Providing for Consideration of H.R. 5856, Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2013; Providing for Consideration of H.R. 6020, Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act, 2013; and Providing for Consideration of Conference Report on H.R. 4348, Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. WEBSTER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of this rule and the underlying bills.

House Resolution 717 provides for a standard conference report rule for the consideration of the conference report to accompany H.R. 4348, the Surface Transportation Extension Act of 2012, Part II, also known simply as the ``highway bill.'' The conference report for the highway bill represents a bipartisan and bicameral effort to address our aging national infrastructure and chronic unemployment with a 2-year authorization.

This long-term transportation bill, agreed to by both Houses and by both parties in this conference report, provides much-needed certainty. It provides certainty not only to States and to State governments but also to the transportation and construction industries and to those Americans whose livelihoods depend on them. Rather than another short-term extension measuring mere weeks or months, this bill authorizes transportation funding for 2 full years and allows businesses to plan ahead, hire workers, and grow.

The conference report ensures taxpayer dollars are spent on high-priority infrastructure projects that support jobs and economic activity. The conference report also contains significant reforms: it streamlines the lengthy bureaucratic approval process with reforms aimed at cutting the permitting process in half; it consolidates and eliminates duplicative Federal programs; and it embraces increased private sector involvement by leveraging Federal, State, and local dollars with private sector funding. As importantly, it does all of this without any earmarks and without any spending increases.

The conference report also extends the current student loan rate of 3.4 percent for student loans for another year. This ensures that young Americans have certainty when it comes to the terms of their student loans for the coming year; and because it is paid for, the conference report ensures that no further debt will be heaped upon the American taxpayer.

Finally, the conference report reforms and reauthorizes for 5 additional years the Federal Flood Insurance Program. This program is depended upon by so many in times of natural disaster.

House Resolution 717 also provides for an open rule both for the Department of Defense Appropriations Act of 2013 and the Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act of 2013.

The Department of Defense Appropriations Act of 2013 includes funding for critical national security needs, and it provides the resources needed to continue the Nation's military efforts abroad. In addition, the bill provides essential funding for health and quality-of-life programs for the brave men and women of our Armed Forces and their families.

The Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act of 2013 has jurisdiction over agencies responsible for regulating the financial and telecommunications industries; collecting taxes and providing taxpayer assistance; supporting the operations of the White House, the Federal judiciary, and the District of Columbia; managing Federal buildings; and overseeing Federal workers. The activities of these agencies impact nearly every American and are an integral part of the operations of our government.

So, once again, Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the rule and the underlying bills. I encourage my colleagues to vote ``yes'' on the rule.

I reserve the balance of my time.

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Mr. WEBSTER. Mr. Speaker, I just want to remind everyone again, as I said in my opening remarks, this bill has no earmarks. Yes, we know how they did it in the past, with 6,000, 7,000, 8,000 earmarks, and certainly there would be a lot of support among individual Members if that were the case. This bill has no earmarks. It's good policy.

The Federal Government says: We know all. We know everything that's needed in every single community, and we can stamp out one of our famed cookie-cutter approaches to funding transportation, as we used to do, so that every single dollar has a little teeny category and every State is brought into spending within those little teeny categories.

Yes, we could have done that, but that's the old way of doing it. We did it a different way. We actually had a conference, no earmarks, and we gave States flexibility. We sent to the States the opportunity to decide. Did we take out any of those things that were mentioned? Absolutely not. They're all options. So every single dollar we send to the State, the State has an opportunity to say, Maybe we don't want to do a sound barrier, whatever it is that's there. No, we can take the flexibility that's given to us, we can use it. We can use it to our benefit far better to build transportation from the ground up rather than to build it from the top down, Washington, D.C. cookie-cutter style.

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Mr. WEBSTER. Mr. Speaker, as I have said during previous debates on short-term transportation extensions, our national infrastructure is aging, stable construction jobs are lacking, unemployment lingers about 8 percent nationally and a little over 9 percent in Florida. Regrettably, that remains the case today, many short-term extensions later. However, unlike the past, the House and Senate have come together to offer a glimmer of certainty to try to address these problems.

A long-term, multiyear highway reauthorization is critical to rebuilding our Nation's infrastructure, reforming antiquated and inefficient transportation programs, strengthening our economy, and creating jobs. A long-term authorization also provides for certainty and stability necessary for the transportation industry to contain costs through long-term planning.

This agreement, while not perfect, is long overdue. It will begin to chip away at the bloated bureaucracy which defines our Federal transportation system. It will create jobs and it will promote economic activity in our local communities, all without adding to the deficit. For these reasons, I ask my colleagues to join me in favor of this rule.

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