With the lame-duck Congress preparing to break for its annual Thanksgiving recess and big fish to fry such as “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” and the economy, a Capitol Hill insider said today that any work on a new transportation bill will likely be pushed into December if not the new year with a final vote not expected until spring at the earliest.

The current extension of SAFETEA-LU, the bill passed in 2005 to fund agencies like NHTSA, FMCSA and FTA as well as highway infrastructure programs, is set to expire on Dec. 31. SAFETEA-LU expired in September 2009 when Congress failed pass new legislation. Since it has yet to make progress in marking up the new iteration as it instead has focused on creating jobs, health care reform and cap and trade emissions. The House and Senate have extended current funding levels several times since to keep programs afloat.

“Most definitely there will be another extension,” said Becky Weber, a managing director at lobbying firm Prime Policy Group in Washington, D.C., which represents NSTA. “The only question is at what length.”

Rep. John Mica (R-FL), the heir to James Oberstar’s seat as chair of the House transportation committee, said he favors another shorter extension. Oberstar, the Democrat from Minnesota who was the key figure behind the passage of SAFETEA-LU, was sent packing by voters earlier this month after the election. As he prepared to return home, Oberstar said he believes Congress should push through a one-year reauthorization to buy more time to finalize a new six-year bill.

But Weber added that was unlikely.

“These days it’s hard to get anything free-standing done,” she said.

Democrats would like transportation rolled up under an omnibus bill that Republicans oppose due to a fear of earmarks. Either way, there are a host of issues that affect pupil transporters including: preserving the fuel tax exemption for fleets; fighting transit encroachment on regular route and charter contracts held by private school bus companies; and securing an investment tax credit for clean vehicles.

Then, of course, there is jobs creation. The coalition Transportation for America, or T4A, developed a funding scenario earlier this year that promises increases investments in highway repair and maintenance, public transportation, i.e., transit, and livable communities. The D.C. think tank Economic Policy Institute said in June that the T4A proposal would support 14,400 direct and indirect jobs for each billion dollars of transportation investment, or 7.2 million jobs from the entire $500 billion proposal. In comparison, EPI said the SAFETEA-LU baseline would support 13,700 jobs per billion dollars.