Bipartisan Legislation to Provide Transportation and Housing Options
Endorsed by Leading National Environmental Group
WASHINGTON, July 16 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- A leading national environmental group today endorsed new bipartisan legislation in Congress that would offer Americans relief from high gas prices by providing expanded transportation and housing options.
The bill, 'The Transportation and Housing Options for Gas Price Relief Act of 2008' (H.R. 6495), was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives by U.S. Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-OR). It is cosponsored by U.S. Reps. Chris Shays (R-CT), Ellen Tauscher (D-CA), Jay Inslee (D-WA), Jerry McNerney (D-CA) and Hilda Solis (D-CA). Both Tauscher and McNerney are members of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, which has jurisdiction over this legislation.
Gas prices in the United States have tripled during the past seven years. As a result, Americans now spend an average of more than $2,000 a year on gas to commute to work. Transportation costs are now Americans' second largest average expense after housing.
'This timely bill provides Congress with a great opportunity to show it is responding to Americans' pain at the pump, insufficient public transit and costly housing options,' said Michael Replogle, transportation director at Environmental Defense Fund and a former consultant for the U.S. Federal Highway Administration and the World Bank on sustainable transportation strategies (http://www.edf.org/page.cfm?tagID=961). 'America has less than three percent of the world's oil reserves, so we will never be able to produce what we need domestically.
