Roadblocks or Reauthorization: Expert Webinar Recap

The Alliance for Innovation and Infrastructure recently convened a panel of transportation policy experts for Roadblocks or Reauthorization: What to Expect – and When – for Surface Transportation Reauthorization. With current federal surface transportation authorities set to expire September 30, the discussion examined whether Congress can complete a full multiyear reauthorization in time – or whether unresolved funding questions, competing policy priorities, and differences between the House and Senate will ultimately lead to an extension.

The conversation featured opening remarks from Aii Founder and Chairman Brigham McCown, followed by insights from Jeff Davis of the Eno Center for Transportation, Eryn Hurley of the National Association of Counties, Marc Scribner of the Reason Foundation, and Andy Winkler of the Bipartisan Policy Center. Moderated by Zach Williams of Bloomberg Law, the panel explored the legislative path ahead, the issues most likely to delay an agreement, and how infrastructure stakeholders should prepare for continued uncertainty. Watch the full discussion and read the transcript below.

Roadblocks or Reauthorization: What to Expect – and When – for Surface Transportation Reauthorization-

Brigham A. McCown  
Good morning, everyone. I’m Brigham McCown, founder and chair of the Alliance for Innovation and Infrastructure. AII is an independent national research and educational organization working to advance innovation across industry and public policy. Strangely enough, we’re the only nationwide public policy think.
tank dedicated to infrastructure. AII serves as a conduit exploring the intersection of economics, law, and public policy.
Welcome this morning to our presentation, Roadblocks or Reauthorization, What to Expect and When for Surface Reauthorization. We’re thrilled to be joined today by an expert panel moderated by Bloomberg’s Zach Williams.

Zach, thank you so much for doing this. The floor is yours.

Zach Williams
Well, thank you so much for the introduction and hello to all of you out there. I’m excited to moderate this panel with a couple real transportation pros on, you know, what is coming next on this all important surface transportation reauthorization before Congress. You know, so September 30th expiration,
looming for the current authorities. And it’s a big question whether Congress can get anything new passed before then. So just a little bit about me. I’m Zach. I cover transportation for Bloomberg Government right here out of DC. I spent a good part of my career before that in New York. And now just into everything that has to do with maritime, rail, trucking, drones, and especially anything to do with the surface transportation reauthors.
So let’s take a quick moment, meet some of the panelists. I’ll start with, of course, the very esteemed Jeff Davis. Jeff, tell us a little bit about yourself and your work in transportation.

Jeff Davis
I got my start in transportation in the 1990s because a guy from Altoona, Pennsylvania lived across the hall from me in the dormitories at AU and was the permanent intern for Bud Schuster. So I carpooled to work with Schuster guys every year, you know, when I was working on the Hill, with that gang and then have been
writing my own newsletter on transportation since 1999. And it’s now part of the, for the last 11 years, the Eno Center for Transportation, a nonpartisan think tank foundation founded in 1921 to study all levels of traffic throughout the US.

Zach Williams 
Thanks so much, Jeff. You definitely got your name in the space. Another person I’d like to introduce is Marc Scribner. Marc, tell us a bit about yourself.

Marc Scribner   2:39
Oh, well, thanks, Zach. Yeah, Marc Scribner with Reason Foundation, where I focus on federal transportation policy as well as some emerging transportation technologies, how they may impact our existing systems. I’ve been working in the transportation policy space for almost 20 years.
And I got into transportation kind of through a previous interest and a remaining interest in urban real estate and the interactions there and just how impactful transportation decisions can be on the urban environment.

Zach Williams   3:23
Awesome. And then of course, we got Eryn Hurley also on our panel. Tell us a bit about yourself.

Eryn Hurley   3:28
Great, thanks so much, Zach. Happy to be here. Eryn Hurley, I am the Chief Government Affairs Officer at the National Association where I lead all of our federal advocacy efforts. So we really kind of cover all domestic policy from A to Z because we represent the nation’s 3,069 county governments.
But on transportation specifically, this is a very much a top priority for counties, given that, you know, we are a bystander in this conversation, given our major ownership and role in operating transportation systems. So again, really happy to be here.

Zach Williams   4:09
And then last but not least, of course, we got Andy Winkler.

Andy Winkler   4:18
Sorry, coming off mute. Good to be with you. Yeah, I’m Andy Winkler. I’m the Managing Director of Housing and Infrastructure at the Bipartisan Policy Center. For those not familiar, we’re a think tank here in town that work on all types of different issues. But under my portfolio, I help to lead our housing center and help to manage our infrastructure work, which historically has focused on
Highway trust fund solvency, public-private partnerships, MP3s, permitting, and a few other transportation issues. So good to be with you.

Zach Williams   4:52
Awesome. Well, we got some real intellectual firepower now, that’s for sure. So let’s get down to some brass tacks. Like I said in my introduction, you know, we got this looming September 30th deadline for the current surface transportation authorities. But, you know, it’s a big lift to get it done before September 30th, to say the least. You know, a bill has
moved out of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee. That’s no small thing, but it’s kind of, there’s been a holdup in ways and means and certainly a House vote is no sure thing in the next week or two before August. So, and then nothing really has been happening in the Senate, at least no formally introduced legislation. So
In order for something to happen procedurally, however remote, what needs to happen before September 30th? Anyone want to jump in on that?

Jeff Davis   5:42
They have to go through the Ways and Means Committee if they want to extend the taxes and the spending authority of the trust fund itself, existing taxes. And also the electric vehicle registration fees that were in the T&I bill, legally T&I couldn’t have those deposited in the trust fund. So Ways and Means has to do that.

Jeff Davis   6:02
And last but not least, they had to print $150 billion of general fund transfer money to the Highway Trust Fund to keep it solvent for the five years and at the spending levels the House T&I recommends. And so they’ve got to do those things. They’ve got to get, and in a very narrow Republican majority,
is making sure that all Republican members are on board with the EV registration fee in principle and the printing of the money made part of the holdup.

