It’s just been officially announced that Rep. Bill Shuster (R-PA) will be taking over for John Mica as Chairman of the House of Representatives’ Transportation and Infrastructure Committee. Former Chairman John Mica is stepping down due to term-limitation rules. Shuster has been the Congressional representative for the 9th district of Pennsylvania and has served on the committee since 2001 where he started relationships with many in the trucking industry including a working relationship with OOIDA. His father, Bud Shuster, also served as the representative for the 9th district, and was also the T&I chairman.
Despite his good-old-boy background, Shuster is looking to shake things up when he takes over in January at the start of the 113th congress. One of the things he addressed when he served as chair in a May meeting of the Subcommittee on Railroads, Pipelines and Hazardous Materials was that states aren’t allowed the freedom to spend their transportation money in the ways they need it most. He used his homes state of Pennsylvania as an example.
“States… lack the flexibility to decide the best transportation projects to be funded and we also [at the federal level] put mandates upon them that restrict how they spend that money,” he said. “We’ve got 5,000 deficient bridges so it is unconscionable to have to then tell them that they can only spend federal money on bike paths.”
Letting states spend money where it needs to be spent sounds like it may give our highways a much needed tune-up, but Shuster has said he’s open to nearly every approach on funding.
“How do we pay for [improvements]? ….the most important thing we do is we look at all the options that are out there. We’ve got figure out a way to finance the system and it needs to be done in a fiscally sound way, not borrowing a bunch of money and spending money we don’t have.”
While he has not committed to anything, those “options” he speaks of do in fact include raising the gas tax, instituting a VMT fee (taxation based off of the total distance traveled over highways), and expanding tolling.
A pledge by Republicans for no tax increases has kept the fuel tax increase from coming to fruition in past, but due to the fiscal challenges the country faces, some Republicans have started to rethink the pledge.
Both OOIDA and the ATA issued statements regarding Shuster’s appointment. ATA President Bill Graves said “Chairman Shuster is a great friend of the trucking industry and we look forward to continuing to work with him to address the funding shortfall in the highway trust fund and to advance a strong safety agenda.”
OOIDA has issued a statement saying that they are looking forward to working with Shuster, saying that they are “optimistic” that he will advance legislation to help small-business truckers.
It’s clear that Rep. Shuster will be bring some changes to the transportation world, and change is desperately needed. Perhaps “optimistic” is a good way to feel, but since this is still the trucking industry, maybe we’ll say “cautiously optimistic.”
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it would not be so bad too pay a little more fuel tax as long as all states get lets say a $.05 increase a gallon and all that money goes to highway funding and not too the railroads or or somebodys pocket and when they are all repaired and the money is coming in faster than what they are using it not too turn around and give everybody a raise they should lower the fuel tax instead also these states like Pa take forever to do a road project compared to some states start a road project and finish it and move on too the next not Pa they need a whole year or more it is like they want too retire after they do it they take so long and they block off 2-3 miles off roadway to do a little area and cause all kinds off backups and the construction workers step out into the travelled part off the construction while worker and it is no wonder why some get hit
More fuel tax and higher tolls? How impressive, original and out standing Shuster is. Good old boy thinking this is. One more reason not to haul freight to the east coast. Well thought out idea.