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Senate panel boosts Delta authority funding Friday, Jul 11, 2008 By Aaron Sadler Stephens Washington Bureau WASHINGTON - The Delta Regional Authority would be funded at the highest level of its short history under a bill moving through the Senate. The Senate Appropriations Committee on Thursday recommended $20 million in fiscal year 2009 for the agency that provides grants and promotes economic development in the eight-state Mississippi River delta region. The recommendation stands in stark contrasts to a House decision in June to cut the authority's current annual funding in half, to $6 million. Advocates for the impoverished region are optimistic that Congress will stick with the Senate recommendation. Lawmakers have done that repeatedly in recent years. The last three years, the agency has received about $12 million annually. "This bodes well for the outcome this year, and an increase to $20 million in this time of budget deficits would be a major surprise and one of the greatest victories in the DRA's history," said Lee Powell, director of a nongovernmental Delta advocacy group. The authority has received $20 million only once, in its first year of existence in 2001. Funding dropped to as low as $6 million in fiscal 2005. Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., was viewed as a key catalyst for the drastic funding hike. Powell said she pledged to secure $20 million for the agency earlier this year. Landrieu serves on the subcommittee that initially approved the extra spending. She faces a tough re-election fight this November. She and other Delta region senators, including Blanche Lincoln and Mark Pryor, both D-Ark., wrote a Senate appropriations subcommittee in April asking for $30 million for the agency. "At this critical juncture in the life of the DRA, we believe this to be the opportune time to make a strong federal investment in the impoverished region," the letter stated. The agency may have to wait for its funding boost, since it appears unlikely lawmakers will finish work on spending bills before the start of the 2009 fiscal year on Oct. 1. The year's appropriations probably won't clear Congress until after a new president takes office. The House panel last month threw in some biting criticism of the agency. The committee said the authority has not distributed grant money to the poorest county in the region and has not properly monitored how agencies use federal grant funding. Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., demanded the admonishment because no counties in his district received grant money from the agency this year. Thompson's district is one of the poorest in the nation. Powell said 93 percent of grant money has been distributed within economically distressed counties in the Delta. The authority's territory covers 240 counties in Arkansas, Missouri, Tennessee, Mississippi, Louisiana, Illinois, Kentucky and Alabama. |
