Federal wildland firefighters earn as little as $15 per hour, with entry level positions earning just less than $27,000 per year, according to Grassroots Wildland Firefighters, an advocacy group. (Photo by U.S. Forest Service)

The $20,000 salary increase for wildland firefighters in the 2021 infrastructure law could be coming to an end next week if Congress doesn’t act.

The infrastructure law included $600 million to boost salaries for the nearly 11,200 wildland firefighters for two years, giving the Interior Department or Forest Service employees a raise of either $20,000 each or 50% of their base salary.

Federal wildland firefighters earn as little as $15 per hour, with entry level positions earning just less than $27,000 per year, according to Grassroots Wildland Firefighters, an advocacy group. Those rates are well below those of some state employees in similar roles.

The problem is Congress provided the higher pay rate would expire with the rest of government spending, which is set for Dec. 20.

Lawmakers are likely to once again pass a continuing resolution prior to that deadline to keep the government open at current spending levels into the new year.

But because the firefighter pay boost was part of the infrastructure law instead of a yearly spending bill, it would require additional legislation to keep being paid out beyond Dec. 20.

Firefighters, their advocates and some members of Congress are now pushing to have the pay raise made permanent, as lawmakers enter the final days of this session of Congress.

Disaster bill

President Joe Biden asked for a disaster relief spending bill after hurricanes Helene and Milton to include $24 billion for the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Biden called for the bill — which is expected to be attached to the continuing resolution — to include “statutory language to support permanent, comprehensive pay reform for Federal wildland firefighters.”

The disaster aid bill appears the best chance of addressing the issue this year.

And appropriators are looking at fixing the issue in their annual funding bills, even as work on those bills is likely to be paused as Congress instead looks to pass a stopgap measure past Dec. 20 to keep the government funded for the next few months.

A House proposal included in Republicans’ spending bill covering the Interior Department, the Environmental Protection Agency and other agencies would direct $330 million for a pay increase to replace the expiring infrastructure law salary increase. It would be a permanent pay fix.

Setting a baseline in an annual spending bill would help keep the salaries consistent and avoid the uncertainty that comes with the expiration of the one-time infrastructure law funding, supporters say.

“Rather than continuing temporary and uncertain Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) supplemental payments, the funding in this bill will permanently address Federal wildland firefighter pay and capacity,” the funding bill’s chief sponsor, Idaho Republican Mike Simpson, and Oregon Republican Lori Chavez-DeRemer wrote in an August op-ed in the Idaho Statesman.

Simpson is the chair of the subcommittee responsible for writing the bill. Chavez-DeRemer, who represents a purple district in Central Oregon, lost her reelection bid this fall but won a nomination to join President-elect Donald Trump’s Cabinet as secretary of Labor.

The Musk-Ramaswamy cost-cutting drive

The effort comes amid an atmosphere favorable to funding cuts in Washington. Republicans, who will soon have unified control of Washington as Trump returns to the Oval Office, have blamed the inflation of the past four years on high government spending.

Trump has tasked entrepreneurs Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy with looking at ways to reduce federal spending. The pair of wealthy Trump backers has estimated $2 trillion could be trimmed from the $6.75 trillion annual budget, though they have been vague about what exactly would be chopped.

The Musk-Ramaswamy organization, which has not been formally created but is dubbed the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, is not expected to be an official government entity. A Trump spokeswoman did not return a message seeking comment about whether wildland firefighter pay would be a target for funding cuts.

Finding the political will to increase spending for any purpose in such an environment could be challenging, though increasing the pay of wildland firefighters — who work to manage the increasingly severe and costly fires that particularly ravage the rural areas known as the wildland-urban interface — has support from across the political spectrum in Congress, including leading GOP members.

The House funding bill authored by Simpson that included the pay raise passed the House nearly along party lines.

In a video message to constituents this month, Simpson sounded broadly supportive of Musk and Ramaswamy’s mission, but indicated there were areas he would fight to avoid cuts. He did not explicitly mention firefighter pay.

“It will be an interesting debate,” Simpson said of the effort to identify funding cuts. “I don’t mind having outside eyes look at how Congress does their job and how the money is spent. It could be spent more efficiently and more effectively, thus saving the taxpayer money.”

He added he was “excited” to see recommendations from the pair.

“There will be some I suspect I disagree with and a lot of them I probably agree with,” he said. “So that will be a debate for Congress.”

Senate bill

The Senate, which generally requires a much more bipartisan approach than the House, has not passed the Simpson-authored bill that Democrats opposed because of its drastic cuts to the Interior Department and EPA.

But the Senate companion spending bill, sponsored by Oregon Democrat Jeff Merkley, who chairs the corresponding spending panel in the Senate, also includes a permanent raise for wildland firefighters, as well as funding for a firefighter health and wellness program and a fund for housing.

“This bill honors the courageous work our federal wildland firefighters do by establishing a permanent fix to prevent a devastating pay cut,” Senate Appropriations Chair Patty Murray, a Washington Democrat, said in a statement after the committee passed the bill 28-1 in July.

