Senators Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) and David Vitter (R-La) – the Chair and Ranking member of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, respectively – have indicated that they have reached agreement on a bipartisan Water Resources Development Act (WRDA) that will be released tomorrow and scheduled for a mark-up on March 20. The bill would authorize locks, dams, flood control and ecosystem restoration projects across the country.

While the full draft bill has not been released, committee leaders have indicated some of the key aspects of the measure. Among the provisions of interest to ASA, the bill will:

• Require all tax revenue collected for the Harbor Maintenance Trust Fund (HMTF) to be spent on actual port maintenance and dredging projects. This is consistent with the RAMP Act that ASA supports to wall off the HMTF dollars.
• Require that any cuts in the annual Appropriations bills to Army Corps of Engineers (ACE) accounts below the previous year’s level would be subject to a point of order that would take a two-thirds Senate vote to waive. This would ensure that lawmakers do not make up for mandating the annual expenditure of all funds collected in the HMTF by raiding other ACE accounts. Appropriators are expected to strongly oppose these provisions.
• Streamline environmental reviews of waterway projects, drawing on the model used in the highway bill passed last year.
• Include "punitive" budgeting penalties that would be imposed on the corps and other federal agencies for missing construction deadlines.
• Allow ACE to dredge eligible ports and harbors to 50 feet – the depth necessary to accommodate larger cargo ships that will soon be coming through the expanded Panama Canal.

Boats enter Cheatham Dam on the Cumberland River in Tennessee. (USACE photo by Lee Roberts)

The draft bill will not include an increase of the diesel barge taxes. Ranking Member Vitter has stated that he and Chairwoman Boxer support raising the tax but it is the jurisdiction of the Finance Committee and would require their approval.

ASA strongly supports enactment of a WRDA that addresses the need to upgrade locks and dams on the Upper Mississippi River. ASA is working closely with the Soy Transportation Coalition, other stakeholders, Committee leaders and staff, and other Members of Congress to move a meaningful WRDA bill forward.