The Fixing America's Surface Transportation Act or the FAST Act is a funding and authorization bill to govern United States federal surface transportation spending. It was passed by Congress on December 3, 2015, and President

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, Obama was the first Af ...

signed it on the following day. The vote was 359–65 in the House of Representatives and 83–16 in the United States Senate.

History

The bill was introduced to the House by Rodney Davis () as the "Hire More Heroes Act of 2015" on January 6, 2015. The $305 billion, five-year bill is funded without increasing transportation

user fee A user fee is a fee, tax, or impost payment paid to a facility owner or operator by a facility user as a necessary condition for using the facility. People pay user fees for the use of many public services and facilities. At the federal level in ...

s. (The federal

gas tax A fuel tax (also known as a petrol, gasoline or gas tax, or as a fuel duty) is an excise tax imposed on the sale of fuel. In most countries the fuel tax is imposed on fuels which are intended for transportation. Fuels used to power agricultural v ...

was last raised in 1993.) Instead, funds were generated through changes to passport rules,

Federal Reserve Bank A Federal Reserve Bank is a regional bank of the Federal Reserve System, the central banking system of the United States. There are twelve in total, one for each of the twelve Federal Reserve Districts that were created by the Federal Reserve ...

dividends, and privatized tax collection. In Section 6021, Congress asked the

Transportation Research Board The Transportation Research Board (TRB) is a division of the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, formerly the National Research Council of the United States, which serves as an independent adviser to the President of the Uni ...

(TRB) to conduct a study of the actions needed to upgrade and restore the

Interstate Highway System The Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways, commonly known as the Interstate Highway System, is a network of controlled-access highways that forms part of the National Highway System in the United States. T ...

to fulfill its role as a crucial national asset, serving the needs of people, cities and towns, businesses, and the military while remaining the safest highway network in the country. The subsequent 2019 report, "Renewing the National Commitment to the Interstate Highway System: A Foundation for the Future," recommended actions Congress could take.

Unrelated provisions

* This law authorizes the

Export–Import Bank of the United States The Export–Import Bank of the United States (EXIM) is the official export credit agency (ECA) of the United States federal government. Operating as a wholly owned federal government corporation, the bank "assists in financing and facilitati ...

through 2019. * New

crop insurance Crop insurance is purchased by agricultural producers, and subsidized by the federal government, to protect against either the loss of their crops due to natural disasters, such as hail, drought, and floods, or the loss of revenue due to declines ...

funding is approved. *

Emigrant Savings Bank Emigrant Bank (formerly Emigrant Savings Bank) is a private American financial institution. It is the oldest savings bank in New York City and it was the ninth-largest privately owned bank in America in 2012, with assets of $8.1 billion. As of June ...

would have been exempted from certain provisions of the

Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act The Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, commonly referred to as Dodd–Frank, is a United States federal law that was enacted on July 21, 2010. The law overhauled financial regulation in the aftermath of the Great Rece ...

. This was not included in the final bill that was passed into law. * The Act also includes several revisions to federal securities law, including Section 76001 of the Act. This provision creates a new Section 4(a)(7) of the

Securities Act of 1933 The Securities Act of 1933, also known as the 1933 Act, the Securities Act, the Truth in Securities Act, the Federal Securities Act, and the '33 Act, was enacted by the United States Congress on May 27, 1933, during the Great Depression and after ...

, a new exemption from registration under that act intended to facilitate secondary trading of private company securities among accredited investors. By doing so, Congress and the President hoped to support smaller, nonpublic companies with their capital raising efforts by providing more liquidity for their securities, with reduced regulatory burdens.

References

External links

Fixing America’s Surface Transportation ActPDFdetails
as amended in the GPObr>Statute Compilations collection

Fixing America’s Surface Transportation ActPDF
as enacted in the

US Statutes at Large The ''United States Statutes at Large'', commonly referred to as the ''Statutes at Large'' and abbreviated Stat., are an official record of Acts of Congress and concurrent resolutions passed by the United States Congress. Each act and resolutio ...

United States federal transportation legislation Acts of the 114th United States Congress 2015 in American law {{US-fed-statute-stub