Deja Vu: House Aims to Eliminate Local Funds for Biking and Walking

It’s come down to a fight for local control.  Negotiations on the federal transportation bill are at a critical point and twenty years of gains on biking, walking and Safe Routes to School are at risk.

Cities and counties all over the country need transportation funding to build sidewalks and bikeways to make streets safer, get local economies moving, and encourage active living. But some members of Congress want to eliminate local access to these federal funds.

Will you ask your members of Congress to protect local access to funds for biking and walking projects?

Selected members of the House and Senate are negotiating right now to produce a final transportation bill. The Senate’s first offer to the House included the bipartisan Cardin-Cochran agreement, which would allow local governments to access federal funds for biking and walking projects.

But the House would prefer to get rid of biking and walking funding. In their counter-offer, the House proposed  allowing states to ‘opt out’ of this funding pot completely, eliminating the Cardin-Cochran agreement, thus taking away local governments’ ability to access federal funds for small transportation projects.

Local elected officials across the country want and need federal funding to build sidewalks, bike lanes, and bike paths. If the House of Representatives gets its way, your local governments won’t have access to funds to build the biking and walking improvements that make streets safer for all of us.

We can’t let Congress eliminate local control. Will you contact your members of Congress today and ask them to rethink the House’s plan and save the Cardin-Cochran agreement?