For the better part of the past year, ports around the world have struggled with unprecedented economic issues that have forced us to confront, head-on, the universal challenges of reduced revenues, tight budgets and the tough, unavoidable decisions that accompany those situations.
In the past months, the American Association of Port Authorities pursued a strategic awareness initiative to achieve greater understanding of the essential role and economic value of ports. This is imperative. "Seaports Deliver Prosperity" became our rallying cry as we promoted widespread understanding and encouraged unprecedented collaborations.
AAPA member seaports worked tirelessly with congressional staffs to urge that maritime-related projects be included in economic stimulus packages. We pursued and obtained federal stimulus funding to move forward with capital improvements that will position ports for the economic recovery. The stimulus included, for the first time ever, a $1.5 billion discretionary multimodal fund that would look at goods movement projects.
Ports also joined forces in creative ways to secure funding. A coalition of six U.S. West Coast ports that are responsible for approximately 50 percent of America's seaborne container cargo applied for $42.46 million in U.S. Department of Energy funding, subject to local matches, for marine shoreside electrical power. Though not funded, this effort signals a widespread acceptance of this technology and facilitates the industry's future involvement in near-zero-emission technologies. A positive side benefit would be the creation of 1,300 jobs coastwide.
The momentum of our collaboration continued as various AAPA member ports received some of the $300 million in competitive American Recovery and Reinvestment Act grants from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for local pollution reduction projects. These stimulus funds are aimed at reducing diesel emissions at ports, including replacement or retrofitting cargo-handling equipment and replacement of older, dirtier diesel trucks.
AAPA has also actively worked on surface transportation reauthorization. AAPA played a central role in positioning goods movement and ports as never before in the draft reauthorization legislation, laying the groundwork with legislators for ports to have a significant role in the negotiations going forward.
In the environmental arena, we moved forward with resolutions on greenhouse gases and coastal zone management. International collaboration is key to our success. In Brussels, the European Seaports Organization Annual General Assembly signed an unprecedented memorandum of understanding with AAPA to encourage and facilitate the exchange of information, experience and best practices. AAPA subsequently signed the document at its spring conference and committee chairs have reached out to their counterparts in fulfillment of the ESPO MOU.
The Curriculum and Projects and Publications committees have pursued the AAPA goal of advancing professional standards in port management and operations. A new PPM® program moves from an individually based program to an interactive "class" program which provides for a group of applicants to go through PPM® together in a four-year period. We're looking forward to rolling-out the revised PPM® program at our annual convention in Galveston.
Also, recognizing the value of stronger collaborative efforts, a Quality Partnership Initiative workshop was held with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in Ponce, Puerto Rico, focusing on partnership issues between U.S. ports and the Corps, addressing current dredging project management challenges, and continuing the dialogue from the previous year's workshop on the regulatory process. Our hemispheric reach was further through the appointment of a new Latin American port coordinator.
We cannot ignore lingering economic threats that remain on the horizon. I am confident that AAPA will continue to meet the challenges for the ultimate benefit of our industry.
