguishing between spending and infrastructure 

spending? I think of a family that has a moderate income and they 

discover that they have a significant problem in the roof of the family home. You could ignore that, you could sit around the kitchen 

table and say, you know what, this family is spending too much. 

We are not going to spend to fix our roof. That would be wasteful 

spending. 

Well, the water would continue to pour through the roof, the 

damage to the house, a family asset, would continue. You could 

easily see a circumstance in which the smartest decision for the 

family would be to go to the credit card, fix the roof, protect the 

asset, save money in the long haul. And that is a very, very different family decision than saying, you know what, let’s take the 

same credit card and take the whole family to Walt Disney World 

for a week. 

Some people here in Washington don’t seem to be able to distinguish between those two kinds of spending. One is money out the 

door, and the other leaves you with a national asset that you can 

go out and touch, a bridge, a highway, a high speed rail system, 

an improved airport that runs on digital technology instead of cathode ray tubes when it is bringing in the aircraft safely to our landing strips. I would love to have the thoughts again of Mr. 

O’Sullivan and Mr. James on that distinction between spending for 

spending’s sake and spending to strengthen America’s infrastructure and our common wealth, to use an old phrase, as a Nation. 

Mr. JAMES. Thank you, Senator Whitehouse, for the question. 

Having spent a lot of years in the business world, where we invest 

heavily in large plant and equipment, the answer to that question 

seems so obvious. When the United States spends money building 

infrastructure, you have created an asset. That asset lasts literally 

for decades. We are all traveling on a Federal interState system 

that has been in existence now, in many parts of it, for four or five 

decades. It is a real asset. 

Unfortunately, there is not a Federal balance sheet like there is 

in the private sector, where we can look at our investments over 

the last 10 or 20 or 30 years and say, here is a real asset, it is producing economic efficiency, it is producing revenue, it is a longterm value-enhancing asset. Somehow we don’t see that, or that 

doesn’t seem to enter—— 

Senator WHITEHOUSE. Indeed, we have no capital budget in the 

Federal Government to work with to accomplish that. 

Mr. JAMES. Yes. 

Mr. O’Sullivan. Senator, thank you for the question as well. Nice 

to see you. 

88 

We talk about accountability. I think we all believe that whatever money we are going to spend on infrastructure, there has to 

be accountability, it needs to be targeted and we need to be able 

to feel it, touch it and see it at the end of the day and that it has 

an impact on our economy, it has an impact on our infrastructure 

and it has an impact on putting people back to work and our ability to move goods and services across the Country. 

I also think that what we need to do is a much better job of the 

general public realizing, we talk about statistics like 27 percent of 

our bridges are structurally deficient or functionally obsolete. But 

people keep driving across them without any real knowledge. 

We did a campaign called Build America campaign. And we took 

out billboards in a number of places across the Country and 

showed the undercarriage of a bridge that was rotting away, because you can’t always see it from the top down, and the impact. 

It was a union-funded campaign, but it was a campaign to inform 

the general public about the sad State of our infrastructure, of our 

bridges in this Country. 

If we don’t get it in Washington, sometimes, I think what we 

need to do is take the message of the crumbling infrastructure 

across this Country so people realize the State of affairs, that we 

do have a $2.2 trillion problem. I even commend this committee 

and Chairman Boxer again on your leadership on this issue. But 

we all agree that this is a starting point and we know we need to 

do even more. 

But I think what we need to do is we need to make sure that 

people understand the State of affairs and the reason that we need 

to invest in infrastructure, because it affects their livelihood. That 

campaign really highlighted it for the general public that we put 

out. We got more calls, not from members, but from the general 

public saying, I can’t believe that bridge is in that repair, because 

they couldn’t see it driving over it. But we had taken pictures 

above. 

