The Golden Gate Bridge is getting a $400 million grant, former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg announced, according to Fox News.
The funding for this project came from the 2021 bipartisan Infrastructure Bill, a $1.2 trillion bill meant to fund improvements for infrastructure. In addition to rebuilding bridges and roads, funding also went toward projects like expanding broadband access, increasing the number of electric vehicle charging stations, and environmental remediation.
According to Fox, the grant will primarily go toward a “seismic retrofit project to protect the bridge from a large-scale earthquake.” The bridge was most recently seismically retrofitted from 1997 to 2014, at a cost of over $385 million. The next phase, which this grant will help fund, is expected to take six years and cost $879 million.
While the project is an appropriate use of funds under this program, the massive price tag raises questions regarding the former speaker’s influence in securing these funds. It is unusual for grants this large to go toward local projects, and Pelosi’s outsized influence in Congress likely helped secure such a large amount of funding for a major project in her home district.
Fox notes that senators from California, Dianne Feinstein and Alex Padilla, also played a role in obtaining the funding, with the pair jointly submitting the formal funding request.
Powerful politicians are consistently able to direct federal tax dollars to their lucky constituents.
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