Marin projects stand to gain $4.5M from federal bill

July 25, 2022

The House of Representatives has passed a federal spending bill that would earmark $4.5 million for projects affecting Marin County, including housing for homeless veterans, transit extensions and more electric vehicle charging stations.

The spending package, which now goes to the Senate, would allocate $2 million to allow MCE — the electricity provider formerly known as Marin Clean Energy — to add more electric vehicle recharging stations and rebates to help low-income residents purchase electric vehicles.

Another $1.8 million would go toward designing and planning the proposed Sonoma-Marin Area Rail Transit rail extension from Windsor to Healdsburg. About $750,000 would go to Homeward Bound of Marin for the construction of its proposed housing development in Novato reserved for homeless veterans.

Rep. Jared Huffman, a Democrat who lives in San Rafael, said he is pleased the funding made it into the House version of the bill, but he said many changes could occur still as the bill makes its way through Congress.

“We’re hoping we can bring all this funding home, but we do have more work to do,” Huffman told the Independent Journal on Friday. The House passed the bill last week.

If the funding is approved, MCE plans to use it to add 385 level 2 electric vehicle charging stations at housing complexes and businesses in its service area of Marin, Contra Costa, Napa and Solano counties. Dawn Weisz, the chief executive, said a large portion of the funding will go toward its program that provides $3,500 rebates to lower-income residents to purchase electric vehicles. The funding would provide 3,500 rebates, Weisz said.

“We have never received federal dollars so this would be the first time,” Weisz said.

MCE launched its electric vehicle program in 2018 and has installed 900 charging ports at workplaces and housing complexes, according to Weisz. Another 600 are planned for construction in the coming six months.

“Our next goal is to start installing another 1,000 ports by March of 2023,” Weisz said. “The funding would help go towards that.”


By:  Will Houston
Source: Marin IJ