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Mica: Highway compromise will be the 'jobs bill for the 112th Congress'
The House Republican who led negotiations for a deal reached Wednesday on a new transportation bill said the compromise would be the "jobs bill for the 112th Congress."
House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman John Mica (R-Fla.) told reporters that the House-Senate agreement on transportation funding would create more jobs than any other piece of legislation being considered by Congress.
"It's been a long, tough battle, but I think this is going to be the bill to put more people back to work than anything Congress does in the next two years," he said.
That would provide enough time for lawmakers to meet a 72-hour review rule in the House for pending legislation. Current highway funding is set to expire June 30.
Asked if he was disappointed in the differences between the proposed compromise version of the transportation bill and the House's original proposal for a five-year, $260-billion bill that tied infrastructure spending to oil drilling, Mica said the agreement between the House and Senate contained what he wanted most.
"I tried to get the most long-term bill as possible...fully-funded," he said. "In this business, you have to deal with what support you have available."
The details of the agreement that emerged on Wednesday suggest lawmakers will approve 28 months of transportation funding at levels close to the Senate's original proposal of spending approximately $54 billion a year on road and transit projects.
The agreement helps lawmakers avoid a 10th extension of the transportation funding bill that was initially supposed to expire in 2009.
Transportation advocates had argued that a temporary extension without new revenue would bankrupt the Highway Trust Fund that traditionally pays for construction projects. The Congressional Budget Office projects the trust fund would run out of money as early as 2013 without Congress passing a new transportation bill.
