The Trump administration is proposing $118 million in funding for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Formerly Utilized Sites Remedial Action Program (FUSRAP) in fiscal 2018, according to a budget spreadsheet leaked last week.
That would be $6 million more than provided in the omnibus appropriations bill President Donald Trump signed into law earlier this month for the current budget year ending on Sept. 30. It’s also a healthy bump up from the roughly $100 million the Obama administration proposed for fiscal 2017 back in February 2016.
However, it might still not be enough for congressional supporters of the Army Corps program that cleans up sites contaminated by weapons and civilian energy programs managed by the Manhattan Engineer District and Atomic Energy Commission from the 1940s to the 1960s. In an April 4 letter to the top members of the House Appropriations energy and water subcommittee, a group of lawmakers asked that funding for the FUSRAP program be returned to its “historical level of $150 million per year.”
As of last year there were 25 active FUSRAP cleanup sites in 10 states. Annual funding for the work has ranged from $99.9 million to $140 million under the Army Corps’ watch, according to its 2016 update.
The White House is expected to release its budget proposal for the upcoming year today.
In total, the Army Corps of Engineers received slightly more than $6 billion for fiscal 2017.
