Budget

EPA's environmental justice advisors are urging the agency in a draft report to build a broad coalition to press Congress to increase funding for affordable, safe and reliable drinking water, arguing that without the funds, the agency will not be able to advance their advice to address what they call “a defining problem of the 21st century.”

The Senate has approved a “minibus” fiscal year 2019 spending bill that largely maintains EPA's existing funding level, teeing up a fight with the House that has already approved an FY19 measure to cut funding for the agency's budget by between $100 million and half a billion dollars, depending on which programs are counted as base EPA funding.

Draft legislation the Senate is slated to consider as soon as next week proposes to slash authorized funding levels for a controversial EPA water infrastructure loan guarantee program -- to roughly 5 percent of what the environment committee originally approved -- in order to comply with Senate budget rules.

A draft bill floated by Rep. Bill Shuster (R-PA), the departing chairman of the House transportation committee, proposes a series of steps to bolster EPA's nascent water infrastructure loan guarantee program but stops short of backing the more far-reaching overhaul that the Senate is expected to vote on this summer.