Senator WHITEHOUSE. Madam Chair, if I could conclude by echoing what Mr. O’Sullivan just said, if you go into the Providence 

Place Mall, which is the big downtown shopping area in Providence, the highway 95 goes by on a large bridge, a viaduct. And 

you go around and underneath it to get into the parking area in 

the mall. If you look up, you will see planks put across the I beams 

that support the bridge. The plans are there because the bridge is 

falling through, and the planks stop chunks of the bridge that fall 

through from landing on the cars as they go by. 

That is the State of the main artery going up the northeast as 

it goes through our capital city. Thank you very much. 

Senator BOXER. Senator, that is a visual that we need to be reminded of. I think Senator Inhofe talked about a tragedy that occurred in his State when a piece of concrete fell on a young mom 

who was walking past, and she is gone. This is our responsibility, 

frankly, I mean, our committee’s responsibility. And I so appreciate 

that. 

I think when we get to our markup, before we leave here, I think 

we should try to get a few photographs of this example and others, 

just to keep it in the front of our minds, maybe from Alabama to 

California and every other place, that is a stark reminder of what 

89 

we are dealing with here is really life and death and safety in addition to the jobs and the movement of goods and freight and the rest 

of it. 

Senator Sessions? 

Senator SESSIONS. Thank you. 

We had some of the top appointments to the Defense Department, and as a Budget member I had to warn them that they had 

to tighten their belts like everybody else. So we are all in that 

mode. 

I think that we need to do our dead level best to maintain the 

kind of funding this committee proposes. Whether we can do that 

or not, I am not sure. We are in worse shape financially than most 

people realize. We are borrowing literally 40 cents out of every dollar. Cities, counties and States have been used to repairing to the 

Federal Government to ask them to help when they live within 

their budgets. And they know we don’t have to live with ours. So 

we will just be a source of money. And it is a very, very difficult 

thing. 

So a number of things that I believe the bill attempts to do and 

I think can be helpful is to reduce some of the delays, some of the 

roadblocks and problems, and that reduces cost. Mr. Ridley, I guess 

you testified about that earlier. But delays do drive up costs. And 

it means you get less miles constructed of roadways as a result. 

And regulations also can drive up costs. Do you agree with that? 

Mr. RIDLEY. Yes, sir, Senator, you are right on target. As we 

talked about, it is not only the cost of delays for putting people to 

work, it is not only the cost of delays for increased inflation. But 

the real cost is for the road user that may have to have a structurally deficient bridge that is load posted and have to take a detour around that with a heavy load. It may be where school buses 

can’t cross over bridges simply because the average load of an average school bus is about 15 tons. So many bridges rated under that, 

they cannot cross it. It may be the shippers that are trying to get 

from one side of the State to the other who are not able to use a 

system because of delay costs. 

But more importantly than that, Senator, it is the accidents, the 

fatality accidents, personal injury accidents that happen on those 

roads and bridges simply because we have been unable to fix the 

problem we know exists. 

Senator SESSIONS. And when people, it takes time out of their 

day, commuting or even carrying out business functions. 

Mr. James, I remember several years ago Birmingham had a serious interState problem, a wreck, I believe, caused it. They put it 

on an accelerated repair schedule and they gave rewards to the 

contractor for coming in under time. What was your recollection of 

how that came out? 

Mr. JAMES. It came out beautifully. A good customer of ours repaired the bridge. They worked 24–7, 7 days a week, they brought 

a lot of labor in. And they got the bridge repaired. It was destroyed 

by a fire. And it was back in service, I think, within 90 days or 

less. And the contractor earned a very nice premium from the Alabama DOT for completing the project on spec and early. 

Senator SESSIONS. And accelerated timeframes don’t always drive 

up costs, either, do they? 

90 

Mr. JAMES. Probably they make it dramatically more efficient, 

because the contractor could mobilize, bring the work force in, finish the project, demobilize as opposed to stop and start construction, which has often occurred. 

Senator SESSIONS. I think some of our Governors and politicians, 

they promise 20 roads and they have money to complete 10, and 

they start 20, and it takes twice as long, and sometimes that drives 

up cost. I am not accusing anybody of anything. But I do see a lot 

of roads that are partially constructed with grass growing up and 

months going by. 

