Republican leaders tell governors to ignore fed policy on new road funds

Governors should ignore recent federal guidance that discourages states from using infrastructure funds to build new highway capacity.

That’s the advice from Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell and Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, the ranking Republican on the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, in a Wednesday letter to U.S. governors.

It’s the latest salvo in a growing controversy over federal road funding stemming from a Federal Highway Administration Dec. 16 memo titled “Policy on Using Bipartisan Infrastructure Law Resources to Build a Better America.”

Bloomberg

The FHWA memo calls for states to prioritize the maintenance of existing roads and highways, as well as new transit projects, over new highway capacity.

State departments of transportation and other industry groups challenged the guidance, saying the administration lacks the authority to enforce it, while some experts warned that the policy would extend beyond the IIJA to all federal road funding.

A group of Republican governors challenged the policy in a Jan. 16 letter to President Biden and the Wall Street Journal weighed in with a Jan. 30 editorial that called the policy a “bait and switch” on Congressional Republicans who supported the IIJA.

Last week, Republican Sens. Mitt Romney of Utah and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina raised the issue during a Senate Budget Committee hearing on the nomination of a new Office of Management and Budget director, saying the FHWA’s guidance went against Congressional intent.

In their Feb. 9 letter, McConnell and Capito echoed Romney and Graham, telling governors the guidance goes against the intent of the IIJA and emphasizing that the administration lacks the authority to dictate state spending.

The “FHWA memorandum attempts to implement a wish list of policies not reflected in the IIJA. These policies, such as discouraging projects that increase highway capacity and prioritizing projects that advance non-motorized transportation options, differ from the provisions negotiated and agreed to in the law,” the letter said. “Nothing in the IIJA provides FHWA with the authority to dictate how states should use their federal formula funding, nor prioritizes public transit or bike paths over new roads and bridges. The FHWA memorandum is an internal document, has no effect of law, and states should treat it as such.”

U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg was copied on the letter.

The Department of Transportation did not respond to a request for comment by press time. In response to a previous story, a DOT spokesperson acknowledged the memo was an internal document that does not restrict new highway capacity investment.