Community and environmental justice advocates say the Biden administration is failing to deliver promised transparency and public engagement around its $7 billion clean hydrogen hub initiative.

“Engagement isn’t merely leading people into a process that’s going to happen with or without them,” said Tom Torres, hydrogen program director for the Ohio River Valley Institute, a nonprofit serving one of the regions where federally funded partnerships are trying to lay the groundwork for new local hydrogen economies. “It means meaningfully involving people in the decisions about the project.”

The U.S. Department of Energy announced funding in October 2023 for seven regional clean hydrogen hubs — clusters of interconnected projects meant to kickstart production of the fuel with little or no greenhouse gas emissions. Since then, the department has held online briefings and virtual listening sessions for each hub, but advocates say they are not getting the kind of information necessary to assess who will be impacted by the projects and how.

Torres and others say they want more than just dots on a map. They want to know how hydrogen will be produced, how it will be used, and how it will get to end users. For projects that depend on carbon capture, they want to know how and where the carbon will be captured, transported and stored. And once the specifics are known, they want a chance to have meaningful input on the final projects.

Spokespeople for the Department of Energy and regional hubs said the answers to those questions are still being worked out and that more engagement is on the horizon.  Advocates are increasingly frustrated and fear that community input will come too late to affect how the hubs are developed.

“It doesn’t make sense … on one hand to say there’s not enough on paper to tell the public about, but on the other hand there is enough to allocate almost $1 billion for these companies,” Torres said.

Are events just ‘checking a box’?

When burned as a fuel source, hydrogen does not emit carbon dioxide, but its production today almost always comes from fossil fuels. Some see a potential for hydrogen to replace natural gas in certain hard-to-electrify sectors such as industry or heavy duty transportation, but the benefits for addressing climate change hinge on whether it can be produced cleanly and at scale.

The Biden administration’s hydrogen hub program, part of the 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, aims to ramp up production of hydrogen made with low-carbon energy, including renewables, nuclear power, and fossil fuels paired with carbon capture. 

“It is literally like building the natural gas infrastructure that we have all over the place again for hydrogen,” said Shawn Bennett, energy and resilience manager for Battelle, the project manager for the Appalachian Regional Hydrogen Hub, ARCH2, which includes projects for Ohio, West Virginia and Pennsylvania. A majority of its projects will use steam methane reforming to make hydrogen from natural gas, along with carbon capture and storage. Other projects in the hub plan to make hydrogen from waste gases or from electrolysis, which uses energy to split water molecules. 

In May, dozens of groups urged the Department of Energy to suspend funding discussions for the ARCH2 project until the public receives detailed information beyond general maps and short project descriptions. On July 31 the Department of Energy formally committed the first $30 million of federal funding to ARCH2, with a total of up to $925 million to be spent over the next decade or so.

Last month, the Department of Energy committed up to $1 billion for the Midwest Alliance for Clean Hydrogen, MachH2, which spans Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and Iowa and plans to produce hydrogen from a mix of nuclear power, wind energy and natural gas. The department will hold a December 9 briefing on MachH2.

In response to the Energy News Network’s questions about community groups’ complaints about a lack of outreach, a Department of Energy spokesperson provided a statement saying it “has been actively engaged with these communities in support of the economic playbook” of the Biden-Harris administration.

The ARCH2 project held a community outreach session in West Virginia in November, and additional meetings will be held in Ohio and Pennsylvania early next year, Bennett said. Some community group members protested outside at the West Virginia session but then came inside for a good discussion, he added.

Torres said there was no general presentation at the West Virginia meeting, and company representatives were present for only a handful of the hub’s projects. Even then, project information was still sparse. 

“It wasn’t an opportunity for people’s voices to be heard,” he said. “What is the value of these events other than checking a box for these companies?”

Advocacy groups focusing on the MachH2 project said months went by without getting updates or details. Then last month, they got less than 24 hours’ notice for a briefing with general descriptions about the MachH2 hub projects.

During that session, representatives for the Department of Energy said a decision on the hub’s funding commitment would come soon, “probably next week sometime,” said Susan Thomas, the legislative and policy director and communications manager for Just Transition Northwest Indiana. Minutes after the November 20 session ended, the Department of Energy announced the MachH2 funding commitment. 

“Our jaws were on the table,” Thomas said.

Details remain to be worked out

Groups have been trying to get answers from the Department of Energy for more than a year, said Chris Chyung, executive director of Indiana Conservation Voters. In his view, the agency’s approach “is just flouting the law.” According to the Department of Energy’s website, engagement with communities and labor is a key principle required in hubs’ community benefits plans, which are part of hubs’ contractual obligations for funding.

Community groups learned in the November 20 briefing that the MachH2 community engagement would not address concerns related to any pipelines associated with the hub. Instead, those would be handled by a separate office within the Department of Energy. 

But a pipeline for northwestern Indiana “is absolutely part and parcel of [a] dirty hydrogen project that is part of MachH2,” and the community should get a say on it, said Lauren Piette, an attorney with Earthjustice, which does not consider hydrogen made with natural gas to be climate-friendly, even with carbon capture.

