CLARK CAUCUS — Replacing lead pipes in Watertown. Repairing bridges in Framingham and Revere. Buying electric school buses for Lexington.

Assistant House Speaker Katherine Clark helped secure funding in the American Rescue Plan Act and the bipartisan infrastructure law to make these projects possible. Now the fourth-ranking House Democrat is touting those successes back home while pushing to resurrect the Build Back Better Act, in some form, in the Senate.

Playbook briefly caught up with Clark earlier this week at the Watertown DPW to talk infrastructure and child care investments. Here are excerpts from our conversation:

These are big projects with big price tags. How are projects like lead pipe replacements going to affect people’s everyday lives?

Projects like this are often hard to see; these are corroded pipes that are under our streets. But what people are going to be able to see is clean drinking water that is safe for their kids, for their families, for their pets. It makes a huge difference in the quality of life. … While we do it, we are creating great jobs and we’re helping save the planet.

Childcare access is a key issue for you. What’s the status of that, and Build Back Better?

We are not ever going to back down from fighting for childcare that we know families need to get back to work, and they need it to be affordable and high quality.

President Joe Biden’s poll numbers are slipping. Thirty House Democrats are retiring. Can Democrats hold the House?

We sure can. … As we look across the aisle, we see a Republican Party that is committed to anti-democratic policies and has forgotten about working Americans at home. Clark later told GBH the midterms are “going to be challenging."

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