GOOD NEWS! On July 31st, the U.S. House of Representatives approved over $7.63 billion for the U.S. Army Corps Engineers Civil Works Program in their passage of H.R. 7617. The Corps funding for Energy & Water Development was included in an FY21 appropriations bill that was combined with five appropriation packages for other federal agencies and programs, also called a minibus appropriations bill. The H.R. 7617 minibus bill included funding packages for Commerce-Justice-Science, Defense, Financial Services and General Government, Labor-Health and Human Services-Education, Transportation-Housing and Urban Development.

Diving into the details of how this impacts the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway (AIWW), the Corps received their funding broken into the following accounts:
Investigations- $151 million
Construction- $2.6 billion
Operation & Maintenance- $3.84 billion
Other- $1.039 billion

Since the AIWW is an existing federal project, we receive our funding through the Operation & Maintenance Account. This year, the individual allocations included in the Administration’s Budget are:
VA – $685,000 for Dismal Swamp Canal & $1.262 million for the Albemarle-Chesapeake Canal
NC – $3.625 million
SC – $100,000
GA – $202,000
FL – $380,000
Total for AIWW – $6.254 million  

The House also included the following mini-pots for Additional Dredging Needs where we can compete for additional funding for AIWW projects this coming year. In our advocacy efforts, we asked that the mini-pots be $75 million each, which was a larger request than we had previously received.

Navigation – $5.7 billion ($40.156 Million in FY20)
Inland Waterway- $55 million (same as FY20)
Small, Remote or Subsistence Navigation- $65 million (same as FY20)

While the numbers were less than requested in two categories (but equal to their FY20 allocation), Navigation funding well exceeded our request and is being envisioned to fund waterway infrastructure projects that will provide a stimulus to the U.S. economy during the current pandemic and recession. Overall, the Corps funding included over $17 billion in emergency funding including the $5 billion in the Navigation mini-pot listed above.

Looking ahead, this completes the process for the House until the Senate proposes their appropriation bills and approves them. Once the Senate completes their process, the two legislative bodies will need to agree on a final compromise (a Conference Bill) and the House and Senate will need to vote to approve the Conference Bill and the President will need to sign the Bill. Since it is a Presidential election year and FY21 begins on October 1, 2020, we do not expect the appropriations process to be completed before the new fiscal year begins. Therefore, Congress will need to pass a Continuing Resolution to continue funding the federal government at FY20 levels until the new bills are passed or we would have a government shutdown. We will be tracking the next few months in Washington, D.C. and we will continue to keep our membership informed.