Save $75 on Registration Fee; Held May 9-11 in DC Register on or before February 12 for the 2016 AGC Federal Contractors Conference (FEDCON) and save $75 off the registration fee. FEDCON—held May 10-11 at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington, D.C.—is the premier conference for federal construction contractors to discuss the latest projects, policies and contracting issues facing the industry with federal agencies, including the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Naval Facility Engineering Command, Air Force Civil Engineer Center, General Services Administration, Department of Veterans Affairs, Department of State, Natural Resources Conservation Service, and Bureau of Reclamation.

Rules Impact Direct-Federal Contractors Snow can close the federal government, but it does not stop the federal regulatory machine. The Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) Council and U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) recently issued final and proposed rules, respectively, that impact direct-federal construction contractors.

In its first analysis of the Highway Trust Fund, following passage of the long-term highway & transit bill known as the FAST Act, the Congressional Budget Office reports that in fiscal year 2021 (the last year of the act’s authorization) the trust fund balance will be zero and that the government will need $113 billion in additional revenue to maintain funding for the ensuing six years. This analysis vividly demonstrates the challenges facing federal surface transportation programs in the future.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released its Clean Watersheds Needs Survey, a collaboration between EPA, states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and other U.S. territories to compile the monetary needs of treatment, transportation, and management of the nation’s wastewater and stormwater. The survey identifies $271 billion over the next five years needed to maintain and improve this critical segment of infrastructure and is likely to be a conservative estimate.

The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) sent a letter on Jan. 8 to its state field offices directing them to comply with a provision (section 192) in the fiscal year 2016 Omnibus Appropriations Act –signed into law in December 2015 – requiring states to certify that three conditions have been satisfied on each federally assisted highway project before it can allow the use of contract provisions that specify a “geographic, economic, or any other hiring preference.” The three conditions states must certify are present before using a local hire preference include:

Congress’s repeated failure to increase the federal gas tax has resulted in eighteen states enacting laws to increase or reform their taxes to provide additional funding for transportation infrastructure since 2013. The recently signed-into-law transportation bill, the FAST Act, does provide five years of slightly increased funding for federal-aid highway and transit programs but fails to address the long-term solvency of the Highway Trust Fund – continuing to place the burden on states to find additional funding for transportation infrastructure.

The fiscal year (FY) 2016 omnibus appropriations bill, passed by Congress at the end of December, includes a provision allowing states to use federal-aid highway funding that was previously earmarked for specific projects to be used for other projects located nearby. Specifically, the provision allows states to transfer funding authority from projects that had funds earmarked 10 or more years ago but have used less than 10 percent of their dedicated funds, to other projects within a 50 mile radius. The Federal Highway Administration reports that Congress has allocated funding for more than 6,700 projects that was never used. Of that number, approximately 1,300 projects meet the 10 year/10 percent requirement with approximately $2.1 billion in funding still available. According to the Eno Transportation Weekly publication, the $2.1 billion of budget authority for highway projects will result in $500 million in new outlays in fiscal year 2016 and another $1.4 billion over the following seven years. States have up to three years to reprogram the earmarked funds or they are lost forever.

Save $75 on Registration Fee; Held May 10-11 in DC Register before January 31 for the 2016 AGC Federal Contractors Conference (FEDCON) and save $75 off the registration fee. FEDCON—held May 10-11 at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington, D.C.—is the premier conference for federal construction contractors to discuss the latest projects, policies and contracting issues facing the industry with federal agencies, including the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Naval Facility Engineering Command, Air Force Civil Engineer Center, General Services Administration, Department of Veterans Affairs, Department of State, Natural Resources Conservation Service, and Bureau of Reclamation.

Passage Expected Before Christmas On Wednesday, Congressional leaders released a $1.1 trillion omnibus appropriations bill that will fund federal agencies and programs for the remainder of fiscal year (FY) 2016. Overall, the bill includes mostly good news for construction accounts, as many see increases compared to FY 2015 levels and others receive significantly smaller cuts than Congress initially wanted. The omnibus bill provides nearly $121 billion for federal construction accounts as tracked by AGC. This is an increase of approximately $8 billion from fiscal year 2015 and $15 billion less than the administration’s fiscal year 2016 budget request. To give time for passage of this final spending package, Congress passed another short-term funding bill—called a continuing resolution—that will fund the government through Dec. 22. The House is expected to pass the omnibus bill on Friday, with a vote in the Senate to follow shortly thereafter.

Contact Your Senators & Ask Them to Support the FAST Act This afternoon by a vote of 359-65 passed the conference report to HR. 22, the Fixing America’s Surface Transportation (FAST) Act, which is the first long-term transportation bill in more than a decade. The Senate is now expected to take up the FAST Act and, if they are successful in clearing potential procedural votes, they will vote on final passage later this evening. Please visit Hardhats for Highways and urge them to support the FAST Act when it comes to the Senate floor for a vote. Please also take a moment to thank your Representative for their support of the bill. If the Senate is able to pass the bill this evening, it appears the president will sign it prior to the expiration of the current extension tomorrow.