The Department of Energy spokesperson did not respond to the Energy News Network’s question about how community benefits for hub projects can fully be assessed if they don’t include consideration of issues and input related to necessary pipelines.

Representatives of the MachH2 and ARCH2 hubs who spoke at an Ohio Fuel Cell & Hydrogen Consortium program last month said they couldn’t practically engage in community outreach until funding commitments had been negotiated with the Department of Energy. Until then, it wasn’t certain whether each hub would move forward.

Also, as a practical matter, “there was no budget for these things,” Bennett said. Details for each hub’s projects are still being worked out, and ARCH2 is still trying to add additional project partners.

Even then, details for projects won’t be finalized until review under the National Environmental Policy Act, according to Neil Banwart, who is the chief integration officer for the MachH2 hub and also the managing director for hydrogen at Energy Systems Network. 

“It’s not a certainty that all of the projects will get built in the locations that we shared on a map,” he said.

Chyung said he felt the comments about funding were “a complete dodge on behalf of these extremely wealthy national corporations that have said since 2023 they were eager to get started on community outreach.”

Advocates frustrated by lack of transparency, engagement on regional hydrogen hub projects is an article from Energy News Network, a nonprofit news service covering the clean energy transition. If you would like to support us please make a donation.

Tech insiders say Biden is leaving a strong foundation for high-tech industry, boosting broadband access, setting a foundation for AI regulation, and encouraging chip manufacturing. (Rebecca Noble | Getty Images)

As he’s poised to leave office in two months, President Joe Biden will leave a legacy of “proactive,” “nuanced” and “effective” tech policy strategy behind him, technologists across different sectors told States Newsroom.

Biden’s term was bookended by major issues in the tech world. When he took office in early 2021, he was faced with an economy and workforce that was struggling to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic, and longstanding issues with a digital divide across the country. As he prepares to exit the White House, federal agencies are working to incorporate the principles from the 2023 AI Bill of Rights, on evolving technologies that will undoubtedly continue changing American life.

Though he was unable to get federal regulations on AI passed through Congress, Biden’s goal was to bring tech access to all Americans, while safeguarding against potential harms, the technologists said.

“I think everything that he does is foundational,” said Suriel Arellano, a longtime consultant and author on digital transformation who’s based in Los Angeles. “So it definitely sets the stage for long term innovation and regulation.”

The digital divide 

For Arellano, Biden’s attempt to bring internet access to all families stands out as a lasting piece of the president’s legacy. Broadband internet for work, healthcare and education was a part of Biden’s 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Deal, especially targeting people in rural areas.

Biden earmarked $65 billion toward the project, which was dolled out to states and federal departments to establish or improve the physical infrastructure to support internet access. As of September, more than 2.4 million previously unserved homes and businesses have been connected to the internet, and $50 billion has been given to grant programs that support these goals across the states.

Arellano said he thinks there’s still work to do with the physical broadband infrastructure before that promise is realized — “I think that should have come first,” he said.

“But I think as a legacy, I think breaching the digital divide is actually one of the strong — maybe not the strongest, but I would say it’s definitely a strong legacy that he leaves,” Arellano said.

Shaping the U.S. conversation about AI

During Biden’s presidency, practical and responsible application of artificial intelligence became a major part of the tech conversation. The 2023 AI Bill of Rights created the White House AI Council, the creation of a framework for federal agencies to follow relating to privacy protection and a list of guidelines for securing AI workers, for navigating the effects on the labor market and for ensuring equity in AI use, among others.

The guidelines put forth by the administration are subtle, and “not likely to be felt by the average consumer,” said Austin-based Alex Shahrestani, an attorney and managing partner at Promise Legal, which specializes in tech and regulatory policy.

“It was something that’s very light touch and essentially sets up the groundwork to introduce a regulatory framework for AI providers without it being something that they’re really going to push back on,” Shahrestani said.

In recent months, some federal agencies have released their guidelines called for by the AI Bill of Rights, including the Department of Labor, and The Office of Management and Budget, which outlines how the government will go about “responsible acquisition” of AI. It may not seem like these guidelines would affect the average consumer, Shahrestani said, but government contractors are likely to be larger companies that already have a significant commercial footprint.

“It sets up these companies to then follow these procedures in other contexts, so whether that’s B2B or direct-to-consumer applications, that’s like more of a trickle down sort of approach,” he said.

Sheena Franklin, D.C.-based founder of K’ept Health and previously a lobbyist, said Biden emphasized the ethical use and development of AI, and set a tone of fostering public trust and preventing harm with the AI Bill of Rights.

Franklin and Shahrestani agreed it’s possible that President-elect Donald Trump could repeal some of Biden’s executive orders on AI, but they see the Bill of Rights as a fairly light approach to regulating it.

“It was a really nuanced and effective approach,” Shahrestani said. “There’s some inertia building, right? Like a snowball rolling down the hill. We’re early days for the snowball, but it just got started and it will only grow to be a bigger one.”

