U.S. Representative Matt Cartwright (PA-08) today voted to pass the Moving Forward Act in the U.S. House of Representatives, which includes two of his bills that would address the problem of abandoned mine lands in northeastern Pennsylvania and across the country. These bills would help eliminate dangerous health and safety risks like acid mine drainage, while making way for new economic development.
The Moving Forward Act would create millions of good-paying jobs by investing in modern and sustainable infrastructure. It is expected to be voted on in the U.S. House before July 4.
“We’ve taken an important step to put Americans back to work in good jobs by rebuilding our physical and digital infrastructure for the twenty-first century,” Cartwright said. “The Moving Forward Act makes critical investments in rural broadband, schools, roads, public transit and hospitals across the nation. I’m also proud that it will help grow northeastern Pennsylvania’s economy by enabling us to transform our abandoned mine lands for years to come. The Moving Forward Act is an investment in our recovery and a down payment on our future.”
The Moving Forward Act includes Cartwright’s legislation to reauthorize the Abandoned Mine Land (AML) Trust Fund, which is essential to cleaning up our waterways and protecting communities from the hazards of abandoned mines, such as acid mine drainage, dangerous highwalls and waste coal piles. The fund would end in September 2021 if Congress does not act, and Pennsylvania’s Eighth District has more than 300 unfinished AML sites.
The infrastructure package also includes Cartwright’s RECLAIM Act, which would accelerate the investment of $1 billion in unappropriated funds from the AML Trust Fund over the next five years, bringing roughly $300 million to Pennsylvania alone for these projects.
WATCH: Ahead of today’s vote, Cartwright spoke on the House floor in support of the Moving Forward Act:
Additional provisions of the Moving Forward Act:
- The INVEST in America Act, a nearly $500 billion investment to rebuild and reimagine the nation’s transportation infrastructure by fixing our crumbling roads and bridges, improving safety, reducing gridlock, and investing in public transit, including $7 billion for commuter rail projects. Importantly, the INVEST in America Act is fueled by American workers and ingenuity through strong Buy America provisions and labor protections.
- The Reopen and Rebuild America’s Schools Act, which funds $130 billion in school infrastructure targeted at schools with facilities that endanger the health and safety of students and educators. This investment will help students get back to school and create more than 2 million jobs to help put workers back to work.
- Addresses structural challenges and upgrades child care facilities by leveraging a 5-year, $10 billion federal investment to generate additional state and private investments in making sure that child care settings are safe, appropriate, and able to comply with current and future public health directives.
- Delivers affordable high-speed broadband internet access to all parts of the country by investing $100 billion to promote competition for broadband internet infrastructure in unserved and underserved communities, prioritizing those with persistent poverty. It also gets children connected to remote learning, closes broadband adoption and digital skills gaps and enhances payment support for low-income households and the recently unemployed.
- Modernizes health care infrastructure by investing $30 billion to upgrade hospitals to increase capacity and strengthen care, help community health centers respond to COVID-19 and future public health emergencies, improve clinical laboratory infrastructure, support the Indian Health Service‘s infrastructure, and increase capacity for community-based care.
- Promotes investments in our local communities by spurring private investment through the tax code, through a revitalized Build America Bonds program, expansions of Private Activity Bonds, and significant enhancements to the New Markets Tax Credit and the Rehabilitation Tax Credit.
- Invests over $100 billion into our nation's affordable housing infrastructure to create or preserve 1.8 million affordable homes. These investments will help reduce housing inequality, create jobs and stimulate the broader economy, increase community and household resiliency in the face of natural disasters, improve hazardous living conditions, and increase the environmental sustainability of our housing stock.
- Protects access to safe drinking water by investing over $25 billion in the Drinking Water State Revolving Fund and other programs to ensure all communities have clean drinking water and to help remove dangerous contaminants like PFAS from local water systems.
- Modernizes our energy infrastructure for a clean energy future by investing more than $70 billion to transform our electric grid to accommodate more renewable energy, expand renewable energy, strengthen existing infrastructure, help develop an electric vehicle charging network, and support energy efficiency, weatherization, and Smart Communities infrastructure.
- Modernizes and strengthens the United States Postal Service by investing $25 billion to modernize postal infrastructure and operations, including a zero emissions postal vehicle fleet, processing equipment and other goods.
- Promotes new renewable energy infrastructure by incentivizing the development of wind and solar on public lands and building a workforce for offshore wind.
A fact sheet on the Moving Forward Act is available here.
