Toledo officials joined by Biden Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg on issue
TOLEDO — It has been over four years since the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act was signed into law by former President Joe Biden. Before becoming law, the bill received bipartisan support in the Senate, passing by a vote of 69-30. The one-trillion-dollar package provided funding for roads, bridges, and highways; rail (both passenger and freight); EV charging stations; broadband expansion; and a number of other infrastructure types.
A sizable amount of dollars allocated by the legislation were set aside for projects in northwest Ohio, which is what local dignitaries — joined by Biden Transportation Secretary Pete Buttgieg — celebrated on Thursday, March 12. They spoke during a press conference at the East Toledo headquarters of the Painters & Allied Trades District Council 6 union. While the event was partly a celebration of the legislation, it was also a call for every dollar the region was allocated initially to be spent, as Congress had intended.
According to the office of Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur, the Toledo Democrat who represents Ohio’s 9th Congressional District, $155.7 million was due to be invested in projects across Northwest Ohio. But now, $48.5 million of that is in limbo: a Neighborhood Access and Equity grant of $28.5 million and RAISE grant of $20 million. The former was due to be spent on lighting and pedestrian improvements to Front and Main Streets in East Toledo, while the latter would have been spent on modernizing the Junction and Uptown neighborhoods, through “new water/sewer infrastructure, protected bike lanes, ADA sidewalks, a TARTA mobility hub, 2,300 trees, and LED lighting.”
The $28.5 million grant was eliminated last summer in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act passed by congressional Republicans. The $20 million grant, meanwhile, has been put on hold. Rep. Kaptur, in her remarks at Thursday’s press conference, voiced discontent with the Trump administration — Vice President JD Vance, in particular — who visited Toledo back in late January.
“He [Vice President Vance] stood at our port and talked about everything he’d done. In order to get to the port where he stood, he had to go over all the streets that he just took money away from,” she said.
Before Kaptur spoke, Mayor Wade Kapszukiewicz (D-Toledo) expressed his frustration over the Neighborhood Access and Equity grant’s cancellation, which he said was “the biggest federal grant the city ever got.” Adding, “with a change in political leadership in Washington, they took it away. They snatched it away from Toledo.”
Asked by the Toledo Free Press to discuss his engagement with the Trump administration on potentially restoring those dollars, Kapszukiewicz said that while in Washington back in January, he spoke to “the next rung below” current Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy. Their focus, he said, was the aforementioned RAISE grant for Toledo’s junction neighborhood — which hasn’t been completely cancelled — but put on hold.
“We had a conversation; I think it was relatively productive,” Kapszukiewicz reflected, adding that he, Deputy Mayor Abby Arnold, and Grant Commissioner Simon Nyi will be back in Washington, next week, “as part of a larger coalition from Toledo.” He said they will, once again, meet with Department of Transportation officials, as well as other members of congress from Northwest Ohio and both of Ohio’s U.S. senators.
Jaden Jefferson is a freelance political journalist for the Toledo Free Press. To check out more of his reporting, you can follow him on X (formerly Twitter), Facebook, Instagram, Threads, and Bluesky. He also has a YouTube channel, Jaden Jefferson Reports.
