America’s national program of maritime rejuvenation, founded on the goal of nurturing an enduring comparative advantage in the global maritime marketplace, is stalling. The president’s imminent release of a Maritime Action Plan alone is not enough, and Congress is taking too long to advance related legislation.

But waterfront communities need not wait.

America is today perilously reliant on China for shipbuilding and shipping, as allies South Korea and Japan—the second- and third-leading shipbuilders—fight to keep shrinking market share. Given the strategic risk posed by a maritime industry dominated by a hostile China, President Trump used his recent Asia trip to secure shipbuilding commitments in the U.S.—$6.5 billion from Japan and $150 billion from South Korea.

To keep these investments on track and progressing in a coherent and effective national maritime revival requires captains of change. Missing are the yet-to-be-named assistant secretary of the Navy for shipbuilding and the president’s nominee to lead civilian maritime industry efforts at the Maritime Administration, who has been waiting since May to be confirmed.

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Plus, ensuring the president’s Maritime Action Plan stays on track will require a Maritime Security Advisor in the White House (something directed in the SHIPS for America Act).

As Congress and the executive branch remain in a budget stalemate, there is no time to waste.

American waterfronts can kickstart investments by nominating themselves as Maritime Prosperity Zones (MPZs). 

Inspired by the president’s successful Opportunity Zones, MPZs are designed to attract investment in the maritime industry as stipulated in Mr. Trump’s April executive order.

As with the Enterprise Zone Program of the 1980s, tax incentives are provided to attract capital, but MPZs must go further. They need to include regulatory relief tailored to each waterfront community to attract maritime industrial and workforce investments.

Philadelphia Shipyard has already been attracting investment and tangible growth since December last year, thanks to investments by South Korean shipbuilder Hanwha. But sustaining investments, like a recent additional $5 billion in this yard by Hanwha and HD Hyundai’s partnership with American shipbuilder Huntington Ingalls Industries (HII) to build warships, will require action. Those acts need to include sustained presidential advocacy and legislation on incentives to fuel what must be a generational endeavor to regain America’s maritime industrial strength.

Anticipating such support, Davie Defense Incorporated recently pledged to invest $1 billion in the Gulf Copper shipyard in Galveston, Texas, to build icebreakers. This comes as Mr. Trump and Finnish President Alexander Stubb agreed to a purchase of 11 ice breakers, with the hulls 5 and up being built in the U.S.

Given this, Galveston is a natural choice for an MPZ to attract additional investments today that can ensure it is ready to begin building icebreakers in the near future.

Other shipyards are ready to begin the process of modernizing and expanding their shipbuilding and repair capacity. For example, Charleston, South Carolina, could accelerate the expansion of cargo handling port infrastructure and the expansion of shipyard facilities.

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In California, there are opportunities to meet the Navy and the Coast Guard’s urgent need for Pacific repair facilities. Along with the revival of the former nuclear maintenance facilities at Mare Island and the so-called California Forever project nearby, that could—in the long term—become one of the world’s largest shipyards.

MPZs are a natural fit for these waterfront communities and could kickstart the revival of America’s maritime industry. But to sustain this effort requires development of an American comparative advantage fostered by investing in maritime innovation incubators—an idea embraced in the draft SHIPS for America Act and Executive Order.

One potential American advantage can be realized in adopting additive manufacturing in next generation and potentially nuclear propelled civilian ship design requiring naval architects, nuclear engineers working with industry like that budding at Detroit’s New Lab and nearby naval architecture program at the University of Michigan.

There is no time to waste. Money is moving, and waterfront communities should act now to self-nominate as MPZs. This will get the attention of those in Congress and the White House, weighing where and how to tailor regulatory relief and incentives to begin reviving America’s maritime industry.