Mr. JAMES. Senator, if I could, I think it is the duration of a program that is really the key to efficient construction. So that a 

project can be started and completed within the duration of a 

multi-year program. And I think that is a huge key. 

We are all supportive of the 2-year bill that this committee has 

reported out. But ultimately to get efficiency in the highway program, there has to be a multi-year bill. 

Senator SESSIONS. Thank you for sharing that. We will have to 

look at some things. I know the President believes in high speed 

rail. I think that is not yet proven, and it is very, very expensive. 

Certain rail projects in high population areas I am sure can be 

worthwhile. But I think we will have to look at that as part of our 

projections as to how to, is that the best place to spend our dollars 

right now, when people, commuters are blocked significantly. So we 

will be looking at those issues and the regulations, trying to get 

more bang for our buck, as well as trying to preserve the amount 

of money, preserve the funding that we have. 

My time is up, Madam Chairman, thank you. 

Senator BOXER. Senator Sessions, I want to pick up on a couple 

of things. You are so right, if we build incentives into completion 

on time or ahead of time, it helps. With this whole Carmageddon 

thing, we also had the contractors finish ahead of time, got a 

bonus. When Pete Wilson was Governor, he put that into play after 

one of our series of earthquakes. It was remarkable how that incentive worked. 

And that is what we have tried very heard to do, is to give, let’s 

just say disincentives to agencies around here to sit on their butt 

and not do what they have to do to move things forward, without 

taking away the rights of people, still giving them their full right 

if they feel there is an environmental issue. OK, bring it up, but 

we can’t string it out forever. I think that is an important reform 

that we did. 

I wanted to just, before I call on Senator Carper, to tell you, you 

are so on track when you talk about the wasted time. The Texas 

Transportation Institute always does a study about this very issue. 

And their latest study was finished in 2010. This is what they said: 

‘‘Americans waste 4.8 billion hours a year sitting in traffic due to 

congestion. This translates to almost 4 billion gallons of extra fuel 

consumed and $115 billion cost to the Nation when cost of fuel and 

lost productivity are factored in.’ 

So when we talk about what our priorities are, and I couldn’t 

agree with you more, this is a question of priorities. If we allow the 

Highway Trust Fund to expire, the authorization to expire, and 

now we see a 34 to 36 percent cut, disaster, that is what would 

91 

happen. It is so counterproductive, because you wind up, this is one 

of those investments that the dividends paid are very clear. But it 

is true, we have to make reforms. We don’t want to have a program 

going that is not efficient. 

The reason I am so proud of the work we have all done here together is we have taken all of the recommendations from a lot of 

the people sitting here, business, labor, environmentalists also, who 

have helped us to work together across party lines to come up with 

a bill that is going to address those issues that you talk about, the 

wasted time. 

But at the end of the day, we have to determine, as Americans, 

and we representing the American people, if investing an additional $6 billion a year for 2 years makes sense. I can honestly say, 

in the size budget that we have, we are going to have to figure this 

out. 

I don’t know if you were here when I pointed out that the Gang 

of Six, which was first a Gang of Six, then five, now it is a Gang 

of 42 or whatever it is, they actually do mention only one spending 

priority, and that is the Highway Trust Fund. They instruct in that 

particular document the Finance Committee to fund the Highway 

Trust Fund at the current levels for 10 years. And they say how 

much it would cost. 

I think Senator Inhofe was very happy with that, because I think 

it showed a bipartisan consensus building. But we all face cuts in 

our future. But in this particular arena, if we were to allow the 

draconian cuts that appear to be on the horizon if we don’t act, it 

is terribly counterproductive, 620,000 jobs lost in 2012 alone. That 

is not a guesstimate, that is a true estimate. And we have seen 

business and labor today confirm that it is just a crisis out there. 

