The process to reauthorize the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act (ISTEA) will begin soon, although ISTEA does not actually expire until Sept. 30, 1997.
With the passage of ISTEA in 1991 came the promise of more funding for county highways, bridges and mass transit systems, and a program which would be more flexible and responsive to the needs of local governments.
In general, this has been the case, with some variations by the state in which a county is located. Most ISTEA funds come to counties through the surface transportation program, the bridge program and several transit programs.
Both the House and Senate will begin the two-year reauthorization process with a series of hearings this spring. The U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) will also hold regional hearings throughout the country. All these hearings will take testimony from a variety of groups, including state and local officials, on what the future highway and transit program should look like.
NACo has already approved its policy on the future of ISTEA, which calls for the retention of the basic ISTEA structure. Several national transportation organizations have adopted policy which would scrap many of the reforms instituted by ISTEA. Resolving these differences and providing enough funding for transportation will determine how, and the level at which, county governments will be able to participate in the future federal highway and transit programs.
NACo supports maximum funding for ISTEA and opposes the use of transportation trust funds to balance the federal budget.
While counties own 1.7 million miles of roads and 219,000 bridges, operate one-third of the transit systems, and invest billions of dollars to build and maintain these systems, there remains a substantial need for federal funds to supplement county investment.
Generally, funding for highways and transit has increased over the life of ISTEA, though never to the authorized levels.
For FY96, the federal highway program was funded at $17.5 billion, a $300 million increase over the prior year. However, transit received slightly more than $4 billion, a 12 percent decrease, the first decrease in a number of years. Much of that decrease came out of the transit operating assistance program, which was cut to $400 million.
The Administration has not yet proposed the FY97 transportation budget, though it is likely to call for some reduction in transportation spending. However, the Administration has announced it will drop its Unified Transportation Infrastructure Investment Program proposal that called for a major revamping of the transportation programs and was included in last year’s budget.
This proposal would have likely resulted in a decrease in funding for local governments.
Whatever the Administration recommends, Congress certainly has a desire to cut the federal deficit, and it is possible that some transportation programs will be considered for cuts.
One strategy to avoid major cuts would be to take the highway, transit and aviation trust funds off budget, an approach with which NACo concurs. Currently, these trust funds have a balance of $31 billion, which is used to make the federal deficit appear smaller.
H.R. 842, the Truth in Budgeting Act, was passed unanimously on May 3, 1995 by the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee; it would remove the transportation trust funds from the federal unified budget. A vote on this bill may occur within the next two months.
A similar bill, S. 729, was introduced in the Senate on April 27 by Senators Trent Lott (R-Miss.) and Max Baucus (D-Mont.), though no further action has been taken.
The National Highway System (NHS) legislation was signed into law by President Clinton on Nov. 28, 1995.
This bill designates the 161,000 miles of existing highways which will become the NHS and be eligible for a separate category of highway funding. The legislation also included provisions that went far beyond the NHS designation.
It repealed the national speed limit, motorcycle helmet law, the crumb rubber mandate, and made the six ISTEA management systems voluntary. It prohibits USDOT from imposing highway sign metrication and design and plan metrication requirements on state and local governments.
The measure also creates a state infrastructure bank pilot program and includes a technical change to preserve $2.7 billion in highway funding for FY96. NACo supported the creation of the NHS and elimination of many of the mandates repealed by the bill.
Congress overwhelmingly passed the Telecommunications Act of 1996 on Feb. 1, and President Clinton signed the bill into law on Feb. 8. The measure contained a number of victories for county governments. These wins will help protect county government authority in the new era of telecommunications deregulation and open competition.
As part of the final agreement, compromise language was worked out on the contentious public rights-of-way issue. The legislation should, in most cases, protect the ability of local governments to manage their public rights-of-way and receive fair and reasonable compensation for their use. Much of that use will be cable operators offering phone service and phone companies providing video or cable service as both of these industries begin to compete against one another.
NACo’s other major issues involved preventing the pre-emption of local zoning authority over the placement of cellular towers. NACo was successful in overturning a House-passed provision which would have required the Federal Communications Commission to issue regulations pre-empting local zoning authority.
A compromise will allow local governments, except in certain limited circumstances, to continue to exercise their zoning authority in respect to cellular towers.
Other provisions in the bill affecting local governments include deregulation of most cable rate regulation, taxation of direct broadcast satellite services and zoning of direct broadcast satellite dishes.
Counties operate or participate in the operation of one-third of the nation’s airports. The federal government funds infrastructure at publicly owned airports through the Airport Improvement Program (AIP).
In recent years, funding has ranged from the current-year level of $1.45 billion to slightly over $2 billion. AIP expires on Sept. 30, 1996 and NACo supports its extension at an authorized level of $2.2 billion annually.
Additionally, the federal airline ticket tax, the proceeds of which go into a trust fund to fund AIP, expired on Jan. 1, 1996. The extension of this ticket tax is part of the budget deficit-reduction package that has been stalled.
(Prepared by Robert Fogel, associate legislative director.)
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