WASHINGTON (CN) — The Biden administration has made $60 million in emergency funding available to Maryland officials to start rebuilding Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge.
The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Highway Administration announced Thursday that the funding was released, shortly after it was requested by the state.
The Key Bridge, located just south of Baltimore, collapsed around 1:30 a.m. Tuesday after it was hit by a Singapore-flagged container ship known as the Dali. The 1.6-mile bridge, part of the heavily traveled Interstate 95 corridor, carried as many as 35,000 vehicles daily. Six people are presumed dead from the collapse.
Maryland officials requested the funding on Wednesday and Governor Wes Moore declared a state of emergency to open up funding avenues.
Federal officials stressed that the money would only be a down payment toward what will be an expensive and lengthy reconstruction project.
“The federal emergency funds we’re releasing today will help Maryland begin urgent work, to be followed by further resources as recovery and rebuilding efforts progress,” Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said in a statement.
President Joe Biden has said his plan is for the federal government to fully pay for the reconstruction.
“We are supporting President Biden’s whole-of-government response to this tragic incident and the federal government is committed to providing all necessary resources to rebuild the bridge,” Federal Highway Administrator Shailen Bhatt said in a statement. “The Emergency Relief funding announced today provides an initial down payment of funds to help Maryland manage ongoing disruptions to traffic, supply chains and daily life, and is the first step in our joint efforts to reconstruct the Francis Scott Key Bridge.”
Additional funding will require congressional approval, but at least one Republican has come out in opposition to covering the full cost.
“It was kind of outrageous immediately for Biden to express in this tragedy the idea that he’s going to use federal funds to pay for the entirety [of the bridge],” Pennsylvania Representative Dan Meuser told Fox News.
The Port of Baltimore has been closed to ship traffic until the channel can be cleared. The port saw the 17th-most business nationwide in 2021, handling more than 37 million tons of cargo and supporting more than 15,000 jobs.
Moore called the collapse a “national crisis.”
“We need to clear the channel so we can get vessel traffic moving, and that’s going to take time,” he wrote online. “We will get to completion. We will get there together. We will take care of our people. And we will leave no one behind.”
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