Sen. Gary Peters (D) visited the Soo Locks Thursday as part of his 9th annual motorcycle trip across Michigan.
He was joined with around two-dozen other riders, including veterans, union workers, motorcycle safety advocates and constituents. The tour around the state started Wednesday in Kalamazoo and took him to Sault Ste. Marie Thursday afternoon.
Peters, who is on the Senate Appropriations Committee, helped secure $450 million for the Soo Locks expansion project in the fiscal year 2025 Energy and Water Development Appropriations Act.
If passed into law, the funding should allow the Army Corps to award construction for Phase III.
"This is clearly a national security, national economic security issue," Peters said. "They did a study to look at what the impact would be if for some reason the Locks were shut down, perhaps a terrorist attack or some other event that shut it down, what would that mean for the whole economy, and as a result of that study, they said within a matter of two or three months the U.S. economy would be severely impacted, and shortly thereafter you could actually see the economy go into a recession."
"It's why we need the redundancies in the Locks and why we need to make sure these Locks are able to operate efficiently and know that the country is relying on them doing that."
Peters said that legislatures understand the importance of getting the funding to finish the project.
“I was able to insert it into the appropriations language, certainly there was some give and take behind the scenes but, we basically put it in the package and it was passed unanimously out of committee, so that bodes very well for us to get it through the senate as well as to get it through the house and get it signed into law," Peters said.
The $3 billion dollar project is expected to be completed in 2030.
