The town of Cortlandt has been awarded $3.2 million from the U.S. Department of Commerce”™s Economic Development Administration (EDA) Assistance to Nuclear Closure Communities Program, according to U.S. Rep. Nita Lowey. Lowey chairs the House Appropriations Committee.
This money is coming from the EDA”™s Public Works and Economic Adjustment Assistant program and will be used for a new educational recreation facility on town-owned property on the Hudson River. The money also will pay for infrastructure improvements, including roads and a water line.
The Indian Point Energy Center is due to close April 2021, costing the area 1,100 jobs and millions in tax payments. In the three years since the announcement of the closing, Lowey has been working with local officials to provide federal economic assistance to the area.
Lowey said,“This federal funding will help the town of Cortlandt expand its tax base to assist property owners and offer new jobs to area residents when Indian Point officially closes in 2021. The closure of a nuclear plant has a significant economic impact on the surrounding community.”
Cortlandt Town Supervisor Linda Puglisi said, “The grant will be for our plans at the Cortlandt Quarry Park site in our hamlet of Verplanck section of the town. This grant was submitted for our vision of these 99 acres, adjacent to the Hudson River that the town purchased five years ago.”
Under a $15 million program announced by Lowey in December federal funds were made available to help the lower Hudson Valley deal with the economic burden of the Indian Point Energy Center”™s closure. Although the Trump Administration sought to eliminate the EDA, Lowey used her position heading the House Appropriations Committee to push for maintaining federal funding for the EDA and its PWEAA program.
