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“NEED FOR INFRASTRUCTURE INVESTMENT” mentioning the U.S. Dept. of Transportation was published in the House of Representatives section on pages H1008 on Jan. 23, 2019.
The Department handles nearly all infrastructure crisscrossing the country. Downsizing the Federal Government, a project aimed at lowering taxes and boosting federal efficiency, said the Department should be privatized to save money, reduce congestion and spur innovation.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
NEED FOR INFRASTRUCTURE INVESTMENT
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Malinowski) for 5 minutes.
Mr. MALINOWSKI. Madam Speaker, I rise today to introduce the Transportation Funding Fairness Act and to express my hope that, after we have come to our senses and reopened the government, this year Congress will come together to fund the bridges, tunnels, railroads, airports, and roads that we all understand America needs to prosper and grow.
In the first decade of the 20th century, commuters in New Jersey towns like Summit, Union, and Westfield could hop on a steam-powered train, ride right up to a terminal on the dock in Jersey City, change seamlessly to a ferry, and be in Manhattan within 50 minutes to an hour, if there wasn't too much fog or ice on the Hudson River.
A hundred years of magical, technological progress later, and we have managed to shave that trip by maybe a few minutes, if the trains are running on time that day.
Decades of underinvestment in public infrastructure have taken its toll on American greatness. Anyone who has traveled the world and has seen the modern airports and seaports and fast rail networks that our competitors are building would understand that.
Just in the last 2 months, as we have not even been able to open our government, the Chinese Government has been busy approving over $125 billion in new rail projects--$125 billion.
No State suffers more from our lack of attention to infrastructure than New Jersey, where twice as many people use public transportation than the national average. To get to and from New York, 200,000 of us a day still depend on just two rail tracks across the Portal Bridge and through a Hudson River tunnel that our great-grandparents built in 1910 because they thought those 50-minute, turn-of-the-century commute times were unacceptably long.
When the Portal Bridge opens to let boats pass today, a worker with a hammer must sometimes lock it back into place while stranded commuters wait, and that Hudson River tunnel has just a few years of life left. If we fail to replace it in time, we will be dealing a crippling blow to the economy of our region and our country.
That is why it is so urgent and important that we get the Gateway Tunnel project built.
Madam Speaker, in New Jersey, when we say we want to build bridges, not walls, that is not just a metaphor. We mean it literally. The $5.7 billion that would be wasted to wall off America from Mexico happens to be almost exactly the Federal share of building a new Hudson River tunnel that would keep Americans connected to each other and, ultimately, to the world.
These are the real choices that we face. Is there any doubt what the voters who sent us here would have us choose: building something that millions of people living in my State and neighboring States say they desperately need, or something people living on the border say they do not need? A symbol of national progress, or a symbol of national fear? Is there any question at all?
That is one reason why I am introducing this bipartisan bill today, which is meant to clear one of the artificial obstacles the Department of Transportation has placed in the path of the Gateway Tunnel.
The Department has argued that when States take advantage of Federal transportation loans to pay some of their share of projects jointly funded by the Federal Government, like Gateway, those loans don't count as part of the State contribution to the project.
It makes no sense. State taxpayers, after all, are 100 percent obligated to pay back those loans. It is like saying that I am not actually paying for my house because I have taken out a mortgage.
Our bill makes crystal clear that States can use Federal loans to cover all or part of their share of these projects.
Speaking of taxpayers, Madam Speaker, I represent a State where we get only 74 cents back from Washington for every dollar we pay in taxes. That is the worst ratio in the country. The average American gets $1.12 back for every dollar he or she pays, courtesy of the Federal deficit.
What we ask, with strong justification, is that Washington give a bit more back in the form of investment in the infrastructure that powers States like New Jersey and, in turn, enables us to power the American economy.
I hope we will make progress on that this year and that this bill will make the task a little bit easier
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