Mayor George Flaggs Jr. said the recent passage of the fiscal 2018 Omnibus Budget Bill could provide the necessary funding to help several proposed city projects.

“That is absolutely great news for the city of Vicksburg,” he said. “One is that in the Corps (of Engineers) funding we can access to help the city and environmental infrastructure.”

According to information from U.S. Sen. Thad Cochran’s office, the bill, which was signed by President Donald Trump, includes $70 million for the Corps of Engineers for funding environmental infrastructure that would allow the Corps to dedicate some of the money for sewer system, wastewater treatment and water supply improvements in Mississippi.

“There’s money we can access for water treatment, for wastewater treatment and the 592 Project,” Flaggs said. The 592 Project is the name for the city’s project to install an auxiliary water line from the city’s water treatment plant on Haining Road to provide a backup waterline for the city.

Flaggs said the project is “ready to go; we’ve got to find the money (match). We don’t want to go until we know we’ve got the money available.

“I hope to have that ready in the next 60 days, now that we’ve got some ways to generate money for it.” The city’s match for the project is $2 million.

The mayor has also discussed building a second wastewater treatment plant in the southern part of the city.

The bill also includes $1.5 billion for Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery, or TIGER grants, which are targeted investments from the U.S. Department of Transportation for local communities for projects to increase safety, create jobs and modernize infrastructure.

According to Cochran’s office, the funding is associated with the goal to rebuild America’s infrastructure. The agreement in the bill includes language to ensure at least 30 percent of grant awards go to rural communities. These grants are primary source of federal transportation infrastructure funding for local communities.

The city is looking at two bypass road structures, the $10 million “south loop” project to link U.S. 61 South to Halls Ferry Road and provide access to the proposed sports complex on Fisher Ferry Road, and a $7 million U.S. 61 North bypass road that is expected to shorten the distance between the highway and Interstate 20, and reroute 18-wheelers away from downtown.

One local area that will get immediate funding is the Vicksburg National Military Park, which will receive $5.9 million to repair an erosion problem at the Railroad Redoubt.

The problem affects a bluff adjacent to the Texas State Memorial and Railroad Redoubt earthworks in Vicksburg National Military Park.

The repairs involve a type of retaining wall called a soldier pile wall.

A Confederate earthen fortification, the Railroad Redoubt was built to protect the Southern Railroad of Mississippi, which was a vital entrance to the city. The Union assault on the redoubt on May 22, 1863, resulted in some of the fiercest combat of the siege, resulting in heavy causalities.

The fortification and the memorial, like the park, are listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

Besides the funding for the Corps and the park, the bill includes $221 million, $39 million above the president’s budget request, for the Army’s high performance computing modernization program, which is a major project of the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center and also impacts Mississippi State University.

There is also funding to support Army research at ERDC involving multiple projects such as polymer development and next generation unmanned systems research, and $25 million to ERDC for other research and development projects.