Zach Williams   6:34
Well, that’s quite a few hurdles to overcome in just a couple of weeks with August recess looming no less. You know, does anyone here have hope that all this can be done? And if so, tell me why.
Not hearing a lot. Certainly the chatter on the hill is a lot of people saying that there’s going to be some type of an extension of the current authorities. That said, you know, Speaker Johnson over in the House certainly has not quite officially thrown in the towel with at least getting a House vote by September 30th. What’s the level of optimism we got on that side?
Anyone?
Not seeing a lot of optimism going to.

Jeff Davis   7:17
Chairman Graves really wants to do this. He’s a very popular man. A lot of members want to do that, try to get this done for him. But you know, there’s a right now the House has not shown its ability to pass anything in the last few business weeks. That doesn’t bode well. And the defense authorization bill and a reconciliation bill, if that comes together,
are just, they’re ahead of the transportation bill in the pipeline. There’s no way around that. So, like you said, there’s not a lot of shopping days till recess.

Zach Williams   7:49
Well, you hit the nail right on the head there, Jeff. You know, there’s a lot going on on the Hill, a lot that frankly is just higher priority than the service transportation reauthorization. But I ask because, you know, at this point, we got the November elections are getting pretty close. And I’m curious what all your thoughts are. You know, is this
House bill, kind of the highway bill for real real, or is this more of a messaging vehicle for the midterms? Who’s got some thoughts on that side?

Marc Scribner   8:17
Well, when they started out this process, it was intended to be the real deal. And I think for a lot of the reasons Jeff laid out with Chairman Graves now, having now announced his retirement, but even before then, he wanted to be able to say he’d done both the FAA reauthorization and surface reauthorization.
a nice feather in your cap as chairman of TNI. But those slipping deadlines have really reduced the chances. And so is this going to morph into a messaging bill? Maybe, but the approval of some of the controversial amendments and markup,
the inclusion of EV fees that can quite easily be framed as a tax increase in the lead up to an election. Maybe that isn’t the best messaging marker, but we’ll see.

Zach Williams   9:15
Yeah, boy, you know, maybe, well, you mentioned some of the controversial provisions. You know, this House bill is really loaded with quite a few. We got the two-person mandate for train crews. Railroad industry doesn’t like that. On the other side, we got this

Jeff Davis   9:27
Yes.

Zach Williams   9:34
provision that would allow heavier trucks on highways or at least states to grant that authority. And then we got this EV fee, which I think is a really interesting one, especially since we got, you know, the brain power here, because on the one hand, you can kind of see where the Democrats might oppose a fee that might discourage people from buying more electric vehicles or hybrids, $30 per year in this case for the EVs, if I’m remembering off the top of my head.
But on the other hand, we’re kind of seeing a horseshoe politics thing going on here, too, where there’s people on the political right that are against a fee on EVs. Kind of, I don’t know, a slippery slope argument, if you will. You tax this, you know, pretty soon we’re going to have states being, you know, tax collectors for federal government other ways. Who’s got some thoughts on kind of this complicated ball of competing
interests in this House bill and how do you think it might resolve itself?

Marc Scribner   10:27
Well, on the EV fee part, I mean, you know, that’s not seen, Chairman Graves, who’s been the, you know, the chief proponent of that and has buy-in from ranking member Larson on the concept, he doesn’t see that as the, you know, the end goal of a propulsion neutral replacement for per gallon fuel taxes. He sees it as an interim step to get to what he would
ultimately like to see, which we can’t get to now, but maybe in the future, is a per mile user fee. So whether or not he can explain that to the other members, who, especially given the rates that were in the bill, which
don’t really resemble a gasoline tax equivalent. Whether or not he can message that, I think remains to be seen. And then on the rail parts of it, yeah, I mean, the Railway Safety Act, which includes the two-person crew mandate that you mentioned, that got in there. That’s not going to, you’re not going to get any rail industry support, both carriers and many of their ships.
if that’s in there. And TNI also included the Titus Amendment, the Secure Tracks Act, which would undo some of the recent moves toward automated track inspection. So you ended up with a situation where the TNI bill was…
very anti-rail automation, while at the same time clearing a path for trucking automation, which is an interesting side-by-side read.

Jeff Davis   12:08
And that’s another problem with the bill coming to the floor. We hear persistent rumors, but we don’t know for sure to what degree the Speaker, the Majority Leader, and the Chairman.
promised the railroad industry earlier this year that the two-man poopers mandate wouldn’t come to the House floor. But to the extent any promises were made because of the wide and bipartisan vote by passing committee, on ringing that bell is very politically difficult. So that may be another reason, other than the Ways and Means Committee’s issues,
why there’s not been a speedy path to the House floor for this bill.

Eryn Hurley   12:44
And I’ll just add really quickly too, besides the items that we’ve already pointed out, I also think talking about the autonomous vehicle preemption piece is also really important, right? This is newer territory, but ultimately preempting state safety authority tends to right draw

Zach Williams   12:54
Mhm.

Eryn Hurley   13:03
bipartisan pushback from governors and state regulators, regardless of what the industry wants. So definitely could see that as, you know, that is also a sticking point here as well, too.

Zach Williams   13:19
Yeah, Andy, just to wrap you into the conversation here, you know, kind of what do you make of this strange combination of bipartisan backlash to the bill has written? Any thoughts?

