Significant investments are being made throughout the United States in construction projects related to our national infrastructure through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA). Hundreds of projects in transportation, water / environmental, high efficiency buildings, energy, and technology are underway or being planned that utilize Cooper B-Line products. 
One requirement of the ARRA is that all iron, steel and manufactured goods used in a public building or public work that receives funds from the Act be manufactured in the USA. This is known as the Buy American provision of the ARRA. It is further required that documentation or certification of that status be available to provide to the project owners on demand.
Cooper B-Line has analyzed the eligibility of our approximately 140,000 finished good SKUs to the Buy American provision of the ARRA. While Cooper B-Line is a global manufacturer, the vast majority of products sold into the North American market are produced at our plants in the United States by our skilled, unionized workforce. This allows over 90% of Cooper B-Line's finished goods to be compliant to the Buy American provision of the ARRA.
In order to simplify and expedite the process for identifying the ARRA status of these parts to our customers, we have developed a database that contains the ARRA eligibility status of all active Cooper B-Line finished goods. Beginning Monday, February 8th , all Cooper B-Line customer service representatives will have access to this database which can simply show the user the certification status on the screen or it can publish a certification report for the requested parts with one of the four following stated conditions –
- ‘Yes' – This means that the product has been verified to be compliant to the Buy American requirements of the ARRA without exception.
- ‘Contract' – For construction contracts with an acquisition value of $7,443,000 or more, eligible products from trade agreement countries may receive equal consideration with U.S. made products. The project must meet the applicable contract thresholds in order for these goods to be eligible for ARRA funding.
- ‘By Request' –This is common for dual-sourced items where we may get some overseas but also have a domestic supply. An ARRA compliant solution is readily available.
- ‘Call CS' – This means that the product is not compliant with our primary source of manufacturing or supply but we can offer a compliant alternative in most cases following dialog with the customer.
For further information, please contact any customer service representative at Cooper B-Line who will be able to produce an ARRA certification document for specific part numbers. |
