WASHINGTON - Lawmakers in both the Senate and House introduced legislation Thursday to restore money for highway construction in the administration's budget, saying proposed cuts could mean the loss of tens of thousands of jobs.
President Bush's budget plan for the year beginning next Oct. 1 provides $22.6 billion for the Federal Highway Administration, down sharply from $32.1 billion this year. Total outlays to the states would be decreased by $8.5 billion. The decrease is reportedly due to the decline in tax revenues generated from gasoline sales -- which are down because of the economic downturn and the increased use of ethanol, which has a lower tax rate, in gasoline.
"We cannot afford to backslide on our commitment to the traveling public," said Sen. Jim Jeffords (I-VT) (pictured), chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, who introduced legislation to increase highway spending together with House Transportation Committee Chairman Don Young (R-AK).
"The calculation of the adjustment is not a policy call on the part of the administration," Mary Peters, Federal Highway Administration head, said Thursday at a hearing of the House Transportation subcommittee on highways. But Rep. Jim Oberstar (D-MN), the top Democrat on the committee, argued that the guaranteed funding level was a floor
and not a ceiling, and that the highway fund now has a cash balance of some $20 billion. That balance could grow to $74 billion by 2012 under the administration's budget proposal, he said.
The House and Senate bills would restore about $4.4 billion in highway spending, Reuters reported.
Subcommittee chairman Rep. Tom Petri (R-WI), said the $8.5 billion cut in highway spending "just doesn't make sense" when the fund is running a surplus and there are "hundreds of thousands of jobs at stake."
It is estimated that $1 billion spent on highways creates 40,000 jobs. Lawmakers said that the president's budget would result in California losing 26,000 jobs, Texas 22,000 and Pennsylvania 14,500.The administration, which is trying to trim spending in many domestic programs to pay for proposed increases in defense and homeland security, argued that, if the continuation of prior-year projects is included, actual spending on highway construction will be down only 3 percent from 2002.
But Oberstar said the budget works against Bush's goal of speeding economic recovery: "You can't be for the jobs and not for the money to create the jobs," he said.
