Contact: Shanna O’Reilly at 202-225-1790 or Shanna.o’reilly@mail.house.gov
Delegate to Congress Donna Christensen hailed today’s announcement from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the awarding of $4,061,700 to the U.S. Virgin Islands. The money will help the U.S. Virgin Islands finance overdue improvements to water projects that are essential to protecting public health and the environment across the territory. The funds will go to the territory’s Drinking Water and Clean Water State Revolving Funds programs.
“This is excellent news for the Virgin Islands,” Congresswoman Christensen said. “There are several important projects in the Virgin Islands that can definitely benefit from this unprecedented funding.”
The Drinking Water State Revolving Fund program, administrated by the Virgin Islands Department of Planning and Natural Resources (VIDPNR), will receive $1,999,000. The program provides low-interest loans for drinking water systems to finance infrastructure improvements and emphasizes providing funds to small and disadvantaged communities and to programs that encourage pollution prevention as a tool for ensuring safe drinking water. VIDPNR will also receive a $100,000 Water Quality Management Planning grant, which supports setting water quality standards, water monitoring efforts, developing
plans to restore polluted waters and identifying ways to protect healthy waters from becoming polluted.
The Clean Water State Revolving Fund program, administrated by the Virgin Islands Department of Public Works, will receive $1,962,700. The program provides low-interest loans for water quality protection projects for wastewater treatment, non-point source pollution control, and watershed and estuary management.
For more information on EPA’s implementation of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 in the Virgin Islands, visit http://www.epa.gov/region02/eparecovery/. For more information on the Clean Water State Revolving Fund program, visit http://www.epa.gov/owm/cwfinance/cwsrf/. For information on the Drinking Water State Revolving Fund program visit http://www.epa.gov/safewater/dwsrf/.