Andy Winkler   13:30
No, I mean, I was just going to add, and we’re all focused still on the House side. So going back to your original question, to work out all of these issues, plus the overall cost of the bill, which is a concern for some members as well, you know, I think we’re just running out of time before we get closer and closer to the election, where it almost necessitates that extra
extension just to be able to work out some of these issues because there isn’t kind of clear consensus. And on the Senate side, some of the dynamics of these issues are a little bit different. Some of the, you know, the House Democrats accepted a lot of, you know, changes to climate related programs that may not fly in the Senate.
So it’s a handful of things that I think people will really have to work out, not just on the house side, but bicamerally, which takes time and doesn’t seem to be happening how we would like it to be.

Zach Williams   14:26
I would just throw in, again, sticking with the rail mandate from the two-person crew mandate for a second. You know, some that really, Jeff was mentioning an interesting dynamic with the politics there, you know, to what extent is, you know, the speaker and House leadership signed on to this for real. You know, we got the president putting his thumb on it.
to get it through committee. And then in the other chamber, we got a former South Dakota state rail director leading the Republican majority. So, you know, I’m not quite sure what Thune might say about this two-person mandate offhand, but I doubt he’s a huge fan of it. He usually comes from it from a more industry-friendly side.

Zach Williams   15:05
And, you know, to say this issue went from zero to kind of high up on the list, I think really understates how much rail policy of all thing, you know, kind of came center stage in the House. But, you know, to segue to the Senate a little bit, I think Andy was getting to, you know, a very good point here. You know, there’s been a lot of changes.
you know, proposed to how the bipartisan infrastructure law handled not only green energy, but grant programs. Eryn, maybe you could take, tell us a little bit about how that’s, you know, first what you’re seeing in terms of the changes and how they affect counties and states and local governments and how you think that dynamic might play out once things get to the other chamber.

Eryn Hurley   15:49
Yeah, I mean, in terms of the actual funding, the changes that we’ve seen in the House bill, so right when we’re talking about like formula versus discretionary funding, like 2 tracks, right? So I’ll say in on the formula side of things, the clearest win, at least from a county perspective,
is on the bridge, bridge funding. So right, the current bridge formula program grows from that 5.5 billion to the 9 billion a year. And that’s for the first time. And then also, what’s unique about this as well, too, is that the set aside for locally owned bridges
increases from the current 15% to 25%. So that’s about a little over $2 billion a year that is going straight to county and other local bridge projects instead of really kind of sitting on within the states to decide how that funding will actually get allocated, right?
And then even on top of that, the set asides for those smaller off system bridges, the ones off the main federal network, which is actually where a lot of county bridges actually live, that grows from 15 to 20% as well too. So
That was, you know, a great provision that we saw ultimately be included in the package as well. I think another area that we’ve been really focused on is the Surface Transportation Block Grant, which honestly, the formula program that has helped counties the most historically, because
more than half of it, so actually 55%, that already gets sub-allocated down to the regional level, right? So this bill grows STBG to almost 75 billion over five years, right? So that’s also a major change that we were very,
happy and excited to see that ultimately was, you know, included in the package there.

Zach Williams   17:55
And what’s your sense of like the level of bipartisanship on these changes particularly? Has it leaned towards one party or the other? Do you feel there’s a lot of buy-in from both sides?

Eryn Hurley   18:06
I mean, from our conversations that we have had, and I mean, at least what you can see in the vote for with House TNI, 62 to 2, right? So what we’ve been able to have conversations about is that this is very much, you know, bipartisan consensus on these specific items. I think what has also really come to the forefront in these conversations
since IJA implementation. And what we saw is that, you know, 90% of that federal funding went directly to the states. Only about 14% was actually sub-allocated to counties. And so from a local government perspective, what NACA has been doing over the course of the last couple of years is
Really?
you know, kind of educating, speaking with federal partners about what that local role actually looks like. And so I think it’s kind of become a point where folks can coalesce around when we’re talking about more direct local funding.

Zach Williams   19:08
Well, certainly Chair Graves has talked a lot about making sure this is a, you know, a roads and bridges transportation, you know, highway bill. You know, but at the same time, it’s pretty bipartisan. And, you know, in most of, I think most of the political problems with the bill as it sits now kind of skewed the normal political lines, but
You know, with that in mind, just kind of curious.
You know, what’s, what’s, um, sorry, back up a second, um…
You know, have you seen a significant difference in terms of what money is going towards? You know, you know, there have been some limits on green, you know, projects for green energy programs, bike, you know, bike paths or transit, you know, a lot of talk about this, but has anyone seen in any real world difference in money getting towards that side of the transportation equation?
You know, for all the talk that Republicans would be kind of tough on transit or bike paths or alternative transit, you know, how was the House bill shaped up in terms of that, you know, with this consolidation of some grant programs?

Jeff Davis   20:18
What they’re doing in both highways and transit is just gutting, to the extent they can, competitive grant programs and pushing it all towards formula-based programs in order to make the overall total higher. So there’s more money provided by this bill for highways and transit, respectively, than there was actually provided by the IIIJA.
But formula, you know, I think $31 billion more for highway formula and 16 billion more for mass transit formula than IJA. But the competitive grant programs are cut back significantly. And also, we call this the authorization bill, but it also, most authorization bills don’t actually provide real money.
This one normally does. Highway trusted money is actually provided by the bill. And so highways and transit are traditionally funded primarily by this bill. Railroad programs never were before. III gave them a huge chunk of real money and this bill does not do that again. So the inner city rail is what really

Jeff Davis   21:22
takes a beating in this bill compared to the IIIJA. There’s not a single dollar provided for Amtrak or other FRA grant programs by this bill. They leave it all up to the appropriations committees and their annual bills as was traditional. And that’s the big difference between us and the IIIJA.
Biggest difference.

