Statement
of the Honorable Marc H. Morial
Mayor
of New Orleans
on
behalf of The United States Conference of Mayors
before
the Senate Environment and Public Works
Subcommittee
on Transportation and Infrastructure
Hearings
on the “Federal Role in Meeting Local Infrastructure Needs”
July
23, 2001
Mr. Chairman and
Members of the Subcommittee, I am Marc H. Morial, Mayor of New Orleans.
I appear today on
behalf of The United States Conference of Mayors where I serve as the
organization’s President. The Conference
is a bipartisan organization that represents mayors of the more than 1,200
cities with a population of 30,000 or more.
Mr. Chairman, I want
to thank you and other Members of this Subcommittee for holding this hearing
today to examine the “Federal Role in Meeting Infrastructure Needs.”
Let me begin by emphasizing that the nation’s mayors
believe that the federal government needs to be a strong leader in partnering
with cities on local and regional infrastructure projects. We also believe that the federal government
is uniquely situated to ensure sufficient flows of public capital in meeting
the nation’s growing infrastructure needs, including the preservation of
existing critical assets, to support an expanding economy.
In my testimony today, I offer some of the mayors’
perspectives on the necessity for increasing federal commitments to
infrastructure investment. In providing
these views, I include findings of a recent survey of the mayors on these issues. I also offer up a new context or benchmark –
investing in our nation’s most potent economic engines, cities and their
metropolitan economies – to guide future federal policy decisions on
infrastructure investment. Finally, I
describe several infrastructure projects in the City of New Orleans to
illustrate some of our needs in this area.
Mr. Chairman, I would to begin my remarks by
thanking you and the other Members of this Committee for your leadership in
crafting the bipartisan agreement on brownfields and in moving this
legislation, S. 350, forward so successfully in the Senate. This legislation will make a real difference
in cities, counties and regions throughout the nation.
There is a clear nexus between recycling America’s
land through brownfield redevelopment and the infrastructure issues before us
today. For too long, we have let these
properties – thousands and thousands of acres of land in existing communities
and places with substantial infrastructure in place – lay idle, as development
races relentlessly to undeveloped and pristine land, ever further away from our
built-up areas. We know that this
pattern of development has been highly consumptive of our public infrastructure
dollars, as we chase ever spreading and lower density development and its
associated needs. This form of land use
requires infusions of capital for new facilities and systems that is
disproportionate to the number of people and economic activity that we are
attempting to serve. This is occurring
all the while incumbent system needs, both modernization and rehabilitation,
are overlooked or ignored, facilities that serve a substantial majority of our
citizens.
When Past Conference President and then Fort Wayne
Mayor Paul Helmke testified before this Committee at your March 1999 hearings
on livability and open space, he helped develop your record on the many
linkages among brownfields, infrastructure and urban development.
By embracing S. 350 and other brownfield-related
policies, we will, for the first time, take significant action to help
decelerate the several decades-old pattern of outward development, while
renewing our attention to the substantial public and private investment we have
made in existing communities and places.
In the very fast growing and relatively new cities and regions, broader
brownfield reuse efforts will not be as potent as it will be in most other
areas. However, it is a crucial first
step in redirecting our public resources inward to places where most Americans
now live and work and where the nation’s most crucial economic assets are
located.
The mayors applaud this Committee’s leadership on S.
350 and we are anxious to see final Congressional action on brownfields
legislation over the next several weeks.
We strongly share Committee Chairman Jeffords’ goal to have this legislation
enacted this summer
Mr. Chairman, let me provide some of our key
perspectives on the challenges before this Committee, the Congress and the
nation in addressing our nation’s growing infrastructure needs.
Mr. Chairman, if there is one perspective that I
believe is most important to this hearing today, it is that ‘local’
infrastructure needs are no longer simply a local concern. These needs are of national significance, of
national economic importance and of substantial cost, exceeding local capital
resources.
It is a given that one of the fundamental functions
of government is to ensure that the nation has a modern and efficient infrastructure
to support our societal and economic endeavors. Among the challenges we face locally, like all leaders in
government, is to find ways to reinforce in the public’s mind the importance of
investing in these infrastructures.
Sometimes, we can’t immediately see the benefits, or in other cases, the
benefits are longer term. And, we know
that investment in the nation’s infrastructure is more than an exercise in
shifting responsibility among levels of government.
An overriding theme of the Conference’s recent
efforts has been to call attention to the role of cities and their metropolitan
economies in fueling U.S. economic growth.
At some point in nation’s economic development, many of the
infrastructure needs in cities and regions ceased to function as ‘local’
infrastructures. Increasingly, these
systems are national infrastructures in their scope and importance. Later in my statement, I share some of the
Conference’s work on metropolitan economics to bolster this claim.
