Fox 21
Duluth Mayor Emily Larson and Senator Amy Klobuchar spoke from Washington, D.C. Tuesday to celebrate a win for Duluth with more than $1 million on the way for infrastructure improvements to the Lift Bridge and to modernize Duluth’s 911 system.
“We are so grateful to Senators Klobuchar and [Senator Tina] Smith for their advocating for us for the city of Duluth, for knowing and understanding that the investments made by the federal government really matter in people’s everyday lives,” Larson said.
Larson and Klobuchar said securing funding in the amount of $1.25 million through a process called Congressionally Directed Spending isn’t an easy task but shows Duluth is a city increasingly gaining attention from lawmakers in D.C.
Larson said the recent visit by President Joe Biden the day after his State of the Union address to talk about his infrastructure bill is a bigger deal than some may think.
Larson said getting Biden to the Twin Ports to see the Blatnik Bridge in person, which will benefit from the infrastructure bill, puts a lot of eyes on the area.
“He chose Duluth-Superior. That says a lot of who we are, who we are becoming, and that the narrative of our hope, our determination, our grit is getting national attention — and that’s great,” Larson said.
Sen. Klobuchar said $500,000 of the $1.2 million in federal funding will go to infrastructure improvements on the Lift Bridge. She said the iconic structure and the port that flows through it is critical to the U.S. economy, and lawmakers know it.
“The port has become more and more important in terms of being a juggernaut on the Great Lakes from bringing in goods, shipping out goods, and also the upgrades to the port that we’ve all worked on, on a bi-partisan basis,” Klobuchar said.
Sen. Klobuchar also pointed out that Duluth was not the only place to land federal funding for infrastructure investments. Cities on the Iron Range also did well.
Click here to learn more about the $750,000 in federal dollars that’s headed to the Duluth Police Department.
###
