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SENATE APPROVES HIGHWAY BILL INCLUDING
WYDEN BOND MEASURE, “SMART GROWTH” FUNDS
Bipartisan measure adds infrastructure bonds
to highway bill;
$15 billion will help repair roads, bridges nationwide
May 17, 2005
Washington, D.C. – Federal
highway legislation passed by the U.S. Senate today included an
amendment authored by U.S. Senator Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) to boost
funding for America’s roads and bridges by $15 billion.
The bipartisan Highway Infrastructure Bonds amendment, which Wyden
offered with U.S. Senator Jim Talent (R-Mo.), will use bonds to
finance repair and building projects for roads, bridges and freight
infrastructure.
“A chunk of our country’s
transportation infrastructure is falling apart, and today the
Senate took a common-sense step to fund the repairs America’s
roads and bridges need,” said Wyden. “The additional
$15 billion provided by these bonds will help create hundreds
of thousands of family-wage jobs in Oregon and nationwide, and
revitalize our highways, bridges and freight projects at the same
time.”
Tax-exempt bonds are commonly used by states and localities to
invest in public infrastructure needs such as airports and water
facilities, but they have never been used for roads and bridges.
The Wyden plan would allow the Federal government to issue $15
billion in bonds to finance projects on roads, bridges and other
transportation infrastructure; some projects may involve partnerships
between public- and private-sector interests. For every $1 billion
invested in federal highway and transit infrastructure, an estimated
47,500 jobs are created. The amendment approved today can create
more than 700,000 jobs and generate nearly $6 billion in economic
activity across the country.
The Senate-passed legislation
also contains a major funding boost for the “smart growth”
provision Wyden authored in the 1998 TEA-21 transportation law.
In that original legislation, Wyden’s Transportation and
Community and System Preservation (TCSP) Program initiative provided
$25 million per year to promote innovative transportation planning
and to fund projects that keep communities’ healthy growth
from becoming destructive urban sprawl; Oregon has received nearly
$4 million in grants from the Wyden program to date. The Senate’s
2005 legislation nearly doubles that funding, to $47 million per
year.
“The TCSP pilot program
was the first Federal effort to incentivize smart growth policies
for states and local governments, and this additional funding
will help more communities plan wisely for the future,”
said Wyden. “Congress should create more Federal incentives
to stop urban sprawl in our transportation and infrastructure
planning.”
The legislation also includes
a Wyden measure allowing more states to band together in partnerships
with each other and with the U.S. Department of Transportation
to establish State Infrastructure Banks, institutions that can
make loans specifically for public and private infrastructure
projects.
The $295 billion Senate highway
bill must now go to a conference committee to reconcile differences
with the transportation bill passed by the House of Representatives.
Following that process, final legislation can be approved for
the President’s signature into law.
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