President George W. Bush's third and latest request to Congress for supplemental hurricane aid includes $600 million to make road and bridge repairs, the journal Transportation Weekly reports. The overall $7.1 billion disaster-aid package will allow for repairs to federal-aid eligible roads damaged by hurricanes Charley, Frances, Ivan and Jeanne, which wrought havoc across Florida, several Gulf states and up the east coast as far as Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
Congress already approved Bush's first request for $2 billion, and was weighing a second proposal for another $3.1 billion when the latest executive branch request was made. The total pending aid request for hurricane relief now totals some $10.2 billion. Appropriators anticipate attaching the emergency relief funding to the Homeland Security appropriations bill during a committee conference. However, the plan has been complicated by debate over whether another $3 billion in drought aid for farmers also should be attached.
Aid requested in the latest Bush package would include $5.1 million for the Federal Aviation Administration to use in repairing such facilities as control towers, buildings and flight-service stations; $52 million for repairs to locks and channels maintained by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers; and $25 million to the corps to address beach erosion.
