|
Perdue welcomes a 'consistent definition' of rural
Story Date: 3/16/2018
| |
Source: POLITICO'S MORNING AGRICULTURE, 3/15/18
Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue was one of five Cabinet members addressing Senate Commerce Committee lawmakers on Wednesday morning on infrastructure priorities. Perdue spoke at length about the needs of rural America, on topics such as clean water, broadband and affordable electricity.
One major issue is the lack of a singular definition of "rural" across departments. Perdue emphasized that investment is vital to the future of the rural and farm economies - and that a clear classification of rural could go a long way.
"We have a number of definitions of rural across the federal government. We'd love to see that synchronized in there, so we can have a common definition of rural," Perdue said, adding that he'd welcome ideas from Congress. "It's one of the issues we deal with in our rural development program - over what's eligible and what's not, and oftentimes, it misses the boat over creating the opportunity of a regional partnership in that area."
Rural, by the numbers: Perdue said that his agency's suggestion would be to create a definition for rural that's "exclusionary - anything less than a certain number." He added that 50,000 to 75,000 people would potentially be a "good cut-off" number to apply in the rural development program.
Perdue supports dedicated broadband funding: Perdue also gave Congress his blessing to add dedicated broadband funding to Trump's infrastructure proposal. He also suggested that the administration wouldn't get in lawmakers' way if they seek to carve out specific broadband funding in any infrastructure legislation, Pro Technology's John Hendel reports.
Federal vs. state dollars: The Trump administration's infrastructure plan would use $200 billion in federal money, with the expectation that communities and the private sector would contribute more than 85 percent of the funding, to bring the total investment to $1.5 trillion. Perdue said that the majority of rural investment - $40 billion - would be sent directly to states in the form of block grants.
|
|
|
|
