kind of experience that we're facing today, i agree that we have not taken a whole of government approach in dealing with some of the challenges we face. what i observed in countless visits over the 13-year experience, you know, in iraq and afghanistan, that much of is the nonkinetic things that needed to be done in dealing with an unconventional enemy defaulted not to other parts of our government, but largely to the united states military. even though, while they're intelligent and have enormous personal attributes and skill sets that they can apply against anything to be successful it's not something they were trained and necessarily had experience in, but they became very good at it. we would always be looking around, where is the rest of our government here to help us do some of these things. so in that regard, i do believe

there's much that we can learn from this 13-year experience in how to take a more comprehensive approach, and to recognize while kinetic actions have a value all of their own certainly and that's blatantly obvious, nonkinetic actions do as well. we can do much better at that than what we have done. >> thank you. general matt is my time is up, but do you have any you want to add? >> very quickly senator i would point out we have to improve the process assuming there is a process. i've been unable to identify one recently. i think it starts with the assumption we must develop a sound strategy or we're going to waste lives and our treasury and our country's future. i think, too, we need to move thor back to the senate, and not concentrated in a small but

mushrooming it at the same time natural security staff that does not have the foreign service officers and the trained military officers who can actually develop what you are looking for here. i don't think we can adopt one preclusive form of war fare and my point is the enemy will all try the kind of warfare they think we are unready for. i think we probably prevented it. that's a pretty great war, from my point of view, the one that never happened because we were ready for it. last i would point out that unconventional warfare always takes a long time. the u.s. cavalry against the american indian from 1850 to 1905 because decades long. this sense of rushing things, for example, setting withdrawal dates and telling the enemy in advance when we're leaving probably chris to the endless wars we get into.

we're engaged in a violent political argument with islam, and we need the diplomatic and developmental tools alongside our military. for a country that could put up voice of america and send the truth inside the iron curtain we're not fighting the war nearly as smartly as we did back during the cold war. i think you should aggressively go after these areas that you're bringing up, ma'am. >> thank you all very much. senator graham? >> thank you, y'all have -- we probably have violated the geneva convention when it comes to the three of you all but you've been terrific. i've enjoyed this. let's assume we can get a more cohesive government that the new prime minister is better than the old that we can get iraqi- trained force, eventually we take back mosul and anbar province, and once again that's

a big if. if they ask us in the future to leave a residual force would you recommend that we honor that request? >> yes, sir. >> absolutely. >> absolutely. >> they're going to ask for sure, senator and how could we say no to that given the circumstance? >> what i want to tell the american people i best can, that it's in our interest that iraq to turn out well. do you all agree? whether or not we should have gone in is behind us. we're there. but my theory behind all of that, a line of defense is best achieved by having allies in the region that we can work with that will fight this radical ideology at its core, and the hardest part of getting this war won, i believe is just the strategic patience that comes from investing in others. as unreliable as they are, as frustrating as they are, the alternative is fortress america, and i just don't believe that works. as we get ready to go into

mosul, i think general keane you said the iraqi timetable is probably different than ours? just imagine for a moment as an american politician there was a town in your state occupied by a foreign force, and the federal government was telling you or some outside entity was telling you it may be a year or two before you can go back in i think the new sunni defense minister is in a real spot here. how long will he 'loy the people in mosul to suffered under the hands of a vicious enemy. we have to realize that the iraqi politician has a different calculation than at american political leader here but it is in our advantage and our interesting to make sure the iraqis do this right. is that correct? >> yes. they're not ready by this spring, are they? >> i'm not on the ground, but talking to the people that are, i don't think so. admiral fallon would you be worried about a spring

offensive? >> i don't know what the timing is, because i haven't been in dialogue with these guys, but my sense is there are probably things we can do in advance, if you accept that they're not ready in a large force i think there's some things we can continue to do. just last week the sense is that you know, we're starting to go back and claw -- i say we, our allies over there, so maybe they're not ready for the big thing, but then again i have a hard time frankly, envisioning the kind of activity that we saw when we had to retake fallujah for the second and third times going in there street to street. i'm not sure that's what's -- that's a scenario that makes a lot of sense. >> i agree, but somebody will have to take mosul back. do you agree with the idea that maybe 10,000 is the right number to have in terms of support? does that make sense? >> i would look more at the

capability, but we have to have enough forward air controllers enough trainers enough advisers to actually make a difference. >> does that makes sense admiral fallon? >> i have no idea the exact number, but you have to have people with the right skill sets. >> just to the american people, we'll have some boots on the ground if we want to get this right. the hope is we don't have to have the 82nd airborne going back in. real quick with syria. i can understand how we get there in iraq, but i really don't understand how we get there in syria unless we have a regional force to supplement whatever syrian army we can muster. very quickly, how do we dislodge isil from syria? and finally the end game is a real problematic situation in syria. how do you salvage a syria with assad still in power? how do you get them out on the

ground? who does it? and should we leave assad in power as an instate? if we do what can we expect from that? >> i'll try to answer that. we've tried to answer it in the past, and this is tough, complicated and very uncertain, but here's what i believe. first of all the mission that we have right now is not to destroy isis in syria. it is to degrade it but to destroy isis in iraq and retake lost territory i believe that is not a very good mission because i don't think you separate syria and iraq. i think you see them as a wholecloth in terms of what you have to do against that enemy. all that said, if our intent is to destroy isis in syria the only way that can be done will

be with ground force supported by airpower. there is no ground force in sight with the capability to do that. and you know better than i because of the briefing you got from general mcgatta, at the pace we're doing that 5,000 or so a year we're not going to get there. we're not even close. so in my mind, you have to push back on assad because of what he's doing to -- what exists of the free syrian army. that brings in the coalition very strongly in support of what's taken place in syria. then you bring turkey to the table, uae to the table bring jordan to the capable and bring saudi arabia to the table. now they're at the table and you've got their interest. they have got to be the coalition force that's going to drive isis out of there with our assistance. >> do the other two of you agree with that? >> the question is how do you convince these people to actually go do that. that's the real challenge.

>> general matt is do you agree with that concept? >> i do senator, but the devil's in the details. we have got to figure out what it looks like or what we want it to look like at the end. it assad still there or not? some say we can't put syria back together if assad is part of it. others say he's the best of the worst options. we've got to get this straight in our heads first, and then we can give you a lot of answers, sir, but how to best accomplish it. senator reid? >> thank you. this has been an extraordinarily useful hearing. i have just one comment. we have repeatedly talked about the need for residual forces on a condition based situation in afghanistan and other places when we commit ourselves. looking at 2011, we're all

looking back. i think it's important to note that the stage is probably set in 2008 when the united states and the government of iraq entered into a formal agreement to remove all troops by 2011. that was signed by president bush and prime minister malaki. it was fine under the threat that if they didn't, our troops would be out even sooner. and it goes to general matt is' point, that when we sign something formally saying we're out, even though there was an expectation we might be able to negotiate, it's awful tough once you've got a deal between the u.s., our president their prime minister p. ratified by their also particularly different and we're already down to a much

smaller figure, and i think it's important to put this in context. this issue of residual forces with a condition-based sort of level is something we have to, you know consider as we look again, as senator graham suggested, going forward in iraq, and also going forward in afghanistan. and i want to thank you. i don't -- i don't necessarily need a comment. you can write me. i'm the only -- e-mail me. i want to thank the chairwoman for an excellent hearing. >> i want to thank senator reed and i appreciate all three of you being here today. i think it was evident your tremendous military experience and all of us appreciated a very substantive hearing and your best advice. we really appreciate everything that you have done and continue to do for our country. thank you all. we're impressed with your endurance as well. the armed services committee has been holding hearings over

the last few days on national security. they can be seen on our website cspan.org. senator john mccain, armed services committee chairman led today's hearing. hear's what happened at the beginning. >> well, good morning all. [ chanting ] >> could i ask the capitol police to help restore order here?

