Home > News > Pelosi Announces $79.4 Million for Bay Area Shipping, Education, and Wetlands Restoration
Pelosi Announces $79.4 Million for Bay Area Shipping, Education, and Wetlands Restoration
Thursday, November 10, 2005
Contact: Brendan Daly/Jennifer Crider, 202-226-7616
Washington, D.C. – House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi announced she helped secure $79.4 million for San Francisco Bay area shipping, education, and wetlands restoration in H.R. 2419, the fiscal year 2006 Energy & Water Appropriations Act. The bill included $6.4 million Pelosi secured for San Francisco projects and $73 million Pelosi and her Bay Area colleagues requested for area projects.
"Economic development and conserving our region's marine ecosystems go hand-in-hand in the Bay Area," Pelosi said. "These projects will help conserve San Francisco's wetlands for our children and promote the local economy."
Pelosi announced the following San Francisco-related projects will receive funds:
- $2.22 million for San Francisco Bay dredging operations, including a 55-foot depth and 2,000-foot width for the San Francisco Bar Channel. The San Francisco Bar Channel is the shipping channel through the Golden Gate.
- $1.8 million for the collection of floating debris that poses a danger to water craft in the San Francisco Harbor and Bay.
- $1.44 million for the San Francisco Bay Long-Term Management Strategy (LTMS) for economic and safe disposal of dredged material in the San Francisco Bay area. Fiscal year 2006 funds would help complete the study of mercury methylation in wetland restoration projects and to study the environmental impact of the regional dredged material management plan. LTMS also funds a study of “environmental windows,” or periods when dredging is allowed, to protect endangered species of fish, and includes the development of upland beneficial reuse sites, such as restoration of the Hamilton Army Wetlands.
- $750,000 for the City College of San Francisco for equipment purchases. This equipment will support health-related education and training services for the greater San Francisco community, including its growing and diverse immigrant populations.
- $200,000 to research a long-term coastal storm damage prevention plan for Ocean Beach. Erosion at Ocean Beach threatens the Great Highway and the underlying sewage transport facility. The City of San Francisco has partnered with the Army Corps of Engineers to work to slow Ocean Beach erosion, and these funds will pay for feasibility studies for their plan.
The following projects were requested by Pelosi along with her Bay Area colleagues and funded by the House of Representatives, including:
- $48 million to deepen Oakland Harbor ship channels to 50 feet to accommodate new deep draft container ships and use the sediment to create wetlands habitat.
- $13 million for Hamilton Army Airfield wetlands restoration.
- $5.83 million for Coho and Chinook salmon and steelhead trout conservation and recovery at the Dry Creek (Warm Springs) Dam.
- $5.59 million for Oakland Harbor maintenance dredging.
- $475,000 to restore formerly tidal marshlands in the San Pablo Bay watershed.
- $125,000 for Napa River salt marsh restoration.
The Senate must now approve the Act before the President can sign it into law.
