On June 25, 2020, Fred Wagner was featured on Roads & Bridges' podcast, Infrastructure Insider, where he discussed the present state of federal infrastructure overtures and the pressure to pass a new long-term surface transportation authorization bill before the FAST Act expires on September 30 of this year.
"I think there is going to be a lot more pressure as the summer wears on and some of the initial budgetary realities become more well known. Everyone is assuming that gas tax revenue is going to show a precipitous drop from March into the beginning of the summer," said Wagner.
"Ordinarily with the expiration of an authorization bill there’s somewhere between a nine to 12 or 12 to 16 month cushion in the trust fund that allows contracting to proceed while the politicians work out their compromises. In this case, that buffer could be much shorter,” he said. “The question remains whether the budgetary sense of urgency will meet the political sense of urgency. It’s pretty clear something will pass the House before the July 4 recess, but it’s much less clear what the fate of that legislation will be once it hits the Senate."
Click here to listen to the podcast.