CAGTC Members,
As promised in my earlier email, please find a more detailed summary of the White House’s infrastructure plan here. The document summarizes the information in the plan we deemed important for CAGTC members. We look forward to speaking to membership about the plan and hearing your thoughts during our CAGTC-only membership call on Wednesday, February 14 at 3:30pm Eastern/12:30pm Pacific. As a reminder, if you are interested in joining the call but have not yet RSVPd, please do so to me at kcross@blakey-agnew.com in order to receive the dial-in information.
Importantly, President Trump also released his budget request for fiscal year 2019 (FY19) today, titled “An American Budget.” The proposed $4.4 trillion budget calls for $76.8 billion for the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT). Around $15.6 billion of that is USDOT discretionary funding, which is $2.9 billion less than fiscal year 2017 levels. Of importance to CAGTC, the budget request eliminates funding for the TIGER grant program and proposes to “wind down” the Capital Investment Grant program (known as New Starts). Because the INFRA grant program and freight formula programs are authorized/funded through the Highway Trust Fund, they are not impacted by the budget request.
President Trump justifies the elimination of TIGER by saying that it “awards grants to projects that are generally eligible for funding under existing surface transportation formula grant and loan programs. In addition, DOT’s Infrastructure For Rebuilding America grant program, authorized by the FAST Act, supports larger highway and multimodal freight projects with demonstrable national or regional benefits.”
As we noted when President Trump proposed the elimination of TIGER in last year’s budget request, competitive grant programs, such as TIGER and INFRA, are critical tools for transportation projects that are difficult to fund through formula programs. Furthermore, TIGER and INFRA are not interchangeable – TIGER can address a multitude of mobility issues of various sizes, including freight and mixed use infrastructure. INFRA is aimed at investing in large-scale, freight-specific infrastructure improvements. Both programs fill very real needs and should continue to be funded.
The trade press is reporting that, given the passage of the two-year budget deal into law last week, it is likely that Congress will ignore the cuts to discretionary programs, like TIGER, proposed by President Trump.
You can find the text of the budget online here, a USDOT Budget Highlights document here, and a USDOT update to the FY19 budget request given the two-year budget deal signed into law last week here.
Thank you,
Katie Cross
Manager, Member Communications & Policy
Coalition for America’s Gateways and Trade Corridors
1625 K Street NW
Suite 1100
Washington, DC 20006
tradecorridors.org