Highway bill conference committee schedules first meeting

By Keith Laing - 04/26/12 12:38 PM ET

The panel of lawmakers tapped to hammer out an agreement on a new federal transportation bill will hold its first meeting next month, a key member of the committee said Thursday.

Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) said the transportation conference committee would meet Tuesday, May 8. Boxer, who is chairwoman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, shepherded the Senate's two-year, $109 billion transportation bill through the upper chamber earlier this year.

Boxer said she is eager to begin negotiations on the bill with the House, though the lower chamber has only passed a pair of temporary extensions of current highway funding through Sept. 30.

"I am sure that every member of the conference, Democrat or Republican, House or Senate, understands how critical it is to swiftly pass a comprehensive transportation bill that is a deficit neutral, reform measure that will preserve or create millions of jobs and thousands of businesses," Boxer said in a statement released by her office.

“Now is the time to set aside our personal wish lists and focus on the issue at hand – the reauthorization of a bill that is absolutely essential to our economy," she continued. "Controversy should not be part of the conference and we should come together for the good of the country.”

Boxer is one of 14 senators who were appointed to the conference committee this week. She will be joined by Sens. Max Baucus (D-Mont.), Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Tim Johnson (D-S.D.), Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), James Inhofe (R-Okla.), David Vitter (R-La.), Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), Richard Shelby (R-Ala.), Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas), Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) and John Hoeven (R-N.D.).

The House has appointed 33 lawmakers to the highway bill conference committee, including Republican Reps. John Mica (Fla.), Don Young (Alaska), John Duncan (Tenn.), Bill Shuster (Pa.), Shelley Moore Capito (W-Va.), Rick Crawford (Ark.), Jaime Herrera Beutler (Wash.), Larry Bucshon (Ind.), Richard Hanna (N.Y.), Steve Southerland (Fla.), James Lankford (Okla.), Reid Ribble (Wis.), Fred Upton (Mich.), Ed Whitfield (Ky.), Doc Hastings (Wash.), Rob Bishop (Utah), Ralph Hall (Texas), Chip Cravaack (Minn.), Dave Camp (Mich.) and Patrick Tiberi (Ohio).

Those GOP members of the transportation conference committee will be joined by 13 House Democrats: Reps. Nick Rahall (W.Va.), Peter DeFazio (Ore.), Jerry Costello (Ill.), Jerrold Nadler (N.Y.), Corrine Brown (Fla.), Elijah Cummings (Md.), Leonard Boswell (Iowa), Tim Bishop (N.Y.), Henry Waxman (Calif.), Ed Markey (Mass.), Eddie Bernice Johnson (Texas), Earl Blumenauer (Ore.) and Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D.C.).