The proposed OC Streetcar is one milestone closer to becoming the county’s first modern light-rail system, after President Barack Obama included $125 million for it in his proposed federal budget for the 2016-17 fiscal year.

Inclusion of the 4.15-mile streetcar in Santa Ana and Garden Grove in the president’s $4.15 trillion budget released Tuesday puts the project in the pipeline to receive nearly half of its total cost from federal funds.

If the OC Streetcar remains in the budget Congress is supposed to approve by Oct. 1, the Federal Transit Administration within the next two years will consider a full-funding grant agreement with the Orange County Transportation Authority that finalizes the total from the New Starts program.

“It is a huge, big deal for OCTA,” transit authority Chief Executive Darrell Johnson said. “New Starts is perhaps the most rigorous federal funding program that exists for transportation, so to be recognized and be placed into the budget proposal shows that we’ve been doing all of our work, our planning, our analysis in line with a very rigorous program.”

OCTA had asked for $145 million in federal funds – about half of the total $289 million for the project – but is “very, very pleased” with the $125 million recommended and has several options, from state programs to local sales tax dollars, to fill the $20 million gap, Johnson said.

OC Streetcar is the first OCTA project to be considered for New Starts funds, and reaching this point was “critical” and anticipated since planning for the streetcar began in 2008, Johnson said.

The planned streetcar would run from the Santa Ana Regional Transportation Center through downtown Santa Ana and to a new multimodal transit hub at the eastern edge of Garden Grove. Construction would begin in late 2017 for service starting in 2020.

Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez, D-Orange, said the president’s budget typically goes through “a lot” of changes before Congress approves it, but that she will work with her colleagues and Rep. Bill Shuster, chairman of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, to “make sure (OC Streetcar) stays in.”

Obama’s proposed budget received a hostile response from the Republican-led Congress, leaving unclear implications for the streetcar funding.

Sanchez said she fought for New Starts funds for a 9.3-mile light-rail system in central Orange County to John Wayne Airport called CenterLine about a decade ago, but it never materialized. OC Streetcar, a smaller project, has support from the cities it traverses and local transit authority officials.

“Now I just have to make sure I can protect that money from people who want to take it and do New Starts in their own backyard,” said Sanchez, whose local office is in Garden Grove.

Santa Ana Mayor Miguel Pulido, an OCTA board member and longtime proponent of OC Streetcar, said the New Starts funding has been a long time coming.

“These types of projects unfortunately take a long time to realize. You have to be persistent, have to have good people around you like my fellow board members,” Pulido said. “All the stars have to line up, and right now all the stars have lined up.”

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