Markey: Federal freeze on $316M for Mass. climate efforts is ‘illegal'
The frozen dollars include $35 million committed to the City of Boston for electric school buses, Markey said.
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Trump, in his first day in office, issued an executive order that directed agencies to halt funding related to the Inflation Reduction Act and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, two major spending packages passed under former President Biden. The legislation allocated billions of dollars across the United States for renewable energy, pollution cleanups, electric vehicle charging infrastructure, public transportation, and more.
Federal judges swiftly blocked a memo from the administration's Office of Management and Budget to enact Trump's executive orders directing a funding freeze. However,
One key program to build solar panels on public housing, called 'Solar For All,' promised $156 million to Massachusetts. Markey said Friday that the program is still frozen. He fears the Trump administration will attempt to block such congressionally-appropriated funds from going out the door in order to pay for tax cuts, a major legislative priority for the new administration.
'It's a very simple plot: Steal and loot the money out of environmental programs … in order to provide tax breaks for the wealthiest people in our country,' Markey said.
One locally impacted group,
Health Resources in Action, was selected, along with two other partner organizations, to help distribute $48 million in
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The funds are intended to benefit historically underserved communities. Now, it's unclear when the partnership, called
'Right now, we cannot access those funds,' said Kathleen McCabe, managing director of policy and practice at Health Resources in Action, during the press conference.
The partnership was on 'the brink' of
She added that projects across the region, including to prepare Vermont for flood disasters and improve transportation in Western Massachusetts, are 'poised and ready' for work.
Erin Douglas can be reached at
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