Recent Streetsblog NYC posts about House of Representatives

Mica, GOP Leadership Looking to Raise Transportation Spending Levels in Bill

By Tanya Snyder | Sep 23, 2011 | No Comments

According to yet another great report from Jeff Davis at Transportation Weekly, House Republican leadership has given House Transportation Committee Chair John Mica permission to seek additional revenues to fund the transportation reauthorization at levels $15 billion higher than initially proposed. One Republican source, quoted in Transportation Weekly, said that given the persistently high unemployment […]

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House Passes Transportation Extension Unanimously

By Tanya Snyder | Sep 13, 2011 | No Comments

Well, that wasn’t so hard. The GOP-led House just approved a six-month extension of the transportation law. After about 45 minutes of debate, the chair called for a voice vote, and no one objected. During the debate, members bickered over whether the FAA shutdown was the Democrats’ fault or the Republicans’ fault; whether the stimulus […]

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House Prepares to Vote on Extension, Coburn Will Try to Kill Bike/Ped

By Tanya Snyder | Sep 13, 2011 | No Comments

In a couple of hours, the House will vote on the transportation extension bill – under unanimous consent rules. That means a single vote in opposition could delay passage. It’s unclear how we went from a House determined to cut spending levels by more than 30 percent to a House unanimously committed to passing a […]

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Senate’s “Dr. No” Says He’ll Block Transpo Extension Unless Bike/Ped Is Cut

By Tanya Snyder | Sep 6, 2011 | No Comments

Oklahoma Republican Tom Coburn is known around the Senate as “Dr. No” for his propensity to hold up key legislation, single-handedly, because it contains something not to his liking (or sometimes because he’s upset about something else entirely.) On Veterans Day in 2009, he shocked even his GOP colleagues by blocking veterans’ benefits because he […]

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It’s Official: Congress’s Next Spitting Contest Will Be Over the Gas Tax

By Tanya Snyder | Aug 11, 2011 | No Comments

Since the 112th Congress convened in January, the federal government almost shut down, the government almost defaulted on its debts, and the FAA was temporarily shuttered. It’s the Crisis Congress, thriving on the chaos of catastrophe. Next up: a bruising fight over funding the transportation system. A few weeks ago, Ben Smith at Politico mentioned […]

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House Votes to Strip High-Speed Rail Funding

By Tanya Snyder | Jul 15, 2011 | No Comments

This morning, the House voted 232-182 for an Energy and Water Appropriations bill that redirects $1 billion of high-speed rail money to flood relief for the Midwest. Never mind that that flood relief won’t arrive for many months, since this is a 2012 appropriations bill. The important thing here is to kill high-speed rail. (Why? […]

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