Chairman Capito Asks Duffy About Bridges, Project Delays Ahead of Upcoming Surface Transportation Reauthorization Bill

To watch Chairman Capito’s questions, click here or the image above.

 

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, U.S. Senator Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), Chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee, led a hearing beginning the development of the Surface Transportation Reauthorization Bill with the Secretary of the United States Department of Transportation (DOT), Sean Duffy.

During the hearing, Chairman Capito asked Secretary Duffy about the importance of bridge funding, the backlog in grant agreements created by the previous Administration, and what hinders the development of transportation projects.

HIGHLIGHTS:

IMPORTANCE OF BRIDGE FUNDING:

CHAIRMAN CAPITO:

“In my state, obviously, we have a lot of rivers and mountains. We’ve got a ton of bridges, and we need your partnership to make sure that we're going to have the ability to fix, and we're on the process right now, some major projects, fixing some of our bridges or maintaining them. What can you say about bridges, in terms of what you've seen since you've been there, on improving our nation's bridges? What more would we need to do to address the issues with bridge safety and bridge maintenance?”

SECRETARY DUFFY:

“We see that people lose their lives when our bridges aren't safe, and so I know it's a top priority for this committee and for the department as well. We will make sure that the grants that have been awarded, we’re expeditiously moving through those grants and making sure we have funding for that which was awarded. But you know, beyond that, I think we have to take a look at the list of priorities, and the oldest and maybe most dangerous bridges, have to be funded first and those projects have to get underway.”

DEPLOYMENT OF DISCRETIONARY GRANTS:

CHAIRMAN CAPITO:

“I have raised concerns about the implementation in the IIJA’s competitive grant programs, and the time it takes, we're going to see this as a repeating theme, I think, the time that it takes to get that funding out the door. Can you please commit to a timely execution of project grant agreements? We know that there are numerous projects that are still – been promised and are not through the pipeline yet. Promised by the previous Administration, which is fine, but they still didn't move them through the pipeline. Can you talk about that, and how you think that you can improve that process in your department?”

SECRETARY DUFFY:

“There are 3,200 announced projects at the department that don't have signed grant agreements – 3,200. We are going to work through those projects. But if you say, ‘where is my project,’ I'm not looking at 10 projects for grant agreements – 3,200. Some of them date back to 2022, so there's a lot of workload to do to get these projects complete, to get the grant agreements completed, and the money out the door to your states. I'll just note that, Senator, usually, historically, there was 47 to 107 projects announced between Election Day and Inauguration Day. This last Administration announced around 950 projects in that time frame, almost 1,000% increase. And so everybody wants their projects, and I'm going to do my best to get those projects out the door, but it is a historic number that was announced.”

CAUSE FOR DELAY:

CHAIRMAN CAPITO:

“I'm interested in the 3,200 projects that basically landed on your desk the day you got sworn in that were not completed. Could you just flesh out a little bit why they might not be? It might be that their environmental review, their financing, can you just kind of line out a little of those?”

SECRETARY DUFFY:

“That's a good point. Some of them are the NEPA work had not been done yet. That's true. There's others that would expand capacity, and so if you're going to expand capacity from, you know, two lanes to four lanes, it's my understanding there was a set of ideas that they didn't want to expand the capacity. They would re-do, you know, current capacity, but if it was an expanding capacity, those projects actually sat for a longer period of time. When the announcement goes, I'm going to work for all of you to get these projects out. But I've got a lot of complaints, it is a lot of projects that we have to get done to make sure we can meet the commitments that were made in the last Administration.”

Click HERE to watch Chairman Capito’s questions.

Click HERE to watch Chairman Capito’s opening statement. 

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