Yakym calls out Buttigieg for infrastructure project delays

In a letter, Congressman Rudy Yakym highlights that only six out of 17 projects have an executed grant agreement under the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and claims the Department of Transportation is saddling grant recipients with "bureaucratic red tape."

Last week, Congressman Rudy Yakym (IN-02) sent a letter to Department of Transportation (DOT) Secretary Pete Buttigieg pressing him on the slow pace that DOT is executing grant agreements for awards under the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA). 

In his letter, Yakym highlights how out of the 17 projects that DOT has touted in press releases under one program, only six of them actually have an executed grant agreement to date. Yakym underscores how this underwhelming grant agreement execution rate is due to all the bureaucratic red tape that DOT is saddling grant recipients with, and how this red tape is causing major delays and preventing projects from getting off the ground in the first place. 

Additionally, Yakym points out in his letter how skyrocketing inflation and the 40 percent increase in construction costs under the Biden-Harris administration has eroded the value of the IIJA investment in the first place. 

Read Congressman Yakym's full letter to Secretary Buttigieg here and below: 

Dear Secretary Buttigieg,

I write to express and reiterate my strong concerns about the slow pace at which the Department of Transportation (DOT) has been executing grant agreements for grants awarded under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA).

IIJA represented an over $1 trillion investment in our nation’s infrastructure. This considerable sum has been counterbalanced by the fact that DOT’s own construction inflation index increased by over 40% under the Biden-Harris Administration. Amid this inflation, unnecessary delays raise project costs and erode the value of IIJA.

The DOT must be a partner in removing hurdles that prevent projects from getting off the ground. Instead, the agency appears to have been a hurdle in and of itself by drowning projects in red tape. For example, recipients of a 2023 Safe Streets and Roads for All grant must certify compliance with 75 laws and regulations, as well as 12 executive orders. This red tape appears to be causing major delays in the execution of grant agreements.

According to DOT’s most recent report, only 163 of 418 (39.0%) grant agreements have been executed for Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity (RAISE) grant awards across fiscal years 2021, 2022, and 2023, including only 94 of 296 (31.7%) capital grants.

Too often, it appears, DOT announces grants to great fanfare only to subsequently bury them under paperwork for months, or even years – only 6 of the 17 (26%) projects highlighted in DOT’s fiscal year 2021, 2022, and 2023  RAISE program press releases have an executed grant agreement.
 
While there is adequate information to assess the progress, or lack thereof, of RAISE program implementation, there is not similar information available for other IIJA programs, including the Charging and Fueling Infrastructure (CFI) program.

CFI, along with the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) program, represent a combined $7.5 billion to build out electric vehicle (EV) charging infrastructure. Yet in the nearly three years since IIJA passed, there are only 25 NEVI stations and one CFI station in service. In fact, the first CFI grants were only announced on January 11, 2024.

Because executing grant agreements seems to be a hurdle for infrastructure programs, I would like to request the following information by December 12, 2024:

1. The target date for all RAISE grant agreements to be executed for:
 a. Fiscal year 2021 awards;
 b. Fiscal year 2022 awards; and
 c. Fiscal year 2023 awards;
2. The number of CFI Round 1A grant agreements executed, by month executed;
3. The number of CFI Round 1A grant agreements pending;
4. The number of CFI Round 1A grant agreements cancelled;
5. The target date for all CFI Round 1A grant agreements to be executed; and
6. The anticipated date for the first CFI-funded charging station to be placed in service.

Thank you for your attention to this request.

Sincerely,
Rudy Yakym 
Member of Congress