Sponsors
The bill directs modest, multi-year federal funding toward measurable, cost‑effective watershed projects with clearer Reclamation governance and congressional oversight, but it risks excluding under-resourced communities, prioritizing easily measured outcomes over long-term conservation, limiting geographic reach, and reducing public transparency while imposing budget and administrative trade-offs.
State, Tribal, and local water managers and water users can access new federal funding and technical support to implement projects that increase surface and groundwater supplies and improve water quality.
Local governments, utilities, and program buyers benefit from pay‑for‑performance contracting and outcome price tables that let them pay only for verified environmental results, encouraging efficient use of public funds.
State and local partners and nonprofits gain improved targeting and cost-effectiveness because required advance watershed analytics quantify expected outcomes and costs before projects are selected.
Small nonprofits, community groups, and under-resourced rural or tribal partners may be excluded or face higher transaction costs because they lack capacity to produce advance analytics and compete for outcome-based contracts.
Tribal lands, rural communities, and complex ecosystems risk being underfunded because the program's emphasis on easily measurable, short-term outcomes favors projects with simple, verifiable metrics over long-term or harder-to-measure conservation benefits.
Rural communities and local governments may be left out because the program limits support to at most five projects, concentrating benefits in a few places rather than broadly across watersheds.
Based on analysis of 5 sections of legislative text.
Establishes a program to fund and partner on analytics-driven, pay-for-performance watershed projects and authorizes $17M/year for FY2026–2031.
Introduced April 1, 2025 by Ronald Lee Wyden · Last progress April 1, 2025
Creates a federal program to fund and partner with state, tribal, local, and other eligible entities to design and implement watershed “outcomes” projects using pre-project analytics and pay-for-performance contracts. The Interior Department (through the Bureau of Reclamation) must solicit partners within one year of enactment, set selection criteria, provide technical and financial assistance (including grants and performance payments), require monitoring and verification of results, and report annually to Congress. The bill authorizes $17 million per year for fiscal years 2026–2031 to run the program.