In this article from today’s Bee federal funding for local flood protection moves forward. The important fact to remember is that at each stage of the federal legislative transition toward actual money in local coffers, movement can be contested by other legislators, but so far ours is growing and holding, a testament to the legislative clout of our representatives and the clear need of the issue.
Here is an excerpt.
Congress expected to add $30 million for flood control
Money to bolster region's levees and Folsom Dam would bring year's funding to $70 million.
By David Whitney -- Bee Washington Bureau Published 12:01 am PDT Thursday, June 8, 2006
WASHINGTON -- House and Senate negotiators working on a final emergency spending bill will include $30 million in additional 2006 spending for Sacramento-area flood control.
If approved by the House and Senate this week as expected, the additional money would mean a total of about $70 million available this year for levee strengthening along the American and Sacramento rivers and flood-control improvements to Folsom Dam.
With the 2006 fiscal year ending Sept. 30, work is under way in Congress on 2007 flood-control spending. The House version includes $46.8 million for work on levees and Folsom Dam, plus $15 million in construction money for a road over the American River near the dam.
Of the new 2006 money, about $23 million would go for Sacramento River improvements and the remainder for additional flood protection on south Sacramento streams.
The Sacramento-area congressional delegation and the state's two Democratic senators, Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein, have been working to boost flood-control spending since organizing a helicopter tour of the region's levee network in February.
They had pledged to seek all the money the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers was in position to spend this summer on emergency repairs to strengthen weakened and eroded levees.
Last fall, about $40 million was included for 2006, but the corps notified the delegation over the last couple of months that it was ready to move ahead with another $37 million worth of work. The delegation sought to add that sum to a bill that finances the war in Iraq and Hurricane Katrina relief.
Rep. John Doolittle, R-Roseville, had tried in April to add money for Sacramento, but was blocked in the House Appropriations Committee when leaders said they were concerned of other parochial demands.
Feinstein, a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, succeeded in adding the money in the Senate version.
