Political Quotes

“I thank Senator Boxer for her extraordinary leadership as chair of the Environment and Public Works Committee. She has stood for legislation that will allow us to rebuild our roads, our bridges, our infrastructure in this country, to create jobs, and make America competitive. I rise to oppose the McCain amendment, and I will give three reasons why: First, jobs; secondly, the transportation enhancement programs help our traveling public. It is what they want, what they need; third, there is a safety issue. First, on jobs. Let me point out that the Transportation Enhancements Program represents 1.5 percent of the annual Federal surface transportation funds--1.5 percent--a relatively small amount of money of the total pie. But it is interesting that the projects funded by the Transportation Enhancements Program actually yield more jobs per dollar spent than the funds that are used for the traditional transportation programs. So on a jobs basis, we actually get more jobs from a lot of the projects that are in the Transportation Enhancements Program. Secondly, let me talk about the type of programs involved. We are talking about bicycle paths. We are talking about when people travel on a road and there is a pulloff where one can safely view the scenery. These types of projects we are talking about could be jeopardized by the McCain amendment. I know my colleague from Alaska talked yesterday about the safety issue, but let me underscore it.…”