Local government leaders meet with USDOT on surface transportation reauthorization

Key Takeaways

On August 15, NACo and the National Association of County Engineers (NACE), met with the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) to discuss county transportation and infrastructure priorities. USDOT Deputy Secretary Steven Bradbury and Special Advisor Sean McMaster hosted the discussion, which comes as the agency works to develop its priorities for the surface transportation reauthorization process.

The meeting also included representatives from other organizations in the Local Officials in Transportation (LOT) Coalition, a nonpartisan group made up of local and regional government stakeholders committed to strengthening America’s transportation systems. Members include NACo, the National League of Cities (NLC), U.S. Conference of Mayors (USCM), Association of Metropolitan Planning Organizations (AMPO), National Association of Regional Councils (NARC) and National Association of Development Organizations (NADO).  

Local governments own more than 75 percent of the nation’s road miles, nearly half of all bridges, and operate a significant number of public transit systems and airports. Counties alone own 38 percent of bridges and 44 percent of public road miles, including over 40 percent of the mileage on the Federal-aid highway system. Locally owned infrastructure is more likely to be in poor condition than state-owned infrastructure, a trend that is exacerbated by federal underinvestment in locally owned roads and bridges.

During the meeting, NACo Executive Director/CEO Matt Chase spoke about how counties have significant infrastructure obligations that they are increasingly unable to meet given rising costs and limited financial capacity. Nationwide, counties spend over $140 billion per year on infrastructure, but state-level restrictions limit their ability to raise additional funding for infrastructure or other uses. This puts many counties, especially in rural areas, in a difficult position. Specifically, Chase brought up the example of Grant County, Okla., which has a population of just over 4,100 but is responsible for 468 bridges.  

Chase also shared county perspectives on how the current federal program works and how it could be strengthened to better serve counties and other units of local government. This included top NACo priorities like improving county access to formula transportation dollars, reforming the grant process and streamlining permitting without cutting local governments out of the picture.

NACo thanks USDOT for their intergovernmental partnership with counties and looks forward to further collaboration through the passage and implementation of the next surface transportation reauthorization bill.