The Great Lakes are in need of congressional champions. Again.
The Trump administration budget released this week calls once again for slashing the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative by 90 percent, from $300 million to $30 million.
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The initiative pays for projects that mitigate agricultural runoff, monitor water quality, restore wetlands and other wildlife habitats, among other work.
The cuts are part of broader reductions in environmental spending proposed by the administration. As it stands, the proposal would reduce overall spending for the Environmental Protection Agency by about 34 percent from 2017 levels.
Last year the administration proposed a similar budget for the lake-saving program that would have reduced the project from $300 million to $10 million. A full-scale rescue effort from a bipartisan group of Great Lakes-states senators and congressmen — Sherrod Brown (D., Ohio), Rob Portman (R., Ohio), and Marcy Kaptur (D., Toledo) among them — restored funding before Congress approved the final spending bill.
Now their efforts are needed again.
At the top of the list of environmental threats the Great Lakes are toxic algae and invasive Asian carp. The pollution-fed algae threatens the drinking water supply of at least half a million people in the Toledo region and many more elsewhere. Asian carp could decimate native fish species in Lake Erie and other Great Lakes, throwing the ecosystem out of balance.
The Great Lakes Restoration Initiative is focused on both these issues and provides the federal resources badly needed to address these dangers.
It is essential for preserving the region’s water supply, economy, and quality of life.
The region’s bipartisan contingent of senators and congressmen have shown that they understand the danger and they can collaborate to protect a vital program. Now they will need to prove that once more.
This is not just a Toledo issue or a northwest Ohio issue. We are talking about the Great Lakes here — a national resource. Our Great Lake, Lake Erie, is sick. It is not expendable. Saving it is not debatable. It cannot be saved for free.
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