President-elect Joe Biden officially announced that former South Bend, Indiana, mayor Pete Buttigieg will serve as U.S. Secretary of Transportation in the next administration. The nomination is subject to Senate confirmation. If confirmed, Buttigieg, 38, will lead an agency of 55,000 employees with an annual budget of $87 billion. "Jobs, infrastructure, equity, and climate all come together at the DOT, the site of our most ambitious plans to build back better,” Biden said in making the announcement. As a candidate for the Democratic nomination for president, Buttigieg put out a detailed infrastructure proposal that called for a vehicle miles traveled fee to shore up the Highway Trust Fund. Upon hearing the news, NAPA President and CEO Dr. Audrey Copeland said, "We look forward to working with Pete Buttigieg to get infrastructure legislation passed in the next Congress that rebuilds our highways, provides jobs, and gets our economy moving again.”