Butler County officials are not worried that the recent partial shutdown of the federal government will affect the $20 million federal grant that will pay to widen and straighten Route 228 in Middlesex Township.

County officials announced Dec. 6 that they received $20 million from the Better Utilizing Investments to Leverage Development (BUILD) program, which is a pool of $1.5 billion in discretionary funding for infrastructure projects to be meted out in competitive grants.

The U.S. Department of Transportation, which has been affected by the recent government shutdown, administers the grant.

But Mark Gordon, the county's chief of economic development and planning, said Wednesday he feels confident that the government shutdown will not affect the project because of the long timeline in completing it.

This is an excerpt — read the full article in Thursday's Butler Eagle.