The CHIPS act

Biden’s CHIPS and Science Act of 2022, which aimed to strengthen domestic semiconductor manufacturing, supply chains and the innovation economy with a $53 billion investment, is a major piece of his legacy, Franklin said. The bill centered on worker and community investments, and prioritized small businesses and underrepresented communities, with a goal of economic growth in the U.S., and especially in communities that needed support.

Two years after the bill was signed, the federal government, in partnership with American companies, has provided funding for semiconductor manufacturing projects that created more than 100,000 jobs and workforce development programs. The U.S. is on track to produce 30% of the world’s semiconductor chips in 2032, up from 10% today.

“He was really trying to position the U.S. as a global leader when it came to technology, because that industry is going to continue to grow,” Franklin said.

It’s hard to quantify what the lasting impact of the CHIPS act will be, but one immediate factor is computing, Shahrestani said. The AI models being developed right now have infinite abilities, he said, but the computing power had previously held the industry back.

“Being able to provide more compute through better chips, and more sophisticated hardware is going to be a big part of what provides, and what is behind the best AI technologies,” Shahrestani said.

Accountability for Big Tech

Many in the Big Tech community see Biden’s AI Bill of Rights, and its data privacy inclusions, as well as the Justice Department’s monopoly lawsuits against tech giants like Apple and Google, as hampering innovation.

Arellano is optimistic about the technological advances and innovation that the U.S. may see under a less regulation-focused Trump presidency, but he cautions that some regulations may be needed for privacy protections.

“My concern is always on the public side, you know, putting the dog on a leash, and making sure that our regulations are there in place to protect the people,” he said.

Franklin predicts that if Biden attempts any last-minute tech policy before he leaves office, it will probably be to pursue further antitrust cases. It would align with his goal of fostering competition between startups and small businesses and reinforce his legacy of safeguarding consumer interests, she said.

When she considered how to describe Biden’s tech legacy, Franklin said she nearly used the word “strength,” though she said he ultimately could have done a little bit more for tech regulation. But she landed on two words: “thoughtful and proactive.”

“Meaning, he’s thinking about everybody’s concerns,” Franklin said. “Not just thinking about the Big Tech and not just thinking about the consumers, right? Like there has to be a balance there.”

GET THE MORNING HEADLINES.

SUBSCRIBE

President-elect Donald Trump said Monday he would nominate former Congressman Sean Duffy as Transportation secretary. In this photo, Duffy and his wife, Rachel Campos-Duffy, speak onstage during the 2023 FOX Nation Patriot Awards at The Grand Ole Opry on Nov. 16, 2023 in Nashville, Tennessee. (Photo by Terry Wyatt/Getty Images)

President-elect Donald Trump will nominate former U.S. Rep. Sean Duffy, a Wisconsin Republican, to be the next secretary of Transportation, Trump said in a statement Monday evening.

Duffy, who earned praise from both parties during his House tenure for helping to pass legislation funding a bridge connecting Wisconsin and Minnesota, won five elections to the U.S. House but resigned his seat in 2019 to care for a daughter born with a heart condition and Down syndrome.

Duffy appeared on MTV’s “The Real World” before running for Congress. He met his wife, Rachel Campos-Duffy, on the show.

After leaving Congress, Duffy returned to TV, appearing as a commentator on CNN, a contributor for Fox News and later a co-host on Fox Business.

A former member of the House Financial Services Committee, he also led the financial services practice at the Republican-leaning lobbying firm BGR Group.

In the written statement from the presidential transition, Trump highlighted Duffy’s years in Congress.

“Sean will use his experience and the relationships he has built over many years in Congress to maintain and rebuild our Nation’s Infrastructure, and fulfill our Mission of ushering in The Golden Age of Travel, focusing on Safety, Efficiency, and Innovation,” Trump wrote. “Importantly, he will greatly elevate the Travel Experience for all Americans!”

Trump and Duffy appear to enjoy a warm relationship, with the former president encouraging Duffy to run for Wisconsin governor in 2022, bypassing the front-runner for the GOP nomination, former Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch.

DOT portfolio

Congress passed, and President Joe Biden signed, a $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure law in 2021. That law authorizes highway and transit programs through the end of September 2026.

The law increased several sources of transportation funding, including some grant programs that are awarded at the secretary’s discretion.

If confirmed, Duffy would also oversee the Federal Aviation Administration, which is monitoring Boeing after a series of safety mishaps involving the manufacturer’s jets.

New standards for rail safety, following a disastrous derailment last year of a train carrying hazardous materials near East Palestine, Ohio, and autonomous vehicles could also be on the next secretary’s agenda.

Trump’s Transportation secretary in his first term was Elaine Chao, who was the Labor secretary under former President George W. Bush. Chao, who is married to outgoing Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, announced her resignation from the administration on Jan. 7, 2021, the day after a pro-Trump mob stormed the U.S. Capitol.

Trump’s record on transportation during his first term was marked by a series of false starts on a massive infrastructure package that never materialized. Some inside the administration sought to boost private-sector involvement in infrastructure, while others favored more direct federal spending.

