Stimulus Bike

Stimulus Bill Passes with Amendments in the House

The House amended and passed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan but still without support from republicans. House democrats drafted the bill, as President Barack Obama urged for a bill that would receive support from both parties, but even with some parts catering more towards republican wants, there were no votes support from the party. The final vote was 244 to 188. Obama is still hoping for a few more changes to get support all around: "I hope that we can continue to strengthen this plan before it gets to my desk... We must move swiftly and boldly to put Americans back to work, and that is exactly what this plan begins to do." The bill as passed by the House includes $607 billion for infrastructure and other direct spending measures, and $212 billion in tax cuts. Earlier predictions for the tax cuts were much higher, and republicans wanted to see less spending and more tax cuts. While overall it appears that this bill will help American's keep and create jobs there is a lot of room for improvement still. Let's hope that the Senate can make that happen.

Making Work Pay Credit
Under the Ways and Means Committee, the details of the Making Work Pay Credit are still unchanged fromthe draft version. American's can expect to receive 6.2 percent of earned income or $500 ($1,000 in the case of a joint return) whichever is lower. The specifics on how this will work are still not clear, but it is apparent that this will come in the form of reduce tax withholdings over 4 months time. This amounts to around $60 per paycheck.

Stimulus Bike
So far Stimulus Bike has about 40 people make the pledge to use their tax credits towards supporting bikes either for themselves or others. This website has been featured on more than 15 other blogs now and issteadily receiving hits. Thanks for helping this resource grow! Even if you stumbled across this site just looking for stimulus details, click around and check out our resources, supported petitions, and the pledge.

Stimulus Bill: From the House to the Senate

The stimulus bill draft by the House has been floating around for us to see, and unfortunately showed a stronger support for highways than public transit and finding ways to create jobs without expanding unnecessary pieces of our infrastructure. Past projects to add roads to ease congestion have - in almost every circumstance - resulted in the same congestion problems. That's why it is so unfortunate to see the House asking for $30 billion to go towards highways while only $10 billion going towards public transit. The argument that comes up is that roads and bridges are sub-par and in desperate need of funding to be fixed. In reality, stimulus money that is headed for roadways can easily be advertised as fix-up projects, but then be spent on adding a new lane in attempts to ease congestion. This is exactly why we should be looking to alternatives to expanding highways, such as trains, buses, and livable streets - places where we can walk and bike and be part of traffic instead of a nuisance to traffic.

Recently the Senate posted a press release online outlining their plans for the stimulus bill. The transportation part is as follows:

- $27 billion for formula highway investments.
- $8.4 billion for formula investments in public transportation.
- $5.5 billion for competitive grants to state and local governments for surface transportation investments.
- $1.3 billion for investments in our air transportation system.
- $1.1 billion for investments in rail transportation.

So highway funding has dropped $3 billion, but transit has also reduced a significant percentage from $9 billion to $8.4 billion. Consider Oberstar's original call for $20 billion needed for transit related projects, and $8.4 billion (although still a heck of a lot of money) is pennies compared to what it should be.

Keep an eye out for details on the new $5.5 billion for competitive grants for surface transportation. The Senate Appropriations website has no further details at this time than the press release, which does not go in depth on this portion of the bill. There is a good chance that this could go towards projects to make 2-wheeled transportation get more notice, but it is all chances at this point. Check out the PDF of the press release from the Senate Appropriations website.

Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure LIVE Thursday 10am

Thursday, January 22 at 10:00am there is a live webcast of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.

Infrastructure Investment: Ensuring an Effective Economic Recovery Package
This hearing will "examine how infrastructure investment contributes to job creation and economic recovery. The hearing will address infrastructure across the Committee's jurisdiction, including highways, bridges, public transportation, rail, aviation, ports, waterways, wastewater treatment facilities, and Federal buildings." - according to their press release.

We're hoping for more talk on public transportation and less support for expanding our highways. Isn't Stimulus Bikes about cycling and not public transportation though? Well, it's a fact that when a city has more ways of getting around, that cycling becomes safer and more popular. For example, when cities can expand their bus service, they can also add bike racks on the front of the buses as they do in many cities. Some cities also allow a special lane for buses and bikes to share. This allows urban cyclists to get around by bike for shorter distances, and hop on the bus to get further or up hills. Teamwork!

The House's Transportation website has a button to click tomorrow at 10am to tune into the live webcast. Check it out here >>