It finally happened. The U.S. House of Representatives passed the Senate’s $1.2 trillion infrastructure package and sent it to President Biden to be signed into law today. The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act reauthorizes the surface transportation program for five years.
Roads and bridges are not the only things covered under the bill, which also earmarks money for expanded broadband access, the power grid, and passenger rail. The good news is that this is the largest federal spending package in history and comes at a time when our roads, bridges, ports, and other transportation infrastructure are in dire need of upgrades. About $100 billion of the total is for highways and bridges.
In addition to the overall spending, there are other things of interest in the bill. One is the truck leasing task force—a 10-person panel to investigate commercial leases offered to drivers, including lease-purchase agreements. A concern is that the committee may broaden its scope and look at traditional truck leases. The fact is traditional truck leases already are highly regulated, so I hope the committee of trial lawyers, owner-operators, consumer protection groups, and businesses who are subject to lease-purchase agreements stays on task.
The bill also includes a voluntary national pilot program for a vehicle miles traveled tax. The program is designed to assess the feasibility of replacing or adding on to the existing federal gas tax. As we begin the move to battery-electric vehicles, a gas tax may not make sense, and so we need to begin looking for other funding sources.
One thing I am especially pleased about is that the Truck Renting & Leasing Association and its allies were successful in getting the Senate to remove the planned increase in the federal minimum insurance level for commercial vehicles operating in interstate commerce. At one point there was talk of increasing the minimum insurance level from $750,000 to $2 million. That would have been burdensome to almost all fleets.
The final passage of the bill took bipartisan support, which frankly is the way it should be. I agree with American Trucking Associations President and CEO Chris Spear, who said, “Roads and bridges are not political. We all drive on them.”
Now that the bill has passed and the money budgeted for improvements, let the work begin. The professional truck drivers of America will be much more efficient if they are traveling on well-maintained roads—and improvements to the infrastructure have been put on the back burner for far too long.
Jane Clark focuses on managing the member services operation at NationaLease as vice president of member services. She works to strengthen member relationships, reduce member costs, and improve collaboration within the NationaLease supporting groups.
