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Consumer confidence retreated in January from a more than 15-year high as Americans tempered their economic expectations and waited for President Trump and lawmakers to deliver on promises to boost employment and jump-start growth, data from the New York-based Conference Board showed Jan. 31.

NASHVILLE — With the state flush with new general government revenues, Gov. Bill Haslam on Jan. 30 unveiled a $37 billion annual spending plan, urging lawmakers to adopt his recommended gas tax increases to pay for better roads and reject temptations to dodge it by turning to burgeoning revenues in other non-transportation areas to fund it instead.

Raising the gas tax, repatriating overseas corporate profits, and incorporating highway funding as part of an overhaul of the tax code are likely among the funding proposals stakeholders will address when the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee meets Feb. 1.

President Trump set a daunting goal for government agencies bound by complex procedures, ordering his department heads to kill two regulations for each new one they issue.

With the contentious 2016 election over and few officials on the ballot again until 2018, transportation stakeholders believe that the current state legislative sessions could see fuel taxes raised to cover large funding shortfalls. Only New Jersey, which has off-year elections, did so in 2016.

With members including representatives of regional business and government agencies, a railroad and ports, a new advisory committee held its first meeting Jan. 26 to devise a state freight plan.

President Donald Trump ordered government agencies on Jan. 30 to propose revoking two regulations for each new one they issue, fulfilling a promise he made shortly after his election.

In his inaugural address as president of the United States, Donald Trump vowed to renegotiate trade agreements, boost the economy by reducing regulations, clamp down on immigration and spend more money to upgrade the nation’s infrastructure.