WASHINGTON, D.C. — While legislation sponsored by a Kentucky Congressman would raise for the first time in 17 years the fuel tax barge operators pay, to support river infrastructure projects – a move the barge industry supports – Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) has called for a change in the funding of lock and dam projects.

Alexander’s suggestion, which would shift a greater onus of the financial burden to all U.S. taxpayers, came during a recent hearing on the fiscal 2013 U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ budget. Cited was a depletion of the Inland Waterways Trust Fund caused by financial overruns associated with the Olmsted Lock project on the Ohio River, as the impetus for securing federal funding for waterway infrastructure projects.

The Olmsted project, authorized in 1993 at a projected cost of $775 million but now projected at $2.9 billion with a completion date of 2021, is expected to absorb most of the trust fund’s assets for the next decade or more. The overrun is slowing repairs and new construction at the crumbling Chickamauga Lock, according to Alexander.

“It is absolutely inconceivable that Chickamauga Lock could close because of the Inland Waterways Trust Fund,” Alexander said, adding that federal funding for some lock and dam projects must be increased in order to address the nation’s waterway infrastructure needs.

Congress should consider changing the methods for generating funds to complete projects such as the Chickamauga Lock, Alexander recommended. “With the Panama Canal being deepened, our ports need to be deepened, we need locks and dams that are safe in the inland waterways, and we ought to be able to do something about that,” he said.

Rick Tolman, CEO for the National Corn Growers Assoc. (NCGA), was among a group of farmers who toured the Panama Canal in February to witness the construction of the third canal and series of locks being built to expand capacity. Tolman called the construction “a project of tremendous scale and undertaking.

“But, what is most impressive is that construction started in 2007 and is on track for completion in 2014. Projected total cost for this massive project is between $5 billion and $6 billion, and by all reports the project is on time and on budget,” Tolman reported shortly after his visit.

“Contrast that to our own internal lock and dam system that continues to deteriorate with little prospect for definitive action by Congress or the Corps of Engineers.”

Because of the lack of a reliable funding mechanism for lock and dam improvements, when the expanded Panama Canal comes online the U.S. inland waterways system – “already surviving on Band Aids and duct tape,” according to Tolman – will be less efficient and effective than it is today.

“Our current system of approving, funding, constructing and repairing our Inland Waterway System is not just broken, it’s a national embarrassment,” Tolman continued. “Even worse, we are rapidly losing competitive advantage.”

Legislation that would fund infrastructure upgrades to the inland waterway system must be passed by Congress, according to Paul Taylor, a farmer from Esmond, Ill. He is also vice president of the Illinois Corn Growers Assoc. and a member of the NCGA’s Ethanol Committee.

“There are some locks and dams that are in perilous danger of major mechanical failures. We’re just really concerned as corn growers that in the coming months or years, it will take a major catastrophic lock failure, shutting down river transportation for a month or longer, to bring this issue (to Congress’ full attention),” said Taylor.

He recently traveled to Washington, D.C., with a group of Illinois corn growers to rally on Capitol Hill for transportation and waterway infrastructure funding. “It’s absolutely critical we have our inland waterway system up to speed and operating efficiently. Most locks and dams were constructed in the 1920s and 1930s and are beyond their projected life.

“We think it is time to look at the next generation (of locks and dams),” he added.

Taylor supports an increase in the barge fuel tax as proposed by Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.) as part of his WAVE-4 waterways infrastructure bill, rather than increasing the burden on U.S. taxpayers for much-needed improvements to locks and dams on the Ohio, Mississippi and Illinois rivers.