Will Braley Be Conductor of Dubuque’s Rail Needs?
By MARY RAE BRAGG
Encouraging news for Dubuque’s passenger train proponents: Rep. Bruce Braley, D-Iowa, is going to be on the conference committee charged with reconciling differences between the House and Senate versions of the Amtrak Reauthorization bill.
Braley announced his appointment to the committee Friday, saying he’s excited to support Iowa’s passenger rail needs.
“With gas prices now over $4 per gallon, it’s time to invest in alternative forms of transportation,” Braley said in his press release. “The Amtrak bill will help make passenger rail service between Dubuque and the Quad Cities to Chicago a reality.”
Braley’s seat on the House Transportation Committee worked in eastern Iowa’s favor as he helped get the bill through the House. The proposed passenger rail service between Chicago and Dubuque and Chicago and the Quad Cities would be eligible to apply for funding under a new $500 million per year state capital grant program for construction of new passenger rail service between U.S. cities.
The bill also includes Braley’s provision mandating a Federal Railroad Administration study into the viability of the widespread use of biolubricants in freight and passenger rail as an alternative to petroleum-based lubricants. The nation’s leading biolubricant research center is located at the University of Northern Iowa’s National Ag-Based Lubricant Center.
The Amtrak Reauthorization bill passed the House last month, and the Senate bill passed its version in October 2007.
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Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, took to the Senate floor Friday, full of Heartland indignation about the way he says aid to the disaster-plagued Midwest is being “held hostage by politics.”
“My colleagues in the Midwest and I have been working with the appropriators on additional emergency assistance to help us with the recovery and rebuilding process,” Grassley said. “I am concerned that this additional emergency assistance is being held up by nonemergency, nonrelated, and controversial provisions.”
Grassley was particularly unhappy with House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charlie Rangel, D-New York, for saying the disaster tax relief package for the Midwest needs to have offsets in spending.
“Well, (Rangel) didn’t hear Chuck Grassley say that the tax package we passed for New York City after 9/11 had to be offset,” Grassley said.
As ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee at that time, Grassley said he helped get the package through for New York City. Later, when Hurricane Katrina came along and Grassley was committee chairman, “… we did not ask for offsets for Katrina,” Grassley said. “People in New Orleans were hurting and we passed the legislation.”
“So I don’t want anyone telling me we have to offset a disaster relief package when we are hurting …” Grassley fumed.
The Midwestern Disaster Tax Relief Act of 2008 that Grassley wants to see enacted was introduced Wednesday by him and a bipartisan group of other Midwestern senators, including Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, and Illinois’Democrats, Dick Durbin and Barack Obama.
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During a conference call with Iowa reporters Wednesday, Grassley enthusiastically endorsed a bill Harkin introduced Monday with Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., that would help create an ethanol pipeline to carry the fuel from the Midwest and Plains states.
The most efficient way of transporting liquid biofuels is by pipeline, but a provision in the tax code discourages the publicly traded partnerships that build and operate most liquid pipelines from providing lines for biofuels.
Current law does not include renewable fuels in the list of depletable natural resources that partnerships are supposed to get 90 percent of their income from by exploration, transportation, storage or marketing.
The Harkin-Lugar bill would add any renewable liquid fuel approved by the Environmental Protection Agency.
It’s not the first time Harkin and Lugar have gotten together to boost an ethanol pipeline.
In March 2007 they introduced a provision directing the Department of Energy to study feasibility of an ethanol pipeline that was included in the energy bill signed in December. An expanded version of that measure also was included in the farm bill that became law in May.
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The Iowa Legislature is planning a special day during its 2009 session to honor individuals and families who have donated land for Iowa’s parks, nature preserves, hunting and other public use.
Coming on the first Monday in April, the plan is to hold an annual “Gift to Iowa’s Future” recognition day, inviting all those who have donated land for public use to come to the statehouse. Lawmakers hope the recognition will increase the number of donors.
The Iowa Department of Natural Resources is creating a registry of all the donors. For more information, contact Diane Ford- Shivvers at the Iowa Department of Natural Resources at 515-281- 6341 or e-mail her at diane.ford-shivvers@dnr.iowa.gov.
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Iowa statehouse candidate Lou Oswald is holding a wine tasting fundraiser from 6-
8 p.m., Thursday, July 31, at his home at 1080 Nowata St. Donations will be collected at the door.
Oswald is running on the Republican ticket to represent House District 27, basically the northern half of Dubuque.
State Rep. Steve Lukan, R-New Vienna, will be on hand to meet- and-greet.
Bragg has been covering politics for the TH since 1996. Her e- mail address is mbragg@wcinet.com.
Originally published by MARY RAE BRAGG TH staff writer/mbragg@wcinetcom.
(c) 2008 Telegraph – Herald (Dubuque). Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.