The Obama Administration has recently signaled its intent to transfer $200 million apportioned to the states for use in highway and bridge construction funding from the Highway Account of the Highway Trust Fund to discretionary planning grants managed by the Office of Livable Communities. This office represents an interagency collaboration by the EPA, DOT, and HUD with the purpose of creating sustainable communities.

This priority shift in funding attacks the basic philosophical justification for the Highway Trust Fund – that because it is user-financed through fuel taxes its monies can be dedicate to highway infrastructure alone. Because of the difficulties faced by Congress in reauthorizing surface transportation programs over the twenty months, the Highway Trust Fund has received $34.5 billion in bailouts from the General Fund in order to sustain funding levels. As a result, key members of the Obama Administration, including Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood, have indicated that these bailouts of the Highway Trust Fund call into question how this fund should be utilize and ultimately justify the transfer of funds to the Livable Communities initiative.