February 15, 2019 – The final fiscal 2019 appropriations package that passed Congress yesterday appropriates a net $49.4 billion for the Department of Homeland Security (excluding the FEMA disaster relief fund and mandatory Coast Guard pay), a $1.7 billion increase over fiscal year 2018.
February 13, 2019 – Last week, House Transportation and Infrastructure chairman Peter DeFazio (D-OR) and Aviation Subcommittee chairman Rick Larsen (D-WA) introduced a bill (H.R. 1108) to allow the Federal Aviation Administration to continue operations – and continue to pay all its employees and contractors – during a government shutdown.
February 9, 2019 – The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee of the 116thCongress formally kicked off its work yesterday with a marathon seven-hour hearing entitled “The Cost of Doing Nothing: Why Investing in Our Nation’s Infrastructure Cannot Wait.”
January 31, 2019 – Projections for transportation excise tax receipts are up substantially in several areas in the new CBO ten-year baseline projections.
November 15, 2018 – Voters approved far more ballot measures to raise money primarily for roads than for any other mode, but transit and multimodal measures will raise more dollars over the next 20 years, according to Eno’s latest analysis of the 2018 transportation ballot measures.
November 2, 2018 – The mystery of what exactly happened to Airport Improvement Program outlays in the just-closed fiscal year 2018 is now solved.
October 19, 2018 – As part of the Treasury Department’s year-end financial reporting for fiscal year 2018, new reports from the Bureau of the Public Debt show that excise tax receipts for the Airport and Airway Trust Fund grew by 5 percent versus last year, while customs duties received by the Harbor Maintenance Trust Fund were up by 9 percent.
October 17, 2018 – The books are closed on fiscal year 2018 and they reveal that net U.S. Department of Transportation spending (outlays) decreased by $946 million in 2018 versus 2017. But all is not as it seems.
October 5, 2018 – The staffs of the House and Senate transportation committees are going to be doing a lot of reading over the next three years. The new Federal Aviation Administration reauthorization bill, which President Trump will sign into law later today, requires various entities (mostly, but not always, the FAA) to submit 119 new reports to Congress in the coming years.
October 3, 2018 – The FAA reauthorization directly addresses the agency’s critical role in certification in order to ensure public confidence in the safety of the system for business and leisure travel. With the industry changing rapidly as new technologies come online, the federal certification process needs to be more flexible and agile.
September 28, 2018 – The House of Representatives has passed the final compromise five-year, $96.7 billion aviation reauthorization bill by a landslide vote of 398 to 23. However, the pending Supreme Court nomination has thrown enough uncertainty into the Senate floor schedule that one last short-term extension of aviation funding, taxes and programs, through October 7, is necessary.
September 26, 2018 – The following is a summary overview of the aviation and surface transportation security provisions of the compromise legislation to be considered by Congress this week.
The following is an overview of the final compromise FAA reauthorization bill released in the wee hours of September 22, broken down into five areas: funding authorizations, airline customer service, aviation safety, airports, and unmanned aviation systems. The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee has released a more detailed section-by-section summary of the bill here.
Saturday, September 22, 2018 (3:45 a.m.) – Just before 1 a.m. on Saturday morning, the House Majority Leader’s office posted online the text of a five-year, $96.7 billion aviation reauthorization bill that the House is scheduled to consider at mid-day on Wednesday, September 26 as a House amendment to a Senate amendment to an unrelated bill (H.R 302). The legislative text is here and a couple of pages of bullet points of the highlights is here.
August 23, 2018 – Praised by both sides of the aisle as an “exemplary leader” who is “uniquely qualified for the position,” Deputy Assistant Secretary for Aviation and International Affairs Joel Szabat had an easy time at his nomination hearing Thursday to become the Assistant Secretary for Aviation and International Affairs.
July 27, 2018 – Although behind-the-scenes negotiations on the Federal Aviation Administration reauthorization bill (S. 1405) continued this week, the press of other business has made it unlikely that the legislation will make it to the Senate floor next week. And with the Senate scheduled to take a recess the week after that, the earliest that the bill could make it to the floor is likely mid-August.
July 13, 2018 – It is still possible – but by no means certain – that the U.S. Senate could consider the Federal Aviation Administration reauthorization bill (S. 1405) in the next two or three weeks. But the bill will only come up if the leaders of the committee can winnow any potential amendments down to the point that the consideration of the bill can be completed in one or two days of floor time.
June 27, 2018 – There was no shortage of suggestions for how federal regulators can better accommodate the growing commercial space transportation industry at Tuesday’s hearing of the House Subcommittee on Aviation.
June 7, 2018 – On Thursday morning, Washington Post Live hosted legislators, industry leaders, and U.S. Department of Transportation Sec. Elaine Chao for Taking Flight: Regulating Our Skies. During two panels and a one-on-one interview, speakers discussed pilot shortage, consumer experience, drones, and the impending legislation.
June 6, 2018 – The Senate Transportation-Housing Appropriations Subcommittee this morning approved, by voice vote, a draft bill appropriating a net $71.4 billion for the Department of Transportation and the Department of Housing and Urban Development for fiscal year 2019. As is the usual practice, the subcommittee markup session was brief (just over 15 minutes), gave out few details, and featured a lot of positive statements and no amendments.