President’s Corner — by Brian Crandall
Dear NAXSA Members,
The end of the summer is coming up quickly and I hope that everyone has had some time to get outdoors and relax a little. As I write this your Association is working very hard to plan the Convention in November so we can meet our old friends, have a great time and ensure the safety of all the attendees. To that point check out our new website concerning the Hotel Contessa’s policies on virus safety and how your Association is planning for the event.
Another thing that is developing is improved software for our website that will improve our ability to communicate with our Members, and the committees that are working hard to develop programs and ideas that will help promote excavation safety and efficiency for our industry.
This past month we have organized the Manufacturers Committee and Steve Hanley has accepted the position of Chair of that group. Regularly scheduled meetings are planned and by Convention time you will see some of the fruits of their work.
Finally, I have done some research to find out what is in the infrastructure bill that is before Congress. Most of this has been released from a number of sites and since the bill is still being debated the numbers may change. I wanted to focus on the parts of the bill that I think might impact our Members the most.
- The bill totals a little less than $1.0 trillion over 5 years or $1.2 trillion over 8 years. I have not been able to find out how the spending duration is determined.
- 40% of the bill is the re-authorization of the Surface Transportation Program, which has been underfunded for many years. So basically, this is not new money but continues the programs that are in place. Our Members who are involved with traffic protection may benefit from this.
- 60% of the bill is considered new spending ($579 billion). I am not sure how they came up with the number and I cannot find a list of projects but based on the titles of the breakdown, we can assume that our Members may find work in the following:
- $55 billion for water infrastructure
- $65 billion for broadband (not sure how much excavation)
- $73 billion for new transmission lines (towers, some excavation)
- $21 billion for pollution remediation (I assume Super Fund work)
- The rest of the 60% does not appear to cover our work but there are no lists of projects, so maybe there will be something related to our industry.
That is all I can report for this month. Until next month, everyone enjoy the remainder of the summer and stay safe.
