Eleanor Holmes Norton: “Today, the House must consider yet another short-term extension to keep highway, transit, highway safety, and hazmat…”

“Today, the House must consider yet another short-term extension to keep highway, transit, highway safety, and hazmat investments limping along, this time for two weeks. We must pass this bill today to avert a shutdown of Federal transportation programs, which expire in just four short days. This stopgap measure is a means to a much-needed end toward which the House and Senate are working diligently: a long-term surface transportation bill to provide certainty to States and to address our nations' crumbling roads, bridges, and transit systems. Every State Department of Transportation, every county, every city, every contractor, every construction worker, every commuter stuck in traffic, every business that uses our roads and bridges to move goods wants Congress to break through its own gridlock and come up with a long-term bill. I would like to thank Chairman Shuster, Ranking Member DeFazio, Subcommittee Chairman Graves, and all of the members who have worked together in a bipartisan manner to craft a surface transportation authorization bill that passed by voice vote out of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and that received robust support when considered by the House. The Conference Committee is now diligently doing its work, and I look forward to continue our talks with the Senate to produce a comprehensive bill for the President to sign. Until such time as the Conference Committee can complete its work, we must keep programs up and running.…”