So I know how you are wrestling with this whole issue of, we 

need to do this but how do we do it. My opinion is, there are certain areas of the Federal Government that some of us don’t think 

ought to grow. We may have different opinions on a host of them. 

But on this one, I think we should build on the bipartisanship we 

have. We have to do this. Because if we don’t do this, it is counterproductive. People are going to lose their jobs. And I am not being 

melodramatic, they will lose their lives. We have seen too much of 

that. 

And we will not be able to compete in the world. So I look forward to working with you. And I am with you, I am going to do 

some tough, tough cutting. We have no choice, we have to do it. 

But we also need to be smart about how we do it. So I just think 

you have been very helpful today, and thank you for being here. 

With that, closing up shop today, Tom Carper, please have 10 minutes, since we have all taken a lot of extra time. 

Senator CARPER. Gosh, I don’t know what I would do with 10 

minutes. I will figure it out. I will do two opening statements with 

that time, and 17 questions. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator CARPER. Thanks, Madam Chair. Thanks for pulling this 

together, thanks for working so hard and your fine leadership and 

working with our colleagues to your right and to your left. 

92 

I really appreciate very much the witnesses being here. Thank 

you, some of you have been here before, a number of times. We are 

grateful for your advice to us and your responses to our questions. 

Senator Boxer was just mentioning how much time we waste sitting in traffic jams around this Country. Every year, I think, you 

may have referred to it, I think it was a university down in Texas 

that actually figures this up every year and tell us how much time, 

puts a price tag on the time we waste. There is, running up and 

down through the east coast of our Country, as we all know, is I– 

95. It starts in Florida, ends up in Maine and runs through Delaware and cuts the northern part of our State in half. For as long 

as I can remember, I came to Delaware right out of the Navy in 

1973. We had I–95 then, we had a toll plaza right along the border 

between Maryland and Delaware. 

During weekends, especially summer weekends when a lot of 

people were trying to get to the beach, going up and down the 

northeast corridor, holidays, we always had backups, traffic jams 

around I–95. Right as you were coming into that toll plaza, coming 

into Delaware, going out of Delaware into Maryland. 

And one of the things that I got to do as Governor was to introduce new technology, EZ Pass, to be able to expedite, at least somewhat, the movement of vehicle through I–95, and to increase the 

number of lanes, booths and so forth that we could try to move people through. I always felt very badly about saying to people who 

were traveling up and down I–95, trying to get through our State, 

not only do you get to sit there and wait for a while for the privilege of coming through Delaware, but you have to pay for that 

privilege. I thought that was abhorrent, so we worked on EZ Pass 

and made, I think, some improvements. 

But as time goes by, more and more traffic comes through. We 

get about 140,000 vehicles a day that come across the border from 

Maryland into Delaware going the other way, 140,000. And one of 

the things I sought to do here in the Senate was to garner support, 

through a series of earmarks, for a highway speed EZ Pass, so we 

would have two lanes northbound, two lanes southbound, and be 

able to really move traffic. It turns out about 55 percent of the vehicles going up and down I–95 through Delaware have EZ Pass. 

If we could just move most of the folks, over half the 140,000 vehicles onto EZ Pass highway speed lane, we help ourselves in a variety of ways. We reduce the amount of time people waste sitting 

there trying to get through my State. We reduce the amount of fuel 

that we waste. We reduce the amount of air pollution that comes 

from all the cars, trucks, vans and so forth that are sitting there 

trying to get through my State. 

And we would actually promote the public safety. If you have 

ever noticed, coming into these toll plazas, you have people darting 

from one lane to the other, trying to get through more quickly and 

so forth. So it works on four different points. 

