Nancy Richardson, chairwoman of AASHTO's Standing Committee on Finance and Administration, appeared before the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee during an oversight hearing on the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, the latest in a series of hearings the committee has held to examine how states are spending their recovery dollars.

"The Recovery Act had a March 2 'use it or lose it' deadline, and I am happy to report that every state obligated every highway dollar they were eligible to receive and not one dime was turned back to Washington for redistribution," Richardson testified. "The real story of the recovery act is about people: the people whose jobs were saved or who went back to work, the people who were able to make their mortgage payments, put their kids through school, and pay for healthcare."

Committee members received a copy of AASHTO's February report, "Projects and Paychecks," which found states had created or saved 280,000 direct, on-project jobs to date on more than 12,100 construction projects approved during the recovery act's first year -- a total of $26.2 billion in federally funded investment in highways and bridges.

More work remains to be done to keep the nation's transportation infrastructure in a state of good repair as well as to expand highway and transit systems to keep up with a growing population and recovering economy, Richardson emphasized to the committee. Additional transportation funds will also spur more job creation, she added.

"States have more than 9,800 projects valued at close to $80 billion that could be obligated within 120 days of enactment," she said. "There is clearly a continuing need for such investment in our nation's transportation network. The unemployment rate in the transportation construction industry still exceeds 20 percent. Commercial construction activity remains very minimal, so it is the transportation sector that has been able to fill part of the void."

Finally, Richardson stressed the critical need for Congress to enact a long-term surface transportation authorization bill by the end of this year.

"Funding the program at the $500 billion level would help to double transit ridership, preserve and modernize the highway system, and enable us to launch a new era of intercity passenger rail," she said.

Other witnesses scheduled to appear at today's hearing were Joyce Fisk, a truck driver with Knife River Corp.; Florentino Luna, a carpenter with Cherry Hill Construction; Brad Miller, general manager of the Des Moines Regional Transit Authority; Jeff Freeman, deputy director of the Minnesota Public Facilities Authority; Stephen Wright, vice president of Wright Brothers Construction Co.; Jeff Wharton, president of IMPulse NC LLC; and Veronique de Rugy, a senior research fellow at George Mason University.

Testimony from today's committee hearing is available at tinyurl.com/HTIC032610.