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1 1 (June 7, 2022)

handle is hein.crs/govefwm0001 and id is 1 raw text is: Congressional Research Service Informing the legislative debate since 1914 0 June 7, 2022 Tribal Highway and Public Transportation Programs The federal government recognizes 574 Indian tribes and Alaska Native villages and holds about 55 million acres of land in trust for tribal entities and individual tribal members. Tribal lands-including reservations, pueblos, rancherias, missions, villages, and communities-are typically rural and sparsely populated. Accessing jobs and community services, such as doctors, hospitals, schools, and retail stores, often requires traveling long distances. Cars and trucks are the primary means of transportation on tribal lands, although public transportation buses and vans, snowmobiles, all-terrain vehicles, boats, airplanes, and other conveyances are important in some areas. Federal funding to tribes for highways and public transportation that provide access to and across tribal land through several programs is authorized by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA; P.L. 117-58). Highways are supported mainly by the Tribal Transportation Program (TTP; 23 U.S.C. §202) jointly administered by the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) in the Department of Transportation (DOT) and the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) in the Department of the Interior. Public transportation is supported by the Public Transportation on Indian Reservations Program (49 U.S.C §5311(c)(2)) administered by DOT's Federal Transit Administration. Additionally, tribes are often eligible to compete with states and local governments for discretionary surface transportation grants. State departments of transportation may also use federal funds under their control to improve tribal transportation facilities, if they wish. Tribal Surface Transportation System Responsibility for public road infrastructure on, or that provides access to, tribal lands lies with governmental entities at all levels-tribal, federal, state, and local. Of the 157,000 miles of road listed in the National Tribal Transportation Facility Inventory-a database of existing and proposed roads maintained by the BIA in cooperation with FHWA-roughly 31,000 miles are BIA-system roads, 26,000 miles are tribal-system roads, and 100,000 miles are state and local government roads. About 11,500 miles of roads in the inventory do not exist but are planned or proposed. Much of the tribal highway system is rudimentary; FHWA estimates that about 70% of BIA- system roads and 75% of tribal-system roads are unpaved. There are about 125 tribal transit agencies that provide public transportation services on tribal lands. Prior to the Coronavirus Disease 2019 pandemic, these agencies provided about 3.3 million trips annually, predominantly using fixed-route and demand-responsive buses and vans. Public transportation can be an important means of travel on tribal lands because the share of households in poverty and the share of households without a personal vehicle are more than twice as high as in other rural areas. Many tribal areas, however, are not served by public transportation. Infrastructure Investment and jobs Act The IIJA authorized and appropriated about $1.1 billion annually for tribal transportation programs for FY2022- FY2026, about an 80% increase from the annual funding authorized under prior law (unadjusted for inflation). This annual average amount includes $709 million of contract authority from the Highway Trust Fund, $185 million appropriated from the general fund of the U.S. Treasury, and $234 million authorized from the general fund subject to appropriation (Figure 1). Of the total amount authorized and appropriated annually under the IIJA, $1.082 billion is for highways and $45.8 million for public transportation. Figure I. Tribal Surface Transportation Funding Annual Average, FY2022-FY2026 (unadjusted for inflation) Highway Trust U General Fund, Genera Fund, Fund, Authorized Appropriated Authorized Total surface su a $1,128.2 transportation $,2. Highways 1,082.4 Public transportation $45.8 in millions Source: Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (P.L. 117-58). Tribal H ighway Funding Most highway funding is distributed by formula to tribes through the TTP and can be used on a wide variety of projects. Up to 5% of funding is reserved for program administration (including the costs of Tribal Technical Assistance Centers) and 4% for safety projects. Another 2% of the total is allocated for planning and $9 million per year is for the Tribal High Priority Projects Program. The remainder is distributed among the tribes. The IIJA also provided $1 billion over five years for tribal bridges. This is a sizable increase from the $73 million reserved for tribal bridges annually under prior law. The IIJA created several new discretionary highway grant programs for which tribal projects are eligible (Table 1). The PROTECT Program (23 U.S.C. §176(d)), aimed at increasing the resilience of highway infrastructure to weather events and natural disasters, sets aside at least 2% for Indian tribes, a total of $28 million over five years. In the other discretionary programs, tribes must compete with other eligible entities, mostly state and local governments. Two competitive, multimodal grant programs may also provide opportunities for tribes. These are the Local and Regional Project Assistance program, known as RAISE

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