Workers remove a lead service line before it’s replaced by a brass one in Providence, R.I., in 2023. A new federal rule will require water systems across the country to replace roughly 9 million lead service lines to protect residents from potential poisoning. (Kevin G. Andrade | Rhode Island Current)

A new federal rule will require water utilities across the country to pull millions of lead drinking water pipes out of the ground and replace them, at a cost of billions of dollars.

States, cities and water utilities agree that the lead pipes need to go to ensure safe water for residents. But they say they may struggle to do so in the 10-year window required under the rule, and they fear some ratepayers will be hit with massive cost increases to pay for the work.

State officials are urging Congress to provide ongoing funding for the lead replacement effort. Local leaders say they’ll need lots of help to meet the deadline. And environmental advocates are calling on states to issue bonds or provide other financial support to water utilities.

“It took us close to 100 years to get all of these lead service lines in the ground, and the EPA is asking us to get them out in 10 years,” said Tom Dobbins, CEO of the Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies, an advocacy group for publicly owned water systems. “The [Biden] administration grossly underestimated the cost. Obviously, if the federal government doesn’t provide the funding for this, the ratepayers will have to pay for this. That exacerbates certain communities’ affordability issues.”

The new rule, issued by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in October, requires cities and water utilities to replace all lead service lines — the pipes that run from water mains to private residences under lawns and sidewalks. Because the lines extend under private property, some water system operators say the rule has created confusion over whether utilities or homeowners will be responsible for the replacement costs.

The EPA estimates that more than 9 million service lines are made of lead, a neurotoxin that can cause nervous system damage, learning disabilities and other health problems, especially in children. If lead pipes corrode, as in the infamous case of Flint, Michigan, they can poison drinking water.

While no amount of lead exposure is safe, the federal rule now requires utilities to notify the public and improve corrosion treatment if lead in their water exceeds 10 parts per billion. Some homes in Syracuse, New York, recently tested at 70 parts per billion.

“This is a significant public health advance,” said Erik Olson, who leads a drinking water protection campaign with the Natural Resources Defense Council, a national environmental nonprofit. “We’ve known for decades that lead service lines are dangerous, and, unfortunately, a lot of utilities just kept putting it on the back burner.”

Under the rule, water systems will have until 2027 to draft a plan for replacing their lead lines, after which they will have 10 years to complete the work.

Olson said President-elect Donald Trump, who has pledged to roll back many environmental regulations, would have a difficult time undoing the lead rule. A provision in the Safe Drinking Water Act prevents “backsliding” for federal protections, he said, and efforts to overturn the rule through Congress could prove deeply unpopular.

Money worries

The federal mandate comes after some states, including Illinois, Michigan and New Jersey, already issued their own lead replacement requirements and directed funding to their hardest-hit communities.

“It’s a challenging goal, but I think we’ve shown it’s achievable,” said Eric Oswald, director of the Drinking Water and Environmental Health Division in the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy. “I’m trying to make Michigan the first state to remove all lead service lines.”

The federal rule will accelerate Michigan’s timeline, as state regulations gave utilities a 20-year replacement window. But the initial state requirement has given water systems there a head start. Michigan has somewhere between 300,000 and 500,000 service lines, of which it’s replaced about 50,000 so far. Oswald acknowledged that the work will be expensive.

In New Jersey, water utilities have replaced more than 25,000 service lines since a state lead law was passed in 2021 (that figure does not include a previous effort that replaced 23,000 pipes in Newark). But the state still has more than 120,000 lead service lines, which it said will cost at least $1.8 billion to replace.

“There’s nothing yet that has made me think that it’s not achievable, but right now the focus has been on getting a good inventory,” said Trish Ingelido, director of water supply and geoscience at the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection. “We’ll have a better sense in the next two years what the replacement rate is looking like.”

The EPA estimates that the cost of replacing lead pipes nationwide will be about $45 billion. A separate analysis by the consulting firm Safe Water Engineering, funded by the Natural Resources Defense Council, arrived at a similar figure. But the American Water Works Association, a coalition of water system operators, puts the cost at closer to $90 billion.

“This is important on the public health side, but it’s a challenge for local governments,” said Carolyn Berndt, legislative director for sustainability at the National League of Cities, which advocates for municipal governments. “We do see this raising concerns about affordability.”

While local governments worry about expenses, the EPA says that the public health costs of lead poisoning are far greater. A federal analysis estimates that the rule, on an annual basis, will prevent 1,500 cases of premature death from heart disease and protect 900,000 infants from having low birthweight. The agency says the savings from avoiding the poisoning of residents will be 13 times greater than the cost of replacing the pipes.

The EPA contends that replacement costs will be affordable. It estimates that household-level costs associated with the rule will range from 10 cents to $10 a month. The agency pointed to the success of states such as Michigan and New Jersey, which have already replaced tens of thousands of pipes, as evidence that the 10-year timeline is achievable. Federal officials argue that the market will correct for any shortages of labor and material that some states fear will slow the work.

