BILLS AND PLANS
Reducing Lead in Drinking Water
S. 3973
Signed into Law
1/4/2011
Bipartisan Co-sponsorship
Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA)
Senator James Inhofe (R-OK)
Support from
American Water Works Association
Association of California Water Agencies
Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies
Plumbing and Manufacturers Institute
WateReuse Association
East Bay Municipal Utility District
Natural Resources Defense Council
San Francisco Public Utilities Commission
Inland Empire Waters Agencies
Governor Chris Christie
New Jersey
Transportation Capital Plan
1/6/2011
Governor Scott Walker
Wisconsin
Releases Draft Legislation to Change the Department of Commerce into the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation
1/6/2011
California Public Infrastructure Advisory Commission
Proposed Work Plan for 2011 (including suggested Amendments to the CA Infrastructure Bank)
Dale Bonner, Secretary of Business, Transportation and Housing Agency, Chair of Commission
1/6/2011
Highlight from Proposed Work Plan #5 - (Note: Stanton Hazelroth, Executive Director, CA I-Bank) -
5. Support Legislation to Empower the California Infrastructure and Economic Development
Bank Policy tools that draw upon a combination of credit and tax incentives can play an important role in advancing California projects. Many P3 arrangements result in a private sector entity borrowing funds to develop public infrastructure. As a result of the current credit crisis, private sector entities have approached the California Infrastructure and Economic Development Bank (I-Bank) for assistance in accessing the bond market at favorable rates to finance P3 projects. The I-Bank's operating statutes1 (the I-Bank Act) limit the I-Bank's ability to provide this type of assistance, which may be important to help finance current and future pipeline projects. Accordingly, the I-Bank has developed proposed legislation intended to facilitate further investment in public infrastructure by: (1) authorizing the I-Bank to loan the proceeds of conduit revenue bonds to private entities; (2) authorizing the issuance of conduit revenue bonds for the benefit of private entities or public entities able to repay the loan of bond funds; and (3) eliminating the current cap on the amount of bonds that can be issued to finance public infrastructure. (A draft legislative proposal is attached.)
QUOTES OF THE WEEEK
Paul Bedard
Obama to Push for Infrastructure Jobs in 2011
Washington Whispers (12/31)
Quoted in
US News
1/7/2011
President Obama, the business community, and labor leaders are all expected to begin a massive jobs push next year aimed at renovating and rebuilding the nation's shabby infrastructure. But it won't be another stimulus: The plan is to make it 'budget neutral.' To do that, the feds want businesses to play a role by promising to help pay via user fees or another type of funding.
Alan Mulally
CEO, Ford Motor Company
Your World With Neil Cavuto
Fox News Network
1/6/2011
I would like to comment on the electrification, because it really is an important question, because it is a system solution. And it is going to take a public-private partnership, and an energy policy, and a manufacturing policy about where we want to take the country.
Ben Bernanke
Chairman, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Statement
Committee on the Budget
United States Senate
1/7/2011
I hope that, in addressing our long-term fiscal challenges, the Congress will seek reforms to the government's tax policies and spending priorities that serve not only to reduce the deficit but also to enhance the long-term growth potential of our economy--for example, . . . by providing necessary public infrastructure . . . We cannot grow out of our fiscal imbalances, but a more productive economy would ease the tradeoffs that we face.
Austan Goolsbee
Chairman, the Council of Economic Advisors
The Employment Situation in December
Council of Economic Advisers Blog
1/7/2011
It is essential that we take the additional targeted actions that the President has recommended to increase growth and job creation, such as . . . investing in our infrastructure
Janet Napolitano
Secretary of Homeland Security
Securing the Global Supply Chain: Announcing Partnership with World Customs Organization to Strengthen the Security and Resiliency of the Global Supply Chain
European Policy Center, Belgium
1/6/2011
While we work to make sure that precursor chemicals aren't illegally trafficked, we also need to strengthen the critical infrastructure of the global supply chain across all modes of transport -- air, land, and sea -- from attack or disruption.
Gary Locke
Secretary of Commerce
Briefing on America's Innovation Economy
1/6/2011
for much of the last 10 years, we really haven't been investing enough or with enough focus in areas like . . . infrastructure . . . And these under- investments have left us falling behind foreign competitors who are fighting for the same jobs in the new industries that we are.
OP-EDS ON P3S
The Right Plan to Tackle America's Twin Crises
Bernard Schwartz and David Rothkopf
Financial Times
9/8/2011
Public-Private Partnerships Hold Great Promise for Pennsylvania
Frank M. Rapoport
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
1/10/2011