Two-and-a-half months after the onset of the 2012 fiscal year, Congress this month approved a $1 trillion omnibus appropriations bill that combined the contents of nine separate government funding bills into a massive legislative package. Many government agencies will experience slight budget cuts under the new spending bill, though some others will enjoy a modest funding boost.
Under the terms of the bill, EPA will receive $8.4 billion this fiscal year. This is $233 million below the agency’s FY11 funding level, but the cut is not nearly as severe as the $1.5 billion reduction proposed by Republican House appropriators earlier this year. Senate Democrats had previously proposed near-level funding for the agency.
The Drinking Water and Clean Water SRFs will see their funding reduced to $919 million and $1.469 billion, respectively, about $101 million below what both programs received in 2011. But each program is still in line for more money in 2012 than they typically received during the Bush Administration. For example, the $919 million appropriation for the DWSRF represents its fourth-highest funding level since the program began in the 1997 fiscal year, and is more than $90 million above the program’s FY09 funding level. The conference report accompanying the final spending legislation notes that in total, 2012 funding for the SRF programs will fund approximately 826 new drinking water and wastewater projects across the country, accounting for more than 131,000 jobs.
The legislation makes several modifications to rules outlining how states may spend their share of SRF dollars. For example, the bill eliminates a two-year-old requirement that states set aside at least 20 percent of their DWSRF allotments to fund green infrastructure projects. Instead, in 2012 each state will be allowed to use their own discretion in deciding what level of green infrastructure to support through the DWSRF. But the bill still requires states to reserve 10 percent of their CWSRF allocations for green infrastructure, and each state must set aside between 20 and 30 percent of their DWSRF and CWSRF dollars to provide additional subsidies (such as principal forgiveness or negative interest loans) to disadvantaged communities.