Moving Ahead For Progress MAP-21
Letter from Senator About Transportation Bill
Last Friday, I asked you to write to your representatives about the Surface Transportation Bill and specifically requested that you ask them to support the trail funding portion of it. Hopefully some of you did that. I especially hope that our trail friends in California contacted representative Boxer about supporting trails in the “Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century (MAP-21) act. Of course, I also sent an email to all three of my representatives and have gotten one back, so far. Here is what Senator Michael Bennet had to say about transportation funding:
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Dear Kevin:
Thank you for contacting me regarding S.1813, the Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century (MAP-21) Act. I appreciate hearing from you.
Let me begin by saying I believe Congress must act to address the dire needs of our transportation infrastructure. We cannot continue to expect states to be able to keep up with the maintenance and capacity needs of our highways, bridges, and transit systems without the certainty of a long-term national strategy.
As you may know, Senator Barbara Boxer of California introduced MAP-21 on November 7, 2011. This legislation would ensure that transportation resources continue to reach the states for the next two fiscal years. It authorizes a national policy on highways, bridges, and transit systems and also addresses a number of highway safety issues. The bill is fully paid for. I was proud to support bipartisan passage of MAP-21 when the Senate on March 14, 2012 voted 74-22 to send the bill to the House of Representatives. It is now up to the House to complete its work on a transportation bill so that the two versions can be reconciled and sent to the President for his signature.
This legislation contains numerous programs that support multimodal transportation needs in Colorado. As a member of the Senate Banking Committee, I was able to promote several transit provisions that will benefit Colorado’s transit agencies. The first is a modification to the rural transit formula that will now account for the number of miles traveled to provide transit service. Since Colorado has been one of the nation’s top providers of rural transit, it stands to benefit a great deal from the passage of MAP-21. I also worked on a provision that authorizes $20 million per year for grants to help communities and transit agencies develop plans for transit-oriented development. It will help community leaders work with the private sector to promote mixed-use economic development around our transit facilities, such as housing, retail, and commercial space.
It is important to note that this is not a perfect bill. Our infrastructure needs are not going to be solved in a two-year window. And the current structure of the gas tax is not a sustainable way to continue financing transportation. Congress must get to work on a plan that will fund our infrastructure needs in the long term. I am eager to work with my colleagues to develop a workable solution that fulfills our obligations to generations of future Americans.
I value the input of fellow Coloradans in considering the wide variety of important issues and legislative initiatives that come before the Senate. I hope you will continue to inform me of your thoughts and concerns.
For more information about my priorities as a U.S. Senator, I invite you to visit my website at http://bennet.senate.gov/. Again, thank you for contacting me. Sincerely,
Michael Bennet
United States Senator
Did anyone else hear back from their Senators or other representatives?
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