A group of 30 Senate Democrats, led by Maryland’s Ben Cardin, introduced comprehensive legislation on April 20 aimed at improving water infrastructure, increasing regulatory oversight of lead screening and water quality monitoring, and helping homeowners remove lead pipes. The bill, which supporters say would cost $70 billion over ten years, in large part compiles into a single legislative package multiple lead bills that have been offered by Senate Democrats throughout the year.
Introduced as S. 2821 and titled the “Testing, Removal and Updated Evaluations of Lead Everywhere in America for Dramatic Enhancements that Restore Safety to Homes, Infrastructure and Pipes Act,” or the “True LEADership Act” for short, the bill would dramatically increase water and wastewater infrastructure funding, including:
- Reauthorizing the Drinking Water State Revolving Fund (DWSRF) at $21.17 billion over five years, and the Clean Water SRF at $34.93 billion over the same period;
- Making the Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (WIFIA) pilot program permanent and providing the program with $1.36 billion in mandatory funding annually over the next 13 years;
- Authorizing a $300 million, five year grant program to help communities and low-income homeowners replace lead service lines; and
- Removing the state volume cap on private activity bonds for water and wastewater infrastructure projects.
The bill would also make several changes to the Safe Drinking Water Act, such as:
- Directing EPA to finalize changes to the Lead and Copper Rule within 180 days;
- Allowing individuals to commence a civil action or petition EPA to do the same when it is believed that drinking water may present an imminent and substantial endangerment to human health;
- Establishing a grant program to offer funding to help schools carry out voluntary tests for lead in drinking water;
- Requiring EPA to notify the public of lead action level exceedances if the local utility fails to do so in a timely manner; and
- Permanently applying “Buy American” iron and steel rules to the Drinking Water SRF program.
Other parts of the legislation would offer tax credits to low- and middle-income homeowners to help pay for the removal of lead hazards from the home, and reform the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Healthy Homes program to expand access to federal lead abatement aid.
Additional provisions included in the bill can be reviewed in a detailed summary of the legislation available on Senator Cardin’s website. No Republicans have yet signed on in support of the bill, and the legislation is highly unlikely to advance with the Senate’s attention turning instead to a bipartisan WRDA bill introduced on April 25.