Reauthorization

Just days after a Senate committee asked the full chamber to consider a four-month extension of SAFETEA-LU, new negotiations have replaced that idea with a six-month extension at current spending levels. The bill also extends the gas tax.

The Environment and Public Works Committee unanimously agreed this morning to send a four-month extension of the transportation bill to the full Senate. Chair Barbara Boxer (D-CA) emphasized that it wasn’t easy to get consensus on the extension, especially with many members wanting to move forward with the full two-year bill.

The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee is meeting tomorrow to discuss a four-month extension to the current transportation bill, SAFETEA-LU. The map above is from a short but powerful document the Federal Transit Administration put out this week explaining "The Impacts of Failing to Extend Surface Transportation Funding" [PDF]. How much transit work would grind to a halt in your state without an extension?

Oklahoma Republican Tom Coburn is known around the Senate as "Dr. No" for his propensity to hold up key legislation, single-handedly, because it contains something not to his liking (or sometimes because he's upset about something else entirely.) On Veterans Day in 2009, he shocked even his GOP colleagues by blocking veterans' benefits because he wanted their cost to be offset. Because of a Senate rule requiring unanimity for certain votes, he alone has been able to block votes on wilderness protections, health care provisions, and disarmament in Uganda.

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor has put forth an idea that major news outlets are calling an "olive branch" to President Obama on infrastructure funding.

As the country awaits President Obama’s jobs plan, to be announced (at a new time!) next Thursday, many are making their own suggestions about how to stimulate job creation. The U.S. Conference of Mayors threw its hat in the ring today, releasing “A Common Sense Jobs Agenda” [PDF] with its full-throated insistence that Congress pass the Senate’s transportation bill.

Two key Democratic senators today released state-by-state numbers showing how many jobs would be lost if the current surface transportation authorization bill is not extended by September 30. Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA), chair of the Environment and Public Works Committee, and Sen. Tim Johnson (D-SD), chair of the Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee, sent a letter to their Senate colleagues urging them to act and highlighting the job loss numbers for their state.

"I'm calling on Congress, as soon as they come back, to pass a clean extension of the surface transportation bill," President Barack Obama said from the Rose Garden this morning. "This bill provides funding for highway construction, bridge repair, mass transit systems, and other essential projects that keep our people and our commerce moving quickly and safely. And for construction workers and their families across the country, it represents the difference between making ends meet and not making ends meet."

Congress returns from a monthlong recess -- oh sorry, "district work period" -- next Wednesday. Before September 30, they'll have to figure out next steps for keeping the transportation program going, assuming there's no way that the two chambers will come to an agreement about a long-term bill before the current extension expires. Both houses are reportedly now on board to pass an extension of the current transportation law, but many questions remain.