Zach Williams   21:45
Now, a big thing is that you brought up the F word funding. You know, there was a lot of chatter early on, back when we were all so young in 2025, and it seemed like maybe a new highway bill might get passed by this point, despite all the odds. And, you know,

One looming question every cycle with these with these reauthorizations, it’s the Highway Trust Fund that’s supposed to pay for, you know, for highways and bridges and everything else. You know, to what extent does this does does the House bill do anything about it? I’m thinking maybe that EV fee and where does that leave the long-term finances of the Highway Trust Fund as you guys kind of see it? Are they just kind of?
Passing the buck yet again.

Marc Scribner   22:31
Well, I’ll let Jeff speak more to that, because he mentioned the money printing earlier. And if you read his newsletter, he documents this quite extensively. But I think you get at an important point here. They’re really not, you know, they’re not solving these growing structural challenges with the trust funds here that

Marc Scribner   22:51
that few billion dollars they might get in the EV and plug-in hybrid registration taxes isn’t going to plug that hole. And I think longer term, what does this mean? I mean, we’re going to be, if we get a five-year bill done this time, the next one’s going to be up just as we have major entitlement programs facing insolvency. So
What does the, you know, I don’t want to start talking about the next surface transportation reauthorization after this one, but it does raise some interesting questions of, is there going to be a political will to continue pouring in this general fund revenue, bailing out the trust fund as we’ve

Marc Scribner   23:34
we’ve seen, you know, over the last couple of decades. I wouldn’t bet on it.

Zach Williams   23:40
Does it matter that, you know, it’s kind of just shifting money around in the government from one fund to another? Does it really matter that the Highway Trust Fund continuously needs these infusions of money?

Jeff Davis   23:52
Globally speaking, it hasn’t so far, but as Marc pointed out, we’ve printed, I think, $270 billion over the last 12, I guess, since 2007 to keep the trust on the float. This bill will require another 150. Over 2 decades, that’s a tremendous amount of money, but from the global bond market perspective, it’s not.
But as Marc pointed out, we’re going to have to have a come to Jesus with the Social Security and Medicare trust funds in the next five, six years. And the amount of money required to get that solvent is so much, you can’t just print money to solve that problem. The global bond market will notice. And once Congress has to do whatever painful things they are going to have to do to fix those programs, there may not be appetite anymore for just printing money to solve the problems of other trust funds. I think that’s what Marc was saying. And that’s, yeah, we’re getting to the point now where we’re talking real money from a global finance standpoint.

Zach Williams   24:49
So, I mean, are you kind of saying that the long-term solvency of the Highway Trust Fund in the end kind of comes down to instilling confidence in the bond market, if you will?

Jeff Davis   24:51
Yeah.
How long can we keep just printing money and pretending that the user pay system is solvent? And I think we should have stopped this a long time ago. It was 130 in the whole of the next five years at baseline. This bill will add another 16 and a half billion in extra spending. The EV fee will only bring in 3.8 billion over that same five year period.

Jeff Davis   25:20
So we’re still digging the hole deeper with each bill.

Zach Williams   25:26
Now, why is there this hole?

Marc Scribner   25:32
Because we’ve been on autopilot since the interstate system was functionally complete, and there’s no real vision on what the national role in surface transportation ought to be. So we just keep adding little bits and bobs here and there, continuing that same structure forward.
But, you know, I think external forces may may cause us to have some of these these deeper conversations on what is the appropriate role for a federal service transportation program. But I don’t think that time is that time is now.

Zach Williams   26:12
I mean, if I’m not mistaken, they haven’t really, the gas tax is supposed to cover much of this, right? And I don’t believe they’ve raised that in quite a few years, maybe about 30 or so. And perhaps not
Pretty unlikely to do that in a ahead of the midterms as well, don’t you think?
Yeah.

Marc Scribner   26:36
Well, and I think…

Andy Winkler   26:36
Not when gas prices are high.

Marc Scribner   26:39
Yeah, I mean, we’ve had politicians talking about gas tax holidays, not going the other direction. But I think to Jeff’s point about the, you know, the bond market reaction to our increasingly dire fiscal situation, I think that’s sort of, you know, printing money has been the politically cheap way so far. But, you know, until you start putting a
Price on on that, I don’t think you’re gonna see much change in in behavior by our elected officials.

Zach Williams   27:13
Well, and, you know, if recent chatters to be believed, you know, getting back to the whole EV and hybrid fee issue and the House bill being stuck in ways and means, it seems like there’s a real reluctance not only to deal with the gas tax and the lack of an increase in 30 years, but to even reauthorize it.
you know, ahead of the midterms. It seems like at least some on the Republican side are either wary of backing this EB fee because of some criticism on the political right, but also just kind of being on the record supporting the continuation of the gas tax, which is a few months to go.
Switching a little bit, back to the other side. You know, we talked a little bit about the railroads, a little bit about AVs and green energy to boot, but, you know, what do you guys kind of see as a state of the play in the Senate and how might that be similar or different than what we’ve seen in the House already?
I’ll pick on Andy. Any quick thoughts just to jump things off? You know, how do you think the Senate, you know, might approach this differently?

Andy Winkler   28:26
Yeah, I mean, I think the Senate has, I mean, they’ve had hearings and they’ve had commitments to working together. And it’s not like they haven’t made any kind of progress or attempt at progress. They’re just so far behind in working out some of the issues that the House seems to have been able to work through. So we’re
We don’t have a bill. We don’t have text yet. You have to get all of the different committees of jurisdiction aligned and in order, and they don’t have all of the committees of jurisdiction over pieces of the bill.

Zach Williams   28:55
Could you explain, sorry to interrupt, could you explain a little bit about the lay of the line with the committees?

Andy Winkler   29:00
Sure. So, I mean, the primary committee of jurisdiction is EPW, but other committees in the Senate have pieces of a highway bill. So Senate Banking has jurisdiction over transit issues. Senate Commerce has jurisdiction. Finance has jurisdiction over the taxes. So
you really need to get everybody aligned to try to move a package forward. And we’re not there on the Senate side, the way that the House has been able to at least put some of those pieces together.

