Durbin Announces $300 Million in Recovery Act Funding for Army Corps Projects in Illinois
[WASHINGTON, D.C.] – Assistant Senate Majority Leader Dick Durbin (D-IL) today announced $300,190,000 in funding through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act for Army Corps of Engineers projects in Illinois. It is estimated that the funding will directly create 2,400 jobs and indirectly create 6,144 jobs.
“This Recovery Act funding will allow the Army Corps to address a serious backlog of important infrastructure projects in Illinois while creating thousands of jobs,” said Durbin. “Chicago District projects alone are expected to generate 514 direct jobs and 557 indirect jobs within the northeast Illinois and northwest Indiana region. Around the state, the Corps will be able to accelerate critical maintenance projects that are long overdue such as increasing flood protection in the East St. Louis region. We will continue to see the benefits from these projects for years to come.”
Today’s funding is part of the Army Corps of Engineers announcement of $4.6 billion for approximately 1,191 projects nationwide. Economists estimate that Corps Recovery Act projects will create or maintain approximately 57,400 direct construction industry jobs and an additional 64,000 indirect and induced jobs in firms supplying or supporting the construction and the businesses that sell goods and services to these workers and their families.
The following projects will receive Recovery Act funding:
Construction
• East St. Louis: $3,000,000 in funding for geotechnical subsurface investigations to obtain information needed for the final design of underseepage control measure for the Metro East Sanitary District levee in Madison and St. Clair Counties.
• Wood River Levee: $15,313,000 in funding to complete drain repairs, pump station rehabilitation and construction of relief wells.
• Chain of Rocks Canal, Mississippi River: $11,450,000 in funding to complete construction of mitigation measures of the Chain of Rocks levee, construct relief wells, complete dredging operations to reduce the risk of levee failure and complete rehabilitation of the north levee berms
• Des Plaines River, Chicago: $1,620,000 in funding to complete Levee 37 contract.
• Cook County Infrastructure, Chicago: $400,000 in funding to complete design and construction for Flossmoor Water.
• Illinois River Basin Restoration, Rock Island: $2,098,000 in funding for construction contact for Waubonsie fish passage.
• Illinois Waterway, Lockport Lock and Dam, Rock Island: $88,861,000 in funding for contracting and developing plans for the rehab of Canal Walls.
• Lock and Dam 27, Mississippi River: $20,700,000 in funding for planning and construction of new Main Lock Miter Gates for Locks 27.
• Madison and St. Clair Counties: $3,171,000 in funding for construction on the Eagle Park Acres sanitary sewer collector system in Madison County and the rehabilitation of a combined sewer system in Belleville.
• Melvin Price Lock and Dam: $1,700,000 in funding for necessary construction at Melvin Price Lock.
• Mississippi River Between the Ohio and Missouri Rivers: $17,934,000 in funding to initiate and complete construction and continue removal of natural rock outcropping from within the navigation channel.
• North Park: $500,000 to complete ongoing construction for emergency streambank protection project for protecting North Park University Administration Building.
• Olmsted Locks and Dam, Ohio River: $4,906,000 in funding to place tainter gate shells in the river to complete low water activities.
• Upper Mississippi River Restoration, Rock Island: $12,029,000 in funding for habitat improvements and restoration projects at various sites on the Mississippi River.
Operations & Maintenance
• Calumet Harbor and River, Chicago: $1,100,000 in funding to increase the capacity for dredged material and allow for additional dredging in the future.
• Carlyle Lake: $21,896,000 in funding for operations and maintenance at Carlyle Lake, including increased dam safety, flood repair, increased recreational safety measures, dredging, perform critical backlog maintenance, and repair damaged roadways around the Lake.
• Chicago Harbor: $21,155,000 in funding to repair and stabilize the main structure protecting Chicago Harbor, a collapsing concrete cap of the mile-long stone filled timber crib northeast breakwater, and install four replacement lock gates.
• Illinois Waterway: $932,000 in funding for a variety of work, including restoration of flood damaged forest and maintenance dredging in critical river bends.
• Kaskaskia River Navigation: $11,411,000 in funding to complete critical ongoing maintenance, open additional side channels, replace emergency generator, and remove asbestos from lock and maintenance building.
• Lake Shelbyville: $11,195,000 in funding for maintenance backlog in recreation and environmental areas, complete shoreline erosion repairs, replace flood damaged facilities, replace deteriorating administration and visitor center buildings with energy efficient structures, and combat invasive plant species.
• Mississippi River between Missouri River and Minneapolis: $28,801,000 in funding for work along the Upper Mississippi River, including forest and floodplain restoration, shoreline stabilization, dredging, spillway rehabilitation, repairs of riverfront erosion, replacement of diesel compressors, safety improvements, repair of concrete lock walls, installation of buffers to reduce sediment input, and repair of several mitre gates.
• Rend Lake: $19,043,000 in funding to resume operation and maintenance of all recreation facilities, increase safety at the facilities, repair flood damage and spillway bridge, complete 2 phases of the Rend Lake bike trail, hire summer employees, perform various backlog maintenance, and consolidate aging facilities with energy efficient buildings.
Investigations
• Des Plaines River, Phase II: $350,000 in funding to complete mandatory Independent External Peer Review for this large study. It will serve to reduce $27 million in average annual damages and the risks associated with flooding in the Chicago Metropolitan Area.
• John Glenn Great Lakes Basin: $200,000 in funding to expand the use of tools developed under the Great Lakes Habitat Initiative by updating the database and developing additional features to foster collaboration and identification of funding sources, and developing a system to track completed projects and their associated environmental benefits.
Mississippi and Tributaries
• Mississippi River: $75,000 in funding to update existing and new benchmarks to a consistent reference plane to insure consistency with other Federal and local agencies responsible for flood forecasting, inundation models, navigation, flood insurance rate maps, and topographic mapping.
• Mississippi River Levees: $350,000 in funding to ensure the structural integrity and stability of the structure and prevent failure of this critical flood risk reduction component of the mainline Mississippi River levee system.