Lawmakers Bare Partisan Divide On Highway Taxes

There’s bipartisan support for quick passage of a comprehensive transportation bill, but members of the House Transportation Infrastructure Committee on Wednesday demonstrated there is still a wide gap when it comes to funding the bill.

Rep. John Mica, R-Fla., ranking member on the transportation committee, Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., chairman of the highways and transit subcommittee, and a number of their colleagues exchanged verbal barbs about transportation finance at a luncheon for freight transportation interests sponsored by the Coalition for America’s Gateways and Trade Corridors.

Mica, who spoke first, said it’s nearly impossible this year to get Congress to raise the gasoline tax and warned it will be even more difficult if a more conservative Congress convenes in January 2011.

“If they passed a gas tax now, not only would I be (committee) chairman, there would be no minority members,” Mica said. He later challenged the audience, “If any of you think we can pass a gas tax between now and November, raise your hands. I want to see who’s been smoking dope.”

Mica proposed replacing the gas tax with a sales or flat tax that would stabilize the Highway Trust Fund. Once the fund is stable, the revenue could leverage investment in public-private partnerships, or a national infrastructure bank.

The Obama administration put forward the idea of an infrastructure fund to pay for transportation, but Mica said the $25 billion fund over five years was “peanut-brained thinking. We need a $250 billion infrastructure bank.”

DeFazio countered that no Republican would support the kind of flat tax Mica proposes – there could be no meaningful discussion on transportation funding without raising taxes.

“Public-private partnerships, infrastructure banks – those are all nice side things, but the problem is we need a substantial increase in direct investment in our national transportation system on a multimodal basis. That means the T-word,” DeFazio said. “Republicans don’t like to mention taxes, neither does the White House.” Between the two, “we won’t be able to have a meaningful discussion.”

-- Contact R.G. Edmonson at bedmonson@joc.com.