Marc Scribner   29:35
Yeah, and I think a lot of it is so much of the jurisdiction over the service reauthorization of the House is concentrated in T&I, and you’ve got more of an expert committee there focused on transportation issues. EPW, which has the highway portion, as Andy said, I mean, has
has the E in its name. And depending on which side of the aisle you’re on, your staff may be more interested in the E versus the PW and depending on what issues are moving. And then as he said with banking, having transit jurisdiction. I mean, banking has a lot of important things on its plate right now. Transit is pretty far down the list. One interesting thing, though, with the Senate jurisdiction is with commerce. And unlike the House, where you have
motor vehicle safety split between energy and commerce for light duty, for NHTSA, and then heavy duty with TNI. You’ve got, you know, uniform motor vehicle safety authority held by Senate Commerce under Chairman Cruz. So we may see you know, in addition to the truck AV provisions we saw in the House, we could see light duty, the kind of the robo taxi things, which could create, I mean, there’s a lot of, you know, support for that, certainly in the, among the automotive industry, but a lot of opposition too. So that could, you know, if we’re talking kind of poison pills that we’ve seen, that could be another one or make the automated vehicle part more intensely opposable by the people who oppose such things.

Zach Williams   31:27
Boy, if we wanted rail, you know, the controversial rail provisions to get overshadowed, I can’t think of a better way than to really get the AV regulatory discussion coming. And Chairman Cruz seems very eager to have that discussion, right?

Marc Scribner   31:38
What?
Yes, he’s, I think, you know, very supportive of it. And you and there is some bipartisan support in commerce for trying to come up. They’ve suggested they wanted to do a an autonomous vehicle title, which would be, you know, presumably much more expansive than what we saw in the House.
But, you know, you mentioned rail and Senate Commerce. I mean, Senator Cruz has long opposed the Railway Safety Act. And then you mentioned Leader Thune earlier, he’s come out against it. So I don’t think the chances, certainly the House, including that, did not seem to motivate

Jeff Davis   32:08
Yeah.

Marc Scribner   32:22
the commerce part of this to move quicker. So yeah, a lot of interesting things in the Commerce Committee jurisdiction.

Zach Williams   32:34
All right, I got a fun one for you. We’re really going to take this discussion in a new direction. You know, a big variable here is obviously the election. It seems like we’re all in more or less agreement that absent a miracle, a legislative miracle may happen sometimes. There’s not going to be a reauthorization passed before September 30th and probably not the election. But that said, could be an extender, could be a lame duck action, or boy, things could go in all sorts of directions depending on if the Republicans keep both houses, or especially if the Democrats take not only the House, but the Senate as well. Although it seems like the Senate, unless one party somehow got like a huge majority, you know, there’s still a filibuster, things will kind kind of stay similar, but who wants to kind of tell me how they just kind of see things going in different directions depending on who controls the House and also the Senate?
You know, do you think what the House, the House bill will more or less stay the same, changes around the edges, or might we see something much more dramatic, you know, as the year comes to a close?

Zach Williams   33:45
Who wants to, who wants to throw in there? Eryn, got any thoughts there? You know, how do you think, you know, control of Congress might, you know, affect how things proceed?

Eryn Hurley   33:59
Yeah, I mean, none of us have a crystal ball, right? I mean, it’s difficult to say. I mean, again, I think it really kind of goes back in terms of… Right.
I think, as you said, Zach, we’re pretty much all in agreement that it’ll likely be some sort of extension in terms of what’s going to happen six months, year.
you know, and really this is going to be left up to the next Congress, right? I think in terms of the House side, we could see maybe a consistent package just given the bipartisan support. I think for the Senate side, we could definitely say if it flips, we could definitely see
see a change. I mean, I’m just speaking from like a county perspective here, right? Specifically with EPW, we have White House and Capitol, right, where the like infrastructure is more of a state role, right? In those two in those two states, West Virginia counties don’t have a major role in infrastructure there. So from a county perspective,

Eryn Hurley   35:06
I mean, what we could potentially see, you know, is, does that open the door to more of a local focus, more of like the direct funding of what we’re seeing in on within the House bill right now. But, I mean, ultimately, again, we just,
The crystal ball, wish, wish we had to see to have it to see what it could actually look like.

Marc Scribner   35:32
Yeah, I mean, it would be, I guess, in the House, I mean, Chairman Graves and Ranking Member Larson have a good working relationship and they really did hammer this out in a bipartisan fashion. You know, if Rick Larson becomes chairman, maybe
around the edges, you may see some changes in emphasis. You know, he’s a big proponent of more funding going directly to the locals. So maybe some increases there, but he got a lot of what he was hoping to get on in the transit title. So
you know, maybe some some slight changes there, but probably the overall the overall structure would be pretty similar. But yeah, as Eryn was saying, I think the Senate would be the they’re the they’re the wild card right now, especially since we haven’t seen seen anything from them.

Zach Williams   36:31
Now, there is a bit of a similar dynamic. You know, what’s so interesting about transportation is people that are normally fighting usually find ways to agree on transportation, because it does affect every district in the country. But while, say, Cruz and Cantwell, the ranker on Senate Commerce, you know, work pretty well, hand in glove sometimes on key issues, I think on transportation, Certainly when it comes to the politics of unions and railroads and that type of thing, they’re very different. But there’s also, you know, other teams, White House and Capito on EPW. Do you see, you know, any key differences between some of the committee chairs and rankers on the Senate side and what that might mean for a bill going forward? White House is certainly
position himself as kind of the defender of green energy programs, such as it is.
Any thoughts? Any thoughts, Jeff, Mark?