Whether it is Mayor Williams’ efforts that anchor a
metropolitan economy that influences three states and the District of Columbia,
an economic engine that last year outpaced the economy of Austria or Hong
Kong. Or, it is Mayor Campbell’s city
that anchors a metropolitan economy that generated more output than Norway or
Denmark. Consider the New Orleans
region, an economic engine that now accounts for nearly one-third of my state’s
total output and easily surpasses the economies of Kuwait or Syria.
As we look at the broader issue of infrastructure
investment, we see the federal government as an investor, a partner in building
national prosperity. It is an
undeniable reality that the U.S. economy will grow or stall, based on the
economic performance of our nation’s metro economic engines. Our metro economy reports show this
convincingly. And, they underscore how
infrastructure assets fuel the output of these metropolitan engines.
As mayors, we see infrastructure investment,
particularly larger scale projects that often surpass locally available
resources, as one of the pathways to improved productivity and economic
performance of our metropolitan engines.
These are investments that influence and shape the rate of U.S. economic
growth.
Look at Mayor Campbell’s capital plan for
Hartsfield, a city-owned facility that serves more people than any airport in
the world. This one asset has helped
define the economic prosperity of the Southeastern United States. There are numerous examples everywhere of
how these infrastructure assets, while perhaps none so dramatic as Hartsfield,
now fuel metropolitan output and, in turn, underpin our states and U.S.
economic growth.
In recent remarks to the National Press Club, I made
the point that the improved health of our nation’s cities and their influence
on their metropolitan economies helped drive one the most significant economic
expansions in this nation’s history.
This did not happen by accident.
Mr. Chairman, when Fort Worth Mayor Ken Barr
testified before this Subcommittee in last Congress, he first introduced this
panel to some of our work on metro economies as well as our perspectives on the
implementation of TEA-21. The report
that we just released now provides data over the ten-year period, 1990-2000,
covering all of the nation’s most recent economic expansion.
We believe that our metro economies data is a
powerful tool in helping this Committee fashion policies to partner with states
and local governments on infrastructure.
It can be a new standard upon which to gauge the effectiveness of
financing strategies and other efforts and can help policy-makers make more
strategic investments for the future.
With this context of metropolitan economies as a
roadmap for making more strategic infrastructure investments, I want to offer some
further observations on where we are in meeting our infrastructure needs.
With the enactment of TEA-21, the mayors saw this as
a milestone in the national debate on rebuilding the federal partnership on
infrastructure investment. With this
legislation in 1998 – where the federal partnership commitment to surface
transportation nearly doubled – mayors and others viewed this as the first
installment in a broader effort to increase our public commitments to the
nation’s infrastructure.
Building upon this legislation, Congress
substantially increased funding commitments to the nation’s aviation system
with the enactment of AIR-21 in the last Congress. Again, capital commitments to airport capital needs and our
national aviation system more broadly were raised to the next level.
Both initiatives – AIR-21 and TEA-21 – were badly
needed and enacted just in time, as our world-class highway and aviation
systems labor under rising demands. But
these are not the only systems that are overburdened.
Mayors anxiously awaited this Congress, looking to
engage you and others on the need to further enhance our federal partnership
commitments to other infrastructure needs.
As you know, mayors have been seeking action on new initiatives to
increase capital commitments to intercity rail, rail transit, water and
wastewater, parks and school modernization, areas of need that are now on the
Congressional agenda and in the queue for legislative action.
We see the need for a longer-term federal
infrastructure strategy that builds upon the gains that we made under TEA-21
and AIR-21, while extending this investment thrust into other areas, through
initiatives such as WATER-21 and RAIL-21.
You have already built a record on the rapidly
escalating needs in the water and wastewater area, with need analyses by the
Water Infrastructure Network (WIN), American Water Works Association, U.S. EPA
and others.
One of your Committee
members, Senator Voinovich, has already stepped forward with a legislative plan
to begin closing the gap in this area of need.
The funding gap here is driven by what is needed to
maintain the integrity of existing systems, while investing in new facilities
to meet federal standards.
One of the areas that the mayors believe warrants
particular attention, along with an expanded federal commitment, is rail
transportation. In January, I led a
National Mayors’ Summit on A National Rail Policy for the 21st
Century to begin to begin pressing for increased investment in the nation’s
rail infrastructure, both for passenger and freight.
