§2341c Criteria for Funding Environmental Infrastructure Projects

Summary

The Secretary must create clear rules, no later than 180 days after December 27, 2020, for how to score and rank environmental assistance projects that Congress authorizes. The rules must at least look at local economic effects (such as benefits to the local economy, help for local development, number of direct jobs, and whether the local partner can pay its share), the community type (rural or economically disadvantaged, including disadvantaged minority communities), how much money the project already got, the funding ability of the Corps of Engineers, whether another federal program could do the project at the same cost to the local partner, and any other factors the Secretary thinks are important. The Secretary must add these rules to the annual Civil Works Direct Program Development Policy Guidance. For fiscal year 2022, and every two years after that, when the President sends the budget to Congress, the Secretary must send a report to the Senate Committees on Environment and Public Works and on Appropriations and to the House Committees on Transportation and Infrastructure and on Appropriations. The report must show how the Secretary ranked each authorized environmental assistance project using the rules above.