[ chanting "arrest henry kissing kissinger for war crimes" ] >> in the name of the people of chile. in the name of people from vietnam. >> we don't want to hear from you anymore. >> in the name of the people of chile. in the name of people of vietnam. in the name of the people of east timor. in the name of the people of laos. >> i'd like to say to my colleagues and to our distinguished witnesses this morning that i have -- i've been a member of this committee for

many years and i have never seen anything as disgraceful and outrageous and despicable as the last demonstration that just took place about -- you know? you're going to have to shut up or i'm going to have you arrested. if we can't get the capitol hill police in here immediately -- get out of here you low-life scum. [ applause ] >> so henry -- dr. kissinger, i hope on behalf of all the of the members of this committee, on both sides of the aisle -- in fact from all of my colleagues i would like to apologize for allowing such disgraceful behavior towards a man who

served his country with the greatest distinction. i apologize profusely. also in the senate today the hill reporting a bill which has garnered partisan support in the senate with four republican co-sponsors was introduced thursday to lift the u.s. travel embargo on cuba, one month after president obama announced sweeping changes in his administration's policy towards havana. some will say we ought to receive something in exchange for this, if we are giving up something, we ought to get some done session from the cuban government, said senator jeff flake of arizona. i think we all need to remember this as a sanction or prohibition on americans, not cubans. six other senators are co-sponsoring that bill. and over on c-span, day 2 of the confirmation hearing for loretta lynch, to serve as attorney general. utah senator mike lee on your screen now law enforcement and other witnesses testifying today

following ms. lynch as appearance for over 7 hours before the committee yesterday. you can watch the entire hearing tonight. it will reair at 8:00 eastern time on c-span. transportation second tear anthony fox told the senate environment and public works committee yes that the may highway trust fund expiration is a bigger crisis than most people realize. the committee also look to transportation infrastructure funding. the governors of alabama and vermont also have remarks with state-level perspectives on the issue.

>> the meeting will come to order. i say to my friend the rankin rankining member, that the whole side back there is oklahoma. i came in last night and they were having a dinner -- i thought two or three people -- i knew gary ridley would be there. and i looked over, and they're all familiar faces there. so, you know, we have this concern -- there's a lot of things about what the government is really supposed to be doing, and quite often -- the reason i got on the committees i did 20 years ago, was because this is what we're supposed to be doing, defending america, building infrastructure. that's it. so we all understand that in oklahoma.

we know that we have gone through a process that most of us -- some of us remember, most of us have not been around that long but i do rare over in the house on the t. & i committee, at that time sfm commissioners fox, you know the problem we had then? too much surplus. we all know what happened since that time, and we all know we can't continue to do as we have done in the past. i think i do have an opening statement, which i will submit as part of the record. i think the significance of this meeting, i say to my friends on the left and right, is that we want to do it right this time. we've done patchwork, put together things we think are a good idea, and i have to say this, we've had successes. i didn't like the way things went back in the 27-month bill we had. i didn't like the idea that a

lot of republicans, my good friends were denial agogging it and not realizing that what they were doing -- they were thinking they were doing the conservative thing, but it's not. the conservative thing is to pass a bill instead of having the extensions. secretary foxx has been out in oklahoma and we've talked about this at length, the cost of extensions. i think it's somewhere around 30% off the top. well, the good in us is that the house, when we went over right after this bill and told them talked to them about this thing, about our constitutional responsibilities, every one of the 33 republicans and the democrats on the house t & i committee voted for it. that was a major breakthrough at that time, and i see that happening again here. we are going to be doing the right thing now, and as we

know -- we decided to do, that we're going to make one change in this committee. we're not going to have everyone with opening statements because we have numerous witnesses in. i will just yield to senator boxer, and then we will start -- continue the hearing. >> mr. chairman, thank you so much for making this your first hearing. nothing could please us more because we know this is an area that there is bipartisan support for, and i think senator vitter and i -- it's no big secret we don't see eye to eye on much, but we were able to get a good bill done through this committee,ivity to make a point, mr. chairman we were the only committee to act last congress. no committee of the senate or the house, but this committee. with your leadership we're going to be working together here to get this done. i'm going to ask unanimous

consent to put my statement in the record and make four very brief points. first, we can do nothing more important for jobs, for businesses, for this economy, for this middle class than passing a multiyear highway bill. that's the first point. there's nothing better that we could do. secondly, we have a great record of bipartisanship on that issue, so nothing should stop us. again, i point to last year, when we acted when no other committee acted in the senate or the house. there was bipartisan paralysis except for us in this committee. and i'm so proud of that. and we need to take the leadership again and hopefully this time it will be emulated. three, we have to have the courage in the senate and in the house to find a multi -- to fund a multiyear bill. we cannot leap over that idea to an extension p.m. and that leads

me to my next point. we are getting perilously close to the bankruptcy of the highway fund, may 21st. rhetorically i ask if you to the bank and want to buy a house and the bank says, great we'll lend you the money but only for five months. you're going to walk away. you won't buy a house if you know that many that's what they've done here. when i say they the vast majority of our colleagues. punted this and this is awful. this is the greatest country in the world. we will not remain so if our bridges are falling down if our highways are crumbling, and so many other ramifications of not investing. >>. so we need certainty. today i learned from my staff i don't know if your staff has informed you that the deficit in the trust fund is less than we thought it will be. we are anticipating $18 billion

a year over six year. it's $13 billion a year over six years. >> i thought it was 15. >> now it's a lot less than we thought it would be. $13 billion a year. if we can't find that, that's a $1.2 trillion budget on discretionary spending. if we can't find that to build the infrastructure we have failed as a congress. so with your leadership and with all your strong support from oklahoma, i think we're going to get things done here. and i look forward to it. >> thank you. it's my honor to introduce and present -- not really introduce secretary foxx. he's been a great secretary. it's been a difficult job. we've had a chance to break

ground on a lot of great things so i'm thankful that you're doing what you're doing, and you'll be in on the big kill, and we're going to do it together. secretary foxx. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman for your kind words and for your leadership as well as the leadership of ranking member senator barbara boxer. the work you have all done and will continue to do is vitally important. i want to tell you that we appreciate your service. i also want to thank the entire committee here. we are in a new year with a new congress, but i'm here to discuss an old issue as has been celt a multiyear transportation bill with funding growth and policy reforms, focused on america's future. america is in a race not jest against our global competitors, but against the high stids of innovation and progress our

nation has shown for generations. we are behind in that race. when you're behind, you must run faster and do more than just keep pace. the transportation system itself does not care about the political challenges of addressing its needs. from its perspective and from mine, we are either meeting those needs or we aren't. in the past year, i've been to 41 states and over 100 cities. mr. chairman, you were kind enough to invite me to oklahoma, where we saw a stretch of i-44 just south of tulsa that needs to be widened, but the funds just aren't there. there are thousands of miles of highway projects in oklahoma that the d.o.t. has said are critical, but they're either not being built or they're not being repaired. unfortunately, oklahoma is not

alone. i've also visited the bridge that connects kentucky and ohio. it's carrying more than twice the traffic testify designed for. chunks of concrete are now falling from the bridge's ramps on cars parked below. it must be replaced but there's no real plan right now on how to pay for it. or you can look at tennessee, the state d.o.t. there has postponed $400 million in projects, and the thousands of jobs that come with them, because of quote/unquote funding uncertainty here in washington. now, tennessee is not the only state to slow or stop projects but it may be the first state to tell the unvarnished trust about what's happening to our transportation system, about how gridlock in washington is now creating gridlock on main

street. last year we sent you a comprehensive multiyear proposal, the grow america act, which included 350 pages of precise policy prescriptions and substantial funding growth, all focused on the future. what america received in response was a ten-month extension with flat funding, which while averting a catastrophe, falls short of meeting the country's needs. it was not the first short-term measure or patch that has been passed. it was, by my count the 32nd in the last six years. and as a former mayor i can tell you that these short-term measures are doing to communities across america what the state d.o.t. says they're doing in tennessee dish literally killing their will to build. at this point we must concern ourselves non

ourselves ourselves not only with the immediate situation that confronts us but with the cumulative effects of these short-term measures. i urge you to make a hard pill volt in and out, from the rear-view mirror to the front windshield. look at ouring system. look at the opportunity we have to grow jobs and the economy. look at our own children and grandchildren. in order for the system to be as good as the american people, we must do something dramatic. to hell with the politics. that's why we sent you the grow america act last year and why we will send you a new and improved grow america act this year. we certainly know that the grow america act is not the only approach to solving the infrastructure and mobility challenges of the future. we look forward to fully engaging this committee with -- and with others on both sides of the aisle to chart this path

together, but we believe there are some essential principles that any bill must have. first, we're going to need a substantially greater investment. we're also going to need a larger -- not just -- if we want communities to build big projects that in some cases can take five years or more we need to ensure funding for roughly that amount of time. i think senator boxer's analogy with trying to buy a house with five-month loan is a great analogy. we believe we can do that while assure better outcomes for the environment. we also believe in opening the door to more private investment and in giving communities and npos, freight operators, a

louder voice in what gets built. we believe in strengthen our buy america program to make sure tax dollars are being invested in american project built by american hands with american products. and we believe we must do everybody possible to keep americans safe. that includes obtaining the resource and authority that we need to combat threats we might not expect in this new century. in the end my entire department has great respect for what the committee has done and the challenge ahead. looking forward, a huge achievement, and now it is time to build on that work. when i was sworn in, i took the same oath that you did, to protect and defend. for me that means protecting and defending americans' fundamental ability to move, to get to work, to get to school, to get goods from the factory to the shelf.