Jeff Davis   37:34
The I am fascinated to see.
I think that capital White House dynamic is one reason why we haven’t seen much movement on a reauthorization bill in EPW so far. And because, especially if there’s a party change in White House as chairman next year, and this is a little simple for Larson in the House, even more so for Larson, because Mr. Larson and Mr. Graves took a great deal this year. The sad fact is Mr. Graves will be here next year.
If the party flips, to what degree will Chairman Larson feel bound by deals he made with someone who’s not there anymore? And also, there’ll be a lot of pressure from the Democratic caucus as a whole on Larson next year, on Chairman Larson next year, if that takes place, to cut a different path than the current bill. So
The question will be, to what degree could a hypothetical Chairman Larson stand up to that pressure from his own caucus and try to keep working a bipartisan product with Republicans in TNI?
And I’m still, the jury’s still on the degree to which, at the end of the day, Shelley Moore Capital from coal country and White House, one of the top climate change forward policymakers in the Senate,
can get together on a transportation bill. That’s yet to be proven that they can actually get to a bill that gets marked up.

Zach Williams   39:08
Well, we’re starting to see not the end, but the beginning of the end of this webinar. So I just want to point out to folks that if you do have any questions for our panelists, please feel free to drop them into the Q&A and we’ll try to get to them in the last 15 minutes. But I do got a couple more questions for our guests where we are now.
You know, at this point, you know, do you feel like the, you know, the election, who knows, if I knew what would happen there or with Trump for that matter, you know, I’d be making a lot more money than I do now. But, you know, we haven’t had a house vote, no language in the Senate yet, just a couple months before the election.
You know, what do you feel is the most likely outcome at this point? You know, a short-term extension and then maybe some action in the lame duck? You think it might have to wait until early next year? What’s the best guesstimates at this point?

Eryn Hurley   40:09
So.

Andy Winkler   40:18
Yeah.

Marc Scribner   40:19
The outcome of the midterms.

Andy Winkler   40:19
Yeah.

Eryn Hurley   40:23
Yeah, I would say six months to, you know, even up to a year in terms of a short extension, I would say.

Zach Williams   40:33
Yeah, both sides will just kind of call a temporary ceasefire on this on September 30th, have a couple months extension and then just kind of argue in the new year with whatever conditions they meet then.
Sounds like a legislature to me. When in doubt, delay, right? And certainly it seems like something’s got to get done, right? I mean, the costs of inaction by September 30th are kind of inconceivable at some level. Wouldn’t you say, Eryn?

Eryn Hurley   41:06
Yes, no, I mean.
Definitely. I mean, I totally agree. I mean, we’re all kind of just waiting to see exactly what ultimately ends up panning out. I think the, just kind of going back to your question too, Zach, about the focus on lame duck, right? I think really there’s a kind of two plausible windows, right? So.
There’s an incentive for current House majority right to push hard here because of the election uncertainty that we just talked through as well. But then at the same time, the case against the lame duck is that it’s a crowded window. We’ve already talked through everything, appropriations bills, we don’t know what’s going to ultimately end up happening there, NDAA, reconciliation and so on.

Marc Scribner   41:53
Right. I think that the thing that or the main thing that I think would motivate House leadership for trying to keep the lame duck window open is Sam Graves retiring and to still give him that last Hail Mary opportunity to get a to get a bill done.
as unlikely as it seems to be. But I think for foreclosing that before September 30th, I think, you know, there are people who would not prefer to do that to Chairman Graves.

Jeff Davis   42:29
Yeah, I think the Senate will insist on a 12-month extension, but the House will insist on three months and the House will probably win. But I could see some differences on that when this comes up in September. If you do a full year, you got to put another $4 billion into the mass transit account, because otherwise it’s going to go broke in August.
or so of 2027.
So, Waysmans has to want to do that.
And then we’ll see where it goes from there.

Zach Williams   43:00
Well, in the meantime, where does this kind of leave stakeholders? You know, I mean, it’s, I feel like it’s a little bit of Groundhog Day every week trying to ask Sam Graves, you know, hey, is it going to move today, you know, it’s going to move this week? You know, oh, we’re still aiming. But you know, what should stakeholders be doing now, you know, assuming that September 30th for a full reauthorization just ain’t going to happen?

Eryn Hurley   43:27
I guess I’ll jump in. On NACO side of things, what we’re telling county leaders in our membership is don’t stop advocating, right, just because this may slip, right? So the position members take now, the votes, the amendments, those really do carry weight into whatever comes
next, right? So even though we’re kind of in this limbo area right now, none of the advocacy that county leaders could be doing is ultimately wasted. I think also another thing or two other things, I guess, to actually think about too is, again, speaking on behalf of counties is
protect the formula wins that counties already secured in the House bill, specifically the bridge funding, STBG, and continuing to speak with members of Congress, especially senators, about why that part is so critical. And then finally, obviously, since I mentioned the Senate,
Is.
Start the conversations with the Senate now. They’re still working on a bill. We haven’t seen anything. There is a real window where county input can actually help shape whatever the starting text may pan out to be, instead of ultimately reacting to something that’s already locked in.
So those are kind of the three key items that I would say.

Zach Williams   44:53
Yeah, when things are up in the air, that’s the time to work, right?
Marc, Andy, Jeff, any thoughts on what people ought to be doing to get their thoughts heard?

Andy Winkler   45:07
I mean, I agree completely. You have to stay engaged now to make sure the committees are hearing from you to not let up the pressure. And in particular, as we get closer to September, that there is a lapse. You know, they do need to find a vehicle too to tie the short term extension so that we don’t hit the end of authorization. So that’s the other.
The other piece of it will get closer and closer to.

Zach Williams   45:31
And you know, not to not to pry you for all your secrets of the trade, but you know, tell me, Andy, Eryn, any any of you want to jump in, but you know, when you say for people to, you know, to reach out, you know, what should they be doing? Should they be, you know, standing outside the Capitol with a sign saying, we want, you know, a bill? Should they be

Marc Scribner   45:32
Yeah.

