Senate committee to hold hearing on infrastructure funding

{mosads}“Congress has shown neither the will nor the courage to put aside divisions and work together to find a solution to our infrastructure deficit,” Rockefeller said in a statement. “But the problem won’t simply go away on its own. In fact, it will only continue to grow until we get serious about making the critical investments required to rebuild and expand our infrastructure. Now, more than ever, we as policymakers should be creating an environment and providing tools to incentivize these pools of funding into infrastructure projects.”

Public-private partnerships, commonly referred to as P3s, are increasingly popular with lawmakers looking for ways to fund infrastructure projects without increasing government spending.

The Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act program has emerged as a popular resources for states to use federal grants to lure matching funds for transportation project from private companies. 

The 2012 Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century (MAP-21) bill included approximately $109 billion for transportation projects in 2013 and 2014. The measure was partly funded by the $35 billion per year that is brought in by the 18.4 cents-per-gallon federal gas tax.

The remainder of the funds for the MAP-21 bill came from a combination of trust fund sweeps and fee increases that was used to generate the approximately $20 billion difference.

The Senate Commerce Committee is scheduled to meet on Tuesday at 2:30 p.m.