but i can't do that. they could do that, and we can't do that unless we take bold action now. i'm here to work with you, and i'm also looking forward to your questions. thank you very much. thank you, mr. secretary. >> i've often thought in that particular job in your job there's no better background than to have been a mayor of a large city. you and i have talked about that in the past. when you see the things that you know are -- that you know that work s. you wonder sometimes how can we build on these because i know the press whether we walk out of here the only thing they want to talk about is how do you pay for it? and we don't know yet. we're going to work on it. but there are some areas that are sometimes controversial, and i have to appreciate both sides

working together on some of these enhancements. we've doth done a lot of good things. what more is out there that's obvious to you, that could make it go faster, and yet get off the ground quicker? >> thank you, mr. chairman. it's a very important question. we do have experience in the recent past building on some of the work of map 21, of doing concurrent reviews in the permitting process which effectively allows all of the federal agencies to sit at the table at the same time in the earlier point of design and construction of a project to comment on that project at a point at which the project can still be changed to respond to the permitting. there's a project in new york called the tappen sill bring. we were able to reduce the

permitting time from what could have been three to five years to 18 months as a result of doing that concurrent process. we do bled there's an opportunity -- >> it's really a direct result of the changes that we made in coming to this point? >> it was building on a lot of the work that map 21 contained, and there was also some administrative work that went into putting that on dashboard and assuring the agencies worked together. but we think there are additional tools that could be provided to enable that to happen more. the good news there is that when you do concurrence reviews, you're not sacrificing it is environment. you're actually putting the environment at an earlier stage and actually getting better results there, too. >> that's right. senator boxer? >> thanks, mr. chairman. mr. secretary i'm going to press you on what's happening on the ground, because we have failed

as a government to give any certainty to this process. so we know that tennessee and arkansas have already delayed hundreds of millions of dollars in highway projects for this year, and last summer over two dozens states had taken similar preemptive action, as the highway trust fund neared insolvency, this whole game of waiting, and then somebody steps up in the house or senate and said i'm going to save this for five months. this is a disaster. and can you discuss the likelihood that we're going to see these cutbacks continue if we don't take action soon to shore up the trust fund? >> thank you for the question. this is a crisis that is actually worse than i think most people realize. your point is very well taken. we have a may 31st 2015 point at which the funding of the ten-month extension runs out,

but the state departments of transportation are having to figure out what their plan of work is going to be during the height of construction season which starts right about the same time that the extension runs out. so i predict that over the course of the next few months you're going to see more state departments of transportation start to slow or stop projects, because they don't know what's on the other side of may 31st. so from a timing perspective i think we have a problem sooner than may 31st in terms of the situation on the ground. i think you'll see states pulling back even before may. >> that's basically my question. i'm not going to take any more time. the one point i'm going to make over and over again to anyone who will listen, and some will and some won't, is this is our duty, this is our job, this is the best thing we can do for the country. this is the most bipartisan thing we can do, and this

committee i'm urging, and i know the chairman feels as i do, that we need to step out here. i would say to colleagues here, we have a really great role to play by stepping out again and doing the right thing. we have the blueprint that senator vitter and i put together with all of your help. that may not be the exact blueprint we go with, but it's a definite start. so thank you for -- in your very calm and collected manner for letting us know that lack of action is already happening and having a result and impact on the ground. the impact is bad. it's bad for businesses it's bad for jobs, it's bad for communities, for our local people, and that's the point i think i wanted to make and you made it very eloquently. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you senator boxer. senator vitter? >> thank you, mr. chairman. i want to echo the comments that having made about the bipartisan work of this committee on

infrastructure. last congress this committee on a completely bipartisan basis produced a really good water resources bill, water infrastructure bill that was very important for our ports and waterways, and that infrastructure maritime, commerce, and as senator boxer mentioned, we put together a very good highway bill in this committee. now, we have an easy part, quite frankly, so i don't want to overstate it. we put together the transportation part of the highway bill good bill very bipartisan basis but the financial committee has the hard part which is the financing part. and i want to cut right to that. so let's cut to the chase. i agree, we need to get this done, we need to get it done on a medium to long-term basis not another band-aid approach. my suggestion for all of us who truly want to do that is to cut right to the chase and to

really dive into those discussions about low we finance it in a realistic way. folks on the left including the administration may have ideas that are perfectly valid ideas that just objectively are going nowhere in this congress. folks on the right in this congress may have ideas that are perfectly valid ideas that are going nowhere with this administration. my suggestion is we blow past that don't waste time and cut to the chase of where we may find a common solution. i believe realistically there are three realistic categories to focus on. one is a traditional gas tax, a traditional means of financing the highway trust fund. i believe that is only realistic, only a possibility, in my opinion -- and this is just my political judgment, you

can't prove this, but i think it's only a possibility if we give all middle class and lower middle class taxpayers a tax offset. something off their income tax, withholding, something so they are held harmless, so they do not pay a higher federal overall tax bill. second big category, i believe, is tax reform maybe focusing on business tax reform, and using elements of that, namely repat lyly repatriation, that is not a truly permanent solution, but those are big dollars that could fund a significant bill of a significant duration. and then the third big category is some domestic energy production with the additional royalty and revenue dedicated to

the highway trust fund. now, i would like to see that to a much greater extent that i'm sure is realistic, given the sensibilities of folks on the other side of the aisle and the administration. so in the spirit i began with i'm not suggesting, i know david vitter's lease plan for the ocs which is a great one, by the way, but i'm suggesting some expanded production, which is good for american energy independence, good for our economy, and would produce significant new revenue at least when the price of oil gets to a better place more stable place that could be dedicated to the highway trust fund. so my question is -- what's the administration doing to cut to the chase as i said and explore those three cad goirs? categories? >> let me answer the question directly and also make a point

the administration has put forward a proposal to use pro-growth business tax reform to pay for our infrastructure, and what we would basically do is put in addition to what the gas tax is currently spinning off, of course it's less than what the highway trust fund needs to be level but we put another amount of a like amount into our infrastructure to not only replenish the highway trust fund, but to do more than that which leads me to the point that i want to make, which is that i think there needs to be a conversation about what this is. what number are we trying to get to? and what is it going to get us? if you think about me and our department as contractors, we can try to go out and build what congress urges us to do, but i want to make it very clear we could go out and build a great

big mansion if we have the resources to build a hut. i think that our system really needs a substantial injection, the long-term bill, but also substantial growth to counteract the cumulative effect of the short-term measures in the recent past. >> i want to follow up specifically on that point, is there a version of that proposal you're talking about that doesn't have the big tax increase on successful folks as part of it? because going back to the spirit of my comments, i'm suggesting that, you know, we get real and cut to the chase so we actually solve this in a meaningful way by may. if we're just talking about that version, in all due respect i don't think that's meeting my test. >> the green book last year published three specific ideas.

sgloop and a third one was pulling some of the untaxed corporate earnings overseas, and brings those back home. and those three ideas very specific ideas are ones that seem to be within the parameter that you have mentioned. let me also extend to you, senator, to the committee and to the entire senate and house the full measure of my attention to help you get to yes on a solution here, because i think it is vital for the country. >> thank you senator vitter. >> senator? all right. senator cardin? >> thank you, mr. chairman. i appreciate that. secretary foxx, thank you for your work. i strongly support a robust reauthorization long term of our transportation needs needs to

be long term, as has been pointed out our states and counties cannot plan without the long-term commitments from the federal government as their partner. it needs to be robust, because it's not only the new roads and bridges and transit systems that we need, but also maintaining the infrastructure that we have. so we have to focus on this. i do want to maintain, and i think this is an important part, the flexibility. i represent maryland, the bald more, washington area is the most congested area in the nation. we need to invest in transit, and we have a game plan to do that. we want to stay on that game plan, but a large part of it depends upon the ability of a sustained federal partner and that requires a long-term reauthorization of a robust bill. i also want to emphasize the need for giving our local governments flexibility. i've worked with senator cochran on the transportation

alternative programs that allow locals to make decisions our mayors, our county people to make decisions, as to what's in their best interests so we have livable communities where you can walk and bike and keep cars off the roads when they're not necessary. then you emphasize safety. i just want to emphasize that point also. we had a tragic bike accident in baltimore just recently. it's critically important that our local governments have the ability to keep their people safe. we recently have another tragedy on the metro system here in washington, and we've been working with -- and your staff to make sure that we find out as soon as possible how we can make the metro system safe. in other words that we don't wait a year for the full review before we. and we want to have the resources to modern i'd our

transportation systems. i -- i had the honor of living in baltimore and commuting to washington every day and never know whether it's going to take me one hour or three hours to get in. so it's -- it's a challenge for people in our regions, challenge for people in our country, and i just urge you to be bold. i think this committee is prepared to be bold. it seems to me the price of energy today we should be able to to get the resources we need, in order to do what you're constituents want us to do have a modern transportation system be able to maintain that, and create the economic engine that will create jobs for the people of our community. that's our goal. that's what we're trying to do. i just want you to know that we appreciate your commitment to this. you have a lot of partners on this committee. thank you, mr. chairman. thank you.

