CWC, SWIIC Take PAB Initiative to the Senate

Last week, the Clean Water Council (CWC) met on Capitol Hill to assess legislative successes to help increase investment in water and wastewater infrastructure. The group first evaluated the non-stop lobbying activities that led to inclusion of an important provision in “jobs” legislation recently passed by the House. The bill incorporated legislation (HR 537) that would allow for significant increases in private investment in the environmental infrastructure market by eliminating the state volume cap on private activity bonds (PABs) for water and sewer projects, reported the National Utility Contractors Association Washington Report

“This provision has been long supported by the CWC and the Sustainable Water Infrastructure Investment Coalition (SWIIC), who have worked collectively to advance the legislation,” says Eben Wyman, NUCA Vice President of Government Relations. “The discussion then centered on taking the fight to the Senate, where the likelihood of another round of ‘jobs’ legislation is uncertain but where prospects of moving stand-alone PAB legislation is increasingly promising.”

The CWC also discussed FY 2011 federal appropriations for the Clean Water and Drinking Water State Revolving Fund (SRF) programs, and the status of Senate SRF reauthorization legislation (S 1005). There were 27 participants representing 23 national organizations including CWC members, our corporate partners and several SWIIC representatives.

“NUCA is proud to chair the CWC and serve a co-chair of the SWIIC, and we thank all of our member organizations that daily with NUCA on Capitol Hill to get the job done,” Wyman concluded.