Washington, DC — Larry Willis, president of the Transportation Trades Department, AFL-CIO (TTD), issues this statement in response to the Moving Forward infrastructure framework released today by House Democrats:
“The people who design, build, operate, and maintain America’s transportation infrastructure network know first-hand the effect decades of underinvestment has had on all of our lives. Rebuilding our country and ensuring our roads and bridges, ports, airports, rail lines, and transit systems can meet the needs of a 21st-century economy will require robust federal funding and serious leadership from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.
“The framework released today by House Democrats offers an important step forward in achieving these goals by seeking to invest $760 billion into our transportation system and infrastructure over five years. By providing a long-overdue boost to public transportation, rail, and highway investments, calling for revenues in the Harbor Maintenance Trust Fund to go toward their intended purpose, and increasing funding for our nation’s airports, this proposal offers real solutions to our nation’s growing infrastructure crisis. Finally, by ensuring that federal dollars come with strong labor protections and Buy America rules, we know the investments in this outline will create the kind of good, middle-class jobs working families need.
“With surface transportation and rail authorizations expiring in October, we urge lawmakers to treat this proposal with the seriousness it requires and to work in a bipartisan fashion to address our nation’s most pressing infrastructure challenges. We look forward to working with the House committees on Transportation and Infrastructure, Ways and Means, and Energy and Commerce to develop the policy solutions and pay-fors that this country and working families deserve.”