Sweeping executive orders, government worker layoffs and the widespread dismantling of long standing regulatory practices at the federal level since President Donald Trump took office have put several local projects in limbo as town officials scramble to determine which initiatives will remain funded.
Projects in Southold currently supported by federal grants include programs for the aging, youth services and counseling, law enforcement and commercial district revitalization efforts. These grants are administered through a variety of federal agencies, ranging from the Office of Economic Development to the Department of Transportation.
Among the projects officials are now concerned about is a plan to renovate the bathrooms at the Southold Senior Center. The town was awarded $200,000 in federal funds in 2021 through the Community Development Block Grant program to bring the bathrooms into compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act. The work was intended to be “100% grant-funded,” through the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s COVID-19 relief program, town engineer Michael Collins said at a Town Board work session on Tuesday.
“We talked to our contact at the county, [and] while nothing has changed, there is no guarantee that these federal funds will be disbursed if we finish the project,” Mr. Collins said.
“There is a possibility — and I cannot assign a percentage to it — that three months from now when we finish the project, we will get zero dollars,” Mr. Collins said. “That is possible.”
The Town Board subsequently voted to allocate $199,000 from that grant to instead install a generator at the Southold Town Annex Building. A public hearing regarding the change is set for March 18 at 7 p.m.
Town Supervisor Al Krupski said the need for a generator at the annex was underscored on Feb. 20 when power was knocked out across the North and South Forks when a box truck crashed into a transmission pole on Route 48.
“It was a disruption in work flow and also a disruption to the public that was in the building,” Mr. Krupski said of the outage.
Funding for a separate project to eliminate remaining outfalls to stem the flow of stormwater runoff and sewer discharge into Goose Creek in Southold, in partnership with Peconic Estuary Partnership, is also now in question, Mr. Collins said. The $98,000 funding was drawn from the Investment in Infrastructure and Jobs Act, also known as the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, passed in 2021.
The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation identifies Goose Creek as an “impaired waterbody” under the Clean Water Act of 1972. The act outlines the protocols for regulating discharges of pollutants into U.S. waters to ensure quality standards. The framework for the program was established in 1948 under the Federal Water Pollution Control Act, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.
“But we don’t know if the funding will be there [for Goose Creek] because of the changes going on at the federal level,” Mr. Collins said Tuesday, noting that the outfalls would be eliminated eventually as the Town Board recently approved a $250,000 bond to finance stormwater mitigation improvements throughout the township. In the near term, Mr. Collins said he will begin focusing on projects backed by local, county and state-funded grants that don’t rely on pass-through funding from the federal government.
“The chaos and uncertainty promoted by the federal government has real negative impacts for our Southold Town community,” Town Board member Greg Doroski said in a statement to The Suffolk Times. Mr. Doroski also pointed to other projects that could be at risk due to the potential loss of more than $700,000 in additional federal funds. “The future of our environment, economy and community depend on it,” he said.