Although the Congressional Budget Office has determined that the federal gas tax is not bringing in sufficient revenue to pay for road and transit projects, President Obama is planning on spending $300 billion over the next four years to fix the nation’s crumbling infrastructure.
While in St Paul Minnesota, Obama will summon Congress to pay for the repair of roads and bridges with $150 billion in new revenue generated through business tax reform. The new proposal will be included in the President’s new budget to be released next week. White House spokesmen said the plan will “address the funding crisis facing our surface transportation programs and to increase infrastructure investment.”
On Wednesday the White House further added in a statement, “This vision will show how we can invest in the things we need to grow and create jobs by closing unfair tax loopholes, lowering tax rates, and making the system more fair.”
Obama’s infrastructure overhaul will include the launch of a competition for $600 million in TIGER grants for local projects nationwide. TIGER grants were created as part of the stimulus program to fund transportation infrastructure projects.
The Congressional Budget Office has projected that without a funding infusion, the Highway Trust Fund will be unable to embark on new highway projects in 2015. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx, accompanying the President on his trip to Minnesota, has said the fund could start bouncing checks in August.
In January at the State of The Union Address, Obama said, “We can take the money we save with this transition to tax reform to create jobs rebuilding our roads, upgrading our ports, unclogging our commutes — because in today’s global economy, first-class jobs gravitate to first-class infrastructure.”
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