The mayors are seeking enactment of the “High-Speed
Rail Investment Act of 2001” (S. 250) as the first installment in this broader
national commitment to the nation’s rail infrastructure. Mr. Chairman, I want to underscore the
strong support of the mayors for S. 250, legislation that will help us further
modernize our nation’s intercity passenger rail capabilities.
Rail transit is another key element of this national
policy. Today, these systems are taking
root in every part of this country, with more than 200 projects – be it light
rail, heavy rail, commuter rail, trolleys and other fixed guideway projects –
now being studied, planned or constructed.
Later, I provide examples of rail projects now underway in the New
Orleans area.
It is now estimated that the pipeline demand for
capital for these rail projects already exceeds $35 billion, against an
expected federal commitment in the next fiscal year of about $1.1-1.2 billion. In our survey, the number and geographic
distribution of mayors who cited light rail or other rail transit projects as
their city’s number surface transportation priority represents a sea change in
surface transportation investment priorities.
In the wake of the 1991 ISTEA law, when local areas
were given the opportunity to help shape transportation priorities for their
local areas and regions, rail investment moved to the forefront of the
transportation agenda. We can no longer
afford to view this need as an issue for cities and regions of the Northeast or
Midwest, it is now national in scope.
To amplify this point, consider the pending FY 2002 Transportation
Appropriations bill, which was recently approved by the Senate Appropriations
Committee, where 38 states are represented in the ‘new starts’ program.
We believe there is much to be done on the rail
transportation, both intercity and local projects, that the mayors would urge
this Committee to consider and work with us on strategies to accelerate
investment in these projects.
Mr. Chairman, we recognize revenue expectations have
changed dramatically since the first of the year, when mayors and others began
pressing to allocate portions of the surplus to these priority infrastructure
needs. Nonetheless, we believe we must
still find ways to finance these infrastructure needs. Mayors are certainly open to creative
mechanisms, like the bond/tax credit approach set forth in S. 250, legislation
we strongly support, to further our progress in addressing our nation’s
infrastructure needs.
And, it is not just about more money or doing things
in the same old way. In the water and
wastewater area, we are seeking reforms that will promote more competition
among private companies in delivering more cost-effective solutions to our
needs. This effort includes seeking
changes in procurement practices and laws to move us away from the more
traditional design, bid and build processes to design/build models. We are also advocating approaches that
emphasize standards-based compliance, not facility-based compliance. We have called for the adoption of tax and
other incentives to attract more private capital in support of our
efforts. While we are seeking ways to
reduce the costs and promoting new partnerships with the private sector, we
don’t want to understate the reality of the needs in this area. We know that there is also an urgent need
for an expanded federal partnership on water investment, one that includes additional
financial commitments to local areas, to address the surging needs in this
area.
As the revenue outlook improves, we would certainly
urge you and others to work to dedicate some portion of any future surplus
revenues and be open to new revenue sources to finance the many infrastructure
needs that we are discussing here today.
To prepare for this hearing, the Conference surveyed
160 mayors to solicit their priority concerns on infrastructure. First, we
learned that surface transportation was the number one priority, with more than
50 percent of the mayors choosing this area (defined as highways/streets and
transit/rail). One quarter of the
mayors indicated that water and wastewater was their city top infrastructure
priority, followed by 13 percent of the mayors selecting schools/libraries as
their top priority. The remaining
respondents chose aviation, telecommunications, parks and other areas of need.
I would point out that these responses generally
follow the functional areas where cities play a dominant role. Cities with counties, for example, own and
operate about 80 percent of the nation’s streets and highways, explaining their
strong interest here. Many cities do
own, but most largely participate in the governance or policy direction of the
nation’s transit systems, which are generally regional providers. With regionalization of many water and
wastewater services since the 70’s, cities are less dominant in these services,
particularly treatment functions, but most own or are responsible for the collection
and delivery systems. While schools are most often a function of independent
schools districts, libraries are generally a city function as are urban
parks. The relative priority of
aviation can be explained by the fact that in most metropolitan areas there are
only one or two owner/operators who are directly responsible for this
infrastructure
Anticipating the importance of surface
transportation issues to the cities, we asked each of the respondents to rank
their top three priorities in surface transportation, choosing from a menu of
ten items. Nearly 50 percent of the
respondents indicated that highway/street maintenance and rehabilitation was
their top priority, emphasizing the interest of cities in system
preservation. Highway/street capacity
was the top priority for 22 percent of the cities, followed by transit capacity
as the top choice for 14 percent.
In addition to strong support for streets and
transit, I would note that 28 percent selected bridge
replacement/rehabilitation, 26 percent selected pedestrian/bicycle/school
crossing and 25 percent selected intermodal facilities/system integration as
among their top three concerns. These
survey results do follow to some degree the basic structure and principles
embedded in the TEA-21 legislation.