senator fisher? >> thank you mr. secretary for being here today. i appreciate it. if your testimony you state quote, too often projects undergo unnecessarily lengthy reviews and we need to make the types of reforming that will exceedate high-priority projects and identify best practices to guide future efforts. i couldn't agree with you more. as you know in nebraska our department of roads or cities our counties, they have been very frustrated with the federal highway administration's what i would call unpredictable approach to the environmental review process. you know that we have been trying to work on that. i don't believe that it comports with the performance base data-driven approach of map 21. i think they need those -- those

reviews need to be performance oriented, not solely processed based, and certainly not inflexible. i appreciated your earlier comment about a concurrent review process where you can cut it down from 3 to 5 years to 18 months that would be great. that would be great if we can do that. i hope that the federal highway administration is going to tip to work with nebraska so we can get there. as you know limited resources become even more stretched and stressed when we have a process that i believe is not working the way it's supposed to. what do you think we can do to be sure that that state of good repair projects within existing. >> reporter: right of ways are -- with regulatory agencies. what's the value added to environmental protection by

conducting even a ce-level review on a resurfacing project or another project in an existing right of way, where transportation facility already exists. do we have rightaway. do we have to document things over and over and over again and pile up paper? >> thank you for the question, senator. i know specifically with respect to nebraska they've been working with the nebraska department of roads making a lot of progress on making greater use of categorical exclusions to expedite projects, and i think you'll see good news occurring there over the next several month, but more generally the work of map 21 it does very important things to give the department tools to make greater use of categorical exclusions but in addition to that we have begun to take a look at the

state review processes and if they are redundant at the same standard the federal review would be we've begun allowing states to have the state review processes and texas has just gone through that process. so we are working to expedite where we can. i want to emphasize that i think that through a new bill congress could give us additional tools to enable us to operationalize concurrent reviews and, again, i think you'll get perhaps even better environmental outcomes by doing it that way because the environmental considerations get brought up early and dealt with early. >> i would be very happy to work with you on those with my office especially so we can stop the redundancy that i believe is happening. if we can move on to tiger grants, do you think you're being distributed in an equal

manner. i know that when we look at rural america, open country small towns. it seems that we're not getting really tiger funds in those areas. can you tell me why that would be? >> well a couple of points. the tiger program requires a minimum of 20% of each round to be distributed into rural america. >> and the definition of rural america at that point is? >> i would have to have my staff confirm this, but i believe it is a community of 50,000 or fewer people. >> i'm talking about very sparsely populated areas where in many cases there's one person per square mile but yet in a state like nebraska we have miles and miles of roads that are necessary for commerce, for

safety and i would think we could look at a new definition of rural america. >> you know we're following the statutory definition, but if there is a new definition we will follow what this congress tells us, but what i would also say are a couple of other points. we in the last round exceeded that 20% minimum. we think of it as a floor, but not a ceiling and we are looking constantly to make sure that we see good transformational projects across the country wherever they happen to come from. secondly we have done more outreach to extend technical assistance to rural communities because in some cases it is the communities that have fewer tools and help prepare their applications that sometimes don't get through and so we want to make sure we're as equitable as possible from that standpoint so we will continue to work with you and others and i will

continue to applause nebraska for the tiger grant that last round for the rapid transit system, the very first in the state of nebraska. >> it was great. thank you very much, mr. secretary. i appreciate your work. >> thank you very much, mr. booker. >> thank you, mr. chairman. >> first and foremost i want to echo some of what's already been said. you are an extraordinary public servant and one of the best cabinet members that the president has and i'm also your friend for many years and former fellow mayor, and i want to thank you also for your numerous trips to the state of new jersey and for your partnership on a number of very specific important projects. as you know, new jersey is the most densely populated state in america. it's home to the most valuable freight quarter in this country. it's home to the busiest airspace in this country and has the third busiest sea port in the united states. we have 39,000 miles of public

roads and 6,500 bridges and nearly 1,000 miles of freight rail. in many ways when it comes to the economic prosperity of our state, new jersey is a transportation hub that really drives our economy, and i don't want to restate anything that has been said already in terms of the importance of moving a long-term funding mechanism forward, first and foremost delays in adequately funding our infrastructure actually costs the taxpayer more money. in other words, it will drive the expense of this transportation deficit even higher. so in other words, all of the fiscal conservatives -- in that and i include myself having been a mayor and you, as well having to be fiscally conservative and we are delayed in our lack of

funding and our short-term actions actually are driving more cost to taxpayers over the long run, is that correct? >> yeah. absolutely. we have estimates, the american society of civil engineers estimates on a state by state basis the cost of poor infrastructure on our roadways and in most cases the amount people are actually paying into the highway trust fund for instance is less than the cost they're experiencing as a result of poor road conditions whether it be having to buy new tires or get a new axle fixed or the cost of gasoline or whatever. folks are paying more than what they're getting. >> it is the height of responsible from the dollars and cents balance sheet analysis for us to do nothing or short-term fixes, not just for the public treasury, but as you said already, motorists in my state on some estimates are spending over $2,000 a year because of

poor road conditions. so our inaction makes people pay twice. once with the taxpayer dollars and also with their own dollars out of their own pocket for direct payments because of repairs to their cars, congestion, lost productivity because you're sitting in traffic. so really, our inaction in congress is making people pay twice. >> yes. money is one thing, but time is something none of cuss create more of. when folks are spending 40 hours on average more a year on traffic that's time they don't get back. that's a soccer game or a work hour or whatever and i think that we have just -- we as a country have stopped thinking about our transportation system as something that gets us there fast. >> i know the importance of finding the mechanism is really important and it's almost like

saying we either pay now or we pay much more later, and so the last thing i want to ask you to component is one of my colleagues did something that many people might think is irradical. senator sanders called for a trillion dollar investment and far more than what the administration is asking for. did you give your opinion on that and knowing that it is far more than a trillion dollars and how do you view senator sanders, a call for the trillion-dollar investment. >> it's a bold step. it's a bold step and a statement about where we are as a country. we need to invest more, and i think everyone strains to figure out how to pay for it but to your further point, what happens if we don't. we're going to pay probably more anyway on an individual basis and we'll lose opportunities to bring jobs to this country. for every billion dollars we invest we estimate 13,000 jobs

come as a result of it and in the transportation sector at large, only about 12% of folks that work in transportation have college degrees and so you look at that versus the long-term unemployed this is also a jobs issue. so we are not capturing opportunities as a country because we're not investing as we should, and so i think it is very, very important and i applaud senator sanders for taking a bold step and actually talking about the needs we actually have. >> thank you, mr. secretary. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you, senator booker. >> it is an honor to introduce the senator for the first time in this committee. >> you'll make great contributions. >> thank you for being here with us today. i was able to meet you first when i was on the transportation committee on the house side and i was also on the conference committee with the ranking member when we did a lot of the

streamlining of the environmental permitting for projects, and i'm glad to know it's moving along. i understand there are still things yet to be done, and so i appreciate that effort. i would tell my colleague, senator fisher that west virginia rural community town of ransom was the recipient of two tiger grants for economic development and we are very appreciative to that and they've been very innovative to that and i think it's going to grow that local and regional economy. so i'm very appreciative of the set aside for rural america because we were the beneficiary of that. you know, the big question is how do we afford all of this. we know that's the elephant in the room and what we're all trying to struggle with. so i would ask you in the private/public partnership arena, are you finding across the country that states and

