New Water Finance Center at EPA
In July 2014, President Obama launched the Build America Investment Initiative, calling on Federal agencies to find new ways to increase investment in ports, roads, bridges, broadband networks, drinking water and sewer systems and other projects by facilitating partnerships between federal, state and local governments and private sector investors. One of the new steps that the Environmental Protection Agency is taking is to launch a new Water Finance Center.
To help address more than $600 billion in needs for drinking water and wastewater management over the next 20 years, the Administration is launching a new Water Finance Center at EPA. The Center will work closely with municipal and state governments, utilities and private sector partners to use federal grants to attract more private capital into projects and promote models of public private collaboration that can address the real needs of cities and towns to provide safe water, rebuild sewer systems and keep streams and rivers clean.
In addition to EPA’s new Water Finance Center, other parts of the federal initiative include a Rural Opportunity Investment Initiative at USDA that includes water projects and an innovative new kind of municipal bond, Qualified Public Infrastructure Bonds (QPIB) to increase private investment. More details on all these actions can be found in the attached fact sheet.
ATTACHMENT: FACT SHEET on Presidential Infrastructure Initiative (1-16-15)