When mayors were asked to describe what federal
actions would be most helpful in meeting city transportation needs, the
self-selected responses (i.e. specify concern) were very consistent. Additional funding was cited most often,
followed by requests that more funding flow directly to cities and local areas,
rather than stopping at the states.
Mayors were also asked to list the single most
important project in their city. While
there was a broad cross-section of responses, it was notable how many cities
indicated that light rail, commuter rail, high-speed rail, continued Amtrak
service or other transit projects among their selections.
Mr. Chairman, I would like to offer a couple of
observations on the survey that we conducted.
It follows some of what we found in our previous survey that Mayor Barr
presented to this Committee in the last Congress. First, we know that TEA-21 substantially increased the funding
commitments to surface transportation.
What we don’t know yet is how the bulk of these funds move around in the
system, given the absence of transparency in the flow of dollars within the
states. This was the central theme of
Mayor Barr’s testimony to this Subcommittee during the last Congress.
But we do know that there are some rapidly rising
needs in the surface transportation area, particularly in the growing demand
for rail projects. Despite dramatically
increased funding and the flexibility that is provided under TEA-21, many
states are not taking full advantage of what the law allows, particularly in
aiding local and regional transportation priorities.
The point to be made about our infrastructure needs
is that isn’t just about more money, it is also about understanding how current
funding is being allocated. TEA-21 was
about more than sparing Governors or the states the political inconvenience
associated with raising state transportation dollars, it is also about
addressing transportation needs in cities and in our metropolitan areas. That is what our efforts on metropolitan
economies is all about – to make the
point that we need to be using these dollars strategically to make the
investments that keep their metropolitan engines running. And, sometimes, these investments may not
be the highest priority for State agencies, but are most important to the
cities or the metropolitan areas.
Mr. Chairman, I know that we will have an
opportunity to discuss these issues with you during renewal of TEA-21, but I
thought it was important to indicate how the mayors are thinking about these issues.
As I previously noted, I recently had the
opportunity to address the National Press Club on the Comeback of America’s
Cities. My message was simply that we
have a new reality before us – American cities, the new American City, can no
longer be defined by mere political borders or by the jurisdiction that a mayor
may serve over. I also made the point
that infrastructure investment is one of the “keys” to furthering this Comeback
of America’s Cities and the continued prosperity of this nation’s economy.
Of particular importance to federal policymakers is
the reality that the growing health and strength of America’s cities and their
metropolitan economies is now the very reason why America's economy came back.
Mr. Chairman, we have
the data that backs this up. Several
years ago, we retained one of the nation’s foremost economic firms, DRI-WEFA,
to compile annual reports on the economic output of our nation’s metropolitan
economies. At the Press Club, I
released our new report on the Gross Metropolitan Product (GMP) for the
nation’s 319 urbanized areas. It also documented the output of our metro
economic engines over the last decade.
Our Metropolitan Economy Report, U.S. Metro Economies: The Engines of America’s Growth, A Decade of
Progress, tells a story that is as significant as any story that's been
told in the last 25 years. If you look
at American cities – cities as the integral parts of the economic units we call
metropolitan economies – and then rank them in terms of the strength of these
economies with the nations of the world, it changes the way you think about the
policy choices before the nation.
Ranking these metro economies, not with states, not with regions but
with the nations of the world, these areas represent 47 of the 100 largest
economies in this world.
These numbers are so compelling that the economy of
New York – yes, the economy of metropolitan New York – is larger than the
economy of Australia. Looking at the
economies of other cities in their broader metro context, you will find that
the economy of Chicago is greater than Taiwan, Argentina, Russia, or
Switzerland. Philadelphia and Houston
are larger in output than Hong Kong.
But even more significant is looking back on the
1990s, a decade of great economic growth, a decade of new jobs and a decade of
expansion in new sectors of the economy, like technology. When we look at where those jobs were
created, where that new economy flourished, it was in American cities and in
their metropolitan economies. Almost 90 percent of the new jobs and in excess
of 90 percent of the technology jobs were created in these areas.
Consider other findings. With 20 percent of the land area and 80 percent of the nation’s
population, these 319 areas last year accounted for about 85 percent of all
U.S. economic output, a share that is projected to rise over the next couple of
decades.
What is particularly striking in its policy
implications is the finding that in 2000 the output of the top ten metropolitan
areas exceeded that of 31 states.
Mr. Chairman, when you look at Nevada, we can
readily detect what you know about the challenges before your state, and why
infrastructure investment is so crucial to the continued economic success of your
state and the nation. The single
fastest growing metropolitan economy in the U.S. over the last ten years was
the Las Vegas metropolitan area, an economic unit strongly influencing your
state’s growth, with spillover into Arizona.
