As a Member of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and the Science, Space, and Technology Committee, Congresswoman Edwards was appointed by Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi as a conferee to the Highway Bill. Below is Congresswoman Edwards statement as prepared for delivery:
Opening Statement
The Honorable Donna Edwards
Conference Committee on the DRIVE Act and the STRR Act
November 18, 2015
Thank you Chairman Shuster and Vice Chairman Inhofe for this meeting and for your commitment to long-term surface transportation reauthorization. As a Member of both the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and the Science Committee, I look forward to working with you and the other Members to send a good bill to the President.
I’m grateful to each of the Ranking Members, too, and the Committee and personal staffs for their leadership and efforts on moving this 6-year reauthorization forward.
Let me open with the fact that transportation and infrastructure has almost always been a bipartisan priority in this nation. I agree with the comments of my colleagues that moving forward with a bipartisan bill is vital to the public health, the safety, and the economic welfare of our communities and this nation. If we are able to get things done, and I believe we can, our constituents will benefit undoubtedly.
As we know, America is literally falling apart. The United States now ranks just 16th in infrastructure, according to the World Economic Forum. And according to the American Society of Civil Engineers, the overall assessment of our nation’s infrastructure grades the U.S. at an abysmal D-plus.
As some of you may remember from The Washington Post back in February, a constituent was driving on the Suitland Parkway, minding her own business, when a chunk of cement fell down hitting her car hood, simply because the bridge was in disrepair. Fortunately, no one was injured.
That is why I support a long-term, six-year bipartisan bill that will begin to repair and improve our nation’s surface transportation infrastructure by providing state and local governments with the necessary certainty to undertake large-scale, complex transportation projects.
For decades, our transportation network, with robust investments in research and development (R&D) at its core, has supported a strong American economy. Transportation innovation stretches across all modes: from advances in highway pavement materials, to mass transit technologies, to innovative railroad track and pipeline inspection. Likewise, intelligent transportation systems research (or ITS), connected vehicle research, and autonomous vehicle research will make transportation safer, faster, and more environmentally friendly.
Making our infrastructure work smarter for us is critical. As the Representative of Maryland’s 4th Congressional District, which borders the nation’s capital, I am personally invested in our Federal efforts to mitigate congestion in this fast-growing region, as well as, across the nation. Encouraging innovative transportation technologies and processes starts with sustainable funding for basic and applied R&D at the Department of Transportation and its research partners, such as the University of Maryland.
I am concerned that both the House and Senate bills contain provisions that tax existing R&D programs to fund new deployment programs or otherwise put research funding at risk by moving it out of the Highway Trust Fund. I may agree that the additional deployment activities are a worthy investment – however, the research funding in this bill is already far below the needed levels. If we don’t protect research investment today, we will not have deployment-ready technologies 10 years from now.
The bills before us include several important provisions which I worked on, among them:
- Bipartisan effort with Reps. Norton and Comstock to provide new and direct federal oversight of Washington Metropolitan Area Transportation Authority (WMATA) Metro;
- Bipartisan amendment with Rep. Comstock that transfers Metro board appointments to the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT);
- An amendment enabling transportation planning agencies to mitigate stormwater impacts of surface transportation and reduce costs by addressing stormwater concerns earlier in the planning process;
- Increased the amount of funding distributed to local governments;
- Increased safety for bus and rail systems and operators;
- Increased requirement from 60% to 70% for buying from American-made manufacturers (Buy-American);
- Funding for workforce development; and
- Continued funding for small-business contract opportunities for minorities and women through the Disadvantaged Business Enterprises (DBE) program.
Nonetheless, I do have concerns with other aspects of the two measures, including:
· Additional proposals to streamline environmental reviews;
· Some of the safety provisions;
· Port metrics in the Senate bill;
· A Sense of Congress on the private engineering industry that could be a step towards contracting out of services;
· Harmful public transportation cuts to the High Density States program, which would directly impact Maryland; and
· The bill’s funding level basically being at the same levels as 2004, which can hardly provide the resources necessary to rebuild the nation’s infrastructure.
I look forward to discussing opportunities to resolve these concerns further. I am anxious to work with all my colleagues of this Conference Committee to improve our final product and to enact a truly bipartisan law that will construct and help rebuild our roads, bridges, and transit infrastructure, create jobs here at home, and will move our country forward. I know that we can achieve these goals. Again, thank you to my colleagues for their leadership.