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Welcome to the NASHTU Website

 

The National Association of State Highway and Transportation Unions (NASHTU) is dedicated to ensuring that federal transportation dollars are spent on cost-effective, safe projects that serve the public interest.  NASHTU is comprised of 38 unions and associations representing hundreds of thousands of state and locally employed transportation engineers, construction managers and inspectors, technical workers and related public servants from throughout the United States.

 

 

 

NASHTU 14th Annual Conference -- May 6-8, 2013

The 14th Annual NASHTU Conference was a great success!  We were privileged to hear from the Ranking Member of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Nick Rahall (D-WV) and many of his colleagues on the committee including Donna Edwards (D-MD), John Garamendi (D-CA), Rick Larsen (D-WA), and Rick Nolan (D-MN).  In addition, the US DOT Deputy Assistant Secretary for Transportation Policy, Beth Osborne addressed the conference. 

The agenda was also full of informative and interesting panel discussions.  Most valuably, we heard from a variety of good government groups and people in the education community who advocate many principles similar to NASHTU.  They will be important allies for NASHTU member unions to draw upon when fighting outsourcing at home and for NASHTU to utilize while fighting for public inspection and cost comparison prior to outsourcing at the federal level.    

If you attended the NASHTU Conference, thank you for joining us!  If you didn’t make it, please consider attending the conference next year (TENTATIVE DATES: APRIL 28-30, 2014).  Visit the
NASHTU Conferences Page for links to presentations and a photo slide show of the conference.  For the first time, we also filmed the NASHTU conference this year.  The video clips are currently in the editing process but will soon be added to the website for viewing.


 

Click here for the NASHTU Conference Agenda

 

MAP-21 Era to Begin July 1

 

The House and Senate both passed the new Surface Transportation Authorization (Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act or MAP-21) today and sent it to the President for his signature. 

The new authorization (H.R. 4348) totals $120 billion that will fund transportation programs at current levels plus inflation until September 2014. The bill includes $27.2 billion in spending that is in excess of anticipated Highway Trust Fund revenues. The shortfall will be covered through a variety of accounting maneuvers to increase general fund revenues. 

Critics of the bill are calling it a “band-aid” that does nothing to fix transportation funding shortfalls and are asking Congress to use the next 27 months to raise gas taxes or fundamentally change the way transportation programs are funded. 

 

News Stories

 

 

 

 

OMB Cracks Down on Wasteful Outsourcing

 

February 4, 2011

The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has released a status report on their efforts to curb wasteful government contracting.  In FY 2010, federal agencies spent nearly $80 billion less than they would have if contract spending continued to grow at the same rate it had under the prior Administration.  NASHTU applauds the Obama Administration’s success in contracting reform for federal agencies, but to make government spending even more efficient, these efforts should be expanded to target federally-funded programs as well. 

 

June 14, 2010

Read Representative Judy Chu’s (D-CA) letter to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) asking that the federal contracting reforms be expanded to apply to all state and local projects that use federal funds. 

 

March 31, 2010

The Office of Federal Procurement Policy (OFPP) released its draft policy letter defining inherently governmental functions that should be performed only by government employees.  Read the Federal Register Notice

 

 

October 27, 2009

WASHINGTON, October 27 – In an attempt to crack down on mismanaged and wasteful federal contracting practices while strengthening oversight and accountability capacity across the government, the Obama Administration has issued guidance today that requires federal agencies to increase the capability and capacity of the civilian agency acquisition workforce to ensure sufficient management and oversight of acquisition dollars.

 

The guidance also provides specific instructions for agencies to avoid high-risk contracts that can result in excessive costs being passed on to taxpayers.

 

July 29, 2009

WASHINGTON, July 29 — President Obama in conjunction with the OMB formally unveiled contracting and workforce reforms that are designed to save the taxpayers at least $40 billion a year. The reforms, released today, focuses on three areas: improving acquisition, managing the multi-sector workforce, and contractor performance information.

 

"Today’s guidance is a major step forward in providing the federal government with the capacity to carry out robust and thorough management and oversight of its contracts in order to achieve programmatic goals, avoid significant overcharges, and stop wasteful spending," said OMB Director Peter Orszag.

 

 

 

March 4, 2009

WASHINGTON, March 4 (Reuters) - President Barack Obama said on Wednesday the U.S. government was paying too much for things it did not need and ordered a crackdown on spending he declared "plagued by massive cost overruns and outright fraud."

 

The Democrat, under fire from Republicans for the $3.5 trillion price tag for his 2010 budget plan, also took aim at predecessor George W. Bush and noted the cost of government contracts had doubled to more than half a trillion dollars over the past eight years. 

 

Click here to read the Presidential Memorandum