local communities and business entities are really stepping up for this public-private partnership. we see this in west virginia, and i wonder how that is going nationally and what your perspective is on that because i notis in your written comments you talk about expanding the tifia opportunities. >> thank you very much. we do see a lot of promise in public-private partnerships and there are clear examples just in the last few months of ones we've been able to move forward. one of which that comes to mind is in pennsylvania where there were 500-some-odd bridges that the state of pennsylvania needed to update. many of them were deficient and not one of those bridges by itself would necessarily attract private capital, but they pulled those bridge projects together and we were able to issue i think it was $1.2 billion in private activity bonds to

support getting all of those bridges done. so we're looking at creative ways to move forward. >> having said that i think we have some problems that i want to be very clear about. number one, this issue of the cumulative effect of short-term measures has hurt us as a country because its hurt our planning process. states and local governments that haven't had the luxury of counting on federal support over a long-term period have pulled back on their planning and so the big projects that are most likely to attract large-scale private capital in many cases aren't actually being planned and they're not going through the review process. they're not teed up, if you will, to rapidly move into a private-public partnership. the second challenge we have is that the programs that we have within u.s. d.o.t. are relatively stove piped. tifia works through some agencies within d.o.t., but not

all. riff works through the federal rail administration and it works through the office of policy, but we think that one of the things that additional approximately see could do is to help us pull those resources together so that we can have a dedicated team to really focuses on public-private partnerships. >> thank you for that, and i share your frustration. certainly in west virginia we had state transportation day because the legislature has come in. there is a lot of frustration at the local level and state government level about the inability here for us to do a long-term highway bill and i'm certainly committed to that. i think what happens and where the frustration for a state like ours falls is because the money comes in smaller chunks you end up really just doing maintenance. you don't do anything innovative and you don't do anything that's telling you population that we're moving to the next century and so we see that in our home state, and i think that's very

frustrating to local citizens businesses and people growing the economy at the same time so i join that frustration and i would join with you to try to make this work and to find the magic formula that we can give the confidence to the states and local folks that we really can get this done. i think there is a great impetus for this and i look forward to working with you. thank you. >> thank you. >> thank you senator. senator markey? >> thank you. mr. chairman congratulations to you on this first and most important hearing that we'll be discussing, and i know that you and ranking member boxer are working very closely together to advance this legislation, and i think if we do it correctly we can have a great success this year, and i thank you for your work on it. mr. secretary, if i may, i would like to talk first of all

transit oriented development. you came up to the ruggel station in boston and we're having great success there with the help of the federal government to encourage development in an area that historically has been underserved and has the potential to be explosive in terms of the growth and use of public transportation. >> can you talk a little bit about that and the role that the congress can play in partnership with the department of transportation, what role do you see that in terms of it being built into the legislation that we're considering? >> thank you very much. >> it's a very exciting project in boston. you know what's happening in boston and across many of the metro areas around the country is the population is starting to concentrate there and if you go to some cities i was with mayor garset garsety in los angeles and they don't havemore highways that

they can build. they need to integrate transit choices into what they do, and when you build a station like ruggel, what that does is it captures the imagination of real estate developers and they start to build dense developments and bring amenities into communities that may traditionally not have them. >> i think the challenge for us is if right now we look at the amount of money we're putting into transit, i think the demand for it will increase substantially over the next several years because of sheer population movement, and that's one of the reasons why i would urge a more robust investment in transit, first of all, and secondly, urge that we do more to partner with local communities whether it's mpos or mayors or governors in some cases to help them develop the tools to utilize the lant use opportunities that come about as a result. >> yeah. >> boston had 800,000 people who

lived there in 1950 that drifted all of the way down to about 600,000, but now with increasing transit-oriented development, boston has gone back to 640,000 and the arrow is straight up in terms of the number of people who move back and use public transportation, live closer to all of the am entities of the city, but also the jobs that are being created around the transit project which then has reduced the number of vehicle miles driven by automobiles all across the country over the last five or six years it's going down and down and down because people want to live and work closer to their mode of transportation and increasingly it's public transportation so thank you for all of your work on that. and can i talk with you about the complete streets program, as well they also find to be very very exciting where pedestrians

bikers children, seniors everyone is included in kind of a project approach that ensures that all of these facilities can be enjoyed by everyone. can you talk about the role congress can play with the development of transportation? >> through our transportation alternatives program we've been able to be a bit of a catalyst in helping communities develop best practices over the greater use of complete streets and what that really means is creating ways in which all users on the roadway safely use the facilities. you'll have places for pedestrians that are safe and bicyclists, as well and we found that it not only helps with safety, but people actually use the entire roadway in

different ways. it's healthier and cleaner in some cases. continuing to support the transportation alternatives program and helping us build additional tools to support states as they measure safety of the bicyclists and pedestrians and bring in bicycling and pedestrians up to a standard that we expect of every other mode of transportation. >> so right now we're seeing that upwards of three-quarters of pedestrians who are killed are killed in urban areas. so the more that we can work together to create strategies that reduce those numbers and make the streets safe for everyone, and i'm looking forward to working with you, but it's a very exciting area and i think you're doing a fantastic job. i think you understand cities having been a mayor, and i appreciate all of the work that you do. >> thank you, senator. >> thank you, and we'll

recognize now senator rounds for his first introduction of this committee, and we have him serving on the commit. >> thank you mr. chairman. mr. secretary thanks for the opportunity to visit with you just a little bit today. coming from south dakota it strikes me in the home state we're between 800 or -- between 800,000 and 900,000 except during the time of the surges rally and then we bump up considerably. it seems as the former mayor of boston and you've had the opportunity to work on transportation projects from a different point of view and the large metropolitan area and one in which you're dealing with the federal guidelines and rules that are required in order to qualify for federal funding. in south dakota we have similar challenges, but on an agricultural basis and on a

rural area basis. just curious as to your thoughts with regard to projects as you indicated earlier and it would be modernized, and we have to be more efficient if we're going to expect taxpayers to put more dollars in at some point in the future. how do you move forward from the federal side now when you're working with communities, large and small, states large and small. differing expectations in terms of the quality and yet at the same time the need for modernization ever different projects. what do we do to convince and gain the confidence of the individual taxpayerses who look at a federal operation here that are under traditional operations take a huge amount of time just to get a project ready to go, approved and then actually built? what do we do to convince them

that we have modern ways and more efficient ways to actually deliver those projects in a timely basis? have you got some ideas and would you share your thoughts in terms of what we can do to actually deliver in a simple way of saying more bang for the buck when it comes to the dollars that we'll be expected to invest in order to maintain the infrastructure today? >> sure. we've had some conversational ready about project delivery and things that can be done to improve it and there's another that i haven't mentioned but i think is worthy. i think we can greatly accelerate the delivery of projects and beating them up in other words, by having more concurrent reviews occurring at federal level. i would also urge creating tools that incentivize the states to do the same thing because sometimes the delays that occur are not just federal delays and sometimes there are state reviews that have to take

additional time and giving the states more tools to be able to accelerate is also more useful. in addition to that there is a quirky thing with the federal government when to it comes to multi-moto projects and ones that involve highways rail or transit and that is that the reviews are sometimes -- they require separate reviews so even within our own department on a project that has different modes involved sometimes we have to have two different sets of reviews occur and it doesn't make sense to me that we do that, but it's a requirement that comes that i think will be fixed by legislation. so i think cleaning some of that up would be useful and it would allow us to move forward without compromising the environment and ensuring project integrity. the other thing that i would say though, is that i think the public has gotten used to a

deteriorating system, and i would urge that if you give us the tools to help speed up projects which i would urge in the way they just discussed that wye also look hard at making sure that we have the resources to make the kind of impact on folks' commutes and their ability to get goods from farm to market or whatever and make sure this counts. if you're going through the brain damage to figure how the how to get it done, make it so they can see it and feel it, and the other thing about the bang for your buck issue is if we're essentially managing a declining system folks will lose confidence even if we speed up projects. >> secretary, thank you. >> thank you. >> thank you sir. >> thank you, senator. senator mushingly. >> thank you secretary foxx and thank you for the steady hand and detailed presentation and the points that you're -- you're

hitting on certainly resonate in oregon regarding the movement of freight and transit innovating finance, the support of transportation for manufacturing and the connection between rural communities and market, all of these, so well done and thank you for coming out to oregon to take a look at the crossing that certainly the federal government was a huge partner in and the network of light rail and street cars and rapid bus transit that is being utilized to try to address some of those job to work or home to work challenges that the lost time that my colleague from new jersey was talking about. something that has really struck me and certainly resonated in my town halls across oregon is the low percent of our gdp that we're investing in

infrastructure and i think that's just a point worth reiterating and the numbers i have generally seen, but i have a feeling you have better more detailed insights on this, is that the u.s. is now spending less than 2% of gdp on infrastructure and europe is spending 5%, that china is spending 10% and i was struck in two trips to china ten years apart watching beijing going from being basically a bicycle city to having a bullet train running 200 miles per hour and to be on that bullet train was more the surrealist experience of my life given what i had seen a decade previous, massive change due to a huge commitment in the infrastructure. are those numbers in the ballpark and how does that reflect on the difference between the foundation we are building for the economy of the next generation and what our

competitors are doing? >> it's a great question and those numbers are in the ballpark, and there are several challenges and one is that our global competitors have the benefit of picking and choosing from the things that we've done with our system and figuring out which of those things they're going to engage in whether it's rail or highways or ports or whatever and improving upon what we've done, and it then becomes a matter of if you're a manufacturer, if you can get things from shop to port faster or some place else it creates a competitive disadvantage for us so one thing is that the rest of the world has looked at what we've done and they're building new stuff that in many cases are better than ours.

