On the recordJuly 15, 2015
Let me thank my friend from Florida (Mr. Hastings) and congratulate Mr. DeFazio and Mr. Blumenauer on all their work on trying to modernize our national infrastructure. They know what every American out there knows, which is that we have an embarrassing state of affairs when it comes to our roads, our bridges, and our transitways. It is not just them. We also know from the American Society of Civil Engineers, who are the nonpartisan pros, that they have concluded we have failing infrastructure. They gave our infrastructure system a grade of D-plus, a grade we should all be embarrassed by. But what is even worse is this Congress should get a grade of F for its refusal to actually do something about it. So we are about to see an expiration of the authorization in a few weeks. Funding will dry out in a few weeks. And so what is the proposal from our Republican colleagues? Let's do 5 more months, through December, at a level they know is inadequate to help modernize our infrastructure. That is their proposal. As my colleagues have said, we have been here before, and we are tired of Band-Aids. Who can plan to modernize their infrastructure with just a 5-month time period? These are major investments our States are making, major investments we are making on behalf of our country, and to not have any kind of certainty that the funds are going to be there after the end of December is something that is embarrassing for a country like the United States of America.…
