House Interior, Environment and Related Agencies Subcommittee Chairman Ken Calvert (R-Calif.) told reporters last week that congressional appropriators are “pretty much done” writing FY14 spending legislation that will fund EPA. Calvert did not offer any details of funding levels to be included in the legislation but indicated the measure would win the backing of both Democrats and Republicans in Congress.
The Interior-EPA appropriations bill will be just one component of massive omnibus spending legislation that will provide funding for all federal departments and agencies for the remainder of the fiscal year. The text of the omnibus bill had not been made public as of Friday afternoon, but its release was said to be imminent.
The bill’s funding level for EPA and its water infrastructure loan programs will likely represent a compromise between amounts floated by House and Senate appropriators earlier this year. House appropriators proposed drastic cuts to EPA and the State Revolving Fund (SRF) programs, circulating a proposal that would reduce overall EPA funding by 34 percent to $5.5 billion. The House plan would reduce funding for the DWSRF by more than 60 percent to $350 million, and the CWSRF by more than 80 percent to $250 million.
Senate appropriators proposed a modest 1.25 percent increase in EPA funding (to $8.48 billion), while keeping DWSRF and CWSRF funding nearly level at $907 million and $1.449 billion, respectively.
Stressing the importance of continued investment in water and wastewater infrastructure, last year AMWA and other utility organizations asked Congress to avoid severe SRF cuts and not allow “critical water and wastewater infrastructure to become a budget casualty.”