From 1990-2000, this metropolitan economy increased its output from
$20.5 billion to $54.6 billion, an astounding increase of more than 166
percent. This represents an annual
average growth rate of more than ten percent.
When you combine the output of the Las Vegas and Reno
metro economies, you see that these two areas account for about 90 percent of
the entire state’s economic output. In
Oklahoma, as another example, the metro economies of its two largest urbanized
areas, Tulsa and Oklahoma City, account for about 62 percent of the state’s
output.
Mr. Chairman, we would
strongly urge you and other members of this Committee to examine this data and
consider its implications as you go forward in setting infrastructure
investment policies for the nation. We
think this is new information and offers further support to a broader
Congressional infrastructure agenda.
To provide local context for my remarks, I have
described some of the major infrastructure projects where the City of New
Orleans is seeking federal assistance.
These projects in rail transportation and sewerage infrastructure simply
illustrate the scale of the challenges before us.
Canal
Streetcar Project:
The New Orleans Regional Transit Authority (RTA) is
developing a 5.5-mile streetcar project in the downtown area, along the median
of Canal Street.
The Canal Streetcar spine will extend from the Canal
Ferry at the Mississippi River in the central business district, through the
Mid-City neighborhood to Carrolton Avenue, where one branch will continue on
Canal Street to the Cemeteries and another will follow Carrollton Avenue to
City Park/Beauregard Circle. The
corridor is located in an existing, built-up area that was originally developed
in the streetcar era. Much of the corridor lies within the central business
district and historic areas, where employment and housing densities, mix of
uses, and pedestrian-oriented development are generally good. The central
business district includes a high-density mix of office, retail, hotels and leisure
attractions.
The total capital cost of this project is estimated
at $156,600,000, of which our RTA is expected to seek $125,300,000 in ‘new
starts’ funding.
New Orleans
Central Business District to Armstrong Airport Light Rail Project:
The CBD to NOIA light rail project is a new start
project authorized under TEA-21. The project is intended to provide commuter
rail transportation via light rail vehicles between the Central Business
District and the Louis Armstrong International Airport. In TEA-21, funds were
provided for preliminary work associated with the project.
Although we don’t have final estimates of the total
project costs, it will be a substantial project and we will need the federal
government as a partner.
Desire
Streetcar Project:
The Regional Transit Authority (RTA) is restoring a
2.9-mile traditional streetcar line in downtown New Orleans, as part of the
locally preferred alternative for the Desire Corridor. The Desire Corridor
streetcar project will operate along North Rampart Street and St. Claude Avenue
between Canal Street and Poland Avenue. The proposed streetcar alignment will
loop at Canal Street and use exclusive right-of-way in the median of city
streets, as much as possible. The project will serve the communities of Iberville,
Treme, Faubourg, Marigny, St. Roch, and Bywater. Six major bus transfer points
with construction of center platforms, canopies, passenger benches, and
landscaping will be provided: 16 intermediate stops with less elaborate center
platforms are also planned. The project also includes the purchase of 13 new
vehicles.
The capital cost estimate of the streetcar project
is $93,500,000, of which RTA will be seeking $65,500,000 in FTA funding.
Sewerage and
Water Board Inflow & Infiltration Project:
The City has embarked on a very ambitious plan to
correct the inflow and infiltration of its sewerage lines beneath the streets
of the City, as required by a consent decree entered against the City by the
U.S. EPA.
Because most of the New Orleans area is below sea
level, over time the New Orleans Sewerage and Water Board developed an
elaborate drainage system to remove the rainwater that falls every year in
tropical amounts on the city. Partially because the system was built in the
early part of this century, and also because of the great amount of subsidence
and settlement of the soils in the area, the New Orleans Sewerage and Water
Board normally spends approximately $5 million per year on line repair and
replacement alone.
Although the repair and upgrade of the system is a
continuous process, we have not been able to keep up with the highest
environmental standards set by the federal government. The Board is under a consent order from the
Justice Department to undertake this project, with the total costs of the
project expected to exceed $400 million.
Mr. Chairman, I want to thank you for this
opportunity to appear before you today to offer the perspectives of the
nation’s mayors on the federal role in meeting our infrastructure needs.
This is a very high priority concern for the mayors
and other local elected officials and we will stand with you and this Committee
as you examine ways to sustain and expand the federal partnership commitment to
infrastructure investment.
On behalf of the nation’s mayors, I thank you for
this opportunity to present the views of the Conference and its members on
these important issues.