By Matthew Cimitile, cimitile@msu.edu
Great Lakes Echo
April 30, 2009
More than $41 million in stimulus funding is going towards dredging channels and repairing outdated structures at 15 Great Lakes harbors in Michigan and Wisconsin, according to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Detroit District.
In all, the eight Great Lakes states scored $94 million for such work. But shipping organizations are angry that only 2 percent of the funds distributed nationwide went to the Great Lakes states.
“We do not think the Corps did a good job of divvying out these stimulus dollars,” Glen Nekvasil, a spokesman for the Lakes Carriers Association, said today. “The Great Lakes are a commercial shipping power, there are lots of people here, lots of jobs needed and a dredging backload.”
Shippers are also dismayed that nothing was earmarked for the new Soo Lock in Sault Ste., Marie, Mich. Its construction would be one of the largest Great Lakes public works navigation projects in recent memory, generating millions of dollars and jobs.
“It is incomprehensible that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers did not include the new Soo Lock,” said Donald Cree, president of the Great Lakes Maritime Task Force. “Someone in Washington has forgotten the Great Lakes region is the nation’s industrial heartland.”
Some of these funds, part of the $4.6 billion the Corps distributed to over a thousand projects across the country this week, will be used to increase the navigability of places like Ludington Harbor in Michigan, Kewaunee Harbor in Wisconsin and nine other Great Lakes ports.
The list of projects receiving funds includes 178 construction, 892 operation and maintenance and 45 Mississippi River projects nationwide.
Projects were selected that could be executed quickly, result in immediate employment, have little risk and be completed without additional funding.
Most of the dredging projects in the region are to bring channels down to the national authorized depth for commercial shipping, said Lynn Duerod, press officer for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Detroit District.
Other funds will be directed at repairing crumbling infrastructure like dams and breakwaters that hindered ships from getting to port.
“Because these are federal channels, they bring in the largest ships and the largest amount of business, but due to the condition of the harbors they weren’t able to get through,” said Duerod.
The funds are part of President Barack Obama’s “American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009” to stimulate the economy and create jobs.
The Corps believes this funding package will contribute to the nation’s economic well-being by putting Americans back to work, Lt. Col. James Davis, district engineer of U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Detroit District said in a press release.
The Corps of Engineers, Detroit District handles federal civil engineering works in the states of Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin.