The White House announced millions of dollars more in funding for the Port of Baltimore on Friday, while calling on Congress to pass additional legislation to cover the full cost of rebuilding the collapsed Francis Scott Key Bridge.
The Transportation Department and Baltimore County, Md. announced an $8.26 million grant will more than double the port’s capacity for cargo vessels carrying cars to and from Sparrows Point southeast of Baltimore City, according to a White House fact sheet.
The latest grant follows more than $60 million in emergency relief funds from the Federal Highway Administration to assist in the aftermath of the Baltimore bridge’s collapse early on March 26, halting imports and exports out of the busy East Coast port.
The damage caused when the Singapore-flagged MV Dali struck the suspension bridge, causing it to collapse into the Patapsco River could amount to as much as $4 billion, insurance analysts say.
Ahead of President Biden’s Friday visit to Charm City, White House Office of Management and Budget Director Shalanda Young also asked leaders of Senate and House committees dealing with infrastructure to fully “fund the repair and rebuild of the bridge.”
“While we continue to assess those costs alongside our Federal and State partners, we are asking Congress to join us in demonstrating our commitment to aid in recovery efforts by authorizing a 100 [%] Federal cost share for rebuilding the bridge,” Young wrote in a letter to the lawmakers.
“This authorization would be consistent with past catastrophic bridge collapses, including in 2007 when the Congress acted in a bipartisan manner within days of the I-35W bridge collapse in Minnesota,” she added.
The letter’s recipients included Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works chairman Tom Carper (D-Del.) and House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure chairman Sam Graves (R-Mo.).
Neither immediately responded to a request for comment.
Rep. Dan Meuser (R-Pa.) said last week it would be “outrageous” for taxpayers’ money to be used “to pay for the entirety” of the bridge rebuild, noting that Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen had already suggested insurance funding could bear some of that cost.
The $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure package signed into law by Biden in November 2021 also contained “$400 billion in excess,” Meuser added, of which $5 billion was allocated for Maryland.
Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg told reporters in a White House press briefing that around $950 million in emergency funding was already available — and Young emphasized in her letter that the administration would consider “all avenues to recover the costs.”
The day after the bridge collapse, Biden promised to “move heaven and Earth” to federally fund the effort by constructing a new bridge and rebuilding the port, which ships between $100 and $200 million worth of goods per day and employs roughly 8,000 workers.
The Francis Scott Key Bridge opened in 1977 after five years of construction, but Buttigieg suggested it could be replaced in less time.
The collapse blocked shipping lanes into the port but also halted tens of thousands of cars from being able to bypass the city on Interstate 695, known as the Baltimore Beltway.