CORPS OF ENGINEERS—CIVIL WORKS

Improving Performance in the Corps Civil Works Program

• Supports the program’s three primary missions. 1) Facilitate commercial navigation; 2) reduce the risk of damage from floods and storms; and 3) restore aquatic ecosystems. The Corps conducts its work in partnership with non-Federal entities.

• Assesses project performance. Develops these programs using economic, environmental, and other performance criteria to produce a greater overall return to the Nation from the civil works program.

Maintaining the Nation’s Infrastructure

• Focuses on the performance of existing projects. Gives priority to operating and maintaining key water resources infrastructure across the Nation, including multi-purpose dams, navigation projects, and levees.

Constructing the Highest-Performing Projects First

• Continues to propose a performance-based, earmark-free construction program. Supports construction of the projects in the main Corps missions that provide the greatest net returns for each dollar invested.

• Reduces the construction backlog. Focuses funds on completing projects that demonstrate a high return within the main Corps mission areas that are already under construction.

  • Requires $19 billion just to complete those ongoing projects that are consistent with the program’s performance criteria and $38 billion to complete all projects including congressional add-ons.

  • Focuses on the highest-performing projects, rather than new starts, and thereby completes them sooner. This accelerates the completion of such projects as the Oakland Harbor navigation channels in California, which will be completed in 2009.

  • Supports studies of those proposed projects that are most likely to produce a high net return for each dollar invested.

• Proposes user fee for inland waterways. Proposes to phase out the current excise tax on diesel fuel for the inland waterways and replace it with a lockage-based user fee.

  • Additional revenue from the proposed fee is needed to pay for ongoing and future construction, replacement, expansion, and rehabilitation work on the inland waterways, consistent with the required 50 percent cost-share for such investments from the Inland Waterways Trust Fund.

Restoring Aquatic Ecosystems

Source: Environmental Science Division, Conservancy of Southwest Florida The Budget would help restore 90 square miles of endangered Florida panther habitat at Picayune Strand, west of the Everglades.

• Restores the Everglades. $185 million for the Corps to help restore the ecosystem of South Florida, including the Everglades, an increase of $54 million over the 2008 enacted level.

  • Focuses on a small number of restoration projects with direct ecological benefits, as recommended by the National Research Council, with projects selected to evaluate the validity of scientific assumptions regarding the effectiveness of current approaches to restoration of the Central Everglades, thereby reducing uncertainty over time.

  • Works in stages to restore, for example, natural hydrological conditions in Everglades National Park. The first stage, which the Corps is conducting under the 1989 Modified Water Deliveries to Everglades National Park project authority, is the centerpiece of the current phase of the overall South Florida ecosystem restoration effort. The Corps will evaluate the success of this project, and incorporate the lessons learned, before proceeding under the 2000 Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan authority with further steps to improve water deliveries to the park.

• Fosters Louisiana coastal restoration. $20 million to protect and restore Louisiana’s coastal wetlands ecosystem, an increase of $17 million over the 2008 enacted level.

• Supports Missouri River restoration. Modifies the Intake Dam on the Yellowstone River to open up the upstream habitat to the endangered pallid sturgeon.

Rebuilding New Orleans and Supporting Overall Response Capability

• Reduces vulnerability of New Orleans to storm damage. $5.8 billion in additional emergency funding in 2009 to provide 100-year storm protection to the greater New Orleans area. The Corps has already provided a higher level of storm protection for New Orleans than the area has ever had. The additional funds, combined with the State’s cost-share, will help keep the project on schedule for completion.

• Supports effective response to emergencies. $46 million for activities, such as preparation, logistics, and training, to ensure that the Corps is able to respond effectively to natural disasters.

Since 2001, the Corps of Engineers has:

• Focused resources on the highest performing projects. The Administration has established principles and performance criteria to guide and rank the allocation of funds among construction projects.

• Completed 70 construction projects. Allows the Nation to realize the benefits of completed navigation, aquatic ecosystem restoration, and storm damage reduction projects. Significant project completions through 2008 include inland waterways projects, such as Montgomery Point Lock and Dam in Arkansas and an innovative flood damage reduction project, Grand Forks and East Grand Forks in North Dakota and Minnesota, which combined structural and non-structural approaches to flood damage reduction. The 2009 Budget will complete funding for construction of the navigation and ecosystem features of the Columbia River Channel Improvements project.

• Placed greater emphasis on existing infrastructure. The Budget emphasizes maintenance of key Corps facilities. For instance, the Budget has emphasized maintenance and rehabilitation of facilities to improve reliability on three inland waterways with the most commercial traffic: the Ohio River; the Mississippi River; and the Illinois Waterway.

• Protected the environment. Through its permitting process, the Corps Regulatory Program has helped protect 30,000 acres of wetlands.