(The following story by Colby Itkowitz appeared on the Congressional Quarterly website on February 27, 2009.)
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A bipartisan group of lawmakers sent a letter to President Obama today urging him to reconsider an “ill-advised proposal” to open up highway and aviation spending to the appropriations process.
The administration’s budget proposal for fiscal 2010 includes a request to make all transportation spending discretionary, which would tear down a firewall that has protected the federal Highway Trust Fund and the Airport and Airways Trust Fund from being raided to help finance other domestic programs.
The administration said the goal was to improve transparency, but the lawmakers said in their letter that it would have the opposite effect.
“If any budget process reforms are to be made, they should serve to increase the separation of Trust-Funded programs from non-Trust-Funded programs.”
The letter was signed by some 14 Democratic and Republican members of both the House and Senate who hold key positions on authorizing and tax writing committees. Two GOP members of the Senate Appropriations panel — Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas and George V. Voinovich of Ohio — also signed on.
Among those expressing their concern were House Transportation and Infrastructure Chairman James L. Oberstar, D-Minn and ranking member John L. Mica, R-Fla., and Senate Public Works Chairwoman Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., and ranking Republican James M. Inhofe, R-Okla.