Ludington Daily News - Huizenga: Senate Transportation Bill Offers Some Good, But ...

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By Steve Begnoche

The U.S. Senate has passed a transportation bill that includes funding for dredging harbors. It accomplishes this by requiring the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to use all funds taken in through the Harbor Maintenance Fund, which collects fees from those using harbors for harbor maintenance. Some funds currently are diverted.

U.S. Rep. Bill Huizenga, R-Zeeland, supports that concept but he's not ready to say he'll support the Senate Transportation bill.

He sees at least a couple problems that could cause him to withhold support for the Senate bill and hope the House can craft a bill better to his liking that the Senate could consider adopting.

"Overall spending is a concern," he said. "We are still not getting very serious. What I'm ultimately serious about, is how we are collecting and spending the money?"

Then there's the problem of how money is collected and given to the states. Michigan, long a donor state in transportation taxes, will get a slight increase in the amount of return on each dollar sent to the federal government. The return rate for Michigan typically was pegged at about 92 cents on each $1 sent.

"Michigan is going up to 94 cents back for each dollar sent, a victory," said Huizenga, "but I would rather see it go to 98 cents and be collected in Michigan and stay in Michigan rather than sent to Washington to fund a bridge to nowhere and beehive museums."

He doesn't like that the Senate Transportation bill still, in his opinion, contains earmarks.

Earmarks are a process in which a member of Congress sets aside money for a project of importance in their district in a larger spending bill that had more support than the individual project. The bill would be voted on as a whole and the "earmarked" projects would pass as part of the whole, when many couldn't pass on their own.

Republicans, in particular, complained about that earmarking process and many, like Huizenga, ran on a promise to end earmarks.

The House is working on a bill that attempts a different approach.

"It's much harder," Huizenga said. "There's no earmarks. No one's bought off… it does make it more difficult."

And, the presence of earmarks in the Senate budget is a problem to him.

"That is what I am throwing out there as one of my markers," he said saying earmarks will make it much more difficult for him to support.

OVERALL BUDGET

Huizenga supports the Republican budget plan based on ideas of Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan.

"The challenge that we have moving forward is we've got to deal with our long-term spending issues," he said.

The GOP budget attempts to start that process, but even if it is enacted as presented, an unlikely scenario, "We don't come into balance for 25 years" by some accounts, he said. Others say it would be sooner than that if enacted.

"It's a ramp down. I'd like to see it go further, faster, but it does fundamentally change how we are spending money," he said.

Huizenga said the real problem is the Democratic-controlled U.S. Senate, which he said hasn't passed a budget in more than three years. He concedes the Senate counters in passing the budget control act authorizing government spending, believes it has done what is required. But, he said, such bills aren't a budget.

"They don't know how much they're going to spend… it's not a budget, it's not a plan," he said of what the Senate passes. "They've been muddling through this for three years. It's wrong. They will argue that because the Budget Control Act is passed, no budget is needed."

But he said President Obama has to, and has, presented a budget each year. The House, "the origin of all spending bills," has passed budgets. "The Senate has decided, for whatever reason, it's easier not to."

Passing a budget, he said, isn't easy.

"This is tough stuff. They are making the decision not to do it ," he said. "I get it. Life's a lot easier when you don't have to get pinned down on tough issues."

FINANCIAL INFORMATION REFORM

The House this week passed a reform to the Dodd-Frank Bill that says privileged financial information held by the newly formed Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) cannot be shared of given out by the agency.

According to a press release, currently, all other federal agencies have laws that protect this information. The Dodd-Frank Bill, when it created the CFPB agency, did not include such provisions. Rep. Barney Frank, co-author of that bill, and current CFPB head Richard Cordray, have both said this needs to be fixed.

This bill received overwhelming bipartisan support when considered by his Financial Services Committee (14 Democrats signed their support onto the Committee Report) and is expected to in the whole House. The bill is expected to also quickly pass the Senate, where the chairman and ranking member of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs have co-sponsored a companion bill.

Health care at the Supreme Court

"Who knows where it's going," Huizenga said. "Court watchers are trying to read the tea leaves. This is going to be a monumental week."

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