secondly, we have. >> it is relatively new. we have new things that we're not building and we have old things that need to be fixed up and both of those problems create a huge challenge for this country. the third issue that we have is that -- and i mentioned this before but i think that we've allowed our system to be stove piped and the reality is that if we're going to improve our ports we need to improve our road systems and our rail systems. if we'll do all that we need to also make sure that we are taking care of our intercoastal waterways in ensuring the free movement there and so our system is a system of system but we can't starve it and expect it to perform for us and to your point, we're

underinvesting. >> thank you very much. thanks. >> >>. >> senator carper? >> i want to applaud you and senator boxer for how you approach this work. it's an inspiration to me and i think to all of us and i think an example to our colleagues in the senate and to the house. >> and we'll make it work. >> mr. secretary, a lot of nice things have been said about you this morning. some of them really over the top. you have been named the -- you were referred the mayor of charlotte and boston and i don't know what else you have in your background, but there is an old saying in our state that says flattery won't hurt you if you don't inhale. so all of these nice things we're saying about you, don't breathe too deeply and you'll be fine. one of the major takeaways from me from the election last november was really three things, one, people want us to

work together and the spirit that senator boxer and inhofe bring to these proceedings are what i think the folks are looking for across the country. they want us to get something done something real done, not just talk about it, not just bemoan the fact that we're getting things done. the other thing they want us to do is find ways to further strengthen our economic recovery and which is now almost at its sixth year and starting to move well and still people hurting and still a good deal that needs to be done and one of the best things we can do that a lot of people are sitting on the sidelines would like to do construction work and i understand they have the transportation plan and including a lot of people that haven't worked for a while. we've had studies smaller than me that have talked about and computed what would happen to the growth in our gross domestic

product if we actually do a robust transportation plan for america and it's not just the tenth of a percentage point. it's between 1 1/2% growth and real gdp. real growth. i think senator kappatow. there is an 800 pound gorilla in the room and the unwillingness it pay for things that we want or pay for things that we need. in energy policy, we have an all of the above approach which includes generating electricity from gas and coal, from nuclear from wind, hydro solar and other sources. i think what we need is an all of the above approach in terms of providing transportation funding. not just financing. there are a lot of ways we can finance stuff that basically means we're borrowing money and we need to fund it as well. there's room for that and infra

infrastructure and there's room for that. repatriation could be harmful for getting one-time projects and, for example the tunnel i came through coming down the northeast corridor this morning through baltimore was built in civil war and that's an example of a one-time project and it could be funded like something like repatriation and we have the vehicle miles traveled and interesting experiments and very slowly advancing, but i think it's a good example. all of those are available but the idea that we haven't talked a whole lot here are user fees and we have paid about the transportation infrastructure for years through user fees and the gas tax that was adopted 21 years ago by 18 cents is worth about a dime. the diesel tax was adopted 21 years ago and it's worth about 15 cents and meanwhile the price of asphalt, concrete, steel and labor has all gone up and we need something like base

load for our energy and coal, nuclear, gas can do that and we need the base here for transportation funding. there are some of us that will introduce bipartisan legislation in the house and the senate probably next month. it would raise that user fee, the gasoline tax three or four cents a year for four years and index it to the rate of inflation and raise it to $125 million and on top of that we still need to do a whole lot more and those other items would be helpful. you and i have had good conversations of late. some of my republican colleagues that i've talked about, why don't we offset the user fee for low income people or others. the problem with that doing that is we have a $400 million budget deficit and reducing the personal income taxes and we make the deficit bigger and one of the things we talked about is

finding savings with the way we do transportation projects and you can share ideas or save money to offset whatever increase we have in user fees and just very briefly talk about the most doable ones you think we should focus and what we can do to help? >> i think the project delivery work is an opportunity done right in a way that doesn't compromise the environment. i think it can be done very well and it would save monoey and not just money at the federal level and it would work at the state and local levels, as well. in addition to that i think we we -- in terms of saving money, i think the more we work to accelerate projects that move through the system at any given point whether it's design environmental review or even as

we work on becoming better with innovative financing tools like private activity bonds and so forth, those are places where i think we can also stand to accelerate and get projects done faster and we work very hard to make the tifia program work better and faster and i think that's been a success but riff still needs some help, and i think the private activity bonds could use thissome as well. >> i would ask you to build up to the list and for us to be real partners in this, and we raise monies through a user fee increase and phase it over ceasent years and to finance the increased user fees through savings and the transportation projects and the degrees were in environment and i know you would

have some of those people do that. >> senator, senator carpo. senator barrasso? >> in your statement you talked about the high-priority projects and i agree. in wyoming we have high-priority projects which could be as small as replacing a single lane bridge and as big as replacing a segment of interstate 80. can i ask you to please share how exp/eed ided project delivery will be with rural states like wyoming? >> the condition current review process so that we're doing that on a more routine basis. it's not some of the high-profile big dollar projects and it could be more of a routine basis and i think working with congress to develop those tools again to do it in a way that isn't environmentally sensitive. i think we can get that do done

and i'll just defer until you get there. senator jillgillibrand? >> this is an incredibly important issue for new york state. mass transit is critical to the economic viability of not only new york, but every state in the country. on an average weekday nearly 8.5 million americans ride the train, subways and busses in new york city, and significant economic revenue and would you agree that it is critically important for mass transit to continue to receive the highway trust fund. can you discuss some of the negative impacts to our national economy and to regional economies across the country if they were to cut funding for public transit. >> well absolutely, i agree that we need to maintain resources for mass transit. it is vitally important of course in the state of new york and many other parts of the

country. there's also a very substantial rural transit program we have that is also vital to rural community, as well. if congress were to eliminate that funding what would happen is is that our roadway ss in high-use areas of the country would become inundated in traffic and freight movements and commutes would actually stall and that would be a disaster for the country. what we really need is a nation that moves more towards multimodal movement and one in which the users have choice and the more choices they have potentially you have more cars off the road that enables more truck and commercial vehicles to use and we end up creating other

problems. >> super storm sandy resulted in a whopping $8 million of physical damage to the region's transportation infrastrucked and affected 8.5 million transit riders and 4.2 million drivers and 1 million air travelers. two years after sandy new york city has not only worked to repair its transportation infrastructure from the storm's damage, but is also taking steps to improve the resiliency of its transit network. however, there is more work to be done. can you speak to the challenges with regard to constructing a more resilient transportation network? what has been effective so far and what policies would be more helpful to assure that the d.o.t. would have the tools to plan for future extreme weather. this is another very important topic and it's one that cuts across many of the department's programs whether they're highway, rail, maritime

transit, et cetera. we learn a lot when we got involved with the hurricane sandy recovery and we're taking the learn that we derived from that and trying to build into more of our programs routine resilient construction. for instance, we found that stop lights needed to be wedged in the ground deeper to be more resilient. we found that in the subways in new york where the electrical wires had been under the trains that putting above the trains and encasing them in a thicker material would provide more resilience resilience. these best practices aren't being left in the northeast. we're actually trying to, you know, see those get implemented in another part of the country so we can build more resiliently going forward. having said that, one of the challenges we'll keep running into is we're underinvesting in infrastructure overall so in terms of building a more

resilient america the less funding we have available the less we'll be able to make an impact. >> my last question i know you've addressed already, but i'll ask it. >> improving pedestrian safety is a critical issue in new york and one local leaders in my state are working very hard to address, whether it's vision zero or projects to improve sidewalks and cross walks in upstate new york building pedestrian infrastructure into how we decide our streets saves lives. as this committee works to reauthorize map 21, we should make sure that we continue to invest in critical safety programs that protect the safety of pedestrians and children, the elderly and what would be failing pedestrian safety at the federal level. >> it's an incredibly important question senator. between 2009 and 2013 we saw an uptick in pedestrian and bicycle debts and it's one of the few

areas in the entire department where we've seen the uptick. so we have to attack this as a country and we have to use a multi-tiered strategy. our program which provides resources to help support bicycle and pedestrian programs has been useful. we've also made significant investments through tiger to help promote best practices including the vision zero program and finally we're working with mayors across the country now to encourage them towards best practices and information sharing because a lot of the capital expenditure for the local level. >> thank you thank you, secretary fox, and i think you're the right guy at the most difficult time and we'll make this together. >> thank you, senator boxer, and

we have the second panel to come in and i believe they're all in the ante room and our first introducer will be senator sessions and he's trying to get into another committee hearing. can our witnesses please come in and sit down? mr. chairman i think the new senate is trying to get busy today. we have four major committees going on at one time that i'm a member of. i know others are having conflict, too. >> on top of that something like 16 votes.

