Several Trucking Measures in Limbo as Congress Enters Lame-Duck Phase

This story appears in the Nov. 29 print edition of Transport Topics.

Several bills introduced in Congress that would affect the trucking industry remain in limbo as the current “lame-duck” Congress races to finish its business by year-end, experts said.

The bills include measures relaxing truck weight limits on some highways, providing subsidies for natural gas-powered trucks, reinstating a tax break for biofuels and requiring use of electronic onboard recorders.

Two measures, however, the highway reauthorization funding plan and a continuing resolution for appropriations will expire soon and will require the Congress to act before the holiday break.

Current highway funding authority expires Dec. 31, and the current resolution funding the federal government’s operations, including the Department of Transportation, expires Dec. 3.

“It looks as though another short-term appropriations continuing resolution will be approved,” said Mary Phillips, senior vice president of legislative affairs for American Trucking Associations. “It’s unclear what’s going to happen after that, whether there will be a long-term continuing resolution or an omnibus bill.”

Phillips said she expects both spending measures to be extended, but for less than a year.

Although the current Congress won’t pass a six-year transportation funding bill, the Republican slated to take over as chairman of the House Transportation Committee, Rep. John Mica of Florida, said a long-term bill will be his priority when the new Congress goes to work in January.

The fate of several other trucking-related bills is in limbo with the lame-duck Congress, said Phillips and Norma Krayem, a senior policy adviser at the Washington, D.C., law firm of Patton Boggs.

A lame-duck session of Congress follows November elections, when some members were defeated for re-election or chose not to seek another term.

Those bills include:

• A measure that would grant Maine and Vermont a permanent exemption from the 80,000-pound truck weight limit on interstate highways.

With a pilot program set to expire on Dec. 17, U.S. Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine), and Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), are working to attach legislation to the appropriations bill in the current lame-duck session that would permanently allow trucks in those two states to carry up to 97,000 pounds on the interstates, said Brian Parke, president of the Maine Motor Transport Association. The Obama administration supports the weight exemption, but the proposal faces opposition from some Democrats.

“I don’t get a sense which way it’s going, one way or the other,” Parke told Transport Topics, “but we’ll know definitively by Dec. 3.”

• A bill that Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) introduced in the Senate that would provide truckers rebates of $64,000 for every natural gas-powered Class 8 truck put into service by 2013.

On Nov. 16, Reid canceled a Senate vote on the natural gas bill and is “engaging in some positive discussions with Republicans about moving forward” to fashion a bipartisan agreement, said Reid spokesman Joel Payne.

But the major hurdle for the bill is finding a way to fund the rebates, said Denise McCourt, a spokeswoman for trade group Natural Gas Vehicles for America, which supports the bill. “There are two possibilities. One of them is that they will figure out a pay-for before Congress goes home for the session,” McCourt told TT. “The other is that it could come up early in the new session.”

• A proposal to reinstate the $1 a gallon biodiesel tax credit that supporters have said would keep the alternative fuel price competitive with traditional diesel. So far, the measure is stalled in Congress, largely because of concerns that biofuel tax credits would cost the federal government billions of dollars in lost revenue.

“Chairman [Max] Baucus [D-Mont.] remains committed to fighting for crucial tax incentives for renewable energy companies,” an aide to the Senate Committee on Finance told TT. “Since the bill is comprised of provisions supported by members of both parties, we are hopeful that it will pass in the coming weeks.”

Meanwhile, dozens of biodiesel plants across the nation have either temporarily or permanently shut down their operations because the tax credit expired Dec. 31, 2009.

• A bill that would require all trucks to use electronic onboard recorders to monitor their drivers’ hours of service. The EOBR legislation, introduced Sept. 29 by Sens. Mark Pryor (D-Ark.), and Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), has not yet cleared the Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, and no hearings have been held.

“Basically, it’s been referred to committee, and that’s where we’re at right now,” said a spokeswoman for Pryor.

But much of the legislative heavy lifting likely will come up next year as the new Congress wrestles to find a way to pay for the maintenance and improvement of the nation’s transportation infrastructure.

Mica has said that he opposes increasing the fuel tax and wants to see transportation infrastructure improvements funded within existing resources through restructuring of the highway program, environmental streamlining and the use of public-private partnerships, Phillips said.

“Congress has not been receptive to a fuel-tax increase,” Phillips said. “I think there will be the same reluctance in the next Congress.”

Krayem said that the new Congress may look to tailor the highway program to available resources and focus on prioritizing federal investment within that revenue constraint.

“Freight mobility is likely to be a part of that vision,” Krayem said. “Democrats placed stronger focus on livability and sustainability, which may not see strong support with House Republicans.”