The feds have provided $15 billion for lead service line replacement through the 2021 infrastructure law passed by Congress, plus another $11.7 billion in state-administered drinking water funds that can be used for new lines. Some communities have used those federal grants and loans, along with pandemic relief funds, to make significant progress on their lead problem.

So far, the EPA says it has distributed $9 billion of the money targeted at service line replacements, enough to change out up to 1.7 million pipes. But many water systems are still working to inventory their lead pipes, leaving them little time to compete for the federal funding that expires in 2026.

“[Federal investments] provided significant new funding for this effort, but it’s absolutely not nearly enough for the successful implementation of the rule,” said Ben Grumbles, executive director of the Environmental Council of the States, a nonprofit association of environmental agency leaders.

Grumbles noted that state agencies also are facing significant expenses from new federal rules to limit exposure to PFAS, or “forever chemicals,” in drinking water (lead, a naturally occurring metal, is not among the man-made PFAS chemicals).

Cities struggle

At the local level, leaders are scrounging for funding as best they can.

“We’re looking at federal money, we’re looking at bonds, we’re looking at different loans and grants,” said Randy Conner, commissioner of the Chicago Department of Water Management. “We’re making sure we turn over all the couch cushions to find every quarter we can possibly find to put towards this effort.”

Chicago has an estimated 400,000 lead pipes, more than any other U.S. city. Because of the sheer scale of the problem, the EPA gave Chicago an extended deadline of 20 years to replace its lines. Even so, that would require pulling out 19,000 lines a year, well more than the city’s current pace of 8,000. That work will cost about $780 million annually, according to city officials.

Conner said the city is hoping for more federal and state support to avoid placing a heavy burden on ratepayers.

Meanwhile, state and local leaders say Congress is interfering with a key source of money for lead line replacement. Two loan programs, funded by the federal government but administered by states, provide crucial financing for water infrastructure work. State agency leaders deploy the funding based on detailed assessments of community needs.

But in recent years, members of Congress have bypassed states’ funding strategies to earmark money for projects in their districts. State agencies say they’re receiving less than half of the pool of money after Congress assigns its favored projects. That has left them less able to help the neediest communities. And many of the congressionally designated projects are lagging because they haven’t gone through the rigorous preparation work required by states.

“By diverting so much funding away from the successful [loan programs], disadvantaged communities are less likely to get funding,” said Grumbles, who oversees the coalition of state agencies.

Grumbles and others argue that any earmarks from Congress should only be in addition to the baseline loan program funding.

Other challenges

Costs aren’t the only obstacle water systems are facing. Some are concerned that the rush to replace millions of pipes nationwide will strain the workforce and supply chain capacity.

“The limiting factor is going to be the availability of contractors and professionals and materials to do the actual work,” said Robert Boos, executive director of the Pennsylvania Infrastructure Investment Authority. “That’s going to be a national issue, when you’ve got tens of thousands of communities trying to do this work.”

Pennsylvania has boosted clean water funding in its state budget, and it’s trying to tackle the workforce issue as well. Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro signed an executive order in 2023 to create a workforce training program for infrastructure jobs, including lead pipe replacement.

Olson, the environmental advocate, pointed to Newark, New Jersey, which partnered with a labor union to train local residents. The city replaced all of its 23,000 lead service lines in just over two years.

“Creative thinking and political will are really what’s needed,” he said. “This is definitely doable.”

Another potential problem is the fact that service lines lie under private property, meaning utilities need cooperation from homeowners to conduct the work. In some cases, they’ve run into opposition from residents or struggled to reach absentee landlords.

“People just don’t trust government; they don’t think that anything is free,” said Conner, the Chicago official. “We want them to understand that we’re not coming into their house to give citations.”

Environmental advocates also note that service lines’ placement on private property has created confusion over who must pay to replace them. The federal rule does not explicitly make water utilities responsible.

“When the city goes to a household and says you have to pay a couple thousand dollars to replace your portion of the lead service line, it may work for higher-income people,” Olson said. “But the studies are showing that lower-income homeowners and landlords will not pay for it. It’s a real exacerbation of environmental injustices.”

He pointed to Michigan, which adopted a rule specifying that water systems are responsible for the costs of replacing lines. He also noted that some cities have passed ordinances allowing residents of a home to authorize pipe replacement if a landlord can’t be reached.

Stateline is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Stateline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Scott S. Greenberger for questions: info@stateline.org. Follow Stateline on Facebook and X.

GET THE MORNING HEADLINES.

SUBSCRIBE

President Joe Biden speaks Tuesday in Milwaukee, announcing a new rule requiring the replacement of all led pipes in the U.S. by 2037. (Screenshot | White House livestream)

All U.S. municipalities will be required to remove lead from their water lines over a 10-year period under new federal regulations the Environmental Protection Agency released Tuesday.

To officially announce the new rule, President Joe Biden traveled to Milwaukee, where he spoke about the role that his administration’s bipartisan infrastructure law played in advancing the replacement of lead pipes in Wisconsin’s largest city as well as across the country.