so we're going to be busy. at this time i would like to welcome our panel. we've had a little bit of illness which changed the makeup of the committee a little bit, but i would like first to introduce for introductory purposes senator sessions. >> thank you. i am honored to introduce governor bentley the 53rd governor of the state of alabama. he's a long-term practicing physician. it's reported he finished at the top of his medical class. i haven't asked him that under oath, but i would not be surprised. in fact i'm sure that's accurate. he served in the air force and made job creation a priority with automobile aerospace and manufacturing industries in alabama showing some real growth. he's vice chair of the economic development and committee of the national governor's association

and the fiscal challenges and he was reelected despite having to make real tough decisions to control spending and not a big victory in this past election. he understands the physical challenges that we face and the money is spent wisely and they streamlined and reduced unnecessary cost in spending. governor bentley, thank you for coming. it's been a pleasure for me to work with you, i've had the highest respect for you, and i will say this, mr. chairman i won't be able to participate in the questioning and we'll see how i hope to get back and i'll share your view and that of senator boxer that we need a highway plan and that we can pass that soundly financed and paid for, that allows our governors to rely on the future

so they can spend their money and because of the uncertainty that's out there. even though you know i'm a frugal budget person somehow we need to make this one work and i'll try to be positive in that regard, thank you for your leadership and thank you for inviting governor bently. >> thank you very much senator sessions for that fine introduction, the governor and we recognize senator rounds for his introduction and i believe i met your guest when i was up in south dakota. >> that's entirely possible, mr. chairman and ranking member boxer. my opportunity today is to first of all, introduce the secretary of the department of transportation in south dakota, darren burrquist. i've known darren for years and i've had the opportunity to appoint him as secretary of transportation when i was governor, and so i can just share with all of you, he has seen the ins and outs and the

challenges of trying to work with limited funding and in a rural state in which there's always a challenge in terms of how you take the dollars and spread them out and literally deliver the best you can and yet come back to a legislative body who was always questioning how you're spending the money. if i could i just want to share with you and in south dakota we have challenges like everybody else does and it's a rural state where 200 miles up and down and 400 miles east and west and we have 85,000 miles of highway and local government own 77% of the miles within the state and 97% of the state's structurally deficient bridges. south dakota has the funds we need to manage the highways and bridges and thereby providing for economic growth and ensuring that all south da coat ans travel safely throughout the state every single day. i can share with you that i look forward to working with other

members of this committee and ranking member boxer. we do need an infrastructure and we need a highway bill and one that delivers for transportation needs across the entire united states. i just hope that as we move through this process we find an appropriate way to fund it on a longer term basis and we also recognize that we've got to do this as efficiently as we possibly can and that means cutting through as much red tape as we can when it comes to delivering these services. something else is that we work through this in a positive way rural and urban areas recognizing that our needs are truly different in many cases but, but we'll have to find a way to keep all of us in the same game and recognizing the needs of the rural and urban states in this methodology. so with that mr. chairman thank you. >> thank you for the very fine introduction.

>> senator sanders. thank you very much. i apologize for not being here earlier, but i was in another committee, and thank you very much for inviting governor peter shumlynn of vermont to be with us today. as senator rounds just mentioned everybody on this committee understands our infrastructure is in many ways collapsing and we used to lead the world in terms of infrastructure and according to the world economic forum we are now in 12th place and that's not anything that anybody on this committee should be proud of. in the state of vermont, we have the same infrastructure problems that every other state in the country has. we have communities with a whole lot of potholes. we have congestion and we have bridges that are in disrepair some years ago and they played an active role and we were hit with hurricane irene. the devastating infrastructure

in parts of the state. so i appreciate your efforts, mr. chairman. i know that you'll be working with senator boxer. there was a lot of division in the congress today and i would think that on this issue there is a common understanding that i would do our kids and grandchildren a great disservice and we don't own up with the problems right now that we work with the governors to vote on this issue. mr. chairman, thank you very much. >> thank you senator. let me make this comment. we are very proud to have all of you here. we had some illness so the full panel is not here and i appreciate you coming and i do believe when i look at this politically, it will be necessary to have a lot of pressure and a lot of pressure from the states in order to get the support necessary to get this through and it's going to be heavy lifting and we know you guys are available and able to

do that. let's s.t.a.r.t. with opening statements. governor billy, would you be recognized first? >> thank you, sir. good morning, everyone. it's a pleasure for me to be with you. senator inhofe and senator boxer and i appreciate senator sessions' great introduction of me, good friend and i appreciate all of you, and all of the members of this committee. i am here on behalf of the national governor's association and also the people of alabama and governor tomlin and i are on the national governor's association and economic and development and commerce committee. we served together on a bipartisan basis and all of the governors of the states have basically the same problems that have just been mentioned today, and i'm here today to highlight some of these problems and some of these situations that you

have. the first priority when we look at priorities is really to continue to maintain a strong partnership between the federal government and the state governments. you know there are selected projects around this country that are of national and regional significants that states and the federal government can partner together on that will benefit the entire country. one such project is in alabama. it's our mobile river bridge also known as the i-10 bridge and senator sessions who had to step out, he knows this very well. this is a project that reduces the congestion and the tunnels that helped with the growth of our great city there in mobile. this is a project and this is a major project that we need to be working on. one of the second priorities that we need to look at is long-term funding which has already been mentioned. funding certainly at the federal

level is essential for planning, budgeting for future projects. we as governors and ceos of the state, and to creating jobs in our states. certainty allows governors the ability to plan and to execute long-term multi-year transportation projects. since i took office in 2011 we have recruited 63000 new and future jobs for the state of alabama and good infrastructure is a key part of the environment that's needed to create the jobs in our state. in alabama we're witnessing first hand the successful partnership of job creation and infrastructure improvement. the first week my first term of office i met and recruited $100 million company, copper tubing to wilcox county which is the county with the highest unemployment rate in the state of alabama.

this new facility will employ 300 people and not only will it change this community, but it will change those families that live there and it will change the way of life. the state gave $7 million of construction money to build roads to this plant and it would make a difference in the lives of the people of that area. the third thing i would like to mention is the flexible they we need in federal dollars. the earmarking of federal dollars hurt his the ability of governors to allocate funds within our states and i want to share also in my testimony very quickly. i want to share a program that i have started and it's an innovative program that we have started in alabama. it's something that we call the

atrip program. we have put a billion dollarses to repair the roads and bridges of every countiy in the state of alabama. we use garvey bonds to do this. we have been able to borrow these at a very low interest rate and the fact that we have ourselves used our gasoline money to back these bonds we've been able to save 35 more million dollars. every county in the state of alabama, 67 counties will receive projects and the least any county will receive is $6.6 million, and this spring congress will have the opportunity to set a new vision for infrastructure investment in america. as a country, we must show that if we are serious about our economy that we must get serious about investing in our roads and bridges. governors urge congress to pass a long-term transportation bill

that provides the certainty needed to plan for future projects and the flexibility needed to taylor those projects to the unique challenges that face each state. governors look forward to working with you, congress and to the administration to authorize long-term funding, and i thank you today for the opportunity to come and testify before you. >> well, thank you, governor bentley. >> governor shymlynn. >> thank you so much, chairman inhofe. i appreciate you inviting us down. senator boxer, thank you so much for hearing us out and for the entire committee and want i want to thank the senators and i'm honored to be here with governor bentley on behalf of the nga. governor bentley worked together to opiate addiction issues and he stated the case well in saying that governors in all 50

