 Three USIBWC engineers, (l to r) John Merino, Gabriel Duran and Rod Dunlap, inspect the site of the levee rehabilitation financed by the ARRA. IBWC Image |
Of the total $787 billion appropriated for the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), the Department received $564 million. The Department will use ARRA funds to create and save jobs, repair and modernize domestic infrastructure crucial to the safety of American citizens, and expand consular services offered to American taxpayers.
Construction Projects - A Hard Skills Training Center ($70 million) for Diplomatic Security will be built within 150 miles of Washington, D.C., and provide a centralized location to support all security-related training that is currently conducted at 19 locations throughout the United States. Passport Facilities ($15 million) will fund five new start-up sites and the renovation and expansion of two existing sites. The National Foreign Affairs Training Center ($5 million) will expand existing training capacity to ensure personnel assigned overseas have the necessary language training and information technology training. Projects include upgrading facility and grounds, updating orientation signage for the 72-acre campus, and upgrading infrastructure wiring and public address systems. An enterprise Data Center ($120 million) will be established in the western United States and consolidate all domestic servers into four enterprise data centers. The program will provide a highly available, scalable, and redundant data center infrastructure that will substantially reduce the Department’s risk and provide for future information technology (IT) growth.
Information Technology Platform and Cyber Security - Funding ($132 million) will provide for new telephone systems, IT equipment, mobile communications for emergency situations, and projects to guard against and track cyber attacks, improve hardware security and testing, safeguard U.S. citizens’ cyber security, and expand cyber education.
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International Boundary and Water Commission (IBWC) - These projects ($220 million) will evaluate and repair portions of the flood control systems for 495 miles of the upper and lower Rio Grande River, protecting about 3 million U.S. citizens in New Mexico and Texas. The projects consist of $213 million for the construction and repair of levees, $6 million to rehabilitate contaminated soil and groundwater, and $1 million for other related projects.
Office of Inspector General - Funding ($2 million) to provide oversight of use of ARRA funds and ARRA projects by the Department.