We finally did it. We used money from the stimulus package and 

finished, it took a while, we had to work with the folks from Maryland, they were very helpful with us, working right along the border. But we opened it up on the 4th of July weekend. And the Governor and I got to do a cool event, we actually have this arc that 

kind of goes over I–95 right where the toll plaza is, you can actuVerDate Aug 31 2005 13:57 Apr 24, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00096 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\23822.TXT VERNE
93 

ally walk up through there. We took some camera crews with us 

and opened it, opened up the sides and you could see the traffic 

coming from the north and heading south and everything and the 

other way. On the 4th of July weekend, that weekend, 4th of July 

was on Monday, but it was like maybe Friday the 1st. No traffic 

jams. Saturday, no traffic jams. Sunday, no traffic jams. Fourth of 

July, no traffic jams, day after, no traffic jams for the first time 

anybody can ever remember we had no traffic jams. 

That is an investment that is not just a two-fer or three-fer or 

four-fer, but it yields fruit in so many different ways. Cost about 

$30 million, but the fruits are great, the headaches will be greatly 

diminished. That is a smart, smart investment of public dollars, I 

think, not just for us in our State, but for people who go up and 

down the east coast. 

And as we prepare to spend money, Madam Chair, transportation dollars in the next version of our transportation infrastructure bill, I hope that we will try to figure out how to use money 

not just to hand it out for formula grants, but to be able to disburse 

the money in ways that actually meet the objectives of our Nation, 

reduce our dependence on oil, especially foreign oil, reduce air pollution, reduce congestion and enhance safety. Those are pretty good 

goals for us, and I would hope that we keep that in mind. 

And the other thing I would say, our Chairman referred to the 

Gang of Six. Gang of Six really flows from the Erskine Bowles-Alan 

Simpson led efforts of a year ago, and the deficit commission created by President Obama. One of the things the President has 

called for, and it is supported, I think, by Bowles-Simpson, et al., 

and I think by the Gang of Six, is while it is important for us to 

reduce our budget deficit, if we don’t, we are doomed. We need a 

comprehensive, we need a bipartisan approach. There are things I 

didn’t like entirely about the Bowles-Simpson proposal, but there 

is a lot of good there. Same with the Gang of Six. We just need to 

set aside our differences and deal with these issues straight up, try 

to do more good than bad. 

One of the things that, if we pull back on the spending, erase a 

few dollars in revenue, one of the things I think is important is do 

what the President suggests. He says if we are going to win in the 

21st century, if we are going to out-innovate, out-educate, out-compete the rest, we have to, as we reduce spending, the global spending, certainly, that we have to continue to invest in three areas. 

No. 1, work force. We are not going to be competitive without a 

world class work force. No. 2, R&D. R&D that has the potential for 

being commercialized, leading to new innovations, new products, 

that we can make in this Country and sell all over the world. 

No. 3, infrastructure. No. 3, infrastructure. And if we don’t have 

a modern infrastructure, whether it is roads, highways, bridges, 

trains, rail, ports, all the infrastructure broadly defined, we will be 

a second class nation some day. Hopefully not in our lifetimes or 

our children’s lifetimes, but some day we will. It is just critical. 

And thank you for reminding us of that. 

But as we go forward and invest in infrastructure, it is important 

for us to invest not just in transportation, not just in domestic 

spending, not just in defense spending, everything we do, health 

care, everything, we need to find out what works and do more of 

94 

that. Invest in the things where we get better results for less 

money or better results for the same amount of money. That kind 

of goes back to the example I used with highways speed EZ Pass. 

OK, question. I am sure you gave me those 10 minutes, Madam 

Chair. Got that off my chest. 

This is a question of Deron Lovaas. The question to you is maximizing return on investments. With new transportation funds in, 

as we know, short supply, we cannot fund every transportation 

project. We have to support the projects that give us the most bang 

for the bucks, the point I was trying to make earlier. Scenario planning is a proven approach that identifies the costs, performance 

and tradeoffs among investment alternatives. 

For instance, the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission uses a strategic planning process that compared alternative investment approaches. As a result, the region was able to accommodate expected new growth while reducing congestion, pollution and 

transportation costs for our families. 

Should more States and cities use this common-sense approach 

to make the best use of constrained funding by targeting our infrastructure investments? 