“For too long, local communities have known how important it was to deal with this problem,” Biden said. “It hadn’t been given the national priority it demanded, though. I’m here today to tell you that I’m finally insisting that it gets prioritized, and I’m insisting to get it done well.”

The U.S. has more than 9 million water service lines still using lead pipes, according to the EPA, including 340,000 lines in Wisconsin.

The infrastructure law includes $15 billion for lead pipe replacement. It also contains incentives to use union labor and to create apprenticeship programs to train more workers.

Underscoring that, Biden was introduced by Alonso Romo, a Laborers Union member who has been among the workers replacing lead lines in Milwaukee.

“I personally helped move 35 lead laterals, and while I have a lot more to do, I know we’re making great pace,” Romo said. “This is hard work, but it is so rewarding. Not only am I getting paid great wages and great benefits, but I know that when I am removing a lead service lateral, I’m helping a family in our community have access to clean drinking water.”

Nationally about 367,000 lead lines have been replaced — and in the process, Biden said, “providing what’s good for our health and for our environment is also good for our economy and it’s good for jobs.”

The rule released Tuesday is an update of the federal lead and copper rule for drinking water. The 10-year timeline it requires for all communities to replace their lead service lines starts in 2027.

“This is also about fairness,” Biden said. “Nationally, I’m directing nearly half of this funding to go to disadvantaged communities that have borne the brunt of lead pipe poisoning for damn too long.”

A disproportionate number of people living where lead pipes remain in use are people of color, Biden said. “We have an obligation to make things right.”

Advocates praised the measure as a boon to public health.

“As we confront the legacy of lead contamination, this rule strengthens accountability and prioritizes the safety of our most vulnerable communities,” said Sara Welling, director of the water and agriculture program at Clean Wisconsin. “Today’s announcement sets us on a course for a healthier future, empowering local governments and water utilities to address this persistent threat with greater urgency and transparency.”

This report has been updated to correct the spelling of Alonso Romo’s first name.

GET THE MORNING HEADLINES.

SUBSCRIBE

Racine Mayor Cory Mason, photographed in the outdoor, rooftop lounge at the Hotel Verdant in Downtown Racine. (Wisconsin Examiner photo)

For Racine Mayor Corey Mason, a small park studded with boulders on the shore of Lake Michigan just south of the city’s downtown is an object lesson on the impact of climate change.

In January 2020, a 100-year storm demolished at least one-third of Sam Myers Park. “If you’d been here at the time, you would have seen a lot of these boulders on the street,” Mason said at a morning press conference on the park grounds last week.

“Climate change, if we don’t address it, is expensive,” Mason said. “We are seeing more frequent and more powerful storms, and the cost of upsizing our wastewater pipes or making a more resilient and powerful lakefront becomes an important investment that we have to make.”

While the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) paid for the restoration, the park served as a backdrop last week for Mason to describe how the city has benefitted from other federal programs: three signature laws passed by Congress and signed by  President Joe Biden over the last four years.

Between the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA), the bipartisan infrastructure law in 2021 and the Inflation Reduction Act in 2022, Racine has gotten a formidable amount of federal support.

“Those three together are sort of the holy trinity of federal legislation,” Mason said in an interview. “They’ve just been so transformational for us. I don’t know how we’d have gotten through Covid without them.”

ARPA, the pandemic relief program that was enacted in the first three months of Biden’s term, funded incentives the city used to encourage residents to get the first vaccine for COVID-19, which was just becoming available then. The city’s ARPA allotment also helped it fund programs for youth employment and adult high school, Mason said.

Some $38 million in ARPA money — $20 million from the state and $18 million from the city’s direct allotment — are helping to finance a new community and health center in Racine’s Lincoln-King neighborhood just west of Downtown.

A $9.8 million infusion from the bipartisan infrastructure law will cover more than 70% of design and construction costs to repave a stretch of one of Racine’s main north-south arteries and put new concrete on three other streets. Some of that money is also covering 80% of the cost of bridge repairs and additional street repairs.

In the coming year, Mason said, the law will fund Racine’s first “smart street” project — reconfiguring streets to be more walkable, adding bike lanes and curb bump-out features that require drivers to slow down “instead of four big lanes where people drive in as fast as they can in each direction.”

And the mayor singles out federal support for strong sustainability measures in the city. The sources of those measures are climate and clean energy provisions in the infrastructure law along with the Inflation Reduction Act, which includes extensive renewable energy and energy conservation provisions.

Racine has been electrifying the city’s bus fleet. The first nine electric buses were purchased from Racine’s share of a national legal settlement with Volkswagen over allegations the automaker cheated on federal emissions tests. The city is buying four more buses, funded through the infrastructure law, at which point the bus fleet will be 40% electric.

A new solar station is planned to recharge the mass transit vehicles. Construction is expected to start in the first half of 2025, with $1.2 million of its cost paid for from ARPA.

Federal government: From uninterested to policy ally

Climate change was a priority of Mason’s from when was first elected seven years ago. He committed the city to following the Paris Climate Accords.

Former President Donald Trump was in the White House at the time and withdrew from the accords in 2017. With federal policymakers uninterested in addressing climate change, Mason said, he looked elsewhere for support.

