About | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline



1 [1] (February 14, 2018)

handle is hein.crs/crsmthzzaag0001 and id is 1 raw text is: 





CRS INSIGHT


Administration's Infrastructure Program

Emphasizes New Nonfederal Revenue

February 14, 2018 (IN10859)




Related Author


   • WilliamJ Malltt




William J. Mallett, Specialist in Transportation Policy (wmll  r IQ , 7-2216)

The Trump Administration's legislative onlinc for infrastructure, released on February 12,
2018, proposes a new Infrastructure Incentives Program to make grants to state and local
governments. This would be the largest single piece of the Administration plan in terms of
dedicated federal funding, with an allotment of half of the $200 billion the Administration
proposes to spend on infrastructure over 10 years. The grants could be used for transportation,
water resources, drinking water, and wastewater, as well as for cleanup of Superfund sites.
This Insight focuses on the potential of the program for projects submitted to the Department
of Transportation (DOT), one of the agencies that would be charged with administering the
program in addition to the Corps of Engineers and the Environmental Protection Agency. The
proposal does not break out the funds that would be directed to specific agencies or types of
infrastructure.

The Infrastructure Incentives Program would depart from previous federal grant programs for
infrastructure in two important ways. First, project sponsors would have to prove that they will
generate new nonfederal revenue to build and maintain the project. Applications for funding
would be evaluated by a set of criteria laid out in the proposal. Of these, the most important,
accounting for half the total score, would be the creation of new, nonfederal revenue for
capital investments. The second most important criterion, weighted at 20%, is the creation of
nonfederal revenue sources to pay for operations, maintenance, and rehabilitation over the life
of the project. Other factors, such as project cost (10%), innovative approaches to
procurement, project delivery, and operations (10%), use of new technologies (5%), and
economic and social returns on investment (5%), would matter much less in the government's