Brown urges House to deal on transit bill

With the Obama Administration threatening a veto if a transportation-funding bill drafted by House Republicans passes Congress, U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown (D., Ohio) on Wednesday called on his lower-house counterparts to develop a bipartisan proposal similar to the one working its way through the Senate.

"If the House fails to do the right thing, the consequences are inexcusable," Mr. Brown said from Washington during a telephone news conference. "The House should follow the Senate's lead, strip the partisanship out of it, and pass it."

It's not just the possibilities that needed improvements to roads and bridges will be deferred or that guaranteed gas-tax funding for public transportation will be eliminated if the House version becomes law, the senator said. There's also the risk, he said, that legislative gridlock will mean no transportation bill is passed at all before March 31, when the latest in a series of program extensions Congress has approved since 2009 expires.

The Senate bill, for which debate opened last week with an 85-11 procedural vote, proposes spending $109 billion over two years, while the House version sets aside $260 billion over nearly five years.

But the latter includes provisions approving controversial oil and gas drilling offshore and in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and construction of a disputed oil pipeline from Canada through the Great Plains to Texas, while eliminating Highway Trust Fund set-asides for transit and safety programs to focus funding strictly on road and bridge repairs.

Throughout Ohio, Senator Brown said, 59 transit agencies receive about $160 million annually in federal funds.

The Toledo Area Regional Transit Authority last year received $6,657,800 in federal capital grants. James Gee, the agency's general manager, said it needs that money to buy buses and undertake projects such as the new Toledo Area Regional Paratransit Service garage it has built on the former Page Dairy site at Wade and Williams streets.

Transit funding would not be eliminated outright, but instead would place transit grants under general-revenue programs, which would make them more vulnerable to cuts. Funding transit programs from the Highway Trust Fund dates back to the Reagan administration.

House Speaker John Boehner (R., Ohio) Wednesday told GOP colleagues in a closed-door meeting he had delayed final action until after next week's congressional recess. Spokesman Michael Steel said the delay would provide more time to work through nearly 300 amendments lawmakers want to offer.

But others in both parties said so many Republicans object to some portion of the 1,000-page bill that it can't pass in its present form. Still others have concerns about how the legislation will affect their districts, GOP lawmakers said.

"There are different issues on the bill that we're trying to work through so we can get 218 votes," the number needed to ensure passage, said U.S. Rep. Bill Shuster (R., Pa.), a member of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood has predicted that in its present form the bill will not win over a single Democrat, and the White House has threatened to veto the measure.

"We all know that if at the end of the day we want to get a bill through that provides jobs and builds the country ... we're really going to have to go back to the drawing board and see if we can't develop a broader consensus," said U.S. Rep. Tom Petri (R. Wis.), another committee member.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.