He joined the bipartisan Climate Mayors organization, municipal chief executives concerned about what many viewed as the central environmental concern of the time. He found the group invaluable for sharing ideas and learning what could work.

“You hear people, ‘Oh, you can’t do police cars that are electric,’” Mason said. “And then you go to a conference, and here’s 12 that are using electric vehicles as police cars.”

He welcomed the sharp federal turnaround on climate policy when Biden entered the White House in 2021.

“I can’t … emphasize enough just what a transformation it has been to have real partners at the federal government,” Mason told reporters at last week’s press event. He called the infrastructure law and the Inflation Reduction Act “generational pieces of legislation.”

The city started its work on renewable energy and energy conservation several years before either of those bills were on the national agenda. Nearly 20 years ago the city installed solar cells near a municipal annex building. In 2020 it leased a 2.6 acre patch of a South Side industrial park to Wisconsin Electric Power Co. to build a solar array.

Racine has been retrofitting municipal buildings, 70 years old on average, with energy-saving measures such as better insulation, which climate experts say shouldn’t be overlooked in the quest to reduce carbon emissions.

The infrastructure law and the Inflation Reduction Act have helped turbocharge those efforts. Besides big projects like the park rehabilitation and the new electric buses, the city has also benefited from much smaller ones.

Homeowners and businesses have been eligible for tax credits to help cover the cost of what they spend on energy conservation. Nonprofit groups and municipalities can’t claim tax credits (they don’t pay taxes), but through the Inflation Reduction Act’s direct pay program, they can get the same sort of reimbursement. 

 “Having a check sent back to you for 30% to 60% of the costs is just transformational,” Mason said.

Green investment nets developer tax credits

The city hasn’t been the only beneficiary of the act.

Five years ago, Milwaukee developer Mike O’Connor paid a visit to Racine and  happened upon what had once been a major downtown department store. Unoccupied since the 1980s, the building had been partially renovated for a nonprofit, but that project was abandoned. “It was kind of a raw canvas — it was pretty well ready to go,” O’Connor said in an interview.

O’Connor and his business partner built their business, Dominion Properties, starting in the early 2000s with a focus on apartment buildings. Central to their business plan was lowering operating expenses by “chasing efficiency” on heating and related costs — adding insulation and high-efficiency furnaces.

In 2014 they went further, building a 20-unit apartment to meet high-efficiency standards known as LEED (for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) set by the U.S. Green Building Council.

Lenders weren’t interested in an apartment block, O’Connor’s first idea for the Racine building, and there was no market for office space, he said. Then the pair hit on the idea of a boutique hotel — a standard feature in many historic downtown neighborhoods worldwide but nonexistent in Racine.

The city welcomed the proposal, seeing it as a likely draw for tourists as well as an asset that the city’s corporate leaders would value for visiting business travelers.  

“We thought if we’re going to build, we’re going to build sustainably,” O’Connor said. “That fit well with what the mayor’s vision was.”

The 80-room Hotel Verdant opened a year ago. It’s heated with geothermal energy and boasts a rooftop full of solar panels that cover most of a green roof planted with sedum. The plant is a source of shade as well as a feature to reduce temperatures on the roof surface and in the surrounding air.

The hotel project preceded the Inflation Reduction Act, but this year the federal law provided an unexpected benefit: Dominion Properties qualified for green energy tax credits, and was able to resell the credits to a third party, O’Connor said.

Projects yet to come

More projects are on the drawing board. Racine will announce a new municipal building that meets “net-zero” standards, meaning its operation does not produce emissions that add to the carbon already going into the atmosphere. And the city’s water and wastewater utilities are on the verge of planning a major investment in reducing their greenhouse gas emissions as well.

That idea came from a Climate Mayors colleague, Mason said. But he’s counting on the federal infrastructure and the inflation act’s climate programs to make it possible.

“More than half the energy the city consumes is from our water and wastewater utilities,” Mason said. “Without something like the bipartisan infrastructure law, it’s nearly impossible to imagine — how would you get to a net-zero water and wastewater utility? But now we are seeing other communities across the country that are using the [Inflation Reduction Act] and the infrastructure law to do exactly that.”

President’s announcement Thursday is just one piece of a big clean energy picture

Racine’s climate sustainability focus extends to the city’s policy with developers — and it has courted developers who share that perspective.

When a developer proposed a new apartment complex on a riverfront corner downtown, city officials included a requirement for 5% of the parking to have electric vehicle charging stations. “And the developer was like, ‘Well, at least — we’re going to need more than that,’” Mason said.

Developers and key local employers have told him they view expanded EV charging capacity as an important amenity to draw customers or prospective employees. “We want to help incentivize that for local businesses here who want to be able to do that,” Mason said.

Even with the growing private sector interest, he sees an important role for government to play spurring the growth of renewable energy.

“I think the more we can get ahead of the market, the more we get a competitive advantage by having those resources available for people who want to live here or work here,” Mason said.

GET THE MORNING HEADLINES.

SUBSCRIBE