Posted on 03/16/2012 12:52:51 PM PDT by mdittmar
Current transportation authorization expires March 31st
WASHINGTON, D.C. – In a letter sent today to House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) and Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA), Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA), Chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, and Senator Tim Johnson (D-SD), Chairman of the Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, called for the immediate passage of the bipartisan Senate transportation bill that saves or creates 2.9 million jobs and is fully paid for. In the letter, Senators Boxer and Johnson cited the urgency of acting prior to March 31st, when the authority for funding America’s surface transportation systems expires.
Senators Boxer and Johnson copied the letter to all Members of the House of Representatives including a state-by-state chart showing the number of jobs at stake.
The letter states:
March 15, 2012
Dear Speaker Boehner and Leader Cantor:
Enclosed is a chart that clearly shows the number of jobs in every state that will be saved or created by the bipartisan Senate surface transportation bill, Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century (MAP-21).
This legislation passed the Senate yesterday by an overwhelming bipartisan vote of 74-22. There is an urgent need to get this bill to the President’s desk, because nearly three million jobs are at stake if Congress does not act by March 31st, when the current surface transportation extension expires.
Nationwide, MAP-21 sustains almost 1.9 million jobs, including over 55,000 jobs in Ohio and almost 40,000 jobs in Virginia. MAP-21 also creates up to one million additional jobs through the expansion of the Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (TIFIA) program, which leverages local funds to accelerate transportation infrastructure projects.
We ask you to immediately take up and pass the Senate’s bipartisan transportation bill. The reforms included in MAP-21 improve surface transportation programs by maintaining current funding levels for highways and public transportation, consolidating over two-thirds of all highway programs, eliminating earmarks, establishing a national freight program, improving safety oversight of public transportation, and instituting performance measures and accountability for transportation infrastructure investments. This bill is also fully paid for.
The surface transportation authorization bill is by far the biggest jobs legislation the Congress will take up this year. It is imperative that Congress pass and the President sign into law this bill by March 31st, because the failure to act means that the nation’s surface transportation programs will be shut down. The nation simply cannot afford these devastating job losses.
Feel free to contact us if you have any questions. We stand ready to help.
Sincerely,
Barbara Boxer Tim Johnson
Chairman Chairman
Committee on Environment Committee on Banking, Housing
and Public Works and Urban Affairs
cc: All Members of the U.S. House of Representatives
Yeah, both Boxer and Johnson are shovel ready
Or at least what they are trying to pass off to taxpayers is shovel ready
BS, the stimulus money in the last year budget is also available in the base line this year, why in the hell do you need a new bill.
Not one of these bastards is going to inquire what the hell happened to all the money collected from the Transportation gas tax that was “earmarked” to cover all these projects.
If John Boehner had a set, he'd tell Senator Reid that the House of Representatives will take this bill under consideration AFTER the Senate brings up all of the bills that they have been sitting on for an up or down vote.
They've been letting him get away with this BS for 'way too long now.
It’s fully paid for...by whom? Us, for Unions to get their “fair share”. Per Obie, all highway jobs have to go through Unions.
It’s called campaign donation money laundering.
It’s fully paid for ... they wrote another check on our national line of equity!
$15,564,809,891,767.99
3/15/12
The word “Bipartisan” means that some larger-than-usual deception is being carried out. - George Carlin
Then, the bigger question, How much wasteful pork/earmarks and other give aways are the Dims packing it with?
Bipartisan meaning GOP Senators got their scraps of highway pork as well.
Up to this point, I haven’t agreed with anything Boxer has suggested. This is more than likely the same.
Sorry, Babs.
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