Hutzell: Annapolis got funding for City Dock the day Kristi Noem was fired. Not a coincidence.

Hours after President Donald Trump fired Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, word spread that Annapolis would finally get $35 million crucial to its massive remake of City Dock.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency grant is a long-sought final piece of a plan to turn the former waterfront parking lot into both a barrier against climate-driven flooding and a new green space that will draw more people downtown.

Were the two connected? You betcha, even if not directly.

“There’s no doubt that the pressure that Secretary Noem was under from every angle, finally caused the release of funds around the country, but including, of course, what we’re celebrating today,” U.S. Sen Chris Van Hollen said.

Van Hollen joined Annapolis Mayor Jared Littmann and a dozen other public officials in the fog Friday morning at City Dock to announce the money.

Noem was a presence as well, even if she was far from Maryland’s state capital.

“Rising seas won’t wait on bureaucracy,” said U.S. Rep. Sarah Elfreth, a Democrat from Annapolis.

It’s unlikely that Noem, who will remain in office until the end of the month, signed off on the money the day she got fired.

But events this week in Washington showed patience had clearly run out.

As hard as Democrats worked on getting to this point — construction started last fall with more than $50 million in state and local money — it may have been a North Carolina Republican who made the difference.

During Noem’s appearance Tuesday before the Senate Judiciary Committee, U.S. Sen. Thom Tillis became the first Republican to call for her to resign.

He criticized her management of President Donald Trump’s immigration purge and her decision to personally approve all grants and contracts over $100,000 for disaster recovery and preparedness.

“We’re an exceptional nation,” said Tillis, who is retiring this year. “And one of the reasons we’re exceptional is we expect exceptional leadership. And you have demonstrated anything but that.”

Unless she could explain the delay of aid for victims of deadly flooding in his state last year, Tillis threatened to block all congressional action on the Department of Homeland Security.

The next morning, Democrats on the Senate Appropriations Committee piled on, releasing a report that said 1,000 projects in red and blue states were waiting for Noem’s approval — $6 billion worth that included Annapolis.

Trump decided to cut his losses, announcing Wednesday afternoon on Truth Social that he was replacing Noem with U.S. Sen. Markwayne Mullin, a Republican from Oklahoma.

“Whether the hearings were the triggering point where they pushed the send button or the release button, I don’t know,” said Van Hollen, who sits on appropriations.

That Noem would stand in the way of this money was strange.

The former South Dakota governor should have understood what FEMA means to states recovering from or preparing for storms, earthquakes and tornadoes.

But under Trump, everything is political. He’s made clear that he wants to punish states that didn’t vote for him.

Developed over the last 10 years, the City Dock redevelopment is the largest public works project in Annapolis history, and the most ambitious climate resilience project on the Chesapeake Bay.

The portion now underway has removed 150 waterfront parking spaces. In their place, contractors will build an elevated park as a flood barrier, surrounded by pop-up walls and pumps, and wrap more barriers and pumps around to Compromise Street.

Atop it all would be the welcome center overlooking the harbor and the bay, with space for the harbormaster, public bathrooms, laundry and other boater facilities, plus a multipurpose area for educational programs and conferences.

Former Mayor Gavin Buckley financed the $87 million cost with state and federal grants, plus what amounts to a 30-year mortgage on parking revenue.

By the time the rest of the City Dock area is added in, the cost will rise to $100 million.

Funding wasn’t the only controversy.

It took far longer to finish the application for the grant than Buckley’s administration projected, and Van Hollen’s office had to intercede and set up a meeting between FEMA and city officials last year.

There have been lawsuits and angry community meetings about the change to what is, essentially, the public square of Annapolis.

FEMA signed off on the grant last fall, but it was caught in Noem’s June decision to review grants and contracts over $100,000.

“Obviously, her $100,000 approval system wasn’t working and getting the money to the people who needed it,” said Elfreth, a former state senator who has helped fund the project.

“Hopefully, her removal will make this better.”

Both Elfreth and Van Hollen cited a Valentine’s Day text from Littmann with kicking off a renewed pressure campaign.

Van Hollen, an appropriations subcommittee chair, reached out to Noem’s office.

“We essentially reached out and said, ‘You know, what the hell is going on? Why are you continuing to hold up these funds?’” Van Hollen said. “And obviously, others were doing the same thing, right?”

Elfreth, meanwhile, went to the Navy, which is spending millions on flood protection for the Naval Academy.

The two projects are connected, and if one fails, the other won’t be effective.

Noem wasn’t just fired for the grants backlog. She also has overseen the president’s brutal immigration purge — friendly neighbors and pregnant women snatched off the street, two American citizens killed by immigration agents.

It may have been popular with Trump supporters, but it has been difficult to watch.

Within a day of Tillis’ latest stand on Noem, and criticism by other Republicans, she was gone — and the grants started to flow.

City Dock is expected to reopen in 2027, although completion of all the work will take two years.

Then the focus will turn to other low-lying parts of the city.

“We’ve got 7 miles of waterfront to protect,” Littmann said.