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ARTBA NEWS: American Road & Transportation Builders Association                   

Phone: 202-289-4434 - www.artba.org/news

 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                                                      Contact: Jeff Solsby

                                                                                                              202-289-4434

 

Transportation Bill Delay Will Impede Recovery and Create Market Uncertainty, ARTBA Leaders Tell Congressional Committees

 

Veteran Industry CEO Urges Action on Federal Highway/Transit Bill While Businessman Outlines Impacts on Small Firms

 

(Washington, D.C.) - Proposals to delay the federal surface transportation program authorization are \"mind boggling,\" contrary to lessons \"learned the hard way\" during previous periods of economic crisis, and can create market uncertainty that will slow job growth begun under the recent economic stimulus law. Passage of a multi-year surface transportation investment bill in the near future will create jobs and speed economic recovery and begin to remedy the congestion, performance and capacity consequences of transportation infrastructure under-investment.

 

Those were the messages of two American Road & Transportation Builders Association (ARTBA) leaders in testimony today before two House of Representative committees. ARTBA Chairman Charles Potts, CEO of Indianapolis, Ind.-based Heritage Construction and Materials, anchored a panel before the Subcommittee on Highways and Transit of the Transportation & Infrastructure Committee. ARTBA member Michael Filipczak, president of Midasco, LLC, an infrastructure contractor in Elkridge, Md., testified to the House Committee on Small Business.

 

Potts outlined the importance of action on the Transportation & Infrastructure Committee\'s proposed $450 billion surface transportation authorization bill saying it would \"substantially meet the nation\'s highway and transit investment needs during the next six years. By comparison, an 18 month extension of the current law would put the nation even further behind in addressing its highway and transit needs.\"

 

He noted a parallel between the current recession and the 2002-2003 economic downturn, when Congress postponed action on the federal transportation investment bill 12 times. The uncertainty caused by those extensions led state and local governments to spend fewer federal highway funds in 2003 and 2004 than in 2002. Potts noted it was virtually impossible for state and local transportation agencies to develop effective transportation investment programs without a long-term funding horizon.

 

Outlining the impact on U.S. small businesses from transportation infrastructure investment, Filipczak noted that the transportation construction industry includes more than 11,000 firms-90 percent of which have fewer than 100 employees, with an industry average of 40 employees.

\"Small businesses depend on the nation\'s transportation network to move people and products around town and throughout the country. Highway congestion has become a major drain on the energy and vitality of small businesses. When the day is spent dealing with the fall-out of highway construction-scheduling, routing, late deliveries, missed appointments, unhappy customers-this takes time away from planning and growing business,\" Filipczak said.

 

Filipczak told the committee that the transportation construction industry as a whole lost jobs in 2008 and today has lost some 40,000 jobs to date - a pattern he noted applied to industry firms as well as subcontractors and suppliers. He said the surest route to recovery was to not pass an 18 month extension of current surface transportation programs, but to enact a multi-year, federal infrastructure investment bill which could create as many as 150,000 jobs in 2010.

 

Over the six-year period covered by the transportation investment bill proposed by the House Transportation & Infrastructure Committee, Filipczak and Potts each said the increased highway funding would support an annual average of almost 540,000 more jobs in the U.S. economy than under the current funding level.

 

Chairman Potts told the Transportation & Infrastructure Committee he had \"never seen a situation as dire as the one facing the nation\'s surface transportation network today,\" and that physical conditions and performance on U.S. highway and transit systems are badly deteriorating because of inadequate investment. These conditions require action, not procrastination,\" he said.

 

Established in 1902, ARTBA represents the U.S. transportation design and construction industry in the Nation\'s Capital.

 

 

 

This project will involve Midasco working as a subcontractor for M. Luis Construction Company for the rehabilitation of Orleans Street. Midasco will be furnishing and installing signing, lighting, video detection and traffic signal systems. This project is scheduled to complete by mid 2010.

This project will involve Midasco working as a subcontractor for TMG Construction Corporation for the rehabilitation of Fort Belvoir South Loop Road. Midasco will be furnishing and installing signing and lighting. This project is scheduled to complete by 8-6-2010.

The project will involve Midasco working as a subcontractor for Rustler Construction, Inc. for the Streetscape Improvements from MD 246 Great Mills Road from MD 235 to West of Saratoga Drive in St. Mary\'s County, MD. Midasco will be building traffic signal systems. The project is scheduled to complete by the end of 2011