The nation’s public ports, following the lead of the highway, airline and transit industries, are asking for $6.8 billion for harbor maintenance in the ever growing economic recovery package.

The American Association of Port Authorities says its members have 153 “shovel-ready” projects from the Port of Anchorage to Port Canaveral that they say would create 250,000 new jobs.

“The trade will move somewhere else if our infrastructure can’t handle it,” Kurt Nagle, president of association, said.

Nagle said one-third of the United States’ economic growth is from exports, but that number could be higher if the ports were maintained to adequate depths.

The 59 largest ports in the country are kept at their adequate depths only 39 percent of the time, he said.

The result is that facilities are forced to request lighter cargo loads or divert larger ships that could run aground. The increased cost to run more ships with smaller loads ripples through the economy straight to the consumer.

Everyday items from coffee to clothing to medicine are moved via the nation’s ports. Nagle argues that maintaining them does more than create jobs, it affects the entire global trade market.

The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee staff, which is drafting its proposals for the stimulus at the request of House leadership, sought about $7 billion for the Army Corps of Engineers in its most recent draft. It is unclear how much of that would be used for ports.

“That will be up to the Corps,” said Jim Berard, spokesman for the panel. “Dredging ports would be an eligible program under the recommendation, but it would be up to the Corps to determine how much, if any, of the funding it were to receive under this proposal would be used for that purpose.”