Mr. LOVAAS. Well, the short answer is yes. More States, as well 

as regions, should use this tool. There are already several regions 

that are doing so, both big and medium sized, and finding that 

there are huge potential savings based on infrastructure that does 

not have to be built by engaging in scenario planning. Corporations 

do it, Fortune 500 companies do it, there is no reason that government shouldn’t learn from them. 

So it is important. And actually, in addition to encouraging more 

of that with the new law, under current law there are requirements that plans and programs be fiscally constrained. I think it 

is a good question to ask of the Federal Highway Administration 

and the Federal Transit Administration whether or not that is actually the case. Because NRDC and I would like to see a lot more 

investment in this program. And let’s be clear, we are probably 

going to have to make some cuts as well. So it makes sense to take 

a look at plans and programs and make sure they are fiscally constrained. 

Senator CARPER. All right. Thanks so much. 

The last point I will make in my last 40 seconds, in Delaware, 

when I was Governor, we used to say, if things are worth having, 

they are worth paying for. Things worth having are worthy paying 

for. And we could have borrowed money until the cows came home 

to put into our transportation trust fund to fund transportation 

projects. We didn’t do that. We did some of that, but we actually 

raised revenues. We raised revenues in part by easing up a little 

bit the tax on gasoline, still to be competitive with the rest of the 

region. And we used other sources of funds, user fees, if you will, 

that were transportation related. 

At the end of the day, we need to raise some revenues. We need 

to raise some revenues as well. It would be smart if we could raise 

revenues in a way that actually reduces our dependence on foreign 

oil and actually encourage us to be more conscious of the need to 

conserve. So I would leave us with that, and with that, my time 

is expired. Thank you so much, Madam Chair. Thank you all. 

95 

Senator BOXER. Senator, thank you so much for your leadership 

on this committee. It is so important. The fact that you are also 

on Finance is key to us, because we have reached a milestone today 

in the bipartisan support for this bill. And we must get that same 

sense of bipartisanship in the Finance Committee, because these 

are tough times, but we know that if we fail to act, we are inviting 

unemployment. We are inviting second class economic leadership. 

We are inviting, it is not like we don’t know. It is not like we are 

walking blindly into something. We know what the options are. 

What I would like to do in closing today is to go through this 

panel. I know the Mayor is gone, but I know he has told me he is 

utterly committed to this. We have starkly different approaches 

going on in the Senate and the House right now. And I don’t think 

it is necessary to bemoan that fact, but it is necessary to recognize 

that fact, that we now have the House proposed bill which slashes 

spending in this area by between 34 and 36 percent. We have the 

budget passed bill over there, which does the same. We know we 

have a looming deadline which does the same. 

So we have three ways to go that will result in a cut of more 

than a third, and disastrous consequences that all of you have 

spelled out, regardless of your views on the environment or politics 

or whether you like the President or you don’t, or you are Republican or Democrat. This has nothing to do with any of that. 

And I guess what I need to hear from you today, in the most unequivocal way, if you can do this, is to tell me whether you are willing to be part of a team that is going to move forward with this 

bipartisan bill. This is not going to be easy. But it is necessary. It 

is necessary for the economy, it is necessary for the environment, 

it is necessary for competitiveness, it is necessary for safety. And 

there are a lot of other necessaries. It is necessary to make sure 

that for a couple of years, the States know how to play. We have 

heard from two incredible people here who deal with the uncertainty of this every day. 

I remember once before when we weren’t going to act on the extension that I believe it was Nevada, but it could have been other 

States, I think it was your State, Susan, that just said, layoff notices are going out, we just can’t proceed. 

So we can’t go into this future. This is America. We don’t do that 

when we know that we can work together. So my question to you, 

and if you give me a yes on it, I will be very grateful. But if you 

can’t, don’t do it. Because I am going to call on you. This is an unprecedented job we have. We don’t have time. We have to mark up 

this bill before we leave this summer. We have to get this bill to 

the Senate floor and pass it. 