Zach Williams   45:50
you know, emailing, setting up appointments, you know, just tell me a little bit about your approach.

Eryn Hurley   45:58
So I’ll just say that, yes, definitely, you know, meeting with your members of Congress, NICO, we actually did an infrastructure fly-in. I guess it was officially started the day after Build America 250 was unveiled. So obviously that’s a key point, but I mean, we’re about to be
in August recess, right? So members of Congress are back in their districts. This is where the grassroots advocacy really happens. So setting up meetings with your member of Congress, even doing a tour of an infrastructure project to kind of outline, hey, this is kind of what is working versus not. And this is how, you know, a future
reauthorization bill could actually help improve these specific conditions. So I think with the month of August, that is a prime opportunity for those types of conversations and advocacy.

Marc Scribner   46:56
I agree with all that. One thing I would add is that, you know, on the Senate, I mean, we’ve talked about how the Senate’s further behind and we’ve, but also I want to emphasize that the, because the jurisdiction is more dispersed,
in the Senate than it is in the House. You have a lot of committee staff who aren’t as familiar with these issues. And then certainly the member office staff are not familiar with these issues. There’s also been a lot of staff turnover. So you shouldn’t, you know, what I would recommend stakeholders, you shouldn’t assume that these staffers are
are up to speed on the nitty gritty of your issues. So kind of starting from square one, explaining why this is important, perhaps explaining a bit about how the surface transportation process works and how that relates to your issue would be helpful because there’s a lot of new folks here who haven’t done a reauthorization bill before. And in the Senate where you don’t have some kind of, you know, a big committee that has a huge chunk of it, like in the House, that’s, it’s a challenge.

Zach Williams   48:16
So I want to get to, we got a couple questions rolling in from our audience. You know, one that was kind of interesting was about, here are the panel’s thoughts on innovation and technology. We’ve alluded to this a little bit, AVs, for instance. Two-person crew is one way to show that the house kind of back to something that was a little
anti-technology, if you will, pro-people, I guess you could say. But we’ve also seen, you know, the House bill and certainly chatter in the Senate encouraging innovation in other ways. So, you know, just in general, does Congress have a, you know, favorable attitude towards, you know, technological innovation in this space? Is it a bit conservative? You know, and immediately I think unions. Who wants to jump in on this?

Marc Scribner   49:00
Yeah, it doesn’t. There’s no coherent, you know, pro-technology position in this bill, in the House bill. I mean, like you alluded to, I mean, it’s an intensely anti-freight rail technology bill while also being a pretty, you know, strongly supportive
truck automation technology bill. And I think, you know, why those, you know, very, you know, big differences between those two modes, I think matter and why members of Congress should probably put a bit more thought to this. You’re putting, if you’re, if you’re simultaneously opposing technological innovation in the freight rail industry and supporting it in the trucking industry. Well, you’re just giving the truck, the trucking industry, a competitive advantage over freight rail. And the downstream consequences of that are we know that trucks are more polluting and more dangerous than freight rail. So
If you’re concerned about, you know, human life, which some of the people claiming to back these anti-rail automation bills, you know, say they are, you probably don’t want to be shifting cargo onto the highways. But that’s, you know, basically what this is designed to do at the moment.

Jeff Davis   50:23
If you can pitch your new technology as reducing the cost of stuff to the government, they’ll be in the cards be in favor of it. If you pitch your technology as reducing the cost of delivering stuff, which would, you know, which would cut into the number and salary, the number and pay of the human beings involved, that consensus breaks down quickly. So that’s the issue.

Zach Williams   50:51
Mm.
Another question from the audience, P3s, to what extent does this bill, you know, embrace them and, you know, a little bit wider, you know, what role should just private money in general have in this space? And any thoughts?

Marc Scribner   51:08
Well, that’s one, you know, waiting for the revenue title, waiting for ways and means, because they have they have jurisdiction over the private activity bond cap. And that’s the, you know, I think for the P3 world, that’s the big thing they’re looking to see. We’ve hit that, you know, IIIJA doubled it from 15 billion lifetime volume cap on private activity bonds to 30 billion. And in, you know, less than the span of that bill, they’ve already allocated all that additional 15 billion. So if we want to see that type of financing for those types of
procurement methods remain available, they’re going to have to do something with the cap and do it soon.

Zach Williams   51:54
Oh, that was a great point, Marc. Yet another bottleneck in ways and memes, right?

Jeff Davis   51:59
I will say that one of the other holdups, the constraints on P3s are the existing federal laws dating back over a century, in some cases prohibiting tolling. And so you don’t want to get more P3s out there, the one way to do it is to lift some of those restrictions. But

Jeff Davis   52:18
The House bill, to my knowledge, doesn’t actually do anything. We were, we kept waiting for the bill to come out to see if there was going to be anything on tolling in there, nothing. So the bill currently does not make life easier for P3s in that regard.

Marc Scribner   52:31
And they actually dial back a little bit of the moderate enthusiasm we saw in IIIJA with the congestion mitigation section 129, that new pathway. Not, you know, major change, but as Jeff said, but

Zach Williams   52:31
The.

Marc Scribner   52:50
Yeah, not moving if you want to see more tolling, not moving in the right direction.

Zach Williams   52:56
Is that just, you know, a matter of politics? You know, nobody wants to be known as the guy that imposed a poll, a poll, a toll on the highway, I guess, right?

Marc Scribner   53:07
That, well, certainly there’s a there’s a populist element there, but the the trucking industry is is pretty uniformly opposed to tolling anywhere.

Zach Williams   53:18
Does that mean the rail industry is foretolling then?