states want to partner with you to get this job done because we all know that our economic prosperity and our national security and our ability to improve quality of life depends on fixing a crumbling and aging infrastructure, and i know that i'm looking forward to hearing from secretary burk wits, as well. i know governor maloy of connecticut, we got whacked pretty hard in the northeast and a snowstorm in the transportation infrastructure and he would be here if he were not digging out. in vermont we got hit, too but our southern states aren't as accustomed to snow as we are up in vermont. so he's still digging. >> i should say that that's the deep south too, governor bentley. >> listen i'm going to paraphrase a little bit and

governor bentley basically just sent my message for me. we know that we can't prosper as a nation unless we fix what senator sanders referred to which is we used to be number one and we're 14th, you all together with the u.s. senate have the ability to fix this challenge for us with congress. i want you to know sort of on the ground as a governor what this means to a small, rural state and what that means to vermont is not all that different than what it means to idaho, north dakota or new hampshire. our challenge in smaller rural states is that we sometimes forget that 80% of our transportation network 3.1 million miles of roads and thousands and thousands and thousands of bridges runs through our rural states. so if you take vermont as an example when we talk about crumbling infrastructure, you

can say vermont doesn't have that many people so why does it really matter with the nation's economy? well, it matters not only to vermonter's quality of life, but we happen as an example and many other states are in the same boat bordering canada and we're the transportation conduit to our biggest trading partner in america, canada. we projections going forward are that in the next three decades we'll see our freight transportation increase by 50% and we have a crumbling infrastructure right now. so in terms of jobs and prosperity, the rural states actually carry a bigger burden because we've got more to maintain and we all know that that infrastructure is crumbling and it's got to be rebuilt. so i just want to make the point that when you look at this challenge of reauthorizing the transportation trust fund it's important to remember that the rural states really have a special burden.

now the northeast states have an increased burden as well just simply because of climate, and if you look at what we're facing together we're dealing with a much shortened construction season. we we obviously have freezing and thawing that takes an extraordinary toll on our pavement and our bridges. and we have to throw salt around like there's no end to it. which is really terrible for steel, which is critical to bridges. and it, frankly, doesn't help pavement out much either. so in a sense, the colder states also, i would argue, but all the rural states are in this one together. i want to just say a word about, in listening to the rural and state challenges. i thought i would be briefer by not having to read you my comments, but then i lost my notes. i want to say a word about the

funding and what it really means for those of us in the challenge as we're losing the battle. for me, and governor bentley just made reference to it in his garby bonds, he's in the same boat, we rely on the funding from the federal government. what happens to a governor like me is that when there is uncertainty about funding or when the fund is out of money and you're literally unable to send the match back to the states, we're in a terrible position of having to dig for cash that we didn't anticipate we would need. or turning to contractors and simply saying, we can't do the work that we contracted you to do, because we're not sure we can pay the bill. this is the reality for governors across america. so we have to remember that when we talk about getting this done, and we know that may is the drop-dead date, in my case, next month we will start letting contracts for the work to be done next spring, and remember,

in a state like vermont or in the northeast, your paving season and building season runs from early april, if you're lucky, early may, to around thanksgiving, it starts to freeze and you can't make pavement below 32 degrees as you know. so those are the challenges that we face together, both timing and funding. i just want to make a comment about funding. there's sometimes the perception that states can kind of go it alone. that they can figure this out without the partnership of the federal government. and i just want to remind us that, particularly small rural states don't have the options for funding that some of the larger states might have. i go across the george washington bridge, you know, with your ez pass and i dream of having that kind of volume and that kind of passage to get over a bridge. we're often asked when we hit our transportation challenges, why don't you do tolls in vermont? well, we don't have enough people to pay the tolls. we don't have traffic to go through. it literally would not be a

break-even proposition for us in all the studies we've done. let's remember that while the small rural states have a more intense infrastructure, more miles and bridges to maintain, we have fewer funding sources to do it. so i really appreciate the opportunity to be before you today. and we would love to answer any questions that you have. i just want to make four quick recommendations if i could. >> i'm afraid we can't do that, governor -- >> all right. carry on. >> thank you very much for your presentation. secretary. >> thank you, chairman inhoff ranking member boxer, and members of the committee. i appreciate the opportunity to be here in front of this committee this morning on behalf of south dakota. governor dugard really wanted to be here himself to tell our story, because he understands and appreciates the importance of a strong transportation investment to our state. he sends his regrets that he was not able to be here today. but on his behalf, i would like to highlight a few of the key

points of his written statement. first of all, we thank you for holding this hearing early in this congress. it tells us as a committee, it appreciates the prompt action to pass good federal surface transpargs transportation legislation that will benefit the nation. the nation needs strong federal transportation funding, and long-term financial stability for the highway and transportation program in order to strengthen the economy and the nation. we believe the transportation program should continue to distribute the vast majority of funds to states by formula. it should further simplify regulations and program requirements providing states with additional flexibility to meet their unique individual needs. the federal transportation program must connect the nation, including rural areas like ours. a rural state like south dakota is far from markets, and population centers, but our contributions are important to the national economy. south dakota and other rural states are the source of products, resources and recreational opportunities that

help define us as a nation. our highways connect cities like chicago to the west coast, enable agriculture and other goods to move to national and rural markets and allow people to visit great places like mt. rush more around attractions that are located in rural areas. extensions and very short-term authorizations are a particular problem for a state like ours with a cold climate and a very short construction season. bout without multi-year funding we have to focus on smaller-term projects. he also have to emphasize the need for transportation investment is apparent and states are taking action. in south dakota governor dugard just this week introduced a proposal to our legislative session that would significantly increase state investment in transportation in south dakota. while we are trying to do our part, states can do it alone.

large rural states like south dakota do not have enough people to maintain our portion of the national highway system. the world population of $7 billion is expected to grow by $707 before closing, mr. chairman we'd like to encourage you to do what you can to simplify the transportation program and make it more flexible. we know that -- we know there necessarily must be some requirements for the federal program, but this is an area where for the public interest, less is more. as an example, one proposed rule would have states collect multiple data items for all public roads. as it turns out this includes gravel and dirt roads which make up the majority of the roads in our state. this is not a priority use of

scarce funds so we urge the congress to simplify the program where it can so that program dollars can provide more transportation investments in projects that improper our system. in summary strong and stable federal funding along with flexibility that reduces requirements will help states provide the transportation system that the nation needs. congress should continue to distribute the vast majority of program funds by formula and of course federal service transportation legislation mufrt continue to recognize significant federal investment in highways and rural areas like ours is in the national interest. again mr. chairman, thank you for the opportunity. >> thank you. excellent statement. the chair is going to take the prerogative and go ahead and start with the rest of you with governor bentley who has a particular scheduling program so recognize you at this time to respond to questions and i would only make this one comment,

governor bentley. when you talk about certainty this is always a problem that you have when you're dealing with the government. right now there's always the uncertainty of all these regulations that are out there that are creating hardships on people certainly it's true in this area, too. is there anything you would like to elaborate concerning the certainty issue that you expounded on? >> well i think certainty probably is the most important thing that we're asking for on a state level. and if we have the certainty we can deal with it. it is so difficult as a state to not know whether or not we will get funding. if this ends in may, which it supposedly will, it makes it difficult for all of us. and one of the things that i have put in place in alabama and that i've talked about is we put a billion dollars into the repair of our roads and bridges. we need to repair what we

already have. we can't just build new roads and bridges. we have to repair what we have and make sure that they're functional so we have borrowed a billion dollars and we've gotten it at such a low rate simply because we have such a high bond rating in alabama. but we need $69 million every year to pay off those bonds over the next 18 or 19 years. so we just need certainty whatever that certainty is. whatever the federal government can help us with. and we appreciate that partner. . that's one of the things -- it is a partnership. all states connect obviously. it is a partnership. the certainty to me is the most important thing and it is what we need most. >> senator boxer. >> thank you. i just want to make a quick point, then i'll ask the governor. i am so for simplification and flexibility and i worked with

senator inhoff and he will tell you that i came a long way on that point. but we do have to protect taxpayers here. so i think for me i want to make sure i'm protecting taxpayers. so just keep that in mind, that we have to find that sweet spot and that sweet spot may look different to you than it does through my eyes but we are going to work together on this. governors, thank you. i know how hard it is to get here and to take you away from your states. governor bentley, i was so interested in your alabama transportation rehabilitation improvement program, because it's a billion dollar program. am i right on that point? >> yes. >> a billion dollar program. and the reason you can do it is you're counting on future federal dollars so you have the is garvey bonds. is that a correct explanation of how it works? >> yes, it is. >> yes. and so i just guess, because