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05-21-2003 Outside Influences - A Tough Road Ahead Let's get right to it: Washington's seemingly invincible highway lobby is in the fight of its life. The lobby has its eyes on a humongous highway reauthorization bill as big as the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee's $375 billion asking price and it wants to pay for it in part by raising the federal gasoline tax or indexing it to account for inflation. But everything seems to be going against the road gang. For starters, the struggling economy, the large budget deficit and President Bush's desire for a tax cut all make it much harder for Congress to produce a big transportation-spending bill. In addition, both the Bush administration and House Majority Leader Delay have signaled their opposition to any kind of hike in the gas tax. And now this: The highway lobby's coalition could be smaller than it was during its victory in crafting the Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century, or TEA-21. In that 1998 fight, which produced $218 billion for highways and mass transit, and which also placed a "firewall" around the Highway Trust Fund, the lobby's tent was incredibly large. Not only were the usual suspects like the American Road & Transportation Builders Association, the Associated General Contractors, and the American Association of State, Highway and Transportation Officials pushing for the bill, but so were governors, mayors, transit groups and environmentalists. Size definitely mattered in moving TEA-21 through Congress. This time, however, there's concern that the tent won't be as big. For example, the American Highway Users Alliance, which was a key ally in 1998, has been tentative about .supporting a gas tax increase. This group, whose membership includes automakers and truck interests, wants all the funds from any type of hike to be dedicated solely to highways. But since 1982, to win the support of urban members of Congress and environmentalists who .favor mass transit, about 20 percent of new revenue has been earmarked for transit. And House Transportation and Infrastructure Chairman Young is willing to keep that 20-percent share: His bill would devote $75 billion of the $375 billion to transit. "If we are to support a gasoline tax, it will have to meet a lot of conditions," said Diane Steed, the alliance's president and CEO. Furthermore, environmental groups aren't entirely behind a big highway bill or a gas tax increase. The pro-transit Surface Transportation Policy Project, for instance, has been disappointed that transportation dollars have been shifting back to highway construction and away from transit and repairing current infrastructure. And environmentalists are also concerned that the eventual highway bill will gut key environmental protections. In fact, when the administration unveiled its reauthorization plan last week, groups like the Sierra Club and Defenders of Wildlife attacked it, arguing that it "slashes the protections of the National Environmental Policy Act, the Clean Air Act, measures to preserve historic sites and targets transit.". But road gang members say they aren't concerned about these possible defections. Pete Ruane, president and CEO of the American Road & Transportation Builders Association, pointed out that environmental groups supported TEA-21 only at the end, and he mentions that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce with its impressive grassroots network is for the first time playing a huge role in pressing for more transportation spending (although the chamber has not endorsed raising gas taxes). Indeed, at the end of April, the Chamber and other road groups had many of their members gather in Washington to lobby Congress for a hefty highway bill. Greg Cohen, the American Highway Users Alliance's senior vice president, said that his group will have a closed-door executive session today, in which participants are expected to give a "qualified" endorsement of a gas tax increase. Essentially, Cohen said, the alliance will support increasing taxes as a last resort to growing. the program, but it still wants all revenue from any hike to be devoted to highways. Cohen added that environmental groups for purely political reasons were always 3