We have to then persuade our friend, Chairman Mica, who I 

agree with on a lot of things, his embrace of TIFIA is so welcome, 

and I know he cares about this, we have to convince him to work 

with us if we get to a conference. This is a long hurdle. We have 

to convince the Administration to please weigh in now. Yes, we 

want infrastructure back, we love it, it is great. That is not the core 

program. But we should build support for it, but it is not the core 

program. 

96 

So I am going to ask you each, will you be part of a team, a bipartisan team, and work as hard as you can to accomplish this bipartisan bill? I will start with you. 

Mr. O’Sullivan. Chairman Boxer, we will be there unequivocally, 

we will be there with you lockstep with this committee. This issue 

is too important. We will be there with you every step of the way. 

Senator BOXER. Wonderful. Mr. James? 

Mr. JAMES. My testimony today was in full support of the bill 

that is being introduced by this committee. We certainly think it 

is hugely important that surface Transportation funding remain a 

bipartisan effort, which it has been throughout its history. And we 

certainly believe that maintaining the current level of funding for 

the next 2 years is the best approach to the highway program. 

Senator BOXER. And will you help us? 

Mr. JAMES. Absolutely. If that was not implicit in what I said, 

absolutely we will. 

Senator BOXER. Excellent, because it is going to take—and look, 

we understand, if this bill takes a different turn and somebody 

here says, any of you don’t like it any more, I get it. But that is 

not our intent. It is our intent to keep it as you see it. 

Ms. Martinovich? 

Ms. MARTINOVICH. Madam Chair, simply, strongly and clearly, 

yes. AASHTO will be there. 

Senator BOXER. AASHTO is crucial. And Hon. Gary Ridley, such 

a close friend of my colleague, what do you say? 

Mr. RIDLEY. Madam Chair, certainly the States and cities, such 

as Los Angeles, cannot rely totally on the gas tax that they produce 

in their local areas. They have to require other funding, because 

they take transportation as a higher priority than what those funds 

will produce. 

The Federal Government needs to do the same thing, we believe. 

If you are going to take transportation infrastructure at a higher 

priority and the gas and diesel tax out of the trust fund cannot 

produce the needed revenues in order to pass the bill, then you 

need to find other revenue sources in order to be able to ensure 

that it is funded. We are a yes. 

Senator BOXER. You are a yes. OK. And Mr. Lovaas? 

Mr. LOVAAS. We are a part of the Blue Green Alliance, along 

with President O’Sullivan. And we look forward to working with 

him and with you and putting our shoulders to the wheel and moving this forward. 

Senator BOXER. Very pleased to hear that. And finally, Mr. 

Cohen, who represents everybody, all the users. 

Mr. COHEN. Absolutely. We are 100 percent supportive of this bipartisan effort, and we are glad to be part of the team. We will be 

there. 

Senator BOXER. Good, because tomorrow every one of you will be 

on a conference call with me, and we will be getting some other colleagues to join on that call, so that we can just keep this coalition 

together. 

I just want to say to each and every one of you, this job that I 

have, that Senator Inhofe has, the rest of us, we would be nowhere 

without the people. We would be just, as Senator Lautenberg said, 

talking to each other. And I honestly believe, in this effort, and I 

97 

cannot thank the staff enough, Republican staff, Democratic staff, 

this has been a team effort. There were moments when I thought 

we would never get here. We have gotten to this point. 

So we now have to keep up the momentum. And your answers 

to this question that I had mean a lot to me. I know Senator Inhofe 

feels the same way, because we can’t move it through our respective conferences unless we know we have a lot of you behind us, 

all of you behind us. 

So thank you very much. This is a milestone. I think this is a 

day that we will remember for a long time. Let’s just keep up the 

spirit. I will talk to you all tomorrow, and we stand adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 12:25 p.m., the committee was adjourned.] 

Æ