Posted on March 11, 2024
The Dredging Contractors of America fully supports the bipartisan package of appropriations bills agreed to by the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate. The package is known as the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2024.
“We understand that agreeing to move on important spending legislation takes time and an enormous amount of effort,”
said William P. Doyle, Chief Executive Officer of the Dredging Contractors of America.
“We want to thank House Appropriations Committee Chairwoman Kay Granger (TX) and Ranking Member Rosa DeLauro (CT) and U.S. Senator Patty Murray (WA), Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee and Vice Chair Susan Collins (ME) for shepherding through the bicameral, bipartisan package of the first six fiscal year 2024 appropriations bills.”
Key points in the Energy and Water Appropriations Bill include:
- The bill provides $8.7 billion in total funding for the Corps of Engineers.
- The bill provides a historic $2.77 billion for the Harbor Maintenance Trust Fund to improve navigation through dredging ports, maintenance of waterways, and ensure goods and people can get to where they need to be. The bill also includes funding for critical inland waterways navigation projects, which transport important commodities like grain, iron, and petroleum.
- The bill continues investments in critical construction projects to protect communities from extreme weather events and more frequent flooding. This funding supports projects and programs that use natural infrastructure and environmental restoration like using dredge material to rebuild and protect communities. The bill also expands the Water Infrastructure Financing Program to include levees, allowing low-interest loans for communities to make improvements and increase protection from flood events.
By the numbers:
- The agreement includes $1,854,688,000 for Construction. The agreement also includes a rescission of $9,678,000 of unused, previously appropriated funds, for a net appropriation of $1,845,010,000. The agreement also includes $1,434,500,000 from the use of prior-year balances from Public Law 117-58. Of the funds made available from Public Law 117-58, not less than $113,537,000 shall be allocated to inland navigation purpose construction projects named below.
- The agreement includes $142,990,000 for Investigations. The agreement also includes a rescission of $11,413,000 of unused, previously appropriated funds, for a net appropriation of $131,577,000.
- The agreement includes $368,037,000 for Mississippi River and Tributaries. The agreement also includes a rescission of $1,110,000 of unused, previously appropriated funds, for a net appropriation of $366,927,000.
- The agreement includes $5,552,816,000 for Operation and-Maintenance. The agreement also includes a rescission of $30,000 of unused, previously appropriated funds, for a net appropriation of $5,552,786,000.
The agreement notes that the Corps has utilized regional dredge contracting in various regions but not in New England. The Corps is encouraged to enter into regional contracts to support increased efficiencies in the deployment of dredges for navigation projects in the New England region. The Corps is directed to brief the Committees not later than 45 days after enactment of this Act on the opportunities to implement regional dredge contracting processes in the New England region.
