Letter to United States Senate on Surface Transportation Reauthorization

The Honorable Max Baucus
Chairman
Committee on Finance
United States Senate
Washington, DC 20510

The Honorable Orrin Hatch
Ranking Member
Committee on Finance
United States Senate
Washington, DC 20510

Dear Chairman Baucus and Ranking Member Hatch:

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the world’s largest business federation representing the interests of more than three million members and organizations of every size, sector, and region, encourages you to mark up and report a bipartisan finance title for the multi-year reauthorization and reform of transportation programs.

The Chamber is pleased that the relevant Senate Committees have favorably reported their titles of the surface transportation reauthorization bill, or are expected to do so. The Chamber encourages the Senate Finance Committee to identify revenues for the Highway Trust Fund needed to support the authorization and obligation limitations contained in these titles. Finance Committee action is the next, crucial step toward consideration by the full Senate, and passage, of a multi-year surface transportation bill that reforms surface transportation programs and, at a minimum, maintains funding for highways, public transportation and safety at 2011 appropriations services levels and adjusting for inflation.

Although the Chamber believes that the necessary revenues should come from a user-fee based source structured to ensure that the purchasing power of revenue sources keeps pace with inflation and is sustainable and predictable, the Chamber recognizes that such as approach lacks consensus in this Congress. Therefore, the Chamber believes it would be appropriate for Congress to employ general fund resources, including spending reductions, rescissions of authority and other savings measures, to move forward with a multi-year bill and the muchneeded policy and funding certainty to the states, locals and the private sector provided in this legislation. The Chamber urges the Committee to reject provisions that would levy retroactive tax increases or other punitive tax increases. Lastly, the Chamber strongly encourages the
Congress to establish a road map for a long-term sustainable user-fee based revenue model in the
final legislation.

The progress in the Senate on surface transportation reauthorization is a positive development. Investment in transportation has proven to grow jobs, and the need for Congress to act on transportation infrastructure is clear. Passing transportation reauthorization legislation is a specific action Congress and the Administration can take right now to support job growth and economic productivity without adding to the deficit. The Chamber urges the Finance Committee to mark up a bipartisan finance title so that the Senate can move quickly to consider a complete reauthorization package.

Sincerely,

R. Bruce Josten

cc: Members of the Senate Committee on Finance

Read the Letter: 

Surface Transportation Reauthorization letter