Green Scissors

Green Scissors Water Targets

Since the settlement of the West, and from the days of large public works projects of the 1930s and 1940s to the present, members of Congress have inserted unneeded water infrastructure projects into legislation for their home states and districts. Like authorizations for highways and military bases, these water projects — mainly built by the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Reclamation and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) — have no other purpose than to benefit local interests at the expense of the federal taxpayer. Many times, incredibly expensive projects that destroy valuable habitat are built when less costly alternatives exist. Since 1902, irrigation subsidies that are components of many of these projects have cost taxpayers an estimated $70 billion.

No federal agency has a greater impact on the waters of the United States than the Corps. Corps civil works programs include construction and maintenance of locks and navigable waterways, the protection of coastal areas and beaches, harbor dredging, and flood control construction projects. The agency is a key lever for members of Congress to pull pork-barrel funding back to their district, and as a result, the Corps currently has a $58 billion construction backlog of authorized projects waiting for congressional funding. Congress last passed Water Resources and Development Act (WRDA) legislation, authorizing Corps civil works projects, in 2000. The Green Scissors Campaign and other Corps reform advocates were able to stall this biennial legislation in 2002 because congressional committees failed to include real reform for the embattled agency.

Like the Corps, Bureau of Reclamation projects are often boondoggles authorized at the expense of both federal taxpayers and the environment. Efforts to reform the Bureau of Reclamation have stalled repeatedly. Legislation continues to advance for the construction of new dams, new irrigation schemes, and giveaways of public assets to private entities. In 2002, the Bureau of Reclamation celebrated its 100th anniversary in the midst of calls for the agency to reform its mission by halting the waste of taxpayer dollars and minimizing environmental degradation.

For almost a decade, the Green Scissors Campaign has championed reform of our nation’s approach to water projects, eliminating unneeded irrigation and water infrastructure projects, increasing cost-shares for non-federal entities that benefit from federal projects, and decommissioning unnecessary, existing water projects. Unless otherwise noted, the Green Scissors Campaign advocates eliminating the following water projects.




	Home \| About \| Issues \| News Room \| Publications \| Take Action