Jeff Gillies, gilliesj@msu.edu
Great Lakes Echo
While many Michigan communities struggle with water problems, the state’s poorest city may still be sitting on 100-year-old wood water mains.
“If they’ve got the flu, you can imagine that we’ve got pneumonia,” said Marcus Robinson, president of Benton Harbor’s Consortium for Community Development.
Benton Harbor is one of hundreds of Great Lakes communities that could benefit from a $1.88 billion federal boost to the region’s state-run water project loan programs.
The federal economic stimulus package will funnel $6 billion through the Environmental Protection Agency into water projects nationwide. The Great Lakes states are in line for $1.4 billion for wastewater projects and another $450 million to improve municipal drinking water systems.
The EPA sent $432 million — the agency’s biggest grant ever — to New York’s sewer program on April 3. The state should see another $87 million for drinking water projects.
Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm has announced drinking water and wastewater projects eligible for a piece of the state’s $236 million allotment. That includes new water mains in Port Huron and sewer improvements in Detroit, Lansing and Benton Harbor.
Ohio will get $279 million and was accepting project applications through the state’s recovery Web site until March 13. Ohio Environmental Protection Agency spokeswoman Melissa Fazekas said that the agency has received applications for more than $4 billion worth of projects.
In early February, after the stimulus bill passed the House but before it passed the Senate, the Indiana Finance Authority published a list of 12 drinking water and wastewater projects that would be the first to get zero-percent interest loans.. When the bill passed it gave Indiana $122 million for water projects — around $40 million less than the state expected when the list was published.
Indiana’s list includes drinking water mains for Liberty, Madison and North Manchester and a $10 million wastewater treatment plant in Peru.
It’s not clear how much money Benton Harbor will get, but it will be a significant help, Robinson said. The sewer projects will put people to work in a city with a 17 percent unemployment rate.
Additional money from the Michigan Department of Transportation will give the city a chance to repave the roads and sidewalks that get dug up during construction, many of which are more than 50 to 75 years old.
“The sidewalks are so bad here that you can’t even plow them in the winter, so people end up walking in the streets,” Robinson said.
Here is the breakdown for the Great Lakes basin:
– Illinois: $256 million
– Indiana: $122 million
– Michigan: $236 million
– Minnesota: $107 million
– New York: $519 million
– Ohio: $279 million
– Pennsylvania: $220 million
– Wisconsin: $143 million