House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Illinois) composed a letter indicating he will allow a two-month extension for the September 11 commision to file their report, currently due on May 27. If this satisfies Senators McCain (R-Arizona) and Lieberman (D-Connecticut), they presumably would drop their hold on the temporary extension of the existing transit law.

McCain and Lieberman held up the law to ask for an additional two months for both the report and the dissolution of the commission. Hastert appears to only be supporting an extension in the report deadline, but not for an extension of the date the commission is dissolved (July 26).

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist Met with the nation's governor's on February 24 and laid out some of the key elements on the Senate agenda for this session of Congress. He had the following to say about key issues:

TANF Reauthorization

The leader said the bill would come to the Senate floor within the next three months. He said to expect "some movement" (in a positive direction) on child care funding on the floor. An extension will be needed before March 31 and Frist said the Senate would enact one.

TEA-21

Frist said he is confident a compromise bill can be worked out that would gain the President's signature. He said the price tag of the bill would have to decrease below the Senate-approved level to achieve this. Despite this show of confidence, he said that various extension options were under consideration, including extending the bill past this congressional session.

Internet Tax Moratorium

Frist said the Senate would have the debate on extending/expanding the ban on taxation of internet access this year. He indicated he did not want to do harm to the states and localities but at the same time he wants to encourage the adoption of new technology.

Budget

The majority leader said the Senate would begin debating the budget resolution during the week of March 7.

Energy Bill

Frist indicated there is a "very good chance" the bill scaled-back energy bill would pass the Senate by mid-March.

Interestingly, the leader did not indicate when the appropriations bills would be completed. Last year at this time he made a point of talking about how important it was to "keep the trains running on time" with regard to appropriations. The problems he experienced last year, which resulted in most appropriations not being completed until the new year, may be repeated this year given the proposal by the President to keep the increase in spending for non-Defense,non-Homeland discretionary spending down to only .5%. Many on Capitol Hill are already predicting a post-election "lame duck" session will be needed to complete the appropriations process for fiscal 2005.

Watch this space for further updates on the legislative calendar for this session.

The extension of the current transit law, passed in the House, has hit a bump: Senators John McCain (R-Arizona) and Joe Lieberman (D-Connecticut) are holding the extension hostage until the September 11th commision is given an extra two months to complete its work.

House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Illinois) has been opposed to giving the 9/11 panel extra time to work with, despite the White House being on record for endorsing additional time. Hastert's spokesman, John Feehery, said Thursday that even if McCain and Lieberman are successful in sending the transit extension back to the house, that they "are not coming back", according to Congresional Quarterly.

If the two measures are not passed or unentangled, the Transportation Department will have to shut down operations at the Federal Highway Administration, the Federal Transit Administration, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, at the beginning of next week.

We are hearing numerous reports from sources on the House side of the Capitol indicating that a decision is near to drop the six-year authorization of TEA-21 and move an extension through September 30, 2005 instead. Apparently GOP members of the House T&I Committee met today (February 26) with White House Chief of Staff (and former Secretary of Transportation) Andrew Card and Mr. Card said the President would veto any legislation with a price tag over $270 billion. Mr. Card indicated, however, that the President did not want a fight on this and would accept the two-year extension with a funding increase in '05 above the '04 levels. Reports we hear indicate House leadership is leaning towards taking the deal on the two-year authorization and planning to come back to this issue next year.

In a related story, transportation newsletters are reporting today that House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas) is threathening to offer his "SHARE" proposal -- to set the minimum allocation in the highway program at 95% of each state's contribution to the Highway Trust Fund -- on a two-year bill if it does come up. This would make passage of the extension more difficult.

Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan testifed before the House Budget Committe today that rising federal deficits coupled with an aging population would leave "no choice but to make significant structural adjustments in the major retirement programs". He indicated a clear preference for a reduction of benefits over a tax expansion, saying "tax rate increases of sufficient dimension to deal with our looming fiscal problems arguably pose significant risks to economic growth and the revenue base."

Greenspan's full testimony is located here.

With the current TEA-21 extension bill expiring on February 29, the Senate must pass a second extension bill by week’s end to keep highway money flowing to the states. On February 11, the House passed a second TEA-21 extension that would lapse at the end of June. However, Senate leaders favor a two-month extension bill, which would place more pressure on House leaders to pass a long-term reauthorization bill before the Easter-Passover recess in April.

On February 12, the Senate passed a long-term reauthorization bill (S.1072), which would fund highway and transit programs at $318 billion over the next six years. With the House unable to even pass a long-term reauthorization bill out of committee, the Senate for the time being, will have to follow the lead of the House and pass another short-term extension bill.

Senator James Inhofe (R-Oklahoma), Chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, feels that a longer extension bill would impose a greater burden on state DOTs trying to plan for future highway construction projects. Inhofe desires a two-month extension, which would force the House to pass a long-term reauthorization bill by the middle of April. Senator Inhofe recently met with House leaders and feels that both Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Illinois) and House Majority Leader Tom Delay (R-Texas) are more interested in passing a long-term bill rather than a long-term extension.

Members of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, such as ranking member, Rep. James Oberstar (R-Minnesota) and Highways, Transit and Pipelines Subcommittee Chairman, Rep. Tom Petri (R-Wisconsin), want the Senate to pass a three or four month extension bill. Both Oberstar and Petri feel the House will need more than two months to consider a long-term reauthorization bill. Members of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee led by Chairman Don Young (R-Alaska), continue to brandish the committee’s $375 billion reauthorization bill. However, such a bill would require an increase in the gas tax and is opposed by House GOP leaders and the President. Chairman Young has indicated that he might drop the price tag of the committee’s bill, but has not yet indicated whether the committee will match the Senate bill’s cost of $318 billion. Chairman Young will have to rely on the Ways and Means Committee to pass a revenue title that will support funding increases in highway and transit programs.

Initially the House T&I Committee was supposed to markup their reauthorization bill on February 25, but the hearing was delayed until either March 1 or 3. Chairman Young is still negotiating provisions of the bill with House GOP leaders and Rep. Bill Thomas (R-California), Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee.

Here’s the list of House Appropriations Subcommittee deadlines. Members must submit their appropriations requests by this deadline in order to be considered for FY 2005 funding. Keep in mind that some subcommittees require a form for each request, and that some members have their own forms and requests deadlines prior to these subcommittee deadlines: