Political Quotes

“This is a big day on Capitol Hill. The Iranian agreement has been signed. Hopefully, we will all have a chance to study it and think through the implications of this historic event, but the legislative clock is ticking down on another area. We have only 10 legislative days left this month before we face another transportation funding cliff. The expectation now is that there will be a 34th short-term transportation extension that we have faced since our last, meaningful 6-year reauthorization. People are scrambling for another short-term funding source to keep us going for the next few months that targets, presumably, $8 billion to $11 billion to get us through the end of the year. This is actually worse than no solution at all because it perpetuates the uncertainty, the crisis mentality, the inability of State and local governments that rely on this Federal partnership to supply approximately one-half of the capital expenditures for our surface transportation. This uncertainty comes at a time when our bridges, roads, and transit systems are all in serious areas of disrepair. We are desperately in need of bigger, longer-term projects. It is a myth that somehow we can't afford to take action. The public is paying now hundreds of dollars a year in damage to each of their vehicles, costs far in excess of a few cents a day for a gas tax increase.…”