F. James Sensenbrenner, March 4, 2004

My wife derives great pleasure from telling our friends that I am the cheapest man she knows. But she means it as a compliment, and it’s one I’m pleased to share with my constituents. It is this sense of fiscal responsibility that I use as a gauge to help me decide which way to vote on massive spending or authorization bills that include money for scores of special interest projects. One such bill in Congress is HR 3550, the Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users, which would reauthorize and modify federal surface transportation programs through fiscal year 2009.

Introduced last November, the transportation reauthorization bill proposes $375 billion in spending over the next six years. This is $119 billion dollars more than what the President has proposed, and $157 billion more than the last transportation reauthorization bill, which was effective until March 1 of this year.

When HR 3550 was first introduced, the funding was largely expected to come from an increase in the federal gas tax, which is already over 18 cents per gallon. In Wisconsin, where our gas prices are expected to soar to $2.00 per gallon for regular unleaded gas this summer, increasing the gas tax would further drain our wallets. Fortunately, thanks in part to a veto threat by President Bush, and pressure from fiscally responsible Members of Congress, the proposal to raise federal gas taxes has been taken off the table. This has led to a re-evaluation of the transportation bill, which is still on-going. Meanwhile, because of the six-year deadline, Congress passed, and the President signed into law, an extension of the old bill so that programs covered by it could continue to operate.

Our priorities are different today than they were six years ago. With our troops in Iraq, and our nation involved in a War on Terror, Congress needs to be selective on how it spends taxpayers’ money. To be sure, we need a transportation authorization bill so that important programs, like the Marquette Interchange, the largest transportation project in the history of our state, can proceed with assistance from the federal government. Moreover, thanks to the efforts of the Wisconsin congressional delegation, particularly those of Congressman Tom Petri, who is the Chairman of the Transportation Subcommittee on Highways, Transit, and Pipelines, Wisconsin now receives its fair share of federal transportation money under the current funding formula.

But we do not need a massive bill full of special interest projects, also known as ‘pork.’ Examples of pork projects include a bicycle path in Oregon, an elevated walkway in Chicago, or $16 million dollars to rebuild a pier in Washington -- all of which were included in the last transportation authorization bill. Pork projects like these suck up transportation funds, leaving less money available for distribution to the states under the federal funding formula. This in turn means there is less money available for legitimate uses of transportation funds, like the Marquette Interchange.

As the cheapest man my wife knows, I will continue to monitor Congress’ spending habits, and do what I can to see that your transportation money is put to good use.

James Sensenbrenner is a Republican Member of Congress representing the Fifth Congressional District of Wisconsin. He serves as chairman of the House Committee on the Judiciary.