U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in St. Louis announces stimulus work

St. Louis, MO – April 29, 2009 – The United States Army Corps of Engineers has released a listing of Civil Works projects to be funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009.
 
The legislation, signed into law by President Barack Obama on February 17, appropriated $4.6 billion to the Corps for its Civil Works program. 

The portion of that work allocated to the St. Louis Engineer District totals $279.4 million.  This is compared with the District’s funding of $160.7 million under the 2009 Omnibus Appropriation.  Work will be conducted across the 28,000 square mile, two-state region of Illinois and Missouri in the St. Louis Engineer District.

“The Recovery Act funds for Civil Works will enable the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to do much good for the nation,” John Paul Woodley, Jr., Assistant Secretary of the Army for Civil Works, said from Washington. 

“In addition to the opportunity to help the nation and her citizens recover from this time of economic hardship,” said Woodley, “the Corps will be able to use these funds to accomplish work on water resources projects that will benefit the nation for years to come.”

“The Corps is fully committed to ensuring the Recovery Act funds provided for Civil Works are used to achieve the purposes envisioned by the President and Congress for the legislation,” said Maj. Gen. Merdith “Bo” Temple, deputy commanding general for Civil and Emergency Operations for the Corps.

“We intend to quickly put these dollars into action to get our fellow citizens to work on Corps projects throughout the nation.  At the same time, we will use these funds to build long-term value for the nation in its water resources projects with these funds.”

Economists estimate that Corps Recovery Act projects will create or maintain approximately 57,400 direct construction industry jobs and an additional 64,000 indirect and induced jobs in firms supplying or supporting the construction and the businesses that sell goods and services to these workers and their families.

In recommending projects up the chain of command for consideration under the ARRA, St. Louis District officials had to carefully consider five criteria set forth by the Congress:

• Work must be obligated/executed quickly;
• It must result in high, immediate employment;
• Have little schedule risk;
• Be executed by contract or direct hire of temporary labor; and
• Complete a project phase, a project, an element, or will provide a useful service that does not require additional funding.

District Commander, Col. Thomas E. O’Hara has said that the District’s mission to provide quality, responsive engineering and environmental services to the nation has been a core part of the process throughout.  “We have and will work hard together with our partners and stakeholders to execute the projects that have been funded by this legislation.” 

The St. Louis District also focused on critical missions or business lines in its determination process.

• Flood Risk Management:  Providing flood risk protection to people in the region is critical.  There are several levee systems that have been assessed to have deficiencies and the ARRA will make major inroads in fixing those problems.  Examples include improvements to the Wood River Levee, Chain of Rocks Levee, East St. Louis Levee, the St. Louis Flood Protection System, Monarch-Chesterfield and Cape Girardeau Floodwall.
• Navigation: This is the District’s oldest mission.  The District maintains the critical 9-foot navigation channel with locks and dams, dredging and river engineering structures.  Challenges to this system include aging infrastructure and backlogged maintenance.  This legislation will enable us to complete the major rehabilitation the Locks 27, the entry and exit point to the upper Mississippi River navigation system.  These are the busiest locks on the Mississippi, moving some 67,000,000 tons of cargo in 2008. 
• Environmental support:  This act funds the Environmental Management Project in the St. Louis District, which is restoring the functionality of critical wildlife areas.  It also funds environmental stewardship efforts at our multipurpose lakes and at the District’s Rivers Project.  This will increase healthy sustainable land and water resources that will provide both enjoyment to the public and contribute to economic development.
• Recreation:  The Corps of Engineers is America’s largest provided of water-related recreation.  Last year alone, more than 16,000,000 visits were logged at St. Louis District Corps of Engineers recreation sites.  This act will enable us to restore previous levels of service at our projects to provide safe and healthy recreation to users as they experience firsthand the many benefits of our environment by visiting Corps recreation projects.  Work to be accomplished under this act will include replacing the visitors center at Mark Twain Lake which had to be closed several years ago due to unsafe conditions. 

The Corps of Engineers acknowledges that the $4.6 billion allocated will not enable it to undertake all projects that met the criteria for selection.  But it will make significant progress on current construction projects and needed maintenance work while putting people to work.  Those projects that were not selected for stimulus funds, will continue to be considered for funding in the 2010 and future budgets.

St. Louis District officials have stated that the list of selected projects best met the criteria set forth, many very worthy projects that did not meet one or more criteria or which simply could not be funded in the total package will continue to receive future consideration as appropriate.  Projects and work funded are in many cases examples of previously deferred maintenance and work.  Their completion will enable the Corps and District to move on to future projects. 

The Corps must, in most instances, expend the funds allocated by the end of Fiscal 2010 – September 30, 2010 – although some funds that are obligated within that time frame may be expended past that date.

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