Legislative Priorities

Long-term, sustainable funding

Build Indiana Council approaches our work on the state and federal levels with a central goal in mind: Ensuring long-term and sustainable funding for our state’s infrastructure network. This work comes as our hard-working construction and materials partners have grappled with rising costs, project delays and supply shortages. The state’s previous 20-year investment plan – the guiding document coinciding with the new funding approach in 2017 – met our needs for only about half the initially contemplated time. The challenges our industry faces from high inflation with road construction project costs soaring by 43 percent since the pandemic, workforce shortages, increased usage of alternative fuel vehicles and other emerging technologies are bringing us back to the table much sooner than expected. 

In the face of these challenges, BIC has doubled down on its work to strengthen working relationships with our state and federal leaders to ensure a robust conversation on our industry’s future and the funding streams necessary to back that critical work.

Our recent victories: 

  • In 2017, the Indiana General Assembly passed our state’s most significant road and bridge infrastructure funding package, HEA 1002 — a comprehensive, data-driven plan to fully fund the Crossroads of America for 20 years. Since its inception, HEA 1002 has generated more than $5 billion for both INDOT and local units of government. The plan also provided for a mandatory tolling study by INDOT to analyze how the mechanism could support future long-term funding proposals. 

  • In 2023, the Build Indiana Council took decisive action to mitigate the effects of significant inflation on our industry. HEA 1001-2023 was a direct result of our PAC’s efforts. It extended the sunset on the gas tax increase to 2027, accelerated the shift of the gas sales tax into the state highway fund, reinstated the road funding task force and increased the alternative fuel vehicle fees passed in 2017. These measures injected over $350 million into our state infrastructure program, a tangible testament to the impact of our PAC’s work.