Highway pork on the menu in both houses

WASHINGTON - While Senate leaders say they disapprove of the sort of rampant pork-barrel spending that marks the House-passed version of new federal highway and mass-transit legislation, Republican and Democratic senators will bring plenty of pork of their own to the table when the two sides begin negotiating a compromise bill this week.

The House bill - which earmarks about $9 billion for 1,467 individual highway, bridge, bike path and economic development projects and another $9 billion for hundreds of mass transit and bus projects - has drawn stinging rebukes from House Budget Committee Chair John Kasich (R-Ohio), congressional conservatives and a raft of groups concerned about fiscal discipline.

"The era of big government is not over," John Berthoud of the National Taxpayers Union complained last week of the $217 billion measure. "The era of really big government is here."

But the slightly less costly Senate version of the legislation, approved early last month with little controversy, includes scores of earmarks or special provisions that would funnel billions of dollars' worth of highway, bridge and mass-transit projects to favored states and special interests.

There is nearly $1 billion in the bill to develop and construct high-speed magnetic levitation trains throughout the country. State officials and private developers in Nevada, California, Florida, Maryland and Pennsylvania have expressed interest in the program for developing passenger trains that can travel in excess of 240 mph.

Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chair John Chafee (R-R.I.) added the funds for the project after personally inspecting - and driving - a MAG-LEV train in Germany last year, according to an aide.

Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) inserted language that would make San Mateo County, Calif., eligible to receive emergency funding for a proposed $146 million highway tunnel project at Devil's Slide.

The bill also contains funding for road construction in and around Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming, and $72 million to construct a dozen new transportation research centers on college and university campuses to promote different facets of the transportation industry.

Another $420 million was added for an "Interstate 4R and Bridge Discretionary Program." According to a Senate aide, that would give states more discretion in spending funds for resurfacing and restoring portions of interstate highways.

Pork-barrel spending - and how much is too much - is among a dozen or so critical issues separating House and Senate transportation committee negotiators as they attempt to iron out a final bill before a May 1 deadline for authorizing new highway projects.

The principal combatants will be House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chair Bud Shuster (R-Pa.), who championed a huge increase in pork and overall highway and transit spending, and Chafee, who cautioned moderation - even as the Senate virtually matched the House in overall spending and loaded up the bill with special-interest provisions and last-minute deals to placate recalcitrant states.

A key dispute is over the formula for allocating the vast majority of highway funds to the states. Both the House and Senate have approved formulas that eliminate or minimize many of the inequities of the 1991 formula that largely benefited states from the Northeast and upper Midwest to the detriment of Southern, Western and Midwestern states. However, the new House formula would be slightly more advantageous to more heavily populated states with larger highway systems, while the Senate approach would favor more sparsely populated states with smaller highway networks.

04-20-98