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COVERAGE OF THE 2013 LEGISLATIVE CONFERENCE
Former House Member: Compromise Key to Progress
Special to Passenger Transport

Political gridlock and its fallout—especially as regards the federal budget and appropriations processes—will continue in Washington, DC, until politicians on both sides of the aisle find ways to compromise, former Rep. Steve LaTourette (R-OH) said during a March 11 breakfast session sponsored by APTA’s business members.

“Everybody’s got to have a little give. We got into this mess together, we need to get out of it together,” he said.

LaTourette, a longtime Washington insider, was known on Capitol Hill for his bipartisan, plain-spoken approach to politics before he announced his retirement from the House in 2012. He is currently president of the Main Street Partnership, a Washington-based ­Republican think tank.

“If politicians would look at issues in the big sense of the word, you [public transportation] would win. The only way it gets better for everyone is that everyone needs to be in it. We need to support people who want to come to the center, who put country before party,” he said, adding: “Today’s political attitude is that unless you can get victory on everything, there’s no point in getting a victory on anything. That’s just nuts.”

He also noted that conflicting priorities complicate funding allocations: “Is transit more important than education, for example? And after you leave, the construction guys come to town—the concrete and asphalt guys. They’ll be advocating for more [highway] lanes, more construction,” he said to emphasize his point.

LaTourette further pointed to conflicting priorities as a contributing factor to the shortcomings of the current transportation authorization law. “MAP-21 stinks,” he said, “not because it’s a bad bill, but because it’s a horrible way to conduct businesses. It’s better than another extension, but it didn’t solve the basic problem of investment.”

During his tenure as a member of the House Appropriations Committee and vice chair of its Subcommittee on Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies, LaTourette helped preserve the Mass Transit Account of the Highway Trust Fund (HTF) in the run-up to the passage of MAP-21.

Like nearly all speakers at the conference, LaTourette also discussed sequestration and the lack of a “Grand Bargain” between House Republicans and the Obama administration.

“Why did we get sequestration?” he asked. “The supercommittee couldn’t cut $1.3 trillion [in federal spending] over 10 years. You [public transportation leaders] could do that in your sleep. They didn’t do their work, so we get sequestration. But it could be a whole lot worse, especially in your part of the budget,” he said, referring to the Mass Transit Account of the HTF, which is exempt from sequestration.

“It doesn’t matter how worthy an initiative is if there’s no money,” LaTourette said, adding that reforming “middle-class entitlements” is key to solving larger budget issues. “When people refuse to make difficult decisions on middle-class entitlements, the rest of the budget—non-defense discretionary spending—gets squeezed.”

LaTourette urged conference attendees to go to the Hill and encourage members from both parties to agree to a Grand Bargain. “Rise up and recognize the politicians in the middle,” he said. “Tell them you’re behind them, you have their back. Tell them to find a way to reach the big deal. Tell them to reform Social Security so it survives and to reform entitlement programs so they survive to help people they were intended to help. Make the pie bigger so we [transportation] won’t be cannibalizing other worthy causes.”

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