Marc Scribner   53:21
I think they are, I think the rail industry is happy with anything that results in trucks paying more.

Zach Williams   53:29
I mean, that’s just, it seems like this bill for how important it is, how it affects, you know, every district across the country, every state, in many ways just boils down to ways and means bottlenecks in the House, of course, and this eternal war for supremacy between railroads and the trucking industry, right?
Since we’re running low on time, I would certainly love to one last question. We’ll see if we can slip in another audience question before that. But, you know, just what we’ll go one by one with you. You know, what is something important about the surface transportation bill that you feel is not getting enough attention? And
If you can say it succinctly and why. We’ll start with you, Andy.

Andy Winkler   54:14
You’re saying in the current draft of the bill or just about the bill generally?

Zach Williams   54:18
The meta, the meta realm of surface reauthorization, yeah.

Andy Winkler   54:24
I mean, I think what is uniquely different, because I do work on other issue areas, transportation has this moment to come together every five, however, so many years to really think about what we want our transportation systems nationally to look like and how do we align federal programs to those goals. And we don’t always do it well, but I think it’s a unique moment to think about you know, what’s the future of transportation policy and to give people that certainty in this bill every few years.
Not every issue area has that. Housing has nothing equivalent to a transportation bill.

Zach Williams   54:59
Just really quick to hang on that very quickly. You know, certainly Biden, when he was president, talked a lot about infrastructure and a lot about bipartisanship. You know, any quick thoughts on kind of the role of the president last time around versus this time around without going down a huge rabbit hole?

Andy Winkler   55:19
No, I mean, I’ll just say real quickly, I think that’s the one thing that didn’t come up when we were talking about scenarios. I think the only other scenario in which something happens later or quicker is that the president personally engages and says he wants something done. So he certainly has a, you know, a position of power and an ability to move things in the House and the Senate if
if he wants to, but he has not, you know, talked about an infrastructure bill or transportation bill in the same way that, you know, we all pushed for the bipartisan infrastructure law.

Zach Williams   55:53
An X factor indeed. Going on to Marc, tell me, you know, as the process continues for reauthorization, what’s something that people should pay more attention to?

Marc Scribner   56:03
Well, I definitely think the rail title may be, may prove to be a stickier wicket than some of those members on TNI thought it might be. That is, you know, rail, right rail is unique in that it’s basically the only, they’re basically the only people.
people who aren’t begging for money every reauthorization, because they’re principally privately financed. So they care about regulation. And they do view this as a what’s currently in there as a long term competitive threat to their to their industry. So I think the intensity of
of rail opposition could make or break, you know, the passage opportunities here. It’s also interesting, that’s one of the few things that the White House has actually weighed in on vocally and intensely, was on the Railway Safety Act, I think because that’s a…
a priority of Vice President J.D. Vance. But it’s a, you know, the Sleepy Rail title is proven to be a lot more interesting this time around than it often is in the past.

Zach Williams   57:16
Gotcha. Jeff?

Jeff Davis   57:21
I would just draw attention to the continuing absurdity that this bill would give out almost $300 billion to states and the ratios that were determined by what the state air quality, population, VMT, et cetera, were in 2007.
and the degree to which their legislators were successfully getting earmarks in 2005. We’re perpetuating that for now 30 years, and I think it’s a long since time to update the way in which this bill gives out the primary bonanza of money.

Zach Williams   57:58
And last but not least.

Eryn Hurley   58:01
Thanks, Zach. I think more kind of as like a nebulous general sort of thing, and then I’ll get into like one specific item of the bill that we haven’t spoken about. I think that, you know, similar to what Andy was saying is that this is the largest, most consistent
piece of federal infrastructure investment there is, right? And almost nobody experiences it as a single event, right? So we kind of look at other legislative vehicles, bills, a stimulus bill, a disaster relief package. Service transportation is really the opposite, right? It’s this kind of like,
quiet, five-year river of money that shapes literally every, it could be a drive, a bus, you know, rail, all of that. And it just keeps flowing in the background, which I feel like is exactly why people forget it’s a choice that
that Congress has to actively make. So I think just as like a nebulous sort of thing, I think in terms of, you know, an actual portion of the bill, and it’s a unique one. So it’s actually focused around public lands specifically. So for counties or folks that are unfamiliar. So there’s a significant amount of federal lands that are within counties jurisdictions. And so since counties aren’t able to actually collect property tax revenue, but we still have to build and maintain roads and bridges that provide access to activities. It’s tourists visiting national parks or so on, right?
So there’s this little program called the Federal Landes Access Program, or FLAP. It’s one of the only federal programs designed specifically to fund locally owned infrastructure, purely because of where that infrastructure actually happens to sit on a map. So in this case,
federal lands. So even though it’s a really small piece of the bill, it’s only $1.63 billion / 5 years. It’s so significant for counties, 62% of them having federal lands within their boundaries, being a really critical lifeline to be able to support and maintain infrastructure within their communities.

Zach Williams   1:00:26
Awesome. Well, that was a very good note to end on. We’ve run out of time. Quickly, I’m just going to bullet point a few key things. Keep an eye on ways and means in the House. That’s a major hold up for the bill that we do have right now. August is going to be a key, key thing, even though Congress isn’t in town.
That might be perhaps the most pivotal time for how things go forward from here. And of course, as always, keep an eye on Trump. You know, his involvement or lack of involvement can take this thing in all sorts of different ways. So with that in mind, I appreciate all of our panelists, you know, being a part of this, answering some questions their expertise and thank you all for tuning in. I’m Zach Williams. I cover transportation for Bloomberg Government. Feel free to reach out anytime. And, you know, thanks again for taking part in this discussion, everyone.

This transcript was generated by Microsoft Teams and lightly edited for clarity. Please excuse any incidental spelling or grammatical errors and refer to the full video.